Of Those Chosen: The Twins - Chapter 12
Chapter twelve has come out to play with all the other chapters on the jungle gym.
This one is fairly big -- nine pages or so, give or take for formatting -- and starts the process of leading up to the climax. Faith seems to have some difficulty staying fully clothed in this chapter. We start to see some hints of Cole and Donner's plan. And maybe see some hints about Xander's true mental state?
Chapter Twelve
All I Have To Give
The vampires were on them before Audrey took two steps toward Xander.
Instincts took over. She drew stakes from her belt, one for each hand. A vampire came up behind her, to her left; she elbowed him in the face. As he staggered back, she fully extended her arm in one continuous motion from the elbow, and the stake found it's mark in the vampire's heart. She spun to her right, where another vampire was, and flicked the stake in her right hand at his heart. He caught the stake just in front of his heart, like she knew he would, and grinned at her, gloating, as she knew he would. A quick shuffle-step, left foot over right, and she delivered a side kick which completely buried the stake in the vampire's chest -- and left her without a stake.
She turned back to the first vampire, who was about to turn to dust, and dove for her stake. She pulled it from his chest just as he started to dissolve, and burst through the cloud of dust, stake in hand.
:#:
Cole and Donner stood back in the shadows and watched the other vampires attack.
"Nice toss with the rock," Cole commented as Xander fell to his knees. "Clipped the top of his head, just like you said you would."
Donner flexed his throwing arm and shrugged modestly. "Well, I used to play baseball," he said. "Had a pretty mean curveball, but I threw my arm out. Of course, that's not really much of a concern any more."
"Of course."
They watched the fight in silence for a few moments.
"That trick with the diving through the dust, that was pretty neat," Cole commented.
"Girl has great moves," Donner agreed. "Will we see more of her soon?"
"It's a possibility."
:#:
Faith stayed by Xander as chaos broke out around them.
He was on his knees on the ground, his hands up on his head and his eyes down. Faith drew her knife in her right hand and held a stake in her left. Janet, Rona, and Audrey spread out in a triangle around her and Xander as the vampires attacked. They looked to be holding their own pretty well.
"Harris, you okay?" she said.
Xander took his hands from his head. They were covered in blood. More blood trickled down his forehead and near his eyes. "Yeah, fine," he said. "Bleeding like a stuck pig, whatever that means, but it doesn't hurt too bad." He looked up and swore. "How many of them are there?"
"Several less than a second ago," Faith said. "Probably twelve or so."
"We gotta get away from here."
Xander scanned the area around them. They were pretty deep in the cemetery, nowhere near the Silverado Xander drove them there in. Something with the ambush seemed strange -- other than still being alive despite odds originally greater than three-to-one -- and his instincts screamed at him.
He watched the fight for a moment, and it quickly hit him: the attack strategy was terrible. Even without Soldier Boy instincts, without a full year's worth of Watcher Tactics Training, he could see the only reason the vampires weren't all dust was the overwhelming numbers. They never worked together against an opponent, never attacked in concert. In fact, they merely looked like a bunch of newly-raised vampires who had never seen one another before.
The vampires near Audrey hung back from her a bit, and Xander decided that was the best direction to head in. Janet was to his left and could see when they broke that way, but Rona was directly behind him and needed to be told.
"Rona!" he yelled, and came up behind her. He touched her lower back as she swung her knife at a group of vamps in front of her and said, "Be ready to run on my signal, Audrey way."
"Gotcha, Watcher-man," Rona said.
"Head out on my signal," Xander told Faith. "Grab Audrey and Janet, I'll hold the rear for a second."
Faith suggested an anatomical impossibility. "I'm not leaving you behind!" she hissed.
Xander touched her lower back. "Trust me. Go!"
Xander pushed Faith toward Audrey. Janet and Rona broke off and ran. The three vampires in front of Audrey stopped and stared, helpless as four angry Slayers bore down on them.
Xander raised the two flare guns he pulled off Rona and Faith and fired at the two knots of advancing vampires. The flare guns weren't the most accurate of weapons, but his aim from fifteen feet was pretty good. Red flares each slammed into a vampire group, setting two on fire. One of the two ran into a third as it flailed in agony, and the third also ignited. Xander dropped the two expended guns to the ground and sprinted after his Slayers.
:#:
"Wow," Cole commented dryly. "That sure was inventive."
Donner turned and looked at him. "You haven't shut up about that stupid kid for days. Are you sure you aren't getting a crush on him?"
"No, not really." Cole grinned. "They're both just so interesting. Quite a dilemma -- who to take, who to torment." He turned and started to walk up a hill toward a crypt they set up earlier. Donner trotted off to a different vantage point. Between the two of them, they would be able to see almost the entire cemetery.
The remaining vampires they raised over the past few days chased the Slayers and the Watcher.
:#:
After Xander's trick with the flare guns, the vampires stayed back far enough to avoid any more shots. Faith looked over her shoulder every couple seconds as she ran, and the vampires fell farther and farther back. She began to think they might lose them, but then realized there was no need for the vampires to keep them in sight -- Xander's head was bleeding enough that they could smell him no matter how far he went.
They ran by a crypt with columns in the front and an overhang. Faith directed everyone into the alcove.
"Are you crazy?" Janet said. "We gotta keep moving, we've almost lost them!"
"We're not gonna lose them," Xander said. He walked between the columns and under the overhang. "They can smell me from a mile away by now." He leaned back against the door and leaned his head back as he panted. "And that's assuming they're not just leading us to another ambush at the entrance."
Faith looked at Xander, worried. She knew head wounds bled a lot, but his face was practically a mask of red, and his hair looked red, too. She didn't have anything with her to stop the bleeding, either -- all she wore was one of Robin's wife-beaters and leather pants. She looked around at the other Slayers; none of them had anything she could use, either. Rona had a hoodie tied around her waist, but that was too thick.
Audrey gently wiped blood from Xander's face, away from his eyes, with one hand while she pressed on the wound with the other. "Pressure on wound, make it stop bleeding," Faith heard her say to herself.
"So what are we gonna do?" Janet said. "Call Kennedy for reinforcements?"
Faith whipped her shirt off over her head, leaving her in just a black bra and leather pants.
"That's definitely not the reaction I expected," Janet said.
"What is this, your secret exhibitionist-fu technique?" Rona said. "Attack of the killer Wonder Bra?"
"Hey! These girls are this perky all on their own," Faith said.
Confused, Xander opened his eyes. He stared for a second. "Best head-wound ever."
Faith drew her knife and cut a long strip from her shirt. "Chill out, Harris. You've already seen 'em, and they've got their own." She cut several shorter strips from the shirt, and moved over to him.
Audrey stepped back out of the way. Softly, she said, "He's seem them?"
Faith glanced at Audrey's wide eyes and faked a grin. "Yeah, see, I'm allergic to tequila. It makes my clothes fall off."
Xander snickered. "I think that was oxygen you were on." He hissed. "Ow! Don't press so hard."
Faith smirked. "Sorry. Didn't realize I was. Slayer strength, you know. Hard to keep track of." She tied the long strip tight around his head and stepped back. "That oughta hold. Rona, you let me wear your hoodie?"
Rona tossed it over her shoulder; she and Janet faced outwards, watching for vamps. "Thank God. Put something on, girl."
"Okay, now that Faith's clothed again, what's our plan?" Janet said.
"We split up," Xander said. "The four of you get back to the house, I'll draw the vamps away from you -- they'll smell my blood and follow me."
Rona spun around, furious. "No way! That ain't gonna happen!"
"We are not leaving you!" Janet said.
"Yes, you are," Xander said. His voice was calm and even. "First off, I'm your Watcher. Second, we don't know how many of those vamps are out there, but it's probably more than we can handle, especially on an ambush site they picked. We have to get out of here. I can't run with you, they'd smell me from a mile away."
Audrey, Rona, and Janet glared at Xander. Faith just grinned. "Don't worry, ladies. I'm going with him."
Xander's eyes narrowed. "Like hell you are."
"You're my Watcher, Harris, but I'm Senior Slayer here," Faith said. She stared at his one good eye; his gaze was intense, hard to hold, but she knew she was right, and could win this challenge of wills. Would win. "According to the Council guidelines you helped write, in a state of emergency or a battle situation there is a clear demarcation of rank and chain of command -- so right now, I out-rank you."
Xander glared at her for a moment before he yanked the truck keys out of his pocket and tossed them at Janet. "Fine. Wait for us to draw them away, then make a break for the truck. Go straight back to the house, we'll hole up somewhere and call you once the sun's up."
Xander stalked out of the crypt. Faith stayed behind for a moment. She looked at Janet and Rona and said, "Him, then me." They nodded. "Her, then you," she added, and they nodded again.
She hurried outside and found Xander waiting. "Me, then you what?" he said.
It was a code the Slayers had worked out, unknown to anyone else, one of the few things Janet and Kim ever agreed on. In a completely hopeless situation, one where vampires were sure to overwhelm them, they would kill their Watcher -- or whatever non-Slayer they might be with -- and then themselves.
There was no way she would tell Xander that, though. So she ignored the question. "So how we gonna get all these vamps to follow us? You don't taste that good, do you, Harris?"
Xander grunted. "Little trick I read in a book. Confusion and chaos. Or at least as close as we can get to the latter."
:#:
Cole's cell phone vibrated. He flipped it open and answered, "Yes?"
"Harris and Faith are on the move," Donner said. "I think they're trying to draw off the fodder so the other Slayers can get away."
"Okay. So we--"
"No, wait, I'm sure of it now." Donner sounded amused.
"Really?"
"Quite." Definitely amused. "Harris just lit a tree on fire with a flare gun, and Faith mooned me. I don't think she's wearing underwear."
"Huh."
"Can we follow them? They're much more interesting than the girl."
Cole smiled. "Sure. Maybe they'll take care of the idiots we raised for this experiment. Let the other three go."
:#:
Xander and Faith sprinted ahead of three vampires by about fifteen meters. The rest of the vampires -- another seven in all -- were several hundred meters back.
Xander glanced over at Faith, whose pants were still unbuttoned. He'd never worn leather pants (he lacked the requisite evil or sex appeal), but even still, experience with his car's seats told him that sweaty legs would stick to the material. He would've thought Faith, with her leather-pants experience, would know that; he guessed she forgot. By the time she got her pants up over her rear, the vamps were charging and they ran.
The cemetery gave way to a residential neighborhood. Why people wanted to live near a graveyard, he had no idea, but the houses were fairly nice and only separated from the graveyard by a wooden six-foot privacy fence -- easily jumped by Slayer, Watcher, and vampire alike.
Xander and Faith cut through the backyard of a house and out onto a lighted residential road. Cars lined the driveways and some were parked on the street, but other than Xander and Faith the whole area seemed devoid of life. Xander could hear the vampires gaining behind them, only a few meters back now; he knew Faith could out-run them, she had the Slayer-speed, but she stayed even with him, and the vampires gained on them both.
"I'm not -- gonna last -- much longer!" Xander gasped. He could feel his legs start to burn. Faith nodded.
She glanced behind her, then dropped down to her knees and skidded to a stop on the sidewalk. The cement tore through her pants and the skin on her knees as she drew two stakes and slammed them back up over her head. The vampires couldn't stop in time, and two of them ran right into her; the stakes found their mark and they turned to dust. The third jumped to the side to avoid its mates, its eyes on Faith, and Xander caught it off balance with a vicious kick to the knee. The vamp cried out and bent over, and he drove his stake into its back.
Faith winced as she stood, but shook off his help. "I'll heal," she said. "We gotta find a place to hide."
"I've got an idea," Xander said.
:#:
Xander found a house he was looking for a few minutes later.
"Owners are out of town, on vacation or something," he said as he and Faith snuck around back. "So the invite rule still holds, but there's no one around to make the invite. Perfect safe haven from vamps, if you can avoid people."
"Yeah, but how do we get in?"
"We break in."
:#:
"We can't touch anything with our hands," Xander said. He and Faith sat on the kitchen floor in the house, her back against the cabinets and Xander across from her. "I'll wipe down the door before we leave in the morning. We can't leave fingerprints or anything."
"Yeah, especially not me," Faith said.
"You and me have the same rap sheet now, Faith," Xander said. "Remember? The new and improved Faith Covington, her record gone."
Faith grinned. "Actually, just the new." She could barely make out Xander's puzzled look in the dark. They couldn't risk being found, so the lights had to stay off. "Covington's not my real name."
"It's not?"
"Nah. Got Willow and Angel to get it changed when we hit up LA together." That was a nice and awkward couple of days. "Figured that even with a cleared record, having a different name might help out. Fresh start kinda thing."
"Huh. So what was your last name? You were always just 'Faith,' no other name needed."
"What, like Dillinger, Capone, and Faith?" she said.
He grinned. "Sure, something like that."
Her smile faded, and she shrugged. "Guess the company fits, huh?"
"Faith, no. Don't do that. It's not true."
"Nah, it's cool. It is true. I mean, I'm not that girl anymore, figuratively and legally..." She trailed off for a second. "Angel called it evil done for a good purpose, getting my charges dropped and a new identity."
"That's stupid," Xander said. "It was against the law, sure, but it wasn't evil. If you're being evil every time you break the law, well, by speeding tickets alone we're all going to Hell."
Faith shrugged, unconvinced. They sat in silence for a little bit, until Xander remembered the pen-sized flashlight he had in his pocket.
"Here, let me look at your knees," he said, and slid across the floor to sit beside her. He turned the light on and shined it on her. "That doesn't look too comfortable."
"Nah, not really," Faith said. "But I'll be fine. Besides, you gotta admit, that was a wicked cool way to stake some vamps."
Xander chuckled. "I guess so. Still, you should get that cleaned up when we get back to the house."
"Xander, I haven't had a cold in eight years. It's not gonna get infected." At his look, she rolled her eyes. "Fine. Will do, Watcher-man."
Xander nodded. He slid across the floor and leaned against the cabinets beside Faith, his right shoulder inches from her left. After a few minutes of silence, he said, "My thing with the flare guns was cooler."
Faith leaned to the left and shoved him with her shoulder. "It so was not."
Xander, laughing, shoved her back. "You wish."
Faith laughed and shoved him back, hard, and he barely caught himself before he fell over. She leaned against him and slapped at him with both hands. Xander laughed and tried to defend himself as her hands darted all over, too fast for him to follow, hitting her hair and his body and his arms about equally. Her slaps were light, barely making contact, and whenever she hit his ribs they turned into a tickle and he lurched. When she realized she was tickling him, her smile widened and a wicked gleam entered her eyes -- and she turned exclusively to tickling him.
Even as he could barely breathe, Xander thought he'd never seen her happier, more carefree. Was this how she would've been as a child, before Slaying and absent parents and the circumstances of life taught her to push people away? He couldn't think of a time when Faith was so innocently happy -- well, innocent in the sense of the moment, as they were currently guilty of breaking and entering. For a good cause, though. They're breaking the law to help fight evil.
Finally, Xander squirmed, rolled around, laughed, and hyperventilated enough to satisfy Faith. He curled up on his left side, still laughing, and she leaned over him on his right shoulder. He felt her hair on his face and neck, tickling and itching the eyelashes of both his eyes. He felt her body shake as she laughed.
He looked up -- to the side -- at her. "I'm glad you enjoyed that so much."
"Me, too." Her face was close, just inches away. She looked him in the eye, not a challenging gaze but just a calm, happy look. Xander has seen her angry, scared, he's seen her break down from grief, but he realized he's never seen this look from her.
Her weight pulled off him some. He rolled a bit, more onto his back, and felt his shoulder push past her breasts before she leaned back into him more. Her face was close now, red lips and pale skin framed by black curls. Here eyes still locked onto his. Their lips almost met, her hips and stomach pressed into his right hip as his torso twisted to meet hers. Her lips stayed apart from his, close enough that he felt the warmth of her breath against his lips, millimeters apart, and her right hand came up and her thumb traced the arc just beneath his bottom lip, his right to left, from one corner of his mouth to another. He felt the touch, but the only thing he saw was her eyes. Her thumb slid lower, from the corner of his mouth to his chin, and her fingertips came to rest along his jaw and neck--
--and something flashed in her eyes and she jumped back away from him, nearly hysterical, "OhGodOhGod I'm sorry--"
Xander hurried forward and grabbed her shoulders. "Faith, calm down, it's okay. It's okay. Calm down."
She looked at him with wide eyes that darted all over his face, but her breathing slowed. "God, I'm so sorry, my hand," she said. She held up her right hand, the one she touched him with. "I shouldn't-- I'm sorry, God, Xander--"
"Faith, it's okay. I'm fine." He smiled, to reassure her that he was fine. "You never came near my eye. It's okay."
Faith pulled back and stared at him. "Your eye?" she said softly. "What?"
:#:
It took her a moment to place Xander's reaction. His eye? Why would his eye bother him? Oh.
All she could think about was how he felt under her, beside her, how he made her so comfortable that she could giggle and laugh like a girl instead of a killer or a Slayer, just a regular girl having fun with a regular boy. And then she touched his neck. It all came back to her then, the anger and distress and distrust and how she tried to choke it all away, all out of the body of a boy she never saw as anything other than Buffy's. And here she was, touching him again, not Buffy's but his own, enjoying him when she had no right to.
And he thought it was about Caleb?
"No, obviously not the eye," Xander said. "What is... God. It's that night, isn't it? Back in '99."
Faith looked away from him and nodded. She remembered looking him in the eyes then, the night they were together, and the feelings that rose up in her. She stared him in the eyes when her hands were around his neck, daring those feelings to come back so she could choke them down, too. How could she look him in the eyes now?
"It didn't bother me," Xander said after a minute.
"You sure seemed bothered then," she said. "You--"
"I meant now. Tonight."
"That's..." She trailed off.
"I can't say I've really thought much about it in years."
She looked up sharply, disbelieving, but quickly looked away again. His eyes were too much. "I tried to kill you," she whispered.
"Do you want me to forgive you?" He shrugged. "You tried to kill me, Faith. But so has Willow, so has Angel, so has Spike. So have more demons and what-all-else than I care to count." He paused, took a deep breath. "Did you know I left Anya at the altar? I didn't break off the wedding. I just left, gone, no note or goodbye or nothing. I let her pair off with Andrew in the battle with the First, and she died. I lied to Buffy to make sure she'd kill Angel. I summoned a demon which danced people to death. Are any of those things forgivable? Hell, should they be? And who the hell am I to be granting someone forgiveness with all I've done, anyway?"
Xander reached out and took her hands. "I trust you, Faith. Now." He lifted her hands and put them on his neck, wrapped her fingers around it. "That's all I have to give."
Slowly, Faith raised her eyes to his. He looked at her calmly, not scared or worried. They stared at each other that way for a while, not smiling or crying, just looking at one another, trusting one another.
And then she lifted her hands from his neck to his jawline, pulled him close, and kissed him.
-:-
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This one is fairly big -- nine pages or so, give or take for formatting -- and starts the process of leading up to the climax. Faith seems to have some difficulty staying fully clothed in this chapter. We start to see some hints of Cole and Donner's plan. And maybe see some hints about Xander's true mental state?
Chapter Twelve
All I Have To Give
The vampires were on them before Audrey took two steps toward Xander.
Instincts took over. She drew stakes from her belt, one for each hand. A vampire came up behind her, to her left; she elbowed him in the face. As he staggered back, she fully extended her arm in one continuous motion from the elbow, and the stake found it's mark in the vampire's heart. She spun to her right, where another vampire was, and flicked the stake in her right hand at his heart. He caught the stake just in front of his heart, like she knew he would, and grinned at her, gloating, as she knew he would. A quick shuffle-step, left foot over right, and she delivered a side kick which completely buried the stake in the vampire's chest -- and left her without a stake.
She turned back to the first vampire, who was about to turn to dust, and dove for her stake. She pulled it from his chest just as he started to dissolve, and burst through the cloud of dust, stake in hand.
:#:
Cole and Donner stood back in the shadows and watched the other vampires attack.
"Nice toss with the rock," Cole commented as Xander fell to his knees. "Clipped the top of his head, just like you said you would."
Donner flexed his throwing arm and shrugged modestly. "Well, I used to play baseball," he said. "Had a pretty mean curveball, but I threw my arm out. Of course, that's not really much of a concern any more."
"Of course."
They watched the fight in silence for a few moments.
"That trick with the diving through the dust, that was pretty neat," Cole commented.
"Girl has great moves," Donner agreed. "Will we see more of her soon?"
"It's a possibility."
:#:
Faith stayed by Xander as chaos broke out around them.
He was on his knees on the ground, his hands up on his head and his eyes down. Faith drew her knife in her right hand and held a stake in her left. Janet, Rona, and Audrey spread out in a triangle around her and Xander as the vampires attacked. They looked to be holding their own pretty well.
"Harris, you okay?" she said.
Xander took his hands from his head. They were covered in blood. More blood trickled down his forehead and near his eyes. "Yeah, fine," he said. "Bleeding like a stuck pig, whatever that means, but it doesn't hurt too bad." He looked up and swore. "How many of them are there?"
"Several less than a second ago," Faith said. "Probably twelve or so."
"We gotta get away from here."
Xander scanned the area around them. They were pretty deep in the cemetery, nowhere near the Silverado Xander drove them there in. Something with the ambush seemed strange -- other than still being alive despite odds originally greater than three-to-one -- and his instincts screamed at him.
He watched the fight for a moment, and it quickly hit him: the attack strategy was terrible. Even without Soldier Boy instincts, without a full year's worth of Watcher Tactics Training, he could see the only reason the vampires weren't all dust was the overwhelming numbers. They never worked together against an opponent, never attacked in concert. In fact, they merely looked like a bunch of newly-raised vampires who had never seen one another before.
The vampires near Audrey hung back from her a bit, and Xander decided that was the best direction to head in. Janet was to his left and could see when they broke that way, but Rona was directly behind him and needed to be told.
"Rona!" he yelled, and came up behind her. He touched her lower back as she swung her knife at a group of vamps in front of her and said, "Be ready to run on my signal, Audrey way."
"Gotcha, Watcher-man," Rona said.
"Head out on my signal," Xander told Faith. "Grab Audrey and Janet, I'll hold the rear for a second."
Faith suggested an anatomical impossibility. "I'm not leaving you behind!" she hissed.
Xander touched her lower back. "Trust me. Go!"
Xander pushed Faith toward Audrey. Janet and Rona broke off and ran. The three vampires in front of Audrey stopped and stared, helpless as four angry Slayers bore down on them.
Xander raised the two flare guns he pulled off Rona and Faith and fired at the two knots of advancing vampires. The flare guns weren't the most accurate of weapons, but his aim from fifteen feet was pretty good. Red flares each slammed into a vampire group, setting two on fire. One of the two ran into a third as it flailed in agony, and the third also ignited. Xander dropped the two expended guns to the ground and sprinted after his Slayers.
:#:
"Wow," Cole commented dryly. "That sure was inventive."
Donner turned and looked at him. "You haven't shut up about that stupid kid for days. Are you sure you aren't getting a crush on him?"
"No, not really." Cole grinned. "They're both just so interesting. Quite a dilemma -- who to take, who to torment." He turned and started to walk up a hill toward a crypt they set up earlier. Donner trotted off to a different vantage point. Between the two of them, they would be able to see almost the entire cemetery.
The remaining vampires they raised over the past few days chased the Slayers and the Watcher.
:#:
After Xander's trick with the flare guns, the vampires stayed back far enough to avoid any more shots. Faith looked over her shoulder every couple seconds as she ran, and the vampires fell farther and farther back. She began to think they might lose them, but then realized there was no need for the vampires to keep them in sight -- Xander's head was bleeding enough that they could smell him no matter how far he went.
They ran by a crypt with columns in the front and an overhang. Faith directed everyone into the alcove.
"Are you crazy?" Janet said. "We gotta keep moving, we've almost lost them!"
"We're not gonna lose them," Xander said. He walked between the columns and under the overhang. "They can smell me from a mile away by now." He leaned back against the door and leaned his head back as he panted. "And that's assuming they're not just leading us to another ambush at the entrance."
Faith looked at Xander, worried. She knew head wounds bled a lot, but his face was practically a mask of red, and his hair looked red, too. She didn't have anything with her to stop the bleeding, either -- all she wore was one of Robin's wife-beaters and leather pants. She looked around at the other Slayers; none of them had anything she could use, either. Rona had a hoodie tied around her waist, but that was too thick.
Audrey gently wiped blood from Xander's face, away from his eyes, with one hand while she pressed on the wound with the other. "Pressure on wound, make it stop bleeding," Faith heard her say to herself.
"So what are we gonna do?" Janet said. "Call Kennedy for reinforcements?"
Faith whipped her shirt off over her head, leaving her in just a black bra and leather pants.
"That's definitely not the reaction I expected," Janet said.
"What is this, your secret exhibitionist-fu technique?" Rona said. "Attack of the killer Wonder Bra?"
"Hey! These girls are this perky all on their own," Faith said.
Confused, Xander opened his eyes. He stared for a second. "Best head-wound ever."
Faith drew her knife and cut a long strip from her shirt. "Chill out, Harris. You've already seen 'em, and they've got their own." She cut several shorter strips from the shirt, and moved over to him.
Audrey stepped back out of the way. Softly, she said, "He's seem them?"
Faith glanced at Audrey's wide eyes and faked a grin. "Yeah, see, I'm allergic to tequila. It makes my clothes fall off."
Xander snickered. "I think that was oxygen you were on." He hissed. "Ow! Don't press so hard."
Faith smirked. "Sorry. Didn't realize I was. Slayer strength, you know. Hard to keep track of." She tied the long strip tight around his head and stepped back. "That oughta hold. Rona, you let me wear your hoodie?"
Rona tossed it over her shoulder; she and Janet faced outwards, watching for vamps. "Thank God. Put something on, girl."
"Okay, now that Faith's clothed again, what's our plan?" Janet said.
"We split up," Xander said. "The four of you get back to the house, I'll draw the vamps away from you -- they'll smell my blood and follow me."
Rona spun around, furious. "No way! That ain't gonna happen!"
"We are not leaving you!" Janet said.
"Yes, you are," Xander said. His voice was calm and even. "First off, I'm your Watcher. Second, we don't know how many of those vamps are out there, but it's probably more than we can handle, especially on an ambush site they picked. We have to get out of here. I can't run with you, they'd smell me from a mile away."
Audrey, Rona, and Janet glared at Xander. Faith just grinned. "Don't worry, ladies. I'm going with him."
Xander's eyes narrowed. "Like hell you are."
"You're my Watcher, Harris, but I'm Senior Slayer here," Faith said. She stared at his one good eye; his gaze was intense, hard to hold, but she knew she was right, and could win this challenge of wills. Would win. "According to the Council guidelines you helped write, in a state of emergency or a battle situation there is a clear demarcation of rank and chain of command -- so right now, I out-rank you."
Xander glared at her for a moment before he yanked the truck keys out of his pocket and tossed them at Janet. "Fine. Wait for us to draw them away, then make a break for the truck. Go straight back to the house, we'll hole up somewhere and call you once the sun's up."
Xander stalked out of the crypt. Faith stayed behind for a moment. She looked at Janet and Rona and said, "Him, then me." They nodded. "Her, then you," she added, and they nodded again.
She hurried outside and found Xander waiting. "Me, then you what?" he said.
It was a code the Slayers had worked out, unknown to anyone else, one of the few things Janet and Kim ever agreed on. In a completely hopeless situation, one where vampires were sure to overwhelm them, they would kill their Watcher -- or whatever non-Slayer they might be with -- and then themselves.
There was no way she would tell Xander that, though. So she ignored the question. "So how we gonna get all these vamps to follow us? You don't taste that good, do you, Harris?"
Xander grunted. "Little trick I read in a book. Confusion and chaos. Or at least as close as we can get to the latter."
:#:
Cole's cell phone vibrated. He flipped it open and answered, "Yes?"
"Harris and Faith are on the move," Donner said. "I think they're trying to draw off the fodder so the other Slayers can get away."
"Okay. So we--"
"No, wait, I'm sure of it now." Donner sounded amused.
"Really?"
"Quite." Definitely amused. "Harris just lit a tree on fire with a flare gun, and Faith mooned me. I don't think she's wearing underwear."
"Huh."
"Can we follow them? They're much more interesting than the girl."
Cole smiled. "Sure. Maybe they'll take care of the idiots we raised for this experiment. Let the other three go."
:#:
Xander and Faith sprinted ahead of three vampires by about fifteen meters. The rest of the vampires -- another seven in all -- were several hundred meters back.
Xander glanced over at Faith, whose pants were still unbuttoned. He'd never worn leather pants (he lacked the requisite evil or sex appeal), but even still, experience with his car's seats told him that sweaty legs would stick to the material. He would've thought Faith, with her leather-pants experience, would know that; he guessed she forgot. By the time she got her pants up over her rear, the vamps were charging and they ran.
The cemetery gave way to a residential neighborhood. Why people wanted to live near a graveyard, he had no idea, but the houses were fairly nice and only separated from the graveyard by a wooden six-foot privacy fence -- easily jumped by Slayer, Watcher, and vampire alike.
Xander and Faith cut through the backyard of a house and out onto a lighted residential road. Cars lined the driveways and some were parked on the street, but other than Xander and Faith the whole area seemed devoid of life. Xander could hear the vampires gaining behind them, only a few meters back now; he knew Faith could out-run them, she had the Slayer-speed, but she stayed even with him, and the vampires gained on them both.
"I'm not -- gonna last -- much longer!" Xander gasped. He could feel his legs start to burn. Faith nodded.
She glanced behind her, then dropped down to her knees and skidded to a stop on the sidewalk. The cement tore through her pants and the skin on her knees as she drew two stakes and slammed them back up over her head. The vampires couldn't stop in time, and two of them ran right into her; the stakes found their mark and they turned to dust. The third jumped to the side to avoid its mates, its eyes on Faith, and Xander caught it off balance with a vicious kick to the knee. The vamp cried out and bent over, and he drove his stake into its back.
Faith winced as she stood, but shook off his help. "I'll heal," she said. "We gotta find a place to hide."
"I've got an idea," Xander said.
:#:
Xander found a house he was looking for a few minutes later.
"Owners are out of town, on vacation or something," he said as he and Faith snuck around back. "So the invite rule still holds, but there's no one around to make the invite. Perfect safe haven from vamps, if you can avoid people."
"Yeah, but how do we get in?"
"We break in."
:#:
"We can't touch anything with our hands," Xander said. He and Faith sat on the kitchen floor in the house, her back against the cabinets and Xander across from her. "I'll wipe down the door before we leave in the morning. We can't leave fingerprints or anything."
"Yeah, especially not me," Faith said.
"You and me have the same rap sheet now, Faith," Xander said. "Remember? The new and improved Faith Covington, her record gone."
Faith grinned. "Actually, just the new." She could barely make out Xander's puzzled look in the dark. They couldn't risk being found, so the lights had to stay off. "Covington's not my real name."
"It's not?"
"Nah. Got Willow and Angel to get it changed when we hit up LA together." That was a nice and awkward couple of days. "Figured that even with a cleared record, having a different name might help out. Fresh start kinda thing."
"Huh. So what was your last name? You were always just 'Faith,' no other name needed."
"What, like Dillinger, Capone, and Faith?" she said.
He grinned. "Sure, something like that."
Her smile faded, and she shrugged. "Guess the company fits, huh?"
"Faith, no. Don't do that. It's not true."
"Nah, it's cool. It is true. I mean, I'm not that girl anymore, figuratively and legally..." She trailed off for a second. "Angel called it evil done for a good purpose, getting my charges dropped and a new identity."
"That's stupid," Xander said. "It was against the law, sure, but it wasn't evil. If you're being evil every time you break the law, well, by speeding tickets alone we're all going to Hell."
Faith shrugged, unconvinced. They sat in silence for a little bit, until Xander remembered the pen-sized flashlight he had in his pocket.
"Here, let me look at your knees," he said, and slid across the floor to sit beside her. He turned the light on and shined it on her. "That doesn't look too comfortable."
"Nah, not really," Faith said. "But I'll be fine. Besides, you gotta admit, that was a wicked cool way to stake some vamps."
Xander chuckled. "I guess so. Still, you should get that cleaned up when we get back to the house."
"Xander, I haven't had a cold in eight years. It's not gonna get infected." At his look, she rolled her eyes. "Fine. Will do, Watcher-man."
Xander nodded. He slid across the floor and leaned against the cabinets beside Faith, his right shoulder inches from her left. After a few minutes of silence, he said, "My thing with the flare guns was cooler."
Faith leaned to the left and shoved him with her shoulder. "It so was not."
Xander, laughing, shoved her back. "You wish."
Faith laughed and shoved him back, hard, and he barely caught himself before he fell over. She leaned against him and slapped at him with both hands. Xander laughed and tried to defend himself as her hands darted all over, too fast for him to follow, hitting her hair and his body and his arms about equally. Her slaps were light, barely making contact, and whenever she hit his ribs they turned into a tickle and he lurched. When she realized she was tickling him, her smile widened and a wicked gleam entered her eyes -- and she turned exclusively to tickling him.
Even as he could barely breathe, Xander thought he'd never seen her happier, more carefree. Was this how she would've been as a child, before Slaying and absent parents and the circumstances of life taught her to push people away? He couldn't think of a time when Faith was so innocently happy -- well, innocent in the sense of the moment, as they were currently guilty of breaking and entering. For a good cause, though. They're breaking the law to help fight evil.
Finally, Xander squirmed, rolled around, laughed, and hyperventilated enough to satisfy Faith. He curled up on his left side, still laughing, and she leaned over him on his right shoulder. He felt her hair on his face and neck, tickling and itching the eyelashes of both his eyes. He felt her body shake as she laughed.
He looked up -- to the side -- at her. "I'm glad you enjoyed that so much."
"Me, too." Her face was close, just inches away. She looked him in the eye, not a challenging gaze but just a calm, happy look. Xander has seen her angry, scared, he's seen her break down from grief, but he realized he's never seen this look from her.
Her weight pulled off him some. He rolled a bit, more onto his back, and felt his shoulder push past her breasts before she leaned back into him more. Her face was close now, red lips and pale skin framed by black curls. Here eyes still locked onto his. Their lips almost met, her hips and stomach pressed into his right hip as his torso twisted to meet hers. Her lips stayed apart from his, close enough that he felt the warmth of her breath against his lips, millimeters apart, and her right hand came up and her thumb traced the arc just beneath his bottom lip, his right to left, from one corner of his mouth to another. He felt the touch, but the only thing he saw was her eyes. Her thumb slid lower, from the corner of his mouth to his chin, and her fingertips came to rest along his jaw and neck--
--and something flashed in her eyes and she jumped back away from him, nearly hysterical, "OhGodOhGod I'm sorry--"
Xander hurried forward and grabbed her shoulders. "Faith, calm down, it's okay. It's okay. Calm down."
She looked at him with wide eyes that darted all over his face, but her breathing slowed. "God, I'm so sorry, my hand," she said. She held up her right hand, the one she touched him with. "I shouldn't-- I'm sorry, God, Xander--"
"Faith, it's okay. I'm fine." He smiled, to reassure her that he was fine. "You never came near my eye. It's okay."
Faith pulled back and stared at him. "Your eye?" she said softly. "What?"
:#:
It took her a moment to place Xander's reaction. His eye? Why would his eye bother him? Oh.
All she could think about was how he felt under her, beside her, how he made her so comfortable that she could giggle and laugh like a girl instead of a killer or a Slayer, just a regular girl having fun with a regular boy. And then she touched his neck. It all came back to her then, the anger and distress and distrust and how she tried to choke it all away, all out of the body of a boy she never saw as anything other than Buffy's. And here she was, touching him again, not Buffy's but his own, enjoying him when she had no right to.
And he thought it was about Caleb?
"No, obviously not the eye," Xander said. "What is... God. It's that night, isn't it? Back in '99."
Faith looked away from him and nodded. She remembered looking him in the eyes then, the night they were together, and the feelings that rose up in her. She stared him in the eyes when her hands were around his neck, daring those feelings to come back so she could choke them down, too. How could she look him in the eyes now?
"It didn't bother me," Xander said after a minute.
"You sure seemed bothered then," she said. "You--"
"I meant now. Tonight."
"That's..." She trailed off.
"I can't say I've really thought much about it in years."
She looked up sharply, disbelieving, but quickly looked away again. His eyes were too much. "I tried to kill you," she whispered.
"Do you want me to forgive you?" He shrugged. "You tried to kill me, Faith. But so has Willow, so has Angel, so has Spike. So have more demons and what-all-else than I care to count." He paused, took a deep breath. "Did you know I left Anya at the altar? I didn't break off the wedding. I just left, gone, no note or goodbye or nothing. I let her pair off with Andrew in the battle with the First, and she died. I lied to Buffy to make sure she'd kill Angel. I summoned a demon which danced people to death. Are any of those things forgivable? Hell, should they be? And who the hell am I to be granting someone forgiveness with all I've done, anyway?"
Xander reached out and took her hands. "I trust you, Faith. Now." He lifted her hands and put them on his neck, wrapped her fingers around it. "That's all I have to give."
Slowly, Faith raised her eyes to his. He looked at her calmly, not scared or worried. They stared at each other that way for a while, not smiling or crying, just looking at one another, trusting one another.
And then she lifted her hands from his neck to his jawline, pulled him close, and kissed him.
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