In the snowstorm, Syd sits in an igloo warming her hands over a fire, and hears a muffled scream in the distance. She crawls out and finds herself as a baby in her mother Joan's arms. The doctors congratulate Joan on having a girl. Syd grows to a young girl and her mother discovers that Syd can't tolerate her touch. Life goes on, and Syd and Joan go to an art gallery. Syd sees a couple kissing and watches them, and goes home and practices kissing with a mirror.
As Joan mother reads a paper for her guests, Syd sits in the bedroom where the coats are. She tries them on and mimics each of the owners, and goes out to hear her mother. A woman approaches Syd, who screams in fear when the woman tries to touch her, and then runs to her room.
Years later, Syd puts on clothing and looks at herself in the mirror. She takes off her gloves and goes to a club. She dances with the others and people start to bump into her. Later, Syd wakes up strapped to a bed with Joan sitting at her side.
Back at the art gallery, a younger Syd looks at the paintings and sees the couple kissing. David approaches her and says that the museum is Syd's core desire. Syd doesn't recognize him, and tells him to get lost. David sits down and says that the painting she's looking at is trapped in negative space. The person in it has no way to communicate, and Syd says that it's honest. She asks what he meant about "core desires", and David says that he sees her there a lot and it's a part of the world where she doesn't need to touch it. Syd tells him that he doesn't know anything and leaves.
-----
In the snowstorm, Syd sits in an igloo warming her hands over a fire, and hears a muffled scream in the distance. She crawls out and finds herself as a baby in her mother Joan's arms. David is there and tells Joan that Syd doesn't like to be touched. Syd grows to a young girl and her mother discovers that Syd can't tolerate her touch. David watches from the window and hears sees the girls taunting Syd, saying that she lives by herself because her father is in hell.
At home, an older Syd reads a book. Joan is writing her paper, and looks at her daughter for a moment and smiles before going back to work.
At school, the girls continue teasing Syd. She draws cut marks on her wrists with an ink pen. Later, a boy invites Syd to kiss him,. When she refuses, he shoves her against a fence and calls her a rigid bitch. The cheerleaders laugh, and Syd kisses the boy. They switch bodies and the boy in Syd's body collapses. Syd picks up a lacrosse stick and clubs the cheerleaders down. Syd revers to her body and stands over her, and says that the boy started hitting them for no reason. The teacher who has found them takes the boy away
Later at the art museum, David approaches Syd and figures that it's the couple,. He says that Syd is trapped in the maze and he needs to figure out what her desire is. Syd comes back every week looking for what the couple has. Syd tells him that he's wrong and tells David to watch it again, and walks off. David tells the couple to get a room and follows Syd out.
-----
In the snowstorm, Syd sits in an igloo warming her hands over a fire. The fire goes out, and she hears a muffled scream in the distance. She crawls out as David sits behind her. He watches as Syd is born and grows up. and traces a pair of scissors along the ink mark that she made on her wrist. She then cuts into her leg. Syd kisses the boy, switches bodies with him, and clubs down the cheerleaders, and then goes to the museum. When David starts to explain what her core desire is, she tells him that he's wrong.
-----
Rather than leave the igloo, David sits inside. Eventually he leaves and goes to Syd's crib, and finds it empty. He goes to the elementary school and sees the girls taunt Syd, and tells them to piss off. David introduces himself to Syd, claiming that he's a teacher there, and Syd tells him that he has to figure it out for himself. David has no idea what is going on, and Syd tells him "Again".
-----
In Division 3, Kerry wakes up and calls to Cary. Cary is inside of her and says that he's stuck, and Kerry pulls him out of her body as Clark walks by. He says that everyone woke up after the monk fell off the roof and died. Kerry and Cary go to the roof and find David and Syd standing, unconscious. They take them to the lab and Cary says that they're awake but their brain wave patterns are different than the others. Their eyes are open, and Cary doesn't know what's happening.
-----
David makes his way through the snowstorms to the art gallery, then approaches Syd and says that he figured out why she's doing what she is. He figures that she thinks that if she shows him who she really is, that he won't love her. David says that it's a test, and reminds her that he's made plenty of mistakes. He assures Syd that there's nothing she can show him that will scare him away. David asks if they can go home, and Syd tells him to try again and walks away.
-----
Syd keeps going through her life, and David keeps watching. He promises that he'll never give up, and sees Syd see Joan and her boyfriend Isaac together. Syd tells her mother that she's going out, and they just smiles at her. David follows her to the club where she touches people until she passes out. He pushes through the crowd to her, but she slips away and goes home.
Syd can't sleep and finally gets up. She sits on the floor and hears Joan and Isaac playing a record. She goes to the living room and finds Joan asleep on the couch, and Isaac in the bathroom taking a shower. Syd goes back to the living room, switches bodies with Joan, and then goes to the bathroom, undresses, and gets into the shower with Isaac. Syd/Joan strokes Isaac's chest and he kisses her. They have sex, and a few minutes later Joan wakes up on the couch to hear Isaac screaming. She goes in and finds Isaac and Syd in the shower. Isaac insists that he didn't do anything, and Joan hits him and assumes that he raped her daughter. The police takes Isaac away, and David looks a Syd, who looks at him.
-----
Back in the igloo, David tells Syd hat it's about the things that she's survived. Syd tells him to go on, and David figures that it's about how the damage make them strong. He met her and it was like a fairy tale to him, and Syd tells him that love is a hot bath. She says that when someone leaves things in the bath for too long, they get soft and fall apart. David says that he read the story collection in her book, and it talked about the hookers and junkies being angels. Syd tells him that their life is a war, and wonders if the lovers or the fighters see the future world that David saw. She insists that love makes them stupid and weak, and it won't save them. Their pain and despair is armor, and Syd asks David to burn with her.
Syd waves her arm and they appear in a white void. She tells David that she's ready, and they join hands and wake in the real world. They look at each other and smile, and soldiers run by outside. They go out into the hallway, running, and find the soldiers holding Lenny. She's in manacles, and says that she's back.
Written by Gadfly on Apr 25, 2018