Kaleb is spreading around feathers and some other things to create a magical boundary for Cleo to use while she invokes some visions. They flirt about his attention to detail and how attractive he thinks that makes him. Cleo has a vision of Jen’s workshop, where Ken is looking at a map of the Salvatore School grounds. He knows Cleo’s there and asks how she got into his dream. He throws a knife at her and she quickly comes out of the vision. Her arm is bleeding and the knife is embedded in a wall.
Alaric gathers the squad to tell them that Cleo’s vision gave them the heads-up that Ken is going to attack the school. They get to choose where the next battle happens. Hope has picked a spot in a meadow, where trees should keep Ken from being able to call down lightning.
Ben has provided information about a “white fire and brimstone” mixture that the gods used to use against each other. It’s just phosphorus and sulfur, and if they can rig up a chain reaction in the meadow, they can set off an explosion of it in the middle. After the witches and vampires gather the ingredients, Jed and the werewolves will work on set-up, then go to their bunker for the full moon. Jed asks why they’re trusting Ben. Alaric says he’s proven that he’s on their side.
Lizzie notes that whoever triggers the explosion is going to get caught in the blast. Even someone with vamp speed won’t get away in time. Hope says she’s working on figuring out who will handle that. Ben suggests Ethan, since he can phase out, but M.G. says that’s not an option. He and Lizzie need to talk to Ethan about that before they discuss that with the group.
Lizzie doesn’t think she should come along, since she’s bad at giving bad news. Once, she had to tell Alyssa that she wasn’t invited to a tea party she and Josie were throwing, and she panicked and blurted out that Josie was dead. M.G. thinks Ethan should hear the news from him instead. Lizzie hasn’t forgotten about M.G.’s declaration of love just before they found out that Ethan’s probably doomed, but M.G. says her response can wait.
Ken tells Aurora that he had a weird dream, and if it means what he thinks it does, there’s something he needs to take care of. He thinks it’s suspicious that an intruder made her way into his dream while his guard was down. Aurora brushes this off as paranoia, but that’s something Ken has always found to be an advantage, since it reminds him that betrayal can come from anyone. He needs to confirm that she’s told him the truth. While he does that, he wants her to convince Jen to make a weapon that will kill Hope.
Landon goes to Zied’s bar for a drink, though now that Zied’s gone to peace, it’s under new management. The Necromancer has taken over both the bar and Zied’s business getting people to collect coins for him. The monsters working for the Necromancer think they’ll be rewarded with resurrection; they’re unaware that thanks to Alaric’s wish, he can only resurrect Landon. Landon asks why he wants coins, since he doesn’t want to go to peace. The Necromancer just wants to have more than everyone else. And it’s not like he has anything better to do.
Landon complains that his soul was traded to someone who literally can’t tell him what he should be doing. Speaking of that someone, the Ferryman has just arrived. It turns out he can talk, and he asks Landon to have a drink with him.
M.G. finds Ethan working out in the gym and starts to tell him that he’s probably not going to be alive much longer. Ethan figured things were bad when he wasn’t invited to the Super Squad’s most recent strategy session. M.G. tells him that he can’t use his powers anymore – it’ll kill him. Ethan immediately decides that he needs to find another way to be useful, because he refuses to sit out the fight.
Hope and Alaric revive their old training sessions, only this time she’s helping him instead of the other way around, since he’s still recovering from his injuries. He calls it quits early, and she teases that if she’d done that while he was training her, he would have quoted The Art of War. Alaric wants to discuss their plan for the battle – he knows that Hope didn’t complete the last manticulum scenario because she didn’t want to know who should detonate the explosion. Alaric says it has to be him.
Hope refuses, but he knows that’s the only way he can help. She doesn’t want anything else to happen to him because of her. It wouldn’t be fair. “None of what’s coming is fair, Hope,” he replies. That’s what Landon wanted her to know. She has to stay alive, but not everyone else will survive. The more she avoids that, the more she puts the others at risk.
She argues that she’s doing the opposite, but Alaric says she’s using the explosion as a fallback. It should be their first plan instead. Hope notes that doing that will guarantee that someone dies. He points out that if it works, they could save a bunch of lives. “You know, everyone keeps telling me I have to accept death,” she says. “Fine. That doesn’t mean I have to choose it.” Alaric urges her to use the manticulum to see if there’s a better option. He doesn’t think there is.
As the students gather what the squad will need for the battle, Finch tries to play peacemaker between Ben and Jed. Jed’s mad not just because Ben betrayed them but because he tried to get Ken to take away his werewolf curse. Ben must think that Jed being a wolf is something he needs to change. Jed doesn’t want him anywhere near the pack.
Aurora goes to Jen’s workshop, where she discovers that Ken put his daughter in a sarcophagus filled with spikes. In limbo, the Ferryman changes his appearance so Landon will feel a little more comfortable talking to him. Correction – talking to her. The Ferryman is actually a woman named Lynn. Peace used to be her home. Some call it Valhalla. Yep, Lynn is another god. She didn’t know there was anything special about her until the gods met humans. She wants Landon to hear her whole story because she needs his help.
M.G. takes Ethan on a long walk through town to Mystic Falls High before telling him that he shouldn’t be involved in the battle with Ken. Ethan still refuses to be sidelined, but M.G. wants to take things a step further: He needs to leave town. A van suddenly comes speeding around the corner, headed straight for a girl in the road. Ethan phases to her, then phases her away before she can get hit. He sees the word “sisto” (stop) appear on the wall of the school. He’s in the therapy box.
M.G. lets him out and apologizes, but he couldn’t find another way to convince Ethan not to fight in the battle. He’s too much of a hero to be able to stop himself from using his powers. He can’t be part of this.
Cleo wants to go back into Ken’s mind, and Kaleb’s not happy with her for not letting him know. He gives her the knife Ken threw at her so she’ll have some protection. She appreciates how well he takes care of her, and he asks if that’s her favorite thing about him. She says no, and he vows to figure out what it is. He tells her that if he thinks she’s in trouble, he’ll do a head dive to come in and help her.
Cleo’s next vision takes her to the woods. Ken has vines rise up from the ground to restrain her, though he notes that things between them don’t have to be combative. Once upon a time, her “kind” worked with the gods peacefully. Cleo doesn’t know what “kind” he’s talking bout. He replies that she’s in luck: “By the end of this, you’ll know who you were meant to be.”
The connection the two of them are sharing is a hallmark of Cleo’s unique abilities. When oracles change the future, they become something else: Furies. Cleo is the last of them, as Ken killed the others “when they stopped being…collaborative.” The two of them are nature’s balance, and this special connection was designed for them to communicate and work together. Ken removes the vines and turns them into two thrones. He tells Cleo that they can be civilized. He only wants one person to die anyway.
Cleo informs him that he can’t kill Hope without red oak, which is all gone. Ken suggests that he has ashes that Jen will turn into a weapon. He presents a deal: Bring Hope to him and he’ll let everyone else live. If Cleo refuses, any deaths from here on out will be on her.
Lizzie tells Hope about M.G.’s big declaration of love and her subsequent silence. She’s hesitant to examine her own feelings for him. Hope notes that once she figures them out, everything will change. She’s been avoiding the end of the battle plan for the same reason. She doesn’t want to know who they’ll lose. She’s finally gotten her answer from the manticulum, and she thinks Lizzie should see it.
Finch averts a possible disaster in the meadow when Jed doesn’t know how to put out a fire because he didn’t get all the details from Ben. Jed thinks Ben just wants to help because he feels guilty. Jed won’t just accept it and pretend to forgive him. Finch points out that Ben isn’t helping just him. They need to put their personal feelings aside. Finch asked Alaric why he trusts Ben, and Alaric told her that Ben offered to sacrifice himself to save everyone. At the very least, Jed can sacrifice his pride.
Lynn tells Landon that the gods were happy once – well, the gods who weren’t her brother Ken. He was power-hungry, so he went to the real world and started killing. Limbo became crowded, and Lynn thought it was unfair that so many lost souls were stuck there. She found a mother and child who had died for no reason and took them to peace as justice for what Ken and the other gods had done. When Ken found out, he cursed her to help humans for eternity without being able to return home.
Lynn has been ferrying souls for the last 10,000 years or so. Now she wants to retire. Landon’s like, “There’s a loophole in your curse, isn’t there?” Yep – she can go home if she finds someone to take her place. Over the centuries, she’s never found someone who wanted to do it for the right reasons. She thinks Landon might be different.
Hope confirms to Alaric that the explosion is their best plan A. He hates the thought of her losing someone else she cares about. He’s also lost plenty of people, and it’s worse when you have regret because there are things you didn’t say. They need to make the most out of the time they have left. Hope says softly that he should take his own advice. He’s not the one who should trigger the explosion – Lizzie is.
If Lizzie can siphon Ken the moment the bomb goes off, she can weaken him, possibly kill him. As a Heretic, she also has the best chance of surviving. Alaric doesn’t want Hope to ask her to do it, but Hope already did. Lizzie called Caroline and Josie, and they helped her decide to agree. “I’m telling her what she’s deciding,” Alaric says angrily. Hope replies that this isn’t his choice.
Of course Alaric doesn’t want to accept that their best chance at winning this battle is letting his daughter sacrifice herself. Hope reminds him that everyone involved is someone’s child or parent. They’ll win by saving as many people as possible, and Lizzie is their best chance at doing that.
Ken asks Cleo if keeping Hope alive is worth the deaths of everyone he would kill. Cleo’s amused that tyrants like him think they’re all unique. She’s heard this all before. He’s predictable. She flings the knife at him but he catches it. He says she’s made her choice. Cleo tries to leave their connection, but Ken is in control and he’s not done with her yet.
Aurora revives Jen, who thinks she’s playing good cop so she can get Jen to build Ken’s weapon. Aurora calls her childish for resisting. Jen thinks that Aurora will put her back in the spiked sarcophagus, then, but Aurora refuses to participate in anyone’s torture. Jen predicts that Ken will change her mind, since he tends to bring out the worse in people. Aurora says she misunderstands her father. He must have had a good reason for putting Jen in the sarcophagus.
Jen guesses that Aurora is Team Ken because he seduced her. His pitch for her to rule the world at his side is a common ploy of his. Aurora says she saw his memories of how awful Jen and the rest of the family were. Everything Jen told her was a sob story to make her look like a victim. Jen tells her that Ken can distort his memories – Aurora just saw what he wanted her to. He always gets what he wants, so Jen might as well make his weapon. She’s stuck in a pattern she can’t escape, but at least she knows it.
M.G. takes Ethan to the bus stop so he can go be with his family in Savannah. Ethan’s bummed that he’s being sent away just when he was getting control of his powers. He encourages M.G. to tell Lizzie how he feels. Heh, nice timing. They laugh over how confusing Lizzie is. Ethan tells M.G. that he’s one of the best people Ethan has ever known, and Lizzie would be an idiot not to see that.
Hope confirms that Lizzie is sure that she wants to detonate the bomb. Lizzie is, since she doesn’t want Alaric to do it in her place. She can’t believe they’ve found a scenario where Hope isn’t going to rush in to be the hero. “Well, there’s still time,” Hope says. They go to the Great Hall, where the school has put together a party. It’s being touted as a pre-victory party, but really it’s an “in case we all die” party.
Landon asks Lynn why she chose him. She says he reminds her of who she used to be. She started off wanting to help as many people as she could. She broke the rules once, sending people back to life, but because of nature and its stupid balances, she couldn’t do it again. She paid a price for it – her heart went numb and she stopped caring about all the lost souls. She put the coin system into use because she wanted to take emotion out of it. Now people have to prove they’re worthy of going to peace.
That wound up making things more complicated. Lynn lost her way and resigned herself to never again feeling the way she used to. When she saw Landon giving up his chance at peace to help others, she realized that he would be good at her job. Other people might use his life experiences as an excuse to pity themselves or hurt others, but Landon does good with what he’s been given. The world needs more people like him, who find new, better ways to do things.
As the rest of the school parties, Alaric talks to Lizzie alone. He won’t try to talk her out of her sacrifice; she has too much of her mother in her to listen (and he means both of her mothers). He knows that one day she’ll have a huge, expensive wedding, and he doesn’t want to wait until then to have a father/daughter dance with her. “Just in case,” he says as he takes her hand.
Landon returns to the Necromancer’s bar, where the Necromancer slams Lynn for trying to get Landon to take on her curse. Landon knows that the Necromancer would try to do the same in her place. The Necromancer admits that, but at least he’d come up with a better story and wouldn’t try to guilt Landon into agreeing. He assumes that Landon turned Lynn down, but he didn’t. Say hello to the new Ferryman!
The Necromancer thinks Landon’s there to take him to peace. He refuses to go, but it’s a moot point – he can’t exist in peace. Landon wants to fulfill his promise to someone who does. He turns the Necromancer back into Ted and tells him that if he goes to peace, he’ll keep that form forever. Ted hugs him and asks how Landon knew that transforming him back would work. Landon didn’t, and he’s not sure how long it will last, so they should probably get going.
Kaleb goes into Cleo and Ken’s connection and finds her unconscious and alone. She tells him it’s a trap. Ken grabs him and holds a stake over his heart. He announces that everything he does there affects the real world. If Cleo doesn’t bring Hope to him, he’ll kill Kaleb.
Alaric and Lizzie return to the party as Hope begins a toast, telling her classmates how much they mean to her. “I need an answer!” Ken yells at Cleo. Hope says she’s a better person because of everyone’s friendship and their belief in her. It’s been an honor to fight with them. Ken starts counting down from 3, and Kaleb tells Cleo not to give Ken what he wants.
As Hope has everyone raise a glass to the families they make and to the people their families help them become, Ken gets to 1. “It’s your eyes,” Cleo tells Kaleb. He smiles a little. Then the stake goes through his chest. Cleo screams and falls to her knees.
“We’re gonna win,” Hope tells her classmates, who cheer in response.
After the party, Jed approaches Ben with the information he got from Finch about Ben wanting to sacrifice himself. Jed thinks dying is an easy way out. If Ben really wants to make it up to Jed, he’ll stay with him during the full moon that night. Being a wolf is who Jed is, and he wants Ben to accept that part of him. Ben will have to stay out of Jed’s cell so Jed doesn’t hurt him, though. Ben says that Jed can’t hurt him. He wants to be there for what Jed goes through tonight.
Lizzie finds M.G. in the kitchen and tells him that he was wrong – her response to his expression of love can’t wait. They don’t know how much time they have, and she’ll regret it forever if she doesn’t tell him how she feels. For a long time, she thought she was going to die in the merge, so she didn’t bother to think about the future. Now she doesn’t know if they’ll make it through this battle. The timing might never be right for the two of them, and she might never figure out how to say the right thing.
Lizzie never let herself want something that was good for her because she didn’t believe she deserved it. She didn’t think she deserved someone like M.G. She doesn’t know what will happen next, but he’s amazing and she wants to kiss him. But before she can, Cleo appears in the kitchen. “He’s…dead,” she says softly.
Etc.: These kids are smart enough to rig a meadow to explode but not smart enough to figure out a remote-detonation system?
I love the thought of Lizzie trying to tell Alyssa she can’t come to a party, then just going, “Uhhhhhhh, Josie’s dead.”
Spotted in the bar in limbo: the gremlin.
I get using the name Lynn to continue the Jen/Ben/Ken pattern (sort of), but since the Ferryman’s name in Greek mythology is Charon, why not name her Sharon?
The show would have continued the god stuff if there had been a fifth season, and while I can’t say I would have enjoyed that, I think it would have been fun to see Cleo as a Fury. She, Hope, Lizzie, and Finch could have become a vigilante squad who got revenge against evil men.
An Eternity of Misery 