Plot
The episode begins with a flashback to Caroline/Echo’s engagement. She and Adelle talk about her “employment” at the Dollhouse. An incident Caroline witnessed is mentioned, and Adelle remarks that this game has been going on for two years now. The name “Rossum Corporation” comes up.
Jump to the present: two students find a fellow student sitting half-naked in the lab, talking to flies trapped in a jar. When they speak to him, he unscrews the jar, lets the flies out and then, without warning, starts banging his head against the lab window. His friend tries to stop him but is pushed back and lands in the shards of the fly jar.
The half-naked student keeps slamming his head against the windows. The other two students start laughing uncontrollably while their friend beats himself bloody. The camera pulls away from the scene, and the words “Rossum Building” can be seen on the building.
The head of the Rossum Corporation visits Adelle and orders a whole army of dolls for the campus. It is about a drug that has got among the students. It is dangerous because it affects impulse control, so that a single vial could wipe out the entire student body. The dead student had also taken some of the drug.
A second vial has gone missing, and it is suspected that it is still on campus – which puts all the students in danger. Strictly speaking, the CEO has two jobs for the Dollhouse: Topher is to develop an antidote, and some of the dolls are to be spread across the campus. They are immune to the drug because it targets a part of the brain that is shut down in the Actives.
Meanwhile Agent Ballard is in the kitchen making breakfast for himself and Mellie. Mellie joins him and asks about what happened the night before. Ballard says he would like to look after her. He also tells her that he ran Hearn – whom Mellie killed – through the FBI database and found out that the killer had connections to the Dollhouse.
He makes clear to Mellie that he wants to keep working on the case despite his suspension. The young woman tells him she is afraid and advises him to give up.
Shortly afterwards several black vans pull up on the campus. A group of dolls imprinted as NSA special agents is to find the missing vial under Victor’s command. Sierra is placed there as a doctor from the disease control unit.
At that point Echo is still busy with another engagement with a young man. By chance she switches on the news, where the incidents at the university are being reported. She has flashbacks from her real life. She has the sudden feeling that she must help “him” and leaves the client where he is – tied to the bed – to drive to the campus.
Flashback: Caroline is lying in bed with a young man – her boyfriend.
In the Dollhouse, Topher uses Mellie as a test subject for the antidote. Since she is immune, he can do so without any problem. Adelle is present too. She says that the Rossum Corporation is the only reason the Dollhouse exists, and that there is only one reason she is not head of the company: because the real boss could not handle her job.
Echo arrives at the university but no longer quite knows what she wants there. Victor speaks to her and, because she is so confused, assumes she has taken the drug; he leads her away. Meanwhile a real user of the drug approaches Boyd.
Echo is taken to a room with the other “infected” students, where she is to be given an injection of the antidote, but she resists. She has another memory from her real life and repeats that she must save “him”. When another student asks whom she has to save, she says she does not know. She says she has to get into the Rossum building.
The other student pricks up his ears and asks whether she thinks the drug was put in their water and they were used as guinea pigs. Echo is confused, and the young man explains what he means.
Echo repeats that she has to get into the lab. The student explains that this could be difficult, since security is guarding the grounds everywhere. But Echo replies that she thinks she knows a way in, and that this frightens her a little. The other student offers to help because he wants to resolve the situation and put those responsible in prison.
He introduces himself as Sam, Echo as Alice. The two escape from the quarantine room but are caught halfway by Boyd. He asks Echo whether she wants treatment, but she refuses. Boyd’s reaction makes it clear that he too has taken some of the drug.
Flashback: Caroline is having dinner with her boyfriend and two other young people. They talk about the Rossum Corporation, and Caroline makes it unmistakably clear that she thinks nothing of the company. She says they experiment on animals and that she wants to break into the company to prove it.
Meanwhile Victor and his team are in the lab examining the dead student’s bloodstains. Mr. Dominic is there too, reduced to watching because Victor has taken control of the case. It turns out that Mr. Dominic is also infected. When Victor tries to send him to the doctor, Dominic threatens him with a gun, but Victor takes it from him. Dominic is taken to quarantine. Victor informs Adelle.
She passes the information on to Topher – but in vain, because he seems to have taken some of the drug too, as does Adelle a few minutes later.
Sam and Echo have escaped to his room. Echo explains that she does not actually study at the university but was drawn there after seeing the news that morning. Sam gets a map of the campus, and they consider how best to get into the lab. Echo says they have to find “Lilly Foundry”.
In the Dollhouse the situation gets worse. Adelle is jumping on a trampoline while Topher gathers his last clear thoughts and phones Victor. He explains that the drug is very dangerous and must be found. He gets a second call – Boyd. Adelle snatches the phone from Topher and asks whether Echo is in custody. But Boyd plays her a piece on the piano, which moves her and Topher to tears.
Echo and Sam walk across the campus, where a professor speaks to Echo. She calls her Caroline – but then bursts out laughing uncontrollably, which suggests she has taken the drug.
Topher and Adelle are lying on the floor in Topher’s room eating sweets. Adelle says that we make choices and then we die with them. She mentions Echo and Caroline but is interrupted by Mellie, who is suddenly standing in the doorway and asks whether they could drop the subject. She collapses in tears.
Topher explains that Mellie remembers. Shortly afterwards the young woman gets up, looking much more composed and tougher. She remembers Hearn’s attack and the code that Adelle spoke onto the answering machine. She repeats it, which brings panic into Adelle’s eyes.
Flashback: Caroline spreads maps of the campus on the table and shows the others that there are underground tunnels where she suspects the hidden lab is. Her boyfriend says Rossum is very powerful and he does not want to mess with them. But Caroline makes clear that she is serious and wants to go through with it.
Sam and Echo find the entrance to the secret passages and end up underground. They follow Echo’s memories and finally arrive near the lab – but security is there. Sam goes ahead to wait for the right moment, and then Dominic hugs Echo. He apologises for trying to kill her. Echo is confused, and Sam comes back to see what is keeping her.
He makes it clear to Echo that Dominic is under the influence of the drug. She tries to calm him down and says everything is all right, but Dominic will not be brushed off and delivers a monologue about his job and how he is not really like this. The security guards are affected too and are fending off an invisible dog.
Meanwhile Sierra has a flashback to the abuse by Hearn and reaches for a gun. Victor has a flashback to a situation in the war and tries to calm Sierra the way he calmed the woman in his vision. But the young woman will not let herself be touched and pushes Victor away.
Adelle and Topher have hidden from Mellie. After a moment they venture out and find the young doll crying on the floor. Together they get her into the imprint chair, where Topher connects her to the sensors. He discovers that the Actives are not immune to the drug, as thought – it simply takes effect later.
Apparently it triggers bursts of memory or breaks down the block. Adelle then asks him about the student who killed himself. Topher can only explain it by an extreme overdose that he could never have taken voluntarily. Adelle realises that Rossum may not be quite so uninvolved in the spread of the serum as previously thought.
Echo and Sam have reached the lab. Echo says it looks different from how she remembers it – though she does not know exactly how it looked back then. She starts talking about “him” again while she wanders around the lab, lost in thought. Sam has taken a blood sample from the fridge, pours it out – and the missing vial of the drug appears! He drips some onto a cloth and holds it in front of the face of Echo, who has meanwhile become suspicious.
Flashback: Caroline and her boyfriend break into the lab and discover many test animals, but also foetuses in jars. Her boyfriend finds a computer that is switched on and shows that the company is also experimenting with human brains and bodies. Just as he wants to look more closely, a guard surprises them…
Echo comes round and asks Sam why he did this to her and the others. The student explains that he wants to sell the drug to another manufacturer – they would pay billions for it… He also says that his friend who beat himself to death was in on it too; it was even his idea.
Echo struggles to her feet to stop the fleeing Sam, but she is very unsteady.
Flashback: Caroline and her boyfriend run from the guard; Caroline drops the video camera. Her boyfriend picks it up, and they are shot at. They hide in a storeroom, where they realise that the boyfriend has been hit. When the guards have run past, they leave the room again…
Echo is still chasing Sam and runs into Dominic again. He is in the antechamber of the lab wing with the other dolls, all of them beside themselves. Echo catches up with Sam in front of the building and pulls him to the ground.
Flashback: Caroline bends over her boyfriend, who is lying on the floor. He coughs up blood and dies a few seconds later.
Sam breaks free from Echo but is knocked down by Boyd. Boyd asks Echo whether she wants treatment, and this time she says yes. The two leave the grounds.
Flashback: Caroline is lying in a hospital bed. We do not see them, but we hear a man talking to Adelle. She asks whether he is sure, and he says yes, Caroline has been through a lot. Adelle thanks him for calling. She goes into Caroline’s room – but Caroline is no longer in her bed, and the window is open.
Back in the Dollhouse, Adelle receives Mr. Dominic. Both are visibly uncomfortable. Dominic explains that all the dolls are clean again and have been returned to their original state. He reports that the press has bought the fake story.
Adelle asks whether he is going to suggest eliminating Echo again, but Dominic only says that it is entirely her decision.
At the same time Mellie is seen leaving her apartment with her suitcases. Ballard comes out of his apartment and says goodbye to his girlfriend. But she says it is not forever…
In the last scene Adelle is in the same room where she sat with Caroline at the beginning. Sam is sitting in front of her. She offers the young student to transfer a certain amount to his mother every month. After five years the contract would end and he could leave.