Overall Rating: 9.0 Matt: 9.0 Eric: 9.0 Writer: Doug Petrie Director: Nick Marck Cast : Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers, Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris, Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg, Marc Blucas as Riley Finn, Emma Caulfield as Anya, Michelle Trachtenberg as Dawn Summers, James Marsters as Spike, Anthony Stewart Head as Rupert Giles. Main guest stars : David Boreanaz as Angelus, Kristine Sutherland as Joyce Summers, Mercedes McNab as Harmony Kendall, Juliet Landau as Drusilla, Julie Benz as Darla, Kali Rocha as Cecily Adams, Ming Liu as 1900 Slayer, April Wheedon-Washington as 1977 Slayer. Original broadcast date : November 14, 2000 My one-line description: This is where we learn that Spike killed Lucy Liu and then Diana Ross… In the graveyard, Buffy is doing her job, fighting a vampire. She pulls out her stake to finish him off, but wait… what’s this? The vampire turns the stake on her and stabs her in the abdomen with it! A disbelieving Buffy pulls the stake out and lets it fall; the vampire is about to pick it up when Riley shows up and chases him away. Buffy faints in her boyfriend’s arms. In her bedroom, Buffy is being taken care of by Riley. She’s concerned that he’ll think she’s a wimp, and he reassures her – until he learns she was staked by a normal vampire. Dawn arrives, warning them that Joyce is coming this way, and Riley quickly hides the first aid kit until the all-clear. On Dawn’s request, Buffy shows her sister her wound, which Dawn finds quite cool. Since she’ll be off her feet for a little while, Dawn agrees to take over household chores, while Riley offers to take over patrolling. That night, Riley is in full soldier mode, stealthily sneaking into the graveyard as Anya, Willow and Xander, loudly munching on chips, follow him. Riley signals them forward, and Xander yells to him, asking what the hand signalling is all about. "It means yell real loud so the vampires who don't know we're coming will have a sporting chance," Riley impatiently answers. "See, now he's all mad and sarcastic », Xander says to Willow. The Scoobies follow Riley, admiring the coolness of his being so stealthy. At the Magic Box, Buffy and Giles are searching through the Watcher’s diaries to find out how previous Slayers died. Buffy fears she may have slipped, and wants to know more about her predecessors’ last battles. However, Giles points out previous Watchers didn’t write much about their Slayer’s demise, since it tends to be a painful event for them. Buffy decides to go to the only person who has firsthand experience of a Slayer’s death… Later, she bursts into Spike’s crypt, punches him and demands that he tell her how he killed two Slayers. At the Bronze, Buffy agrees to pay cash – and chicken wings – if Spike tells her how he did it. The vampire figures out that she wants to know because she’s been injured, and Buffy, a bit ticked, asks him if he was always such a pain in the ass. "I’ve always been bad…" Spike begins. London, 1880. At a party, a bespectacled young man composes poetry – in honour of Cecily Adams, a young woman just now coming down the stairs, a young woman whom he’s in love with. A man asks the poet – William – if he’s heard about recent attacks in the neighbourhood, but William replies that he does not concern himself with such things – he prefers creating things of beauty. Suddenly, another man grabs William’s poem and starts reading it aloud, intent on embarrassing him. The group laughs at the horrible rhymes, and we learn that William’s nickname is "The Bloody", because he writes such bloody awful poetry. Retrieving the piece of paper, the young man retreats to the living room, where Cecily asks him if the poem is about her. He confesses his love to her, and she turns him down; "You’re beneath me", she says before leaving. In the street, a distraught William tears up his poetry and ends up in an alley, crying. A dark woman approaches, and offers to "unleash his imagination". He accepts, and she bites him, turning him into a vampire… Back in Sunnydale, the Scoobies have tracked the vampire that hurt Buffy back to a vampire nest. They decide to come back at daybreak to dispose of the nest. At the Bronze, Spike is playing pool with Buffy. Picking up where he left off, he recalls that after he was sired by Drusilla, he decided to live by his own rules. However, he says, he needed a gang… London, the 1880s. In an alley, Angelus is holding William by the throat, threatening him. It seems the gang – Darla and Drusilla included – are angry at him because he’s careless and forces them to run. The guys fight, until Angelus lets William – Spike, William says his name is – go, saying that if he can’t teach him, an angry crowd will… or the Slayer. "What’s a Slayer?" Spike asks. At the Bronze, Spike comments to Buffy that it was the start of his obsession with killing the Slayer. China, 1900. It’s the Boxer Rebellion, and peasants are fleeing their burning village. Inside a small house, Spike is fighting the current Slayer, a young Chinese woman. She seems to be at the top of her art, using very fancy moves. However, Spike gets the best of her, floors her and starts drinking from her. The dying Slayer asks him to tell her mother she’s sorry. Spike apologizes – he doesn’t speak Chinese. Drusilla enters, sees the dead Slayer, and accepts some of her blood from Spike – a powerful aphrodisiac, he claims. As the village burns, they make love near the dead Slayer’s body. Outside, Drusilla announces to Darla and Angel that Spike has killed the Slayer. Angel – who has probably gotten his soul back by now – half-heartedly congratulates him. The four of them leave the village, looking quite mean. At the Bronze, Spike comments that it was the best night of his (after)life. Buffy is outraged, but Spike is surprised she doesn’t get off on killing vampires. He points out that her work is futile – there is only one of here, and hundreds of thousands like him are all looking for the same thing: one good day. Riley goes back to the cemetery even though it’s still night; it seems he wants to go it alone. In the vampire nest, he succeeds in staking the vampire who hurt Buffy, and he chucks a grenade at the rest. Walking outside the Bronze, Spike tells Buffy how he killed his second Slayer… New York, 1977. In an empty subway train, Spike is fighting a young African-American woman. The scene switches back to Sunnydale, where he comments that the question isn’t how he won, but how the Slayer lost. Buffy doesn’t understand, so Spike explains… In the train, Spike, dressed and coiffed a la bleached punk, is still fighting the Slayer. He tells Buffy that all Slayers are haunted by the same question - is this the day they’re going to die; part of them wants to, just to end the fighting. The reason Buffy has lasted so long, he says, is because of her friends and family. But every Slayer has a death wish… In the train, Spike kills the Slayer and takes her long leather duster. Back in Sunnydale, he promises Buffy that when she’s ready to die, he’ll be there to have himself another good day. Spike’s lesson is over, and Buffy orders him out of her sight. However, he taunts her and tries to kiss her. Disgusted and bewildered, she pushes him away. "It would never be you, Spike", she spits at him. "You're beneath me." She throws the money at him and storms off. He picks up the money, crying. Back in his crypt, Spike takes a rifle out of a trunk, promising that Buffy will be "six bloody feet beneath me." Harmony tries to reason with him, but he stalks out of the crypt, intent on killing her. "Why can’t you kill her?" asks a familiar voice… South America, 1998. Outside a bar, Drusilla and Spike argue. She tells him that whenever she looks at him, all she sees is the Slayer. Buffy comes back home to find her mother packing. Joyce announces that she has to spend the night at the hospital for a CAT scan. She tries to reassure Buffy, saying that if they do find something, it’s still early enough. Shaken to the core, Buffy goes outside, sits on the back porch and starts weeping. Spike chooses this moment to show up with his rifle; she just looks up at him, and seeing the tears, he asks her what’s wrong. She doesn’t want to talk about it, so he just sits down next to her and tries to comfort her… Summary by OttsFiveByFive.