Episode 21 Synopsis: North

"She believed in you because you weren't afraid.  Your people will live.  And you will get to die a beautiful death." - Nick Clark

Finally, IGN's review on the season finale and my thoughts were cohesive.  They gave it a high rating (the review was for the last two episodes), which I agreed with.  The episode was very well done, tied up soon loose ends but gave us enough to want more for next year.  Pretty sweet.

The episode started off with Travis left in a catatonic state after raging against Brandon and Derek, and accidentally injuring Oscar in the process.  Hector bashes through the window, while other security guards take out Travis.  Travis doesn't even fight it, but Madison chases them.  Strand tells her to stop.  Madison instead compartmentalizes the situation, takes Alicia's knife and stabs Brandon and Derek in the ear, remembering that, oh yeah, they are going to turn eventually.  They are now officially gone. 

Strand reminds Maddie that by her decree (remember: no violence!), Travis needs to be locked up or sent away.  He's compromised us, Strand says.  Travis needs to leave.  Alicia agrees with him.  But she tells Maddie that they will leave together.  "We found this place. We'll find another."

Which we see as a rolling theme in all these shows.  You stay in one place too long, you become compromised.  You either die or you leave.  It's a pretty simple concept.

And did we truly believe in happily ever after at the hotel?

Yeah.  That's what I thought.

Strand is incredulous though.  Each time Madison has compromised her integrity and rationale, she's put the group at risk.  Now she appears to put herself at risk by leaving with Travis.  "Are you really going to leave for the man who abandoned you?"

I'm certain Strand at this point thought to himself: get me the fuck away from these crazy ass white people.

Madison goes to Elena and Hector, who have Travis locked up.  Madison tells them, I know that Travis needs to go, he committed violence.  But they will all leave together in the morning.  Elena agrees to this, if they leave at dawn.  They have the night.  Hector is disgusted.  Elena tells him in Spanish that she fought for us once, and we can give her this.

Madison talks to Travis, says that he has to leave the hotel.  But that they will leave together.  They found each other again.  She feels this is a bigger reason why they found each other.  He waits the night out with Madison and Alicia.

Back at La Colonia, Luciana is preparing Alejandro to speak to the people.  He is already starting to feel the effects of the virus.  Luciana makes him "presentable."  He tells her that beyond the walls is death and more death, but Nick is right: the end is near for them.  She thinks he still needs to lie to the people though.  While addressing the masses, he tells them that men with guns are coming to do them harm.  He says their faith is stronger than any weapons the men have.

As he addresses the people, Nick leaves and sees a medevac in the distance.  He realizes there is activity at the border.  He makes his way back to Colonia to try one more time to convince the people to leave by appealing to Alejandro.

Back at the hotel, Andres operates on Oscar, as he believes his brain is swelling and needs to take out part of his skull.  Alicia offers to help, but Hector is there and tells her that if it were up to him, Travis would be gone.

Travis, meanwhile, tells Madison that he his not sorry that he killed the bromigos.  Madison tells him that she hasn't been much better, that she was responsible for locking Celia in the cellar with the dead, in an effort to "protect Nick."

She says that the world has changed, he did what he had to.  You'll do it again, because you will have to.  I can face that if you're with me, she tells him.

Oscar dies on the makeshift operating table.  Hector is very angry, tells Elena that she made the deal with Madison to save Travis.  He wants revenge.  Hector and Andres go to their room as Alicia and Madison slept, but Travis was wide awake.  Hector decks Travis, while Andres pulls a gun on him.  Travis seems resigned and accepting of his fate.  He asks them though, if they're going to do it, not in front of his family.  Well, I thought that was very noble of Travis. 

As Madison and Alicia scramble to save Travis, Alicia stabs and presumably kills Andres.  Hector lashes out at Alicia, while Travis fights back.  Strand enters the room as Travis, Madison and Alicia stand there with bodies everywhere.  Calmly, in the biggest understatement of the year, Strand says, "We need to run.  Now."

So Alicia, Travis and Madison hop into one of the hotel trucks, as they hear a ruckus in the distance (probably riling up the security muscle to take out those three), Strand stays behind.  He tells Madison he will stay behind.  He gives her his gun.  "I'll be okay.  Go.  Now."  Travis drives through the fence.

I mean, you just gotta love this new world.  You need a vehicle?  Fucking take that shit!

As the three of them drove away, I thought - wow, in the course of several months, each one of them has killed someone who was somewhat innocent (by our civilized standards of course, most of them had it coming in this world and it was in "self defense").  Madison has killed Celia, Travis the bromigos (and remember, he beat the ever loving piss out of Adams, the private who shot Ofelia after Travis had let him go) and now Alicia took out Andres to protect Travis.  They've adapted, all right.

They're on their way to Tijuana it seems, as Madison is intent on finding Nick.  I was disappointed that Strand didn't go with them, but Colman Domingo later said on the Talking Dead episode that night that he will still figure into the storyline.  Which makes me giddy because I do love his character.  I wasn't sure what to expect of Strand when he was introduced, but he just adds an element to the show that no other character does.

Alejandro is getting high on the Oxy reserves as he's preparing for his imminent death.  I mean, why the fuck not at this point, am I right?  Nick comes back to reason with Alejandro.  Tells him that he saw "something."  But before he says what it was, Nick flat out tells him that he is playing with other peoples' lives, when he knows he's already dying.  If the men come to La Colonia, they are all dead.   Alejandro needs to give them permission to go.  Alejandro asks where they will go.  Nick says, "North."

I ask...What is north of "north?"  Nothing.  I find it very symbolic that after crossing the border, Nick is now realizing that north is where an answer may lie for the people.  The end of the first season, they go "west."  Now they are going back North.

Nick says Luciana needs permission to go.  She was staying because of Alejandro, because he was not afraid.  If you tell her it's okay, they will all be safe.

Madison, Travis and Alicia arrive at the warehouse, which is now ransacked, completely empty, no one in sight.  Madison tells them there were about 100 people there.  She goes to the office where she interrupted the interrogation of Francisco, hoping to find clues about where Nick was or where these people were from.  They find Francisco's family, and Travis appears to have found something on Francisco's person.

In the next morning, the warehouse henchmen (including Marco and Elena's nephew Antonio) scale the wall of the dead and make it into the Colonia, without so much of a fight.  They celebrate; yet their victory is shortlived.

The wall of the dead, the wall that Alejandro and Luciana were convinced protected them from outside evils, was locked in by a school bus.  Alejandro, who had a death sentence anyway, stayed behind and moved the bus, allowing the dead to infiltrate the Colonia.  The men were outnumbered by the dead, and they start to run.

 
I have to say, when these leaders of the small communities go out, they go out with a bang (like Deanna at Alexandria in the main show).  The way Alejandro took them out was predictable, but needed to be done.  A+.  

Meanwhile, in the streets of Mexico, Nick and Luciana lead the remaining living to a new life.  "Where are we going," a little girl asks?

"North," says Luciana.

After all the bloodshed went down at Colonia, the Clark/Manawa tribe come in, after everyone has vacated.  Travis and Maddie tell Alicia to stay behind, where there about a dozen trucks from the banditos, who left them all behind when they took the Colonia.

Travis starts collecting the ammunition that was left behind when everyone started to run.  We see Marco and Antonio, as they are now bitten and have turned.  Alicia finds Alejandro in the bus, who is near death, and she attends to him.  Madison asks if he knows who Nick is.  Mistaking Madison as an angel at first, he tells her that Nick is still alive.  When she asks where he is, he spits out one word: "Border."  He saw something...before he could tell her what he saw, he passes.

I have to say, as far as death goes, Alejandro went out total balls to the wall.  He took out the banditos, protected his people and managed to give Maddie hope that Nick was still out there.  North, it is.

As the Colonia people get to the border, there are about a million abandoned cars, some infected border toll people.  Nick sees in the distance what appears to be a refugee camp.  As Nick lets his guard down for a second, presumably a border guard shoots at him, Luciana warns him and the Colonia people are scattering when the guns fire.

Nick and Luciana are captured in the last moments of the show, while Madison puts down Alejandro before he turns.

Nick was right.  Alejandro died a very beautiful death, giving hope to those around him.

Episode 20 Synopsis: Wrath

"The old rules of conduct no longer apply."  - Victor Strand

This episode represents the second to last of season two, which was aired as a back-to-back two part finale.  I also had the opportunity to watch much of the first season in a FTWD marathon over the weekend prior.  It was fascinating to watch the entire undoing of the world unfold, once again.  They gave us little clues here and there as to how the characters were developed.  Like some were more equipped to handle the new world more than others.  Like Alicia and Nick, for starters.  They've seemed to adapt more than the adults.  Which I guess is a good thing.  After all, the children are our future.  Or some shit.

Moving right along, another character that has developed in a direction that I completely did not think would ever happen was Ofelia.  Mercedes Mason, the actress who plays Ofelia, has been on Talking Dead after some of the shows recently.  She talked about her evolution as this sheltered daughter of two pious individuals who were escaping evil and served their lives to protect her.  In the very first episode she appeared in, she was wearing a cutesy dress and trusted that the family her father was giving shelter to (Travis, Liza and Chris) were good people she wanted to help.  In the end, Griselda (her mother) passed, her father's fate remains to be seen (I don't know how you can cast Ruben Blades and NOT bring him back, but we don't know if he died in the fire), and Ofelia has literally no ties to these people other than they survived the fallout together.

Her character has become sort of a solitary bad ass.  A little misinformed, but when you go all out bad ass, you fucking go all out.  She took Strand's truck, and while attempting to cross the border, her truck overheats and soon, she finds herself surrounded by infected.  She takes a few out, then decides to hoof it.  Well, okay.  I guess when you commit to something, you commit.

Plus, I noticed that the world is sort of ripe for the taking.  How many characters have we seen just take take take?  Perhaps she just had faith that she'd get to Santa Fe (I mean, it's been implied she's trying to find her ex-fiance who we found out had moved there), and that she'd find a way.  Day of the Dead and religious references still abound, as she takes her rosary and water, and walks.

This episode we see the fate of the kids.  Besides Ofelia, we've been following Nick's evolution as "gringo" in La Colonia to being a saviour to the group.  He's formed an alliance with Luciana, who he is also involved with romantically.  The leader of La Colonia, Alejandro, has been playing it safe the whole time, by bargaining with men at the warehouse.

Clearly, Alejandro doesn't realize what has happened to communities like Alexandria, where the hubris and false sense of security of the leaders usually leads to their untimely demise or kills innocents who should not be.  His philosophy has been what is outside the walls is less safe than staying in, even if it means being sitting ducks.

The last we saw Nick, he was trying to convince Luci and Alejandro to do the Oxy exchange with the warehouse banditos.  They overruled him, even though Nick believed that they found the colony and were planning to infiltrate.  Nick leaves against their wishes.  Marco, the leader of Pelicano warehouse, is running sinking ship.  Supplies are dwindling.  Their force is getting less effective.  They still have guns and other ammo, so they're clearly "takers."  Nick tries to negotiate drug drop offs to ensure the safety of La Colonia.  Marco shows that his henchmen have killed Francisco and his family.  They plan on taking La Colonia.  "Leave now or die."

Travis has been holed up back at the hotel, I'm guessing he was lost in his own thoughts.  Madison talks to him, tries to convince him he did the right thing by letting Chris go.  "You kept your promise to Liza.  The rules are different, and they're always changing."  Travis wasn't understanding Chris and his needs anymore.  He's safer with people who understand him.  She tries to convince him to join the others in the world downstairs.  They're ready when he is, she says.

See, this is a common thread that I've discovered.  Nick left, Chris left, Ofelia left.  In each case, each person had made an empty promise to look out for each other.  In Ofelia's case, Daniel asked Madison to look out for her.  Ofelia decided to go out on her own.  As for Chris, there was no changing him.  In that case, he had to change for himself.

Alicia comes to Travis to bring him food.  She apologizes, says that she felt responsible for driving Chris away.  Travis says she was right, that Chris is "sick."  He felt responsible for not protecting her.

Alicia has also found a niche in being a medical assistant to Andres, who has been attending to the hotel refugees.  She reports on some vulgar Americans who came in during the night.  One of whom had a dislocated shoulder from a wreck.  That was Brandon, who along with Derek had found the hotel.  Their typical entitled Americanism shine through, and Alicia wants to kick them out.  Madison overhears their accident story.  Their truck rolled about a dozen times.  The "buddy" who was driving...he didn't make it.  "Who grows up in LA without a license?," one of them muses.

Maddie is struck: this has to be the Americans who Travis described.  The similarities were uncanny.  Easily, one of the weirdest parts of the show so far is how she reacted.  She RUNS to Strand, who is still recuperating from his stab wound from Ilene, and she has this meltdown about how Travis left Chris with these men, she told Travis he did the right thing, that Chris was probably safe out there, and now she thinks he's dead.

Strand tries to rationalize with her, but she wants to kick them out.  In an effort to protect Travis (remember, each woman in Travis' life felt like "something" would break him...whether it was taking out Liza when she was bitten or losing Chris...they've all made some kind of association that Travis was weak, which was further beaten in by Chris when he left to join the Bromigos), she feels that the *hope* that Chris might be alive is enough.  Strand asks if the hope that Nick is alive keeps her going.  "It's a dark world Madison.  Do you think he can handle it?"  I like how they've got Strand as like this Jiminy Cricket for Madison.

The answer she clearly believes is no, though.

Back at La Colonia, Nick tells Luciana and Alejandro about the Pelicano banditos coming for the site.  While Luci and Alejandro talk about "faith" and getting through it, Nick believes they need to cut their losses.  They're out numbered and outgunned.  See, this is where I like Nick.  He was willing to give into a higher power (it's almost like being in NA or AA, where you put your troubles on the shoulder of a higher being), but when it came down to it, he was a realist and they needed a plan.

At this moment, a patient under Alejandro's care has turned and surprises everyone by biting Alejandro along with a few others.  Nick took the infected out, but now the jig is up: Alejandro is now scared.  Nick thinks he is not immune (I mean, I don't think he ever bought that story).

After the two others were bit, they sacrificed themselves to the "Wall."  Nick starts packing, says to Luciana, "Faith will not protect us."  Alejandro shows up.  Nick says that he never saw him afraid until yesterday, when people were leaving.  Now he's afraid of the bite.  Luciana is confused.  Alejandro then admits the day Luciana thought he was bitten and survived, he was bitten by the drugged out boy, who had not yet died.  He justified his actions as that more people survived than died as a result of his lie.  Nick tries to convince Luciana to come with him.  "I'm sure as shit not committing suicide for a fraud."  Luciana says that she won't leave. 

Meanwhile back at the border, Ofelia finds a fence with a hole and presumed to cross into the U.S.  However, she is shot at from a distance.  She takes cover, and she is approached by a man as she protects herself with a knife.  "Buenos dias, señorita.  Welcome to America."  I'm guessing he's some sort of border guard, still protecting the border.  Kind of funny, since Ofelia is Latina, they're probably going to assume she's Mexican...she needs to break out into song.  "Born in East LA," perhaps?

I'll save you the trouble: this is the last we see of Ofelia for this season.  BUT I have a feeling where the story is going with her, and I predict she will be reunited with the rest of the group at some point.  

Back at the hotel, Andres takes a look at Brandon's shoulder, says he will need to pop into place, but someplace private.  The rest of the patients take umbrage with this plan.  Some of them have been there a few days and haven't yet seen a doctor.  Crying preferential treatment, Madison and the group take them outside and plan to let them go as they are basically chased out by the rest of the refugees.  Travis, of course at this very moment decides to leave his room and hears the commotion.  He sees that Brandon and Derek are at the center.  Strand sees this, tries to stop him, but no avail.  Travis rushes downstairs and stops them from setting them out.

"Where's my son?!?!?!!!!???"

Travis goes to talk with Brandon and Derek in an empty cafe.  Andres, Oscar and Madison go with him.  Andres pops Brandon's shoulder back in.  The conversation was civil at first.  Travis asks where Chris was.  Brandon and Derek negotiate a car out of there, as theirs was wrecked.  Madison agrees to this.

They begin to talk about how they didn't make it very far.  Between banditos on the highway, wasted, they were all exhausted.  Brandon and Derek take a nap in the back of the truck, Chris drives.  "He wanted to contribute," they said.  (They said earlier in the triage that he wasn't "pulling his weight."  Which is sort of ironic because Chris had told Travis earlier that he felt that they would think nothing of killing him, but he told Travis that in an effort to trick him.  So there's that).  They guessed that he must have "dozed off," the truck rolled about a half dozen times.  They said Chris went through the windshield.  He didn't make it.

Travis, though, presses for more info.  They said they buried him, and took him out of the truck.  He notices inconsistencies.  Was he thrown...or did they take him out?  Derek jumps in, says he was thrown, but they pulled him out by the tree.  Travis, once the others leave the room, in an unprecedented Travis move, locks them in the cafe.  All the rage he's felt by the world falling apart around him, these two assholes who seduced his child into a false life of badassery and losing his son, he starts beating the piss out of them, while the others helplessly watch outside.  Oscar runs to get the keys.

Travis demands to know the truth.  Brandon admits, they had to put him down.  They had to, he says.  The writers had us see that Chris had broken his leg in the wreck, tried to beg for mercy.  Something tells me though, the "bromigos" weren't too broken up over it.  I mean, shit, they're getting a brand new car out of it!!

Travis then re-dislocates Brandon's shoulder, starts wailing on both Derek and Brandon.  Oscar tries to break up the fight, but Travis in a blind rage knocks him unconscious too.  He choked the life out of Derek, then took his boot to Brandon's head.  Ending it. 

I'm not going to say that the bros didn't deserve it.

But I understand.

Episode 19 Synopsis: Date of Death

"There is no more good. There is no more bad, right or wrong. It's us or them, kill or be killed." - Chris Manawa 

I wasn't crazy about this episode.  It seems like every episode I really like, IGN gives it a low rating.  Yet this one was rated higher than usual over there, an 8/10.  I chalk my feelings up to the next to last episode of the season finale doldrums (technically it's the third to last, but the last episodes aired back to back).  Yet, there was a theme to this episode.  Basically, the idea is, the world could end tomorrow.  Whether you are in the middle of the zombie apocalypse or what seems to be a good life.  Tell your loved ones that you care, and that you love them. You never know when that choice can be taken away from you.

Travis had left Maddie and her family to be with his son.  He left with the idea that he may never return.  Madison was separated from Travis and her own son.  Her daughter, Alicia, stayed behind with her.  Yet they've never really dealt with the underlying issues of Alicia and Nick's father's death prior to the apocalypse, and how Madison treated her children differently before and after this event. 

In the previous episode, we saw Madison come off her rocker once she heard about a gringo with ratty hair dealing drugs to the thugs at the warehouse.  Lighting up the hotel for the entire world to see, she is talked down by Alicia who convinces her that she is putting the entire tribe at the Rosarito Beach Hotel at risk.

We saw that one person who saw the lit up hotel in the distance was Travis, who had been separated from the Rosarito since the mid-season finale.  Travis, as we know, took off with his son Chris, who had a tough time adjusting to the new world, his life without his mother (who was one of the first casualties of the infection) and being linked to a family that he really had no other connection to than the fact that his father was attached to them.  Last we saw of them, they had teamed up with a couple of "bromigos" who crossed the border just days before the shit hit the fan.  Chris liked them.  Travis, needless to say, did not.  When we last saw them, the group had taken residence at a farm that appeared abandoned.  Turns out the owner was still there, but when he shot "Baby" James (one of the bromigos - hat tip to Talking Dead for calling them that), Chris in turn shot the farmer dead.

When we saw Travis in the distance, peering at the lit up beacon of a hotel, he was Chris-less.  At the time, we didn't know that Chris was no longer in the picture.  We just sort of guessed it, though, because it seemed as though it was a matter of time before Chris left him. 

In addition, Travis was not the only person who saw the hotel.  Several others have stormed the gates, demanding to be let in.  Elena, Hector, Oscar, Andres, Alicia and Maddie are all standing guard, apologizing, saying it was a mistake, etc. etc.  Now, the irony is, Maddie had told the group that another group could come and they will take.  These refugees are essentially benign, and rather than "taking" they are begging to be let through the gate.

Maddie sees Travis in the distance, she allows him access.  He shakes his head, silently, when asked about Chris' whereabouts.  What's interesting about them now is that both of their sons have left them, when they desperately tried to hold onto them against the odds.  

Like many other episodes this season, we are treated to a flashback of more recent times, and more precisely, what happened after Chris shot Señor Suarez (who we find out was named Elias).

Baby James is writhing in pain from the shot from Suarez, which had gone through his leg.  On one hand, it was a good thing the slug wasn't lodged in his leg.  The other hand, he would need stitches and medical help.  Of course, that's not happening here.  Keep in mind, Ofelia was shot in season one, and it took her weeks to fight the infection and get at least close to 100%.  James is now a liability, injured and needing immediate medical attention.

Travis, being the adult in charge, ransacks the house to find anything that can stitch him up or any pain medications.  He makeshifts a stitching of the wound, says that he needs rest and a few days before they can leave while James recovers.

The bromigos killed a chicken and start to cook it up.  Travis said something like, they should be eating eggs.  At first, I thought it was a bizarre thing to say, then it made sense: a chicken will keep laying eggs, even if they eat the eggs.  Eat a chicken, the chicken AND the eggs are gone.  Ah-ha! Of course, they don't listen.  James tells him also that on a scale of 1-10, his pain was like a "3 or 4."  It was clear that he wasn't being honest.   Travis feels for him, thinks he is holding back with him.  Turns out, he guessed right. 

Travis takes Chris aside and confronts him about shooting the farmer.  Chris says that he had to do it because the man shot his "friend."  Travis in incredulous: these boys are not their friends.  He calls them "savages."  Chris says that he is a "savage" then.

Chris related a story from when he was in grade school, how he used to come home crying becayse of bullies.  Travis had told him to play the game, to find his place.  Which was probably the worst advice that Chris could hold onto now.  Chris suggested that Travis has "proved his worth" to the guys by saving James.  "You could come out of this as a hero."  Travis doesn't want to be the hero: he just doesn't want them to kill him and Chris too.  Chris says that they need them, Travis disagrees.  Well, *I* do, says Chris. 

Chris didn't fit in as a youngster in school.  A young kid with anger issues in this new world is now trying to find his place.  Travis is trying to help him, but to no avail.  He's going to ally up with a bunch of strangers who think he's a cool kid, Travis will always be his annoying old man.

Several days pass in the flashback.  The bros say that they've gone through all the chickens, and they need to leave.  Travis has his "I TOLD you so" moment about eating eggs.  Travis says that they can't leave James behind, he's still recovering and it's much too soon to move him.  James reluctantly agrees to go, tells Travis his pain is basically zero.  The bros say they are going back to San Diego.  Travis says that San Diego is no longer there (he's told them this before, as well).  Chris says, "Well, we didn't see San Diego."

Before they leave, Travis creates a cross for Señor Suarez's grave, discovers his name is Elias and his birth date.  He also realizes that he has no idea what day or month it is, he's only guessing that the year (2010, when most of the people at the farm has perished).  As they drive away, the activity causes James to pass out from the pain.  Travis implores them to stop: he's not going to live if they keep going.

Brandon, Derek and Chris discuss the fate of James.  "He's not getting any better."  Travis, in protect mode, grabs a gun.  Brandon mocks him, says that he doesn't have the "balls" to use it.  Of course, Chris being the sullen teenager is all, "Geez, Dad, stop embarrassing me!"

When Travis goes back to James, he asks why Travis has a gun.  Travis is honest: he says he's protecting him from his friends who would think nothing of killing him.  Travis asks out loud, "Why not just leave you here?"  James then tells the story of when they first crossed the border, they were a foursome, and a buddy named Troy was with them at the Sea of Cortez.  Troy got bitten before they knew what was going on.  Troy knew he was going to turn, made them promise to "take care of him" (meaning: kill him).  However, Troy lost his nerve, got scared and begged them not to.  James took care of it.

Travis says that this is different: you are not dying, he tells him.  James says that it doesn't matter...they *think* he's dying.

Most of all, he is holding them back. Or rather they have the perception that he is.

Travis stays locked in the barn with James, keeping watch over him.  Judging by the amount of empty food cans around them, it's been a few days.  Chris brings Travis more food.  Travis pats him down, checks for weapons.  Chris empathizes with Travis, says that he gets what he's doing, that James' life still matters to him.  Even says - hey, they've known James since he was like six years old.  Imagine what they'd do to me.  Travis falls for the bait, tells him they will be all right, hugs Chris, but Chris in turn holds him down, the others come in and shoot James in the head.

Earlier in the episode, Travis had asked Chris where his remorse was.  Chris not only didn't feel or show any remorse, he allowed the others to hold Travis at gunpoint after they took care of James.

Chris is preparing to leave with the remaining bromigos, and head back to the states.  Travis tells him that this is forever, that if he leaves, they won't find each other. Chris tells him that his way of doing things won't work in this world.  To Chris, Travis was weak and wouldn't do what needed to be done.  He talks about how when his mother was bitten, Travis had it in him to take care of Liza.  Travis says it was different (of course it was: Liza was bitten and there was no cure; James was just injured and needed time to recuperate.  In Travis' mind, James didn't need to die).

Chris drives away with the bros, while Travis yells out, "Goddamn you, Chris!"  Travis buried James on the property, then started his journey to the Rosarito Beach, which took two days, then found the hotel lit up.

Travis says that if he hadn't found Madison, the hotel and everyone else, he wouldn't have had to tell a soul that he left his son, that he didn't do right by him.  Travis promised Liza he'd protect him, and he didn't.  He told a story about when he was a young boy, he had the biggest heart.  By the time Maddie came into his life, he was so angry, and Travis' reaction towards Chris' anger only deepened their wounds.

His last words to him before he left was "Goddamn you, Chris."  He had regret that he didn't tell him that he loved him.  We are now living minute by minute.

Now remorse, regret.  That's the prevalent theme in this episode.  In the normal world, we do live minute by minute, as Travis says.  However, there's always this promise of "tomorrow" that whatever it is, can wait.  Their own mortality is staring them right in the face, and now that families are getting torn apart, Travis is expressing some deep regret about not going along with what Chris decided.

Madison leaves Travis, heads to the parking garage at the hotel, which is now serving as a triage for some of the refugees.  Alicia and Andres are examining some people, to see if they are healthy and can pull their weight.  They seemed grateful for the help, as Alicia said.

Madison takes Alicia to the pier to talk.  Taking a cue from Travis' theme of regret, she tells Alicia that when their father died, the car accident...wasn't an accident.  The kids were told he fell asleep at the wheel.  Madison tells her that was not the case.  His suicide note was found in the glove box of his car.

"I love you all, but enough is enough."

Alicia asked if Nick knew.  Madison told her that Nick is the reason why she kept it to herself.  He's too much like his father for his own good, and that she was afraid he'd be like his father.

I never loved you any less, she tells Alicia.  I just thought you were all right.  Alicia tells her that she had to be all right.

Travis finally cleans up, washes away the last few weeks of filth and negativity.  In the dead of night at the gates, a few people pull up to the hotel.  Two of the faces are familiar.

They are Brandon and Derek.

Chris is not with them.