"Hey Mom." "Mom?" "Mommy?" "There's some money stuff we're gonna have to talk to you about." "So you're telling me I'm broke?" "Hospital bills." "Pretty much sucked up all the money." "I don't think I can do this." "Yes you can." "So you guys wanna team up and take over Sunnydale?" "Okay." "We're like super-villains." "Why are you always around when I'm miserable?" "That's when you're alone, I reckon." "I'm not one for crowds myself these days." "Me neither." "That works out nicely then." "Buffy, what is it?" "Angel." "He needs to see me." "I have to see him." "You'll leave for L.A. tomorrow." "I have to go now." "Hello?" "Buffy?" "It's me, and I brought dinner." "Deep fried chicken parts." "Hope you're..." "Hungry." "You already ate." "No!" "Well, yes, obviously." "We didn't know when you'd be coming back." "It's okay." "More for me." "I don't know about everybody else, but..." "I would love some chicken." "Yes." "As would I." "I'll take a drumstick." "I'm a breast girl myself." "But, then again, you knew that." "So." "What so?" "So how was it?" "Seeing Angel." "Him seeing you." "Was it weird?" "It was intense." "Well, if you wanna talk about it..." "I don't." "It's not important." "Past." "I'd just rather keep this one to myself, if that's okay." "Sure, whatever." "Buffy, there was some discussion in your absence about, what you're gonna do now." "You know, your plans." "I've been giving that a lot of thought actually." "I think I've figured it out, what I should do." "That's good, that's good!" "Yeah." "I figure, if I hold off paying the plumber, I can pay the utility bill." "And then I can wait to re-shingle the roof until we get the refund back" "I meant with your life." "Life plans." "Well..." "I have no idea." "I guess, well, I left school, you know, when Mom got sick, but I always figured I'd go back and then she..." "I was thinking about re-enrolling, but I missed the registration cutoff." "Busy being dead and all." "Well, if it's too late for late registration and too early for early," "You can always come to classes with Tara and me." "Right." "You can audit for the rest of the semester until registration." "Audit." "I guess I could do that." "Yeah, that sounds like a good plan." "What do you think, Giles?" "The Slayer always knows what she's doing." "Sharp." "Decisive." "Always with a plan." "We're never gonna become the crime lords of Sunnydale with her always one step ahead of us." "Well, that's why we're throwing these tests at her," "Seeing which one of us can shake her up the most, maybe find a weakness or two." "She's ready." "Sweet." "Run me through it." "We got nine high-resolution surveillance cameras hooked in," "Super-wide angle, infrared, auto-iris, plus six types of audio matrix monitoring..." "That's filtered through a dual quad DVS system, and a..." "Yeah, yeah, fine, just tell me." "Are you sure with all of this stuff that we'll be able to watch Buffy without her noticing us?" "Absolutely." "I mean, she'll never even know ..." "What the hell is that?" "Death Star, dude!" "Wicked?" "Thermal exhaust port's above the main port, numb-nuts." "For your information, I'm using the Empire's revised designs from Return of the Jedi." "That's a flawed design!" "Guys!" "Okay, the thing is, since we're messing with the Slayer," "Who could pummel the three of us into a sludgy substance," "It might be a good idea for us to NOT draw attention to ourselves!" "I could paint over it if you want." "Yeah, well, do that!" "Because this time tomorrow, the games begin." "And the Slayer will never even know what hit her." "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" "Season 6 Episode 5 Life Serial" "This is gonna be great." "I thought it might be a little weird being back, I mean, it is weird, but like a good kind of weird." "There's the teacher, Mike." "You'll like Mike." "You call your teacher Mike?" "Boy, school sure has changed since my day." "Social Construction of Reality." "Who can tell me what that is?" "Rachel." "A concept involving a couple of opposing theories, one stressing the externality and independence of social reality from individuals." "And the flip side?" "Steve?" "That each individual participates fully in the construction of his or her own life." "Good, and who can expand on that?" "Chuck?" "Well, those on the latter side of the theoretical divide stress..." "Will, I'm not following this too well." "The trick is to get in the rhythm, kinda go with the flow." "Flow going would be a lot easier if your classmates weren't such big brains." "Buffy, that's ridiculous!" "They are no smarter than you or me." "Because social phenomena don't have unproblematic objective existences." "They have to be interpreted and given meanings by those who encounter them." "Nicely put." "So, Ruby, does that mean there are countless realities?" "What?" "You're not dumb." "Just rusty." "Maybe I should ease back in with some non-taxing classes, like, introduction to pies, or maybe advanced walking." "Hey!" "How'd it go?" "She did fine!" "Sociology, not a big fave." "She didn't like Mike?" "No, look, it's fine." "I just need to spend a little more time re-acclimating." "You know, to get back into the swing of things." "Hey!" "You could at least say sorry, rude-o!" "Everybody's in a hurry." "Francis 7, this is Logan 5." "I'm in position, do you copy?" "Yeah, Warren, we copy that." "And you're up on the monitor." "Hey Warren, this is working great." "Runner is tagged, inhibitor is on." "Repeat, inhibitor is on." "Initiate omega pulse sequence." "My art appreciation class doesn't start for another twenty minutes, so we've got some time to kill." "Here." "You'll like it, it's very mellow." "Didn't think she liked my cooking until I realized that that was her yummy face." "You know how her nose ..." "What was that?" "What was what?" "That noise, what was that about cooking?" "Whose yummy face?" "Willow." "Wow, you... really got engrossed in that Renaissance book." "I guess." "I must have spaced out." "I do that sometimes." "Once, Willow and I were watching "Spongebob Squarepants"..." "Buffy?" "Are you coming?" "We're gonna be late for class." "What the f..." "Is it working?" "Is it doing it?" "Dude, it's doing it." "And it's wicked cool." "Tara!" "Tara!" "Buffy, where have you been?" "You missed art class." "Missed?" "Tara, something freaky's going on, it's like I'm ..." "Look, there!" "There!" "Did you see ..." "Crap!" "Tara!" "Tara, wait!" "That noise." "There's something on me." "No." "She found it." "This is bad, this is bad." "Self-destruct!" "Self-destruct!" " I don't know!" " No!" "Okay, score me." "Right." "Fifty points for ingenuity, another thirty since it involved actual contact." "Very smooth, by the way." "On the freak-o-meter I'd say she was at a six." "Come, it's an eight, easy!" "We'll split the diff, call it a seven." "Which is good for a hundred and forty, giving you a grand total of..." "Two hundred and twenty." "Beat that!" "I will." "I will." "This is gonna be great." "Diving into the workforce." "Being a bread-winner, building things with my hands." "Actually, you won't be building so much as lifting and toting." "Toting?" "It's just a temp gig, Buff." "You know, unless it tanks." "Since you're not union, I had to call in a few favors to get you on a crew." "Well, I appreciate it." "Muchly." "You saved me from having to accept Giles' offer to work at the Magic Box." "I mean, retail?" "Yeee." "I'd rather be dead." "Again." "So, Giles have any thoughts about your little fast-forward freak-out at school?" "No." "Well, he implied that maybe it was stress-related." "Like I was imagining it or something." "I don't know." "Maybe." "I guess I could have been blacking out, but..." "There was this thing on my sweater, you know?" "And then it just, blew away, or went poof." "Maybe it was lint." "Maybe it was evil lint." "Okay, first tip of the day." "When I introduce you to Tony the foreman?" "You might wanna leave out stuff about blacking out and evil lint." "Hey." "Tony." "This is Buffy." "You know, that friend I told you about." "Nice to meet you, Tony." "Guys." "You gotta be kidding me." "We're a week behind, I got two men out on the DL, and now you want us to baby-sit some little girl?" "Excuse me, but I ..." "Hang on, Gidget!" "This stinks, Harris." "What am I supposed to do with her?" "Give her a chance." "She's stronger than she looks." "That's the spirit!" "Don't mind him, he may seem pig-ignorant, rude, and a little hostile..." "Have fun!" "Where are you going?" "Upstairs." "I need to supervise the sheet rock hangers." "Don't sweat it!" "I'll be back to check on you later." "Okay, Danny, finish putting in those J-boxes, Vince, Marco, I need you to haul the steel inside." "Gee, I don't know, Tone." "I don't wanna get in trouble with those affirmative action lawyers, you know what I'm saying?" "Why don't you put, little Britney here on hauling duty?" "It's Buffy." "Okay, princess, you're on it." "Try not to break a nail." "Don't worry about it." "And don't let them hassle you into doing something stupid and hurting yourself." "These beams weigh quite a few hundred pounds." "Which way?" "Thanks!" "So basically I'm just trying to learn everything I can, you know?" "'Cause I don't want just a job, you know?" "I want a career, you know, something I can grow into." "I mean, I never thought I'd be working in construction..." "but when you think about it kinda makes sense" "Hey." "We get paid by the hour." "You wanna ruin it for the rest of us?" "Slow down." "Got visual of subject, four o'clock." "That's not four o'clock." "Well, it is if you're facing the front of the van." "But we're not facing the front of the van, we're facing out that way." "That's twelve, so she's at two o'clock." "Look, she's over there, okay?" "Okay." "You're up." "Jumpy?" "What's the matter?" "I scare you?" "No, don't hurt me!" "Please!" "Help me!" "Hey!" "Man." "She took 'em out." "Lemme see." "Okay, give it back now." "No, I'm still looking." "No, you had your turn, now gimme" "No, I'm still ..." "Hey." "All you said was lose the mural." "My god." "Buffy, what happened?" "Buffy, I know these guys can be jerks, but was it really necessary ..." "I didn't do that!" "I'll tell you what she did." "I came over to tell your friend I was impressed by the job she was doing, liking the way she handles herself," "And all of a sudden she goes berserk and attacks me." "What?" "I saved you from the..." "The demons!" "They were these three big apey things!" "No." "No, not here." "Not at my job." "That's your job." "I can't help where the forces of darkness attack me, Xander." "Buffy, would you look at this mess?" "Do you have any idea how much it's gonna cost to repair this?" "And what am I supposed to say to the clients, should I just show them the demon bodies and say it's all their fault?" "You can't." "They melted." "But..." "There, there are witnesses!" "Vince!" "Vince!" "You'll tell him, right, how I jumped in and protected you from those things?" "I don't know what you're talking about." "All I know is you were losin' it or something." "That time of the month?" "What?" "!" "You were huddled in a corner!" "Crying!" "Like a baby!" "Hey, hey." "No way." "Me, crying?" "You're tripping, sweetie." "What's her problem?" "I didn't imagine this, Xander." "I know." "I believe you." "In fact, I'm starting to think between this attack and the school thing that somebody's messin' with you." "Really?" "You think they're connected?" "Well, there's something going on." "I think it's worth checking out, and I don't mean later." "You need to see Giles and get on it right away." "I'd start with ID'ing those demons." "You're firing me, aren't you." "Big time." "The whole melty thing oughta help narrow it down." "Try sketching them." "That always helps, and then maybe, when I get off work I'll help you go through the mug shots." "This is gonna be great." "You know, I've always been interested in ... interested in retail." "Is this all research, or just some kind of stress test for the table?" "I just want to be thorough." "This time anomaly, and then the, the demon attacks could be completely unrelated events," "But if they're not you might be in some danger." "So, situation normal then." "Let's review." "You record returns here." "These are the slips for special orders, you ship them wherever the customer wants." "And these are the hold slips." "Fill out two hold slips for each item." "And be sure to remove the items from the shelf." "I can illustrate with an amusing story about a crystal." "See, there was this certain customer who wanted to purchase a sapphire." "Sapphire well ding-dong." "Right?" "And so anyway, I..." "This is so dull I might actually have fallen asleep and be dreaming you guys." "Why is the Slayer here anyway?" "She's a student, she's a construction worker, and now she's some kind of selling stuff person?" "It's like she's completely without focus." "Should we check the other channels for free cable porn?" "Guys, I'm ready." "I need you to hold hands." "With each other?" "Well, you know what homophobia really means about you, don't you?" "Stop touching my magic bone!" "Shut up." "Okay, it's in Latin, so don't laugh." "It's supposed to sound like this." "Opus orbit est, et ea in medio, tempus ad calcem intendit." "Buffy, a word in your ear." "While I was running the store, I found it useful to imagine myself back in the library." "You know, if you concentrate on service and not on making a sale, you're more likely to have a satisfied customer." "Guess I'll have to find my own style." "Yes, quite, quite, quite." "That woman." "Go sell her something." "Miss?" "Which candle creates a more, you know, romantic atmosphere?" "Hmm. "Lemon Seduction. "" "Ew! "Essence of Slug" Here you go." "Thank you." "Yeah." "May I help you?" "I need something for a prosperity spell." "I heard you have it." "The mummy hand?" "Yeah, actually, I saw one downstairs." "It's kinda hairy, though." "Maybe it was a daddy hand." "I'll just get it." "'Petrified hamster'... uch!" "Eyeballs and honey." "Dagger of Lex..." "Ancient mummy hand." "And you get the dagger of Lex for free with it!" "See the inlaid mother-of-pearl underneath the black oozing goo?" "This hand is dead." "The power is gone, I'm not giving you money for this!" "It's just playing dead." "Little scamp." "Buffy, a word in your ear." "While I was running the store, I found it was useful to" "What?" "Imagine myself back in the library to ..." "We did this just now." "Giles, something is happening." "Yes, quite right." "You did it!" "Dude, she's looping!" "What'd you do, enchant the hand thing?" "Well, not exactly." "I made it so she had to satisfy a customer with a task that resists solving." "Maybe I shoulda done more." "Like what?" "I don't know." "Like make her kind of itchy?" "Go help the lady who just came in." "Wait" "Don't worry, don't be nervous." "Do what I do, just picture yourself naked." "Miss ..." "Here." "Hi." "I'm looking for something really specific." "I heard you carry it." "A mummy hand." "You look like the mummy hand type." "Sorry, I can't get that for you." "I called here twenty minutes ago, and someone said you had one." "Yeah, but there's a thing happening." "You have one, and I was told I could buy it," "And I'm sorry, but I'm really gonna have to hold you to that." "I'm not leaving until I get a mummy hand." "Okay, I guess I'll have to get it for you." "Smart." "She's figuring out the game." "Satisfy the customer." "Well, she might just have you beat there, Stretch." "No way." "It hasn't even started yet." "I just hope she solves it faster than Data did on the ep of TNG where the Enterprise kept blowing up." "Or Mulder, in that X-Files where the bank kept exploding." "Scully wants me so bad." "Fingers sold separately." "Where are you going?" "Lady needs a mummy hand." "What?" "You haven't even talked to her yet." "I could explain, but you would just forget it." "I'm worried about you." "Retail is a fast-paced and exciting world." "I mean, this whole day, has it gone by too quickly for you?" "No." "No, I don't think that's exactly the problem." "Buffy, a word in your ear." "If you think of the store as a library, it'll help you to concentrate on service rather than selling." "Yes." "And then I'm going to marry Bob Dole and raise penguins in Guam." "Yes, quite, quite, yes." "Miss, I..." "Mummy hand, right?" "I got it." "Miss..." "Miss?" "Hi." "You like slug?" "Go with slug." "She's not gonna sleep with you anyway." "This mummy hand has ceased to be!" "It is an ex-mummy hand!" "Buffy, a word in your ear." "It's you." "You, you're doing this!" "I know we promised you a mummy hand, it's just..." "I can't get it for you." "There's something wrong with it." "It's defective." "Defective?" "Are you sure?" "There must be something you can do." "But there's no way to get ..." "To get that hand." "But I can special-order one." "We can deliver it anywhere you want." "Really?" "Thank you for shopping at the Magic Box." "Yes!" "So Warren had 220 and I had that bonus for getting her fired..." "But the biggest component has to be how long it took to finish." "Mine took the longest." "Only from a perspective external to the time-loops." "From Mr. Giles' perspective, it was shortest of all." "So what do we do?" "It's obvious." "I mean, it's not over." "Buffy, your first sale!" "Congratulations." "You, you didn't charge for delivery." "Well, your first day, you know, these things happen." "Yeah, I'll just take it out of your pay." "Yes, I'm sure Buffy would understand that." "Absolutely." "This is gonna be great." "Life is stupid." "I have a dim memory of that, yeah." "And I didn't figure you were here cadging my whiskey 'cause life's all full of blood and peaches." "No." "There's this thing someone's doing stuff to me." "Messing up my life." "Except that it was kind of pre-messed already." "You know, with school, and jobs pretty bad even without the evil." "So you, just what?" "Gonna let this whoever play you till it figures out what kills you?" "Giles is working on it." "Good, 'cause Giles wields the mighty force of library books." "You'd do better?" "Damn right!" "I'd hit the demon world." "Ask questions, throw punches, find out what's in the air." "It's fun too." "It's not my kind of fun." "Yeah." "It is." "And your life's gonna get a lot less confusing when you figure that out." "You have had so too much to drink at this point, I am cutting' you off." "You're not a schoolgirl." "You're not a shop girl." "You're a creature of the darkness." "Like me." "Try on my world." "See how good it feels." "Are there drinks in your world?" "Your motorcycle is loud." "Sssspike." "The usual, Dave, and one for the lady." "We're heading for the back room, pet." "It's where the real action is." "These lowlifes know everything happens in this town." "Good." "These are the lowlifes." "Fine." "A little louder." "Boys, what's the game?" "You know the game, Spike." "You in?" "He kills our kind." "Don't let him in." "Ask him if he's heard ..." "Later." "You're gonna play cards?" "I need a moment with my lady." "You wanna play, that's fine." "Okay?" "I am sticking to the original plan." "Which one do I kill for information?" "Listen." "These guys talk while they play." "We'll get more information out of their mouths than out of gaping holes in their corpses." "I'm in." "Everybody okay with that?" "Ante up." "You play for kittens?" "!" "So, who's gonna advance me a tiny tabby, get me started?" "Come on, someone's gotta stake me." "I'll do it!" "What, you thought I was just gonna let that lie there?" "Where're we going?" "To Final Jeopardy." "Where Buffy's the one in jeopardy." "We are really super-villains now, like Dr. No." "Yeah, back when Bond was Connery, and movies were decent." "Who remembers Connery?" "I mean, Roger Moore was smooth." "You're insane." "You're short, and you're insane." "I like Timothy Dalton!" "Don't make me pull over, okay?" "You're lucky today, Spike." "Got my good-luck charm with me." "You cleaned us out." "No-one's that lucky." "Yeah." "I'm starting to think you cheat." "Me?" "I cheat?" "He's got X-ray vision!" "I'm not using it." "We are not the ones who are cheating!" "I had no idea that was there." "I could have leaned on that days ago." "You better go, Spike." "Things could get ugly." "Got ugly the second he walked in." "Him and his human." "Her skin's so tight, I don't even know how you can look at her." "Leave your winnings and get out." "We'll forget this whole thing." "Ah, so it's a setup, isn't it?" "Squeeze a few quid outta the vamp." "Well, I'll tell you what you didn't count on." "Me and the bird." "You wanna fight?" "You face the two of us." "What?" "I'm not getting into a bar fight!" "I'll beat 'em up for information, great, but not to defend your right to gamble for kittens!" "Which, by the way, is stupid currency." "They're delicious!" "Come on, Slayer, a big fight's just what you need." "Forget it." "I'm not playing by anyone else's rules any more." "I'm done." "Hey, I won those two!" "Be free, kittens!" "They're getting away!" "What's wrong, luv?" "What's wrong?" "!" "You were gonna help me!" "You were gonna beat heads and fix my life!" "But you're completely lame!" "Tonight sucks!" "And look at me!" "Look at, look at stupid Buffy!" "Too dumb for college, and freak Buffy, too strong for construction work." "And my job at the magic shop?" "I was bored to tears even before the hour that wouldn't end!" "And the only person I can even stand to be around is a neutered vampire who cheats at kitten poker." "You saw the cheating, did you." "Also?" "I think you're drunk." "Connery is Bond." "He had style." "Yeah, but Roger Moore was funny." ""Moonraker"?" "The gondola turns into a hovercraft?" "It's retarded." "Besides, the guy had, like, no edge." "Dalton had edge." "In "Licence to Kill" he was a rogue agent." "That's edgy." "And he was amazing in "The Living Daylights"." "Yeah, which was written for Roger Moore, not Timothy Dalton!" "Okay, this is stupid!" "We're wasting time." "End of discussion." "I mean, there's a shot of like pigeons, doing double-takes when the gondola blasted by! "Moonraker" is inexcusable." "That van." "You wanna steal a van, I'm with you, luv, but we have got the motorcycle." "I've seen it before." "At the construction site." "Connery is the only actor of the bunch." "Timothy Dalton should get an Oscar and beat Sean Connery over the head with it!" "Okay, that's it." "Hey!" "Stop it!" "Guys!" "Look!" "She's coming over here!" "What do we do?" "Jonathan, grab your magic bone." "You have discovered me!" "But do not try to defeat me, for I have been testing you and I know your weaknesses." "I'm okay!" "I'm fine!" "Get off me!" "I am well struck!" "I call on the misty portal to my demon dimension, where I will lay my head and gently die." "He blew up." "Did you see that?" "Yeah, I saw." "He's gone." "Gotta love it, you know." "It makes you feel all powerful." "Strong." "Kinda sick." "She hurt me all over." "Someone'll see you!" "Get in the back." "I won't fit." "Well, do the thing." "Right." "Let the spell be ended!" "Next time I do that spell, one of you guys has to look like the demon." "The Slayer touched you." "Yeah, it was sexy the way she touched me real hard with her fists." "I only looked big." "I actually had the proportional strength of me." "Guys, think about this." "We took on the Slayer." "I mean, we've got all kinds of stuff in the computer now speed, strength, reaction time." "We're getting what we need to really become a threat to her." "We tested her, faced her and we survived." "Unless I have internal injuries that will eventually kill me." "Of course, but barring that, Warren's right." "We did good!" "The Trio versus the Slayer." "It's not over." "Plus, look what Warren and me discovered by accident before we drove away!" "What?" "Free cable porn!" "Feel any better?" "I think at one point, I actually turned completely inside out." "But yeah, better." "I'm sorry I didn't find this demon with my research." "It's okay." "It wasn't much of a fight." "I got lucky." "I'm really screwing up, Giles." "What?" "Come on." "You were being tested sequentially, by some unknown demon." "I don't call that screwing up." "No, it completely is." "I let the demon set the rules." "Go easy on yourself, will you?" "I mean, you don't have to figure the whole thing out at once, you know, job and everything." "You're pushing yourself too hard." "The nice people at the phone company?" "Seem to think it's not hard enough." "Well, maybe there's something I can do about that." "This is, I..." "It's for you." "A check?" "This is, is too much, I can't take it." "Well, tear it up then." "No!" "I was just being polite." "I'm taking the money." "This is, this is great." "This is more than great." "I don't really know how to say this" "But it's a little like having Mom back." "In this scenario, I am your mother?" "Wanna be my shiftless absentee father?" "Is there some sort of rakish uncle?" "I'm just saying..." "Thank you." "So much." "I'm gonna show this to Dawn." "She loves it when things get easy." "I just wanna tell you that, this makes me feel safe." "Knowing you're always gonna be here." "THE END"