On the darkened streets of Trillium, an intense battle was taking place. From each side, demons moved in to surround the hapless Slayers. Unfortunately for the demons, however, Buffy, Faith, Kennedy, and a dozen or so of their trainees were proving to be not so much hapless as they were brutal. Bodies and associated parts were beginning to litter the street like discarded soda cans and fast food rubbish.

As though it were some manner of carnage-based fashion show, each of the main Slayers wielded a different weapon, tailoring it to their own unique style. Buffy drove her axe into the midsection of one large assailant, nearly cleaving the monster in half, just as Faith delivered seven separate wounds with a pair of twin daggers. Kennedy, eschewing the brute attacks of her peers in favor of a terrifying ballet of death, spun around her victims, lopping off limbs and heads as she went.

The newer Slayers mostly watched their seniors in action, attacking when opportunities presented themselves, but the vast majority of evil's felling came at the hands of the three. The demons, realizing this, started to scatter and run, some with success, many less so. One unfortunate victim met his end at the blade of Buffy's axe, and his head went sailing through the air in an almost surreally graceful arc.

Time stopped, Slayers and demons frozen alike. The head floated motionlessly in the air, a quizzical look on its face. Only this miracle appeared to have stayed the vicious hand of Buffy and her implement of destruction. Gritted teeth and narrowed eyes only added to the fearsome countenance.

A demon wearing a well-tailored lime green suit stepped in front of the stilled image, which was revealed to be a video display. The demon was several inches shy of six-feet tall with shiny red skin and yellow reptilian eyes that shone with keen intelligence. He flashed a wide, charming smile at his audience—vampires, demons, monsters and every other sort of nightmare fuel imaginable. All were intently focused on the video, and that attention shifted to the demon as he spoke, deferring to him naturally as their boss.

He gestured to the frozen Buffy with a wave of his hand. "Slayers. Our enemies. We all hate them." His voice was rich and inspiring, but the Boss was using more venom now than honey. "Time was, this city was ours, now we're practically in the middle of a turf war with a bunch of little girls."

The gathered denizens of the dark murmured amongst themselves in agreement. There was much grumbling about the Slayers.

"But that's okay. There've been some setbacks, but this doesn't necessarily have to be a bad thing." The Boss shrugged. "Heck, it might even be one of the best things that's happened to us."

There was more murmuring of agreement. A few demons enthusiastically threw in a few "Yeah!"s for good measure. Then they seemed to actually start to comprehend the last part of their leader's statement and there was a low voice of dissent.

"Yeah, we owned this city, and no one could stand up to us. And we all started to get soft." He pointed to a member of the crowd. "Admit it, G'thanj, we can all see the flab you've developed over the last year." Without waiting for reaction, he pointed clear to the other side of the room. "And you, Mariad. You probably couldn't bend a steel girder to save your life now."

The crowd was shifting more towards the agreeing side, although some still harbored reservations. As is likely to happen when addressing a large group, there were some demons on the slow side who had completely lost track of the conversation and weren't even sure what he was getting at.

The Boss was not about to let that fact slow him down. "Bottom line is, this city belongs to us and we're going to reclaim it. These Slayers come in and threaten to kill and maim honest demons just trying to put in a hard night's evil. It's time we struck back!"

With this statement, he achieved unanimous agreement, signified by cheers from all segments of the gathering. The Boss crossed his arms and smiled, just as a jagged, exotic-looking weapon whirled from out of the crowd, impacting between the eyes of the projected image of Buffy Summers.