Just to warn you this story right now gets a little rocky , and sad , but it'll be better soon I promise
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Chapter 10
( I think I love you)
Buffy wandered around wondering where Faith was , she hadn't come home last night from her patrol , and she was now getting slightly worried , it wasn't like she could do much, she had waited and waited , thinking maybe Faith ran into a friend and went dancing sometimes she liked to do that , but it wasn't like her to not call in the least ..
It was now 6am and Buffy was getting ready to go and look for the dark slayer , Willow and Tara had already gone out earlier this morning and said there had been no sign of her , Xander and Anya did a once over the town as well and now they were all getting ready to go look for her .
Dawn and Tara were trying to insist that Buffy stay home and see if maybe Faith showed up there , they said it wasn't good for the baby the stress of walking and worring .
But Buffy being as pigheaded as she is had put her foot down and was going she didn't give a damn who tried to stop her .
"are we ready?" Xander asked grabbing his car keys , he was at least driving Buffy to each place to look , he had suggested it and they were all up for that rather then the girl walking everywhere .
"yes" Buffy said quietly she was worried and wasn't really in the mood for any talking not until she found Faith anyhow.
They all headed towards the front door , Buffy was opening it when it slowly popped open on its own or so they thought till Buffy looked down and seen an extreamly beat up bleeding Faith laying on the steps ..
"Oh god Faith!" Buffy cried as she tried to bend down carefully to see if she could help the girl and to make sure she was breathing .
"Help" Faith whispered looking up scared into Buffy's eye's before she passed out .
"oh shit shit shit" Willow said as her and Xander hurried over to carefully life the slayer and bring her into the house , Tara was already calling 911 and Dawn was getting water and towels , Anya didn't know what to do so she headed into the kitchen to see if there was anything she could grab ..
Buffy paced slowly in the living room waiting for the paramedics to get there , she didn't know what happened , Faith hadn't woken up yet .
"Do you think she'll be okay?" Dawn asked Tara a worried look in her eye's .
Tara was to busy to answer so she just softly nodded , she was hoping the slayer would be okay but by the looks of the wounds , Tara even wasn't exactly sure .
they could hear the ambulance coming up the street it's siriens screaming at them , just as Faith opened her eye's , Xander ran out the front door to wave them down ..
Faith looked up to Buffy "Warren" was all she whispered before passing out again , this time Tara noticed her breathing stopped , she didn't just pass out this time , she died ..
"XANDER TELL THEM TO MOVE THEIR ASSES!" Anya sceamed out the front door noticing the look in Tara's eye's .
"CPR" Willow stated calmly as she moved over infront of Tara , tilting Faith's head back she breathed into her mouth three times then pressed on her chest , she had to do something and she was trained to do this .
It took only a moment for the paramedics to get there , they started quickly hooking Faith up, and working on her , then within moments , yet it seemed like hours , they had her in the back of the bus, "who did this to her?" one of the men asked his face weary.
"Some guy we don't know she passed out before she said anything" Tara answered the man Buffy was leaning against her ..
"We have to go Jim" One of the other man yelled out from the back of the bus "Someone coming with ?" He asked looking at the group of people his eye's landing on Xander .
"I am" Buffy said as she stepped up both of the paramedics looking confused .
"are you sure ma'am ?" he asked looking down at her large belly "and who are you to her?"
Buffy was starting to get pissed off she wanted them to move their asses and get Faith going , "I'm her partner !" Buffy hisses as she , with Xanders and Anya's help climbed into the back of the truck , one of the men closed the door and took off speeding down the street the siriens once again screaming at the others that were left standing there with interesting looks on their faces .
~~~
Xander and Anya , gathered a few things and took Dawn to the hosipital with them to meet up with Tara Will Giles and Buffy .
Tara and Willow had left right away with Giles to go make sure everything was okay with Buffy, Xander and Anya and Dawn and stayed behind to gather some food and drinks as well as a change of clothes for Tara and Buffy since they had Faith's blood all over them .
"any word ?" Dawn quietly asks as she walks into the surgical waiting room , going straight for the seat beside Buffy.
"ya" Tara started rubbing her face roughly , the Dr. had come out a few moments before the others showed up to tell them what was going on with Faith , it wasn't good not at all .
"and?" Anya was getting impatient , "ya" wasn't a good enough answer for her .
Tara and Willow looked over to Buffy to see if she wanted them to tell the others of if she wanted to , when Buffy looked pleadingly to them Tara went on .
"The Dr. Came out a few moments ago , she has some really bad internal damage , her skull is fractured , her nose is broken , but those are the least of our worries" Tara again ran her hand roughly over her face taking a breath.
"oh god" Xander sighed , if those were the least of their worries , then what was the bad stuff , he wasn't exactly sure he wanted to know he was afraid if he found out he himself would go kill Warren .
"ya" Willow sighed she took over for her lover "her heart was almost literaly torn in half" she shook her head , if it wasn't for her slayer strength she would have been dead .
"the dr's have no idea how she lived , but he said by the looks of things she had been beaten through the night , some of her wounds were already healing , some were fresh" Buffy finished shaking her head tears rolling down her face , she was pissed she was so pissed she was thinking about leaving to go hunt down Warren , it was enough that he had shot her and Willow , Willow who was still recovering from it , not yet having full use back in her hand but she was doing alot better then the Doctors had ever expected , but to do this to Faith, she was angry , but she knew there wasn't much she could do with well being as pregnate as she was .
"he'll pay" Tara whispered as she wrapped her arm around the slayer , holding her tightly knowing exactly what she was thinking .
"yes he will" Anya stated as she charged out of the waiting room , not even saying another word .
"oh no" Xander's eye's widened when his mind finally caught up with what Anya was thinking.
He quickly followed her out hoping to catch her before she called on Dahoffrin .
"wha?" Buffy just looked up not following either of them at all.
"I think Anya is thinking about calling on a old friend" Willow smiled slightly , as long as it wasn't one of them actually killing Warren she really didn't care what happened to him.
"that's not good" Tara shook her head "the karmah is bad from things like that and with the baby and Faith we don't need bad Karmah !" Tara said as she jumped out of her seat to Follow after Xander and Anya .
"Bloody hell" Giles tore his glasses off his face and madly cleaned them "Hopefully Xander will stop her" was all he could say , at the moment bad karmah be damned he wanted Warren to pay as well .
~~~
It had been almost 7 hours since Anya had ran off , and Xander and Tara had followed , three hours after they had left Tara had come back , a few moments later Xander and a pissed off looking Anya followed .
No one had said a word for the first hour or so and Willow finally spoke up " did you call on him?" she asked looking to Anya
"Xander and Tara stopped me" Anya glared at her man and her best friend .
"He'll pay An , He will I swear , just not by you doing it !" Tara was gritting her teeth ...
and again no one had said a word they just waited and waited hoping the doctor would come out soon and tell them some good news ... and now it had been 7 hours.
Dawn had finally fallen asleep , Giles had gone to get coffee , the others just sat quietly each thinking wondering what had happened , praying to which every god or goddess to help Faith through this .
Buffy had finally stopped crying , not to long ago her face still tear stained, she stretched her arms above her head just as the Dr. came walking into the waiting room , she slowly stood up , since she could just jump out of her seat anymore due to her very large belly.
"how is she?" Buffy blurted out rather harshly at the Dr.
"She's ......" The Dr paused for a moment "We did everything we could to help her" he waited and looked at the ground "she's alive but " he went on all of them holding their breath "she isn't good" he shook his head , he wasn't lying.
The tears started to fall again Buffy's knees felt weak and Tara must have noticed she quickly made it to Buffy's side just as she was about to fall over , Tara wrapped her arm around the little blondes waist and Willow held onto the other side..
The Dr. noticed how weak the blonde was looking , "lets take a seat and talk" he suggested as he moved towards the chairs in the middle of the room .
They all took their seats and waited a moment for the Doc to go over his charts .
"well , as I told you before her skull was fractured , and nose was broken , but the worst was her heart , we fixed it yes but at the moment its weak , and at any moment it could stop again , we lost her 5 times on the table , luckily your friend Faith is a fighter , a very strong woman and I think that might be what saved her ." He paused for a moment a small smile on his lips then it was gone as he read over a few things "once we were done with the major things we took our time looking her over , her leg is broken , and so are 9 of her ribs , he lung was punctured , he liver was sliced" he shook his head he had never in his life seen someone with so much trama done to her body and lived .
"oh my god" Tara was also in tears , Faith was a fighter yes but even she didn't know how the girl was pulling through this .
"yes" The doc sighed "the next 4 days will be the roughest ones , but if she makes it through those then she has a good chance of making it " He sighed again " If she wakes up" he looked at Buffy seeing the extream look of hurt and pain in the girls eye's "You can go in and see her any time you want to , if you would like to stay I can get a bed brought in for you" he smiled again at the small blonde "and are you okay ?" he asked worried wondering how she was holding up .
Buffy looked up at the man confused then she realized he was talking about the baby "ya we're fine as far as fine goes right now" She looked down at her tummy ..
"May I ask how this happened ?" The Doc was confused it never did say in her chart what happened , if she was in a car accident or what alot of strange things happened in this town but he had never seen someone in this shape come into this place alive .
"We're not sure , we won't be till she wakes up" Tara answered him , she wasn't sure so she wasn't lieing , she didn't want to tell him who it was due to the fact that the police would be called .
"What do you mean?" he asked extreamly confused .
"she went for a walk last night and didn't come home , so we went looking for her , or well we were about to when we opened the front door she was laying on the stairs looking like this , all she said was help before she passed out " Willow rambled on nervously .
"oh" he said , he wondered who did this , he knew he was going to have to contact the police , not really knowing if there was anything they would do anyhow ..
"what room?" Buffy asked standing up she was getting antsy she wanted to see the slayer she wanted to hold her hand and tell her it would be okay .
"114" he simply stated and Buffy took off before she could realize it was the room her and Willow had shared a few months back .
~~~~
When Buffy had walked into the room she was almost sick to her stomach , Faith was a mess , she was bruised and stitched everywhere possible , she was hooked up to a dozen different machines to keep her alive , they were breathing for her , making her heart beat for her , everything you could imagine .
"Oh Faith" Buffy sighed as she walked towards the bed slowly picking up the bloody and bruised hand of the lifeless slayer .
Taking a seat next to the bed, Buffy softly held her hand running her tumb over it over and over again .
Buffy took a few moments to adjust , then she started talking to her ..
"you have to pull through Faith" Buffy's voice just a whisper. "there's so much you have to do still, there's so much I still need to tell you Faith" the tears were in the blondes eye's "I always meant to tell you this Faith , but there was never the right time , and if you wake up I promise to say it every day a million times a day if you'd like " she took a deep breath she wasn't sure if Faith could hear her or not but she was sure she could ."I love you Faith , I want you to raise our baby with me , I want you to see her take her first steps , I want you to be there when she has her first day of school , I want to spend the rest of my life with you and I've wanted to since you came back , well actually since before that I was just to scared to admit it to anyone till now but I swear if you pull through Faith I won't hold anything back ever again " the tears were flowing none stop not landing on the broken slayers hand ..
Buffy didn't know how long she was sitting there , it could have been moments or weeks she wasn't sure , but she jumped about 2 feet when Willow and Tara walked into the room softly touching her shoulder pulling her from her thoughts .
"No signs yet" Willow more stated then questioned as she looked at the beaten slayer .
"goddess" Tara sighed as she took in the sight of the slayer as well "You need to eat Buffy" Tara stated softly running her hand down Buffy's back ..
"I'm not leaving her" Buffy calmly stated as she looked up to Tara and Willow .
"you don't have to leave just tell us what you want to eat and we'll bring it back to you" Willow tried a small smile but it wasn't working out so well .
"I'm not hungry" Buffy grumbled as she looked back to Faith .
Tara gritted her teath slightly "you need to eat even if you're not hungry the baby is" Tara reminded her that she had to at least eat for her daughter.
"fine" Buffy said rolling her neck " can you get me some orange juice too Faith would make me drink orange juice if I hadn't eaten yet"
Tara half smiled "sure" she started to walk out of the room as Xander walked in "what can I get for her?" he asked in a whisper knowing Buffy could hear him because of her slayer hearing but he felt the need to whisper anyhow .
"she didn't say I guess something light but full of vitamins and some OJ" Tara sighed looking back to the slayers and her lover .
"and once you come back , take Dawn and Anya home" She softly stated she knew everyone was getting tired they had been at the hosipital now for nearly 14 hours.
"are you sure?" the man asked as he looked over to the bed wincing when he finally noticed the condition Faith was in.
"Yes" Tara sighed "can I ask you a favor though?" she looked at the man with hopeful eye's.
"anything?" Xander smiled and put his hand on Tara's shoulder in a comforting manner .
"can you take Isis for a quick walk for me I know you are tired but she's been locked up for 14 hours i don't want her to think she did something wrong" She sighed, she knew the dog was going to be pissed when they finally made it home , but oh well her friends were slightly more important right now .
"for sure" he smiled he didn't mind taking Isis for a walk she was a good dog and needed love too .
"And ask Dawn to feed her for me?" Tara again asked blushing lightly she hated asking their friends to do things for them but she had to at this point .
"not a problem Tara" he smiled and walked out of the room to go get the three of them some food .
~~~
It had been two day's and Buffy hadn't left Faith's side , they had brought her in a bed which she half slept on , most of the time she stayed away just incase the other slayer woke up she didn't want her to think she was alone .
The other's had all come and gone , giving Buffy time to shower and use the bathroom , they had all sat daily beside Faith's bed talking to her telling her she had to just had to wake up.
The day after the surgery the Doc had come into the room and took the breathing tube out of Faith , she was breathing on her own she just needed to wake up now , the Doc had said things were looking good it was all up to Faith at this point .
It was almost 4pm and Buffy was waiting for Tara to show up , she was going to take over for her for a little while , Buffy needed to go for a walk and stretch her legs and back they were starting to get extreamly stiff from the lack of walking she had done the last few days .
Buffy stayed holding Faith's hand whispering to her while she waited for Tara , "Come on love wake up for me just for a moment so I can tell you how much I love you" Buffy sighed , it almost felt hopeless , and she felt more helpless then she had ever felt before in her entire life .
"Love you to" Faith croked out her voice raw and scratchy she tried to open her eye's but the light hurt to much ..
"Oh my god Faith you're awake!" Buffy jumped up still not letting go of the girls hand .
"Seem's that way" Faith tried to smile but her face hurt to much as well, she let out a slow steady breath "where am I?" she asked turning her head slightly to where she sensed Buffy was standing .
"hosipital" Buffy sighed and leaned in brushing her lips over Faith's forhead "I love you Faith" she whispered again a smile on her lips for the first time in days .
Faith also tried to smile again, she didn't care how much it hurt she had been wanting to hear those words for years and by gods great funny humor it took nearly dieing to hear them either way she was glad "I said love you to" she tired to joke , lightening the mood slightly .
"good" Buffy stated as she took her seat again , "I have to get the Doc" She said looking slightly torn for a moment she didn't want to leave the girls side not for a moment now that she was awake .
"go" Faith croked out again.
"be right back" Buffy leaned down to kiss Faith's hand , then she darted out of the room and was back within a few moments a dr. and nurse following closely behind .
Buffy took her spot right beside Faith while the Dr. walked to the other side , " how are you feeling Faith?" the dr. asked .
"okay" Faith tried to smile , but it hurt to much again " I feel like I was hit by a bus" she looked over to Buffy finally being able to open her eye's silently asking if they told the Dr. anything.
"Well your vitals seem great actually" he smiled as she read over what the nurse had just told him.
"That's good" Buffy smiled as she stroked her thumb over Faith's hand.
"yes it is" he said , "we'd like to run a few tests , but it seems if you keep doing as good as you are now you might be able to go home next week" he smiled as he stepped back from the bed "I will be back in a few hours to ask you a few questions about what happened but right now I'll let you relax and get some rest"
"Thank you" Faith croked out again her voice still raw.
"yes thank you Dr." Buffy said as she watched them leave the room.
"Do you remember what happened Faith?" Buffy asked.
Faith closed her eye's tight, she was trying to stop the tears that were gathering "Warren" she said slowly trying to sit her self up slightly , she stop when the pain shot through every single inch of her body.
~~~
It took nearly an hour but Faith had finally told Buffy everything that happened , it was a story from hell it's self or pretty close at the least , Buffy had gone and called Tara and Willow asked them to call the officer that they had spoken to and to call the others and let them know that Faith was awake , it was almost an hour after that , that everyone had showed up with gifts and food and flowers , Faith couldn't help but smile when Dawn gave her a teddy bear with a little leather rose in his hand .
The officer came and took the statement , he told them he would put a warrent out for his arrest as soon as he got back to the station , and they would be doing an intensive search for this Warren guy , he also reassured them that he would be spending along time behind bars once he was found .
They thanked him and then he left .
Now the room was quiet , everyone was scattered Willow Tara and Buffy standing beside Faith's bad , the wounded girl was starting to doze off now and then when Buffy nodded to the rest of the group that it was time to go and let Faith get some rest , they all said their goodbyes and see you laters and headed out leaving Buffy and Faith alone again .