The Fourth Season Machine

• • •

by Dorky



Episode U-623: Looking Back



Previously on Sliders: When the group, Remmy, Wade's double, Maggie and Mallory land on in a world, they meet up with Logan and Sid, who assist in spliting the 2 Quinns and able to send the group home, after the creation of a device, to scan people for their home coordinates. Now the journey continues.

Logline: After the group land on a world, seemingly normal, Mallory meets his depressed double, still in a wheelchair, while Quinn tries to find a way to locate Colin.

Guest Stars: Jerry O'Connell as Quinn Mallory, Tembi Locke as Diana Davis, Charlie O'Connell as Colin Mallory, and Amy Smart as Chastity Decker

Synopsis: Quinn is in a lab at the University of California, during a stormy night, working on a way to stabilize Colin, with construction of a machine, which Quinn is unsure of it being able to work. Quinn zaps himself with an electrical short-out, accidently, then the machine's power shuts off, as smoke starts coming out. Maggie, Remmy, Wade and Mallory show up in the lab, telling Quinn that the campus security was on to them, so they should get moving, but wouldn't have to worry if their not caught. Mallory tells the others they slide in 1 minute, 25 seconds. Quinn takes his equipment, placing it in a bag, then they exit, heading up the stairwell to the roof, as they see the security officers close by, with flashlights, chasing them up the stairs.

When arriving on top, the rain soaks the group, waiting to slide out. They manage to hide behind the statue by the edge of the roof of the California Mayor, Janet Reno. The police officers exit onto the roof, to find no one. They split up, to look around to find the group, Mallory looks at the timer, with 10 seconds, a security officer finds the group, telling them they were under arrest, but then Mallory opens the portal over the side of the building, and the group quickly enters, as the security officer, joined by his fellow comrades, see the group disappear.

The portal reopens above a bench in the park, each member of the group exit, and quickly get out of the way to make room for the ones coming out. Mallory comments that they must of scared the security officers out of their minds, with sliding out. Wade looks around, to find it dark, but not raining like the previous world, and not much lighting; she asks Mallory for the time until the slide, and Mallory tells the others they slide in 45 hours, and 32 minutes, leading for the group to get to the Chandler, before the hotel clerk locks the doors for the night.

By the following morning, the sun was shining right onto the hotel, with the group moving right along with the rest of the people of this earth. Maggie and Remmy watch the news, as the reporter talks of no rain in the past 6 months, and things were getting bad for farmers, and the citizens of the city. Maggie figures the climate area is more closely like Arizona, than California, or some other desert area. Remmy just wants the temperature around 70 degrees, and he wouldn't care if the sun was out for the time they were there.

Wade and Mallory return from the pool, who both enjoyed a nice swim to get their energy going. With Quinn exiting his room, drinking coffee, he brings his bag of equipment out, telling the others he was going to try to get into the university to continue work. Remmy and Wade decide to go along, with Maggie and Mallory deciding to go for a walk.

As the 2 exit a taxi, Maggie and Mallory start walking on the sidewalk, watching people jay walk, with no one stopping them. Maggie figures the police enforcement's are either not caring, or it could be a law for people to do such a thing. Mallory agrees to her statement, but really isn't paying attention, so Maggie asks him what was with him, and Mallory states he can't believe he would getting home soon, but wished that Diana was coming with him. Maggie states that with her being brainwashed, and no memory of the year they spent together, it could be harder to get her to trust them again, since she mainly was a sniper killing machine.

A block ahead, a man in a wheelchair is rolling himself to the sidewalk, about to cross over, when a few kids knock him over, and pushing the wheelchair down on the cement sidewalk, giving the man problems, to get across the street. Mallory sees what is happening, and goes to help, pushing the kids out of the way, who are taunting the man. Maggie grabs the wheelchair, placing it upright, and heads to the man, asking if he was okay, but she got shocked to find it was Mallory's double.

After dealing with the kids, Mallory turns around to see who it was on the ground, Maggie and Mallory help his double back into the wheelchair, with his double telling the 2, he could of managed himself. Mallory tells him they were just trying to help, but the double doesn't care, as he crosses the street, nearly being hit by a biker coming across. Maggie soon turns around to see that a glasses case was on the ground, so she picks it up, with Quinn Mallory in bold letters on it, giving it to Mallory, figuring his double dropped them, when falling, and should get them back to him immediatly. When crossing the street, Mallory's double is being taken by a neon pink taxi, up town, so the 2 decide to return to the hotel, to locate his double.

Over at the university, Quinn manages to get into another lab, to work, with no problems from the teaching staff, by telling lies of who he was and of his work. Wade and Remmy walk around campus, chatting about the good old days, when Wade use to go to a community college, and wonders how she would of done, if she stayed to complete her time there. Remmy asks Wade what her double did, and Wade states that her double was a high school dropout, getting her GED, and going to work in a cafe as a waitress and cook for 4 years, until that same night, when her Quinn took her on an adventure. Remmy talks of joining a short lived band a few months out of high school, which helped him to join the Spinning Topps and still never regrets going to college.

Over at an apartment complex, Mallory and Maggie show up to apartment number 56, and Mallory comments of his old days of living in the exact building and apartment before heading to work for Dr. Geiger. When knocking on the door, a woman answers it, and she is shocked to see Mallory, telling him he looks exactly like her boyfriend, Quinn, but usually named Mallory by her. Maggie states that he lost his glasses when falling from his wheelchair earlier, and just wanted to return them. The woman tells the 2, she wants them to come in, so her Mallory could thank them in person. The woman introduces herself as Chastity Decker, and she tells the 2 to take a seat on the couch. With taking a seat, Maggie asks Mallory if he dated the Chastity of his world, and Mallory states he went out on a couple dates, then she suddenly left, without notice, but it seemed here, she decided to stay with his double. Mallory's double and Chastity enter into the living room, and his double takes the glasses, thanking the 2, and wanted them to leave, since there was no other business to deal with. Chastity speaks up, asking if Maggie and Mallory wanted to come for dinner, since her Mallory really doesn't have friends. Mallory hesitates, but he, along with Maggie, agrees to show, despite Mallory's double's reacting to Chastity asking the 2 to come over.

With the sun going down, the university started to clear, giving Quinn more time to complete work. Quinn is able to get the device working, but can't figure out, how to create a stable bubble to retrieve his brother. Soon, Quinn does achieve to get a bubble, the size of a piece of paper, then as he increases the power level, he is able to keep it stable, with some extra help from a few machines nearby in the room, that Quinn hooked the device to. Within seconds, Quinn is able to make a bubble large enough to fit a person inside it, but isn't getting any readings of a quantum slide signature. Just before he starts to shut machines down, and decrease the size of the bubble, he hears a faint voice, and soon sees a faint image of his brother's body. Quinn yells to Colin, telling him to hold on, with increasing the power, and it soon goes over the maximum power for the bubble to expand the bubble into that room only. Quinn heads for his brother, to hug him, telling him it was nice to be back together, after nearly 2 years apart. Colin states its nice to be back, and ready to go home. Quinn stops Colin from heading to the door, telling him, he is having a problem, to expand his quantum slide signature to this world, and grounding him, so he wouldn't go unstuck anymore. Colin states he can figure things out, and he could get to work, and should be finished by morning.

Over at Mallory's double's apartment, the 4 are sitting around the dining room table, eating dinner and chatting about things. Chastity brings up that her Mallory works in a library, while she works as a secretary. Maggie tells the 2, that her and Mallory travel around a bit, around the world in a way. Mallory's double finds it odd, that they look exactly alike, yet never met before or even related. Maggie intervenes, figuring its that whole meeting your double in the world, since everyone is suppose to have a double somewhere; Maggie laughs a bit, but only Chastity laughs too. Mallory's double decides to grab more wine, so he heads to the kitchen, only for the 3 sitting to hear a loud crash, with them rushing into the kitchen to find the double on the floor, with the wine bottle smashed, and wine everywhere; the Mallory double gets back in his wheelchair, excusing himself from dinner, and heads to his bedroom. Chastity apologizes for her Mallory, and would like them to stay. Maggie states they should get going anyway, since they have friends to meet back at the hotel they were staying at. Chastity stops Mallory, telling him to show up at the library the next day, since her Mallory would probably like to see him, to chat. Chastity hands Mallory a business card with the address for the library on it, with a map on the back.

By the following afternoon, Mallory headed to the library, that his double worked at, and finds him putting books away down a few aisles of the building on the 4th floor. Mallory tells his double he was here, wanting to get to know him better. The double tells him he made a waste of time showing up, knowing Chastity sent him here. Mallory stops his double from moving his wheelchair, telling him the truth of who he really was. The double finds it absurd, and doesn't believe travel to alternate worlds exist. Mallory tells of his past, about being in a wheelchair himself, until he was melded with a couple of doubles to no longer have paralysis. Mallory's double finds his story false again, and tells him he could leave, to never show his face around the library again. Mallory asks the double what was with his attitude, and the double states it was too obvious, with ending up in a wheelchair, and not having the respect from others, that is degrading to his life, knowing people look down upon him, for his disability. The double continues that the chair makes life hell for him and he can't handle it anymore. Mallory tells his double that Chastity doesn't see it that way, but then his double tells him that the reason she was with him, was due the fact he was wealthy. Mallory finds it hard to believe, but the double talks of taking up stock options, and deciding to live a normal life, without having a mansion and even fake friends. The double soon heads to an elevator, telling Mallory to have a good day.

Back at the hotel, Mallory returns to find the group, with another person, Colin. Quinn states he was able to stabilize him, with his assistance, making sure he couldn't go unstuck anymore. Maggie asks Mallory of how it went with his double, and he finds that the double is so depressed, he won't let anyone into his life, to care for him. The weather finally changes from bad to worse, as rain pours down on the city, with flooding starting to occur, but the group would be leaving in a few hours, so it wouldn't matter of what happened to this earth. Quinn, Colin and Remmy head to the bar, leaving Maggie, Wade and Mallory in the room.

Down in the bar, Colin asks questions to Quinn and Remmy about what their future plans were, and what would happen if truth was told, that their parents weren't alive when getting to Kromagg Prime, since he's starting to have doubts about it. Remmy agrees with Colin, feeling they may not be alive, since when they slid there the first time, the kromaggs had it under control, and they may be dead. Quinn figures they would learn the truth, with sliding from the designated coordinates that were scanned from him, but considers that who really would wnat to return to a world, controlled by the 'maggs. Colin figures he could use the timer, to find a new world, or stay on Earth Prime. Quinn agrees, since they are brothers, so they would have to stick together, but figures he should down 4 beers, since he needs to unstress his life, after just getting it back.

In the room, a couple hours later, the phone rings, with Wade answering it, only to hear screams from the other line. Mallory takes the phone, noticing it was Chastity's voice. She tells Mallory that her Quinn was missing and thinks something could be wrong. Mallory tells her to calm down, and he would return to the library, to see if he was there still. Mallory hangs the phone up, with Maggie and Wade asking if he wanted them to go along. Mallory tells them both, that he could handle this, figuring, why his double was gone, but would be back before the slide. Mallory exits the hotel, and taking a taxi downtown, and soon is dropped off, at the library his double worked at, only to see it was closed. Mallory pounds on the door, when seeing a light on, yelling to be let in, but no one answers him. Mallory's double enters an elevator, by the main entrance, when he looks out the window of the door, to see his double, looking right back at him. Mallory yells to him, telling him to let him in, but the double doesn't listen, with getting on the elevator, and the doors shutting. The double pushes a button, leading to the roof. Mallory decides to break the glass window of the entrance, abling him to get inside, to head the roof, by the stairwell. After the opening of the elevator doors, out onto the roof, the double wheels himself to the ledge, looking over, then back at the elevator, wondering if his double was coming, since he doesn't hear his double yelling. He whispers to himself that there is nothing to be afraid of, and knows his pain will disappear, when falling to his death.

Mallory finally makes it to the top, finding his double by the ledge, Mallory heads to his double, who tells him to get back, since there was nothing changing his mind. Mallory tells him, that even though he was wheelchair bound, he still has a good life, and has many opportunities he can look forward to. Mallory's double tells him that he has nothing; he's been waiting to walk again, and to really live in this world, like a real human being. Mallory tells him he can already do that, but by killing himself, it would end all chance to walk again. Mallory's double tears up, without showing his emotion to Mallory, sucking it in. Within the next few seconds, Mallory's double knocks himself over the ledge, but takes hold of the edge, with his hands, and Mallory rushing to grab his arms, to pull him back up. Mallory's double tells him he doesn't want to deal with the pain, and bangs his arm against the edge, causing Mallory to lose grip, and the double falling 12 flights to his death, with Mallory rushing to him, only to find blood coming out his double's ears and nose. Mallory holds his double, crying and yelling out to God, wanting to know why this had to happen.

Minutes later, an ambulance is rushed there, but they couldn't do anything, besides send him to the morgue. Chastity arrives, with Mallory giving the bad news to her, and she cries as well, but when able to control herself, she tells Mallory that her Quinn's doctor called 20 minutes ago, telling her, that he had plans for the double to show up the following day, to start a new medication, that would increase his strength, in his spine, but its too late now.

With returning to the hotel, Mallory sadly returns to the room, to find another surprise in there, waiting for him. Its Diana Davis, with a few body guards, who hold machine guns on him with the others handcuffed, telling him she has found them, so they can be put on trial for the death of the Seer. Diana opens a portal with her timer, the guards enter first, followed by the group entering one by one, then when Mallory is near Diana, she handcuffs him, then pushing him into the portal, then enters herself, with the portal closing seconds later.

Executive Producer: Jerry O'Connell




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