Episode Title: SAN ANTONE
NOTE: This episode was (audio) recorded by Scott, soon to appear on his Story Schtick webcast.
SYNOPSIS: The episode begins in the southwestern deserts. AUDITOR CUMSHAW is waiting there with a mysterious covered box, about the size of a chaise lounge. WARDEN ALABASTER'S cruiser is seen landing nearby. WARDEN ALABASTER arrives and AUDITOR CUMSHAW introduces him to MR. BLACK and MR. BLACK's slave/assistant, JEREMIAH CULLEN (obviously DR. CULLEN's son.)
AUDITOR CUMSHAW says that the box holds the answer to both their problems, that of the assassin that WARDEN ALABASTER has been hunting and the Cradle Monks in general. It turns out to hold the frozen body of CONNIE (a true human who attentive viewers may recognize as NOVICE RUSH's long-lost wife.)
While they are dealing and posturing, AUDITOR CUMSHAW and WARDEN ALABASTER come under fire from mysterious forces wearing statue-like masks. AUDITOR CUMSHAW wants to leave CONNIE's frozen body to be blown to smithereens, but WARDEN ALABASTER orders it taken aboard his ship. JEREMIAH CULLEN bravely rushes out to save the frozen true human and gets it aboard the WARDEN's cruiser, but is wounded and left behind in the process. (Getting left behind becomes a major theme in this episode.)
There's a bit left to write and I have to go to work soon. So here's the skinny:
DR. CULLEN tricks CAPTAIN RAYLIN into going to San Antonio rather than Arizona, as she originally planned, with the help of her giant tree-rock-giant friend, ALBA.
BROTHER NARAT reveals the ability to use his cybernetics to see partially cloaked and de-phazed intruders, at FATHER BEN's prompting.
In the remains of the San Antonio river walk, NOVICE RUSH has a flashback to proposing to CONNIE and we meet JEFF, a man NOVICE RUSH knew well in the days when True Humans ruled the Earth, who tells them of an outbreak of plague.
The search party (NOVICE RUSH, BROTHER NARAT, CAPAIN RAYLIN and DR. CULLEN) get ambushed by the guys with stone masks. FATHER BEN, via telecom, orders BROTHER NARAT to hold a gun to the head of his ward, NOVICE RUSH, and that saves the day. However, BROTHER NARAT reacts badly to this and abandons DR. CULLEN to search San Antonio alone for his son while dragging CAPTAIN RAYLIN and NOVICE RUSH back to the ring station of the Cradle Monks.
DR. CULLEN discovers his son alive, but being used as bait in a trap. He rescues his son by poisoning a stone-faced man whom DR. CULLEN recognizes as a member of the Centrals, enemy of CAPTAIN RAY's people, the Unity. (But the viewer does not see the face of the man.) As DR. CULLEN is trying to spirit JEREMIAH away, MR. BLACK shows up and forces DR. CULLEN to make a sinister deal.
Back on the Ring Station, the men in stone masks show up (cloaked and dephased) and try to steal AI. NOVICE RUSH risks his life to try and save AI but fails. She gets stolen by the men in stone masks, one of whom NOVICE RUSH captures and it turns out to be JEFF (who dies horribly.) There is some hint that JEFF was left behind on Earth and may still carry the Plague which NOVICE RUSH and the other true humans left the Earth to avoid (and which caused the Quarantine in the first place.)
DR. CULLEN contacts CAPTAIN RAYLIN, there's more backstabbing and sneaking around and, finally, NOVICE RUSH finds out his wife's cryocapsule is being held aboard WARDEN ALABASTER's cruiser. NOVICE RUSH takes the controls (against CAPTAIN RAYLIN's better judgement) and crashes the Chaucer II into the observation deck of WARDEN ALABASTER's cruiser. There, he, DR. CULLEN and CAPTAIN RAYLIN manage to secure the cryocapsule only to be rescued in the nick of time by BROTHER NARAT, who has finally decided on a peaceful way to save his ward.
Back on the station, BROTHER NARAT discusses the difference between struggle and conquest/killing with FATHER BEN while NOVICE RUSH talks to DR. CULLEN about his fears for the future.
I swear! That's pretty much what happened, except for the bits I accidentally left out.
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