Synopsis of No Place Like Home

Written by TK

Two months ago
Two monks are running through the halls. They get into a room with a third monk and frantically bar the door behind them. In Czech, they say that their lives are worth nothing, but they must protect the key. They sit in a circle and hum, holding hands, while something large pounds on the door. They try to ignore the banging as their power grows. Just before the door bursts apart, a glowing light rises from the middle of their small circle.

Now
Buffy slays a vampire in a vacant lot next to a factory. A security guard comes over and tells her if she's looking for a rave, it was last night. She plays along. He tells her she has to get off the property. She complies. He says not to forget her ball lying on the ground. He hands her a glowing sphere that he picks up off the ground nearby. She takes it with her, wondering what it is.

Summers kitchen, morning
Buffy is making a nice breakfast for her mom because Joyce is still not feeling well. When Joyce comes in, Dawn takes all the credit for making breakfast. Buffy is jealous of Joyce and Dawn's relationship. Joyce is still having tests run at the hospital, no one can figure out what's wrong with her. Buffy is off to Giles's grand opening of his magic shop, and she brings Dawn along so that Dawn won't bother Joyce all day.

Magic Box
Buffy and Dawn show up at Giles's store and the opening is not so grand. No one's there. Buffy tells Giles how she's worried about her mother because she's still sick and no one seems to know why. She also shows the gang the sphere that she found last night, and they decide to figure out what it is. Dawn lets it slip to Riley that Buffy was talking about how she has to protect him now. Buffy is furious with Dawn. Willow defends Dawn.

Summers house
Buffy and Dawn get home and find their mother suffering from a really bad headache. Buffy heads to the hospital pharmacy to fill her mother's pain medication prescription.

Hospital pharmacy Buffy sees an intern named Ben treating a crazy patient. She helps Ben restrain the patient and then realizes that the crazy man is the security guard she spoke to last night. The man babbles at Buffy how they'll get her, and they'll to her through her family. Buffy is shaken by the man's words since she's worried about her mother.

Old factory
A scared monk is writing something when there is a loud bang at the huge metal door behind him. He looks at the door and sees that it's been dented inward. Suddenly, the huge industrial metal door completely breaks free of the wall and comes flying into the room, taking pieces of wall with it and leaving a big gap about the size of a mac truck. As the dust clears, a pretty blonde woman in a red dress and red strappy heels tells the monk that she's been looking all over for him.

Magic Box
There are finally some customers. Just a few, but enough to make Giles happy. customers. Anya comes in complaining that Giles's prices are too high. Really, she's just cranky because she's running out of money and isn't used to budgeting (no, I have no idea where she used to get her money either). Buffy comes in and tells Giles about her experience with the suddenly-crazy security guard. She says she thinks that her mother's illness is due to something supernatural and someone is trying to get to her through her mother.

Old factory
The blonde bombshell has the monk tied up in a chair, and a security guard tied up on the floor nearby. She starts into this long speech about how she's the victim here, stuck in this miserable existence. All she wants is the key, and the monk is torturing her by not giving it to her. The monk mumbles to kill him in Czech, and the blonde says that we're in the new world now and we should speak American. The monk says in accented English that he will tell her nothing. She keeps whining about how hard this all is for her as the tied-up security guard begs for his life. Reality seems to break down around her a little bit, and suddenly she grabs the security guard by the head and zaps him. It looks painful for the security guard. It's almost like she sucks his energy or something. She lets go, saying she feels much better. The security guard falls in a heap on the floor.

Magic Box
The magic store is now brimming with customers. Willow and Anya are behind the counter helping out. Someone asks Willow if they gift-wrap, and she figures out that they do. Giles is going insane with way too many customers. People are asking too many questions and breaking things and he's running out of things.... Xander comes in and coaches Anya on how to be more friendly in the retail business. Buffy is trying to look up what might have been done to her mother. Anya remembers a French sorcerer that had a way of seeing other spells, so Buffy could use this method and then see the spell that has been cast on her mother. Giles says it might work.

Buffy's bedroom
Buffy is preparing to do the ceremony/meditation that will make her see other spells. She has Riley there to help. She really only needs Riley to light incense and pour sand. Riley feels a little silly since this is obviously something Buffy would be better off doing herself. Riley tells her that he doesn't want her to feel like she has to take care of him. How about they take care of each other? She agrees. He leaves her to conduct her ceremony in peace. Buffy lights the incense and pours the sand and starts to meditate. Dawn comes to the door and asks her if she's doing magic. Buffy says she's not. Dawn wants to watch. Buffy says she's not allowed to. Dawn walks off in a huff.

Later that night, Buffy's bedroom
It's gotten dark. Buffy is still meditating in her room. Suddenly, she opens her eyes and walks downstairs. Everything looks basically normal. Her mother calls out to her, telling her she's feeling better and she's going out. Buffy looks at her mother and is disappointed when she doesn't see anything out of the ordinary. Behind her mother there is a family picture on the wall: Buffy, Dawn and their mother. Suddenly, Buffy notices that Dawn's image in the picture blinks for a moment. She looks closer and definitely notices that Dawn's image is blinking in and out of the picture. Buffy's mother leaves and Buffy walks up to Dawn's room. In Dawn's room, the entire room is flashing in and out. One moment Buffy sees Dawn's pink-clad preteen bedroom, and another moment she sees a gray spare bedroom full of spare stuff. Dawn walks in and asks Buffy what she's doing in her room. Dawn herself is flashing in and out of existence. Buffy grabs Dawn and slams her against a door, telling her she's not her sister and asking her what she is.

Summers home
The phone rings. It's Giles, still dealing with way too many customers. The glowing ball turns out to be a Dagon Sphere, which is a protective device to ward off ancient primordial evil. It repels that which cannot be named. Buffy says she's going back to factory to figure out why someone there had a Dagon Sphere. Giles says to be careful, because usually that which cannot be named is really horrific. Giles asked how the spell to see spells worked, and Buffy starts to tell him about Dawn, but then realizes that Dawn is listening to her conversation, and instead says nothing. When Buffy gets off the phone Dawn tells her she doesn't care if she's the Slayer. Buffy says she's going out. Dawn reminds her that their mother will be home soon. Buffy says she'll be home first, and to stay away from her mother. Buffy walks outside and finds Spike lurking by a tree. They have a strange exchange where Buffy is rude to Spike as usual, and gives him a punch in the nose for good measure, while Spike is awkward and almost child-like, denying things he hasn't been accused of. He's obviously got a crush on Buffy, and is still trying to pretend like he hates her. When Spike finally leaves, Buffy notices that there is a huge pile of cigarette butts beside the tree where she found him outside her house. He'd been there for awhile.

Old factory
Buffy finds the huge broken door and the hole in the wall. Summers home
Joyce comes home. At first, she can't find either of her daughters at home, but then she sees Dawn holding a cup of tea. She asks Dawn where Buffy is. Dawn tells her not to worry about Buffy. She asks her mother if she wants some tea. She made it especially for her.

Old factory
Buffy finds the monk tied up to the chair and starts to untie him. The blonde in the red dress sneaks up behind Buffy, but Buffy senses that she's there and turns to face her. They grapple for a moment, and then the blonde smacks Buffy hard and Buffy goes flying across the room and bounces off a wall.

Magic Box
Giles, Xander and Willow are all sitting around a table. The store has closed for the day and they're all tired and relieved. Anya is still behind the counter tidying up, rearranging things, and giving advice to Giles on what the most popular items were, how he should discount things, and what he already needs to reorder. Giles offers Anya a job working for him. She happily accepts. He says that's great, now they can talk about all this work stuff tomorrow because he's too tired to do it now. He mentions to everyone that Buffy's spell to figure out what was making her mother sick didn't work.

Old factory
The blonde and Buffy are duking it out. The blonde is way stronger than Buffy, although Buffy puts up a good fight. The blonde is also chatty and whiny, while Buffy is just fighting for her life. The blonde notices that Buffy has superpowers. Then she asks Buffy if that means she can fly and throws her flying across the room. Buffy jumps up, grabs the ill monk off his chair where he's still sitting untied, and jumps out a window. The blonde runs after them but one of her heels snaps. She takes off the shoe, curses the heel, and stomps her bare foot in frustration. The stomp is so hard that it runs a crack through the cement floor of the factory. The crack runs up one of the supporting beams and the whole room collapses in on itself. From outside, Buffy is trying to get the monk to hurry away from her, and sees a huge cloud of dust come out of the window she just jumped through. The monk is dying, and finally collapses. He murmurs to Buffy to protect the key. Buffy asks what the key is. He says it's energy... a portal... it opens the door. He says that when the beast found the monks, the protectors of the key, they made the key human and sent it to Buffy so that it would be protected. They made it Buffy's little sister so that she would be sure to protect it. Buffy is pissed off that the monks messed with her mind and her family that way. She can't believe they manufactured these memories. The monk tells her that even Dawn doesn't know what she is, she's an innocent in all this.

Summers house
Buffy comes home and Dawn and Joyce are sitting on the couch. As soon as Dawn sees Buffy, she stomps off upstairs mumbling that she wasn't bother mom. Joyce asks what that was all about, and Buffy says it's just sister stuff. Buffy goes upstairs to Dawn's room. She apologizes to her little sister for what she said and did earlier. Dawn calls her names and whines that she hurt her arm. Buffy apologizes again. They finally make up as sisters do after a fight. They are both still worried about their mother.

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