sunnydalealum | (no subject)

Historically, as a rule, the funeral of a Slayer has been a quiet affair. On occasion there have been families to make the arrangements, but most of the time, the parents and (if any) siblings have long since lost all contact with their daughter, whether deliberately or not. The Council has always seen to it that the Slayer is given a decent burial: a hardwood box, and six feet of consecrated ground, and someone to say the words, and the Watcher as sole mourner.

This, like so many other things since the Call, has changed.

It's the first time they're all back together again in over a year, the women who came to Sunnydale as Potentials and fought the First Evil there as Slayers. Caridad and Chao-Ahn, Rona and Vi and Shannon, half a dozen others. Many of them died in the battle at the Hellmouth ... but Kennedy is the first of them to have died since then.

So they're here, and so are newer Slayers who had Kennedy as their first combat instructor, and field Slayers who had her as their team leader. And so are at least one ex-lover, and at least one current one. About four-fifths of the Slayers are in somber black; the rest are in equally somber white.

Kennedy's parents and her half-sister are here somewhere too, in the crowd. Buffy and Giles are talking to them.

Soon someone's going to stand up front and start the memorial service.

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Faith wishes she agreed with him, that she wasn't hard enough to keep going. She wishes she could believe that there was any end in sight for her.

But she knows better. Of course she's going to keep going, alongside the others, until the day comes when she's just that little bit too slow, not strong enough, not good enough. She knows herself well enough, now, to know that. That's what Slaying is. Hard and brutal and everyday, a futile, bloody race, and their spell, all the new Slayers, that's not going to change the basic facts.

Marathon's the same whether you've got one runner or one thousand.

He's right about one thing, though. Well, two things.

They've got to figure something out.

They're our girls.

"Metaphor pardoned," she assures him, quietly. "And we will."

He didn't say keep on going. He said keep surviving. It is a fine, but dramatic line. On one side you're a an organic machine, on the other you're a person.

"Ta, Faith." Spoon says, taking comfort as best he can, "Dunno if it's exactly the right time, or exactly the wrong time, but my girl...she's going to make an honest wolf of me. Marry me."

"Good on you, Spoon."

Maybe it's not exactly the right time, but Faith thinks Kennedy wouldn't mind.

It is possible that her arm just went around Spoon's shoulders, to facilitate sort-of-hugging.

It is probable that Spoon's echoes the arm movement. He has to remember life. Because otherwise everything is death.

Faith has a rosary in her hand, mostly hidden, when the service starts.

She's Irish Catholic to the very marrow of her, but most people will never know that. Most people she doesn't trust with knowing it.

Spoon is Church of England. He doesn't mind people knowing that. He does make a point of not looking down at her rosary.

These things are personal, even when they're in public.

The leaning doesn't let up, during the service.

If anything it gets more neediness-intensive.

Spoon isn't a sane or normal person. Not even for werewolves. He's got testosterone where other men have common sense. On the other hand, he's got paternal instincts where other men have machismo (once you have killed a T-Rex, from the inside, with your teeth, you no longer need machismo).

Which is why he's not only willing to be leaned on, he's got that whole fatherly/older brotherly protective thing going. Yeah, he knows that under normal circumstances she could probably tie him into a half dozen knots within the span of five minutes. These ain't those.

And obsessively guardian animal has been used to describe him more than once.

Faith hasn't had a lot of fatherly or brotherly influences in her life.

The biggest of the ones she did have ended up turning into a snake.

It's kinda new having one she doesn't have to worry about.

She likes it more than she'll ever admit.

He does his best. The Witherspoons were a very small family, and before he got infected and ended up with a fiancee who didn't want to ever have children, his life-plan involved a half dozen or so kids.

He makes up for it with one adopted Cora and a bunch of Slayers. He'll just hang out here, with Faith, until they're done.