“The problem with all research done on serial killers and other dangerous subjects is that it is all conducted when the subject is in a captive state when in fact they are not the same person at all as when they are free. It has been the objective of my work to study them in their natural state…in the wild so to speak.” –- Dr. Lydon Dane (a.k.a. Dr. Babylon)

By day, Dr. Lydon Dane was a well-respected Beverly Hills psychiatrist with highly esteemed patients. His research was greatly renowned in the field and, among his peers, he was re-garded as the ultimate authority on reaching the unreachable.

His radical techniques were especially effective for treating the darker souls on our planet — the truly mad ones — those who had long ago crossed over to the other side with no intention of getting back.

Dr. Lydon Dane’s secret was that, unlike the research of his colleagues in the psychiatric community, his work was not theoretical, but absolute — his subjects were real and alive. His research was not done in sterile institutions with control-led environments and sedated patients — it was in the streets, the alleys, the dark corners of society, his subjects reveled

in their madness and he saw them in all their glory. By night Lydon Dane roamed the underbelly of the city and danced with the devil.

Dane knew his methods would never be sanctioned by the American Psychiatric Association, and were in fact, highly illegal. But to Dane it was more than research. To Dane these people were the lost and he was their savior. To Dane the treatments were salvation to the damned.

As time wore on, more and more of Dane’s life had become devoted to the Hyde half of his character. Each night he submerged himself completely into a psycho-sexual world — the zombie like nocturnal existence of the sado-masochist, the leather freak, the hard-core addict, transvestites, mis-shapened birth defected mutants and grotesquely scarred accident victims, diseased ridden nymphos, Satanists, multiple personalities and psychotic schizophrenics — Dane made himself one of them to “set the captives free”. But each time he emerged victorious he found himself more anxious to return and each time he went under it was harder to get back.

For Lydon Dane had lost track of his original motives. The bizarre life which he had chosen had led him to behaviors more macabre than most of his subjects. His undercover approach had forced him to share their madness and part of the experience always remained. Lydon Dane’s particular neuroses had taken a form which reflected the view he had of his methods — a Christ fixation. Each new trip into “hell” saw Dane take on more and more the role of a twisted Messiah until it became difficult to see where the act ended and the insanity began.

Dane had spent the last few years working his way down to the deeper aberrations. Some of his theories took only hours to test and evaluate, some months and some could only be undertaken with truly specialized subjects. When he reads of a serial killer performing horrible mutilations among the sado-masochistic community, he knows he has found the ultimate test. Just as he is about to embark on this new venture his life is complicated by a graduate student, Diana Waltrip, who shows up at his office desiring to study with him. She has read all of his published works and scientific papers, but of course has no idea that he has made the leap to putting his methods into practice. Dane naturally refuses her request, knowing that it could expose his alter ego, but Waltrip is more than persistent, she’s imaginative. She dates one of his assistants and learns enough to really ignite her curiosity. Eventually she decides to tail the good doctor and winds up following him into the netherworld.

Tracking Dane to the Club Capernaum, a wild all night bar frequented by the Los Angeles underground, Diana watches from a distance and becomes fascinated by the people of the night. An exotic drug is slipped into her drink and, under its influence, her rigid self-control falls away until finally she abandons all restraint and engages in a night of uncontrolled passion culminating in lascivious flirting with a group of sado-masochists. Just as they are about to kill her, Lydon Dane appears in time to save her in an eerie scene vaguely reminiscent of Christ’s stopping the stoning of Mary Magdalene.

By now Dane is too far gone to make regular appearances at his office anymore, but Diana comes to his apartment in the daylight and confronts him with her belief that he needs serious treatment himself. At first he denies it, but when Diana discovers self-inflicted puncture wounds on his hands, he admits that perhaps she is right. Dane agrees to seek help after his current case is finished. He refuses to give up now because he is in the midst of his greatest challenge. He believes he may have found the serial killer.

Mark Serazin has an almost unfathomable fascination with evil. Deranged since the brutal murder of his brother and sister by a passing drifter when he was only twelve, Serazin has shown no response to Dane’s best prodings and manipulations. After much debate Dane agrees to bring Diana in with him on Serazin’s case. With Diana assisting him, Dane takes greater and greater risks and pushes himself to deeper and more shocking sacrifices. However, it is Serazin’s attraction to Diana that enables him to slowly open up. As Serazin draws Diana further into his world, it is with terrifying revulsion that she finds herself becoming attracted to this obvious psychopath, eventually making love to him.

Serazin’s attitude towards Diana seems to alter between an almost brotherly love and unabashed lust coupled with jealous rage. He increasingly resents her relationship with Dane. Diana and Dane have become the brother and sister that Serazin altern­ately grieves for and resents. Dane is now convinced Serazin is the one who has been doing the sado-masochist murders because of his love/hate relationship with his dead brother and sister.

The next night when a drunk accosts Diana, Serazin brutally murders the man and then suddenly begins to beat Diana until Dane can pull him off. With horror, Dane confides to Diana that he now believes Serazin’s psychosis began with the rape of his sister. Unable to handle the guilt he transferred the blame to his brother and then, in a rage, murdered them both. Though he suppressed this for years it has lead to an increasing identification with evil. This explains the horrible nature of the crimes — here is a killer who identifies with Satan himself. Dane’s techniques have caused the root problem to emerge from the subconscious and Serazin has already relived the rape of his sister through his sexual encounter with Diana. The murder of the drunk was in part an attempt to keep from killing Dane and Diana, but it is only a question of time before he comes for them.

Diana wants to call the police, but Dane, now reveling in his own Messiah madness, refuses. He insists that Diana stay behind this night and, when she objects, he drugs her. Finding Serazin, Dane attempts to probe deeper into his psychosis and finally triggers the manifestation of the demonic. Serazin believes himself to be possessed, at one with the Devil. Yes, he raped his sister when he was only twelve and, when his brother discovered them, he killed them both. Confronted with this, Dane now totally surrenders himself to his Christ fixation and a climatic struggle between good and evil takes place. Serazin flees to the roof of an abandoned hotel. Dane pursues, but realizes too late he has been lured into a trap.

Shortly afterwards, Diana wakes up when Serazin breaks into the apartment. He drags her to the hotel, where she is confronted by an awesome and horrible sight. Serazin has crucified Dane to a large neon sign leaning against the base of a radio antenna on top of the building. The sign reads: “KFDR IS THE KING OF ROCK IN L.A.”, but Dane’s body blocks out part of it so that it now reads “THE KING OF L.A.”. In a full psychotic rage, Serazin now attacks Diana. She escapes for a moment, but he corners her near the sign and closes in. Suddenly, Lydon Dane seems to come back alive. He opens one eye and with great difficulty raises himself enough to gasp another few breaths of air. Seeing that Diana is about to be killed, he struggles to free himself, but cannot. Still not aware that Dane lives, Serazin grabs Diana and begins choking her. Enduring tremendous pain, Dane manages to tear one hand away from the spike that has been driven into it and reaches for Serazin, but he is too far away.

With his free hand Dane grabs a cable coming from the sign from the antenna and pulls himself closer to Serazin. Jerking the cable hard, Dane manages to reach out and touch Serazin with a bloody, accusing finger. Shocked by the touch, Serazin staggers back away from Diana. He stares in awe at Dane whom he was sure was dead as Dane resolutely continues to point the accusing finger of God at him. At that moment the cable breaks and showers Dane with sparks casting an eerie glow behind him. Thrusting himself forward, Dane grabs the loose cable and jabs the open end into Serazin’s chest. From Serazin’s angle it appears Dane is coming down off the cross wielding a bolt of lightening. He staggers back from the jolt of the electricity and tumbles over the edge of the roof. His body falls and impales itself upon the power transformer below setting off sparks that light up the night sky before he bursts into flames. As Diana struggles to her feet she hears Dane mumble, “I saw the devil fall from the sky like lighting.”

Diana attempts to free him, but can do nothing. She looks for some sort of tool to extract the nails, but Dane shakes his head. One look at his eyes and it is evident that he has gone totally mad. “I have the keys to hell and I go to set the cap-tives free.” As he dies, his arm rests on the bloody spike with the accusing finger still pointed into the night.