Episode Report Card Manimal: B | 1 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Spirit
By Manimal | Season 1 | Episode 10 | Aired on 12.15.2001
SD-6. Sloane's VO fills someone in on Hassan having a new face and living in Havana. Except it's Jack, not Sydney. How did Sloane know this? Sloane says that they have to deliver an ass-whuppin', fast, to set an example; Sloane wants Jack to rendezvous with his usual contacts to locate and take care of Hassan. There's a little silence. Jack says he heard about Russek, and now with Hassan, he understands that Sloane is having a difficult week. Sloane then takes a trip down memory lane. He talks about his first briefing at the White House, back when he was CIA lo these many years ago, and how even in that moment of promise -- before crappy things happened to him, like the CIA betraying him and his wife getting diagnosed with lymphoma -- that he knew that the dark was rising. Except he says "the dark was coming," which is just as melodramatic, really. He says that he's always had that feeling, that the darkness was waiting there, and he knew that it would come, and that in difficult moments like he's having now, he always remembers that moment. It's really a bizarre speech, but Ron Rifkin does a great job. In fact, I'm almost wishing that Ron Rifkin would mess up, so that just once I could write something other than "Ron Rifkin does a great job."
CIA Warehouse. Sydney tells Vaughn that Hassan's new identity is Npsemi Isad (I think) and that she told Sloane Kenya was a failure. Vaughn tells her that Sloane already knows everything, and that he sent Jack to Cuba to kill Hassan. Apparently, Vaughn got the scoop from Jack himself.
Pointless flashback. Vaughn and Sloane meet in the back of a van. Jack asks for his counter-mission. Vaughn tells Jack that Hassan needs to be alive, and the CIA needs his client list. Vaughn starts to fill him in on the background but Jack snaps that he doesn't need a lesson in international arms trade. Vaughn snaps back, "Fine," and tells Jack that he's to convince Hassan that he's going turncoat on SD-6, and that he'll help Hassan fake his death for the client list. Jack says that Vaughn is making a huge mistake, trusting Hassan. Vaughn tells him that men will be waiting to ensure that Hassan will never be a free man again.
Back to Sydney and Vaughn. Sydney asks if that's all that happened. Vaughn says, "That's it." Sydney nods. She doesn't believe him. Vaughn asks if something's up. Sydney says it's nothing, and they exchange a drawn-out goodbye. There's four creases on his forehead, counting the ones directly between the eyebrows, so it must be bad.