Nothing ever changed in the Master's lair. Nothing of importance anyway.

Oh, a few minions and undead assistants always came and went, but they fit into the nothing-of-importance category.

The Master had lived in these dreary, monotonous tunnels for nearly thirty years. By now he was deep in the process of going stark raving mad, simply from the razor-sharp dullness of virtually everything.

The Master felt he was living beneath his station. He felt like a giant, gilded cockroach, scurrying up and down the tunnels in perpetual search of an exit which did not exist.

That was on the good days....

Lately the Master had become less prone to shout. For this his lowly, sniveling minions were infinitely grateful -- the echoes made their ears bleed. The Master rarely shouted when a plan was going well. And recently he had bragged often about devising his most subtle, devious plan ever.

Keep in mind, the minions never saw the Master actually working on a plan. He never did anything.

The minions clung to the faint, doubtlessly futile hope that the Master's current plan, whatever it was, would succeed beyond his wildest expectations.

Then, the Master would be gone. Out of here. Splitsville from the Lair. At long last striding the surface of the Earth like a primordial god from the lower depths. Badder than Mars, more twisted than Hades.

On Earth the scene would be chaos, as the population found itself as close to the lower depths of the spiritual underworld as one could get without actually being there,

Thus preoccupied with a personal reign of terror of mythological proportions, the Master would have little time to devote to the insignificant minions minding his former prison.

So that down here, in the place where nothing ever happened, the unworthy minions could walk off the stage of history forever, and never have to do anything again.

Looking back, Buffy realized the entire adventure had begun long before she'd ever realized it. When had it started? When the Master had begun his manipulations? Had it begun with the idea of the exhibition? Or when Mom had moved to Sunnydale?

Maybe it had begun with creation of the Moonman. Or perhaps with Prince Ashton Eisenberg's Prophecy of the Dual Duels. Maybe the Salem witch trials were the true beginning. It was odd to think that certain events of 1692 could have such a direct bearing on events in 1996. If stranger things had happened, Buffy did not want to know what they were.

For Buffy personally, it had begun with the dreams. At first they consisted only of a few images that recurred now and then. They had been going on for a few weeks when one afternoon in the library, Giles, from out of the blue, suggested Buffy write down her dreams first thing every morning. "Before you even get out of bed!" he insisted.

"Why?" Buffy asked, thinking of those images. "And why now?"

Giles shrugged. "Other Slayers have kept dream journals. It might help you get in touch with your inner warrior." He handed her a notebook. "This should do quite nicely."

"For me? Giles, you shouldn't have."

"You're welcome, Buffy."

"Maybe I don't want to get in touch with my inner warrior. I can't be the Slayer all the time. Sometimes, I just want to go to sleep and forget all about this last-stand-against-evil nonsense." She stopped when she saw her friends' faces. "Forget it. Bad idea. Never mind."

"I think she's trying to say she wants a life," Willow said, typing in a series of commands without looking up from her computer screen.

"A life? Whatever do you mean?" asked Giles, taken aback at the enormity of the concept.

"Yeah, Buffy, whaddya mean?" Xander teased. "We have times, don't we?"

"Buffy, is this some kind of career thing?" Willow asked.

"A motivational problem?" Giles asked, raising one eyebrow.

Xander perked up. "A good action movie will make you forget your troubles. There's a new Jackie Chan-Jim Carrey team-up. We can go together. Tonight."

"No thanks," said Buffy, taking the notebook, "I was just under the delusion that if I kept a few private thoughts to myself, I'd have an actual private life some day. Guess I should have known better."

"You are the Slayer for this generation," said Giles, in all seriousness. "A private life is out of the question. And as the current Watcher, I should know."

"Giles, you need to get out more." Buffy said. Then she looked at the cover photo on the notebook. "Who's gramps?"

"That's Sigmund Freud," said Giles in his best you-should-already-know-this-too tone. "I thought his example as a pioneer in the exploration of the human mind might be inspirational."

"Oh yeah. He had a thing about cigars, didn't he?" Buffy handed the notebook back to Giles. "That's okay. I think I can find my own inspiration."

"As you wish," said Giles coolly.

When Buffy got home, she found her Mom unpacking a box. "New shipment?" she asked.

"Look at these! They'll fit in perfectly with the new show." Buffy's Mom held up a notebook. The photo on the front was of a sculpture of a man composed of squares and rectangles. "This is the great sculptor V.V. Vivaldi's masterpiece, 'The Moonman.'"

"Cool!" said Buffy admiring it. "I just so happen to need a new notebook."

"Then it's yours. But tell people they can see the original at the gallery."

Before she went to sleep, Buffy dutifully put the notebook and a pen on the nightstand beside her bed. She was out like a light the moment she'd put head to pillow. Her sleep was deep, deeper and colder than any she'd previously known.

When she awoke, she discovered she'd already written down her dream.

The images themselves creeped her out. There was a pulpit lying in a heap, as if smashed by a giant club. Maggots swirled around the feet of a guru whose face had been seriously rearranged. Graves burst open with blasts of lightning, young women danced in the moonlight, and people or things passed by on the wind, only to go nuts and attack her.

Okay, so they weren't exactly the sort of dreams she'd thought she'd be having, but they were interesting, and they sort of made sense if you happened to be a Slayer.

But one image had struck her as being out of place -- not really the sort of thing she'd associate with being Buffy Summers, a Slayer for the nineties -- but there it was: the moon, with a huge meteor heading directly for it!

Every morning she wrote down her dreams from the night before. After about a month she reread what she'd written to see if anything struck her as noteworthy.

She was surprised to find that while some of the images were indeed random -- as you'd expect in a dream -- others had an internal chronological order.

The story in the dreams began through the image-distorted eyes of a little girl learning how to sew with her hands and how to cook using a huge fireplace in the kitchen. Soon she learned how to gather chestnuts and berries from the woods, and how to grind wheat for bread. When she grew older, she took to preparing the meat. Evidently she'd taken rather well to that chore, because there were a lot of images from the girl's point of view, like plucking geese and chickens and cleaning fish.

Eventually the girl reached adolescence. While the other young women were being courted by the eligible young men of whatever village this happened to be, Buffy dreamed of taking over the household hunting chores. She sensed a tragedy had happened to the head of the household that had necessitated this, but she couldn't be sure.

Her dreamself could use an ax and a knife, and a flintlock rifle whose powder had to be lit with a match before she could fire it. She was a good shot, and Buffy dreamed of bringing down turkeys at a hundred and fifty yards as well as geese and duck on the wing. She was also adept with the bow and arrow, and used them not only for hunting but for fishing as well.

There were images of people interspersed with all this sewing, cooking and hunting. Buffy had no idea who they might be, though it was reasonable to assume they were friends and family.

Around the time the girl was fifteen, the nature of the images began to change. Violently. Indians killed most of the friends and family she'd glimpsed in previous dreams, and those images were interspersed with images of herself killing Indians in return. And, as time passed in the dream, of killing all sorts of abominations. Vampires. Zombies. Demons disguised as Quakers, Indians, or British aristocrats. Stuff that struck Buffy as being rather usual. Only the time period was different.

One night, without warning, the dream became a single coherent narrative. It began with Buffy's dreamself in the middle of the square in a strange village on a starry night. Patches of ice-hard snow were on the ground. The clean, neat square was illuminated by a series of oil lamps. At one end stood a huge wooden church, its position in relation to the shops and offices designating it as the most important place in the community.

In the center of the square was a gallows. A group of angry men in plain black suits pushed a young man wearing a cleric's collar toward the steps leading up to the hangman's noose. A few of the men carried old-fashioned flintlock rifles, the kind where the powder and bullet were loaded separately. Occasionally, when the young man wasn't moving fast enough, they prodded him with the rifle barrels.

Buffy looked down. Her dreamself sat astride a horse; across the saddle laid her flintlock, loaded and ready for bear. A muscle twitched in her wrist. She calculated how fast she could reload, and how many men she might shoot if they rushed her.

She sighed; such an approach was not worthy of the righteous. She fired her flintlock. Into the air.

Some of the men gasped, others denounced her or shook their fists, but none made a move toward her. Her hands and powderbag were a blur as she reloaded faster than any had ever imagined possible.

She pointed the weapon directly at the man at the forefront. "Forgive me, gentlemen, I usually refrain from interfering with matters of justice--"

The man was large and fat, but clearly possessed great confidence and personal power. He looked up at her defiantly. Behind his brave smile, however, lay profound fear, though whether it was directed at Buffy's dreamself or at the situation in general was a little hard to tell. "Samantha Kane. I might have known. You are tardy once again."

"I was delayed."

"By the presence of evil, I presume?"

Samantha Kane shrugged. "What is evil in your eyes, sir, is not necessarily evil in mine."

She lowered her flintlock and got off her horse. The crowd of men whispered furtively among themselves. Samantha Kane did not care. She knew they thought her unusual. Women in this day and age did not ride horseback, they did not travel alone, they were not marksmen, and they never, never were feared by common rabble. Such women would have been accused of witchcraft, found guilty regardless of the mitigating circumstances and hanged.

Yet no one dared accuse Samantha Kane of witchcraft. Her reputation precluded that. "It is good to see you, Judge Danforth, though I wish the circumstances were more pleasant."

"Circumstances are never pleasant in these perilous times, Goodwoman Kane. You are well?" He looked at her kindly, the fear in his eyes replaced by a great weariness.

"I am well. And you, my friend?" Samantha regarded this Judge Danforth as an ally, though she still harbored suspicions about him.

"Well enough to carry out my sad duties. This poor wretch has just been pronounced guilty of practicing the rites of a warlock and of consorting with a witch. The sentence is to be carried out immediately."

"Immediately?"

Danforth shrugged and frowned. "Normally those found guilty of consorting with the devil are given twenty-fours to contemplate the error of their ways and ask for forgiveness, in the hope that their soul may be redeemed. But this wretch" -- the judge sneered--"was a protégé of mine. I had high hopes that he would one day become a righteous leader of the community and would save many souls. It saddens me greatly to see how far he has fallen."

Samantha looked the "wretch" in the eye. They were golden, sensitive eyes, and she found herself liking them.

"Your name, sir," Samantha demanded.

He regarded her coldly. "I am the Right Reverend John Goodman. And you are Samantha Kane, the witch-hunter."

"Among other things." She noted his clothing was filthy as a result of his imprisonment, but he still wore the white collar of the clergy despite his fallen status. His face was bruised and his long red hair was matted. She supposed be was holding up pretty well for a man who was about to be hanged.

"You people," Samantha said to the crowd, and especially to a man pouring whale oil over the wood, "just wait."

"Why?" sneered one, who obviously thought her no different than the rest of the witches.

Samantha grabbed him by the frills of his waistcoat, pulled his face close to hers and growled softly, "Because it is not a good night to die." She released him, then looked around. "Your 'warlock' can die tomorrow night just as easily."

Judge Danforth took her by the arm and drew her gently away from Goodman and the crowd. "Are you defending this man?" he asked patiently. "This devil worshipper?"

"I know I missed Goodman's accusation and trial because I was away dispatching abominations in New York," said Samantha, flashing on an image of the natives rising from their burial grounds to attack a town meeting, "but I have reason to suspect you and the others have been duped. I would know more."

Shocked, Danforth said, "First, Goodman denounced a woman as a witch. Second, after we debated the evidence and came to our decision to try the woman, he was nowhere to be found. He only reappeared after she'd been found guilty and was scheduled to be punished. Third, soon after he visited her in the witch dungeon, she made good her escape. The witch is still at large. What more evidence is needed to conclude he is in league with the devil?"

"How righteous is the tribunal who sanctions the execution of an innocent man?" Samantha shot back. "I would know more?"

"For instance?" Danforth asked.

"Was this witch accused on his word alone? Or are there others who believe this woman in league with the devil?"

Danforth's mouth curled up. He nodded to a man Samantha recognized as Sheriff Corwin, who in turn nodded to the man Samantha had pushed around. "Bring out the girls," said Sheriff Corwin, "bring them out immediately and show her the devil is not in New York, nor Williamsburg, nor any other place people believe him to be. It is 1692, and the devil is here in Salem."

Salem in 1692! Buffy almost jolted awake. This past Slayer had operated smack in the midst of the witch hunts in Salem, Massachusetts. It was one of the most notorious incidents in early American colonial history. Buffy had learned a lot about it from renting horror films.

The man Samantha had pushed around glared at her. "This is your fault, woman. You deny me justice."

"If what you want is just, it will not be denied," Samantha replied. "Now please, sir, do as you have been asked."

"This is Joseph Putnam," said Judge Danforth. "His daughter Heather is one of the girls he must fetch to satisfy your curiosity. Go, man, and let us do what must be done."

He went. Samantha barely noticed. "It is not mere curiosity that causes me to question your wisdom."

"Though that is certainly true in part."

"Yes."

Samantha and the men waited in silence. Fireflies flew everywhere, reflecting in the eyes of the angry crowd. Goodman stood calmly, unmoving, looking at her. A breeze ruffled his long hair. Samantha was impressed by his bravery. She felt that under different circumstances, they might have been friends.

She saw no reason why she should not fight for his survival. After all, was she not charged with protecting the innocent as well as eradicating abominations?

"He is the one!" cried out a young girl hysterically. "He is the one responsible for my delirium!" The material and workmanship of the girl's dress marked her as a member of a wealthy merchant family, yet the sleeves were tattered and many stitches were torn. The girl's eyes were wild, and fresh red scratches marred her ivory complexion.

Samantha recognized her as Heather Putnam. She noted the tips of Heather's fingers were bloody; the girl had injured herself, an indication of contamination by the devil himself if ever there was one.

Back in the twentieth century, Buffy ascribed her condition to hysteria, pure and simple.

Heather and two others approximately the same age and in the same general condition were bound at the waist by a single rope. Putnam and four other men were required to hold the rope in order to drag them in the desired direction. Having brought them this far, the men were now obliged to hold the girls in their place to prevent them from lunging at Reverend Goodman and, presumably, scratching out his eyes.

Putnam's mind was not on his job. He stared mournfully at his daughter and occasionally wiped a tear from his eye.

Danforth shook his head in pity at the girls. Goodman, on the other hand, muttered a prayer for them. The men in the crowd regarded them with horror.

"He is responsible! He is the one!" the girls said. "He is responsible!"

"I thought you said the slave woman was responsible for your condition," Danforth protested.

The girls got very quiet. Heather frowned, deep in thought. The other two pointedly looked at her, if silently asking for direction. Heather nodded. Then, almost in unison, they proclaimed, "The slave is responsible too! Tituba is the one! Tituba is the one!"

"Do you see?" Danforth calmly asked Samantha. "They are all quite mad. And very easily confused. Each and every one. Obviously the work of the devil."

Samantha's sharp retort formed in Buffy's mind, but the dreamworld of the past was suddenly obliterated in a flash of red light, and Buffy realized, with a groan, that she had fallen out of bed.

"Buffy!" shouted her mother from down the hall. "Are you all right?"