[12]

BUFFY: Check the supplies. See if anyone's hungry.

(Xander looks at Spike, then they both walk out. Gregor chuckles and Buffy closes her eyes briefly, then looks angrily at him.)

GREGOR: Dissention in the ranks. Seldom a harbinger of glad tidings.

[13]

(Buffy scowls, walks over to him and backhands him across the face.)

BUFFY: Shut up.

(Gregor turns his head and spits blood. Buffy turns her back to him.)

General: Poor frightened girl. You've no idea what you've gotten yourself into.

BUFFY: Why don't you tell me?

General: Would it make a difference? What do you know of the Beast?

BUFFY: Strong. Fast. Hellgod.

General: From a dimension of unspeakable torment.

BUFFY: A demon dimension, I know. She ruled with two other hellgods, right?

General: Along with the beast, they were a triumvirate of suffering and despair, ruling with equal vengeance. But the Beast's power grew beyond even what they could conceive. As did her lust for pain and misery. They looked upon her, what she had become, and trembled.

BUFFY: A god afraid?

General: Such was her power. They feared she would attempt to cease their dimension for herself, and decided to strike first. A battle erupted. In the end they stood victorious over the Beast. She was cat out, banished to this lower plane of existence. Forced to live and eventually die, trapped within the body of mortal. A newborn male, created as her prison. That is the beast's *only* weakness.

BUFFY: Kill the man, and the god dies.

General: Unfortunately, the identity of the human vessel has never been discovered.

BUFFY: I don't understand. I've seen Glory. Not a while lot going on in the hairy-chest department.

General: You have seen a glimpse of the true Beast. Her power is too great to be completely contained. She's found a way to escape her mortal prison for brief periods before her energies are exhausted and she's forced back into her living cell of meat and bone.

DAWN: What about me? What about the Key?

BUFFY: Dawn!

DAWN: I want to know.

General: The Key is almost as old as the Beast itself. Where it came from, how it was created, the deepest of mysteries. All that is certain is that it's power is absolute. Countless generations of my people have sacrificed their lives in search of it. To destroy it before it's wrath could be unleashed.

DAWN: But the monks found it first.

General: Yes. And hid it with their magicks.

BUFFY: Why didn't they just destroy it? If the Key is as dangerous as...

General: (interrupts) Because they were *fools*. They thought they could harness it's forces for the powers of light, they failed. And paid with their blood.

DAWN: What do I do? What was I created for?

General: You were created to open the gates that separate dimensions. The Beast will use your power to return home and seize control of the Hell she was banished from.

BUFFY: (laughs) That's it? That's Glory's master plan? To go home?

General: You misunderstand. Once the Key is activated, it won't just open the gates to the Beast's dimension. It's going to open *all* the gates. The walls separating realities will crumble, dimensions will bleed into each other. Order will be overthrown and the universe will tumble into chaos. All dark. Forever. *That* is what you were created for.

• Ben's Issues
• Buffy vs Glory
• Dawn as the Key

written by: Steven S. DeKnight; Typed the partial transcript of this episode myself. Full transcript at:
http://www.studiesinwords.de/98spiral.html