A Simple Act of Faith Chapter 2

Los Angeles had been terrorized.  Vampires were receiving word that it was best to stay away from the slayer of LA.  She had decided to wage war against them and had spread the word that she was going to stake every last one of them.  There would be no protection, no running away.

Faith had been in the last three months working out her aggression on the vampires she slayed.  Lilith never knew because Faith was acting all dainty and slayer like when she watched.  But when Lilith was gone, Faith did a beat down on every vampire she encountered.

Everything had gone wrong since she came back from Sunnydale after giving Angel back his soul.  Doyle had left—doing his duty by serving the warrior for the Powers that Be.  Faith was back to being a vampire slayer.  Without Doyle, Alex’s cases were just normal ones, although word had gotten out that she did take cases for the paranormal.  A few had come in, but most of her cases involved helping the police and boring ones such as trailing cheating spouses.

That was not what bothered her.  She knew the vision and Angelus thing would not last and she would be back to being a vampire slayer again.  It was not Lilith.  She seemed nice and even more liberal than Wesley.

It was Lindsey.

Ever since they had gotten back from Sunnydale, he had become a little more distant to her.  Faith had decided to give him time because he never really had it to deal with Cordelia’s death.  She had decided to move in with Lilith.  Not that she planned to stay there much longer.  Alex had given her a 10 grand raise. The extra money could secure her a small place in West Hollywood.   Faith did not want to think that Alex had the extra money because of the loss of Wesley, Cordelia and Doyle.  She wanted to get her own place as soon as she worked out things with Lindsey.

She was starting to think she had waited to long for him. It seemed that giving him space seemed to be driving him further away.
 

Lindsey placed the guitar in the back of his closet.  He was not sure if he ever wanted to play again.

The host had told him to be careful.  That it was okay to mourn Cordelia, but he should not dwell on it.  That would lead him to darkness.

It seemed that everything he did lead him to darkness.  He wondered perhaps if that was where he belonged and he made his life harder by not going with the flow.

The pain of losing Cordelia, of causing her death, was more overwhelming than the hollowness he felt when he worked for Wolfram and Hart.

Lindsey lay down in his bed.  The queensize bed he shared with Cordelia for only two and a half short months.

He looked at his clock.  6:45.  He used to get up at 6:45 when he worked at Wolfram and Hart.  Not that he ever actually got up at that time.  He never really slept well when he worked there.  It was only after Angelus murdered that child did he realize the reason.

Alex always said they should report to work around 10, but she was very liberal about that.  It depended on the cases.  He had planned to get up around 8.  He used to get up at 7 and make coffee so Cordelia would not have too.

Instead he turned off his alarm and went back to sleep.  Sleep never came.  Millions of reasons went through his mind on what he could have done to save Cordelia.  Five minutes earlier, she could have lived.

But the reason he kept coming up with was if she had never fallen in love with him.
 

Alexandria Taylor, called Alex to her friends and good clients entered the empty dark office at 8:30.  She used to look forward to this time, but now the office felt cold and uninviting.

She sighed.  For two months, Lina had worked here full time.  She opened the office in the morning, actually made good coffee and had even brought doughnuts.

Lina was now back in school, so the office remained dark.  Lindsey would not show up until 10 if she were lucky, even though he was only one story up.  Faith, due to her patrolling and training schedule usually showed up at noon.

For the past week, Lina was in school, so Alex remembered how much she wanted to sell this place.  She wanted a new place with better security.

Alex sat down at Cordelia’s desk.  It would always be Cordelia’s desk.  Alex had decided to never hire a replacement. She could answer her own telephones.

She missed the both of them, but she especially missed Wesley.  She did not know what would happen in their relationship and that’s what bothered her.  It could have been the best one ever.  She would never know.

She sighed.  She went over to the new coffee machine to make some.  She had thrown out the other one in a fit of rage one morning.  It still contained the moldy coffee grinds for when Cordelia last made coffee.

She sighed, she didn’t need caffeine.  She went into her office.  Instead of making coffee, she decided to bury herself in her work,
 

He lay in bed for the next three hours.  They all thought he slept.  But once he woke up, that was it.  There was no going back to sleep for him.

Faith had asked him to start sleeping back on his side of the bed.  She said it was unhealthy.  Although he felt safe and secure on her side,  He was surrounded by her scent now fading due to the passing time.  He wished he hadn’t listened to Faith.  He could have taken in her scent just a little while longer.

If only they had a little while longer.  He remembered that she wanted to make love the day she died and he told her to wait for him to get home.

They should have had children, they should have had a normal life.  Their children would have been so beautiful.

He sighed.  Every day he thought about it.  He thought that Angel was out there and she was not.

He had sacrificed her for Angel and he did not think Angel deserved it.

Neither did he.  When he married her, he thought he would be the one to die.  With Angelus and Wolfram and Hart gunning for him, it was only a matter of time before he slipped up and they caught him.

He should have known.  That’s how Wolfram and Hart worked.  That’s how evil worked.  It never went after you only the ones that you cared about.  Eventually it would come for Faith.  So he suddenly stopped caring about her. In hopes that evil would never find her.

Lindsey had heard movements downstairs.  He guess Alex had come in.  He supposed he should get ready and face the day.
 

Alex heard someone creeping around the office.  She assumed that it was Lindsey.  She looked at the picture taped to the wall next to her desk.  It was a candid picture of Wesley taken at Lindsey and Cordelia’s wedding.

“Wes,” she said to the picture.  She found it comforting to talk to him since there was never anyone to comfort her.  Faith was far to concerned for Lindsey, Lindsey was far to concerned about himself, Doyle was gone, Kate was not close enough and Lina was a kid. “What am I going to do?”

Wesley did not respond, not that Alex expected him to.  He stood there in the picture and smiled—forever happy.  She felt utterly alone. Instead she decided to get up and say good morning to Lindsey.
 

Coffee smells were in the next room.  Lindsey was sitting at Cordelia’s desk, drinking coffee.  She guessed he decided to make some.  He barely went into his office at all.  That never bothered Alex.  No one wanted to go into the room where Cordelia died.  They rather sit at her desk knowing that she was happy when she sat there.

“Good morning, Lindsey,” Alex said and smiled.

“Oh,” Lindsey said and yawned slightly.  “Good morning Alex.”

“Sleep okay?”

“Like a baby,” he said and they both knew he was lying.  Alex and Faith had both realized that Lindsey wasn’t sleeping well.

“Have you been thinking about that number I gave you?”

Lindsey shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t like that new age stuff.”

“It’s not new age stuff.  He’s a shrink.  His group deals with—deals with the death of a spouse.  Come on,  go to him once— we’re worried about you.”

“My wife hasn’t even been dead for three months,” he replied.  “I’m supposed to act this way.”

“It’s just one meeting.”

“These people are probably parents,” he retorted.  “It hurts more if there are children involved.”

“That isn’t true,” she replied.  “It’s for people who have lost someone very close to them.”

“Then you should go or Faith.  You both lost people close to you.  You should both go,” he retorted.

“We’ve been moving on with our life,” she replied.  “We are worried that you aren’t.”

“I’m not ready yet,” he said.  “Okay—“

Alex did not want to argue.  But she wondered how much longer she would have to wait.
 

The Beatles had invaded her sleep.

Each one believing that love never dies,
But watching her eyes
And hope that there’s something there…
 

“Faith,” said Lilith’s voice.  Her voice chased away the Beatles.  John Lennon who was still alive in her dream faded into obscurity.

“Faith,” Lilith’s voice repeated.

Faith finally opened her eyes.  She realized what happened.  She had slept right through her alarm.

Lilith was standing over her, wearing the same type of business suit she had worn every day.  It just changed color.

Faith had treated Lilith just like a teacher she respected.  Their relationship was just watcher-slayer that was it.  She was not close to her like Giles was with Buffy or good friends they way she had been with Wes.

“Wake up, Faith.  Your alarm’s been going off for the past ten minutes.”

Faith stretched.  What time had she set the alarm for?  She had gone on patrol until 3am.  She looked at her clock, it was 10.  She wished she could sleep a little longer.

“Come on,” Lilith said and tried to smile.

“Let me sleep a little more,” she said.  “I like dusted over 15 vamps last night.”

“That’s very good,” Lilith said,  “but you should be staking more.  I’m not waking you up to train, though it’s time.  You have a phone call.  It’s Buffy Summers.”

Faith suddenly woke up.  Buffy and her had limited contact over the summer.  They called each other once in a while.  She knew she had to talk to her now. She stretched and headed to the other room where the phone was.  She picked it up remembering when Wesley bought it.   It was a white touch-tone phone with no extra features.  Not even redial.

“Hey, Buffy.”

“Hey,” said her voice.

“How’s everyone?” she asked. “How’s your mom—“  For a moment Faith felt dizzy.

“Faith?”

“Oh nothing, how’s Dawnie?”

“Same way she always is being a royal pain in the ass.”

“Not much worse than me,” Faith said and laughed.  “So what’s up?”

“Well—“ she said, hesitant.

“Everyone’s alright?” Faith asked, growing concerned.

“Everything good—I met someone a few days ago.”

“Met—like in you’re dumping Riley met.”

“No—no—nothing like that,” she explained.  “Riley’s been my rock, especially after that whole deal with Angelus.”

“Then what?” she asked.  She didn’t want to talk about Angelus.

“Promise me you won’t laugh.”

“Yeah, what is it?”

“It was Dracula—I met Dracula.”

Although Faith had promise, she could not help but to start laughing.

“Faith,” Buffy said, sounding annoyed.  “You promised.”

“I know, I know,” Faith said.  “I promised.  The Dracula—He really was the Dracula?  Like Bela Lugosi?”

“Yep,” Buffy replied.  She paused for a moment.  “I wanted to talk to you about the things he said to me.”

“Like what?”

“Our powers—he said they were founded in darkness.”

“What?” Faith asked.

“That’s what he said-- Look you know what Giles, Willow, Xander and I did to defeat Adam? Right?”

“Yep.  Combined yourself or something, just not in a sexual way.”

“Well, I didn’t tell you that afterwards the four of us had the same dream.  The first Slayer came to us and tried to kill us in our dreams because the slayer-- We’re supposed to be alone.  She wasn’t to happy I was sharing the power.”

“You know I don’t know or care about this mumbo jumbo crap.  All I know is that I kill vamps and I stop evil.”

“Well I’m interested in it.  So I’m wondering if you can do me a favor.”

“Okay.  Anything B.”

“Tell Lilith you are interested in learning about the slayer’s history and then pass that stuff on to me.  Giles has some stuff he hid from the watchers, but it is not much.”

“Sure thing.”

“It was good talking to you Faith—“ Buffy paused for a moment.  “How’s Lindsey and Alex?”

“They are fine,” she lied.  She didn’t want to burden Buffy about what’s was going on with Lindsey.

“And Doyle—“ Buffy said, beating around the bush.

“Buffy,” Faith said.  “I do my best not to see him.  It’s to painful, but as far as I know, he’s okay.”

“Thanks,” she replied.  “We’ll talk again soon, okay.”

“Right.  Love ya, B.”

“Me too.  Bye.”  Faith hung up the phone.  Lilith came back into the room.

“So what did Buffy want?”

“It was real cool.  Buffy met the actual Dracula.”

“I hope she staked him.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“Anyone, get ready, you have to go train.”

“Can we at least go out for pancakes first?” she asked.  “Oh, yeah, Lilith, who came first the vampire or the slayer?”
 

Darla was being briefed by a young lawyer named Gavin Park who was explaining what happened in the four years since Angel staked her.  Drusilla had filled in some of it.  Apparently the Master had failed and was long dead.  Died not long after she did.  Spike and Drusilla had taken the Master’s place, but had briefly broken up when Spike had side with the Slayer to get rid of Angelus, but apparently Spike and Angelus had made some kind of peace before he had his soul restored.

“Where’s Angelus now?” she asked Gavin, after he explained what had happened the past year.  How Faith and Lindsey had restored Angel’s soul, but not before he killed Lindsey’s wife and Faith’s watcher.

“He and the seer have set up shop in the seers’ apartment on Sunset, but I think he plans to move.”

“And what is his relationship to the slayer and this Lindsey fellow?”

“They both despise him.  Apparently the two groups avoid each other completely,” Park explained.

“Lindsey McDonald has been frequenting Caritas singing very depressing songs.  He has been unable to get over his wife’s death.  Which is fine with us.  Mr. McDonald was a former associate with Wolfram and Hart.  He betrayed us.”

“Angel most be feeling that horrible guilt,” she said.  “It keeps him from being what he once was.”

“That is what we want.”

“But you failed miserably, that is what Dru said.  Two of your employees aided in restoring his soul.”

“A mistake that will not be repeated.  Mr. Reed screwed up terribly on this project.  Mr. Manners is far more skilled in helping people see their true calling.  With his help, we’ll get Angelus back to our side.”

“Oh he lies,” Drusilla said.  “Liar Liar, pants on fire.  That’s why I like him so much.”

“We must drive him into my arms,” Darla said.  “He loved me so.  He will lose his soul.  We must make his life so very painful that he’ll want me to make it better.”

“How are you going to do that?”

“I will make his guilt so overwhelming.  I will make things that he has done as Angelus haunt him.”
 

Chapter 3

Home

Main

Faekitty Pages