Loss of Faith
Chapter 2: Is It Her?
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the recognizable characters contained within.
That would be Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, etc….
As those words leave my lips, suddenly I can't catch my breath. It's too close in here. I stand up and head for the door with Xander right behind me. He stops long enough to pay the check and then hurries out to catch me. I'm standin at the corner of the building leanin over with my hands on my knees takin huge breaths and tryin to slow down my runaway heartbeat. I look up at him as he stands in front of me and slowly straighten up while wiping my mouth from where I just blew half my breakfast over the sidewalk.
I let out a long breath and tell him, "Xand, ya got two minutes to tell me what the fuck you think is goin on. Then I'm gonna walk away and if ya know what's good for ya, you won't try and stop me." Yea, I know I'm bein a bitch, but how much am I supposed to take. If Buffy survived me tryin to kill her on the pier and she remembers everything that happened, there's no way in hell she's gonna wanna see me again. And if she does see me, I just know she's gonna try and kill me. That's what I would do.
"Faith," he starts in. He's speakin real low and slow, like ya would to a crazy person. And yea, I am a little crazy right now. Who wouldn't be in my place?
"First off, I don't know for sure that it's Buffy," he says. "But after reading your journal, I can't see who else it would be."
One word is runnin through my mind over and over. 'No, no, no, no….' Xander's voice is almost bein drowned out by it and I have to concentrate to hear what he's sayin.
"Will you please just tell me what the fuck ya think is goin on?" I shout at him. I'm standin here losin my mind and he keeps tryin to beat around the bush. If he don't start explainin soon, I'm not gonna be responsible for what I do to him.
"A few weeks after you left, the Council sent Shannon to protect the Hellmouth ," he starts to explain. Good thing for him too. "She showed up at the school one day looking for Giles and I guess the Council had already sent word to him, because he didn't seem that surprised. She told us she was sixteen, came from London and had been with the Council ever since she was eight years old."
That kinda freaked me out a little. I couldn't imagine what it would be like bein under the control of those sick fucks for all that time. Old men and young girls just brought back too many bad memories for me. Xand waved his hand in front of my face to get my attention back.
"Hey, you still with me?" he asked.
"Yea, I'm here," I tell him. "Just went to a not so happy place for a minute. They actually had her for that long?"
"It looks like it," he says. "And believe me, they didn't waste one moment in brain washing that kid either. To her the Council is everything. As in they can do no wrong, ever. We tried to tell her some of the shit that they put you and Buffy through and she just blew us off like we were crazy. It was like we were trying to turn her against her family or something. Well, we were trying to turn her against them, but only by showing her the truth. It's not like we could have made half that shit up."
"You tell her about Travers sending a hit squad to kidnap me before they found out B had died? I mean the last time," I ask him.
Turned out that when the Council had sent Wesley to Sunnydale, his real assignment was to scope out the place so Travers could have me taken back to England. He figured that with Buffy guardin the Hellmouth, he could kidnap and indoctrinate me in the ways of the Council. We found this out after Giles was re-instated and Travers let slip that it was just as well they didn't get the chance to grab me. He'd have had his own personal spare slayer just waitin in the wings and under his control if something should happen to B. It would also give them the first time in history they could actually experiment on and test a slayer. Amazing what those assholes could come with when they thought they had a spare around. This Shannon chick might not have been a full-on slayer, but it looked like she was already there when they came gunnin for me.
Xand was noddin his head before I'd even finished my question. "She said that 'Uncle Travers' explained to her that you were dangerous and that you were 'unstable due to your lack of proper upbringing and family life'. They told her that if she found out where you were to subdue you and notify them immediately."
Oh this shit keeps getting better and better. I still wanna hear about why Xander thinks Buffy's still alive. "What does all that have to do with you comin here to track my ass down?"
Xand leans against the wall next to me and kinda looks off in the distance. His voice is soft as he tells me, "The first couple of nights she was patrolling, we wanted to go with her to help. Being brought up by the Council and all, she didn't want anything to do with that idea. She was all about living the 'One girl in all the world' part to the max. You know, no friends, no family nothing but the duty, yada, yada, yada. So, she shows up at the library the next day to report in to Giles. He's sorta her temporary Watcher until a replacement comes over from the mother land. I happen to be there, but Willow and Giles had gone over to the computer lab for a new monitor or something for the library computer. Anyway, I asked her how the patrol went and she said it was strange. Strange how, I asked. Then she said that she was never told that vampires would hunt each other."
My head snapped around at that and he's got my full attention now.
He turns to look at me and says, "Yea, that caught my attention too. Shannon went on to say that she caught a glimpse of a female vampire that was dusting off a group of other vamps. She said she could tell the woman was a vampire because the vamp vibe was coming off her in waves, even though she was too far away to get a good look at her. This Good Samaritan vampire finished off the clan, turned and looked at Shannon, then took off into the night. Shannon tried to catch up to her, but didn't have a chance. She said this vamp moved faster than any she ever heard of. I told her she must have just stumbled into a clan war or something, trying to buy time to figure out what it could mean. I already had a half assed idea forming, but didn't want to believe it. Then she said to me that at first she thought the girl fighting the vamps might have been you, but she didn't fit the description she was giving. Plus the whole vamp vibe thingy. Faith, she said that the girl moved like a super-slayer. That's what finally made it click for me."
I let out the breath I didn't know I had been holdin. It sounds possible, probable even, but why would Xander put two and two together and leave Giles and Willow out of the loop? "So what led you to come lookin for me?" I ask him, but I already think I know the answer.
"Faith, I read your journal and remembered the entry about your lighter." He replied, "About how Buffy was able to get through the fire and return it to you. I know there's something that happened on that pier that you won't tell anyone. I also know that a guy on a fishing boat that was there that morning said that right after you hit the water, and I quote, 'the sun reflected off of the splash like a comet had followed her in'. He was passed off as being a local crazy, but it made some sense to me. What do you remember about going in the water?"
My stomach twisted again as I thought back to that day. I have nightmares about it just about every night, but I never let myself think about it when I'm awake. It hurts too much. Xanders right though, I need to think about it now. I need to go back to the worst day of my life and remember if there's anyway, anyway at all, that Buffy could of survived. If she did survive and If she is still fighting the good fight, does that mean the en-souling spell took? And if she has her soul, conscience, humanity, whatever, what does it mean for her, for us? How could she possibly exist knowing what she is? What she was? What I did to her?
If there's even a chance that Buffy is still alive and in Sunnydale, I know damn well what I gotta do. I gotta go back and find her. It turns out Xander was right about something else he told me once, I can't run.