“Back to Where You’ve Never Been” is episode eight of season four of Fringe.
Peter is at home and Walter is there cooking. The Olivia shows and kisses him. Walter mentions something about getting a machine working and drops it. Then Peter wakes.
Walter is messing with pinwheels and talking to Astrid when pastries are put in front of him. Except it’s Peter there, not Astrid. Peter explains that he’s kept clear, but has to talk about the machine. It’s the only thing that can get Peter back where he belongs. Walter built it; he’s the only person who can reconfigure it. Walter says it’s capable of destroying universes. Peter says he may be too. He has to get home and Walter is the only person who can help. However, according to Walter, Walter may be the only man who can help but he’s also the only one who can’t.
Peter heads to see Olivia to see if she will ask Broyles for permission for Peter to cross to the other universe. The machine is his best chance of getting home and Walter won’t help. Maybe Walternate will. He has no other choice. Olivia explains Broyles won’t even let Peter near the bridge; the other side doesn’t know he exists. And Walternate is the Secretary of Defence; how will Peter even get close if he did? Then Lincoln arrives. Peter says that’s how. AltLincoln is the lead agent of Fringe Division and Fringe reports directly to Walternate.
Olivia has a requisition form for Walter’s original machine he used to cross over. In this universe, Massive Dynamic fished it from the lake. She was thinking of crossing over. Peter mentions she can do it by herself. Olivia wanted to look for information on the new shapeshifters. Peter doesn’t want to risk his chance of getting home. Olivia agrees not to pursue it, but she might not be telling the truth.
On the other side, a boy enters some toilets and sees two men scuffling in a cubicle. His mother calls the police. However, one of the men is dead; the other is clearly a shapeshifter. He runs out, up the side of a bus and jumps down, into the path of another bus.
Walternate is told by AltBrandon that he may be able to trace the signal from the shapeshifter. Walternate will do it himself.
Fauxlivia and AltLincoln are at the scene where the shapeshifter died, when Fringe is pulled away by the military on Walternate’s orders.
Lincoln calls Olivia and Peter who are heading to the same theatre used to cross over before. When they cross, AltAstrid tells AltBroyles there’s been a class 3 breach. He directs AltLincoln and Fauxlivia be sent there.
The shapeshifter’s body is brought to the lab and Walternate orders AltBrandon and all of his staff to leave.
Lincoln and Peter arrive at the ferry to Liberty Island and Lincoln tells the soldier guarding it that Peter is an off the books prisoner for Walternate. Lincoln naturally doesn’t have AltLincoln’s ShowMe and the soldiers says he will report it missing.
Fauxlivia and AltLincoln check out the theatre and report that there isn’t a breach. Fauxlivia talks to AltLincoln about the body; she thinks it was a shapeshifter, the ones the other side are accusing them of using. Fauxlivia is wondering if there’s any truth in Olivia’s claims that Walternate is sending them. Perhaps that’s why they were removed. When they get in the car, AltLincoln tries using his ShowMe, but it’s been reported missing. By the guard at the DoD checkpoint.
Lincoln and Peter are arguing, as Lincoln was trying to get into Walternate’s records when they got onto the island when they are surrounded by AltLincoln, Fauxlivia and guards.
Walternate is definitely keeping secrets from his own people, which looks suspicious.