“Lost Souls” is episode nine of season two of First Wave.
Two workmen are in the subway, complaining a bit. One tells the other that there is 6′ of concrete to cut through. The man starts cutting it away when he comes across a white arm. He clears more concrete away from the arm – which reaches out and tries to grab him. The others come across and see that the side of a body has been revealed. The workman says the arm grabbed him; this isn’t believed. Another touches the body and says it’s still warm. The subway was built 50 years ago; the body should be a skeleton. He clears away more, revealing a woman’s head. Which opens blood red eyes and asks for help.
Travel writer Francesca Dutton disappeared 55 years ago without a trace, according to Cade, but was found two days ago, entombed in a New York subway tunnel, still alive. Cade heads to the Maple Ridge Retreat, a small psychiatric hospital in upstate New York, to which Francesca has been transferred. He’s posing as her grandson, Jack.
Francesca is in a room with a one-way mirror and a man in the observation room introduces himself as Special Agent Haley Burbitt (Blu Mankuma). He and his partner, Agent Simon, are with the National Agency for Missing Persons. What brings Cade there? Cade claims he heard his grandmother was staying at the hospital. He’s with the Philadelphia PD and a buddy on the NYPD told him. Burbitt checks up on Cade’s identity as Simon asks Cade questions about his grandmother. Unusual medical conditions, going on journeys, possessing ancient charms and crystals, unorthodox religious beliefs. They deal with missing persons – but those with unexplained phenomena. Welcome, Mulder and Scully.
Burbitt talks privately to Simon. Cade checks out and Burbitt thinks they should give Cade a shot at Francesca; she won’t talk to them, after all. Simon points out that it’s classified and they’ve been ordered not to. Burbitt states Cade is her grandson and deserves to know. The relationship between the two agents seems closer than is probably allowed.
Burbitt explains to Cade that Francesca, who is totally white apart from her eyes, is like an albino currently, after being trapped in concrete for 55 years. Simon believes there’s a scientific explanation for what happened; Francesca’s survival and not having aged a day. Hibernation, nutrition through the rocks, there was a live toad found in 6,000-year-old limestone. Reaching more than a little. She’s the Scully personality. Burbitt says Francesca hasn’t spoken a word and asks for Cade’s help.
Cade enters and speaks to Francesca, saying that he is her grandson. When he mentions her daughter. Patricia, Francesca responds. Her baby is only 6. How long has it been? 55 years. There was no light and she couldn’t move. Only the cold and the rumbling. She thought she was in Hell. All Francesca had were her memories and they faded to nothing. Cade asks who did this to Francesca. She won’t tell; they might be out there.
Outside Francesca’s room, Burbitt asks Cade if he knows what she meant. Cade claims not. He’d like to take home the files to read up on the case, but is told he doesn’t have clearance. Forensics found a couple of things that were probably in Francesca’s pockets before her clothes rotted away. Plus, something else. A shiny metal ball whose metal they can’t identify. Cade recognises it of course.
Cade calls Eddie and tells him about everything. Eddie thinks Francesca is an alien; Cade things she’s human. She seemed like a victim, a subject of an experiment. Just like him. Cade would like to trust Burbitt, who has evidence of alien presence, even if he doesn’t know it yet. Eddie doesn’t like that idea. Cade isn’t going to do it until he finds out what happened. This involves heading into the subway and speaking to the workman who found Francesca. The workman said the concrete seemed soft, but he thought it was just old.
The agents have had the concrete analysed, and the limestone in the concrete exceeds industry standards by nearly 200%. Eddie is analysing it as well. He and Burbitt recite a Tibetan tale about how limestone traps the human soul; Cade gets it, Simon does not. Eddie suggests it’s a way of storing human bodies for centuries.
Francesca is not the only one who was buried. Who can be trusted, though? Is she the victim of an alien experiment? Will Burbitt and Simon be open to what really happened? And how come being trapped, alive and conscious, in concrete for 55 years didn’t send Francesca insane?