Act Three
The gym. The Ugly Man hits Buffy in the face, knocking her off of the stands and onto the floor. She quickly gets up as he tries another swing and misses. She ducks a third swing, kicks him in the jaw with a high side kick and follows up with a spinning out-to-in crescent kick to his face. He isn't fazed. He swings again with his club arm and hits her squarely in the back, knocking her into the stands. He swings again as she gets up and knocks her legs out from under her, making her fall backward and onto the floor again. She rolls out of the way as he swings again, gets up and quickly follows Billy, who's already gone out the door. She's limping. Cut to the library. Giles, Willow and Xander walk out to find Buffy.
Giles: Buffy doesn't know this is happening. And given the sort of thing that she tends to dream about, it's imperative that we find her.
They come through the doors into the hall.
Xander: Probably faster if we split up to look for her.
Giles: Good idea.
He and Xander go off in opposite directions.
Willow: Oh, uh, faster, but... not really safer.
Cut to outside the gym doors. Buffy slides a hockey stick through the door handles to slow the Ugly Man down. He pounds on the door as she leans against it. She looks around, sees Billy and goes over to him.
Buffy: Billy!
Billy: I'm sorry, I can't help it.
Buffy: Who is he?
Billy: He's the Ugly Man.
Buffy: He's too strong! I can't fight him! We have to find my friends. They can help us.
Billy: We have to hide.
Buffy: No! He'll find us!
Billy: Yes, but we have to hide. That's how it happens. We hide, and then he comes.
They go to find the others. Cut to the hall. Willow comes down the stairs and sees a commotion down the hall. Cordelia is being dragged by some nerds into the chess club.
Cordelia: No! What are you doing! Hey, no! You don't understand! I don't wanna go! I'm not even on the chess team! I swear, I'm not!
They drag her into the room. Willow smiles at the sight. She hears her name being called from the door to the basement.
Voice: Willow!
Cordelia: Nohoho!
Willow turns toward the voice, goes to the basement door, opens it and looks inside.
Voice: Willow!
Cut into the basement looking up the stairs at Willow.
Willow: Buffy?
She starts down the stairs, leaving the door open.
Willow: Hello? Buffy?
She reaches the bottom of the steps and looks around.
Willow: I'm not afraid. You'd think I'd be afraid, but I'm not.
She continues into the room and looks around. A hand grabs her on the shoulder and pulls her away as she screams. Cut to the hall. Xander comes through a door and finds the hall has been vandalized, with swastikas spray-painted everywhere. A light hanging from the ceiling is flickering. He spies a chocolate bar on the floor.
Xander: Alright! (picks up the bar and tears it open) Someone else's loss is my chocolatey goodness.
He takes a huge bite. He looks around some more and sees a Hershey bar. He walks over to it, picks it up and tears it open.
Xander: This is my lucky day!
He takes a huge bite out of the Hershey bar and looks around again. Cut outside. Buffy and Billy come out of a door.
Buffy: (confused) Wha... I was sure this led to the library.
Billy looks at a couple students playing on the other side of the fence. Buffy goes over to him.
Buffy: They're just playing. What is it? What's bothering you?
Billy: Baseball. When you lose, it's bad.
Buffy: Did you lose your game last week?
Billy: (nods) It was my fault.
Buffy: Why was it your fault?
Billy: I missed a ball and I should have caught it.
Buffy: You missed one ball and the whole game was your fault? What, you were the only one playing? There wasn't eight other people on your team?
Billy: He said it was my fault.
Buffy: Who said? Billy, did he hurt you after the game?
Billy: Can we go another way to find your friends?
Buffy: Sure. Okay. We can go around the cafeteria.
The Ugly Man comes in their direction and punches a student out.
Buffy: Bad idea! (looks around) Uh, this way! C'mon!
She pushes Billy ahead of her through some bushes. When they get through to the other side they are in the cemetery, and it's night.
Buffy: What just happened?
Billy: Is this where your friends are?
Buffy: No, it's not.
Cut to the basement. The show director is pulling Willow through a door to a dressing room. She is dressed in a green kimono for the part of Cio-Cio-San, the title character of Puccini's opera Madame Butterfly.
Director: Man, I thought you weren't gonna show! Aldo is beside himself.
He makes some adjustments to her kimono. Willow can hear the Emcee make his announcement on the stage.
Emcee: Ladies and Gentlemen, we are proud to present two of the world's greatest singers!
The audience begins to applaud. The director guides Willow onto the auditorium stage behind the curtain.
Director: I hope you're warmed up. It's an ugly crowd out there tonight. All the reviewers showed up.
Emcee: All the way from Firenze, Italy, the one and only Aldo Gianfranco! And all the way from Sunnydale, California, the world's finest soprano, Willow Rosenberg!
Willow sees Aldo on stage through the curtain, dressed in a tuxedo and holding out his hand to greet her. She backs away into the director.
Willow: But I...I didn't learn the words!
The director gives her a shove onto the stage, and she stumbles through the curtains and bumps into Aldo. He shoots her a look. She's terrified. The applause dies down. The spotlight is on Aldo, and he begins to sing the famous love duet from Act I.
Aldo: Bimba dagli occhi pieni di malia, ora sei tutta mia.
Translation: Child, from whose eyes the witchery is shining, now you are all my own.
The spotlight moves to Willow when it's her turn. She is stiff with fear and remains silent as she looks between Aldo and the crowd. Realizing she's not going to sing, Aldo begins again, and the spotlight shifts back to him.
Aldo: Sei tutta vestita di giglio. Mi piace la treccia tua bruna fra i candidi veli.
Translation: You're dressed all in white like a lily. Your ebony tresses are shining on ivory shoulders.
When he finishes his bar he gives her an annoyed look and stomps his foot. She's still frightened.
Willow: (meekly) My turn?
Aldo: (annoyed) Mm-hmm!
She turns to the crowd and lets out a high-pitched squeak. Numerous murmurs come from the audience. Aldo is disgusted and turns away. Cut to the halls. There are sheets of plastic hanging from the ceiling. Xander pushes though a pair and stops. His hands are full of various chocolate bars.
Xander: I love these bars!
He spots another one on the floor.
Xander: A Chocolate Hurricane! These are the best! I haven't had one of these since my...
He hears incessant giggling coming toward him.
Xander: ...sixth... (looks around) ...birthday.
He sees a shadow come up behind another sheet of plastic, and a clown suddenly bursts through. Xander screams in terror as the clown holds up a knife. Xander falls as he tries to get away and somersaults backward into the next hall. He starts to crawl away fast. Cut to the cemetery. Buffy walks and looks around.
Buffy: I don't see the Ugly Man. I also don't know where the sun and the rest of the world went.
Billy: Look at this.
She looks down where Billy is looking and sees a freshly dug grave with an open pine coffin inside.
Billy: I guess we're gonna bury someone. I wonder who died.
Master: Nobody died.
Buffy and Billy look up at him in surprise.
Master: What's the fun of burying someone if they're already dead?
She stares at him in disbelief.
Buffy: You!
Master: So! This is the Slayer! You're prettier than the last one.
Buffy: This isn't real. Y-you can't be free!
Master: You still don't understand, do you? I am free because you fear it. Because you fear it, the world is crumbling. Your nightmares are made flesh. You have little Billy to thank for that.
She looks behind her, but Billy is gone. She turns back to the Master.
Buffy: This is a dream.
Master: A dream is a wish your heart makes. (grabs Buffy by the neck.) This is real life. (pulls her around so her back is to the open grave) Come on, Slayer! What are you afraid of?
He growls and bares his teeth, but doesn't bite. He throws her into the coffin at the bottom of the grave, and the lid slams shut.
Buffy: No! Help me!
Master: How 'bout being buried alive?
The Master laughs maniacally as he starts to shovel dirt into the grave.
Buffy: Somebody help me! Please! No! No! Please! No! No! No! Somebody help me! Please! No!
The first shovelful of dirt hits the coffin, and some falls in through the cracks of the poorly constructed coffin.
Buffy: Please! No! Help me! No!
The next shovelful of dirt covers the crack between the boards.
Buffy: Help!
Act Four
The halls. Willow comes through a door while being pelted with tomatoes. Xander runs up to her.
Xander: Did you find Buffy?
Willow: I had to sing! Very bad to sing!
Xander: Willow, c'mon. Let's find the others.
Willow: What happened to you?
Xander: Remember my sixth birthday party?
Willow: (laughs) Oh, yeah! When the clown chased you and you got so scared that you had... (stops smiling) Oh!
The clown slices through a sheet of plastic. Willow screams and they start to run, right into Giles.
Giles: No sign of Buffy?
They grab hold of him and pull him with them. He sees the clown and starts to run, too. When they reach the end of the hall Xander stops, tired of the whole thing. He goes up to the clown, and as the clown raises his knife to attack, Xander punches him dead in the face and knocks him out.
Xander: You are a lousy clown! Your balloon animals are pathetic! Everyone can make a giraffe!
They leave the clown lying there. Cut outside. They come running out of the building and stop.
Xander: I feel good! I feel liberated!
People are running past them.
Giles: You seem to be the only one. Things are getting worse. In a few hours reality will fold completely into the realm of nightmares.
Willow: Well, what do we do?
Giles: The only thing I can think is to try and wake Billy.
Xander: Uh, no, we can't leave without Buffy.
Giles: Agreed, but who knows where she might have gone?
Willow sees a dimensional rift to the graveyard across the street.
Willow: Excuse me, when did they put a cemetery in across the street?
Xander: And when did they make it night over there?
They walk through the rift into the cemetery.
Xander: Whose nightmare is this?
Giles looks at a gravestone that reads: Buffy Summers 1981 - 1997.
Giles: It's mine.
They all gather around the grave. Giles kneels next to it.
Giles: I've failed...in my duty to protect you. I should have been more c...cautious. Taken more time to train you. But you were so gifted. And the evil was so great. I'm sorry...
He lays his hand on the fresh soil. As he starts to get up a hand reaches up through the dirt and grabs his. Willow screams. Giles tears himself away as Buffy comes up through the dirt out of the grave. She brushes herself off.
Giles: Buffy?
She looks up. She has turned into a vampire.
Buffy: I thought I was dead!
Willow: Buffy, your face!
Buffy feels her face and realizes what's happened.
Buffy: Oh, God!
She keeps her hands up to hide her face. Xander takes a couple of steps toward her.
Xander: Buffy...
Buffy: (turns away) Don't look at me!
Giles: You never told me you dreamt of becoming a vampire.
Buffy: This isn't a dream.
Giles: No. No, it's not. But there's a chance that we can make it go away. This all comes from Billy. Now, if, if we can only wake him up, I believe that the nightmares will stop and reality will shift back into place, but we must do it now! I need you to hold together long enough to help us. Can you do that?
She looks up at Giles.
Buffy: (nods) Yeah. I think I can.
Giles: Thank you.
They face the others.
Buffy: Well, we better hurry... 'cause I'm getting hungry. (starts away)
Xander: (following) That is a... joke, right?
Willow: Are you sure everything will go back once he's awake?
Giles: Oh, uh, positive.
Willow: Well, how do we wake Billy up? What if we can't?
Giles: Willow, do shut up.
Cut to the hospital. Pandemonium reigns. They come running down the hall to Billy's room. The doctor is there looking into Billy's room.
Giles: Doctor! Is the boy Billy still here?
Doctor: My hands!
The doctor's hands are severely crippled. He goes away. They run into Billy's room.
Xander: What now?
Giles: Um... (bends down to Billy) Billy! Billy?
Billy: That won't work.
His astral body is standing by the curtains. Giles looks up at him.
Giles: Billy! Uh, Billy, you have to wake up.
Billy: No. I told her. I have to hide.
Giles: Why? From what?
Buffy: From him!
She's still in the hall and sees the Ugly Man coming toward her. Giles goes over to the window to look.
Xander: Aw, man, what do we do?
Buffy: I think I know.
She takes off her jacket. Willow hears buzzing outside and peeks through the blinds to see giant black wasps flying over the town.
Willow: Whatever it is, it better be soon!
Cut to the hall. The Ugly Man is making his way toward Buffy.
Buffy: Glad you showed up! You see, I'm having a really bad day.
Ugly Man: Lucky nineteen!
Buffy: Scary! I'll tell you something, though. There are a lot scarier things than you. (takes two steps forward) And I'm one of them.
The Ugly Man stops in his tracks and looks at her. She roars and runs to attack. She jumps on him, knocks him down and punches him twice in the face. She tries for a third punch, but he blocks her and gets his foot under her stomach. He pushes hard, and Buffy falls backwards. She gets up quickly and roundhouse kicks him in the gut, making him double over, but he pushes her into the window of Billy's room and then throws her into the opposite wall. He tries to punch her with his club arm, but she ducks, and his arm slams into a wall. She comes up behind him and side kicks him in the back. He slams into her, knocking her through the door into Billy's room and against his bed. She gets up to face him as he comes in after her. He swings again with his club arm, but she grabs it and roughly brings it down, breaking it over her knee. He wails in pain, and she body checks him into the wall, where he hits his head and slumps to the floor unconscious. Everyone just stares at him.
Billy: I-is he dead?
Buffy: Come here, Billy.
Billy: I, I don't...
Buffy: You have to do the rest.
Billy slowly comes around the bed and over to the Ugly Man.
Giles gestures for her to be quiet.
Xander: I get it.
Buffy takes Billy's hand. He looks up at her.
Buffy: No more hiding.
Billy looks down at the Ugly Man. Buffy lets go of his hand, and he reaches for the Ugly Man's neck. He peels back his face and a bright light streams out. In the next instant everything is back to normal. The Ugly Man is gone, Buffy is herself again, Xander and Willow are in their regular clothes and the hospital is functioning. Buffy smiles and feels her face. Willow breathes a sigh of relief. Billy wakes up.
Xander: Hey, he's waking up!
They all gather around.
Billy: I had the strangest dream. And you were in it, and you... Who are you people?
They all smile.
Giles: Let's get a doctor.
Billy's coach comes in as Giles and Xander are about to go get a doctor.
Coach: Oh! Huh. Billy's got company. (takes off his cap) I-I-I'm his kiddie league coach. I come by here every day, just hoping against hope that he's gonna wake up soon. He's, uh, my lucky nineteen.
Giles and Buffy exchange a look.
Coach: So, um, how is he?
Buffy steps aside to show him that Billy's awake.
Buffy: He's awake.
Coach: What?
Buffy: You blamed him for losing the game. So you caught up with him afterwards, didn't you?
Coach: (acting innocent) What are you talking about?
Billy: (sits up) You said that it was my fault that we lost.
The coach realizes he's been found out and tries to get away. Xander grabs him by the jacket and stops him.
Billy: It wasn't my fault. There's eight other players on the team. You know that. (lies down)
Buffy: (to Billy) Nice going! (smiles)
Billy smiles back. Cut to the school. Willow, Buffy and Xander are walking.
Buffy: I just can't believe a kiddie league coach would do something like that.
Xander: Well, you obviously haven't played kiddie league. I'm surprised it wasn't one of the parents.
Willow: I'm just glad he's behind bars where he belongs.
Buffy: But that was kinda heroic, Xander, grabbing him and all.
Xander: Well, I just did what anyone else would've. I mean, if you wanna label it heroic...
Hank drives up, honks and gets out of the car and waves.
Hank: Hi!
Buffy: Have a killer weekend, guys!
Xander bows his head to her. Buffy goes to her dad. Hank comes up the steps and hugs his daughter.
Hank: Hi, sweetheart! Oh, it's so good to see you! (releases the hug) How was your day?
Buffy: Fine. You know, usual.
Willow: (to Xander) Personal question?
Xander: Yeah, shoot!
Willow: When Buffy was a vampire, you weren't still, like, attracted to her, were you?
Xander: Willow, how can you... I mean, that's really bent! She was... grotesque!
Willow: Still dug her, huh?
Xander: I'm sick, I need help.
Willow: Don't I know it.