Carnivale (2003) - 2x08 - Outskirts, Damascus, NE

from HBO.com
http://www.hbo.com/carnivale/episode/season2/episode20.shtml

Dying on the floor, Belyakov grabs Ben by the throat, and the two are transported to the site of the tree. A suddenly younger Belyakov intones: "Behold, the Usher, a dark heart dwells where the branches meet. Anointed dagger, plunge thee deep." And stabbing the dagger into a fork in the tree, he releases blue blood from the branch.

Belyakov places his hand on Ben's head, and the young man screams. Across the country, Justin gasps in a fit, twisting his Bible in his hands and falling to his knees. As Balthus looks on, gurgling in an attempt to speak, and Iris and the maid stare in horror, Justin rears up, his eyes completely black, and collapses.

"Accept your fate," Belyakov says to Ben, his last words before dying. The pool of blue blood draws back into the knife, and Ben realizes that Scudder has disappeared.

Wandering through the carnival, Scudder makes it to the parked cars before collapsing. There, he is greeted by Varlyn Stroud. "You led me on a merry chase," Stroud says. "I got a friend who's just dying to meet you." And with that, he plunges a syringe into Scudder's neck.

Searching, Ben runs into Samson. "Something bad happened," he says. "Something terrible bad."

In town in Damascus, Jones and Libby are singing, stumbling drunk and embracing in the street. "Hey, I got an idea," Jonesy says, and the two are off.

Iris takes care of Justin, who wakes in his bedroom with a start from his fit and won't allow her to undress him. Afterward, the maid pulls Iris aside. "Did you see? The devil in him; I saw the devil in him," the woman says. But Iris chides her. "You know Justin is a man of God."

A burly man named Bud gets rough with Stumpy trying to collect his gambling debt, but Rita Sue is straight with him. "If you want to slap him around, have at it," she says. "But if you want your dough, you best come talk to me." The two come to a payment arrangement.

Samson is completely stunned by the scene in Management's trailer. "Goddamn Scudder, he finally did it," he says. But Ben explains that it was in fact him. He tells Samson that Belyakov had orchestrated the entire thing, that he was never searching for Scudder, he was just keeping tabs on him. He brought them all together in the trailer because he knew that Ben could never kill him, except to save his father.

"He had to die," Ben says. "And he had to be sure that I was the one that killed him." He explains to Samson that Management was a prophet, and that he died so that Ben, a prince, could rise. "Everything he was, everything he knew, everything he believed he gave to me," Ben says, in order to stop the Usher-Alexi Belyakov, Management's son.

Samson, shocked and upset, declares it all "bullshit."

Later, Ben goes looking for Sofie and is stunned to find out that she has left.

From a gas station on the road, Stroud reports to an agitated Justin that he has managed to find Scudder and that he will be in Mintern in two or three days. Stroud's hand, injured in his fight with Ben, is in bad shape.

Alone, Ben spreads his arms and listens. A buzzing noise?-points him in a certain direction. "West," he mutters. "West."

He tells Samson that they have to head west, but the man is not interested. "You're so powerful, you bring him back," he says. Ben presses him, but Samson, holding Management's empty shroud, wants to know where the body is. Ben tells him Management "ascended."

Samson is irate. Holding the shroud with its Christ-like image, he lashes out. "You killed him...look at what you killed. Don't you see what he was?"

But Ben is resolute. "I know what he was, cause that's what I am," he says. Samson is unmoved. "I'll tell you what, Prince. I'll give you all the help you want, as soon as you bring him back."

In Mintern, Justin convinces Templeton that he has more than enough supporters to get him elected to Congress. He tells the man that he is planning a sermon on the mount for a new America, and he would like Templeton to be a keynote speaker at the candlelight sermon. Pointing out to a valley full of his followers, Justin makes his pitch. "Over 17,000 souls. We provide them with food...blankets...medicine...Who do you suppose they'll vote for, come November."

Rita Sue is furious when she learns that Jonesy and Libby have been married, and the couple seem a little sheepish themselves. But as Libby packs up to move out of her parents' tent, she has more disturbing news: she's quitting the cooch.

Samson discovers that Ruthie is not working and finds her holed up in her trailer. She tells him that she has discovered that she has had "the sight" ever since her snake bite, and tells him that she even saw Scudder the other night being hustled into a car. Samson's ears perk up when he hears this. Samson explains to her that Scudder isn't dead, and that he really was on the midway and tells her he needs to know exactly what she saw.

Over a "family" dinner, Rita Sue and Jonesy argue over Libby's future until she finally puts and end to the discussion. "You can't tell me what to do, and you can't neither," she says. "I'm going to dance the cooch, but no blow off and no tricks. And that's the way it's going to be."

Justin talks to Smith about his fit and shows him that the tree tattoo on his body has now burned into a scar. "Your enemy has received his boon," Smith says. "But what concerns me more is this business you told me about the dagger." He explains that if his enemy has the dagger in his possession "along with his boon, he not only has the strength, but the means to destroy you."

He also asks that Justin call him when Scudder arrives, saying that he has unfinished business with him.

At the Carnivale, the colossus Ferris wheel comes apart in a huge disaster and broken bodies litter the ground. In the chaos, Ben goes to help, and finds a mother and son. The boy is dead, and the mother, trapped, is muttering, over and over: "Please, God, take me and not my son Please God..." Ben takes a long look, then gently touches the mother's cheek. She grows quiet, and her son rises, calling for his momma.

Later, with the injured off to the hospital, the troupe hastens to make a run for the state line before a mob shows up. Samson, rushing around, comes across the mythic Baggage trailer. "What the hell..." he mumbles, entering.

Inside are relics of Belyakov. Samson walks among them and stops at his death shroud, staring into the image of his face before leaving. He walks out and finds Ben. "Sorry about your friend, it was the best I could do," Ben says, and Samson, looking behind him, sees that the trailer is gone. "I'll help you, but it's going to have to be a different deal," Samson says. "No secrets and no lies.'

He tells Ben about Scudder and Stroud, and Ben is disturbed. "He's got a car and a full day's lead on us. We haven't even started and we're already lost." But Samson bets him that it's not over yet.

In his house at the Temple of Jericho, Justin is morose, looking through the broken death mask that had offered him a vision of his enemy, but he sees nothing. Limping up the stairs, he takes solace looking lasciviously at his new maid. And as she rises from her work, we see the face of the woman he covets: It's Sofie.