Episode Report Card Keckler: C- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Nobs And Nonsense
By Keckler | Season 1 | Episode 9 | Aired on 11.13.2001
In a forest, the fall foliage seems to be in full force, as Riaan and Quantum watch the man with his crates. The man speaks a foreign tongue into his communicator, which, from the looks on their faces, neither Riaan nor Quantum can understand. Quantum moves closer to get a peek at the crates; as Riaan follows, he tells her she has to go back. "Not until I get a look at what's in those crates," Riaan tells him, and starts tugging the lids off. Somehow I don't think that someone, who went through the trouble of carting those things all the way out there, is going to go very far away. A bright light beams down on the two of them, and it's just like any other bad alien-abduction movie. "Move!" Quantum commands Riaan, and they scuttle out of sight. A shuttlepod hovers above and tractor-beams the crates into a cargo hold. After the shuttlepod zips off, Riaan breathlessly asks, "Have you ever seen anything like that?" Quantum dramatically turns to look at her and says, "Actually, I have." Oh, boy. There's a blast of plasma fire, and Riaan squeaks in surprise. Quantum whips out his weapon, tells Riaan to stay where she is, and fires back. Quantum and the other guy trade fire for a while, jumping in and out of trees, blah blah blah. They each get their weapons knocked away, so they engage in hand-to-hand for a bit until Quantum actually manages to knock his attacker cold. Quantum hovers over the comatose man and, in a move totally stolen from V, rips part of his face off, exposing a green, reptilian underside. Pulling the latex skin off seems to make the alien come around, because he flutters his eyes and punches Quantum. More hand-to-hand. The guy crawls after Quantum, peeled face a-flapping, and attempts to grab him, but Quantum fires at him with a phaser pistol. The guy collapses. Wonder if it was set on "Stun" or "Kill." Riaan looks agog at Reptile Face. "It's all right," Quantum tells her. "He's not dead." Quantum goes through the guy's pockets -- he's getting good at that -- and pulls a few odds and bobs out. "Is there anything else you'd like to tell me, Jon?" Riaan asks. Quantum sighs.
Ye Olde Curiosity Shoppe. "If your ship can travel to so many stars, then why would you come here?" Riaan is asking Quantum, as they walk in to the shoppe. No need to pick locks this time, apparently. "To meet you," Quantum says. Oh, get a better line, please. "Me?" Riaan says, pulling out her stalker repellent. "Well, not you personally, but your people," Quantum explains. Riaan wonders why he would want to meet them, and says, "We're so backward compared to you." Quantum says, "If you take away our technology, we really aren't that different." Hath not a Quantum eyes? Hath not a Quantum hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affectations, passions? If you prick him, does he not BLEED? Quantum holds up one of the doohickeys he stole from the V creature, which my father noted looks like a Norelco shaver, and fiddles with the forcefield. ZZZAP! Forcefield is no more.