This week starts off with an angry Britten sitting in Dr. Lee’s office. Lee is apparently not supposed to be here, which makes me wonder if the world-switching has broken down. Lee asks about the last thing Britten remembers…

Rex: Britten’s at a carnival with Rex and Emma; Bird’s there too – as a clown. As they walk toward a bungee-jump ride, some guy bumps into Britten. There’s hasty apologies, and when the detective moves on the man stares after him. Britten volunteers to jump first, and the ride operator explains he’ll count backwards from 3. But right then Britten’s vision goes blurry – then the gate opens and he falls instead of jumps.

Hannah: Britten wakes up beside Hannah, who asks if he had a bad dream. Then we switch back to Dr. Lee, who asks for more details – apparently as the day went on Britten realized something was wrong.

The day started off normal enough though. Britten and Hannah went with Emma to a doctor’s appointment, where they heard the baby’s heartbeat and saw the kiddo on the ultrasound.

Then Britten heads to work, where he and Vega investigate an odd murder perpetrated by a guy who walked in without any concern to the cameras. Yesterday he committed a murder for no reason at a bus stop, and today he killed a guy he got along with. Britten comments the guy’s lost his mind… and is probably hearing voices telling him to kill people.

Dr. Lee asks Britten if anything was unusual about his evening routine. Britten says there wasn’t, but he did recall the carnival and wondered what would be waiting for him there. Then he fell asleep… and when he woke up he was still with Hannah. Which has never happened before. And so Britten demands Dr. Lee help him get back to Rex.

Dr. Lee tries to tell Britten this is a positive step. The way the carnival ended – with a fall – is a traditional way for a dream to end. And the biggest problem right now is for Britten to treat this as a setback instead of a breakthrough. But Britten is adamant that he’s not going to lose Rex again.

Britten heads down to the car, and in the backseat sees the same man he bumped into at the carnival. There’s a very confusing conversation, where the man admits he doesn’t know who he is, and then Dr. Lee shows up with Britten’s cellphone. Britten looks in the backseat while Lee’s there… and there’s no one.

Lee walks away, and the strange man appears in the passenger seat. He reveals then that he’s Britten’s imagination; he’s only able to say what Britten tells him to say. So Britten spitballs that someone who looks like him might have something to do with the Pietrowski case.

Britten and Vega head back to the second crime scene – the office – and the workers there tell him they’ve never seen anyone matching Imagination Man’s description. Vega asks Britten where he’s getting this info, but Britten tells him he can’t say because he’s not sure the source is reliable.

As they walk away from Pietrowski’s apartment – another dead end – Britten suddenly collapses. He flashes back to the night of the accident, where Hannah and Rex sang Bohemian Rhapsody much to Britten’s displeasure. When he comes to, he tells Vega merely to take him home.

There, at dinner, he looks over the Pietrowski notes while Hannah and Emma talk around him. Emma says her father won’t pick up her calls, which leads Hannah to suggest Britten reach out to him again. Britten says he will, and then sees the little imagination man walk past. At Hannah’s question, he replies he’s going to go lie down.

The next morning, imagination man still stands where he was the night before. Vega calls and tells Britten that Pietrowski is staying with a friend of his. Britten asks what the friend looks like, but Vega comments that he’s not doing this again. Britten tells Vega he’ll meet him there, and then when he hangs up the phone asks the imaginary man if that’ll be him. Imaginary man comments that he hopes so – since Britten’s not that fun to hang out with. Well that was a burn.

The friend is actually a tall redhead, so that’s a no-go. Pietrowski stayed there only for a night before bolting, something that Thompson – the friend – was curious about until he saw the news. Vega sneezes at the cat hair in the apartment, then the imaginary man begins sneezing repeatedly. And that’s when Britten notices there’s a piece of paper missing from the table. Foreclosure listings, Thompson tells them, and then gets them a copy. Dun dun duuun.

Pietrowski’s hiding out at a foreclosed home. He tries to run, but the cops appear on both sides with guns. Then he rushes Britten and Vega, but Vega grabs him and slams him into the wall. At the station, Pietrowski talks about how his crimes seemed dreamlike; he didn’t even realize he killed his friend until after it happened. Britten mentions the little man, but then Vega pulls him out of the room and tells him to go home. Otherwise he’ll ruin the case. And that ain’t good.

So Britten heads home, asks if there’s anyone there, and then sits on the bed. He suddenly looks underneath… but there’s nothing. Then Britten goes to sleep, and wakes up again with the red band still on his wrist.

Britten calls for Rex, and then runs into his son’s old room to find the imaginary man still sitting there. The man for whom there’s no reason right now. Hannah walks in, wondering what’s going, and reminds Britten that he’s supposed to meet with Emma’s father later today. Britten tries to beg off, but she won’t let him. Bummer.

So then Emma’s father sees Britten flipping out a bit at the imaginary man outside. And then inside, the dad has the gall to say butt out of our lives. The imaginary man tries to get Britten’s attention, while Emma’s dad tries to angrily get Britten to shove off. He’s convinced Emma thinks raising a baby will be nothing more than a hiccup when really it’ll be the end of her life.

At last the imaginary man shouts that he sees himself through the window. Britten leaps to his feet and runs out of the coffee shop. He tries to run down the car, but finally has to stop after too many swerve to avoid him. Britten stands next a car that’s struck a water fountain, while the imaginary man says he tried to tell him but he wouldn’t listen.

Then Britten flashes to the night of the accident again. He comes to with Emma’s father standing over him… and then he bolts to pursue the lead. With the police sketch artist, he gets an image of the imaginary man down on paper. Vega comes in and tells Britten that Harper wants to talk to him, but Britten shouts him down. Turns out the mystery man is a cop – Ed Hawkins – who’s now Bird’s partner in this world.

Britten meets Bird at a coffee shop, where he asks about Hawkins. Bird says he seems like good people, and so is confused about why Britten’s asking. Then Hawkins himself comes in. Not long after, it’s revealed Hawkins was one of the first on the scene to Britten’s accident. He tried to help – or so he says – and then offers condolences about Rex.

Britten goes home, where he remembers more about the accident. Including Hannah telling him to slow down and watch the curves. And Rex commenting that the cops trained Britten to drive like this. He also remembers Hawkins there, shaking his head about whether Rex was alive.

Hannah finds Britten on the floor later. She initially comes in, angry, and then realizes something’s wrong. Britten has a breakdown, sobbing that he’s at fault for the accident that killed Rex. Hannah assures him that she doesn’t blame him in the slightest, and there’s a bit of an emotional hit here. I didn’t know Lucius Malfoy was such a good crier – yeah, I went there.

He and Hannah go to sleep curled up together. Then Britten wakes up, sees her sitting there, and says good morning.

In Harper’s office, Britten apologizes for his actions of the past few days. Harper informs him that he’s suspended pending a full investigation into his actions… she then suggests he take this time to do what he wasn’t able to before – grieve for the loss of his son. Britten hands over his gun and badge with the words “I killed my son, captain. You can keep them.”

Britten stands over Rex’s grave and apologizes. Then he looks up, sees Imaginary Hawkins, and flips out on him. The imaginary man disappears at Britten’s insistence, which is honestly rather surprising. But I suppose makes sense, since the guy’s his imagination.

At home that night, Britten slips the red band off his wrist. There’s no point anymore, since he won’t go back to the other world. Then he crawls under the covers.

Britten goes to talk with Emma’s father again at the man’s office, where Britten admits he’s been having more trouble dealing with Rex’s death than he thought. Cue the speech about how losing your kid is the worst thing ever… and I think we’ve got a breakthrough for Emma’s dad.

Why? Because Emma, Hannah, and Britten are watching TV later when Emma gets a call from her dad. Hannah thanks Britten, but he cautions that they don’t know what Emma’s dad is saying yet. They’re talking though – which is a very good thing.

Even later that night, Britten goes to sleep after looking at a family photo. He goes back to the accident, with a distorted Bohemian Rhapsody playing over the accident. This time Britten remembers even more – he looks back in the rear view mirror after Hannah and Rex start singing from the top again. The headlights suddenly turn off, and in the side mirror Britten sees the car speed up and hit them. Then, to the side, he sees Hawkins driving the car. Holy crap!

Rex: Britten wakes up on the ground at the carnival with Rex standing over him. Britten leaps to his feet, overjoyed to see Rex again. He hugs it out with the boy while several onlookers stare at them. Bird steps forward even.

A conversation between Britten and Dr. Evans begins in voiceover, where Britten asks to meet with the good doctor as soon as possible. He needs to talk something through with someone, and she’s the only one he can trust now. She asks what’s going on; Britten reveals there was no accident. Another cop was trying to kill him. And I half-expected the show to end with Evans saying to Harper (or Carl) that “He knows.”

All in all a pretty decent episode given the last crop of “meh” ones. What did you all think?

Did you miss an episode of ‘Awake’? Check out our recap of last week’s ‘Slack Water‘.