A Psychic Cricket Chirps Into The Action On American Horror Story

Should We Rule Out The Possibility That Flora's Very Happy Wherever She Is?

The podunk inbred cops -- hey, I'm just describing them the way the show seems to want me to -- have rustled up the county's tallest ladder and sent an officer up to retrieve that hoodie we closed on last week; Lee, holding it up to her face and breathing deep, confirms that it's Flora's, which I'm pretty sure no one doubted? Is there an epidemic in the area of little girls "losing" outerwear at the top of impossibly tall branchless trees? ...Okay, in this area I guess there could be.

Anyway: an organized search of the woods ensues. Lee was grateful to the local volunteers (which: this season has not been so overstuffed that we couldn't have met at least one decent townsperson by now -- and if not at the search, literally when?), but the cops were shitty and Lee suspected that they could be in league with the infamous Polks, which she assumes are the ones who've taken Flora.

They also may be outsider artists?

Nearby this installation -- which Lee can see has been made with the doll Flora was going to trade Prescilla for her life -- is a farm that seems abandoned. And since the other half of this pig/doll combo is on the grounds...

...these three idiots decide to pop in and check it out in case Flora's inside. Surprise! It's fucking disgusting.

If you don't have electricity, don't have a fridge. If you do have a fridge and it's not plugged in, don't put anything food-adjacent in it? I feel like even Cletus would have tried a cool wet sack. The trespassers are soon distracted from their search of the house by the sound of, what else, a squealing pig, so off they go to the barn.

MISTAKE. (Though as a childless person I will say that these grimy, feral creatures -- much like the one kid in The Good Dinosaur -- are about half a step up from any of your children in terms of appeal. Why are your kids so STICKY all the time?!) But I digress: it's a horrible scene with which to be confronted, but it does teach Matt, Shelby, and Lee an important lesson.

Kids Say The Darnedest Things

Mason vs. Lee

After seventy-two hours without anyone's having slept, Matt suggests that they all go back to the house and get some rest. They're joined by Mason (who'd previously tried to storm the interrogation room where a social worker was trying, unsuccessfully, to get the boys to tell her their names), who sits stewing at the kitchen island before bursting out with an accusation against Lee: that she orchestrated all of this. His theory is that she knew she was going to get destroyed when their custody agreement was revisited, so she's hidden Flora away somewhere and intends to make everyone think she's dead before going to wherever she's squirreled her away and fleeing with her to Mexico. Lee angrily says that Mason should know she's not capable of that, but since she just KIDNAPPED FLORA FROM SCHOOL THREE DAYS AGO, she's not that credible. When she comes toward him, he shoves her away, immediately putting his hands up in a half-assed apology and then stomping out of the house.

CUT TO: the middle of the night, when a mentally exhausted Matt is awakened from a sound sleep by his buzzing phone: the cops have found a body. He has to go in and tell Lee, and as they drive up, she voice-overs that she'd thought the uncertainty about Flora's condition was the worst feeling possible, but this is worse. But when she's shoved her way through the crowd to the ceremonially displayed corpse...

...it's not Flora. And when a cop hands her a ring that was on the body, she recognizes it as Mason's. And that's why you try to make sure your parting words to a loved one are always sweet? (Yeesh.)

Winner: Lee. Not a victory she can really be that proud of, though.

"Maybe She Just Snuck Out To Get Blackout Drunk!"

Situation: In all the hubbub about what was apparently Mason's corpse, Matt missed several notifications to his phone from his security system.

What makes it awkward? (a) That motion-activated cameras show Lee having left the house just after 10 PM and returning four hours later, which raises Shelby's suspicion that Lee killed Mason. (b) Lee comes into the kitchen just in time to hear Shelby and Matt debating whether she could have done it.

How is order restored? This one's left dangling for now! (But, ring or no, that body was not identifiable except by DNA testing at this point; we shouldn't necessarily assume that it even is Mason.)

Readings That'll Make You Flip Your Wig

Burning Questions

To prove he's legit, Cricket does a walkthrough on the house and finds that little cubbyhole closet, declaring that Flora was there -- generally a safe bet to make about any out-of-the-way hiding place a kid can fit in, although of course he is right, and yanks open the door to reveal Prescilla's bonnet on the floor. He tells Lee et al that Flora's alive, but that she wasn't taken by the living: "Your daughter is with Prescilla." Lee remembers the name from what she thought was Flora's make-believe and says that Prescilla isn't real, but Cricket says she is: "She's a child. She has a fondness for corn husk dolls. She died in the late 1500s." Shelby is convinced! Matt thinks Shelby is gullible. Let us never forget: she is a yoga instructor. Anyway: Cricket needs the owner of the house to consent for him to do "a communication," and she gives it.

Cricket then sets up a séance with the usual shitload of candles in a very orderly arrangement and fresh blood (from Cricket's finger, drawn with a prick from a pearl-tipped hatpin, because literally what else would he use), and though he calls for Prescilla to show herself, when the candle goes out, Cricket tells the gathered living that it's not her: "A woman, a horrible woman."

She does, but only Cricket can see her.

Windows break; candles are extinguished.

Missing Kids And They're Found Not Cheap

After the events of the séance, Matt and Lee are as convinced as Shelby that Cricket's gift is real and eager for him to go ahead and get down to the business of finding Flora. He's all for it! But it's not free.

Recovering Flora = $25,000 -- and he takes Visa

As soon as Cricket mentions his fee -- "Even the FBI pays," he shrugs -- Matt dismisses him as a con artist. Lee goes a bit further by pulling her gun on him, demanding that he tell them where Flora is. Matt, trying to cool things down, tells Lee Cricket doesn't know anything: "He's a fraud. He's just messing with your head." Lee finally lowers her gun and moves away to lean against a doorway. When Matt orders him to leave, Cricket remains calm: "I will be back. You will invite me."

On his way out the door, though, Cricket leans in to Lee and whispers something to her...

...and since we then see Interview Shelby tell us she didn't hear what he said but that it obviously rattled Lee, we then see an offscreen producer ask Interview Lee about it. Lee claims not to remember, but the producers know she went to see Cricket the next day. About Cricket's parting remarks, the offscreen voice prods, "Something about your first daughter? About Emily?" Lee's shocked that they know about her, but the producer tells her they did background checks on all the show's participants, and that a death certificate came up in the process. So we return to that exchange and hear what Cricket told her: "Emily says hello. She wonders why you quit looking for her all those years ago." Lee then tells us about Emily: Lee had her when she was seventeen. When Emily was around four, Lee was out running errands and left her in the car to run into the store for five minutes. When she came out, Emily was gone, and Lee never saw her again. "I know how this looks. I had absolutely nothing to do with Flora's disappearance from the house. If I had, why the hell would I pay a psychic twenty-five thousand to get her back?" I have to say, a picture is emerging of these two siblings as having EXTREMELY BAD LUCK to the point where Matt's purchase of the hell house seems like what their whole lives have been building to?

Do Not Even Try Doubting Thomasin

Once Lee's payment has gone through, Cricket and Lee head out to the woods, where all the spirits come out at once and download to Cricket's mind "like a paranormal zip drive." He wants to find out everything he can about the "dark woman" who fucked up their candle the other night, so here's your origin story!

They might know her now as The Butcher, but first she was Thomasin White, wife to John, the governor of the colony of Roanoke. At a certain point, he went back to England to get supplies and left her in charge. Guess who wasn't down with taking orders from a woman? FUCKING WHITE MEN, AS USUAL. A delegation led by Thomasin's son Ambrose (that's Wes Bentley) approach her to try to get her to supply them with "real food" from ???? After Thomasin reminds them that the female colonists are currently only eating half portions, and informs them that they're not budging from the spot where John left them even to find more food, she tells them they can all fuck off (I'm paraphrasing) because she's acting in the governor's stead.

At this point, Lee breaks in to say that every kid in North Carolina knows the story of the lost colony, and that Roanoke was nowhere near where they are. "You only think you know the story," Cricket intones.

Back to the 16th century: a bunch of these colonist dicks snatch up Thomasin while she sleeps -- itself a hanging offense, in my opinion -- and when we see her next, she's got a hellish torture cage on her head and is being told that she's lost their allegiance and is being banished. Ambrose the fucking coward is also present, and begs the lead rebel for leniency, claiming that Thomasin will not survive. "Then God's will be done," says the traitor. "I put this on you not for spite, but for justice. Thou shalt find it as hard to live with this around thy neck as it was for us to live with thee around ours." He then moves on to Ambrose, demanding that he pledge fealty to the new order; Ambrose refuses...

...for about three seconds. When Ambrose has given up, he implores Thomasin, "Beg for a reprieve, Mother!" "I bend my knee to no man," says Thomasin, like a BOSS.

SOOOOOO Thomasin was abandoned to the woods for three days, dying of hunger and thirst. When she hears the sounds of feral pigs, she assumes they're on their way to maul her and starts running desperately. All she had left were her prayers, Cricket tells us, and we hear her repent: "The kingdom of heaven is nigh. My Lord, if I'm to be torn apart by wild beasts, that is thy will. I surrender my soul for thy safe keeping." And THEN!

Yeah, we can't see a goddamn thing. But from how it sounds, a...thing? Gallops up? And kills all the pigs?

Thomasin's saviour then comes to her with a still-beating heart and, after shattering the cage on her head, orders, "Eat. Surrender thy soul to me!"

Friends! Thomasin's feeling so much better after all that heart that she heads straight back to camp...

BYE BRO. When another dude tries to protest what is clearly happening and will not be stopped...

C YA! Ambrose gets very scared, proving he's not a complete idiot, and kneels before her. "Beg for a reprieve, Ambrose," orders Thomasin. "Mother," he sputters. "Have mercy." "Were thou not birthed of mine own treacherous flesh," spits Thomasin disgustedly, "I would cut thy throat and hurl thee into bloody damnation. Do not defy me again." But Ambrose learned his lesson, and so did everyone else present!

Anyway, after that Thomasin changed her mind and decreed that they would move inland, and they did, and that's why she now claims dominion over Matt and Shelby's land: it's where the "lost colony" actually settled. She means business and they're probably fucked. Sweet story!

Lee, reunited with Matt and Shelby, searches the woods some more with Cricket -- this time, with him holding up Prescilla's bonnet and trying to call her forth. Once again, he only summons Thomasin and some of her "muscle," but that's okay because he wants to make her an offer: if she'll return Flora and convince Prescilla that there can be no friendships between the dead and living, they'll all leave. And to prove they definitely do not intend to return, they'll also burn the house down. Shelby protests (SHELBY JESUS CHRIST IT'S ONLY MONEY, YOU MIGHT NOT MAKE MORE BUT MATT WILL), but Lee says that Matt already agreed. Bad husbanding; good instincts w/r/t angry spirits.

But then Matt's gone, so Shelby has to go try to find him, and finds another dead pig (natch), a couple of yokels jerking off shoulder to shoulder, and a dazed-looking Matt giving it hard to a Burning Man refugee type in a dumb headdress. What up, Lady Gaga? At this point Shelby has probably used up all the screams she was allotted for her life, so she just turns around and leaves.

Cricket reports that Thomasin has agreed to the deal, but since Matt and Shelby have both taken off, they have to put it on pause, I guess? Matt materializes from somewhere and goes back to the house, where Shelby had returned alone, though when she hears commotion and cop cars (must be Wednesday), she comes out. She's real pissed at Matt for volunteering to burn down their life's savings and also for his cheating on her with forest strange, and insists, "Shelby, I don't know what you're talking about!"

But they can't really get into it because Lee's getting arrested. "What did you do?" Matt yelps at Shelby, knowing quite well that she gave the cops the footage of Lee leaving and returning to the house the night they found that burned body. "I don't know what you're talking about," says Shelby. ICE. You're winning me over, Yoga! When it turns out Shelby's a direct descendant of Thomasin, no one should be surprised.