Drops of blood bead along a newly inked line on Michael Scofield’s forearm. Sid, Michael’s tattoo artist, puts the finishing touches on a set of fanned playing cards. The suits of some of the cards remain hidden, but the numbers are visible on all ten.
From the fanned cards in the flashback, a card is slapped down on the bleachers in present day Fox River. Abruzzi, recently stripped of his power by Philly Falzone, sits alone playing solitaire. He looks on with concern as the new P.I. crew moves into the guards’ room. There, the crew tears the walls apart, still unaware of the hole that has been dug beneath them. Abruzzi sees Bellick walking past the fence and asks if he can work out a deal with him. Bellick doesn’t care about Abruzzi or the history between them. It’s Falzone’s bribe that motivated Bellick to allow Abruzzi free reign over P.I.. Without Philly’s envelope, Bellick snarls, “You’re out of business.”
Michael stands by the fence line, watching the new P.I. crew come and go from the guards’ room. Abruzzi approaches and verbalizes his plan. The only way he can see getting P.I. back is “if I prove to Falzone I’m still worthy, that I still got what it takes. And the only way I’m gonna do that is if I give him Fibonacci.” Michael questions Abruzzi’s motives for discovering Fibonacci’s location. Is it to help the escape? Or does he just want to get in good with the mafia again? Abruzzi swears that he only wants the information to get them back into the guards’ room, but Michael isn’t convinced.
In chapel, Michael whispers his new quandary to Lincoln. Michael knows that if he reveals Fibonacci’s location within the Witness Protection Program, then Falzone will certainly track him down and kill him. Lincoln doesn’t see the moral problem of facilitating the death of a mafia scumbag. However, Michael explains that Fibonacci was just a middle-manager at a mob-run warehouse where he saw Abruzzi order the execution of two men. Fibonacci is not the heartless mobster turncoat Lincoln is imagining. He came forward as a witness because he thought it was the right thing to do. Like Lincoln, he is an innocent man who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. For the escape to move forward and for Michael to save Lincoln’s life, an innocent man has to die.
Kellerman answers his cell phone inside a downtown Chicago high-rise hotel where he and Hale await their next assignment. The Vice President’s voice is all business as she informs them that she has a “friend” who is going to meet them in the hotel to make sure that their plans are still on track. Kellerman says that everything is under control and “nothing will affect tomorrow, if that’s what you’re concerned about.” The Vice President calmly replies, “I’m not worried about tomorrow. My friend’s a problem solver, that’s all... Do me a favor and make him feel like part of the team.” Hale squirms as Kellerman gives him the unsettling news. “She’s bringing someone in.” Hale regrets lying about having LJ in their possession. Though Kellerman is quick to remind his partner that revealing that detail would have damned them both, Hale mutters uneasily about the conspiracy, “Swear to God, it just gets deeper and deeper.” Kellerman retains his signature cool when he parries with a remark that lands somewhere between a joke and a threat. “You keep talking like that, I’m going to have to put a bullet in your head.” Kellerman smiles, then tells Hale that they’ll find out what this friend wants and “deal with it accordingly.”
Sucre hustles across the yard, “Michael, you’d better see this.” He leads Michael back to the fence line next to the guards’ room. There, an inmate hefts a large roll of new carpet. Sucre calls out to him, asks him when they’re going to be putting that new carpet in. The inmate shouts back, “Got to tear up the old stuff first. Soon as we’re done with that. Tonight. Tomorrow maybe.”
C.O. Patterson brings a chow tray to Lincoln’s cell. In addition to Lincoln’s daily prison food, there’s a form on the tray. Patterson says that it’s Lincoln’s last meal request form. Lincoln slips the form back out through the slot and it falls near Patterson’s feet. But Patterson is compassionate; he would hate for Linc to be stuck eating whatever’s on chow that day as his last meal. Patterson slides the form back under the door, “In case you think of something.”
C-Note creeps along the fence and calls discreetly to Gus, the new P.I. boss who still has a bandage covering his left eye. C-Note tells him that he wants a job, even offers to pay Gus one-hundred dollars a month to work on P.I.. Gus counters, “One-hundred and fifty dollars.” C-Note smiles, “Sign me up then, baby.”
Michael tracks down Abruzzi in the yard. He’s been thinking about what Abruzzi said and asks him to set up a meeting with Falzone. Abruzzi laughs, explaining Philly doesn’t deal with guys like Michael. Michael smiles, “Tell him if he wants Fibonacci, he’s gonna have to.”
Abruzzi calls Falzone and tells him that Michael is ready to deliver Fibonacci. Falzone praises Abruzzi for finally doing something right. But before they hang up, Falzone makes it clear that if he comes all the way to Fox River and Michael gives him nothing, then Abruzzi’s suffering will have only just begun. Abruzzi walks off and Michael is next to pick up the pay phone. He rolls up his sleeve and checks the tattoo of the playing cards. He proceeds to dial the number inked onto his forearm: 312-909-3529. The female voice that answers is thick with an Eastern European accent. Their exchange is brief, but there is clearly a rapport between them as Michael asks, “Remember I said I might be calling you on Fibonacci?... Well, it’s time.”
In the infirmary, Sara cleans the bandage on Michael’s left foot. He is still healing from the first time Abruzzi tried to elicit Fibonacci’s whereabouts from Michael. When Sara again tries to ask exactly how Michael lost his toes, Michael changes the subject. He asks about the flowers sitting on her desk. Sara explains that they are from her father; today is her birthday. Michael wishes her a happy birthday, but this is clearly a touchy subject. “It's just in those twenty-nine birthdays, my dad's actually seen me on exactly six of them. So I get flowers instead. Flowers that end up dead and in the trash a week later.”
Gus points to a pile of lumber and barks to his men to take it into the guards’ room. C-Note insists on doing it and eagerly brings the wood inside. He closes the guards’ room door behind him, props the lumber against a wall and begins to investigate the room in search of the source of the cement fragments he’s found. After checking the walls and sink area, he hears an odd squeak from the floor. C-Note pulls up the carpet to see the wooden plaque. He lifts the plaque and looks inside. C-Note smiles.
LJ sits alone outside the secluded cabin. Nick walks outside and sits next to him. Nick tries to connect with LJ, confiding that when he was LJ’s age, his dad was also in prison for something he didn’t do. In the end, Nick’s father was exonerated, but it was a long battle in which they lost almost everything. But that’s why Nick knows that they have to keep fighting to save Lincoln’s life; they can’t give up. Nick assures LJ, “We’re gonna beat this thing, okay?”
There’s a knock on the door of Kellerman and Hale’s hotel room. At the door is a middle-aged man in an ill-fitting suit. His tie is askew and he appears a bit winded as he lumbers into the room. Kellerman asks the man’s name, the man only replies, “Quinn.” Quinn tells them that he’s only there to make sure things are under control as they get closer to “the big event.” Kellerman tells him that he was unaware that things were out of control, but Quinn calls his bluff. Quinn knows Kellerman and Hale have lied to the Vice President; Veronica, Nick and LJ are all very much alive. Kellerman walks towards Quinn, raising a finger but Quinn simply grabs Kellerman’s finger, snapping it in two places. Hale jumps up, but Kellerman calls him off. Quinn stands up with an authority that silences Hale. “You and your friend are off the job until further notice. That doesn’t come from me, that doesn’t come from the White House, it comes from the Company, understand?” He calmly advises Kellerman on how to treat his broken finger and walks out.
Veronica sits behind her laptop, studying a large and detailed spreadsheet. Nick sees that the spreadsheet is Ecofield’s SEC fillings. They begin looking over the figures and see that almost a half a billion dollars was funneled into Ecofield via federal grants for alternative fuel research. But Veronica notes that they never made a profit, nor did they make any fuel cells, patents or findings. Nick realizes that EcoField was just a shell company. Veronica turns from her computer. “Question is, for what?”
Michael walks into visitation, followed by Abruzzi. Michael sits down next to Falzone, who immediately wants to know how Michael found Fibonacci. “Did my homework,” Michael notes. Philly doesn’t appreciate Michael’s elliptical remarks and Abruzzi instructs Michael to “Give it up.” Michael explains that before people are placed in Witness Protection, they are supervised by a local sheriff. Michael called each sheriff on duty in the area. “If the sheriff was on duty, he wasn’t protecting Fibonacci.” Only one sheriff wasn’t in his office, so that had to be the one guarding Fibonacci. Michael also knew that it can take awhile to arrange new identities for people under protection, so the sheriff would have to spend a long time cooped up in a hotel far away from home. Men in that situation tend to call home a lot. So Michael ordered a duplicate phone bill for the sheriff and stole it from his home mailbox. On the bill, Michael found an out of area phone number that was called nearly every day, then reverse-traced it to find the location where Fibonacci was being held. Michael smiles as he reveals that he still has a contact watching Fibonacci. Falzone examines Michael, then realizes, “This is about money, isn’t it?” Michael smiles again, glibly noting that once he’s on the outside his resumé’s not going to cut it. Falzone is flabbergasted. Abruzzi, betrayed, slaps a photo of Veronica on the table. Michael pales. He asks how they got that photo. Abruzzi reveals, “Since you took it upon yourself to have people watching our interests outside, we took it upon ourselves to have people watching yours. So, who’s it gonna be, Fish? Fibonacci...or your little girlfriend there?” Michael has no choice. He implores Falzone to promise that his hit on Fibonacci will be quick and painless, but Falzone’s only promise is that if the next thing Michael says is not Fibonacci’s address, then Veronica will be his first target. “Canada. 345 Hamilton Avenue. Thunder Bay, Ontario,” Michael mutters. Falzone sends him away and embraces Abruzzi in a fraternal reconciliation. Falzone will fix Abruzzi’s situation with Bellick immediately. Falzone turns to leave, but Abruzzi grabs his arm. “Right before you pull the trigger, look that son of a bitch right in the eyes and tell him John says goodbye.”
Michael returns to his cell. His face falls into his hands.
Television cameras gather around a gazebo that is covered in red, white and blue banners. The Vice President walks down the steps where she is confronted by Kellerman. Kellerman is incensed that she sent in a “baby-sitter.” The Vice President snaps, “Don’t take that tone with me. Remember who you’re talking to. I’m the Vice President of this country.” Kellerman replies, “No. Actually you're Caroline Reynolds of Montgomery, Illinois.” The Vice President takes him aside to explain that had Kellerman done his job, she wouldn’t have been forced to summon reinforcements. Kellerman shakes his head. “Something you need to understand. You just awoke a sleeping beast by calling those guys in. They got a bigger agenda than any of us.” He adds that if things aren't going their way, they get real nasty, real quick.
Veronica’s ex-fiancé Sebastian Balfour returns to his apartment. From down the hallway, Quinn calls out to him and introduces himself as, “Nestor Pollack. Midwestern Life and Casualty.” He tells Sebastian that he’s trying to track down Veronica about the explosion in her apartment. Sebastian is stunned at the news. He tells Sebastian that Veronica may have survived, but he can’t seem to locate her. “We were hoping you could help.”
C.O. Patterson does cell check on death row. As he walks past Lincoln’s cell, Lincoln slides the last meal request form under the door. Patterson picks it up and looks it over. “Blueberry pancakes, huh? Interesting choice.”
Nick is fast asleep on the cabin sofa; LJ sleeps in a chair across from him. But Veronica is still awake, working on the laptop. Suddenly, a message window appears on her screen from Sebastian. It reads, “Veronica, are you out there?” A moment later, another message pops up. “If U R out there, I’m worried.” Veronica sighs, then can’t stop herself from responding, “I’m fine.” The next message asks where she is, but she only replies she can’t say and needs to go. Back in Sebastian’s apartment, Sebastian is dead on the floor. As Quinn finishes typing, he plugs a device into the computer. On the computer screen, a detailed map of the United States appears, a marker is moving across from the west and closing in on a location. It stops, beeps and produces an exact location.
Michael sits awake, tapping his thumbs on his watch.
On a dark, suburban street in Canada, Falzone and his hitmen pull up to the address provided by Michael. “This is it.”
Fibonacci kisses his three kids before he puts them to bed. Then he heads down stairs where his wife is folding laundry.
As they ready their weapons, Falzone announces to his men, “Tonight we send a message, gentlemen. We’re going to hurt him, and his family, like he hurt ours.” The four men exit the car, guns drawn. They cross the street, looking around to make sure the coast is clear.
Fibonacci reaches for the knob on the front door.
As Falzone and his men exit the car and ambush the house, flood lights flip on from several locations. Then the Royal Canadian Mounted Police pour out of vans and from around the corner. It was a set up. Philly and his men drop their guns and are handcuffed by the officers.
Fibonacci walks to a bench on his porch and flips open a newspaper. The paper’s name reads “TOPEKA TRIBUNE.”
On the phone in the yard, Abruzzi listens to an associate fill him in on Falzone’s bust. “International gun charges. Parole violation. He’s in deep...” Abruzzi nods his head as he registers the news.
Up in the infirmary, Michael sees that Sara has already thrown out her father’s flowers. He tells her that they’re not dead, but she replies with intention, “I don’t like getting attached to things if I know they won’t last.” Michael tries to cheer her up, but is unable to make her smile. On his way out, he slips something onto her desk. After he leaves, Sara turns around and discovers an origami rose. She picks it up and can’t help but smile.
Abruzzi storms down the second tier of cell block, pushing his way through inmates until he reaches Michael’s cell. He swoops in, putting his face in Michael’s. “We have a lot to talk about, don’t we, Fish?” Abruzzi tells Michael what happened to Philly and Michael asks him how he feels about it. “Pretty darn good,” Abruzzi says. The shared smile between these two reveals that they had orchestrated this sting together. They now have P.I. back. “Nice work John, you’re a hell of an actor,” Michael says. Abruzzi hands Michael the photo of Veronica, which Michael reveals is actually Lincoln’s picture. Abruzzi asks, “You are going to give me Fibonacci when we're outside those walls, right?” Michael says of course, but Abruzzi snatches Veronica’s photo back… for insurance purposes.
Lincoln closes his eyes and flashes back to cooking breakfast with a young LJ. LJ asks his dad why they can’t have breakfast together every day. Lincoln explains that it’s because LJ lives with his mother. But Lincoln promises that when they do have breakfast, it will always be very special. Lincoln proceeds to the stove to make another batch of blueberry pancakes.
Abruzzi walks up behind Gus, sitting at a table of thugs. “Take a walk,” he tells Gus. Gus leaves without a word and Abruzzi, now fully back in control, deals a hand of cards.
Across the yard, C-Note walks up to Michael and sprinkles a handful of broken concrete the table in front of him. “We got a lot to talk about, don’t we?” Without answering C-Note, Michael sweeps the concrete off the table and moves away without explanation. C-Note assures Michael that he’s not done with him.
On P.I. duty, Michael updates the crew on the status of the hole. They’ve made it through the hardest part and he tells Sucre, Abruzzi and Lincoln that they’ll be into the pipe by Friday. T-Bag slithers in and announces bulls are on their way. They quickly cover up the hole just as Bellick marches in with C-Note. C-Note insists that he’s on this P.I. detail. Abruzzi denies him, but C-Note walks purposefully toward the escape hole and stands directly on the plaque covering it. A nod from Michael tells Abruzzi there’s no other way to placate C-Note – he’s on the P.I. team.
Nick and Veronica still wrestle over where all the EcoField money went. Nick reaches over and turns up the television, where the Vice President announces her candidacy for the Presidency of the United States. Veronica comments that the amount of money missing from EcoField could “run a small country.” On TV, a news reporter states that the Vice President has the largest campaign war chest in history and is therefore the odds-on favorite to win her party’s nomination. Nick turns back to Veronica. “Maybe not a small country…maybe this one…”
Outside the cabin, Quinn stands hidden in the trees, watching Nick and Veronica through the windows.
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