Barely conscious and unable to move, Angel grunts himself into focus. He’s being held in place by a big purple cloud, made of magic smoke. He closes his eyes, briefly, wondering for a moment if he’s dreaming again, but then remembers the smack on his head and notices the pain in his ribs from the last time he hit the floor. And then there’s her voice, sickly sweet and oily with deceit. The voice reaffirms to Angel where he is and he knows he was right when he studied Amy. She really is crazy. And she never shuts up!

“So the wonderful, self-righteous Angel refuses to help me? You know what? I’m glad. So much better this way.” Amy has a huge grin of satisfaction on her face as she looks up at her prisoner. The purple glow around her just heightens how unhinged she looks, standing there, power crackling.

For no other reason than to prove she can, she throws him from her fists to the other side of the room. Angel goes careening into some furniture with a thud, once again smacking his head.

But Angel never gives up. He works until the end comes. He slowly starts to bring himself to his feet, regards Amy and proceeds, once again, to warn her from this path. “You know I’m right, Amy. Resurrections are trouble. I got lucky bringing Giles back. Ninety-nine percent of the time it goes wrong, and even when it goes right there are unintended consequences.”

Amy laughs in his face, looks down at him on the floor, taunting him. “But you’re not right, Angel. You couldn’t be more wrong. The Magic Town magic is pure. I can do anything. Any spell.”

She moves over to him, getting closer. “I just needed to test myself against you. And now I know. I know I’m strong enough. Willow might be able to stop me, but in time, I’ll be stronger than her.”

Angel turns to her, blood still trickling down his face. “You want to test your strength?” And then he’s in the air, pouncing towards her at a speed Amy can only gasp at. “Then let’s make it a real test!”

Before he reaches her however, Amy simply opens her mouth. She screams at him, but it’s no ordinary scream. It rings through his ears, through every part of his body, until he’s vibrating in thin air, the shock wave of her spell overwhelming.

When he rights himself up again, Angel is glowing with blue energy and, as he looks over to Amy, she’s conjuring a blade, from the same energy, into her hands.

“I might not be as good at killing vampires as Buffy, but separating head from body can’t be that difficult, right?”

Angel growls, the energy around him, shaking, almost trembling. And then he flexes, breaking the spell around him, which shatters like glass. He turns, and kicks Amy’s feet out from under her.

She goes falling backwards, unable to catch herself, and hits the nearest table. The table wobbles and it’s contents head for the ground. One of the items is the jar containing what’s left of Warren Mears.

Amy notices it from the corner of her eye and is horrified. There’s no spell she can cast in time, and she won’t be quick enough. She watches and gasps as Angel looks at her. And then he grabs the jar, just as it’s about to smash everywhere.

He holds it in his arms in front of him, partly for Amy’s benefit and partly because… well, what it looks like. “Maybe you’re right,” he says, standing away from her. “Maybe you are powerful enough to cast any spell. Even a complex and dangerous resurrection spell. But if there’s nothing to resurrect…”

Amy bolts up right and shouts at him. “Angel, what are you doing?”

But Angel doesn’t answer. He propels himself out of the flat’s nearest window and out into the night, taking the jar of gunk with him. Amy screams, her tone first one of panic, but then one of righteous indignation. “ANGEL!”

The Suriname Jungle. On the ridge overlooking the vampire camp, Sam and Faith are preparing their strategy. Sam has one idea however, and Faith isn’t budging on hers.

“I’m not sure about this plan, Faith. Riley is my husband. I should be the one going down there.”

“Yeah, your husband, which is why you aren’t being objective. I can’t use that sniper rifle any more than I can fly the space shuttle. Or bake. Your being our ace in the hole from up here, is our best bet. Cover our escape and we can do this.”

Faith gets up and looks at her. As far as she’s concerned, it’s settled. Sam looks up at her now. “I’m trusting you, Faith.”

Faith doesn’t smile. But she nods slightly. “I got this,” she says, but she’s not sure if she’s saying that for Sam’s benefit or for her own reassurance. “Here come the troops. Miss Zane, you know your job?”

Reese Zane rattles off her previous command with slight snarkiness. “Feed ammunition to Sam and look behind me once in a while to… how did you put it? Make sure nothing climbs up on our six.”

Faith grins slightly at Reese’s determination. “Solid. Okay, Mai, you’re with me. Let’s move.”

As she and Mai move away from the other two members of their troop, Faith motions at her and whispers. “We do this fast and quiet. Any sentries, we take two on one.” Mai nods.

Soon, after silently taking out a sentry, they find themselves in the thick foliage with an open path and view of the prisoners. Faith looks out. Now, she’s waiting for her moment.

Elsewhere, across the Atlantic, Angel is once again in Rory’s bar. This time, however, he’s actually arranged an appointment. As he sits there, notably without a drink this time, he hears a voice behind him, as the chair opposite him scrapes out on the wooden floor and is filled.

“So the amazing Angel needs my help?”

Angel doesn’t appreciate Inspector Brandt’s sarcasm. He’s had a long day. The police officer can tell by the bruises. “I explained what I needed, Brandt. It was your idea we should support one another, remember? I can count on you later?”

The officer smiles now, sarcasm gone. “Of course. I just like to feel useful, so I’m milking it.” He goes to turn to Rory. “Let me set you up with a drink.”

Angel stops him with a wave of his hands. “I’m good, thanks.”

Brandt looks at him, puzzled. “I thought you fancied your whiskey. I’ve seen you lay into it.”

Angel shrugs, not believing his own explanation. “Coping with stress and not necessarily in the best way. Frankly, I haven’t been sleeping well. Bad dreams. But I’m feeling better suddenly. Like some weight’s been lifted.”

Brandt sighs and takes some of his own drink. “Lifted off you and landed on me. Can you feel it? There’s some vibe. Some whisper on the wind. You don’t need bad dreams or guru powers like Nadira’s to sense it.”

Angel smiles for a moment. “Is a sixth sense standard for London cops?”

Brandt jokes, but there’s a seriousness to his tone. “It should be. There’s some kind of storm brewing – and it’s coming this way.” And then he finishes the rest of his drink without talking.

From their position in the jungle foliage, Faith whispers to Mai. “There’s no cover out there by the prisoners. I don’t like it.”

Mai whispers back her own suggestions. “It’s daylight. Vamp down time?”

Faith shakes her head. “We can’t count on that anymore. Something’s changed. Can you run fast?”

Mai quips back: “I guess I’d better.”

Faith then looks over at the prisoners, looks about one final time and then whispers to Mai. “Go.”

They race silently across the sand under their feet. Within seconds they’re with the prisoners, cutting their bonds. Faith heads straight for Riley, and whispers at him, rousing him from delirium. “Riley? Can you hear me?”

She’s relieved when he speaks, but he’s still out of it. “Who… who are?”

“A friend,” she replies. “I’m here with your wife, Sam.” She cuts his arms free and is shocked for a moment as he tumbles to the ground with a thud. Faith rushes to his side to pick him up.

He grumbles, almost unintelligently at her, struggling to stay awake. “Circulation. Hands and legs.” She shakes him slightly, her whisper in his ear louder. “Riley, you’ve got to pull it together. Now.”

His eyes flash open now. He’s beginning to come around. He locks eyes with his rescuer. “Wait… Do I… Do I know..?”

Then Mai screams her name, loudly. “Faith!” She knows that the volume means they’ve been rumbled. As Faith picks up Riley and carries him towards cover, she finds her way blocked. Then, as she sees a group of the tribal vampires surging towards them, she hears Mai’s next words. “We’ve got problems.”

Turning to Riley, still waiting for an answer to his question, Faith drags him now, urgently to his feet. “Riley, we really don’t have time to go into it right now.”

The Pharmacist’s voice repeats it’s usual line for the second time in two days, as the Pixie leaves his shop. “Your mistress is rapidly becoming my best customer. Please tell her the Hellhound blood is very fresh.” The pixie is only half-bothered, replying under his breath with snark. “It better be mate.”

He’s out of the shop and less than a minute later, he’s grabbed by something. It’s a hand. Once trapped, Perry already knows who’s holding him. It’s not rocket science, even to the pixie.

Angel looks down and glares at him. “Perry, isn’t it? I was hoping I’d find you here if I hung out long enough. Why didn’t you clear out of Magic Town when we took Corky down?”

The pixie tries to shrug, but it’s difficult in the vampire’s firm grip. “A fellow needs a vocation, eh? I figure why not side kicking duties for the witch.”

“What’s the blood for?”

“The mistress was going to toss a tracking spell together and find you and… well… kill you. Not that I thought it was a good idea, you understand.”

Angel pulls the pixie close to his face. “Maybe we can avoid killing. Amy wants Warren back, and I want her out of Magic Town. Tell her to meet me at midnight. The warehouse Corky used seems like a good out-of-the-way spot. I’ll bring the jar.” And with that, he lets the pixie fly, empty handed, back to his witch.

Amy greets him a short while later with her usual sing-song tone. She thinks it makes her sound more powerful than him. “It’s a trap of course.”

Perry shrugs. He’s thinking to himself, not really paying attention to Amy any more. “I couldn’t say mistress. But Angel wants you off his turf, that’s for sure.”

Amy shrugs, unbothered. “Fine. I’ll meet him wherever he wants. It doesn’t affect my plans. I’ll even get Warren back as a bonus. Not only do I have the firepower to do it, but I’m learning to use this magic better each time.”

The Pixie looks up at her, sees the mania in her face. She moves to the shelves, rows upon rows of bottled magic. She picks one off the shelf, talks to Perry like she’s teaching him something.

“It’s not just concentrated. It’s different here. Like some kind of unique blend found nowhere else on Earth. It doesn’t matter what Angel’s trap is, because my trap’s better.”

Perry flutters to her side now, nervously speaks. “Should be quite a show mistress. Wish I could be there to see it.” Amy doesn’t turn to look at him. She tells him he’s welcome to come along. But Perry looks at her, trying not to show his fear. “Oh, marvellous, cannot wait,” he says, knowing inside that her madness is too much. He wonders how Ireland is these days.

In the jungle, surrounded by tribal vampires, Riley turns to his saviours with no small amount of sarcasm. “This is not good.”

Faith likes his tone, goes with his flow. “You’re not tied up anymore. That’s an improvement.”

“Depends on what happens next,” he counters.

Faith turns to Mai and then back to Riley. “Wait for the signal. Then fight our way to the rendezvous point.”

Riley turns to her. “Signal. What’s the..?” A shot rings out that exact second, striking one of the vampires in the chest with silver. Riley gasps in shock. “Oh.”

On the ridge, Samantha Finn is moving like a robot. She doesn’t take her eyes from her scope and recharges fluidly. She lays down cover for the group as they scatter to exit the camp. As Riley stakes a vampire, and wonders why they’re in sunlight, he thinks better of asking questions, but does turn to Faith. “Faith. As in the Faith? We’ve only met when you were wearing Buffy’s face.”

“Yeah, I’m that Faith. I’d rehearsed a whole apology, but I’m multitasking right now.” She stakes a vampire as she says it. A vampire in front of them is taken down by gun fire and Riley looks up in the direction it’s coming from.

“That’s some good shooting,” he grins. “My wife?”

Faith smiles. “She’s a keeper,” as she dodges another vampire.

On the ridge, Sam has finished what she needed to do, as she sees Faith and the others reach the foliage and cover. She turns to Reese, tells her it’s time to move, but Reese stops her, asking about her father. Sam tells her he could be anywhere and reiterates that they have to move now, to make the rendezvous. Reese nods.

Within minutes, Sam screams Riley’s name, completely shedding her professional soldier behaviour that she’s cultivated all the way through the mission. Riley reaches her and they reunite with a kiss, a kiss that goes on too long for Faith’s liking. She smiles as she tells them to knock it off.

“Hate to bust up this hallmark moment, but we still got vamps on our tail. We’re not out the woods… uh, jungle, yet.”

Riley looks into his wife’s eyes. He smiles. “More of this. Later.” Sam nods. “Count on it.” Then she’s back into leader mode, turning to Faith and Mai with new orders.

“If we keep going in this direction. we’ll hit the river and then we might have a chance. It might slow them down.” Mai brings up the rear as the troop, relieved to have at least three prisoners alive, keep moving, heading for higher ground.

In Corky’s former warehouse, with nothing but a table in the centre of the large space, Angel waits. He puts his hand on the jar, and then he senses Amy before he can see her. The magic gives off a specific scent. “I wasn’t sure you’d show. But what I’m proposing is pretty reasonable. Take Warren and go. No need for conflict. Bygones and all that.”

Amy stands away from him, unimpressed. “No need for conflict? No, I guess you wouldn’t want that. Not after the smackdown I put on you last time.” Her smiles fades. She’s got maliciousness running through her voice now.

“Counter-proposal. I reduce you to a pile of smug ash, take charge of Magic Town, resurrect Warren myself, and then when I’m ready, take care of that final errand.”

Amy twists her mouth into an evil grin. “And then I end Willow. As soon as I’ve mastered this new magic. As soon as I’m ready for her. And then…”

Angel interrupts her. “You say you’re strong, but when you talk about Willow, you hedge. What makes you think you’ll ever be ready for her?”

Amy dismisses him. “Let’s stay focussed. You’re here all by your lonesome. Killing you will do fine for now.”

Angel grins at her now, broadly. Amy looks slightly nervous. “Do you really think I’d be here without backup?”

As she turns, the entrance to the warehouse opens. The street outside is full of police cars, their lights flashing, signalling an emergency. Angel’s smile increases as Brandt comes in, heavily backed up and armed.

“Here we are, Angel. I believe you promised us a show.”

Amy sneers at Angel and glares at Brandt and his men. “This is your backup? All you’re doing is lining people up to get hurt.”

Angel reacts to her, feigning shock. “What? Them? No, they’re not the backup. They’re just making sure this doesn’t spill out into the streets.”

As Amy looks at him confused, he simply points up. “That’s the backup.”

Suddenly, as Amy looks up, her face is cast in shadow by the demon above her. It’s like a spider, but huge, it’s eyes blinking at the witch as if she were a fly caught in his web. She screams in fright, but then composes herself, unleashing magic from her hands, created by the bottle she’s pulled from her bag.

As her magic seems to work, Amy laughs and shouts at Angel.

“A bug? You don’t think I can squash a bug? Watch me.” She grabs the bottle and uses the magic seeping from its opening. She summons lightning from nowhere and watches at it crackles along the spider’s body, lighting it up like a fly in a bug zapper. Amy grins in satisfaction, but then watches in horror as the spider absorbs the lightning and burps in greed.

Angel has a grin on his face as he hears Amy’s gasp.

“A friend of a friend is a sort of supernatural zookeeper. Set me up with this Najakot demon. It eats magic, so all you’re doing is serving it up a smorgasbord. Well trained too, by the way. And I know the command words. Should I call him off?”

Amy is on the floor, backing away from the demon, it’s mandibles snapping now that it’s tasted her power. It wants more. Amy refuses to give in, or show her fear and starts conjuring again. “Eats magic, does he? Everyone knows what happens to bad little boys who eat too much Halloween candy. They get tummy aches!”

This time, the bottle overwhelms the spider, and it screams in unholy agony. Angel looks up as the spider starts to be fried by lightning and curses under his breath. “Uh-Oh.”

As the energy comes down on the spider, it builds, more and more powerful and suddenly, without warning, sends a shock wave that illuminates the whole warehouse. When the light fades, the warehouse is as silent as a grave.

In the jungle, Sam looks around her. She doesn’t recognise where she is and turns to Faith, slight worry on her face. “Something tells me we took a wrong turn.”

As they walk forward, in a man-made crevice, the group come across ancient tribal statues lining stone ruins. An old temple or place of worship, maybe? It makes Faith shiver though and she feels the urge to leave – quickly. “There’s something unsettling about this place. It’s getting way too Temple of Doom around here.”

Then, from the ridge above the ruins, there’s movement. Sam calls to them. “We’ve got company. Lots of it.” The tribal vampires are back, and in force this time, lining at the top of the ridge, looking down at the small space the team has inadvertently walked into.

Riley shouts when he spots more coming from the direction they’ve travelled. “More of them coming up behind us!”

Faith sees something out of the corner of her eye, raises a warning, but it’s too late, and a heavy rope net fills the gap above them, trapping them in the small space. They all turn and look up at the ridge and are surprised as the tribal vamps separate, standing aside to let someone, presumably their leader, through.

It’s then that Reese Zane speaks. “Daddy?”

The figure now in front of the tribe, wears modern clothing. The team all recognise him as Reese’s father, company head, Walter Zane. The man who arranged the doomed expedition.

Surprised, Walt raises his arms in surprise, calling out to her. “Reese! I figured they’d send somebody sooner or later, but I didn’t know my own daughter would come in person.”

Then his face changes, morphs. His teeth are now fangs, and his eyes are yellow. He snarls down at them.

“I guess I have some explaining to do.”