Chapter 4: 'Full Mystical History of the World, Part II'
Faith wasn't sure what she'd expected to run into when she'd smashed Wood and rode out in a blaze of rage and hurt, but whatever it was, this 'get drunk and get swept up by a group of rogue vampire killers then get a surreal slayer vision' thing here definitely wasn't it. Beat the hell out of anything she would have planned for on her own, though. Hell for entertaining so far. And lots of sweet eye candy around to watch while she figured things out.
Speaking of, she was enjoying watching Blade as he paused, realizing he'd worked his way into something that was going to require a lot of talking to work out of, and he was almost visibly and painfully uncomfortable about it. Kinda like an embarrassed Giles, only expressionless. She grinned, internally. She was going to have to sit on both hands, or maybe chew them off at the wrists, if he picked up his sunglasses and started polishing them. The temptation to take them away to keep from having a Sunnyhell flashback would be overwhelming.
He almost defined 'taciturn', in the short time she'd seen him. She had the feeling he was more the 'Say little, kill lots, break things' type, rather than the Watcher/Lecturer type. She could relate... although, she'd found herself getting uncomfortably motormouth the more she was around people she felt comfortable with.
Tough. If he was going to explain that "not complete" statement before Hannibal had an embolism, he was probably going to have to resort to like, complete sentences And words and shit. She grinned. Would probably prove as fun to watch as Willow in full-on babble-mode.
Damn. She also hadn't expected to be enjoying herself by this point today, rather than homicidally depressed over Wood and the wreck she'd left at the Slayer School. Not complaining. Just weird feeling.
Blade finished looking off past the wall and nodded once, decisively. And looked at her, in that intense 'I can see into your soul' kinda way. Whatever internal debates he'd been engaged in, he'd settled it.
"Figure before we get into all that, ought to cover a couple of things, first." He propped his elbows on the chair arms and settled low in the armchair, steepled his fingers in front of his face, and looked at her over the steeple-point. She leaned back, elbows on the counter behind her, open, and regarded him back. Unafraid and nervous as hell, and she caught the tiny half-smile as he registered both.
"Shoot." His eyebrow almost quirked and he nodded microscopically. Damn. She could enjoy spending her life cataloging the list of almost expressions that dude had, and where the hell did that thought come from, anyway? Stupid brain.
"Don't want anything out of you, aren't interested in killing you, this isn't a kidnapping." She nodded. "Way I see it, we have similar interests, and hunt similar things. Probably have similar kinds of enemies?"
"Most likely." Faith cocked her head microscopically and ghosted an inquiring look. She could do 'expressionless and not givin' up nuthin'' herself, when she wanted. Abby had that fascinated look again, watching them. King had gone completely unreadable, and wasn't that interesting? Too easy to forget that that manic fully open guileless-wise ass act was just that, an act, and a cover for a very sharp and dangerous man lurking behind it.
"Wether you stick around a bit, or not... " He paused, "Kind of like to know that we're not going to have to pack up and leave sudden like, a jump ahead of something you called down on us." The 'you will not hurt my family and live' thing didn't have to be stated, it was just a part of him, like skin.
She paused a long bit, considering. Not the question, that was a no-brainer, but the sudden hunger that shot through her at the 'stick around for a bit', like he'd considered it, and decided he - they - wouldn't mind. No, dammit. She wasn't that starved fifteen year old anymore, lunging like a rabid shark at any tiny scrap of acceptance and 'place' offered. No matter that she kind of liked what she was seeing here, even on a short glance.
"No." She gave him a level look. "Not from me. Not ever." She watched him weigh that, accept it. "My associates will look for me though. Maybe even my one or two actual friends. I'll have to deal with that - that could be a problem."
That got a barely perceptible shrug, kind of an 'of course your friends will look for you, and want to know what you fell in with', as if in his universe, that went without saying: like the sun coming up. In his universe, maybe it did. Faith couldn't say: this whole 'friends' and 'people who gave a shit' thing was kind of new to her, and not real comfortable. Too many hidden traps, and too many new ways to hurt.
"I figured." Faith's turn to quirk the corner of her mouth up in a barely perceptible smile. Of course they'd gone through her ID's, run checks, and looked into her. She would have, positions reversed. These people weren't stupid, or amateurs. Way they'd been reacting to her since she woke up said that whatever they'd dug up didn't bother them... and that said volumes about things she hadn't time to think through. "Can you deal with them?"
Faith shrugged. "Yeah. Think so. Can't - I leave. My family issues don't become your problems."
"Good enough." He nodded.
"Curious, though." She watched him look inquiring while not looking inquiring, trying to figure out how he did it. "Why'd you bring me here? Had to know it'd be a possible threat to," she made a comprehensive motion, "this. Why not pass me by, or dump me somewhere safe-and-elsewhere to wake up?" She could see from the curious looks that both Abby and King had wondered that. Could imagine there'd been some... discussion.
Shrug. "Couldn't leave you for leech bait. Or for some of Jersey's 'finest' to scoop up."
Raised eyebrow back at him. "I would have."
"No. You wouldn't." And she wondered how the hell he knew that about her, anyway? Because she wouldn't have, wouldn't have left a dead drunk stranger who'd wandered into the middle of one of her hunts to their own non-existent devices. And she hadn't realized that until just now, either. WTF was happening to her lately? Long pause... "And I was curious."
snicker "That I believe, B-man."
"Question for you, now." He had that intense thing going again. "Why do you register on my instincts the way you do? Could feel you halfway down the block when you wandered up."
Heh. And that was the curiosity nut, right there: he got intrigued by whatever it was that set off his version of a 'Slayer Sense'. She gave him the Faith grin. "Deal: I'll show you mine, if you show me yours. Why do you set off my 'Big Bad' radar sense and all my alarm buttons?" Watched him consider that carefully, nod.
"Dhampir." He waited, watching her, probably curious to see if the one-word answer was enough.
"Vampire human crossbreed, like Hannibal mentioned?"
He nodded. "They call me 'The Daywalker'. I scare them."
"Living?" Stupid question: slayer ears could hear his heartbeat and the blood flowing in his veins from this close, if she concentrated, feel the body warmth radiating off of him. Another nod. "Stronger than King though. He registers as a vamp, but faintly. You're off the scale." She almost snickered watching Hannibal swallow that without exploding into a half-dozen acerbic remarks.
"My turn?" Faith cocked her thumb at her chest. "Slayer. The Slayer, or one of them, depending on how you look at it."
Long pause, nodded, like he'd expected it, just wanted it confirmed. What the fuck had she blurted out when she was squaring off to those vamps-not-vamps last night? She'd of bet he was listening, watching.
"Thought the Slayer was a small, blonde girl on the West Coast?" He asked.
"That was before me. And after." She nodded. "Long story."
He narrowed his eyes slightly, "Are you evil?"
THAT got her, cracked her up completely. She flat couldn't help the wild crazy laughter that exploded out of her. Couldn't stop, either - every time she tried to meet his oh-so-serious look, it set her off again, tears running down her face. One of the good laughs, from something humorous rather than snarky, like she'd forgotten about. She waved a hand at them, King and Abby both looking at her like she'd gone flat-barking-insane like they'd been expecting. Only not in the way they'd expected. Saw Blade looking like he was trying to decide between offended, amused, or annoyed and broke up again.
"Sorry!" She gasped. "sorry... jeeze. Man: you just startled me." Finally got herself under some kind of control, still giggling. "Serious look, 'Are You Evil?' question, reminded me suddenly of a friend-not-friend's Trademark Question. And you don't look a damn thing like her." She lost it again, finally managing to stop. "Man!"
"Friend?" Blade looked like he'd finally settled on 'bemused'. Other two were still trading 'WTF?' looks, quietly.
"Friend. Sister. Not sister. Best Enemy." Faith grinned. "She always saw things in that black & white, 'Evil/Good', 'Soul/Not-Soul' way, like it made a damn' bit of difference. Like there wasn't a thousand shades of both. Snarky bitch." She sputtered again, wrestled it down. "When you hit me with that, suddenly saw you as tiny, blonde, huge green eyes going 'But but but... Are you EVIL?!' in a high pitched California whine and lost it." She snickered. "You just don't know how off you look as a tiny blonde. Sorry."
King shook his head, rolled his eyes. And gave Blade a behind the back look that clearly said that that 'But but but... Are you EVIL?!' crack in Faith's imitation of Buffy's voice was going to come back to haunt Blade some day. "So. What's a 'Slayer'" he asked, bringing them back to the topic at hand.
Faith gave him a mock glower. "I'd say that I thought this Trade was between me and Blade-man here, but you already showed me yours. So..." She cocked an eyebrow. "Guess that brings us to 'Full Mystical History of the World, Part II' then?" Nod from King.
"Wicked." She drew herself up in a mock imitation of Wesley in Lecture Mode. "There's people who do this better than I do, but... Going back to the 'earth is older than we know' thing where we left off, after the Old Ones left or died off, vampires and demons overran the world, making it a hunting ground. Werewolves. Trolls. Evil Faerie. Pre-history: what we call history wasn't invented yet. Constant warfare, and humans weren't getting the best of it. We had magic, but they had fangs and teeth and things that go bump in the night. Vampires considered humans cattle, and hunted them like mobile Happy Meals. So did demonkind. Things like your Dagon. Or treated them like things to experiment on. Silly putty with legs. We were losing, slowly. Life was nasty, brutish, and short."
She paused for a sip of coffee. "So a bunch of old Shamans decided to get together and do something to even up the odds. And what they did Sucked, but I suppose it was all they had: They took a young girl and chained her up, did Big Mojo, and somehow conjured up the essence of something that hated demonkind and hunted them, and infused the girl with that essence and bound it into her. And the First Slayer was made...
"One girl in All the World with the power to hunt and kill demonkind. Faster, stronger, tougher, betterer. Quicker healing. Able to leap tall buil- oh wait, that's Supergirl. Never mind." She grinned, wondering if it really was possible to give King apoplexy with snark. "She died. And the Slayer Essence moved on... somehow, the magics they'd used identified girls with the Potential to become Slayers in turn, and when one was killed, the next was Chosen. Slowly but surely, the Slayers and the handful of other hunters and Champions," she waved her hand inclusively at the three of them, "that came up through the ages managed to beat back the tide of demons and other mystical predators, until they left this world through portals into various hell dimensions. Mostly. Some stayed, and so did the Slayer, still hunting. Still dying."
"The original Shamans became Watchers: dedicated to using their magics and hidden knowledge to assist the Slayer in her hunts... although that changed after a time." Faiths voice couldn't help the bitterness on 'changed', no matter that she tried to keep it light and Mock Wesley, "Centuries passed, and there's always been a Slayer. Most of them live short lives and die young. You very seldom leave a handsome corpse fighting demons. Always young girls between the ages of 13 and 15 or so. Always One. The Slayer Essence isn't sentient, not really, but it's there: like another side of you. It comes with enormous strength, speed, incredible resistance to damage, inhuman healing, and heightened senses. You gain instinctive knowledge of weapons, fighting. You can master any combat art with only a little training or from watching it done. It can drive you insane... you become Predator, Killer. You live for the hunt, the fight. And the kill. It can take over, if you let it."
Hannibal was definitely going to explode if he kept his mouth shut much longer. Abby, too. Faith glanced around, saw a thick bar of stainless steel on the nearby workbench with a narrow hole: bull barrel for one of the rifles, some inch or so thick and 30" long. She picked it up and casually bent it into an upside down U with a flex of her biceps. Tossed it to him and left him gaping suddenly.
"Don't care if you believe it, Hannibal. It exists. Don't care if the idea of Demons offends you, Vampire Hunter. Fucking deal with it."
She stood, hands on her hips, locked his eyes in a calm, level gaze. "I am The Slayer. I am the Thing the Darkness fears. I was Chosen at fifteen from a feral street kid. I watched my first watcher tortured and killed in a way they don't have words for. I've fought Gods, and helped kill them. I've been fighting since I was Called, watched friends die, been swallowed up by the darkness, become the damned Slayer Essence - and walked out the other side of that hell at least semi-sane. I am a champion. I've known bigger champions. And you Will. Not. Fucking. Sneer. at me, boy."
She locked his eyes until his gaze broke, and he stepped back, just a hair, from the power radiating out of her: full Slayer essence at the fore until she choked it down and locked it away. 'You ain't the only one who's got The Attitude, C. And I'm sorry too that we'll never get to know each other.'
She shrugged and focused on Blade. Who was Not Impressed, damn him. But curious as hell - he radiated it. "Slayer. The full package. Prophetic dreams, ability to sense 'other', dreams of past Slayers fighting, dying, an endless chain of them." She felt Abigail start at that, felt Blade notice it too.
He crossed his arms over his chest, settled deeper into the chair with a sleepy look, every controlled movement radiating power, Capital P. No wonder he wasn't impressed. "You said 'or one of them', earlier?"
King smirked. Recovered fast: not one to stay intimidated for long. Or speechless. She could like that about him, oh yeah. "Yeah. One Girl in All the World. So how can you be 'one of'?"
"The previous Slayer died, don't know who she was. California Blonde was Called, Chosen - the 'But but but... Are you EVIL?!' asker." Faith grinned. "She went through a world of shit, ended up in Sunnydale as guardian of the Mouth of Hell." She saw the 'Sunnydale' register on Hannibal and Abby - oh yeah, they'd done checking. "Boca del Infierno. The Hellmouth, or one of them. Went after a Master Vampire, was bitten and left to drown, resurrected by CPR. Died just long enough, though, and Kendra was Chosen. The Slayer Line passed to her. Kendra died at the hands of a Master named Drusilla. And then came me... " She had her eyes closed, voice soft, too many memories of old pain tied to that story. "Me. The wild child, the feral Psycho Slayer. The fuckup Slayer. The Chosen One of the Chosen Two now."
She smiled, something twisted that didn't reach her eyes, looking at Blade. Not flinching from the calm regard there. "I got better."
"Blondie died, I went to prison, she was resurrected by Big Magic. Black magic. Her friends thought that she'd ended up in some Hell when she died, had reason, brought her back kicking and screaming. Ripped her out... and opened the way for something Nasty to come in with her." She heard Abby whisper 'Glorificus' so soft only Slayer hearing could probably pick it up. Oh yeah... she had the dreams too. Definitely Slayer. "I broke out, because a friend needed me... went back to Sunnyhell to help with Big Nasty. Things got ugly."
"To try and deal with it, one of us, the one who'd done the big resurrection thing on Blondie, did a mojo that Called all the Potentials. Made them Chosen, not Called. All at once. Had to. We were fighting, losing. Dying. The First's right hand was stalking and killing the Potentials to destroy the Slayer line completely.
"We won, kinda. Closed the Mouth of Hell. Created Lake Sunnyhell." Faith shrugged. "And now instead of one girl in all the world, there's Many. We're finding new ones all the time... not as many in the US - Caleb killed most of them - but all over."
Blade nodded. Definitely a story there. Stories. Definitely answered questions for him, and Faith had a pretty good idea which question.
"You asked me if I was evil, Blade." Her voice was bitter, smile twisted. "I can't answer that. I don't know the answer. I've killed, tortured, wrecked the lives of people around me. And tried to make up for it and fucked up again." She met his eyes evenly. "All I can tell you is... I'm the thing that hunts monsters. And I don't hurt people any more. Only myself."
She was watching him, watching them try to fit all the pieces together, and waiting to see where this goes, when her cell phone went off. Giles' number on the ID when she dug it out.
"Fuck me."
...
She thought about taking the cell off to one side, and figured that slayer hearing and two sets of vampire enhanced ears would make that about damn' useless. Fuck it.
"Yo, G."
pause
"Said I was going to call you. Been busy."
pause
"Yeah, just bet you have too. Sorry. Kinda happened."
pause
"Screw him. Didn't Vi give you the skinny?" short pause "Man... She's level, dude. You can believe her."
pause
"Xan tried to tell you guys. You didn't give him a chance. I didn't give him a fucking chance, and I should've damned known better." pause to listen "No, G. That man doesn't belong around kids. I didn't just freak and break him for no damn' reason. Neither did Xan, the first time. Heh - you should have figured there was probably a reason why Sunnydale High, home of the fuckups hired him, eh? Had to be something there - the fucking Hellmouth, guy."
pause
"Can't. Can't be around it, Giles. I'll hurt someone. Need time to wrap my head around this."
pause shrug
"Put Vi in charge. Give her a damned Watcher. She's one of Xander's girls - she's got a damned good head on her shoulders. She's trained, she's a Sunny-D vet, Mini-Slays respect her. She can deal with the responsibility."
pause
"Yeah, and if Vi and I are right, you do owe Xan an apology. So does B. So does Will. Me too, but it's probably too late for me. Guess Little-D and Vi and Rona were the only ones of his close friends that didn't turn on him, huh?"
pause softer voice
"Yeah, sorry. Not for breaking Woodie, but for leaving a damn mess. And for leaving it to you and Vi to clean up. Sorry."
pause
"snicker No, don't sweat it. I'm not going to go all 'psycho slayer' and find a book depository or something." Listened, "Heh. Why, yes you were thinking that, I could hear it." grin "I can hear you polishing your glasses now, too."
pause
"Seriously, G: I'm going to be All Right. And yeah, I know you're worried, for me, not just about what I might do. Thanks. And sorry, again."
pause
"Yeah. Favor?"
pause
"Don't let B get all 'I have to Save The World!' and launch herself into looking for me to 'rescue me' or some shit. Don't let Will get a paranoid attack and track me down. And don't let Ken decide she needs to bring me in cause I've gone fuckin' rogue or something. That wouldn't be pretty."
pause
"Just need some space. Gonna travel awhile. I find any noobs, I'll ship them to you, in Cleveland, or somewhere Wood ain't. Don't worry - not gonna start setting up a rival Slayer pool or something." Listen, laugh "Oh you were so too thinking it. I would have been. snicker"
pause
"Yeah. Fucking mess, huh? Sorry... I seem to keep saying that a lot" pause "Mean it, too. Really didn't want to disappoint you, or have another Faith Thing blow up. Shit happens."
pause
"Naw. I'll be alright. Meant that part too. Got enough in the bank til I can find something to do. You need someone on the job, earning their pay... not off moping and cruising."
pause
"Yeah. Laters. Good luck." She closed the phone, looked at it a bit. Then turned it over and opened the back, removed the battery after turning it off, muttering "Shoulda done that earlier, dammit." Wouldn't stop Willow from tracking it, but it would kill the inboard GPS she'd read about.
"Friends." She swept Blade and the others a look. "Can't live with 'em, can't bury 'em in the backyard without the cops getting bent."
...
Later. Pizza, good beer, and light conversation and banter that didn't go back to Slayers, vampires & demons, or heavy shit. Well, conversation between Faith, Abby, and Hannibal: Blade seemed satisfied with monosyllables and watching the interplay between her and his 'kids', as she'd started thinking of them. Family tight, and one that wasn't adverse to making someone else feel comfortable around them. At least... someone who could deal with that Addams Family vibe. Weird.
Faith had never seen a 'normal family'. She wouldn't know what to do with one.
Blade and King seemed comfortable with food, no cups-of-microwaved-blood drinking, so the 'recovered vamp' and dhampir thing evidently didn't leave Angel/Spike like after effects and cravings. Cool - she could deal, but watching Angel slurp down a mug of O-pos had always left her a bit sqeemed.
Abby kept shooting her curious looks, thoughtful, when she thought Faith wasn't looking. evidently, more than a bit of the Slayer history had resonated in her. Faith wondered how she'd dealt with the sudden rush of strength and speed, power, a few months ago. With the dreams... endless lines of young girls fighting, dying in horrid ways, born again with different faces and skins. Faith had damned near gone nuts when she was Chosen, before her Watcher found her. Taken weeks before she finally figured out how damn' careful she had to be all the time to not break glasses, tables, doors. People...
"So... your boss going to be a pain?" Hannibal asked around a slice, cutting his eyes sideways to her.
"Hrrmmm... ?" She blanked for a moment. "Oh. Right - you went through my stuff while I was passed out." She grinned back at his completely unrepentant look.
"Yeah. Couldn't hear the other end of that, but your side was fascinating. And funny." He snickered, shrugged. "I've left a few messes behind in my day. Know the feeling."
"I'll bet." She thought a bit, like she hadn't been ever since she'd hung up. Heh. "Probably not. He'll be pissed he had to fly in to pick up the mess... but he'd have had to do that if it'd blown up some other way. No big. Not sure some of the others will let it drop, so I'll have to go through a couple more of those, probably."
"Oh joy." His eyes crinkled.
"Yah." She rolled her eyes. Getting to be a habit lately. "Helps that most of the others will be just as glad to have the psycho slayer out of things, with minimal breakage, and they'll let it go." She couldn't quite keep all of the bitterness out of the snark. Decided she liked King for ignoring it.
Abby frowned. "Man... if they're your friends, they won't give you a benefit of a doubt?"
Faith shot her a look. "Lot of history there, Whistler. Not all of it pretty." She remembered Abby saying 'and friends call me Abby', but also that she hadn't said Faith could consider herself one of those. So.. 'Whistler', and never you mind that it brought visions up of a small, very badly dressed demon way at odds with the trim feline girl.
She stood, stretching. "This a 'hang out at the hideout' kinda night? No hunting?"
Blade said, "Been quiet out lately. Not much to hunt." He didn't elaborate.
"And you ashed our leads to possibly anything big enough to be a problem last night, so... " Hannibal snickered.
"Sorry. Next time I'll ignore the screams of prey and go pass out in an alley."
"Cool. No fuss no muss that way." He stuck his tongue out at her faux outraged look. "So for a night or so we lay low, let the leeches decide the heat's down, they come out of their holes, and we go hunting again. Find, watch, trail them to.. what did you call it? Big Bad."
She laughed. "Yup. Then 'Find. See. Kill. Party.'"
"Yup. I see you do know The Drill."
"Been there, did that, got the souvenir ashtrays." She stretched again. "So, going to be quiet... got a gym? Going to have to burn off some energy later."
Abby nodded. "I'll show you whenever you're ready. I need to cut loose too, a bit."
"Cool. Later - right now: stuffed, lazy, an' my head don't hurt like it should have been if not for 'Pop's Cordial'. I'm good." Faith cracked the top on another St. Pauli Girl and swigged. Belched. Gave an unapologetic look to Abby's groan.
Sooner or later - best sooner - she was going to have to get some personal space and make a few calls. At least one, to Wesley. Get some Watcherly input on her dream, and on anything that might be a lead to what was going down. Not Giles.. not good to dump a mess on him, and then yell for help with an apocalypse. Damn good way to get B, Wills, and the others involved, and she didn't need to deal with that right now. See if she could work it out on her own, for a change, and call in the Cav later if needed.
She cracked her knuckles, settled into a chair, then sighed and desisted when Abby and King glared at her for picking up stuff to fiddle with. She looked over at tall, dark and taciturn "Yo, Blade." He turned his head and gave her a slow look. "So, gonna finish the 'You're both wrong' sitrep for me?"
She grinned at his almost sigh. "No, I didn't forget. Yes, I do want to hear it. Yes, I know you were hoping to get out of like, actually having to speak with like, words and shit."
Hannibal bounced on his seat. "Ooh! Yeah!" He made puppy dog eyes. "But Unca Bwade! You PWOMISED us a Stowy!!"
That actually got a growl out of Blade, that completely bounced off the impervious King. He shook his head, barely, and leaned back in his chair with a beer.
Faith settled back, gestured with her beer. "Hey, professional interest here. Unlike Kid Smartass there." Smirked at King's glare. "Gotta know it to kill it. Helps with my ambitions to be the Longest Lived Slayer in history of the world and shit."
"Ok. Both right. Two types of vampire." Paused, thoughtful. "Maybe more."
He glanced at King. "You and Abby know about Dagon and his Childer - you did the research on him. What you didn't run across, or didn't register was that there was more than one Primogen like Dagon."
Inclined his head fractionally towards Faith. "Other old ones, pre-human. There was Kaineron, for one. Probably not his real name, if he had one. He infused his essence into his childer, creating the vampiric undead: Childer of Kane. Dagon created the unliving: Childer of Draaken. Both types feed on blood, essence of life."
Faith tipped her bottle to him. "It's always about the Blood."
Nod. "One line is created by an infection that burns out the host and changes it to vampire, possibly a mystical virus." He sounded dubious, but grudgingly conceding the possibility. Obviously the idea of magic didn't set well with him. "Hence the allergy to sunlight and bursting into flaming ash when killed, reaction to silver: all mystical items. Damned near incurable, but can be reversed. Sometimes. Other is an animated corpse preserved by and inhabited by the essence of a Primogen, diluted by now. As Faith outlined. Little or nothing of the host survives except enough to leave a facade. Not reversible: when you destroy one, the essence goes back where it came from. Corpse goes to dust. Not a reversible condition, that I know of. Different types of energies, slightly different weaknesses and results when destroyed."
Hannibal frowned. "Ok, so why are we just hearing this now? I was a freaking infected, for crying out loud - I never once heard anything about 'other lines' from even the old sucks around."
Blade curled his lip. "And how much time you spend talking to old leeches and Masters about vampire lore?"
"Heh." Hannibal made a face. "Point. I mostly tried like hell to not get noticed by them."
"Good idea. Why you probably not dead." Blade looked through a place on the wall, continued. "Childer of Draaken don't like Childer of Kaineron. Vice versa. Competitors for Prey. They tend to kill each other. Congregate in different areas. Draaken's childer tend to draw to each other's society, vampire underworld, and to humans. Kaineron tend to draw to mystical places and places of power."
"Like Hellmouths." Faith nodded. "Demonic calls to demon; people, violence, and blood calls to once-human."
Nod. "And seldom the twain shall meet." He looked at King, and Abby. "You just never happened to run into the other type. They're not much drawn to New York, and it's Draaken territories: the ones that do come in stay hidden or get killed by other vampires."
Abby looked at him. "How do you know about this stuff? We didn't, and we've been hunting a long time. Family business."
Blade moved his shoulders slightly. "I didn't, til recent. Whistler - your father - and I ran across the information while researching the Hybrids and the Blood Pack. After I found him again... he ran across some things that didn't fit while he was... out. We started digging deeper into vampire lore."
He riveted Abby with a look. "When you were researching Drake and Dagon, didn't you ever wonder why there were so many vampire legends, in every culture? All of them similar, but all of them with differences? Russia, Europe, Middle East, Africa, South America..."
She nodded. "Afraid we kind of wrote it off as being transmission error: legends getting distorted over time and retelling, clouded by superstition and human error."
He shrugged. "Now you know: different Primogens. Different lines. Different origins, probably, with different pre-human ancestors."
"Ok, makes sense." Faith nodded. "Do kinda wonder why the Watchers never mentioned a lot of this stuff. A lot of what I know was picked up from slayer dreams and information gleaned from other sources and non-Watchers."
King gave her an unexpectedly sober look. "Maybe they didn't want to complicate things for girls who were probably not going to live long enough to learn it?"
"That makes way too damn' much sense given what I know of them," Faith growled. "Thanks. I could have gone all damn night without hearing that."
"No prob. Glad to help."
Faith gave Blade a guileless look. "See? Didn't take nearly as many words as you were afraid of. Didn't even break the loquaciousness barrier." She winked.
She heard Abby choking on a laugh as she walked out.