Hi guys. Sorry, I know it was more than 10 days, but coursework and assignments got in the way. Thanks for the reviews. I hope you like this part :)


Act two

It had felt like a minor earthquake, a 3-pointer maybe, but without the ground shaking part. A mind-quake? Dawn blinked, still dizzy and a little nauseous as she heard the Bou Academy boys shouting at each other angrily. One yelled out an apology about technical hitches.

"You okay, Sunny D?"

Dawn swallowed hard against the saliva in her mouth. "Yeah, did you see that?"

"No, but I sure as hell heard it," Fen complained, rubbing her ears and shaking her head slightly. "Made my brain go funny."

Charlie looked like he had a headache all of a sudden and Aaron was looking up at the ceiling, confused.

"Did the chandeliers just come on for a second?"

Fen looked up at them. "Candles don't just come on at random, at least not without some person randomly lighting them."

"I just coulda sworn they were all blazing away up there for a second," Aaron gave himself a little shake, forgetting about it as he slapped Charlie on the back. "Come on, there's still loads of heavy stuff in their van we need to shift.

"Did they bring decorations too?" Fen followed them. "This is supposed to be a Halloween party, not a sixteenth century ball! This place has to be super scary tonight or else everyone's gonna think its lame."

"Yeah they have a bunch of plastic skeletons in the van." One of the boys answered.

"Ooh, scary!" Fen mocked a shiver, laughing as she followed them out of the room. "Dawn, come on, let's see if they went all out and got plastic spiders too."

"Just a minute," Dawn called, and watched them leave before she looked back down at the scuffed dust on the floor. Slowly she crouched down to take a closer look and reached out to touch the white blob she'd spotted.

Wax. And it was still warm.

With a wary, perplexed look at the chandelier she shot to her feet and raced after the others.


The house in Wooster couldn't have been further removed from the psychologist's fancy office if it had actively tried. The paint on the walls was probably more expensive than the house itself. Not that Buffy could see any paint on the walls, or the walls themselves for that matter. The stuff in here gave clutter a good name; made clutter look tidy by comparison.

There were giant urns, Aladdin-esque lamps and Ming vases fighting for floor and shelf space. There was a cauldron hanging over the fire; and although Buffy had been told it was purely for show, she was sure the burnt carrot smell had originated there. There was a three dimensional model of the solar system hanging from the ceiling, several broomsticks stacked in one corner and a stuffed goat in the corner opposite. There were crystal balls and tarot cards and ouija boards and dribbly candles. The room looked like the Magic Box having a bad hair day.

The jet black parrot in the large ornate cage was staring at her, unblinking. Every now and then it would let out a screech followed by a stream of gibberish mixed with foul language. It was pissing her off.

Buffy shifted in her seat, her ass going numb, whoever had stuffed the armchair obviously hadn't known the difference between foam and bricks. Willow and the self-professed wizard had gone through to a little adjoining room that was bare save for the circle of white sand they were sitting in cross-legged facing each other. Buffy could vaguely hear their chanting through the beaded curtain.

Oz was sitting in a chair next to hers, and while Buffy had been checking out the room, he had been staring fixedly at the curtain. She didn't know if he was worried that Willow was in there alone with the strange – very strange, in fact – man, or if he was just taking advantage of the gentle breeze swaying the beads to catch glimpses of her.

"What do you think they're doing in there?" Buffy asked, needing to break the edgy silence.

"Something magical," Oz replied softly.

"That the best you got?" Buffy gave him a half grin.

Oz didn't add anything. Buffy let the grin drop and had another staring match with the parrot. She lost again.

"She's come so far, it's… frightening."

Buffy looked hard at Oz, he didn't look like he was being funny, so she checked her initial light-hearted response.

"She has. In fact she went too far and had to come back some."

"She told me about the black magic."

"She did?" Buffy was surprised; Willow often went out of her way to not talk about it.

Oz nodded, "It was hard on her."

"It was hard on all of us," Buffy said sharply. "No one remembers that time as a picnic."

"I meant, for her to tell me."

"Oh. Well, like I said, no picnic."

Oz nodded and was silent long enough for Buffy to think the conversation was over. She looked up at the solar system above their heads. The parrot listed the fifty states in alphabetical order, twice, and then let out a really long fake belch.

"Was it Tara's fault?"

Buffy snapped her head around to glare at Oz, "Well, seeing as I'm pretty sure she didn't mean to get shot in cold blood, I'm gonna have to go with no."

Oz held her stare, his eyes solemn. "I was referring to…"

"Also no." Buffy cut him off, her voice an angry whisper. "When Will first started dabbling in the dark stuff, Tara left her – even though it must have nearly killed her to do it – she sure as hell didn't encourage her."

"Sorry." Oz sighed. "I'm just trying to understand."

"I get that," Buffy's anger simmered down. "But you won't find the answers you're looking for by laying the blame at Tara's feet. If you want someone to blame, blame the universe for giving her the power in the first place, or blame Willow for not asking for help before she got to deep in it, or blame me for being the Slayer and giving her the reasons to use that power in less than white ways."

"Or I could blame myself." Oz was back to staring at the curtain. "Her gift always scared me. Not because I thought she would harm anyone else, I was scared it would harm her."

"It did, but not because you left," Buffy said. "It did because that's what power does. It corrupts, even the good guys."

"Maybe if I hadn't left…"

"No offence, Oz, you're swell an' all, but Willow loved Tara as much as she loved you." More in Buffy's honest opinion, but she didn't want to hurt him. "And if she wasn't enough to keep Will from the dark side…"

Oz stood up abruptly and went to the bird cage; there was a dish of monkey nuts resting on a pile of astrological magazines. He took one and poked it through the bars. The parrot grabbed it in its talon and made a noise like car horn – honk honk – before carefully pulling at the crispy pod with its beak to get at the nuts inside.

"How well do you know Kennedy?"

The sudden question should have been unexpected, unfortunately, it wasn't. Buffy closed her eyes briefly and mentally groaned again.

"Not as well as Will, obviously, but pretty well. Well enough to know she's got the makings of a great Slayer, well enough to know she's a nice person, and well enough to know that she and Willow are good together."

"I thought they were having problems." Oz said quietly.

"Did she tell you that?" Buffy asked carefully.

Oz nodded, giving the parrot another nut case.

"Well, don't worry, I'm sure they're gonna be fine." Buffy injected as much cheer into her reply as possible, pretending she didn't get where he was coming from and hoping he wouldn't clarify it for her, and thinking, 'Hurry up, Willow!'

"What if they're not?" Oz came back to his chair, ignoring the bird screeching obscenities for more nuts. "If Kennedy leaves, do you think Willow would, could, go there again?"

Buffy levelled her gaze to his, a don't-bullshit-me look in her eyes. "I thought you were hoping Kennedy would leave her? You want her back, don't you? That's not gonna happen if Kennedy stays."

Oz gave the smallest of shrugs, "I want Willow to be happy. And she doesn't seem happy with Kennedy. If I'm wrong, then I'm wrong, but if I'm right… I'm not gonna lie, if I'm right, I'm hoping she'll give me another chance at making her happy."

Buffy, surprised by his honesty, didn't know what to say at first. She couldn't really refute his argument. She wanted to get a promise out of him that he wouldn't try and split Willow and Kennedy up, but she knew that wasn't her place. She had a strong urge to call Kennedy and tell her to stop being a dick right this minute, but she totally got why Kennedy was being a dick in the first place, so that wouldn't work either.

It was between the three of them. She just had to hope that Willow and Kennedy would work it out if they were meant to. And if not, that Oz would indeed be there to make her best friend happy. Kennedy not going rogue Slayer on them if she was dumped would be a plus too.

"I appreciate you being straight with me," Buffy finally answered, smiling a little. "I know you probably don't see this as any of my business, but, I'll be straight with you too. It kinda feels like my business when you are coming seriously close to screwing with the harmony in my house."

"I thought Giles owned the property."

"That's just a technicality. I'm head Slayer," she grinned at him. "Wherever I lay myScythe is myhome. And I'm all about the harmony – not the Harmony, obviously, just harmony in general – so I'd really appreciate it if you didn't come any closer to the screwing." She grimaced playfully as she realised what she'd said, but rallied well. "Yeah, I think that sums it up."

Oz finally smiled. "So, changing the subject; Harmony – did you ever put the dust on her or is she still at large?"

"She was working as Angel's secretary last time I saw her; which would be a couple of months ago now."

Oz showed some surprise at that, but before he could comment Buffy's cell rang.

She pulled it from her pocket and a look at the caller id made her smile.

"Hi, honey. What's up?" Buffy rolled her eyes as she listened to the reply. "What's wrong with honey? It's a nice endearment."

She listened some more. "I'm not answering the phone 'Hey sexy', at least, not when I'm in company."

She sat back in her chair. "I'm with Oz. Willow's with some magic guy in the other room."

Buffy grinned at Oz. "I'm sure he wouldn't mind me answering the phone like that, it's me that minds…Of course I think you're sexy… because that's not how I answer the phone, that's why!"

Buffy rolled her eyes again. "Faith, not that I mind shooting the breeze with you like this, but, did you have a reason for calling? 'Cause if so I think it's gonna get lost if we keep arguing about phone-answering etiquette."

"No, don't you dare hang up just so I can answer correctly…!" Buffy was speaking to a dial tone. She shook her head and snapped the phone closed, but didn't put it away. "Can you believe her?"

"So, you and Faith, huh?" Oz asked, smiling.

"Huh about sums it up, yeah," Her phone rang again. She picked it up and said hello, but there was no one there. Bemused, she closed it.

The phone rang again, but no name flashed up on the caller id. Buffy looked at it with a frown. It rang again, still no name.

"What the hell?"

It rang a third time and Buffy started pressing buttons, trying anything to get the damn phantom ringing to stop. The fourth time the ring ended with a long belch and Buffy narrowed her eyes at the parrot.

"Do that again and I'll pluck your feathers one by one, understand?"

The bird did it again, and raised one of its talons. It was impossible for a bird claw to give her the finger, but she was pretty sure that was the intention.

The phone rang again and Buffy jumped to her feet. She stalked towards the cage as the ringing continued. Feather plucking might actually be too inhumane, but she was more than prepared to smack the cage enough to knock the infuriating parrot from its perch.

The ringing was still coming, over and over. Buffy had one hand up to sway the cage when Oz called over,

"I think that might actually be your phone."

"Oh." Buffy looked down and saw Faith's name flashing on and off. "You got lucky this time, bird," she said before turning away to answer her cell. "Hello."

"Yeah, well, you hung up on me and I've got a parrot pissing me off, so no one is looking all that sexy right now… No it's okay. I can beat up the damn bird myself if I need to, besides we're in Wooster, you wouldn't be able to get here. Just, why did you call?"

Buffy went and sat back in the hard chair, her nose scrunching a little at what Faith was saying. "A costume? Why do I need a costume? I'm not sure we're up to role-play just yet."

She flicked her eyes Oz's way, but he was obviously no wiser than her. He did look mildly amused though.

"No, I'm sure I can get something, but a clue would be nice… Come on, just one!... Is it inside or outside?... It's not a stupid question! Inside means party, outside means trick or treating," Buffy started chuckling. "See, it is a good question, that's why you won't answer it now… okay, fine, I'll do my best. So what are you going as?... So you haven't thought of anything yet?... No, no, I'm not questioning your mad costume skills, or should that be skillz…no I pronounced it with a z on the end that time, hence the zzz sound… You start calling me Bumble B, I'm never calling you sexy… Because bumbles are rabbit poo, F … no, rabbit poo is only endearing if you're a bunny with a poo fetish… okay, this is getting more disturbing by the minute… no, I meant our relationship."

Buffy was laughing now; it got worse when she saw the weird look Oz was giving her. "I have to go… yes, I'll get a costume…" She smiled bashfully at something Faith didn't quite say, "I awkward hesitation you, too. I'll see you when I get home: Sexy." Buffy blew a kiss down the phone and hung up before Faith could say anything else.

She grinned at Oz as she slipped her phone back in her pocket. "Think we can find a costume shop in Wooster after?"

"Sure, why?"

Buffy shrugged, still smiling. "Faith asked me to."


As Faith put the phone back in its cradle on the wall she was surprised to hear herself giggling.

She was pretty damn sure she hadn't giggled since she was pre-pubescent. In fact any laughing she'd done for as long as she could remember had been sarcastic, cynical or, well, evil, if she was being honest. It was nice to finally be laughing because she was in a good mood, and not just because she'd thought up the coolest way to ruin someone else's good mood.

Weird as hell to though.

Nice and weird seemed like a pretty accurate description of her current sitch. It was a different life alright.

She had a home, like a proper one – more welcoming than a room with a hotplate and adjoining bath; more cosy than a stone-walled cell with bars on the windows – for the first time since she was, what… fourteen?

She had a job that paid more than minimal wage and didn't involve washing sheets.

She had – or was slowly growing – friendships with the people she'd been too scared to let in once upon a time. Sure the bonds were hella tentative, and there were still times she'd catch Willow looking at her with suspicion in her eyes, and still times Xander would be suddenly abrupt with her for no reason she could figure, and Dawn…

Well, Dawn was still all kinds of hostile, but she was so caught up in the golden-haired watcher-boy that it wasn't difficult to stay out her way. With any luck Dawn would get the message that Faith wasn't going anywhere and the anger she obviously felt entitled to would drain away, and if not, in a year or so she'd be going off to college.

All things considered, there had been a serious drop in the suck that usually stuck to her life like a loogey to a brick wall, and to top it all… she had Buffy.

Faith grinned to herself as she looked around the kitchen for a costume idea. She still couldn't believe it, not at all. The other changes were pretty friggin' phenomenal all on their own, but being with Buffy… She didn't have the vocab to do her feelings justice.

Faith hadn't had someone, a special someone, since her mid-teens. Not since she'd blown outta Boston, leaving Kenny-the-little-drummer-boy without a backward glance. There had been people, 'course, a lotta people, but no one she wanted around for more than one night, no one… special.

Fact was, Buffy had been the special person in her life since before Faith had even met her. Buffy had never known it, until recently, and still only knew the half of it thanks to how good Faith had gotten at playing those cards close to her chest.

Hell, she'd even managed to convince herself it was hate, not love, she was feeling for good portions of the last five or so years. It had been easier that way, easier not to think about what she was missing, what she could never have. Even if Buffy had had the final say in ninety percent of her choices – good and bad – ever since Faith had been called, the blonde had been completely unaware of it, and Faith had been equally unwilling to admit it.

And… it was a little hard to let that mentality go.

Faith looked in the refrigerator. She wasn't expecting any awesome costume ideas to jump out and go boo at her, but maybe a beer would get her brain working.

She sure as shit wanted to let that kinda thinking go, the kind that was making her be all closed-off with the great chick she'd been into for so damn long. She couldn't seem to do it though, at least not for more than a minute or two at a time. She tried to relax when she was with the blonde, did her best to just be herself and not put on the front she was famous for, but it was not easy.

It didn't help that they never got to spend much time together, and it didn't help that every single time Faith started to feel like a normal person in a decent relationship, some self-destructive part of her reminded her that this wasn't her kinda gig – she didn't do normal, she had no interest in decent. Where the hell was the fun in decent? And while it was on the subject – what was with all the hand-holding and the sweet little kisses every time one of them just walked into a room – was she ten again all of a sudden? And since when was one person enough for her, especially when that person wasn't even putting out?

Faith popped the top from her beer and sat at the kitchen table. One of Willow's magic books had been left lying around. Faith pulled it towards her and started to leaf through, hoping for inspiration.

She knew she shouldn't be thinking like that, or even letting that side of her retard brain have any kind of say in how she did things now, but, yeah, hard. She knew she'd come a long way, but past habits didn't die overnight or over the course of a few months either, not all of them. And it wasn't as if she only wanted Buffy for the lay, hell no, she was damn sure she wanted Buffy for just about everything from here on in, but, and it was a big freaking but right now, the only time Faith didn't get that stupid little voice telling her this was all the things she didn't want, was when she was kissing Buffy. Because then, she couldn't think about anything but kissing Buffy. And every time Buffy stopped the kissing – which was getting sooner and sooner every night – the stupid side of her seemed to come back stronger.

Every time Buffy pulled away, Faith started doubting the blonde's conviction. Not even on a conscious level really, but the doubts were there. She was still having a hard time believing that Buffy wanted to be with her in the first place, after so long of never believing it could be in a million years, because why would she? After everything Faith had done, what in hell would make Buffy take this chance on her? And what the hell was she gonna do when Buffy finally woke up, realised she was a dumbass for going down this road and called it quits? Faith was leaving herself wide open for a whole new world of pain and that was the one and only thing she was scared of… and it scared her bad.

God, she'd never thought she'd say it, but she could not wait to start therapy. She'd hated it in prison, and she was probably gonna hate it once it started here too, but damn, she needed something or someone to talk all this shit out with. That wasn't her either, she didn't do the talking thing when she could avoid it, but she had enough sense to know that if she was gonna stay with Buffy, she needed to figure this shit out quickly – actually figure it out and not just shove it under the carpet like she did with most of her internal drama.

She may have been slowly starting to feel like one of the gang around here, but there was no one she could talk to about, well, anything really, but that went double for Buffy-stuff. They were all her bestest pals. Her parole officer had said she needed to work through things by talking, so stuff didn't bottle up again, but she'd made it clear she wasn't paid to listen to her romantic problems.

As much as Faith knew she needed it, she wasn't so sure about Buffy joining her in a few sessions. Devenrowe seemed to think it wasn't only a good idea, but essential to their relationship. She'd even mentioned it to Buffy already, which, in Faith's opinion, was a bad move. The blonde had agreed automatically, but Faith had seen the traumatised look in her eyes.

It had been five days since that conversation and although neither of them had mentioned it again, she knew it had to be eating at Buffy, and it was about that time that B had started cutting their goodnight make-out sessions in half. If the two weren't linked, it was a hell of a big coincidence.

Faith's page flicking had stopped as her thoughts got deeper, but all this thinking wasn't getting her ready for her date. She blinked herself out of them now and focused on what she was looking at. It was a spell for killing the walking dead – not vampires, but the more literal walking dead. That would work; it wouldn't be too hard to make it look authentic and had the added bonus of not being something as done to death as a witch or a vampire.

Faith looked up from the page as Kennedy wandered into the kitchen. The girl looked listless, and that wasn't a word that would usually describe the brash kid.

"Wassup?"

"Huh?" Kennedy looked surprised to find herself not alone. "Nothing, I'm fine."

"Okay." Faith didn't question it.

Buffy had mentioned Ken and Red were having some problems, but it wasn't her place to pry crap out of the girl if she didn't want to talk.

"So, you settling in okay?" Kennedy fidgeted just inside the doorway.

"Sure, I guess," Faith closed the magic book, pushed it away from her and took a sip of her beer. "S'only been two weeks. I get the feeling it'll be a while before all this stops feeling weird."

"Why weird?"

Faith shrugged, "Just not use to playing happy families."

"Happy families?" Kennedy gave a short laugh. "If this is what you call a happy family, I hate to think of the one you left behind."

Faith shrugged again and took another sip of her beer before replying, "Yeah, well, I hate to think about it too."

Kennedy nodded slowly, realising that might not be the best conversation to get into. "So how's Alison doing?"

Faith smirked, "You mean: How are my Watcher skills screwing up the job you started?"

"No! I just…" Kennedy came further into the room to lean on one of the kitchen chairs. "I don't think you're going to screw anything up."

"Yeah, sorry, forgot you're not one of the old gang there for a minute."

"No, I'm not," Kennedy said softly. There was silence in the kitchen for a minute and Faith was just wondering if it was okay to get up and walk out – she had stuff to do after all – when Kennedy looked up at her again. "From one outsider to another, uh, how well do you know Oz?"

"Well enough to know he was love of Willow's life the first time I was in Sunnydale, shocked the hell out of me they ever broke up, they were so tight." The outsider comment had rankled the hell out of Faith, however unintentional it might have been, but seeing Kennedy's face drop about a thousand degrees brought none of the satisfaction it would have done once. "But, hey, what the hell did I know? Wasn't like they ever really brought me into the loop. I do know she seems pretty crazy over you right now."

There was a little light back in the younger girl's eyes, "Did she actually say that to you?"

"Well, no. But you only gotta look at her to see it."

"I look at her all the time, and I don't see it."

"Maybe you ain't looking hard enough, or maybe you're just seeing what you want to see."

"Yeah, this is what I want to see." Kennedy gave a sardonic chuckle.

Faith shrugged, "Ken, if you knew me, you'd know I'm not exactly advice-girl, alright? Willow and Wolf-boy were close, but they broke up. She's your girl now, and if that's how you want it, why go looking for reasons to screw it up?"

"I'm not!" Kennedy insisted.

"Fine, you're not. I gotta go. I have to make this…" she pointed to her face. "…look dead and butt-ugly before Buffy gets home and that is gonna take some doing." Winking, she slid her beer bottle across the table to Kennedy and stood up. "Finish that for me and chill the hell out. Getting all worked up ain't gonna make ya feel any better."

Kennedy watched as Faith walked out of the room, a little confused as to why she was gonna make herself ugly for Buffy, and then when she was alone, she looked down at the half-full bottle in front of her.

With a miserable shrug of her shoulders, she downed what was left.

(Thanks for reading. Comments are always warmly welcomed.

More soon.)