Scorpion: Cabe is gravely wounded in exclusive clip

Cabe Gallo’s life is in serious danger when Scorpion returns in the new year, and EW has your exclusive first look at the episode.

In the CBS drama’s first episode of 2017, the team travels to the desert on a mission to fix a malfunctioning turbine, which Cabe (Robert Patrick) hopes to use as an opportunity to relax; however, that’s far from the case, as we see in the clip above, from Monday’s episode. Cabe walks in right as the overheating turbine explodes, and he is wounded by the shrapnel.

“This episode is a wonderful presentation of the frailty of life,” Robert Patrick tells EW. “It gives the team a chance to realize, ‘Oh god, we’re vulnerable, and we could lose each other at any time, and we have to take the time to really appreciate each other.'”

Stuck in the desert without any cell reception and racing against the clock, Walter (Elyes Gabel) and the rest of the team must resort to unorthodox methods to save Cabe’s life. They construct a makeshift tub in order to freeze his body to stop his heart from beating because he’s losing blood really quickly — which means Patrick spent most of the episode confined to said tub.

“My performance is pretty much on my back looking up at people and communicating with them near death, in and out of consciousness,” says Patrick, who admits that it ended up being harder than he expected, because he had to figure out “how to weave in some nuance of personality within that condition.”

He continued, “As my friend Arnold Schwarzenegger so famously said when we were making Terminator 2: Judgment Day, ‘Pain is temporary, but film is forever.’ It’s so true. My neck may have taken a little bit of a beating, and I might have been a bit stiff and sore for a couple days afterward, but we got through it. In reality, whatever discomfort I had pales in comparison to so many other jobs people do every day in life, so I can’t really complain about anything.”

There’s plenty of humor in the episode, and Patrick promises that there’s also a hefty dose of heart. As Cabe’s life hangs in the balance, the members of Scorpion try to make sure Cabe know how much he means to them, which we know will be especially difficult for Walter, who isn’t great at communicating. The result is a scene both touching and uncomfortable. “It’s a wonderful thing because it’s still an awkward scene,” says Patrick.

Watch the exclusive clip above.

Scorpion returns Monday, Jan. 2 at 10 p.m. on CBS.