Courtesy of CBS
Warning: Spoiler Alert
Paige walks in on Walter talking to no one but holding Ferret Bueller. A genius talking to himself would not be a first by any means, but it seems to concern Paige. Walter quickly asks about his ammonium nitrate. When Paige confirms its in the garage, Walter passes off Ferret Bueller and dons a bicycle helmet. Walter has ‘scienced’ his way to fake snow that doesn’t melt and plans to Clark W Griswold it down the stairs on a sled. Before Paige can shove Walter down the fake snow, Cabe comes in with a job, and to demand to know what Toby did to his SUV.
A fifty foot pine tree has fallen over and significantly damaged a power station. Toby feels like this is not a job for them, until the contact mentions how they need computer and engineers skill. Walter, while talking to himself, turns a very large blackboard around to reveal his plan. Toby decides to ride with Walter after Paige mentions that was the second time she saw him talking to himself.
The leaky roof of Walter’s car has been dripping on Toby’s leg. When Walter won’t open up about why he’s talking to himself post Megan’s death, Toby looks for napkins in the glove box. But instead he finds a not empty coffee can. Walter tells him not to touch it. Toby not only touches it, but also shakes it. When he sees Walter’s reaction he stops to look inside. Walter has not had time to spread Megan’s ashes yet.
The team scurry to execute Walter’s almost Wiley Coyote plan. This would include a tarp over the building in question, balloons and a massive inflated blue gorilla with the word ‘sale’ on it’s chest. Not so hectic that Toby didn’t have a moment to suck down some helium. Despite the look on Cabe’s face, he and then Happy follow suit, in order to execute a lovely piece of comic relief with their high-pitched helium voices.
Toby: Grandma got run over by a reindeer…
Cabe: Coming back from our house Christmas Eve…
Toby and Cabe together: People say there’s no such thing as Santa…
Happy: But as for me and Grandpa we believe…
Paige and Toby watch from the doorway as Walter runs through computations out loud. Toby’s diagnosis, the grief has forced his inner monologue outward. Toby also believes no progress can be made unless Walter wants it. Outside Walter inspects and is pleased with their structure. Just then a loud sound is heard. Happy confirms that it was a pressure crack in concrete about 15 feet thick. A nearby dam.
Right about the time Cabe breaks the bad news that there is no evacuating 100,000 people with no roads that have now been closed due to flash flooding, there is another crack in the dam. The dam is at 110% capacity and below are 100,000 people celebrating Christmas Eve that have no idea of the impending doom on the high side of the valley.
There is a new problem and an eventually problem. They need to somehow plug the crack. Walter thinks they can freeze just the water around the crack using the ammonia nitrate. That should buy Happy enough time to create a quick drying concrete patch, but someone will have to repel down 200 feet to do it. Toby is relieved to find Cabe has volunteered.
Walter has rigged a very long pvc pipe with a make shift trap door held by string. When it’s at the right depth, pull the string the chemical released, gets pulled towards the leak and instantly freezes. At that point Cabe who is in position just above the crack will use a back pack type rig that Happy’s constructed to apply the quick dry concrete. Everything works as planned until Cabe has to swing to reach the last portion of the crack. The cable frays and thinking quickly Walter tells Cabe to use the sprayer to create rock climbing like foot holds. He is able to do enough to get above the crack line and plans to walk up one step at a time.
New problem. The mudslide that caused all this in the first place is preventing the reservoir from draining. They have about 30 minutes before the concrete dam starts losing its structural integrity. That’s when Toby has an idea. The dam needs a colonoscopy. Happy of course has a schematic for just how to pull this off, but it will take everyone. By attaching an outboard boat motor propeller to a long metal hose which is connected to a car battery, the hope is that this will chew through whatever is clogging the drainage system.
The water pressure after relieving the clog is too strong. Happy and Cabe try to jump out of the water but the jumper cables to the car battery snag Happy and take her under water. They have 64 seconds to save her before she drowns or meets the turbines and certain death. Walter grabs orange highway netting and Sly grabs sand bags. They wait for her to make it to the next point where the water is exposed. They drop the net and sand bags and save Happy by catching her like a bass fish.
Next problem. Two of the three turbines have failed. With only one turbine there won’t be enough power to drain the reservoir in time. Walter is still talking to himself. Toby gets in his face and tells him of Paige’s resounding speech about people not statistics at stake. And if Walter is going to talk the computations out, he will fight his nature to talk it out to Toby. Which becomes the catalyst. The river feeding the reservoir needs to fight its nature. It needs to flow in the opposite direction.
Walter and Happy collaborate on a plan involving something called a Tsunami Bomb. By dropping this bomb at just the right point, it will hit bedrock and for almost half of the water volume back up river. They just didn’t factor in the newest crack that showed itself on the wall of their command center. Cabe and Sly use the rest of the concrete solution to patch the command center crack while Walter and Paige drive to a separate access point. During which Paige mentions all the Christmas lights. Walter immediately does the math, the Christmas lights will kill them all. Time to call Ralph.
Paige believe the emergency alert system is a smarter bet, but Walter has a plan for Ralph.
Walter has Ralph hack into the emergency alert system to send out a message to every cell phone, television or radio for all of the people to cut off their power. A little literary polish from Paige and it works. The entire valley cuts off everything using electricity. With power reverted they reverse the turbine. Meanwhile, Happy uses a laser pointer to give Toby a target for their Tsunami bomb encased in rock salt (the chemical needs to stay dry as it travels. The rock salt will slowly melt away in water). Toby is not as good at throwing a rock salt bomb as he may have thought, he misses the mark. Apparently not as bad a throw as he may have thought. It took a moment, but the bomb did its job, reverting half of the water back away from the dam.
With the crisis averted and the people saved, team Scorpion finally gets to settle in for some Christmas festivities. Walter checks their messages while the rest surround a gingerbread house. We won’t go into detail about Walter erasing a message from Drew and we’ll jump right into the message about the contest concerning Walter’s rocket research. Walter has been declared the winner of the 15 million dollar prize. But slow your excitement. Walter’s about to get really upset. The whole point of entering was to use the money to save Megan.
The team is excited for him, but you can see the emotion welling up behind his eyes. Then he notices Ferret Bueller is missing and his cage is open. Instead of reflecting on Megan or the money, Walter moves into panic mode over Ferret Bueller.
Toby: Bueller…?
Walter finds him moments later and returns him to his cage. He demands to know who left the cage open. This is where even the genius mind snaps. Paige tries to calm him down by claiming no harm no foul as the ferret is safe.
Walter: I closed the cage. I always close the cage.
Paige: Well its ok now, the ferret is safe.
Walter: WELL I COULD HAVE LOST HER. Don’t any of you comprehend that? I don’t want that! I didn’t want to lose her.
(Paige comes around to get closer to Walter)
Walter: I didn’t want to lose her. I didn’t want to lose my sister.
(Paige holds him close as the wall protecting his emotions comes crumbling down)
Walter: She was…I miss her so much. (He backs away from Paige) Oh I’m sorry this is unprofessional.
One by one, Walter’s friends walk over to embrace him in his moment of vulnerability. Then Walter gets an idea. Happy had been working on a launch pad on a nearby beach. Instead of taking the money, money that was intended to save Megan, Walter decides to send his ‘meal ticket’ into flight.
Happy after hearing Sylvester’s story about not wasting any time with Megan, decides to take that advice. She tells Toby that she doesn’t want to waste any time. Logic would be, if last year she kissed him and it didn’t work out, this time he should kiss her. Despite the lame logic, Toby doesn’t waste any time and goes right in. This time it may have actually worked.
Walter and Sylvester stand by the rocket. Walter mentions how she always loved the stars, so why not send her up to be with them. He then extends the can with her ashes. “Maybe the husband should do the honors”. Sylvester takes the can and places it in a lock box onboard.
Sylvester: We didn’t really talk about it, but technically when I married Megan, it made you and I brothers in law.
Walter: You know, I’ve always found that term to be antiquated. How about we just go with brothers?
The team watches as Megan’s ashes attached to a real rocket ascend the heavens. Walter as he watches the rocket mentions to Paige that he heard what she said about opening up and thinks maybe its time he fight his nature. Then Paige opens her hand in an inviting way, and this time Walter doesn’t run.
