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1.
"You ain't nothing," Faith's mother used to tell her, "so don't even start with that attitude, missy. What are you ever gonna be besides a two-bit tramp?"
"Just wait," Faith always wanted to say. "I'll show you. Because I'm so much better than you, you don't even got a concept for what I am."
Okay, actually, that's bullshit. What Faith really wanted to say was "Fuck you, bitch!" -- and sometimes she went ahead and said it. But she was thinking, "I'm better than you. I know it."
So when she got her slayer powers, when she found out for real what she WAS, it was like this huge, what do you call it, vindication. She wanted to go back through her neighborhood to everyone who'd ever put her down, to shove it in their faces. Take that, motherfuckers! I'm a fucking superhero. I'm the goddamn Chosen One, so suck on that.
Except she was supposed to keep it all a secret. Because it was this whole sacred duty and whatever, so she could save the world like every night and nobody was ever even going to know about it. Which honestly? Really fucking blew.
2.
Okay, and the thing about Buffy? Was that it was not fucking fair. Never even mind about her being Little Miss Perfect who everybody loves, with the perfect home and whatever, but what was up with her having all these friends who know about the whole slayer deal? Faith is a slayer; where's her fucking Scooby gang? What, so the whole It's a sacred duty and you can't tell anyone blah blah rule doesn't apply to Buffy? The whole thing is a crock.
3.
But her real problem with Buffy was that, it was like, girlfriend just doesn't know when to stay down. Because yeah, coming back from the dead is cool, Faith sees that. It's badass. And Buffy's a good fighter and sometimes she can even be fun if she ever loosens up. But there's only supposed to be one slayer at a time.
When her powers came online and her watcher found her, he gave her all these lectures, and maybe Faith didn't catch every word but she definitely knows she caught that. Only one. The new one is called when the old one dies. Faith has been called, that means this is HER time. She'll fight evil, and she'll be really damn good at it, and she'll even keep it a secret if that's what she has to do. But this gig is supposed to be all hers.
It's the only goddamn thing in the world that's ever been all hers. It even came with, like, a guarantee, written in all those dusty books: the Chosen One. If it's Faith, that means that Faith is the only one who gets to do this now. Some other chick'll get her turn when Faith dies. That's how this goes.
Except fucking Buffy is too badass to stay dead. Bitch.