Episode 1 of Countdown opened with the death of HSI officer Robert. That prompted FBI’s Nathan to coordinate with the HSI’s Damon to form a task force to look into this daylight murder and identify the people who had given him a bribe of around $200,000. The agents that were tasked with this responsibility were Mark, Amber, Evan, Keyonte, and Luke. The first breakthrough that they got, thanks to Evan, was that the guy who’d shot Robert was named Murillo. While the search for that individual happened in the background, Mark, Ambert, Keyonte, and Luke headed over to the CBP to conduct some interviews with the people who had worked with Robert. Out of all of them, Spellman stuck out like a sore thumb, and when the task force pulled at that thread, they found out it was actually he who was conducting illegal operations with the cartel and another anonymous party to ship something into Los Angeles. When Robert found out about it, Spellman sent the cartel after him and got him killed. After combing through Spellman’s telephone records, Keyonte found out the exact place where the transaction of the aforementioned shipment was going to happen. The task force somewhat managed to stop the exchange, but they were shaken by the fact that the USA was looking at a Chernobyl-like event. Did Nathan and his team make any more progress regarding this case in episode 2? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
Borys
The 2nd episode of Countdown opens in Minsk in 2008, where we are introduced to a man named Borys, and his brother, Anton. It seems like Borys used to be in the army, and now he works at the Defense Ministry. Anton has apparently executed some shady deal with an American named Dennis, and now he needs Borys’ help to stay alive. Since Anton is pretty serioisly injured, Borys tells him to spend the night at his place, eat up, and recuperate. The following day, though, Borys demands answers. Anton tells him that he was approached by Dennis, who claimed that he worked for a food company named Harris-Fordham-Deere, and was willing to pay him a huge sum of money for information on the Belarusian agricultural yield and the statistics for the latest harvest. Anton thought that since all the supervisors at his company are taking bribes, why should he skip out on the opportunity to earn some extra moolah? That said, Anton stayed loyal to his company and gave him some tampered data. I guess Dennis figured that out and had Anton beaten up. In order to avoid getting killed, Anton promised to set up a meeting between him and Borys because, well, the latter has access to information on all the email exchanges that have happened between the Belarusian government and the Kremlin. If Borys fails at this task, Anton is going to die. Borys does complete the task and returns home, where Anton is waiting for him. He apologizes to Borys for putting him in this situation and laments that he has always been a liability to him and the family. He excuses himself to go to the bathroom and dies by suicide. Borys blames Dennis for this. Yet he meets the American and gives him the storage device that has the email exchanges. That said, when Dennis goes back to his apartment and turns on the toaster so that he can have some bread while parsing through the damning data that Borys has collected for him, it explodes, thereby killing him and destroying the storage device as well. Maybe that was the same toaster that Borys was working on, or maybe it was the toaster that Dennis always used; either way, using the electrical appliance that symbolizes the last personal task Anton had given him makes this assassination somewhat personal and poetic.
Nathan Is Harassed By Grayson
Dane informs his task force that while the US government has ordered every agency to look into the nuclear threat, they have to continue looking for that rogue individual who escaped from Pier 31 with an integral part of the radioactive device (called “fissile material”). Damon informs the team that they’ve nabbed a few members of the cartel, and they are being interrogated regarding their involvement in this whole affair. Meanwhile, Amber advises that they establish contact with an important member of the cartel, Javi Lopez, in order to further their investigation. Amber’s cover was that of a smuggler. So, it won’t be that big of a deal to convince Javi that she intends to get back on the horse; the difficult part will be uncovering whether or not he has anything to do with the radioactive shipment. Nathan wants Mark and Luke to assist her on this mission even though she wants to do it all by herself. Amber wants to have a discussion on this particular topic, but, unfortunately, Nathan is called away by DA Grayson Valwell because he is unhappy that Nathan is conducting a mission in Los Angeles using LAPD detectives without his authorization. Nathan obviously refuses to entertain him and walks out of that conversation pretty unceremoniously, thereby leaving Grayson pretty flummoxed. Grayson tries his luck with Keyonte, since Keyonte’s dad knew him, or maybe it was the other way around, but even that doesn’t work out. During a conversation between Nathan and Damon, we learn that Grayson’s interest in the task force’s affairs isn’t exactly motivated by his love for protocol; he’s actually running for the post of Governor of California, and that’s why he wants people like Nathan to kiss his ring.
A Cross-Country Heist
Mark and Amber arrive at Huntington Park to have a chat with Javi and try to become a part of his operation. Javi is understandably skeptical of Mark and gets his IT guy to run his name through the system. The cover that he used to stay undercover in the correctional facility in Palmdale shows up, which quells Javi’s doubts about Mark. So, Amber takes that as her cue to begin convincing Javi that she needs cash. She reminds Javi that he is having problems smuggling stuff across the border. Therefore, he can employ her and Mark and let them do all the heavy lifting while he sits back and reaps the fruits of their labor. But why? Why do a drug run for Javi? Well, because Javi’s trust needs to be earned before Amber and Mark can gain entry into his inner circle, thereby giving them access to all the info they need about the cartel’s involvement in the shipping of radioactive material. They can’t just waltz in and say that they need damning information on all the dubious stuff that’s been transported into the Port of Los Angeles. Anyway, Javi accepts Amber’s offer, and she and Mark relay this information to Nathan and the rest of the team, and they begin chalking up a plan to avoid being identified by border patrol. A few seconds later, Amber, Mark, Keyonte, and Luke find themselves in “proper” Mexico transporting a truck full of “pig feed,” which is obviously filled with packets of heroin. They make a pit stop at a gas station so that Amber can bribe an officer of Mexico’s Federal Police, Gerardo, to get the keys to his squad car, while Luke drives the truck and Mark and Keyonte are in their respective cars. Upon reaching the border, Mark unleashes absolute chaos and gets arrested. Keyonte orders the border security officer to help those who are trying to arrest Mark so that he can allow Luke and his truck to pass. While all this is going on, Amber abandons the squad car and drives into the USA in the vehicle that she had used to enter Mexico. Eventually, Keyonte goes to the holding facility where Mark is being kept and takes him out of there under the pretext that he is the FBI’s responsibility, not the Mexican police’s.
Javi Is Dead
At the end of Countdown episode 2, Mark, Amber, Keyonte, and Luke rendezvous with Damon and Nathan at a random parking lot to convey the information that they have just transported a truck full of heroin across borders. Nathan gives them the green light to deliver the drugs to Javi now in exchange for whatever he knows about the Pier 31 affair. Meanwhile, he returns to his office, only to find Grayson waiting for him at the lobby yet again. Apparently Grayson knows everything about the cross-country operation that Nathan’s task force has just conducted. That’s why he has advice for Nathan: bring Grayson into the fold so that he can help Nathan cover his tracks before things get too hairy for him to control. This time, Nathan doesn’t have a comeback because maybe he is starting to think that Grayson is onto something. Anyway, the focus shifts back to Mark and Amber’s meeting with Javi. They drop off the payload in his backyard, and Amber steals a kilo of heroin because, according to her, at least that’s one kilo of drugs that will be hitting the bottom of the river instead of the streets. Mark thinks that that’s weird, and he is right for doubting Amber’s behavior because, if you remember SSA Ray Kubler’s words, you know that she is a junkie and that kilo isn’t going into the river or the streets, but right into her veins. Before either of them gets to call it a night, though, they meet Javi one last time to get some info on Pier 31. Javi talks about the Russians being involved, but before he can remember any further details about the information, the bomb in his car goes off, mortally wounding him in the process. Before taking his last breath, Javi utters the name Volchek. If it isn’t obvious already that Borys is Volchek, IMDb has him listed as Borys Volchek. So, yeah, in case you are wondering who has killed Javi and who is behind all that radioactive stuff, it’s Boris. The reason is kind of obvious as well, right? According to him, the Americans are responsible for the death of his brother. He killed Dennis, but he knows that the rot runs deep, and somewhere down the line, maybe he vowed to himself that he wouldn’t stop until the USA has been obliterated.
