From: davideml@bellsouth.net   
      
   3-13  One Against An Army   
      
      
      
             First air date Feb 9, 1998.   
             The story starts out with Gabrielle trying to perfect Xena's forward   
   flip. She   
   handsprings off her staff lashed between two small trees. Then she tries it   
   without the staff. She   
   lands wrong and sprains her ankle.   
      
   While cooling Gabrielle's ankle in a spring, a man runs up and says a huge   
   army with tall ships   
   landed and destroyed the army in Marathon. Xena guesses they are Persians, and   
   if they reach Athens   
   then Greece is lost. So, of course, Xena is going to stop them. Xena tells the   
   man to run to Athens   
   to warn them.   
      
   Gabrielle is riding on Argo with her foot wrapped up. Xena plans to cause a   
   landslide to slow them   
   down, so the Persian army will have to go the long way around a mountain.   
   Gabrielle asks about   
   Xena's power she had in Chin. Xena says it's gone.   
      
   A soldier tries to take Argo. Xena disarms him. He says he is a Spartan   
   soldier who deserted when   
   the Persian army attacked Marathon. Xena asks him about his home village in   
   Sparta.   
      
   A Persian scouting party is spotted. Xena tells Argo to take Gabrielle into   
   the woods for safety.   
   Xena attacks the Persians. The Spartan is frozen with fear. Gabrielle rides to   
   save him. Then while   
   running away a Persian archer shoots Gabrielle in the back.   
      
   Xena breaks off the back of the arrow and pushes it through Gabrielle, then   
   cauterizes the wound.   
   Xena smells poison on the arrow head. Xena puts a poultice on it until they   
   can get to Tripolis and   
   some medicine.   
      
   Xena tells the Spartan about the landslide and sends him ahead to Tripolis to   
   tell the militia to   
   get ready. After he leaves, Xena tells Gabrielle the Spartan is a Persian spy,   
   and now they will   
   think there really is a landslide.   
      
   When Xena and Gabrielle get to Tripolis, it has been burned down by the   
   villagers to keep the   
   Persians from getting anything useful. Xena goes into the physician's hut but   
   the bottle of   
   serum/antidote is broken. Xena wants to take Gabrielle to Thessaly where there   
   is medicine, but   
   Gabrielle tells Xena they need to stay there to slow down the Persian army as   
   she told the runner   
   she sent to Athens she would do.   
      
   Xena takes Gabrielle to the armory where she has hidden a crate of weapons.   
      
   Gabrielle starts coughing up blood. Xena says the arrow grazed her lung.   
   Gabrielle says she just   
   ran out of time.   
      
   Xena is preparing a litter to take Gabrielle away but once again Gabrielle   
   refuses, citing Xena's   
   principle of  the greater good.   
      
   While Gabrielle is sleeping Xena tries the mind power on a vase but can't make   
   it work.   
      
   Gabrielle is feverish and dreaming and is talking in her sleep, saying what   
   she told Xena when they   
   first met in Poteidaia. Gabrielle finishes by saying she wants to be just like   
   Xena. Xena, watching   
   her, sheds a tear and says she wants to be like Gabrielle.   
      
   The Persian army attacks the armory and Xena fights them off. A soldier drops   
   down through the roof   
   behind Xena and cuts her throat with his sword. Gabrielle wakes up suddenly;   
   it was a bad dream.   
      
   For a third time, Xena insists they are leaving. Gabrielle says she knows she   
   is going to die, and   
   accepted it might happen when they first started traveling together, and she   
   isn't afraid. Xena   
   comments on Gabrielle's bravery.   
      
   Xena releases Argo and makes her run off.   
      
   Xena carries Gabrielle up to the loft and puts a cauldron of boiling oil or   
   tar up there with her,   
   and tells Gabrielle if the soldiers come up after her to pour it on them.   
   Gabrielle balks, but Xena   
   tells her if they are coming after her then they have gotten past her (Xena).   
      
   Gabrielle tells Xena about her dream and says to watch out for a man with a   
   double-edged sword.   
   Gabrielle then apologizes for her betrayal in Chin. Xena says they are past   
   that now, Gabrielle is   
   her friend and family. They embrace and say I love you, both expecting they   
   will die.   
      
   The Persians attack. Gabrielle's dream comes true, except when the solder   
   drops down through the   
   roof, Xena back flips over him and kills him.   
      
   While fighting, Xena spits fire, uses her Chakram, her sword, and a   
   spiked-ball chain mace to fight   
   off the soldiers. She throws the mace up to stick in a roof beam. She climbs   
   up it, kicking the   
   soldiers in the face, and tells Gabrielle to dump the pot of oil on them. Xena   
   climbs on up and   
   breaks thorough to the roof and fights soldiers there. She get a cut on her   
   upper arm.   
      
   Xena looks down to see the "Spartan" is back and is about to kill Gabrielle   
   with a knife. She drops   
   back down inside and kills him  Then she drops back to the floor to fight some   
   more. An archer   
   shoots at her but she catches the poisoned arrow, then plunges it into a   
   soldier. Xena watches him   
   crawl to a pack where the antidote is.   
      
   She faces the regrouped soldiers and tells them to go home, that there are   
   thousands just like her.   
   The Persians retreat.   
      
   Xena climbs up to the loft to give Gabrielle the antidote but has to fight off   
   a couple more   
   soldiers.   
      
   Gabrielle asks if they are dead. Xena gives her the antidote and lies down   
   beside her to rest.   
      
   ..........   
      
   How do the writers keep coming up with such great episodes?   
      
   Although there wasn't a lot of action for Renee (poor Lucy!), they both gave   
   such outstanding   
   performances, it would be hard (impossible) to say which one gave the better   
   one.   
      
   And there were just SO MANY great, poignant scenes between the dying Gabrielle   
   and Xena. I won't   
   include the lines of every scene, but some just have to be repeated.   
      
      
      
   *Xena:  "I am not going to let you die.  I can still get you to Thessaly and   
   the antidote."   
      
             Gabrielle:  "And then what?  What happens to Athens?  What's my life   
   worth then?"   
      
             Xena:  "First things first."   
      
             Gabrielle:  "The first thing is the greater good -- you taught me   
   that. You taught me   
   that there are things in life worth dying for -- things that hold a higher   
   meaning than our own   
   existence."   
      
             Xena:  "Not your existence."   
      
             Gabrielle:  "Why?  'Cause I'm your friend?"   
      
             Xena:  "Yes!"   
      
             Gabrielle:  "Well then, honor my memory.  We both know that I'm   
   right. This is right.*   
      
             [Gabrielle talks like she is already dead! Talk about your   
   pessimism!]   
      
      
      
   *Gabrielle: I know that I'm going to die-I accept that. Why can't you?  A long   
   time ago, I accepted   
   the consequences of our life together -- that it might one day come to this.    
   It has.  I'm not   
   afraid."   
      
               Xena:  "You always said that I was the brave one.  Look at you   
   now. If this is to be   
   our   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)