Props to mononoke, because I never would have noticed any X-Files references in this show. Look, I don't have time to watch every crappy SF show, only two-thirds of them.
I think it's time that the Mutant Enemy people and the WB people exchanged phone numbers, because this thing where they're each creating their own version of the previouslies suggests that they're not talking to each other very often. I'm going to stick with the Mutant Enemy version, because at least it doesn't have silly narration. So, previously on Angel, Lilah dug through some files, Gavin Park introduced himself, Angel was bored, Fred said "Handsome man...saved me from the monsters," for the five thousandth time, and wow am I sick of hearing that line every week. Cordy had visions, and if they were visions of Angel pulling his pants off, no wonder she's in so much pain. Oh yeah: and Darla had a little surprise for us.
Wesley and Gunn are standing at the front desk of the Hyperion, munching on Chinese food. An entire hotel full of furniture, and no one could scrape up a card table or something so they could sit down? Wesley says that they shouldn't act differently, but they should "be gentle in [their] inter--" and then he stops abruptly as Cordy wanders through. The boys greet her with a little too much love, and she ignores them and leaves the room. Gunn asks how they did, and an invisible Fred answers, "B-plus, C-minus." Wait, she's not invisible; she's just sitting under a table as she eats. My mistake. Oddly enough, due to a chain of circumstances I cannot easily explain, there was a period of a few months in high school when I spent a lot of time talking to friends from underneath tables. When we start recapping my therapy sessions, you'll hear all about it. Moving right along, Wesley asks Fred whether she'd like to join them for her meal. Well, she's with them, she's just not at the same altitude. Frankly, if I was in her place, I'd try to keep large objects between my food and Wesley's hair. She finally climbs out and joins them at the desk, and then resumes shoving food in her mouth. Gunn politely suggests that Fred might enjoy using chopsticks or a fork to eat her dinner. This inspires Fred to share some stream-of-consciousness about forks as Cordy strolls back toward them. Wesley chirps, "Hello again!" and Gunn adds, "Nice day!" Cordy stops and growls at them for being "all fake-nice and super-sensitive" toward her just because she hasn't had a vision in a while. She insists that she looks forward to her vision, saying, "The Powers That Be have seen fit to choose me. Who am I to refuse?" Wait, didn't they "choose" her because Doyle kissed her? Fred merrily asks why Cordy doesn't use "that vision thing" to locate Angel, thereby earning the $50 bonus for naming the episode. "Because I don't care," Cordy answers. Gunn intervenes to point out that Cordy can't decide to have a vision, or determine what she sees. So it turns out that new viewers just had to wait one extra week to find out all these details. Lucky them. It must be nice to be hearing this for the first time, instead of the hundredth. Fred is told to think of the visions as gifts, leading Cordy to describe them as "having-[her]-head- torn-open-and- hot-lava-poured- into-[her]-skull gifts." Which she was honored to receive a minute ago. I sense some mixed feelings about the visions. Or confused writing. I hope it's mixed feelings.
They're interrupted when Gavin Park strolls in for a visit. Cordy coos over his expensive shoes. Wesley tells Cordy that Gavin works for Wolfram & Hart, and Cordy forgets about fashion. Gavin eyes Fred and asks, "New player?" Wesley steps closer to block Fred from view and tells Gavin to "piss off." He's trying too hard to sound tough. Besides, I prefer the time-tested "piss off and die." That's this week's conversational tip; try it at your cocktail party. Gavin hands Angel a list of "fifty-seven city code violations for your hotel," a copy of which has been filed with the city planning office. Angel asks, "Fifty-seven? Is that a lot?" I assume he's trying to show how unconcerned he is about the violations, but one can't help wondering whether he simply can't count that high. Gavin says he'll be in touch, then leaves. After he's gone, Cordy describes Gavin as a "minion of darkness, Satan's toady...but that is a nice suit." It was, too. Angel notices that Fred is downstairs, and greets her enthusiastically. She agrees that it's nice to be out of her room, and adds, "I've been forkin' with Gunn." Gunn and Angel do nice reaction shots, and ha, I suppose, but what on earth did she mean? "Eating," I guess. We'll never know, since that's when Cordy collapses and begins flailing about in agony as the vision-scope shows us Chinese characters and a hockey puck. Okay, it turns out to be a large coin, but humor me. Cordy calms down and tells the boys that they have to retrieve a coin from "two clawed things" at an herb shop in Chinatown. She heads for the bathroom, and stops to add, "It has a hole in it." The coin, or the plot? Or both?
Cordy closes the bathroom door and looks in the mirror. Wesley raps at the door and gently asks whether the creatures she saw had four claws or five. "Are you certain?" Wesley asks. Cordy pulls up her shirt to reveal five parallel scratches across her abdomen. "Pretty certain," she sighs. Credits roll. That was a super-long teaser.
Wesley is still looking at his books, and Fred is imitating him with a copy of the phone book. It's nice that when Cordelia gets these urgent messages about evil that must be thwarted, they take their own sweet time about it. Sure, it turns out that Fred is looking up stores in Chinatown, but couldn't someone do that in the car? Particularly since Fred has had the time to be distracted by all of the words that start with "H" in the phone book. Angel wanders in, and Wesley announces that he's narrowed down what kind of demon Cordy saw. But is that important? I'm just saying, sometimes they hurry off because, you know, evil stuff is happening; gotta hurry and stop it. And other times they do research for a while first. Apparently Gunn has noticed the same thing, since he points out that they're "burning moonlight" and should hit the road. Angel tells Fred that he has a job for her, which causes her to get all excited about being teacher's pet.
Cordelia, still in the bathroom, gulps some aspirin and eyes her new scars in the mirror. She's got three nasty gashes on her shoulder blade in addition to the cuts on her stomach. Angel knocks and tells her to open the door. She puts her little twinset jacket back on and grumpily opens the door. Angel says that Fred will take Cordelia home, although it's not clear what means she'll use. I'm going to decide arbitrarily that Cordy lives within walking distance of the hotel.
Angel lets Gunn drive the Angelmobile so that he can concentrate on fretting in the back seat. Gunn helpfully notes that they've checked out four of the five herbalists in Chinatown, and asks, "How come whatever we're searching for is always in the last place we look?" Wesley guesses that it's "one of the unwritten laws of being a dick." He'd know. Sigh. When they serve me a straight line on a platter like that, it kinda takes the fun out of it. Off Gunn's look, Wesley explains that he meant "a sleuth, gumshoe, Sherlock." Wesley is so down with the hip lingo of 1953. Wesley then announces that the shop is called "Van Hoa Dong." Guessing that he should try to say one line that doesn't require penile humor, Wesley asks Angel how Cordelia was. Angel says, "She said she was fine." Wesley asks, "You don't believe her?" In response, Angel gives Wesley a very strange look -- like he can't believe Wesley has the nerve to ask that, or something. It's nice that Boreanaz is learning different expressions, don't get me wrong, I'm just not sure this one really fits the scene. As they arrive at the shop, Gunn declares, "time we're hitting the last place first."
They walk into the shop and find an older Chinese couple behind the counter. The woman immediately says, "Your kind not welcome here." Gunn asks, "Since when can't a brother buy some ginseng tea?" The man clarifies that it's Angel who's unwelcome. Wesley goes over the "public building, no invitation necessary" thing again, because Captain Thesaurus doesn't understand the difference between being able to enter, and being welcome to enter. Wesley then explains that they're looking for a coin. The couple look at each other and then leap over the counter and strike an ass-kicking pose. Gunn isn't impressed, at least until the couples' fingers morph into CGI claws. I pause the tape to figure out a way to work "fu" into a description of the fighting, and then I remember what "fu" comes from to begin with, and then I wonder what happened to my brain. So there's a lot of you-know-what, and slashing and clubbing and Angel plays yo-yo with the old man, and the couple is eventually knocked out. Angel then finds the coin hanging on a leather thong around the man's neck. He pulls it off and stares at the blipvert it contains.
Lilah grabs something out of a printer at Wolfram & Hart. "I think that's mine," Gavin snaps as he walks in. He explains that his printer isn't working, so he's using Lilah's. He also mentions that he's moving from Real Estate into the Special Projects division. Gavin explains, "With so much karmically damaged real estate, not to mention the demon infestation, the Senior Partners felt I would be more useful here." Buildings have karma? He adds that he's working on something aimed at Angel, and suggests that Lilah might like to be on his team. Lilah looks amused. Her door suddenly opens and a kid wearing a fez pokes his head out to look at her. She tells fez-boy that she'll be there in a second, then snickers at Gavin and heads for her office. I was sort of hoping that they wouldn't ever explain what that kid was doing; it'd be funny to just see day-to-day life at Wolfram & Hart, with people spontaneously combusting and slime monsters working in the mailroom and so on. Gavin snipes that "just because they gave [Lilah] Lindsey's old office doesn't mean --" Lilah insists that she earned her position, but also defends Lindsey, who "sacrificed his flesh and blood for this company -- literally had his hand cut off, fighting against Angel." Hee. Lilah's kind of protective of Lindsey, isn't she? Lilah's in looooooove. With Lindsey! Point at her and laugh. She mocks Gavin's legal nitpicking about building codes, but Gavin says that he's fighting Angel in his own way. Lilah snarks, "I bet he's really terrified," and enters her office.
Cordy emphasizes how very tired and ready for bed she is as she wanders through her apartment. All this exaggerated sleepiness is for the benefit of Fred, who turns out to be lurking under the kitchen table with a jar of peanut butter for company. Oh, Fred and her eating under tables. Cordelia tries to lead Fred toward the door, but Fred whines that Angel told her to wait there until he called. Cordy insists that she's "right as rain," and of course Fred goes off on a tangent about that, and I'm really eager for Fred to have some reason to be on the show. There is some redeeming value to be found in Cordelia's expression as Fred wonders how rain could be right, "or wrong, for that matter." I have a particular expression when I'm getting irritated -- I don't know what it looks like, I just know that sometimes my friends start yelping, "Please don't kill me!" I suspect that the look they're reacting to is kind of like the one Cordy is giving the oblivious Fred. I may have to keep this episode on tape and ask my friend Niels to confirm this theory. If I look that scary, go me. Fred and I wind up our digressions together, and she asks Cordy, "What's it like to have a vision?" Cordy, nonplussed, comments, "Wow. You know, to you, I am downright linear." Fred ignores this and starts doing a little Selina Kyle imitation by wondering whether Cordy actually sees the events, or just knows what will happen, "like in fifth grade when I saw Grayson Wells, and I just knew we'd go steady, and even though we never did, looking back on it, it feels like we did." I probably should have typed that last sentence as one long word to properly convey how it was delivered, but I don't think Wing would put up with Joycean nonsense. ["As usual, you think right." -- Wing Chun] When Fred finally pauses to take a breath, Cordy says, "Okay! Time to go!" and leads Fred to the door. But Fred's not done: she compares Cordy to Lassie, in that they both warned others about people in danger. Fred says that Angel needs and depends on Cordy, and I think we get the part where she envies that. Cordy says she'd be flattered "if it weren't for that Lassie-being-a-dog part." She asks Dennis for help, and the door obligingly opens. As Cordy finally shoves Fred out the door, she's interrupted by a vision of a blurry, bumpy demon slashing the air. She falls to the floor as the vision continues and...my mistake: judging by the chin, it's actually Jay Leno, who's far more terrifying than any mere demon. Fred nervously turns the unconscious Cordy over onto her back so that we can watch as yucky boils surface on Cordy's face and neck.
During the commercial break, Gunn, Wesley, and Angel arrive at Cordy's place. Cordy has let her hair down to cover her face, and calmly tells them that there's a boil-covered demon at a store "on the corner of Fifth and...something." The demon is guarding a key that the gang needs to retrieve. Cordy hops up as she offers to draw a picture of the key, but Angel pulls her back down. He brushes her hair away from her face so that they can all admire her blech-y skin, and says, "We should talk about this," although I'm not sure what good that'll do. "So, those visions are sucking more and more, aren't they?" "Yup, they sure are." Seems like that'd be the whole conversation. Cordy sides with me, asking, "What's there to say?" This is when her voice starts cracking and squeaking and it's like that time Peter Brady's voice changed, only it's not supposed to be funny. And it isn't. I'm not entirely sure why her voice is affected by what's happening, but it sure does make me want to bring her some soup. Angel asks whether this has happened before, and Cordy pulls up her shirt sleeve to show them the gashes she received earlier. Wesley, who some would have me believe is the brains of this outfit, asks, "Are you saying your visions had a physical manifestation?" Was some part of that connection unclear? Stupid Wesley. Cordy looks in the mirror and moans, "This must be a mistake. The Powers wouldn't do this to me on purpose!"
Cordy presumably takes to her bed while everyone else gathers in the living room. Angel wants to know why this is happening. Gunn makes a totally out-of-character remark that makes him look stupid and insensitive and so, in protest, I refuse to recap it. Nyah. Wesley repeats Cordelia's question about why The Powers That Be would do this. Fred is suddenly given a purpose: to inspire particularly ludicrous ideas which are necessary to the plot. Swell. She says that maybe they should ask TPTB, because everything is really energy, including the visions, so all they have to do is "figure out the frequency and trace the calls." Bet it turns out that they're coming from inside the house. The best part is that, after Fred makes this bizarre suggestion, Wesley says, "Yes...of course!" Oh, come on. It looks as though they're still pretending that Wesley's in charge: he tells Gunn and Fred to go retrieve some books from the Hyperion, and instructs Angel to retrieve the key from the demon Cordy saw. Angel doesn't want to leave Cordy, but Wesley insists that he has an idea. Doesn't he mean "Fred had an idea"? Honestly, though, this might have been a little easier to take if Wesley had said, "Fred's deranged babbling gave me an idea that might actually work."
The Angelmobile drives down a blipvert to the demon's location. Well, that sure was easy to find. He marches in, sword in hand, and declares, "I want the key and I want it now." A nervous guy in glasses asks which key he's looking for, and of course it's a key shop. I have a sudden overwhelming urge to play "Faxanadu." Angel look around at all the keys and sighs, then pulls out a sketch of the key that Cordy made. Hey, Angel's shirt is still slashed from the fight with the Chinese couple! Continuity, woo. The storekeeper looks at the drawing and says that it'll just be a minute, and reaches over to press a silent alarm. The characters in this episode say "just a minute" an awful lot. The boil-faced demon from Cordy's vision drops down from the ceiling. Swordplay begins.
Cut to the Hyperion's courtyard as Gunn and Fred return to the hotel. Oh! Okay, Cordelia's place must be within walking distance, because Angel took the car. Excellent, that's one less thing for me to worry about. Until it's contradicted five episodes from now. Fred tells Gunn that she knows how disappointed he must be that he's not fighting demons with Angel instead of taking her home. Gunn charms my socks off as he agrees, "Why would I want to walk with a cute young woman on a beautiful night when I could be out hackin' and slaying an ugly boil-covered demon-monster, and gettin' myself killed?" Fred cluelessly apologizes again, and then there's a joke about how she's jumpy and Gunn isn't, at which point Gunn jumps upon finding a guy wearing a gas mask inside the hotel. The guy says, "Sure Kill Exterminators -- you can't come in. We're fumigating." Gunn thinks this is a bit odd, because if they can't have crossovers with UPN, how come they can do in-jokey references to a disintegrating Fox show? He sends Fred in for Wesley's books and tells the exterminator, "You've got thirty seconds to show me a work order before I start doing some exterminatin' my damn self." Not the smoothest line, but Gunn's the only character I respect, so let me enjoy the fact that he got more than two lines of dialogue in this episode.
Angel returns to the apartment, hands the mysterious key to Wesley, and hurries to the bedroom. Cary is there with Cordy, who he says is "resisting the process." Wesley explains that since the Host reads auras, he must be able to connect to TPTB. Angel, bizarrely, thinks this makes sense, and chimes in with the conclusion that Cary can use Cordelia to "trace the calls." Er. Whatever you say. If we're dropping the premise that Cary needs people to sing to read their auras, we might as well get amnesia about the fact that he doesn't mind using his powers to aid Wolfram & Hart's lackeys. Which makes me think his connection to TPTB is tenuous. Besides, I prefer to believe that destiny has nothing to do with TPTB, and I hereby resent this episode for suggesting that they are connected. Cary moves aside so that Angel can work his bedside manner. Angel asks why Cordy doesn't want Cary to "trace the visions." Cordy explains, "With The Powers That Be doing this whole Book of Job thing, the last thing I want is more noise in my head." Angel suggests that Cary can make the noise stop, and Cordy sniffs, "I hate looking and feeling like this, but if I lose the visions, I wouldn't be able to help you any more. You wouldn't need me." Because back when she first joined the show and Doyle had the visions, she was unable to help Angel. Okay, you could make a case that she wasn't any help then, but that didn't seem to bother her. Angel insists that he doesn't need Cordy's visions, and that they're just "after-market extras, like a Hurst shifter or Krager wheels." I have no idea what he's talking about. Cordy does, though, and asks if Angel is comparing her to a car. Angel tells her that it's a very nice car, and Cordy decides it's better than being compared to Lassie. Angel tells Cordy to let them help, and she agrees, so Cary sits beside her again. He begins rubbing her temples and drags out the old hypnotism act he used to eke out a living on the vaudeville circuit sixty years ago. "You're on a mountain top. It's warm, the sky is blue, full of big fluffy clouds. You're Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music." Amazingly, Cordy doesn't jerk upright and scream, "Like the scars and boils weren't enough horror?" He goes on about how she's spinning, and the camera's spinning, and their connection is broken suddenly, as Cordy explains that all the whirling about is making her ill. Cary apologizes, and they start over.
Lilah's in her office with the guy we saw earlier. I'm gonna call him Archie McPhee. He finishes filling out his 1099, and Lilah asks if he remembers his instructions. "All that fire? How could I forget?" Archie chuckles. He sits on a table and after taking a few deep breaths, begins levitating. Then he pulls his Fez off to reveal his ooky grey exposed gelatin brain. Lilah looks on happily.
Cary's still rubbing Cordelia's temples. Hypnotists creep me out. Cordy begins twitching, Archie's brain pulses away, and then the blipvert hits. There's an unhappy guy on fire. Although he doesn't look as unhappy as you'd expect a guy on fire to be. We also see a gold demon. Cary is suddenly thrown across the room, crashing into a mirror. Angel and Wesley run over to Cordy, who's jerking about on the bed and screaming. She calms down, as we see her arms are now burned. Nasty. Her skin is all black and dull red and cracking. Archie slowly settles down onto the table and puts his hat back on. "I think she got the message," he tells Lilah.
Angel tells a dazed Cordy that Cary is "unconscious, but he's fine." Cordy rasps, "Am I a bad person?" Her voice is killing me, I tell you. She says she knows that she's snippy sometimes, but she wants to know if she's a horrible person. Angel assures her that she isn't, and says that this is happening to her because she's strong. I'm not sure I care for that whole "you only get as much pain as you can bear" attitude, because it's not very comforting and implies there's some divine justice to suffering, and I would expect Angel to remember that he's committed acts that go way beyond snippiness, and he's not covered with scars and scabs. Cordy whimpers that she isn't strong, because she doesn't want to have the visions anymore. She says, "I tried to be brave, I did, but I'm just scared now." Only she says it all creakily, and was she smoking a pack of cigarettes between takes to make her voice that bad? Wow. She sniffles and wipes her eyes, and when her burned hands came up into the frame, it scared the heck out of me. Anyway, she says that she can't understand why TPTB are making her suffer, and Angel says that he doesn't get it either. I wouldn't expect him to figure it out considering he can't count to fifty-seven. Wesley pokes his head in and does the old "hey, c'mere" head jerk. Angel does the "dude, I'm busy comforting my horribly wounded friend" frown in return. Wesley finally resorts to speech, and tells Angel that there's something he should hear. Angel reluctantly wanders out to the living room.
Fred and Gunn have returned, and Cary is reclining on the couch. As soon as she spots Angel, Fred announces that the visions aren't from TPTB. Cary gripes at Fred for spoiling his news. Angel asks who is responsible for Cordy's visions, and Cary says he doesn't know, but that it's coming from somewhere local. He suggests that Angel examine his "mile-long list" of enemies. "Who wants to get to you, who has the sizable resources, and who'd be willing to mess up a pretty face like Cordelia's?" Maybe a blipvert will have the answer.
Lilah is focused on the game of golf she's playing on her office computer. She, uh...I don't know golf lingo. Well, I know some, but I don't know what it means. The point is that she screws up somehow and curses. She's startled when she hears Angel say, "Jeez, I hate traps," right behind her. Angel explains that Gavin helped him to enter the building without setting off the vamp-detectors. Lilah makes a really funny "oh, that's just typical" face at that. Angel tosses the key and coin onto the desk and asks whether she's looking for them. Lilah admits that she is, and Angel declares, "You got what you wanted. Now it's over." Lilah demurs, and says that Angel will need the key and coin to finish the job. She tells Angel that he needs to rescue a prisoner. Angel clarifies that if he does this, she'll stop sending painful visions to Cordelia. Lilah says, "No. You'll do this for me because I tell you to." She might be pushing her luck just a teeny bit. She sidles up to Angel and starts running her hands over his shoulders, ew, as she says that he could kill her, but then the visions won't ever stop. She coolly adds, "For the record, those little skin problems on what's-her-name weren't intended -- just an unfortunate little side effect." Angel grabs Lilah's neck, which spoils her calm and collected attitude, and growls, "Her name's Cordelia, and you will help her." He releases Lilah, who pauses to collect herself. Some people don't think Lilah's menacing enough because she's scared of Angel. I don't think she's menacing either, but I like that Angel scares her because, y'know, he should be scary. And if he's not going to be scary in flashbacks when he's Angelus, he might as well be scary when he's Angel. Anyway, Angel turns his back and finally asks, "So where's this jail?" Lilah resumes her touchy-feely behavior and says, "I needed a champion of good, a warrior...and I needed someone who could travel in and out of a fortressed demon dimension." More dimensional travel. I really need to update my story-generator.
For some reason Wesley has returned to the Hyperion, where he is examining the mysterious coin. Angel enters and reports that Gunn and Fred are looking after Cordelia. So I guess that after leaving Wolfram & Hart, Angel went to Cordy's, picked up Wesley, told him to start researching, and then went back to Cordy's, and now he's back at the hotel again. How long a night is this? Did they all move to the North Pole when I wasn't paying attention? Wesley reports that both the key and the coin are "considered [to be] objects of good." Angel sighs, and confirms that the Chinese couple and the boil demon were also good guys. He grumbles, "It's so hard to tell these days. Y'know, they should wear lapel pins or something." I'm not sure whether Angel was supposed to be serious, although we were meant to find that funny, or if Angel was actually making a joke. Wesley goes on to say that the coin and key work together to allow entry to the other dimension. Angel wonders what the other dimension is like, and Wesley guesses that, based on Cordy's vision, there will be fire, and based on the description of a fortress, there will be guards. Angel heads for the weapons cabinet as Wesley sniffs, "If Wolfram & Hart are behind this mission, it can't be good." Wesley goes on belaboring the obvious, such as the fact that Lilah might be lying about the details, and that helping her goes against everything Angel stands for. Angel stands for something? I must have missed a press release. Angel agrees with both of those points, and then Wesley insists on coming along. Angel says that Wesley needs to stay behind in case something goes wrong, and finishes arming himself. Wesley doesn't need much convincing, because he sucks. When Angel's ready to go, Wesley puts the key through the hole in the coin, and spare me the Freudian analysis, please. He then tosses it down so that it spins on the floor like a top. Except the tops I had didn't create a swirling blurry light. Wait a minute: there's a magic key that opens a dimensional portal, and the title character is going to enter it in order to save a co-star's life. Do I have that right? Because it sounds strangely familiar. Sigh. Angel tells Wesley to take care of Cordy, and walks into the swirl. He goes poof, and the weapons he was carrying clatter to the floor. Oops.
We pan across a wall adorned with various odd-looking skulls as Angel materializes in a dungeon. He notices that his weapons have vanished, pats himself down, and grumps, "Sure. 'Cause it'd be too easy if I could actually defend myself." He picks up the key/coin combo and spots a stairwell leading toward a flickering light. At the bottom of the stairs, he sees a pretty neat-looking CGI flaming cube, inside of which is a person. Angel steps forward without noticing the metallic gold demon two steps behind him. At last his spider-sense tingles, and Angel turns around. Unfortunately, the flaming cube doesn't look quite as neat when Angel is superimposed in the foreground. The demon, who's all bumpy and horned and has a giant ring going through his chin -- dude, what is up with the chins in the episode? Sorry. Er, the demon just stares at Angel. Angel finally wiggles his eyebrows and says, "Hi." The demon says "Hi" back, and asks, "You know you're not supposed to be here, right?" Angel acknowledges that, and asks after the flaming guy. The demon says, "Oh, he's supposed to be here." The demon goes on to say that someone has to be pretty darn bad to get sent to this "high-end institution." Angel asks whether it's the demon's job to keep the guy imprisoned. The demon nods, "Yeah. I'm Skip." Heh. Angel introduces himself, and they shake hands. Angel asks whether Skip lives there, and Skip says, "No. I commute. It's not too bad. About twenty minutes." Angel questions Skip some more, and determines that Skip's will keeps the mysterious evil person in the flaming cube. Skip's will also prevents them from hearing evil guy's screams of agony: "I mean, there's only so many 'Oh my God, the pain, please make it stop's you can listen to before it starts to bug the crap out of you." Angel nods, "I see your point." Skip sniffs the air and confirms that Angel is a vampire, but that he works for TPTB. Skip points out that they're on the same side, so Angel shouldn't want to rescue the flaming guy. Angel agrees, "I know -- long story, involves a girl, I don't like it any better than you do." Skip guesses that he can't talk Angel out of it, and Angel proposes that they agree to disagree, except halfway through that line, Skip whacks him across the room. So they punch and flail and Angel vamps out and they fight some more. Skip is knocked back toward the flaming cube, and from inside, the prisoner reaches out and tries to drag Skip back into the cube. Angel devamps and lunges forward, pulling Skip away. He asks, "Skip, are you okay?" Skip is. Angel apologizes, and then conks Skip on the noggin, knocking him out. The cube of fire dissolves, and the man inside looks at Angel. I'm gonna call him Llan for a while. He's generically cute. Although he should maybe clean up and wipe some of the ashes off his face before he hits the clubs.
Two limousines parked in a flood control channel, and I, I took the one with less mileage...Lilah paces between the cars, wishing she had a hanky to drop so that the drivers would take off in a race. The Angelmobile appears, and pulls to a halt a short distance away. For our benefit, Angel reminds Wesley and Gunn that if anything goes wrong, they know what to do. Gunn clarifies, "Pop goes the weasel," as he eyes the mysterious Llan sitting to him in the back seat. "Clarifies" probably wasn't the right word for that. Is Llan a weasel, even metaphorically? And if so, how would one pop him? I'm overanalyzing again, right? Angel gets out of the car and a bunch of big guys get out of the limos to guard Lilah. Lilah tells Angel that she was the only one at Wolfram & Hart who thought he'd be able to rescue Llan. She calls him "a remarkable man," and Angel responds, "Yeah, and you're an evil bitch." Such language! Angel tells Lilah to take care of Cordelia, and not in the Sopranos sense. Lilah smirks for the umpty-umpth time and goes over to one of the limos. The window rolls down so that we can see Archie inside. This couldn't have been handled over the phone? Whatever. Lilah says it'll just be a moment, and Wesley pulls out his cell phone. See, even the MoG realized that phones would be useful here.
Speaking of consequences -- and yes, for Pete's sake, we get it already -- we cut to the Yoro Mountains, in Honduras. A certain Shaman, who would almost certainly be played by Graham Greene if he weren't too expensive and otherwise occupied, is throwing the bones, and he doesn't seem to like what he sees. He likes it even less when Darla strolls into his hut. I'm not going to mention that it's raining, because if I get into the dramatic flashes of lightning my computer will be so full of cheese that it'll turn CDs into Kraft singles. Darla asks whether the Shaman knows why she's there. He nods, and she says that he's her last hope. "I've tried everything and I can't get rid of it, so I ask you -- what is this thing growing inside of me, and how is it possible?" At least she's just as bewildered by this turn of events as the rest of us are. The Shaman asks, "The father is also a --" Darla interrupts: "Vampire? Yes. Though not a very good one." Heh. The Shaman needs blood. He pulls out a big knife and Darla obligingly stretches her hand out for him, but he starts shaking. Darla grumbles, "Men are such babies," takes the knife, and slashes her palm. Blood drips into the cup the Shaman holds. He does some Shamany stuff with herbs and insists that the resulting goo has never failed. He pours the goo onto his hands and then presses them onto Darla's belly. Inside her, a little baby monster thinks, "Not the daddy! Stop touching me!" After trembling for a minute, the Shaman flies across the room and says, "I cannot help you. No man can. This is not meant to be known." Darla sighs, "Yeah, yeah, like I haven't heard that before." She rubs her belly and simpers, "Time to go visit Daddy."
time, a fight breaks out at Caritas, and some muses check into the Hyperion. I sense wackiness.