For a change, Fred is twitching and gasping. Wesley tries to give her an injection of what I'll assume is painkiller, but the needle snaps off when he presses it against her arm. Fred speaks for the audience as she moans, "I've sinned, and I'm being punished." The camera tilts so that Fred's head is angled down into the lower left of the screen. Why? I'd say it was "to annoy the viewer," but I've a correspondent who offers another theory: "You are clearly a silly little girly. Now, go and play with your Barbies, while ME get on with the serious task of dragging the direction down to the same banal 'slap-em-around- the-face-with-it- until-they-vomit' approach of their scripts." Hey, I didn't say it. Fred snivels that she never got a B-minus before. Don't worry Fred; you won't be getting anything close to that this time. Wesley weepily tries to hold Fred, but she wails in pain and begs him to make it stop. Wesley puts a hand over his mouth to contain his horror at this embarrassing scene.

Meanwhile, I guess Angel and Spicule are having a friendly chat when Drogyn suddenly asks if Illyria's essence has been freed. Spicule snaps that that's why they came, and spits out a bunch of questions: "What's your favorite color? What's your favorite song? Who's the goalkeeper for Manchester United and how many fingers am I holding up?" It's another two-finger salute, of course. Spicule says that Drogyn can try to kill him if he wants, but they're in a hurry. Kind of. Drogyn says that to return Illyria to the Deeper Well "requires a champion who has traveled from where it lies to where it belongs." Angel notes that they've done that. Drogyn repeats that he didn't know that Illyria was free. Reaction shot of Angel, except without the part where he has a reaction. Everyone stares around for, seriously, almost ten seconds. They're in a race against time, you know. Finally Drogyn remembers his line: "If we bring the sarcophagus back to the Well, it will draw Illyria out of your friend and into every single person between here and there. It will become the mystical equivalent of airborne." I spent quite a long time puzzling over this, because for being kind of important, it's not explained very well. So, I think the deal is, Drogyn can magically drag the sarcophagus back to the Well. If Illyria were still in the sarcophagus, that would solve the problem. Since it isn't, Illyria will still be dragged along, as if it's mystically tied to the sarcophagus, but by pulling it out of Fred, they will actually give it more freedom for a while, letting it infect lots of other people until it's finally yanked back into the Well. Or something. That's the only translation I can come up with that makes much sense, so I guess I'm stuck with it. Drogyn sums it up with several dramatic pauses: "Tens, maybe hundreds of thousands...will die in agony...if you save her." Angel says, "No," and walks over to stare down into the Well. Spicule looks down and says, "That's madness." Drogyn says, "This is a place of madness." I shout, "This goddamn script is a work of madness!" Drogyn says that he'll prepare the spell while Angel decides what to do, and walks off. Angel stares some more, and Spicule looks down into the Well from the other side of the bridge, like maybe he thinks Angel's spotted something interesting down there. Then Angel grunts, "Hell with the world," and chases after Drogyn.