The Slayers had scattered with the generous help of the Watcher's funds. Their new job was to collect the newly activated slayers from around the world and begin their training. Buffy just wanted a vacation.

            Dawn and Andrew had began attending UCLA, and were living with Angel and his team in the Hyperion. Dawn was studying History and Andrew was taking film making. Willow was working with Giles to revamp the Watcher/Slayer program. Xander had an excellent contractor's job. It seemed everyone had a purpose.

But Buffy was restless. Angels' eyes had quietly watched her but she wasn't ready for his unspoken questions. Not done baking. So she had done the drastic and moved up to Bellingham, Washington. She rationalized it to Giles as the search for Slayers in the Seattle/Vancouver area. His eyes had met hers seriously, not fooled for an instant.

A month later she was firmly ensconced in a large apartment with a view of the old buildings and trees of downtown. She had started patrolling and had met with a few resentful vamps. They had had it good until she arrived and they let her know that they weren't happy.

"We didn't have a Slayer before! Why are you here now? Is it because the Hellmouth disappeared? You can't just muscle in on any neighborhood you know." Buffy had finally gotten fed up and staked him. "Ah, peace and quiet." She said and brushed the vamp dust off of herself.

As she was heading back to her apartment she heard the familiar sounds of a battle. She sped up and jogged around the corner in time to watch two men sword fighting in a deserted alley.

Buffy stopped to watch, pulling her own sword out just in case. They were both tall, though the bald one ran to being fat. The other was hot. He had dark brown hair, just long enough to pull back in a short pony tail. His eyes were concentrating fiercely and neither was aware of her presence.

The bald man was manically shrieking insults in a language that Buffy didn't know while the other man just fought. The fight was like watching poetry if you could ignore the fact that they were obviously trying to kill each other. Suddenly the fat man pulled out a pistol and shot the other man in the chest at point blank range. She watched as he sank to his knees, hand to his bloody chest, eyes wide in disbelief.

"That doesn't seem fair. Bringing a gun to a sword fight I mean." The sarcasm in her voice stopped the fat man from advancing on his dying opponent. Buffy carefully maneuvered herself between the fat man and the injured one and held up her sword.

"There are rules! You can't interfere!" he shrieked and Buffy smirked at this, "Oh, and using a pistol was in them?" She took her sword and used the flat of it to smack his hand, causing the gun to drop and she kicked it under some trashbins. She raised her eyebrows mockingly and began her advance. Their swords clashed and Buffy steadily beat back the fat man. He was breathing heavily from his previous fight and was starting to worry.

Duncan was feeling an amazing amount of pain but could see the blond woman fighting expertly through the haze of sweat in his eyes. He could feel the blood dripping through his fingers and the irony of Randall whining about her not following the rules.

Buffy twisted to the side to avoid a clumsy thrust and slapped the man with the flat of her blade as he stumbled by. "What are you?" He gasped, wheezing now. "Just a good citizen trying to stop a murder. I don't want to hurt you." She bit out as she steadily advanced. This time the fat man threw his head back and laughed, "You're just a human! You can't kill me little girl. I'm not human, I'm immortal." He began to fight furiously but Buffy had had enough, "Oh well, in that case…"She spun quickly around and sliced off his head.

Duncan watched helplessly from his knees as she was caught in the initial backlash of the quickening. It curled around her, into her as if curious, raising her off of her feet before dropping her and racing for Duncan. It enveloped him, the power like fire, feeling like pain and pleasure. Lifting him, causing him to cry out as all of the energy, knowledge and experiences of the dead immortal flooded into him.