milliways_bar | (no subject)

(no subject)

Her head still hurts. It's getting worse, in fact.

But Faith's stubborn, and used to dealing with pain.

So, Slayer inna bar, sitting in a corner booth with coffee and dinner, occasionally rubbing her temple and generally looking pained.

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"Hey Faith. Are you okay?"

Guppy appears, speaking softly because temple-rubbing is a bit of a giveaway.

Faith gives him a wry look.

"Headache."

"I guessed as much."

He smiles at her gently. "Do you need painkillers or anything? Curse or not, the physical symptoms do seem to respond to treatment to an extent."

"To an extent," Faith agrees. "I've been taking things."

"Well that's a good start. No need to suffer unnecessarily."

He looks concerned. "Do you need help with anything else? Some people have had this really bad."

"It's nothing I can't handle, so far," Faith says, with a shrug. "How'd you know, anyway?"

"Giles and I have been collecting data for over a week now. Before we knew who was behind it we were trying to establish links between victims. I wouldn't have bothered you but you looked rather uncomfortable."

"Oh."

Faith smiles, faintly, nodding. "Yeah, it's...uncomfortable is one way of putting it."

"If you'd rather I went away that's fine. I just wanted to check you were okay, or as okay as you can be given the circumstances. Equally if you want to talk, I'm always happy to listen."

"Like I said, nothing I can't handle, so far," Faith says. "Little pain, but I can deal."

"What I'm saying is you don't have to. I know you can. I never doubted that."

"Thanks. If I need anything, I'll get it from Bar."

"Okay."

He gets up.

"Take care, and if you need anything from me, come and find me. See you soon."

"Thanks, Guppy. See you."

There's a concerned Watcher walking over. Very relieved that Halloween was done with.

He sat down, studying her eyes intently, "Peter gave me your message. How bad is it now?"

Her eyes, so far, are unchanged.

But her voice is very tired when she replies. "I can almost hear them. It's a buzzing, sort of."

Giles sighed, "Back here again. This happened very recently though, the other evening, correct?"

"Yeah."

Faith rubs her forehead. "This is important, maybe. He can change his appearance. He was a bird, and then he was a...really, really gorgeous guy..."

Giles frowned, "He's considered to be on par with Tim's level, though there's some theories saying that he's weakened considerably. Do you remember when exactly you ran into him? I know some have had a hard time recalling him."

"I remember," Faith says, quietly. "He was very...memorable. It was two nights ago, about this time, maybe a little earlier."

Giles listened, and mentally counted back the days, "Halloween night then. The appearance change may have been him taking advantage of the Bar's own ability for the holiday. We've had other eyewitness reports of him appearing as a skeleton with black flames in the eyesockets."

"I think I'd rather have seen him like that than the way he was. He was all pretty and seductive."

Giles's frown deepened, and he was afraid to ask.
"Was the curse all that occured? Did he say anything of significance? A clue?"

"He claimed to be Tim's father. Gave me something, a little stone...might be how the curse was delivered, I don't know."

There was an interested light in Giles's eyes.
"I see. Where is this stone now?"

"'S in my apartment. Kitchen. Floating in a bottle of holy water in the spice rack."

Giles nodded, "The water alone might help, though it should be examined and dealt with."

Faith nods and gets up, holding up a finger, then takes herself off to her apartment.

When she comes back, she's clutching a Jack Daniels bottle that's been drunk, rinsed out, filled with holy water. The stone is inside.

Giles eyed the choice of container with mild bemusedment.

He stared at the stone, and asked, "If you don't mind, I wish to study this further. There is another artifact back in my room I wish to compare this with. These might give us something to work with."

Hey, Giles drinks scotch, Faith prefers whiskey. To each their own.

"Have at it," she says, putting the bottle down in front of him. "Can always get more holy water."

Giles nodded, "Thank you. We might be able to come up with something to duplicate his magic,inverted, and hurt him with it. It's similiar to what Rho wanted to do using one of those er...proton devices."

He took the bottle, and got up. He stepped over to lay a hand on her shoulder, "We are assembling healers and medics to assist with ending the curses. If you need anything, I'll be here."

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