As a glowing and giddy Severin dangles over a hole that goes down through the planet, he’s rambling, mumbling quietly, and Simone is rapidly losing her patience. They’re heading for a large rectangular platform, that seems to be made of glass, with a bright light emanating from inside it, making it appear solid. There doesn’t seem to be anything holding it in place. It’s just…

“There. That’s where I’ll be able to take all of it.” Severin points down, eyes wide.

Simone, above him, looks up, checking how far down they’ve come. “You sure we shouldn’t climb deeper?” Severin doesn’t look at her, but bounds across the platform, his energy still flaring Illyria’s shade of blue. He yells after her, telling her that they don’t have too much time. He calls her Clare.

“Clare? You’re losing it. You’re not with your girlfriend yet!” Simone spits out in anger. She cannot afford for him to mess up now. He looks back at her, his hands on his head.

“Sorry. All this power is making it hard to think.”

She gets close to him and points in his face. “Focus. If you can’t handle this kind of power, you’ll never get back to her. And I’ll never get the mojo I was after…”

On the Bridge above, looking down into the hole, is the Magic Council, gathered inside, watching Buffy and Willow as they peer over the edge. Willow has her eyes closed, feeling the magics around her. “The power we need to save your sister is somewhere down there. I can feel it.”

D’Hoffryn‘s voice comes from behind them, the usual sardonic drawl that makes Buffy want to smack him. “We must stop the Siphon before he gains enough power to rip the universe apart.”

Buffy looks back at him and almost shrugs, until she thinks better of it. Her voice, however, remains flippant. Bordering on disrespectful. By the look on D’Hoffryn’s face, it’s getting to him.

“You’re going to have to start the fight without me.”

D’Hoffryn comes close to her, looks down into her eyes, makes his point clearly and bluntly to the Slayer. “The only reason we granted you entrance to the Deeper Well was so you could help us defeat the Siphon, who threatens to destroy the world because of what your friend did.” He points at Xander, who’s being held back by the Zen demon. He’s not struggling, but that doesn’t mean he’s quiet as well.

“Is this really necessary?”

Buffy shrugs off both D’Hoffryn and Xander with a wave of her hand. “Sorry. My sister comes first. I’ll help if I can, but I’m sure you’ll manage without me. My sister won’t.”

D’Hoffryn glares at her, a threatening tone beginning to emerge. “We will stop you from removing magic from this place.”

Buffy shrugs again. Rolls her eyes this time for extra annoyance. “Before you stop Severin?” When D’Hoffryn has no answer, she turns away from him, leaps up onto the rail of the bridge and looks down into the seemingly bottomless chasm. “Didn’t think so,” she grins and leaps without looking.

“Slayer!” D’Hoffryn moves to the edge to stop her, but he’s too late. Even worse, as his back is turned, Willow does exactly the same thing. “Right behind you, Buff!”

He sighs and grumbles something in a demon language under his breath. Eldre Koh is next to him. He lights his circular blade and waves it in front of the demon lord’s face, stopping him from pursuing. “The Slayer is right. We can defeat the Siphon without her.”

In San Francisco, Spike is angry, pacing in front of a concerned Andrew. The recording he has made won’t stay recorded!

“It’s on here somewhere. I recorded every single thing I could remember about her! So why isn’t a bloody word on here?” He growls, turns to Andrew, his face enraged. “This is your fault Wells! You gave me a bum recorder.” He rushes towards Andrew, his fangs unfurled. He’s only stopped by a weak, tiny voice from the doorway.

“It’s not his fault. I’m disappearing.” Dawn stands there, looking awful, pale as a spectre and now, looking at her arms, she’s started to look like one, her limbs fading away.

In the Deeper Well, Willow and Buffy make steady progress on their way down the chasm, using Old One coffins as steps on a ladder. Willow looks up, not for the first time, watching in case D’Hoffryn gets the drop on them. “You sure ticking off the guy who sics vengeance demons on people was a good idea?”

Buffy lands on a coffin and looks around her for her next step. “There wasn’t time to argue. Not when we need to find the right strain of magic to save… Willow?” She looks up at her friend, confusion in her eyes. And fear too. “Can you remember my sister’s name?”

Willow doesn’t say anything. She just looks at her best friend sadly. “Neither can I,” Buffy says, shaking emotion from her voice. It serves to push them further. “Let’s move.”

Eldre Koh, hanging onto the rail of the Bridge at the top of the Well is looking down into it’s long, long drop. He actually sounds nervous. “It’s a long way down.”

“You think I won’t survive the journey because I am powerless.” Illyria assumes that this is the only explanation. Never mind the fact that the Nitobe warrior could be scared.

He watches as D’Hoffryn orders the army down into the Well, yelling like a drill sergeant. Illyria stops for a moment.

“Perhaps you are right. But I spent an eternity in this tomb and the Siphon possesses my power. You will need me.” They both begin their descent, abseiling down using the coffins as fast as they can.

Xander watches them go, a look of worry on his face. “Maybe I screwed up. But that army of misfit demons is going to need all the help it can get down there.”

The Zen demon is still behind him. “There is only one way you can help. By staying put.” He’s floating above Xander, who has no patience for lectures right now. “Now release your anger and accept your place in the universe.”

Xander gets in the demon’s face, getting angry. “And what about my fist? Where is it’s place in the universe?”

Suddenly, in his pocket, his phone rings. Already annoyed with everything else happening, he opens the phone and yells down the line at the poor unfortunate who’s called. “WHAT?”

Spike is on the other end. But there’s no deadpan humour in his voice for once. No insults. No sarcasm. “Cheers to you too, Harris.”

“Spike? This is not a good time.”

“Like I need you to tell me that. I’m staring at the Slayer’s sister right now.”

Xander reacts in shock. “What? You’re with… her?”

In San Francisco, Spike is standing by the couch, speaking quietly, trying not to upset Dawn anymore than she is, fading away, the couch visible through her now. “Lucky for you I am. Because I’m not sure how long she’s going to be here. And Xander, I still remember what she means to you… so I thought you might want to say hello while you still had someone to say it to.”

Xander regrets his angry tone and starts to speak quietly, cautiously preparing his words. “Put her on.”

On the glass platform, Severin is surrounded by blue lightning, surging through him, the platform and the walls. He whispers to Simone, tries to warn her. “The Council. They’re coming. I sense it.”

When he doesn’t get an immediate response, he opens his eyes. “I can’t stop. Not now. You must protect me… Simone?”

As Severin screams Simone’s name, needing someone to anchor him in reality, Simone is climbing from the platform, up one of the coffins and into one of the tunnels scattered around the Well. “Sorry Sev. Your girlfriend’s gonna have to wait. I’ve got my own reunion to plan.” As she climbs up, further away from him, she whispers to herself. “If I can find him.”

“Through here.” Buffy beckons Willow to follow her into a chamber on the side of the Well. It appears empty to Willow as she scans the dimly-lit cavern. “So what exactly are we looking for?”

Willow doesn’t look at Buffy, but does spot a red glow coming from somewhere in the chamber. “I’ll know it when I find it.”

“Um, Will..?” Buffy points at Willow’s chest and, when she looks down, Willow cannot quite believe what she’s seeing. “Oh my Goddess!” she exclaims.

Inside Willow’s chest, a red light has started to emanate, lighting up the cavern with waves of iridescent crimson light. The light is spherical, glowing and expanding inside Willow. She looks excitedly at the light, and then up at Buffy’s confused stare.

“This means we’re on the right path!” Buffy peers closer to Willow, using a hand to stop her from being blinded by the red glare. “The right path to what?”

Willow grins back at her. “Magic.” Buffy exhales, like she’s been holding her breath. Thank God is written all over her cautious face. “Enough to save my sister?”

“No, Buffy. I think this is bigger than just your sister. I think there might be enough magic down here for everyone.” Buffy looks at her in silence and Willow nods nervously. “You mean, like a new Seed?”

“I don’t know. But whatever it is, it wants me to go this way.” Willow follows on, entering into another cavern, and this time it’s her that beckons to Buffy.

“Who are you?” As soon as Xander hears her voice, a tear forms. When she speaks, her question stabs in his chest. “And why does the guy with the accent want me to talk to you?”

He breathes, finds the right tone. “I’m Xander. I know that name doesn’t mean anything to you right now, but it used to. And it will again.”

Dawn listens intently on the other end of the line, Spike observing her from the window. “I’m scared, Xander.”

“Don’t be. Buffy’s fixing this as we speak.”

A flicker of recognition passes on the young woman’s face. “Buffy? She’s my…”

“She’s your sister. And lucky for you, she’s the Slayer. Which means no one can stop her from getting what you need right now. Not the Council, not Doffler, not Severin, or whatever else is down here.”

His voice is steady and calm. Hopeful, he hopes.

“That’s what he keeps telling me,” she says, waving at Spike even though Xander can’t see her. “He says I have to hold on for Buffy to make things right. But I can’t fight it off any longer.” There’s a silence on the end of the line, and for a moment, Xander fears the worst. He doesn’t realise, until she speaks again, that his heart had stopped for a second. When she speaks now, it shatters.

“I don’t want to die, Xander.”

Immediately, and slightly more forcefully than he intended, he snaps back. “You’re not going to die.”

“But you’re all forgetting me.”

“Listen, even if Buffy forgets, even if you vanish from that loft, even if no one remembers you ever existed, there’s one place you can’t disappear from.” He gestures to his chest, even though she can’t see him.

“Here,” he says pointing at his heart. “You’re a part of me. And as long as you’re part of me, I will never stop fighting for you. Do you understand me?”

Dawn isn’t on the other end now, but she has heard him, Spike assures him. “She does, Harris. And I hope you’re right. Because she’s going to need all the fight she can get.”

Xander fights back emotion and then slams his hand down onto the rail of the bridge in anger. Then he hears Spike yell at him. “Harris!”

Xander yells back down the phone. “What now?” he rages. Spike ignores the tone, but does sound concerned. “If Doffler’s in that Well, like you say, there’s something you need to know.”

“Simone?” Xander doesn’t think he heard Spike right.

“Simone’s turning Slayers. Into Vampire-Slayers. Emphasis on the hyphen.”

“Slaypires? And you’re just telling me now?” Xander yells back at Spike, but then the vampire stops him with a brisk warning. “You want to take your anger out on someone, save it for Doffler and whatever army she’s building down there.”

Down, deep inside the Deeper Well, Simone has found what she was looking for. She checks the photos on her phone and matches a diagram to the markings on the coffin she is now struggling to open. Once she’s managed, she climbs upon the heavy stone casket and uses her dagger to slice her palm. She holds it out, over the markings. “Wake up,” she orders. “You gotta be hungry.”

Above Simone, a sudden roar registers with Illyria and the army up above. It’s a roar of something old stirring. Koh turns to Illyria and asks if the sound is the Siphon. She looks down at below them and shakes her head at the warrior. “No. But I recognise that sound. We must keep moving!”

Buffy and Willow also hear the roar as they clamber through into the next chamber. “You hear that?” Buffy asks Willow.

She nods, a look of relief on her face. “Good thing the light wants us to go this way.” She points into another cavern and, as they walk through it, Buffy trips over something large and heavy on the floor. Willow looks back at her friend in alarm, but Buffy rights herself and looks down.

“I’m okay. But someone just… left their coffin open?” Buffy looks at the markings on the casket. She also spots the fresh blood all over it. “I’ve seen that before,” she says, staring at the markings, trying to remember.

“Maloker.” Willow is quiet and reverent. Buffy’s not sure why.

“Why does that sound like a name Giles lectured me about?”

Willow rolls her eyes and looks at her. “Because it was a name Giles lectured you about. Remember? Maloker. He’s an Old One?” Buffy looks at her blankly. “Like Illyria?”

“Worse,” Willow says. She looks down at the markings, checking her facts in the book. “The demon who was in that sarcophagus sired the first vampires.” Another roar echoes from elsewhere, but this one sounds closer.

“And the wonder twins let him out to slow us down.” Buffy sighs. She reaches for her Scythe, tethered on her back, but Willow, placing the Vampyr book back into her satchel, shakes her head. “Not us. The Council.” The spherical glow in her chest is becoming more and more brighter. A deeper shade of red.

“If he fit in that coffin, they can handle him.”

Willow looks at her friend. “Buffy, with the Old Ones, I think it’s more a just-add-water-and-watch-it-grow situation. He is why vampires exist. He’s why you’re the Slayer. He’s why the Scythe was forged.” She finishes her history lesson with a look of fear. “You have to help them.”

Buffy turns, resolute, but tears behind her eyes, emotion in her cracking voice. “I need to save my sister.”

Willow smiles and puts her hand on Buffy’s shoulder. “I can handle that. Just because Xander let you down, doesn’t mean I will. You know that.” Buffy looks at her for a moment, but the silence answers Willow. “You don’t know that?”

Buffy gestures at Willow’s chest and the light from within. “Willow, you’re glowing red. And when you start to change colours, it’s usually not a fashion choice.”

Willow shakes her head. “This isn’t dark magic. It’s me. It’s always been me.”

But Buffy admits that she’s annoyed about other things too. “It’s not just the magic. You left Willow, when I needed you the most. You didn’t even say goodbye. At least when we were still awake.”

Willow walks closer towards her. “I know I let you down. But I won’t this time.” She looks into Buffy’s eyes and takes her hands. She pulls them close to her heart and the light. Buffy nods. “Okay. I’m counting on you.”

Buffy doesn’t look back as she rushes into the next chamber, following the sound of the now-louder roaring. Willow looks at the expanding light in her chest.

“Please don’t let me down,” she whispers to no one.

Way above Willow, Maloker has risen. He’s gigantic, three storeys high and shaped like a giant bat. As D’Hoffryn sends his army into the fray, they launch at the Old One, who screams in an unholy shriek at the valiant Council members.

“YOU WILL ALL DIE!”

Illyria and Koh are still descending into the Well, listening to the battle up above. “We have to reach the Siphon.” Koh looks above and then below. “We’ll never get close.”

Illyria points down below them, where she can see the light coming from Severin. She recognises the energy as her own. “We must. That power will overwhelm him.”

Down in the Well, Severin is screaming now. He starts yelling Simone’s name, but as the energy crackles through him, it’s Clare’s name he yells in pain.

Emerging into a tunnel that appears to be less than stable due to the battle above her, Buffy hears something that makes her spin around.

She lunges at an unseen figure in shadow, swinging her Scythe and knocking the figure off their feet and into the ground. She swings the Scythe down and brings it towards the figure’s throat, but stops when she hears Xander’s voice, angry and loud. “Back off.”

Buffy gets up and removes the blade. “How’d you talk the Zen demon into letting you go?”

“Let’s just say I’m going to have bad karma for a while. I never should have trusted Simone. But I’m not the only one who messed up. We wouldn’t be here if we all hadn’t made mistakes.” Buffy doesn’t have time for a huge explanation and, harshly, asks him what he wants.

“Simone is building an army of Slaypires. Thought you should know in case she calls for backup.”

A moment of clarity hits Buffy instantly. “Tessa Freer. She was the zompire who almost broke my arm.” She’s more angry at Simone now, and directs it. She looks back at Xander.

“I don’t get it. If Simone thinks Sev is going to reset the clock, why is she turning her Slayer army into Zompires now?” Xander shakes his head, but points at something on the ground by her feet. It’s blood. He suggests that they stop her wounds first, but Buffy looks and then shakes her head.

“That’s not my blood.” She follows the trail, through the dirt and the rock and, by the side of a casket, finds a body, dried blood around its mouth.

Looking down, Buffy immediately identifies the corpse. “Simone.”

She jerks her head back then, a realisation dawning. “Maloker wasn’t a diversion.”

She grips her Scythe and looks at Xander, worry in her voice. “And Simone’s not building an army.”

She unclips the Scythe from her back, swinging it, the whistle echoing through the small chamber. She aims to dismember the corpse, but doesn’t even have time to gasp as someone grabs her wrist, hard. With no effort at all, they twist, breaking it, and Buffy loosens her grip on the Scythe.

Xander can do nothing but watch as Simone rises and pins Buffy to the ground, her face a bizarre mix of demon and vampire. Her teeth are sharp and her eyes seem hollow, like something ancient has emptied them. He calls Buffy’s name, but she’s staring up at Simone in shock. She is now a true Vampire Slayer. Fangs unfurled, with all the strength and skill of the Chosen. She reaches for the Scythe.

“Build an army?” Simone snarls in Buffy’s face, saliva dripping from her teeth.

“I don’t need one anymore.”