Damned if I don't, damned if I do.

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viii: Hard to Leave; Good to Go.

They ran as fast as they could; the thud of heavy paws still audible. Faith’s throw had been strong but it was only a matter of time before Cerberus came back the other way with his trophy stick and right now Toni didn’t know which would be worse – to be torn apart by the savage three-headed dog or be humped to death by the love-struck mutt!

“Fuck! A river!” Faith yelled as they came upon the Styx, and digging her heels into the sticky mud was the only thing that saved her from running straight off of the bank.

Toni stopped beside her. “It is okay; we can build a raft.”

“What out of? Grass and sand?”

Faith’s concern was understandable. There were no trees or driftwood on this side of the river and they didn’t have time to weave something out of the reeds.

Toni looked around for inspiration, “Um.”

“Um? You’re saying um right now? Do fuckin’ better, Tone!”

“Shut up!” She was trying to think.

“You shut up. Is that a boat out there?”

“Si.”

“Hey, dude! Dude!” Faith started waving her arms.

“Stop it! What are you doing?”

“Getting us a ride out of here!”

“Faith, that is Charon!”

“So?”

“He is not a dude; he is the Ferryman.”

“Which sounds exactly like what we need. Hey, Charon! Sail over here!”

“You do not understand! He ferries the dead from the living world to Hades. He is not going to give us a ride!”

“Wanna bet?”

“What?”

Faith was ducking down into the tall reeds. “You’re one of them, right? All mythical and that. . .like him.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” She could see that the boat was coming closer. It did not give her a good feeling.

“Well, he’s gonna know you. Use that!”

“How?” she asked incredulously.

“I dunno, ask about his kids of something.”

“He is Charon!” That obviously still meant nothing to Faith who was now out of sight of the river. “What is your part in this insane plan?”

“Keep him talking and we’ll see.”

“And you think that is better than ‘Um’?” Toni shouted.

Faith didn’t answer and Toni wasn’t foolish enough to yell anymore. The boat was close enough now for her to hear the creak of its oars as Charon rowed. It was a big boat and she wondered how he sculled it so expertly to the bank – millennia of practise, she supposed.

The hull butted gently into the outermost reeds and Charon looked back over his shoulder. “It is you,” he said in Greek. “I forget your name. There are so many names.”

“Si, it is I, Antonella. It is a pleasure to see you again, Charon.”

“The pleasure is all yours. How are you here and why did you hail me?”

Toni hesitated but she really couldn’t think of anything better. “I was wondering how your children are?”

The Ferryman’s face was covered by his deep cowl but Toni could sense his confused frown. “What is this nonsense?”

Faith made her move then; hurtling out of the reeds with a war cry and launching herself at the boat. Her large stomach hindered her, slowing her leap and making it awkward to climb over the side. She managed it but lost the element of surprise and by the time she’d boarded Charon was standing up with an oar held up between them.

It did not faze the slayer. She ducked the first swing of it and jumped over the second. The third struck her left arm and she grunted in pain but reacted swiftly, reaching out with her right hand to grab the middle of the oar. The boat rocked as they wrestled for control and Faith won when she yanked him forward and punched him in his hooded face. As the Ferryman flailed backwards Faith took advantage and beat him continuously with the paddle until she managed to knock him over the side. He landed with a big splash in the fetid water.

“Are you comin’ or not?” Faith called down to her. “And for the record, I’m happy with not.”

It had all happened so quickly – maybe ninety seconds had passed since Faith had jumped out of the reeds – that Toni was still standing on the bank with her mouth open.

She could hear paws thundering towards them as Cerberus brought back his stick and Charon was splashing around in the river, cursing them both to Tartarus, and the combination made Toni recover fast. She leapt onto the boat – much more gracefully than Faith had – and said, “Go!”

“Yeah, about that.” Faith was looking at her oar now like it was a foreign object.

Toni sat down on the low bench and grabbed the other oar in both hands. “Just put the big end in the water and copy me.”

Faith complied and they started to move – in circles!

“You are rowing too fast!”

“I figured fast was good!”

“Not if we cannot keep the same time! Follow my instruction: In the water. . .two. . .three. In the water. . .two. . .three. In the water. . .two. . .three.”

They were soon zipping across the river like a speed boat, leaving foamy, white crested waves on the yellow-brown water.

“How did you overpower him?” she asked when they were more than halfway across the wide river. “The Ferryman is infallible.”

“You want infallible you don’t pick a dude with a girly name like Karen.”

“His name is Charon.”

“S’what I said.”

They hit the opposite bank with the sound of splitting wood but neither of them cared. Toni leapt out easily and then leapt back in to help Faith jump over the side. When they were both on solid ground they looked back. Charon was swimming towards them, nearly as fast as they had rowed; he was only feet away from joining them on the shore. Cerberus had taken to the river too but one of his heads didn’t seem to like the water as much as the other two and his snake-mane was siding with the disagreeable head. He was going around in circles more than the boat had before they’d figured out the rowing.

“He catches us, it’s bad, right?” Faith asked, meaning Charon.

“Si.”

“Then let’s split!”

They turned and ran together and behind them they heard the Ferryman come out of the river, his boots sucking at the mud and his clothes squelching as he walked.

“This sucks, man!” Faith yelled as they ran. “Are we ever gonna get out of this fuckin’ nightmare?”

Toni laughed, exhilarated, “Si, Faith, we are. See those mountains?”

They were maybe a mile away. “Yeah.”

“Run for them with every ounce of strength you have left!”

It turned out to be more like five miles but Charon gave up before they were halfway there. Both exhausted, they walked the last half mile and when they finally entered the shade of the tunnel, Toni stopped.

“We are here.”

“Really?” Faith looked around the rocky passage. “Home doesn’t look like I remember it.”

Toni felt relieved enough to chuckle. “Be patient.”

She led the way up the tunnel until they met the barrier between the planes. It didn’t take her long to recite the incantation and they passed through with no problems.

“We are on the surface again,” she said, her relief making her voice giggly.

She could not believe they had done it, she had done it. It was miraculous. When she had promised Buffy she would undertake this mission a big part of her had never thought she would survive it, let alone accomplish it.

“Not seeing a lot of surface around here,” Faith said, refusing to share her jubilant moment.

Toni walked up the tunnel.

Faith followed. “Oh. Eww. Ow! Shit. What is that?”

“Bat shit,” she said, grinning, wiping the stinging crap from her own arms as the squeaking rodents flew away.

They reached the sunlight soon enough and Toni held out her arms and threw her head back to soak it up. She had half-expected it to be an overcast day just to spite them but the sun burned down brilliantly. Even Faith smiled again when its natural warmth enveloped her.

“We’re really back.” She chuckled self-consciously, “Kinda got the urge to get down and kiss the earth, yunno?”

Toni smiled. “I will not think less of you if you do. Although it would be hard for me to think less of you anyway.”

Faith nudged her shoulder, laughing. “Save it, Tone. We both know you love me.”

“Not as much as you love me.”

“Is what it is,” Faith said, laughing again. “So where on Earth are we exactly?”

“Greece. Which means we have to leave very quickly because I am banished right now and I cannot imagine your presence will be welcomed either.”

“Okay, so how do we leave?”

“We call for a portal.”

“Sweet.” Faith perched on one of the smaller rocks by the cave to rest, her hands going to her lower back. “I need either a hot bath or a massage like now. Preferably both. So go to it.”

Smiling sympathetically, Toni reached into her pocket. Then she checked her other pocket. Not alarmed just yet she checked the back pockets of her pants. They were empty too. Now she was alarmed!

“Where is it?”

“Where’s what?” Faith asked, not too concerned.

“The stone!” She checked all of her pockets again but she found nothing but the Key. “We cannot get home without the stone!”

“What stone?”

“The stone! It is. . .a magick cell phone, you could say. I need to recite the words over it to let Marco know we are back. It must have fallen from my pocket.”

She remembered taking off her pants and stuffing them carelessly into a bush, and then just as carelessly washing them in a fast flowing river.

“It is lost.”

“Good going. Got an actual cell phone on you?”

“Of course not. Do you?

“Of course not,” Faith echoed her. “So now what do we do?”

Toni sighed; the nearest village was miles away. The nearest city much further. Still, there was no other way.

“We walk.”

So they did, a long way in the scorching heat, until Faith was fed up.

“Okay, that’s it. Next car goes past I’m showing some leg.”

“I think you’ll be showing more stomach than leg.”

“Screw you.” They walked in silence until Faith said, “Okay, you show the leg.”

“I’m wearing pants.”

“So take them off.”

“I do not think so.”

“I’m starting to see why B likes you.”

Toni smiled, “Why?”

“You’re both prudes!”

“I am not a prude!”

“Prove it.”

“No.”

“Well, either you get us a ride soon or I’m dying on the side of this road like a dog.”

“I am okay with that.”

But two miles later. . .

“You are getting very heavy!” Toni hoisted Faith further up her back.

“You shoulda thought twice about getting me pregnant then,” Faith retaliated.

“I did not get you pregnant!”

“Yeah but Troy ain’t here and you were all proud about having a hand in it.”

“I did not say I was proud of it.”

“Whatever. Giddy-up, horsey.”

“I am not averse to throwing you over that fence, you know?”

“Go for it. I’ll just climb back on and kick harder.”

“So Buffy has told me.” Faith kicked her hip but it just made Toni grin more.

Three miles later they were walking side by side again.

“Yunno, I thought escaping from the underworld was gonna be the hard part.”

Toni sighed. “Maybe if you stopped talking for two minutes this would be easier.”

“And why would I want to make it easier on you?”

“Why would you not?”

“I wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for you. I didn’t forget. That lightning bolt had your name on it!”

“I did not ask you to jump in front of it.”

“If I hadn’t Buffy would have been the one stuck down there.”

Toni nodded, “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For that.”

A mile later they reached the village. There was a tavern, there always was, and while Faith ordered a jug of water, she used the old-fashioned payphone beside the bar.

Despite having called it several dozen times before, the number for the house eluded her so she called Troy’s cell. She spoke to him for less than a minute, giving her location and not much else regardless of his questions, before hanging up.

She walked to Faith’s side and ordered a vodka for herself. “The portal will be ready in five minutes,” she whispered.

“Good.” Faith nodded slowly. She glanced down at her stomach. “What do I say?”

“To whom?”

“Either of them.”

Toni shrugged, “You should tell Buffy that you love her but can never be with her now because you are carrying Troy’s son.”

“Okay I’m confused. Are you saying that ‘cause you want me away from B, or because you’re looking out for Troy?”

Toni smiled, “Can it not be both?”

“Things are screwed right now, I know, but that don’t mean I’m giving up on her.”

“I never thought you would.”

“If things get ugly, they get ugly.”

Toni nodded.

“And they’re probably gonna get ugly.”

Toni nodded again, “I will not give her up without a fight either.”

It was Faith’s turn to nod, “Long as we’re on the same page.”

Toni downed her vodka. “We should go. Our portal is probably waiting.”

Faith clambered down from her bar stool and together they walked outside.