Act3

“Wicked!” Hope repeated for what appeared the thousandth time to Faith. “So, you are THE Faith?”

“I think I already told you that about a hundred times,” the dark-haired Slayer said, rolling her eyes, but a slight smile tugging at her lips.

“Not that many,” Hope protested. “Hardly three or four times. Five at most.” She added when Faith gave her a skeptical glance. “I didn’t get it at first” the young girl resumed.

“Got that much,” Faith commented.

“That’s natural,” Hope resumed as if Faith had not spoken. “How did you want me to have time to think about something like that in the middle of a swamp haunted by an ugly monster with three pairs of eyes?”

“Only three?” Faith asked without thinking. “And I remind you that this thing wasn’t even there when I introduced myself”

“I felt it was about to come,” Hope replied seriously.

“Yeah, right,” Faith smirked.

“Could you shut the window? It’s freezing in here.”

“We’re stinking too,” Faith remarked. “That swamp’s mud is foul”

She nevertheless closed the window on her side when she saw the girl trembling with cold. A silence followed and Hope sank into her seat as she wrapped her arms around herself to get some warmth. After a moment, she mumbled under her breath:

“Vi is going to kill me again…”

Faith remained silent at first, but seeing the girl casting a glance at her, she finally asked:

“What does Vi have against you? Despite the obvious fact that you disappear in the middle of the night I mean.”

Hope sat up slightly and answered, though not turning fully to Faith:

“I think she finds me a little too enthusiastic about the Slayer gig…” she said in a somewhat evasive tone.

The dark-haired Slayer glanced at her and sighed slightly.

“I see…” she breathed.

“Vi keeps telling me it’s a dangerous mission; that it’s not fun, that you can die and yada yada…” Hope went on, rolling her eyes as she obviously did not hear Faith.

Faith tried to suppress a smirk without completely succeeding, but Hope was not even looking at her.

“As if I didn’t already know that,” Hope resumed without waiting for a reaction from Faith. “But that’s what makes the thing great, isn’t it? If there wasn’t any risk, it wouldn’t have been a sacred mission for generations.”

She stopped for a brief moment to catch her breath before going on:

“And how do you want us to be ready for when you’re sent to Cleveland if we never go and fight real monsters? The Slayer’s handbook’s illustrations may be very accurate but they won’t hurt us.”

Again, Faith suppressed a small smile, and for a brief moment, Sarah Marple desperately trying to get her to read said handbook, flashed before her eyes. The brunette banished the memory from her mind as soon as it had come and focused back on Hope who concluded:

“I want to fight monsters, real monsters.”

“I kinda got the idea.” Faith said, amused.

Then, she replied more seriously:

“But you know, I’m sure Vi is acting for your own benefit.”

Hope rolled her eyes, and Faith bit her tongue for saying such a commonplace. After all, she used to be fifteen too, even if she tried to forget about it.

“What I mean,” she resumed carefully, searching for the right words. “Is Vi must keep you all alive; you’ll be more useful alive in Cleveland in two or three years than dead by…”

“Two or three years!” Hope exclaimed, interrupting the brunette. “You want me to stay there for two or three more years?”

“I dunno,” Faith replied. “I don’t really know what’s planned, but believe me, the better you’re trained here, the better it will be for you and the others when you turn up on the field.”

“Don’t you like being on the field?” the girl asked. “You have such a wonderful life!” she added without waiting for an answer. “You’re alone, you do whatever you want whenever you want with nobody to tell you what to do and when to do it! You fight monsters the way that fits you!”

Faith’s face hardened despite Hope’s enthusiastic description of her life. She wavered a second before she replied:

“You know, it’s not as wonderful as it sounds… I mean, fighting monster might help to get some steam off or help you to feel useful and all that, but believe me, you can soon go off the rails by dint of taking yourself for a superhero.”

She had said the last part in an elusive tone, trying to conceal her embarrassment. To her surprise, Hope apparently perfectly followed her train of thought.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” she said in an obvious tone. “I know what you’re talking about y’know, I know your story, I read the passage about you”

Faith frowned and turned to the girl, surprised.

“You what? Read about me ? What do you mean you read about me?”

“Of course,” Hope answered good-naturally. “The two-page spread about you in the Slayer handbook”

“What?” Faith exclaimed in a rather cutting tone, as she felt shared between disbelief, anger and a hint of pride.

“The double page spread about you in the …” Hope started again.

“I heard that part,” Faith interrupted. “What’s the hell? A page spread about me in the Slayer handbook!”

“A double page spread,” Hope clarified, as if it was of great importance. “I think you’re the only one to get so much place only for yourself in the book, except for Buffy Summers of course, there’s a whole chapter about her and…”

“Can’t say it’s a surprise…” Faith grumbled, too low for Hope to hear and without listening to Hope’s short summary of the blonde Slayer’s adventures. Faith nevertheless noticed that stabbing her in the gut on the roof of her apartment was apparently not on the list.

“I’ll show you the book when we arrive,” Hope suggested enthusiastically, as if it was perfectly obvious that Faith was dying to read said-chapter or the pages about her.

She did not dissuade her anyway, leaving her to talk alone and ramble about how Faith’s solitary life had become her vision of the perfect life she wanted to live later. As she caught Kennedy’s name in her young counterpart’s flood of words, she wondered what other subjects this new handbook could be about. It probably referred to Willow and the Slayer spell, and Faith wondered briefly if Tara was mentioned. It was clearly nonsense, since there was strictly no good reason Faith could think of that would justify it. But the thought occurred to her nonetheless and before she could stop herself, she wondered where the blonde might be and what she might be doing. A mixed feeling of anger and guilt shook her then, but it disappeared as soon as it had appeared as Faith pushed the thought away. She tried to focus again on Hope who was now rambling about the fact that using real weapon during training was forbidden and was complaining about the lack of practice with crossbows. How Hope had gone from the story of Buffy, Kennedy and the others to Vi’s imposed restrictions of using weapon in the gym and the shooting practice timetable, the brunette had no idea.

“Don’t you agree?” Hope asked suddenly and turned to her.

Faith jumped slightly and tried to remember her question. She did not need to, though, as Hope resumed for her:

“Of course I’m right, that’s quite obvious. I really don’t see what sense Vi makes of this. Yet, she’s clever and all and…”

Faith tuned out again and for a second, she wondered if the reason why Vi wanted to send the girl back home was not simply because she was such a chatterbox. Hope looked undoubtedly nice but probably proved to be quite exhausting after some time. The brunette was probably too much used to her silent relationship with Tara to understand how anyone could talk so much and even less manage to follow the girl’s unconnected train of thoughts. Again, she cleared any thought of the blonde from her mind as quickly as possible, and sighed with relief when she caught sight of a road sign.

“Almost there,” she said flatly. “We’ll be there in less than half an hour.”

As she expected, the news did not please Hope too much and she sank in her seat with a defeated look on her face, and fell silent – at last- for the rest of the trip.

***

“You sure you don’t want me to spar a little with them?” Faith asked as she sank deeply in the armchair Vi had offered her a moment before and spreading her legs on the bench in front of her.

Both young women were in the wide gym of the center, slightly apart from the younger Slayers who were training for the last time of the day. Faith had flopped into a wide rattan armchair covered with an old worn cushion whose sides had been probably frayed by the many cats living in the mansion, and had her legs extended on a wooden bench where Vi may have sat, had it been free. But the redhead remained standing, slightly ahead of her counterpart’s armchair, her eyes fixed on the young girls at training. She nevertheless gave an annoyed look at the brunette for being so rude but did not comment.

“No,” the redhead answered. “It would only distract them, and they had enough distraction for today.”

“You’re taking yourself very seriously,” Faith remarked casually.

“Too seriously for your taste?” Vi asked, the tone of her voice betraying the annoyance she was trying to conceal.

Faith shrugged and hesitated to go on with this, feeling it was potentially dangerous ground.

“They’re just kids,” she finally said. “They can’t have too many distractions.”

“You’ll tell that to their parents when they’re killed because they were too distracted to pay attention during training.” Vi replied sharply.

Faith rolled her eyes as Vi had her back to her.

“They’re safe here,” she remarked. “There’re not even enough cars to be ran over while crossing the street.”

“Yeah,” Vi grumbled without turning to her. “I remind you that you just came back from a haunted swamp with one of them.”

“I thought she was quite the character here?” Faith asked. “The others are calmer, aren’t they?”

“I don’t want to lose not even one of them”

“She’s restless, send her to captain Kennedy, she’s going to calm her down.”

Vi gave a bitter laugh.

“Of course not,” she snorted. “She would get killed on her first step outside.”

“Aren’t you overreacting? Young or not, she’s still a Slayer after all.”

Vi shrugged wearily.

“Not every Slayer is as good as the next,” she said in a regretful tone.

“I know…” Faith mumbled in a low voice as she looked down. Then, she asked a little louder: “She often happens to flee like that?”

“It was the first time.”

“A particular reason?”

Vi did not answer and took a few steps to call out two girls in the back of the gym.

“Marianna, Lucy, more energy please!”

Then, she came back toward Faith and talked to her as if they had not been interrupted:

“I told her it would be better for her to give up and go home like two newcomers who left last week”

Faith arched an eyebrow at this:

“Why? Unmanageable?”

“You can say that,” Vi answered and turned again to glance at the girls. “She’s not good at being a Slayer, that’s the problem with her.” She explained, coming back toward Faith. “If she had been called when there was only one Slayer, she’d had ended up dead before the end of her first day. That’s why I advised her to give up and come back to her family. Since then, she decided she would become a Slayer alone.”

Faith was now gaping at her.

“Wait a sec,” she said, straightening up slightly. “You’re telling me that Giles asked me to come here to run after an awkward Slayer? When you said she was peculiar, that’s what you meant?”

Vi grimaced at the word ‘awkward’ but nodded slightly.

“You can say that,” she admitted in a sigh.

“And there I thought she was a young hooligan whom I was supposed to lecture as the reformed bad Slayer I am…” the brunette grumbled with a look both upset and offended. “So, you want to fire the girl because you think she’s not good enough?” she resumed after a brief pause, in a clearly disapproving tone.

Vi perceived the underlying reproach and glared at Faith before explaining in a dry tone:

“That would be far better for her and the others. She’s a danger to herself and the group.”

“What do you have against her? You find her to be too motivated and impatient?”

“You’ve seen her, haven’t you?” Vi replied. “She’s reckless and clumsy.”

“Okay, I admit that the girl won’t be the next B, but she’s willing to do that shitty job, isn’t it what’s important?”

“Have you forgotten rule number one? Don’t die. We’re a team now, and I need girls who can play in a team.”

“Yeah, you’re just trying to get rid of her because she’s more difficult to manage than some others.”

This time, Vi turned frankly to Faith and she crossed her arms over her chest, towering above the brunette still flopped into her armchair, her eyes narrowed and her face set in a rather angry expression.

“How easy for you to say so and to go all moralizing,” the redhead growled dryly. “You decided to do whatever you want without bothering about anyone but you. Someone has to take care of these kids instead of leaving them on their own. My job consists in keeping them alive despite the responsibilities and powers that weight on their shoulders now and believe me, that’s a very time-consuming task. So please miss I’ve-seen-it-all, just keep your hasty comments for yourself, some of us are trying to act for other people’s benefit here”

Faith remained dumbfounded for a moment. Not that anyone had ever lectured the brunette. She was quite used to it in fact. But she had never heard Vi talking so dryly to anyone before, let alone herself. After witnessing her prowess on a battlefield, Faith should have known that Vi was more than the shy awkward girl she had once been, but she could not help being stunned by the younger Slayer’s unusual dry and authoritative tone.

“Easy, Red,” she finally said. “All I’m saying is if that girl wants to be a Slayer at all costs, she should be given a chance.” Then she added with a stubborn look on her face: “And I still say that you could have gone after her yourself.”

“I already told you why I didn’t,” Vi replied, annoyed. “I can’t leave the center for hours! Most of the older girls have been called to Cleveland and I’m overworked. I can’t leave thirty kids alone to run after another one.”

She fell silent for a second, appeared to hesitate and finally added in a calmer tone:

“But you’re right about one thing. Asking you to go after her, when you make clear you want to remain alone at all costs, wasn’t exactly the best idea, since I keep telling them that we’re a team and we have to work together.”

Faith flinched slightly at the comment, but she did not reply. Seeing that she remained silent, Vi turned back to her girls after a moment and they stayed several minutes just watching Hope sparring with Camille without exchanging a word. Finally, Vi took a few steps forward and pulled the cord of a bell hanging near the entrance of the room that Faith had not noticed until then. At the sound of the bell, all girls stopped and turned to her.

“It’s over for tonight,” Vi said sharply. “Everyone to the dorms, take a shower and go to bed. Natalie, Camille, you’re leading the way. And I don’t want any mess. I’m coming for inspection in half an hour.”

A light hubbub welcomed that declaration as the group of girls headed for the door, guided by the two older girls. Vi watched them until the last girl had exited the room and the sound of their voices had vanished into the distance. Finally, she came back toward Faith and flopped onto the bench where Faith had her feet, forcing the brunette to remove them hastily to avoid Vi to sit on them. The brunette expected Vi to carry on with where they had left their previous conversation or to make a comment about the training or the mess she supposed thirty teenage girls living in the same place could make. But the redhead remained silent, apparently keeping these thoughts to herself, and Faith finally felt she had to break the silence.

“I thought you were in Brazil with Rona, Kennedy and Willow,” she said.

Vi looked up and nonchalantly shrugged.

“I came back when things slowed down there.” She explained. “And when Rona gave up, since Kennedy had to stay for a little longer in Rio, I chose to take a center to lead rather than end up alone in Cleveland…”

“What?” Faith interrupted, surprise obvious in her voice. “Rona gave up?”

Vi gave her a sidelong glance, her eyes gleaming with a mix of weariness, sadness and some contempt.

“You haven’t heard?” she asked sharply, in a tone which clearly told she found that fact perfectly intolerable.

Faith shrugged.

“As you already know, I don’t work for the Council anymore; I may have missed the last news…” Seeing Vi arching an eyebrow and on the verge of reacting, the dark-haired Slayer resumed quickly:

“What happened? Last time I saw her, she looked fine.”

This time, Vi was the one to shrug as she answered in a low voice:

“We lost Shannon in Brazil,” she explained, and Faith tried to hold a look of surprise back without really succeeding, but Vi did not really look at her anymore. “It was a real blow.”

“I guess…” Faith whispered thoughtfully.

The brunette hardly knew Shannon. She vaguely remembered the teenage girl whom she and Willow had found on the roadside after Caleb had stabbed her and thrown her off his van. The only thing she knew was that the girl had been part of Kennedy’s squad in Brazil and that the younger Slayer had always spoken very highly of her. From what she had gathered, the two were friends. Kennedy, of course, probably had a hard time over that too. She wanted to ask, but refrained herself. She perfectly knew what Vi would answer. Seeing the melancholy look on the redhead’s face, she preferred changing the subject.

“So, you came back from Brazil,” she resumed casually. “How was the mission? Have Willow and Kenn finally controlled the situation?”

“They have,” Vi answered, apparently grateful for talking about something else. “It’s already been quite some time.”

Seeing Faith’s surprised expression, she clarified:

“Kenn is going to come back from Brazil soon too, Giles called her back to Cleveland.”

“I thought she was supposed to take the lead of the European branch once the Brazil mission was finished?”

Vi shook her head.

“There was a change in plans. Buffy and Will took charge in Europe.”

This time, Faith sat up straight.

“B is back to work?”

The redhead stared at her, dumbfounded.

“Don’t tell me you weren’t aware of that too?”

Faith did not answer but her expression changed to an obviously ‘do I look like as I know?’. Vi sighed and carried on:

“It’s rather new. Two or three months ago at best.”

“And Willow chose to go to Europe with B rather than going to Cleveland with Kennedy?”

It was more an affirmation, spoken in an accusing and disdainful tone, than a real question.

“Another thing you don’t know it seems,” said Vi, her tone accusing too. “They broke up”

“What?”

“I thought you two were friends?” the redhead replied. “You should call her from time to time.”

Faith did not answer and apparently pondered what she had just learned.

“If I understand correctly, they broke up and Will took off to Europe and left the Cleveland’s mess to Kenn?”

Vi grimaced at Faith’s obvious ignorance of her remark, but she did not insist.

“That’s what Kenn wanted.” She countered, rolling her eyes.

“What happened with Red?” Faith asked after a silence. “It’s new?”

“Not really,” Vi explained. “A few months back. To be fair, it did not last long after they came back from the last annual meeting of the Council in Cleveland.”

Faith hesitated to ask more, having a good idea of what might have soiled the young women’s relationship. She did not need to anyway, since Vi resumed almost immediately:

“They had a little problem of former dead girlfriend resurrected.” She said, staring intently at Faith. “Which gets me thinking…” she added, her eyes set even more firmly on the brunette. “That said former resurrected girlfriend was supposed to be with you, wasn’t she? What have you done to her?”

“The plan was me playing baby-sitter until she was able to watch after herself.” Faith grumbled with an annoyed grimace. “She’s ended up leaving the nest.”

Vi stared at her for a moment in silence, probably wondering if Faith was about to talk further about the matter, but the dark-haired Slayer looked away and obviously decided that she would not give any more detail.

“So, Kenn will take care of Cleveland?” she finally asked, in order to divert Vi’s attention.

“Someone has to, don’t you think?” the redhead replied. “Cleveland doesn’t miss action. If Kenn and her squad are not enough to get things back to normal, Giles may call the European squad for help. And if they’re also not enough, we’ll close the school here and I’ll go too.”

Faith’s eyes widened in surprise.

“It’s that bad?”

“Three seriously injured last month,” Vi said between clenched teeth. “It never happened before. The Council is worried.”

“Not surprising…” Faith whispered thoughtfully. “Last time I was there, the squads seemed to control the situation…”

She paused, and then added in a small voice:

“Why hasn’t Giles called me?”

Vi glanced at her and scoffed.

“As you reminded me earlier, I think you do not work for the Council anymore? I heard you resigned after you were given a little well-deserved reprimand?”

The brunette smiled sarcastically at the comment.

“It wasn’t a little reprimand and I did not…”

The sound of hurried footsteps and a young girl storming in the room interrupted her. A gleam of relief passed in the newcomer’s eyes when she saw they were both still here, and she needed to catch her breath before being able to answer Vi’s impatient ‘what’s going on?’ question.

“Vi,” she said between two labored breathing as she supported herself against the wall beside her. “We’re under attack”