“God, what were you thinking, Faith?” Buffy’s half-an-octave higher than normal exasperated scream grated Faith ears like nails on a chalkboard.

Faith tried to shrug her shoulders but the beating the Hellmouthy Cops had given her made her hurt all over so bad that she was unable to move her arms even a bit. Just standing up took almost everything she had.

“Seemed like a good idea at the time,” she mumbled. Breathing hurt but she would be damned before she showed any physical weakness to Buffy. She saw the flying fist but was unable to block it. It connected with her cheek with the force of a sledgehammer, spinning her around. As Faith went down, a series of images of every single time Buffy had punched her flashed through her mind. She hit the ground hard and her already injured ribs sent a flash of pain through her, almost enough to make her pass out.

“A good idea!?” Buffy screeched and Faith could almost visualize the veins popping in the blonde’s head. She was in a really bad shape and decided to just wait until Buffy had let out all the steam. What happened next was something she could never have expected. She heard Buffy take a step forward and then a solid kick landed in her side.

“You almost got them killed, Faith! You almost got Dawn killed!” Buffy continued screaming, totally out of control, and landed a final kick in Faith’s stomach.

Faith couldn’t move, the pain she was in was totally paralyzing. Like from a great distance she heard Buffy’s receding steps. “Stay out of my way, Faith, until we need you,” was the final thing she heard before she really passed out from the pain.

---===---

Faith regained her consciousness slowly. She was cold and shivering. It was raining lightly and she saw she was alone in the dark alley behind the Bronze. The cops who had given her the initial thorough beating had slunk away while she was still unconscious. There was an almost blinding pain in her chest and she couldn’t keep back the tears escaping her eyes as she lay in a foetal position in a shallow puddle.

‘Why, B?’ she asked herself as a dry sob shook her. ‘The punch I get but you were never this cruel. You saw the state I was in and still you struck me when I was already down.’ She coughed feebly and a splatter of blood escaped her mouth. ‘Shit, not good,’ she thought and felt a rising panic somewhere inside.

“Well, you’re right where I expected to find you, you little slut,” a voice said suddenly right next to her, a voice Faith thought she would never hear again. It still managed to frighten her.

She whipped her head towards the voice on instinct almost passing out again from the sudden flash of agony in her neck. “M-mum?”

---===---

“I’m actually pleasantly surprised, Fai,” Caroline Lehane snorted. “Even totally wasted you still recognize your dear, old mother.”

“I-I’m not...,” Faith breathed weakly, still lying on her side with her arms holding her injured chest.

“Couldn’t pay your dealer, right? Or was it your pimp? Whoever beat you up did a real good job of it.”

“No, Mum, I-I’m not doing drugs, I swear,” Faith defended herself automatically. “And I’m not a...”

“A what, Fai? A whore?” Caroline asked in amusement. “Of course you are. You are a just sneaky little whore who would spread her legs for anyone who would have her, like your mother’s boyfriends for example. And you thought I wouldn’t find out?”

Faith felt like she couldn’t breathe. How could her mother turn everything upside-down so casually? She had to know. She had to remember.

“Mum, no. It was them... they came to my room... and I... I couldn’t stop them.”

“Oh, please,” Caroline laughed dryly. “I wish you wouldn’t try to insult my intelligence like this. All those little signals you thought I couldn’t see – bringing attention to your lips and your ass. Did they whisper in your ear what a good little fuck you were, how sweetly you gave it? Did it turn you on that you had to be quiet, 'cause your mother was sleeping in the next room?”

“You... you were passed out and they...”

“Told you they loved you? Told you they’d take you away from all that? Lord knows I would have slit my wrists for the shame alone.”

Faith saw dimly her mother crouch down next to her in her light summer dress. For some reason she appeared to be totally dry. “In fact, Fai, it’s not yet too late to atone,” Caroline continued in a much sweeter tone. “You can still do it and regain a little bit of dignity. You have a knife, and in your condition, you won’t even feel a thing. Just a few deep cuts and it will all just... drain away.”

“You’re not my mother,” Faith gasped, as realization hit her. “You’re the First!”

Caroline tsk’ed and rose to her feet. “What gave it away? Was I too eager? I know, I shouldn’t have mentioned the drugs. Was that it? But I know I got close. I can get closer still.”

With that the apparition of Caroline Lehane was gone.

---===---

Getting back to her feet with every little movement sending jolts of excruciating pain throughout her system was probably the hardest physical exercise Faith had ever done in her life. Leaning against the back door to Bronze, she tried to breathe lightly as each indrawn lungful increased the ache somewhere close to her heart.

Lightheaded, she realized she was only a few yards away from the spot where she had first met Buffy, her sister Slayer. She had been so nervous about meeting the older Slayer that she almost missed the vampire’s heart when she dusted it with the stake she had borrowed from Buffy.

‘I was so happy then, briefly. I had waited for so long to meet the only other girl in the world, the one Diana had told all those stories about.’ She sniffled with a shuddering sigh. ‘We were supposed to have been best friends. The only ones who could really understand each other – the Chosen Two. But you already had your best friends. You had your impenetrable ring of Scoobies around you within which there was no room for the slutty, white-trash Slayer. All those times I waited alone in my room at that roach-infested Motel for you to want to spend time with me. All those times I sat alone on a tombstone for hours waiting for you to come patrol with me, but you never did. It was always “Scooby this” and “Scooby that”. Did you even remember my existence until you needed some extra muscle? All I wanted was...’

“You wanted a family, Faith, and I gave you one,” came a deep voice from the other end of the alley.

“Boss...”

---===---

“Well, my little Firecracker,” Mayor Richard Wilkins said cheerfully as he stepped casually to where Faith was leaning against the door. “Things don’t look all that good for you at the moment, do they?” Wilkins asked matter-of-factly with his hands in his trouser pockets.

“You’re not him,” Faith shook her head despite the sharp pain each side-to-side movement caused.

“That’s right, Faith,” Wilkins said with his head tilted to the side a little. “I’m not. But that doesn’t mean I don’t care about you just as much as he did. The dead are my province and I know and feel everything they did when they were still alive. He... I really loved you, Faith, like a daughter. You mistook me once for a Sugar Daddy, understandable in the circumstances, but I forgave you that little slip immediately. Men had taken advantage of you before, and you just naturally assumed no-one would ever give you anything except in exchange for... let’s say physical services. Darn! I wish I could have been there to teach a lesson to those who had mistreated you so.”

“I-I’m sorry, Boss,” Faith said quietly with her head held low. It was so hard not to think of the apparition before her as the Mayor.

“But, still, Faith. You did betray me in the end,” Wilkins said in a more serious voice.

“No, Boss, no I didn’t,” Faith panicked again, this time because it was the truth.

“Yes, you did, Faith. Yes, you did,” Wilkins shook her head sadly. “Did you really think Ms Summers would forgive you... would accept you if you gave her that little piece of information on how to stop my Ascension? You have no idea how disappointed I was when I realized that. I thought you were ‘solid’ as you put it but, in the end, you clung to the vain hope that they... sorry, she would welcome you back with open arms.”

There was nothing Faith could do but hold her head low and cry silently.

“You are a traitor, Faith. Do you really think Ms Summers will ever trust you again? Do you think her friends and all those pesky little Potentials will? She has told them all about you, all the gritty little details. And try as you might to prove otherwise, a first impression is a first impression. There’s no place for you there anymore, Faith. They will lose, and they will lose everything. That’s inevitable, and the only wise thing for a smart girl like you to do is get yourself patched up and get yourself gone. Isn’t that how you always handled bad situations? ‘Get some, get gone’? Well, you’ve really gotten some this time around, haven’t you? Why not follow through as well? Just a short visit to Sunnydale General and then... just leave this place forever.”

Wilkins took a few steps towards Faith and came to stand within touching distance.

“I retain a... whisper of everyone whose resemblance I’ve taken. If you stop fighting me, you will have a place of honor in my new world. I do care about you, Faith, and you have earned peace for yourself a thousand times over. Just... turn your back on that ungrateful bitch and her gang, and you’ll have all that and more. You have my word that none of my minions will touch you.”

The First waited a full minute for Faith to answer but she just kept her eyes on the ground.

“I see,” Wilkins said evenly. “Well, life’s full of second chances, and here’s chance number two for you, Faith. Think about it. Think about it real good.”

And with that, he was gone.