By Daniel
Peter makes one desperate plea to Walter to help him find his way back to his own timeline, but Walter won't -- mainly because the last time he tried to help another Peter, he wound up colliding a couple of universes and possibly dooming everyone to death. You know, the usual. So Peter decides to cross over to the other side to ask Walternate for help. He discusses it with Olivia and Lincoln Lee, who see an opportunity to do some recon on the other side and find out what's up with Walternate sending these illin' shapeshifters over to Earth-prime. Peter's not so keen on that, because he doesn't want their spy mission to affect whether Walternate tries to help him. Olivia agrees with Peter, but she had her fingers crossed behind her back, so it didn't count.
On the other side -- well, things could have gone better. Peter and Lee wind up captured when Fauxlivia and Alternalee suss out what's going on, but the Earth-2 Fringe Division agents are starting to have their own suspicions about Walternate's possible involvement with some shapeshifter excursions. With Lee distracting Fauxlivia and Alternalee, Peter makes his way to his parents' house and enlists his not-really Mom to protect him when the army comes in. He gets taken to Walternate's office, where the Secretary of Defense turns out to NOT have been behind the shapeshifters being sent over to Earth-1. Brandonate is involved, however; in fact, he's a shapeshifter himself (one that's dispatched by Walternate, who'd had some suspicions for a little while). Walternate figures he can trust Peter, since Peter has no allegiance to either universe.
Meanwhile, Fauxlivia and Alternalee -- Fauxlivia especially is suspicious of what's going on -- are checking out Lee's story about shapeshifters being sent over to the other universe, and a traced call leads them to an address in an industrial park that they go to check out. They try to be casual about it with Col. Broyles, but nothing's as it seems with Col. Broyles either, as he calls ahead to warn one Mr. Jones (!) that the agents are on their way.
Back in our universe, Olivia waits at the Orpheum theatre, where Peter and Lee crossed over. She's visited by the Observer, who has something to tell her, and given that he's got a gunshot wound to the chest, he only has so long to tell it to her: "I've looked at all possible futures, and in every one, the result is the same: you have to die," he says. Then he disappears. Welcome back, Fringe!
Daniel is a writer in Newfoundland with a wife and a daughter. He's glad Fringe is back, or else he'd just be covering The Bachelor, and no one should have to go through that. Follow him on Twitter (@DanMacEachern) or email him at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.