I need some help. My daughter is in Akron Ohio, 500+ miles from home, and her 96 850 NA has lost compression in #3 cylinder. She took it to a garage and they did a compression leak down test. They think it's leaking through the exhaust and maybe intake valves on that cylinder. It started running rough on the way up there, but would smooth out once they got to speed. I think they drove it another 150-200 miles like that. It doesn't seem to be any worse since it started. I don't know what happened, could be carbon or it somehow sucked something in, or the lifter, cam or something else went bad.

I've done some looking around on this site and others and it seems it might be able to be driven back if the injector for that cylinder were disconnected. My options are to

1. Spend $2k (or more - the garage estimated at least 1000 and as much as 2000)on a car that's only worth 2k.
2. Tow it back and replace the engine (which I can do).
3. Have the injector disconnected and let her limp home. (she's a big girl of 29 and she can travel halfway in the company of her sister who has a newer car.
4. Junk it.
5. leave it at her sister's house and have her sell it as a "needs engine work" for like $3-400

My question is can it be gently driven 500 miles with the #3 cylinder dead as long as the injector is disabled? I figure that engine is already toast. Other than being stranded what have we got to lose? Which option do you (the informed Volvo public) think is best?