- Angel's friends are affected by a man with the power to make other men brutalize women.
- A man named Billy is infecting men with primal misogynistic impulses; when he touches them, they brutally attack any woman that they come across. Lilah is beaten, and several other women are found dead. Angel and Cordelia try to track Billy down, but Fred finds herself in danger when Billy's blood infects Wesley.—katierose295
- At the hotel, Angel tutors Cordelia on sword fighting techniques. They have a little disagreement as Angel teaches her only defensive maneuvers to use until he can "swoop in to save her," while Cordelia wants to learn how to finish her opponent off. Plus, she points out that Angel himself might be the one that she has to fight.
At Wolfram & Hart, Billy, the misogynistic young man that Angel freed from his own cage in Hell in order to save Cordelia from her increasingly violent visions, is in Lilah's office. It turns out that he is the nephew of congressman Nathan Blim and part of one of the most distinguished political families in the United States. He has been missing for three days, and Wolfram & Hart has just recovered him. Lilah finds him in her office, talking to Gavin. Once Billy is safely back with his family, Lilah starts arguing with Gavin for coming into her office and "sniffing around" one of her clients, and for trying to take credit for Billy's recovery when he actually had nothing to do with it. Normally mild-mannered, Gavin abruptly turns on Lilah and starts punching and brutally strangling her. Billy hears this and smiles as he walks away.
The gang are all having dinner at Wesley's house, and they're having a good time. It turns out that Wesley is attracted to Fred, and invited her over for dinner... but he also invited everyone else over so that he wouldn't be alone with her. Cordelia suddenly has a vision of a man beating his wife to death in a convenience store. But the events from the vision actually occurred one week earlier. They investigate and find that the man had no history of violence, and his only explanation for turning on his wife was that he was trying to get her to listen to him as she wouldn't stop talking. Reviewing the security tape, the gang find Billy was in the store at the time of the attack. Cordelia blames herself because the Billy was freed by Angel to save her. Angel tells her that she shouldn't feel guilty, as he was the one who freed Billy from his prison.
Angel goes to confront Lilah about Billy in her apartment, and finds her drinking, with a badly beaten face. She explains that Billy can never be caught because he never lays a hand on the women that he's responsible for hurting. She also reveals that Billy is extremely rich and that his powerfully connected family protects him. She points out that Angel's chivalric concern is misplaced, since she knows he wants to kill her; she then slams the door in his face without inviting him in.
Angel sneaks onto the Blim estate and confronts Billy. He walks right into the house without needing an invitation, indicating to him that his hunch is correct; Billy is not fully human. The police arrive, presumably to arrest Angel for trespassing, and breaking and entering. But "no," an unperturbed Billy explains; they are there to arrest him, and that the police had found a body right where he said it would be. He set it up as a way to get off of the family estate, since they have been trying to keep him there. As they take him away, Billy touches one of the cops, and the place where he is touched glows for a moment. It turns out that Billy has some kind of demonic power such that when he touches men, he brings out some kind of "primordial misogyny" in them, causing them to attack and perhaps kill nearby women. On the way to the police station, the male cop who was touched by Billy attacks the female cop who is driving the police car, until she is forced to shoot him to protect herself. Billy is able to escape when the police car crashes during the fight. At the crime scene, Angel smells that Billy's blood is not fully human. Wesley takes some blood samples, accidentally touching Billy's blood in the process and getting infected. As Angel tracks Billy, he comes across some non-demonic misogyny on the path, as he meets men who speculate that the women just had it coming, or were nagging and "deserved it."
Meanwhile, Cordelia goes out to stop Billy, explaining to Fred, "How can I not [go]?". Cordy first visits Lilah, and connects with her despite being on opposing sides as Cordy mentions Lilah's face, and that she's been crying. She cleverly uses Lilah's own pride and ruthlessness to fuel Lilah's desire to rebel against the horror that is Billy, against the interests of Wolfram & Hart.
Billy has made his way to a party of some kind where he meets his cousin Dylan, who is very uneasy around him. After he leaves, Angel arrives and has a talk with Dylan who is more than obliging with information once Angel states that he's looking to kill Billy. He explains that the whole family has a set of rules when dealing with Billy with the most important being that you don't, under any circumstances, touch him. Billy is heading to Santa Monica to get away on a private plane. Dylan also reveals that Cordelia visited earlier and he gave her the same information.
Back at the Hyperion, Wesley and Fred do some sleuthing. They figure out that Billy's misogyny is transmitted by blood, as Wesley, already infected, slowly starts to treat Fred with hostility. He tells her that she has been dressing too provocatively, that men are wired a certain way, that she secretly mocks men, and then he slaps her, knocking her down. Fred flees, and Wesley starts chasing her with an axe, repeating common misogynistic statements as he goes. Gunn arrives and helps Fred escape, but because he knows he has been infected (having also touched the blood which Wesley was examining), he gives Fred a chair leg and begs her to knock him out. At first she refuses, but when Gunn's attitude starts to turn for the worse and he tries to get the chair leg back so he can beat her with it, she knocks him out cold. She then subdues Wesley with a trap.
Cordelia, armed with a crossbow, finds Billy at the airport waiting to get onto his private plane. She confronts him, but before she shoots him, Angel arrives, and Billy infects him and goads him to attack Cordelia. Instead, he turns and attacks Billy (much to Billy's surprise); he is not affected by the hatred. Unfortunately, it is revealed that Billy has other powers. Using them, he is able to easily outmatch Angel when they fight. Cordelia picks up the crossbow and prepares to shoot, but can't get a clear shot of Billy. Suddenly, Billy is shot dead-by Lilah.
Later, as the entire gang have decided to take a few days off to reflect on everything that happened to them, Angel talks with Cordelia and they speculate as to why he was not affected. Angel thinks that the anger was something brought out in men, a primordial hatred that was always there but that Angel lost a long time ago, back when he was evil. Angelus never killed because of hatred, he did it for the sheer pleasure of it. Cordelia notes that, in a very strange sort of way, the demon inside of him is less petty than humans.
Meanwhile, Wesley has isolated himself in his apartment, as Fred tries to coax him to come back to work. He is too ashamed, feeling that Billy brought out a hatred that he didn't know he had. She argues that what he did was not his fault, that it was something that was put there, rather than something was let out. Wesley agrees to return to work, but as Fred leaves he starts to cry. Fred, hearing this, considers returning but decides to leave him be.
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