Quantico recap: 'Cleopatra'

Annnnnnnnd we’re back! Quantico returned from winter break this week and wasted absolutely no time when it did.

Alex Parrish is in custody and awaiting debriefing when Hannah — yes, that Hannah, Ryan’s ex-wife — walks in. She wants Alex’s intel, and she says she’ll need some serious convincing to help call off the drone strike that the military currently has planned for the area.

“10 months ago I went undercover at the Farm…” Alex begins, and we get caught up, along with Hannah, via the ensuing flashbacks:

Alex and Ryan are in bed; Ryan is reminding her that now that she is officially donezo with the FBI and strictly CIA, he won’t be able to tell her what his side is up to. Alex doesn’t look bitter, and, at breakfast with Harry Doyle, it turns out that’s because she’s not. She’s got her own plan: find out who Owen Hall is recruiting AIC members for.

While Alex is at breakfast, Ryan fills Miranda in on that weird killing challenge he, Dayana, and León completed. Ryan is definitely not at ease with what’s gone down, but the other two are polar opposites; Dayana, it turns out, is positively beaming, while León is barely getting by. He also promises that the secret phone the AIC gave him will stay secret from Alex, indefinitely.

Someone else who is struggling is Owen Hall. Since Lydia’s departure, he’s sunk into depression — which to Harry and Alex is good news, since it makes him an easy target.

At this point, Hannah is annoyed that Alex is telling her about so many people. But Alex explains that every single one of these people is inside the crisis zone and at least one of them is a terrorist. Hannah, truly the most annoyingly cast person on this show, ever, presses her, asking for the name of one masked terrorist. Alex gives in: “Ryan is a terrorist, Hannah,” she says.

With Hannah re-hooked on her story, Alex goes back to the Farm — well, actually to the Gold Leaf bar, where each recruit is working on their wooing skills. They have to recruit assets, and at what seems like the end of their exercise, Owen ups the ante: He wants the recruits to each wake up next to their new targets, whom they will get assigned at a nearby hotel, tomorrow. Before they set off, Harry hands Alex a pill that he suggests she slip Owen.

When Alex finishes this bit, Shelby throws open the door — she’s been listening in, naturally — and tells them that Harry isn’t the bad guy, and neither is Ryan. The AIC isn’t responsible for the attack, she says; they’re the target! (Hannah sums it up more clearly when she asks, “One group of rogue agents is holding another group of rogue agents hostage?”)

When Hannah says she is going to go get Miranda, Alex is surprised to hear that Miranda is there; she screened her last call. This concerns the two blondes, who set off in search of the director. But they’re headed the wrong way. Miranda is behind the one-way mirror of this interrogation room loading her gun.

NEXT: Certain bedfellows refuse to play along…

Rewind to months ago at the Farm. The recruits are all trying to land, and bed, their targets. Earlier at the bar, Alex promised Ryan she would stop investigating Owen if Ryan promised that he would tell her all AIC updates, but it turns out this is not a promise she ever planned to keep. She finds a very drunk Owen at the bar and drops Harry’s little white pill into the water she offers him. When he really begins to slur and slump, Alex leads him back to his room. There, they argue about who wants the other one more or less, and when Alex leaves, Ryan spots her in the hall.

Oops! Harry accidentally bumps into Ryan, knocking his AIC phone to the ground. (Honestly, who secures a top secret phone so poorly?) In a room nearby, Dayana is hysterically crying. Something went wrong with her target — he’s now lying unconscious in the bed, battered — and León is helping her clean up the mess.

The next day, Ryan is at the top of the murder board (sorry Alex!) and after class, Harry fills Alex in on the secret phone business.

Outside, Dayana is on the phone. She tells her caller that she got all the information from her target that was requested, adding that she had León clean up the mess “because he’s weak.” She adds that he shouldn’t be involved in what they’re doing.

Speaking of León, he’s at Shelby’s house — and he’s mad. He feels like Jane (Shelby’s alias) is using him for information; there’s something off with how much he’s shared with her. Eventually, he’s assuaged. (Before I can agree with Dayana, though, it turns out León is also playing a game. When Nimah leaves Shelby’s house later, he’s down the street doing recon and sees.)

There are two surprising twists that wrap up this episode, and, not surprisingly, they both involve Alex.

In the past, Alex goes to confront Ryan about his AIC phone at the safe house. When Ryan tells Alex to back off, that the AIC chose him and she needs to deal with it, she pops out her own secret AIC phone and says they chose her, too.

And in the present, when Shelby and Hannah return to Alex’s briefing room, she’s gone. Hannah says they should give her a head start. “She’s the only one who can end this,” she explains. Unfortunately, though, Alex actually needs help. Miranda is holding her hostage in her car. As they begin to drive, Miranda tells Alex, “I am one of the terrorists, and after the conversation that we are about to have, you will be, too.”

Lingering questions:

• Has Alex really been recruited by the AIC, or did she snag a phone from behind Owen Hall’s secret wall earlier this season without us knowing?
• We didn’t talk much about it here, but when Sebastian cries about having hooked up with a female to Harry, is he faking remorse? Maybe Sebastian has been playing everyone all along.
• Speaking of Harry, his reaction to Sebastian — does the MI6 agent have real feelings?