Alex arrives in her office to find her boss slumped at her desk still wearing his winter coat and fedora. Ever the grump he looks up and says "I see you've had a miraculous recovery." Alex hangs her coat on the stand "I've felt better… To what do I owe this honor?"
The District Attorney says "I thought you had a confession in that decapitation case. The press is having fun with "Seinfeld" references calling the killer 'The Lopper' and "The nenogginizer.' Why haven't you wrapped it up?" Seeing he isn't going to get up, Alex sits in her own side chair. "The suspect was coerced." Schiff nods "By the cops?" Alex shakes her head. "Is there a record of this coercion?" Alex responds "The threats were made by a guy claiming to be the confessor's attorney." Adam looks annoyed "The guy's own attorney' threatened his client into confessing? …Didn't even ask for a deal? What kind of defense attorney is that?" Alex winces "One who turned out not to be an attorney…but a guy that is Detective Benson's significant other." Adam grimaces and shakes his head in disbelief. "So she's shacking up with a guy that threatens her suspect into confessing?" Alex nods. "And it happens right in their interview room…" Alex nods again and Schiff looks at the ceiling after taking off his hat. Alex continues "And I don't think he did it." Adam Schiff looks at Alex carefully. "Why?" Alex shakes her head "I just do." She can't reveal more because she doesn't know if her own boss has been read into what she knows about immortals. Adam Schiff leaves with a rhetorical question. "What the hell is going on in SVU?"
Alex leaves her office and heads for the antique store on Hudson Street. She watches the store from the entrance to another shop down the street and on the opposite side as the sun slowly sets and lights in the apartments above the stores start to come on and the chill evening air seeps through her coat. She's not observing so much as pondering what she's learned and trying to make sense of it all.
Lost deep in thought, she suddenly realizes with a start that Duncan is standing next to her. "Looking for me?" Duncan says with a smile. Alex is frightened. "Why don't you just come in where it is warm?" Duncan walks on and Alex is drawn to follow him.
Olivia sits as Adam brings the food he's prepared for her to the table. Creating the meal has taken most of the day between skillfully selecting the ingredients and preparing them carefully to finally allow their flavors to mingle and mature. To his pleasure Olivia enjoys her first appetizer. It has taken some time to get her to slow down and experience the food and its subtleties. Olivia can concentrate on a case, but her diet has been largely hastily grabbed meals with coffee from a Styrofoam cup or cold leftovers with too much mediocre wine. It had taken patience to bring her around to slowly enjoy a meal.
After some compliments on how much she appreciates the food and flirting about having a man cook for her she says "Did you castrate that guy?" Adam pretends to be confused. "What guy?" Olivia has grown to accept that nothing comes quickly from Adam. "They translated what you said about ripping his…root and berries off." Adam nods, not as fazed as she thought he might be. "Actually it is a funny story and not what he believes, but his belief does have its uses." Olivia sits quietly waiting for the rest. "Are you sure you want to hear this now?" Olivia nods. "All right… He wanted to join us. Kronos thought it could be fun to make him prove his nerve. We told him he needed to pass a test…"
Adam inserts a corkscrew into the cork of a wine bottle. Olivia waits for the tale to resume. "We blindfolded him, tied him to a tree…" The corkscrew is fully inserted. "Caspien pulled his pants down and tied a rope on it. Silas tied the other end to the hoof of my horse which was grazing nearby." Adam begins to pull the cork. "We were eating beans and Kronos farted. He was so embarrassed that I burst out laughing. The horse bolted and…" Adam pulls the cork loose with a pop. "It went flying through the air, landed on the horse's rump with a wet plop which only made him run more. The wannabe was screaming. I'm laughing… Took two days to find my horse… " Adam, barely resisting the giggles, sees the look of disapproval on Olivia's face. "Well, I guess you had to be there…" Olivia slowly shakes her head. "Come on, I've heard your cop friends laughing about stuff at least that bad... "
Alex is led by Duncan into the heart of his quarters above the antique shop. Alex looks around the circular room dominated by a sunken circular couch at the center and is quickly drawn to objects around the room's perimeter. Duncan descends a couple of steps to the level of the perimeter floor and then a couple more and takes a seat on the couch watching Alex begin to explore what appears to be a museum. The first object she approaches is a medical bag with a red cross on it. "I was in the Red Cross…" Alex examines the bag and opens it, finding it contains some supplies but none of it is anything close to being current. Alex looks to Duncan. "… in France between 1917 and 1918. I saw a lot of bad things…and some good."
Near the bag is a picture of a man in Arab garb that is clearly not Arab. "In 1916 I was in the British Army as a driver and messenger attached to the Arab Bureau and under the command of T. E. Lawrence." Alex is startled "You knew Lawrence of Arabia?" Duncan nods.
Alex moves on around the room and is attracted to an American Indian sewing kit. Duncan says "That belonged to Little Deer. She was my Lakota wife until she and her son Kahani were killed in 1872."
Alex silently moves on to a few mementoes of the American Civil War. "I helped slaves get on the Underground Railroad in 1862. I was hung in 1863, but a Confederate Captain and fellow immortal dug me up. I was in Andersonville POW camp in 1864." Alex's head begins to spin.
"You're so casual about it." Alex says and Duncan shrugs. Moving forward, Alex picks up a scimitar. "Mid sixteen hundreds…" Alex stares. "I was captured by corsairs and sold as a slave to Hamza el Kahir in Algiers. He taught me a lot including how to use that. A few years later, I met Niccolo Machievelli in Venice…" Alex stands holding the scimitar in disbelief. "You should try that…it becomes you somehow." Duncan says in amusement. She returns it to the stand.
"When were you born?" Alex asks. "1592… I had my first death in 1622…which is when I became immortal." Alex gasps slightly "First death?" Duncan nods. "First?" Duncan says "There have been others…" Alex decides to let the matter rest. How much of this does Olivia already know she wonders? Melinda's warning about prying comes to her mind. Alex slowly realizes that Duncan is a very dangerous man, who has already admitted to one murder and nobody knows she's in his home.
Alex feels a need to escape, but does not want to offend her host who has been treating her well. Duncan opens a cabinet and retrieves two glass snifters and puts them down where Alex can sit on the sunken couch. She watches him retrieve a bottle and a small pitcher of water. He pours a small amount of Glenmorangie into each glass followed by a tiny amount of water, swirls the contents and hands a glass to Alex who takes it. She takes a deep sniff followed by a sip. "Glenmorangie. Good." She says with a smile to Duncan's surprise and amusement. Glass in hand, Alex returns to examining Duncan's collection. "The claymore?" Alex asks. "It is what I used at the Battle of Culloden…"
Eventually Alex completes her circumnavigation and sits on the couch near, but not to close to Duncan. Eventually, the whiskey and being awake for a day and a half take their toll and she drifts off to sleep. Duncan removes her high heels and glasses, lays her down on the couch, and covers her with a blanket. He exits turning off the main lights leaving just some illumination of the shelves. He leaves the door open.
Duncan joins Melinda in eating dinner. "Was that Alex?" Melinda asks. Duncan nods, being careful not to say too much. "I didn't see her leave." Duncan shakes his head. "She's asleep in the trophy room."
Alex sleeps so long that Melinda and Duncan leave her in piece and each of them turns in. In the early morning hours before dawn, Alex awakens with an urge to relieve her bladder. She takes a moment to recall where she is and puts on her glasses, seeing nobody around she starts searching silently in her stocking feet for a bathroom. The hallways are dark and she's worried about entering the wrong room. Suddenly from behind her she hears Melinda challenge her. "Alex?" Alex freezes and then turns around slowly. Even knowing what Melinda is and her level of concern about the recent murder of her student, she's shocked to see Melinda in her underwear in a fighting stance with a saber at the ready. Melinda lowers the sword when she sees that it is Alex. "What are you doing? That's a good way to get killed." Alex blushes "I have to pee…"
Olivia goes to the range to practice with her 9mm. She's annoyed by some male officers fawning over a blond woman who has come in with a forty-four which is clearly too large for her. After flirting with the male officers and receiving a lot of "instruction" from them. She says "Let's see how I do. After all, I'm only a girl. I might loose my nerve. I might even miss." Then she empties her weapon into an amazingly small grouping dead center on the head of the silhouette target. "But not this time." The male jaws drop and Olivia suppresses a grin realizing even she had underestimated the woman. The clip is swapped for a full one with an economy of motion and speed without haste and the performance is repeated.
Adam stops by the station house to drop off some lunch hoping that Olivia is there. He finds the detectives watching a video of a rally at Hudson University. They are watching a group of college women protesting the university's lack of campus security. Almost unnoticed Adam joins them.
As the camera pans Adam asks Munch to scroll back and then pause. Adam watches, nods and says "Thanks. I've got some sandwiches…and one chef's salad. By the way, where was that filmed?" Munch says "Hudson University." Adam nods and puts a sack of food on a desk and starts to leave.
Olivia and Munch look at each other and go after him. They take him into the observation room. "What did you see?" Olivia asks. "There was a woman who was doing the same thing that you're doing, watching those watching the protest to see if they were paying more than casual interest." Much shrugs "Campus security possibly." Adam shakes his head "I doubt they could hire her… She only takes causes she believes in… and this isn't her normal part of the world." Olivia is shocked. "Is she….?" Adam nods. "Remember when I told you there are people out there that frighten me?" Olivia nods slowly. "She would be one of them. John, your Rueben will get cold." Munch stares at Adam. "We have a microwave. I watched that video a dozen times and didn't notice her. Who is she?"
Adam shakes his head slowly. "She didn't want to be noticed. She's fought in more wars than I can recall. In World War 2 she fought a personal war of attrition against the Axis in the Balkans. She normally works as a bodyguard… You would consider her one of the good guys. She will obey your laws. But if she has to kill to protect her client, she'll do so efficiently without hesitation."
Olivia asks "What is her name?" Adam responds "Irrelevant. She'll be using an alias. To you, she's more of an ally than a problem. I don't know what she might think of me, and I really don't need to find out."
After Adam leaves, Munch and Olivia review the video again and zoom in. Olivia gasps a bit "I met her this morning at the range. She left a bunch of our guys feeling distinctly under gunned... both in skill and stopping power."