Angel

When Angel tells Spike that he wishes he had someone who could tell him what the Senior Partners are up to these days, Spike says he knows just such a person. A bit later they arrive at Lindsey’s apartment, where Eve is still hiding. Angel threatens to tell the Senior Partners where Eve is if she doesn’t help them, but before he can do so, the walls begin to shake and Eve, trembling, begs Angel to save her. A moment later a well-dressed man named Hamilton enters, but the room is empty. Angel, Spike, and Eve return to Angel’s office, where Angel tells Harmony to lock down the building. Then Angel visits Gunn, who’s still in the hospital wing, and learns he can take custody of a wayward employee, which should help him protect Eve from the Senior Partners. Angel thanks Gunn, but warns him that no matter how guilty he feels for his role in Fred’s death, he can’t hide in the hospital forever. Meanwhile, at Fred’s apartment, Wesley dreams about Fred, but when he wakes it’s Illyria watching him from Fred’s body. Illyria comments on Wes’ nightmare, saying that if this world is so disappointing, he should leave. Back at Wolfram and Hart, Angel tells Eve he can protect her, but demands that in return, she tell him all she knows about the Senior Partners. She says she knows nothing Angel doesn’t already know. She does say, though, that Lindsey knew much more than she, which is why the Senior Partners snatched him away. Also, although Angel assumed Lindsey was dead, Eve says he’s probably locked in some sort of hell dimension. Then we see Lindsey (wearing a distinctive necklace) waking up, kissing his beautiful wife, and cuddling his adorable 9-year-old son in a perfect suburban utopia.

A bit later Lindsey steps out of his perfect house, picks up his perfectly centered newspaper, waves to the perfect postman, and goes back inside. At Wolfram and Hart, Spike and Angel try to figure out which hell Lindsey’s in, but then Gunn enters and says he knows where Lindsey is. Meanwhile, in suburbia, as Lindsey helps his son Zach with his science homework, Lindsey’s wife Trish asks Lindsey to get a light bulb from a shelf in the basement, which makes Lindsey very nervous. At the same time Gunn directs Angel and Spike to a special Wolfram and Hart car that drives them through a long tunnel to the perfect suburban neighborhood. At Fred’s apartment, Wesley turns Illyria’s suggestion around, saying that if she’s not happy here, then perhaps she should leave. Illyria gets mad, but then breaks down, saying the walls are closing in on her and she can’t breathe. Back in suburbia, the Wolfram and Hart car arrives at Lindsey’s house. Angel, Spike, and Gunn go in, but Lindsey doesn’t recognize them, and says he’s never heard of Wolfram and Hart. Meanwhile, back at Angel’s office, Harmony assures Eve that nothing can happen to her... but then sirens blare, announcing an intruder. Hamilton punches out a guard in the lobby, and as he approaches Angel’s office, Eve, Lorne, and Harmony scream. Back in suburbia Angel snatches off Lindsey’s necklace. The spell he was under ends, and he finally recognizes Angel. Then Trish enters with an Uzi and starts shooting.

While Angel fights Trish, the others run outside, but their magic car has vanished. As Zach enters with another Uzi, Gunn says the only way out is through something called the Wrath. He asks Lindsey what’s behind the cellar door, and when Lindsey reacts fearfully, they realize they’ve chosen correctly. Back at Wolfram and Hart, Eve, Lorne, and Harmony flee to the elevator. Hamilton chases them, but the doors close just in time. In Lindsey’s basement Angel, Spike, and Gunn are shocked to find a fully outfitted torture chamber, including a pile of bloody human hearts that have been brutally cut from their owners. There’s also a large furnace where an intense fire - the Wrath - flares. Before they can figure out how to open it, however, a massive medieval demon, outfitted as an executioner, appears. Angel and Spike grab weapons and start to fight the demon, but then Gunn steps back and dons the necklace Lindsey used to wear. As he does, the demon senses him and stops fighting. Angel realizes what’s happening, and Gunn explains that if someone is freed from this torture dimension, another person must remain behind. Angel realizes that Gunn planned this as his own penance from the beginning, but Gunn is already starting to fade away, and there’s nothing they can do. As the demon starts to fade, too, Angel, Gunn, and Lindsey walk into the Wrath’s flames while Trish calls down to Gunn, who suddenly can’t remember why he’s in the basement. A moment later, as Lorne, Eve, and Harmony flee through the Wolfram and Hart garage, Angel, Spike, and Lindsey, still flaming a bit, hit the hood of their car. Lorne and Eve jump out to help them, but then Hamilton arrives.

Eve cringes, but as Hamilton approaches, instead of a weapon, he whips out a contract and instructs her to sign it. Finally, resigned, she does, and Hamilton explains that Eve has been fired by the Senior Partners, and he is taking her place as Angel’s new liaison. He tells Angel he’s looking forward to working with him, welcomes Spike to the team, and leaves. Back at Fred’s apartment Wesley and Illyria stand on the balcony, looking out at the city. She’s calmer now, and says she can breathe again and doesn’t feel quite so trapped here. Wes realizes finally that she really can’t leave, and she marvels at how Wesley can stand to live here, shut inside tiny rooms all the time... but he says it’s not the rooms that make it hard. Finally, at Wolfram and Hart, Angel asks Lindsey about the Senior Partners and Lindsey says Angel already knows what he knows: the world’s a bad place. Angel insists he’s done a lot of good since coming to Wolfram and Hart, but Lindsey says hell and the apocalypse are going on right here, right now. Angel doesn’t believe him, but Lindsey points out all the compromises Angel’s been forced to make lately, and gradually Angel realizes that everything he’s been doing in the past few months has been just a distraction to keep him busy so he won’t notice the real evil... which must have been the Senior Partners’ plan all along. As the horror of this sinks in, we see Gunn sitting with Zach at the kitchen table, going through the same science lesson Lindsey was helping him with earlier. Then Trish asks Gunn to go down to the basement to fetch a new light bulb.