Novation - Recap

The man claiming to be Peter Bishop is brought to the Federal Building in Boston, where Broyles takes custody of him and escorts him to an interrogation room.

When Olivia gets to Walter’s lab, she discovers that he’s unconscious and hooked up to two IV feeds. He wakes up suddenly and explains that he’s had to use drugs to sleep and wake up, since he’s dealing with the stress of the man from his dreams turning out to be a real person. Olivia tells him that the newcomer has stopped cooperating with them and now will only speak with Walter. When Walter asks her why, Olivia explains that the newcomer is claiming to be Peter Bishop... Walter’s dead son.

In Hillsdale, New York, a man returns home and finds his wife Karen turning the place upside down, going through his papers. He notices that she’s wearing a sweater that she said she didn’t like, but Karen says that she’s decided to give it a second chance. She glances at the keys on his belt, says that she was going through the papers to find an electric bill, and goes to make dinner. However, once the man gets in the shower, Karen goes to the adjoining bedroom and takes the keys, and then goes to the safe hidden in a closet. As she opens it, sweating, the man comes in and asks what she’s doing. Karen turns to face him, her face transparent, and demands to know where his files are. The man backs up, stumbles, and falls on the floor where he sees the real Karen dead, hidden under the bed. The shapeshifter grabs him, takes on the face of a different woman, Nadine, and repeats her question while squeezing his head with superhuman strength.



Astrid and Olivia take Walter to Fringe Division to meet with Peter. Broyles explains that they’ve checked Peter’s DNA and confirmed that he’s related to Walter. Walter is reluctant to talk to the stranger, but Olivia and Astrid assure him that they’ll be watching from nearby. They set up and Walter goes into the interrogation room. Peter realizes that Walter doesn’t know who he is and explains that he needs his father’s help to figure out why no one can remember him. When Walter reluctantly agrees to help, Peter explains that he helped Walter build the Machine, a Machine that this world’s Walter knows about but never built. Walter angrily insists that his son Peter died when he was a boy, and he brought the Peter over from the Other Side, only to watch him drown in Reiden Lake. Peter realizes that in this world’s history, the Observer didn’t save him, and that he had to be eliminated from reality so that the two worlds could be saved. However, he tells Walter that something must have gone wrong since he has returned. Having heard more than enough, Walter panics and runs out of the room.



As Olivia watches the exchange, Lincoln to tell her about the murder. When she arrives, Lincoln explains that the dead woman with the transparent skin is Karen Truss, who was married to Dr. Malcolm Truss. Malcolm worked at Massive Dynamic but left the company ten years ago. The dead man is Donald Kellen, Karen’s current boyfriend. Malcolm and Karen separated some time ago but the house is still in his name. They figure that the shapeshifter is after Malcolm, but no one knows where he is.

In Eden, Vermont, Malcolm is working in his garden when the shapeshifter arrives and demands at gunpoint that he help her.

Olivia and Lincoln go to see Nina at Massive Dynamic. While they wait in her office, Lincoln notices a photo on the desk of Olivia, and she explains that after her mother died, Nina took in her and her sister Rachel. Nina comes in and asks how Walter is, pointing out that he’s dealing with the appearance of someone claiming to be his dead son. Olivia admits that Walter isn’t doing well and then asks Nina to look into Malcolm’s research. When Nina does so, she determines that Malcolm worked there on a project involving cellular replication, using healthy cells to regenerate damaged one. William Bell shut down the project due to ethical concerns and Malcolm left shortly thereafter.



The shapeshifter, using the name and shape of a woman named Nadine, forces Malcolm to drive while explaining that her employers want to pay him to continue his cellular replication. Nadine shows him her own skin, which is transparent, and explains that she had cancer and her employers were able to synthesize a cure to the cancer. However, the process is now killing her. Malcolm tells her that he’s memorized the information and agrees to help her as long as she puts away the gun.

Olivia and Lincoln arrive at Fringe headquarters and tell Broyles that the shapeshifter has abducted Malcolm for his knowledge of cellular replication in the hopes of getting a cure for her condition. As they start to trace the equipment necessary for the project, Broyles wonders if the disks they’ve pulled out of the shapeshifters is involved. Peter, who has listened in via the intercom, says that the disks are memory storage and that he’s seen it before. When they explain that it involves shapeshifters, Peter is surprised that they’re involved since he thought he had killed them all. When he informs the others that he decrypted several of the memory disks, Lincoln suggests that they let him examine the disks they obtained from the two transparent shapeshifters. Broyles refuses but Peter agrees in return for the chance to talk to Walter. Olivia says that she’ll see what she can do to convince Walter to return.

At the lab, Walter is going through Peter’s old lunchbox, which holds the boy’s collection of items, including his beloved silver dollar.



Malcolm stops for gas in Rutland, VT, and warns Nadine that she’s bleeding. He tells her to go clean up and promises that he won’t leave without her. As Nadine gives him her credit card, Malcolm notices a photo of a young girl and she explains that it’s her daughter, Hayley. Malcolm talks about Karen and how he hopes to one day be reunited with her. As Nadine goes in, she notices a state trooper spotting Malcolm’s car and call into headquarters. A few minutes later, Malcolm pays for the gas and comes out. Nadine joins him and they drive off… while the state trooper’s transparent corpse cools beneath his car.

As Peter examines the memory disks, Lincoln watches him and tells Olivia that he’s confident he’ll find something. He points out that Olivia is avoiding Peter and she admits that she doesn’t understand why she would dream about Peter. The agents get the call about the state trooper’s corpse in Rutland and go to the gas station. When they check the monitors, they confirm that Malcolm is acting normally and realize that he doesn’t know he’s dealing with a shapeshifter.

Nadine has Malcolm drive to a warehouse on the pier in Boston, equipped with state-of-the-art technology compliments of her “employers.” He examines her and determines that the artificial tissue has adapted to her own physiology, but admits that he’s surprised she’s still alive. Malcolm wishes that Bell were there to see her, since he was the one who shot down his cellular replication process. After analyzing the samples, Malcolm informs Nadine that her genome isn’t propagating properly with the artificial tissue, but that he can fix it and stabilize her.



Nina comes to see Walter at his lab and discovers him making custard, his son’s favorite food. She says that they need to overcome their differences now that Peter is back, but Walter insists that his son is dead. He finally admits that while she was the one who tried to stop him at Reiden Lake 25 years ago, causing the vial with the cure to break. He’s hated her for it ever since, but finally admits that it was his fault for going too far. Walter believes that he should suffer and that while he can see his son’s eyes in Peter’s face, he doesn’t deserve a second chance to be happy because of everything that he’s done to put the two worlds at risk.

Broyles meets with Peter, who has tapped into the memory disks. Peter explains that the new shapeshifters are capable of drawing upon any shape they’ve had in the past, and that they are undetectable due to DNA replication. Once Malcolm perfects the process, the shapeshifters will be perfect infiltrators.

Malcolm injects Nadine with the serum and she starts to convulse. When she loses control, Malcolm stares in surprise as she takes on the features of his wife, Karen. He tries to run but Nadine grabs him and orders him to finish the treatment.



Peter calls Broyles to tell him that the memory disks are broadcasting a signal, and he needs more computing power. Broyles reluctantly gives him access to the computers in the command center and Peter quickly decrypts the signal and determines that each shapeshifter has an implant that broadcasts a tracking signal. He’s located one signal broadcasting from the pier but warns that as soon as whoever is monitoring the implants learns that he’s breached the system, they’ll lock him out.

When Nadine regains her base form, Malcolm demands to know why she looked like his wife. She tells him that his work led to her creation, and that it’s important that he remain objective. He remained objective when he chose his work over Karen, and now he has the chance to reclaim the legacy that bell deprived him of. Malcolm agrees to help and mixes a new batch of the serum, but Nadine knows enough to realize that he plans to give her restriction enzymes that would kill her. She tells him to finish the job properly.

Olivia, Lincoln, and a team of agents arrive at the warehouse. They break in as Malcolm tells Nadine that it will take five more minutes for him to finish the serum. When Nadine goes to investigate the noise, Malcolm grabs the vial of serum and tries to sneak out. However, Nadine doubles back, takes the serum, and shoves him across the room. Olivia follows her to the roof and finds one dead agent and one wounded agent, Warrick. Warrick tells her that Nadine jumped off the ceiling to the water below.



Later, Olivia talks to the injured Malcolm, who blames himself for his wife’s death and realizes that Bell was right to stop his experiments. Lincoln call Olivia over to the side of the pier, where a diving team has found a body in the water: Warrick’s. She calls dispatch to intercept the ambulance, but the police arrive too late and discover that the EMTs are dead and Nadine has disappeared.

Later, Olivia returns to Fringe headquarters and gets some files from an agent, Jill. Once she sets the files on her desk, Olivia goes over to Lincoln and assures him that they’ll find the shapeshifter who killed his partner. He appears depressed and Olivia suggests that they go get some dinner. Lincoln turns her down and leaves, and Jill gives Olivia the same files from a minute ago. She doesn’t remember giving the files to Olivia before, and when Olivia looks at her desk, she discovers that the original files are gone.

Walter comes to see Peter again, and Peter admits that he isn’t sure what to do since no one knows who he is. He asks Walter to help him fix thing, and Walter holds Peter’s head. He then says that he doesn’t deserve to have Peter back, and that he won’t give into the temptation to tamper that damned him the first time. Walter then gets up and leaves.



In Boston, Nadine is posing as a worker and goes into the bathroom, sweating and gasping for breath. She finally injects herself with Malcolm’s serum and stabilizes. Once she’s cured, Nadine gets an old typewriter out of a locker, sits down, and types out a message to her superiors. She tells them that she now has a cure, and they tell her to begin preparations for the others that they are sending through.

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