Sadly, the second half here of season 7 is 0-2 in my eyes of having a solid episode. This episode, titled Mourning Cloak, was another soft episode, and that is because Charlie is not a strong enough character to carry a stand-alone episode. Speaking of trying to hold it down for a stronger character, Howard is trying to play leader while Strand is out on a run. Howard makes a kid go on an RPG style fetch quest telling him he needs to go fetch a butterfly for Strand to try to prove he is ready to be a Ranger, the young man Eli heads out to the woods to look for the butterfly, he is able to catch one. Someone is looking into his saddlebags on his horse. It was Charlie, and she tried to play it off that she was separated from her group and was looking for food.
Howard, John Dorie, and some other rangers catch up with Ali as he didn’t return when he should have. Charlie and John recognize each other. When Howard realizes she is one of Morgan’s, he has her come back to the tower. Howard interrogates Charlie to see why she is here, and she says she wants to sneak in to try and stay and live because she is tired of always fighting and running and wants to have a normal life. One of the Rangers that was with Strand came back in bad, bad shape. He said they couldn’t find the supplies they wanted, and Ali was able to diagnose that the guy had radiation poisoning. Charlie volunteers to go and get the elevator parts if she can be granted citizenship inside the tower. Howard lets her go but wants Ali to go with her, and he wants her to find out why she is really here.
The two head out on a horse, and Ali sees some of the rival Stalkers in town, so he takes a detour to a bowling alley he used to go to when he was younger and knows it’s a safe place. Inside, Ali shows Charlie how to bowl because she never has, and then after the Stalkers move on, they head to the building in question. Ali tells Charlie that the place is filled with walkers, so she decides to start on the second floor. So she climbs up to the second floor. Stalkers sneak up on Ali, who is watching, and ask why people keep going to the pit. They want to be let inside, but Ali notices he can open and hide behind the door, and all the walkers overrun the Stalkers.
Inside he struggles to shoot a ranger when Charlie catches up with him. He is impressed by how many walkers she has killed and how she got a bunch more locked in a room. She lost her mask but told Ali she was careful, and she got to work removing the needed part from the elevator. She confesses to Ali that she was originally sent to go to the tower to turn off the big searchlight, which would cause the walkers to disperse so they could get Grace and the baby out of the tower, but she won’t do it now because she doesn’t want to keep with the fighting. She gets the part out and gives it to Ali, who double-crosses her and pushes her into the elevator, where she can’t escape as all the walkers in the room escape. Ali changes his mind really quick and dispatches the walkers, lets her out, and says he is willing to run away with her and experience more firsts together, including their first kiss. Shortly after, she collapses, so Ali calls John Dorie for help.
Back at the tower, June checks up on Charlie and sadly tells Ali and the others that she has bad radiation poisoning and, based on how severe it is, she should just enjoy the little time she has left as long as she has it. Ali tries to cheer her up and feels bad he wasn’t there for his dad and wants to be there for her as long as she might have left. He decides he doesn’t care about Strand or anyone else and that he would go and find a way to turn off the spotlight, which was Charlie’s original mission. Unfortunately, he gets caught quite quickly and thrown over the edge to his death.
This causes Howard and June to go face to face, Howard wants Charlie, and June says no. She says that nothing will happen to Charlie, and she will be under June’s care because she is more important to Strand and the tower than Howard is. If something happens to her and anyone else in the tower gets sick, they are in trouble. June apologizes to Charlie that she knows she should never have let Charlie go in the first place, but she has been hiding in the tower, and up until now, it has never hurt anyone else. She promises Charlie that she doesn’t know how long she has left, but she will live to see Strand fall.
