On the TinCan social-networking platform, a chat begins. “You must protect our investment.” “The only way to do that is to kill him,” comes the instant response. Another beep. “Then do it.” A pause. “As you wish.” A slimy tentacle raises up to touch the keyboard and scroll across the screen. Theo Daniel’s profile is on full display.

The messages are also being read by Buffy Summers, who asks Theo if Wolfram and Hart are aware that he’s aware of their messages. He tells her that normally chats like this would be private, but when someone is trying to kill you, you use all the pull you have to bend the rules. Buffy questions if Wolfram & Hart could really be behind targeting Theo: last Buffy heard from Spike was that they’d hijacked their way out of this dimension running from Twilight. Kennedy states that if that’s true, then the destruction of the Seed of Wonder would have also trapped them out of this dimension. Buffy confirms that she’s right, but Theo acts surprised. “You don’t know?” he asks her. “TinCan works from the Hell dimensions.”

Pulling over, Kennedy and Buffy are waiting as Theo pulls his laptop out and places it on top of the car. He loads up TinCan. Buffy winces. “Social networking… for demons?” Kennedy notes her disgust and then asks how it works, considering there’s no magic. Theo iterates that it’s not magic. It’s demon technology. “A few years ago, Wolfram & Hart gave me start-up money in exchange for embedding code in the software. I thought they were looking for a way to track advertising. Instead they created a digital portal to their home dimension.” Buffy looks him dead in the eyes. “Before I destroyed the Seed.”

Kennedy wants to know how the connection stayed open when the dimensional doorways closed, but Theo tells her he doesn’t quite understand the coding. But he’s sure if the connection goes down now, there’s no way for it to reconnect. Kennedy suggests he delete the code, but Theo tells her that he already tried. “The company is about to go public next month, and I wanted to pull the code before anyone discovered it. But they embedded it too deeply.” Buffy asks how they stop the connection completely, and Theo tells her it’s tricky, but essentially, destroying the servers will erase TinCan’s existence. Buffy thinks that’s easy. Theo looks at her, visibly upset. “You don’t understand, Buffy. We’re not turning off a website. We’re wiping out data that belongs to millions of users, we’re stealing billions in advertising and we’re pissing off a lot of people who thought they were about to become very rich. And,” he adds with extra weight, “TinCan is my life.”

Buffy interjects. “Won’t be for long either way. If you don’t cut them off, Wolfram & Hart won’t stop until you’re dead. And somehow I doubt you’re the only person on their hit list.” Theo says that’s why he hired the Slayers, but Kennedy balks. “Corporate terrorism? DeepScan can’t be a part of this.” Buffy insists that they set up DeepScan to help people. And their mission is to protect Theo at all costs. Kennedy know she’s trying to get round her, but she also says it has to be off the books: DeepScan cannot be named. Everything has to go through Kennedy. Once that’s agreed upon, she asks where the servers are located. “Under TinCan headquarters,” Theo grins.

At the front desk of TinCan HQ, distinguished for miles around by the giant soup can outside, a guard has his feet up on his console, clearly not expecting any issues with security. He doesn’t see an orange tentacle come into the room, or see it pull the cord from the wall socket. The screens go black and the guard races to his feet, panicking. He notices the unplugged cord and bends down to investigate – and is taken unaware by the tentacle. He screams loudly into the empty building.

Outside, Kennedy sees the guard go down through her binoculars. It’s a Teuth demon, Buffy tells her. A big Teuth demon. They’re going to need back-up, she insists. Buffy says she’ll call the girls from DeepScan, but Buffy says no. She thinks she has a better idea: what better way to fight a demon than with a demon who’s on their side?

In his home, in an empty cell on Alcatraz Island, Koh senses Buffy before she approaches. “I heard you’d shacked up here, but I had no idea you’d made it so warm and serial-killer-y,” she jokes. Koh is cross-legged on a bunk. He tells her that she has interrupted his meditation on his foe. He was attempting to recall everything he knows. Buffy tells him that the tables have turned: she now needs his help. He looks at her, curiously. “You ever heard of Wolfram & Hart?” she asks him. He confirms that he has heard of the Wolf, the Ram and the Hart. “In my time, they were considered nothing more than chattel.” He also spits the name.

He turns to look at her. “When I sought help, you turned me away. Why should I not do the same?” Buffy thinks for a moment, and then says that she’s calling in the debt he owes her, as a member of the Nitobe tribe and following their code. Koh immediately asks her where they must go.

Outside TinCan headquarters, Koh seems rather excited. He hasn’t faced a Teuth demon in hundreds of years. “This will not be easy,” he tells Theo, standing next to him. Kennedy and Buffy are gathering weapons. “He’s kind of cute. If you’re into that sort of thing.” Buffy looks up at Kennedy. “Demons?” Kennedy chuckles. “Guys,” she responds. She asks Buffy is she’s sure they should let Theo do this, but Buffy insists they’ll need his knowledge to blow the right stuff up. Kennedy shakes her head. “I mean, should we let him destroy TinCan?”

Kennedy theorises that since the Seed was destroyed, this is their first real connection to magic they’ve come across. Buffy insists that it’s a connection with very bad demons involved. But Buffy thinks Kennedy wants to say something else. “This isn’t about the Senior Partners, is it?” she asks. Kennedy shakes her head. “Maybe Willow could use TinCan to get her magic back.”

Buffy looks at her and puts her hand on Kennedy’s shoulder. “Willow getting magic back isn’t going to undo what happened between you two. And you told me the breakup was a good thing.” Kennedy’s eyes look sad. “Doesn’t mean I don’t care about her anymore. And, Buffy, it might get other people off your ass for a change.”

Koh comes towards them before Buffy can say anything. “The Teuth strikes on many fronts. So must we.”

Kennedy sets the plan: Koh is with her. Buffy and Theo are heading for the server room. They move fast and they stay in touch. Everybody confirms they understand. Koh says that he will do whatever the Slayer asks of him. As they head down towards the building, Buffy reminds Koh that that also means following Kennedy’s orders. Koh tells her that a true warrior keeps his head clear in battle, to which she responds: “A true warrior knows when to pick his battles.”

As they reach the building, they can see the demon writhing through the glass windows. Kennedy asks Koh if he needs a weapon. He flexes his arm and a curved light blade is suddenly glowing in his hand. “I brought my own.” They enter the building.

Elsewhere, Buffy and Theo are following wires to the server room. Buffy checks in on Kennedy mid battle, who insists that they’re actually ahead of schedule. As she says this however, a tentacle bigger than her, picks her up and tosses her in the direction of the console. Kennedy’s face hits one of the screens and she sees Buffy on it, warning her colleague that the demon knows her location!

Buffy, deep in the server room, Theo cowering behind her, prepares to strike at the large mass of tentacles in front of her. “We know,” she deadpans over her ear device. She leaps up into the air, brings her axe down on the mass, but a tentacle wraps around the hilt, snatching her weapon away. As she looks down, Theo is being squeezed to death by the tentacles and, as Buffy asks for help, more tentacles threaten to overwhelm her, constricting tighter and tighter, cutting off her breathing. Koh, above with Kennedy, insists, they must find the root of the demon, which pushes Kennedy to follow a tentacle as it slithers away from them.

A voice booms suddenly, across the tannoy system in the building. It’s distorted, but not from the speakers – the voice is otherworldy and unmistakably evil. “You cannot win.”

Kennedy asks if the Teuth demon is speaking to them, but Koh tells her that Teuth demons cannot speak. Buffy realises, as she’s being tossed around the server room, that the voice must belong to Wolfram & Hart. As Kennedy and Koh enter a room with even more tentacles, Kennedy asks where Buffy is and which limb has her. Buffy yells that her tentacle looks like a tentacle! Wolfram & Hart continue to repeat their message over the speaker again. “You cannot win. You will not destroy our foothold.” By now, all four of them are wrapped in tentacles, helpless to move. Kennedy, however, has one more trick. She unpins a grenade and throws it into the centre of the tentacled mass. The resulting explosion causes enough damage for Buffy to break free and she tells Theo that it’s time to end this.

“No matter what you do, we will find a way to stop you,” the voice bellows. In the server room, Theo is hesitating. Buffy asks him if he’s having second thoughts. Theo smiles a thin smile. “And third. And fourth. If I shut the cooling systems down, the servers will catch fire. The thing I spent my entire life building will be gone.” Upstairs above them, Koh hears Theo’s words with his enhanced hearing.

“It’s not about the money,” Theo explains, looking at Buffy in the red light of the servers. “I don’t care if I live in a giant house, fly on private jets, or can afford Slayer bodyguards. Though at the moment that’s coming in handy.” He stops and turns towards Buffy. “I created TinCan to connect people. To change the world.”

Buffy looks at him. “Trust me, I know the instinct.” Theo tells her that no one will understand why he destroyed the one thing in his life he’s worked so hard to build. Buffy understands, and pulls him close so that he’s looking in her eyes. “You’re right. They won’t,” she tells him. “You’re going to get blamed for being selfish. For doing this to save your life. To fix the mistakes you made. You’re going to lose friends.”

She speaks more tenderly now, more sympathetic. “But at the end of the day, Theo, you’re doing it for the right reasons. To keep Wolfram & Hart and their brand of evil out of our world. Sorry, Theo,” she says, “you’ve got to destroy TinCan.” Theo knows and slowly reaches up to pull the main switch. “Not so fast,” a voice says, just before he does. Koh has entered the room. And he’s armed. He yells at the speakers in the room. “Wolf, ram and hart, I know you can hear me. If you identify the demon responsible for my imprisonment I will kill the boy. Your connection to this world will be saved.” Without warning, he grabs Theo, holding his light blade to his head.

Buffy reacts in shock: “But the Nitobe code…” Koh interrupts her. “You mistake the code. Honour ranks above all else. And I cannot honour without vengeance.” He looks straight up into the camera, so whoever is watching can see his face and his words plainly. “Give me what I want. And I will kill him for you.”