See Part 1 for disclaimers and story details

Author's Notes: I continue to be amazed at the generosity of everyone reading this. Thank you all for the great comments as well as the wonderful guesses as to what happened to Faith. Have no fears, all questions will be answered by the end. And if it weren't for Lynette, you wouldn't be able to read this thing with all little mistakes she catches. Thanks, lady! As always, any and all feedback is appreciated.

Part 6

Between Jack's mumbled directions and her memory of the trip to the restaurant, Faith got them back to the house in one piece. She carefully set the big truck in park, shut it off and climbed out. By the time she got around the hood, he already had the door open and was trying to find the driveway with a dangling foot. One hand shooting out to grab his arm before he fell out of the cab, she gave him a worried look. "Hold on a minute. Let me help you."

"I am fine," he said, each syllable enunciated carefully. Holding him in place for an extra second, she looked him over. Pale, small beads of sweat clinging to his forehead, deep furrows of pain between his eyebrows. Yeah, he was fine all right.

She didn't bother to respond to his stubborn comment directly, merely helped him to the ground and wrapped one arm firmly around his waist. There was no need to pretend she wasn't strong enough to just pick him up and carry him to the house, but she didn't think his head or his pride could handle it at the moment. Instead, she took as much of his weight as his taller frame would let her and guided him as fast as his feet would move up the walk. Fumbling with the unfamiliar keys, she propped him against the side of the house and hurried to work the lock. She tossed her purse and keys in the entryway without a glance to where they landed and got Jack through the door.

The couch was the closest place she could get him sitting down so that's where she took him. He didn't make a sound when she deposited him on the cushions and ran to the cabinet in the bedroom where she'd seen the bandages. There had to be aspirin or Tylenol in there somewhere. There was aspirin, Tylenol, motrin, naproxen, celebrex, codeine, and even a small bottle of oxycodone. Some of the bottles were over the counter while the big stuff was clearly printed with his name and that of the United States Air Force Academy Hosptial. Wow. What did he do in that mountain to need the heavy pharmaceuticals? She knew it wasn't her stash of painkillers.

Grabbing the Tylenol since it seemed to be the least likely of the assortment to have any side effects, she went back to Jack, making a stop in the kitchen for a glass of water and a towel. She set them on the coffee table and kneeled in front of him. His eyes followed her, still slightly dazed. First she needed to check for a concussion. Tilting his head to one side toward the lamp with gentle fingers on his chin, she stared at his pupils, relieved to see them contract slightly. Unfortunately, he winced away as soon as the light hit his eyes. Now she'd have to do it again. "Hold still this time," she ordered, tugging his head back into position. "I'm sure you know how this drill works." She took it as a good sign when he simply glared at her, but didn't yank his head out of her grasp.

Someone must have taken pity on her because his pupils reacted equally, if a little slowly. No concussion at least. She picked up the towel, gently blotting the sweat from his face. "You must really be one thick skulled son of a bitch to keep your head in one piece after getting cracked like that by a vampire." The words were harsh, but the relief in her tone kept them from having any sting.

"Vampire?" It was the first thing he'd said since agreeing to come home with her other than his short insistences that he was fine. It was a step up from the damning silence. But there was one other thing she needed before she got started.

Holding up the water glass and bottle of pills, she waited for him to take them. "Trust me, I know exactly what you're feeling like right now. This will help."

Surprisingly enough, he took the bottle and twisted it open to pour three pills onto his palm. He set the bottle on the table and chugged them down with the full glass of water. She'd been counting on the fact that he'd accept the bottle whole but not the pills alone. The trust she'd been so amazed at having just days ago was hanging by a very thin thread at the moment. It wouldn't take much to sever it completely.

So she backed off, set the towel next to him on the couch and stood to put some room between them. Taking a deep breath, she tried to push down the horrible sinking feeling in her gut. She could do this. Maybe. "What do you want to know first?"

He searched her face, much as he did back on the street, eyes constantly moving. "So you really are Faith?"

"Yes, I am. I just can't remember us." He didn't say a word, only kept watching her with those probing eyes. "The last thing I do remember is walking down an alley at night in Cleveland. And then I woke up in our bed." It was too soon to tell him about Willow and her search for spells and possible time demons. He was going to have enough trouble swallowing the rest of her story as it was.

His eyes closed for a moment, brow tightening slightly before he seemed to collect himself and sit a little straight. "We'll come back to that one later. You said those punks were vampires?"

While his tone didn't imply she was completely off her rocker it was close enough to send a touch of fire through her veins. "Sharp, pointy fangs, bad attitudes, heavy brow ridges, disappear in a cloud of dust when impaled on a bunch of wooden sticks? What would you call them?"

"I was just hoping beating my head against concrete had made me see things." He was awfully calm for someone who'd just been told a fairytale boogeyman was real. "They really did explode into dust?"

She nodded, idly wondering why he wasn't calling the little men in white coats yet. "Every time."

"Great." This time it was his sigh filling the space between them. "That guy, vampire, he seemed to know what you were talking about when you said you were the. . ."

That was one he couldn't seem to say aloud so she did it for him. "Slayer. I'm a Vampire Slayer."

"Uh huh. And what exactly is that?"

Why wasn't he freaking out? This was not the reaction she'd expected. Shouting, cursing, flailing around, all those had appeared in vivid color in her imagination on the drive home. Nothing about sitting calmly on the couch and asking questions had been anywhere present. She almost wished he was shouting. At least then she would know how to respond. "Did you ever notice how I never get sick? No colds, no flu, no sore throats? I seem to heal faster than average? Brightman said it herself, I'm always in perfect health. All benefits of being a Slayer." She didn't bother to tack on anything about the dismally short life expectancy, the life spent constantly injured in one form or another, the horrendous human and demon stains on clothes no washing machine could get out, or any of the other less than pleasant aspects of the job. There would be plenty of time for that later, she hoped.

"You still haven't said what a Slayer is."

Where was Giles when she needed him? She'd never had to explain what she was, what she could do to anyone. Wasn't there a script somewhere for this? "A Slayer is the boogeyman's boogeyman. Boogeygirl. The person who kills the boogeyman." She was a blithering idiot. Looking down for a moment, she almost missed the hint of a lifted corner of one side of Jack's mouth. But the expression vanished within seconds, the blank faced stare returning as if never gone. "Vampires, demons, the occasional werewolf. Anything that preys on humans or wants to remake their own little hell on Earth. The Slayer either kills or neutralizes it. My job was to be the fly in their ointments."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

There was the hurt she'd expected. It ripped the hole wider in her gut, sending guilt pouring through her. "I told you earlier that I don't know. I wish I did. But most people don't take the news too well. Maybe I was afraid of how you'd react."

He fiddled with the towel at his side, nodding absently as if trying to push the pain aside to focus on more important things. "Those guys tonight were fast and very strong." Looking up, he caught her gaze. "And you didn't seem to have any trouble hauling me up the walk just now."

She knew what he was really asking. Moving the empty glass and the bottle of pills from the coffee table to the floor, she studied the knee high table. It was a solid piece of furniture, a gleaming wood that spoke of care and home. Gripping it on one side with both hands, she lifted it easily before walking back a few careful steps. She tilted the table lengthwise, dropped one arm and watched Jack's face shift from blank to disbelieving. "Things usually get too awkward for me to lift before they get too heavy. I'm just not tall enough. Most of the things I have to fight are even faster, stronger and meaner than I am." He watched silently as she set the table back on the floor with the one hand, no hint of any effort on her face.

"That explains how you took those guys down when I got my ass handed to me." He was still too quiet, even the self-directed insult strangely muted. "How did you find out about being this Slayer person? You weren't born like this, were you?"

She didn't take offense at the question. She knew what he meant. "I was called when I was sixteen, but I'd already known about the world of demons for years, training to take the place of the current Slayer whenever it was my time." That didn't come close to describing the torturous years of hiding from her mom and sneaking out to meet her watcher. Or the fact that her mom never even saw the extra bruises that mingled with the ones she'd given Faith herself. "I was almost too old to be called, but apparently that wasn't as big a concern as it should have been."

She'd finally broken the mask, but it wasn't how she'd expected. Frustrated confusion mingled with pain as he waved one hand to halt her. "Called? Trained? You mean there are others out there doing this, this stuff?"

Apparently she wasn't explaining things as well as she thought. How was she expected to give him a lifetime's worth of knowledge in anything less than a week? Even the smallest of details had to be explained. Leaning down, she straightened the coffee table back into its original position and moved to sit in the chair beside the couch. Faith rested her elbows on her knees, meeting his questioning eyes. "It all began before humans walked on Earth. . ."

Jack let her speak almost totally uninterrupted as she did her best to give him as concise a history of the Watcher Council, the Slayer mythos, and demons, vampires and Hellmouths. When she finally stopped, her mouth was dry, her throat was aching and her stomach was knotted even worse than before they'd walked in the house. What was he thinking? She wanted to pry that expression off his face to see what was really going on in his head. She never had been very good at waiting.

"So this Watcher Council," he started slowly, a heat beginning to build up in his eyes. "They use young women who are little more than children to fight monsters?"

She'd honestly expected a question about her sanity or supposed abilities, not anger at the people who'd essentially taken over her life for most of her formative years. Did that mean he believed her? Somehow she didn't think it was that easy. "The system was created so long ago the Council can't even be sure it's got the whole truth of it. All they have are mostly destroyed records from that time."

"Why the hell did they choose girls? Why didn't they do it themselves?"

That's why he was angry? Because the Slayers were girls? No, he wasn't angry. There was so much more than simple anger blazing from his face. "That's the way it's always been. The way we were created."

"But they used kids!"

The outburst rang in the room as he winced back against the couch. Wanting to touch his arm, his hand, his anything, she clenched her fists to keep them from moving. He'd allowed her touch while she was tending to his head, but she didn't think he'd accept anything else from her just yet. "The theory was that girls could handle the power better than boys. They would have less inclination to abuse it. And for the most part they were right." There was no need to mention her own turn to the dark side.

"You said you were sixteen when you were called? Why is that late? Why are you called at different ages?"

The questions ran ever each other, jumbling their meaning together. Jack's anger was still there, just waiting for the moment to leap out at the unexpected. "There's some sort of order. Don't ask me what it is, even the Watchers don't know how Slayers are chosen and they can tell you all sorts of more useless things. One moment you're a normal teenage girl and the next you can throw a man through a wall. Poof."

"So how many Slayers are there? Do you all work together? Is this Watcher Council all over the world?" It seemed Jack was relentless once he was on the trail of something he wanted. A good thing to remember in the future. If they had a future after tonight.

"Well, normally there's only one Slayer at a time. When the current Slayer dies the next is called."

"Dies?"

That was a tone she never wanted aimed in her direction. Ever. "Yeah, dies. This is a dangerous job, Jack." She didn't get any farther.

"Who died for you to be called?"

"Kendra. She only lasted a few months. I never met her." Which was something she'd been grateful for. There was no way she could have done the job if she'd met her predecessor. Too much bad mojo there.

"And before her?"

"Buffy."

Finally something other than boiling anger and that blank mask showed on his face. "Summers? How is she in Cleveland if she's supposed to be dead? And you just told me there was only one Slayer at a time."

How had she ever thought she could explain her insane life and that of her friends? "Buffy was killed at the end of her sophomore year of high school in a fight with one of the big bads. Drowned." She rushed on before he could ask for specifics. "Xander gave her CPR, saved her life. But she was officially gone long enough to activate the next Slayer."

"How many times have you almost been killed?"

Another question she hadn't been expecting. But since the answer wasn't relevant, she didn't bother to try and come up with a lie. "That's not-"

"How many?" It was a roar of sound that brooked no disobedience.

"I stopped counting at fifty." In the first six months.

That shook him, anger draining instantly. His face paled even further, turning a ghastly white that would have given a bleached sheet a run for its money. One hand came up to rub his eyes, the fine trembling not quite hidden by the motion. "Is that why you quit?"

"When I talked to Buffy she said I never told her why." The reminder brought his hand back down, the fingers clenched tight.

"So obviously Buffy knows about this whole other world. Do the rest of them as well?"

"Yeah, they do. They went to high school on top of a Hellmouth. It was kind of hard not to notice." She watched in silence as he fiddled with the towel at his side absently. " Willow's been checking to see if there was something that could erase my memory, a demon or spell or anything, but nothing's come up yet. And there's no record of anyone ever being sent into the future. The past, yes, but she gave me some explanation I didn't understand about why the future would be too difficult to manage."

"She should talk to Carter one of these days," he muttered in an undertone she didn't think she was supposed to hear. Abruptly, Jack pushed himself to his feet, staggering a small step until he found his balance. Halfway to her feet herself, she stopped, letting him do it on his own. "Basically that means we don't have a," he paused, obviously searching for the appropriate word, "supernatural explanation for you missing three years of your life."

"It means we have nothing, supernatural or not. But spells and demons aside, I just don't see myself up and leaving Cleveland, let alone ditching B to make her handle the Hellmouth on her own." And it had been bothering her since Buffy had told her. "Slayers don't get to quit, Jack. Once called you fight until you lose. There's always another demon, another big bad, another master vampire thinking they can take over the world. We can't just stop."

"And yet you did." He paced to the far side of the room before swiveling back. "Unless you kept doing things here?" It was a cross between hurt and accusing and she had no idea which one was better.

"I haven't patrolled here, if that's what you're asking." She hated the fact she sounded defensive, but the perfect life she'd been getting used to was crumbling at her feet. "Buffy says there's some kind of energy field that keeps demons out with the exception of a vampire or two every now and then. I don't know what causes it, none of us do, but I imagine I wasn't too upset by it once I got here." He didn't say anything to that, merely stared at her from across the room. "Slayers don't quit, but we do burn out. If we last long enough." If we don't die. She could see the words float in the air between them. "We're surrounded by death and evil and everything normal people would run shrieking from if they even got a glimpse of our lives. You can't help but be tainted by it, at least a little."

And still he didn't interrupt, just watched her with those eyes that absorbed every word, every emotion betrayed by them. But there was no judgment in them, no disgust. Maybe she could tell him all of it.

Suddenly it was spilling out with no thought. "Did I ever tell you I spent some time in prison?"

"I know all about that. I know about your entire record. Who do you think helped you get that whole mess cleared up?" One hand waved it aside impatiently. "It's over, done, in the past. Remember how we don't talk about that?"

"But this time we have to. The darkness that taints all Slayers to some degree? Well somewhere in all the slaying I got lost in it." Somehow this was harder to say than any of the rest of it. "When I say I got lost, I mean that literally. I got lost in the power, the knowledge that no one could touch me. I was above the law. I was judge, jury and executioner. And it didn't matter that I wasn't dealing with only demons anymore. I nearly killed four people, all of them friends at one time, because I was in so deep. I was out of control. That's the real reason I was in prison."

"You're not the only one to find herself in that pit." His face had softened, the caring she'd come to recognize taking over his features.

But caring and empathy were the last things she deserved. Why couldn't he understand? She was going to have to spell it out for him in small words. "I don't know who you think I am, but I'm not a good person, Jack. I never have been." And suddenly it wasn't about telling Jack of Slayers and the world of demons. It was about getting feelings out in the open she'd thought she'd dealt with long ago. "That dark place I went to before they locked me up? It's still here, inside me. It's always been here. I could feel it growing again in Cleveland before I woke up in our bed."

"You obviously found a way to beat it." He stepped closer as if to physically show his support, but stopped a few feet short of her chair.

Shaking her head, Faith stood. "I don't think I beat anything. I think I was scared and just ran." Her brain was connecting the dots in a way it never had before and two and two finally made four. "Buffy once told me she was better than I was. Even after all the crap I pulled I never believed her. But she was surrounded by all the same evil as I was and she never fell." Staring blindly in Jack's direction, she no longer saw the room or the man standing in front of her. "They really must have been at the bottom of the barrel when they chose me to be a Slayer."

"Stop right there." His voice was back to instant obedience, breaking her introspection. "I don't care what you've done or even what you think you've done. I know you. And I mean you as in Faith the person. Not the Slayer. I couldn't care less what the Slayer did or didn't do. I care about Faith and who she is right now." He paused, looking away, up at the happy couple above the fireplace. "I've done many things I'm not proud of. Too many, since we're being so honest. And I can't blame all of them on orders or bad decisions by superior officers. I have to live with those decisions. They are part of what formed me into who I am. Your actions back then, but even more important, your actions in the past three years have shaped you into who I know today. The woman I love. My wife. So go ahead and try to tell me who you are."

He was serious. He didn't care about prison or darkness hiding inside. He cared about her. But he was blinded by his emotions. He didn't, couldn't see the real Faith. If he did there was no way he would say those things about her. She jumped up off the couch, hands pushing the heavy weight of her hair from her face. "God, why aren't you angry with me? You should be shouting, hurling things. I lied to you. Don't you get that?"

"Oh, I imagine pissed off's going to come into play eventually," he said, setting the towel down on the table. Standing unmoving, he stared across the short distance, face thoughtful. "Maybe it is shock, I don't know. Maybe it'll all kick in later. I won't deny I'm hurt, not only because you didn't tell me about all of this, but because you kept so much of yourself from me. I could yell, freak out, storm out of here in a rage. Call Brightman to check you out again." He took a hesitant step forward only to stop before it was completed. "But I think you're doing enough kicking for the both of us."

"Stop being so understanding, damn it!"

Before the words had faded from the air, she was trapped against Jack's chest, his arms a band of warm steel across her back. She pushed feebly against him, all her fabulous Slayer strength nonexistent in the face of his total acceptance. "You know what I think?" His voice rumbled through her entire body, accompanying the trembling that started deep in her gut. "I think you took a chance and got out before the bad things started happening again. That's not weakness, Faith. That's strength. And knowing exactly what you can handle." Leaning ever so slightly away from her, he gripped her chin and pulled her eyes up to meet his. The shadows she found there matched hers, tainting his soul, yet they didn't blot out all the light. Somehow he'd kept his hope. "I also think it takes more courage to walk away from everything you know than to stay in a place you know you can't be anymore."

His words shattered the shell that had been slowly cracking around her for months. His face blurred as the tears she'd denied herself for years threatened. How did he do that? How did he reach so far inside her and pull out the truth when she didn't even know it herself?

"I think maybe you didn't tell me about any of this because you wanted to forget it yourself. You wanted us to be as far removed from your old life as you could get it without separating all ties to the people you knew. You said it yourself, Faith – Slayers don't quit. But everyone has a breaking point. Three years ago, I think you were about to hit yours. And then you came and found me."

A more overconfident, self-aggrandizing statement she'd never heard. It was also the truest. Collapsing into his arms, she allowed herself to let go as she'd only done once before, years ago on a rainy night in Los Angeles. She had no idea how long they stood there in their living room, motionless but for the slow stroking of Jack's hand over her back. Eventually, the storm subsided and instead of feeling overwhelmed or drained as she'd expected, she was energized, filled with a lightness she'd never experienced before.

Stepping away from the circle of his arms, Faith wiped her cheeks with uncharacteristically clumsy hands. "So what do we do now?"

"Now?" He gave her a lopsided smile, shrugging slightly. "Now we get some sleep. My head is killing me and I have to go to work tomorrow." He glanced quickly over to the clock on the mantle and winced. "Make that today."

"That's not what I meant."

The smile vanished. "I know. But it's all I've got right now."

She knew not to push any farther just then. They both needed some time to process. "I have to tell you I'm surprised you took the whole vampires are real thing so well. Most people freak out a little bit more." The look he shot her pulled a smile she didn't think she had at the moment. "Okay, a lot more."

"After some of the things I've seen in my life, vampires were relatively easy to swallow." Taking hold of her hand, he tugged her toward the hallway and their room. "Of course the up close and personal introduction might have had something to do with that."

A shiver worked its way down her spine at the memory of him lying in a heap on the ground. "Next time let me handle it."

He didn't respond to the thinly veiled order, merely kept walking. At the door he paused, turning to look down at her. "I expect you to remember how understanding I was tonight the next time I do something stupid."

Squeezing the hand cradling hers, she didn't bother to halt the smile from taking over her face. "Don't worry. I think you're paid up for the next few years."

TBC