After an extra Heated Rivalry, Criminal Minds: Evolution‘s Connor Storrie era is over. And boy, did Lance Kingston go out with a bang…

Spoilers for Criminal Minds: Evolution Season 19, Episode 9 ahead.

Season 19’s penultimate episode, “Special Agent Garrity,” took viewers and characters alike on a wild, adrenaline-pumping ride as The Fan aka James Crowley (Justin Kirk) put the next phase of his diabolical plan into motion. Though Episode 8 ended with Crowley strangling Laura Boyd (Jessi Case), in a twist, he didn’t kill her. He kidnapped her and held her hostage, along with Brian Garrity (Paul F. Tompkins) and his ex Sheila (Yvette Nicole Brown).

In another twist, Crowley intentionally got himself arrested by the BAU. When he went in for questioning, the team tried to trigger his OCD and trip him up with findings about leather belts and the font used in his book, but he wouldn’t crack — until Prentiss (Paget Brewster) thought of one final card to play. The BAU invited Laura’s ex Lance (Storrie), back to the office and had him stand behind the two-way mirror to see if he could identify The Fan’s voice. Tyler (Ryan-James Hatanaka) placed an index card in front of Crowley and asked him to read the message written on it: “I WANT YOU TO FOLLOW MY INSTRUCTIONS.” Instead of “want,” Crowley said, “need.” Twice. And though Lance assured the BAU they had the wrong guy, “need” formed the exact phrase that Lance recalled hearing while being tortured. So Prentiss knew they’d found The Fan.

While Lance hung back in the office, the BAU released Crowley on the condition that Rossi (Joe Mantegna) tail him. Shortly after letting the killer go, the team realized Lance had also escaped.

After losing Rossi’s tail, Crowley returned to St. Michael’s church, where Brian and Sheila were tied up. Brian was sure that the BAU would track him, so when he heard a knock at the door, he was hopeful. But instead of Rossi or another agent, LANCE walked in!

“You were right. They did try to tail me, but Lance here was my ace in the hole all along. He disabled Rossi’s vehicle with a tire spike,” Crowley explained. When a confused Brian reminded Lance that The Fan branded him, Lance replied, “He has Laura. Said if I helped him, he’d let her go.”

When Sheila begged Lance not to trust Crowley, he pulled a gun on the killer and demanded he reveal where he was hiding Laura. “This phone has Laura’s GPS on it. After you put the gun down, I can unlock it, and you can rescue her,” Crowley said. “If I die, Laura dies. Cause where I put her, no one’s gonna find her.”

Wanting to be the knight in shining armor, Lance put the gun down, grabbed the phone, apologized to Brian and Sheila, and ran outside to find his ex. As he hopped in the car and prepared to speed away, Crowley asked Sheila and Brian, “Do you know what main character syndrome is? We all think we’re the hero in our own life story. But we’re not.”

As Crowley turned a laptop with security footage of Lance in the car towards his captives, Lance looked down at the phone, tapped Laura’s GPS location, and got a message from an unknown number that read, “PATHETIC!” In a jump scare-worthy moment, the phone exploded, splattering blood everywhere, blowing his face to bits, and ending Connor Storrie’s impressive Criminal Minds: Evolution run. The scene hit so hard that I actually jumped and yelped while watching in my office, much to the dismay of my colleagues, who were relieved to learn that Storrie was still alive and well off-screen.

“When you realize you’re not the main character, you become aware of your role in a bigger game, a game where every outcome has been predetermined,” Crowley concluded. And though Lance and Storrie weren’t the main characters of Season 19, we loved watching Lance’s evolution and the Heated Rivalry star’s incredible range.

When Storrie made his highly-anticipated Criminal Minds debut in Episode 4, he dropped the incredibly convincing Russian accent he used in Heated Rivalry and picked up the devious confidence and charm that Lance had when we met him. Subtle jaw clenches, withering stares, and palpable internal conflict emanated from Storrie in his early interrogation scene, but manipulative narcissistic tendencies took a backseat when he endured The Fan’s torture. As Lance suffered through the season, Storrie ran the gamut of emotions and exposed his softer layers. In the end, he even had viewers sincerely rooting and feeling for him. It’s no wonder his one-episode role was upgraded to a four-episode arc!

We’ll miss Storrie, and we’ll even miss Lance! But thankfully, Brian, Sheila, and Laura are still alive. And now that Voit broke out of the literal Prison Break prison, we can’t wait to see where Criminal Minds: Evolution‘s Season 19 finale takes us.

New episodes of Criminal Minds: Evolution premiere Thursdays on Paramount+.