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The first few minutes of the episode were awesome! Lechero, T-Bag and Bellick head up into No Man's Land and begin jogging across it, and mere seconds later, the backup generators kick in and they are caught! Haaaaa! Scofield set them up on purpose!
Actually, the whole episode was really entertaining, but I'm telling you, those first few moments when it sinks in just how much of a scheming brainiac Michael is...oh, I'm going to be chasing that high for the rest of the series.
Anyway, Lechero keeps running despite being told to stop, so he's gut-shot and begins dying very slowly. Bellick spends the rest of the episode alternately sniveling and bleeding after the guards try to beat some answers out of him (good luck with that one), and T-Bag gets smacked around too. For a moment, it looks like he might finally get what's coming to him in an extremely painful way, but T-Bag happens to notice Sucre juuuuust about to leave the police office after a long night. So do the cops. So our poor papi is now on the short end of a long beating. One hopes he's so busy thinking, "Ow, ow, ow, owwwww" that he won't stew on how he regrets helping out here.
Okay! But back to the escape...Michael times it all perfectly and the cons just happen to race out as the convict count is going on. They sprint through the woods and down to the sea, and Linc meets them there. Then, they dig up air tanks and swim underwater to a buoy, and Michael is just the kind of selfless bad-ass who can A) share his tank with Splenda and B) basically carry the guy out to the buoy. Then things aren't looking so good for the escapees as the boat piloted by Sucre doesn't show up (for obvious reasons), but then Splenda's dad comes by in a boat and fishes them all out of the drink. We get a really nice sequence where they're all just silently hanging out on the boat, just drained by the events of the last 24 hours.
Anyway, everyone's officially escaped, and in nice clean clothes. Splenda and his dad take off. Everyone reluctantly carpools. Susan B. harshes their vibe further by trying to run their car off the road, but Lincoln manages some tricky driving and they decamp to an abandoned warehouse. There's a nice brotherly bonding moment, and then Whistler and Mahone have to mess it up by existing, because Mahone's good-bye reminds Linc that, oh, yeah, he meant to kill him. While Michael talks his brother out of this, Whistler makes his escape. So the episode ends in frustration for the brothers, as Mahone scampers one way, Whistler goes the other, and the brothers are still not reunited with L.J. However, I'm not particularly frustrated -- the whole thing kicked all kinds of ass and I feel confident the finale will continue the streak. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
"We only have 30 seconds -- go!" So says Michael to the escapees in front of him, and Lechero, T-Bag, and Bellick promptly do the hustle. The guys in the back of the line are getting nervous, but Michael's just sitting tight and checking his watch. When Splenda frets, "We have to go now! We're running out of time!" Michael tells him to sit tight and trust him.
We cut to the first three escapees jogging across No Man's Land, and then the backup generators kick on. All three men immediately halt. No, wait -- only two did. Lechero decides to run for it again and gets gut-shot for his trouble. This puts the fear into Bellick and T-Bag. The latter's eyes are like saucers, and he makes a nice, discreet hand gesture to Bellick indicating that the former prison guard needs to drop to his knees with his hands up. We zoom over to see Michael confirming that the guards have the inmates in custody, and then he lowers the tunnel's lid back into place so it's not detectable. Mahone asks what happened and Michael burns a hole in the tunnel wall with the intensity of the Blue Steel as he says, "They got caught."
Immediately outside the prison gates, Captain Mullet is responding to the prison klaxons by handcuffing Sucre to a nearby file cabinet. Sucre asks what's going on, but Captain Mullet declines to share. Oh, Sucre, this is not going to be your episode, is it?
T-Bag and Bellick are walked over to Lechero's prone figure and approximately a hundred different guards and Jeeps have descended on the scene. Michael checks this out, keeping his counsel. Somewhere out in the bushes, Susan B. listens to the police radio ("We have an escape in progress!") and snaps, "This sure as hell better work out...for everyone's sake." She and her van's driver turn to look back at L.J. and Sofia. Sofia looks frankly shocked to have her hands duct-taped. L.J. has his eyes closed, no doubt tired because this routine has gotten really old.
We cut to T-Bag and Bellick looking genuinely shocked and dismayed. It's a nice reaction -- I like how it suggests that both of them unconsciously assumed Michael's escape would have worked. And speaking to that point: Bellick asks where Scofield is, and T-Bag replies, "If he doesn't get caught, he can fix this mess."
Or, you know, not. Michael has just broken it to the edgy Mahone and Whistler that letting T-Bag, Lechero, and Bellick get caught was his plan. Subtext: do not mess with Michael. Mahone better hope Michael will let bygones be bygones, or else he's going to have to go back on the crazy mind-bending drugs to deal with the paranoia-induced fallout of knowing that Michael's coming for him.
Whistler doesn't quite get it yet: "How was them getting caught your plan?" Mahone says, "You told them they had thirty seconds to get across, the generator kicked in sooner." Michael hides his grin as he says, "I must have miscalculated." Oooh, I love Evil Genius Michael -- not only does he plan for the serial killer, the drug lord, and his personal bully to remain incarcerated, he refuses to tip his hand to everyone else that he's so ruthless. Mahone is definitely going to need heavy drugs to deal with knowing that Michael's out there. Everyone continues to freak out, but Michael's checking to see where the cops have parked their jeeps.
Linc, ,meanwhile, tries to call Sucre to see where he is. Unfortunately, Sucre answers the phone right as Captain Mullet comes back in. The mobile is promptly impounded. Oh, Sucre, this is not going to be your episode, is it?
It may not be Linc's either. He leaves a panicky message for Sucre: "Where the hell are you? We're counting on you to be here! If you're not there, we're dead! Now call me back, please!" (The "please" kills me.) We quickly switch back to where Sucre is, i.e. handing over everything in his coverall pockets. Captain Mullet orders an underling to cart everything off and stick it with Sucre's personal effects. Sucre then asks why the alarms are going; upon learning some prisoners tried to escape, he asks avidly, "Did they get out?" Bafflingly, this fails to set off Captain Mullet's crime-sniffing instincts. He tells Sucre, "They got caught. And one of them got shot pretty bad." He walks off shortly before Sucre goes into full-blown fret mode.
Meanwhile, Splenda's dad Alfonso has called Linc. There's some completely non-informative chatter regarding Lincoln's Suburban and then the men agree to meet at the "312." Linc then hangs up, the better to go sprinting through the jungle.
Inside Sona, the guards are doing a count. They take a brief break to interrogate the would-be escapees. With the lion's unerring instinct for cutting down the weakest member of the herd, some guard immediately goes for Bellick and begins choking him, while the new general in charge of Sona keeps asks how they got into no man's land. After approximately fifteen seconds of valiant resistance, Bellick chokes out, "a tunnel!" We cut to T-Bag, looking shocked again. There went his "Plan B," which probably went something like "Wait for all the fuss to die down. Try the tunnel again." Bellick then adds that the tunnel's under Lechero's room, and T-Bag just winces in exasperation. Lechero opts to bleed quietly in a corner. The guards order Bellick to show them where the tunnel is.
Speaking of the tunnel...the remaining four escapees are in there, and Whistler's getting nervous. Michael assures him, "It's just a matter of seconds now." What follows is a tense sequence in which we see the four escapees slithering out of the tunnel's entrance, rolling below the Jeep parked conveniently overhead, and making for the break in the fence that Sucre helped create. And the reason it's so tense: it's interleaved with shots of Bellick bringing the guards down to the tunnel, them shooting their way through the lock, and the posse just barely missing Splenda as he gets out. (And T-Bag only now realizing that Scofield planned this on purpose.) Because this is a nicely paced sequence, I'll ignore the little voice in my head asking, "How did Michael know the Jeep would be parked right above the tunnel, thereby shielding everyone from detection from the many armed guards still swarming through no man's land?" Shut up, little voice! Michael's near-omniscient mastery of coincidence was established in the opening sequence of this episode! So you just shut up real good!
Anyway, the four guys get out just as Bellick snivels about how if the guards do the count, they'll be four short. General Whoosis immediately radios the guards doing the count to discover...they're four short. And he has a nostrils-flaring reaction shot that is totally telenovela-worthy. All he needs is some sweet, sobbing young thing in the background and a henchman with a pencil-thin moustache. But wait! (Imagine the music swelling dramatically here.) When Whistler rolled out from under the Jeep, his field guide to North American birds fell out of his pocket. Mahone rolls on by it too. Fortunately, none of the guards have noticed it either. I'm just imagining that season four will be all Susan B. threatening to kill people and shouting, "You broke out of that prison, you can just break right back in and get that book, mister!"
We then get a truly beautiful sunrise shot. My, how quickly the morning has broken. The four escapees are running through the lush jungle, not at all impeded by underbrush nor besmirched by sweat. The guards right on their tails are looking similarly fresh -- this despite having to run with rifles cocked at their shoulders. I feel like the NRA should look into promoting this sort of activity as a new fitness craze. In a nation that loves its guns and its faddish exercise activities (Tae-Bo, anyone?), riflerobics should be huge. ["Depressingly, my reaction is something like...oh, I'm sure there already is this, somewhere." -- Miss Alli]
We take a minute from the chase to cut to all the bus passengers providing the local police with a stunningly accurate verbal portrait of the man who busjacked their ride the night before. Oh, Linc. You had a clean slate with law enforcement for what, a week? This keeps up, by season five, Michael's going to have to resort to temporary tattoos, the better to keep updating the scrapes you get into.
Meanwhile, the newly wanted man is busy driving Sofia's little VW into the jungle where, one presumes, he'll meet with Michael et al. The escaped prisoners are still hurtling through the underbrush. Ah, now they're shvitzing a little. I'll take my semi-realistic touches where I can get them. Everyone's making good time until Whistler catches his ankle on a root and goes down. Instantly, he's rolling around and groaning, "My ankle! I've torn it apart!" Michael and Splenda haul him to his feet, and Mahone provides encouragement thusly: "Mr. Whistler, I'll drag you by your hair if I have to. We gotta go!" Whistler insists, "I'll slow you down! Just leave me! Go!" He seems to have forgotten that Michael has a vested interest in his safety. Michael has not forgotten. He points out, "We both know that's not an option. It's only a quarter mile to the beach. If we stick to the underbrush, we should be safe." Then Michael delegates Whistler's aid to Mahone and everyone's off again.
Within seconds, the guys are on the beach. With a "Hey!," Lincoln bursts from the underbrush. Michael "hey"s him back -- one hopes the brevity of the greetings were inspired by a tight timeline and not an emotional issue -- and they get down to business. "We got what we need?" Michael asks. "We got what we need," Lincoln confirms. "What do we need?" Splenda asks. Lincoln notices him for the first time and says wryly, "Always picking up strays, huh?" Heh.
Everyone heads toward a spot on the sand -- Mahone helping Whistler -- and they begin to dig. Well, everyone except Whistler, who's checking the stopwatch Susan B. gave him and attempting to weasel out of the escape once again: "If you think [the One World Conspiracy] is going to swap me for your nephew, you're mistaken." Michael: "Shut up." Whistler continues, "Once they get hold of me, they're going to kill all of you, and I don't want Sofia caught in the crossfire. Listen, just let me go. I'll contact them. I promise. I'll say I'll turn myself in once L.J.'s safe." This time, Linc has had enough: "Hey! You've got no say in what happens to my son. You got it?" He and Whistler are about to throw down when Mahone comes over and reminds them that really, the point here is not to get a suntan, but to escape already. As if to underscore the seriousness of the situation, we get a shot of the soldiers doing riflerobics. By the time they're done, they’ll be able to say, "Check out the guns!" and mean it in multiple ways.
Michael opens the cooler that Linc buried those many episodes ago, and he pulls out tiny air tanks. As he begins to hand them out, he explains, "The military controls all the roads around the prison." "You didn't consider a boat?" Whistler asks incredulously. "They show up here and we're ten yards offshore, and we're target practice," Michael replies, tossing him a canister. Mahone notes, "Five guys, four tanks." Oh, lord -- please don't tell me we're about to witness this year's "Two girls, one cup." Actually, we're about to witness Linc being hostile: "Sucks for you, Mahone." Michael tosses Mahone a tank and says he'll share with Lincoln. As Linc orders everyone to toss their boots in the cooler, he's also fielding a phone call from a very tense Susan B. She tells Linc he's got 20 minutes to meet her at a predetermined meeting spot in Panama City. He's all, "Gotta swim! Bye!" Then, demonstrating some forethought, he whips out a baggie for everyone's valuables. Whistler says, "I need to put my book in there," which is how he discovers that he no longer has said book. When he begins freaking out, Michael says coolly, "I thought you already figured out the coordinates." Whistler hollers, "I didn't memorize them! I wrote them in the book!" Keep it up, James, I'm sure there are a few soldiers in the jungle who haven't heard you yet. Mahone is all, "We can continue this discussion once we've escaped" and Linc begins herding people toward the water. Mahone asks Linc to please put his photo of little Cameron Mahone in the baggie, but Linc tells him, "Screw you, Mahone." Probably not a good idea to work the father-son angle with the guy whose dad you killed, Mahone. Splenda balks because, "I don't swim so good." Linc says brusquely, "Too bad, kid, because you're getting wet. Get in." Michael tends to his stray; he'll basically swim Splenda along, and they'll share tanks, switching off every ten seconds. That settled, the guys get in the water. Sadly, they do not disrobe first. I have to take a minute to get over my crushing disappointment over this tragic oversight.
All right, all better. We get a sweeping shot of the beach -- where everyone's footprints are visible, and I cannot believe neither Michael nor Mahone thought about rubbing them out -- and then zoom over to jungle. Lord, it makes me want to go on vacation. The guards also want to head to the beach, only they've come out at a point just down the beach from where the boys jumped in the drink, so they're missing all those footprints. After scanning the horizon to see if there are any watercraft, the lead soldier asks, "Where the hell are they?"
Answer: swimming in an amazingly clear and blue body of water. I read that this was filmed around Florida, but I have to tell you: I was swimming in the Gulf of Mexico last November, and it was nowhere near as clear and blue as this. Lovely -- who can complain about chillaxing on the beach after Thanksgiving? -- but nothing like this. Anyhoodle, everyone swims along. And you know, for someone who allegedly tore up his ankle, Whistler's doing a very strong breaststroke. As is Michael who, let us not forget, lost a few toes only a few months ago in Prison Break time.
Back at Sona, the guards are taking out their frustrations by thrashing Bellick to within an inch of his life. Frankly, I'm surprised they haven't shot him and T-Bag as an example to the others. You'd think that after three escape attempts in two weeks, the administration would want to quell the possibility of a fourth attempt.
And outside Sona, the boys continue to swim along. On the beach, lots of armed guards are running around, ignoring the pre-existing footprints and creating plenty of their own footprints to further confuse matters. The leader of the investigation radios General Whoosis -- also known as General Mestas, by the by -- says he'll be sending more men. Immediately over his left shoulder, Sucre's still trying to see what's going on, while Captain Mullet stands and soaks in his own self-righteousness. As Captain Mullet prepares to head out, Sucre pleads, "This is getting crazy. I'll plead guilty for the warrant. I'll show up for the court hearing. Let me get out of here. With these alarms and the guns, things are making me nervous." Captain Mullet could not care less: "Until things settle in, you go nowhere." Oh, Sucre, this is not going to be your episode, is it?
We head back to the beach, get a lovely shot of a brown pelican flying by, and then we see all the guys popping up right near a buoy. Everyone swims over and begins clinging to it. Linc looks around the empty waters and begins asking, with increasingly urgency, "Where is he? Where is he? Where is he?" Whistler asks who "he" is, and that's when Lincoln confirms that Sucre was supposed to be there with a boat. Michael is watching for an exhausted Splenda, while Mahone pulls Whistler out of the water. Linc points out that the exhausted men can't hold out for too much longer. Michael replies, "Sucre's coming -- be patient." We get a long, long shot indicating how far out they really are.
We cut to Alfonso pulling up at the boat pier in anticipation of meeting Splenda. However, when he walks over to boat slip 312 (ha-HA! There it is!), the boat is still there. Alfonso asks, "Wasn't boat 312 supposed to go out today?" and a wonderfully Falstaffian dockhand replies, "Someone reserved it, but they never picked it up." We cut to a close-up of Alfonso looking worried.
Then we cut to the beach, where the head of the search is telling General Mestas that he thinks the fugitives may have headed back into the jungle. We cut to Mestas rolling his eyes before he points out, "The jungle? You asked me to send men to the beach!" The guy on the beach winces, but he's saved by a few dogs, who have sniffed out the shoes in the cooler. Once he sees the shoes, he's back on the radio: "General, I think we have to call the coast guard." Cut to the general having a little temper tantrum. Sucre looks increasingly nervous.
And out on the water, everyone's debating whether you get the pruney fingers because your skin's taken on extra water or because the skin's shriveled in the water. No, not really. They're talking about the ending of the movie Open Water. I kid again! They're not really doing much of anything past trying to drown (Splenda) or saving the would-be drowners or bitching at Michael because Sucre hasn't shown up. Michael defends his bromantic partner with "Sucre's not just going to abandon us! He'll show. He'll show."
Or he'll continue sweating in the police office. Captain Mullet has concluded that the escapees are likely fish food at this point, and Sucre struggles to maintain a poker face. It's easy, because soon, he can make the Shame Face. It seems that "Jorge Rivera" is wanted for more than a drunk-and-disorderly; he's also wanted because he hasn't paid child support. Captain Mullet asks, "What kind of man doesn't take care of his family?" Sucre swallows the bitter irony and replies, "Not a good one." He pleads to go, but Captain Mullet's adamant that there will be paperwork first. The captain walks off, leaving Sucre to marinate in his guilt. Oh, Sucre, this is not your episode, is it?
We then cut to Susan B. having a small hissy fit, on account of having lost all track of the escapees. Her driver says reassuringly, "Burrows will reach out if he wants his son back." Susan B. snarls, "That might no longer be an option." We cut to Sofia's clueless, panicky face and L.J.'s more resolved one. That poor kid -- in the past few months, he's weathered more murders and death threats. I fully expect to learn in a future season that he's retreated to some remote Buddhist monastery to pull his head together. Susan B. gets out of the van, grabs a sedan, and drives off somewhere.
Meanwhile, out on the water, a boat has come straight for the buoy. However, since it's not flashing a light like Sucre was supposed to, everyone quickly concludes it's not him. Splenda promptly panics. "The coast guard! They've found us!" he says. However, it turns out to be his dad instead. Oh, relief all around! The guys all swim over to the boat and struggle aboard. Whistler says, "Michael, if I don't get another chance, I want you to know that I appreciate everything you've done." Michael replies, "You're welcome." We then get a moist reunion between Alfonso and Splenda. When Lincoln clambers aboard, he asks, "How'd you find us?" Alfonso explains, "You said you'd be coming from the southwest, so I took a chance." Michael frets a bit about Sucre, but then the boat takes off. We get a beautiful, wordless sequence where we see all the guys silently slumped on the boat. Michael looks worried; Lincoln looks angry but resolved; Alfonso radiates serenity; Splenda looks older, yet calmer; Whistler looks nauseous (which would seem like a liability in his line of work...unless he's feeling ill about something else). Mahone -- well, he's smiling slightly.
Anyway, we go from that short interlude of calm to another shot of Bellick getting beat up some more. And you know, for all that he's a class-A prick, I still don't enjoy watching him get tenderized. Surprisingly, neither does T-Bag, but I suppose he's just uneasy because it's a preview of what he's in for. Lechero continues to bleed quietly. And now, the guards have decided to walk T-Bag through no-man's land, instead of, say, shooting him and making an example of him in front of the other inmates. For that kind of dumb thuggery, they deserve to be dealing with prisoner breakouts on a regular basis. Anyway, this little walk through the sand is pretty much an excuse to get Whistler's book into T-Bag's hot little hand (he's tossed to the ground, notices it there and manages to grab it because the guards are totally not paying attention to their little would-be escapee) and it is such a contrived set of circumstances even for this show, I can't be bothered to say anything else.
We're back with the escaped crew. They've docked and disembarked, and it turns out that Linc's got clothing for everyone. Whistler remembers that he had a foot injury for five seconds, and then everyone changes OFFSCREEN, perpetuating yet another aesthetic injustice in this episode. Linc takes a time-out to shake Alfonso's hand and thank him for his help; the smaller man says, "Thank you for my boy. I hope you get your son back, too." Linc's good mood deflates. Splenda shakes Michael's hand in thanks, and the father and son head out.
We then transition to Susan B. driving along and trying to raise Lincoln on the phone. She gets him heading up what must be the world's least fun carpool, and Linc lies about how they're in downtown Panama. Susan B. snaps, "No, Lincoln. You're not." Linc checks his rearview mirror and sure enough, there's a One World Conspiracy sedan creeping up on his tail. A car chase promptly ensues. Whistler would like to know how the One World Conspiracy found them, and it only takes Michael a moment to reason that the bug's in the stopwatch, and the only reason it didn't work in the ocean was that the water blocked the signal. Whistler hands it over with "Oh my God, I didn't know, I didn't know!" Michael throws the offending object out the window. Linc practices some more evasive driving maneuvers and eventually uses the SUV's bulk to force the cars off the roads or into each other. This buys him enough time to drive everyone to the remote cabin he and Sucre rented a while back. Mahone expresses some concern about this ("This is looking like a dead end here") and Linc snaps, "Stay in the car then!" He does not add "OR LINCOLN WILL SMASH COMPLAINING MOUTH."
Everyone runs into the cabin. Linc smashes out a window and fires a gun a few times while everyone else ducks to stay out of the returning volley. Linc is a lousy shot. So is the guy with the submachine gun, given that he's got a submachine gun and he can't hit anything in the cabin with it.
Back at Sona, a guard is busy beating T-Bag, as Sucre watches nervously. We can tell the guard has no imagination, because he has not grabbed T-Bag's prosthesis and used it as a cudgel. That would have been more devastating to T-Bag, to be sure. Anyway, where Bellick was a sniveling little baby as he took his beatdown, T-Bag's a combative little Don Rickles, insulting everything about the guy who is currently making him bleed his own blood. General Mestas is storming around the office, and as he makes his rounds, he notices Captain Mullet standing guard over Sucre. The general asks, "What the hell is he still doing here?" and Captain Mullet says wanly, "He has an outstanding warrant." The general orders, "Unless it's for murder, get him out of here!" Hey, it might turn out to be Sucre's episode after all!
We switch back to the cabin, where the guy with the big gun is ducking behind a tree every time he hears the pop-pop-pop-pop of bullets from the cabin. Susan B. pulls up and does her own shooting as she assesses the situation. The big gun-totin' guy tells her they're barricaded in the house. Susan B. sits tight for a moment, then gets up and walks over to the other guy. He's all, "What are you doing? Get back!" and she replies, "All that gunfire and they only hit your car three times?" The stooge does not reply, "I'm paid to shoot things, not notice my surroundings." Susan B. kicks open the cabin door and notices the tape recorder playing the gunfire. Then she notices that there's a road behind the cabin leading to parts unknown. I am sort of in awe of Linc and Sucre managing to craft the audio decoy plan and find a cabin situated in the middle of a road in the middle of nowhere. Susan B. opens her mouth and bellows. "Son of a b --"
Beeep! Linc has just gotten into traffic with the hoopty old sedan he's driving now. Whistler is leaning over the front seat, saying, "You've done a great job of getting us out of the frying pan, but it'll be for nothing if we end up back in the fire." Whistler is a big ball of negativity, isn't he? Lincoln thinks so anyway. "They want you, they get you -- it's that simple," he says. Whistler protests, "This is not about me -- it's about Sofia and your son. Michael, tell him! Tell him these people just won't let us walk away." What magic words does he think Michael can use? Does Whistler really think that poor Linc -- he who discovered Dr. Sara's head in a box, he who was framed, he whose ex-wife was killed and son was framed -- is oblivious to what the One World Conspiracy can do? Michael tells Whistler to cram it.
Oh, lord, we're back at Sona and T-Bag's about to get seriously tortured -- some guard's just asked him to take off his pants. Meanwhile, Sucre has foolishly stuck around waiting for his stuff. No, Sucre, no! Run while you can! Run while this is still your episode!
Anyway, T-Bag is busy trying to talk his way out of getting a car battery attached to his gonads, and he finally says -- or rather, screams -- something useful: "[Sucre] knows everything! He knows everything!" And right as Sucre's hand is on the doorknob, someone off-camera says, "Hey! Not so fast, mi amigo." Oh, Sucre. I had thought this was going to be your episode after all.
Meanwhile, on the outside...Linc pulls up to an industrial-looking space. It looks like a cross between a middle school and an office park. Whistler prevails upon Mahone for help out of the car while Michael asks what the place is. Linc says, "We're going to make the exchange on our terms. There's a service road out back just in case we want to get lost." Whistler grunts, "Assuming we're still alive." Lincoln asks dismissively, "You still talking?" I love it when Linc gets snotty. Mahone offers Whistler an arm so they can limp over to the other side of the car and gossip about how mean that Lincoln is and did you hear what he said to me and why, I never. Linc's phone rings.
Susan B. is stalking out of the cabin, saying, "I've got to commend you on that boombox trick. Very sophisticated. You steal that one from Home Alone?" "You fell for it, bitch," Linc replies. Susan B. chuckles mirthlessly then says, "All right, listen. If you want to see your son --" "Hey, hey, hey," Linc interrupts her. "You're not calling the shots anymore." "As long as I have L.J. --" Susan B. starts, but Linc continues, "As long as I got Whistler, you're going to do exactly as I say. You got it?" He tells Susan to meet him at the exchange point in 20 minutes with L.J., then hangs up. Mahone shoots Whistler a look, and Whistler rolls his eyes and shakes his head.
Michael comments, "So now we wait?" "Yeah," Linc replies. "Think this will work?" Michael persists. Linc answers uneasily, "Yeah, this will work. You, me, L.J." Michael frets a little over Splenda. Dude, forget the substitute! Fret over the real thing! Sucre's in trouble now! But while we're talking about Splenda: yeah, he's in a little spot of worry; he and his papa have just rolled up to a barricade. Splenda freaks, "You've got to turn around, Papa! I can't go back to Sona! I can't!"
Back at Sona -- oh, this is so painful to watch. Poor Sucre has just been found out as being Fernando Sucre, and if I know my Sona law enforcement professionals, a crunchy beating is coming forthwith.
Meanwhile, on the outside...Mahone is helping Whistler splint his ankle. Michael retreats from that action, and heads over to talk to Linc. He says, "You know, you did great." FINALLY! Linc shrugs that off with, "Thanks. I just want L.J. back, you know?" Michael assures him that it'll just be a matter of time. Mahone comes over and says, "Since I don't have a pony in this race, I guess this is where I say goodbye." Mahone has guessed wrong; Lincoln plans to kill Mahone since Mahone killed his father. He says, "I was going to kill you at the beach, but I didn't want to do anything that was going to get us caught." Whistler begins sidling discreetly toward the door. Lincoln says, "You shot my dad in the back. I'm going to give you the courtesy you never gave him. Now turn around. Turn around." We get a close-up on Mahone; he looks positively teary, but resigned. Michael implores Linc to think about what he is doing. Mahone turns around, saying, "I was told to choose between your family and mine. That was my option. I chose mine." Michael continues to try and dissuade Linc from killing Mahone, but Whistler ultimately does the job by leaping out of the building and escaping. (I KNOW!) Mahone takes advantage of the ruckus to run off, while both brothers try to take off after Whistler. Unfortunately, Whistler carjacks someone. Michael asks, "What are we going to do now?" Well, we'll all find out week!