[buffyverse/dark angel] a new breed of monster
Title: A New Breed of Monster
Author: aaronlisa
Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Dark Angel
Pairing/Characters: Faith Lehane, Max Guevera, with mentions of Willow Rosenberg
Rating: FR13
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer belongs to Joss Whedon and company, while Dark Angel belongs to James Cameron, Charles H. Eglee and company.
Prompts: Written for 7_crossovers for Table #7, Prompt #4 (stain)
Notes: Set post-Chosen and pre-Season One of Dark Angel. This story is not Season Eight complaint.
Summary: Faith goes to Seattle to find a new Slayer on behalf of the Council.
Word Count: 1638
At thirty-nine, Faith was starting to feel as if she as far too old to be chasing after monsters. This feeling was not helped by the fact that she was currently lying on a lumpy bed just outside of Seattle in a cheap motel with a water-stained ceiling. She was cold, tired and hungry and not looking forward to having to enter a city that was still under martial law.
She rolls over on to her stomach with a sigh as she thinks about all of the friends that she had buried in the last sixteen years since the collapse of the Hellmouth in Sunnydale. There were so many faces that she can barely remember the names and circumstances of the friends and Slayers that she had buried over the years. And she wonders how come she was still alive, still slogging through her crappy existence when far better Slayers than herself had had such short lives.
Faith closes her eyes and tries not to think about the bitterness and sadness that were starting to become constant companions to her. Instead she focuses her thoughts on the phone call from two days ago. If she closes her eyes tight enough and shuts out the negativity, she can almost hear Willow’s voice. Willow had called her from London, her voice faint and the line full of static, to inform her of a new Slayer.
Something that they had both given up hope on finding a long time ago since Willow’s spell seemed to have disrupted the way things work. Over a thousand girls and women ranging from the ages of twelve all the way to forty-nine had been turned into Slayers with an incantation from Willow when Buffy had needed to raise an army.
Faith remembers the early days after the collapse of the Hellmouth, Buffy and Giles had gone to England to reform the Council while the rest of them had scattered around the globe searching for other Slayers. She still has the occasional nightmare about the Slayers that they couldn’t save: the ones who had been murdered by vampires and demons and other monsters almost as soon as they had been Chosen. And the ones who had turned bad with the sudden influx of power coursing through their veins making them feel invincible. Or the girls that they had lost in the wars fought as demons, monsters, demi-gods and vampires tried to restore the equilibrium between good and evil.
It wasn’t until Buffy’s death seven years ago that people in the Council started to worry about the future of the Slayers. There were many of the doom and gloom variety who prophesized that once the last Slayer died, there’d be no more Slayers chosen and then evil would take over the earth. Faith was always grateful that those who held those beliefs weren’t high in the Council, since many of them also darkly prophesized that it would only be her death that would restore the natural line of Slayers.
Faith might be tired and jaded but she wasn’t in any mood to test out that particular theory. As long as Willow and Giles remained in charge of the Council, there were Watchers and Slayers that could debate about the lack of a Slayer being called forth at Buffy’s death and what it meant.
Or at least that had been the way it had been according to Willow until two weeks ago when the routine ritual to find Potentials and Slayers had pinpointed a new Slayer in Seattle. Willow had given her all of the details that she was able to ascertain with her rituals and spells and Faith had turned her bike north towards Seattle wondering for the first time if Willow’s magic might have failed the red head.
* * *
Seattle was filthy and poor. Although Faith had only spent a week in the city before the electro-magnetic pulse that had changed things over night one fateful day in 2009, she could see the changes that had occurred in the city. It was horrifying and it served as a reminder that the worse horrors that she had seen in her life hadn’t been those caused by monsters but those caused by humans.
When the Pulse had hit, she had been in New Orleans hunting a group of vampires that were trying to become as renowned as Angel’s old family once was. Faith had followed them all over the eastern United States into New Orleans. She had been sleeping when the Pulse hit, when she awoke that in the late afternoon, nothing had seemed out of the ordinary. When she couldn’t turn on the lights or the TV, Faith had assumed that it was a problem with the power. It wasn’t until she had left the motel and had started to hunt her prey and she had found New Orleans burning as the human occupants rioted.
She had fled New Orleans that night after the mayhem and destruction that she had seen caused by the human citizens of the city. Later on, she found out that many of the vampires and demons who had called New Orleans home had also fled the city.
For six months after the Pulse, Faith had been on the run cut off from London and the Council and hearing the most fantastical rumors. As she travelled from one place to the next, she had encountered groups of Slayers, sometimes with a Watcher or two, who were desperately trying to survive the madness that had seemed to consume the world while fulfilling their destinies.
Evil didn’t take a holiday just because the world had turned upside down and inside out. Faith had come close to death herself several times during those first six months. Yet things had gradually improved over time as the government had reasserted its power and control. Nothing would ever be the same as it was prior to the Pulse but things were finally starting to improve ten years after the fact.
Except in Seattle where martial law was still the norm and the crushing poverty was evident everywhere Faith turned.
* * *
Finding the Slayer wasn’t that hard, Faith was certain that the young woman was doing her best to remain incognito but she was failing. Then again, all Faith really had to do was follow the trail of dead monsters to find her Slayer. The minute Faith laid eyes on the new Slayer; she could tell that something wasn’t right. Although she wasn’t sure what was wrong, she did know that the girl hadn’t been turned. She wasn’t a vampire, yet she moved with a preternatural grace that went beyond anything Faith had ever seen before.
For five days, Faith followed the Slayer. She even went as far as taking a job at Jam Pony where the girl, Max, worked. Five days, she followed Max as if she was a vampire that Faith was hunting.
On the night of the fifth day, just as dawn was breaking, Faith collapsed on yet another lumpy bed in yet another cheap motel room that had stains on the cheap nylon quilt and rust-coloured water stains on the ceiling. She knew that she should just approach Max and tell her what she was but there was still something holding her back. Something that prevented her from dramatically walking out of the shadows after Max had staked some vampire. Something that held her tongue so that Faith didn’t just tell Max that she was a Slayer and what that meant.
It was Max who forced the confrontation when she broke into Faith’s motel room that night. It was Max who forced the confession from Faith about why she was following her. And it was Max who forced Faith to prove to her what a Slayer was.
Afterwards, when Faith’s jaw was sore from talking, Max’s eyes had flashed with pain before she had left the motel room. Faith didn’t go into work that day or the next, instead she waited for Max. Only leaving the comfort of the motel room for food and to do a nightly patrol of the neighbourhood. Five days later, Max came back and started to tell Faith a fantastical story, one that Faith might not have believed had she not seen evidence of the government’s shadowy involvement with and manipulation of the supernatural.
When Faith reported to Willow, neither of them knew what to make out of it. Was Max simply a girl who had been created in a lab by the government who just happened to be a Slayer? Or was she was specifically a Slayer created in the lab by the government as a weapon? They had decided between the two of them for Faith to stay in Seattle to help Max with her search for her siblings.
Faith had moved from the cheap motel room where she had been staying into a small apartment that the Council was paying for. It wasn’t really that much better despite the cost of the rent. The only thing that made the cramped space better was that there weren’t any water-stains marking the ceilings or the walls so that when Faith couldn’t sleep and she found herself staring up into the ceiling looking for answers, all she found was a white ceiling with no marks for her imagination to twist and turn into the faces of those that she had loved and lost or those that she had wronged.
She still felt far too old to be chasing after monsters, but somehow since her arrival in Seattle, the type of monsters that she was chasing after had changed. Willow sent her other Slayers to deal with the vampires and demons and such, while Max and Faith chased after human monsters who would create children to be super-soldiers.
**END**
Author: aaronlisa
Fandom: Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Dark Angel
Pairing/Characters: Faith Lehane, Max Guevera, with mentions of Willow Rosenberg
Rating: FR13
Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer belongs to Joss Whedon and company, while Dark Angel belongs to James Cameron, Charles H. Eglee and company.
Prompts: Written for 7_crossovers for Table #7, Prompt #4 (stain)
Notes: Set post-Chosen and pre-Season One of Dark Angel. This story is not Season Eight complaint.
Summary: Faith goes to Seattle to find a new Slayer on behalf of the Council.
Word Count: 1638
At thirty-nine, Faith was starting to feel as if she as far too old to be chasing after monsters. This feeling was not helped by the fact that she was currently lying on a lumpy bed just outside of Seattle in a cheap motel with a water-stained ceiling. She was cold, tired and hungry and not looking forward to having to enter a city that was still under martial law.
She rolls over on to her stomach with a sigh as she thinks about all of the friends that she had buried in the last sixteen years since the collapse of the Hellmouth in Sunnydale. There were so many faces that she can barely remember the names and circumstances of the friends and Slayers that she had buried over the years. And she wonders how come she was still alive, still slogging through her crappy existence when far better Slayers than herself had had such short lives.
Faith closes her eyes and tries not to think about the bitterness and sadness that were starting to become constant companions to her. Instead she focuses her thoughts on the phone call from two days ago. If she closes her eyes tight enough and shuts out the negativity, she can almost hear Willow’s voice. Willow had called her from London, her voice faint and the line full of static, to inform her of a new Slayer.
Something that they had both given up hope on finding a long time ago since Willow’s spell seemed to have disrupted the way things work. Over a thousand girls and women ranging from the ages of twelve all the way to forty-nine had been turned into Slayers with an incantation from Willow when Buffy had needed to raise an army.
Faith remembers the early days after the collapse of the Hellmouth, Buffy and Giles had gone to England to reform the Council while the rest of them had scattered around the globe searching for other Slayers. She still has the occasional nightmare about the Slayers that they couldn’t save: the ones who had been murdered by vampires and demons and other monsters almost as soon as they had been Chosen. And the ones who had turned bad with the sudden influx of power coursing through their veins making them feel invincible. Or the girls that they had lost in the wars fought as demons, monsters, demi-gods and vampires tried to restore the equilibrium between good and evil.
It wasn’t until Buffy’s death seven years ago that people in the Council started to worry about the future of the Slayers. There were many of the doom and gloom variety who prophesized that once the last Slayer died, there’d be no more Slayers chosen and then evil would take over the earth. Faith was always grateful that those who held those beliefs weren’t high in the Council, since many of them also darkly prophesized that it would only be her death that would restore the natural line of Slayers.
Faith might be tired and jaded but she wasn’t in any mood to test out that particular theory. As long as Willow and Giles remained in charge of the Council, there were Watchers and Slayers that could debate about the lack of a Slayer being called forth at Buffy’s death and what it meant.
Or at least that had been the way it had been according to Willow until two weeks ago when the routine ritual to find Potentials and Slayers had pinpointed a new Slayer in Seattle. Willow had given her all of the details that she was able to ascertain with her rituals and spells and Faith had turned her bike north towards Seattle wondering for the first time if Willow’s magic might have failed the red head.
* * *
Seattle was filthy and poor. Although Faith had only spent a week in the city before the electro-magnetic pulse that had changed things over night one fateful day in 2009, she could see the changes that had occurred in the city. It was horrifying and it served as a reminder that the worse horrors that she had seen in her life hadn’t been those caused by monsters but those caused by humans.
When the Pulse had hit, she had been in New Orleans hunting a group of vampires that were trying to become as renowned as Angel’s old family once was. Faith had followed them all over the eastern United States into New Orleans. She had been sleeping when the Pulse hit, when she awoke that in the late afternoon, nothing had seemed out of the ordinary. When she couldn’t turn on the lights or the TV, Faith had assumed that it was a problem with the power. It wasn’t until she had left the motel and had started to hunt her prey and she had found New Orleans burning as the human occupants rioted.
She had fled New Orleans that night after the mayhem and destruction that she had seen caused by the human citizens of the city. Later on, she found out that many of the vampires and demons who had called New Orleans home had also fled the city.
For six months after the Pulse, Faith had been on the run cut off from London and the Council and hearing the most fantastical rumors. As she travelled from one place to the next, she had encountered groups of Slayers, sometimes with a Watcher or two, who were desperately trying to survive the madness that had seemed to consume the world while fulfilling their destinies.
Evil didn’t take a holiday just because the world had turned upside down and inside out. Faith had come close to death herself several times during those first six months. Yet things had gradually improved over time as the government had reasserted its power and control. Nothing would ever be the same as it was prior to the Pulse but things were finally starting to improve ten years after the fact.
Except in Seattle where martial law was still the norm and the crushing poverty was evident everywhere Faith turned.
* * *
Finding the Slayer wasn’t that hard, Faith was certain that the young woman was doing her best to remain incognito but she was failing. Then again, all Faith really had to do was follow the trail of dead monsters to find her Slayer. The minute Faith laid eyes on the new Slayer; she could tell that something wasn’t right. Although she wasn’t sure what was wrong, she did know that the girl hadn’t been turned. She wasn’t a vampire, yet she moved with a preternatural grace that went beyond anything Faith had ever seen before.
For five days, Faith followed the Slayer. She even went as far as taking a job at Jam Pony where the girl, Max, worked. Five days, she followed Max as if she was a vampire that Faith was hunting.
On the night of the fifth day, just as dawn was breaking, Faith collapsed on yet another lumpy bed in yet another cheap motel room that had stains on the cheap nylon quilt and rust-coloured water stains on the ceiling. She knew that she should just approach Max and tell her what she was but there was still something holding her back. Something that prevented her from dramatically walking out of the shadows after Max had staked some vampire. Something that held her tongue so that Faith didn’t just tell Max that she was a Slayer and what that meant.
It was Max who forced the confrontation when she broke into Faith’s motel room that night. It was Max who forced the confession from Faith about why she was following her. And it was Max who forced Faith to prove to her what a Slayer was.
Afterwards, when Faith’s jaw was sore from talking, Max’s eyes had flashed with pain before she had left the motel room. Faith didn’t go into work that day or the next, instead she waited for Max. Only leaving the comfort of the motel room for food and to do a nightly patrol of the neighbourhood. Five days later, Max came back and started to tell Faith a fantastical story, one that Faith might not have believed had she not seen evidence of the government’s shadowy involvement with and manipulation of the supernatural.
When Faith reported to Willow, neither of them knew what to make out of it. Was Max simply a girl who had been created in a lab by the government who just happened to be a Slayer? Or was she was specifically a Slayer created in the lab by the government as a weapon? They had decided between the two of them for Faith to stay in Seattle to help Max with her search for her siblings.
Faith had moved from the cheap motel room where she had been staying into a small apartment that the Council was paying for. It wasn’t really that much better despite the cost of the rent. The only thing that made the cramped space better was that there weren’t any water-stains marking the ceilings or the walls so that when Faith couldn’t sleep and she found herself staring up into the ceiling looking for answers, all she found was a white ceiling with no marks for her imagination to twist and turn into the faces of those that she had loved and lost or those that she had wronged.
She still felt far too old to be chasing after monsters, but somehow since her arrival in Seattle, the type of monsters that she was chasing after had changed. Willow sent her other Slayers to deal with the vampires and demons and such, while Max and Faith chased after human monsters who would create children to be super-soldiers.
**END**