Chapter 7

I woke up, nearly shaken from my sleep by some unearthly call. Lindsey's arms were still around me in a gentle embrace, making me feel cosseted and safe, and all his face held was serene adoration. I felt as if I betrayed him just by being there, in his arms, without sharing his curious devotion. Slipping easily from his embrace and out from under the covers, I located my clothing and clad myself again in the comfortably binding attire. I knew that under no other circumstances would I have left the false, but loving arms, but something compelled me to leave…to hunt.

The term itself was unfamiliar to me. I had never *hunted*, or referred to it as such, but something told me that that was exactly what it was: the hunt. I left the building with such swift silence, that I was amazed to find that it struck me as entirely natural.

I walked along the streets lit only by flickering streetlights and predawn moonshine. The very few passersby were mysterious fledgling luminaries and street-hardened paramours who barely glanced up to see me in the hazy darkness of LA life. Each one had a story, a purpose that was on the forefront of their easily breeched minds, each one with a secret and a façade that cloaked their reality and others' perceptions of such. LA was alive because of the malcontents and their hidden pain, their all-consuming disenchantment and regret. But I wasn't meant to notice them, or to help them. A higher power than suffering called to me, forcing me away from the sorrow and shame.

The call drew me into an alley, into what a small group of vampires had made their feeding ground. The moment that the five saw me, what I took to be the leader stood up, dropping the already dead victim to the ground.

"Hello little girl," He said, with only the skill of decades to call upon. "Did you lose your way?" I stood at the center of the alley, chillingly silent. The leader took measured, sauntering steps closer to me and I glanced to my side noting the heavy wood box to my right. "Don't be afraid, my little moppet." He continued to come closer and I readied myself for the moment he'd be near enough. "We won't hurt you."

When he was less than a foot away from me I looked into his fierce yellow eyes and responded softly, "You're right." Before he could react, I quickly splintered the wooden box with my elbow and brought one of the fragments down and into his chest, watching his ridged features crumble to mystic dust at my feet.

Taking the stake-like splinter into my hand adroitly, I wordlessly beckoned the other four vampires who were at the end of the alley. They attacked all at once; attempting to blow me down with the sheer force of undisciplined kicks and punches. Each was blocked, each was countered, and nothing could touch me. There was no longer the deep seeded remorse at the back of my mind, now it was just instinct. Everything was aligning in me, everything awakening. Darkness no longer existed; nothing was to be guilty of. I was now the intense force my birth had afforded me, and I was again what I was meant to be, a true power of good. It seemed to cleanse me of the ubiquitous pang of knowing that I was infected, impure, because I no longer had need to know. I no longer was. Not now, not ever again. I was a Slayer now, more than I ever had been. The return of my clairvoyant powers made sense. I had become.

Maybe it was my way of redemption, the return of my own soul, a gypsy curse miscalled. Perhaps this was how I was to atone for my crimes, to give in to the primal call that drew me from the bed of my 'enemy', away from my evil. I didn't know.

The vampires had turned to dust under the expert use of my stake, but the victims were beyond saving, so I went on my merry way, certain that yellow police tape would decorate the alley in the morning. My somewhat unconscious 'merry' way led me to nest after nest of vampires who I dusted without batting an eyelid, finally leading me to what almost certainly beckoned to me in the first place: the Hyperion. Angel.

It was a draw that I wished to God I could fight, but just as it had shaken me from sleep, it took me there. I was without my own will as I gazed up into the sole lighted window, the lamp still burning bright and he still pacing like an animated statue of Jove, looking left and right from under hooded eyes. The attraction that had been so fierce for so excruciatingly long had not diminished as I wished it would, but instead strengthened as my steely gaze still focused on that window. Once I knew he sensed me, he mentally perked and stopped his incessant pace, but then shook it off, convincing himself he was being driven to insanity by his longing, before he could glance out the window and see my sadly desiring eyes looking up from the parking lot.

But there was a strange permeating intensity hovering over the layer of our beings, an odd balance of purpose and need, an inconceivable feeling of rightness and intention that stemmed beyond our own emotional satisfaction or our existence itself. Almost as if we were drawn now, here, this way for some reason, some ultimate goal. I shook my head at the thought and drew myself away, convincing the battling concepts in my head that I was romanticizing something that resembled a crush gone horribly wrong… no that would imply that at least one of us had some semblance of control or grounding in the matter of this attraction, which was, quite obviously, not true. A final gaze to the window and then I forced myself from the Hyperion and into the darkness.

When I did reach the door of Lindsey's apartment, I could feel him moving around inside, awake and wondering where I had gone and already forming his own conclusion to the query. I also knew that if I did step in, a confrontation would be inevitable and Lindsey's obstinacy would almost certainly result in a conflict. I really wished that I had cared.

The door was unlocked and I silently passed over the threshold, watching Lindsey pace for a moment. I could feel something strange in the air though, an odd upset infecting the atmosphere. Lindsey turned to meet my eyes, the very nearly sickening affection ever present in them.

"Where were you?" His tone was almost innocent and his eyes luminous in the soft overhead light, looking at me with the possibility of betrayal.

"Out," I said, casually leaving it vague, "You know, just a walk to clear my head."

"Oh," His voice softer than his meaning. The small disturbance in the room still gnawed at my nerves, begging me to acknowledge its importance.

"So, how long have you been up?" I asked, casually broaching the subject.

"A couple of hours…"He shrugged, then saying somewhat more pointedly, "Long walk apparently."

"Well, I guess I had a lot to do," I quickly corrected myself, "Think about…" I had the gentle stinging feeling in my mind that so often preceded a premonition, though I tried my best to numb it into knowledge. "So, uh, you've been just walking back and forth during those few hours?"

"No, I…did some things…cases." His eyes showed the tinge of dishonestly he had yet to learn to hide, and the mild stinging stopped, coming instead a flash of light as his untutored nature allowed me narrowly into his recent memories:

"The end of days Lindsey…she's the key."

"Sir…Holland, is it really necessary to…"

"Lindsey, your attachment to her will hinder it, I've discussed it with the Senior Partners and hers is a major role. She's in no way expendable, however, as most certainly you are."

Lindsey must have seen my eyes change, as he suddenly faltered when he glanced up at me again. He knew. He must have known, but he still attempted to slip through my knowledge in a manner of well-practiced poise.

"So, uh, what's on your mind?" He said, resting his arm against the ceramic counter, "What did you need to think about?"

"Things." I answered quickly, "Personal stuff."

He cast an anxious stare down against the carpeted floor, seemingly trying to decide whether to play on or to acknowledge the serious matter that cleaned the air of easiness and relaxed feeling. He looked up at me and decided. "You saw him."

"From a distance." I nodded and wet my lips, mentally urging him on.

"And you know?"

"Know what?" I feigned ignorance as I calculated him, quietly judging his movements; I wanted to hear it from him. There seemed a strange, guilty lassitude about his downcast eyes, his adoration and call of duty warring against each other on the sanguinary battlefields of his psyche.

"You know…" He said, silently challenging me with melancholy looks.

I took in a deep breath, mentally testing my resolve, pressing the pins and needles of his sad eyes against the hardened barrier of protection. My fingers unconsciously trailed along the end of mahogany table beside the door, tapping my fingernails against the dark sheen of varnish.

"Planning on breaking the silence?" He whispered just loud enough for me to hear, a nervous tinge to his soft voice.

"I like the quiet…" I said, glancing down at my hand and pulling it from the brunette surface of the table. "What key?" I asked, my voice surprisingly stable.

"Come again?" He feigned ignorance and I fought the urge to press him to the wall in exasperation. I loathed this game.

My voice was an unbelievably serene, yet somewhat disturbing monotone. "Tell me what role I play in the End of Days, Lindsey. Our lives will all be much smoother and the better for it."

It was more the icy calm of my tone, I suspect, that affected him than my words could have ever done, and he feigned no more. "The End of Days is the apocalypse."

"Another one of those?" I murmured low enough that he remained oblivious.

He went on. "The dependent variable, whether or not it will happen is all up to the fate of Angel. To what side he is on." He stopped.

"So what do I have to do with it?"

"You're going to make that decision." He said simply, "You're the determining factor."

"I can save the world…" I trailed off.

"Or you can end it."

I suddenly felt limp and inwardly swayed, steadying myself against my now strangely solid resolution. "I see." I nodded to myself and looked on him, dazed but unchanging. "Thank you." My voice lowered by it's own accord and became distant, emotionless. "Good-bye Lindsey." I turned with the slow evenness of a sloth and touched the metal of the doorknob.

"Faith, don't…" His voice trailed to the sharply attuned ears and I ignored it, leaving out of obligation and out of sympathy.

Chapter Eight