Giles gets closer to the truth. Connor tries to defend his recent behavior to Angel and Cordy. And Nina gets a chance to wreak vengeance in LA.
While Buffy is out with Kate, Giles and Willow work at a table in the back left corner of the bunker's living room. Most of the rest of them are watching television in the front right section of the room. "I know I've seen it somewhere," Giles maintains. "Though I can't seem to find it in any of my books."
"What about these?," Willow asks, showing him illustrations in three different books.
"That one's Canaanite. That one's Luwian. And she's Libyan."
"Are you sure?"
"The clothes are very similar. But the hairstyle and the head dress are different."
"How do you know she has to be Egyptian?"
"The prophecy refers a Slayer from the Nile Delta. At least that's how Emiliano and I both interpreted the passage."
"He's the author?"
"Correct."
"You talk about him like he's your best friend. Even though he's been dead for 170 years. Then again, having a friend who's been dead that long wouldn't be too strange around here."
"I've spent a lot of time inside his head over the past two days. In his commentaries, Emiliano concludes that the Slayer in question lived about four thousand years ago during the Middle Kingdom period."
"What's so special about her?"
"She was worshipped for a time as incarnation of Isis."
"Not bad," Willow responds with surprise. "How'd she pull that off?"
"For a time, she was impervious to physical injury."
"So was Buffy. Remember, with Adam?"
"That was only for a matter of seconds. This Slayer was impervious for more than a year."
"Which means she must have had something a lot more powerful than our summoning spell."
"A physical object with extraordinary mystical properties, to be more specific. If we find a picture of her, we can spot the mystical object on her person. Then we'll know what we are looking for."
"Maybe you're going about this wrong. You're focusing on the Slayer angle. What about the goddess?"
"Good thinking. You can search through Isis worshipping. I'll continue with my Slayer research. I should probably give Claude a call. Is Dawn still on the phone?"
"I think so. Want me to get her off?"
"That's okay. It's past two in the morning over there. I'll try after he's awake and before I'm asleep." Buffy walks in. Giles, Willow, Xander and Anya turn to look at her.
"Where have you been?," Giles asks. Spike walks in from the kitchen. He's holding a mug of blood.
"It's been more than an hour," Spike notes. "Did I miss out on a good demon-thrashing."
"No thrashing. No demons. I went over check on my mother's grave. To see if the tombstone was still there. And it was. It had been knocked over and driven six feet to left. And about a foot into the ground. Guess the wave pushed it down. I pulled it out and put it back where it belonged."
"That was very good of you," Giles responds. "By the way, we're making progress."
"Giles is close to finding something that can make you invincible," Willow adds optimistically.
"Sounds peachy," Buffy nonchalantly comments. Giles decides to clarify.
"I'm close to discovering what the object is. Finding it is a whole other matter."
"So I can take the night off?," Buffy asks. She likes to keep the conversation light when it comes to discussing such momentous hypothetical.
"I don't see why not," Giles answers. As Buffy walks to her room, Spike steps in her way and sniffs her.
"Just for record, sniffing – not exactly a turn-on," Buffy tells him.
"You were with somebody. A lady."
"You think your nose can tell the difference?"
"Who was it?"
Buffy shakes her head. "You're being paranoid."
"Paranoid of what?," Anya asks. "Of you being a lesbian?"
"She's got a point," Spike adds.
"What? How?," a truly mystified Xander wonders.
"I got nothing to be paranoid of. I know you with someone. I'm just curious who it was. And why you're so hell-bent on keeping it a secret?"
"I'm not hell-bent on keeping anything a secret. You're the one who got in my face and started giving me the third degree."
"Stella called a half-hour ago," Giles reports, seemingly appropot of nothing. "She was wondering if I knew where Kate Lockley was. She hadn't come back."
"The cop!," Spike exclaims.
"She gave me ride to the cemetery. We talked on the way."
"What did you talk about?," Willow asks.
"Demons. Our jobs. Stuff like that."
"You talked with that woman," Spike begins. "For over an hour. Didn't know the copper was so chatty. She struck me as the sort who has something to hide."
"She's not," Buffy maintains. Spike, however, was on to something, even if he didn't know what. "Kate's nice."
"Not to me she wusn't," Spike pouts.
"I don't think you're her type," Kennedy jokes. She's right, though not in the way she means to be.
"I didn't know Buffy was," Anya notes. "I thought I was the one she liked."
"What are you talking about?," Buffy wonders with genuine perplexity.
"Lemme see if I got this right. After we went inside, Kate hung around to spend some one-on-one time with you?," Willow asks.
"No. She started driving around town. I was suspicious, and asked why she wasn't leaving. Then we got to talking, and I asked for a ride."
"You came over to her?," Willow reiterates.
"I guess. So what?"
"You think she took that the wrong way?," Kennedy asks Willow.
"What the hell are you trying to tiptoe around?," an unnerved Buffy demands to know. Willow cuts to the chase.
"No toe-tipping. Or tip-toeing. It sounds like you came across as a little forward. Running her down. Asking for a ride. You were really friendly. So she was really friendly. Maybe you led Kate on." Buffy finally gets it, and can't believe what she's hearing.
"You guys really need to get out more. Bunker fever has made you nuts. Kate is not gay."
"How do you know that?," Kennedy asks. "Did you two talk about guys?"
"No. God no! With my dating history? I didn't want to scare her away."
"So you just assume she's straight, because that' the normal' thing to be," Kennedy responds.
"I didn't mean it like that. And speaking of assumptions, why do you automatically assume she's gay?"
"Enough of this bloody nonsense," Spike interjects. "Rupert, she's your friend. You know her better than anyone here."
"Our relationship is purely professional. We never discuss our personal lives."
"Never discuss personal lives?," Xander responds incredulously. "Giles, she set you up with your girlfriend!"
"I thought she set his girlfriend up with him," Anya clarifies. "By the way, have you even thought of returning the favor? You do owe her."
"Anya, that's ridiculous."
"No. It's good manners."
"Who would Giles set her up with?," Willow wonders. "What single men does he know?"
"There's always Xander," Spike jokes. Buffy starts laughing.
"Oh, come on!," Xander exclaims. "Do you really find me that repulsive?"
"I'm sorry, Xander. It's not that you're not good enough for her. The two of you just aren't each other's types."
"Then what is her type?," Xander asks Buffy.
Angel angrily paces back and forth in Connor's room. Cordy stands on the other side of the bed. "Seething instead of brooding," she observe. "An interesting change for you."
"You think he's turned a corner. You think he finally gets it. Then he goes and does something like this."
"You mean like a teenager?"
"Cordy, he wasn't acting like them. Connor was acting like me. Like Angelus. He took pleasure in causing pain. She broke down in tears, and all I could see on his face was joy. It was sickening."
"It was vengeance."
"For what? What could that girl have possibly done to him?"
"She could have done something to Dawn. Maybe she and Kirstie didn't get along. This might have been his twisted idea of chivalry."
"Like when he nailed my hands to the table."
"Hold on just a second. Connor did what?"
"I sired three of her friends. Well, one friend, and two other kids she went to school with. They attacked her – when she was with Connor. After I got my soul back, that was his way of getting even."
"Oh my God. Angel, that's horrible."
"I was evil."
"Not that. Connor crucifying you. Granted, your thing was also pretty bad. But that wasn't you. Connor should have known that."
"Part of him did. He told me he loved me."
"Before? Or after?"
"Right after. First time he ever said that. Then he hugged me. First time he ever did that." Confused is perplexed and worried about the boy.
"Maybe there's some sort of medication he should be on. God knows he's been through enough to put ten normal men in the loony bin."
"He was letting off steam. Learning about Buffy – how I lost my soul with her, but didn't with Darla – that made him feel like an accident."
"Accident – miracle – it's the same thing when you get down to it."
"But we've been getting along great ever since. By our standards, at least. I thought we were really connecting."
"It's my fault," a distressed Cordy argues. "I messed with his head so much when I was evil. Plus, there's his whole nightmare childhood with Holtz. Guess it'll take time to work all the bad blood and bad habits out of his system."
"Quiet," Angel says as he stands still. "He's coming." Angel can hear Connor coming down the hall. He's happily humming the keyboard riff from Dre's "Nuthin' but a G Thang." Connor enters, and immediately stops humming when he sees that he has visitors.
"What are you two doing here?," Connor asks suspiciously. He notices that both of them have their arms folded and are scowling angrily. "Is something wrong?"
Cordy slowly walks up to him. "I just spent the better part of a half-hour listening to Kirstie cry her eyes out." Connor grins. Cordelia slaps his face with her right hand. He winces in pain.
"Ow! What the hell was that for? And why do you care about her?"
"I don't know. Because she's a person?," Angel sarcastically responds to Connor's heartlessness.
"Shouldn't you care about people who are really in trouble?," Connor asks Cordy. "I thought we cared about saving lives."
"We also care about you," Angel counters. "I don't like seeing my son hurt someone for kicks. You're better than that, Connor. You're a champion, not a bully."
"She deserved it," Connor sullenly replies.
"What could she possibly have done to deserve that from you?," a genuinely mystified Angel demands to know. Connor's face tightens with anger and intensity.
"She hurt Dawn. She made Dawn cry. Said a lot of mean things about her when Dawn was in a lot of pain."
"When?," Angel asks.
"Two years ago."
"Two years ago," Cordy repeats in astonishment. "Back before you were even born."
"So what?"
"Connor, in high school, two year is an eternity," Cordy explains. "There are statutes of limitations."
"Did Dawn tell you about this?," Angel inquires.
"No. One of Dawn's old friends mentioned it to me today."
"She wanted you to hurt Kirstie?," Angel asks, trying to lead Connor to the proper conclusion.
"No. She just mentioned it when she saw Kirstie."
"Would Dawn have wanted you to do this?"
"Probably not." Angel is surprised by how easily Connor concedes this point.
"Then why did you do it?," Cordy asks.
"Because nobody hurts Dawn and gets away with it."
"Even if she doesn't want that?," Angel follows up.
"She's not here."
"You think can do things she doesn't want you to do, so long as she doesn't find out?"
"It's not like that. Look, I love her. A lot. And when I find out someone hurt her, it makes me mad. Dawn doesn't like it when I'm mad. But she's not around to help me chill, so I can't chill. And I stay mad until I make things right."
"You mean until you settle the score," Angel clarifies.
"It's better than staying mad and taking it out on you guys. And come on! I only hurt her feelings. She deserved it. That's why everyone was happy."
"You were playing to the worst in them," Angel explains. "Using the worst in yourself."
"You know that's not my worst," Connor responds with a smirk. "Not even close."
"It wasn't even close to your best, either," Cordy points out.
"I know," Connor confesses with a tinge of contrition. "But since when did I have to be a saint? I guess I'm just a better person when Dawn's around." Angel fears where this logic could lead. (Let me be with Dawn, or else?) But he tries to use Connor's feelings to reinforce Angel's argument.
"I think she'd want you to be a better person, even when she isn't around. Don't you?"
"Of course."
"So what's the problem?," Angel wonders. "Why did you let her down? Are you just weak?" Connor's amazed by how upset they are.
"This is mad whack. You're buggin' over nothing." Angel looks a Cordy, hoping at least one of them understood him.
"We just don't want you turning into a complete jerk and making a habit out of acting like this," she tells him.
"It's the sort of thing you only do once," Connor pledges. They look relieved. "Now that everyone knows the trick, it won't work the next time round." They look a lot less relieved. "Chill. How many other people coulda made Dawn cry?"
"That depends how unpopular and/or annoying she was," Cordy responds without thinking. "Also, how tough she was."
"She's very tough."
"Having demons trying to kill you can do that. I know from experience. Angel, I think Lorne wanted to have a word with you."
"About what? Oh." Angel takes the hint and leaves. Since Cordy knows more about being a modern adolescent, she convinced Angel to let her handle the non-moral aspects of the lecture. During the lull, Connor recalls something.
"Why were you talking with Kirstie? How do you know her?"
"When I was head cheerleader in high school, she was captain of the junior high squad. We met once. Of course I don't remember, because why would I care about some dopey pre-teen? But Kirstie remembered. Mostly because I was kind of her idol. I mean role model. Or maybe both."
"She's nothing like you."
"That's sweet of you to say," Cordy replies, affectionately but condescendingly patting the top of Connor's head.
"Is that what you were like?"
"Not completely. I was a little taller and a lot prettier."
"I know," Connor replies with a smile. "But, were you mean like her?"
Cordy takes a long pause. "Sometimes. But everyone is at that age. Though you could say I was a lot better at it than just about anyone." Connor looks crushed, and sits down on the bed.
"You hurt people."
"That wasn't the point. Look Connor. It's really sweet that you're so crushed to learn that I wasn't always perfect, and that I used to be mean self-centered and didn't care about other people's suffering."
"You? Not caring? I don't believe it." Cordelia doesn't know whether to laugh or cry.
"If we had my high school reunion here, saying that would definitely get the whole lobby laughing. Connor, relax. This sort of thing isn't evil. It's just high school. Even for people whose high schools aren't on the mouth of Hell. It's survival of the fittest. Everyone tries to pull themselves up by pushing everybody else down. That's the way kids are."
"I thought that's just how the mean kids acted."
"Everyone's mean to someone. You earn your status by making fun of the people below you. I was the most popular. Which meant that everyone was below me." Cordy's feeling the need to take the scrutiny off herself by reiterating the universality of this sort of pecking order. "And Buffy was the most popular at whatever loser school she went to before getting kicked out and moving the Sunnydale. So she would have acted to same way."
"She still does," Connor unfairly quips, displaying the anti-Buffy bias that Cordelia finds so refreshing.
"And if Dawn was the most popular in high school – Which, based on all the great things you say about her, I'm sure she would have been if she didn't have that Key Problem and an embarrassing older sister – she would have acted just like that to the people she didn't like. When you're popular, you have to impress your friends and cronies. Otherwise one of them takes your place, and starts making fun of you. Which isn't very fun." Then something occurs to Cordy. "In fact, that's what YOU were doing! You make fun of her, everyone laughs, you're placing yourself at the top of the pyramid. At least for a moment. You obviously liked the rush. Everyone was on your side. Made you feel pretty special, didn't it?"
"A little. I guess," Connor confesses with a reluctant half-smile.
"At that moment, you were no better than Kirstie."
"LIke I said, it was a one time thing. Unless someone disses Dawn. Or me. Or my mom."
"Connor, I'm pretty sure that if they knew who your parents were, they're not going to risk insulting you."
After he left the room, Angel started thinking about Lorne. He hadn't seen him all evening. It's past midnight. The lobby is deserted. Angel finds Wesley in the office. "Still looking for the amulet?"
"Actually, I found it three hours ago. Under a boulder in a backyard in Rolling Hills. Gunn delivered it to the client. Cordelia will deposit the five thousand dollar check into our firm's account tomorrow morning."
"That's a nice payday. And I didn't do a thing to earn it. It's great to delegate," Angel jokes. He hits down on the couch. "Have you seen Lorne?"
"He's in the basement. At his brand-new late-night hangout."
"What hangout?"
In the ballroom in the basement, where Angel's friends shed so much blood, blood that has now been thoroughly washed away, Lorne sits at the piano, surrounded by about thirty mildly inebriated men and women. They raise their glasses at the end of the verse and sing the chorus along with him:
"Those . . . were . . the days my friend, I thought they'd never end, we'd sing and dance . . . "
Giles, Willow and Dawn sit around the table in the back of the living room, doing research. The phone rings. Dawn picks it up. "Hello. Who? Giles, it's for you. Not sure who." He takes the phone.
"Rupert Giles. Hello Annette. Is your father there? Oh. You've been working on this as well. And you think you found her!?" Willow gets excited upon hearing this. "A U-R-what? Annie, I don't follow. It involves a computer. There's no other way? Willow, I think you should take this one."
"Willow here."
"Do you have access to the net?"
"We don't have much else, but we do have that."
"Good. Go to this address." Annette slowly reads out the address while Willow types. As the page is loading, Annette explains.
"I asked myself who would want people to know about this girl?' Not the Council. She was a rebel. Not Isis worshippers. She failed them. Then it came to me – feminist antiquarians. Like Lyn Webster Wilde and her book on women warriors."
"You read that?" Willow's delighted to be talking to a fellow geek.
"I liked the chapter on Cybele worship."
"Me too! Then again, I am partial for the Earth goddesses." The web page is loaded. Willow's confused by what she sees. "Wait a second. This is a guy."
"She is dressed like a Pharaoh."
"Right down to the fake beard. Which is never flattering on any girl."
"But she has long hair. And look at what she's holding in her hands." The person in the picture was seated on a throne with her arms crossed in front of her chest. In her left hand was a sickle sword. In her right hand was a stake. That catches Willow's eye. "Instead of a mace, she's holding a stake. That is suspicious, no?"
"Definitely. What's this caption say? Warrior princess. Heretical worshipper of Neith who tried to overthrow the government and establish matriarchal rule."
"They don't know what they're looking at. But read the next part."
"Her followers claimed no man-made weapon could harm her. While sleeping one night on the banks of the Nile, she was eaten by a crocodile. The High Priests claimed the animal was actually the god Ammit, the devourer of the wicked."
"My father says Egyptian Slayers were usually buried in the Pharaohs' tombs, but have been mistaken for servants by archeologists. As a reward for protecting the bodies of the living from demons, Slayers spent eternity with Neith, who protected the souls of the dead from demons. This Slayer didn't follow the rules, so she disappears from the records. But one of her followers carved a picture of her on a piece of limestone that gets buried in the sand and preserved. Lucky for you."
"Yeah. Lucky us," Willow deadpans about their unenviable position. "Thanks, by the way."
"No trouble. Good luck." Willow hangs up the phone, prints out what's on the screen and takes it over to Giles.
"Of course," he says to himself upon seeing the picture. "I should have known."
"About this Slayer in drag?"
"About the weapons. They're the power source. We have to find them before Nina."
"How do we do that?," Willow wonders. "Cause you've read that book cover-to-cover and back again, and I think you would have noticed if it mentioned where the magic weapons were."
"If they're around here, you should be able to find them with a locater spell. Unless they're cloaked."
"In which case I would do an uncloaking spell. So who should I invoke? Isis or Neith? Or should I try both at the same time? And by the way, who made these weapons?"
Giles flips through the pages and glances at his notes. "Here it is. The Reaper harvests the Slayers.' It's not a reference to the First, or its minions. It's about this weapon. There's a brief story on this page, just a few sentences long, about a Harvester that kills many Slayers, until the demon is staked."
"Sounds pretty standard issue to me."
"It did to me as well. But what if the Harvester is this sickle? Say, for instance, that a vampire used the weapon forty centuries ago to kill a couple Slayers. The Watchers responded to the threat with a mystically-charged weapon of their own."
Willow finishes Rupert's hypothetical. "Slayer stakes vampire, takes his tool, becomes a Super-Slayer. The double shot of mojo makes her invincible. Unless, you know, she gets swallowed alive while you're napping. Which we could easily protect Buffy against."
"Better get to work," Giles says, stating the obvious as Willow walks away from him and towards her room.
"Way ahead of you." She leaves. Buffy walks up to Giles.
"You two sounded pretty peppy. Good news?"
"It could be. I doubt Nina will let us have our secret weapons without a fight."
"What secret weapons?"
"Look at this picture."
"Buffy! Buffy, you have to see this!," Anya calls out, annoying Buffy.
"Maybe later."
"She's right, B," Faith chimes in.
"I don't believe this," Xander exclaims. "Why does Angel get all the glory? He didn't do anything." That catches Buffy's attention.
"What about Angel?"
"He's on tv," Anya explains. "That's what I was trying to tell you. And look. There are his friends. Oh my. Wesley does look far more masculine than I remembered." Buffy rushes over. As does Dawn, who was sitting with Giles.
"Is Connor on? Are they showing him?" She smiles and sighs. "There he is. He's standing funny. Is he hurt? Are we taping this?"
"What's all this commotion about?," Giles demands to know as he walks over to the television. He's standing behind the couches everyone is either on or sitting in front of. "Why the devil is Angel on the tele?" Buffy stares at the screen, not saying a word. This is too surreal for words. The Potentials scan the background of the camera shots in the lobby for their boyfriends.
"Is that Clarence?," Amanda asks Rona. "I thought I saw part of his head for a second there."
"Talk about undeserved fame," Xander grouses. "They showed up on their own. All he did was not kick them out. How is that heroism?"
"What does fame have to do with heroism?," Anya asks him.
"Okay, wrong word. But he hasn't done anything. The people who crashed his place did everything. In fact, he's being praised for doing nothing. What kind of responsible newscast celebrates laziness?"
"Oh God. They're interviewing Cordelia," Buffy notes with mild revulsion. "Boy, does she look old beyond her years." She couldn't resist a catty comment, as surely Cordy couldn't if she saw Buffy on tv. They listen to Cordelia talk.
"Sunnydale is my home town, and I feel a strong connection to its people. I told Angel that we should help them in their hour of greatest need. This is the community that raised me. With so many suffering, I needed to give something back. It's the least I could do."
"He's going to let her get away with that? He's praising her! I don't believe it. Can't he tell when he's getting used and lied to? This is a disgrace."
"At least her last sentence was true," Anya jokes. "And the reporter is bad at asking questions. He didn't even find out if Angel was charging them for the rooms."
Buffy's still angry about Cordy's moment in the spotlight. "So now thousands of people, maybe hundreds of thousands, will think that Cordelia's some Good Samaritan local girl made good. I'm the local girl made good. And I have the Class Protector Award to prove it."
"This is great free advertising," Anya notes. "If they wanted to turn it into a real hotel, I mean. People all over the nation saw their sumptuous interior."
"You mean the one I rebuilt," Xander adds.
"For which you were very well-compensated," she reminds him.
"Nation?," Buffy wonders. "That looked local to me."
"It was produced by the local affiliate, but the network picked it up," Andrew explains. "They're always looking for the human side of a natural disaster."
"We're the human side of this disaster," Buffy reminds him.
"Yes we are. But as a super hero, you must toil in obscurity, the world never knowing how much you've done to keeping it spinning through the heavens."
"Then why does a vampire get to bask in the limelight?," Xander asks.
"Good point." Andrew strokes his chin and thinks about this paradox. "He must not be playing by the rules."
Nina walks along the beach barefoot. The hem of her black dress skims the sand. Over her face is a long black veil. Darla pops up in front of her. Nina can't see her on account of the veil. Darla reaches out and rips it off. She's mad at her moping, brooding assassin. "In all my years, in all the ages, NEVER have I seen you like this. Have you no shame?"
"I have nothing."
"Except for me." Darla puts her right hand to Nina's left cheek. Nina holds it with her left hand.
"You look good," she says to Darla, who's wearing tight black leather pants and gold halter top.
"You like?," Darla asks with a flirtatious smile, trying to cheer Nina up.
"A lot more than that other outfit," referring to the school girl look Darla had first adopted. Darla pulls her right hand away from Nina and puts her arms behind her back. She smiles mischievously, and is disappointed when Nina doesn't smile back.
"I wish I could say the same for you. What's with all the black? Even your hair's gone dark. It must be all that ugly sleep you've been getting. For two days straight!"
"I don't sleep."
"That's why it worries me. You've never done it before."
"I can't sleep. But I can dream. It's been so long since I had anyone to dream about."
"You haven't forgotten about Mal. I'm glad. Because I have a little job for you. In Los Angeles." For the first time in three days, Nina smiles. Then some doubts start creeping in.
"I thought those two were off-limits?"
"Only if they don't get in your way."
"Which means, all I have to do is make them attack me. Yes!!" Darla is delighted to see the fire return to Nina's eyes. She puts her right arm around Nina's shoulders. The two of them walk down the beach as Darla explains the mission.
"There's only one way to get rid of pain," Darla tells Nina. "Make someone else feel it."
"I'll do more than that. I'll make them wish they never killed Mal. No. Not good enough. I got it. I'll make them wish Mal killed them."