Chapter 9 (continued)
“Alexander
Camarin, do you agree of your own free will to be bound to my will, to speak
only the truth; without prevarication, deception or distortion until I release
you from this bond?”
“I do
agree,” Alex answered calmly, with no outward sign of unease.
‘He’s
braver than I am,’ Faith thought, grudgingly, to herself. ‘Course,
he never held a knife to her throat and threatened to kill her either,’
she added in her mind as she glanced over to
The cobalt blue glow
of
‘Down
girl,’ she tried to reassure herself. ‘She said she forgave you
already, and besides; if she wanted to hurt you she could probably do it all
the fricken way across town.’
“Elizabeth
Camarin, do you agree of your own free will to be bound to my will, to speak
only the truth; without prevarication, deception or distortion until I release
you from this bond?” the redheaded witch posed her challenge to
Faith’s other lover.
‘Bethy’s
not as tough as Alex,’ Faith noticed as her girlfriend shot her a nervous
glance and licked her lips before answering.
“I do
agree,” Beth’s voice was only slightly louder than a whisper.
“Showoff,”
Tara’s low comment, and
“So, how do we
know it worked?” Buffy asked.
“So,
Alex,” Faith said with a suddenly wicked smile despite her remaining
nervousness. “The other night when Beth was joking that I should give
you a go with the strap-on, you were all; ‘I don’t think so,’
is that how you really felt?”
“Actually I got
really turned on by the-” he was cut off by Beth’s hand on his
mouth.
Faith laughed at
Beth’s glare and Alex’s horrified stare.
“I’d say
it worked,” Buffy’s voice matched the look of disturbed incredulity
on her face.
“Yep,”
“Yes,
well...” Giles removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Perhaps you could start by telling us how and why you’ve
insinuated yourself into Faith’s life.”
“Right,”
Beth said, nodding her head and then looking toward her husband.
Alex gave his wife a
slight smirk before turning serious once again. He took a deep breath and began
speaking, “In the late nineteen sixties Beth and I were stationed in a
military hospital in the city of
“They
hadn’t come up with the concept of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder back
then,” Beth added.
“Hold on, wait,
that was like, over thirty years ago!” Buffy interjected. “Are you
saying you two are like, in your sixties or something?”
‘Crap, I’m
screwing people old enough to be my grandparents?’ Faith was struck by
the thought. ‘I thought Red said they were human...’
“Not exactly,
Buffy,” Beth answered.
“Let them finish
explaining themselves Buffy,” Giles admonished gently. “Then we
can ask any questions we might have.”
“Right,
sorry,” Buffy muttered.
“As I was
saying,” Alex continued. “We were in Hué for almost two years when
January 30th 1968 came upon us.”
“Good
lord,” Giles muttered. “The massacre at Hué.”
“That’s
right,” Alex said, nodding toward the watcher. “The Tèt Offensive;
a coordinated assault by the Viet Cong on about a dozen different targets in
South Vietnam—including Hué.”
“They killed all
of the soldiers at the hospital, even those who were already wounded,”
Beth continued the story. “Alex and I, along with the medical doctors
and nurses, were marched out into the jungle...they accused us of crimes
against the people of Vietnam and one by one held ‘trials’ on us.
After the ‘trials’ the executions began...”
‘Damn, that had
to suck, big time!’ Faith thought, feeling a pang as Beth trailed off
with a visible gulp.
“Night fell, we
were sure that the coming sunrise was to be our last,” Alex went on.
“Then...man, I thought I was hallucinating–”
“You and me
both,” Beth interjected.
“This little guy
in a bowler hat and a plaid jacket comes walking though the jungle like
it’s the middle of
“Tell me his
name wasn’t Whistler,” Buffy interjected with a frown.
“How did you
know that?” Beth asked, sounding startled.
“We’ve
met,” Buffy's voice was flat.
‘Damn, B, talk
about a small freaking world,’ Faith thought. ‘Gonna have to ask
‘bout that some time.’
“Okay,”
Alex gave Buffy a confused look for a moment before continuing.
“Obviously, at that point we were pretty open to any proposition that
included us getting the hell out of that place.”
‘No
doubt!’ Faith thought, seeing everyone else in the room nodding in
agreement.
“Next thing we
knew, we were in this...place—white everywhere, but not like a room or
anything, just...white.” Beth continued the story. “It was like a
dream, except both of us were there, along with Whistler.”
“He said he
represented The Powers that Be,” Alex explained. “Then went on to
explain what that meant, and then he told us a little bit about The Slayer, and
the things that go bump in the night.”
“The craziest
thing was that we didn’t think he was crazy,” Beth interjected.
“I guess being pulled out of the jungle into this...whiteness...kinda
burned out any skepticism we would have had.”
“It sounds as
though you were taken into a dream-state,” Giles spoke up. “Such a
state of consciousness—well unconsciousness really—exists apart
from the rational mind and as such we tend to accept at face value anything
seen or heard in such a state. It is only once awakened that we question the
experience.”
“Ah, well, that
makes sense I guess,” Beth nodded.
“In any
case,” Alex went on. “He said that there was a Slayer that needed
our help, and asked if we were willing to take on this task on behalf of The
Powers which he represented.”
“I think that
we’d have said yes in any case,” Beth interjected. “But given
the alternative...”
“Wait, I
don’t get it,” Faith interjected. “They told you in
’69 that I needed your help?” She turned to Giles and almost
pleaded with him, “How the hell did they know that? I mean, I
wasn’t even...hell, my Mom was barely seven years old!”
“I...I have no
idea,” Giles sputtered. “While certainly there is such a thing as
destiny, I’ve never believed that fate held such tight sway as that over
our lives.”
“I’m not
sure that it was destiny or fate,” Alex interjected.
“Right,”
Beth agreed quickly. “See, when we came out of that whiteness, it
wasn’t nineteen sixty-nine any more. It was February first, two
thousand.”
“I was still in
a coma,” Faith muttered, remembering back to that date.
“We were in our
house...Whistler told us that The Powers had arranged our ID’s and
employment—on retainer for the Watchers’ Council as combat-trauma
psychologists—and said we had three weeks to ‘get caught
up’,” Alex added.
“We didn’t
know what he meant,” Beth said exasperatedly. “He didn’t say
anything about us missing thirty one years.”
“Yeah, he has a
thing about leaving out the fine-print,” Buffy muttered darkly.
“Three
weeks,” Faith whispered harshly. “I woke up from my coma February
twenty-second.” She glanced over at Buffy only to see the blonde drop
her eyes and avoid he gaze.
“Somehow he must
not have known about that little present the mayor left for you,” Beth
said softly, drawing Faith’s attention with a voice filled with empathy.
“He showed up
the same day you turned yourself in to the police in LA,” Alex went on,
his voice too reflecting empathy. “Told us we’d have a little more
time to get caught up on recent history, and that he’d be back to let us
know when it was time.”
“It was a year
to the day,” Beth finished the thought.
“When the
watchers got me outta prison,” Faith said with realization.
“Yes,”
Alex agreed with her. “Travers called us with our
‘assignment’ about two seconds after Whistler gave us the
news.”
“Yes, and what
exactly was your assignment?” Giles asked with a pointed glance.
Alex sighed
resignedly, causing butterflies to start flying around in Faith’s
stomach. ‘Here it comes,’ she thought, clutching her hands in her
lap to keep them from shaking.
“Travers gave us
a file on Faith, and told us that we were to find a way to help, ‘keep
her on the side of angels,’ is how he put it,” Alex explained.
“His only real
stipulation was that we keep him updated regularly,” Beth added.
“Which we translated to mean monthly reports on her progress—using
only general descriptions—improving, opening up, making progress,
etc.—not personal details,” she said in an aside directly to Faith.
“It quickly
became apparent that his idea of updates was more along the lines of specific
and intimate reports of every aspect of our interactions with Faith, and her
interactions with the so called Scooby Gang,” Alex admitted.
“Which we
refused to do, of course,” Beth clarified.
“Why?”
Faith blurted out.
“Aww
Faithy,” Beth said, shaking her head sadly. “Even just from the
doctor-patient privilege aspect, we’d never share that kind of
information with someone not directly involved in the treatment. Not to
mention how we quickly came to care about you on a personal level.”
“Faithy?”
Buffy asked with a grin, causing Faith to blush profusely—followed by
flipping-off the blonde Slayer.
“Whistler told
us we needed to try and keep the watchers from taking any action—he
encouraged us to comply with their requests as much as possible,” Alex
added. “But, we were able to use the idea of doctor-patient privilege to
push Travers off, at least for a while.”
“And what
exactly were the instructions regarding Faith that this Whistler-person gave
you?” Giles pressed.
“Demon,”
Buffy interjected.
“Pardon
me?” Giles asked, looking confused.
“Whistler’s
a demon—balance demon,” Buffy clarified. “At least
according to Angel.”
“Ah yes,
well...” Giles trailed off, raising his eyebrows.
“He just said
that we were supposed to help Faith find herself, keep from falling back into
the dark place she’d gone before,” Alex answered.
“So did one of
them tell you guys to seduce her, or did you come up with that on your
own?” Buffy asked pointedly.
‘Easy B,’
Faith thought, taken aback. “Since when do you care who I screw?”
she rebuked her sister Slayer.
“During the time
you were in prison,” Beth interjected, clearly trying to prevent an
argument. “We had a lot of time to read what the watcher’s had on
slayers—reports and diaries from their watchers, as well as council documents
on slayers in general.”
“It didn’t
take much to read between the lines and figure out that slayers tend to be
motivated by primal instincts,” Alex continued. “The urge to hunt,
usually followed by a marked desire for both food and sex.”
“Ain’t it
funny how slaying makes you hungry and horny,” Faith said proudly, and
pointedly toward her sister Slayer.
It was Buffy's turn to
blush, even as her lovers smirked at her, Faith noted merrily.
“Without going
into any of Faith’s personal details,” Beth began, again looking
toward Faith with a hopeful set to her gaze. “Alex and I discussed the
possibility of formulating a relationship, and we both thought it could be a
good idea.”
“Is that how you
normally conducted treatment with your patients?” Giles asked, sternly,
but not unkindly.
“No, of course
not,” Alex answered.
‘Weird, he
don’t sound pissed that Jeeves asked,’ Faith thought with surprise.
“In the army, we
were doing the equivalent of mental health triage—trying to identify what
a soldier might be suffering from and how and where they might best be
helped,” Beth explained. “We didn’t have long term contact
with any of them.”
“Also,”
Alex interjected. “While the watchers might have seen this as a
temporary assignment, we definitely got the impression from Whistler that we
were being asked to make a long term commitment here.”
“Plus, once we
got to know Faith, we both decided that a long term commitment was exactly what
we wanted,” Beth said softly, looking at Faith with longing in her gaze.
‘Damn I want
you,’ was Faith’s knee-jerk response. ‘God, I hope I
didn’t say that out loud,’ she immediately thought, chagrinned, and
trying to surreptitiously check for any reaction from the others.
“How could we
know Faith and not fall for her?” Alex added, his look matching
Beth’s.
‘Not gonna
cry...not gonna fricken cry!’ Faith thought as she—with
difficulty—swallowed past the lump in her throat.
“And what are
your intentions now?” Giles asked.
Beth softly answered
Giles question, but made her response directly to Faith, “Hopefully
rebuild our trust and our relationship with you.”
Alex nodded in
agreement. “You’re a huge part of our life, Faith. I’d like
to think we’ve become an important part of your life too—we
don’t want to lose that.”
Faith gaped, unsure of
how to respond. ‘Jeeze I hope this ain’t some kinda dream,’
the thought ran through her head.
“And if she
rejects you?” Giles prompted after a moment of silence.
“I
won’t,” Faith whispered.
Hopeful looks on her lovers
faces and Giles question, “You won’t what?” made her realize,
‘Oh, guess I did say it out loud that time.’
“You won’t
what?” Giles sought clarification.
“Did you mean
it,” Faith asked softly, ignoring Giles question. “When you told
Travers you loved me?”
“He told you
that?” Beth asked, looking and sounding shocked.
“If he told you
that, it’s probably the only truth he uttered,” Alex added, looking
similarly surprised. “But, to answer your question; yes. Yes we meant
it, yes we love you.”
“I love you
Faith...I didn’t imagine that this would be how I first told you
that,” Beth said with a smile, gesturing to the rest of the Scoobies
present. “But I’m glad I got to tell you while under this spell,
because I don’t want you to ever doubt me when I say it. I love
you!”
“Once upon a
time, I wouldn’t have believed it was possible to truly be in love with
two people at the same time,” Alex continued in a soft, but intense
voice. “Now I can’t imagine not being in love with both of you. I
don’t want to imagine not having you in my life, Faith. If polygamy were
legal I’d get down on one knee and propose to you right here and
now.”
‘Is this
love?’ Shocked though she was, it was a feeling of intense heat running
through her body that nearly overwhelmed her. ‘Christ, I ain’t
never felt anything like this before!’
“Faithy, are you
ok?” Beth asked after a moment, making the dark-haired Slayer realize
that she was crying.
“I’ve
never been in love before,” Faith said, almost sobbing. “But this
is gotta be how it feels.”
Suddenly she found
herself enveloped in the arms of her lovers, experiencing a feeling of safety
and belonging like nothing she’d ever had in her life before.
‘Huh, they all
took off,’ she noted sometime later when she decided to bid the Scoobies
goodbye.
Pulling away from Beth
and Alex just enough to look them both in the face at the same time she uttered
words she’d never before believed she would say, “Let’s go
home.”
===== BtVS ===== BtVS
===== BtVS =====
The twelve women of the
Devon Coven, joined by the Sunnydale Coven—all three members of
it—were ensconced in a lushly appointed private dining room in the
convention area of the Bellagio hotel and casino. Tara was at the end of the
table opposite Sarah with Dawn on her left and
‘Well, this
wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it’d be,’ Dawn mused as she
looked around the room, taking in the renaissance art and old world
architectural features. ‘They certainly went all out...I wonder if
it’s just that they feel guilty about yelling at me—which they
totally should! Or, if it’s something else.’
‘Mmm, one more
bite,’ she decided as she looked back down to the remains of the
chocolate soufflé that had capped off a five course meal. ‘I’m
definitely going to have to try and work this off tonight...I hope Xander has
plenty of energy!’ the image brought a smile to her face.
“It is quite
rich, isn’t it?” the young witch sitting next to her opined as Dawn
dropped her spoon with a slight groan.
“God yes,”
Dawn agreed. “I’m completely stuffed.”
“I shall have to
extend my morning calisthenics for a month just to make up for it,” the
witch—who had earlier introduced herself as Melinda
Sharpely—commiserated.
“That’s
one way, I suppose,” Dawn answered with an even larger smile.
“Poor
Xander,”
“Try not to
break him, Dawnie,”
Dawn blushed slightly
as Melinda nodded with understanding. “Ah yes, your young
man...certainly a more enjoyable exercise regimen than I have planned,”
she said with a playful pout.
‘The only
work-out plan I’ll ever need,’ Dawn thought smugly despite the bit
of embarrassment she felt.
A clang of knife
against glass drew Dawn’s attention to the head of the table.
“Ladies, if I
may have your attention,” Sarah, head of the Devon Coven stood up to
address the group. “I would like to take this opportunity to formally
thank our guests—Tara MacLay, Willow Rosenberg, and Dawn
Summers—for consenting to meet with us. And to you, Dawn, I would like
to formally apologize for our ill-treatment at our first meeting.”
Dawn nodded her head and
gave a small smile in response. ‘No hard feelings, mostly,’ she
thought.
“Other than
taking pleasure in meeting other practitioners of our craft, we are meeting
tonight for two reasons. First, we have the puzzle presented to us by our old
friend Rupert Giles in the form of an amulet.”
‘Oh, they must
have figured it out!’ Dawn thought excitedly. ‘I wonder what it
is...I wonder how they did it when
“After examining
the amulet, we were able to ascertain that it is indeed a genuine amulet of
Libitinia,” Sarah went on. “However, such artifacts were never
created to be magical in nature—Libitinians being a cult dedicated to the
care and interment of the physical remains of the dead, rather than anything to
do with the mystical. They also had absolutely nothing to do with the undead
in any form.”
“Whoever gave
that amulet to your would-be vampire-king was clearly setting them up to
fail,” she concluded.
“But there was
definitely some kind of spell on it,”
“Oh yes,”
Sarah nodded in agreement. “Fiendishly clever and entirely frustrating,
was that enchantment.”
“Frustrating is
right!”
“Even our most
delicate probing eventually broke the enchantment,” she went on to
explain.
A glance at her fellow
Sunnydalers showed concerned looks.
“Only then was
the source of the spell made apparent,” Sarah said with a dramatic
pause. “Ianna’s lark.”
Dawn frowned as the
seeming non-sequitor. She looked to see an equally confused look on
“It’s
supposed to be something the goddess Ianna used to chastise practitioners that
bothered her with constant requests,”
“Much ado about
nothing,” Sarah said with a smirk.
“Why would
someone do that to a vampire?” Dawn asked, her frown deepening.
“From your explanation
of the subsequent events, I can only imagine that the amulet was the delivery
method for the curse on your sister, the Slayer,” Sarah opined.
“To what end, we can only speculate, though it would seem evident that
one purpose was to debilitate her, at least for a time.”
“Meaning
somebody’s going to try something and doesn’t want the slayer in
the way,”
“Which brings us
to our second reason for this evening’s meeting,” Sarah stated.
“Of late there have been signs and portents of a re-emergence of a very
old and powerful evil. Something so dangerous that we have actively been
searching for allies—something our coven hasn’t done...hasn’t
had to do...in nearly two centuries.”
“Some big bad
demon on the rise?”
‘Only
Sarah’s voice
was rather the opposite of
===== BtVS ===== BtVS
===== BtVS =====
“I can’t
believe I’m letting you take me to a strip club,” Buffy muttered as
they got out of Xander’s rental car.
“Hey, this
wasn’t my idea, remember?” Xander said with a smirk.
‘I really
can’t believe Tara and
“You could have
gone to dinner with them,” Xander continued to remind her. “You at
least were invited,” he added in a grumbling aside.
“Come on,
Xan,” Buffy said, taking his elbow in her arm. “Neither of us
really wanted to be the only non-witch at the Wicca jamboree.”
Walking through the
front doors of the ‘
“You mean that
stench of smoke, sweat and lust?” he asked with a frown.
“Yeah,
that,” she elucidated.
“I have no idea,
I’ve never been to one of these places before,” Xander admitted.
“Really?”
Buffy asked, surprised.
He just turned to her
with eyebrows raised.
“I just mean, I
thought...” Buffy stammered. ‘I thought all guys...’ even
her thoughts trailed off as she realized she was assuming.
“With Anya, I
wasn’t allowed to—not that there was any need for it with
her,” he ended with a mutter and a chagrinned smile.
“And now?”
Buffy asked, intrigued.
“Never really
thought about it, I guess,” he said thoughtfully. “Obviously, Dawn
doesn’t have a problem with it...but look at those girls,” he
said—gesturing toward the writhing dancers. “Not one of them is
half as hot as Dawn...even dressed, let alone naked.”
Trying not to cringe
at the mental image of her sister in the buff, Buffy took a moment to watch the
clearly surgically enhanced figures as they rubbed themselves against the brass
poles. ‘They’re sexy...but I can’t imagine one of them
having the kind of passion or heat that
“I
wouldn’t mind seeing
“What was
that?” Xander asked, apparently not hearing her comment.
Buffy blushed at the
realization that she’d said it aloud. “You’re right...I mean
not the naked Dawn part, but the part where I’m not really into
this,” she quickly explained.
“Want to find
someplace that’s else?” Xander asked.
“Maybe some café
or something, away from the casinos and stuff?” Buffy asked.
“Food, quiet,
hanging with the Buffster,” Xander said with a wide smile. “How
could I say no?”
===== BtVS ===== BtVS
===== BtVS =====
TheBear!
Willow: "It's a good fight, Buffy, and I want in."
Buffy: "I kinda love you."
--'Choices'
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