“Second Wave” is episode ten of season two of Continuum.
In the previous episode, “Seconds”, after Kiera found out that Julian was going to become Theseus, she threatened to kill him – and perhaps would have if Carlos hadn’t intervened. Now she fears that she may have turned him to the course where he became Theseus. Julian has met up again with his followers, and they have asked Travis to leave. It was also revealed just what Theseus did in the future. Factory cities – which weren’t as good as Kiera had presumably been raised to believe – were using people as essentially organic robots after implanting them with a chip (the factories seemed to be run by Sadtech, Alec’s company). Julian (older, as Theseus, and with what would appear to be a beard of evil) attacked the cities in 2035 – and they probably needed something doing about them. However, instead of freeing the workforce – which, going by the reaction of his follower, might have been possible – he had their chips shut down, killing tens of thousands of people in the process. Even if Theseus no longer believed them to be people. Just who is in the right in the future is really murky. No-one, by all appearances. Old Alec may know this, hence his actions.
Once again opening in the future, and again in a prison, it sees Travis, in prison uniform, entering the cell of Curtis. Curtis, it seems, regrets some of his actions, and Travis takes some stuff that, at the time, probably sounded fairly mystical, but was probably related to their time travel in “A Stitch in Time” (which hasn’t happened yet).
In the present Alec is using Ark to search for any members of Liber8. Kiera wants to know why they haven’t heard anything from Gardiner. It’s because he’s dead, killed in “Second Listen”. Not that she or Alec know that yet. Alec hasn’t detected anything from Gardiner over the past week. Kiera wants Julian adding to those that Ark is looking for. She says that as long as Julian keeps his word, so will she. Then Alec detects Garza, so Kiera and Carlos go looking for her. Garza is buying weapons – which makes her fairly heavily armed. However, Kiera’s future gun evens things up and Garza is captured. Dillon gives Kiera the go-ahead to get information any way she wants; Carlos is concerned about this and Dillon’s new methods. Garza says something by accident that gives Kiera a clue as to how to find Travis.
On the way, Kiera spots a demonstration in progress and goes to investigate. The demonstration looks to be being run by Julian’s followers, and two of the bodysnatchers from “Second Degree” are there to. Then Alec tries to track Travis more precisely and accidentally links Kiera and Travis’ CMRs. The freelancers are after Kiera, and they have the technology to defeat her suit’s capabilities. During the commotion, which turns into a riot, one of Julian’s followers takes Kiera to his base, where Julian recognises her, and she’s taken prisoner. Julian wants to know why Kiera was willing to kill him – especially as both Kiera and Kagame used the same terms regarding him and his future.
Emily is seen with Escher for the first time. She is getting second thoughts about spying on Alec though; she does have feelings for him. Escher wants something regarding Alec – as he may know who he actually is, what he may want is Alec himself.
Kellog is meeting with Sonya, wanting them to both look into Escher to find out what he wants. Sonya is reluctant. Lucas seems to be having problems; he sees Curtis, even though the latter was killed in “Wasting Time”. Mind you, in the previous episode, he was apparently talking to Kagame, who died in “Endtime”. Lucas may be losing it.
More is revealed about the Freelancers, but indirectly and through guesses.