SlayerFest '98

“Competition. Competition is a beautiful thing. Makes us strive. Makes us accomplish. Makes us kill. We all feel the desire to win, whether we're human... vampire... or whatever the hell you are, my brother...”

―Mister Trick

File:Slayerfest.jpg

The SlayerFest logo

SlayerFest '98 was a "contest" arranged by Mr. Trick in 1998 in order to eliminate Buffy Summers and Faith Lehane after he established himself in Sunnydale.

Participants

“Ladies, gentlemen, and spiny-headed lookin' creatures... welcome to SlayerFest. Ninety eight.”

―Mr. Trick

• The Old Man ("won") and the Gruenshtahler Twins (killed)
• Frawley (forfeit)
• Kulak of the Miquot Clan (killed)
• Lyle Gorch (forfeit) and Candy Gorch (killed)

The Event

Pre-Event

After the death of his master, the vampire Mr. Trick assembled a group of assassins wanting to kill the Slayer: this consisted of the humans Frederick and Hans Gruenshtahler, two German terrorists under the direction of an unnamed English man, human hunter Frawley, demon Kulak and vampire newlyweds Lyle and Candy Gorch. Each member paid a large fee of money to enter and arrived at Mr. Trick's mansion where the contest began.

The old man and the Gruenshtahler twins, having used advance technology, took the time to spy on Buffy before the competition. The twins watched her from a van whose surveillance was connected to the old man who operated a computer system and gave them orders through earpieces.

Taking place the same time as the Sunnydale High Homecoming Dance, Buffy and Faith would've been tricked into arriving into a dissociated woods in a limo driven by the twins where they would receive a video message by Mr. Trick who would inform them of the event. However, since Buffy was currently at war with Cordelia Chase, their friends arranged that Cordelia would be put in the limo in place of Faith so they could work things out during the journey there. The event went likewise and the two girls were given tracking devices disguised as corsages, allowing the old man to detect their movements and inform the twins of where they were. 

Frawley

After receiving the message from Trick that informed them about the event, Buffy and Cordelia were first attacked by Frawley who sported a rifle. Buffy was able incapacitate him by getting him caught by one of his own bear traps and he was then forced to give up the identities of his competitors when Buffy took his rifle and held him at gunpoint. Buffy and Cordelia were shortly thereafter attacked by Kulak who used his own self-made blades. 

Kulak

Taking refuge in an abandoned hut, Buffy and Cordelia looked for weapons to fight with and found a phone which Buffy used to call her Watcher Rupert Giles. However, he was already knocked out at that time by Lyle and Candy, who wanted preform a surprise attack on Buffy and Cordelia at Sunnydale High School library after they took out some of their competition. Detecting the phone call, the old man commanded the twins to kill Buffy and Cordelia with a bomb. During this time, Kulak had already found them and initiated a fight with Buffy. The twins fired the bomb into the hut and, in the little time that they had, Buffy and Cordelia escaped while Kulak was left to die as he also attempted to escape out of a boarded-up window. 

Back at the mansion, Mr. Trick was then apprehended by police and taken to Richard Wilkins, Mayor of Sunnydale. 

Lyle and Candy Gorch

Returning to the library, Buffy was immediately attacked by Candy, though she quickly staked her with a spatula Cordelia took from the hut before it exploded. Lyle, angered by the death of his wife, threatened to kill them both until Cordelia managed to frighten him into leaving by pretending to be a slayer and threatening him, claiming she was worse than Buffy. 

The Gruenshtahler Twins and the Old Man

As Giles recovered, Buffy noticed the tracking devices on the corsages. In an effort to stop the twins, Buffy covered the corsages in wet toilet paper and threw them on Hans, causing Frederick to mistake him for the Slayer and shoot him, making Hans shoot back, killing each other as they were in separate rooms.

The old man was then left, the only competitor that didn't die or forfeit, thinking he just won.

Appearances

• "Homecoming"