Until It Sleeps: Chapter 3

Realized I can never win
Sometimes I feel like I have failed
Inside where do I begin
My mind is laughing at me
Tell me why am I to blame
Aren't we suppose to be the same
That's why I will never tame
This thing that's burning in me

I am the one who chose my path
I am the one who couldn't last
I feel the life pulled from me
I feel the anger changing me

- Korn

`Angel, I just. I'm stuck.'

`What do you need Buffy?'

`Can you come?' A pause. `I mean, I know it's a lot to ask but...'

`I'll come.'

`Thankyou.' A pause, then a sniff. `God. it's so hard here.'

`It'll be fine.'

Silence.

`I need to ask you something else-'

`What is it?'

`It's big. actually it's huge. Actually on the scale of favours I think it just about tops-`

`Buffy?'

`How hard would it be to break someone out of prison?'

A smile. `Not too hard, actually.'

`...wasn't quite the answer I was expecting.'

`Faith's out of prison, Buffy. She was released six months ago.'

`Released?' Another pause, then an unsure `Faith was released?'

`Yes. She's living with me.'

`Wow.' Muffled voices as a hand went over the receiver. Then back. `Is that wise?'

`They thought so.'

`Do you think so, Angel?'

Silence, then `Yes, I do.'

`We're desperate, Angel. That's the only reason-`

`I know.'

`Xander's dead against the idea. Tara, Anya and Dawn don't really know her. and Willow and Giles. well I think they're just as desperate as me.'

`It's not going to be easy for her, either Buffy.'

A short, bitter laugh. `She'll love it that we've asked for her help.'

`I don't think she will.'

A sigh. `Would she come?'

'..I don't know.' Pause. `I'll try.'

`We're all staying in the house.'

`I don't think that's such a good idea.'

`We have no choice. This thing is beyond any of us, Angel, I don't want her in my house, but that's the way it needs to be. No separation. And-`

`-You don't trust her.'

`Of course not. None of us do. Enemies closer, remember?'

`She's not your enemy any more, Buffy.'

`We'll see.'

`Not for the first night.'

Silence.

`I'll book a motel. I'll meet you there.'

`If I can get her to come.'

`If you can.'

`I'll talk to you later.'

Pause. `Thanks, Angel.'

click

The three of them sat in a triangle in the motel room. Angel on the bed, Buffy in a chair by the door, and Faith in the second chair opposite buffy, arms flung over the side and legs crossed. Buffy had updated them as much as they needed, but the truth was they already knew most of it. She'd been talking with Angel almost nightly in the last week. working up the courage to ask the question, that brought them all here.

"They've almost translated the diary. There's just a few more paragraphs." Buffy said. "The problem is that there's... it's a language that doesn't seem to derive from any one particular one."

"That's odd." Angel pressed his palms together. Buffy nodded.

"Odd, and very hard to translate. Willow and Giles have been working almost every day since we found it."

Willow. Giles.

More names brought into the fray.

"How is Red? And the big G-Man?" Faith asked.

Angel looked at Faith in warning. Buffy linked her fingers together and clenched her jaw.

"You can ask them yourself when you see them, Faith." She said icily.

Faith pretended to ponder that comment. "I'll do that."

"Should you really have been standing alone out there?" Angel asked softly, changing the subject. It worked. Buffy's lips curled into a tiny smile. Ever the protector was Angel.

She shook her head.

"It's only ever `struck' around the city. At least.. that's what we think. Besides. I'd take the most effort for it."

"Has anyone actually seen this thing?" Faith asked, then added "You know... someone who's actually alive to tell us what it looks like?"

Buffy just didn't have the energy to bite at Faith's flippant tone. She simply shook her head. "No. I've been chased by it a couple of times. I've tried to shoot at it, but nothing works. It's like." Her brow furrowed at the recollection. "It's like a shadow. I don't know - it just appears. It doesn't seem to move anywhere."

"Well shit." Faith crossed her arms and leaned further back against the chair. "So what's the plan?"

"We're still. trying to figure out what it wants. We don't know what it is, and until we do we can't kill it."

Faith blinked. "Since when?" She leaned forward and regarded her carefully. "Since when did we ever have to know about something B? What happened to kill first, ask questions later?"

Buffy sighed and rubbed her forehead. It was clearly a question she had asked herself a hundred times over.

"I can't get to it. I can't seem to kill it." She said in resignation. "I've tried. It's just... never where I want it to be."

"Ah, but now I'm here." Faith wiggled her eyebrows. "And the game's changed."

Buffy smiled, a grim, pale smile, but one nonetheless. For only an instant, Faith felt a connection with the better times in her past, when she and Buffy worked together. When they were a team, and, strangely enough, when she felt most alive.

Then the smile was gone, and the moment over.

"Everyone has been staying at the house. There's a lot of room there." Buffy looked at Angel expectantly, and he nodded. Faith caught the interchange.

"I heard about your mom." She offered, perhaps still clinging to the vestiges of her semi-pleasant recollection. "I'm sorry-"

Buffy's eyes flashed, reaffirming the end of it.

"Let's not-" She interrupted, holding up a hand. "-get into details we can't get out of."

Faith knew it was her way of saying, `stay out of the past so we can get through the present'. Faith understood, although a part of her regretted that Buffy hadn't let her finish. She really did like Joyce. She was sorry she had died. Unfortunately she also understood there were some things she would never be able to give Buffy. Sympathy was one of them.

She wondered silently if an apology was another.

"Sure, whatever makes you happy."

The second look Faith received left no doubt in her mind that right now, there was nothing about this whole situation that was going to make Buffy happy.

"Stay here tonight, get some sleep. Meet me at the house tomorrow at 7pm and we'll sort out the rest."

"Whoa-" Faith's eyes darted between Buffy and Angel. "-you weren't serious about that whole, `staying together' thing, were you? I mean, what a way to put the fox with the hounds!"

"Or the fox with the chickens." Buffy said quietly. "Depends which way you look at it, Faith." Faith opened her mouth to say something more, but Buffy cut her off. "Whichever way, that's how it needs to be. This thing is bigger than any of us. We need everyone together in case." She trailed off, but left no doubt in her meaning.

"We understand, Buffy. We'll be there." Angel said.

"The hell we do!" Faith stood up from her chair. "The hell we will!" She stared at Angel incredulously. "You said I was here to help. You said nothing about rooming with them!"

"That's how it needs to be Faith." Angel echoed Buffy's words, which annoyed Faith even more.

"Fuck that!" She spat. "They can all go play Brady Bunch as much as they like, but I'm not fucking buying. I mean, let's be serious here. Buffy-" She curled her lips into a snarl and stalked towards the older girl. Angel leaned forward, and Buffy recoiled back into her chair as Faith leaned close to her ear. "How would you feel sleeping next to a psychotic murdering bitch?"

Just the sound of Faith's voice so close to Buffy's ear sent a shiver down her spine, that she concealed. Faith had always been about the physical reactions. Always using herself as a weapon. Buffy had been prepared for this.

"We're way too busy with fighting a demon to worry about attacking you, Faith." Buffy said neutrally. "I only hope you feel the same." Faith pulled back, instantly frustrated she hadn't been able to illicit a reaction. Buffy shrugged. "If we defeat it however, then that's a different story." She then fixed Faith with a very fiery glare. "You'll be gone by then anyway, so it won't matter."

Faith stalked back and slumped into her chair, scowling at the wall. "Yeah, sure, whatever."

"I think it's best if we all get some sleep." Once again, it was Angel's voice that was the knife slicing through the tension. "Is there anything else we need to know Buffy?"

It was an invitation to leave, and a look of relief instantly passed across Buffy's face as she stood up.

"No, I think you know it all now. Hopefully, the rest of the diary will be translated by tomorrow night and we can start doing something more than sitting around."

"Hopefully." Faith repeated in a low mutter.

"We'll see you tomorrow, Buffy." Angel said, ignoring Faith's comment. Buffy nodded, opened the door and stepped out, closing it quietly behind her. Angel and Faith listened to her retreating footsteps, and continued to listen until they heard the whirring of a car engine starting.

Instantly, Faith was up, stalking backwards and forwards between the door and the first bed.

"I need to get outta here." She said, running a hand through her hair. "I gotta go gut something."

"That's not a good idea, Faith." Angel said quietly. "Not right now."

"Fuck good ideas!" She snarled. "Fuck it all. This is all just fucked up Angel!" She shook her arms, trying to release some of the tension in them. "I shouldn't have come here."

"You're here now."

"Fucking hell! I hate this place!" She stalked over to the bed and slammed her fist into the mattress. Angel didn't flinch even though the punch landed barely an inch from his leg. "FUCK."

In a lightning fast move, Angel grabbed the sleeve of Faith's jacket and pulled her down to his eye level.

"I don't care how you do it Faith." He hissed. "If you need to beat me then beat me. But you need to get rid of this, and you can't do it out there."

Slowly, a sneer grew on Faith's face. She tilted her head back, her hair brushing against his shoulder, then reached up with her other hand and closed her fingers around his neck.

"You want that, big guy?" She whispered seductively in his ear. "You want me to beat you?" In a swift movement she was out of his grasp. She swung her leg over his, landing squarely in his lap, then lifted both legs up and locked them behind his back. "You want that?" She asked again. She pulled herself forward, grinding against him. "What about this?" Faith leaned in and took his earlobe in her teeth, biting down on it. "I bite too." She breathed.

Her hand, still on his neck, began to clamp down. Her other hand snaked up between his shoulder blades to the back of his head, her fingernails digging into his scalp.

Anyone else would have been a whimpering ball of putty right now.

But Angel. Angel made no sound.

He never did.

With a guttural growl of frustration Faith leapt off him and stalked around the bed, glaring at him the whole way. Angel didn't meet her eyes, just continued to stare ahead at the wall.

"This isn't you, Faith." He whispered. "You don't need to do this."

Whether or not she heard him, she showed no indication. Instead, she had flung her coat onto the second bed and was stretched out above the ground beside it, pumping out the first of what would be hundreds of push-ups for the night.

Angel looked down at his hands.

Tomorrow was going to be a long day.