There was rarely a man in the world brave enough to ask the question: where did I go wrong? and genuinely seek an answer. Wesley knew, for most of his life had been spent fleeing from the truth of his shortcomings. Be it his failure to acquire his father’s approval, no matter how hard he pressed onward in his studies, his failure as an expert in his chosen field, even his failure as a man of courage—Wesley had only recently taken the turn down the path which would force him to face his fears. To admit his inadequacies and attempt to win the respect of everyone he had ever disappointed.

To ask the terrifying question: where did I go wrong? without flinching.

Wesley wasn’t there yet, and oddly, he had accepted this. He wasn’t ready to ask the hard questions. He wasn’t ready to look inside himself. He didn’t want to see what remained. He didn’t want any reminders of how very far he had to go until the journey was complete. For the time being, he was content to cower. To take baby steps toward the inevitable destination. To keep from seeing his own reflection.

However, it was difficult to remain detached when the embodiment of one’s greatest failure was standing only feet away.

More so when said embodiment had dedicated the last several hours to making him bleed. He was tied to a chair in a dead man’s apartment, a gag stuffed in his mouth and his hands bound behind his back.

His own words rang back at him with mocking irony he couldn’t ignore.

I was your watcher, Faith. I know the real you.

There was no Real Faith. Not anymore. The Real Faith was dead and buried somewhere within the hollow shell of what his destruction had left behind. She was the face of his collapse, and he hated her. He hated her more than he hated the cuts in his body or the feel of blood oozing between flaps of torn skin. He hated her more than he hated the knowledge of what was to come. Five methods of torture, she’d said. Blunt. Sharp. Cold. Hot. Loud.

She had come to punish him. To do to him what he’d done to her.

Only she was going to do it in a way where the wounds wouldn’t be left to fester beneath layers of skin. These weren’t psychological inflictions she was leaving; these were scars she was determined would mar his flesh forever.

He hated her, because he knew, somewhere beneath his screaming subconscious, he had this coming.

He was a coward. He always had been. Faith was the result of such cowardice.

His life was one failure followed by another.

It had never, however, been like this. His failures had never before led to the ruination of a human being. And even through the blistering pain fusing his ripped flesh, through the agony he knew was to come, he couldn’t help but wonder what she’d been like before.

Before he came. Before he destroyed her.

Had she ever laughed at a joke? Had she ever experienced a genuine hug? Had she ever had someone to tuck her in at night and kiss her brow, wishing her sweet dreams ahead? Had she ever loved? Had she ever truly loved?

These wounds were temporal. Skin and blood and sweat. These were things which would fade if he survived. Even if they never fully disappeared, time would weather them away until there was nothing but a glance of what had been done to him. He would heal. He would walk again. He would cry. He would feel.

He would move closer to the question. The ultimate question. The question which refused to give him reprieve even now.

Where did I go wrong?

Was it the work of his father? The man who haunted him still—who would haunt him, likely, until he was old and gray, provided he actually got there. There were moments when she moved that Faith looked like his father. Not physically, of course, but it was there. A gleam in her eyes Wesley had only seen but from one other human being.

A gleam which declared Wesley nothing more than a scab—a scab picked too many times, resulting in a mark of permanence with a lasting effect which could not be ignored or denied.

She was approaching again, this time with a jagged piece of glass in her hand. It was the same one she’d used during her demonstration of the sharp torture method, only now it was chilled. He wondered what had taken her so long, though in retrospect, it made perfect sense. Faith wanted him hurt. She wanted him hurt so badly he begged for death, such to the point that when she finally stopped one round he was so surprised he allowed for the possibility of hope.

Strangely, though Wesley knew death was imminent, he didn’t expect to meet it tonight. He caught glimpses, of course. Between blackouts and sluggish climbs to consciousness, he saw the immediacy of his own mortal end quite clearly. But there was something holding him back. Something tying him to this world—this temporal plane of rage and despair. This place which would allow a girl so young to stray so far.

He saw his own blood on the glass, captured like a photograph beneath a thin layer of ice.

“Hope you’re rested up,” Faith said absently, rubbing the makeshift weapon against her thigh. The friction was enough to inspire a thick drop of pinkish water, and she relished in his horror as he watched it splash against the floor. “Don’t want you blackin’ out on me again.”

No, he mused dryly, we can’t have that.

She held up the piece of glass, her eyes darkening dangerously. “Let’s try for cold, yeah? Tell me when it hurts.”

In his mind, Wesley didn’t make a sound. Out of his mind, his howls of pain were muffled by the gag. And no matter how hard he tried to swallow them, she wrenched every moan from his unwilling lips and took them between her own.

From the sparkle of her black eyes, his pain was delicious.

Wesley abhorred consciousness.

Faith was sitting in the open window of the apartment. He didn’t know how long she’d been waiting or how long he’d been lost in darkness. His initial instinct was to, effectively, play dead, but the Id of his subconscious released a long-suffering moan at the first surge of agony against his earthly body.

At first, Faith made no move to indicate she’d heard him. She merely sat, tapping the bloodstained glass against her open palm. She didn’t flinch when a roughened edge scraped her skin hard enough to draw blood. It was as though she was completely departed from this world. She didn’t feel anymore. She didn’t react. She was a woman lost somewhere no sane man would ever try to follow.

Where did I go wrong?

There must have been a moment in the beginning; a moment where he could have said no. A missed chance. An opportunity lost.

He would do better next time.

“That’s refreshing,” she said suddenly. “But I’m feeling a little cold.”

There was a puddle around her feet. A puddle of water and blood.

His blood.

“What do you say we warm the place up?”

She was moving then. She was in the kitchen. She was flicking a lighter.

“Did you ever wonder if things would have been different if we'd never met?” she asked a second later. There was irony in her voice even if she didn’t hear it. Faith might be crazy, but there was a part of her burning with intelligence. She knew he wondered. She knew the question haunted him. She knew, and this was why she threw it in his face.

It was a taunt. All of it. A glance into a world which didn’t exist. A world wherein he didn’t have to ask himself questions.

Where did I go wrong?

“What if you'd had Buffy—and Giles would have been my Watcher? You think you'd still be here right now?” She turned to him, her brows perked appraisingly. “Or would Giles be sitting in that chair?”

The thought of Giles gave Wesley an inexplicable rush of peace. He knew Rupert would never have allowed Faith to trap him. His dealings with the older man had proven enough. Rupert might not look much, but he was strong. He was so much stronger than anyone, even Buffy, likely knew.

“Or is it just like fate?” Faith continued. “You know, there is no choice. You were gonna be here no matter what.” She bent over to her table of sadistic goodies and selected a spray can. “You think about that stuff? Fate and destiny?” Seemingly satisfied with her selection, her feet carried her back to Wesley. “I don't.”

She held the lighter to the spray, igniting it. A rush of fire shot forward and the room seemed to burn as a result. A long groan filled the air—one colored in his voice—and for the first time all night, Wesley was aware of the thunderous poundings of his heart and the cold, fear-laced sweat dampening his brow.

Pain turned concrete. He realized then just how mortal he was.

How much of the earth he was.

How easily breakable. How easily he could die.

It wouldn’t take much.

“Not that any of this is your own fault,” Faith went on. “Since this may be the last chance we will have to unload on each other, I feel that it is kind of my duty to tell you that if you'd been a better Watcher, I might have been a more positive role model.”

There was no way Faith could know her words hurt more than anything she could do to him, and he wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction of knowledge.

He was, after all, only a man.

Again the lighter flicked. Again the air was scorched with fire. “Face it, Wesley, you really were a jerk. Always walking around as if you had some great big stake rammed up your English Channel.” A frown befell her face and she knelt forward, jerking the gag down. “I think I want to hear you scream.”

“You never will.”

Where those words of bravery came from, he knew not. Certainly not himself.

Then she was talking again, but he was through listening. The dark was on its way back.

The dark would reclaim him.

And this time, perhaps, the dark would bury him in the ground.

Where did I go wrong?

Perhaps he would never know.

And strangely, painful as the question was, being denied its answer seemed to him a fate worse than death.

 

Over the past two years, Wesley had come to understand a fundamental truth about himself: he needed people. He didn’t do well when he was alone. When he was left to his thoughts. When he didn’t have the support of those he loved. His childhood had been a testament to isolation, and while he had excelled privately in all subjects, he hadn’t had friends with whom to share his success. No, Wesley had always been the social outcast. He was the one who brought books with him to the playground. He was the child the stronger, meaner kids threatened when an assignment was due. He was friendless; he always had been.

It was one of the reasons he’d become so pompous. Upon reaching the academy and surviving the induction into the Watcher’s Council, Wesley had silently promised to become a version of himself who would never be subject to bullying again. Someone to be taken seriously. An authority figure.

A watcher.

The truth, however, wasn’t as forgiving. He could change his looks, his clothes, the people around him, but he couldn’t change himself.

He was still the same little boy he’d been in school. Prefect. Head Boy. Pansy-arsed know-it-all.

Isolated.

This time because he knew he needed space.

Wesley couldn’t draw his eyes away from his apartment window. He was parked in a stiff wooden chair, staring through plated glass at nothing in particular, and he had been for hours. There wasn’t a muscle in his body which didn’t ache, but pain was deserved, and he made no attempt to quell it with ice packs or other rudimentary healing techniques.

Where did I go wrong?

The question hadn’t haunted him in years. The night following his abduction, following Faith’s slow, methodical torture of his worn body, he had taken a step toward the light. Toward righting the wrongs of his past. The Council had come to him, and he had turned them down. He had proved to himself that he wasn’t the man he’d once been. He hadn’t allowed them to take Faith no matter what she’d done to him, what realities she’d forced him to face, because he knew what she meant to Angel.

Redemption. Faith, in many ways, was Angel’s redemption.

It startled Wesley how very much he and Angel were alike. Both had perfection in the form of light, but they were both similarly drawn to the dark. Angel in the form of Buffy, whose light he’d tarnished with dark, and Wesley in Fred.

Fred. Just the thought of her made him ache. She was too pure, too bright for him. The closer he became to her, the further he felt. For a while, he thought he could fool himself into believing she could save him. Into believing he was the sort of man who could be good for her—do things right by her. He’d believed he wouldn’t taint her with the inner darkness he’d fought so long to repress. He thought he’d come far enough.

He’d been wrong.

Oh, Wesley was prepared for the arguments. Cordelia had been ringing him nonstop, begging him to talk to her. Reassuring him with message after message that what had happened hadn’t been his fault. It had been the touch of a callous devil who enjoyed watching humanity destroy itself. He’d touched Billy’s blood, and therefore the aspect of the demon had tainted his soul.

It wasn’t Wesley who had pursued Fred through the halls of the Hyperion Hotel. It wasn’t Wesley who had remarked on how she adorned provocative dresses because she was a whore. It wasn’t Wesley who had tried to kill her because he yearned to touch her.

It wasn’t Wesley. It was Billy.

And yet Wesley was the one with the memories. With the guilt. It was Wesley who had to live with the knowledge of what he’d nearly done to the woman he knew he was falling in love with.

Fred, with her impassable perfection. Perhaps the time for when they would have been perfect for each other had already come and gone, if it had ever existed at all.

He didn’t know. The only thing he knew was the thought of meeting her eyes made his soul ache.

He feared touching her, knowing what sins he’d nearly committed with his hands. He feared looking at her only to find himself locked within his own body once more, unable to do anything but watch as she screamed and ran for her life. As she trembled in fear because of him. Because of Wesley.

Prefect Wesley. Head Boy Wesley. Wesley Wyndam-Pryce of the Watcher’s Council. Wes Pryce, Rogue Demon Hunter.

Wesley of Angel Investigations. He was the one who signed the paychecks. Who assigned the missions. Who called the shots. Angel had walked out and he was the boss now.

They had traded one demon for another.

He found himself inexplicably thinking of Faith. Was this how it had been for her? Falling into darkness without anything on which to hold? Nothing to break her fall? No friends to lean upon, no hope to rely on. Nothing but a predetermined path of destruction.

He remembered watching her the night she’d tortured him. The crazed gleam in her eyes, her body tight with a rampant need for destruction. She’d sizzled and fused, trying so hard to convince herself she was a creature without conscience. A creature without a soul. Someone who could do whatever she wanted, kill whoever she wanted, and destroy whoever she wanted without feeling the effects of the pain she caused.

Wesley wasn’t stupid. He knew it had started like this.

Just like this. In an empty room, reflecting upon her sins. Knowing there was an answer; all she needed to do was reach out for help. Solitude, in the end, would only get her killed.

Faith was in prison, now. She’d taken the first step toward rehabilitation. There was little chance she would ever breathe free air again. And though Wesley hadn’t seen her since she offered her confession to authorities, there was something which told him she was freer now than she’d ever been in the open. She was at peace with herself, or at least on the way to peace. Her demons had stopped screaming.

There were times when Wesley’s own darkness scared him; during those times, he liked to think of Faith. She had gone as dark as any human he’d known, but she was saving herself. She was fighting through her darkness. She was reaching for light.

And yet, something else rang true to him. Something she’d said the night she’d ripped him apart.

Fate.

Perhaps for Faith to reach peace, she needed the darkness. She’d had little other option in her upbringing. Her mother, the state of her childhood, her lack of friends, the string of men she’d entertained before barreling into Sunnydale. Angel had told Wesley shortly after Faith’s incarceration that, among other things, Faith had lost her virginity at the age of eleven while staying in a home. He never mentioned whether or not it was voluntary—if she’d wanted it in her quest to become a woman. The point didn’t seem to matter. What did matter was everything which remained unsaid.

The fact was that Faith’s path had virtually been constructed for her. Yes, she’d had choices and yes, she’d made the wrong ones. However, she’d similarly had little to no guidance which choice was right. She was a good person, victimized by bad circumstances.

Wesley couldn’t claim the same fate. His childhood hadn’t been idyllic, but he hadn’t suffered through half as much as Faith had. His mother had coddled him, his father had dismissed him; he’d had every opportunity to make something of himself. From the minute he learned to walk, the lines of right and wrong, yes and no had been drawn in permanent ink. Wesley’s life hadn’t been constructed on a lack of discipline—rather an abundance of it.

Faith was redeemable, then. Circumstances had made her who she was.

Circumstances had made him who he was.

And yet, in so many ways, they were the same.

Someone knocked at the door. He didn’t move. He’d been expecting visitors for two days.

“Wesley?” a soft voice called through the wooden barrier. “Wesley, it’s me, Fred.”

He turned his head slightly, his breath catching in his throat. He didn’t want to see her now, but his feet wouldn’t obey him. In seconds, he was walking to the door and pulling it open. In seconds, he was lost in her warm, concerned eyes.

Concern he didn’t deserve.

Fred frowned immediately and raised a hand to his face. “Oh,” she gasped softly, “does that hurt?”

She was referring to a bruise he’d sustained while falling through the rotted floors of one of the Hyperion’s many rooms. Possessed, he’d walked into her booby-trap—thank God—and she’d managed to render him unconscious. And when he’d awakened, the spell Billy had cast over him with his murderous DNA had faded.

There was nothing left but scars.

The sort which never faded.

Nevertheless, Wesley couldn’t abide her touching him. Not now. Not after what he’d done. He turned away from her before her gentle fingers could find his face, a long shudder commanding his body.

She flinched at his rejection, and while it hurt, he forced himself not to comfort her. “Sorry,” she whispered. “I left a bunch of messages.”

He knew. He’d listened to her over and over again all night. His answering service was a tribute to the women in his life. Cordelia and Fred. Fred and Cordelia. Both calling him nonstop. Both begging him to pick up the phone.

He hadn’t. And now Fred was here.

“Yes,” Wesley heard himself saying. “I meant to call you back. I’m sorry.” The words served as a mental collapse and he felt something within him shatter. He looked her in the eyes and bore all. “I’m so sorry.”

Fred smiled tenderly. “Wesley, you gotta come back to work.”

“How can I?”

It was obviously not the answer she’d been expecting. “What do you mean?” Fred repeated, bewildered. “How can you not? You’re the boss. We need you. You took a few days off—that’s good. We all did. But now it’s time to come back.”

“Fred…I tried to kill you.”

There it was. It was between them now. The thing they both knew, solidified in words.

However, it didn’t haunt her as it haunted him. There was no condemnation in her eyes. There was only light and forgiveness, and trust beyond trust. Nothing he deserved. And yet it was her words which rendered him a half-man. “That wasn’t you.”

“How can you know that?” he countered. “Something inside me was forced to the surface. Something primal. Something…”

“Do you wanna kill me?”

The question was asked bluntly, and his reaction was instinctive. “Oh God, no.”

“It wasn’t something in you, Wesley. It was something that was done to you.”

He looked at her and he knew she believed her words. He knew she believed them, and it made him want to collapse in awe of her. This girl he had nearly destroyed. This girl he feared he loved beyond reason.

Fred might believe in him, but he didn’t think he could believe in himself. Not after what had happened. Not after what he’d nearly done.

“I don’t know what kind of man I am anymore,” he whispered.

He didn’t mean to say it, but it was out there.

He wished it wasn’t. Fred’s faith, while invaluable, was likewise empty. She couldn’t see inside him. She couldn’t see what he saw.

Thus she had no answer to give him but, “Well, I do. You’re a good man.”

Her trust was precious.

“Will I see you back at the office?”

Wesley nodded, choked. “Yeah.”

“Good.”

And that was it. She offered a watery smile, and it was the last thing he saw before he closed the door.

Before he broke down weeping.

Before the inevitable query resurfaced.

Where did I go wrong?

He was terrified it was a question with many, many answers.

 

He could hear her crying.

He remembered the first time he’d heard her cry. The only other time. Outside a dead man’s apartment as she attempted to bring Angel to her mercy with angry fists before finally sinking to her knees and begging him to kill her. He’d heard her cry then. He’d remembered that night that she was truly human.

Now, she was almost too human for him. Too real. Too tangible. He heard her sobbing under the weight of the showerhead. Heard the crack and crash of cement and knew without needing anything that she was hurting herself. She was forcing her hands to bleed in order to feel, even if all of her was a mess of broken bones and torn muscles.

It was bizarre having her here. Bizarre, but strangely right.

Even under these circumstances, it felt like he had brought her home.

She shouldn’t be alone. She was aching in ways he didn’t wish to fathom. Wesley sighed heavily and rose to his feet, tentatively approaching his bathroom door. Though she might not wish his company, especially now, there was a certain sort of intimacy they had already attained. Intimacy which didn’t require the union of bodies or anything primal in the slightest.

They were kindred souls.

Wesley didn’t bother to knock. He pushed the door open and stepped boldly across the threshold.

“Is everything all right?” he asked softly. The mirrors were steamed, the air too thick to make out shapes. The blurred vision of her nude body struck him in ways he never thought possible, but he forced his first instinct aside with casual ease.

Faith was panting hard, her hands braced against the tattered remains of what had once been his shower wall. “Y’know, Wes,” she said, her voice tempered but strained. “If you wanted a peek, you coulda just come in here and watched me strip. Would’ve been a helluva lot hotter than this.”

“I heard—”

“Yeah. Shower. Sorry.” She kicked at a chunk of concrete with her bare foot. “I just…I needed to let out, you know?”

He swallowed hard and nodded. He knew. God, he knew. If he had even half the strength Faith possessed, his shower wall would have been dismantled with his own tortured fists months ago. Back when he sank into the shadows—shut out by the people he cared about due to his misreading of an ancient prophecy.

He had tried to rescue Connor, and in doing so had damned him. Damned him and destroyed Angel.

In some way, what was happening now was Wesley’s fault. No matter what he’d done in the interim to make amends. To put things right between them. He’d pulled Angel from the ocean, and yet there was nothing which could fix the void.

Their relationship was permanently damaged. All because Wesley had tried to save his son.

“I know how tempting it is to hide, Faith,” Wesley said, swallowing hard and taking a step forward. She had turned to face him fully, unashamed of her nudity in ways which had nothing to do with the rippled shower-glass separating them. “To vent your frustrations on walls and save your screams for your pillow while bottling everything else inside.”

Faith snickered appreciatively but didn’t say anything.

“I’ve been there.”

“I don’t think so, Boss,” she retorted. “I get it. You went through the Change. Guess the other one finally dropped, yeah? Your voice stopped squeaking and you gave it away to some very, very special girl. Don’t think that means you got some special insight. I’m the way I am because it’s—”

“I don’t have insight on what you’re going through. You’re right.”

Faith blinked and tossed the shower door open, leaning against the doorway. “You don’t? So you’re not in here, trying not to stare at my tits while under the guise that because you got a little rough and dark you suddenly get me?”

Wesley didn’t break his eyes away from hers, despite the wholly male need to drag his gaze downward. “I only mean I know how it is to be isolated,” he replied. “To keep your pain inside and hope it will ease with time. But we both know where that leads with you.”

“Hey. I’m not the kinda girl to make the same mistake twice.”

“No. You’re the sort of girl to make the same mistake over and over again. Twice is selling yourself short.”

Faith snorted. “Well…you know it’s the definition of insanity, right? Doin’ the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. You think I’m crazy, Wes?” She shrugged. “Wouldn’t be the first.”

“I think you need people, and you don’t wish to admit it. Because needing people makes you weak, doesn’t it, Faith?” Wesley swallowed hard and took another step forward. “And after all this time, even after facing your ghosts, you’re afraid to be perceived as weak.”

She stared at him for a long minute before breaking away with a sharp, angry laugh. “Trying to play therapist? Don’t bother.”

“I’m trying to tell you…I’m here.”

Faith’s eyes darted to his crotch, her brows arching appraisingly. “I’ll say.”

“You can’t change the subject.”

“Well, you can change your shorts, right? That looks wicked painful.” She paused thoughtfully. “Or is that the real reason you came in here, Wes? Hot naked jailbird in your shower. You busted me out—I pretty much owe you. Want me to suck you off? Give you a taste of what—”

“Stop.”

“Right. Stop. Drop. Open my mouth real wide.”

Wesley frowned and claimed another step. “Why do you do that?”

It was small, nearly indiscernible, but it was there. A flicker of fear in her eyes and a waver in her confident stance. Her arms were crossed but she couldn’t hide how hard she was trembling. Her body was worn and bruised, the wounds which hadn’t yet stopped bleeding forming purple patches against her sunkissed skin. The defenses she’d built around herself were nearly indestructible. She could bat an eye, curl her lips in a way guaranteed to wrap any man around her little finger, and offer a smile which promised nothing but pleasure if he just stopped talking. Wesley couldn’t imagine many men strong enough to push beyond her greatest weapon—her dark, alluring self—to reach the scared little girl inside.

He was determined to show her that he was different.

“Do what?” she asked. If she was aware of how hard her voice shook, she didn’t betray it.

“Devalue yourself.”

She quirked a brow. “Huh? If I could do that alone, I wouldn’t need a vibrator.”

Wesley’s lips tugged upwards reluctantly. “You equate yourself with the sum of your parts,” he explained. “You don’t think you have anything to offer but your body.”

“I got a wicked punch, too. Or don’t you remember?”

“I remember.”

“Then you oughta know you’re risking—”

“You’re not alone, Faith.”

She spread her arms. “Who’ve I got?”

“Me.”

“Yeah. Till Angelus is stuffed back inside Angel’s soul. Wanna take a bet at how fast you’ll reach for the phone? That’s how good I got you, Wes.” She paused. “Or will you do it yourself? Rassle me to the ground and drag me to the nearest precinct, ‘cause I got you so fucking well?”

Wesley didn’t blink. “It is my understanding that prison is designed to rehabilitate people,” he replied. “You are not the girl you were when you went in.”

“You think?”

“I know.” He paused. “I believe in you, Faith. You don’t have to be alone.” His eyes fluttered downward, focusing on the crumbled chunks of his bathroom wall. “If you need to beat on something, beat on me. I won’t fight you. I will still be here when it’s over.” His gaze found hers again. “You don’t have to do anything alone.”

The look in Faith’s eyes was unlike anything he’d ever seen. Deep, fathomless confusion wrapped in gratitude. The face of a girl who didn’t believe she could exist except in the body of someone else. And before he could say anything, do anything, she had seized him by the shirt and tugged him to her.

For an insane instant, he thought she meant to kiss him. She didn’t. Instead, she folded her bruised body in his arms and began to cry.

She cried, and he held her. She cried under a cold baptism of shower water, holding onto him as though he was the only thing keeping her anchored to this world.

Faith was crying. This girl who had wandered through darkness. Her face had been a ghost of hope throughout his own trial. He’d wandered through Hell over the past year, clawing desperately for freedom. Clawing toward the light.

He tainted everything he touched, but he couldn’t taint Faith. He couldn’t.

But perhaps—just perhaps—he had a chance at saving her.

And if he succeeded, he at least had the hope that she would save him back.

 

 

A/N: I stole a rather notable speech from The West Wing because it fit so well here. Well, not a speech so much as a morality tale I’ve only heard once; it might be Sorkin stole it from something else.

Never in a million years had he dreamt something like this could happen.

Willow had come to Los Angeles to restore Angel’s soul, and she’d been successful. In return, she was taking Faith to Sunnydale. From one battle to another. Faith had barely survived her head-to-head with Angelus; Wesley didn’t want to consider how she would react upon returning to the place which had initiated her self-destruction. He worried for her, but he didn’t object to her leaving. He knew he couldn’t.

He did, however, convince Willow not to leave immediately. For whatever reason, the idea of parting with Faith left an irrationally bad taste in his mouth. Their relationship wasn’t a healthy one; he knew that. They had developed a tentative friendship over the past two days, but it was one which existed on an understood time table. The connection itself wouldn’t fade; however, there was no telling when, or if, their paths would ever cross again.

Faith couldn’t understand what she meant to Wesley now.

She hadn’t just saved Los Angeles, and with it, the world.

She had saved him as well.

She was walking proof that people could survive the fire. She had braved flames and while she emerged a little singed, the fact remained that she had indeed emerged.

Wesley at last understood. It was time to stop asking himself the same query over and over again.

Where did I go wrong?

The question targeted the past. In order to explore it, one would have to relive it. And as long as the past was being relived, the future could not be explored.

Faith had taught him that. He would never be rid of his ghosts, but perhaps he could be stronger because of them.

This was a lesson she’d given him without being any the wiser. And while its significance wouldn’t fade with her absence, it certainly would leave a hole in him which he feared would never heal.

It was easier to be sure of oneself when the person who provided such assurance was at one’s side.

Life would inevitably return when Faith was gone. Wesley had tarnished things so horribly between himself and Fred, he didn’t believe there was room for reconciliation. And while it hurt, he’d long known Fred wasn’t his to lose. It was a painful truth, but a truth nonetheless.

She was so bright she blinded him; looking at her made him ache.

Looking at Faith gave him peace.

In the end, he supposed Fred would become another ghost. He knew he would love her all his life, but his tattered heart would move on. She was a dream—something distant. Something he couldn’t quite reach. Something he’d wanted so much for such a long time that he felt, for once, his eyes were opening wide.

Because of Faith. Faith had opened his eyes, and she’d done it simply by letting him hold her as she wept.

Wesley turned over in bed and sighed hard. It was beyond difficult trying to sleep when he knew he was going to see Willow and Faith off in the morning. Life as he knew it had been one rollercoaster after another, and now the thing which had fleetingly offered him stability would be gone in a number of short hours.

He didn’t pretend to understand it. How the girl he’d once loathed was now someone he needed. She had once been the face of his failure. He had destroyed her with his arrogance. With his need to prove he wasn’t the same little boy who had cowered and conceded every time a bully cornered him with a threat. At the time, Faith had been a bully. She could have been saved then were it not for his foolish actions.

Were it not for him, everything which had happened to her—her descent into darkness—might never have occurred.

Faith. His failure.

And now she was his savior. She was proof that the journey didn’t necessarily corrupt the traveler. She had faced inner demons and fought them back.

It had started with acceptance. With a confession.

Someone knocked on the bedroom door. Wesley frowned and sat up. “Faith?”

There was a long creak as the door swung open, and though he couldn’t make out her face through the darkness, he sensed her bemused grin as others might sense a change in the weather. “Good guess,” came the soft reply. “But then again, how many burglars knock, right?”

“Is everything all right?” Wesley asked, reaching for the nightstand where he kept his glasses. “Is Angel—”

“Still mopin’ around ‘cause of the rotten soul Willow shoved up his ass? Yeah, pretty much sums it up.”

“I don’t understand. Why are you here?”

His glasses only succeeded in making her shadow a little less blurry than it had been seconds before. He watched as she shuffled self-consciously, a strange air of doubt—one which days before he never would have associated with Faith—rolling off her like hot steam. “Couldn’t sleep, I guess,” she replied at last. “Goin’ back to Sunnydale…even as a reformed murderer…tends to give a girl wicked nightmares.”

Wesley sighed and glanced down, running a hand through his ruffled brunette locks. This he understood. “It will be all right,” he promised softly. “Buffy is not the sort of person to hold a grudge.”

She laughed harshly. “Damn, Wes. I know you weren’t B’s watcher and all, but this is Buffy we’re talkin’ about. My history with her has been nothin’ but me trying to fuck her up and take what’s hers. Last time I saw her…well, let’s just say she made the decision to turn myself in a crapload easier. Figured I’d be safer in prison.”

A wry smile tugged at his mouth. “Things change.”

“Yeah. And you’re livin’ proof, aren’t you?”

Wesley swallowed. “So are you.”

Faith snorted incredulously, blinking hard and averting her eyes. “Yeah,” she agreed dryly. “I’m a real prize.”

He didn’t know what to do. The past few days had pushed their relationship into a strange new world where boundaries weren’t so easily defined. Once, perhaps, Wesley would have placed a hand on her shoulder or drawn her to him in a comforting, however chaste hug. Perhaps it was all in his head—the awkwardness, the strain. He’d held her naked body against his, and while nothing untoward had happened, he didn’t know how to react to her. Not anymore.

Not when she was in his room. Not when she was sitting on his bed.

If it were Lilah, he would have known exactly what she was after. There wouldn’t be a bloody gray area. She would be under him already, writhing in pleasure and clawing at his forearms. They would bruise each other with their bodies; send each other spiraling so far away from reality that the crash was always ugly.

But Faith wasn’t Lilah. She wasn’t. She wasn’t something to be used in order to lose himself.

Lilah had dragged him down. The knowledge she was lost and without a conscience about it had appealed to him, but he couldn’t emulate what she wanted. He couldn’t be like her. He couldn’t because he cared.

Faith was lost, but she had a conscience. She had a heavy conscience, and she wore her guilt around her like a blanket. She carried her sins with her wherever she went; she didn’t allow her failures to prevent her from doing what was needed.

Faith didn’t drag him down—she pulled him up.

“There was this thing they used to say in group,” she said softly, her eyes having fallen to his bedspread, her fingers gently tracing the embroidery. “A…parable, or whatever.”

“Parable?” He was impressed she knew the word. “What was it?”

She shifted on the mattress. “Knowin’ me, I’ll probably tell it wrong.”

“Try me.”

Faith nodded and slowly glanced up, and the vulnerability in her eyes would have floored him were he not already sitting. “So this guy’s walkin’ down a street, right? And he falls into this wicked big hole. The walls of the hole are so steep he can’t find a way out. A doc walks by and the guy shouts up, ‘Hey! Lend a hand!’ The doc scribbles a prescription, tosses it down the hole, and leaves. Then this clergy member comes by. Same deal, right? The guy yells, ‘Father, I fell. Think you can help?’ The priest jots down a prayer, tosses it down the hole and moves on. Then a friend walks by. Again, same deal. ‘Hey, it’s me. Can you help me out?’ The friend jumps down in the hole, and our guy says, ‘What are you doin’, you freakin’ moron? Now we’re both stuck.’ But get this—the friend says, ‘Yeah, but I’ve been down here before, and I know the way out.’” There was a long pause. Her eyes fell again. “Stupid, I know…but I…I get the feelin’, Wes, that you—”

“It’s not stupid, Faith. Not at all.”

“You just…you helped me. A lot.” She sighed and shook her head. “It wasn’t much, but…somethin’ I learned is you can only help like that if you’ve…”

“If you’ve needed it,” he supplied softly. “You’re right.”

“Not sayin’ we need to be bestest buds or anything. But you…I never gave you a reason, Wes. Notta one. But you…you still…” She trailed off, trembling with uncertainty, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. “Just be straight with me. Did you do it to gimme strength enough to face him, or was it real?”

A small shock raced through him. He’d never thought she would question him. That she could possibly be as unsure of herself as he was of himself. That she would even believe him capable of being so emotionally manipulative. He wasn’t wired that way, and when he tried to alter his wiring, things went badly.

“Of course it was real,” Wesley swore. “I wouldn’t…Faith, I would never—”

He didn’t know what he was going to say, and the next instant it didn’t matter, for his face was in her hands and she was caressing his lips with her own. Wesley froze in astonishment and all around him fell still. She tasted warm and dangerous, flavored with the faint hint of nicotine. She tasted like no woman he’d ever known. She tasted real.

Faith froze against his mouth when he failed to kiss her back, then pulled away, her eyes bright with rejected humiliation. “Sorry,” she said quickly, moving to get up. “Dunno what I was thinkin’. I’ll just—”

Wesley didn’t allow himself think. He couldn’t, lest his brain talk his body out of something he knew he wanted. His brain shut down as his hand grasped her wrist, tugging her back to him before she could leave his side. And this time when their lips met, there was no hesitation. No roadblocks. He welcomed her into his mouth and leaned back, taking her with him. Then she was astride his hips, her warm femininity rubbing against his cock, and he knew then.

He knew.

He was lost.

“Faith…”

She pulled back, stripping her tank top over her head, freeing her breasts to his hungry eyes. And before he could help himself, he found his mouth wrapped around one perfectly fleshly globe as his hand traveled down the toned flesh of her stomach. She was a slow drink of whisky, Faith. She tasted dangerous and vulnerable all in the same—the embodiment of a woman who knew what she wanted but was similarly afraid to seize it.

He was drunk. He was completely drunk on her. He felt years of wandering through darkness were finally over. Faith had jumped into the darkness with him, and she would lead him out because she knew the way.

In mindless seconds, they were naked together, Faith doctoring his abdomen with an uncharacteristically soft pathway of kisses. Never before had Wesley equated her with soft, but for the way she caressed him, it was, at the minute, difficult to think of her as anything but.

“I’ve never done this and meant it,” she whispered, rubbing her cheek against the head of his cock. “Sucked a guy. Fucked a guy. It’s always been a laugh. A big joke.”

She capped her confession with a tender lick of her tongue.

“Christ, Faith—”

“I want it to mean somethin’, Wes. Can you make it mean somethin’?” Her hands cupped his balls, her lips exploring the underside of his length before welcoming him back within her deliciously wet mouth. She took him in as far as she could, relaxing her throat muscles with expertise he didn’t want to consider, until the head of his cock was brushing the soft back of her throat.

He knew he was supposed to give her an answer. He was supposed to tell her it meant something. Between them, it always meant something. She could torture him, he could brutalize her, and they could fuck each other until their senses numbed, but it would always mean something. Always. There was never a disingenuous touch or an unfeeling glance—they would always be layered with meaning.

He needed to let her know. He needed it between them.

But with her mouth moving up and down his cock, with her eyes burning him into a new life, words had no hope of escaping him.

“Fa…”

She squeezed his balls, trailing her lips to his tip. “Got somethin’ to say?” she asked, nipping at him with her teeth. The rush of pain-laced-pleasure unmade him completely.

Where he found his voice, he didn’t know. But suddenly it was out there—gasping for freedom. “It means something, Faith,” he gasped. “It always has to me.”

She smiled and pressed his cock to his stomach, her tongue bouncing his sac with playfulness that lightened his heart.

Then she was prowling up his body, the warm wetness of her pussy sliding against him. Her breasts found his hands, her mouth consuming his. And as she welcomed him into her body, he found himself propelled into a strange new world.

She was hot. Christ, she was hot. Her vaginal muscles clamped so tightly around him he wondered if she meant to keep him forever.

At the moment, he wouldn’t mind being kept.

The few times he’d allowed himself to entertain the possibility of sex with Faith, he’d always imagined it would be fast and hard, nearly brutal. He hadn’t imagined kisses. He hadn’t imagined vulnerability. He hadn’t imagined any of what had happened.

In many ways, he felt he’d lost his virginity all over again.

“Wes?” she asked, her husky voice sending ripples of masculine pride through his sated body. He’d done that to her. He, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce, had fucked a slayer hoarse.

“Yeah?”

“Are you busy?”

“Hmmm?”

“Big daddy’s all caged up again. Is there some evil here you gotta fight?”

Wesley stretched luxuriously and glanced over at her. She was on her side, presenting him with the tantalizing view of her bronzed back. Somehow, she was even more magnificent in the soft glow of morning. “There will be eventually,” he decided. “But I suppose…in the immediate future…no. The Beast is destroyed. Wolfram and Hart is in shambles. Angel is…well, back to himself.”

Faith fell silent for a few seconds. His curiosity ebbed, but he didn’t push her.

“Do you think…you could come with us? To Sunnydale, I mean.” Faith turned over, teasing his eyes with the sight of her bare breasts. His hand couldn’t help but reach for one, taking a dusty nipple between his fingers. “You…could…”

“You want me to come with you?”

Her face went blank, her lips pursing. The answer was obvious but she didn’t want to give it. She’d already proven herself more vulnerable than he or anyone would have granted.

He wasn’t going to push her. The fact that she’d asked was enough.

“I’ll need time to pack.”

The warmth which split her once-broken face filled him with hope. Faith had pieced herself together again.

And slowly, she was helping him do the same.

 

It was late afternoon when Willow pulled up to the familiar home on Revello Drive. Wesley sat in the backseat beside Faith. She hadn’t said a word since leaving Los Angeles, but upon passing the mileage sign which put a mere fifty miles between them and Sunnydale, she’d seized his hand and squeezed. And so they’d sat. Comforting each other without words.

“All right,” Willow said, her voice overly cheery as though to make up for the tension ripping them apart. “Home sweet Hellmouth.”

Faith heaved a sigh and leaned back. “Where are all the kiddies?” she asked. “Way you talked it up, Will, I figured they’d be rolling out the windows.”

“I called ahead,” the witch explained. “Since I got more than one evil fighter in the deal, we figured it might be easier without a bunch of girls gabbing and…making with the…” Her eyes flickered to the rearview mirror and her alabaster skin blushed with vivid red. “You know…as those…teens are so prone to do.”

Wesley and Faith exchanged a glance.

“I just…I thought with everything…it might be easier to be surrounded by mostly-familiar faces.”

The familiar faces, as it turned out, consisted of Buffy and the vampire Wesley knew to be Spike. They were huddled in quiet conversation on the sofa, and if they sat any closer together, Buffy would be in the vampire’s lap. This didn’t surprise him. In the car, Willow had mentioned something about Buffy and a confusing relationship with Spike. To Wesley, there seemed to be a definitive lack of confusion.

He wondered what Rupert thought of this. But then, Rupert had never attempted to control Buffy, and when he had, it had ended badly. Wesley could only assume this was a temperament which had only hardened with age.

“Hey guys,” Willow said brightly, closing the door with more force than she needed. “I was just on my way back from Los Angeles and lookee what I found.”

The air around them grew still. Buffy froze the second she saw Faith, her body rising elegantly to its feet as though detached from her brain and operating solely on instinct. And without warning, the temperature in the room plummeted. “Faith,” she said, nodding civilly.

Faith sucked in a deep breath, steadied by Wesley’s hand at her back. “B,” she answered in kind before offering the vampire a nod. “And blondie.”

Spike assumed a position beside Buffy, giving Wesley the vague impression of a showdown from an old western. He didn’t say anything in return, but there was a slight flicker of acknowledgment in his eyes.

“I was under the impression you were coming with Wesley,” Buffy said, eying him with a notably lighter gleam of amusement. “Who’s this?”

“I know,” Willow agreed. “Freaky, huh? He’s turned all Indiana Jones on us.”

Faith clamped a surprisingly possessive hand around Wesley’s wrist. “Well, I heard you had a new boy in tow,” she said, sidling up to him. “Figured I’d bring my own this time.”

“Nice switch,” Buffy replied, voice clipped.

“Well, if this First thing goes better than we think, we can always hold a poll to see who looks hotter together. Blondes versus brunettes…and all that jazz.”

At that, Spike frowned self-consciously, and for a second Wesley caught a glance of self-loathing that rivaled his own during the best of times. It was deep enough for merit, and he understood without needing to be told it was the markings of a soul.

A soul in another vampire.

The child in him cackled with glee. Despite everything he and Angel had done to repair their friendship, there was an undeniable rush in the revelation that his once-employer wasn’t quite the oddity he envisioned himself.

Spike cleared his throat. “Buffy an’ I aren’t—”

“Going to play that game. We have more important things to worry about.” Buffy’s short explanation earned a bewildered and more than conflicted glance from the vampire. She ignored him, continuing, “But if you’re interested in hearing what’s-the-what on the First, pull up a chair.”

“Yeah, startin’ with this thing where I was freakin’ ambushed in the prison yard by a bitch with a wicked looking knife.” Faith’s brows perked. “A bitch who, funny enough, didn’t have a problem with me a week ago.”

Buffy nodded stoically and led Spike back to their seat on the sofa, indicating the twin chairs before them with a quick jerk of her head. For an insane second, Wesley thought Faith might snuggle up in his lap. She didn’t. Of course she didn’t. She would sooner dive head-first off a cliff than ask for help, especially in a room composed of people she felt were enemies.

“We’ve been getting Potentials here for days,” Buffy said softly. Her hand rested on Spike’s knee in a silent whisper at possession. It didn’t go unnoticed by anyone. “The First is trying to wipe out the Slayer line.”

“Willow tells me this thing’s been targetin’ little wannabes,” Faith retorted. “And here, I already got the superpower thing in check—you didn’t think it’d want me, too? Or did you think it beneath you to ring me up with a friendly phone call?” She paused. “Well, lukewarm phone call, I guess. Can’t hope for too much, now can we?”

Buffy wet her lips. “Sorry,” she said, her voice dropping. “Really, I’m sorry. I guess…I dunno what I thought. Maybe that you’d…be safe in prison?”

Faith snorted but didn’t say anything, rather glanced to Wesley for help. And inexplicably, Wesley found himself overcome with a rush of fondness. Something unprecedented; something he couldn’t ignore. Something which went beyond the strains of the effect she’d had on him—on grasping his hand and leading him away from darkness. Out of the hole of which she’d told him—the one where she knew the way out.

He cared about her. She was scared but she wasn’t a coward. She didn’t let her fears govern where she went. And she was here because she wanted to help. She wanted to make a difference.

She was in the proverbial lion’s den and she wasn’t flinching.

“I’m going to want to see the notes Rupert has on the First,” Wesley said softly. “My contacts in Los Angeles might be able to uncover something if I give them a starting point.”

Buffy hardened visibly at the mention of her Watcher, but her discomfort refused to bleed into her words. “Giles took all the girls out for training. He’ll be back soon.” She glanced at Spike. “We have patrol tonight.”

“We’ll go, too,” Wesley offered.

Faith blinked and looked at him.

“There are plenty of cemeteries in the area,” he continued reasonably. “Faith’s encounters with Angelus notwithstanding…I believe we can utilize the demonic breeding ground to test her resilience.” He met Faith’s eyes and graced her with what he hoped passed for a reassuring smile before returning his attention to Buffy. “You two can take the east. We’ll cover all the ground past…oh say, the ruins of the school.”

“Not ruins anymore,” Buffy said. “Actual school.”

“And the Hellmouth?”

“Hell and mouthy and right beneath the principal’s office. You guys can take him with you, if you’re gonna patrol.”

Wesley frowned. “The principal?”

“Robin Wood,” she said, favoring Spike’s knee with a reassuring squeeze when he stiffened. “He’s…well, his mother was a slayer, so I’m betting he’d love chatting you up.”

“Robin Wood,” Wesley repeated. “Nikki’s boy? The Slayer who…” Comprehension dawned and he shot Spike an uncomfortable, albeit empathetic glance. This must be awkward. “Ah. Right.”

“Yeah,” Buffy agreed. “I don’t want him with pointy, lethal objects around Spike anytime soon. We had a chat but…you know…boys with vendettas.”

Wesley pursed his lips and nodded. “Understood.” He sighed and rose to his feet. Faith did the same. “Is there a place where we can…?”

“We cleared out Dawn’s room for you earlier.” Buffy fidgeted slightly. “Willow…she mentioned it wouldn’t be a problem if we bunked you together.”

“You cleared out Dawn’s room?” Willow asked incredulously. “Does Dawn know this?”

“She will soon enough,” came the wry retort. Buffy met Wesley’s eyes again. “It’s not, is it? A problem? ‘Cause space is kinda of the nonexistent around here.”

“No,” Faith said sharply, surprising him with her random interjection. It seemed she needed to get a word in edgewise, and he understood. He understood all too well. “No, no problem, B. Just hope the whiny one doesn’t throw a hissy.”

“Whiny one’s gotten freakishly tall,” Buffy retorted, her eyes glistening with amusement. “I’d think twice before reintroducing her to that nickname. She’s not too thrilled you’re here.”

Faith snickered dryly and rolled her eyes. “Yeah, well, who is?” she retorted, and turned on her heel to head upstairs.

Wesley was helpless to do anything but follow her.

He would never forget the look on her face when he received the phone call.

They were training in the basement, drenched in sweat but having too much genuine fun to notice the other was out of breath. Wesley would be lying if he said his eyes hadn’t dipped more than once to her ample bosom; especially now that he knew how she tasted. How those fleshy mounds filled his hands. Faith would catch him staring at her and make some snide remark, but he noticed said remarks were always followed with moves which only accentuated the curves God had given her.

She had nightmares sometimes. Terrifying nightmares. Once she’d awakened him with her throaty moans, her silent plea not to be abandoned. Not here when she was a foreigner in a strange land. Sometimes it took a few minutes to reassure her that she wasn’t alone. He was with her, and he wasn’t going anywhere.

They were making their way out together. Because, while she might know the way out, he was still learning the path.

He was in awe of her courage. Of her strength. She’d come here against every instinct. She was facing her demons—not running from them. She was doing what he had still failed to do in his own life, and she was doing it with seemingly little awareness to how monumental these steps were. How much she was accomplishing simply by facing the thing she didn’t want to face.

It made the betrayal in her eyes even fiercer when he hung up.

“That was…Fred,” he said quietly. “There’s…something has happened in Los Angeles.”

He didn’t miss the way her breath caught in her throat. He didn’t miss the way her jaw hardened. He didn’t miss the flash of angered jealousy she couldn’t hide. He didn’t miss anything.

While Faith wasn’t privy to his past with Fred, he knew she knew something of their relationship. Wesley had broken her out of prison just a day or so after he accidentally instigated the breakup of Fred and Gunn. Accidental inasmuch as he had kissed Fred—and Christ, how that’d felt—and for Gunn, that had been the final straw in their rapidly deteriorating relationship. The same tension had followed Wesley into the Hyperion after he brought Faith into the mix, and it was the sort of thing one always noticed, even if it went unmentioned.

Faith sensed Fred meant something to him.

She sensed what any fool could see.

“Oh?” she said, swallowing hard. “Somethin’ apocalyptic? ‘Cause we’re kinda up to our asses in that shit here, if you hadn’t noticed.”

Wesley frowned. “No…more along the lines of…a cult.”

“A cult,” she replied incredulously. “You’re seriously bailin’ on the end of days for a cult?”

“It’s complicated…it’s more than that.”

“Isn’t it always?”

“She’s alone, Faith. Whatever lies this leader has spun, she’s the only one who can see through them. She needs…she needs—”

“You. Just say it, Wes. She needs you. She needs you all over.” She snorted. “Yeah. Her fuckin’ hero. I got it.” Faith batted a dismissive hand and turned away from him, reaching for one of the towels they’d brought downstairs. “You gotta go.”

Guilt crashed with desire. He didn’t know what to do. He was a man with a foot in both worlds and he didn’t know what to do. A few weeks ago, the decision would have been easy. This wouldn’t be a scenario which demanded a decision. Fred was the girl he loved. No matter what he meant to her, she was the girl he loved. And if she asked him to come for her, there was nothing in this world to prevent him from going.

Fred was the girl he loved.

But Faith…Faith was the woman he needed.

“I’ll come back.”

She snorted again and dabbed her brow with the towel. “Whatever.”

“I will come back. As soon as—”

“Just…get out. You’re wastin’ time. She needs you, remember? Go.”

Wesley stared at her back for a few long, endless seconds. Then, without another word, he sighed and turned away. And while every step hardened his legs into stone, he pushed onward. He made it out.

Faith didn’t call after him.

And he didn’t look back.

 

A/N: Thank you to everyone who gave this story a chance.

Five-by-Five

In the end, life is made of choices. No bells. No whistles. No pomp and circumstance. No catches. Life is incapable of being reduced to absolutes. There is no black and white. No right and wrong. No evil and good. No proverbial line drawn in the sand, declaring sides in a war without end. Life is a series of answers, not questions; the questions were already there. It was left to those who tackle them to decide their meaning.

Why it took him so long to realize this, Wesley didn’t know. He supposed it was symptomatic of living.

There was no reason for Faith to have saved him. Not after he walked out on her. His promise to her hung over him, poisoning his dreams and haunting every step he took in the space between sleep. What he thought would only be a day or so turned into a week, then two, then three.

Then nothing, for word came that Sunnydale was gone. There was no news on survivors. Not for two weeks, then a grief-riddled Buffy had knocked on his door with Willow and Xander at her side. At first, Wesley had assumed the worst…before he remembered that while Buffy didn’t hate Faith, she certainly wouldn’t weep over her. Not like this.

No. It was Spike. Spike was gone.

Wesley didn’t learn of the amulet or Angel’s abrupt mini-holiday to Sunnydale until after the vampire had returned, ready to assume presidential duties at the Los Angeles branch of Wolfram and Hart. And after he was told what had happened, Wesley’s guilt had consumed him. Had he not left, he would have been able to help. Had he not left, Faith wouldn’t be lost to him. Had he not left, Buffy wouldn’t have lost her lover. He would have known the medallion’s powers were malevolent. He would have known.

Angel hadn’t told him. Hadn’t told anyone, and he’d done it out of selfishness. He’d gone to Sunnydale on two fronts: to put the memory of Cordelia and the mess which had transpired over the past year behind him by revisiting his past, and to confirm Wesley’s report on Buffy’s apparent relationship with a vampire who wasn’t him. Wesley had been adamant about returning to Sunnydale—about helping Faith—ever since he and Fred successfully detoxed Angel, Gunn, and Lorne’s minds from the intoxicating allure of Jasmine’s lies. Angel knew how important it was for Wesley to return. How important it was to Faith.

And yet, no matter how irritated Wesley was with Angel, he was livid with himself.

There was only so much blame he could pass around before it landed in his lap. The fact remained he’d run out on her when she needed help. He’d done so thoughtlessly, and though not without motive, without carefully weighing the consequences. Without realizing how much damage one little decision could make.

One choice. Wesley had made his. He’d returned to Los Angeles. To the Hyperion. And when it became clear that Faith didn’t wish to be found, Wesley had given up.

Then Fred had whispered she loved him, and all the grief, the guilt, the anguish to which he’d submitted himself evaporated into nothing at all. The tunnel no longer existed; he was in the light. He was free. There were no more questions, no more definitive arguments; he was at the end of a long journey, and he had the girl he loved at his side.

But with every kiss they’d shared, with every stolen moment he could clearly assert as theirs, there remained a lingering sensation of falsity. The notion that life was never sweet or storybook like—life was real, and if it seemed too good to be true, chances were it was.

He lost Fred just days after she told him she loved him. He lost her to a God King.

And with her light ripped away, he found himself spiraling backward. Back into the tunnel—lost in the hole. Only now, there was no friend to help him out. He’d burned his last bridge reaching for a fairytale—something he knew, even if he didn’t wish to admit it, wouldn’t have lasted even if Illyria hadn’t murdered Fred’s precious soul.

It wouldn’t have lasted because Fred represented his past. The thing he wanted to hold onto more than anything. He loved her, of course, and he always would.

But he wasn’t the man he’d been when he’d first started falling in love with her.

That man was dead. That man had died in a park, his throat slit and a vampire’s miracle child ripped from his arms.

The kind of darkness he’d faced remained imprinted in his skin, and even though Fred herself had known dark times, she was pure enough to recover. To pull herself out. In the end, he would have only ruined her. A person who has never cracked couldn’t know how to love a person who had been broken as long as he had.

Fred represented his past. The thing he couldn’t work toward because it was gone. And while he mourned her—mourned the loss of the purest person he’d ever known, mourned the fact the world wasn’t screaming with him—there was a part of him which refused to scream for himself. It wasn’t what she meant to him that mattered—it was what she meant to those around him. To light itself.

When all was said and done, Wesley found himself needing Faith.

Only Faith didn’t need him.

Buffy had told him everything he cared to know about what happened to Faith, and was good enough to give him an update when he telephoned her after Spike’s mysterious reappearance in Angel’s office. She hoped to bring Faith with her when she came to collect her lover after he was made corporeal again, but like Wesley, she had little to no luck tracking her down.

It was as though Faith had dropped off the face of the planet.

That was, until, the night Angel decided to overthrow the Black Thorn and in doing so, Wolfram and Hart itself.

He’d seen Faith that night. She’d come for him. She’d saved his life.

And she’d disappeared. She’d moved so fast, she might as well have been a shadow. Had she not barked at him to keep to the ground, he might have thought himself delusional. But there was no mistaking the voice.

There was no mistaking the way her body curved.

Two years had passed since that night. He hadn’t heard a word from her since.

Now everything was different. Gunn was dead. Angel was living with his werewolf somewhere. Illyria worked with the Watcher’s Council, headed by Buffy and Giles. Dawn Summers was in college. Xander was engaged to a slayer and living in a rural town in Mississippi, where he claimed there to be a surprisingly high number of southern vampires. Willow and Kennedy stuck close to the Council, though word was they were on the verge of splitting up for good. Buffy sent Wesley letters every now and then, often signed Buffy and Spike, (no matter what he tells you). He wondered if she was secretly prodding him for information about Faith; surely she couldn’t know how his heart galloped upon receiving every correspondence. And how disappointed he was when she offered him nothing new.

Nothing which would lead him to her.

It seemed obvious, of course, that he would find her the second he stopped looking.

Then again, two weary souls such as theirs were always destined to cross paths. No matter how far he wandered from everyone else, Wesley always seemed to find his way home when he met her eyes.

“’Lo Wes,” she said as he approached, tossing back a stiff drink. She was seated on a barstool in some nondescript pub, acting, for all the world, as though not a day had passed since he left the Summers’ basement.

As though nothing at all had happened.

“Faith.”

She met his eyes at last, but they revealed nothing. She was hardened and calloused, her body tight with anxious tension, prepared to throw herself into a fray at the drop of a pin. “Word has it you’ve been lookin’ for me.”

Wesley paused, a lump seizing his throat. “Oh?”

“Well, come on. You’ve made a lot of noise these past coupla years. A girl’s bound to figure it out eventually.”

“I’d almost given up.” He said almost because he didn’t want to admit he had.

“Maybe you should have.”

“You disappeared.”

She shook her head and threw back another drink. “Nope, Boss. Sorry. That was you. Heard the hero thing worked out for you in the end though, right? Good for you.” She quirked a brow, fresh pain bleeding through her eyes. “Guess there’s no competition when the other chick’s one who never tied you up and tortured the livin’ crap outta you, huh.”

Wesley pursed his lips. “Fred’s gone, Faith. She died.”

Faith stiffened. “Oh. Sorry.”

“It’s been a while.”

“This the reason you’ve been turning over stones to find me?”

“No.”

“’Cause I gotta tell you…playing second fiddle to anyone, living or not…not exactly this girl’s dream.”

Wesley inhaled sharply. “You are no one’s second fiddle, Faith.”

“History begs to differ.”

“I was wrong to leave you when I did.”

She snorted and rolled her eyes. “Like I cared,” she retorted coldly, finishing off another drink. “You were out, Robin was in. He thanked you, by the way, for keepin’ the sheets toasty.”

Wesley didn’t want to contemplate the jealousy which speared his weary veins at the thought of her with another man. It was testosterone; he had no reason to be angry, and he knew it.

“What happened to him?” he asked instead, determined to burn the image of their bodies entwined out of his head.

Faith shrugged. “He wanted to show me I was worth more than just a few tosses in the sack. Think I scared him. There are dark people, Wes, and then there are dark people…and I’m not talkin’ cosmetics. Robin thought he’d gone all wicked ‘cause of his mom and Spike. He got too close to me, and I scared him. Figures. I’m good at doin’ that.”

“You didn’t scare me Faith.”

A cruel smile twisted her lips. “And again, Wes, we’re not talkin’ about you.”

“I’ve searched the world for you—”

“I don’t wanna hear it.”

“Faith…I always meant to return. Always.” He paused. “It’s a meager excuse, and you have no reason to believe me. By the time it was over, you were gone. Buffy told me you had…developed a relationship with Robin Wood, therefore I assumed—”

“So it’s my fault?”

An exasperated sigh tore off his lips. “Of course not.” He fell silent, his eyes falling to the dirty pub floor. “I made mistakes. I will always make mistakes. There is no reason for you to…but I found myself searching for you.”

Faith tossed her head back with another drink. She didn’t say anything.

He held his breath. “I…I need you.”

She snorted. “That has to be the dumbest line I’ve ever heard. Really…is that all you got?”

“I…”

“If it’s true, I’m sorry for you. I’m sorry for anyone who—”

“It was real with you, Faith. It was real for me, and I know it was real for you, too.” His heart jumped but he forbade his face from revealing it. The way her eyes flashed alerted him that he had struck something—be it a nerve or a memory or both, he didn’t know. All he knew was, in that second, he felt she might be within reach. “It was real with you…and it’s never been real with anyone else.”

He fell quiet and she didn’t reply. Not for long seconds. Around them, bar patrons drank and laughed and talked loudly about crude matters. No one looked at them; they were unremarkable. Two lost souls converging in a dirty corner of the world.

Even when they strayed, they found each other.

“Look,” Faith said suddenly, her voice clipped, “I’m not lookin’ for a savior—”

“I am.”

“Then I’m sorry for you.” She slid off her stool and tossed a few pounds onto the counter, nodding at the bartender. “Sorry. We had fun. We did. But—”

“It was more than fun.”

Faith shrugged. “Not to me.”

“You’re lying.”

“Whatever.” She strode past him without blinking, claiming a leather jacket from the coat rack. “I’m outta here.”

“Where are you staying?”

“Don’t see how it’s any of your business.”

“I’m determined to make this right, Faith.”

“You’re determined to get laid. Big difference.” She quirked a brow, and though it was the furthest thing from the truth, he knew better than to challenge her. “See ya, Wes.”

“Don’t go.”

“And yet, here I go.”

He let her get as far as the door. It hit him out of nowhere—knowledge beyond knowledge. A truth which rendered him leveled. If she left, this would be the last time he saw her. There would be no reunion. No hope to fix all the wrongs he’d committed. He needed this—he needed this so very much. This relationship which had no boundaries or definitions. This relationship which had saved him in his darkest times.

If she left, he would be left in the hole forever.

The idea of never seeing her again knocked air out of his body. He couldn’t let her leave.

Thus he said the first thing that came to mind.

It was just coincidence it was also the truth.

“I love you.”

Faith froze in the doorway, and his breath caught in his throat. She didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Didn’t breathe, from the looks of it. She just stood, seemingly frozen. Caught between realities. And if he knew her at all, swimming in disbelief.

It was only fair. He hadn’t known it, either. Not until the words knew life. But now that it was out there, he knew it was real. With them, it always had been. The ugly truth. Five methods of torture. Blunt. Sharp. Cold. Hot. Loud. In a manner of seconds, he experienced them all.

Slowly, Faith turned around, her eyes unreadable.

“Well?” she drawled, her fingers flexing. “You comin’ or not?”

A dull ringing filled his ears and his jaw went slack. It wasn’t until she stepped forward and seized his hand that he realized it was real.

It was real.

Faith was pulling him into the night. She was leading him out of the tunnel.

And while the journey would be grueling, for the first time, his mind was free of questions. There was nothing but wind in his face and Faith at his side.

The rest was silence.




THE END