Yet more bodyswap shenanigans

One moment Joyce was being threatened by Buffy's former friend Faith. The next, she was watching helplessly as her own daughter fought the woman who had just threatened her life.

It should have been an easy fight. Buffy regularly triumphed over creatures that were much more bigger and stronger than her and by comparison, fighting Faith should have been easy. But Faith was no rank amateur and she had grown up in a neighborhood where you learn early to fight dirty if you wish to live to see another birthday. Not to mention the fact that like Buffy, she too was a vampire slayer.

Then Buffy tripped. Faith took advantage of Buffy's mistake by striking her on the back of the head.

"Now I know how Giles feels," Buffy said just before she collapsed into unconsciousness.

Faith smiled for a moment as she stood over her fallen adversary. But before she could do anything else, Joyce ran up behind her and grabbed her from behind with a chokehold.

Joyce knew she had no hope of physically overcoming an experienced vampire slayer. But she figured that if she could hold onto Faith long enough, then maybe help would come and everything would work out okay.

Then Joyce felt Faith thrust something small and metal into her left hand. The next thing she saw was a flash of bright light. The next thing she heard was a clap of thunder.

Joyce found herself letting go of Faith -- or so she thought. Then she blinked and suddenly she was now the one in the chokehold -- and someone was letting go of her.

She looked down at the floor and saw a small metal talisman. On impulse she raised her left foot and crushed it. But as she did, she noticed that the shoes she were wearing were not the shoes she had put on earlier in the day. These were more like tennis shoes. Almost like they were the type of shoes that a teenager or a college student would wear.

Or a person Faith's age, she found herself thinking for some strange reason.

Then Joyce turned and saw her own body staring at her. She had no idea who was in her body but since she was viewing it from the outside, it obviously wasn't her.

The occupant of Joyce's body just smiled at her and said, "I'm sorry you did that, Mrs. S. You really were a nice lady. If it weren't for B, we might have even been friends. Still... You leave me ."

Then the woman in Joyce's body clenched her left fist and hit Joyce very, very hard. So hard that Joyce found herself staggering back from the blow and then eventually collapsing upon the floor next to her own daughter.

As Joyce lost consciousness, she could see the woman in her body looking down at her with a big sneer on her face. What happened after that she had no idea...

xxx

A few minutes later, Buffy woke up and saw her mother Joyce standing over Faith's body.

"Oh my God!" Buffy exclaimed. "Are you all right, Mom?"

Joyce turned toward Buffy and said with a smile, "Five by fi -- er, Never better!"