We've flashed forward to Halloween. Six weeks have passed since Padma's abduction. Very little hope remains for finding her, with no contact between the Initiative and any of our heroes. Nolan is a broken man obsessed and receiving very little help from a detective. He has his entire office littered with surveillance photographs and equations he's written to try and triangulate where she could be. It's all very sad, I guess, but it's hard to feel bad for a genius who thought it was a good idea to let the love of his life meet an SUV full of terrorists all alone with just one snooty sniper offering protection. Still, Nolan is so pathetic that Ems is really worried about him. She goes to Aiden to ask for some help recovering Padma.
The plan involves Aiden making some bad investments on Trask's behalf at Grayson Global to lure him out, and it does just that. It also causes Trask to take his business away from Daniel, and declare him some sort of terroristic chess winner. So, Daniel seeks out Emanda to resume their romance now that he feels like the Initiative will leave him alone, and Aiden seeks out Trask so he can be led to Padma. Unfortunately, the Initiative murdered Padma that morning. Aiden doesn't appreciate this and taunting about his father and Colleen. He snaps Trasks's neck. So now our Revengers have to rely entirely on Emanda's fauxmance with Daniel, and Aiden doesn't like that at all. You should've thought of that before murdering your creepy terrorist contact, 007.
One other possible avenue of ingress would be pulling on the thread of the mystery behind Victoria's first-born son. Because it's a holiday, Victoria of course is throwing a grand party -- a masquerade ball, even. Ems takes the opportunity to send an ominous RSVP that would seem to be from Victoria's illegitimate son. Ems arrives at the party on Daniel's arm and watches as Victoria is fooled into thinking she's come face-to-face with her masked son. The Queen passes out and makes a big scene. I guess that's what passes for a takedown, these days.
The masquerade ball also served as yet another publicity event to further Conrad's run for governor. It comes just on the heels of a town hall-styled meet-and-greet at the Stowaway where Conrad does a pretty awesome job of interfacing with the working man. Jack offers up his help for the event so he can have Nolan pipe in some of the audio tapes he got from Kenny into Conrad's earwig to inform him that someone is out to get him. They also plant a concerned citizen with a question about David Clarke. Conrad's so shaken up by hearing those audio tapes that he offers to champion getting a presidential pardon for David Clarke. Later at the ball, Conrad wonders about who could have been responsible for the awkwardness, and accuses Ashley. Jack overhears this and summons her to meet at the Stowaway, offering an alliance to bring down Conrad from within his campaign. She accepts because what else is she going to do -- be interesting?
Victoria's staged brush with her "son" reveals to us through flashback that -- despite her insistence to Conrad that she aborted her child -- she in fact gave him up for adoption under the condition that he could never know who she was and vice versa. Emanda tracks Victoria's guilt-ridden trip to the nun who she trusted with her child, then poses as a desperate mother-to-be herself. She's about to get some orphan answers.
-- Pablo G. is some guy who lives in Austin, Texas. He used to co-host TWoP's original "Trailers Without Pity" with his brother Omar G. Check out their webcomic Space Monkeys! and follow Pablo's writing at Pablog. Follow him @PendejoJoe on Twitter.
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We pan across Grayson Manor in the morning. The same music from that nefarious skeet shooting montage opening plays and we get the same style of montage. I don't think I will ever write "nefarious skeet shooting montage" again, but here's hoping. We cut to a close-up of Victoria's hands cutting a red ribbon on a black velvet box with scissors. She opens it to reveal two masquerade masks. She now sits at her vanity and holds one up to her face. Emanda voice-over: "All too often, we mask truth in artifice..." Fade cut to a copy of the New York Post with Conrad and Jack on the cover and the headline "Hallow-win?" sitting on a nightstand. We pan across to Aiden and Ems making out on the bed in slow motion. VO continued: "...concealing ourselves for fear of losing the ones we love..." Fade cut to Declan carving a jack-o-lantern while Jack (his brother, not the pumpkin) sets up signage for a town hall Q&A for Conrad at the Stowaway. VO: "...or prolonging a deception for those we wish to expose." Fade cut to Charlotte typing away on her laptop for her application to UC Berkeley, then picking up a plaster cast of little Carl's hand. VO: "We hide behind that which brings us comfort from pain and sadness..." Fade to Nolan in his office at Nolcorp, feverishly scribbling code with a marker onto his windows, which are littered with surveillance photos and equations. This is a pretty long montage, guys. VO: "...or use it to repel a truth too devastating to accept." Nolan was clutching a photo of Padma while he scribbled. He sets it down on his desk next to another one as his phone rings.
The phone call is from a Detective Durand, whom Nolan makes it a point to just call "Durand" since he's yet to find Padma. It's been six weeks since her abduction. Oh... shit, that sucks. They're very snippy with each other because Durand questioned Nolan as a suspect initially and Nolan has been hounding him for updates ever since. Nolan is noticeably desperate and disheveled. His patience ends when Durand bizarrely thinks it's a good idea to remind him that the first 48 hours are most important in cases like this. Cutting him off, Nolan snaps, "We're 968 hours past that! Right. Got it." He hangs up. Emanda stands in the doorway, having caught the end of the conversation. There's no snarky introduction exchanged here, though. Nolan sheepishly asks how long she's been standing there, and Ems ignores the question to say, "I'm worried about you." That really says all you need to know about the situation these two find themselves in. While infiltrating the social elite, orchestrating numerous life-ruining plots and watching the death of Amily, these two have always maintained their playful bickering and impassioned ideals. Here there's nothing but sorrow, regret and pity. He shows Ems an old letter from Padma that makes him think she's out there waiting for him somewhere. He has to believe that. Nolan's obsessing here and it's freaking Ems out. She tries to calm him down, but instead he rants about his failures saving Amily and helping with Gordon Murphy last year. Ems reminds him that he saved Jack's life. That seems to snap Nolan back to reality a bit. And with perfect TV timing, Nolan gets a text from Jack at that exact moment, asking for some help. "Wow... start your revengines," Nolan deadpans. Even in complete darkness, Nolan can still shine. Emanda asks him to emerge from this cave he's created for himself and to trust her. She's going to help him find Padma.
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