7.3

Episode 7.3

"Test"

written by: A. Jean Clayton a.k.a. silver

October 01, 2001

Previously, on Buffy the Vampire Slayer:

Buffy stumbled across a murder in the cemetery and was questioned by the police. Willow told Buffy that she couldn�t find any demonic reason behind the murder, but she did track down the human serial murderer who is. Buffy punched the murderer in the back room of the Mystic Mind Tarot shop, and subdued him. Grant voiceovers: �You know, I wasn�t kidding when I said maybe we should hire you.� Shot of Buffy walking up the steps to the police department. Xander and Anya were caught in several compromising positions in the Magic Box. Tara saw Grant remove a pendant from the body of a murdered witch. Buffy killed the witch-killer.

* * *

We open on Dawn�s school, where she sits in the counselor�s office with her advisor and principal. She wants to know if she�s in trouble for something, and they say no, but that there�s a special assessment test coming up that they�d like her to take. She asks what it�s for, and they tell her that in effect, it�s a way to test out of senior year. They think that she�s got potential, and as a student with high marks, they think she might be eligible for some financial assistance programs if she qualifies. Dawn looks nervous.

Cut to Anya, also looking nervous; sitting with Xander in a doctor�s office. They both jump when a nurse comes in, then abashedly relax when she�s just there to drop off a clipboard. She tells them that the doctor is on her way, and leaves. Xander and Anya peer over at the clipboard for a moment before Xander finally just gives in and goes to pick it up. He rifles through the pages, frustrated by the medical jargon. �Blood count, estrogen levels, lunar cycles�why can�t it just say whether or not the rabbit died?� �Rabbit?!� Anya exclaims. Xander starts to explain the expression, but a noise at the door causes Xander to fumble to put the clipboard back, and he returns to Anya�s side as if nothing happened as the door opens and the doctor comes in. She flips through the clipboard briefly before looking up at them. �Mr. and Mrs. Harris?� she smiles. �Congratulations�you�re going to be parents!�

Opening Credits.

It�s dinner at the Summers house, and everyone but Spike is there. Tara asks Dawn where he is, because she thought Anya had told everyone to come. Dawn says that he�s patrolling, and relays that he can maybe accept that he�s voluntarily working for the good side now, but no way was he willing to eat whatever Buffy ended up scorching for dinner. Buffy says �hey, I heard that!� as she enters with a roast that does, indeed, look like it�s seen less-crispy days, and Dawn and Tara share a grin.

Everyone sits down and Dawn takes the opportunity to shyly inform them about the possibility of graduating a year early and getting into college. Everyone congratulates her, and Buffy tells her she�s proud of her. Dawn replies that she hasn�t even taken the test yet, but Buffy tells her she�s still proud. After the commotion dies down, everyone realizes Xander is still standing. He holds out a hand to Anya and she rises also. Everyone goes silent, and they tell them the big news�the Scooby Gang is going to have a new member�Anya�s pregnant! Dawn jumps up squealing, and excitedly congratulates them as everyone else reacts with amazed and pleased surprise. Everyone but Willow. Unnoticed for a moment in the sudden bedlam, Willow looks shocked, then seems to come out of her numbness and joins everyone else in congratulating the couple. No one notices but Tara, though she doesn�t say anything.

Cut to Spike patrolling, who�s been joined by Buffy after dinner. She tells him about Dawn�s test, and Spike grins. Then she tells them about Xander and Anya�s news, and he scowls. He says that they�re insane to bring a child into a world like this, especially living the lives they lead; with all the evil all afoot, and all. �Besides,� he says, as their rounds take them near the woods by UC Sunnydale, �don�t they know that bloody Scrappy Do was the worst thing that ever happened to the Scooby Gang? They�re tempting fate, I tell you.� Buffy shooshes him as she spies what appears to be a group of people in cloaks gathered around the crime scene where the flayed witch had been found the week before. Deciding that whatever they�re doing, it can�t be good, Spike and Buffy creep closer.

Suddenly they hear crying, and they realize a child is tied down in the circle the cloaked people are standing in, and the little boy is crying. Buffy and Spike immediately attack, and the circle disbands, fleeing in all directions. Buffy yells for Spike to follow a couple of the cloaked guys who appear to have a spell book, and she takes off after the two who ran off with the kid. She tracks them through the alley ways, and traps them in a dead end. She confronts them, resulting in a skirmish. She keeps them from finishing the ritual on the boy, but they manage to escape when she stops to take care of the frightened child. Cut to Spike pursuing the other two cloaked dudes, as they run away. They give him the slip, but not before he sees the face of one of the one who appeared to be the leader.

Commercials.

At Willow and Tara�s, Tara eyes Willow over coffee in the morning. Willow seems okay, but her usual good cheer seems forced as she reassures Tara that she�s fine. Willow leaves for class, and Tara looks thoughtful.

Cut to Buffy in another alley like the one she�d found the boy in. She walks down the alley, passing up a homeless guy lying against one of the walls. He looks up at her as she passes and smiles. Buffy nervously continues on, and after a few steps she turns around and the man is gone. She continues into the now-empty alley, as a dark mist closes in. Buffy searches for the boy, but she can�t find him and soon is trying just to leave, but the alley suddenly has four sides�three walls and a high fence with barbed wire at the top. Buffy realizes that if she�s gonna get out she�s gonna have to climb the fence, and she has to hurry because there are dark tentacle-looking things on the surrounding walls, which are reaching out for her.

She climbs the fence and with difficulty gets through the wire at the top, cutting her arms as she tries to claw her way through toward a blinding light on the other side. She reaches out to it and falls over the side�jerking awake in her bed. Sitting there, looking around at the sunny room, Buffy says �Well that sucked!�

Buffy�s taking the final test at the academy, along with a class of maybe a dozen others. She looks nervous as she glances from the clock back to the forms in front of her, but then buckles down to work. At the end of the test, everyone hands in their papers and Buffy wanders out through the precinct toward the front door. She�s stopped when she sees an older man in a cloak at the front desk, signing some papers. He�s telling the woman behind the counter that it�s ridiculous that he�s got to sign to get �out� of jail, ridiculous that they appear to have �lost� his favorite pinky ring, and that, oh yes, it�s ridiculous that they�d arrested him just because he was wearing a cloak. As he turns, Buffy starts when she realizes it�s the man who was in her dream the night before�the one who�d smiled at her in the alley before vanishing.

�I know a lot of people who wear coats, cloaks, and dusters�it doesn�t mean they�re evil.� he says as he reclaims his items. Buffy�s brow furrows as he turns and leaves, and Buffy quickly walks up to the woman behind the desk. She asks who he was, and finds out his name is Fence. Chills running up and down her spine, remembering her dream with the fence, Buffy runs outside to find him. She spots him across the street lighting up a cigarette, looking almost as if he�d been waiting for her. Buffy walks over and asks why the police questioned him. He tells her that they just like to bust his chops every now and then, but that that isn�t what she really wants to ask him, is it? Buffy looks disconcerted, but nevertheless asks why he referred to �good and evil�, instead of �right and wrong�. He asks her if they aren�t the same things, and she says not always. He nods, puffing on his cigarette. �There�s a little good and evil inside all of us,� he says. �The basis for yin and yang.�

Buffy looks thoughtful and starts to walk away, but stops abruptly when the man comments �So you�re the slayer, eh?� She turns back to him, and he goes on to say he knew from the moment he saw her; she�s a legend already in her own time�what with the �having been brought back from the dead twice� thing, and all. Buffy asks him who or what he is, and he responds that he�s just a pawn-shop owner. �If I were you,� he says, finishing his cigarette and tossing it, �and I wanted to ask questions, I�d be asking Detective I-remove-evidence-from-crime-scenes Grant, over there.� He nods toward the precinct, and Buffy looks to see Grant walking down the steps. She turns back to Fence, but he�s gone.

Commercials.

Dawn sits at a desk in a small classroom with only one or two other students, and a couple teachers. One of them administers the test, and Dawn takes a deep breath, breaks open the seal on the test, and dives in. Buffy follows Grant to his one-story apartment and watches as he goes inside for a moment, then leaves again. Casing the apartment; she spies a window cracked open. Muttering to herself that she�d thought a cop would be a little more careful, she lifts the window and screen, and climbs inside. Her search of his apartment reveals nothing until she goes to the closet and sees a cloak inside. Remembering Fence�s words about not judging people by commonplace possessions, Buffy puts it back and exits�unable to find the pendant Grant had removed from the dead witch. She leaves.

Tara finds Willow grading papers in a classroom, and asks again if she�s okay. Willow wants to know why she keeps asking her that. Tara replies that it�s because Willow is acting like she�s upset over Xander and Anya�s news. Willow starts to deny it, but then finally admits that she�s jealous. Buffy goes back to the Police Station and sees Grant and a man in a suit exchange a small velvet box. The man pockets it and walks inside, and Grant turns away, then notices Buffy. He greets her and is pleased that she took his suggestion to try to go out for police work. Buffy wonders what the next step is, and Grant tells her that if all her tests come back with high enough marks, she�ll start training, which involves both class work and physical training. Upon passing all that, she�d graduate to field training, then certification to be a police officer. Grand smiles. �Then you�d be a rookie, and paired off with another officer to learn the ropes on actual calls.� Buffy seems a bit overwhelmed, and Grant laughs, saying that maybe she�ll be assigned to him once she passes; as that�s one of his jobs.

Buffy asks what he�s working on right now, and he vaguely mentions the flayed witch case. Buffy casually alludes to the pendant, watching for Grant�s reaction, and he�s shocked; demanding to know how she even knew about it. She says it was just something she thought she heard somewhere, and he finally admits that the victim had been wearing a pendant. When Buffy asks why that wasn�t part of the story on the news, he explains that sometimes the Police Department doesn�t release small bits of information like that so the killer isn�t aware of just how much the police know, or where they�re going with their leads. Buffy asks if that was the case this time, and Grant looks kinda guilty. He tells her that he�d first removed the pendant to study it on his own but that he�d just turned it over to the captain to take to the evidence locker. Buffy asks what he could have learned from it that forensics couldn�t and he looks sheepish. He says it sounds stupid, but since he moved there, he�s always kinda felt that there was something �off� about Sunnydale, and he�d thought that maybe he could tie the death to some kind of occult practice. Buffy asks him if he was able to, and he says no; he couldn�t find a match for the design on the pendant.

cut to inside the Police Department, where the Captain places the velvet box inside the evidence locker.

Commercials.

Tara looks stunned. �you�re�you�re jealous?� she repeats. Willow hastens to explain that she�s not really jealous of Anya�it�s not over Xander. She just means that she�s jealous over the whole family thing. That while she knows Tara is her family, she kind of misses the traditional things that happen in families�for instance getting married and having kids. Tara softens as she begins to understand.

On patrol again that night, Buffy and Spike are looking for the cloaked people they chased the night before, but with no luck. She asks how business is, and he tells her it�s the same old, same old. She asks if he�s behaving himself around Willy and Spike just smirks. Buffy laughs. �Hey, remember that time you paid Willy to lead me right into your clutches so you could kill me, while you had Drusilla and Angel involved in some bizzaro ritual to give her strength back?� Spike lights a cigarette. �It worked, didn�t it?� he asks. Buffy chuckles. �Yeah, except you got your ass kicked and spent the next few months popping wheelies, if I recall.� Instead of scowling, Spike grins. �Well, you can�t deny we�ve got a history, slayer.�

Cut to Xander and Anya�s place. Willow settles on the couch as Xander and Anya sit down across from her. Xander apologizes for calling her there under such a cloak of mystery. Willow asks how Anya�s feeling, and she glibly replies that she�s starting to get sick in the mornings, and how surprised she is that that doesn�t seem to dissuade Xander�s morning woo�� yaaah!� Xander interrupts, cutting her off abruptly. He turns again to Willow and says that while he knows it�s still kinda early, he and Anya have talked about it, and they want Willow and Tara to be the baby�s godmothers. Willow is speechless, and Xander goes on to say that Willow is his oldest, dearest friend, and that if anything ever happened to Xander and Anya, who would be better to take care of their child than his best friend? Willow cries and says of course, and that she�s sure Tara will be thrilled too.

Back on patrol, Spike and Buffy finally come across the cloaked ones from the night before. This time they�re not taking any chances, and they rush right into the fray. Again two of the circle break away with the book, and Buffy sees this time that there�s some kind of design on the front. It looks vaguely familiar, but her glimpse is too quick to be sure. Determined not to lose it this time, Buffy follows them as Spike continues to thrash the rest of the group behind her. Buffy is surprised when the men she�s following seem to be heading toward the police department, and she swerves, hoping to intercept them there. They lose her, and she speeds up, hoping to find them again. Cutting toward the station, Buffy drops down behind a bush and spies upon the entrance. She sees the Captain walking up the steps and wonders what he�s doing there so late. On edge, Buffy almost stakes Spike as he slams against the tree next to the bush she�s hiding behind. �Well that was fun,� Spike says, looking very satisfied. Buffy shooshes him, gesturing toward the Captain.

�I think they were headed here,� Buffy said. �the Captain could be in danger.� Spike�s eyes narrow as he sees the captain reach toward the door. �He�s not in any danger, slayer.� he says seriously. Buffy looks up at him, confused, asking what he means. Spike looks back at her. �That�s the plonker I saw in the robe last night. Your new boss is one of them.�

Commercials.

At the Summers house, Buffy congratulates Dawn on passing the test. Dawn says that if she can keep her GPA at or above a 3.5 for the rest of the year, she�s got it made. Buffy tells her again how proud she is of her, and says that she knows Joyce would be, too. Dawn suddenly remembers that Buffy�s last test was that day too, and asks how it went. Buffy says she thinks she did okay, but there�s a lot of harder stuff in front of her. Thoughtfully, she remarks that work just got * really * interesting. Cut to Xander and Anya�s, where the pair have just gotten to bed and are settling in for the night. They talk about becoming parents, and how glad they are that Willow will always be there, though Anya still worries about anything happening to them now. Xander teasingly says that this means she�s going to have to be more careful. NO more conjuring party-hearty ex-boyfriend trolls, or demonic vampire alter-egos into this dimension, and no more shoving Xander out of the way of a falling pile of bricks and ending up in traction for two months, either. Anya says that�s all well and good, but he�s the one who�s always getting beaten up, and he needs to be more careful too. Xander kisses her and says that he will.

Cut to Willow and Tara�s, where the witches are already asleep. The camera pans over the slight smile on Willow�s face...over their slumbering forms, and over to the bookcase. Focusing on one with the same symbol on the front as the ones the people in cloaks had. Elsewhere, at the police station, Captain Penderghast picks up the ringing telephone. A voice on the other end asks him if he was able to complete the spell. He says �No��, and starts to explain, but the voice tells him that the charm needs to be destroyed, then. It�s getting too dangerous to keep around. The Captain hangs up the phone and walks over to the evidence locker. Using his keys, he lets himself in and removes a velvet box; taking it with him back to his office. Once there, he sits down at his desk and opens the box. Inside is the pendant that Grant originally removed from the body of the witch, the design on the front of it faded with time and use. Penderghast lifted the magical charm out of the box, and placed it flat on the desk. Out of the desk drawer next to him he pulls out a hammer and smashes the pendant, sending dust and fired clay everywhere, and a reddish haze floats up out of the pendant and dissipates.

End Credits.

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