Genre: Drama

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: They’re not mine, I just wanted to play with them for a little while. No harm intended, only the greatest love and appreciation for the people who have created these fabulous characters and bring them onto my TV screen every week.

Summary: Spike gets his chip out and Faith gets out of jail to help in the fight with Glory.

Notes:  This story takes place after "The Body". "I Was Made to Love You" never happened, and just to be clear, in my story there is not even the remote possibility of a CyberBuffy.

Much thanks to Cousinjean, my wonderful beta-reader, for all her excellent advice.

PART THREE

She was having the dreams again.

It had been a long time since she’d had the dreams. At first, she tried to dismiss them as simple nightmares. It was easier that way. Nightmares she was used to. Lately, it seemed she had them almost every night.

After having the same dream three nights running, though, she could no longer deny that these dreams were no ordinary nightmares. These were Slayer dreams.

The image of the Hellmouth opening and unleashing the forces of some demon dimension was vividly clear; but the rest of the images, of people mostly, confused her. Some of them she recognized, others she didn’t: an extremely powerful, extremely evil woman; a dark haired man in hospital scrubs; a bunch of nasty looking demons; men, human beings, who wore chainmail and had strange tattoos on their foreheads; a peroxide-blonde vampire; a teenage girl.

So many images – but none gave her any idea of what she was supposed to do.

Not that there was anything she really could do. Not as long as she was stuck behind these prison walls, two hours and a million miles away from Sunnydale.

Faith didn’t know what to do. She knew, however, that she had to do something. She wouldn’t be having the dreams if she weren’t supposed to do something.

There was only one person she could think of who might want to help her. Angel. He had been willing to give her a chance before. Even as she had been trying to kill him, he had been trying to save her. No one but Angel understood the nearly irresistible pull of evil and the struggle to resist it, the struggle for redemption. Everyone else considered her a lost cause… beyond help. Not that she could blame any of them. She’d gone out of her way to prove them right.

Only Angel had believed there was still good in her. He’d seen through her evil deeds and recognized a death wish – a cry for help. He had helped her. Maybe he would help her again.

Later, during recreation hour, Faith got permission to use the phone. She called information to get the number and soon she heard a voice saying: "Angel Investigations. We help the helpless."

Damn. Why did it have to be him? Of all the horrible things she had to pay for, Wesley was the one she regretted the most. He’d been good to her. She vividly recalled his words to her: "It's not too late to let me help you. I realize there've been failures… on both sides. But I also believe in my heart that you are not a bad person." Wesley had wanted to help her, and how had she repaid him? With brutal torture.

She almost hung up. She considered disguising her voice and asking for Angel, but she decided she couldn’t do that. If she was really going to change, she had to face the things she had done.

"Hey, Wesley."

********

The hesitant female voice on the other end of the line surprised him. He sat down abruptly, wincing a little at the sudden pain from his still-healing bullet wound. "Hello, Faith. I certainly wasn’t expecting to hear your voice."

"Yeah. I guess not. I was calling for Angel, but… listen, I know it doesn’t mean much, but for what it’s worth, I’m… I’m sorry… for what I did to you."

"No, Faith, you’re wrong. It does mean something." He paused for a second. "But, as for the other, I’m afraid Angel is out of town at the moment."

"Oh." Well, Faith thought, that was disappointing. Now what was she going to do?

"Is there, perhaps, something *I* could help you with?"

Faith smiled at his precisely worded question. Same old Wesley. He’d lightened up a bit since his Sunnydale days, but in many ways he was still the same stuffy old Brit she remembered. "Well, I don’t know. Maybe nobody can help. I’ve been having dreams. Slayer dreams. About the Hellmouth opening, and a whole bunch of other stuff I’m not sure I understand."

"If you want someone to warn Buffy, you don’t need Angel for that."

"Yeah, like she’d listen to me. I’m not exactly her favorite person, you know."

"If you could tell me a little about what you’ve seen, I suppose I could call Giles with the information."

"Yeah. Okay. I guess that would work." Faith went on to describe what she had seen. There wasn’t a lot, and much of it didn’t make any sense to her, but maybe it would help Buffy. She could never make things up to B, she knew that, but she had to do what she could.

"I just wish I could do more, Wes. It’s just so… I mean, I know I belong in here. I have to pay for all the things I did. But, sometimes I just… I mean, I’m a *Slayer*. I should be out there fighting the evil. I feel so useless in here."

"Yes, I imagine it must be rather frustrating for you."

"Well, anyway, you’ll make sure B knows about the dreams, right?"

"Certainly. Well, I should go now, so I can ring up Giles." Wesley paused for a moment. "Faith… good luck. I do believe you want to make peace with the people you’ve harmed. But, more importantly, Faith, you have to make peace with yourself."

This was getting too personal. It made her uncomfortable. "Yeah, whatever. Look, rec hour is almost over, so I gotta book. Thanks for your help, Wes. I only hope it helps Buffy a little. Bye."

Wesley sat looking at the phone for several long moments, considering his options. He remembered the way Faith had collapsed, crying, into Angel’s arms last year. The way she had begged Angel to kill her for all the bad things she had done. The way, in the end, she had turned herself over to the police rather than let Angel come to harm. He knew that Angel believed Faith really had changed. Wesley decided that he believed it, too. Maybe there was a way he could help her to prove herself.

He picked up the phone once again and dialed a number. "Yes, hello. I need to speak with Quentin Travers, please."

********

It had been two days since she had spoken with Wesley, and she’d hardly exchanged a word with anyone since hanging up the phone. The other women in the prison tended to leave Faith alone. At first, quite a few had given her a hard time. Pretty, petite little thing like her. A couple of Berthas, who obviously had no idea that Faith was a Slayer, or even what a Slayer was, had figured she would be an easy mark. Boy had they been wrong.

Now most of the other inmates hardly ever spoke to her. Faith preferred it that way. Which was why she was surprised when one of her fellow inmates approached her.

"I don’t know how you done it, little girl. I never done half the nasty stuff they say you did. I ain’t never killed nobody, and I been in here 5 years. You, you’re barely here a year! It ain’t right."

"What are you talking about, Sally?"

"You! The warden’s in a meetin’ with a couple of stuffed-shirt looking British types. Rumor has it one of them got a pardon, signed by the governor, in his prissy little hands. You’re outta here. It ain’t fair," Sally concluded as she walked away, shaking her head.

British? Damn. Faith knew what that meant. The Council. If they got their hands on her, who knew what they would do. More than likely lock her up in chains again and throw her in some dungeon in England. If anyone had given her a choice between prison and the Council, there was no contest. She’d much rather stay right where she was, but this was the Council. Nobody was going to give her a choice.

It wasn’t long before one of the guards came and took her to the warden’s office.

The warden was there, along with Wesley and Quentin Travers. When she entered the room, all it took was a glance from Travers and the warden left them alone in his office, muttering something about business he had to take care of.

Travers spoke first. "Hello, Faith. Please have a seat. We haven’t much time, so let me get right to the point. The Council has arranged for your release from prison and we are prepared to reinstate you to your Slayer duties. On a probationary basis, of course."

That wasn’t what she had been expecting. "I don’t get it. You can just come in here and, suddenly, just like that, I walk?" She looked at Wesley. "Can they really do that?"

"The Council has a great deal of power, Faith. There is very little they can’t accomplish when they set their minds to it."

Travers broke in. "It is only through your former Watcher’s intervention that we have decided to take this extraordinary step. There is a great evil about to arise on the Hellmouth. Wesley has convinced us that having two Slayers there to fight it would be to our advantage."

She couldn’t believe this was happening. "You did this, Wes? For me?"

Travers was the one who responded. "Not for you alone. For the world. Despite your questionable history, you are a Slayer. You can accomplish more good on the Hellmouth than you can locked up behind these walls."

Faith looked at Wesley again. "Is this for real? They really want me back in Sunnydale? This… isn’t just some trick to get me out of here so they can chain me up and take me back to England?"

Wesley winced a little at this reminder of the fact that he was not entirely blameless in Faith’s fall from grace. He felt more strongly than ever that he needed to do what he could to help her redeem herself. After all, he thought, we at Angel Investigations are in the business of saving souls. And he believed that Faith had a soul worth saving.

"This is real, Faith. The other day, you told me that you believe you should be out there fighting the evil. Well, the evil arising in Sunnydale is great. Worse than anything you’ve ever faced. Buffy may be unable to defeat it alone. If you’re willing to resume your sacred obligation, you could be a great asset to the Council."

"Who … are you gonna be my Watcher again?"

"No, not I. I am no longer part of the Council."

"Then who?"

Again, it was Travers who responded. "For the time being, Mr. Giles will serve as your watcher."

"Giles? There’s no way he’s gonna want to be my Watcher. He won’t do it."

"Oh, I think he will. He works for us, and we don’t intend to give him any choice in the matter. You will get a new Watcher eventually, but we can’t wait until then. Mr. Giles is already established in Sunnydale, and time is of the essence. We can’t afford to wait until a new Watcher can be selected for you. "

Faith looked back at Wesley again and he could see the uncertainty in her eyes. "Don’t worry, Faith. I’ll talk to Giles before you depart for Sunnydale. I’ll do what I can to smooth things over for you."

"So, this is, like, really for real? I’m outta here? I’m, like, free?"

"Free of prison, Faith," Travers responded. "But, be assured, the Council will be watching you closely. If you revert to your old ways, we have methods of punishing you that are far worse than anything you’ve experienced here in the California State prison system. Now, if you would please go and gather your belongings, we can be on our way."

"Gather my... Oh, forget that. I don’t have anything here I want to keep. You know me, travel light and all that."

Wesley rose from his chair. "It’s not going to be easy for you, Faith. You will have to work quite closely with Buffy and Giles. It will be difficult, perhaps even impossible, for you to earn their trust. But I want you to know that, if you ever need anyone to talk to, I’m just a phone call away."

How could he be so nice to her after everything she had done to him? If Faith had been the crying kind, she probably would have broken down at that. As it was, though, she just looked down at the floor and muttered something incoherent.

Mr. Travers opened the door and signaled to the warden. "We’re ready."

The warden came back into the office. He gave Faith a couple of papers to sign. Then Wesley handed her a shopping bag. "I assumed you would rather not go out wearing that prison garb. This seemed more the style I remember you wearing. I hope I got the size right." At that, she nearly did cry.

She took the package and quickly went into the bathroom off the warden’s office. It only took her a minute to change, and then just a few minutes later she was walking out the prison gates. She looked up at the sky. She’d seen it every day from the prison yard, yet somehow it looked so much bluer from the outside.

Faith smiled. For the first time in over two years, she felt like her life was actually headed in the right direction.

********

"They can’t do this to me!"

Giles was having a hard time getting Buffy to calm down. "I’m no more pleased about it than you are. But the Council feels –"

"I don’t care what the Council feels! Faith didn’t steal the Council’s body and almost get them killed and sleep with their boyfriend!"

"Well, no, I suppose not. However, Buffy, there’s simply nothing we can do about it. The Council has made its decision, and we are just going to have to make the best of it."

"I don’t want to make the best of it. There is no best. There’s only bad. This is bad. Faith! I don’t want her here."

"Buffy, Wesley told me that he believes she has changed."

"Wesley. Yeah, he’s a real brain surgeon. He’s the one who tried to take her back to England in chains in the first place. That’s when she really went all psycho-loony on us."

"I’m not suggesting that you should accept her return with open arms, or that you should give her your unconditional trust. I know I don’t plan to. But the fact remains, she is coming here, whether we like it or not. She says she wants to help you fight Glory. Perhaps it would be wise if we gave her a chance to prove herself."

Buffy sighed. This was really going to happen, and there was nothing she could do to prevent it. "Okay. She can fight vampires. She can even fight Glory. But no way are we telling her anything about Dawn."

"I agree completely. Considering her history, it would be unwise to trust her with so important a secret."

"Great." Buffy was still annoyed that Faith was being thrown at her like this. She felt restless. "I think I’m gonna go patrol now. You want me to stop back here before I head for home?"

"No, no. I’m just about done here. Unfortunately," Giles gestured to the open books on the table in front of him, "these books contain very little useful information about how we can defeat Glory or about why she needs this Key."

"Okay. See you tomorrow then." Buffy got up from the table and began gearing up with stakes and crosses.

The door to the Magic Box opened, and they both turned in time to see Quentin Travers walk through with Faith close behind him.

"Hello, Ms. Summers. Mr. Giles, I’ve come to deliver your new charge to you."

Faith stood beside Travers and smiled hesitantly. "Hey, B."

"Faith." Buffy said, in the coldest voice she could manage, before turning to Travers. "You’ve come at a bad time. I’m just heading out to patrol."

"Excellent. Faith can accompany you on your patrol while I speak with Mr. Giles."

Buffy started to protest, but one look at Travers convinced her that there would be no changing his mind. She remembered his threats to have Giles deported. She had managed to gain the upper hand the last time the Council had come around, but that was in large part because they needed a Slayer as much as she needed their help getting information about Glory. Now, with Faith out of prison and working for the Council, they had their Slayer. She’d better try to cooperate, or they might decide they didn’t need her anymore and make good on their threats. She couldn’t take losing Giles. Not now. Not so soon after losing her mother.

As the two Slayers left the magic shop, Buffy turned to Faith with undisguised loathing on her face. "I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but I’m not buying it. You want to patrol, go ahead. The Council wants us to work together, and I’m willing to try to play nice. But when we’re not patrolling, you'd better just stay the hell away from me and my friends. Are we clear?"

"Yeah. We’re clear."

"Fine."

As the two Slayers headed off towards the nearest cemetery, their thoughts could not have been more different.

Buffy was thinking that her life could not possibly suck any worse than it did at that moment.

Faith was thinking that this was the best day that she’d had in as long as she could remember.

Continue to Part 4

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