"The Gift" -- How exactly did that work, again?

[tkts]

Just got through rewatching Season 5, and I still don't understand the mechanics of Glory's vortex.

It's stated that the vortex will only close when the blood stops flowing, and that's taken to mean when Dawn dies.

1. How does the blood no longer flowing automatically mean Dawn dying? If the vortex is being fed by her blood, wouldn't slapping a bandaid on her do the trick?

2. If the blood needs to stop flowing in order to close the vortex, how does the sudden infusion of an entire adult body full of blood close it?

[Skytteflickan88]

I guess that once the lifeforce has started to flow (blood=life) the life needs to end. It's more about the enery in the blood, not the physical aspect of the blood.

That's why, when Buffy's heart stopped, the vortex closed. She got hit with electricity/energy and her lifeforce stopped.

That's my guess.

[Tea - Total]

When Dawn blood hit the hot spot, it automatically opens and stays open.
And Dawn blood can close it by killing her that why Buffy didn't let her so instead she jumped in.

[ddupler]

I think that by 'flowing' they didn't mean flowing into the portal, but flowing through her veins. Dawn's blood was 'the key to the key', so if Dawn is destroyed (or killed), so is the key's energy. But since she was made out of Buffy, Buffy is in a way a substitute for Dawn. By jumping into the portal, I don't think that that could have been a definite way for Buffy to die (she could have gone right through, or slipped into another dimension), but the fall itself probably would have killed her anyway. I think jumping into the portal, having her float in the energy, and see her die while in the energy was just a way to draw out her death so that the right effect could be given to the audience.