Eleven

PROMISES TO KEEP

Faith crouched on the roof of the old warehouse in her socks, so she could be as quiet as possible. She held a katana in her hand.

Trick sat in front of a computer set up on an old wooden roll top desk on the floor of the warehouse. Faith watched him through a dirty little skylight.

Trick was going to die for what he did to Rebecca. Faith was going to see to that.

She needed it. Watching him through the skylight, she felt like she needed to kill him more than she had ever needed anything in her life. Her hand moved to the stake in her back pocket. She imagined how it would feel, penetrating his chest, slicing through the meat, until it reached the heart, and popped it like a balloon. She could jump down through the skylight right now and do it...

A Slayer always thinks tactically.

No. She’d play this smart. The way Rebecca would have wanted her to.

The wind shifted, and Buffy’s scent came to her.

Faith smiled. She hadn’t heard Buffy’s approach. If the wind hadn’t shifted she wouldn’t have known Buffy was there at all. The girl was good.

“Hey,” Buffy said quietly, and crouched down barefoot beside Faith, carrying the other katana. “I checked all around, Special K’s not in there. What’s Tricky doing?”

“Still gettin’ his geek on,” Faith whispered back. They both knew vampires had very sensitive hearing. “What about exits?”

“Back door. Fire escape around the side along the second floor.”

“Okay, if it’s just Trick I don’t think we need to get too fancy. How about you go around back, I walk in the front. He runs, no way he gets by both of us.”

“He’s probably carrying a gun, you know.”

“Figure he is.”

The two most dangerous predators on Earth looked down at Trick through the dirty skylight, baring their teeth. Savoring a fresh kill.

They were Slayers, now. Slayers, and nothing else.

Their humanity was far away, now. There was no room for it: they were traveling light. They only took what they needed on the hunt. They were strong and fast and hard and lethal and they reveled in their power. They knew their prey wouldn’t escape them. But they hoped it would at least try.

They were aware of their humanity, peripherally. They knew it was still there somewhere. But it seemed unimportant; a complicated, monotonous, hopelessly mundane thing next to the lush, vivid world that was opened up to them now. It wouldn’t have mattered to either of them at that moment if they lost their humanity forever. It was a burden, and it was so much better to travel light...

Buffy loved Faith’s scent. She loved being close to it. Faith’s scent made Buffy feel like she’d found something...something that belonged to her, that she had somehow lost for a time without even knowing it.

There was a connection, a physical connection, when they were together: it had been there in the cemetery and the motel room and Buffy felt it again now, like a warmth that suffused her whole body.

Buffy’s heart beat faster as she looked down at her prey. Energy exploded through her in anticipation of the hunt. She felt like running a marathon. She felt like dancing. She needed a good, long fucking. She thought about Angel, then stopped herself. He was too complicated, too tangled up in her humanity; he was part of the boring, colorless world she had set aside. Buffy much preferred the vivid world she found herself in now: the world of the hunt.

She thought about Faith in her nightgown. She thought about peaches.

Faith liked Buffy. She liked the way she smelled and she liked her voice and she liked the warm feeling that she got when they were together, like being in bed under the blankets on a winter morning. She liked that Buffy was crouched very close to her now, their bodies almost touching. She couldn’t believe she had disliked Buffy before; all those feelings of anger and resentment and wounded pride seemed a million miles away, seemed like someone else’s life. Those feelings were buried deep down now, along with all the other trivial, unimportant details of her human life. They were Slayers. Not one single other thing mattered.

Faith looked at Buffy’s legs. She liked Buffy in that skirt. She liked her without her boots on.

Then Faith looked down at Trick, and felt her heart in her chest. Energy pulsed through her; she nearly trembled with it. She wanted to leap, and scream, and roar like a lion. She gripped her sword so hard she thought she might break it.

Buffy and Faith looked at each other, inches away, and inhaled each other’s scent, and felt the connection: the connection that no one else in the world could ever share.

Buffy wondered what it would be like to have sex with Faith.

Faith nearly threw Buffy down and kissed her.

They both let the moment pass. They were afraid of it, a little. Each was afraid that she alone felt it, and the other didn’t.

And they were working now. There was no time for it.

“Ready?” Buffy whispered.

“One thing before we get started,” Faith whispered back. “Get your licks in, smack Trick around all you want, smack K around when we catch up with him too. I know Trick shot you and K beat you up some and you owe them for that. But I owe them more, so the kills are mine. For what they did to Becca, the kills belong to me.”

“I get to hurt Trick, before you dust him. And I want a piece of Kakistos. You can have him, but I still need a piece. He hurt Willow and he needs to find out why that’s bad.”

“Done.”

“Remember, don’t you go hogging all the fun. I’ll get cranky.”

“I’ll take good care of you, B. Don’t you worry about that.”

“Gonna hold you to that,” Buffy whispered, and showed Faith her backside, and stalked away as silently as a cat.

“Hey Trick,” Faith said, stalking out of the darkness behind him in her socks, a sword in each hand. “How’s tricks?”

Trick was fast. He jumped out of his chair, spun around and pulled a gun from inside his coat without missing a beat.

Faith was faster. She threw her rapier straight through Trick’s hand before he could even take aim. He screamed and dropped the gun, and before he could pick it up again, Buffy was suddenly standing behind him. She snatched the gun from the floor and pointed it at his chest. He froze.

“Hey, Tricky, miss me? Oh, that’s right,” Buffy said, and pointed to her shoulder. “You didn’t.”

Faith moved up beside Buffy. “Dyin’ ain’t much of a livin’, boy,” she said to Trick, and smiled.

“What’s that from?” Buffy said.

“Eastwood western,” Faith said. “Clint said it to this bounty hunter guy who was after him just before he shot his bounty huntin’ ass.”

“How did I know you’d like Clint Eastwood?”

“’Cuz I’m a total fuckin’ bad ass, girlfriend. And so are you,” Faith said.

“Got that right, baby,” Buffy said, and shot Trick six times, emptying the gun. The gun was a .44 magnum and each shot sent Trick flying backwards. He finally collapsed like a marionette with its strings cut, coughing up blood.

“Hey, this thing’s kinda neat,” Buffy said, twirling the gun around and practicing quick draws. “Am I a bad person for liking this? Do I have to vote Republican now?”

“Nah,” Faith said. “Figure it just makes you like, an American.”

“I think I’m a bad Californian though.”

“Yeah, probably, but they’d love your pretty ass in Texas. Know what? Dirty Buffy. I’m callin’ you Dirty Buffy from now on.”

“Wanna see me being dirty, huh?” Buffy said.

“C’mon, don’t make me blush now, honey,” Faith said, and threw Buffy her sexiest smile.

Faith wondered if she and Buffy meant what they were saying. How far were they going to take this? Faith felt out of control, like she was saying things without thinking...like she was drunk. She knew it was Buffy’s scent that was doing this to her. Being so close to it, Faith needed all of her self-control not to take Buffy in her arms and kiss her.

Jesus Christ, Faith thought. Am I the one who likes girls? What the fuck?

“Hey Trick, you feelin’ lucky, punk?” Faith said, staring down at Trick and showing him her teeth.

“I don’t think Tricky’s feeling lucky,” Buffy said. “I think he’s all sad now. I think he’s pouting.”

“He sure doesn’t look too good. But you know what the problem here is? We haven’t beat on him at all. The gun was cool but...”

“Right there with you, girlfriend,” Buffy said, and walked toward Trick. But Trick suddenly sprang to his feet, his face changing to vampire form, and roared at them.

“Boy’s feelin’ his oats,” Faith said.

“C’mon Tricky,” Buffy said, and tossed the gun away, and spread her hands, and smiled. “Let’s see those oats.”

Trick leaped at Buffy, growling like a dog. He still had Faith’s rapier sticking through his hand. But the leap was slow and awkward and Buffy easily avoided it; she stepped out of the way and Faith batted Trick out of the air with her katana, carving a good chunk out of him. He fell to the floor, screaming.

“Shit,” Faith said. “Don’t even tell me he can’t fight.”

“Maybe he really is a computer nerd,” Buffy said. “And I did kinda just shoot him six times.” Buffy moved to Trick’s desk, one of the few furnishings in the huge, mostly empty room. The small desk lamp was the only source of light; the windows on the upper floor of the warehouse were too covered with grime to let much sun in. She looked at his computer screen. He had an AOL account. She smiled.

“Or maybe it was five,” Buffy said. “To tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I've kinda lost track myself.” Faith giggled.

“Thought you weren’t into Clint?” Faith said, and stepped on Trick’s hand and pulled her rapier out of it. Trick screamed. Faith looked down at him and kicked him in the face. “Shut the fuck up, asshole, we’re talkin’ here,” Faith said.

“Xander likes him. He keeps on renting Eastwood movies,” Buffy said.

“Beats Star Trek,” Faith said. “Hope for that boy yet.”

Trick tried to stand. He had a nasty diagonal slash running from his chest down to his waist, marring a very expensive suit.

“Shit,” Faith said again. “He’s got nothin’ left. Now I’m all frustrated.” She kicked him in the face again and he went sailing toward Buffy. Buffy plucked him out of the air and threw him to the floor before he could crash into the computer; she had a feeling the computer would be useful.

“Why don’t you beat on him for awhile, honey,” Faith said.

“Hmm. I think Tricky needs some dental work,” Buffy said. She picked Trick up, dragged him over to a nearby metal support beam, and smashed his face into it. He bounced off it with a clang that echoed through the warehouse and sounded just like one of those old cartoons where an anvil lands on someone’s head. Buffy and Faith both giggled.

“Ow,” Faith said. “Lose any teeth?”

Buffy let Trick go and he hit the floor like a wet sack. She looked around, and noticed a bloody tooth nearby. Trick looked delirious.

“Hey Tricky, Tooth Fairy owes you a quarter,” Buffy said, picking up the tooth and throwing it back in his face. She walked back to his desk and looked at his computer again. “Let’s see if we can get it up to seven-fifty. Or you can always talk to us about your old pal, Special K.”

“You’re not gonna beat on him some more first?” Faith said, and strolled over to Buffy. Buffy was leaning back against the desk, and her skirt had hiked up. Faith looked at her legs, and made no effort to hide the fact that she was looking. “You goin’ soft on me, girlfriend?” Fuck it, Faith thought. If I like girls then I’m gonna like girls. Starting with this one.

“Nah, I just thought I’d let the big bad vamp make a speech,” Buffy said, and sat in Trick’s chair and put her feet up on the desk. Her skirt hiked up even more as she did it. She was showing Faith her legs. She couldn’t believe she was doing that, but she was. She noticed Faith didn’t seem to mind. “All these extra special super-bad vamps just love making with the speeches first. It always just fills me with dread.”

“Hey Trick, you wanna make a speech?” Faith said, grabbing him by the neck, standing him up, and moving her ear close to his mouth. “What’s that? Can’t hear you.” Trick was nearly unconscious.

“Try banging him into the pole again,” Buffy said.

“Think that’ll work?”

“It’ll be fun to watch.”

Faith shrugged her shoulders and smashed Trick’s face into the support beam again. His nose broke, and blood spurted out of it. She giggled at that, and so did Buffy. It was funny. It was like a day at the circus. She dropped him to the floor. He lay perfectly still, face-down. “Christ, he’s out cold already,” she said. “Say what you want about K, at least he can throw down. I’m all frustrated now.”

“Computer nerds have their uses,” Buffy said. She brought up the computer’s e-mail program. “Any more teeth?”

“Tooth Fairy needs to pony up seventy-five cents now,” Faith said, turning Trick over and looking at his mouth.

“Well, we’re getting there,” Buffy said, leaning back in the chair and waving her sword around aimlessly. “Faith, take a message.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Faith said, with a big grin. “You want I should bring you your coffee first? Or like, uh, quarterly reports or something?”

“I got something you can do for me,” Buffy said, stretching her legs out some more. “But first the message.”

Buffy blushed a little; she couldn’t believe she had just said that. It was the strangest feeling...she felt drunk. It was Faith, she knew. Her scent...hunting together like this, being so close...it was intoxicating. She was losing herself...

“Yes, ma’am,” Faith said, looking at Buffy’s legs again.

“Message reads,” Buffy began, smiling down at Trick. “There are two kinds of vamps. You got your regular loser vamps, and then there are the vamps who think they’re all that. Now you haven’t been a Slayer too long yet, Faith, but you’ll find that vamps who think they’re all that, like Special K and our man Tricky, are really a dime a dozen, especially on a Hellmouth. And the big thing they do is, they make speeches. They go on and on about their big plans, and...” She looked over at Trick again. He still wasn’t moving. “Is he still asleep? Secretary Faith, wake him up. Time for a vamp to hear my big speech.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Faith said, and grabbed Trick and stood him up again. He was unconscious.

“Hey!” Faith screamed in Trick’s face, and slapped him. “Wake up!”

Buffy giggled. Faith started giggling too.

Trick opened his eyes, sluggishly.

“He’s done,” Faith said. “He’s not even trying to fight anymore. Shaft my ass. More like Urkel. Hey Trick, Boss B’s making a speech. You better listen up or I’ll get grumpy.”

“Thank you, secretary Faith,” Buffy said. “So, yeah, the vamps who think they’re all that really like talking about their big plans. Like, for instance, our man Tricky here of the snazzy suits and the fabulous shoes, who cornered Will and me in the cemetery with a bunch of vamps and started talking about how he’s all cool and East Coast and how my skirt was a bold fashion choice and blah blah blah whatever. Oh, and the speech-making vamps are further subdivided into two groups, the quippy speechmakers and the self-important speechmakers.”

“K’s definitely self-important,” Faith said.

“And Trick’s quippy,” Buffy said. “They make a good team. So Trick was all, ‘Hey, you’re obviously Buffy Summers and look how cool I am that I know who you are and check out my cool suit and blah blah blabbity-blah’. And the funny thing is? All these big bad super-vamps I’ve run into over the years, who make all these speeches and think they know Slayers? Who think they know me?”

She got up, pulled Trick away from Faith and stabbed him through the heart with her sword. He gasped, and made a squealing sound. “You don’t fucking know me,” Buffy snarled, in Trick’s face. “If you did you’d all run home to your fucking mommies.”
She wrenched the sword out of his heart, and he gurgled and spit up blood, and fell to his knees at her feet. Buffy looked down at him.

“You look good there,” she said.

Faith’s eyes were on Buffy; she watched Buffy from her head down to her toes as Trick knelt bleeding at Buffy’s feet. Buffy felt it; she felt Faith’s eyes caressing every inch of her. She liked the feeling.

Buffy picked Trick up by the throat, wiped her sword on his suit, and looked him in the eyes. Trick was dead weight in her hands.

“Got any more badinage for me, Tricky?” Buffy said. “I’m waiting.”

“What’s badinage?” Faith said.

“Banter,” Buffy said. “Trick’s smart. He’s way into big words. I bet he even knows what ‘intractable’ means.”

“You sure he’s smart?” Faith said. “Pissing me and you off doesn’t seem too smart to me.”

Buffy lifted Trick up by the neck and looked him in the eyes again. “You vamps think you’re scary?” she said. “You think you’re the monsters? That’s only because you haven’t seen the monster I’ve got in me. THREATEN MY FRIENDS?! THREATEN MY FAMILY?!”

With a roar, she smashed him across the face with a backhand that sent him flying across the room and crashing into a wall thirty feet away.

Faith looked at Trick, lying motionless on the floor, then back at Buffy. She had allowed herself to think Buffy was soft, in the cemetery. Faith would never make that mistake again.

Buffy sat back down, and looked at the computer.

“Kill him,” she said, as if she was telling Faith to get her a cup of coffee.

“He needs to tell us about K first,” Faith said.

“He won’t talk because he knows we’re gonna kill him anyway,” Buffy said. “He’s a creampuff but he’s not dumb, and we don’t have all day to waste beating on him while he stalls and hopes Special K shows up to bail his undead ass out. Besides, I got it covered.” She pointed at the computer screen. AOL’s e-mail program was open. “Faith, welcome to the information superhighway, also known as ‘What A Bunch of Nerds Think About Star Trek, Plus Porn’.”

Faith looked at the computer screen over Buffy’s shoulder while keeping one eye on Trick. Trick still wasn’t moving. There was an open e-mail message on the screen from ‘Kakistos12@aol.com’, and a reply being composed to the same address. Faith liked the way Buffy’s hair smelled.

“Kakistos12@aol.com?” Faith said.

“Sad when old guys try to get all cool and with it, huh?” Buffy said, and picked up one of the phones that sat beside the computer. “You take out the trash while I get Will working on backtracking this.”

“Lightning bolts, locator spells, now computers too? Girl’s a triple threat.”

“Yeah, before the magic took off she was computer hacker girl. She broke into France’s Defense Department by mistake and went all Matthew Broderick on their asses one night when Xander got her drunk on Cosmopolitans. The French computers got all, ‘Would-you-like-to-play-a-game?’ and there was almost a nuclear war between France and China. Will denies it, but Xander swears it really happened. Anyway she’s always been my secret weapon. Faith...thanks. For what you did for Will. If those vamps had...if you hadn’t been there...if I ever lost Will I don’t know what I’d do. I owe you, Faith. More than I can ever pay back.”

“Hey, no problem,” Faith said, and smiled.

Faith stood over Trick, looking down at him. He lay on the floor, his body riddled with gunshot wounds, his face covered with blood, his torso sliced open, his hand clutched to his chest.

“Guess we won’t be doing lunch,” Faith said.

Trick didn’t move.

“Gonna take B and me awhile to track Kakistos down,” Faith said. “And we don’t like to be kept waiting. Nope, we surely do not. We get bored, y’know? And then, well...we get impatient. And then we have to find a way to occupy ourselves. And someone to occupy ourselves with.”

She kicked him in the ribs, and felt some of them break. Trick slammed into the wall, and groaned.

“Which makes you our fuckin’ piñata,” she said. “So you gonna get up or what? Gonna at least take a shot? Look at me.”

He didn’t look at her. He looked down at the floor, and bled.

“I SAID LOOK AT ME!” Faith screamed, and picked him up and smashed him back into the wall. “YOU’RE GONNA FUCKING LOOK AT ME!”

He looked at her. He saw Faith drop her sword to the floor.

“Tell you what,” Faith said. “Free shot. I’ll give you a free shot.”

She let him go, and he slumped back to the floor.

“Well?” she said. “Take a shot.”

He didn’t move.

“Take a fuckin’ shot!” she said. “Grow a dick and take a fuckin’ shot!”

Trick shook his head, and looked down at the floor. Waiting for death.

“Christ,” Faith said, disgusted. “Even K’s got more balls than you, and I cut his off.” She picked Trick up again and slammed him back against the wall. He whimpered. She pulled her stake out of her back pocket, and showed it to him.

“Said I’d stick you like a fucking pig someday, Trick,” Faith said. “I always keep a promise.”

She pointed the stake at his heart.

“Got anything to say?” she said. “You were a talkative motherfucker in Boston. Famous last words? Fashion advice? Maybe some badinage? Anything?”

“Fuck...you,” Trick grunted, and closed his eyes, and groaned.

Faith smiled. “Yeah,” she said. “That’s better.”

She spit in his face.

“Becca says fuck you too,” Faith snarled, and staked him.

“You okay?” Buffy said, when Faith eventually came back.

“No,” Faith said. “Got a line on K?”

Buffy put her hand on Faith’s shoulder, and touched her hair. “Will came through,” she said, pointing to the computer screen. “She backtracked his e-mail and found the computer he’s sending from.”
“Good,” Faith said. “So we can go there and kick the shit out of him. Where’s he at?”

“Across town, about twenty minutes from here. But I think there might be a better way to do this. Trick and K have been e-mailing each other...”

“Shoot K an e-mail. Pretend we’re Trick, tell him to meet us. Set a trap.”

“Great minds think alike. I say we bring him here, tell him Trick captured us. Wherever K is now it’s his turf and he’ll have the advantage there. But if we bring him here we can wire this place to explode right on top of him.”

“I like it, but don’t say Trick’s got both of us, Trick’s too much of a pansy to take us both down. Too much of a pansy to take even one of us, but there’s no way K believes Trick nabbed us both without any vamp goons backing him up. Say Trick’s got me. I’m the one K really wants anyway, he’ll come out for me. Say I came here alone looking for Trick and he shot me.”

“Makes sense, it’s how it could’ve gone down anyway if you came here alone and he managed to get a shot off. I found something else on his computer too. He’s got some program open I didn’t recognize. Willow walked me through it. We were right. Trick was tapping our phones. Giles, my Mom.”

“So K knows we got Giles and your Mom stashed.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t know where. Turns out Will and I did take out all the hired help last night, Trick’s got no men right now. He had no one watching the houses, so when I called Giles and told him to get the hell out of there Trick wasn’t able to get there and follow the cab.”

“You know that for sure? And what about Will and Xander? Trick have a line on them?”

“I’ve been reading his e-mails. Trick e-mailed K saying he was looking into recruiting more vamps. And they’re worried about Willow, they’re a lot more worried about her than they are about us, but they don’t know who she is. Xander’s not on their radar.”

“Good. And I’d worry too if a witch torched all my guys with one shot.”

“Lucky for us they don’t know she can’t just do it whenever she wants. And it turns out K’s still hurt. Problem is he might be so hurt that we can’t convince him to leave his place. What if he wants Trick to take you out to him?”

“Tell him I can’t be moved, that I was shot bad and if they move me I could die. K wants to kill me himself. I don’t care how hurt he is, a guy doesn’t forget it when you cut his dick and balls off. He’ll come out here, no way he leaves me to Trick.”

“Okay,” Buffy said. “Let’s wire this place up and figure out just how we’re gonna go at this guy. We should wire the front and back doors, we don’t know which entrance he’ll use, but that still gives us plenty of bang for our buck. Xander walked me through the remote detonators last year, they’re easy. Set the dynamite, press the button, boom. Once we’re wired I’ll send the e-mail. Then...”

“Yeah,” Faith said.

Then it would be over, one way or the other.

Faith wondered what she would do after that.

They lay together, side by side on the roof, watching.

An SUV with blacked-out windows turned the corner a few blocks away.

“Show time,” Faith said.

They crawled on their bellies toward the other side of the roof, keeping low. Faith had the flamethrower on her back, and her katana in her hand. Buffy had her katana in one hand and four detonators in the other.

They reached the other side of the roof and were about to climb down the fire escape, when Buffy grabbed Faith’s shoulder.

“Look,” Buffy whispered.

Faith looked back, and saw the SUV parked near the front entrance. Its door was open, and she could see Kakistos inside...along with five other vampires. They all wore heavy hoods and cloaks.

“Son of a bitch,” Faith muttered. “Where the hell does he get these guys?”

“It’s only five,” Buffy whispered.

“Still might slow us down some, and we need to be able to concentrate on K. Okay, here’s what we’ll do. You hit the detonators on schedule. I hop down there and torch the goons with the flamethrower while K’s down. Then we both run at K like we planned.”

“Got it,” Buffy whispered, and looked at her sword. She smiled.

“Where is she, Trick?” Kakistos growled, as he opened the front door of the warehouse and limped inside, and two bundles of dynamite exploded a foot away from him. The explosion collapsed the doorframe and part of the roof, sending it all down on top of him and instantly incinerating one of the vampires who had been about to walk in behind him.

“Right here,” Faith said, and strolled right up to the other four vampires from behind and sprayed them with the flame thrower. They burst into flames and ran around screaming for about two seconds, before exploding into dust.

Kakistos shrugged off the rubble and tried to stand. His face was covered with blood and his hood and cloak were gone, leaving him exposed to the sun. His skin, still partially burned from Willow’s lightning strike, began to smoke. With a grunt of pain he leaped further into the warehouse to escape the sun, and fell to the floor. As he forced himself to stand again, Buffy ran at him with her katana and sliced his left arm off. He screamed, and tried an awkward punch with his right, but Buffy dodged and spun around behind him as gracefully as a ballerina and sliced his right arm off like it was the easiest thing in the world. Blood spurted from the stumps of his arms, and he fell to the floor again in shock.

“Hello, loser,” Buffy said. “I’m Buffy.”

He looked up, and saw her smiling down at him.

“You hurt my friends,” Buffy said. “Mistake.”

The blood continued to flow out from the stumps of his arms, collecting in a pool on the floor. Kakistos became very pale, and he began to shiver.

“And now Faith would like a word,” Buffy said.

Kakistos managed to get himself up to his knees, before Faith kicked him in the face and knocked him back down again.

Faith stood above him, her sword ready. Buffy stepped back.

Kakistos struggled back up to his knees again, but he couldn’t stand. He had lost too much blood. Faith watched him, silently.

They looked at each other. Kakistos was shivering badly now, and he was nearly unconscious. But Faith could still see the hatred in his eyes. And he smiled...a small smile.

Faith had rehearsed this moment in her mind a hundred times. She always knew just the right thing to say, when she rehearsed it. Just the right last words to send him off to hell with.

She looked down at him now, and couldn’t think of anything to say.

No clever insults came to her mind. No taunts. No jokes. No catchphrases.

There was nothing to say. There didn’t seem to be any point, now.

Faith started to cry.

There was nothing to say.

Except...

“For Becca,” Faith said.

And she sliced his head off, and a depraved, malignant thing collapsed into dust...and a reign of brutality and terror that had lasted more than eight-hundred years finally came to an end.

Faith knelt down, in the pile of dust that had been Kakistos...the creature who had defiled and killed the person she loved most in the world.

“He’s gone, Becca,” she whispered, crying. “He’s gone. He’s gone.”

Buffy knelt down beside her, and hugged her, as the rising sun finally found them.