1.1.1 WEAPONS/ FORM/ WORD

descend: to swoop or pounce down (as in a sudden attack)

thread: to pass a thread through the eye of a needle
 

1.1.2 WEAPONS/ FORM/ WORLD

it was always different for her, with him, right from the first encounter. "do we really need weapons for this?" she said to him, and his body spoke to her in his answer. lesson the first. the bells gave warning then of the near approach of the Wild Hunt, chasse Arlequin. he who woke from a dream to journey to the land of death. so here they are, on opposite sides of that one last river. 

the trouble always was, both of them loved the dance too much to stop. both built for hunting, evenly matched, exhilarated every time they upped the stakes. beautiful and wild and, within the dance, free. no quarter. grace. and so they circled, endlessly wary, around one another. allies under a temporary truce. she gave him mercy, he gave her help. he gave his heart, she took his flesh. all that life, pouring out of his undead shell,  kept her alive in a bad year. he gave her pain, she gave it back. he erased himself, and started over. he gave up all his natural weapons, and he knelt before her judgment.

she gave him trust, on a battlefield.
they are bound by blood, two eternal champions.
he will never give up, she will never give in.
they have mated.
 

1.1.3 WEAPONS/ FORM/ MAKER

spiralling down, through the dark matter of empty space. whirlpools in which she drowns again, over and over. nightmares in which she is bitten, and drinks, and wakes to find herself undone, unmade, undead, unloved, abandoned.

spiralling up, he wakes to all the memories of death he dealt, of harm. and thinks, for a moment, to find her, keep her safe somehow from harm, from him. and he remembers her, so bright it hurts his eyes, lost in the dark.
 

1.2.1 WEAPONS/ DIVINATION/ PROPHECY

the challenge that causes
a man to measure
himself against standards
more than human
to gamble life for
honor or both for love.

(found poem, from: definition of aventure, P.M. Matarasso, The Quest of the Holy Grail)
 

1.2.2 WEAPONS/DIVINATION/ TARA

Do you mind if I walk beside you awhile?

I'm afraid to look behind me.

Don't worry. We'll make a garden of it someday. On your way back you'll see.

Sure I'll be coming back then? Nobody else is.

It will be okay.

How do you know?

Let's see, I know he'll wait for you to come forever. And I know you won't give up until you find him. Et voila!

I really miss you.

I'm always here. Earth and air, you know, both you and me. We're still connected.
 

1.2.3 WEAPONS/ DIVINATION/ FATES

a man in Caithness saw in a vision
supernatural women weaving the
battle on a loom of slaughter, where
men's heads were the weights, and
men's entrails the warp and woof.

(Nora Chadwick, The Celts)
 

1.3.1 WEAPONS/ CHORUS/ FORCES OF EVIL

Irina, hey, Lilah here. Listen, things in the office are going all to hell and I just can't get away. Can I ask a favor? All the lines are down, and I need to send a message to the Senior Partners, make sure I'm covered on this. Yeah, in the contract it's dealt with, I think, Clause 39b? Okay, just say the Slayer's entered the playing field. They'll know what I mean.
 

1.3.2 WEAPONS/ CHORUS/ FORCES OF BALANCE

Okay, so the question is, do we want to intervene? Girl's got a history of confounding prophecy, as we have cause to know. And a temper worthy of the Irish, I mean: my ribcage for a hat. So small, and there she is still standing after so long. The Angel intervention, in retrospect, probably a mistake. And now the whole prophecy racket is far from a sure bet, two vampires with soul, ya gotta admit nobody could have predicted that. Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking that too, best to leave it alone, see how the thing works out. Maybe no cause for alarm. One thing I know, that girl doesn't take too well to interventions.
 

1.3.3 WEAPONS/ CHORUS/ FORCES OF GOOD

Dawn? Are you there? I can see the first stairwell ahead.

I wish I could have gone to guard your back. I'm ready. But what if the monks made me for some other purpose?

This is what you were made for, Dawn. To open all the doors between dimensions.

But I'm way darker than you inside, you know.

Not sure that's true. But even if: wasn't it some vampire that told you once you didn't have to be good to be okay? Use what you have.

Buffy? He was so good to me, when you were gone, he really was. I'm just not strong like you. 

Sisters, remember? Summers blood. It's not our gifts, it's mom who taught us to be strong.

Promise you're coming back.

If I can, I'll come. Tara says we're going to plant gardens. 

Tara's there? Really? I'm so glad. Bring me back something good?

Working on it. Tell Willow it's time now to start to sing.
 

1.4.1 WEAPONS/ SOLILOQUY/ ANGEL

No weapons, no friends, no hope. Of course I remember. Whatever the 'I' entails. Angelus and I, between the two of us, we separated the Slayer from her strongest weapons, the purity of her soul and the radiance of her light. Gifts she gave to me freely, but after Angelus came and she skewered me to close the portal she hid them away and never took them out again. Now, every time she dies, I know who to blame.
 

1.4.2 WEAPONS/ SOLILOQUY/ SPIKE

Once I lived caught in the moment of death myself, the death of Slayers, of William, of everyone I ever ate, and called that glory. Master of the Wild Hunt. Red Man with Half a Cart. Dru was the Mistress of reading entrails, but the making of death answered the call of chaos in me, and I went willingly to all its pleasures. Waded in red blood to the knee, did William the Rhymer. It was her made ashes of it, every pose, every sodding construct I put up against her, all crashing down against the reality of what she was in herself. The weight of her regard. Her best weapon. "Do we really need weapons for this?" she said to me the first time I fought her. She didn't need to be armored against me, she was herself the weapon that brought me down.
 

1.4.3 WEAPONS/ SOLILOQUY/ BUFFY

Weapons chest, hope chest, aren't they just what every girl born ever wanted? I have wielded the hammer of a god, and plundered signage for a stake. Why do I have to stake them in the heart that doesn't beat? This is not a sensible occupation. Every so often, I wish the world would make sense. Every so often, though, gotta admit, I wish there was blood in the fridge and a vampire in my bed.

Maybe it's an attention span thing: apocalypse on the way, right, perfect time to go looking for poor lost vampires who have gone astray. I know it's stupid to feel guilty, but he did all of it for me. I hardly noticed how he changed, or how much I hurt him, but he kept me alive all that desperate year, at great cost to himself. He wanted so little in return, and I gave nothing back. Not a smile, not a crumb, not a word. I took what I needed, as if he was nothing. I hated him for everything he did for me. I felt unclean and I took it out on him. I think in the end he would have preferred it if I'd killed him. Or let Xander kill him.

Guess I kinda got sex and death tangled up together. Basis of western civilization, or so I hear. The ordinary world doesn't have much to say about souls these days. In some ways, I find him scarier with than without. I wonder what that says about me. But I have to accept that Mr Formerly Bad is a work in progress. And so am I. Good times, bad times. I am not the stuff of dreams. And I'm not sure what he is any more. He could rightly say the same about me. But there is.... I trust him to.... I believe in....There is something there. Worth going for. A good man inside him. Someone who sees me as I am, and still cares. He wouldn't choose to leave me. I won't just leave him there, I can't.

It's too late to brandish weapons in his direction. He'll only kneel down and offer himself and break my heart. I think it was always too late. Besides, do we really need weapons for this?
 

1.5.1 WEAPONS/ ECHO/ WITNESS ARIAS

But the thing with Angel, wasn't that supposed to be forever?

So romantic. Couldn't you just die?

Yeah, they both died. He couldn't save her because, no breath. She couldn't save him because, world in peril.

Also, not too romantic when the curse kicked in. Getting a happy acquired a whole new meaning. Entering a nunnery acquired a new appeal.

How could Angel and Angelus be so different? Spike's soul didn't make him not-Spike. And even as a demon he had long since stopped wanting to kill Buffy.

Angelus certainly meant to kill her. Unsouled Spike, on the other hand, teamed up with her to stop him. No fun for Buffy to have to send her boyfriend to hell to close the portal.

Not much fun for Jenny, either, or Giles. So how come there's a horrific Angelus inside a good Angel souled, while Spike is just kinda Spike, not so much bad or good but hovering in the middle, co-existing with William and determined not to hurt Buffy.

But Angel is noble. Spike's not noble.

What, you're kidding me, right? Angel was cursed with his soul: you think Angelus was just too bashful to admit he really wanted one of his own? Give it up.
 

1.5.2 WEAPONS/ ECHO/ MEMORY

Inanna the Goddess of Heaven and Earth, of War and Fertility,
descended during the harvest rite to the Underworld.
From the Great Above she opened her ear to the Great Below.
My lady abandoned heaven and earth to descend to the underworld.
She abandoned her office to descend to the underworld.

(from The Cycle of Inanna)
 

1.5.3 WEAPONS/ ECHO/ INVOCATION

Elements of dark and light, hear me.
The Chosen One is walking now through the Underworlds.
She walks unarmoured through the nether regions.
She means no harm to any: let her pass through.
Emptyhanded she storms the gates of the underworld as once she stormed the gates of heaven, and those gates fell before her.
She is herself a weapon against the darkness.
In the endless battle between light and darkness, she is eternal champion.
She has conquered all the darkness in herself, but she knows your pain.
She has fought the dark in the upper worlds, and given peace to the damned.
She has lost so much, she has little left to lose.
Though she has lost so much, she continues to hold the center.
Though she has lost so much, still she continues.
In the dead ground, new life is kindled in her wake.
Earth, and Air, inhabitants of the outer darkness, the blessed one walks among you.
She is an innocent in this, she has come only to gather.
Grant her the comfort of your absolution.
Give her your blessing now to carry out her mission.
Tied to her fortune hangs the fate of this world.
 

1.6.1 WEAPONS/ PLAINSONG/ BARD'S TALE

And the Slayer came to the keeper of the first gate. "Let me through", she said. "Where is your token?" "I come unprepared. What would you have from me?" "Every weapon you own." "Done." And the gate opened, and the Slayer walked through empty-handed, her burden lighter. And descended the stairs.
 

1.6.2 WEAPONS/ PLAINSONG/ LYRIC

1.6.3 WEAPONS/ PLAINSONG/ BALLAD

What will you give me, Joan of Arc,
To take this calling back today?
Where do you stand, when you stand with god
To take confession or to slay?

I did not seek this calling out
But I am Chosen all the same.
I would be free of it at last
But I am caught inside this game.

How will you keep this whole world safe
If you put down your weapons here?
I am the sum of more than this
And these are not the things I fear.

I have been called and I will stand
Against the dark, until the day
When all my weapons turn to dust
Because there are no more to slay.

I will go unarmed if I must
But in the night, the final test
Is how to save the world alone
One final time, before I rest.

I would give everything I am
To give this calling back today.
God does not speak to me at all.
I went to heaven, but could not stay.

And I confess I wish that cup
had passed from me now long ago.
But I'll still put that crossbow down
And challenge heaven to snow.