The Walking Dead “Here’s Not Here” opened with Morgan telling one of the Wolves that he’s ready to give him what he wants – but then it skipped back in time to “then.”

‘The Walking Dead’ Recap: Season 6, Episode 4

In his darker days, which were spent clearing the woods of zombies – and humans – Morgan (Lennie James) opened fire on a man who only wished to give him something to eat. Upon waking, he found himself locked up in a cell in the man’s cabin. The man, Eastman (John Carroll Lynch), supplied Morgan with food, water and soap, but the only sentence he could manage to get out was “Kill me.” Eastman, in an effort to return Morgan to reality, gave him a copy of The Art of Peace.

Eastman doesn’t give up there. Upon informing Morgan that he had worked as a forensic psychiatrist, he further reveals that he had never locked the cell in which he’d left him. Morgan, who’d opened up to Eastman about “clearing” everyone and everything, then tries to clear Eastman as well. However, he’s no match for him, as Eastman is trained in aikido. Eventually, Eastman manages to start schooling Morgan in the art.

During a lesson, Morgan asks Eastman about the cell in which he’d been kept. Eastman explains that he had built it for a psychopath named Crighton Dallas Wilton – a man who he suggested should not be paroled. When Wilton escaped from prison, he killed Eastman’s wife and children out of revenge. Eastman planned to capture Wilton himself and starve him in that cell. He doesn’t make it clear whether or not he went through with the plan, but maintains that now he believes that “all life is precious.”

Later on, Morgan brings Eastman out to his campsite where he’d burned countless zombies. He only wants to pick up some of his gear, but Eastman wants him to name those he loved and lost and then go through his aikido forms as a sort of therapy. Morgan resists, but eventually obliges. Before long, however, a walker starts making its way towards them. Morgan recognizes the walker as a kid he’d “cleared” before and can’t move. While saving Morgan’s life, Eastman gets bitten.

As Eastman made his way back to his cabin, Morgan reverted to his more feral ways and went hunting around the woods with one of his spears. After saving a couple from zombies, he decides to go check on Eastman, whose goat has just been attacked by zombies. Together, they bury the goat in Eastman’s cemetery, which also features a grave marker for the man who’d killed the shrink’s family. When Morgan points it out, Eastman admits to killing him, but notes that it never gave him peace. Eastman’s parting message to Morgan before he accepted his own death was that the only peace he’s gotten is from not killing. He also offered Morgan his lucky rabbit’s foot.

Back in the present, Morgan tries to do for the Wolf what Eastman had done for him. Will it work?

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