The Slayer fights alone.
That was one of Spike's realisations during his epiphany episode, "Lies My Parents Told Me."
In Season 2, during the big showdown with Angelus she was told much the same thing. Slayer=fighting alone. But of course, being alone is part of the human condition, isn't it?
But we've also had some interesting evidence that being alone and being a Slayer aren't mix-y things. In Season 2, Spike remarked on how unusual it was for a Slayer to have friends and family. It made Buffy harder to kill because she had helpers. In Season 4, Buffy rejected the First Slayer's advice, telling her she wanted to shop and sneeze and be a Slayer. She embraced the mantra, all work and no play makes Buffy a dull girl. Or it may very well make her a dead girl. Again.
From the show's inception, Buffy was charming because she defied authority (Giles), subverting his attempts to get her to buckle down and work, work, work, in favour of playing at the Bronze, trying to date, hanging with Xander and Willow. These fun activities were essential. They kept her grounded in the face of all the tragedy and death that constantly surrounded her. Eventually, Giles embraced Buffy's unorthodox methods, and it quite literally lost him his career.
But at the end of Season 2 (or perhaps even at the end of Season 1) a bit of this carefree Buffy died. Since then circumstances and the power of being a superpower have gradually eroded Buffy's ability to be that girl in skirts and kicky little boots, pissed off when she chips her perfectly manicured nails on the undead. Now her uniform is more utilitarian (trousers). Her approach to life is analytical, not emotional because all the emotions have been suppressed. She has a superiority complex and inferiority complex about it. She's been damaged by life (and death) and has trouble feeling anything at all. The signs were there in Season 5. She tells Giles that the killing is making her hard. That she almost can't love anymore.
Of course, the end of The Gift was supposed to demonstrate her love for Dawn, but it could also be read as self-abnegation, that ultimate reach for the "sweet release" that only death can provide. Perhaps it was both things at once. She chose love and death at the same time.
But now, the love part has almost fallen completely from the equation. Buffy seems hard, brittle, emotionless. And this makes her fragile. We know (because she's told us) that if she had to choose again, she'd choose the world over Dawn. A perfectly moral decision. Billions of lives over the life of the individual. But it lacks emotion. No "once more with feeling" for the Buffster.
So we have a Slayer, isolated from her troops and from her friends. This is poignantly demonstrated throughout Drew Z. Greenberg's script. Buffy alone as she watches the mass exodus from Sunnydale. Buffy unable to connect with Xander and Willow on a human level in the hospital. Buffy alone at the school, her shadow (darkness) long and looming before her.
Oh, but we do see emotion twice in the episode. And both times Buffy separates herself from the group, from her friends, to indulge in those feelings she might consider weak. At the end of the episode, she saves her tears until the door closes. It would have been a private sob session, had Faith (the emotional, sympathetic, caring Faith) come after her.
More significant is her retreat to her school office, where she considers a picture of herself and her friends, Willow and Xander, in happier days, eyes and all other body parts accounted for. Just as she begins to cry, Caleb appears, mocking, derisive, making her feel self-conscious and weak about the feminine "waterworks". Last week, Caleb indicted sex. This week it's emotion in general he scorns. This should be a clue to Buffy. She needs to reconnect with her friends and with those who love her--soon--or her greatest strength will be lost. Her humanity. She's forgotten how to use her power and she's become isolated as a result.
In the past, Buffy's friends followed her willingly. Why? Because there was an emotional connection there. She wasn't a dictatorial general ordering them into dangerous situations. She was Buffy, their friend who blew off homework with them at the Bronze, who made their lives exciting, and, most importantly the girl who made them feel special.
Buffy's friends don't feel that anymore.
Instead, Faith, the Slayer who still feels everything, deeply, has made her way into their hearts in a few short days. She knows the secret of leadership that Buffy has forgotten. You have to connect. You have to let the people know you care. You have to be human, especially when your charges are getting all hellmouthy on you. (If the hellmouth is affecting everyone else, why not Buffy, the Scoobs, Giles, and the Pots?) After all, the best antidote to evil is love.
Love, Give, Forgive.
Buffy has forgotten how.
Spike, the one person who may have stood up for Buffy has been sent away, leaving her even more alone. But his desertion may have served a greater purpose: he finds piece of Buffy's destiny. His classical education as William (we've all suspected as much for many years) comes in handy with the Latin translation found on the monastery wall: "It is not for thee. It is for her alone to wield."
Is there a mystical weapon specially made for Buffy? Or is it something metaphorical? That she will have to learn how to wield her power effectively, stop tilting at windmills?
To close, I must wonder about all the hints that running away is the right thing to do. After all, they fled from Glory at the end of Season 5. Of course, that didn't necessarily end well, but still . . .
What would happen if Buffy and the Gang became pacifists? Chose to fight another way? Sometimes not fighting is the right decision. We've had that message hammered home on numerous occasions over the course of the season, most recently with the debacle at Caleb's vineyard.
At the beginning of the episode, Clem advises Buffy, "Maybe you should just get out of town this time."
Faith refuses to fight with Buffy. Why? "Other things matter more."
Caleb, not a reliable source by any account, tells Buffy, "Fighting back didn't do much good last time, did it?"
And finally Andrew (another dubious source) tells the monk, "Running away saved your life."
I don't think all these lines were simply included by accident. I'm not sure what they mean, just as I'm not sure whether Buffy was right about Caleb hiding his power at the vineyard. The one man who "saw everything" has now had his judgment metaphorically impaired by Caleb. Even Xander rejects Buffy's seemingly suicidal plan, but his words are telling, "I'm trying to see your point here, Buffy, but I guess it's a little to my left." The eye that is gone may have been able to see her point, but now he has been blinded.
So, was the Gang right to reject Buffy's sanctimonious dictatorship in favour of Faith? Or were they under the influence of the Hellmouth? Should they all become pacifists, turning the other cheek? Will Buffy's problems be solved if she can just feel again? Will she then be able to wield the power?
I obviously have more questions than
answers after this episode. We shall have to wait and see what transpires.