Writer: Drew Goddard
Director : James A. Contner

Cast : Sarah Michelle Gellar as Buffy Summers, Nicholas Brendon as Xander Harris, Emma Caulfield as Anya, Michelle Trachtenberg as Dawn Summers, James Marsters as Spike, Alyson Hannigan as Willow Rosenberg.

Main guest stars : Abraham Benrobi as Olaf, Kali Rocha as Halfrek, Andy Umberger as D’Hoffryn.
Original broadcast date : October 22, 2002

My one-line description: Season 3: Buffy tells Faith that Slayers are not above the law. Season 7: Buffy tells Xander she is the law. So what is the law here?

While Willow unpacks her things in her new bedroom, Dawn gives her a (unnecessary) pep talk on how to act when she returns to college. Willow smiles at Dawn and tells her she’s been to college before. Xander and Buffy enter with some more of Willow’s stuff, carrying on a conversation about Anya. Xander says he hasn’t talked to her since the Gnarl demon – and even then it wasn’t a happy talk. He thinks he should call her, but Buffy advises him not to get his hopes up. He tells her that he’s over Anya; he’s just concerned that she looks so lonely. Buffy is worried about Anya’s “vengeance vibe”, but Xander thinks that after turning back that worm guy, she might be coming around…

In a room, some guys lie all over the place, holes in their bloodied chests. Their hearts are gone. “What have I done?” whispers a stunned Anya, standing there covered in blood…

Sjornjost, Sweden, A.D. 880. A grainy, old-film quality image shows Anya – Aud, her name is - taking some rabbits into a small hut. Her husband Olaf bursts in and exclaims (in old Swedish) that he is hungry enough to eat a small child. Aud asks him (in old Swedish) why he smells of blood, and Olaf replies that he’s been battling some ugly Trolls. Aud starts taking care of her man, sitting him down and taking his battleaxe. He looks around and notices they have more rabbits than usual in the place; she explains that she got this idea about exchanging the rabbits for goods and services to the townspeople. He laughs and comments that her logic is like that of a Troll, and that all the matrons at the bar are talking about her… Aud isn’t pleased that he’s been to the bar, and she asks whether Rannveig was there. He calms her down by telling her he has no interest in Rannveig (who apparently has large hips). Aud puts her jealousy aside and hugs Olaf, telling him that she loves him so deeply that she couldn’t live without him.

Back in the present, in a washroom, a shaken Anya washes her blood-stained hands, arms and clothes…
In the school basement, Spike confides to Buffy that he doesn’t trust what he sees anymore. As she listens compassionately, he tells her about the days when Drusilla would “see things” that would make him think she was crazy; he remembers that she would see the starry sky indoors, and it would make her so happy… “I’m in trouble”, Spike tells Buffy. He admits he can’t ask for her help after what he did, but she softly tells him that it’s different now – he’s different. And they’ll get through this…

Wake-up call. “Spike, this basement is killing you”, a differently-dressed Buffy declares as she enters the place. Spike laughs his not-quite-sane laughter and replies that he has nowhere else to go.

On the UC Sunnydale campus, Willow is pleading with one of her old teachers to accept her back in; “How could I deny one of my best students?” the teacher says, smiling. She comments that although Willow’s grades slipped around mid-term, suddenly they went back up, just like magic. (hmmm…) She asks Willow to meet her at her office the next day so they can discuss catching up. As the teacher leaves, Willow sees Anya walking out of a frat house, wearing a zipped-up raincoat. She calls to her and happily tells her about being admitted back in college, but Anya is barely paying attention. Willow asks what she’s doing here, and Anya lies that she went to see her new boyfriend, and they had lots of sex… Willow thinks it’s great that Anya is moving on with her life. However, when Anya nervously brushes her hand in her hair, Willow spots a smear of blood on her palm… Anya excuses herself, and a concerned Willow enters the frat house.

Inside, she notices a pool of blood on the floor and some bloody smears on the walls. She follows the bloody trails to a door, which she pushes open… she looks around, horrified, as she takes in the heartless corpses. Suddenly, she hears a faint human voice, repeating “I take it back, I take it back…” over and over. She tracks the sound to a closet – inside, a terrified and tearful girl is crouching on the floor. Willow asks what happens, and the girl explains that there was a party and everybody had brought dates; her boyfriend had invited her there to break up with her in front of his friends, who thought it was really funny. She reveals that she yelled, just once, that she wished they’d know what it feels like to have their hearts ripped out… “And then it came”, she sobs. As Willow asks what came, we see a HUGE spider-type bug crawling up the wall behind her…

The girl notices the bug and panics; Willow notes that the girl is looking up behind her, and whirls around just in time to see the bug poised to attack her. “Protect!” she says, keeping the thingie at bay with a force field. The poor girl behind her is whimpering like a lost soul. “For God’s sake, shut your whimpering mouth!” Willow snaps, her eyes solid black. Going back to work, she uses the force field to bounce the monster away and sends it crashing through a window. Now back to normal, Willow, uneasy with what she just did, apologizes to the girl.

Back in 880 Sweden, the village people are running away from an enormous Troll. “Stop! It’s me, Olaf!” pleads Aud’s husband, now quite green and horned and brandishing a huge hammer. One of the villagers yells that the Troll is impersonating Olaf, and another yells for them to hit him with “fruits and various meats”. As they run after the Troll, lapidating him with goods, Aud watches on. The grainy image texture clears to normal. In English, D’Hoffryn asks her how she performed the spell, and then asks what Olaf did. “Bar matron… a load-bearing bar matron”, Aud replies. D’Hoffryn remembers his manners and introduces himself; Aud tells him her name, which prompts him to say that she is not Aud – she is Anyanka. He tells her he’s from a family of vengeance demons.

Now it’s Olaf’s turn to chase the villagers, saying they’re as small as toys. Meanwhile, D’Hoffryn invites “Anyanka” to join his team. She asks what she’d have to do, and he replies that she’d do what she’d good at – help wronged women punish evil men. “They all deserve it”, she bitterly replies.

In her office, Buffy is busy… balancing a pencil cup on her forehead. Suddenly the phone rings, jolting her and sending the cup flying. She answers it, and hears Willow’s report about the spider-bug monster and the frat-house massacre. She takes notes and promises she’ll bring Xander along to investigate, then abruptly asks Willow if she got that physics class she wanted. (huh?)

At Anya’s apartment, Halfrek is congratulating her fellow vengeance demon on the horror she wreaked. Anya is still shaken, however, but she puts it on the fact she didn’t realize how much damage a Crimslaw demon could do, and she didn’t expect it to hit her like this. Hallie reassures her – she’ll get back in the swing of things. Suddenly, Willow enters uninvited, and tells Halfrek to get out. Hallie does, albeit uncomfortably; Willow pleads with Anya to stop what she’s doing, but Anya insists the boys got what they deserved. “I’m a vengeance demon, don’t you understand?” she says, unsure of herself.

In the forest, Buffy and Xander are hunting the bug monster. The stumble upon a dead body under a tree, its heart ripped out. Xander sees some black, icky vine things hanging from a tree, and grabs some of them; he comments that they’re sticky, and suddenly he and Buffy hear some rustling in the branches above… They try to see what it is, but with the glare of the sun they can’t tell. A long web-vine slaps Xander, and Buffy pushes him aside… just before the bug-demon lands on her and pins her to the ground. It tries to lower its three-pronged mouth to her chest, but she keeps it away and finally manages to throw it off. It escapes back in the tree, and Xander suggests they come back later with some swords. Buffy, however, isn’t listening – she concentrates, then throws her battleaxe up into the tree. It comes back down, imbedded in the dead bug-demon…

As they walk into the house, Buffy tells Xander they should worry about more of the bug-demons appearing and do research. “I know where they came from”, says Willow, sitting in the living room. She reports there are 10 or 12 of the monster. Xander is angry that Willow didn’t tell them until now, but Buffy understands why the redhead didn’t – Willow knows that Buffy has to kill Anya.

St.Petersburg, 1905. In an ornate dining room, Halfrek and Anyanka enjoy the food and drink amidst the bodies of dead noblemen slumped on the table. After congratulating Anyanka on her handiwork, Hallie suggests they go and see the winter palace burn (it’s the Revolution), but Anyanka wants to go to Madame Dubisov’s brothel to seek out scorned women. Hallie complains that Anyanka is always work, work, work, and suggests she should relax and enjoy. “Vengeance is what I do, Halfrek”, Anya replies. “I don’t need anything else.”

Buffy tries to convince Xander that Anya isn’t the girl he knew, but he’s very disturbed (to say the least) at the thought of killing her. He insists there has to be another way – the boys died mystically, so there must be a way to bring them back. Willow counters that she doesn’t have that kind of power – not for 12 boys – and she doesn’t trust the power she does have. Buffy tells Xander she knows it’s hard for him to hear, but it’s what she has to do. He argues that when their friends go crazy and kill people, they try to help them (“Sitting right here!” protests a slightly miffed Willow). Xander confesses that he still loves Anya, and Buffy replies that she knows – that’s why Xander can’t see this for what it really is. She argues that Willow is human, while Anya is a demon. “And you’re the Slayer”, he replies. “I see now how it’s all very simple”. Buffy argues that it’s never simple; unlike Spike, who didn’t have a choice to help the gang, Anya chose to become a demon – twice; she adds that she doesn’t care what Anya is going through. Xander accuses her of once again cutting herself from everything human and acting as though she’s the law. Outraged, Buffy reminds him that she killed Angel, whom she loved more than anything else, because it had to be done, and that they cheered her on. "And at some point someone has to draw the line and that is always going to be me”, she adds. “You get down on me for cutting myself off but in the end the Slayer is always cut off. There's no mystical guidebook no, all knowing councel. Human rules don't apply. There's only me. I am the law." Xander still thinks there has to be another way; “Then find it”, Buffy pleads.

As he storms out, Buffy goes to her weapons chest and retrieves a sword. Before leaving, she glances at Willow. “I can’t…”, the redhead says. Buffy heads out.

A few minutes later, Willow rummages through her drawers in her room. She pulls out a talisman. In the bathroom, she sprinkles some powder on the ground and chants a spell in Latin. D’Hoffryn appears in a cloud of smoke, and greets her. He compliments her on the vengeance she wreaked upon Warren (a fellow demon has a sketch of it on his wall). Willow tells him they have to talk about Anya; sighing heavily, D’Hoffryn agrees.

Xander finds Anya in the frat house, and tells her he wants to help her. Anya sarcastically says that with so many friends wanting to help her, she should have killed people weeks ago. He tells her he’s sorry for what he put her through, then reveals that Buffy is on her way to kill her. “She’s going to try”, Anya rectifies. She adds that she always knew this day would come – Xander just didn’t want to realize it. Buffy appears in the doorway, her sword drawn, and tells Xander to get out of the way. He refuses, but Anya puts on her demon face and backhands him out of the way. Buffy swings her sword at Anya’s head, but the demon easily ducks and punches Buffy, sending her flying across the room. As they fight, Anya taunts a silent Buffy, commenting that the Slayer doesn’t have a good retort. “Anya, I’m sorry”, Buffy curtly says, before sending Anya into the wall and jamming the sword into her chest.

Sunnydale, 2001. Xander is lying in a recliner chair, bushed from a hard workday. A blonde Anya, sitting nearby, comments about the “singing and coconuts” weirdness earlier. Going to the window, she hears, in the distance, Mustard Man (David Fury) and Parking Ticket Lady (Marti Noxon) singing to each other about the mustard stain. She asks Xander whether he wants something to eat, but he’s fast asleep. Covering him with a blanket, Anya breaks into her own song about their getting married soon – it’s clear she’s concerned that she’s nobody, and that she’s convinced the wedding will give her the identity she craves - Mrs. Harris.

The song stops, bringing us back to an inanimate Anya impaled on a wall. Xander comes to, sees her like this and calls her name. Suddenly, she gasps and opens her eyes, commenting that she’d forgotten how much a sword through the chest hurts. With a yelp, she takes the sword out, then takes a fighting stance, observing that Buffy forgot it takes more than that to kill a vengeance demon. “I was just getting started”, Buffy coldly replies. The two go at it again, with Xander tackling Buffy to prevent her from killing Anya.

Suddenly, D’Hoffryn appears in a crackle of lightning, causing the fight to stop. He takes in his surroundings, marvelling at the horrific scene. He reports he had a chat with Ms. Rosenberg, who seems to think Anya would be better fitted outside the vengeance fold. “We know what Ms. Hacks-a-Lot wants”, he says, glancing at Buffy; he adds that Xander sees things only through the eyeballs of love, and that no one has asked Anyanka what she wants. “I want to take it back”, a distraught Anya declares. She wants to undo what she did to those 12 boys. D’Hoffryn replies it’s not an easy thing to do, but not impossible – it requires a sacrifice, the life and the soul of a vengeance demon. Xander begs for Anya not to do this, but she gravely agrees to D’Hoffryn’s terms.

He claps his hands, and Halfrek appears in a flash of lightning. She grins when she sees Anya, but then screams in pain as she is engulfed in flames and disappears in smoke. Anya is shocked and horrified, but D’Hoffryn scolds her, saying that what she wished for wasn’t punishment enough. “You should have killed me”, Anya mumbles. “All in good time. From beneath you, it devours”, he pleasantly replies – eliciting a stunned glance from Buffy. He disappears, and the three stare at each other. Anya starts walking, sadly, towards the door. Buffy instructs Xander to go to be with her, while she takes care of the 12 boys.

Outside, Xander catches up with Anya and tells her she shouldn’t be alone in this. “Yes, I should” she says. “My whole life, I’ve just clung to whatever came along”. He replies that as a cling-ee, he didn’t mind, and she thanks him… for everything. “Xander? What if I’m really nobody?” she asks pitifully. “Don’t be a dope”, he teases. “I’m a dope?” she asks. “Sometimes”. She says that it’s a start, and the two sadly walk off in different directions.

Special thanks to www.leoffonline.com