FIC: Echoes of Faith - Chapter 2
Fandom: BtVS/Dollhouse
Title: Echoes of Faith
Chapter 2: What You Don’t Know
Characters/Pairing: Buffy/“Faith”, Echo
Rating: PG-13ish
Warnings: None.
Summary: Willow and Buffy talk. Buffy prepares for her meeting with “Faith”.
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Boyd: You really think it has anything to do with need?
Dr. Saunders: Sometimes, yes. Having a desire you're afraid or ashamed of expressing can be terribly debilitating. Look how many same-sex engagements we're called for, even today.
-from Dollhouse S01E09: A Spy in the House of Love-
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Buffy sat at a small table outside of a cozy little café. The afternoon sun was bright and the outdoor tables were shaded with large parasol umbrellas. A light breeze rustled down the promenade as busy people passed to and fro. A couple of the other tables hosted customers, but the café was not very crowded. Buffy anxiously awaited her guest’s arrival…
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:::4 Days Earlier:::
“Buffy,” said Willow insistently, “can we talk about this?”
The pair sat on opposite ends of a couch in the suite where Buffy was currently staying. A gentle rain drummed against the windows and the overcast sky left only the yellowish glow of a lamp to light the room. The Slayer shifted uncomfortably.
“What do you mean?” Buffy questioned, trying her best to sound innocent.
“You think I don’t know what this is for?” Willow waved the hard drive she was holding.
“I was kind of hoping you wouldn’t know exactly what it’s for,” said Buffy meekly.
“You’re going to the Dollhouse,” Willow stated boldly. “You’re gonna have them imprint someone as Faith so you can,” she gestured aimlessly for a moment, “you know.”
“Oh,” said Buffy, unsettled. “Well, you still made the wedge,” she accused.
“I did,” said Willow calmly. “And I’ll give it to you if you want it, but as your friend - I’m asking you to think about this.”
“You think I haven’t?”
“I didn’t say that,” Willow defended flatly.
“Because, what?” Buffy persisted hotly, “I couldn’t possibly arrive at a decision other than the one you think is right?”
“There’s really no need to be so-”
“I need this, Will,” Buffy stated firmly.
“Why?” Willow countered levelly. “Why this specifically?” She waved the drive again for emphasis.
“I need this experience,” she answered, “I need to know…” she trailed off, struggling for the right words to describe it.
“Okay,” said Willow, voice still unnervingly calm. “I understand wanting to experiment. And I still disagree, but I can even see how the Dollhouse could be helpful there. But you asked me to make a Faith wedge. And - the difficulty of techno-mystical hybrids aside - I think there’s something that should be addressed there, don’t you?”
“What’s there to say?” Buffy mumbled with a shrug.
“Buffy, if it’s Faith you want then you should just go and see her,” Willow reasoned.
“Go and see her?” Buffy repeated incredulously. “And say what?”
“Well, a lot of people start with ‘hi’, but you could always go another direction if you-”
“Oh, sure, make jokes,” Buffy fumed.
“All I’m saying is if you want Faith, you should go to Faith. And if you don’t then you shouldn’t just dump her personality into some brainwashed zombie,” Willow’s calm faltered slightly as she spoke. “You know what this is like, don’t you? This is just like the Buffybot.”
“You don’t know the - never mind,” Buffy stopped her reaction in mid-sentence.
“What?” asked Willow sharply.
“I said never mind.”
“Half of it?” Willow guessed. “What else is there?”
“It really doesn’t matter,” said Buffy quickly.
“Buffy,” Willow sounded seriously concerned now, “are you - you’re not taking Faith in there, right?”
“What? God no,” Buffy dismissed immediately. “And why would I need a brain scan if I had her whole brain?”
“Oh - yeah - right,” Willow realized. “But what is it then?”
“You wouldn’t like it,” Buffy cautioned.
“Tell me,” Willow insisted.
“Okay,” Buffy sighed. She pulled a small drawer from the table next to the arm of the couch and passed Willow a photograph from inside it.
“So - you’re stalking Faith?” asked Willow, mystified. “Working on a shrine, maybe?”
“No, it’s - Willow, that’s not Faith.”
“What?” Willow studied the photograph for a moment and her eyes widened. “Oh!”
“Yeah,” said Buffy shortly, unsure of what could be added to the photograph’s testimony.
“How did you find out?”
“I saw her on a news report,” Buffy explained. “It was something out of Arizona, but she was long gone by the time I got there. There was a guy with her picture though - FBI, I think - I followed him back to L.A. I spent a lot of time looking and getting nothing until one day I saw her again - getting into a black van that went to 23 Flower.”
“Is that where it’s at then?” Willow questioned.
“Pretty sure,” Buffy confirmed.
“Wow,” said Willow blankly, still staring at the photo. “I mean - she looks just like her. Which of course means this is exactly like the Buffybot.”
“Well, I…”
“Do you remember how it made you feel when you found out Spike was doing that?”
“Of course I do,” Buffy assured her.
“Why would you want to put Faith through that?”
“Well, her finding out isn’t exactly part of the master plan,” Buffy pointed out.
“Buffy,” Willow began slowly, “what’s the real reason you’re afraid to go to Faith with this?”
“Will you listen to yourself?” Buffy demanded. “How do you go up to someone and say, ‘oh, by the way, can we try some gay stuff sometime?’”
“Most people wouldn’t open with that,” Willow replied. “It’s more of a build-up-to-it kind of thing. And I think you know that, so what’s the real issue here?”
“There is no - this is what I can have. You and I both know it would never work with Faith; this is something I can actually have.”
“You think it wouldn’t work?” Willow inquired. “I mean, maybe you guys wouldn’t be my first pick for a couple, but there’s definite chemistry between you two. Kennedy even thinks you guys have probably had some really good hate sex.” Willow let the sentence hang for a moment, wondering if Buffy would answer the claim.
“We haven’t,” said Buffy flatly.
“The point is: chemistry. You guys could probably make it work if you wanted to.”
“No we couldn’t,” Buffy countered dryly. “Faith’s never really been long term-”
“Neither is a doll-zombie,” Willow observed.
“And look at my track record with relationships,” Buffy continued. “We’d just get hurt. And yeah, it would still be short term with a doll because I’d have to give her back when it’s over…but at least I know she wouldn’t hurt me.”
“That’s what you’re afraid of?”
“I’m afraid of everything,” Buffy admitted sadly.
“You know that’s normal, right?” Willow reminded her. “I mean, everyone goes through that stuff in relationships. And you know better than anyone how much Faith has grown over the years.”
“That doesn’t mean-”
“Why’d you leave, anyway?”
“What?” Buffy questioned.
“I mean - why did you leave Cleveland?”
Buffy looked down as she twisted her hands in her lap, hesitant to answer the question.
“Buffy?” Willow prompted. “Did something happen that I don’t know about?”
“No, not really,” said Buffy plainly. “She just - I mean, she was always so on-again, off-again with Robin. And I couldn’t keep putting myself through that - just wondering if one of those times she might turn around and realize I was there. I decided I couldn’t just spend the rest of my life hung up and waiting.”
“And look how far you’ve come,” Willow noted.
“This isn’t - I was so moving on,” Buffy defended. “When I saw that girl on TV I thought I must’ve been imagining things, but then I replayed it-”
“Replayed it?”
“Will, it’s the twenty-first century, no one watches live TV anymore,” said Buffy flatly.
“Yeah, I know that,” said Willow, “but you DVR the news?”
“Oh - no - I - they…” Buffy trailed off for a moment. “Okay, you can’t tell anyone about this,” she cautioned. “As of now your lips are Fort Knox.” Willow mimed locking her lips with a key. “They interrupted my soap.”
“Buffy Summers, you shallow, vapid trollop,” said Willow slowly, grinning to herself as she spoke. “Which one?”
“Days of Our Lives,” said the Slayer with a blush.
“Oh,” Willow sighed happily, “I could eat Sami Brady with a spoon.”
“Um, yeah,” Buffy mumbled supportively. “I’m - really more of an EJ gal, myself.”
“And yet there’s Faith,” Willow noted.
“All this time we could’ve been talking about Days-”
“Nope,” Willow cautioned firmly. “Stop dodging the subject, missy.” She wagged a finger disapprovingly.
“Yeah, there’s Faith,” said Buffy softly. “But it won’t happen, okay. So, can we please just drop it?”
“What are you more afraid of?” Willow prompted.
“Will you stop it?” Buffy insisted.
“Buffy, there are clearly a lot of layers to this,” said Willow concernedly. “I’m just trying to help you figure out what you really need to be addressing here. Because this,” she waved the drive yet again, “isn’t it. And I don’t buy the Robin thing either.”
“What?”
“She’s been on-and-off with Robin since back when Sunnydale was still standing,” Willow pointed out, “so, what changed?”
“I don’t know,” mumbled Buffy. “I guess maybe I - sort of felt like was cramping her style or something.”
“Really?” asked Willow curiously.
“I mean - Cleveland’s sort of her town,” Buffy explained. “I guess I started to feel like I was in the way.”
“I think there’s still something you’re not telling me,” said Willow decisively. “Did she ask you to leave?”
“No.”
“Did you make a move on her?”
“No,” Buffy repeated. “And why would that make me leave?”
“If you got rejected-”
“Well, I didn’t,” she offered flatly.
“Because you’re clearly not over her,” Willow observed.
“I never said I was, did I?”
“And you don’t think maybe that’s what this is about?” asked Willow. “That maybe you’re doing this because-”
“I’m doing this,” Buffy interrupted, “so that I can do it. It’s about having that moment and experiencing it and getting out of my system and then moving on.”
“You think this is the way you’re gonna get Faith out of your system?” said Willow wonderingly. “What, you saw how well it worked for Anya and decided to give it a go?”
“What?” Buffy asked blankly. “What does Anya have to do with-”
“That was her big plan when she came back to Sunnydale,” Willow informed her. “She was gonna get Xander out of her system.”
“Oh.” This brought Buffy up short for a moment. “Well - I’m not her.”
Willow rolled her eyes.
“Well, I tried,” the witch decided with a sigh. “It’s pretty clear that you’ll do what you want do.”
“So, can I have the wedge?” asked Buffy hopefully.
“Yes,” Willow assured her, leaning forward to hand the hard drive to her friend. “And also,” she pulled something from her pocket. As Willow unfolded it, Buffy realized it was an airline ticket.
“I already booked my flight to L.A.,” Buffy muttered.
“It’s to Cleveland,” Willow corrected her.
“Oh…” Buffy stared blankly as Willow passed her the ticket and the wedge.
“It’s an open-ended ticket,” Willow stated informatively, “any time in the next year.”
“I - thanks,” Buffy mumbled awkwardly.
“It’s up to you, Buffy,” said Willow kindly, taking the Slayer’s hands between her own. “What you do is always up to you and you know I’ll be your friend no matter what you do. Just think about what it is that you really need, okay?”
“Yeah…” said Buffy, eyes still glazed in thought.
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:::Present Day:::
Buffy fidgeted nervously as she waited. She wasn’t even sure when she had pulled out Willow’s airline ticket, but it wasn’t the first time she had done so in the past four days. Staring blankly down at it, she persistently folded and unfolded the well-worn rectangle while trying very hard to ignore the thoughts and doubts it was stirring in her mind.
“Hey, B.”
Buffy hurriedly stuffed the ticket into her pocket and out of sight.
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