Episode Recap: Liberty or Death

We start this week's episode off with a flashback: Hansen is talking with one of his subordinates about how they lost the Van Helsings. She's got some good news for him though: she has some Van Helsing ova that are ready to incubate. Once they have a fully-formed Van Helsing, they can use them to raise the Dark One.

Flash forward to the present, and we're at the Loveland plant. Phil (FKA Flesh) is still chained to the pylon. When a young boy approaches to give him food, his mother and ex-wife of Phil, Jennifer, snatches him back, and lambasts Phil for being such a crummy father — infanticide is like top of the list of things parents aren't supposed to do. That's just the beginning of Phil's rough day. After that, warden Max drops in to try to torture answers out of him, but Phil's resilient.

Back at modern-day Black-Tec, Hansen is hosting a contingent of evildoers. He shows off for them his answer to the Van Helsing problem: Violet. They're all quite impressed. Speaking of impressed, Jennifer is both angry and amazed at Phil, mostly for being able to sustain mortal wounds. While relocating Jolene, Jeremy and she have a discussion about what it means to have faith, particularly when it comes to what's happening in Denver.

Back at Black-Tec, Violet snakes in to Doc's lab looking for the answers she may have left behind on her life history. What she finds: a magazine article detailing how she was hatched in a lab. She goes to confront her dad about it, but he's in the middle of a dinner with all the bad guys—the two Brides and Sam. Hansen reveals to us that he's actually centuries old, merely parading around in human form. But enough of the dinner chat, let's get to the occult ritual! It involves the Oracle, Sam, Hansen, and McKayla all sucking the blood from an innocent like pigs at a trough.

In town, Axel is making a deal with the bartender and ex-boyfriend of Violet. In exchange for Max's pilfered booze and smokes, the bartender gives him guns and ammo. What exactly is Axel planning?

And down at the mines, Max is getting frustrated that the radio that links them to Denver can't work and expresses this concern in his office. First, he shoots the guy trying to fix the radio, and Jolene steps in, and lets, Jeremy, the guard skedaddle with the body. Max and Jolene are finally alone, and he makes advances toward her. She tells him she'll kill him first chance she gets. That's when Axel arrives with a full case of booze!
    
Jeremy gets to work untying Phil and collecting Jennifer and the kid, while Max gets high and drunk with Axel and Jolene. Of course, Max hasn't seen the stack of C4 inside the crate with the whiskey yet. Axel asks if he can "borrow" Jolene (wink wink) for a few hours, to get her out of the room. Max obliges, but before Axel leaves, he asks him what's up with Denver. Cover blown: Axel says the place is finished. He makes a movement that reveals his relationship to Jolene, and Max takes her back.

In the ensuing scuffle, Jolene blows a hole through Max's head with a handgun. Axel and Jolene run out of the building just in time, for seconds later it goes up in a cloud of smoke.

But Max isn't dead though, his body heals, and he wants vengeance. He abducts Jennifer and her child, takes Axel's truck, and hits the road. Understandably, this doesn't sit well with Flesh. The team breaks up to find their respective loved ones.   

Having seen what her father really is, Violet attempts to leave Black-Tec for good. But Sam is on her trail. And it seems he's got more than just a professional interest in tracking her down.