“Dinoslide” is episode twenty-four (originally shown as episode twenty-three) of season three of Sliders.
Colonel Rickman is harvesting brain fluid again. The first he takes doesn’t hold; the second seems to. The Sliders arrive at the same place and Quinn says that Rickman is still there; his face is still changed. Behind them, a woman is checking Rickman’s victims and says they’re dead. Rickman reverts and slides out. The Sliders’ window is in six minutes. Quinn takes a look at the dead and sees that Rickman has been at them. Something’s wrong; he’s never killed before and never taken more than one at a time. The DNA mismatches must be taking their toll. Wade is concerned that they, and especially Maggie, are more focused on revenge than that people are dead. Quinn says Rickman has to be stopped.
They slide out and into the world that the survivors from Maggie’s world settled in in “The Exodus, Part 2”. They see dinosaurs in the distance. Quinn and Rembrandt are talking; Maggie says they saw dinosaurs and they’re rattling on as if nothing happened. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. Slide for long enough and you’ll see anything. Quinn says on their world the dinosaurs would be plant eaters. Maggie wonders how they can be killed and Wade makes a comment about killing being all she thinks about. Rembrandt tells Wade after the other two head on that if she wants a fight, Maggie will give her one. Wade wants things back to how they were. Rembrandt tells her it isn’t Maggie’s fault the professor is gone and their fighting is hurtful to them all. They find the settlement, but it’s been destroyed. Rembrandt finds a drawing by Malcolm. A T. rex.
They find a field of graves, but probably not the settlers, then hear a gunshot. Rickman finds the shooter, who doesn’t immediately recognise him. He does look different, after all. Rickman disarms him and is about to harvest his brain when a T. rex shows up. Both run; the other falls into a pit trap.
The Sliders find the tracks, and a dropped gun, and hear a call for help. They find the man in the pit trap; he tells them Rickman attacked him. The others are scattered in different camps, trying to survive the dinosaurs. Maggie wants to go after Rickman. Quinn says he will go with, leaving the gun and the timer. They’ll meet the others at the camp. At the camp, they’re talking to a woman, Gretchen, when Rembrandt sees Malcolm.
Quinn and Maggie feel vibrations, then have to climb up a rocky outcropping to get away from a T. rex. Maggie has no problem with Rickman being eaten by a T. rex. As long as she gets to watch. And Quinn wants him just as badly. Quinn tells her that he was out of control then; now, he just wants Rickman’s timer to get home.
At the camp, Wade and Rembrandt are told that the T. rex has wiped out everything larger. The graves are because the natives caught flu and were too superstitious to let the others inoculate them. The settlers lost people when the T. rex attacked. The natives used to worship the dinosaurs, giving them animal sacrifices to keep them happy. When game was short, they asked the settlers for some livestock, but the settlers considered their stock too valuable and refused. The dinosaurs became hungry and attacked. Most of the T. rexs died of starvation, leaving the biggest, most aggressive one alive, as it ate the others’ bodies.
Rickman is still out there, on a world where the settlers were specifically chosen for compatibility with him. There is a bigger, more current problem in the aggressive T. rex, though, which needs dealing with first.