WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for the Fear the Walking Dead Season 5 episode "The Little Prince," which premiered Sunday on AMC.
Fear the Walking Dead used its sixth episode of Season 5 to rebuild some planes, calm down a nuclear reactor and tame a bunch of feral children. That's right, "The Little Prince" finally revealed what was behind all the dirt and hostility that Max, Annie and their child army display at all times. And in typical post-apocalyptic fashion, they have good reason to be so cynical.
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While Al works on fixing the plane and Morgan runs a generator to Grace, Max, Annie, Dylan and their friends chill out at the truck stop and enjoy baths, cartoons and protein bars. Knowing the nuclear reactor could melt down soon, even with the generator Morgan brings to Grace, Alicia tries desperately to convince the kids to leave their walker-fenced territory. Annie isn't as angry or standoffish as she's been in the past, but she's still unwilling to leave with Alicia and their group (despite yet another impassioned speech from Morgan about helping people), same as always. But she does finally reveal what's driving her to stay, and it's both heartbreaking and familiar.
It turns out, Annie and her parents lived at the camp Morgan and Alicia discovered a few episodes back. They shared the space comfortably with several other families, until one day a scavenging group accidentally attracted a herd of walkers from the nuclear power plant back to the camp, despite all efforts to keep the place hidden. Annie and the other children holed up in a predetermined hiding spot and waited three days for their parents to return. When they never did, Annie returned to the camp by herself, only to discover her parents were still alive, but suffering from radiation poisoning after having killed every last walker. They locked themselves inside one of the cabins and, even though Annie begged to be let in, and even though they said they would get better, she watched as they died after telling her to take care of her brothers and the other children. Annie has serious doubts about Al's abilities to get that plane in the air, much less safely away, so she's sticking to her parents' orders and taking care of her pack as best she can. For now, that means staying where they are.
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Alicia is moved by Annie's story, in part because it's a lot like hers. She lived with her mother in a place, like the camp, that seemed built specifically for the apocalypse. The stadium was also overrun after nefarious entities discovered its existence, and Alicia also left with a promise to take care of everyone in her charge -- a role she took a little too seriously until she met Morgan. Alicia attempts to communicate as much to Annie when the younger girl insists it's her job to stay there and protect everyone. But Alicia astutely points out that it's possible what Annie's really doing is hiding from the pain in the middle of a deadly area. She leaves Annie a key to one of their vehicles and restates her offer to take them with her. Annie and the other children disappear before the end of the episode, though, seemingly refusing her offer.
But, it's entirely possible we'll see them again and they'll all get out of the way of the nuclear plant for good. Fear the Walking Dead is a much lighter show than The Walking Dead these days, so it feels unlikely we'd see a swath of children die on this show like we did at the end of The Walking Dead Season 9. It makes more tonal sense if they make it out somehow, and presumably gathering them once more out of the clutches of danger will be a huge part of the action for the next two weeks.
Airing Sundays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on AMC, Fear the Walking Dead stars Lennie James, Colman Domingo, Alexa Nisenson, Alycia Debnam-Carey, Garret Dillahunt, Jenna Elfman, Austin Amelio and Karen David.