“Elixir” is episode five of season one of First Wave.
The episode opens in a pub and a young woman enters, catching many a man’s eye. She heads to the dance floor and starts putting on quite a show; the men are enjoying it, the women are less impressed. She’s dancing on a table when her hair turns grey then she ages rapidly. She says something about how it didn’t last, then collapses, not only dead but apparently mummified.
Cade has heard about this and Crazy Eddie has tied it to a quatrain. The dead woman, Margaret Grant, had a nephew in Alaska, and Cade is heading to Fernwood Lodge, pretending to be said nephew. Fernwood Lodge is a home for the elderly. He meets with the woman running the home, Sarah. She says his aunt left home late Friday and in the morning the police found her dead. Regarding the claims that Margaret aged quickly, Sarah says the witnesses had drunk a lot of whisky. Margaret may have had the spirit of a 22-year-old, but she assures Cade she was 71. Cade claims the last memories he had of his aunt were when he was 10, and wants to know if there’s anyone he can talk to to find out more about her. Sarah tells him that Patricia and Leonard where Margaret’s closest friends. They’ve been acting strange since she died. Scared.
At the morgue, the coroner is briefing the sheriff on the body. He thinks it’s a hoax; someone has used hydrochloric acid to age the corpse. The witnesses he thinks are in on it. The sheriff doubts that all 30-odd of them were. But no-one ages from 20 to 120 in 3 minutes. There’s talk Margaret was poisoned, though the coroner, Ken, says there’s no medical evidence to support homicide. The sheriff’s main concern is that it’s an election year.
Cade meets with Leonard and Patricia. Patricia makes snide comments about Cade not visiting his aunt when she was alive. After she leaves, Leonard says that Patricia is just upset. Cade recognises a framed insignia and realises that Leonard was on Omaha Beach. Him recognising that impresses Leonard. Leonard says he never felt more alive, and would give anything to feel that way again. He gives Cade a photo of Margaret with her husband. He died on Iwo Jima and she never married again. Regarding the patrons saying Margaret looked like her picture, Leonard says they were drunk. He knows something else, but promised not to say anything.
Outside, Cade speaks to Patricia again and apologises. She was right; he wasn’t there for his aunt. He’s had troubles of his own. He lost his wife a couple of months back and her death made him realise how important family is. It’s too late to talk to Margaret, but he’d like to get to know her better. Patricia talks, including about how nice it would be to have a second chance, youth with the wisdom of age. On Margaret being young again, Patricia says the nice man at the organic store said it would turn back the clock.
Cade heads to the store and the owner is talking about how his Elixir is Ponce de Leon’s Fountain of Youth to several elderly people. They can have it for a nominal fee, if he’s allowed to monitor the results. Cade challenges the owner on something he said and, afterwards, he offers Cade something.
Eddie is looking up the owner, Trevor Hyams (Garwin Sanford). He has an impressive resume, but the aliens do what they can in order to blend in. Cade is going to head back; Hyams said the substance had magnetic properties so he’s going to use a compass to track it. It could be the evidence they need.
That night, Eddie breaks into the store and finds the Elixir. He takes a bottle, but Hyams and his dog catch him. Hyams, somehow, forces Cade to drop the bottle and sets his arm on fire. Cade puts out his arm and manages to escape; Hyams is a bit too strong to be human. Hyams’ dog drank some of the spilled Elixir and is now a puppy.
Cade tells Sarah, Leonard and Patricia. Both deny buying any of the Elixir. Neither is convincing. Cade had managed to save a small sample and he’s going to get it analysed. Afterwards, Leonard tells Patricia she has to throw it away. Patricia says it might not have been the Elixir that killed Margaret. Leonard asks her if being young again is worth dying for. Basically, yes.
Colonel Grace, first seen in “Mata Hari”, turns up on the scene looking for Cade and throwing her weight around. Currently, it’s totally unclear just what her goals are, or what she knows.