Author: Angel the Part-time Succubus (Angelia Sparrow)

Email: valarltd@hotmail.com

Rating: PG, language

Summary: Faith and the mayor take a meeting

Spoilers: Consequences

Disclaimer: These are not my characters.  They belong to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy and WB.
I receive no monetary gain for these stories.

Distribution: Any and all.  You want it, you got it.  Just let me know where it is.

Feedback: Here's where I get paid, in applause.

Author's note: No offense to Baptists intended.  I am not a Baptist, but play one on Sundays.
 

***
Sunday Meeting
c 1999 Angelia Sparrow
****
 

Tired, she was bone weary.   Patrolling all night had left her dragged out in
a way it usually didn't.  Not one vamp had showed it's distended face.
Buffy had nattered all evening.  Now she was tense from not fighting,
stressed from trying not kill the annoying blonde and pissed that it was
Sunday morning and every church bell was ringing.

Faith, despite her name, had not set foot in a church since she
was 10.  Her mother had alternated drunkenness and religion in
equal doses until Faith would not tolerate either.

But Mayor Wilkins had set the meeting for 9:30 outside
Sunnydale Baptist, where he was a deacon.  He would slip out
of the early service during the last hymn.

She paced, early.  The choir was audible through the open windows
on this May morning.  Too hot for heat, too cool for A/C.  Perfect for fresh air.
Unfortunately, it also meant Faith got a heaping helping of
"I Surrender All" and more than a little of the invitation.

Once again, she wondered how the Mayor, with his infernal
contacts, his soul selling and the Ascension, could stand to sit in
a Christian church.

A line from a story Willow had read her occurred
"Either the symbols of God were only as holy as the
men who used them, or..."  She couldn't remember the rest.
She was so tired, she fell into a yawning fit that
put the Tanith Lee line out of her head.

She leaned up against the white adobe wall of
the church, and folded her arms.  The choir
started the last hymn, and the door opened.

The mayor walked out.

"Ah, Faith, on time, even.  Shall we go somewhere
cooler?  How about the drug store?  The restored
soda fountain should be open.  An ice-cream soda after church
always hits the spot."  He grinned at her, and she managed to
smile back.  "I love this song,"he added.

From inside, came the chorus: "Faith is the Victory.  Faith is the
Victory.  Oh, glorious victory, that overcomes the world."

"So, chocolate or strawberry?"
 

Slayerettes came in strong on the "A-men."