Season 1

Complete listed story — includes the ending

1. Night Zero

When JFK ground control loses all contact with an inbound jet after it lands, the CDC Canary team, headed by Dr. Ephraim "Eph" Goodweather, is called to investigate. Goodweather and Dr. Nora Martinez discover all the plane passengers are seemingly dead. They also discover strange parasitic worms aboard the plane and fear an Ebola-like plague could break out. Four people are unexpectedly found alive, including the pilot, Doyle Redfern, though none know what happened. At JFK, Goodweather is approached by Abraham Setrakian, an elderly Harlem pawnbroker. He insists the victims' bodies must be destroyed and the elaborately carved, coffin-like cabinet that was removed from the plane's hold not leave the airport. Meanwhile, recently paroled Gus Elizalde is hired by Mr. Eichhorst, a mysterious man connected to Eldritch Palmer, a wealthy and powerful entrepreneur. Gus is to retrieve the cabinet from the airport. Eph and Nora discover the cabinet is missing, unaware that Jim Kent, their CDC co-worker, has improperly allowed its release. An airport official is killed by an enormous human-like creature that uses a throat appendage to suck out blood before smashing his head.

2. The Box

Gus delivers the cabinet to its destination, but is frightened off by strange noises inside it. The four survivors continue exhibiting symptoms, though the CDC releases them despite Ephraim's protests and insistence that they are suffering from a viral infection and not carbon monoxide poisoning, which is the "official" public explanation for the disaster. Ephraim's CDC boss, Dr. Everett Barnes, removes him from the case, but Eph continues working to expose the worm-driven virus, focusing his attention on the large box he believes is the source of the contagion. Eichhorst visits his old enemy, Abraham Setrakian, who was jailed after being arrested at the airport. Setrakian vows to halt the Master's plan to create a vampire army, though his weak heart has hampered his efforts. Attorney and airplane survivor Joan Luss files a lawsuit against the airline while another survivor, rock star Gabriel Bolivar, bites a girl's neck, craving blood. Captain Redfern, who has been hospitalized, quickly deteriorates as his body begins transforming. Eph is surprised and confused when Mr. Arnot calls him saying his daughter, Emma, one of the victims, has returned home safely. Eichhorst grants Palmer's request to meet the Master. Eph discovers that Dr. Bennett, the medical examiner autopsying the victims, is missing, along with the victims' bodies. At the Arnot home, Emma attacks her father with a throat appendage.

3. Gone Smooth

Eichhorst's true appearance is revealed when he is shown applying nose, ear, and throat prostheses as well as disguising his eyes and teeth, preparing himself to look more human. The four survivors continue to worsen. Captain Redfern is quarantined, but Eph and Nora are unable to treat him, and his condition deteriorates. The CDC worker Jim Kent meets with Eichhorst, refusing to take any more bribes. Eichhorst states Jim's terminally ill wife will be admitted into an experimental cancer treatment trial in exchange for his continued cooperation. Right after Setrakian is released from jail, Nora seeks him out for information. He insists the victims' bodies must be destroyed. Elsewhere, Bolivar remains holed up in his penthouse, showing increasingly erratic behavior and strange physical transformations, including his atrophied genitals falling off. After turning completely, Redfern escapes quarantine and flees to the hospital basement and feeds on stored blood. As Eph, Nora, and Jim approach, Redfern attacks. After a struggle, Eph bludgeons him to death with a fire extinguisher.

4. It's Not for Everyone

Eph and Nora, assisted by Jim, perform an autopsy on Redfern's transformed body and are completely baffled by his transformation. Jim confesses to Eph and Nora that he allowed the large box to leave the airport and has been accepting small bribes to help pay for his wife's medical bills. Eph, furious, strikes him. Elsewhere, Eldritch Palmer hires computer hacker Dutch Velders to disrupt the city's entire Internet and telecommunications systems. Meanwhile, Ansel Barbour, another survivor, tries to mask his worsening symptoms from his worried wife, Anne Marie. He insists she take their children to his sister's when he starts lusting for blood. Returning home, she finds the family dog dead and Ansel has chained himself inside the garden shed. He wants to attack her, but, still cognizant, restrains himself and pleads that she leave and never come back. She manages to push her angry neighbor into the shed for Ansel to feed on. Eph and Nora visit the Arnot household to verify Mr. Arnot's claim that Emma returned home. They find Emma and her father fully infected. Setrakian arrives and decapitates father and daughter. He urges Eph and Nora to join his quest. Nora is repulsed by Setrakian's cold-blooded killing of the infected, but Eph is more open to joining him. They plan to video record an infected human (or strigoi, as Setrakian calls them) which Eph can show his superior, Dr. Everett Barnes, at the CDC.

5. Runaways

After Gabriel Bolivar slaughters the urologist sent to treat him, his agent hires a "cleaner" to remove the body; Bolivar also kills the cleaner. Joan Luss, another survivor, turns more slowly. When her housekeeper Neeva sees Joan's inner horizontal eyelids, she flees with the Luss children. At the house of Ansel Barbour, Eph and Setrakian find Ann Marie, who has hanged herself, unable to face life without Ansel. The fully turned Ansel and the neighbor are in the garden shed, and Eph video records Setrakian killing them. Eph takes the recording to Everett Barnes at the CDC, but quickly realizes he has been set up to be arrested for murdering Captain Redfern. He escapes with Jim Kent's help. Flashbacks reveal a young Abraham Setrakian arriving at a concentration camp commanded by a still-human Eichhorst. Setrakian's brother says they are carpenters, so they are ordered to do woodworking for the Third Reich. At night, Setrakian witnesses a strange creature feeding on sleeping prisoners and plots to kill it with a stolen silver knife. One night, Abraham's brother becomes a victim. In the present, Nora visits her dementia-impaired mother at the nursing facility. When a strigoi attacks the residents, Nora and her mother flee to Nora's apartment. Vasiliy Fet, a city exterminator, notices city rats behaving strangely and tracks them to the sewers where he encounters subterranean strigoi, barely escaping alive.

6. Occultation

The FBI arrest Eph at his estranged wife Kelly's house, after her new boyfriend Matt contacts them. Before being taken away, Eph urges Kelly to take their son Zach and leave the city, telling her it is unsafe. Eichhorst forces Gus and Jim Kent to remove Redfern's body from the hospital morgue and dump it. Knowing that recently turned strigoi return to their loved ones, Setrakian visits a plane victim's home intending to execute any infected he finds there but, physically weakened and outnumbered, he is nearly killed. To evade the FBI, Nora and her mother leave the apartment. With coming nightfall, the streets are unsafe, and Nora seeks refuge at Setrakian's pawnshop. Fet returns to his office and discovers his co-workers have been turned; he kills them, discovering that sunlight destroys strigoi. He tries persuading his estranged father to flee the strigoi threat, with no success. An eclipse provides an opportunity for the strigoi to feed and infect more victims during daytime. In the ensuring mayhem, Eph escapes while being transported by two FBI agents. Gus and his occasional partner in crime Felix are attacked on the street by Dr. Bennett, now a strigoi, and Felix is infected. Gus kills the strigoi, but he and Felix are arrested. Eph goes to Setrakian's pawnshop where he is reunited with Nora.

7. For Services Rendered

Joan Luss' husband, Roger, arrives home from a business trip unaware of the horrors awaiting him. He escapes strigoi on the street, only to be ambushed and fed upon by his newly turned wife inside their house. In flashbacks back to the concentration camp, Eichhorst observes Setrakian's woodcarving skills and orders him to build a giant box and carve an intricate design on it. Back to the present, Eph and Nora, hiding out at Setrakian's pawnshop, gather weapons and supplies. At their colleague Jim Kent's apartment, they find him attempting to explain to his cancer-stricken wife that his actions (accepting bribes from Eldritch Palmer) were only intended to help her. She is unforgiving and leaves for the airport to take part in an experimental cancer treatment in another state. Jim is steadfast in his desire to make amends for his past misdeeds and vows to help Eph and Nora. They formulate a plan to use Jim as bait to lure Eichhorst into leading them to the Master, but the plan fails, and Eichhorst escapes. Elsewhere, Neeva, frightened by Joan's strange behavior, has kept the Luss children at her home, only to be countermanded by her own daughter, who insists on returning the children to their parents. At the Luss' house, Joan and a deliveryman strigoi attempt to attack the group who barricade themselves in a wine cellar. A rebel band of strigoi led by Vaun arrive, and kill Joan and the deliveryman vampire. They also kill Neeva's daughter, who was infected, but release the others unharmed.

8. Creatures of the Night

Following their unsuccessful encounter with Eichhorst at Grand Central Terminus, Eph, Nora, Jim, and Setrakian regroup while awaiting the Master's retaliation for attacking Eichhorst. Making their way to Brooklyn, they break into a medical supply store to procure ultraviolet lamps to combat the strigoi where they encounter Fet, who had the same idea. The group stocks up at a nearby convenience store but when strigoi attack, they barricade themselves inside the store. The other customers, including computer hacker Dutch Velders, are shocked by the horrific events unfolding. Setrakian explains that the Master is controlling the strigoi to specifically hunt them. During a skirmish outside, Jim is infected. Eph and Nora remove a worm from his face, only to realize it has spread throughout his body. Jim begs to be killed before turning. Setrakian concurs and Fet fatally shoots Jim. As the strigoi are about to overrun the convenience store, the group escapes in a delivery truck parked outside.

9. The Disappeared

Eph and the others go to the Goodweather house in Queens, arriving just in time to save Zach from an infected Matt. Setrakian, Dutch, Fet, and Zach return to the pawnshop while Eph and Nora stay behind to burn Matt's body and wait for Kelly, who is missing. Dutch's apartment building has been infected, and Fet convinces her to come with them. At the pawnshop, Fet agrees to join Setrakian's mission, and Dutch admits to being responsible for crashing the communication networks for Eldritch Palmer. Elsewhere, Felix has fully turned into a strigoi and, while en route to Rikers Island, attacks the occupants inside the police van, crashing it. Gus kills Felix before escaping. Kelly's friend Diane arrives at the Goodweather house, just after Eph and Nora have been intimate. After a short argument, Eph tells her to contact him if she hears from Kelly, then he and Nora return to the pawnshop. In a WWII flashback, Setrakian, armed with the knife he hid, tries to kill the Master while it feeds on the prisoners. He underestimates the creature's stealth and strength, and it crushes his fingers with its enormous hands. The following day, Eichhorst, after seeing Setrakian's injuries, sends him to the group about to be executed. The prisoners escape, thanks to a surprise Allied attack on the camp. Later, Eichhorst, fleeing the Allies, arrives at a secret bunker in the woods that houses the Master's coffin. There the Master transfuses a worm into his body, triggering Eichhorst's rebirth as a strigoi.

10. Loved Ones

At the pawnshop, Zach tracks Kelly's phone on a laptop, but Eph discovers that a homeless woman found the phone next to Kelly's abandoned car. A bloody tissue is inside. In flashbacks, Kelly is attacked at home by a newly turned Matt. She escapes but has been infected. Over the next 24 hours she gradually turns, and, thirsting for blood, arrives at Diane's house where she attacks Diane and her son. When Eph searches for Kelly there, he is forced to kill the infected. Finding Kelly's necklace in Diane's hand, Eph breaks down, realizing Kelly likely attacked and turned them. Dutch tells Setrakian it may be possible to undo the damage she caused to the city's communication networks but to do so she needs to infiltrate Eldritch Palmer's Stoneheart Group headquarters. She and Fet enter under the guise of city exterminators, but security spots Dutch. Palmer's personal assistant Fitzwilliam and his team intercept them. Dutch is taken to Palmer, who reveals his plans for immortality, then orders Fitzwilliam to kill them. Fitzwilliam instead releases them, admitting that he now doubts his boss' actions. Fet entreats him to join their cause, but Fitzwilliam, still loyal to Palmer, declines. Eph returns to the pawnshop and insults Dutch, who angrily leaves, preferring to take her chances on the street. Meanwhile, a fully turned Kelly is summoned by the Master, who meets her face-to-face and tells her to "rejoice."

11. The Third Rail

The group plans to infiltrate the Master's underground lair that Setrakian believes is near the 9/11 attack sites. Eph wants Nora to stay behind with Zach and her mother, who suffers from dementia. Nora refuses, and Eph instead tells Zach to look after Mrs. Martinez, leaving him the keys. Eph, Nora, Fet and Setrakian enter a deserted railway tunnel to search for the Master. Meanwhile, Zach, yielding to Mrs. Martinez's incessant demands for cigarettes, leaves the pawnshop to get her some. He finds a deserted grocery store, but when looters arrive, he hides in a back room and encounters a strigoi. Zach narrowly escapes as Gus enters, armed with an ax. After escaping the police, Gus had returned home and discovered his infected family. He killed his brother and also the turned landlord, but left his mother alive, unable to harm her. Gus sends Zach safely on his way, then destroys the strigoi and its victims. Meanwhile, Eph and the others locate the Master's lair only to find it littered with resting strigoi. Eph hears Kelly's voice crying out for help, but Setrakian knows it is a trap leading them to the Master. Eph nevertheless follows the voice into a large chamber containing the Master's coffin, only to be surrounded by strigoi. After arriving and finally meeting Eph face-to-face, the Master attempts to kill him, but Fet, Setrakian and Nora arrive and set off a home-made UV light bomb, killing some strigoi and repelling the Master. Setrakian wants to pursue his old nemesis, but is forced to retreat when the group come upon hundreds of newly turned strigoi inside a cavern.

12. Last Rites

Setrakian, Eph, Fet, and Nora return to the pawnshop. Zach, reunited with his father, claims nothing happened while they were away. Dutch Velders returns with computer equipment and a plan to use the Emergency Alert System to transmit Eph's warning about the strigoi invasion. Elsewhere, Gus locates Alonso Creem, a former acquaintance he forces at gunpoint to provide him weapons, ammunition, and cash. Gus discovers Creem has unwittingly been transporting cargo containers containing strigoi. After opening a container, Gus battles the strigoi inside (and also Creem). Vaun, a strigoi, and his strigoi-killing team arrive and destroy the remaining vampires. Vaun and his team kidnap Gus, leaving Creem behind unharmed. Meanwhile, Dutch and Eph partially broadcast Eph's announcement before TV stations block the signal. Gabriel Bolivar breaks into the pawnshop and attacks Mrs. Martinez, infecting her, while Eichhorst and his strigoi army storm the shop, forcing Setrakian and the others to escape through a secret passage. Before exiting, Nora decapitates her mother to prevent her turning, while Setrakian abandons his deceased wife Miriam's still-beating strigoi heart. Flashbacks to 1967 reveal how Eichhorst exploits Setrakian's obsession with killing the Master to lure him into a trap, leaving Miriam unprotected; when Setrakian arrives home, he finds her infected, decapitates her, and removes her worm-infested heart as a keepsake. In the present day, Eichhorst taunts Setrakian as he and the others are escaping. Later, the Master rejuvenates a dying Eldritch Palmer by dripping bodily fluid from his finger down Palmer's throat.

13. The Master

Having escaped the pawn shop, Eph, Setrakian and Fet regroup. They deduce that the Master needs his damaged coffin repaired and is nesting nearby. Eph and Fet set out on a recon mission leading them to Gabriel Bolivar's renovated theater. Using his exterminator skills and historical knowledge of the area, Fet infiltrates the theater through an underground passage connected by the rain sewers to a nearby building. Inside they discover the Master's coffin and surmise he is close by. Before retreating, Fet removes a street manhole cover, flooding the sewer with sunlight to block any strigoi passing through. Meanwhile, Palmer is angry that the Master only restored his health rather than bestowing immortality. Eichhorst assures Palmer he will be rewarded once he completes the Master's work. Fitzwilliam, convinced Palmer has gone too far, leaves his boss' employ. Later, Palmer and Eichhorst confront Secretary of Health and Human Services Margaret Pierson and CDC Director Everett Barnes, who plan to quarantine the entire city. Palmer tosses Pierson over a balcony, making it look like suicide, then he and Eichhorst coerce Barnes into joining them. Elsewhere, Eph, Fet, Setrakian, Nora, and Dutch Velders prepare to attack the theater. Nora suggests bringing Zach when Eph is reluctant to leave him behind, unprotected from Kelly. In the tunnels beneath the theater, Fet dynamites a mob of strigoi. The group enters the theater and fights more strigoi, including Bolivar and Eichhorst. Upstairs, Setrakian and Eph confront the Master and drive him into daylight where he is severely burned, but escapes. Eichhorst, wounded, also escapes, along with Bolivar and other strigoi. Setrakian and the others are stunned that sunlight failed to kill the Master. As they retreat, Zach feigns an asthma attack to trick them into stopping at Kelly's house for his medication. Zach instead retrieves a family photo album. Kelly, now a fully turned strigoi, appears, calling Zach. Eph restrains him while shooting at Kelly, wounding her before she escapes. Setrakian warns Eph that the Master will use Kelly to track the group. Meanwhile, Vaun tells Gus that the Master is one of an ancient group of strigoi who has broken a truce amongst them. Needing a human to help slay the Master, the Ancients recruit Gus, who wants to avenge his family.