Brave New World (Fringe)
Several people in an office complex suddenly exhibit signs of spontaneous combustion and die; others witnessing it realize that the symptom is onset by movement and stand perfectly still as help arrives.
As Fringe division investigates, they find a device planted in the building's escalator system that released nanites into those that rode it, triggering the combustion by body movement.
One survivor, Jessica (Rebecca Mader), offers to be a test subject for Walter (John Noble) as he tries to discover a cure.
The Fringe team finds that David Robert Jones (Jared Harris) had planted the device, and worry that despite the deactivation of the bridge, he is still trying to collapse both universes to create a third one.
Nina Sharp (Blair Brown) rejects this theory, explaining that, in the new timeline, Bell had committed suicide in a car accident in 2005 to end his suffering from lymphoma.
Unknown to Fringe division, Jones reports to William Bell aboard the container ship (seen in "Nothing As It Seems") that Olivia and team have created a cure for the nanites.
Walter identifies it as sunlight, reflected to satellites likely under Jones' control, aimed to ignite an oil reservoir deep below Boston.
Olivia utilizes her Cortexiphan abilities again, and is able to telekinetically control Peter's body, allowing him to get the upper hand, throwing Jones into one of the antennas.
The electrical shock causes Jones' body, previously altered by his teleportation, to disintegrate, and he realizes too late that he was the bishop to be sacrificed before crumbling into ash.
Astrid implores Walter to leave, but he is enticed by a strange sound from the back of the warehouse, finding several shipping containers being moved about with the noises coming from them.
Olivia (Torv) and Peter (Jackson) return to Walter's (Noble) laboratory, finding both him and Astrid (Nicole) missing.
Jessica was aware of the Observers' reflexes, and then uses a specially designed gun that fires quicker than September can react, and the bullet strikes him in the chest.
Peter races Jessica's body back to Walter's lab, and with Nina's (Brown) help and resources from Massive Dynamic, connects her brain to equipment to briefly give her consciousness to determine Bell's location.
The Fringe team sets off for Bell's boat on helicopters as initial signs of the final collapse begin to occur around the world.
Bell's freighter and biological experiments are stored away, and the US Government grants Broyles' request for a funding increase, as well as a promotion to general.
In that episode, Olivia, having her mind taken over by Bell, had observed a man wearing an X-marked shirt, dubbed "Mr. X", that she had identified would be the person that would kill her at some point in the future.
Wyman explained that the shape of the X in the nanites revealed in the first part of the episode alluded to this scene, naming Bell as the person that will kill Olivia.
[12] Bell uses a stanza from the William Butler Yeats poem "Lake Isle of Innisfree" to describe his vision of his new world to Walter Bishop.
[13] The first part of "Brave New World" was watched by an estimate 2.9 million viewers on its first broadcast, earning it a 0.9 in the adult demographic, slightly lower than the previous week's episode.
