Airdate: November 3rd, 2002

Special Guest Star: Andy Hallett
Guest Starring: Stephanie Romanov
Randy Oglesby

Written by: Elizabeth Craft & Sarah Fain
Directed by: Bill Norton


Teaser

Hyperion Hotel. Fred’s ecstatic; her article on supersymmetry has been published in Modern Physics Review. Gunn’s happy for her and as he starts reading the article out loud, she goes to him and they make out.

In Lorne’s room, Angel is providing the recuperating Lorne with some room service, but Lorne won’t read Cordelia again: he’s not a champion, just a regular lounge lizard. Angel insists that if he saw something and knew what it was…Lorne cuts him shorts saying that Wolfram & Hart will come after him again and they might not stop with just drilling for the information. Angel hears something outside and goes to Cordelia’s room, Connor’s there. Angel tells him the front door’s always open and he doesn’t have to sneak in. Connor says Cordy wanted some of her stuff, and fills a box. Nothing’s come back to her so far, Angel’s concerned that Cordy’s along, but Connor insists that she’s safe: he can take care of her. He gives Connor Cordy’s slippers, remembering that her feet get cold; Connor says that’s god because she’s always stealing the covers. Conner leaves and Angel swallows hard what he just heard.

ACT I

Fred comes rushing to Angel: she’s been asked to present her theories at the Physics Institute, then rushes back to read it to them (Gunn, Angel and Lorne). She’s still psyched but doesn’t think much of her theories; she thinks they’ll be disproved in no time. She says that she always wanted to discover something, to have those people she looked up to, to notice her too. She sees Angel’s lack of enthusiasm, Lorne tells them about Connor’s visit the previous night. Fred thinks Cordy’s just trying to put the pieces back together, and that it’ll all work out for the best.

Wesley’s Apartment. Lilah’s brought him a gift; Wes thinks it’s either a bribe or a setup. He opens it and it’s a knight’s helmet: since they’ve been butting heads lately, now he’ll have the advantage. It’ll take him hours to “thank” her properly, but he has to leave, he does thank her for the gift. Left alone in his apartment, Lilah find’s Fred’s article laid open.

Cordy at Connor’s is setting the picture of those she knew on a wall, except Angel (Connor didn’t bring any of him). She’s gussying up the place too, making it more liveable. She has her stuff, but there’s something still missing, Connor gives her a two-sided axe: maybe she misses the action. He can train her; she wonders what to wear to go to battle.

Fred, Gunn and Angel are at the symposium, where Fred’s been bumped from a minor speaker to being in the middle of two big ones. She thinks that someone must have made a mistake, Gunn is sure she’ll blow them away. She sees her old professor, Professor Sydell, and he’s going to be introducing her. He says she’s doing some great work and she has nothing to be worried about. She introduces Gunn and Angel to him, and there’s chitchat about her days in class. Angel leaves the heavy discussion to them, Fred and Sydell’s heavy discussion leaving Gunn in the dust, causing some hurt feelings in the latter.

In the auditorium, Angel notices Wes taking a seat in the back row. Gunn sits down next to Angel, both guys are out of their league in this. The presentation starts, Sydell butters up Fred. She stats nervously as Lilah come s in and spots Wes. She makes a call and steps out, Angel spotting her as she does. A portal opens right above Fred and a Medusa-like snake creature attacks Fred, one of the snake bodies wrapping itself around her, and lifts her up. Gunn, Angel and Wes rush to her.

ACT II

Most of the attendees flee, while Gunn tries to flee Fred while Angel attacks the creature. A guy snaps pictures of all this. The creature wraps itself around Angel’s neck, trying to choke him. Angel gets out an ankle knife and rips off that section of the Medusa. The creature drops Fred and retreats before Wes can reach them. Fred is traumatized by the situation.

Lilah is driving in the W&H parking garage when Angel rips off the top of her convertible’s roof. She stops, is taken out, and points out to him that she could have had Lorne killed. But Angel’s not here for that, but about the convenience of that portal opening on top just after Lilah left. Lilah’s surprised but says if she had it in for Fred, she wouldn’t have done it in a room full of people and make a conspicuous getaway. Even though this smells of classic W&H, he believes her. But, he says, they’re going to have a conversation about Lorne. Lilah’s not scared, even with the smashed roof, and gets back in her car, speeding off.

Gunn and Fred’s room. Gunn wakes up during the night to find Fred writing long equations on the wall, she couldn’t sleep. Gunn tries to comfort her by pointing out that demons and portals, they happen; it doesn’t mean she’s going back to Pylea. But she sees it happing all over again, her barely surviving there. Even though he can’t know what she’s been through, it’ll all look different in the morning and brings her back to bed. She’s freaking out, Sydell can’t see like this in the morning, he says she’ll do fine, he and Angel will take care of it.

Morning, Hyperion. Angel has recreated the seating of the auditorium in the Lobby and has Gunn sit down where he was yesterday. The scene changes and both Gunn and Angel are in the auditorium; something triggered really when he saw Lilah yesterday. He begins picking out the crowd, notices that Lilah was only stalking Wes, and focuses on a guy, the one who pulled out the camera, with a “Twack” t-shirt. He was expecting the portal to open. Gunn knows where he can find him…

…And Gunn and Angel are interrogating the guy in a comic book shop. After realizing Gunn is serious about hurting him, he explains that he wanted to see if it was true: if Fred was one of the students that disappeared.

On Campus, Fred is talking to Sydell about some the dimensions she’s come across. He’s open to the idea of other dimensions, but it’s the fact that she’s naming them. Sydell reintroduces her to his T.A., the same one when Fred was in his classes. Fred and Sydell go into his office, he gives her back her last report card: an A minus. He admits he graded her differently, anybody else who would have handed that quality of work would have gotten an A plus. He’d like to teach her again, but she says she has a different life now. He thinks it’s something she stumbled into, she says it chose her. He doesn’t know what he saw yesterday at the auditorium, but he sees now a young talented woman who deserves to live the life she was meant for.

The “Twack” guy says he heard a rumour about the disappearances, 3 or 4 girls before Fred, once since, he goes on that he thought Angel was a rumour too, until he met him.

Sydell leaves Fred in his office when he’s needed on campus, she stays to give him her phone number. She then picks up an out-of-place book in his collection and under the dust jacket it’s revealed to be a portal spell book, including a depiction of the one that nearly got her yesterday.

Angel and Gunn, through the Internet at the hotel, find out that all the girls who were in the rumour all had Sydell as their professor. Fred comes in, she already knows, and he’s the one who sent her to Pylea. Angel swears they’ll get him, She says he’s going to die.

ACT III

Gunn asks what she means by that, she doesn’t know, but it’s going to be about pain. takes out a weapon out of the cabinet and starts thinking of ways to kill Sydell, especially after he played her, acting all innocent. Gunn tries to calm her down, but she’s not listening: Sydell sent countless others to hell dimensions that didn’t make it back, she’ll calm down when he’s dead. Gunn tells her a couple of years ago he would have killed the guy himself, but this isn’t what they’re about. She counters that they monsters every day, Gunn says they help people, if she does this, she’ll be stuck with demons she can’t get rid of. She says he wrong, but Angel says Gunn’s right: what she’s feeling now isn’t going to compare to what she’ll feel afterwards, Gunn insists that it’s against everything they believe in, she may have idolized him before but she can’t let him define who she is now. She gives Gunn the axe she was wielding, saying she lost and goes to lie down. After she’s left Angel admits he doesn’t know what to do with Sydell, but they’d better do it fast, before she changes her mind.

Fred’s gone to see Wesley, telling him how Angel and Gunn expect sweet old Fred to turn the other cheek, but they saw what professor Sydell was capable of. Wes says they handled it well enough, she realizes he was at the conference, he explains that he read her article, fascinating stuff. She says he’s been keeping tabs on her, he admits it. He asks what she had in mind for Sydell, but beyond pain, she’s not really sure. He tells her Angel and Gunn are right, vengeance comes at a price, she has to live with her actions forever. She reminds him that Sydell is a serial killer; that does stop Wesley, he has the appropriate solution for her and pulls out a book. Fred gets a call, weird symbols show up on her display screen and a portal opens up in Wes’s apartment. He pulls her back, and jumps with her behind a couch.

Connor and Cordy are fighting a vampire, Connor doing the bulk of the work until he’s shoved aside. Cordy fight the vampire and dispatches it effortlessly. She’s shocked, she actually did that. She hugs Connor, they kiss until she breaks it off, embarrassed.

Gunn and Angel are standing in Fred’s empty room, they know she’s going to kill him, unless Sydell kills her first. They split up, Angel can reach the professor faster than Gunn can.

Fred’s loading a crossbow while Wesley drives her to the campus. They’re going to give him what he deserves, thanks to Wes. Wes is surprised that Gunn’s not here, he should be, no matter the consequences. She says that Gunn doesn’t have it in him, it’s part of what she loves about him. Wes says she can still back out, if she thinks Gunn was right. She says it’s not about what’s right, he drops her off, and she goes in alone.

Sydell is packing up when Angel comes in, throwing his desk aside. Angel threatens him while h grabs a book, Sydell tells him to get out. Angel can’t do that, Fred’s a friend of his, and that “sabbatical” he was planning for her wasn’t nice. Sydell says to him that he has no proof, and before Angel can do anything Sydell is reciting a quick incantation, a portal opens and a bipedal reptile demon steps out, snarling. Sydell flees but Fred knocks him over with the butt of her crossbow.

ACT IV

Connor gets too comfy with Cordelia for her taste and has him sit down to talk. She tells him that what happened earlier, the kiss, she shouldn’t have done it. She doesn’t know who she is, where she belongs or with whom, there’s a lot to figure out. She’s sorry, Connor asks if she, going back to Angel. She explains that she just needs time to think. She leaves, Connor hits the wall.

Angel’s battling the demon, hitting it hard and often enough to think it’s dead. It grabs his leg and throws him to the wall.

Fred’s got the crossbow pointed at Sydell, who’s on the floor. He’s begging for his life, wanting to talk, she says he never gave her a chance. He know her, she’s not capable of hurting anyone. She says he doesn’t know her: 5 years in a hell dimension can make a girl capable of a lot of things.

The demon is lying on the floor, decapitated. It convulses and gets up, Angel’s incredulous “come on, I’m holding your head!” a new head appear on the demons shoulder, even more enraged.

Fred now sees that Sydell was threatened by her intelligence when she was a grad student, that’s why he sent her and the other girls away, and why his T.A. is still around: she can’t threaten him. He’s begging for her to let him go, she agrees, she’s even got a goodbye speech ready and chants an incantation. A portal appears in the floor, Sydell hangs on to a desk for dear life. Gunn comes in, she says to him she’s not going to kill the professor, not exactly. Gunn says she is, there’s no chance he can survive that, he can’t let he her do this to herself. She says he doesn’t know what it was like, he promises to find another way, they’ll stop him; if she kills him, he’s going to lose her. He gets the professor off the desk before it’s sucked in, then breaks Sydell’s neck and throws him in the portal. It closes right before Angel comes in, asking what happened. Gunn says it’s taken care of.

Back at the hotel, Gunn and Fred leave Angel after he explains that the demon literally had nine lives. Cordy comes in, wanting to talk and they go to the garden. She knows they were friends, and she knows that he was trying to protect her, but she staked a vamp today and she realized whoever she was before, she’s still her. She doesn’t need protecting and doesn’t want any more lies, and Angel agrees. She has to know, were they in love?


Summary by Dannyboy