The Long Way Home, Part I

Plot

First we learn a few facts about the situation after Sunnydale:

Buffy and the others have by now tracked down 1,800 awakened Slayers. 500 of them already work with them, organised in ten squads. There are two Buffy decoys. One of them works – quite literally – underground; the other parties in Rome for all the world to see and is dating a guy called “the Immortal” (Andrew’s idea). The real Buffy is in a castle in Scotland, the current headquarters. Everyone calls her “ma’am”, because she is the oldest and most experienced of the Slayers. She still fights demons, even if she does not always know what for; she still has a Watcher and her friends. Xander is with her in Scotland. He is a kind of “technical Watcher” (he does not like being called a Watcher, nor Mr. Harris) – he monitors the missions via satellites and computers. Dawn has turned into a giant. She does not want to talk to Buffy about it, only to Willow, because Buffy would just blame her. The two have not really talked since they changed the world. Buffy assumes it has something to do with Kenny (whom everyone warned Dawn about): she thinks Dawn slept with him and then kept growing. Buffy does not understand why Dawn will not talk to her – after all, she knows all about a first time with terrible consequences – and she does not see why of all people Willow should understand more about it. Dawn says Willow taught her a lot, especially while her sister was dead. They try to reach Willow, so far without success, and Dawn wants no other help. Buffy misses her home, her mom, and she misses sex; but she is a grown-up and has to deal with it.

A first mission under her command takes the Slayers to a demon nest with five dinosaur-like creatures. They have killed their victims and are now wiped out by the girls. Carved into the chests of the human victims is a strange symbol – and it must have been done some time ago, which tells them there is more behind it all. They do not want to guess, so Xander sends the symbol to Giles; Buffy and Xander also try to find out something themselves, without success. Someone is watching them during the mission.

In Barcelona, too, a group of Slayers is on a mission: a large vampire nest has been discovered there. Since everyone there is still rather inexperienced, Andrew is to pick the ten best girls from his Italian squad and send them to Spain to help – with Xander stressing that someone should tell Andrew again that the ten best does not mean the ten best dressed.

In America, meanwhile, the military has become aware of the sheer number of Slayers. They know of Buffy as their leader. They see her as charismatic, uncompromising and utterly destructive, and the Slayers as an army with power and the means to use it – a terrorist threat. General Voll flies to the Sunnydale crater, which is being examined by the army. They find the destroyed Sunnydale but no bodies. During the operation, however, they are startled by something: two beings whom they now hold captive. “Subject 1” has told them that it will help them destroy “her”. “Her” is Buffy, and the beings were only able to survive by magic; they must have fed on everyone who survived down there in the rubble. The military still has some trouble with such supernatural things, but they are beginning to understand. “Subject 1” wants all the information about Buffy and the Slayers, freedom, immunity and a weapons lab for its friend, the other being – though it is not clear who, or rather what, this friend is (and the army members who know would rather not imagine the two). It also wants plenty of cheese. They asked the being its name: Amy.

An injured, insane Amy sits in her room.