S02E24 - Clean Slate

"Clean Slate" is the twenty-fourth episode and the season finale of Season 2 of We Can Fix Pawbert. It follows on from "Last Day" and covers the single day between Pawbert Lynxley's last morning in the emptied Site Two safehouse and his first night back inside Zootopia Correctional Facility, where a year of his commuted sentence is still to be served.

Synopsis

Pawbert Lynxley spends a last morning in the emptied Site Two safehouse before a ZSI transport returns him to Zootopia Correctional Facility to serve the year left on his commuted sentence. Nick Wilde and Judy Hopps see him off at the curb, and he and Luther kiss openly and agree the parting is not a goodbye. He rides in uncuffed and unmuzzled, and this time walks through the gates by choice. The intake officer who processed him the first time logs the modification and the year remaining. He mentions the weather wall crisis, then tells Pawbert he is still an inmate. A property officer catalogs the green sweater, his mother's album, the corkboard keepsakes and the heist trophy into storage for the duration, then clears the STAY notebook and the laminated photograph as therapeutic material. In the corridor Officer Kett tells him Warden Hartwell would have been glad about the commutation and that he had his old cell held. Dr. Venn resumes therapy and reworks the guilt phrase Pawbert once gave her into one shaped for fear. Luther goes home alone with Pawbert's soup pot. Nick and Judy get home and stop holding the day together. That night he writes the first notebook entry and starts a 365-day countdown. Several cells away, an unseen mammal asks about a plan.

Plot

The Site Two safehouse has been emptied. The boxes are gone, the walls are bare, and the kitchen has been scrubbed back to the state it was in before four mammals cooked in it. Pawbert Lynxley stands in it one last time, in the room where he learned to cook for mammals who wanted his food. The pans are gone from their hooks and the spice rack is cleared; the cutting board stays behind because it was never his. Luther comes to the doorway to say the van has arrived. Pawbert says he is ready, then admits he is not sure and is going anyway. Luther calls that courage. Pawbert says it does not feel like courage, and Luther tells him it never does.

Outside, a black ZSI transport waits at the curb with two officers beside the open door. Nick and Judy are on the sidewalk. Pawbert carries one small bag holding the STAY notebook and a change of clothes. Everything else travels in a sealed property box in the back: the green sweater, the album of his mother's photographs, the corkboard keepsakes, the heist trophy, the recipe cards. Nick sets the terms of the coming year as Wednesday visits and terrible snacks, and Judy confirms them. Pawbert drops to one knee so Judy can reach, and the three of them fold into a hug that has stopped being awkward. Nick tells him a year is nothing measured against what he has already survived.

Pawbert and Luther take a few steps apart from the others, close enough to the pack that this is privacy and not hiding. Neither will use the word goodbye. They say they will see each other Wednesday instead, and Luther names the difference out loud. They kiss in front of everyone. One year, Luther says, and then they work out the rest. They tell each other they are loved, an officer says the schedule needs them to move, and Pawbert climbs in. Through the window he raises a paw to the three of them on the sidewalk and watches until the vehicle turns a corner.

The transport runs through quiet early-morning streets with Pawbert uncuffed and unmuzzled, the standard handling for a cooperating witness returning voluntarily. He measures the ride against the one after sentencing, when the seatbelt had felt like a restraint and his paws would not stop shaking. The building ahead of him is the same building; the difference is in him. The vehicle turns onto the industrial access road, passes the sign for the North Complex, and the gates close behind it.

At intake, the hippo officer who processed him the first time reads the file back to him: sentence modification, one year remaining, post-release supervision to follow, protective custody in Unit 3C as before. He mentions the weather wall crisis, tells Pawbert not to let it go to his head, and reminds him he is still an inmate. At property, a gazelle officer works through the box item by item, naming the sweater with Judy's mending visible where the bullet went through the shoulder, the photograph album, the recipe cards, Charles's napkin, Maddie's card, the squad Pawlaroid and the trophy, and logging each into storage bins marked with his inmate number, accessible only for approved visits. The STAY notebook is flagged as therapeutic material and approved for in-cell retention, and the laminated photograph of his mother clears under the court order from his prior sentence. Both go into the cell with him.

A bison and a pangolin walk him through corridors he knows by heart. Officer Kett intercepts them partway along and says Warden Hartwell would have been glad about the commutation. Pawbert says he thinks about him. Kett tells him Hartwell deserves to be remembered, then reveals that he had Cell 3C-17 held so Pawbert could finish where he started. The cell is exactly as he left it. He walks in on his own, and when the lock engages behind him he does not flinch. He sets the notebook on the narrow shelf and the photograph beside it.

An hour later he is escorted to psych services, where Dr. Venn is waiting with his file and the terms of the commutation. He tells her this time is different because he chose it, and when she asks whether that is true he works it through: the alternative was running and hiding and becoming something he is not anymore. She puts his own reasoning back to him, that he chose the option which let him stay who he has become, and calls it growth. Then she raises the phrase he gave her in their last session before the furlough, Dr. Fuzzby's formulation about guilt, and tells him that what walked through the door an hour ago was not guilt. She reworks the same structure for fear and hands it back to him. Sessions resume on the old schedule in a new context, and she closes by telling him to make the year count, the charge Harvey and Nikki each gave him before her.

Luther lets himself into a house he has not lived in for months. The air is stale, and the furniture belongs to the life he had before the pack. He walks through the rooms and opens the one box he kept from the safehouse for himself: Pawbert's soup pot. He carries it to the kitchen and sets it on the stove, meaning to keep practicing the recipe until Pawbert comes home. Across the city, Nick and Judy get through their own door and stop holding the day together for the first time in weeks, after the siege, the hospital, the hearing and the goodbyes. Nick says Pawbert is going to be okay, and that they are going to be okay too.

That night Pawbert lies on the thin mattress and listens to the prison settle. He takes the notebook down from the shelf and opens it past Luther's inscription to the first blank page, and with the pencil issued at intake he writes the first entry: day one of three hundred and sixty-five, and the word STAY. Several cells down the protective custody corridor, a figure moves in the shadows, and a hushed voice asks about a plan.

Key Moments

• Pawbert stands a last time in the emptied Site Two kitchen before the transport arrives
• Luther names Pawbert's going anyway as courage, and tells him it never feels like it
• The pack folds into a group hug on the sidewalk outside Site Two
• Pawbert and Luther kiss openly at the curb, in front of everyone
• Pawbert watches the three of them through the transport window until the vehicle turns a corner
• The transport carries him in uncuffed and unmuzzled, and he walks through the gates by choice
• The intake officer logs the sentence modification, then tells Pawbert the weather wall crisis changes nothing about his status
• The property officer logs the green sweater, the Lillian album, the recipe cards, Charles's napkin, Maddie's card, the squad Pawlaroid and the heist trophy into ZCF storage for the duration
• The STAY notebook and the laminated photo are both cleared as therapeutic material and go into the cell with him
• Officer Kett stops Pawbert in the corridor to say Warden Hartwell would have been glad about the commutation
• Kett reveals he had Cell 3C-17 held so Pawbert could finish where he started
• Pawbert walks into 3C-17 on his own and sets the notebook and the photo side by side on the shelf
• Dr. Venn reworks Dr. Fuzzby's guilt phrase into a version shaped for fear
• Venn closes the session with the same charge Harvey and Nikki each gave Pawbert
• Luther returns to his house alone and sets Pawbert's soup pot on the stove
• Nick and Judy get home and stop holding the day together for the first time in weeks
• Pawbert writes the first notebook entry and opens a 365-day countdown
• Several cells down the protective custody corridor, an unseen mammal asks about a plan

Key Lines

Locations

• Site Two - Kitchen and street exterior, emptied
• ZSI transport vehicle
• Zootopia Correctional Facility - Intake, property, corridor, Cell 3C-17, psych services, protective custody corridor
• Luther's house
• Nick and Judy's apartment

Items

• STAY notebook - Cleared as therapeutic material and approved for in-cell retention; on the cell shelf, carrying Luther's inscription and the first countdown entry
• Laminated photo - Cleared as therapeutic material under the court order from the prior sentence, still valid; on the shelf beside the notebook
• Green sweater - Logged to ZCF property storage for the duration; Judy's mending visible at the bullet-wound shoulder
• Lillian album - Logged to ZCF property storage
• Recipe cards - Lillian's recipe card and Pawbert's own collection; logged to ZCF property storage
• Charles's napkin, Maddie's card, squad Pawlaroid - The corkboard keepsakes; logged to ZCF property storage
• Heist trophy - Logged to ZCF property storage
• Soup pot - The one thing Luther kept from the safehouse; set on the stove at his house

End Credit Song

"Seasons of Love" (From 'RENT'), Original Broadway Cast

"Seasons of Love" opens the second act of RENT, sung by the whole company in a line across the front of the stage: it asks how a year is measured and answers that the measure is love. The episode is built out of ways to count that year. Nick sets the terms at the curb as a visit every Wednesday and Judy confirms them, the property officer logs the sweater and the keepsakes into a storage bin for the year, Dr. Venn restarts therapy on the old schedule, and Luther carries the soup pot home to keep practicing until Pawbert is back. That night, in his old cell, Pawbert writes the countdown's first line in pencil. The song is an ensemble number, and the pack closes the season in three separate places, all four counting the same year.