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quietblueriver · 1 month ago

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Alive and rewatching Doctor Who and wrote this little Yaz/Thirteen thing because I couldn't help it. In which Yaz gets to have complicated feelings and the Doctor can never quite get it right.

Yaz knows that she can’t know the Doctor. Not really. Doesn’t stop her from loving her, though.

The problem with loving the Doctor, or one of the hundred problems with loving the Doctor, really, is that it makes Yaz different. But that’s one of the great things about loving the Doctor, too, because she likes herself when she’s different, when she's braver, bolder, kinder.

That’s got nothin’ to do with me, Yaz.

She can hear it, the Doctor’s voice strong and easy, eyes taking a moment to still on Yaz between flipping switches at the glowing console. Just a moment, though, a moment of making Yaz feel seen before tearing back to everything else, barking a gruff order for Yaz to twist this or pull that or…Hold on!

And Yaz does twist this or pull that or hold on. She does whatever the Doctor asks, even as the drop in her chest between that second of the Doctor’s full attention and its loss makes her stomach clench. It happens enough that she should be over it. She’s not.

It’s embarrassing. It’s embarrassing to be such a melt. She can feel her eyes get big, or, worse, wet, when the Doctor seems to forget that Yaz is supposed to be special, hers, in a way that the others aren’t. She can see Dan, see whatever visitors for the day, watch as the Doctor talks to Yaz like…like a soldier, if she wants to be kind about it. Like a child, if she wants to be honest. (Loving the Doctor has not made her more honest.) She clenches her jaw, maybe, or raises an eyebrow, but it’s nothing, not really, because in the end she does as she’s told.

She knows what it must look like, her doing anything the Doctor asks, no matter how she asks it.

Yaz’d spent time around Sonya’s boyfriends, around the boys down the pub and at the station. She’d shouted them down if they made the mistake of thinking she wouldn’t but mostly she’d ignored them, because Sonya and the others could handle themselves. They’d made their choice, a choice Yaz would never make.

Except. Except.

Years with nothing but a hologram. She should’ve known better than to think it would be different when they were together again. Daft. Pathetic. And here for as long as the Doctor would keep her.

“Alright?”

She smiles in answer, and the Doctor’s eyes flit up from her mouth, lips turning down briefly. It’s too much, too close, the wrong kind of attention, but she doesn’t stop it. She’d rather be a problem the Doctor’s figuring out than nothing at all.

“Been thinkin’ maybe Florana next.” Her body leans closer to Yaz, forearms pressed together on the railing. At the raise of Yaz’s eyebrow, she says, “Beach planet.”

“Promises, promises,” Yaz says lightly, bumping her shoulder, and because she can’t help herself, “I get it. Bit borin’ for you.”

The Doctor’s brow furrows and her eyes narrow and there is only Yaz, then. Only Yaz and the Doctor and it happens sometimes, this between the two of them. It happens and it wrecks Yaz and makes her feel bigger than anything. It happens and then the TARDIS jolts, or Dan, bless him, wanders into the room, or the Doctor or Yaz or both of them find something suddenly very important to do.

This time, though, it’s quiet. This time Dan is flinging through pirate clothes and the TARDIS is humming only in the normal way and there are startlingly small fingers wrapping around Yaz’s wrist.

“There’s nowhere I’d rather be. You know that?”

Yaz can see her, because the Doctor lets her, and she’s soft and sad and maybe…scared? And there’s something else, something she can’t…so she says, grasping, “The beach?”

Her cheeks go hot immediately, her voice a crack, and my god, she sounds like an idiot. She bites back a groan, but the Doctor only smiles, bright and beautiful and Yaz thinks, for the millionth time, that it’s a good thing she can’t read minds.

“Alright there, Yasmin Khan?”

Maybe she can read minds. Yaz looks down and tucks her hair and feels absolutely stupid, but when she takes a breath and meets the Doctor’s eyes again, ready to break the moment, it’s the Doctor who looks flustered, the fingers holding Yaz’s wrist squeezing slightly as her body fidgets. Still, she stays, and...

“With you, is what I mean to say.”

“Really?” It’s out before she can stop it, because Yaz doesn’t know, hasn’t known, and the Doctor still isn’t bothering to hide, so Yaz sees shock and hurt and a look she’s used to, the hard line of determination.

“Really. Nowhere I’d rather be in the universe. You should know that. It’s my fault you don’t know that. I…”

The TARDIS jolts, and Yaz moves before the Doctor can, because she needs to be the one to leave. She needs to draw the line, to make the choice, because she’s going to be the one who feels whatever that was for weeks and weeks and…the Doctor’s eyes catch hers as she passes to the console, and Yaz grips the rail so hard her knuckles go white.

Yaz knows she can’t know the Doctor. Not really. But she could swear she knows the look on the Doctor’s face, and suddenly she finds it very hard to breathe.

#yasmin khan #thirteenth doctor #thirteen x yaz #ficlet

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quietblueriver · 5 months ago

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I'd love a little something Buffy/Faith with the prompt "you need me"

News about the reboot got me motivated to finish this little thing, which has been sitting in my drafts for forever. Thank you for the prompt!!! 💜💜💜

Season 7 (forgive me, pls) canon divergence. The crew doesn’t act like a bunch of clowns and vote Buffy out. Faith wrecks them for thinking about it.

Faith’s not a good person.

She’s trying. She’s really trying, actually, in the painful, cringe-inducing way—she did prison, did repentance, did the whole soul reclamation bit with Angel as her angsty guru, all mournful eyes and gelled hair and shirtless Tai Chi. Now she’s here, acting as B’s literal and metaphorical punching bag, trying to be a fucking mentor and saving her rage for the gym and the spiral notebook that’s sitting at the bottom of her duffel. She’s writing things out, being honest—what a fucking nightmare—and resisting the urge to burn the pages immediately so that no one in this fucking house can ever see.

So yeah, she’s trying to be a good person, to make amends, to really think before she acts. She’s trying to “be mindful,” as a pouty, brown-eyed vampire had put it as he meditated with her in his broody little hotel full of rejects and freaks including, somehow, Cordelia Chase who no question counts as both of those things these days. Jesus fucking Christ.

Okay, so. She’s trying.

But the trying, it takes time, that same cultish fuck she somehow counts as a friend told her, and she’s not there yet. She’s not there yet, so she’s not surprised at the feelings of satisfaction and vindication that bubble up in her stomach when B starts catching shit from the potentials and then from her own precious Scoobies. Her lips twitch a little, pulling against the skin, barely closed from Buffy’s fist in that alleyway, and yeah, this feels good.

The part of her that’s still seventeen, vengeful and ashamed and so fucking lonely, is basking in B’s confusion and anger. She knows what this is—the self-righteous Scoobies interrogating her after a hard decision, a mistake; Giles’s disappointed dad vibes; the scorn and judgment and isolation. It’s about fucking time.

Faith’s not a good person, and it feels like something she deserves when iron bursts bright on her tongue as she licks at her lip, fully split again from the smile she couldn’t quite suppress.

The guy next to her, Robin, who has been here for like fifteen minutes and somehow feels like he’s got a right to call shots, says, like he matters, “So we vote.”

There’s a flash of something in B’s eyes before she can tamp it down, and Faith’s suddenly back in her cot at the prison, tearing at her blanket and throwing her book to the ground as she falls out of a vision, hands and nails aching from clawing at velvet and wood and dirt, lungs screaming from deprivation. She remembers the stiffness and tingle of unused muscles, the panic and confusion and pain, her whole body like a raw nerve, consciousness yanked roughly back into the world and met with what she knows now was a closed coffin six feet under still.

She’s in front of B before she can really process what she’s doing, body coiled and voice steady and dangerous as she says, “Enough.”

She whirls at the hand on her bicep, snaps lowly at Buffy before she can get out whatever obnoxious bullshit she’s definitely going to throw at her, “I’m with you, B, so shut the fuck up for once, okay?”

Like a fucking miracle, she does, jaw snapping closed so tightly that Faith could’ve heard it even without her slayer senses and hand dropping back to her side. She shrinks a little, and Faith is reminded of how young she is, how young they both are. Not children, no, and Faith was never really a kid anyway, but still.

She turns back and eyes Giles, ever the Watcher, and lets her lip curl as he stares at her, opens the door she’s gotten real good at keeping closed in her murder rehab. She feels something in her stretch like a panther in one of the nature docs they showed at the prison–strong and hungry, lazy and confident, lying in wait. He flinches and the monster flashes its teeth in approval.

“Enough,” she says again, and lets her gaze cross the room. The Scoobies are unsurprised, which stings a bit, but this version of her, dangerous and defensive and slayer, even if nobody wants to admit it, is new for the potentials, and she clocks their reactions, which run the gamut from wide eyes and open staring to attempted nonchalance. She’s made it most of the way across the room, eyes lingering on Dawn and the little bit of hope in her eyes, the little bit of gratitude, when a voice sounds out beside her.

“Faith.”

This fucking guy. Her eyes narrow as she turns to Robin, and she knows she’s doing it right when he takes half a step back at her glare.

“Listen, Robin?” She says it like she isn’t sure, derisive and dismissive because his ego’s fucking outrageous, and she’s stretching muscles she hasn’t gotten to use in a long time. When he frowns, offended but clearly aware he can’t make a big deal of it, she bites back a smile. She doesn’t let it go further because she has a goal here, and she is trying, fucking still, can feel Buffy behind her waiting on shit to go sideways. Faith has no interest in proving her right.

Faith is not a good person, but right now, in a coincidence that works out super well for Buffy Summers, the not-so-good parts of her and her better Angels (gag) are leading her to the same result. She’d rather hurl herself through the front window of the house and do a coordinated dance routine with Drusilla’s bleach-blonde creep than feed Buffy’s superiority complex one more tiny morsel, which means she’s keeping her shit together.

“Robin,” she says again, with more certainty, her fit-for-public-consumption adult voice in place. “Gimme a minute here, okay? I think I deserve that.”

He nods, like it was really a question, and she lets him, because growth and not proving Buffy right and also helping Buffy. What a mindfuck. She imagines how good it will feel to let loose on the punching bag later.

Nobody has moved during their little exchange, and pretty much everyone is still avoiding eye contact. Faith can see Kennedy in the corner of her eye, her back and shoulders kept rigid with unearned confidence and entitlement, but Faith doesn’t take the bait. All she wants is attention. She can get it from Red.

Instead, Faith takes a second to think through how to do this, can feel Buffy’s anxiety rolling off her in waves. B hates the loss of control, but she’s not an idiot, never has been, and it seems like she has processed that Faith’s doing her a favor here.

“We don’t need a vote. B’s in charge.” She sees some shuffling among the potentials, Giles’s ever-present furrow getting deeper, Willow’s frown comically pronounced, Robin’s feet moving half an inch toward her. She breathes out, filling space like it’s hers, and it is. It always is, but she rarely reminds people of it, these days. And anyway, even when she wasn’t trying to be a good person, she didn’t love making the wrong people feel afraid.

Her shoulders roll back, her feet spread just shy of a fighting stance. A reminder. “Do you know why I’m here?”

“You broke out of prison.” It’s immediate. Faith hasn’t spent much time with Anya, but the literal answer, the deadpan delivery, both seem pretty on target with what she’s got so far. She fights an eye roll. Red doesn’t, and she feels a small, terrible burst of solidarity.

“Yeah,” she acknowledges.

“Where you were because you killed a man.” Anya’s voice has an edge to it now, and Faith’s patience is wearing thin.

“Right again,” she says, instead of telling her to go fuck herself, letting the potentials’ reactions to the exchange roll off of her. “But before that…” She catches Red’s hand grasping Anya’s forearm when it looks like she might speak again and the bite of gratitude is annoying as hell. Respecting her is one thing, but Faith’s nearly certain they’re going to be friends.

That’s for later. She focuses up. “You know the whole deal. Into every generation, a slayer is born, one girl in all the world, whatever whatever.”

Giles pulls some kind of face. She fights the urge to say something just to piss him off more, misquote the sacred misogynist texts or talk about the Council, maybe, while she stares him dead in the eye. I know who you are, you old fuck. I remember just as much as you do. She might call Angel after this, to brag on herself and her self-control.

“One girl. One slayer. Then she dies, usually pretty quickly, and another girl gets called.” Robin’s tense now, arms crossing, and ah. Maybe that’s it. Some slayer connection. Poor bastard. “That’s the drill. And we all know B’s the slayer. The one girl. But see, I’m a slayer, too. And I’ve never been great at school, but the math on that is easy enough.” She doesn’t look back as she asks, “How old were you when you died, B? The first time.”

“Sixteen,” Buffy answers, voice flat but clear.

“Sixteen,” Faith repeats. She eyes Dawn as carefully as she can, but small fry notices, because she’s no dummy. She’s got her jaw all clenched, looks so much like the little teenage shit she is, and the monster in Faith bristles in a mostly new way. Protective. She’s so angry, but not just for herself anymore. Dawn gives her a tiny little nod. “The Master drowned you, yeah? After taking a bite? Ugly fuck.”

The hum of affirmation isn’t loud enough to be heard by anyone but Faith but that one was rhetorical anyway.

“So one dead slayer means a new one gets called. But still not me. Not first, anyway.”

“Kendra,” Buffy says from behind her, loud enough to be heard by the rest of the room, but barely. Faith turns her head enough that Buffy can see her dip her chin in acknowledgement. She understands. Buffy needs to say her name. Faith does, too.

“Kendra. Kendra and Buffy, even though there’s only supposed to be one. But then Drusilla killed her.” William the Bloody’s been smoking cigarettes in the front yard, but she’s not sure that name will mean anything to them.

“Only some of them know,” Buffy says lowly, mind meld in full effect, and it makes her skin crawl as much as it feels like a warm blanket.

“A vampire with a special flavor of crazy,” Faith adds to the group.

“Do you have a point?” It’s Robin, arms crossed tighter and looking like Faith has personally kneed him in the balls, which she has spent serious time not doing, actually.

“Who even are you? You’ve been here for, like, five minutes.” It’s Dawn, lip raised in a look of disdain so purely Summers that Faith can’t help but smirk. Her split lip splits a little more, and she licks the blood away as she watches Robin try to figure out how to answer.

Buffy, uncharacteristically, remains silent, although Faith can practically feel her desire to rein Dawn in, can see in her mind the exact face B’s making, the pout of disapproval, eyebrows lowered in judgment.

“You know who I am,” Robin says, like small fry was being literal.

“Yeah, my principal. And that’s not what I meant, anyway.”

“What did you mean?” His tone is somewhere between genuine and careful, young lady, and yeah, a principal for sure. Gross.

“I meant,” Dawn says, words slow and deliberate and condescending, and Faith fights a snort as she watches Robin realize he’s miscalculated, “that I would rather hear from the actual slayers in the room. Faith’s talking. You should listen.”

She’s done with the conversation, which she signals by turning away from Robin and back to Faith. It’s impressive, given that she can’t actually turn fully away from him, but the vibes are there loud and clear. A big, teenage fuck off.

Dawn catches her grin and one corner of her mouth tilts up just a little and Faith can’t believe how much she likes Buffy’s only-still-kind-of-a-kid sister.

“My point,” Faith says with a measured look at Robin, “is that Buffy got called, alone, when she was fifteen years old. Then she died. She died saving all of you, even though none of you had any idea, because a group of old fucks decided she was expendable. That we all were.” She looks Giles dead in the eye because she’s never been very good at the passive part of passive-aggressive. He looks like he’s sucking a lemon. Good. “And then she got brought back, and she kept going. She got Kendra and lost her. She kept going. She got me and I was a massive fuckup who tried to kill her.”

B doesn’t interrupt her, but Faith senses the movement, slow and deliberate, and then there’s a small, warm hand on her back, a gentle press that stays there.

“And then she was alone again. And she kept going.”

“She wasn’t alone.”

Faith doesn’t want to fight with Xander. She doesn’t. But he’s wrong, and he needs to know it.

“She was, actually.” It’s Willow, looking at Xander with understanding and maybe pity, tone familiar and kind but not uncertain. “We loved her. We helped where we could. But neither of us is chosen. We could have walked away whenever we wanted. We still could.” Her face shifts and she’s looking at him almost the way she did when they were in high school, the way she probably has for all of their lives, if Faith’s got it right. It’s a kind of gentle that’s a little embarrassing to watch, even if it’s more complicated, more grown-up, than the half-love-struck thing it used to be. “It means something that we stay, but it’s a choice she will never be able to make. And the one time she tried to make it, we stole the choice away from her.”

It’s the last bit that does it, that keeps Xander’s mouth shut and makes Willow’s eyes tear, and sends Buffy’s body rocking just enough to let Faith know she wants to move—to go to Willow or to bolt or to punch something—but won’t. Willow can tell too, maybe, because she turns to Buffy over Faith’s shoulder and smiles at her, real and hard and unconcerned with anyone else and shit, yeah, they’re gonna be friends.

“She died again,” Faith says, carefully as she can. “Gave herself up for everyone again.” There’s a flash of pain at the memory of it, the burst of light from nowhere and the certainty that she was the lone slayer in the world, the certainty also that no one would be coming to tell her anything more. “How old were you that time, B?”

“Twenty.” Flat but clear.

“I don’t think dying repeatedly is a great argument for leadership.” It’s Anya again, and she sounds almost apologetic, but she can’t quite stop herself. Willow might murder her, if looks are anything to go by, eyes flashing dark and dangerous. Faith’s adding points to the Red column by the minute.

“She sacrificed herself.” Dawn’s voice is sharp, though not as sharp as it had been with Robin. “The point is, she chose to give up her life to save everyone, which she did, and then she was brought back against her will and is still fighting. It’s about why she died the second time. And what she did when she got brought back. Again.”

“What small fry said,” Faith offers with a nod, and Anya is quiet again. Faith gears up to give a speech that’s going to make her feel disgusting. “The point is that B is the only one who has been tested in the ways that this is going to test us, and she’s the only one who has made the choice to end her life for everyone else, and she’s the only one who has shown that she’s willing to do it again and again. I’m not saying we don’t need teamwork.” God this is so gross. She’s going to annihilate a bag later. “I’m just saying B is and always will be the leader of this team. At least as long as I’m on it.”

And there’s the threat. She can see them all process it, can feel Buffy behind her, palm flattening against her shoulder blade. Her body reacts the way it always has to affection from Buffy, but she doesn’t bother to lie to herself about what it means anymore. There are lots of things she wants and can’t have. She’s trying not to run toward mess these days, and anyway, this is bigger than that.

“We should keep a vote on the table.”

Her patience snaps, and her head turns slowly to Robin, arms easy at her sides, eyes running him over in a lazy calculation. “You still think we’re at the same fuckin’ table?”

His eyes widen, a little, but he looks like he might square up. In other circumstances, Faith might be impressed by the audacity. Now, though, she just lets her bleeding lip curl and tracks his eyes as they watch the red spread.

“Faith is right.” There’s not even a hint of disgust in Red’s voice, though Faith knows from personal experience how much that must have cost her. “Buffy��s the leader of any team I’m on.”

“Me too,” Dawn says, followed quickly by several potentials.

“We need a plan.” It’s Giles this time, and Faith watches relief flood Robin’s face, irritation making her skin crawl.

“We’ll make one.” Xander says, and then looks at Faith, past Faith, at the body that steps up beside her, close enough that their elbows are brushing. “Right, Buff?”

“We’ll make one. I’m not…I’m not the best at asking for help but I know I…” Faith begins to tune out, exhausted, and the hero’s back, her job done, but the minute she tries to take a step back, Buffy’s fingers are around her wrist. It’s a hold she could break easily, which they both know, and Buffy’s still talking, not acknowledging the conversation her body is having with Faith’s, but her thumb and index finger squeeze gently, a request. “I’m sorry.” Faith has no idea whether the apology fits with whatever else Buffy had been saying. She stays.

Later, forearms pressed against the porch railing, Faith flinches briefly at the creak of the back door and then relaxes again, scooting slightly to the right to make space for the reedy arms that settle near hers.

“I’m afraid we’re going to be friends.”

Faith snorts. Sighs. “Yeah. I think you’re right.”

Willow’s profile is as sharp as ever, but the curl of her lip is newly affectionate. The door creaks again a few minutes of quiet later, and Willow moves, body replaced by one Faith has never known quite what to do with.

“Thank you.” It’s real, makes Faith want to say something unserious and possibly offensive. She doesn’t, because growth, but she does let herself smirk, is rewarded with an eye roll. “And I’m sorry. About your lip.” Before Faith can figure out what to say to that, she adds, “About a lot of things.”

“Yeah,” Faith tries. “Me too.”

“You’re different.” It’s not a question. “I mean, I knew. But you’re…” Faith waits. She’s good at quiet now, when she needs to be. “I feel like I’m not as different as I should be. From the way I was then.”

“Yeah, well, I had a lot more room to grow. You weren’t out there staking humans.”

“That was an accident.”

Her immediate response, her certainty, is relief on a wound so constantly sore that it almost makes Faith gasp. “Thanks,” she says simply and without a struggle, “but what came after wasn’t.”

“No.” It’s a concession, not a dig, and Faith isn’t sure how much longer she can take this level of earnestness, this kind of honesty. “I can’t do this without you.”

Well, shit. But at least it’s a lie.

“Of course you can.”

“Okay.” Another concession. “But I don’t want to.”

“You saying you need me, B?”

She isn’t. What she’s saying is about a thousand times scarier. They both know it. Maybe a good person would reach for the truth. Maybe a good person wouldn’t run, wouldn’t hide behind a joke. Faith isn’t a good person.

“Maybe,” Buffy shrugs, pressing her forearm against Faith’s. It’s something, to know she isn’t the only one who needs a little distance from the full truth, good person or not.

She presses back into the contact and lets it lie.

#buffy the vampire slayer #fuffy #fuffy fic #ficlet

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