• • •

-The blue colored vortex opens, tossing out the 4 sliders. Joe quickly stands up, with helping Laura and then Arturo up. Quinn wipes his butt off from the grass stains on his pants, and he looks around to see they landed near a lake.

"Well we slide in a few days, maybe we'll get to have a vacation after all." Joe puts the timer in his back pocket, with the group heading up a hill to find out they were farther from the nearest city than they thought, since they've landed on an island which is quite large.

"Maybe California is a group of islands and the cities are no longer around"

"That's probably exactly what happened Ms. Cosgrove, but I wonder where the people are," Arturo adds.

Quinn looks around and notices a path close to them, so he takes off for a jog to head down the path as the others follow.

"Well professor, you can at least have the sun shining on you, instead of living underground."

"Mr. LaFountain, if you hadn't fallen for the leader of a cult, we actually could have enjoyed the time at the Concord Hotel."

"How was I supposed to know? She looked normal as all the other women I've met before."

Laura smiles with adding her own comment,"Lets just be glad the militia helped us out and we managed to hide until the slide." The three quickly catch up to Quinn, but they soon are ambushed with nets being tossed over them and people dressed in early 20th century clothing pointing guns at them with the sliders looking back at them.

-The sliders, whose hands are tied with rope are lead into a small town and soon into a house where a man welcomes them and telling him friends to leave.

The man stands up, "Welcome, I'm Phil Landers, please, have a seat. My men don't mean to be this way, but we've got to remain our distance from suicide bombers."

Quinn raises both of his hands which are tied together, "Well we apologize for appearing in the area, but we just showed up accidently. If you untie our hands, my friend here could explain everything to you." Phil Landers calls a man named Garreth into the room, telling him to let the four be cut free.

After Garreth does as Phil asks and leaves, Arturo asks Joe for the timer, which he shows to the man, "As my friend had said, I should be able to explain this situation. Here in my possession is a timing device which allows us to travel between parallel worlds. Now I know this may seem outrageous, but I should tell you it's the truth."

Phil Landers takes the timer out of Arturo's hand, examining it very closely. "Well your story is fantastic and quite hard to believe. For all I know, you could be from the other side and here to kill us all."

Laura gets near Arturo, looking at Mr. Landers, "You need to listen to us, we are in fact travelers between worlds. If we knew about all of this, why would we be confused as to what is going on? From where I come from, California is all one state, and I never knew that California could be a group of islands unless I'm not from around here."

"I guess that would be true, but I still don't trust you four yet. I think until your story can be proved further, you'll have to be detained." Arturo starts to grab for the timer, "Then I suppose you wouldn't mind if we kept our device then, would you?" Phil looks at the timer once more, than hands it back to Arturo, "If it's a bomb, you'll be more stupid to keep it. And you'd be the first suicide bomber to kill themselves without any innocent civilians." Garreth and 2 other strong looking men enter the room taking the sliders to a large motel, and they are placed on the third floor in room 66.

As the sliders sit around, they try to enjoy what time they have.

"I think this slide may be more easier than the rest. I mean if they think we're terrorists, and we're stuck here until we leave, then we won't have a problem with sliding out."

"That could be true Joe, but again, they could find our doubles and kill us on the spot, if our doubles are such terrorists," Quinn states.

"I believe we've landed in a war-torn California where there are islands battling it out to control them all. This situation could be quite handy for us, in some way I'm unsure of yet."

"Maybe your onto something professor, I'm wondering if it's possible, since in a way, we're explorers, we could help this earth any way we can and then leave," Laura says.

"Why not, we can become the new ambassadors to parallel dimensions where we solve problems and make each earth better than before we arrived," Joe adds.

"Well that is what Mr. Mallory and myself used to do along with Ms. Welles and Mr. Brown, but after we got experience in sliding, we soon realized that wasn't the case and some worlds could never be helped."

By the following morning, the sliders awaken to explosions all around them. Quinn opens the room's door to see grenades being dropped nearby. Quinn looks to his friends, "Guys, lets go, this place could be next!" The sliders quickly get themselves dressed, as well as Arturo taking the timer. The four rush down a flight of stairs and out into the open with them rushing to find a place to hide. Joe notices a man nearby who is suddenly attacked by a grenade with his arm blown off, as well as Joe getting hit in his arm with a piece of metal. Joe quickly rushes to the man's aid and helps him to cover along with Quinn helping Joe. The explosions stop, but people are still stir crazy and running around panicing.

Garreth soon stops the sliders, "Where do you people think your going?"

"As you can see sir, my friend is injured as well as another man we want to help."

"Fine, this way," Garreth leads the sliders and the man to a medical tent not far from the house they entered the day before. The man is placed on gurney with a doctor trying to help the man. A nurse heads to Joe, asking him to take a seat on a gurney while she helped him. Laura, Arturo, Quinn and Garreth head to find more wounded and take them to the medical tent.

After the nurse asks Joe to take his shirt off, she examines his arm, and soon disappears from the room. The nurse returns with bandages and ointment, "I don't think you're in serious danger of dying."

"That's good to know," Joe states, as he looks over his arm.

"So, you must be part of the group who showed up yesterday and were held as prisoners in the motel."

"How did you hear about that?"

"The whole town knows about you four. I should tell you this island is small and everybody usually knows everything within an hour."

"So what were those explosion earlier?"

"You don't know?"

"No, like you said, we got here yesterday."

"Well to be frank, Victor Montage, a very selfish corporate conglomerate, probably wanted his men to give us a wake up call, and he also wanted to kill a few of us."

"Why does he want you people to die, I mean you didn't kill anyone did you?"

"No. It's a long story, basically we've been fighting for years to take control of the islands Victor Montage owns, since we want peace and he wants war. He even has used his islands for testing grounds as well as ours to see how far his weapons will go. Ever since the quake in '89, which caused the state to split, we have been battling over this group of islands. Even Philidelphia won't help; I don't get those senators or even the president for not helping us out. But they're all into staying out of other people's business."

"I don't want to be too forward, but if you would be interested, we could go for dinner and continue this conversation?"

"I'm not sure about that. You guys seem like a mystery to me. I mean for all I know you could kidnap me and hold me hostage."

Joe smiles at the nurse, "Only if you say please." the conversation is cut short when a badly wounded woman enters. The nurse tells Joe he was fine and she would be in contact with him later. Joe quickly stands up, puts his shirt back on and exits the tent, with finding his friends with Garreth who all were heading toward the house.

When entering the house, Phil tells the sliders that they should be in their room. Arturo gets in the his face, "Sorry for interrupting you, but we need to talk."

Phil sighs heavily, "Fine, lets head to my office." The sliders, along with Garreth follow Phil into the room they had sat in the day before. "Have a seat or stand if you all must."

"Sorry to do this, but we need to know what is going on here. It could mean life or death for us all."

"Well to be short about it, there is a war going on between myself and another man by the name of Victor Montage. He wants to take control of all three islands I own so he can rule California and possibly do things that could hurt more people."

"Why hasn't the government stepped in, I can't believe this society is so into killing each other that they don't care. This really reminds me of a few worlds ago where the president didn't care about people stuck in a compound and wanted it left that way. Maybe we landed here again, or something close to it!"

"The president doesn't know this is going. Mr. Montage and I have made an agreement to keep things quiet."

"For what reason?"

"Mr. Arturo, have you ever been in a place where you must do something, but can't allow other people to know, since more problems could exist?"

"Sorry to say, I haven't. But California is part of the USA, isn't it? If so why can't you people stop these childish acts and try to be civilized men?"

"Mr. Arturo, you don't know what you're saying, your in the devil's playground and there is no way this battle will end."

"Have the both of you discussed this rationally? since from what I've seen, you haven't."

"Well if you want, you try something. If you can get Montage to talk, then I'll agree to a meeting."

"What is the number?" Phil hands Arturo a cell phone, and tells him a phone number he can use. Arturo dials the number and after a few rings, he gets a response from a woman,"Yes, I'm speaking on the behalf of Phil Landers and it's my duty to make sure things go well between these two rivals. I want to ask if it's possible for a meeting to discuss recent attacks on our society, in exchange to make the islands exist as a state, instead of two." Arturo listens to what the woman has to say and Arturo soon shuts the phone off.

"So what did they say professor?" Quinn asks, eager to get an answer.

"Not much. It seems that there is no chance of a chat unless we decide to kill ourselves or make Montage our leader."

"I told you the phone call wouldn't work. Like I've said before, we'll be doing this for years to come."

Later in the evening, Joe and the nurse, named Diane are walking through the dark to her home. The 2 arrive at a white picket fence and Diane looks to Joe, "Well this is my place. I guess I was wrong about you and your friends, so I should apologize."

"Thats okay, you need to be cautious with people you barely know, I usually try to be nice to everyone, but I can sometimes get aggressive with people who want us dead."

"I did want to thank you for dinner, I really enjoyed it."

"Your welcome. I should thank you for coming along. I know most of the time when my friends and I travel between worlds, I get pretty lonely and just wish I could go home and start a family."

"You'll have to fill me in more on parallel cultures, I would really enjoy it." Diane and Joe are about to share a kiss and they're stopped when Phil opens the front door, "Diane, is that you?"

The two stop and look at Phil, "Sorry dad, I guess I should be more careful when standing out in the dark, I'll be in the house in a couple minutes."

"Well don't take too long, and as you for you Mr. LaFountain, I hope you don't plan to hurt my baby, or I'll stalk you down and kill ya."

"You won't get any problems from me sir," Diane laughs a bit as Phil closes the door, "So thats your dad?"

"Yeah, I guess that will explain how I knew about you and your friends. My dad watches over his islands with cameras, so we saw you enter this dimension and it didn't take long for us to realize who you were."

"Well I guess I'll find you tommorrow, maybe we could go for lunch."

"I'd like that, I should be in the medical tent most of the morning, but I may be moving around, since the islands my dad control are in short supply of medical assistance." Joe and Diane finally share a kiss and Joe walks away into the darkness. Before Diane can open the gate that leads to her home, a mysterious man comes out of the bushes and attacks Diane and after placing a cloth over her mouth, she closes her eyes and falls into the man's arms with him wisking her away into the night.

By the following morning, the sliders arrive at Phil's house and they are shocked to see police there. Joe heads to Phil, "What happened here?"

"Maybe I should ask you. Diane never came home last night. So where did you go last night?"

"I said good-bye to Diane and returned to the motel; my friends can prove I was there." The other sliders join Joe while Phil heads to talk to a police officer. Joe turns around to others, "Someone kidnapped Diana last night."

"You don't think that phone call I made yesterday has anything to do with it, do you?"

"Not sure professor, it could have, but no one will be sure of that until we get more clues." Seconds later, an attack started to happen, the sliders rush for cover with people appearing out from the bushes and firing in the air and then at Phil and his wife, Joanne, along with the surrounding area. Joe rushes out behind the trees where he and the others were hiding and risks his life to save the two. Joe manages to push Phil out of the way, but Joanne is shot in the head and dies on the ground. The attack quickly ends with no one able to catch a suspect. Phil rushes to his wife with her gone and he begins to cry with holding the body of his dead wife. The sliders rush to Joe's side, "Great, first he loses his daughter, now his wife."

Arturo bends down to help Phil stand back up as paramedics rush to the woman's side. Phil looks at Arturo, "I think I'll hold you personally responsible for the death of my wife. Maybe I was wrong about you from the start. Maybe you're working for Montage and this was a set up."

"You must realize we are not the murderers you hate so much. As we said before, we're travelers between parallel worlds." Phil ignores Arturo and enters his home, slamming the door to the house. The sliders decide to return to hotel, to figure things out.

On another island, inside Victor Montage's home, sits Victor drinking coffee, with him looking at Diane, tied to a chair and duct tape over her mouth. A woman comes in heading toward Victor, "I just got word Landers is quite upset. I guess killing his wife will mean making him more pissed off than before and he will really want revenge."

"I suppose so. I'm starting to think this war has gone too far, maybe I'm wrong."

"You are wrong Victor, ever since you started a campaign to control all the islands, we've beaten Landers to the point that he will have to give up if he wants to see his girl again."

The woman heads to Diane, ripping off the tape, "You'll never get away with this. My father is the smartest man alive, and I know for a fact, he will not give up so easily."

"Are you sure, because if you haven't realized, we have an undercover agent working for us, but on your father's trusted side. You probably would know him as Garreth." Diane is shocked, but doesn't say anything.

Victor looks at Diane, "Maybe we can make a deal with Landers, offer him his daughter's life for his islands, then when he is given a chance to come over here, we sentence him to death, and kill him and you of coarse Ms. Landers."

Back at the house, Phil sits in his office looking over papers, when Garreth enters the room, "I apologize for interrupting you, if I have."

"No, come in, I'm just looking things over, preparing for my wife's burial. What's on your mind?"

"I started thinking about what that Arturo had said yesterday. Now I know Diane has been captured, but Arturo told you about getting the government involved. Maybe with the president's help, Montage can be easily defeated and we will gain control over all six islands."

"Well I wish I could consider that an option, but I'm just not to sure, because if the rest of America finds this out, they could want to help, we could end up like the civil war all over again and I don't want that!" The phone rings with Phil answering it, "Hello, who is this?"

"It's your pal Victor Montage, I'm surprised you wouldn't remember me."

"What do you want, and where is my daughter?"

"We have her here, safe and sound. But I've called to make a deal, I'll let your daughter go, if you give me the papers that claim you owner to the islands you have, sign a few things and I'll leave you alone."

"I guess I don't have any other option do I? You've killed my wife, so how can I be assured my daughter will get to live?"

"You can't, you just need to trust me." Phil laughs at Montage's statement, "How can I, you crazy bastard!"

"Now don't be rude, or yours daughters life may be near the end sooner than you think."

"Fine. I guess I have no other way out of this. Give me a few hours to get the papers prepared, myself and a couple others will be coming to your island, so don't shoot us until we've made the deal and my daughter goes free, long before signing the papers."

"Deal. I'll be waiting," Phil slams the phone down, "damn it!"

"What is it?"

"Montage has beaten me Garreth. There is no other way out. I don't want to lose my daughter too. You and I will be heading to Montage's property, I suggest you bring along Arturo, since I know he will want to speak his mind to Montage. But I've made a deal to have Diane go free before we sign the papers. Maybe I'll have Arturo's friends help out with Diane's escape."

"Do you think this is wise to give up so much, after we fought for years to keep it?"

"Like I said, I don't have a choice."

Hours past, with already having Phil inform the sliders of the plan and that Joe, Quinn and Laura would do to get Diane out of harms way, before they all end up dead. Garreth prepares a pontoon boat to head to Victor Montage's main island. As the sliders wait for Phil, they talk of hope that they'll all survive this situation.

"Now you remember what Phil explained to you. Scuba dive in, enter through the back way and grab Diane, before she is killed, since we are definately sure Montage is planning something else for her besides rescue."

"I know I won't let Phil down. I'm starting to like Diane, and if she died, I would never be able to let myself live with such guilt."

"Mr. LaFountain, just tell yourself you'll succeed and you will complete you part of the mission."

"What about the timer, where is it?"

"I've left it in the room Mr. Mallory. I believe we slide in 28 hours, I've forgotten, you probably better check the time. In case of an unfortunate end, where Montage decides to kill Phil, Garreth and myself, the timer will be in your hands. Just slide off and never look back. I do hope we see each other again, if not, have a good life." Arturo tears up a bit, but Phil arrives with patting Arturo on the back, as Phil looks at the other three sliders, "Now remember, wait until we arrive at the dock before you procede into the water. The map I gave you should lead you through the underground tunnels and into a hiding space where Montage will never find you."

"Good luck, the both of you." Laura heads and hugs Arturo, "See you soon." Arturo and Phil soon head to the end of the dock, where they get on a boat with Garreth already waiting for them to get on. The boat starts to take off with Arturo looking at his younger companions then takes a seat, looking forward at Montage's home island.

Laura gets in front of Joe and Quinn, then turns around, "We'll have to succeed. As I said before, Arturo is the only one who can get us home, and we can't fail him." Joe and Quinn both shake their head in agreement and soon take off for their entrance into the ocean.

With arriving at Montage's dock, two guards, along with Victor Montage welcomes Phil and Arturo to his home and wants them to come in. After Garreth turns off the boat and ties it up, he joins the men with them heading up the stairs to the house. When entering Montage's den, Phil and Arturo soon notice Diane tied to a chair, and her mouth covered with duct tape. "Let her go! she doesn't have anything to do with this."

"I'd have to agree. Let her go." Montage motions for one the guards to untie her and take the tape off. Diane heads to her father, "Dad, I'm so glad to see you. What are you doing here?"

"Sorry to say, but I've made an agreement with Victor Montage to give him our land." Diane gets upset, "You can't be serious! I'll remain here as his hostage instead. We've worked so hard to keep our islands in peace, and you're just willing to give it up?"

"I'd rather have you alive than dead Diane."

"Take the woman back to her land." One of the guards grabs Diane's arm, and begins to head out of the door. Montage soon joins the man, "Take her to the edge of the island and shoot her, then toss her in the ocean, and let the sharks have at her." Diane screams out to her father to reveal a secret, but she is gagged and forced down the hallway. Montage returns to the room, with a gun in his hand, pointing it at Arturo and Phil, "Sorry to do this, but I know if she is let go, she'll fight to keep your land, and we can't have that."

"You made a deal."

"Well I said I wasn't trustworthy. Garreth, what other plans did Mr. Landers here take into action?"

"He has three scuba divers on the way, to save Diane." Phil and Arturo are shocked to see Garreth on Montage's side who then walks over beside him. "You didn't think Garreth was your friend now, did you Landers?" Phil is still shocked, then is about to attack Garreth but held back by a guard, "You bastard. I trusted you with all my life."

"Sorry, I got a better offer from Montage." Garreth turns to Montage, "I'll see that the others don't get Diane." Garreth exits the den. "Well now, I guess we can sign the papers, or I can just shoot you both now and I'll have ownership either way."

Arturo gets near Montage, "All I can say to you sir, is that your the devil and no matter how many people you kill for your fun, you'll never be half the man Phil Landers is today," Arturo says in an angry voice.

"How touching Mr. Arturo, but that won't save your ass today. But since you tried to stick up for your friend here, which I admire, I'll hold off on your execution until tomorrow, before sunrise. Take these men to the cage." Arturo and Phil are escorted out of the room by two large men.

Meanwhile, outside on the island, Joe, Laura and Quinn make it to land, and notice Diane is being forced toward the edge by the water. Garreth soon arrives in front of the sliders, who are surprised to see him, "It's a good thing your here Garreth, I think we just are in need of your services."

"Sorry, but I'm working for the opposite side this time Joe. I think Diane, and the rest of you guys should be together for all of your executions." The sliders drop their scuba equipment and are lead toward Diane. The guard notices the sliders and Garreth coming, "Hold on, for just a bit. I have new people to execute besides Diane Landers." Diane is shocked to see Garreth, "Great! what else can go wrong? First my father is betraying everything he believes in, and now I see a trusted friend ready to kill us all!"

"Sorry Diane. I guess it's better to be on one side than the other, and I choose evil." With Garreth not paying attention, Joe quickly attacks him, and Joe soon has the gun Garreth had, while placing Garreth in a head lock, Quinn and Laura attack the other guard. With Garreth being strong, Joe loses his grip and is thrown to the ground and the gun out of his hand. Garreth rushes for the gun, but gets attacked by Diane, who gets on him while Joe gets a chance and grabs for the gun. Quinn and Laura manage to get the other guard in the ground, with Laura holding a gun at the man's head. Garreth fights Diane, but Joe has no choice and fires the gun, hitting Garreth in the heart, knocking him down to the ground as he dies off.

Diane rushes to Joe to hold him, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, what about you?"

"I'm fine. I would have to say you made the right choice in killing Garreth. If you didn't, he would be a threat to us now."

"What about this guy. We could always take him for a hostage."

"That may work, since this man, named Finn can talk, if he is put in a lot of pain. Isn't that right Finn?" Diane flips Finn's ear with her finger and then gets back from him.

"What about my father and your friend? We need to save them."

"We don't have time Diane. Reinforcements are probably on the way. We should have some time, right?"

"Possibly. I have known Montage to kill before dawn, so we have some time to wait. Just until then, we'll need a plan to save them both."

"Except how do we get back to our side, since I know this hostage won't go willingly." Laura looks to the others for an answer, but they don't say anything; Laura quickly fires a few bullets into the man's back, with him falling to the ground. Laura looks to the others, "Never mind, I've figured things out. Lets go!" the other three are shocked of what Laura had just did, but with her demanding voice, they didn't bother saying anything, leading for Laura, Joe, Diane and Quinn to rush back to where the three sliders arrived and they soon take off, after Diane is given equipment to scuba dive in the water.

As the sun began to set, Arturo and Phil sit in a cage made out of wooden poles. Phil has his head down, while Arturo looks out at the ocean. "I guess I never thought things would come to this. I should apologize for getting you people involved."

"This is a worthless war we're fighting. So I would very much agree that you should apologize to us for getting involved!"

"Mr. Arturo, I don't get why you're so mad. I've had to deal with Montage for so many years, and you'd never be able to understand what we're fighting for."

"It's Professor Arturo to you, you blistering idiot! I wouldn't be caged up and sentenced to death, if you two men would act civilized and figure things out the logical way."

"Maybe from where you come from, things are so easy to resolve, but here, things are different, I can't understand why you don't get that."

"In my society, California isn't a bunch of islands, and even if California broke off into islands, people would be leading normal lives, not fighting to the death for ownership to just a small group islands."

Victor Montage soon arrives near the cage, "I see that we're settled in and ready to die."

"Montage, I think this is rediculous. As I told Landers before, this whole thing is stupid. I guess at least when my friends return home to their worlds, they will know what it's truly like to live in an environment where things make sense." Montage gets a confused look on his face, "World? what in the hell are you talking about Arturo?"

"You don't know about my friends and I?" Well I'll tell you. We're sliders between parallel worlds and so far, this world is hell."

"Interesting. With recent news, I may consider changing my mind about killing you Arturo and force you to give me travel between these such worlds."

Back on the other island, the sliders, along with Diane and a few others are examining a map of all the islands, "I'm thinking we may have a chance to save your friend and my father, but this will be risky."

"Lately, everything has been risky Diane, we just need to have an upper hand in the rescue mission."

"Joe, you just gave me an idea. I believe my father has an airplane hidden underground. We could manuever through their territory, attack where the two are located and we may have a shot to get them out alive. Good thinking." Joe smiles at Diane then mentions the idea was nothing and must have popped into his head.

The phone rings, with Diane answering it, then she hands it to Quinn, who takes the phone, "Yes, who is this?"

"This is Victor Montage. You obviously know we have your friends here and unless you rescue them by sunrise they'll die. But after learning from Arturo about your little device to travel between worlds, I'll make you an offer you can't refuse. Give me the timer, and they will be spared. I swear on the bible they will remain alive."

"You'll need to give us time to think about it. Give me an hour, call back then." Quinn hangs up the phone and returns it near Diane, who looks to Quinn, "What did he want?"

"Our timer, in exchange for your father and the professor." Joe and Laura look at each other surprised, then at Quinn, with Laura heading toward Quinn to speak, "So what do we do now?"

In the motel room, the timer can be seen on a dresser, with it counting down from seven seconds. When it reaches zero, the blue colored vortex opens, then several seconds later, it closes as the screen fades to black.

Note: After this episode, the show will be moved to Sundays in the fall.