“Underworld” is episode twenty of season two of First Wave.
Three men are in a club and one is complaining that this is the third funeral in two months. They need to find out who is behind this and kill them. Another suggests blowing up Jack Mitchum’s car; that will end it. The first, evidently the boss, says Mitchum has out of town help and is taking orders. He’s not smart or strong enough alone. Until they know who to hit, it’s business as usual. Which means he has to look at the new girl, who starts dancing around a pole. Before ripping it out of the stage and trying to impale him with it. She flees, as they shoot at her, turning to liquid outside and disappearing down a drain.
A quatrain has led Cade to Kansas City and a gangland war that has resulted in over 30 dead. He enters the club, as two men in a car watch, as he is looking for Sammy ‘The Horse’ Kozack. Eddie thinks mixing with mobsters is insane. Inside, Cade speaks to the barman and says he wants to speak to Sammy. Another comes over and Cade tells him he can see all kinds of way to kill Sammy. The barman pats him down and finds a gun. The other asks how he got it through a metal detector. Cade didn’t; it’s the thug’s. If this was a hit, he would already be dead and Cade would be on the way to put a bullet in Sammy’s head. A woman, Sophia, claps. Cade states he worked security in Miami and came to offer his services to Sammy.
Cade is escorted in to see Sammy; the woman, Sophia, is his wife. Sammy checks up with Cade’s supposed boss – speaking to Eddie, of course. Eddie says Cade took care of an annoyance and on the safe side is taking a break for Miami. The bartender confirms Cade has a rap sheet; he checked with KCPD. Sammy asks how much Cade charges. See how Cade does, then pay him what seems fair.
Afterwards, Sophia is coming on to Cade and gives him some keys. Cade says he has one law; respect and protect the boss. He lives and dies by it. Sammy comes over; Cade has a feeling that was a loyalty test. It was, the final one. Cade passed. Failing would have been bad.
According to Sammy, until last year four families controlled the city. They met regularly and everything was peaceful. Now, there are only two left. It started 9-10 months ago. Liquor stores being knocked over, truck hijacked. Sammy tried to be above it all but last week a stripper ripped a pole out of the floor and tried to kill him, then disappeared into thin air. Sammy thinks someone from out of town must be behind it. He tried talking, sending the thug, Bud, to talk. Mitchum swore he wasn’t behind the hits. It’s like they know every move he makes. He has the place swept twice daily for bugs and there are feds outside. Cade wants to bring in his own person to sweep the place.
This being Eddie, of course. Cade says he’s a little weird but good. Bud sets off Eddie’s detector and Eddie says he’s the transmitter. There’s a red mark on Bud’s stomach; it seemed to appear after he went to see Jack Mitchum. Sammy gets a knife out and Bud doesn’t want him to cut him. Until the mark starts moving; then he does. Bud ends up throwing up something, a three-legged starfish with a metal centre.
This is the bug and, like most Gua stuff, it disintegrates. Sammy is about to shoot Bud when Cade tells him to stop; he doesn’t think Bud knew. Bud didn’t eat anything at Mitchum’s, but something bit him, maybe a spider. Cade and Eddie tell Sammy they’ve seen this technology before; it’s possible it entered Bud without his knowledge.
Cade isn’t going to immediately tell Sammy about the Gua; he’d think Cade was crazy. Though when entire bodies go the way of the bug, that tends to be helpful. What Cade and Eddie want to work out is, if Mitchum is working with the Gua, why they targeted him in the first place. The quatrain mentioned invasion. What does Mitchum have that the Gua want? Eddie suggests strippers.
Cade has to keep working with Sammy, and the Gua husks are showing new abilities. There’s an event close to the end that can be seen coming.