Fic: The Sisterhood (Buffy & Faith, PG13)
Title The Sisterhood
Author Brutti ma buoni
Rating PG13 (for Faithish language)
Word Count 1500
Characters Faith and Buffy
A/N: this story is set in the Rulesverse, my post-Chosen AU. The Rulesverse is vast now, and though I’d love you to read it (I promise there is lots of Faith throughout), all you really need to know to understand this story is that in the future as our Slayers get older, they start to have families. Which brings its own issues when you're a Slayer running the Council...
“You really did it, huh?” Faith’s voice brought Buffy’s head round from the window she’d been aimlessly gazing through. There was nothing new to see anyway. Soggy Scottish countryside looked pretty much the same as it had for the last five months, since she’d been sure it had happened this time.
Faith had been back a few hours. Just a flying visit. No surprise she’d gone to Giles first. Some surprise she’d come to see Buffy, though. Even more that she was going to talk about It.
People were mostly avoiding the subject. Giles, for example, had said essentially nothing apart from “Oh, er, congratulations.”
Trust Faith to be less discreet.
“I thought you were kidding, when you called. Never thought you’d go for it. Man, you are huge. It must be due soon, right?”
“Another three months.”
“Shit.”
Which was fair; and pretty much what Buffy thought about the size of her bulging abdomen.
“You still Slaying?” Faith expected the answer no, it was all over her tone.
Shrug. “Sure. When it’s needed. Not often. But it’s not that bad. Just a bump, throws off my balance sometimes. Like if you’re shielding an injury, maybe.”
“No way. I thought you’d be packed up in cotton wool and babying yourself the whole time. Seems like a weird situation for a Slayer.”
“It’s not as weird as you’d think. I’ll still be a Slayer after; I’m still a Slayer now. I just made a choice most Slayers never got to make.” Faith looked disbelieving, so Buffy risked a tease, “You’re not tempted to go for it yourself?”
Faith flinched. “Me? Never. Wouldn’t want my genes passed on, you know? And G, I think he’s a little past all that, don’t you?” Her light tone demanded Buffy not explore what might be wrong with the Lehane genes, or come to that whether Giles got a vote in this decision. Okay, but silence worked both ways.
When Faith asked the question no one else had dared, Buffy answered simply. “Spike’s the father.”
There were advantages to most people not wanting to get in Buffy’s face about having a baby with a dead man. It meant Faith was literally the first person to say the next thing that came out of her mouth. Unfortunately, it also meant Buffy hadn’t yet learned to mask her irritation at the probably-inevitable follow up.
“Sure, if he was here, he’d be playing Daddy. But, you know who’s the actual Dad?” Stupid biology-based definitions of fatherhood.
Buffy thought Faith had underestimated her strength, as though the baby was a parasite, sapping her of Slayer powers. Either that, or she was exhausted after travel plus reunion with Giles (eeuw, bad thought). Either way, Buffy had Faith slammed across the conference table faster than either of them could remember in recent sparring.
“Spike is the actual father. Okay?”
Faith, still surprised and short of breath, gave in. “Yeah. Whatever, B. Good luck with it.”
Buffy felt oddly better for having said it. But they still didn’t speak again till after Annie was born.
*
June 2010
“So, you really did it, huh?”
“Go ahead and laugh, B.” Faith looked disgustedly at the tiny, discreet bump that said Pregnant Woman, Four Months Along, and that had finally made her confess her situation.
“I’m not laughing. Babies are of the good. Mostly.” Buffy looked over at her daughter, who was running a mild fever and was manifesting this in the runniest nose she’d ever seen. Ugh, mucus monster.
“Well, not for me. I’m a Slayer. I’m not a Mom.”
“And yet....”
“Yeah. This is one determined little sucker; believe me. So not in my plans. Like, Faith the Yummy Mummy? Are we gonna start special Slayer daycare?”
Buffy paused. Not a bad idea, actually. Given the age profile of the Slayerettes, she and Faith were probably the start of a fertility tsunami. But Faith’s emotional state seemed more urgent to deal with. Be positive. “It’s cool though. Being a Slayer doesn’t define who we are anymore.”
“Bullshit.”
Yeah, that positive approach could have gone better. “Okay, we’re Slayers. But we’re not only Slayers. We get to have partners. Husbands, kids.”
“Yeah. Cuz we don't die at fifteen. We live long enough to want those things alongside our sacred duty blah blah. But it’s not the important thing. The day we have a Slayer who’s also a lawyer or a carpenter or an astronaut, that’ll be the breakthrough.”
“You want to be an astronaut?” It didn’t really seem like Faith.
“Fuck, no. Can you imagine? Zero-g crapping? Six months in a space station doing experiments on lab rats? And I don’t wanna be a carpenter either. Or, Christ, a lawyer. I’d just like the girls to have that choice, you know?”
“They have it. We don’t make them work for the Council.”
Buffy was defensive. Faith called her on it. “No, sure. We’d be real happy with superstrong brain surgeons running around out of our control. We might let them do it, B, but we’d watch the hell out of them. You know it. Plus, they don’t actually choose to be anything else, because of Slayers’ fuckin' destiny.”
“Okay...” What the hell was going on with Faith?
It must have been written on Buffy’s face, because Faith came up with the answer at once. “I don’t want my kid to be a Slayer. Okay?”
Long pause. Faith started to soften those words.
“Or if she is... I want her to know she has choices.”
“It might not be a girl.” Buffy was scrabbling for answers.
“B... so not the point.”
“I thought you liked the Slaying. Seemed like it suits you.”
Faith shrugged. “From where I was? Being the Slayer was the best thing that could have ever happened. And that would still be true if you had actually killed me ten years ago.” Ouch. On both counts. Buffy tended to try not to think about gutting Faith that one time. Bad for morale. “But I’m planning on this brat having it all. School, family, fuckin’ ballet lessons, whatever. But what’s the point if she’s gonna end up staking vamps as soon as she’s a teenager?”
Was this really Faith? With family and ballet lessons and career choices? What the hell was the baby doing to her? Sounded like a mom already. Buffy had a brief moment of imagining Faith carrying a demon child that turned her into a Stepford Wife. Funny stuff, but not helpful. The baby in question was definitely human, and real.
Still, curiosity was rampant. “So, you’re giving up Slaying to do the mommy thing?”
Faith didn’t actually answer her, but the look of amazed distaste covered it pretty well. “I need a beat that’s nearer HQ. Think you can fix it, B?”
“Uh, we don’t have any European vacancies right now. Not at senior level. You want a specialist squad instead? Vengeance demon liaison’s pretty office-based...” Though also requiring a lot of negotiation and diplomacy, and other words that didn’t go with Faith in Buffy’s head. Must be something... “Oh, how about Scandinavia? Peri was talking about maybe looking for another beat. You could swap Ulan Bator for Stockholm.”
“Yeah. That’ll work. Tell her tomorrow.” Faith was ruthless in grabbing that chance. Buffy was trying to picture Peri’s face at being ordered to swap. New challenges didn’t always mean wanting to spend the next few years in Mongolia. But that operational issue had distracted Faith a little from her pregnancy desperation.
“Cool. That’s plan A. Now I just have to figure out all the Mommy stuff and I’m set.” Hollow laughter didn’t cover Faith’s ongoing semi-panic at all.
“It’ll be okay. I knew nothing, my baby has a vampire for a Dad and I wasn’t even sure he’d be around to help out. Compared with me and Spike, you’re in good shape.”
“Hah. Maybe.”
There was a pause. Faith finally stopped fiddling, making up new things to freak out about, and avoiding Buffy’s eyes.
“B? I’m really scared about being a mom.”
Buffy thought of all kinds of things she could have said. About how most people manage to bring up kids okay. About Faith not being alone in this, and with as much support as she’d accept from dozens of friends and colleagues. About how having crappy parents didn’t necessarily mean you’d be a crappy parent. About how Slaying wasn’t ideal to combine with motherhood, and yes it narrowed your options but also saved the world and brought them into contact with a hundred cultures every year, human and demon and...
All of which was true. All of which was important. None of which needed to be said right now. So Buffy just grabbed for Faith’s reluctant hand and said, “Yeah. Me too.”
*
Author Brutti ma buoni
Rating PG13 (for Faithish language)
Word Count 1500
Characters Faith and Buffy
A/N: this story is set in the Rulesverse, my post-Chosen AU. The Rulesverse is vast now, and though I’d love you to read it (I promise there is lots of Faith throughout), all you really need to know to understand this story is that in the future as our Slayers get older, they start to have families. Which brings its own issues when you're a Slayer running the Council...
“You really did it, huh?” Faith’s voice brought Buffy’s head round from the window she’d been aimlessly gazing through. There was nothing new to see anyway. Soggy Scottish countryside looked pretty much the same as it had for the last five months, since she’d been sure it had happened this time.
Faith had been back a few hours. Just a flying visit. No surprise she’d gone to Giles first. Some surprise she’d come to see Buffy, though. Even more that she was going to talk about It.
People were mostly avoiding the subject. Giles, for example, had said essentially nothing apart from “Oh, er, congratulations.”
Trust Faith to be less discreet.
“I thought you were kidding, when you called. Never thought you’d go for it. Man, you are huge. It must be due soon, right?”
“Another three months.”
“Shit.”
Which was fair; and pretty much what Buffy thought about the size of her bulging abdomen.
“You still Slaying?” Faith expected the answer no, it was all over her tone.
Shrug. “Sure. When it’s needed. Not often. But it’s not that bad. Just a bump, throws off my balance sometimes. Like if you’re shielding an injury, maybe.”
“No way. I thought you’d be packed up in cotton wool and babying yourself the whole time. Seems like a weird situation for a Slayer.”
“It’s not as weird as you’d think. I’ll still be a Slayer after; I’m still a Slayer now. I just made a choice most Slayers never got to make.” Faith looked disbelieving, so Buffy risked a tease, “You’re not tempted to go for it yourself?”
Faith flinched. “Me? Never. Wouldn’t want my genes passed on, you know? And G, I think he’s a little past all that, don’t you?” Her light tone demanded Buffy not explore what might be wrong with the Lehane genes, or come to that whether Giles got a vote in this decision. Okay, but silence worked both ways.
When Faith asked the question no one else had dared, Buffy answered simply. “Spike’s the father.”
There were advantages to most people not wanting to get in Buffy’s face about having a baby with a dead man. It meant Faith was literally the first person to say the next thing that came out of her mouth. Unfortunately, it also meant Buffy hadn’t yet learned to mask her irritation at the probably-inevitable follow up.
“Sure, if he was here, he’d be playing Daddy. But, you know who’s the actual Dad?” Stupid biology-based definitions of fatherhood.
Buffy thought Faith had underestimated her strength, as though the baby was a parasite, sapping her of Slayer powers. Either that, or she was exhausted after travel plus reunion with Giles (eeuw, bad thought). Either way, Buffy had Faith slammed across the conference table faster than either of them could remember in recent sparring.
“Spike is the actual father. Okay?”
Faith, still surprised and short of breath, gave in. “Yeah. Whatever, B. Good luck with it.”
Buffy felt oddly better for having said it. But they still didn’t speak again till after Annie was born.
*
June 2010
“So, you really did it, huh?”
“Go ahead and laugh, B.” Faith looked disgustedly at the tiny, discreet bump that said Pregnant Woman, Four Months Along, and that had finally made her confess her situation.
“I’m not laughing. Babies are of the good. Mostly.” Buffy looked over at her daughter, who was running a mild fever and was manifesting this in the runniest nose she’d ever seen. Ugh, mucus monster.
“Well, not for me. I’m a Slayer. I’m not a Mom.”
“And yet....”
“Yeah. This is one determined little sucker; believe me. So not in my plans. Like, Faith the Yummy Mummy? Are we gonna start special Slayer daycare?”
Buffy paused. Not a bad idea, actually. Given the age profile of the Slayerettes, she and Faith were probably the start of a fertility tsunami. But Faith’s emotional state seemed more urgent to deal with. Be positive. “It’s cool though. Being a Slayer doesn’t define who we are anymore.”
“Bullshit.”
Yeah, that positive approach could have gone better. “Okay, we’re Slayers. But we’re not only Slayers. We get to have partners. Husbands, kids.”
“Yeah. Cuz we don't die at fifteen. We live long enough to want those things alongside our sacred duty blah blah. But it’s not the important thing. The day we have a Slayer who’s also a lawyer or a carpenter or an astronaut, that’ll be the breakthrough.”
“You want to be an astronaut?” It didn’t really seem like Faith.
“Fuck, no. Can you imagine? Zero-g crapping? Six months in a space station doing experiments on lab rats? And I don’t wanna be a carpenter either. Or, Christ, a lawyer. I’d just like the girls to have that choice, you know?”
“They have it. We don’t make them work for the Council.”
Buffy was defensive. Faith called her on it. “No, sure. We’d be real happy with superstrong brain surgeons running around out of our control. We might let them do it, B, but we’d watch the hell out of them. You know it. Plus, they don’t actually choose to be anything else, because of Slayers’ fuckin' destiny.”
“Okay...” What the hell was going on with Faith?
It must have been written on Buffy’s face, because Faith came up with the answer at once. “I don’t want my kid to be a Slayer. Okay?”
Long pause. Faith started to soften those words.
“Or if she is... I want her to know she has choices.”
“It might not be a girl.” Buffy was scrabbling for answers.
“B... so not the point.”
“I thought you liked the Slaying. Seemed like it suits you.”
Faith shrugged. “From where I was? Being the Slayer was the best thing that could have ever happened. And that would still be true if you had actually killed me ten years ago.” Ouch. On both counts. Buffy tended to try not to think about gutting Faith that one time. Bad for morale. “But I’m planning on this brat having it all. School, family, fuckin’ ballet lessons, whatever. But what’s the point if she’s gonna end up staking vamps as soon as she’s a teenager?”
Was this really Faith? With family and ballet lessons and career choices? What the hell was the baby doing to her? Sounded like a mom already. Buffy had a brief moment of imagining Faith carrying a demon child that turned her into a Stepford Wife. Funny stuff, but not helpful. The baby in question was definitely human, and real.
Still, curiosity was rampant. “So, you’re giving up Slaying to do the mommy thing?”
Faith didn’t actually answer her, but the look of amazed distaste covered it pretty well. “I need a beat that’s nearer HQ. Think you can fix it, B?”
“Uh, we don’t have any European vacancies right now. Not at senior level. You want a specialist squad instead? Vengeance demon liaison’s pretty office-based...” Though also requiring a lot of negotiation and diplomacy, and other words that didn’t go with Faith in Buffy’s head. Must be something... “Oh, how about Scandinavia? Peri was talking about maybe looking for another beat. You could swap Ulan Bator for Stockholm.”
“Yeah. That’ll work. Tell her tomorrow.” Faith was ruthless in grabbing that chance. Buffy was trying to picture Peri’s face at being ordered to swap. New challenges didn’t always mean wanting to spend the next few years in Mongolia. But that operational issue had distracted Faith a little from her pregnancy desperation.
“Cool. That’s plan A. Now I just have to figure out all the Mommy stuff and I’m set.” Hollow laughter didn’t cover Faith’s ongoing semi-panic at all.
“It’ll be okay. I knew nothing, my baby has a vampire for a Dad and I wasn’t even sure he’d be around to help out. Compared with me and Spike, you’re in good shape.”
“Hah. Maybe.”
There was a pause. Faith finally stopped fiddling, making up new things to freak out about, and avoiding Buffy’s eyes.
“B? I’m really scared about being a mom.”
Buffy thought of all kinds of things she could have said. About how most people manage to bring up kids okay. About Faith not being alone in this, and with as much support as she’d accept from dozens of friends and colleagues. About how having crappy parents didn’t necessarily mean you’d be a crappy parent. About how Slaying wasn’t ideal to combine with motherhood, and yes it narrowed your options but also saved the world and brought them into contact with a hundred cultures every year, human and demon and...
All of which was true. All of which was important. None of which needed to be said right now. So Buffy just grabbed for Faith’s reluctant hand and said, “Yeah. Me too.”
*