Original air date: March 28, 1998

Written by: Mark M. Dodson

Directed by: Fred K. Keller

Jarod joins a SWAT team after one of its members is killed in the line of duty, and Sydney is stunned to find out that a woman who used to work at the Centre is the mother of his child.

Jarod’s Discoveries: Chia Pets, Police Shooting Targets

Jarod’s Occupations: Swat Team Officer

Jarod’s Aliases: Jarod

Behind the scenes insights and the Creator’s Take

Official Synopsis

Jarod impersonates a SWAT team member when a father of two is killed by a gunman.  Sydney discovers he has a son.

Jarod watches a DSA which opens on a white duck in a glass cage.  Behind the duck are three white ducklings, and then a mallard duckling.  During the experiment, a young Jarod observes that the white duck will not accept the mallard as part of her family.  He concludes that the family bond is a primal impulse that cannot be broken.

In the present day, Miss Parker, Broots and Sydney burst into Jarod’s old lair.  There, they discover a cache of guns, as well as cardboard cut-out targets of themselves.  The threesome conclude that Jarod is preparing to wage some sort of war.  Sydney discovers an envelope stapled to his cut-out.  Inside is a piece of paper that leaves him visibly shaken.

Meanwhile, Jarod, now the member of a SWAT team, participates in the rescue of a mother and her 12-year-old daughter.  Later, he and his fellow team members, Sergeant Glen Stephens, Officer Tom Mooney, and Officer Megan Cooke, relax at a barbecue with their families.  Jarod tells the others it will be difficult filling the shoes of Lieutenant Dan Lange, who was killed in the line of duty, ambushed by a unknown assailant.  Lange left behind two young boys, who struggle to cope with their father’s death.

Sydney asks Broots for his help in locating a woman named Michelle Luca.  He does not elaborate on who the woman is, and asks Broots for his confidence in keeping the matter a secret.  But Miss Parker overhears the conversation and instructs Broots to report any information about his findings to her.  Later, Broots discovers that Michelle was a Centre employee who had worked closely with Sydney on the Pretender project.  He also learns that the piece of paper Sydney discovered in the envelope is a birth certificate, naming Michelle as the mother.  Though no father is listed, Broots and Parker conclude it is Sydney.

Jarod comes to suspect foul play was involved in the killing of Lieutenant Lange.  He accompanies Mooney to a roller rink where Lange was ambushed.  Mooney explains that the SWAT team was dispatched to the rink to flush out a fleeing bank robber.  As Stephens and Cooke provided backup, Lange advanced.  Mooney was struck down by a fragment of debris as Stephens and Cooke opened fire on the shooter.  But Lange was shot and killed when the robber opened fire with armor-piercing bullets.  It was Mooney who gave police a description of the robber—a white male with goatee and baseball cap.

Jarod listens to a recording of the SWAT dispatcher’s conversation with the officers on the night of the killing.  He recognizes something in the voice of the dispatcher, a woman named Liz Brantley.  He later interviews her, and she admits she was in love with Lange, and was very close to his two sons.  Liz tells Jarod that Lange believed the armor-piercing bullets were smuggled into the U.S. by a man named Petrovka, a member of the Moscow Mafia.  Jarod performs further research—and concludes there never was an armed robber inside the rink.  Later, Jarod discovers the existence of secret audio recordings made by Lange.  The recordings detail Lange’s secret investigation of his SWAT team colleagues, and how they conspired with Petrovka to smuggle contraband into the country.

Meanwhile, Sydney seeks out Michelle, who confirms that she did indeed give birth to his son.  She explains that an unidentified man from the Centre approached her upon learning of her pregnancy.  The man told her that if she did not relocate, Sydney would meet a “terrible accident.”  The Centre, Michelle explains, did not want Sydney distracted from the Pretender project.

Miss Parker discovers Sydney packing up his belongings.  Sydney explains that the Centre threatened to have him killed if he ever discovered the truth about his son.  Miss Parker counters that if he should leave, he will never find out who was behind the plot.

Jarod sets in motion a plot to entrap the three SWAT team members.  He stages a phony call about the gunman having fired shots from inside the rink.  When the threesome arrive, they discover cardboard cut-outs of themselves acting as targets.  Jarod, dressed as the fictitious gunman, opens fire on the threesome.  They return fire, only to discover their ammunition was replaced with blanks.  Jarod continues to fire rounds over their heads until they finally confess to their crime—confessions recorded by Liz the dispatcher.  Later, Jordan and Cody relocate to their grandparent’s house in Seattle.  Jarod arranges for a dispatcher job in Seattle for a grateful Liz.