"Help! Somebody stop them," the nurse continued as Ellen was hustled to the elevator. Dr. Lowell, her psychiatrist, happened to be coming down the opposite end of the hall and hailed the errant officers who didn't stop. "What the hell is going on," he asked Maria who was standing there wide-eyed.

"That asshole Dobson just took off with her! He placed her under arrest but I don't think he's taking her to the station, he said he had something else planned."

"Holy shit," Lowell swore, heading for Dr. Branigan's office at breakneck speed, Maria tailing him. "All we need is another Wydell repeat."

Outside, Ellen struggled with the cops as they tried to maneuver her into a waiting van. Still dressed in her interview clothes, she tore off a brooch that Grace, the hospital busybody, had given her. It fell unnoticed to the sidewalk while one of the bulky deputies bodily pulled her from her wheelchair and tossed her into a seat, where she landed in a boneless heap. Her means of transport was folded and thrown to the back of the van carelessly, and the vehicle started up. The woman tried sitting up and found it difficult, but she saw the the hospital recede into the distance as they started moving. She found she could move the fingers on her right hand without pain, but it was a short-lived euphoria. She managed to squirm her way to a sitting position, thankful they hadn't cuffed her. Guess they figured she was a harmless cripple.

"Yanno, we're gonna be in big shit for this," observes one of the deputies.

"The end justifies the means, my friend," Roy Dobson replies coolly.

"She looks mighty good in that purple pantsuit...bet she looks even better out of it," he muses, looking her over like she was a juicy steak. "A little more wrongdoing wouldn't hurt us any more." He sat his bulk beside her, and Ellen leaned away from him as far as she could. "Besides, she can't run away." He ran his meaty hand up her leg, which she couldn't feel due to the nerve damage but seeing it made her skin crawl. She socked him in the face with her arm-cast. His grey eyes flashed angrily at her, and he raised his fist to strike her.

"That's enough, Todd. We don't wanna rough up the prisoner too much, how would that reflect on us? No, I have other ways of making her suffer."

The female opened her puffy eyes and found herself strapped to a chair, her arms tied behind her. She tried moving her head and found it in some kind of restraint--she couldn't turn her head or move it at all. They must've given her some kind of sedative from how groggy she felt. "Hello," she called out. Don't be scared, she told herself, keep your wits about you. Breathe. Ok. She must be in a different hospital, it had that sterile look about it from the room she was in.

"Well, well," came Dr West's effete voice. "Looks like the prisoner is awake. We have something we want you to look at."

"Fuck you," she said.

"No thanks, I like girls with more meat on their bones. I'm also afraid the, shall we say, fruits of your love, are too oft-tasted, my dear."

Roy Dobson appeared before long, smoking a cigarrette and looking a bit disheveled. Behind him an officer was carrying a stack of old film reels, which Roy threaded into a projector behind Ellen's seat. He then came around to face the woman, pulling a chair up. He was very close to her, their knees nearly touching. He reached and ripped the wig from her head, handing to a deputy who put it on a table, one of the few pieces of furniture in the stark room.

"Now. Miss Firefly, just cooperate an' you'll make it through this alive. Tell me the truth, was it you who killed Sheriff Wydell? Or was it that scumbag father of yours? Broke 'is neck and left him lyin like a dog in the dirt."

Staring into his wrathful eyes she shook her head, gasping "I don't know. I don't remember!"

"Really and truly?"

"Yes," she insisted.

He leaned closer to her, his hands on her upper arms, the fingers digging into her flesh. Don't freak out, don't freak out, she repeated to herself. She squirmed her upper body, jutting her chest up to his face. "Lookit these! This what you want, you sicko?" Dobson had to pull his gaze up from her cleavage, the smooth still-tanned skin of her chest, her delicate collar bone and graceful neck, up to her defiant face. She blinked her eyes from a feeling of deja-vu coming over her.

Chines, Japanese, dirty knees, lookit THESE!

She saw two couples on a queen-sized bed, covered in blood. Terror and disgust were evident in their expressions as they looked on her as she danced. Then just like it appeared it was gone.

"Doctor, did she just have a flashback," queried Dobson. The psychiatrist had rushed forward when she jerked in her chair.

"What did you see? What did you see," he demanded.

Ellen's eyes focused on them again, her breathing becoming more normal. She remembered something, it made no sense to her for the time being but it was something at least.

"She remembered something, didn't she Dr. West," Dobson exclaimed. "Get that truth serum an' we'll find out."

Ellen didn't recall a whole lot immediately after they started administering various drugs to her. She answered their questions and then was made to watch the films, which were mostly Otis Driftwood's 'home movies'.

It started out with Otis behind the camera and Baby posing with a group of three victims, all teenage girls. She mugged and preened in front of the camera, then cut the lips off one girl and a couple of fingers off the other one, giggling with glee. Ellen couldn't turn her head from the sight so she shut her eyes which were welling with tears. "Watch, damn you," barked Dobson. He pulled his revolver and put it to her head, then cocked the hammer. "Watch or I'll blow yer brains outta that pretty head of yours."

She opened her eyes to see that her former self had taken the camera, and filmed while Otis carved slogans into the flesh of the third unfortunate. After a while he untied her and Baby followed them as her adopted brother chased the girl around the room, ripping her clothes off bit by bit. "Oh, God," she breathed when he began raping the teenager who fought and struggled for all she was worth. "Please turn it off," she sobbed. She couldn't take any more. "Please, I've seen enough! Turn it off!" Otis was banging the girl's head on the floor as he fucked her brutally and Baby giggled and commented while he did it. After a few more moments the film was removed and another threaded into the projector.

The next one was news footage, much of it not shown on television, about the Dr. Satan Cult Murders, as it was being called. Then came a shaky camera view of the massive roadblock, where the Devil's Rejects were captured. Lead peppered the blue car Otis was driving, and the vehicle's occupants as well, who kept getting back up to fire at their enemies. Baby and Spaulding finally slumped in the back seat, their weapons falling out of their lifeless fingers. Screaming at the top of his lungs Otis swerved the floatboat, broadsiding the roadblock and sending cops flying. In the dust cloud and confusion the longhaired fugitive pretty much fell out of the car in his attempt to get out. He nudged Spaulding and Baby and got no response, and the horrible amount of blood everywhere and the bulletholes riddling both of them forced him to limp past a police Blazer, desperate to get away. His guns were empty. Aw, fuck it. "Fuck it," he repeated out loud.

He rushed the officers with just his Bowie knife and was promptly mowed down, and left a twitching, bleeding mess on the highway. It was still several moments before the remaining officers would approach the downed Otis or the car, and only then with guns still trained on them. Opening the passenger door Cutter's large frame rolled out with a thunk, completely devoid of life. Baby's door was opened to reveal a young woman almost completely covered in blood and dirt, but still breathing.

"One of 'em's still alive," shouted a cop. "Get the medics over here!"

Roy rushed along with the paramedics to the female fugitive who was moaning, her eyelids fluttering. "Get her! Save her! I want her to tell me why! I WANNA KNOW WHY!"

The footage ended. Silence descended upon the room. The only sound was Ellen's sobbing. Slowly Dobson lowered the gun he had against her temple and reholstered it. "Why...why are you doing this to me," she asked.

"I wanted you to see what you an' your family did. I want you to know that you can't escape justice, no matter what your excuse. And I want filth like you removed from society."

"Officer Dobson," she sneered, since he still wasn't officially sheriff yet. "I'm sorry for all the things the Fireflys did, but I'm not Baby. Baby no longer exists; I'm Ellen. Killing me ain't gonna bring all those murdered people back."

"No," conceded the acting sheriff. "But it may stop more innocent people from being murdered."

"But I would never--"

"Baby Firefly's still in there," Dr. West cuts in. "Still there, just waiting to come out."

"You don't know that," she shrieked at them. "I've been persecuted all my known existence! You're criminal is dead! Why can't you all leave me alone!"

"My, she's getting worked up...Time for sleepytime," the skinny man injects her with more medicine.

"Ellen? Ellen, can you hear me," Dr. Branigan asked softly, touching his patient's face.

Ellen's eyes flew open, she jerked involuntarily in the bed. The concerned faces of Dr. Lowell, Maria and Dr. Branigan came into view and she calmed down a bit. Then she noticed the cast was off her arm, and other than being slightly atrophied due to nonuse it seemed fine. Branigan, Ruggsville County Medical Facility's master surgeon, explained to her that she should have most of the use of that arm, but the damage to her legs was more complicated. She had a good chance of walking again, but it was going to take a very long and strenuous recovery.

"Where's Dobson," she asked fearfully.

"He's been temporarily suspended from duty due to gross misconduct," the bespectacled Lowell responds. His black hair needed a good trimming, but the young man rarely paid attention to such mundane details.

"I can't believe he'd stoop to doing something like this," Branigan fumed. "The potential damage to you mentally was bad enough, but the drugs they'd given you nearly put you into another coma. One good thing, though--due to the police department's unscrupulous actions the court has suspended any sort of charges against you, at least until you've healed more. It'll make people more sympathetic to your plight, as well."

"This is like some sort of terrible game, ain't it," Ellen said bitterly. "With my life and future in the balance."

"You're not without your own weapons," Dr. Lowell tells her. Her charm hadn't escaped his eye either. All who came to know her seemed to love her. "Or without friends."

She tried to remember through the pharmaceutical-induced haze what Dobson and his cronies had done to her, and recalled the footage she'd been forced to watch, and suddenly she was inside the film--reliving another memory. She slowly raised her handgun and aimed at an officer, her face a mask of pain and rebellion. Her father was beside her, her caretaker and hero. Otis floored the gas in the car and they sped toward their fate, all squeezing the triggers of their weapons.

"Get those IV's in here," Dr. Branigan shouts and the nurses began scurrying. Their star patient was twitching, her eyes rolled back in her head. Baby was struck by myriad projectiles and Ellen jerked and convulsed in her hospital bed. She was groaning and struggling for air as if she was going through the terrible situation all over again.

"She's reliving a memory," declared Dr. Lowell.

"Daddy," Ellen screamed piteously, as if she couldn't believe with her father beside anything bad could happen to her. "Otis!"

Ellen's heart stopped.