'THERE IS NO HOPE!' Spinner Cortez thought with panic.

The elder Cortez did not mean this in the usual sense of despair, though he was hopeless of finding his goal.

When Sage had reprimanded Vert for failing to thoroughly research a potential recruit, Spinner had done just what she had suggested and attempted a background check. The hacker had spent the hours after "Hope" left poring over thousands of records, trying to find a Hope O'Shaughnessy of South Boston, Massachusetts, but the search had been absolutely fruitless. There were no fewer than fourteen Hope O'Shaughnessys from that area that were the right age, and dozens more counting multiple variant spellings of O'Shaughnessy, but none of the records he had found were a match. Spinner had been able to cross several records off the list by virtue of included pictures of the subject. A few he had been able to ignore because O'Shaugnessy was their married name or the record had listed them as African American. The rest he knew could not possibly have been the Hope he knew, due to the fact that their paper trails were continuously added to in their home state. Spinner had even double checked Handler's Corners' records and discovered that Grace's rental agreement only included her and not her cousin, and there were no nearby banks that had a Hope O'Shaughnessy on record as having an account. From all of this evidence, or rather lack thereof, Spinner could only conclude that there was no Hope; Hope O'Shaughnessy was not a real person.

This brought up a host of new problems. If "Hope" was living under an assumed name, what was she running from? She had said it herself that vampires were no big deal for her, so what could possibly make her run and hide? It simply did not add up.

Spinner paced back and forth as he pondered this for a moment before returning to the internet. After looking up a very specific procedure on Wikipedia, he retrieved some baking powder, an artist's paint brush, and a roll of packing tape. When he was sure the others had gone to sleep, he tiptoed towards the elevator and began dusting around the wall to the right of the keypad. After a few minutes, Spinner pumped his fist in the air at his success: there on the wall was a complete hand print, fingertips, palm and all. Carefully he smoothed a piece of packing tape over the tip of each finger, slowly and deliberately removing them and placing them against a piece of plastic.

If the others saw him sneaking around, Spinner knew they would think he was up to something. In truth, Spinner was unsure as to why he was even sneaking around in the first place. Really, any information he found was best shared with the team, as they all had something to lose if their secret got out and the government descended upon their base. But, still… There was just, well, something about the way Hope acted so nonchalantly about keeping quiet that seemed off to him. The hacker wasn't really sure what he was looking for, and he supposed that was why he said nothing to his teammates. He didn't want to worry them unless he had proof, but he had this nagging hunch that there was more to the story.

Spinner had to know the truth or he would explode from sheer curiosity. This was the thin justification he gave himself for scanning "Hope's" fingerprints and hacking into a federal database in an attempt to learn her true identity.

Within a few minutes of typing, Spinner was inside the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System, the system used by US police departments and various federal agencies to catalog criminal records. It was a longshot, he knew, that he had taken the fingerprints correctly, or even that "Hope" would be in the system; she seemed like a trustworthy girl, or at least one smart enough not to get caught if she did anything illegal.

'Beating up Simon notwithstanding, of course,' he thought to himself. Simon had been a prick in death, but he had been almost as bad in life. Anyone would have done the same thing in her place. He doubted she would have any record attached to her prints.

The computer screen started blinking furiously with flashing alerts and warnings. Spinner's jaw nearly hit the floor.

"Okay, so vampires are real," Grace said frantically. "I totally get that. There's no way around that, I know what I saw. But you have to cut me some slack, here, Faith—I mean, Hope, Hope; your name is Hope now. I'm sorry, this is all a bit much for me and I think I'm having a meltdown." She looked at the afternoon sky through the newly repaired window and groaned. "And I really don't want to be here right now."

Faith smirked. "Relax, Gracie. They only come out after dark."

"But what about things that don't have to wait for the sun to go down?" she demanded. "How can you be so calm about this?"

"It's not exactly new to me," she said. The diner was empty; they were alone. Zeke was god only knew where, maybe hunting for alien artifacts, or perhaps doing some maintenance on the old warehouse where he locked himself up to wolf out. Lunch was long over, but not so long that they were expecting the dinner rush to start in less than a few hours. They had the place to themselves, and if Grace hadn't made her promise to try and quit, the rogue slayer might have dared to light a cigarette—gasp!—inside the restaurant. As it was, she decided to take an even bigger risk.

"So there's this prophecy right?" She stretched and leaned back in the booth, cracking her knuckles above her head. "'Into every generation she is born, one girl to stand alone against the darkness.' Now, this girl, she's called the slayer, and she's super badass and tough, and even though there were a lot of girls born with the potential to become a slayer, only one would be called at a time. That one chick would fight monsters until she died, and then the power would pass on to the next girl. You with me so far, Gracie?"

Grace furrowed her brow. "Slayers?" she asked meekly. "Like that terrorist group the government was warning people about…?"

"They're not terrorists, or radical militant feminists, or anything like that," Faith said wearily. "That was just propaganda spread by a doomsday cult that infiltrated the US military."

"Wait, WHAT?"

"Anyway, slayers are basically magic chicks who kick serious ass. But a few years back, the magic changed because of something that the slayer before me did. After that, every girl who could be a slayer became a slayer, and there were, like, two thousand the last time we counted, and fifteen hundred or so working together in small groups across the globe." She stopped and sipped her soda. "I've seen all kinds of things, Grace. Witches and warlocks, demons, vampires, ancient caveman vampire demon things; I'm even pretty sure there's at least one werewolf living here in town. And from the way Sheriff Johnson was handling things the other night I'd say he's known what's what for a long time."

Grace was frozen in her seat. "This," she gulped, "Is a lot to take in."

Her cousin laughed and headed for the register. Under the counter, right next the shotgun, was what Zeke liked to call the emergency bourbon. Of course the old man expected them to be sober at work, but he also understood that sometimes, when shit hits the fan, you just need a goddamn drink. The rogue slayer grabbed the bottle and the two tumblers, bringing them over to the booth and pouring each of them a little something to take the edge off. Grace downed hers too quickly, nearly choking, but was calm enough to sip the second. Once the tension had eased, Faith started chatting to get her cousin back out of the dumps, and Grace was soon flooding her with questions. When did Faith kill her first vampire, how old was she when she became a slayer, what was the scariest thing she had ever faced? Faith did her best to answer everything Grace threw at her, but it got to the point where she was rolling her eyes and explaining things slowly when her younger cousin mentioned a few choice pop culture references. Some of the things Grace began asking about, she had only seen in episodes of Charmed.

Thankfully, mercifully, finally, they had a customer, and Faith put the emergency bourbon back next to the shotgun while Grace went to splash some water on her face.

"Welcome to Zeke's Diner, I'm Hope, and I'll be serving you this evening," she said on autopilot before recognizing the young man standing before her. The rogue slayer watched him with a steely gaze, her voice cold. "Hey, kiddo. Where're your friends?"

"Just me today," Spinner said. "Hope, you and I need to talk."

She narrowed her eyes, untrusting of the so-called 'Battle Force 5.' This little guy, she had him pegged from day one as a weasel. He was scrawny and twitchy, and his hair was ridiculous. Still, this unimpressive fellow had fended off a number of dangerous vampires, saving the lives of his friends. She wanted more than anything to toss him out on his ass, but despite Spinner Cortez being too pathetic to hit, she had to respect his willingness to fight above his weight class. She settled for utilizing snark. "Look, if this is about the job offer, you can tell your boss to go stick it. I'm not that desperate."

Spinner gulped at the scowl he received. "They don't know I'm here," he said. "I-I-I just thought that if—"

"Well, ya thought wrong, half-pint," she said. "Listen, I don't got all day here. Are you going to order or what?"

The gamer looked around quickly and, seeing no witnesses, swiftly shoved a manila envelope into her hands. The waitress took it in confusion.

"What's all this?" she asked, opening the seal and taking out a sheet of paper with her picture, what looked like the record for some minor shoplifting charge…

And the name Hope O'Shaughnessy.

"It's everything you need to start again," he said in a hushed tone. "Birth certificate, driver's license, the whole shebang. As far as anyone's concerned, you've only ever been Hope… And Faith never existed."

She took a step back, staring down at him as if he were crazy. "What the hell are you talking about?" she asked, though she knew full well. "Who's Faith? I don't know what you've been smoking, but where can I get some?"

The hacker grinned. "Plausible deniability, gotcha. Good strategy!" He cleared his throat. "Seriously, though, I cut your rap sheet in half, then I realized you still looked pretty bad, so I got rid of some more. I left in the shoplifting stuff from early high school, the runaway status, got rid of the time in the pen for murder—"

She lifted him off the ground. "Listen, you little pipsqueak," she hissed quietly. "You've got the wrong girl. I always have been Hope O'Shaughnessy. I don't know what you're talking about."

"Then I guess," Spinner said softly, "That I forged all those IDs and deleted all the information connecting Faith Lehane to Grace McCallister for no reason."

Faith nearly staggered as she dropped him on his feet. She'd been made; her cover was blown. This inconsequential little nothing had figured out her real name, and there was nothing she could do about it. Here in the envelope was her apparent salvation, and she could never dare touch it. In a case such as this, how could she keep from looking a gift horse in the mouth?

This was some kind of setup. It had to be. Nothing ever came without a price.

"It's been three days since the interview," she said. "Why now, and with no backup? What do you want, Spinner?"

Spinner brushed himself off. "I did a background check on 'Hope O'Shaughnessy', and nothing came up for you. There's no such thing as a person without computerized records attached to their name in this day and age. You were a ghost. It was a mystery, so I ran your prints, which you were kind enough to leave by the elevator."

'Fuck.' She winced. Yes, Faith had casually leaned against the wall as she waited for the elevator, her palm pressed flat on the cold steel.

"I learned all about you, and that lead to the slayers. And then it all made sense." Spinner threw his arms up in exasperation. "Nobody believed me when I said Simon was going to rise as a vampire. They thought I was telling a sick joke to hurt Stanford's feelings, but c'mon, I do have some taste. And you knew all about the vampires, and how to kill them, and you were so strong, and you kicked our asses. So—"

There was the distinctive sound of a woman painfully wretching coming from the lady's room. Spinner only ceased to panic after Faith assured him that her cousin, Grace, was the culprit, though he raised his eyebrow and refused to continue after the rogue slayer insisted Grace was not pregnant.

"I get that you would want a quiet life after all that hell," Spinner said, pushing the envelope back into her hands. "But you still did something great for us, saving my friends' lives. And I just thought, maybe if I showed you some appreciation…"

Faith faltered as she looked over the forged documents. They were excellent. She had no idea what the hell kind of printer he had used, but she supposed it must have been a good one to get something of such high quality. The kid had clearly gone to a lot of trouble for her. "You made all these yourself?"

Spin shrugged. "Pfft, please! Once I'd hacked into the right databases, all I had to do was create the files from the inside. After that, it was just a matter of getting the records departments to send copies."

And he was a hacker, too! Maybe he meant what he said about Faith's records being deleted. "And you're sure everything else is gone?"

"Completely gone," he said with a manic grin. "Gotta love super-cool alien tech. The pentagon never knew what hit them!"

The temptation grew greater every minute. She could disappear, go somewhere new, and live her life without looking over her shoulder. She could finally be free, if only she took the chance. But she had the nagging feeling that something was wrong, because really, she believed deep down that she was a bad person and did not deserve to be happy. She had done and seen horrible things. Her records were gone, but there were still the people who knew her for who she really was. She would never be left alone. And as she knew only too well, nothing was ever free.

"What's the catch?" she demanded, her voice dripping with an icy venom.

Spinner put up his hands defensively. "Once in a while, we might run into something we can't handle," he said. "Something supernatural or whatever. Just, like, y'know, if we need help, could we count on you? And if you see anything with aliens or something, give us a call, and we'll take care of it."

She glared. "That's all? No favors? No blackmail?"

"Isn't having a slayer on call cool enough on its own?" he said. "I know, you said you didn't want to save the world, but I cleaned that mess so good you could go into law enforcement if you wanted."

She laughed. "Damn it, there you go with the jokes again! Are you sure the guys didn't put you up to this?"

"I swear the others don't even know I'm here," he insisted, putting his hand over his heart. "Please, Hope, just give us a chance. This is a token of faith on my part—"

"Ugh, bad pun."

"—and all I ask is that we can call you for help if we run into something spooky."

Hope looked at the kid skeptically—and yes, she did know that from that day forward her name would always be Hope—as she considered the situation. Clearly, she was getting the better end of the deal. What did this kid want from her? What was his angle? But as she looked the hacker up and down, looked into his little golden eyes, she recognized not the look of naïveté, but of calculation. Spinner was planning something—something big. Maybe he was going rogue himself, and wanted her as an ally. Maybe he was looking to extort sexual favors from her. She knew that if the spike-haired brat had given her this gift, he could just as easily hand her over to any number of authorities who were after her. There was really no way to know if the hacker was on the level.

She sighed. In the end, this was just too good to pass up. "I swear to god, you better not try to play me."

"Of course not," Spinner said indignantly.

"Because I will fucking kill you." She glared down. "I'm serious, little man. Better men than you have tried to screw me over and every single one of them got what they deserved."

"Double-crossers usually do," he chuckled. Spinner offered his hand. "So…?"

The rogue slayer snickered, grabbing hold for a firm handshake. "Alright, kiddo" she said with a grin. "You got yourself a deal."

Hope. The name on her new birth certificate was Hope Marie O'Shaughnessy. She watched Spinner leave the diner and smiled.

She had more than hope that things were going to be all right, she had faith. Today was the first day of the rest of her life.

THE END

A/N: It was a wild ride, but that's all folks! And now that the last chapter is completed, the rogue slayer shall forever be included in my canon as Hope O'Shaughnessy. She'll always be referred to as such, and I'm pretty sure no one but Spinner will ever know. YAYZ! And I finally officially got his black ops squad started! Oh, hey, oops, did I say that out loud? Yeah, that's right, Spinner's starting a black ops squad behind Vert's back because he doesn't think Vert can make the decision to calculate a sacrifice of innocents to save more people and this way he'll have some awesome sauce people to run assassinations for him or whatever. WOOT!