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Tweak says, "im depressed😢😢😢"

winchester, sam. (ex_demonbloo908) wrote in wariscoming,
@ 2010-03-09 17:13:00

Entry tags:

pike, sam winchester

WHO: Sam Winchester and Pike.
WHAT: He's not drunk enough for this shit.
WHEN: Evening.
WHERE: A bar.
RATING: TBD.

It was his stubborn refusal to turn to Ruby that brought him to the bar that night. Rather than visiting the demon for his usual fix of blood, he had decided to aim for something else. Alcohol was going to be the replacement, but it would keep him away from Ruby for the evening. Why was he trying to avoid Ruby, one might ask? He had a list of reasons: they were moving too quickly, he didn't want to get too close to her right now after everything that had happened, he wasn't sure that he was supposed to be getting close to her in general, and, of course, she had gone ahead and pissed him off all over again. He had known, from that moment in which Ruby had admitted to being on Azazel's side all this time onward, that Ruby had gone out and done some things prior to then that he was going to hate. She had killed people. Sam had been somewhat able to accept that fact. But learning that she had been partly responsible for the deaths of those people at the police station? Where he and Dean had done everything in their power to keep those people from being murdered by the dozens of demons grouped outside the building? It had set him off so badly that Sam found himself unable to respond to her any longer. Over the computer. How hard was it to really type in a response over the computer? Either way, he had been itching for a good fix. Now that he was too pissed off to bother with Ruby for the night, Sam was substituting his craving with booze.

And, oh, what a poor substitution it was.

Having claimed the peanut bowl as his own, Sam sat hunched over the bar quietly with a beer in one hand and an impatient wrist occupied with drumming his fingers against the bartop. If he didn't slow down, he was probably going to get himself drunk. It had been a good while since Sam had drank himself silly, but this was beginning to look like one of those nights. He couldn't help himself. He was frustrated, he needed blood, and he had to do something. If this was the solution? Then so be it. Except Sam knew that it wasn't quite a solution. It was more like a temporary way to keep himself from dealing with the fact that being with Ruby sometimes came with crap like this that was going to catch him off guard. He had to eventually learn to accept that fact and deal with it as it came along.

Right now though? He was going to drink. And he was going to enjoy it very much. When the bartender came back around and asked him if he wanted another beer to replace his last, Sam shook his head. No, the beer wasn't cutting it. Even though he was already feeling a bit lightheaded, he simply said, "Whiskey this time. And keep 'em coming."

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notafishie
2010-03-10 07:33 am UTC (link)

And then, finally, his third point. "No, you're right. Faith can't." He hesitated a second here. "No one can. That's why I'm there. So that when she stumbles on the path, I can catch her and help her get her feet under her again. It's not, and will never be, easy. There are absolutely going to be times where I want to just give up and go find someone easier to hang around with. There are going to be times where I'm so plagued with worry I want to just tear out all my hair, or go wander off to some remote corner of the world and get drunk and forget all about everything. There will be times where Faith will tell me something about her past, about what she did, and I'll think 'how can she ever come back from that?' But at the end of the day, I pretty much figure it's like this: If she's willing to work at this redemption thing, if she's willing to give it the kind of attempt it deserves, then doesn't she at least deserve one person to lean on?"

And that was all true. Every last word Pike had just said was true for him. But there was also how he felt about her. "I won't lie. I have feelings for her. Pretty deep ones, if I'm being totally honest with myself. But even if I didn't, I'd still believe every single word I just told you. Even if I hated her, I would still have answered you the exact same way." He looked back down at his beer and shrugged slightly. "But it helps, that I," he paused, glanced up at Sam, and just decided what the hell, he'd been honest about everything else, "that I love her. It gives me a little extra strength to stick with her."

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ex_demonbloo908
2010-03-10 08:38 am UTC (link)

Before tonight, Sam would have taken little to no interest in the conversation that they were having now. He had always believed in redemption and prevention (after all, it was his fate that seemed to be so damned cursed), but when it got to a certain point, Sam could only feel and do but so much in regards to a person. However, having ended up falling in love with a demon who had once been out to do nothing but destroy the world, Sam could honestly say that he was more than able to relate to the situation here. He could no longer turn his back on what Pike and Faith had appeared to be going through. While he was uncertain about Faith in general, as he was still terribly wary of her when it came to her attacking his brother, Sam was more than able to understand where Pike himself was coming from. The fact that the poor guy had to worry about her all the time like this was a hard burden to have weighed on his shoulders. How did one keep themselves on track when they constantly had to look out for someone else? How did Pike manage to keep an eye on Faith this long without cracking and telling her that she was just too much for him? Even without the verification there, Sam could tell that Pike really did care about her. If he didn't care, after all, he would have done the exact same thing Sam technically should have done (by everyone else s terms, anyway) - he should have killed her off or boxed Faith away for all eternity. Prison or Hell, it didn't matter. Most people would find either location suitable for a person like her. Well, for people like them. Faith and Ruby. Messed up and twisted on the inside, but each looking to come back from that no matter what it took.

Sam understood that to an extent. Yet with Pike here, explaining how hard it truly must have been for the both of them (unknowingly on Ruby's part, of course), it did make Sam think. Admittedly a bit slower than usual, what with the alcohol pumping through his system, but thought came along all the same. If it was hard for Faith, how much more difficult was it for Ruby? Faith was human. Ruby...she hadn't been human for a very long time. All she thought, felt, and breathed was evil. How did someone like her come back from that? It was a hard thing to imagine, let alone believe in. But Sam was trying. He really was. "I...get it. I think I do. I just...I dunno, man. I feel like if we can do this stuff, they should be able to as well. Like -" He frowned, trying to think of a way to properly word what he was thinking and feeling without giving too much away. Maybe he couldn't do it like that; maybe he was better off just telling Pike how much they really had in common after all. "It's common sense. I think it is. Don't kill. Avoid doing things that are going to hurt the people that you care about. Don't end the world." Sam tapped at the edge of his glass, brow furrowing as he looked over at Pike carefully. "You know what I mean? And I get it. It's hard to come back from what you know. But at the same time..."

Sam considered taking another gulp of his whiskey down. Instead, he leaned back a little, pushed some of his dark hair out of his eyes, and laughed. It wasn't a bright, happy laugh; no, that laugh was filled with uncertainty. "I guess my problem is that I have high expectations. I mean, I guess it's no secret now that I'm in love with a demon, is it?"

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ex_demonbloo908
2010-03-10 08:38 am UTC (link)

That felt so strange to say. So strange, in fact, that Sam actually had to pause to take in the rush of emotion that poured through him upon that very statement. He had hidden his relationship with Ruby for so very long that he didn't know how to actually talk to a person about it without feeling like he was going to get a gasp of shock or a violent reaction in response. It was strange. Yet, at the same time, Sam felt a twinge of satisfaction coming from it as well. Ruby was his now. And no matter how fucked up people thought that it was, they were also able to recognize and understand that she was off limits. He had never felt quite so possessive of a person before. Possessive and, mostly, protective of. One would think that because of her demonic nature - because of the fact that she was more physically capable of defense than most were - that he'd be far more relaxed about her ability to survive in this world. It was exactly the opposite, however. Ruby was a demon. Demons were hated with a passion among most of the people he knew. He had to protect her with his every breath, even if that meant having to stand between her and the people that he loved. Sam only hoped that it would never have to come to that. He didn't know what he'd do with himself if it ever did. "I always viewed Ruby in a better light than the rest of her kind. I was convinced that she was better than all those other demons. You have no idea how much faith I put into the fact that she wasn't...not good. But not evil either. Just something special." Something different. Kind of like him. "But now that's gone. Broken. Completely destroyed. And now she has to build her way up to that all over again. Well, not exactly that, but something different. Because I honestly don't think she'll ever be what I had thought that she was in the first place. Not after finding out the things that I did about her. There's just no way that'll ever happen."

Sam didn't know why he was doing this. Opening up to some random guy that he barely knew at a bar. But he had bottled up so much stuff for so long that he couldn't help but let these thoughts and feelings leak on through. It helped that he was drunk, too, he had to admit. Sober, Sam didn't think that Pike would find Sam Winchester quite so honest. "What you're going through with Faith seems a lot like what I'm seeing with Ruby right now. She's been doing little things and she seems so excited about it, you know?" Sam looked to Pike, a glint of amusement showing in his eyes. The little things. Something as simple as helping a kid out and Sam had known that Ruby was feeling all kinds of proud of herself. He also knew that she had been hoping for an encouraging response from him when he had found out all about what she had done that day. Unfortunately, finding out about those deaths had hindered that. He had ruined it, really, and if Sam wasn't feeling so annoyed with her right now he probably would have gone back and apologized for it. Maybe he would later. After he got a grip on himself. "But it's average. And for most people, it even would come off as incredibly unextraordinary. I don't expect for either of these women - not Faith or Ruby - to come back from the terrible things that they did before overnight. But I do want them to be better. And, with Ruby, because I once viewed her in such a good light prior to all this crap that got piled into everything, I can't move past those high expectations that I have. I know that I should. But I can't. I want her to do well so badly that it..." He raised a hand, pressing it over his heart as if to illustrate his point. "It physically hurts to see her fail. And tonight that's exactly what happened. She tried to do good, but then she failed. And I don't know how to get over that." Sam finally reached forward to take another drink of his whiskey. Fuck, he really needed some of that blood. "How do you do it?" Sam looked over at Pike curiously. "How do you deal with something like that? How are you still here, supporting Faith when something like that happens? Has it?"

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notafishie
2010-03-10 04:33 pm UTC (link)

Pike was definitely getting the picture that he and Sam weren't as different as he'd thought. For just a moment, Pike had an image of an Oprah special titled Bad Women and the Good Men That Love Them. It would have been amusing, in less heavy circumstances. Instead, there was just a sense of irony, and maybe a hint of dark humor.

He felt for Sam, now moreso than ever. Pike knew how hard this Faith situation was on him, and he could only imagine it would be harder for Sam, given what Ruby was. Faith, for all her faults, was still human, which in the eyes of many meant that she had at least a ghost of a chance at coming back from this. Ruby didn't have that, and quite suddenly Pike felt for Ruby, too. Not for the first time, he wondered why the Powers - or God, or fate, or whatever it was that set down the plans for their lives - could never be satisfied with letting their servants be happy. Why could they never catch a break? He fought off a wave of religious bitterness, forcing his thoughts to stay with the conversation. Now wasn't the time for him to get all bitter.

"They should, yeah," Pike agreed, nodding. "They should be able to do this stuff, and they can. But they don't always know it until someone shows them." He shrugged one shoulder and took a sip of his beer. He was keeping it to sips for now. He really didn't want to be drunk for this conversation. He didn't look at Sam as he explained, dancing around the details. "I've been...in a dark place, like Faith is. Not as bad, but I know what it's like, to do something terrible. To hurt so much that you just want to give in to the bad, because at least if you do you won't care anymore, all the guilt and the pain and the self-loathing-" He bit off his words there, taking a second to think about how he could really explain it. "It's like alcohol," he said at last. "The darkness. You give in to it, and for a little while you don't give a shit, all the...stuff, it just goes away. Then you wake up the next day and it's worse, and you have to drink more, give in a little bit more, until the next thing you know you're so far gone you can't even tell which way is up anymore. If you use alcohol, like I did, the only thing that comes of it is a lot of embarrassing stories and a liver that probably won't last to your sixtieth birthday. If you use that darkness, like Faith did..." He gave Sam a very light shrug. "You end up with a lot worse than embarrassing stories. If you're lucky, you've got people around you that can help you, people that will call you on your bullshit and won't let you push them away, no matter how hard you try. If you're not, then there's a good chance you'll get crushed under the weight of everything that's happening. Things get confusing, and morality gets hard to see. What should be common sense is floating up there on the surface of the ocean, but you're so far under the water that you can barely even see it, let alone reach for it." He sighed, gazing down at his bottle of beer. "Is it any wonder, then, that the first person that treats you kindly, like you're not a monster, is someone that you'll do anything, even the wrong thing, for?" He was talking about Faith and the Mayor, but without even realizing it, he could be describing Ruby's situation.

No, it was no secret, but Pike didn't say that. He had a feeling that question had been a little bit rhetorical. Instead he considered what Sam was saying. This was dangerous ground, talking about Ruby. Not because Pike hated Ruby, quite the contrary actually, he considered her a friend, and a good one at that. He just knew that right now, Sam was feeling a whole mix of emotions towards Ruby, and that plus the alcohol could end up being a bad combination. Still, right now he seemed fairly calm. "You're going to find out these things about her, Sam. There's no way around it. We're in love with women with checkered pasts, there really is no avoiding it, but you're handling it so far. I mean, think about it for a second. You're here, rather than doing things involving Latin and traps. If you really couldn't handle it, would that be the case? Some part of you believes this is worth sticking around for, or at best you'd be out of the state by now, at worst..."

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notafishie
2010-03-10 04:35 pm UTC (link)

He didn't think he needed to finish that sentence. "It sucks," Pike added, punctuating his point by jabbing a finger down against the bar. "It sucks, and there are days that your heart is going to break for them and other days where you think you want to break them, but you don't. We don't. And maybe neither of them will ever be what they were before, but if they can manage to pull themselves out of this, they'll be stronger for it. Better, in some ways, than they were before. They'll always have their scars, but sometimes, scars can be a helpful lesson, constantly reminding them of what can never happen again."

Truth was, Pike didn't mind talking to Sam about this anymore. It had been uncomfortable at first, but Sam was clearly at least willing to listen. Maybe it was the alcohol doing it, maybe it wasn't, right now Pike didn't care. The point was that he was listening, and they were talking, and that was helping the both of them. He listened as Sam talked, and when he placed a hand over his heart Pike lifted his bottle slightly in a salute. He understood that feeling very well. "Average, sure. Unextraordinary, sure. For us. For most people, people who have never been through what they have. But they have to start somewhere. You have to tread water in the shallow end of the pool before you can start swimming laps in the deep end. So maybe they're doing little things, average things, unextraordinary things right at this moment. But that's paving the way for bigger things down the line, when they're ready to try the deep end of the pool."

He wasn't sure what had happened with Ruby earlier. He'd missed that thread on the boards. Still, it confused him. Ruby hadn't seemed like the type to backslide. "Did she fail, Sam? Did she fail tonight, or did she tell you about something that happened before she decided to change? I know hearing those things are hard, but there is a difference between failing now and failing then, back before she knew there was any other choice. It's a terrifyingly fine line, practically invisible, but it's there all the same." Without knowing the details, he couldn't really say much more than that.

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notafishie
2010-03-10 04:36 pm UTC (link)

Then Sam asked him how he did it. That got a little smirk out of him, and he lifted his beer for another sip before he answered. "Something like her backsliding? It hasn't happened, not really, but there have been tough times. How do I deal with them?" He shrugged again. "I don't really have a formula for it. It would be so much easier if I did, if there was some kind of mathematical equation that I could rely on, but there really isn't. I have to take each instance as it comes." He paused, thinking about how he'd made it through Faith's brief MIA stint. "First demon I ever encountered here stabbed me." He gestured to his side, where the wound was. It was doing much better now. "It was during the kryptonite thing. Faith and I were getting the kryptonite from the place we'd been dosed, so we could give it to Clark in a little lead box." The little amused smile that played up his lips there was understandable. Helping Superman. Talk about surreal. "On the way back, we noticed that someone was tailing us, and sure enough, it was a demon. We had a scuffle, I got stabbed, and Faith got me out of there. She didn't have to. Back then, we were still getting to know each other. I was starting to care about her, but I don't know if she'd started to connect with me yet. I was bleeding all over the place, and I'm sure that wasn't easy for Faith with all she's been through, but even though she could've just turned around and left me, a relative stranger, there to die, she didn't. She got me back to the room, and she patched me up, and she even made sure Clark got that kryptonite." He glanced up at Sam, pride and confidence in Faith shining in his eyes. "She did an amazing thing, and not for any personal gain, not to get in good with anybody, not as part of some maniacal plan. She did an amazing thing because it was the right thing to do. I guess, when times get tough, I remember that. I remember that she has the capability of doing something genuinely good, for genuinely good reasons. I remember that and I know, about as certainly as I've ever known anything, that if she could just dig herself out of all that crap she could be an amazing person. Maybe even a hero." He considered Sam for a moment, and then said, "Remember the good. When times get tough, stop and make yourself remember the good things she's done. Remember her potential. It won't always be enough, but it can get you far enough that your love can take you the rest of the way."

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ex_demonbloo908
2010-03-11 02:07 am UTC (link)

This was officially the first time that Sam had ever been able to confide in anyone outside of Andrea about Ruby before. Yet even Andrea, hard as she may have tried, couldn’t possibly understand everything. It was something that one had to personally experience in order to fully comprehend; the experience itself was hard for someone on the outside looking in to look at and make an honest opinion of. If any example needed to be seen, Sam could have very well taken his own opinion of what Pike and Faith had been doing before and compared it to how he felt about them now. Before? He would not have hesitated to put a bullet in Faith’s head if he thought for a second that she was going to snap. Whatever progress she would have made would have counted for nothing in his eyes, so long as Sam saw to it that she didn’t harm anyone that he cared for. Things were different now that he saw the situation from a more personal level. He would always be wary of that woman, but at the same time Sam felt like it was actually okay to be rooting for her. If Faith could change, didn’t that mean that there was hope for Ruby to do so as well? Did that mean that this strenuous journey that he had decided to take part in would be worth it after all? Sam had a hard time maintaining faith in a lot of things lately. Especially lately. But the mere idea of Faith getting through her struggles with Pike backing her the entire time spiked a bit of that hope into his chest that Sam had almost forgotten existed in the first place. He couldn’t help but look at the man sitting next to him with a hint of admiration in his eyes. To think that he was able to stick with Faith for this long and that the two of them were actually progressing toward…toward something that wasn’t as bitter and fucked up as wherever it was that they had started brought forth an air of inspiration that Sam had not expected to find sitting at this bar tonight. All it had taken was the simple pass of a bowl of nuts and he had found someone who was willing to exchange thoughts and answers to the questions that he had been juggling through his mind for quite some time now. No, this didn’t make everything better. That was something that only time could do, as Sam very well knew. But it helped. And Sam felt nothing but surprise at that simple realization.

“Not every person out there deserves a second chance,” Sam said, somewhat gruffly as he looked down into his glass, “in fact, part of me still wonders if giving Ruby one was the greatest idea in the world.” Sam twisted the side of his mouth downward, brow furrowing heavily. “But I saw something in her that no one else did. She did evil things. She killed innocent people. As a Hunter?” Sam glanced over at Pike with a shake of his head. “It was my duty to take care of her from the start. The second that she came to me and revealed that she was a demon, I was supposed to drag her ass into the first trap I could get my hands on and send her straight back to Hell where she belonged.” Why he did not at the time, Sam would not say. It was a long story. One that involved him playing the part of a desperate man with a clock over his head and nowhere else to turn. “Then I find out that she’s actually not who she says she is and suddenly it’s all so much worse. But I still couldn’t do it. You wanna know why? Because while she was two parts fucked up and a whole fistful of crazy, she was the first demon I ever saw that was able to love. I’m not talking that fake crap where she could get away with using the ‘l’ word and convince all of the world that she was the most genuine and pure demon to ever walk the earth. No, she definitely isn’t the most genuine creature that I’ve ever…” Sam smiled faintly, eyes falling to his hands as they settled against the edge of the bar in front of himself. “I know that this might sound strange to you, but she’s warm. On the inside, I mean. At first I could feel it…I - it’s hard to explain.”

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ex_demonbloo908
2010-03-11 02:09 am UTC (link)

He had used his abilities on her. Rather than latching onto the demon and dragging out, torturing it, or ultimately destroying it, Sam had done nothing. He had just maintained that grip, feeling the demon for what it was as he did so. It was nothing like the cold, violent, angry reaction that he got out of all his other enemies. Ruby was different. There was something inside of her that he had never expected to find when he grasped onto what she truly was. Warm. Unafraid. That wasn’t something that she, as a demon, could fake. What he saw through his abilities wasn’t a lie. It couldn’t have possibly been. “That warmth grew. It went from me being able to test her to see if it actually existed to me actually being able to see bits and pieces of it coming from her. I could just look into her eyes and know. And coming from someone who has spent his entire life hunting down monsters like…like what she was -” Because Sam certainly wasn’t going to call her a monster now. “- it’s probably one of the most amazing things that I have ever seen in my entire life. So when I decided to put my faith in her completely after learning the truth, I knew that I wasn’t going off of nothing. Ruby can be good. I’ve seen it in her. It’s just that darkness inside that I’ve also seen that makes me worry. But she’s worth it.”

She was worth it. That statement, too, came as a surprise to him. For all the anger that he felt directed at Ruby right now for what she had done, he knew that she was still worth the trouble all the same. Sam brushed his hair out of his eyes once more and finished off his drink. The bartender, at another nod from Sam, swept the glass away and vanished along the opposite end of the bar to whip up another. “She didn’t fail, no.” Sam realized that wasn’t the right way to have put what he felt. “I mean, in a way? Yeah, she did. She failed to tell me about what she should have told me a very long time ago. But Ruby didn’t necessarily fail. She did a good thing today and I’m…I am proud of her for it. At the same time, I’m also incredibly disappointed by what she told me right after. She knows that I’m disappointed.” Sam raised a hand to rub at his eyes, frustration flaring through him at the thought. It wasn’t directed at Ruby for the first time tonight though. Sam was disappointed in himself as well for having handled the situation so horribly. He was supposed to be helping her through this, not kicking her down whenever she accomplished something. What she had done in the past far was far from right. She also should have admitted to what she had done at that police station a whole lot sooner. But Sam had long since told Ruby that he was going to accept and deal with the evil that she had committed in the past. Quite suddenly, perhaps by the influence of the alcohol, Sam slammed a large fist down against the bar. The peanut bowl jumped up in response, spilling a few of it’s contents onto the wooden bartop, but Sam didn’t pay it any mind. “I screwed up, didn’t I? I‘m supposed to be supporting her, but I went right back and…and you just said right there that it was going to be hard. And it is hard. It‘s beyond hurt. It‘s…it‘s fucking insane is what it is.” He shot Pike a pointed sort of look, as if that alone would demonstrate as to how complicated what they were both dealing with truly was.

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ex_demonbloo908
2010-03-11 02:10 am UTC (link)

“I half feel like grabbing her by the shoulders and giving her a shake, while the other half of me just wants to crumble in and apologize like some kind of -” Of what? There was nothing wrong with apologizing. “- I really want to do right by her, man. I just hope that she gets that it’s not gonna be easy. Because when you throw something bad and unexpected into someone’s face, you can’t possibly expect for them to take it all in and say that everything is perfectly okay. It’s not. And I want her to understand that. I don‘t want for Ruby to look back at what happened there and think ‘oh, Sam got mad at me because of that, so it must have been pretty bad.’ I want her to look back at it and realize that innocent people died because of what she did that night. I worry that she doesn’t sometimes. I worry that as warm as she can be on the inside, that there’s some part of her that doesn’t fully understand the things that she’s supposed to. I know that goes hand in hand with her learning and coming from a completely different place than you and I do, but damn it all. It is hard.”

He was beginning to rant now and Sam understood that. So he looked down, took a deep breath, and smiled a bit more warmly than the former had been. “I kind of sound like I’m in over my head here, huh?” He laughed, taking up the fresh drink that had been shoved in front of him. Slopping a little onto the bar as he lifted it, Sam took a gulp of it and grinned. “I am in over my head. In fact, if this apocalypse stuff doesn’t drive me crazy? I’m betting that all this stuff with Ruby will. And I’m oddly okay with that. Because like you said before about Faith…she is worth it. All the bullshit, all the frustrations, all of the unpleasant surprises and inevitable confrontations that are going to come along because of what these two women have done in their pasts…when you look at who they are and you feel what you do for them, there’s nothing in the world that can change that. Nothing that can make you just up and give up on the one that you love. Kinda funny coming from a Hunter like me, but there it is.” Sam lifted his glass and raised it to Pike in a sort of salute. “To redemption. And to our sanities.” God knew that they’d need all the help that they could get.

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notafishie
2010-03-14 10:01 pm UTC (link)

Pike listened quietly as Sam vented. He was glad the other man was getting all this out. At the same time, he was amazed at how alike the two of them really were. Sure, some of the details were different, but at the end of the day they were two men that, by rights, should be hostile towards these two women. Yet somehow, they both saw something in them, something that stayed their hands and drew them in. This certainly wasn't what Pike had thought he'd find tonight, but he was actually thrilled he had.

Pike wasn't sure what to say. Sam seemed to have pretty much said it all. At first, he just grinned a little and lifted his bottle in the same salute. "I'll drink to that." And he promptly did, letting out a satisfied little sigh as he pulled it away from his lips. He considered the bottle a second, then smiled over at Sam. "Y'know, man, we are both in over our heads, here. Hell, technically I didn't even graduate from high school." He shrugged and sat back, bringing the bottle with him, the neck clutched between his index and middle fingers. "And there are times where I worry that she'll catch me with something at the wrong time and I'll react badly, and then that'll be it. I worry that in the end I won't be able to help her, that I'll get tired and slip."

He smiled again, this one very warm, and more than a little because of the image of Faith he'd just called up in his mind. "And then I'll look at her. She'll be doing...whatever, maybe even just sleeping, but even if she's not she doesn't notice because when I look at her like this, I don't want her to see me. In those instances she's without all that hard shell of badass, she'll be just Faith, and every last doubt and fear just melts away." He nodded towards Sam. "It's like you said. I can just see it, in those moments. She's not Faith, the stone cold killer. She's not Faith, the badass chick that you never want to cross. She's not even Faith, the," he lowered his voice here, "Slayer. She's just Faith. And underneath all the defenses, underneath all the issues, underneath all the crap that's been piled on top of her, both normal and...otherwise, Faith is a lost, lonely little girl that wants so desperately for someone to be there. To not be alone. For a chance."

He had a feeling, based both on what Sam said and how he said it, that he understood. "She shows one thing on the outside, but it's not the real her. Not what she could be, if she let herself. But she's trying. She's fighting her way back. Slowly, and not without issue, but there it is. All she needs is a hand, and no matter what she's done, no matter how many people are ready to write her off, I can't ignore that. I just can't."

His eyes had glazed over slightly as he talked, that warm smile plastered on his face, but now he focused again, giving Sam a knowing look. "I know Ruby a little bit, Sam. She helped me when I needed it. She helped Faith, too. I consider her a friend, hell, a good friend. Don't get me wrong, I don't know her like you do. But you and me, we're in the same line of work. Sure, things are different where I come from, but at the end of the day the things that matter aren't that different." He took a breath. "I think she's going to be okay, Sam. I don't know if anybody else here has said that to you, but I want you to know that you're not the only one that thinks she'll be okay." Pike was trying to tell Sam that he wasn't wrong. That this thing he had going with Ruby wasn't a mistake. Because as far as Pike could see, it really wasn't.

(OOC: Sorry about how long this took! I totally forgot it was my tag.)

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