Baird joins Nicole Noone, who is trying to head off a group of Russian mercenaries, ransacking her empty graves in search of an extremely powerful magical artifact. Flynn starts to doubt his own work as a Librarian.
Tropes
- Armies Are Evil: Ukrainian military is portrayed as extremely trigger-happy, shooting at the Librarians, not even bothering to ask questions.
- Artifact of Doom: Koschei's Needle is capable of slaughtering entire armies, as well as killing an immortal.
- Beard of Evil: As Rasputin is restored to his full strength, his famous shaggy beard grows back in an instant. Before that, he was clean-shaven.
- Brought Down to Normal:
- Rasputin uses Koschei's Needle to steal Nicole's immortality for himself, as well as deal her a mortal wound.
- In order to save her and redeem himself for doubting her, Jenkins undergoes a ritual to transfer his own immortality to her.
- Casual Danger Dialog: During their first fight with the mercs, Eve and Nicole take verbal jabs at one another's fighting style.
- Evil Sorcerer: The villain turns out to be Rasputin himself, still alive thanks to dark magic.
- Good All Along: Despite Jenkins' reservations and her own desire not to be a part of the Library, Nicole is firmly on the side of good.
- Immortality Hurts: When Flynn and Nicole are running away from Ukrainian soldiers, he points out that she's probably not afraid of bullets. Nicole replies that they might not kill her, but they still hurt like hell.
- Internal Reveal: Flynn and Jenkins tell the others about the two Librarians, who plunged the Library into a civil war, resulting in the Dark Ages, and about Darrington Dare's request that there be only one Librarian.
- Rasputinian Death: It's revealed that the Mad Monk himself managed to survive the multiple assassination attempts by using dark magic. One of the assassins was Nicole.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
- Rasputin’s mooks immediately bolt once he reveals his true identity. One of them can be heard saying, “I’m not getting paid enough for this” as he runs off.
- Flynn resigns from the Library at the end of the episode, following Nicole's advice and without even telling Eve.
- Sherlock Scan: When Flynn and Jenkins visit the site of Nicole and Eve's scuffle with the mercs, Flynn is able to instantly reconstruct the fight and the moves employed.
- Slavic Mythology: Given that the artifact everyone is searching for is firmly rooted in Russian fairy tales, this pops up a lot.
- Too Spicy for Yog-Sothoth: Eve directs Raputin's hand, still holding the Needle, at a pipe full of radiation from the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. The Needle attempts to transfer all that energy into Rasputin, resulting in his disintegration.
- Translation Convention: Averted. The Russians always speak to one another in their native language.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: Both Nicole and Jenkins start to doubt whether eternal life is a blessing. In Nicole's case, Eve finds out that Nicole has lost many friends and loved ones over the centuries. It can be assumed that Jenkins did as well.
