Summary: This is a sequel to my story A Creature I Don't Know which can be found here: s/8467907/1/A-Creature-I-Dont-Know
A/N: I strongly recommend a good understanding of season 5 to follow this: Fool For Love especially for this update.
Disclaimer: Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, 20th Century Fox, UPN and WB Television Networks own the television shows, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Angel". Dark Horse and IDW own the Comics. No copyright infringement is intended, no money is being earned by myself. The title of each chapter, and the story as a whole, come from K's Choice songs/Album titles. (Given that I had soundtrack for the first I thought I should have one for the second).
Thank you all for your kind words and support for my last story. I hope you enjoy my continuation of it. I would love to hear your thoughts on my thoughts. Many thanks.
4. Laughing As I Pray
She'd been studying. Giles was making her re-sit her SATs and had managed to convince she might want to revise for them this time round. He'd gone to bed a few hours ago, it was simply her and her books now. She hadn't heard Buffy climb through her window, she'd had her headphones in, the volume slightly too loud.
Buffy had had to tap her on the shoulder and then react quickly as Faith instinctively threw a punch assuming an attack.
"Jesus!" Faith exclaimed clutching her hand to her heart. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"
"Bleeding, mainly." Buffy sighed, dropping down onto the bed and gingerly lifting up her top. The blood had already started to clot around the cotton. It was going to be a nightmare to get it cleaned up.
Faith fell to her knees and looked closely at the wound. She saw the blood, she saw the cotton, but she also saw a couple of splinters. "You got staked?"
"I got staked with my stake." Buffy nodded, pulling at a couple of the strands she could see around the edge of the injury.
Faith looked at the damage. It was a few inches below the heart and already starting to heal. She wondered if she'd been off the mark that night, if Mr Finch had been slightly stronger… Her own abdomen twinged with a sense of phantom pain. She wondered if Buffy had thought of her as the wood had penetrated her skin. She wondered if Buffy worried that she might die. She wondered if Buffy worried that Faith might of died that night.
She shook her head. Now was not the time.
She pushed herself back up to her feet and headed downstairs. She filled a bowl with warm water a gathered a couple of bits and pieces from the bathroom before returning to her bedroom. She handed the bowl and a clean flannel to Buffy to get started with before diving below her bed. She emerged again with a small wooden box and pulled out a needle and thread from within it.
"Don't give me that look." Faith said as she held up the two to the light trying to find the eye. "We get cuts, bumps, bruises and sometimes we get them bad; I hate hospitals." She managed to get the thread through the needle, a feat she'd thought would take longer given she'd taken her contacts out over an hour ago when she found she'd been getting tired. "Do you want to do this or shall I?"
"Shouldn't you buy me dinner first, or at least spend a couple of years in med school?" Faith handed the needle to Buffy. The blonde held the needle tentatively to her skin before passing the object back. "You better make this up to me."
"I let you have sex with me." Faith smiled up at her as she started to sew her back together.
"With you," Buffy gritted her teeth as the metal cut through her, "I don't think its ever a case of let."
"You trying to say I'm easy, girlfriend?"
They fell into silence, a quiet that was only broken by Buffy's hushed inhales of pain, as Faith finished the last of the stitches.
"I'll wake up Giles and I'll walk you home. If you don't think you're mom would mind I'd like to stay over, check it," she nodded to her stomach, "before I head over to school. And tomorrow afternoon, we'll deal with whatever this thing was that attacked you."
"Thing?" Buffy frowned down at her. "It was just a vampire."
She'd dropped Dawn off at school for Buffy. Dawn had still excited from being involved in a Slayer-related-Mom-cover-up-thing and being crowned as the short, annoying man. She was too much for Buffy this morning. Buffy was struggling to move around the house without her mother noticing she was wincing. Anything else was beyond her.
Faith ducked into town during her lunch hour and headed towards the mausoleum Buffy had described to her. She kicked open the door and bathed the dark space in light. She looked around as the vampires started to stir around her. She was blocking the only exit. She was running the show now.
The last time she'd hit a nest during the day, Buffy had stood by her side. So much had changed since then. She barely had time for slaying between school and Giles' curfew. Occasionally, when she lay awake at two in the morning she thought about sneaking out and fighting a couple to dull the itch. She would always consider the man sleeping in the room besides her though and try and find something else to occupy her mind.
Buffy's injury told her that she needed to be out there. Slayers had an expiry date. It was her job to keep Buffy going as long as possible. It was her job to help.
She never slept at night anyway.
Giles would have to see that now.
She knew he was trying to save the girl by suppressing the slayer within, but maybe they were entwined. Maybe she could be both.
The others had gone home hours ago. Now they sat comparing each others findings. Giles would punctuate their reading by placing another book on the pile every so often, open on a page he deemed helpful. Aside from that they were still.
Faith could sense Buffy's irritation growing. She'd lost the battle last night and she'd got scared. Last time she'd died she been fighting a master, a prophecy, a destiny. This time she had just been fighting herself.
Last year Faith had read a lot of books about their shared history. A journal by a past slayer that Giles thought she'd relate to, old Watcher diaries, histories and council theories. All to help her better understand herself. Now she was rereading Dickens and leaning over textbooks. She wondered when he'd given up on the slayer on her. She wondered when he'd deemed her a failure and thought best to save the girl and the girl alone.
She needed to be out there. She missed being out there. The night still called to her. One day the shouts were going to be too loud to silence. They would erupt. They would scream. She would bleed.
It was when Buffy realised that the best account would come from someone who had killed two Slayers did Faith lose patience with the game. She swore, she yelled, she stormed out. But Buffy was not to be deterred. She was to speak to Spike about how the girls died.
She arrived at Xander's appartment with six bottles of beer. When he let her in she explained that none of them were for him. He enquired about her upcoming SATs and she reluctantly passed him one of the bottles. He asked her when they were due to start and she passed him the rest.
"Do I want to know what you're doing here in such a fowl mood?"
"Not that we don't like having our night of sex interrupted by an angry slayer." Anya nodded opening one of the bottles.
"I'm here to complain about vampires and you're here to listen."
"Well that sounds like much more fun than sex!" Anya nodded, heading over to the sofa and flicking on the television.
Xander wrapped an arm around Faith and ushered her further into his home. He gave her back one of her beers and rescued the remote from his girlfriend.
"I'm thinking an old fashioned made for TV movie."
She walked across town all set to apologise to the girl. She and Xander had worked out a 'I'm sorry I over reacted' speech together. Anya had simply recommended that she got her breasts out. Xander always liked it when she got her breasts out. Lesbians liked breasts. Faith was a lesbian now – with Buffy – she should get her breasts out.
She was ready to say sorry, move on and nothing more would be said about it. They would kiss, make up and she would go home and go back to studying for her SATs. She would go back to suppressing the slayer within. It was all planned. All worked out.
That was until she saw Spike sat on her back porch with a hand on Buffy's shoulder.
She was on him in an instant. His back was pressed up against the wall. His body pushed against it so hard his feet were off the ground.
"Bloody hell, Slayer!" He hissed as she pushed her forearm against his neck.
If he was a man he would have died.
"Faith." Buffy placed an arm on her shoulder and tried to ease the girl.
"What the hell is going on?" she growled. "Why the hell is he here?"
Buffy, knowing she was unable to reach her, punched the girl and forced her to drop the vampire.
Faith placed her hand to her cheek as she bit her tongue. All her instincts were screaming at her to punch her back. All her instincts were roaring at her to fight. She simply pointed to the gun that lay abandoned on the decking and then back to the creature cupping his neck, trying to catch a breath he didn't need.
"You let that touch you." was all she managed by way of a response.
"Mom's got to go into hospital. They don't know what it is."
Faith simply held the crying girl, the argument forgotten, as the vampire slunk back into the night.
Once again, thank you for all your responses. Circus.