Requiem (Sliders)

Template:Infobox Sliders episodes Requiem is the eleventh episode for the fifth season of the science fiction television show Sliders. While the Sliders relax in a garden waiting for the next slide, Rembrandt receives a message in his mind from former slider Wade.

Diana, Maggie, Mallory, and Rembrandt are enjoying a peaceful walk in a garden when Rembrandt has a flashback of the time he and fellow slider Wade (played by former series regular Sabrina Lloyd, who provided the voice for her character in this episode) were trapped in a Kromagg prison. In his vision, Rembrandt is oblivious to Wade's cries for help. His friends try to convince him to rest, and when Rembrandt opens his eyes he sees a barely defined sliding vortex and claims that he heard Wade call to him. Since the others didn't see the vortex, they assume Rembrandt just had a dream.

On the next world they slide to (inside a room at the Chandler Hotel), Diana and Maggie argue about whether to get Rembrandt professional help or let him rest. Suddenly the same vortex appears in the room with Rembrandt. Mallory sees it too, and Diana and Maggie arrive just as it disappears. Diana measures high quantum fluctuations and Rembrandt is convinced that Wade is on the other side of that vortex. When it opens again, the four slide through to a Kromagg-occupied parallel Earth.

Following Rembrandt's lead, for he's the one who hears Wade's voice guiding him, the other Sliders break into a Kromagg compound where Maggie pockets some tranquilizers. Just before they turn a corner and meet two Kromagg sentries, an alarm sounds by them that draws the guards away. Rembrandt credits Wade with sounding it, and they enter a laboratory where the Sliders find a disembodied head suspended in fluid. Besides being disgusted, the Sliders don't find out what this means until they meet Wade, whom they find in the same condition. Rembrandt's relieved to find Wade still alive, but then the four are captured. Just before they're led away, Mallory turns off the tranquilizers on Wade's tank that inhibit her and Rembrandt's communication.

Rembrandt strikes out at their would-be jailors and is cut across the arm during their escape. While Diana binds his wound, Rembrandt reveals what happened between him and Wade during their imprisonment on "Earth Prime" (shown in the fourth season episode "Genesis"). The Kromaggs would interrogate them separately and sometimes Rembrandt would return to his cell with Wade across from him and sometimes not. Wade begged him for help, but Rembrandt ignored her because he wasn't sure if she was herself or a Kromagg tricking him into revealing secrets. The last time they saw each other, Wade was being taken away to be shipped to a Kromagg breeder camp on another world. Rembrandt could then tell that it was truly Wade.

Wade has since become part of a Kromagg program to open folds in space with human consciousness, allowing the Kromagg fleet to bypass the Slidecage and lay siege to their lost homeworld. Her increased awareness allowed her to find Rembrandt and the other Sliders across dimensional boundaries, so she has been opening the wormholes to this world. Rembrandt is urged to send Wade a message with his mind, and he, Diana, Maggie, and Mallory slide into the launch compound undetected. When they reach the main control room, they are captured again. Rembrandt urges Wade to cause a power feedback in the controls, and the Kromaggs there are quickly overpowered. Just as Maggie indicates that the time to slide is approaching, Rembrandt tells them that he's not abandoning Wade "like I did before".

Wade looks at herself through Rembrandt's eyes and sees what the Kromaggs did to her just as they break through after Diana, Maggie, and Mallory have slid. Wade responds, "I love you, Remmy . . . but I can't let you do this." She appears to overload her systems, killing the Kromaggs, wrecking their invasion plan, and sending Rembrandt through a vortex to the idyllic world where the others are. Maggie sees Rembrandt come through the other vortex, and she and the others find him able to live with what's happened. Rembrandt sees Wade's reflection before his own in a pool and hears her say that she'll always be with him.