- The team must recover priceless artwork from a band of thieves.
- When Nate accepts to 'steal back' Nazi-confiscated art, Sophie is nearly killed by a bomb, so they stage her 'funeral' and identify it's the work of a rival, non-reformed mastermind's team. Only he constitutes one for every big job and this one must have been a 'test-drive'. Nevertheless, the battle of robbery skills and wits for a van Gogh proves closer-matched than ever before.—KGF Vissers
- Nate and Sophie meet elderly siblings whose father smuggled a Gustav Klimt out of Nazi Germany, but did not make it to safety, himself. Even after showing their provenance, a judge and a bribe adjudged a new owner. This episode introduces evil super-hacker, Chaos (Wil Wheaton). Griffin Dunne appears as Marcus Starke, forger and grifter, who specializes in whiz mobs that only stay together for a couple of days. Sophie, his old partner, knows all of Starke's tricks, including "The Mona Lisa Variant." Sophie gets bombed.—LA-Lawyer
- An elderly German couple explain their plight to Nate and Sophie. They recover art stolen by the Nazis.They're after a Gustav Klimt painting, which belonged to the man's father. The man explains that the painting made it out of Germany, his father did not. Now they know it's there in Boston. A wealthy software tycoon has bought it on the black market and has it hanging in his office. They have a photo of it in a magazine. The Leveragers are on the job.
The crew arrives at an office adjoining the one in which the painting is located. Sophie and Nate distract the receptionist while the rest go to the back to steal the painting. The plan is to cut the wall from behind the painting and steal it from the other side. When Parker questions why they don't just go directly into the office to steal the painting, Hardison explains that the software mogul has too much sophisticated security, and it would just be easier to "hack a wall." He tells Parker how hard it'd be to break into the security system. As he narrates the steps that would have to be taken, we see a mysterious rival team doing exactly that. To top it off, the floor is pressure-sensitive, so they would have to hang from the ceiling -- just as a thief is currently doing as he speaks. Eliot gets through the wall with the painting but it's not the Klimt. It's dogs playing poker.
As Sophie and the team are leaving, a man who's been lurking in the hallway (Griffin Dunne), recognizes her.
The Leveragers regroup at the bar -- minus Sophie. Eliot checks her on their ear coms. He hears her reason and deems it a good one. They go to Sophie's apartment and find her standing ramrod straight holding a vase of flowers and a motion-sensitive bomb.They can't reach into the vase because it might detonate. Parker asks for instant pudding. They dump it in the vase, which should slow the motion of the water and give Sophie time to run. They insist on staying, but she tells them to leave.
Eliot prepares her to not to throw the vase because that would cause the water to move too much. They all clear out. She takes a deep breath, holds the vase over her head and drops it. She turns and runs. From outside, we see the entire floor of the building blow up.
(Back from commercial...)
We open on a cemetery... and Sophie in a coffin. Eliot's giving a eulogy, saying she took care of people and he's going to miss her "Soph--er, so much...Katherine." Parker gets up next and gives the most sincere eulogy she can for "Katherine Clive" (Sophie's alias, when working as a stage actress), talking about how weird it is that she's dead. Hardison rescues her.
Nate and Eliot look around for suspects. Nate says that when you go to the trouble of killing the likes of a Sophie Devereaux, you make sure they're dead. He closes the coffin.
They watch it get lowered into the ground. "Not much of a turnout, is it?" says a woman in black behind Nate. It's Sophie.
Flash to him closing the coffin lid and tapping on it. Then Sophie peering out from the skirt of the stand underneath it.
She walks off and the mystery guy who we saw earlier walks up behind Nate and says it's a shame she's dead. He didn't know her as Katherine. Sophie listens behind him. He says the lesson is that mistakes can get you killed. Nate says a gas line broke. "That is a story," the man says.
Back at the condo, Sophie says she knows exactly who's to blame. She puts Marcus Stark (Dunne) up on the big screen: a grifter and forger. They used to work together. "Are you saying you saw other teams before us?" Hardison says.
He doesn't work with a regular crew, he puts people together and then they scatter. They usually do a smaller job to test before the big one. She figures he wanted her dead because she knows his favorite scams, including one based on the theft of the Mona Lisa in which the con man made six copies and sold them all on the black market.
They start checking upcoming auctions. She knows it'll be Van Gogh, Stark's favorite. Cut to Stark with his crew, unveiling five Van Goghs.
She thinks they need something to trade for the Klimt - like the Van Gogh up for auction that she thinks Stark's team is about to steal. The Leveragers plan to get there first.
At the auction, Eliot tries to fill in for Sophie as the face of the con. Sophie sits in the van with Hardison, surprised by all the work he does in there. From inside, Nate thinks it'll be a cake walk.
Then Hardison's comm starts fuzzing and he hears someone else's voice. Zoom to two cars over and there's a guy (Wil Wheaton) performing Hardison duties in a similarly equipped van.
Inside, Parker lifts a guard's badge, but missed the wallet. A guy dressed as a waiter walks into her tray and lifts the badge from her.
Hardison and his opponent trace each other on their computers, in a tech nerd-off. The other computer guy announces to his team that they have a visiting team.
Eliot and Parker spy their counterparts inside. Then Stark walks up to Nate.
Eliot prepares to face off with that team's muscle - a super hot Israeli chick. Without moving to engage the other, both mentally play through their upcoming fight in their imaginations.
The other team's equivalent of Parker lifts the auctioneer's wallet, but she takes it from him. She shows off her loot and he shows off her phone.
Stark runs down the Leveragers' past accomplishments and over the comm Sophie tells Nate to admit nothing or he'll use it against them.
In the van, Hardison recognizes the hacking as belonging to Chaos. The tech nerds step out of their respective vans, gunslinger style, and face off. They go after each other with keyboards, setting off car alarms and generally wreaking electronic havoc.
Inside, Eliot and the Israeli chick examine nearby swords, but still just fantasize their fight.
As Parker and her opposite prepare to have a serious pickpocket-off, the head security guy realizes he's lost his wallet and badge. He tells his team to triple security and shoos all the patrons out.
Stark grabs his Israeli muscle as Nate grabs Eliot (their imaginary fight having progressed to a kung-fu-flick climax with dozens of dead or unconscious bodies piled around them) and both teams clear out.
Back in the condo, they run down Stark's team. Each Leverager recognizes the name or exploits of their counterpart. (And for all you Star Trek nerds out there, Hardison mentions that Wil Wheaton's character -- Colin Mason a.k.a. Chaos -- is called the Kobayashi Maru by the CIA computer guys.)
Parker remarks on the thief Appollo, without apparent awareness of the irony, "people in that line of high-risk work tend to be very unstable. We can use that," which raises a few eyebrows.
Nate's fired up to go against Stark.
Cut to Stark, telling his crew all about the Leveragers. Both Nate and Stark conclude they have to go in tonight. Both resolve to get the painting, no matter what.
Back at the auction house, at night, the security guards turn on laser, motion sensors and cameras. Hardison gets control of the systems from the van. Sophie drives something into position.
Nate walks up to the auction house door, banging on it like a drunk guy so Eliot and Parker can sneak in while the guards are distracted. They run into an underground passageway where Parker quickly ends up in her usual heating duct. From the van, Hardison tells her to freeze - a motion sensor triggered.
But it's just a bird that got into the hallways, triggering the sensors. The guards turn off all the motion sensors until they can catch the bird. In the heating duct, Parker runs into Apollo. And then Eliot runs into the Mossad chick, Raquel Dayan. Turns out, he speaks Hebrew. And she doesn't hit like a girl. Chaos and Hardison talk to each other from their vans, alternately grabbing control of the systems.
Outside, Stark walks up to the security guard to check what's going on with Nate. Stark introduces himself as Nathan Ford, with the insurance company.
In the vent, Parker asks her counterpart what kind of bird he used to set off the sensors. They chat for a while then they both take off in opposite vent directions. Eliot keeps fighting, tearing Mossad lady's shirt open and bashing her into a pipe, which douses her with water to up the hotness quotient.
Parker comes into the main room to find her counterpart hanging next to the painting - but she's on the other side of the room. Chaos gets control of the lasers and turns off the power in Hardison's van.
Parker is trapped in a moving laser field.
The angry and now soaking wet Mossad chick fights back against Eliot.
Outside, a cop car pulls up behind Nate and Stark. Stark thinks Nate's sunk. But it's Sophie behind the wheel.
He asks if they went through all that trouble to get him. She tells Stark they went through all this trouble to save him. Parker backflips and cartwheels her way through the constantly shifting lasers and across the room. She unhooks the dude's harness, pins him on the ground with her foot and rips off her sneaking clothes.
Nate tells Hardison "now" and he cranks his power back on with a generator. You can't hack a classic.
Parker pulls out a gun and holds the dude to the floor, shouting for security. She's dressed as a cop. Security comes running.
Eliot and Mossad lady continue trading jabs until they're dripping wet and pressed against each other. Naturally, they start making out. Eliot hooks them together with cuffs. She doesn't seem to mind.
Upstairs, Parker as a cop greets Hardison as a cop and they tell the security guards they're having the painting dusted for prints.
Eliot walks up in a cop uniform, too, holding Mossad lady in cuffs. Hardison compliments the security guards for catching the crooks as the Leveragers lead them away.
Stark asks Sophie how exactly they're saving him. She explains that she thought he set the bomb. But he said something to Nate.
Flash back to Stark reviewing their exploits, implying Sophie was still a thief. He told his team he wanted to recruit her for the job.
Flash to Hardison looking up Stark's crew and comparing Chaos' face to footage from Sophie's apartment security camera, showing him delivering the bomb.
Stark asks Chaos why he'd want to kill Sophie. Chaos says he'd set up the perfect double cross and Stark bringing in Sophie would have ruined it. He wasn't about to try out-conning someone of Sophie's caliber.
Sophie thinks there might be a similar bomb in Stark's car. Stark doesn't believe them -- until his car explodes behind them.
Sophie proposes a deal. They'll trade the paintings and keep their mouths shut to avoid ruining his rep. He agrees.
In the bar, each member of the team hangs out with their counterpart, sharing trade secrets and war stories. Eliot and Mossad lady compare scars. When Eliot shows off the bullet wound he got from a sniper in Myanmar, Raquel reveals that she happened to work as a sniper in Myanmar at about the same time. She holds up his cuffs with a naughty smile. He's embarassed.
Stark magnanimously gives the Klimt back to the German couple.
Stark says Sophie's not the Sophie he remembers. But she does still run cons, break laws and handed over a stolen masterpiece - so she's still a thief.
After he walks away, Sophie checks with Nate that she gave him one of the fakes.
Flash to Parker lifting the security guard's badge in the auction hall and her counterpart getting her phone... which the Leveragers traced to Stark's hideout in order to swipe the prepared forgeries.
But they made good use of the real one. Cut to Chaos trying to board a flight to Paris and getting stopped by security with four Van Gogh's in his checked baggage, one of which is marked as the real one with a cheery post-it note.
At the cemetery, Sophie meets Nate at "her" grave, which now bears the name "Sophie Deveraux", rather than "Katherine Clive". She tells Nate she isn't Sophie any more - Nate killed her with his do-gooding. She says he's the closest thing she has to a real friend and she's never heard him say her real name. She'll tell him after she's done burying all the aliases and all that's left is her. He steps closer to her and asks how long that will take.
They go in for a kiss, but she pulls away. Then she walks off.
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