Fear the Walking Dead Ends Alicia vs. Victor Strand War

Warning: this story contains spoilers for Sunday's "Divine Providence" episode of Fear the Walking Dead. All's fair in love and war. Alicia Clark (Alycia Debnam-Carey) declared war against former BFF Victor Strand (Colman Domingo) to take his Tower and turn it into PADRE, somewhere safe for outcast survivors of the nuclear-zombie apocalypse. But Strand — who lit a beacon on the Tower roof to draw a walker horde and keep Alicia away to start Season 7 — made a chilling confession in "Divine Providence": "When I first lit that beacon, I did it to keep you out. Now it's to keep you in."

After Alicia arrived at Strand's Tower with her army of survivors, Wes (Colby Hollman) warned Strand against letting Alicia in —both literally and figuratively. With Alicia trapped inside, Strand revealed his plan to re-ignite the light, luring a crater's worth of radioactive walkers to the Tower to kill Alicia's army. 

Alicia's attempt to take Strand hostage at gunpoint and force him to turn off the light ended with her collapsing from chronic fever before they could reach the roof. Having revealed that she's dying from a mysterious illness after suffering a walker's bite, Alicia agreed to spend whatever time she has left with Strand in his Tower in exchange for a cease-fire. "Give me what you have left," Strand begged Alicia. "I want to show you that you're wrong about me."

Wearing the Saint Christopher medallion Strand gave her at Lawton in Season 6, which she later reclaimed after Strand threw Will (Gus Halper) from the Tower's roof just to hurt her, Alicia accepted her fate — but Wes did not. Wes led a Ranger mutiny against Strand, determined to protect what Strand built by taking the Tower to keep the walker-attracting beacon turned on. 

Outmanned and outgunned, Strand lied to the confused Daniel Salazar (Ruben Blades) after Luciana (Danay Garcia) convinced him that his daughter, Ofelia, was alive on the top floor of the Tower. "I know you must think I'm a monster, but I'm the same man I've always been. I've just stopped apologizing for it," Strand told Alicia. Asked if he believed that, Strand responded, "I do. And so will you. That's the reason why I'm willing to turn off that light — because I want you to see that everything that I've done was worth it."

That led to Strand getting the ailing Alicia to the Tower infirmary to save "the closest thing" he has to a daughter. Surrounded by Wes and the Rangers on the top floors of the Tower, Strand confessed to Alicia that her friend Will made him "realize something that I should have told you a long time ago: that I love you, Alicia. You're the closest thing to family that I have left."

"That's what this was about. That's what it was always about," Strand explained. "I just wanted to prove something to you. I hoped that this place would show you the man that I am. Everything I've done, everything that it's cost me, that it was worth it. Because if it didn't... then it was for nothing." 

At gunpoint, Alicia admitted to Wes she wanted to reach the Tower roof to broadcast a message to the survivors searching for PADRE. The Tower could be the place people have been trying to find. As Alicia attempted to convince Wes to spare her and Strand from execution, telling Wes he believed in them once before, Strand stabbed and killed Wes in front of the shocked Alicia. 

"Why would you do that?" she asked. "The same reason I built the Tower the way I did," Strand answered. "So you wouldn't have to." 

Alicia and Strand worked together to get Morgan's (Lennie James) group of survivors to safety inside the Tower, sparing them from being torn apart by a walker horde of the irradiated dead drawn by the light. But when Strand went to turn off the Tower's beacon, he doubted Alicia could ever forgive him for his sins. 

"It was never gonna be enough. It was never gonna make you love me," shouted Strand. A physical fight ensued, breaking the light forever. From atop the darkened roof, Alicia transmitted a message to the survivors looking for PADRE by broadcasting coordinates to the Tower. 

But then the Tower roof caught ablaze, sparks from the broken beacon igniting a fire that would soon spread through the whole building. The Alicia Clark versus Victor Strand war — and their friendship — seemingly ended in flames as Alicia collapsed from fever atop the burning Tower. 

Fear the Walking Dead next airs its 100th episode, "Amina," Sunday, May 29 on AMC. 

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