No Better to Be Safe Than Sorry: Season 4, Episode 13

WARNING: If you don't want to know what happened in this episode, don't read this photo recap! 

Quentin and Alice are powered up with magic from the reservoir in Fillory and headed to the Library to stop Evils Eliot and Julia. Just as Evil Julia is threatening Fogg, Quentin calls out for her. She heads to the hallway where Quentin and Alice have an ice axe and a bottle to hold the possessed spirit.

And as Julia is confronting them, Penny 23 appears behind her and whacks her with the other ice ax. It removes the demon monster spirit from her body, and they use magic to cast an incorporate bond and contain it in a bottle.

They are out of magic, so they travel with an injured Julia and Dean Fogg to get more from the reservoir. Which is now empty, thanks to evil wants-to-be-a-god Librarian Everett.

Julia is in the hospital and not healing properly. Her body is healing and then reopening the wound from the ice ax. Penny 23 realizes he needs to reach out to The Binder. He advises that he can help Julia -- either become a goddess or become human. And Penny 23 has to choose for her.

Julia tells Quentin what she realized the Monster wanted when she was possessed. She wants to kill the old gods, and is just fine to kill all humans in a nuclear apocalypse scenario if that's what it takes. Luckily the scroll she had recovered from the Library to travel to them is still in Julia's pocket.

Josh-Fish becomes Josh. He and Margo embrace and are adorable and super into each other.

Then Penny shows up with the bad news: They helped Julia, but not Eliot. Margo is not surprised, and she is furious. Then Josh realizes he has some residual magical powers and they realize they need to talk to rest of the gang.

Kady finally resolves to get healing from the Library from her Poison Room experience after a talk with Pete. They need her. She sits with Zelda and lets her have it for everything she has done while Everett has gone full evil and she has been blindly obedient to him. Zelda admits she was, and says she has changed.

Julia is furious with Penny 23 for choosing for her. And for making her be human -- she doesn't have magic anymore and she is devastated. Penny apologizes but says he would do it again to save her. When he goes to leave, she asks him to stay. She just wants him to be nearby while she is quietly mad at him for a while.

Back at the Cottage, Margo and Josh discuss what to do next with Quentin. They know Everett wants to kill Evil Eliot in order to get his powers and both Quentin and Margo agree that they can't do anything that endangers Eliot. Suddenly EE appears. Josh reaches for the scroll and a magical portal opens. He and Quentin jump through it before EE can. And, wormhole!

Dean Fogg appears and casts a spell that transports EE to Fillory and confuses him. It will buy them some time.

Quentin and Josh land in the office of some mid-level manager to the Old gods who is carrying a putter and talking about his tee-time. The scroll is the prize for a quest they didn't complete, and he isn't inclined to help them talk to the gods. But he does have advice: Throw the Monsters into "the seam." He describes what Quentin realizes is the Mirror World, and tells them that there is a place where the world leaks and if they throw the Monsters in there they will be gone forever. And then they get congrats cake.

Josh and Quentin fill in the gang on their middle manager quest-cake experience. And the idea of the seam. Alice remembers seeing it in the Mirror World when she was a niffin. But they still don't have enough magic…

Kady suggests reaching out to all of the hedge witches and magicians all around the world to do a cooperative spell and raise ambient magic. If it works, it should be enough to give the team the power they need to cast the incorporate bond to save Eliot and toss the Monsters into the seam. And they can surprise Evil Eliot while he is still confused in Fillory.

Alice and Quentin talk -- they both want to protect each other from the dangers of the Mirror World. Ultimately they agree that they should both go -- that they work best when they are a team. They kiss.

Julia is sad that she has no magic and she can't go with her friends and help. Penny 23 comforts her. Then he heads off with the gang to work out the plan.

Penny, Quentin and Margo sneak up on Evil Eliot and ice ax him. They use ambient magic that everyone is summoning to move the possessed spirits into one of the bottles and cast an incorporate bond. Margo tends to Eliot's wound and calls to him. He recognizes her, but is seriously injured and passes out again. They rush him to the hospital for treatment but since all magic must be used for the bonds to hold the monsters they have to treat him the old fashioned way -- surgery.

Penny, Quentin and Alice travel to the Mirror World. They find the seam, and Alice warns that no magic can be used there. She leads them to the room where she sensed the seam. They find it, in a room that looks like an alternate Brakebills lab. And inside, a large mirror holds the seam.

Quentin successfully throws the first bottle into the seam. One monster gone. Then Everett shows up. He's pissed, and he wants that god power for his own. He knows he can't do magic in there, so he throws an object to break the mirror so they can't toss the other bottle into the seam.

Everett says it's over. Nice try, but give him the bottle. Alice tells Quentin that he should give the bottle to Everett. Quentin says OK, and gives Penny a look.

Quentin tells Penny to "do it," and Penny grabs Alice and moves toward the door. Everett, enraged, asks Quentin what he's done. He answers: "Just some minor mending." Quentin worked magic to repair the broken mirror and heal the seam.

Quentin tosses the bottle into the seam. He saves his friends, and the world.

The magic reverberates, annihilating the furious, power-hungry Everett.

The wave of magic continues through the room. It hits Quentin. It kills him. He's gone.

Magicians and hedge witches sense that everything is OK. They begin to celebrate. Only Penny and Alice know about Quentin. The two of them survive because Penny 23 pulled her out of the room, and he holds her while she sobs. Magic returns to the world.

Penny 40 is at work, just after receiving his promotion and heading to "Secrets Taken to the Grave." He stands in the hallways, and the elevator dings. The door opens.

It's Quentin. Penny 40 welcomes him to the Underworld.

They sit in Penny's office. Quentin is crying. He knows he has to reveal his truth -- and Penny tells him he has to reveal it to himself. He talks through his history, his struggles with mental health and self-harm. And how he found Brakebills and thought that everything changed. But here is the question that Quentin is now facing: Did he do something brave to save his friends? Or did he finally find a way to kill himself?

Penny 40 takes him to witness his friends in mourning. They are sitting outside by a fire at night, and sing a song in his memory. Everyone throws something meaningful from their time with Quentin into the fire.

Alice throws in a mug. Kady thows in Quentin's first edition of Fillory & Further. Penny 23 throws in an egg from the dragon-egg-hangover experience.

Eliot arrives. Oh God -- he's hurt and limping but alive. Margo supports him as they join the group at the fireside.

Quentin, observing the remembrance, catches his breath when he sees Eliot.

Margo adds the crown that she had once placed on Quentin's head to the fire. Fogg adds Quentin's Brakebills admissions form to the fire. Penny 40 and Quentin take a moment to appreciate everyone's sincere grief. And they laugh now at how Quentin inappropriately laughed when he learned Penny was dead. Penny then tells Q that he didn't just save their lives, he changed their lives.

Eliot bites a peach and throws it into the fire. It's tragic. Quentin asks for one last look at the group. Then they head back to Penny 40's office.

Quentin asks what happens to everyone. Penny tells him. Magic comes back, powerfully. Fogg finds more students on the globe in his office. Zelda the Librarian asks Sheila to find Alice and beg her to run the library.

Eliot and Margo head to Fillory. But they find that Acting High King Fen and Josh the Fresh Prince were overthrown 300 years prior. They are in a Fillorian future.

Quentin says he is most worried about Julia. She is devastated and throws a deck of cards into the fire -- where they freeze in midair and then move at her command. She has magic again. Penny 23 is at her side.

Penny 40 takes Quentin to a large empty room with a door. He hands him an underworld Metrocard and says goodbye.

Quentin goes through the door. And he's gone.