A frustrated Murphy finds himself stuck behind a vehicle. When he checks on what the hold up is, he finds a family about to mercy their dying daughter. Murphy helps by biting the child and driving away. Yep, he's building his new world order.
In the meantime, Warren and Co. are tracking Murphy. Unfortunately Murphy but the transponder on a Z which Addie quickly takes out. The team decide to keep moving because they need fuel and Roberta wonders if Murphy is getting smarter. Before they can siphon off gas, they come across a man trapped in a mail van surrounded by zombies. Roberta moves to take out the Z's the former postal worker calls out for Roberta not to mercy them because the zombie are just a little riled up. The man tosses some kind of flesh out of the window and instructs Warren and Co to follow him if they want to live.
Away from the zombies the man agrees to help Roberta and co get fuel and water, as long as they promise not to mercy the zombies. The crew agree but Roberta makes it clear that they will defend themselves if they have to.
Citizen Z is working out at the behest of Kaya, who is determined to have improve his strength so he can back on the air. Citizen Z only participates reluctantly but then stops to say that because there's no more transmitters there's no more Citizen Z, who now calls himself Simon. Apparently, Simon is worried that even if he could get back on the air that there's no one left to listen. Kaya however won't be stopped and points out that she and her grandmother would listen.
Murphy and his crew of blends arrive at Spokane, where he plans to set up his base. 10K is clearly suspicious that he has been bitten and strokes his face.
The postal guy makes it clear that he loves his friends and neighbours and this is why he hasn't given them mercy. Apparently, he's been living off of Christmas packages...yeah old fruit cake doesn't seem appealing to me either. In exchange for his help, the postal guy wants a push start for his mail truck.
Murphy is talking about his new world order which prompts 10K to call him, "insane". Murphy however says that they've been doing the same thing for two years and now it's time for something completely different. Zombies begin to make their way across the bridge and Murphy tells 10 K to relax because he's with him now. Even though 10K claims that he will never be with Murphy his ability to resist seems limited. He does however pause long enough to think about throwing himself into the rapids.
The crew split up once outside to get the mail truck and grab gas and water. The zombies only follow the mail guy and completely ignore Sun, Doc and Addie. Doc and Addie come across a zombie and try to maneuver it around because of their promise to the postal guy but Sun has no patience and shoots the walker in the head. Once inside, they start to work on the radio and Addie is shocked when Sun takes over. Addie wants to contact Citizen Z but Sun makes it clear that she has a mission to complete. Doc is forced to pull Addie away from Sun. Clearly, Sun didn't mean all of her promises about working together.
Up north, Kaya is spinning the dials on a radio, as Simon tells her repeatedly that there's no one out there. When Kaya doesn't pick up a signal, she starts to cry, forcing Simon to comfort her. It seems that Simon was her hope and now that he's there, she doesn't have any hope. Simon assures her that they are still alive and that means they shouldn't give up. Simon moves in for the kiss but Kaya turns her head when she hears a sound. The radio is broadcasting what sounds like music which he calls static.
In the lower 48, Sun hears the music as well. It turns out that it's a signal used when all other means of communication is gone. A crying Sun explains that this means that everyone is dead. Addie finally gets Sun out of the way and she calls out for Citizen Z, who is dancing with Kaya. Simon realises that Addie is still alive and so attempts to respond but the signal isn't strong enough to reach Addie. The transmitter goes dead before they can hear each other. Roberta shows up to pick up Sun, Doc and Addie. Roberta learns that Sun's forces are all dead.
Simon talks about how isolated he felt on the base, how hard he really tried and now he feels like he has nothing left to give. Kaya presents a plate of food to Simon but doesn't provide food to her family. Kaya makes it clear that she made the food for Simon and he realises that Kaya and her family are starving. Simon checks the food supply and realises that at best, the family has a few months left of food without him.
The postal worker heads out to free a zombie who is stuck to a car because she was once the town's librarian. Roberta and crew watch, as the zombies all turn towards the postal worker and ignore Roberta and Co. They are all start to wonder why it is the zombies seem particularly obsessed with the post man.
Murphy's dreams are crushed when he enters a museum only to find it looted. Murphy walks through the building and says that one day soon, one of the rooms will belong to Lucy. Learning that Lucy is alive is a shock to 10K and so Murphy explains that he left her because he couldn't trust certain people. Murphy then moves on to choose a room for himself. Murphy starts making plans about growing crops, endless fresh water and building his very own world. Murphy declares that he's home. The daydreaming stops when Murphy hears a sound and sends his blend soldiers off to investigate. It turns out that the interruption is an Ender, who Murphy orders 10K to shoot. 10K repeatedly says no, but ends up pulling the trigger anyway. With eyes wide, 10K realises that he's under Murphy's control.
Roberta and Co press the postal worker for an explanation of his unique zombie attracting abilities. The postal worker claims its because the people know him so well and Roberta orders him checked for bites. When they come up with nothing, Sun questions if he has been clawed by a zombie or exchanged bodily fluids with a zombie. The postal worker says no to all of Sun's questions and so she decides to take his blood to see if there's anything about it which attracts zombies. Sun discovers that he hasn't been bitten and decides to take another blood sample. The postal worker is now distraught and decides that he wants Warren and Co to leave.
The postal worker leads them to a shelter which he claims houses enough food and water for a hundred people. At this point they should have stopped and questioned why he was living off of fruit cake if there was a storage of food. Addie and Doc come across the bodies of postal workers who have been mercied. The postal worker doesn't answer, he simply opens a door and releases a horde of zombies on Warren and Co. They kill the zombies and come across the real post master. Roberta realises that the people didn't just die, they were executed.
Sun is still in the lab and its now surrounded by zombies. The postal worker shows up with a gun and is now ready to show Sun why the zombies follow him. The postal worker leads Sun outside to his own little gruesome laboratory. It seems that he has been cutting up people and throwing the meat to zombies. The postal worker claims that they died so that his friends could live. Sun says that the people aren't his friends and neighbours but his trophies. A desperate Sun offers to help the postal worker as he rants about how much he hated the townsfolk. He's clearly unhinged at this point as he explains how he shot every man, woman and child in the city, starting with his boss. He shot them in the heart so that he could watch them turn. The postal worker says that the zombies know he is the last thing they saw before they turned. Sun throws a bottle containing brains at the postal worker and then opens the door, allowing the zombies to at long last feed on him.
Sun then meets up with Roberta and crew and they are impressed that Sun got rid of postal dude.
Citizen Z leads Kaya and her family back to the military base.
Roberta wonders if the zombies have souls and this is why they wanted the postal worker so badly. Sun however counters with her belief that zombies don't have souls, causing Roberta to question why they give them mercy then. With the truck all gassed up, they leave town.
Murphy sits on his new throne as 10K sweeps the floor. The Chaffins, the family with the sick little girl arrive to thank Murphy for saving their daughter. They call what Murphy did a miracle and the girl climbs on Murphy's lap and wraps her arms around him. The Chaffins then ask Murphy to bite the mother of the little girl and a smile crosses his face.
So that's it for this week's BORING episode. The whole time spent with the serial killer postal worker was simply the weakest part of the plot which is unfortunate because it took up most of the story. Were we supposed to walk away wondering if zombies have souls? I hope not because frankly, I don't really care. Even Doc didn't have it in him to be decent comic relief this week and that's most likely because of how BORING the entire insane postal worker plot is. Haven't we seen this somewhere before? The only thing that made it worth is is learning that Sun is still running her own agenda despite her promises to Roberta and the near contact between Addy and Simon.
Speaking of Simon, I like that he was given a chance to see that he mattered to people. With a cast of characters now joining him at the base, that means there will be more for him to do beyond following remotely the lives of Roberta and Co. That being said, I really didn't like the idea of a White guy coming to the rescue of an Indigenous family and getting to be saviour. I had to remind myself repeatedly that they saved him first.
On to 10K and Murphy. It's clear that it's now starting to dawn on 10K that he no longer has freedom. Given his absolute aversion to Cassandra under Murphy's control, it's fair to say that this is an untenable situation he finds himself in. Watching 10K come to slowly realise what the audience has known about him all along added real meat to the story. When the Chaffins show up looking to have another family member bitten, it adds credence to Murphy's planned kingdom. If people ask for it and they have the illusion of control is this really a bad thing? Let's be honest, Murphy in charge of anything is a bad idea though it's clear that this will ease his conscience (that is if he has a conscience). The Chaffins present another side to this story. There will always be people like Roberta and 10K who want to be free no matter what and people like the Chaffins who simply want to survive. There are no easy answers to this one.
