Angel

The episode begins with Lorne doing his phone thing, walking down the halls of W&H, pushing a new movie concept he describes as Grapes of Wrath in outer space. (Nod to Firefly, perhaps?) He’s juggling phone calls and cell phones, his assistant Van at his side, nodding to various employees as he passes. He reaches Harmony’s desk and they exchange cutesie-poo greetings. Where’s Angel? Returning from a mission, and he didn’t sound happy. Which makes more sense as he appears on the scene, roughed up a bit and covered in green goo.

Wes asked him how their new techie weapon worked, and Angel tosses it to him, saying it didn’t. Wes says he’ll take it back to Fred and the drawing board. Lorne moves in to try and talk to Angel and follows him into his office, but Angel tells him he’s tired and gooey and wants a shower before he deals with anything else. Lorne moves off, now looking at draft promotional materials. His office door is covered in post-it notes. He dismisses Van and collapses into a chair in front of a large mirror, head in hands. Suddenly, the Lorne in the mirror looks up at him and starts trying to give him a pep talk. Lorne throws something at the mirror, shattering it. Undeterred, his reflection starts singing, and Lorne dances out of his office, now singing himself.

Angel, wrapped in a towel from the waist down after his shower, emerges to discover Eve waiting for him. She explains she had a key — which Angel promptly takes from her. She comments on the long shower — was he taking care of other things? She reminds him they had a meeting scheduled. They go to the lobby together, where there are Halloween-type decorations scattered everywhere. Angel asks what’s going on, and Lorne tells him it’s for the Wolfram & Hart annual Halloween party. He’s sent Angel numerous memos on the subject. That’s what the meeting was about. Lorne is concerned because the most important guests seem to be giving it a miss. Angel asks where’s the bad in that — the clients are all evil to begin with, and he doesn’t want to be doing this party anyway. Lorne gets upset; then calms down and asks Angel to meet him at Angel’s office in 25 minutes.

Wes, Fred and Knox are discussing their defective weapon hybrid, and what might have gone wrong. Lorne walzes in, giving Halloween greetings, and telling them he needs their help with the party. Fred and Wes confess they hadn’t really planned to go. They want to work on the defective weapon. Lorne pleads with them — surely someone else can work on that? — and he really needs them. Knox offers to work on the problem, and they agree to meet in Angel’s office.

Lorne then goes after Gunn. Tells him he needs his help to get Angel on the party parade. Tells Gunn he needs to assert himself more, stake out his territory. Gunn, who is reading a legal file this whole time and not paying much attention, agrees — once he finishes his work. Lorne tells him about the meet in Angel’s office.

The meeting. Angel is there, along with Eve, Gunn, Fred and Wes. And Spike. Spike is griping about how no proper demon would be going out on Halloween —it’s for the posers and wannabes. Lorne comes in, reiterates how important the party is. Gunn backs him up. They have to keep face — show who’s in charge and that the new team is not going away. Eve points out the party is also for their employees, who need some decompressing. Reluctantly, Angel agrees to work the party.

Angel goes with Lorne to convince Sebassis to attend. Sebassis is kind of demon royalty — if he comes, everyone will come. Lorne says he’ll do the talking. Sebassis, flanked by demons and demon slaves in speedos, isn’t impressed by Angel — he preferred Angelus. As offered, Lorne does the talking, asking Sebassis to reconsider — and Sebassis does, much to the surprise of his number two, Artode. Thrilled, Lorne hustles Angel out of there before he can gum up the works. Artode expresses concern that they will be in danger, and Sebassis assures him they will come prepared to deal with any threat or treachery.

The Halloween party is NOT going well. Disco playing, but no one is dancing, except Harmony, by her lonesome. Guests are keeping to themselves. Employees are bitching about how much worse this party is then last year’s. Lorne moves among them, encouraging folks to have a good time.

Wes and Fred are hanging out near a food table, looking miserable and uncomfortable. Wes is nursing a beer; Fred is munching on a few veggies. They watch Lorne, across the room, surrounded by a group of guests, making them crack up at something he said. He notes how good he is at this party stuff, unlike them. Lorne comes over to them, chides them to get into the spirit of things. He sees how uncomfortable they are — and latches onto the problem: it’s Halloween, and they’re sober. They should be drunk by now!

Lorne moves away as another demon, Devlin, calls him over to see his costume — he’s dressed as a human *bean*, complete with uncomfortably realistic looking human face. Devlin asks where the head honcho is — Angel is not at his own party. Lorne goes off to fetch him, get him to the party.

Spike is at the party, and Harmony is urging him to dance with her. He says he’ll go to hell sooner than dance. He’s still griping about being there. Angel and Lorne show up, and Angel and Spike both wonder what the other is doing there. Spike snarks about the party, and Lorne suggests that he might try to be a wee bit more positive.

Their attention is taken when Sebassis arrives, oohs and ahs running through the crowd. Angel is whining — does he have to be nice to him? Lorne says yes — he does. So Angel goes over and greets Sebassis very enthusiastically — rather to Sebassis’ surprise. Lorne, meanwhile, is greeting Artode and complimenting his jacket. Artode explains rather nastily that it’s made from a Pylean he hunted down himself — anyone Lorne knows? Not so happy now, Lorne keeps his happy face on and makes pleasantries. Angel is still telling Sebassis how great he looks, and thanking him profusely for coming.

Meanwhile, Fred and Wes are swaying their way around, looking very drunk. Harmony warns them to watch their step — someone peed on the floor. Gunn is chatting with a client when Lorne comes over; they express pleasure at how well the party seems to be going now.

Spike is talking to a demon by the bar. His mood has changed 180 degrees, and he’s bouncy and exuberant. He’s showing off his latest skill — using his ghostly powers to move a swizzle stick around. Isn’t that cool? The demon gets his drink, and get the heck away from the weird ghostie. Spike remains excited — great party!

Sebassis and Artode are meanwhile watching for traps, when Artode excuses himself to visit the little boys room. I guess even demons gotta go — some of them anyway.

Eve is chatting with Angel. She’s really impressed at how he handled Sebassis — never expected that of him. They’re teasing each other when Lorne walks by and makes a joke about the sexual tension between them — he tells them to get a room. They look at each other blankly. And then...

Angel and Eve are macking it up bigtime in Angel’s office. They agree it’s a bit sudden — and neither of them even knows the other’s last name — but what the hey. Let’s get it on...

Artode, unfortunately, is not having nearly so good a time. He’s still in a stall in the men’s room, when he hears a growl. He’s reaching for a weapon when he is confronted by a huge figure (we see the shadow, not the reality). And then we see blood — lots of it.

Party is still going gangbusters. Sebassis is wondering where Artode has got to. Fred and Wes are still weaving their way unsteadily around. They realize they are drunk. How much did they have? Fred — well, nothing. Wes — oh, must be a few sips. That’s odd. Odder is when Gunn comes up to them and pees on Wes’ shoes. Positively alarming is when Spike comes up to them beaming and joyful and excited about the great party. Now they know there’s something wrong. Gunn asks Spike when he started to be so cheerful. Spike thinks on it, says it was after he spoke with Angel and Lorne — Lorne told him to be more positive. Lorne comes over to them, and they all turn wary eyes on him (except Spike, who is too upbeat to be concerned about anything).

The gang reconvenes in Lorne’s office. Lorne has done something to them — Spike is positive, Wes and Fred are drunk, without the benefit of having imbibed alcohol — and Gunn is peeing all over the place. Spike is making rapturous comments about Angel’s desk. Gunn suddenly realizes that Lorne told him to stake out his territory, and he’s been *marking* — that’s what the peeing is all about.

They figure out that it’s because Lorne had his sleep removed. There weren’t enough hours in the day for Lorne to get everything done and sleep too, so he arranged to get rid of it. Problem is, that’s apparently a bad thing for an empath demon. Angel orders Wes and Fred to find Lorne’s sleep and figure out how to put it back.

Meanwhile, Sebassis and his slaves have found what’s left of Artode. And they are not happy.

Wes and Fred start looking in the W&H storage area for Lorne’s sleep, which has been deposited in a vial. As they look, Fred says they should do this kind of thing more often — be friendly and hang out and tell each other stuff. Wes wholeheartely agrees. Fred asks Wes what he thinks of Knox. Crash.

Sebassis and his folks burst into Angel’s office, ready to kill him for betraying them. Lorne tries to play peacemaker. Meanwhile, Wesley has found some disturbing information: if sleep- deprived, empath demons can start directing destinies instead of interpreting them. And if the condition continues, their subconscious can physically manifest.

Down in the lobby now, Lorne is weakly trying to explain that he is the one responsible, and that it’s all an accident. Sebassis’ response is to threaten to kill Lorne first. Suddenly, they are interrupted by a roar — from a huge *monster* that jumps from the balcony to the dance floor. It’s Monster-Lorne, over-sized and out to kill!

The crowd of partygoes scatters as MonsterLorne steps forward. It starts attacking Sebassis’ people, and when Lorne tries to intervene, it tosses him aside as well. MonsterLorne moves in to kill Sebassis, but Angel intercepts the blow and tells Sebassis to run. Gunn and Angel take on Monster Lorne, and get tossed around the room. Wes and Fred burst in on the scene. Fred has a very odd-looking gun, which she fires at real Lorne, just as MonsterLorne was about to pulverise Angel. Lorne collapses, falling asleep, and Monster Lorne disappears.

Next day. Employees are talking about what a great party it was. Knox, seeing the destruction, is really sorry he missed out, but he thinks he’s fixed their malfunctioning weapon. He can’t imagine why he offered to do it that night, and Fred notes she wished he was at the party. He suggests they go have coffee together.

In Angel’s office, Lorne is dozing on the couch. Wes is talking to Angel, and Spike is perched on the desk. Wes and Angel are trying to make sense of what happened with Lorne and his subconscious. Eve passes by, and Angel says he supposes they should talk. Eve remarks it’s not like it was the first time she’d had sex under a mystic influence.

Wes leaves, and Gunn arrives. He’s smoothed things over with Sebassis’ people. They’re actually okay with what happened — they enjoy a little blood and guts at their social gatherings. He also warns Angel not to sit in his chair. He’s already called the janitor. What? Oh. Spike thinks it’s hilarious that Gunn peed in Angel’s chair. Gunn asks Spike to please turn off the good cheer. Spike says the Lorne thing wore off awhile ago; he just thinks it’s funny. Angel chases everyone out of the room so Lorne can sleep. And he does.