"That's not gonna happen," Faith said, her expression not even changing as she gazed at Buffy. Her cheek lying on the pillow, arms folded beneath her head, she looked more like someone about to doze off than someone looking up the barrel of a gun.

Buffy couldn't believe what she was hearing; neither, apparently, could Kimberly.

"Faith-" She began, eyes locked on the pistol. She was on the far side of the renegade Slayer's body from Buffy, too far to make a try for the gun even if she were inclined to try. The girl on the bed didn't turn her head towards the doctor; she remained where she was, still with an expression of unconcern on her face.

"Don't worry, doc. Whatever happens here you'll be okay." Her lips quirked slightly, a bare suggestion of a smile. "My girl here doesn't like hurting 'innocent people', do you, B? You wouldn't shoot her just 'cause she's helping me out, would ya?"

Buffy couldn't understand Faith's lack of fear. She couldn't be as calm as she appeared, not in this situation.

"No, she's fine. Other than having a serious deficiency in the morals department, that is."

Amazingly, the doctor bristled at that.

"Faith saved my life," She said, drawing herself up and staring at the blonde Slayer. "And my mother's also, actually. Held against that, the lives of strangers don't mean much to me." She seemed to only then realize what she was saying, and her eyes fell. Even so, her voice held a stubborn note. "I'm sorry if that seems cold, but that's the way it is."

Buffy shook her head in disbelief.

"Where do you people come from? How can you…?" She had to stop, there just weren't any words for how she felt. And Faith was still just lying there, utterly relaxed, watching her with those placid eyes. "Get up; slowly." It occurred to her then to wonder if there was a phone in the room, to use to call Giles. A quick look failed to show one, and she scowled. Of course, Faith still had her cell phone, it just wasn't likely that the girl would be willing to loan it to her. "Come on, get up. Or do you want a bad arm to go with that leg?"

The girl just eyed her lazily, and then had the audacity to grin.

"Go ahead and do it then. Oh, and the safety is that little slide over your thumb."

Buffy blinked, then hastily fumbled the indicated slide back until a small red dot was visible. Faith watched all this with ill-disguised amusement, though the Slayer didn't think it was particularly funny.

"You don't think I'll do it? I can shoot you, no problem." She shifted the gun until it was aimed at the girl's right arm, just above the elbow. At a range of less than six feet, there was no way she could miss. "I'm serious, I'll do it."

Faith's grin went away, but her gaze never flinched.

"No, you won't." Buffy gaped, at a loss, and the girl glanced back over her shoulder. "Doc, were you done?"

Kimberly, hugging herself and staring fixedly at the gun, nodded rapidly.

"Yes, I suppose so."

"Great." Moving slowly, Faith drew herself up and into a sitting position. Her good leg she curled beneath her, the injured one, the one with a gun identical to the weapon Buffy currently held nestled in her boot, remained stretched out straight. Now was the time to shoot, if shooting was going to happen, and she….

And Buffy couldn't seem to make herself do it. Why, she had no idea, surely she had ample cause. It wouldn't even kill Faith to shoot her in the arm, and yet….

"If you were going to try something you would have done it already," Faith said, watching her with a sort of idle interest. "And I don't mean just now, with that."

The Slayer glared at her, the gun wavering back and forth from the girl's arm, to her face, to her injured leg… and finally she let her arm fall to her side.

"All right, since you know me so well, tell me why I'm not using this stupid thing on you like you deserve."

Faith smiled, though it was a weary smile. It had, after all, been a very long day.

"That's easy; because you don't want to." Buffy opened her mouth to hotly refute that one; the renegade didn't give her the chance. "Baby, I know you. Every time today, when you started thinking about comin' at me, I could practically hear those little gears inside your head turning. You've had half a dozen chances since we killed that demon; when my back was turned, or when you had a weapon in your hand and I didn't. If you'd taken any one of 'em you probably could have beat the crap outta me, but you didn't." She shrugged, and turned a hand palm up. "And that's because you didn't want to hurt me. You might think you do, and your little friends would expect you to. You probably even think it's your fucking duty to take me down, and you still won't do it."

At some point during that little speech Buffy's breathing had gotten fast and shallow, and now that she'd noticed it she was doing her best to get it under control.

"Maybe you're wrong," She said, all but spitting the words. "Maybe you don't know me as well as you think."

Faith folded her hands in her lap, and quirked an eyebrow.

"Okay then, prove me wrong. Use the gun, or that knife you have up your sleeve, there."

She waited then, patient as she'd never been back when the two of them were stalking vampires together. Buffy stared at her, then at the gun she held. Kimberly was trying her best to be invisible on the far side of the bed, but her presence there made it even more humiliating for the Slayer. Eventually she had to admit defeat. Carefully replacing the gun atop the bedside table, Buffy passed a trembling hand over her eyes.

"What is wrong with me?" She asked plaintively. "I can't believe any of this is happening."

Faith cocked her head slightly to one side.

"You think not shooting me makes you a bad person or something? Trust me, you have to go a lot further than that before the villain's union gives you a membership card." She looked at her leg, prodding the area around the bite with a cautious finger. "And don't feel bad; I should have shot you again, earlier, when you spouted that Clint Eastwood line at me." The girl gave a her a lopsided smirk. "Guess we're both way off our game today, huh?" She brushed at her let once more. It must have still hurt her, she winced just a little, but the wound stayed closed, and she nodded her approval. "Thanks, doc. Nice work." She paused, her eyes flicking back to Buffy, and the way she was standing there with her weight awkwardly balanced on her good leg. "Do me a favor, if you've got time." She looked at Kimberly while jerking a thumb back at the standing Slayer. "Fix my friend here up too, would you?"

The doctor did not look happy about the request; a sentiment that Buffy shared.

"I'm fine, really. No need for you to go out of your way or anything-"

Faith had already scooted over to the far side of the bed, and was patting the spot where she'd been lying. "Come on, B; don't be shy."

Reluctantly, Buffy stepped forward and eased herself down on the bed. Adopting Faith's old position of sitting propped up against the headboard, she watched as the doctor warily donned a fresh set of latex gloves and withdrew some fresh instruments from her bag.

"I should start with something for the pain," She said, unwrapping a disposable hypodermic. Buffy tensed in a hurry, Faith's hand on her arm the only thing keeping her from leaping out of the bed.

God, no; not again! Ever since Giles had tricked her, injecting her with the alchemical mixture the Watchers used to negate a Slayer's abilities, she'd had nightmares about it. Not just the helplessness of being merely human, but the way it had violated her. She'd trusted Giles, trusted him as she trusted no other person on the planet… and he'd betrayed her.

Just as Faith had betrayed her, with her defection to the Mayor, and her deceptions that had nearly led to… what? She claimed now that the torture session would have come to nothing, that it had all been a mistake, but how could Buffy be sure of that?

Even now, the needle that this doctor friend of hers was holding might contain poison, or worse yet, that same mixture the Watchers had used. If Faith had planned ahead, if she was hoping to render the Slayer unable to even fight her--

"No need for that, doc," Faith said to the woman. "B here is like me; she can take a little pain. And… she has kind of a thing about needles." Kimberly nodded, setting the hypo aside. Buffy breathed a soft sigh of relief, somehow more uncertain now than she had been a few seconds earlier.

I'd almost rather it had been a trick, she thought to herself in confusion. At least then I'd know how to react. Evil Faith I can fight, this one-- The hand was still resting on Buffy's arm. Not gripping painfully to hold her down against torture; it was more like a gesture of reassurance, of… possessiveness?

--This Faith is just not making any sense to me. Is it because there's something wrong with her, or because there's something wrong with me? Buffy wondered. When the Slayer stared pointedly at Faith's hand, though, the girl took the hint and removed it.

She remained sitting where she was, though, which was nearly close enough for their hips to touch. Only by folding her injured leg half under her was Faith able to give the doctor enough room to reach Buffy's injury, and the awkward posture had to hurt some, though she gave no sign of discomfort. Instead, she looked on with keen interest as Kim began cutting away the bloody cloth around the wound.

"I'm going to look pretty silly, walking home like this," Buffy commented, just to break the silence. Faith nodded towards the chest by the far wall, her eyes still following the doctor's hands as they moved on the blonde's leg.

"You can take whatever you want outta there; I'm not taking the rest of that with me, and I can't come back here anyway, now that you know where it is."

Buffy had a strange, nearly overpowering urge to apologize for that, but the impulse vanished when one of those metal probes started digging around in her wound. She hissed, and pressed her head back against the wall, and only the awareness that Faith was there, watching her, prevented tears of pain from streaming down her cheeks. Closing her eyes helped, but even so the few minutes that followed seemed like an eternity.

She was certainly no stranger to pain, but normally it was something she held at bay with a wall made of adrenaline. In combat, with your life on the line, there was literally no time to feel an injury. That wasn't the case now, with this slow, careful digging through her torn flesh. It hurt, badly, and it went on, and on, and on-

Buffy hadn't even realized that her hand was digging into the mattress, that her rigid fingers were tearing, clawlike, through the sheets and into the wire and fabric beneath, until someone took hold of that hand. With gentle, inexorable strength, her fingers were drawn out of the shredded material, then interlaced in a strange hand. Slightly larger than her own, with a narrow palm and long, strong fingers, it suffused her shock-chilled flesh with warmth. She knew, in a distant sort of way, who it had to be, but the pain was much more immediate. When a lance of agony more intense than the others went through her, the Slayer squeezed that hand in response, and she didn't remember to be careful. No one, human or vampire, could have endured that without having a dozen or so bones reduced to powder. This person, though, just squeezed back with a firm, reassuring pressure.

It was comforting; amazingly so, just to have her hand held like that. It helped make the rest of the process bearable, and when she realized that the agonizing probing and cleaning was over, she wasn't able to open her eyes immediately. So it happened that as she lay there recovering, Buffy slowly realized that it wasn't just her hand that was in contact with someone else. Her hair, which had already been half-torn out of it's intricate arrangement by day's struggles, had been unpinned and untangled, and was now being slowly stroked. It was soothing-and also quite disturbing. Opening her eyes, she saw that, of course, it was Faith. When she turned her head slightly towards the girl's hand, the fingers that had combing through her hair stopped… and then gave her cheek a final, light caress, just barely brushing against her skin.

Buffy stared, and the tenderness she saw on Faith's face was as confusing as all the rest of it.

"What are you doing?" The blonde Slayer asked, and she meant more by that than just the hand holding. The girl chose not to answer, instead carefully extracting her hand from Buffy's, and leaning back a bit as she looked to where Kimberly was stripping off her gloves and moving to pack up her equipment.

"Will she be okay?"

The woman nodded, her expression sour.

"Oh yes; as you said, she's like you. Wounds that should have her unconscious from shock and blood loss are already beginning to close. I would normally give you both massive doses of antibiotics to help stave off infection-"

"-But that would only get in the way," Faith finished for her. "Yeah, we do better on our own, without all that crap. Thanks, doc." Coming up on her knees, the girl leaned across Buffy, stretching to reach the pile of personal effects she'd left on the bedside table. The older girl sat there, frozen in place, as Faith picked up the roll of cash from atop the pile. The renegade could just as easily have grabbed the gun if she'd wanted to try something, but then, Buffy could quite easily have slipped the DragonBlade from her sleeve and plunged it upwards and into Faith's chest. Having retrieved the cash, the girl pulled slowly back, pausing halfway to give the Slayer a secretive little grin. "I hear some gears turnin' there, B," she whispered, and when Buffy flushed red in embarrassment Faith only laughed. Sitting back into place, the black-clad girl peeled off roughly a third of the cash, and handed the money to the doctor. The woman made a weak effort at protest, but Faith waved the attempt away. "You're gonna have a lot of bills, getting moved out of town and all. This is just me sayin' thanks," She glanced at Buffy, and then back at Kimberly. "And, I guess me saying 'sorry', too. About draggin' you into my mess."

The woman reluctantly pocketed the money, all the while giving the girl a stern look.

"Don't be sorry, Faith. No matter what they tell you, the most important thing is to take care of your own. Don't ever be ashamed of that." That last part was delivered while looking at Buffy. Then she had picked up her bags and was slipping out the door. "Take care, both of you. Try not to undo my work, if you can help it."

Once she was gone, the room seemed a little too small, all of a sudden. Or perhaps it was the bed which seemed too small, with the two of them sitting so close together. Buffy looked down at her bare leg, touching the orange-stained skin with one forefinger. Whatever antiseptic the woman had used, it had tinted the area around the gunshots a decidedly icky color. Faith reached out with a finger of her own, and trailed it lightly across Buffy's thigh.

"Does it still hurt?" She asked. The Slayer shook her head, watching as if mesmerized as Faith's finger moved back and forth, caressing her right on the border of the wounds. Any closer and it would have been agony, any further away and it would have been a pleasurable caress. As it was, there really wasn't any way to describe it.

"Faith, stop it." The girl didn't stop, she kept right on doing what she was doing until Buffy grabbed her wrist in one hand and pulled it away from her. It took a lot of strength to hold Faith's arm in place; the two of them stared at each other, gazes locked above arms that were motionless save for a faint tremble as they strained. Buffy actually felt relief for a moment; she was keeping the girl's hand away from her leg without quite using all the force of which she was capable. She was still stronger than Faith, if not by a huge margin. That knowledge made her feel at least a tiny bit better about the strange situation in which she found herself-until the younger girl reached out with her other hand. Those dark eyes never left Buffy's, not even when her fingers found the edge of the older Slayer's sleeve, and delicately pulled forth the DragonBlade that was nestled there.

Buffy let go of Faith's wrist, drawing back a bit and wondering which move would get her up from the bed and across the room the fastest. Even that, though, betrayed how confused she was. If she'd really felt that there was danger, she wouldn't have been sitting there thinking about moving, she would have already done it.

The girl sitting beside her watched all of this flit over her face, but mercifully chose not to say anything. Instead she shifted slightly, reaching behind her and unhooking something from the small of her back. A moment later she drew forth a dark leather sheath, shaped to accept the odd blade of the knife she held, and constructed so that it could be clipped easily yet securely to the wearer's belt. Sliding the weapon home, she weighed it in her hand for a few seconds, and then reached out. Taking hold of Buffy's hand, she turned it over. It was clenched tightly into a fist, so Faith tugged gently at the fingers until they opened. With her other hand she lay the sheathed knife on the Slayer's palm, and then folded the fingers back over it.

"Keep it," She said, softly. Her eyes were dark and deep, even when her teeth gleamed whitely from between lush, red lips. "I hear there's some dangerous stuff roaming around this town."

"I know there is," Buffy managed, her own voice just as quiet. The two of them were too close to speak at normal volume; it would have been as bad as shouting. "Thanks."

Faith just looked at her, her fingers lingering on Buffy's hands for much longer than was polite, before pulling away and climbing out of the bed. Still moving very carefully, she limped around the foot of the bed. As the blonde Slayer watched, she retrieved the fresh clothes from the bedside table, leaving the gun where it was. Moving to stand beside the overstuffed chair, Faith draped the clothing across it's back… and then began stripping away the torn and bloody garments she was currently wearing.

Buffy looked away in a hurry, before she caught more than a brief glimpse of the girl's pale, cleanly-defined form.

Argh! Was her first, scandalized thought. Sheesh! Still the, um, same old Faith all right!

Pretending a sudden fascination with the knife she still held, the Slayer cleared her throat.

Anything, say anything, start at the beginning of the alphabet and use the first 'A' word you think of-

"Ascension," She blurted. The movement visible from the corner of her eye paused at that, and she could feel Faith's gaze resting on her.

"Yeah…? What about it?"

Buffy shrugged uncomfortably, eyes still resolutely downcast.

"What's it all about? I know when, hey, even that doctor lady knows when, but you never said what it was." The seriousness of that topic did a lot to help bring her back to reality. Whatever strangeness was going on here, today, between herself and Faith, stopping the Ascension was still her first priority. "What exactly is going to happen when the Mayor does his big trick?"

The girl stood there, motionless, for what seemed like a long time, and Buffy found herself having a tough time of it. She had the moral high ground here, and yet it was hard to feel all forceful when you were prevented from glaring at someone by their extreme nudity. When Faith resumed the process of changing, her anger was discernable in the sound of her movements and in their sharp, violent, quality, just visible at the edge of Buffy's vision.

"Fuck, haven't I already helped you people out enough?" Self-loathing dripped from her words, even muffled as they were as she pulled a clean top over her head. "You already knew what it was called, and you tricked me into telling you when it happens. Can't your crew of big brains take it from there?" The girl threw herself down into the chair, grunting in pain even as she started fumbling with her boots.

Buffy shifted her position uneasily, still studying the knife.

"I just thought you might help us. I mean, we could use the help, your help." She peeked up from under her eyelashes; Faith had her boots off and was in the process of sliding a new pair of pants up her legs. Buffy looked back down. "If you came back, now, with me, and told us everything you know, it would be big. Huge, actually, it would be huge; I'll bet the Watchers would forget all about that disciplinary stuff if you helped us bring down-"

"Forget it." Buffy glanced up again, and this time it was safe. Fully clothed now, Faith was pulling her boots onto her feet… and burning holes in the older Slayer with the angry heat of her stare. "No way am I screwing him over; especially not to get in good with those Watcher fucks."

"Faith, I know that-"

"I said forget it." Faith spent a moment adjusting the gun nestled in the right boot's holster, and then she pulled herself to her feet. Buffy could almost see the clothes reinforcing the girl's villainous persona. Sadly, the blonde Slayer clipped the knife sheath to her waist, where it would be close at hand.

"Then we're right back where we started out today, aren't we? Working against each other, and likely to end up killing each other."

Faith stood at the foot of the bed, looking down at the older Slayer.

"Doesn't have to be that way you know," She finally said, her 'tough girl' veneer failing to hide her uncertainty. "Mayor Wilkins, he's not out to kill you, B. He doesn't care if you live, or those lame-asses you hang with." She lifted a hand, half-way extending it in entreaty. "All you have to do is leave. Take your mom, and the rest of the gang; hell, evacuate everybody you know, if they'll listen; it won't matter to us one way or the other." There was something suspiciously like pleading in her words, and her eyes had a look of desperation. "Just leave. Let whatever happens happen, and you can set up shop someplace else. There has to be some other town out there that needs a Slayer, right?"

Buffy looked at her, at her outstretched hand, and for a tiny sliver of a second she was tempted… then the moment of weakness was past, and she was shaking her head.

"It doesn't work that way, Faith. Either you make him stop, or I'll have to stop him… and you."

The girl dropped her hand back to her side, and now her dark eyes glittered like black jewels.

"I won't stop very easy, B. You think you can work yourself up to killing me if that's what it takes?"

Good question. Buffy had to think about it, she thought about it for a lot longer than a Slayer should have had to, but eventually she nodded.

"Yeah, I think so. If it comes down to my friends dying, along with all the other people who live in this town, then yes, I think I can do it."

Faith's expression went still, absolutely unreadable, and she began limping slowly around the bed. Buffy watched her come, watched her move up to stand beside the little table where the spare gun still lay. She picked it up, and with a sidelong glance at the blonde girl, ejected the clip. Buffy's eyes widened as Faith displayed the inner portion of the magazine. She was a Slayer, not a gun expert, but it was easy enough to see that there were no bullets in there. Still without expression, Faith did a little sleight of hand, producing another clip out of nowhere (or from within her cupped palm, where she'd held it since pulling it from the stack of clothing where it had been hidden). This one, Buffy saw, came complete with a cargo of shiny brass cylinders. With a graceful movement, Faith slid the clip into place. Buffy looked from the gun to the girl's face, and gave her an accusing stare.

"It wasn't loaded; cute." She thought back to when Faith had first opened the chest. With her body blocking her actions from the watching Slayer, it would have been easy for her to substitute an empty clip for a full one before bringing the gun out into view. She couldn't believe her own stupidity. "I guess that kind of lets the air out of your little display of trust earlier, doesn't it? No wonder you weren't scared; you knew you weren't in any real-"

The gun plopped down on the sheets next to Buffy's hip. She stared down at it, though at this point she was beyond disbelief. When she looked up, Faith was waiting with her arms folded.

"Go ahead," She prompted, her face cold. "You're going to kill me later; so why wait? Go ahead and get it over with."

Buffy picked up the gun like it was a dead rat; even the feel of the object revolted her. Looking at Faith, she hefted the weapon experimentally. It was heavier now, ready to kill with just a squeeze of the trigger.

"Why give this to me?" She asked.

Faith looked back at her, as solid and uncompromising as a marble statue.

"Because I'm not gonna make it easy on you. When I walk out of here, you're going to know that it's not because of some shit I pulled. It'll be because you let me do it."

The Slayer felt her stomach twist, though she kept her face smooth.

"Then go." She threw the gun at Faith's face, gaining some tiny measure of satisfaction from the gesture even though the girl easily snatched it out of the air with a blurring movement of one hand. "Take that thing, and get out of my sight before I change my mind and use it on you."

The renegade didn't look away, though she slipped the pistol into the spot at the small of her back where her knife would usually rest. Then, instead of turning to leave, she put both hands on the edge of the bed and leaned towards Buffy. When her face was only a foot away from the other girl's she stopped.

And when she spoke, the words came so softly that even in that empty, silent room, only a Slayer's ears could have heard them.

"You said I grew up not knowing what love is, but you're wrong. Want to hear a secret, B? I'll tell you one. I'll tell you something nobody else knows, not even the Mayor." Buffy stared, incredulous, as the mask crumbled. She saw Faith's eyes brimming with unshed tears, and heard her breathe her secret. "You might be able to kill me, but I can't kill you. No matter what happens, the one person who's walking away from all of this is you. So long as I'm breathing, nobody is going to waste you. Not me, not a vamp or a demon; not even the Mayor." She took a shuddering breath, and her hands clenched handfuls of bedcover in her fists. "I'll do my best to keep you from stopping us, and I might have to do you a little damage, like I did today. Oh, and any Scooby who gets in my face is dog food, just so we're clear on that. But if I have any say, then you'll come out the other side of the Ascension alive and kicking." She blinked, and a shimmering silver trail made its way down one pale cheek. "I just thought you should know that, for some reason."

Buffy was lost, utterly and completely.

"Why?" She asked; god, it felt like she'd been asking that question all day long. It was worth asking, though, over and over, as many times as it took. She was sure that if she got the answer to this one, then all the rest of it would fall into place. Faith, though, just shook her head.

"I'm not real sure about that one, B. I think I know; I hope I do, anyway." That smile again, the shy, secret one that was more real than the calculated leers and the cruel grins. "And I could tell you, except… you're not ready for that-" Before the Slayer could move, before she could think, Faith had leaned forward that last small distance, and her lips were on Buffy's lips. It wasn't violent, or even particularly aggressive. Her mouth moved across the blonde girl's, warm and caressing, and for just an instant the very tip of her tongue touched Buffy's lips. The moment the older Slayer opened her mouth to protest (and it was to protest; she was almost sure of that), Faith pulled back. With their eyes locked, and a safe six inches or so of space between them, the girl gave Buffy a long, searching look.

"-Yet."

And with that she was off the bed and limping towards the door.

"Faith!" Buffy said, a million things tumbling in her head, some of them vicious and cruel, some of them childlike and uncertain, and a lot of them hanging somewhere in between. She tried to find something that would work, that would put what had just happened into a place where she could look at it calmly and rationally… and the words just wouldn't come. Faith, already at the door, paused just long enough to look back.

"Relax, you don't worry about any of this now it if you don't want to." Her mask was firmly in place now, though a vulnerable shadow still lurked behind her eyes. "Graduation's still a ways off. A lot of things can happen in the meantime, right? So let's just wait and see." Faith turned away, then. As noiselessly as a wraith she slipped out through the door, and pulled it shut behind her.

Left all alone in the empty room, Buffy stared at the wavering images on the television screen, and tried to find meaning in their silent movements.