Broken Things
Dana never felt crazy. It all made perfect sense to her. Fight bad. Kill bad. When they told her she'd been bad, it took the combined tranquilizers, straps and constant supervision to stop her killing some more. Slayer or not, crazy was plain nuts.
She'd lost weight, until the doctor they'd persuaded into the cause inserted an IV. Eventually, she started to wake. The dreams of Slayers past present and future got worse and made her try not to sleep. Some of the pills didn't help.
Lucid was still too strong a word for what she said when awake.
Faith found her one winter day, trying to cut her wrists on the dull plastic strap buckle.
When she saw Faith during one of her good phases, she tried to use the buckle on her. Buffy took one look and washed her hands, heading off to recruit more sane Slayers. Faith stayed.
Faith always felt crazy. To her it never made sense. Like she was trapped inside her body screaming to get out. Fighting just made it worse.
Perhaps that was why she seemed to spend more and more of her substantial free time talking to Dana. Giles came by, occasionally, talking to Dana like she was a baby, asking her help in filling in the blanks in the histories. Faith never used anything than full-frontal, x-rated language and Dana seemed to respond.
Perhaps it was time to stop treating Dana like a child.
They called it socialization. Faith called it bullshit. Sitting around with the wounded playing endless games of Ludo and Snakes and Ladders. Dana's face a book to read -- elation if she won, cunning if she saw a move no one else did. Bitter and deep sorrow if she lost. They wouldn't let Faith near her for a bit, after Dana used one of Faith's ever present cigarettes to burn the eye of a competitor.
They scolded her like a kitten, tapping her on the nose, and locked her back in solitary.
At last she stopped trying to tear Faith apart with her teeth and started talking back. And in return, Faith taught her how to fight safe. How to control the heart, fight with the head that they'd put back together. Lock the emotion away.
Dana coughed the first time she smoked the cigarette she stole instead of using it as an offensive weapon. Her mimicry made a mockery of Faith's composure.
Giles raved about her memory, her recollection of detail. Faith knew he didn't understand half that came out. She knew. She'd learned. Slayer to nursemaid to companion. Buffy laughed to hear that Faith was teaching anybody table manners and polite conversation. Giles polished his glasses furiously when Dana told him to fuck off, taking Faith to one side to ask her the appropriateness of the language.
Faith was tempted to lash out with her teeth.
They were swapping. Faith was happy locked in with those unable to fight for many reasons, whilst Dana itched at the confinement. When they brought her outside clothes, she spun into a fashion parade for Faith. That was during her obsession with reality TV shows and soaps. She soon moved onto cop shows.
Mean streets were what she wanted. A few tame training vampires were not enough anymore. She needed action.
Dana's first kiss was sensitive, tentative and altogether opposing to her nature. The first time she came, the violence returned. Between tentative and animal something happened. The voice was that of adjustment, the words coherent. She could tell Faith she loved her there.
Faith didn't know whether she was coming or going in those moments.
Faith pleaded that she wasn't ready, that the shock would do her ill. Giles polished his glasses some more, before handing the sword over. Faith nodded in understanding, and leaned over to hold Dana close. She kissed her once. Dana straightened with the sword, and joined the other lambs ready for the slaughter. Crazy or not, she was a Slayer.
Faith was the one who wept when she found Dana, lips, tongue and teeth reddened by the use of the only weapon she'd had left. She slept in a straight-jacket that night, the dreams of Slayer past, present and soon to be dead shredding the walls in her mind.
The asylum door swung shut behind her.