A ship stuck in the frozen sea. A team arrives to investigate. The interior is dark, cold, and still. The crew is dead. All the Abnormals are dead as well. Tonight, the Sanctuary team is trapped with an unknown entity that can alter reality, making you question your eyes, your ears, and your sanity.

Henry and members from the UK Sanctuary, Declan, Terry, Alistair, and Murray, investigate the ship because they received reports that the crew were smuggling Abnormals. To gain access to the ship, Henry and Alistair change into their werewolf forms to force open the door. Henry finds the first dead crewmember; he appears to have shot himself. They search the rest of the ship. The rest of the crew shot each other, and the Abnormals killed each other. Food is present, and there is no obvious sign of what could have caused everyone to lose their senses and kill each other.

After the boiler and lights are fixed, the team is on the bridge. They’re startled by a noise. They draw their weapons. A member of the team opens the door, and Helen and Will enter. Henry is surprised. They weren’t supposed to be there until morning because of the weather, but Will says Helen was determined to arrive that night, so piloted the plane through the storm. The team catches Will and Helen up. Helen asks about the rumored priority Red-Listers, but they tell her they have only found dead things and guns.

Helen has everyone search the entire ship, and they find five blocks of ice attached to a wall. Something is alive inside the ice. Helen agrees to Terry’s idea of taking one upstairs to the research room. Because they do not know what is in the ice, they decide to turn off the boiler so the creatures are not released.

Another nest is found. The boat shifts. There is an explosion. The gas line malfunctioned. Murray is dead. The boiler is shut off.

In the research room, Terry finds something in the microscope. Helen looks and tells everyone they are dealing with Magoi. When the Magoi are threatened, they will defend themselves by taking the form of someone familiar and altering another’s reality. The Magoi can make you see and hear things that aren’t there. According to Helen, the Magoi are being kept in freshwater because saltwater will make them stronger. Since the explosion is making the ship sink, they have to take the other Magoi out to avoid making the situation worse.

They thought they stopped the ice from melting, but the Magoi in the research room escapes.

With a creature that can alter someone’s perception of reality loose on the ship, the entire team begins to question and doubt who is who and what they see and hear. It’s dark, so no one can see clearly. The scenes are tense and filled to the brim with taught paranoid energy.

Declan, Will, and Helen find Alistair and Henry over Terry’s dead body. She has been mauled, so one of the werewolves killed her. Both men are locked in a room. One could be a disguised Magoi or under the influence of one. Nothing is certain.

Declan finds the real Alistair’s body in the water. Alistair is dead. They rush to the room, now knowing that Henry is in trouble. Declan opens the door. Henry is alive.

Declan is distraught that his team is being massacred, but Helen tells him that there will be time to grieve after the initial threat is neutralized. They stick to Helen’s plan of moving the blocks away from the saltwater.

Henry gets back to work removing more blocks from the wall. Will sits on the edge, avoiding getting wet. Henry feels responsible for Alistair’s death because he convinced Alistair to join the Sanctuary. Will tells him that he taught Alistair how to live life, and Alistair decided to live his own life. Henry is in no way to blame for Alistair’s death.

Declan finds a larger block of ice missing its Magoi. There could be many Magoi on the loose. Helen tells everyone to stay in pairs and to not approach anyone alone.

Henry and Declan appear to be locked in a room by Will. Has Will been fooled by the Magoi? No. Declan sees the door handle on the floor and realizes they have been fooled by a vision. They hear Will claim to be locked in the stern. Henry and Declan meet Helen; she says that Will is missing. They go to the stern and question Will. Still in doubt, they open the door and find Will. All four are in the stern.

Then Helen and Will appear.

Who is who? What is real? The new Helen and Will claim to have just arrived. Henry says that he knows they are Magoi. The new Helen understands the situation. She tells Henry and Declan that Magoi cannot read every thought, but they can piece together realities based on your memories and random thoughts. The new Helen notices that Helen and Will are not wet. The new Helen knows a way to settle the matter. She pushes the other Helen, and both fall into the water. The Helen we have been with screams in pain. Saltwater doesn’t make a Magoi stronger, salt hurts the Magoi. The real Will shoots the fake Will as it tries to run away.

Henry is stunned that he was fooled, but Helen tells him that because he knows her so well, the Magoi were able to construct good replications of her and Will by using Henry and Declan’s memories.

Although three people are dead, Helen understands that the Magoi acted out of need to protect each other. The creatures were being smuggled and should not have been on the ship. Helen will take the rest of the Magoi to the Sanctuary.

This was a thrilling monster story. I was scared, and the shifting reality bred confusion, which added to the suspense. However, telling the three male UK Sanctuary members apart was difficult. If you haven’t seen the show before, then you did not recognize Declan and Alistair. All three guys were about the same height and build, had dark hair, and wore the same coat; combined with how dark the setting was, the viewer could easily get the characters confused. Putting them in different colored coats would have helped a great deal. Also, if you’re new to the show, then the scene with Henry blaming himself for Alistair’s death didn’t have as much resonance as the writers wanted. Nothing before that moment in the show hinted that Henry and Alistair were close.

Were all the characters necessary? Actually, they were. The different characters distracted the viewer away from clues about the fake Helen and Will. I didn’t notice that they didn’t interact a lot with physical objects or get into the water until the real Helen pointed it out at the end. With so much to focus on, I missed the little things, and to paraphrase Magoi-Helen, the little things can reveal the truth.

If you missed the previous episode, be sure to read our ‘Sanctuary: Homecoming ‘ recap to catch up.