• • •

Logline: After the sliders get used to being in New York, they travel to a world where they find it seemingly normal, until an earthquake hits, leading the sliders to reunite before they are killed from earthquakes that continue occurring in the state.

Episode 3: The Shaky State

Starring: Robert Floyd, Alicia Witt, Tembi Locke, Nicholas Lea, and John Haymes Newton as Joel Douglas

Guest Stars: Molly Hagan as Kim Reynolds, Chuck Norris as Bill, Yvette Freeman as Leesha, and Randy Vasquez as Carlos

Synopsis: In Callie and Bill’s Diner, Mallory and Wade are sitting at a booth, eating lunch, when the others arrive. Diana states they slide very shortly and would prefer a private spot for them to exit this world. Mallory states that he was almost finished with his food, but Wade tells Mallory he couldn’t swallow a whole hamburger in 30 seconds. Mallory wipes his hands from eating the greasy onion rings, stating that he hates to waste food but doesn’t want to be left in a world where pollution can kill you in minutes. Wade grabs her purse and heads to the counter to pay for the food while Mallory and Diana join Joel and Ryan near the front doors, then they all proceed head outside of the diner as customers are walking in. Wade soon exits the diner, joining her friends in the back of the diner, close to the dumpsters, with her stating that she will be glad to leave this place once and for all since the bill wasn’t so cheap this time. Mallory states that she was the one whining about being hungry. Wade looks to Mallory, stating that he could shut up now. Diana activates the wormhole with the group all heading into the portal with it closing seconds later.

The portal opens in an alley way, tossing the group into a dumpster. Once the portal closes, the sliders get up, with Wade commenting ever since the timer was remodified, they keep getting dropped in dumpsters. Diana states at least they aren’t being seen by citizens who are ready to turn them over to the FBI; Diana places the timer in her jacket pocket so no one would notice it. Once exiting the alley way, they notice the Empire State building five blocks away on the left side of them. Joel states that he is clueless when it comes to New York, but they could easily find a hotel close by. The group all turn right and begin heading down the sidewalk to find a place to stay. Mallory asks Diana how long they had on this world; Diana tells Mallory, along with the others that they leave in 57 hours, 13 minutes. After crossing over to another street, Ryan points out that a Motel 6 was available, and after Wade looks at their bank account, she tells the group they will have to be smart, since they only have enough money for a room which she knows will be small, but they will have a great view of the Statue Of Liberty. Mallory states that they’ll have to flip a coin to see who gets the bed and who gets the floor.

After the group get a room on the second floor, they begin to relax in the room, with Mallory stating that he should do something to have some fun, asking if anyone was interested in doing something. Wade states she wouldn’t mind doing something, but she wouldn’t know what to do, but explore this world’s New York. Diana states that she is going to head to a bookstore, maybe to catch up on this world’s history. Joel tells Diana he would tag along, since he is new to sliding, and he should get a feel for each new earth, by learning of their alternate history. Ryan states he would be interested in going to the Statue of Liberty, so he should probably get going before the boat rides end for the day.

Once the sliders got moving on their fun adventures in the big city separately, Diana and Joel arrive at a Barnes and Nobles bookstore and Joel tells Diana he would catch up with her after a while, since he used to enjoy coming to Barnes and Nobles in Los Angeles and drink their coffee along with having a donut. Diana states she would be in the history section and would join him soon enough since she would really like a nice cup of coffee; Joel tells Diana he would treat her to coffee and get her a cup also. Diana thanks Joel, telling him he is a really nice guy. Diana and Joel go their separate ways, with Diana soon arriving in the history section to find a book on America’s history.

Ryan manages to get a ticket on the last boat ride for the day and he quickly heads to the boat which is about to take off. Ryan takes a seat near the back of the boat, staring at the Statue of Liberty, when a woman soon sits close by, asking him if this was his first time visiting Lady Liberty; Ryan explains it was, telling the woman, he had always wanted to see the statue that showed him their freedom, and often feels sorry for other countries who aren’t so lucky to have a symbol showing freedom. The woman agrees, saying if it wasn’t for Lady Liberty, the entire nation would be at war, killing innocent people. Ryan seems confused, but doesn’t let on to the woman that he wasn’t from around the area. The woman introduces herself as Kim Reynolds, with Ryan doing the same. Kim explains that she always takes a trip to see Lady Liberty once a week, since without having much of a social life, she tries to go out and visit something that means a lot to her. Ryan tells Kim she seemed like a great person and surprised that she didn’t have an exciting life. Kim explains to Ryan that she has a hard time socializing with people and so she talks to a statue, hoping that maybe someday she would have someone to talk to. Ryan asks Kim if after the ride if she would like to get a drink some place. Kim seems surprised, agreeing to the idea of going out with Ryan and talk more. Kim apologizes, stating that she likes to be at the front of the boat when she arrives at her mentor, but would catch up with him later. Ryan states she has good spirit and would talk to her later.

Mallory and Wade are continuing to walk downtown, when Mallory tells Wade he is hungry, since he didn’t get to finish his burger on the last world and heads to a hotdog stand close by in a park. The two head over, with Wade deciding she was still thirsty. After Mallory pays for a hotdog and two beverages, they head farther into the park, and find a bench to sit down on. After Mallory takes a few bites, he looks to Wade, stating he thinks this world is pretty nice and likes the idea of just enjoying a world, without running every other second. Wade tells Mallory to just appreciate the worlds they can do this on, compared to ones where they could lose their lives if they made the wrong decisions. The ground suddenly begins to shake, with Mallory and Wade soon falling to the ground, after the bench tips over on them. Joel loses both cups of coffee, spilling them on the floor, and the boat Ryan is on, begins to shake violently, nearly tipping over and the people close to falling into the water manage to remain aboard.

Buildings begin to collapse, landing on each other, like the domino effect. In Barnes and Nobles, Diana tries to find Joel, but she gets knocked down by a book case, forcing her to remain on the floor. Joel tries to find Diana, but he can’t manage to walk around, with the shaking, causing him to be unbalanced and falling to the floor. The boat heading to the Statue of Liberty tips over, causing the passengers to fall into the cold water. Ryan tries to remain afloat and find Kim so he could try and save her as well as himself.

Once the earthquake was over, Mallory and Wade can be seen in the park, shocked to have experienced an earthquake in New York, than what they usually would deal with in California. They get up, to notice a tree had fallen on the hot dog stand they visited, but don’t see the vendor anywhere in sight. Mallory tells Wade they should get going and get to the others, since its likely they could be worse off than compared to how lucky they were.

Joel quickly heads around the book store to find Diana, and he manages to get to her, trying to get the book case off of her. Joel helps Diana up, asking her if she was okay; Diana tells Joel she wasn’t injured badly, but her left leg wouldn’t be working properly, so she would need to get to a hospital to get it checked out. Joel states he would carry her to a hospital, but asks if she had the timer; Diana pulls the timer out of her jacket pocket, stating it was still in working condition, and puts it back in her jacket pocket. Joel picks Diana up, with them heading toward the door, as many other people were helping others out. Diana states that after her leg is checked out, they better find the others, since she fears the worse in an earthquake situation. Joel tells Diana that he is surprised that New York would get an earthquake, since it shouldn’t have a fault line like the great state of California does. Diana smiles at Joel, who then opens the front door and the two take off going right down the sidewalk.

Ryan swims over to the Kim and gets a hold of her, realizing that she is struggling to remain afloat, with Ryan telling her it would be okay, but Kim seems scared and not realizing Ryan wants to help. A boat is seen coming toward them to rescue the passengers, but Ryan quickly realizes the boat is out of control which is heading right for him and Kim; Ryan pushes Kim out the way, and whacks his head on the speeding boat and goes under water. The boat speeds ahead, heading straight for the Statue of Liberty, with it hitting the dry land and soon knocking over the Statue Of Liberty into the water which hits quite a few people.

Mallory and Wade return to the motel room to find the others not there. Wade states that Diana and Joel were going to a bookstore and they should probably start searching right away. The two exit the room and manage to exit the motel and realize they had to walk, so they walked across the street and continue down the sidewalk going right as a lot of other people are struggling to stay alive and damage done to most of the city. As Joel and Diana continue to head to a hospital, they soon are stopped, when they hear a woman in a video store screaming out for help. Joel sets Diana, down, stating he would be back, leading Diana to rest up against a brick building next door to the video store. Joel enters the video store, to find the woman caught underneath two racks of movies. Joel tries his hardest to get them off the woman, but he can’t budge them off in another direction to help the woman up. The woman, whose head is bleeding, tells Joel she can’t feel her legs and needs to get to the emergency room. Joel tells the woman he would need to get some help and promises to be back as soon as possible. Joel quickly exits the store, to head to Diana, and explain their trip to the emergency room is going to be delayed, since he couldn’t get the woman unstuck from where she was and would need to find help. Diana states she would stay with the woman until he returned with help. Joel asks Diana, if she needed help to get into the video store, but Diana states she would be fine. Joel rushes off, with Diana limping into the store and sits on the floor by the woman, stating things would be alright soon enough because she has faith in Joel to save the day The woman smiles, introducing herself as Leesha, with Diana introducing herself to the woman. Leesha states that she is glad someone can be with her in her final minutes. Diana tells Leesha to not speak like that, since she would survive this earthquake and others that will occur in the future. Leesha states that she plans to move away after she is fixed up since she can’t stand living in a city that shakes too much.

As Mallory and Wade continue down the sidewalk, they continue to see what destruction had been caused by the earthquake. A man rushes up to them, introducing himself as Carlos, and stating that he needed help to put out a fire nearby. Mallory and Wade join Carlos and race back down the opposite side of the sidewalk and toward an apartment complex. Carlos points out that the building was on fire and a family on the top floor was stuck on the fire escape since the rest of it collapsed. Wade asks Carlos if the firefighters would be on their way, with Carlos telling Wade that no one was coming and they would need to get the family to safety. Mallory asks Carlos if there was a hardware store nearby, Carlos thinks for a few seconds then answers that there was one down a ways and he could probably find a ladder there; Mallory tells Wade to remain where she was and they would be back soon enough with a ladder. Suddenly, another earthquake starts to shake the city, causing Wade, Mallory and Carlos to fall to the cemented sidewalk and soon enough, the family comes crashing down to the sidewalk, with everyone getting injured. The earthquake stops again, with the three able to get up and help the family. The father and mother are badly burned and unconscious, Wade grabs the baby, who is crying loudly, and tries to calm it down. Mallory and Carlos take off to find medical assistance, while Wade stands by the family as she continues to calm the baby down.

Joel manages to find two construction workers who were working on a construction site, and asks for help to save a woman. The two men agree to help and run back with Joel to the video store. As Mallory and Carlos luckily find an ambulance not that far away, they get a paramedic, named Bill and explain the situation. Another shake begins, with the three losing balance and falling to the pavement. The ambulance starts sliding off down the road and hits a fire hydrant. After the quake stops, Bill rushes back to the ambulance to see if his coworkers were okay and they were. Bill tells his coworkers to take off and he would need one soon enough because there were more injured. The medic who is driving, asks for a location to send an ambulance. Bill looks back at Carlos and Mallory, who both stand back up, but a few cement bricks fall off of a roof nearby and one hitting Mallory on the head, who then collapses to the ground. Carlos heads to Mallory, but he is unconscious and bleeding from his head. Bill tells his coworkers to get a strecher, since a man was down. The other two medics get a stretcher from the back of the ambulance and they quickly load Mallory into the back with the ambulance rushing off and heading to the other spot where Wade was standing since Carlos and Bill felt it would be a waste of time to lose other people. The back doors to the ambulance open, and all three medics exit the ambulance, quickly placing the two adults on stretchers and placing them in the back with Mallory and a woman who is already in there. Wade hops in the front seat with the driver, still holding the baby as the ambulance takes off and rushes to a hospital a few miles away.

After arriving at the hospital, Wade sees Mallory taken down a hallway, but she runs into a nurse, stating the baby wasn’t hers and was not sure what to do since the babie’s parents were out of it. The nurse states she would take the baby from Wade, and then Wade asks where her friend would be going. The nurse states if her friend was badly injured, he would be going up two floors to get help. Wade thanks the nurse and then decides to use the bathroom.

Back at the video store, another ambulance is seen, loading Leesha into the back. Diana is helped up by a medic, with Joel getting inside beside Diana. Joel looks to the two construction workers, thanking them for the help; they both tell Joel he was welcome and said good-bye as the back doors of the ambulance closed. The ambulance races off to the hospital to help both Leesha and Diana.

After exiting the bathroom, Wade finds a drinking fountain and gets a drink of water. Close by, a man and woman are speaking and Wade overhears that they were talking about the boat heading to the Statue of Liberty and that after it tipped over, everyone drowned. Wade is surprised of this news and heads to the couple, asking what was going on and if they really knew of every person on the boat falling into the water and drowning. The woman states she was by the harbor and saw the whole thing and so she went to get help after the statue fell into the water, but by the time she got back, no one was around in the water. Wade asks the woman how long she took to take off and return; the woman thought about the time it took her to get help and figures about a half hour. Wade tells the woman that within the half hour, people could have been saved. Wade waves them off and heads down the hallway with getting onto an elevator.

An ambulance shows up at the entrance to the same hospital, with Leesha and Diana, who is being brought in by a wheel chair. A nurse takes Diana to an elevator, explaining she would be fine and since her injury wasn’t that bad, she would have to wait in a room until a doctor could see her. Joel tells the nurse he is with her and wanted to stay with her until a doctor showed up; the nurse agrees, telling Joel to follow her to the room. The three get onto the elevator and the nurse pushes the 18th floor button and with that, they took off upward to the 18th floor.

Wade arrives two floors up to find Mallory in a see through room and noticed a doctor over looking him and she hoped the news was good. Wade enters, with the doctor asking if she was with Mallory and she tells the doctor she was. The doctor explains to Wade that he would need stitches since his head was split open, but the procedure shouldn’t take long to do. Wade asks the doctor if Mallory would awake anytime soon; the doctor isn’t sure due to the blow to the head, but figures within a few hours, Mallory should be awake and should be able to leave after a couple days of making sure he was okay. Wade thanks the doctor, stating she would leave, but return later, the doctor tells Wade that Mallory was lucky to have gotten to the hospital when he did, or he could have died. Before Wade leaves, she turns around and asks the doctor if he knew anything about the boat accident which a boat was supposed to have gone to the Statue of Liberty, but didn’t; the doctor tells Wade he did have a few survivors come to the hospital, but wasn’t sure what floor they were on. Wade asks the doctor if she could talk with someone about it, and the doctor tells her that a nurse at the front desk on the first floor would be more helpful and with that Wade turns around and heads for an elevator with leaving Mallory in the doctor’s care.

After learning of the whereabouts of the survivors from the boat incident, she heads up to the 35th floor and exits to find a main desk so she could find Ryan. Wade finds a nurse and asks if she could see Ryan Smith which should be on the floor. The woman looks in the database for Ryan’s name, but she doesn’t have any luck. Wade starts to tear up, then the nurse apologizes, stating she skipped over his name and he would be in a room down the hall in room number 16. Wade wipes her tears away and glad to know her friend survived the accident. Wade enters the room to find Ryan in the second bed, sleeping peacefully. Ryan has bruises on his face and his head bandaged up. Wade gets closer to Ryan with him slowly opening his eyes, and surprised to see Wade. His voice is weak, but Wade tells him not to talk and that everything was okay. Wade felt that she had to lie, so Ryan wouldn’t feel any worse than he already did. Ryan has Wade get closer to him, asking if she could find out about a woman named Kim Reynolds. Wade states that she would get back to him on if she made it or not. Ryan thanks Wade and closes his eyes. Wade exits the room and returns to the desk, stating she was glad to see her friend not badly beaten up, but he had wanted to find out about a woman named Kim Reynolds, who was also on the boat. The nurse tells Wade that the woman her friend brought up had drowned, since prior to her arriving on the floor, she had someone take her body to the morgue, which explains the quick response. Wade thanks the nurse for the information and tells the nurse that she would be back later to check up on Ryan.

Joel and Diana are sitting in another room on another floor, with a doctor entering the room, apologizing for being late. Diana explains that during the first earthquake, she got under a book case and injured her left foot. The doctor takes Diana’s shoe and sock off and examines her foot and realizes her foot wasn’t so bad off, but she did bruse it up somewhat. He states that he would bandage it up and prescribe ointment for her to put on once a day for a couple weeks and her foot should be back to normal. Diana thanks the doctor, stating she is relieved it was only a minor injury and she would be back to running a mile soon enough. The doctor laughs at Diana’s joke, and after bandaging it up, the doctor exits the room and returns quickly with some crutches, handing them to Joel. The doctor states that Diana should use the crutches whenever possible because if she continued to walk on her foot, she could create more problems. Diana states this would be the first time to use crutches, since she was always careful in life up until today. The doctor grabs a pad of paper from his packet, and writing up a prescription and handing it to Diana, stating that pharmacy on the third floor would be able to help them with getting the ointment and more bandaging tape for her to change on her foot. Diana thanks the doctor as does Joel, who shakes the doctor’s hand, with the doctor exiting the room. Joel tells Diana he still feels bad for getting her injured; Diana tells Joel not to worry because they weren’t expecting an earthquake in New York of all places. As Joel helps Diana up, he asks her if the fault line was across the state of New York, or would something else have caused the earthquake; Diana states it would be obvious for the fault line to be in the area, but since she would layed up she could read about it, if Barnes and Nobles was going to be open for business prior to their departure from this earth. Diana puts her jacket on, along with Joel putting a shoe on Diana’s right foot. The two head for the door, with Joel carrying Diana’s other shoe and opening the door for them to exit.

Once placing the prescription, Joel tells Diana that he wanted to see how Leesha was doing since he did practically save her life. Diana tells Joel that they have some time to kill, but after the visit, they should go the cafeteria to get something to eat or drink because she felt both thirsty and hungry. Joel smiles, with helping Diana back up on the crutches and taking off again toward an elevator. Once arriving to the first floor, Joel tells Diana to wait by the elevator and he would be back with information about Leesha’s room. Joel heads to the front desk, asking a nurse where a woman named Leesha was at. The nurse remembers Joel, stating that the woman she was referring to was in surgery and likely wouldn’t be out for a few more hours. Joel asks the nurse if he could find out what was wrong with her, but the nurse apologizes, stating that she wasn’t allowed to give out such information. Joel thanks the nurse for the information and heads back to Diana, telling Diana the same information he recieved, and stating that they could just head to the cafeteria for whatever pleases them.

As a couple of hours had gone by, Diana and Joel are in the elevator, with Diana holding a small, white colored bag, with Joel stating that hopefully the pain will go away in her foot. Diana states that she hates being disabled but is willing to relax after so much work she has put in to get where they were now. The elevator doors open, with Wade and Mallory waiting to get onto the elevator. Wade heads to Diana and Joel, giving them both a hug, stating she couldn’t believe they were alive and so relieved. Diana looks at Mallory, asking what had happened to him; Mallory explains to Diana and Joel that he got hit on the head with a cement brick and so he needed to get stitches. Mallory continues, explaining that he would need to stay for a couple days, or until they slide out so he won’t slip into acoma and die. The others looked shocked, but Mallory tells the others to relax since that was a joke that he made. The three smile, with Diana stating that Mallory still has his awkward sense of humor. Wade explains that she was able to find Ryan and that he was doing fine, but if someone hadn’t got to him in the time rescuers did, Ryan would have drowned since the boat trip wasn’t a pretty sight. Joel asks if they could go see him and Wade states that that was the place they were going to on a upper level. Diana states they just came from a higher level, but she figured it was obvious to push a button to go back up.

Once arriving on the 35th floor, the group exits, with Diana slowly coming off since she had crutches to use to walk around. Diana states she will be counting the next 14 days until she can walk normally again. Joel asks Wade where Ryan was at and Wade tells him, as well as Diana and Mallory to follow her down the hallway and then turning left. The four start walking and after turning left, Wade leads the others to a room on the right side and as she opens the door, the three enter before she does, with Wade coming in last. Ryan is sleeping, but the sliders decide to look in on him; Diana states that Ryan looks peaceful and she often had wished she could sleep, since lately, she has just been busy in trying to keep them all alive. Joel tells Diana that she doesn’t have to be a super slider and take it easy for a while, since it’s been a couple weeks since they’ve gotten back into the groove and nothing bad has happened yet, besides visiting this earth. Wade tells Diana that on the next earth, she can sleep and they would worry about the problems that arise for them. Ryan awakens, surprised to see his friends, with raising his head a little; Mallory tells Ryan they just came in to see how he was doing. Ryan states he doesn’t feel that bad, but the boat ride really got him thinking that he shouldn’t take life for granted, since he realizes anything can happen in an instant where he could lose his life. Joel agrees, stating that even though they were sliding between worlds, they should try to take it easy and enjoy life, since sliding between parallel worlds is their life. Wade tells Ryan that she found out that Kim didn’t make it and had drowned. Ryan gets teary eyed and then places his head back on the pillow. Wade tells Ryan they would return later and to take it easy and get some rest. Ryan agrees, closing his eyes and the sliders decide to exit the room and head back into the destroyed city to see if they still had a room they could stay at, at the Motel 6.