Sleepy Hollow S1E3 - "For the Triumph of Evil" Recap

Abbie dreams that the teenage version of herself is interrogated by Ichabod in the police station. There's also a forensic psychiatrist present. Ichabod's eyes turn white and then he becomes a white demon with sand falling from his hollow eye sockets. Sand man?

She's woken by a call regarding a jumper. Upon arriving on the scene, Ichabod briefly questions her regarding her dream before they're interrupted by Irving. He questions Abbie as to whether he knows Dr. Mara Vega, the jumper, as she is refusing to speak to anyone but Abbie. When Abbie reaches her, Dr. Vega says, "It's my fault. Everything she saw was real. I believed her and I lied." Turns out she's referring to Abbie's sister Jenny, who was once Dr. Vega's patient. When Dr. Vega turns to Abbie, her eyes are white, like Ichabod's were in Abbie's dream, and Abbie also recognises her as being the forensic psychiatrist in it. Dr. Vega jumps from the ledge to her death. Abbie tells Irving and Ichabod about Dr. Vega's eyes and when they examine her body, the white eye is visible until it explodes into a puff of sand.

Irving sends Abbie to the hospital where the doctor worked. Abbie tells Ichabod the rest of the details of her dreams and Ichabod tells her that she had a prophetic dream and it must relate to the passage about them in Revelations. Ichabod believe this evil is part of what he and Abbie must fight against. After looking through the tapes and records, they find that Dr. Vega believed Jenny wasn't delusional, but kept her institutionalised out of fear for also being thought of as crazy. Ichabod convinces Abbie that they should visit Jenny.

At the institution, Jenny doesn't want to speak to Abbie but when Abbie is prepared to leave, Ichabod asks Abbie if he may go speak to her alone. Also, she's in room 49 - remember what vision-Sheriff told Abbie? Jenny admits she let Ichabod visit her because she was curious. Ichabod delivers the bad news to Jenny about Dr. Vega and tells her he needs to know what she knows. She wants to send him away but he tells her the Four Horsemen are coming and that the first one is already here, taking victims. She tells him that her conscience is clear and to ask Abbie if she can say the same.

Abbie confesses that when they were teenagers and passed out in the forest, it felt like they'd only been asleep a few minutes but had actually been out for four days. Abbie denied seeing anything and Jenny's sticking to the story of what they really saw is what got her locked up. Also, the rancher that found them also saw the demon that came out of the ground but like Abbie, he never admitted to seeing anything.

They set out to visit Mr. Gillespie but before they arrive, he goes to sleep, wakes from noises, cuts himself on a nail, the blood spatter forms the shape of Ichabod's tattoo, and shoots at the demon from Abbie's dream before it disappears. When they arrive, Captain Irving and other officers are already there after receiving a call about shots being fired. Abbie goes inside, armed and wearing a vest. Mr. Gillespie is in the kitchen, sitting on the floor with white eyes. His wife is being held hostage. When Gillespie sees the demon behind Abbie, she shoots into the air but Abbie radios Irving to tell them all to stand down. Gillespie tells her that the Sandman is coming after her and that she's dead the next time she goes to sleep. He then shoots himself in the head.

Abbie tells Ichabod the story of the Sandman, as he's unfamiliar with it. They research the legend and realise that it's a creature from a Mohawk myth. This demon would strike when people didn't do what was morally right but sometimes, the spirit could be warded off by a particular symbol. Ichabod suggests they visit a Mohawk shaman and the only one they're able to track down is a used car dealer named Wendel Clark. He refuses at first, thinking they're insulting his heritage.

Ichabod asks Wendel what he'll do when the Sandman comes for him but Wendel says that his conscience is clear. Ichabod quotes Edmond Burke, saying "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." Clark finally agrees to help and takes them to a cabin where he tells them the story of the demon. He gives Abbie a tea to send her to the dream plain where she must fight the demon. If she loses, she will die. When Ichabod hears the riskiness of the mission, he takes some tea for himself, much to Abbie's objection. The tea will only put them to sleep and they must be stung by scorpions; the venom is what sends them to the dream plain.

In the dream plain, they are separated but both are in a forest. The Sandman appears behind Abbie and throws some sand falling from his eyes into her face. Ichabod finds a red door in the forest and opens it. Abbie tries to shot the demon but its to no avail. Then she's back in the interrogation room seeing her teenage self with her sister. She then sees that the officer is actually the demon in disguise. When Ichabod goes through the red door, he is in a hallway where the Sandman's victims are all hanging from nooses. He comes across Abbie being attacked by the demon and tries to stop him, but he turns around and begins attacking him. Abbie then finds her strength and confesses her mistakes and states that she was a coward for abandoning her sister and that she will not do it again. The Sandman begins to turn to glass and Abbie then smashes him to pieces.

Abbie and Ichabod awake from the dream plain, unharmed. They chat and recover from their ordeal in the records room where Captain Irving comes across them. He tells them not to break any more walls and says that he'll get them a key to the room. Ichabod offers to discuss how they stopped things but the Captain doesn't want to know any more than the fact that it's over. Ichabod stay in the records room and Abbie leaves to visit her sister. When she arrives at room 49, she finds that Jenny has escaped through an air shaft.

Sleepy Hollow airs on Mondays on FOX at 9PM.