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First Wave - 'The Heist' (spoilers)
By Chris Aylott
Associate Editor
posted: 05:10 pm ET
19 June 2000

While investigating yet another Nostradamus quatrain, Cade reunited with the thieves he worked with before went straight

While investigating yet another Nostradamus quatrain, Cade reunited with the thieves he worked with before he went straight. Now they're in Silicon Valley, on a mission to break into a computer company’s vault and steal possible military technology.

Cade wants to know what’s so special about this technology – and if the Gua are involved in trying to steal it – but he didn’t expect the heist to go wrong so quickly. He recommends pulling out, but Harley is determined to keep going.

Cade begins working on one of the room’s doors. He’s not reassured by the fact that it’s a ridiculously simple key lock.

After tossing a ball in to trigger possible traps, they enter the next room. It’s lined with shotguns and pistols.

"What’s a computer company doing with an arsenal?" Cade asks.

Richie doesn’t know, but he’s more than happy to add some of the arsenal to his personal kit. Since nothing else about the job is going according to plan, he intends to be ready for anything.
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Harley warns him that he’ll spend an extra twenty years in jail if he’s caught with the weapons on him, but Richie confidently asserts that he’s too pretty to go to prison.

"Right," Harley comments. "You let your friends go in your place."

Heated discussion

The third room of the vault is hot. Once again the doors close behind the crew, and the temperature begins to rise.

As the crew argues over what to do next, Cade notices his boots are beginning to smoke. Moments later, flames spring up from the floor.

Cade frantically works the door, and they dive into the next room. Cade looks back for a moment, and when he turns forward again he’s shocked to see two Eddies standing in front of him.

"What’s wrong, bro?" one Eddie asks. The other one comments, "You look like you’ve seen a ghost."

Two Eddies, no waiting

Cade quickly figures out that he’s hallucinating. He’s talking to Harley and Richie, but he’s seeing Eddie and Eddie.

Harley’s not convinced the job is a setup yet, but she’s concerned enough to backtrack and leave. They decide to brave the room of fire again, and dash back in – to find an empty room.

Blood streams down the walls, spelling out "Foster" as it pools. The other two – who are themselves again – turn on Cade, demanding to know what connection he has to the strange events they’re experiencing.

Cade tells them he’s got a secret agenda: pursuing the people who framed him for murder. He doesn’t try to tell the others about the Gua, though.

Everyone begins loudly blaming each other. Richie accuses Cade of "betraying our trust."

"Trust!" Cade screams back. "I trusted you and ended up in jail for two years."

"You were my best friend," Cade continues, "and you sold me down the river. I’ll never get over that."

Richie pulls out a shotgun he got from the arsenal, pumps it . . . and blows a hole one of the room’s doors. He storms out.

Harley and Cade continue to argue, and Cade begins to strangle her. After a moment he pulls back, asking himself "what am I doing?"

"I hated you for what you did," says Harley, "and I still hate you." She walks out.

Put on a happy face

The next room boasts bright yellow smiley faces, and Harley begins smiling with them as soon as she walks in. Cade follows, catching the same buoyant mood.

They apologize, giggling. They kiss, and Cade tries to explain Nostradamus’ prophecy.

She has no idea what he’s talking about, but nobody minds. They cheerfully agree that they have to get out of there and find Richie.

As they leave, the smiley faces sport a nasty, toothy grin.

Harley and Cade find themselves sober, and back in the Armory. They also find Richie, who is armed, depressed and wracked with guilt for selling Cade out and sending him to prison.

"You never forgave me," Richie says. He puts his pistol in his mouth and pulls the trigger.

Move or die

Harley is transfixed by Richie’s dead body, but Cade insists that they have to keep moving. If they stay any longer, they will be afflicted with the suicidal impulses that destroyed him.

Cade is sure there’s a pattern to what they’re experiencing, but he can’t tell what it is. He’s also having trouble with the lock.

As he struggles to pick it, Harley sees a container of cyanide and a glass of water. She picks up the container and shakes the pills out into her hand.

Cade opens the lock and tries to pry open the door. When he asks Harley for help, she tells him, "I want to die."

He whirls around, sees the cyanide and dives across the room, knocking the pills from her hand.

As he hustles her into the next room, though, he pauses and picks up the handgun Richie was carrying. Staring at Richie, he raises the handgun to his own head – and then throws it away.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before

In the next room, Harley demands to know what is going on. Cade tells her about the Gua and the prophecies of Nostradamus.

Searching for a pattern, Cade asks Harley to tell him everything about the deal.

She remembers hearing about the job from a man named Weaver, who gave them plane tickets, money, and a briefcase. The crew went to a hideout to prepare for the job, and opened the briefcase.

Neither of them can remember exactly what happened after that, and they don’t know where the briefcase is now.

Deadly gas pours from the walls. They rush to the door, and Cade cuts his finger on a sharp edge as he picks the lock and they dash through.

They land naked on a bed and begin kissing. After a moment, Cade pulls away, realizing that this isn’t real.

"Feels real to me," Harley replies. She asks why he left her, and what Hannah had that Harley couldn’t give him.

Asks why he left. "What did she have that I couldn’t give you?"

Hannah inspired him to go straight, a path he couldn’t take with Harley. "I fell in love," Cade explains.

"No," says Harley. "You destroyed me."

Dead man walking

Dex suddenly reappears, holding a gun. "Miss me?" he asks.

Telling Harley he was only dead in her mind, he points his gun at her. Cade grabs it, knocking it aside but taking the muzzle flash in his eyes.

He shoots wildly at Dex, who disappears and reappears. Moments later, Dex is gone -- but Cade can’t see.

Darkness, take my hand

Blind, Cade panics. Heeding his advice to keep moving, Harley drags him to the door.

"Your eyes don’t pick the locks," she tells him. Remembering Richie’s story about Cade’s stepfather, Harley suggests that the rooms are playing with them, making their fears real.

Cade cuts his finger again on the lock edge. Why is it sharp?

Harley checks the locks on the other doors. Their edges are smooth.

"It’s the pattern," Cade mutters. "It’s what we’re looking for."

Cade picks the lock. She goes first, leading Cade into the next room, where his vision returns.

Mice in a maze

"Maybe the machine rewards correct choices," Cade muses. He had to rely on his other senses to escape the trap.

They check other locks for sharp edges. Harley finds one, and they take that door.

The next room features Eddie, hanging from another noose. The rooms are trying to scare them, Cade decides.


Harley comments, "It’s working." The room after that draws from her childhood nightmares, and presents them with a feral clown.

"Scared, little girl?" the clown cackles. She shoots the clown, and he disappears.

No curtains

The next room is all white. No doors, no exit.

All five of their senses are working, Cade deduces, so leaving must require some kind of sixth sense. "We have to get out of our heads to get out of this place," he says.

Dex reappears, and shoots Cade several times. "You’re not real," Cade tells him, and his wounds and Dex both disappear.

"We’re still locked in a room with no door," Harley points out.

The machine is reacting to them, leading them to where they expect to go. It helped them find Richie when they were separated from him.


Cade tells Harley to forget the guilt and pain of the past, and listen to her inner voice. "It’s all a dream, just a dream," he says.

Richie appears to Cade, holding a gun. "I betrayed you," he says. "I’m sorry."

"It’s okay," Cade tells him, and forgives him. Richie puts down the gun and vanishes.

Cade and Harley walk through the wall.


A long strange head trip


Cade reawakens in the hideout. He brings Harley around, but Dex and Richie are dead. They believed in the dream, and it killed them.

Harley offers to go on the trail with him, but Cade turns her down. It’s too dangerous – but he will ask for her help if he needs it.

Back to the main review of this episode.


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