Chapter Text
The way Red had sold her on this was that she’d get Faith out of prison with a little hacking and some magic, or at least that was about all Faith had managed to understand from the explanation. She’d tried explaining that she was in jail entirely by choice and if she wanted out there wasn’t much stopping her, but Willow was very single minded these days. She’d seemed more like a doormat than the kinda gal to beat you into submission but Faith never had really bothered getting to know her. In return for the unwanted jailbreak she’d be their replacement on call Slayer after what had happened to Buffy.
God, Buffy. She’d known the second it happened. She should’ve known anyway she hadn’t wanted to admit it but one night well after light’s out she’d been laid there awake when all of a sudden it’d felt like the most important piece left of her soul had been torn out. Was that what it was like for Buffy when the one before Faith had eaten it? She’d gotten another sign from the universe when she finally managed to fall asleep and for the first time in years her dreams didn’t even have a hint of Buffy, had she had the same issue but with Faith? All sorts of things she’d never know, she’d always figured there’d be more time, however long it’d take to get her shit together Buffy’d still be there. Still she didn’t admit it to herself, more likely that Buffy had gotten tired of sharing dreams with her and finally figured out a way to cut her out than anything could’ve happened to her. But finally as if just to make sure she couldn’t deny it any longer, her first non vampire visitor ever Willow Rosenberg of all people had arrived and laid it all out clear as day.
Buffy was dead. The Hellmouth needed someone to keep a handle on things. The last time they’d tried it without a Slayer it hadn’t gone great so Faith was up. Willow had said everybody would get behind it easy since who else was gonna keep the Hellmouth on lock?
“What is she doing here?”
It only took running into one of the old gang to put a stop to that idea. One step through the front door and Buffy’s kid sister was already on her case, arms crossed and glaring daggers her way. She must’ve hit a growth spurt while Faith had been inside.
Faith smirked over at Willow, “Check it out, brat’s all woman sized now,” it hadn’t seemed possible but Dawn started glaring even harder at her, it might not have been the best road to take.
“Willow,” Dawn looked past Faith to Willow “What is she doing here?”
“Buffy’s,” Willow paused and swallowed looking for the best word “Gone. With the Hellmouth and everything else in Sunnydale we need a Slayer to watch over it, Faith’s the only Slayer we have. I’ll be making sure she doesn’t get up to anything, don’t worry,” she hurriedly tacked on at the end.
“Buffy’s dead. And she tried to kill her! Now she’s dead you want her to just slide in and take her place?” Dawn’s raised voice was attracting more people to say their piece on what to do with her, Xander and a girl she was pretty sure she recognised as Willow’s girlfriend from the last time Faith had been in town came in from the other room.
“Faith? You said you were just going to break the news to Angel and you bring back Faith? I’m not being alone with her,” Xander wouldn’t meet her eyes. That was pretty fair.
“You won’t have to. I’ll be keeping her in check on patrol and other than that she’ll be handcuffed in the basement,” Dawn did not look happy at that and after another quick glare in Faith’s direction and a barely muffled scream she stormed off, up to her room probably, with a door slam following soon after. Willow’s girlfriend flinched at that but Faith just shrugged it off, it’s the sorta reaction she’d expected, if anything she’d been expecting worse.
“So what are you like my Watcher now, Red?” Faith smirked “Careful you know how that ended for the last few,” with that it was Willow’s turn to glare at her. She could probably have been doing more to help her case, but it wasn’t like she’d asked to be sprung from jail.
“Should we really be keeping someone locked up in the basement?” Willow’s girlfriend, Tara if Faith remembered her right asked quietly.
“Yes, Tara’s right she needs way more than handcuffs and a locked door, she needs to be back in jail. A very far away from us jail!” Xander added much louder and still angry, still looking anywhere but at her.
Tara pulled a conflicted looking face before soldiering on, “I meant more it seemed kinda unethical?”
Faith couldn’t hold back a snort of laughter, “It’s cute you’re worried but I’ve been through worse. It’s all five by five with me,” she saw Willow roll her eyes at that “I was gonna be in jail anyway, Willow here convinced me I may as well be doing community service under house arrest instead,”
“I’ll get Faith set up downstairs, could you talk to Dawn for me,” Willow laid a light touch on Tara’s arm and smiled reassuringly at her, she still looked conflicted to Faith’s eyes so Willow really laid it on thick and added “Please, you’re so good with her, I need you,”
That was enough to get Tara to slowly nod in agreement “Okay, sure, but uh I think we should probably still talk this over, you know? Make sure this is actually the best option. For all of us,”
“And I’ll go warn Anya and Giles who you’ve brought back to town. Since this is happening no matter what I say! Maybe I’ll go crazy and drop in on Spike let him know we’ve got someone almost as soulless as him on the case,” he stormed out slamming the front door behind him. Tara flinched at that one as well but started to make her way up the stairs.
“He’ll come around,” Faith must’ve looked sceptical since Willow added “Probably, enough that he’ll settle for someone else patrolling that isn’t us trying to fill Buffy’s shoes,”
Speaking of Buffy’s shoes, she saw them in the next room that Willow was pulling her through, The thing in them wasn’t Buffy. She knew that as soon as she saw it, even if she hadn’t been assured that Buffy was actually for real dead. Sure it had the right shape, sure when it opened its mouth it had the sound of her if not the words or quite the right tone, Faith knew all about trying to get that down. But it didn’t have the spark, the thing that whenever she saw Buffy it’d make all her hairs stand on end, make her want to fight or run as far away as she could. She’d always figured it was because they were both Slayers, something about not being meant to ever see another one but she’d never asked if Buffy felt the same looking at her. And now she never would.
So no it definitely wasn’t Buffy. It was just something pretending to be her. And from Willow’s nonchalance she figured she was the only one out of the loop here.
“Mind filling me in on that thing?” she stuck a thumb out at it.
“That’s Buffybot, it’s a long story you don’t need to know. Hey, Buffybot,” the thing that looked like Buffy looked to Willow as she spoke to it, “This is Faith, don’t let her out of her handcuffs or the house unless I’m with her got it? I’ll give you more instructions later,” the robot nodded, it was a decent Buffy nod but Faith knew she could do one that was more like her.
“She’s not in any handcuffs, Willow,” the robot pointed out.
Faith couldn’t resist looking down at her bare wrists “It’s right, Red. It’s our first day and we’re messing up already,”
“She’s going to be, don’t let her out of them if she’s wearing them,” the thing stiffly nodded again.
“You built a robot to replace Buffy? Damn, I gotta hand it to you I didn’t think you could just do that,” Faith paused, running it over in her head “I didn’t know anyone could do that. What do you even need me for if you’ve got a roboslayer?”
“Oh no, I just repaired it,” Willow shrugged as if that wasn’t a big deal either “It’s not even the most impressive robot I’ve seen, you should’ve seen Ted, now he was good at passing for human, or Moloch. Definitely not on Buffy’s level, so probably not on yours. But she’s good for keeping the social workers at bay,”
“Coulda used one of those back home,” Willow raised an eyebrow at that but Faith wasn’t getting into all that and she was sure it wouldn’t take much to push past the topic “So where’s my new cell, basement you said?”
She pushed Willow out into the corridor and away from the robot towards where she thought she remembered a basement lookin’ door the last time she was here. She was gonna toss the brat down there while she was waiting for B and have some alone time with Joyce before settling on just locking her in her room.
God, Joyce. Willow had been even less willing to talk about that than she was about Buffy. It’d almost felt worse to hear about that. B was a Slayer and Slayers may as well have been made to die, even if Faith had been sure she was an invincible one. Joyce should’ve had longer, she was more decent to Faith than she’d deserved.
Before she’d realised it the two of them were at the bottom of the stairs, snapping her out of her moping as she took in her new digs. It was real spacious down here, way roomier than her old motel room, definitely nicer than her cell. It made it even funnier that Tara was worried about how ‘ethical’ it was to stick her up down here. It was sorta nice to have someone on her side though. Willow might be but it’s not like she’s not getting something out of the deal, Slaying for freedom. Well, sorta freedom, closer to it as she deserved.
“We’ll get a mattress down here sometime, for now I’m sure you’re more than capable of sleeping on the floor,” Faith shrugged in agreement, wouldn’t be her worst sleeping arrangement, there was still a bit more housekeeping though if this was gonna be long term.
“You got a change of clothes for me? This,” she gestured at her fresh from prison chic “is nice and all but I’ll need a bit more than the one outfit,”
Willow frowned, looked like she hadn’t thought of that, “I’ll head to the mall, get you a few things,”
“It’s either that or you can give me Buffy’s old stuff whenever the robot’s not using it but I don’t think anyone wants that, least of all Dawn. But you know I can make a good Buffy in a pinch,” she adopted the holier than thou glower she’d spent so long practising, which must’ve been too close to the mark the way Willow repelled from it, that was probably the biggest reaction she’d gotten out of her. She dropped it, no need push it too hard with just about the only person that was vaguely on her side this soon “You remember my style right or do I get to come with?”
“Cleavagy, evil and slutty, yeah I remember it,” Willow said it like it was a bad thing.
“If that’s what you want to see me in go ahead be my guest. But is your girlfriend okay with you flirting with other women?”
Willow didn’t seem willing to explore that scenario with her. Instead she’d pulled a pair of handcuffs from her bag and tersely ordered. “Hands,”
“And you want me in handcuffs as well?” Faith obliged and offered her wrists up to Willow “You’re wilder than I ever thought, how come we didn’t have fun like this back when I was still around?”
“You were evil,” Willow said bluntly, snapping the cuffs shut tight around her wrists, Faith shrugged in agreement it was a fair point “We’re gonna go on patrol tonight after I get back, make sure you’re still up for it. Behave while I’m gone,” so she’d be happy with her misbehaving as long as she was around? Good to know, but she gave her a lazy salute and even crossed her heart for good measure. Willow seemed satisfied and headed up the stairs closing the door behind her, then Faith heard what must be the lock click shut.
Faith was pretty sure whatever door that lead out of the basement wasn’t built to restrain a Slayer and she’d be able to kick it down if she really wanted to. She was pretty sure Willow was sure of that as well. Faith would hold up her end of the deal, as long as she could. She laid back against the wall opposite the stairs, slouched down to the floor and waited for Willow to come back.
She must’ve managed to at least half doze off because the next thing Faith heard was the lock upstairs clicking and her eyes snapped open. It’d been a long drive here and if Willow was back to take her for a walk it wasn’t a bad idea to be rested. She’d always been good at sleeping with one eye open and only gotten better at it in jail, so she was almost fully awake before the door had even finished swinging open.
She had to squint a bit into the light flooding down the stairs, it’d still been bright out when she’d nodded off but night had rolled in since then. It didn’t take long for her eyes to adjust, she was pretty sure that something in the Slayer package helped out there, just as she’d figured Willow was back, a couple of bags of clothes in hand.
“I’m back, get ready and we can go patrol,” she dropped the bags at Faith’s feet.
Faith cleared her throat and shook her cuffs at her, Willow turned red and dug the key out of her pocket. She mustn’t have had much experience being a jailer yet, they’d get her trained up. She let Faith out of the handcuffs and replaced them along with the key back into her pockets.
“You wanna turn around? If you can’t even trust me to get changed without watching, patrolling’s not gonna work out. Unless you want a show?” Willow managed to turn even redder as she turned away.
You couldn’t say Willow didn’t have a good eye for ‘cleavagy, evil and slutty’, she’d be more than fine wearing this. She hadn’t gotten to dress in much beyond the best that the Northern California Women’s Facility had had to offer, she was gonna look good for her big return to Slaying, even stood next to Willow.
She cleared her throat to get Willow’s attention and asked “Do I get any weapons?” while she went through a few quick stretches, she was still a bit stiff from the drive and sitting on the floor with her hands cuffed hadn’t helped. Willow’s eyes were tracking Faith’s arms as she stretched, Willow was real twitchy if this was enough to get her on alert.
Willow swallowed before answering. “You get a stake. If this works out maybe we’ll talk about something a bit deadlier,”
Faith shrugged “Fair enough, I think I can handle things with just that,” she grabbed a short sleeved leather jacket from one of the bags, before heading out of the basement “Let’s show ‘em all who’s back in town,”
They were on their way out to the front door, Willow leading and her following, when she heard a creak on the stairs. She was a little worried it was Dawn coming back for round two but when she turned and looked it was Tara she saw, a couple steps down framed with the landing light behind her.
“I thought I heard you come back in, are you heading back out again?” she barely managed to make it to the bottom of the stairs before Willow had rushed over and clasped hands with her.
“Tara,” Willow beamed at her girlfriend, it was almost sickening how sweet she looked with her, Faith wondered which one was Willow fronting, the one who was all bossy and short with her or the one who looked all innocent and sweet with her girl, “Yeah I’m gonna take Faith on patrol, make sure this’ll all work out. It’s later than I thought it was going to be and I didn’t want to wake you. How’s Dawn, did you get her to see why we’ve got to do this?”
“I think so, I mean, I’m not so sure we need to do this,” she was managing a slight frown on her face even under the force of Willow’s full powered beaming smile “but I got her to understand you’re not trying to replace Buffy and that you’re just trying to do what you think is best,”
“This is what’s best,” Willow nodded firmly. Honestly Faith wasn’t quite so sure her being out of jail was what’s best but she was the one with the least say in all this. “Everyone will understand, eventually,”
“Y-yeah,” Tara did not sound nearly as confident in this as Willow was. Faith hasn’t exactly known her for long but nothing she’s said sounded particularly confident, this rang especially hollow to her.
“We shouldn’t be too long just a quick patrol to get us all back in the swing of things, don’t worry about us,” she leaned up and kissed Tara on the cheek “I can handle myself and Faith was pretty good at being a Slayer when she wasn’t all, y’know, evil,” Faith’s almost offended, just ‘pretty good’.
“Yeah I’ll keep her safe for you,” she wrapped an arm around Willow and pulled her towards the door, she looked annoyed but let it happen “You keep an eye on the kid, we’ll go out to work and she’ll be back before you know it,” Tara gave them a small hesitant wave before Faith closed the front door behind them and set off into her first night back on the clock. “So what’s going on in Sunnydale you need a Slayer to take care of?”
It turned out there was nothing big brewing, no cults or kidnappings to stop, no rampaging demons. All Willow had for her was just a standard sweep of the cemeteries tonight, keep the local vamp population down. Like she’d done tons of times, this wasn’t the first time she’d had company but it was probably the first time she’d done it with anyone other than Buffy or one of her Watchers.
Slaying was like riding a bike, you never forget how to get it done. She still wasn’t quite ready for the rush of going all out like she could. It wasn’t like it’d been quiet in jail, but she’d definitely kept herself relatively restrained. Not like this, here she was all fists and feet, full force no need to worry about how if other guy is gonna be able to walk it off. Because, as she punched her stake through the vampire’s heart, the other guy walking it off wasn’t really what she was here for.
“You get that rush, Red?” she called back, taking her eyes of the two vampires she had left to go, she probably shouldn’t be stopping to chat but even with her eyes off of them it’s like she can feel everything they’re gonna do before they can even think to do it. It was child’s play to step around anything they throw at her and push them back “You’ve filled in on patrol before. You get all that good stuff flowing when you slide a stake into one of these guys?” she demonstrated slaying another of them.
“Not really,” Willow was a few steps back, far enough she’s not gonna get in the way, close enough to keep an eye on her. Though honestly even if she’s got a few tricks Faith didn’t see how Willow would be able to keep her in line if she wasn’t going along with it “I kinda get it though, sounds like when I’m doing magic. I know we’re putting you through your paces but you don’t have to drag it out this long,”
Admittedly Faith was playing with the last one, letting him get as close as he could before darting away, watching the frustration build and build as he got more and more reckless, she could drag this out forever. But this wasn’t gonna be the only night she had, if Willow wanted this wrapped up she’d throw her a bone. He looked more surprised than in pain when he looked down and saw the stake that she’d planted in his chest, just had enough time to reach out at her one last time before crumbling to dust. Faith caught the stake before it could hit the ground and slid it back into her pocket, “Happy?” Willow was trying to look clinical but Faith could tell she was pleased with how this was going, “Hold up, I missed one,” he looked kinda dweeby for a vampire admittedly, sure he had the style that most vampires seemed to swear by and the bleached hair made him stand out but most of them weren’t holding onto a couple of grocery bags on the way through graveyard. She pulled her stake back out and got ready to jump at him but Willow held her back.
“You on the outs with the girlfriend? She know you’ve got a new girl out here in the graveyard?” he was pretty casual for a vampire, it was almost like he and Willow were on good terms, even more so when she stepped in between them .
“Faith this is Spike, the vampire, he’s,” she trailed off looking for the right words “kinda helpful. Sometimes. She’s Faith, the Vampire Slayer,”
Spike, the vampire, squinted at her “Great,” that one word was dripping in sarcasm as he inspected her at a safe distance “Really is the new girl, you finally tracked down the one who showed up after Buffy,” he stumbled over what Buffy did, it seemed like almost everyone was, “Well after Buffy. You got big shoes to fill y’know,”
“She’s the one before actually,” Willow admitted and it all clicked in his head.
“Oh the one after Dru,” he mimed slitting his throat.
It was Faith’s turn to be out of the loop again “Dru? I thought the one before me was Kendra,”
“Yeah,” a big smarmy grin spread over Spike's face “And it was my Dru who took her out, I was so proud. I took out two myself back in the day,” he took a step back after Faith narrowed her eyes at him.
“Faith, we’re finished for the night,” Willow warned her.
“You want me to just let him go?” Faith turned her glare onto her, “You know he’s a vampire, he’s bragging about taking out Slayers. You brought me here to slay vampires its pretty simple, what’s the deal he got a soul like Angel?”
“I’m nothing like Angel,” he spat out.
Willow didn’t even look at him, “No it’s just,” she shrugged, “He’s Spike, he’s harmless. He’s even got a chip in his brain that won’t let him hurt any human, he’s less of a threat than you are. Like I said he’s even useful sometimes,”
“I’m still plenty bad,” he sounded more like a kid than Dawn had all those years ago.
“Sorry, Red. Just because you’ve got a rabid dog on a leash doesn’t mean you don’t have to put it down,” she lunged towards the vampire, stake raised to plunge through its heart. The world was just better without some things in it, Willow seemed all about the big picture these days she’d understand. He yelped and dropped his bags, trying to jump backwards but he had no chance of getting away from her, ‘specially not if he couldn’t even fight back.
Then she was on her ass staring up at the night sky. It was like she was in glue, it was worse than when she’d first woke up after the coma, back then her body didn’t want to move but she could force it. Here it desperately wanted to and all she could manage was to squirm.
Faith heard the vampire laugh at her “Now look who’s on a leash,” her stake got yanked from her hand by some invisible force, whizzed through the air towards him and he swore.
“Spike, get out of here,” the voice was Willow’s but it wasn’t like Faith had heard her before, sure she’d been bossier than Faith had remembered, but here, it was low, almost bored sounding. It reminded her of Mayor Wilkins, not in the tone exactly, the Boss had been way more cheerful, but in the edge she could hear barely buried in there. She heard two sets of footsteps, one scrambling away, the other slow and heavy approaching her, eventually she saw the tip of Willow’s boots enter her eyeline and heard her let out a disappointed sigh “We were doing so well, Faith,” she crouched over Faith’s frozen body and peered into her eyes from an uncomfortably close distance. Even more uncomfortable was the sight of her pitch black eyes, Faith tried to look away from them but she was still stuck fast. “The deal was you get out of jail and you’re my Slayer. That means you have to listen to me. I know you’re a little slow so I’ll let you off with a warning this time. If you can you say that you understand that you have to listen to me?”
Faith opened her mouth fully intending to mouth off to her but after a few strangled attempts she understood that the only thing that could come out was “I understand that I have to listen to you,”
A slow grin spread across Willow’s face, she patted Faith’s head and she felt a tingle go down her spine “Good girl, see I knew this would all work out,” Willow's eyes flicked back to their normal colour and Faith knew she could move again. She still felt paralysed knowing what Willow could just flick on whenever she wanted, was this the kinda magic she was talking about that gave her a rush? She stayed down there until Willow offered her a hand to pull her up, Faith took it rather than risk Willow magicking her up. Willow tutted while circling around her and inspecting her, she’d never gotten a predatory vibe from Willow before but this was a whole new her “I just got you these clothes, you’ve gotta take better care of them,”
Faith swallowed nervously and nodded. Despite how dry her mouth had gotten she managed to croak out “You got it, boss,” as enthusiastically as she could manage. Faith had been a little worried about the sort of things the Hellmouth might throw at her. She’d been more worried about how she’d manage without anyone to really keep her in check. Willow might end up being more dangerous than all of that.