The scene opens with a shot of blood on some bed sheets, and someone coughing. Nick’s asleep, again, but this time in a bed. He wakes up in the infirmary, due to the woman coughing. He looks over at the side of the bed and sees the blood. This is the third time we’ve seen Nick wake up during the series, including the very first episode. I wonder if it’s foreshadowing of some sort that he will eventually become a walker, or if he becomes special in some way.
Anyway, he gets up and goes outside into the camp. It’s empty. Like deserted empty. Nick wanders around to see what he can see. This camp also has a wall surrounding it, like other encampments we’ve seen on The Walking Dead. There’s even a guard posted on a platform on the wall, looking out for any approaching danger. Nick climbs to similar high vantage point and sees a little girl. She’s crying, and when Nick asks her what’s wrong, she says ‘my papa’.
Then we all see where everyone went. We see a large pen containing many captive walkers. Halfway in and halfway out sits a bus. The front doors of the bus are on the human side, and the back doors are on the walker side. A scared, but resolute, youngish man goes to approach the bus on the human side. Luciana hugs him and he walks into the bus. He walks through the bus and steps out into the walker pen. All of the people chant as he approaches the walkers. The man takes deep breaths and then the walkers attack and eat the man. The little girl runs away from Nick, who looks horrified.
credits
Meanwhile, Strand is driving the truck down a dusty road. Madison bangs on the side of the truck with her hand to signal Strand to stop the truck. She wants to keep looking for Nick, but Alicia and Strand suggest that they go back to the boat. Maybe Travis headed back there. As they debate what to do, a few walkers approach. Madison eyes the walkers and agrees to go back to the boat.
Nick wanders around his new camp, and people try to get him to help the doctor as he visits people and cares for him. The doctor says he’s a pharmacist as he helps an older man with his meds. Nick helps a couple of women who are tending to a different person. There’s a definite language barrier as Nick struggles to understand what people want of him.
Back to the people on the truck. They get back to where they left the The Abigail, but to no one’s surprise, it’s gone. Strand is devastated and says the military probably took it. Alicia steps up and suggests they go to the hotel they saw because they need shelter. She also picks up some driftwood. They leave a note in driftwood for Travis and/or Nick – ‘Abigail lost, head north’. Again, it kind of reminds me of the notes people left directing others to make their way to Terminus.
The group is seated by, and on, the truck, by the hotel by the pier. It’s heavily misting outside and everything is gray. Very atmospheric, pun intended. They all make comments about the hotel. No one appears to be inside, but Strand says it could be picked clean, and Ofelia thinks it could be ‘crawling’.
Back in the makeshift camp, Nick is gathering water and bandages. Luciana says the water is worse than the bandages that he’s cleaning. Luciana wants him to go with her.
Our group in the truck approaches the hotel, which was probably pretty nice at one point. It looks really nice from the outside. They’re making a lot of noise as they go into the lobby. Madison comments that someone really locked this place down, as they leave the front door wide open. There are walkers nearby because we saw one plant its hand on a window from a shop across the street.
Strand rings the lobby bell, again and again. Madison wants to know what he’s doing. He’s probably trying to see just how empty the hotel really is.
Luciana and Nick get on the bus to walkerville. She lectures Nick to be quiet three times, very reminiscent of Strand lecturing everyone that it’s his boat a few episodes ago. Luciana nails a walker to the wall, and they use his guts a a disguise. She lets the walker go once they are covered in walker guts.
Strand and everyone explore a ballroom in the hotel. There had a been a wedding reception in progress there, as we see a lopsided cake. Ofelia confesses that she was almost married once, but she needed to tend to her parents. Strand is unimpressed with Ofelia’s ‘good man’ since said ‘good man’ ditched her when she had to take care of her parents. Also, Strand doesn’t want them to dwell on the past because it will only make you sick. Madison is looking at what’s maybe a guest list, and looking sad. Alicia wants her to go help Strand with the exploration of the kitchen.
Luciana and Nick are walking along a street. Nick wants to know what was happening with the sacrifice, of the little’s girl’s dad. She says that the man was near death, so he was sacrificed. It ends up as protection. Luciana says that the dead are returning, and when they depart, the world will be new. And she trusts Alejandro, the pharmacist, because he was bitten and didn’t die. Nick doesn’t believe her, he says once you’re dead, you turn, that’s it. They keep walking through Tijuana.
Now Madison and co are in a dining room. Alicia says they should check all of the sleeping rooms, maybe there’s food and stuff inside the minibars. Alicia and Madison clash, Alicia wants to search rooms, and Madison says no. Alicia goes off with Ofelia to search the rooms. Strand says he’s going to fix them both a drink. She needs one, and so does he.
The camera pans over a vista of large men with guns. We’re outside of the La Colonia. These men are in gangs and control this area. They’re all playing cards, but have guns. Luciana approaches a group of those men. She surrenders all of her weapons as a show of good faith. She says they’re looking for water. She gives the man a small bag of medicines (oxy) as a trade for water. It’s enough for a small shopping trip. They go into an old store with a shopping cart. The store is dark, of course, and in they go.
Strand and Madison are seated in the bar, drinking martinis. Madison’s a southern belle, from Alabama! She tended bar when she was in school. She goes for the tequila.
Meanwhile, Ofelia and Alicia are in one of the sleeping room halls on one of the upper floors. Alicia goes to open a door but there is a walker inside. In fact there are walkers in several of the rooms. They go into a room that appears empty and go to loot the room. The previous guests already looted the minibar. There’s a walker hanging in the shower. Ofelia can’t stop looking at the walker. Alicia wants her to come away. They leave.
Back in the store – they are looking for water and gauze – anything they can use in the infirmary. Nick goes for junk food, but Luciana says ‘only what we need’. There are people camping inside the store. There’s a woman who looks kind of bad off, and she’s being tended to by a man. Maybe it was a costco-type place, or a warehouse that is multipurpose?
Back to Ofelia and Alicia. There’s still hot water in the rooms, says Ofelia, while Alicia raids the mini bar. Alicia wonders why that guy would give up and hang himself. Ofelia says maybe he was tired of surviving. Alicia doesn’t understand that mind set. Ofelia says they aren’t going to make it. Alicia disagrees. Ofelia feels alone, and Alicia says she has her, and that they’re family now, for what it’s worth.
Nick and Luciana go to leave, and Nick is tackled by one of the gang members. They find stolen food on him (a little bag of junk food) and pistol whip him. They’re going to cut off Nick’s hand for stealing! Nick tries to talk his way out of his predicament. He has a lot of knowledge of drugs, oxy, that can take care of the man’s sister, and who is an addict, by the way. Good thing Nick has essential drug knowledge and can spot a fellow addict a mile away. Luciana translates for all of them. Now Nick has their attention, and bargains up. Nick and Luciana will give them oxy, for one more water. And then they are back on their way, with lots of water.
Luciana doesn’t want the gangs to know where their colonia is. Nick apologizes for his bad behavior.
Strand and Madison are in the bar continuing to drink and talk about Tom and Steve, her dead husband. Strand is kind of flirting with her, telling her that if he saw her in a bar, he’d chat her up. He doesn’t really want to talk about Tom. She’s like, you would have hit on me? He laughs and says he’s ‘a seducer of people’. Alrighty then! Strand says, but now there’s nothing to talk about. No Tom and no Steven. Not even a bar. They both get quiet. Madison says Alicia’s right, she’s never going to see Nick again. Strand says Nick’s alive, he’s bullet proof. Madison says he was born lost. She says he’s been slipping through her fingers since he was born, and Strand says maybe you were holding on too tight. Maybe it’s a reference to the grotesques from last week? She held on too tight, and now Nick’s corrupted?
How did Steven pass away? He came home from the work site, late, he crossed the divider into oncoming traffic. ‘He fell asleep?’, asks Strand. ‘That’s what I told the kids’, replies Madison. Wow, that’s heavy. Steven was trying to protect the kids (from his darkness). Now that Madison is a little drunk, she’s got a drawl. She tosses her drink when she toasts to motherhood. Then she drinks to false hope and breaks her glass. Strand goes to play the piano. He’s loud, and can’t play. He’s just banging on the piano anyway, not playing it. We see the lobby doors as he bangs around, and we hear the walkers across the street locked in a diner, or some such building. They’re banging on the glass doors, and will break out at any moment.
Alicia has taken a shower, and tells Ofelia it’s her turn., but Ofelia isn’t there. Alicia looks around the room for her and is worried. She sees an open sliding door and a body go over the side. We’re supposed to think it’s Ofelia, but it’s not. Alicia looks outside and sees walkers on the balconies jump, fall to the ground, and get back up. They probably hear the piano and are drawn to it. Not sure how they manage to get right back up with all of those broken bones, but hey, it’s a great image. Alicia tries to warn her mom that there are falling walkers all around. Alicia runs down the hall looking for Ofelia and sees a staircase filled with walkers. No Ofelia to be found.
Nick and Luciana are back to their camp loaded down with water. Nick sits down to rest and sees the little girl playing with the doll. He give her the snacks he stole. Luciana sees that he gave the treat to the girl and is touched.
Nick goes to see Alejandro. He tells the pharmacist that he wanted to help the little girl who lost her father today. The pharmacist says they are running out of medicines. In fact, the injection he gave the old man today wasn’t medicine, it was just saline solution – a placebo. The dead are walking to their final resting place. Then the world will be clean. We will remain, we will outlast death. The pharmacist says that if Nick threatens their existence again he will feed him to the wall. We also see what looks like a healing bite on Alejandro. Hmm.
Back to Strand and Madison who are making a lot of noise as a walkers fall behind them. Strand sees the walkers falling and massing toward them. They are trapped inside the bar as walkers stream in. Man, they can’t even get drunk in peace!
The pharmacist gives his ‘congregation’ a rousing speech, not unlike the priest from a few episodes ago.
Madison and Strand fight. Cuts to the pharmacist. He is talking about the dead, and whipping up the gathered group. The camera cuts often between Alejandro and Madison and Strand fighting the dead. Alejandro talks about “the migration of the dead”, as Strand and Madison fight the dead. “But what about us, we were counted among the dead but we won’t leave, we, the chosen ones. The Children of Resurrection. They chant.
Alicia is trapped in the sleeping room. Madison and Strand are trapped behind the bar surrounded by the dead. Nick is enthralled by Alejandro’s sermon, and chants along with everyone else.