“Heavy Metal” is episode fourteen of season five of Sliders.
The captain of a ship is told there’s something in the water. It’s the Sliders, and he orders them fished out, but to keep the deck guns ready. The Sliders claim that they were fishing when their boat sprung a leak. When asked where the ship is bound, the captain, Thompson, says trouble if they don’t get out of these waters. He tells them to ask his crew if there’s anything he needs and to help themselves to the galley.
The four are drying out and Maggie asks what happened, as they’ve never slid underwater before. The next time it might be underground, or ten thousand feet in the air. Rembrandt says Quinn told him that the timer had a device that would only allow them to slide onto dry land. Diana tells them there’s something wrong with the timer; it’s having trouble locking onto a stable set of slide coordinates. It’s weatherproof, so the immersion shouldn’t have harmed it. Have they ever changed the batteries? A loss of power could explain the problem. Surely they didn’t think it would run forever? Evidently they did. Diana thinks she can jumpstart the timer with her PDL, but they could be in for some pretty rough slides. If they slide at all.
It’s three days until the next slide and Diana thinks the timer will probably be recharged enough. Mallory tells them there’s good news; they’ll be in Hawaii in two days. Rembrandt and Maggie explain this is bad news, and explain their sliding radius, which is an area of about 400 miles around their original slide. They need to be in it when the timer reaches zero. They don’t know what will happen if they aren’t, and with the timer on the fritz, they don’t want to slide from an island surrounded by water. Or the vortex might not open, or they may enter but never leave.
Thompson isn’t turning around; they can get another ship and be back in LA by the end of the week. They try claiming a medical emergency, but all he can do is have the ship’s doctor take a look. He can’t call for a medevac, because he doesn’t know what a helicopter is, and no plane will come this far out to sea.
Diana has been to the ship’s library to see if they had the tech to fix the timer. She took a look at the periodic table of elements. Basically, this world has no aluminium. Either it doesn’t exist, or the process to extract it hasn’t been discovered. The aeronautics industry is stuck in the 1930s without it. They wonder how they can get off the ship. Mallory suggests a mutiny. This is promptly followed by an explosion.
On the deck, Thompson says they’re being boarded by pirates. He’s about to be killed by one when Maggie intervenes. They try and get out of there, but are surrounded. The leader of the pirates says they should know not to fight back; they might get hurt.
Cargo is being offloaded and the leader, Paxton, congratulates one of the crew of the ship, Brice. She was a plant. The pirates are heading back to the mainland and Mallory suggests they switch sides. The pirates are businessmen and Mallory knows how gangs work. He goes to speak to Paxton, making the case that they need his skills to operate more efficiently. Paxton decides he’s a spy from the Coastal Guard and orders he walk the plank.
On the plank, Mallory says they were found at sea; Brice can confirm it. She does. He’s brought back in. Paxton asks Maggie if she wants to join his crew. The conversation sounds more like flirting on both their parts. Maggie agrees that she and the others can give it a try. Brice tells Paxton afterwards that if it doesn’t work out, they can get a fair price for the Sliders in San Francisco.
The pirates are based in an off-the-map settlement. Diana is rather horrified by the rowdiness of the tavern they’re in. Paxton arrives and offers Maggie a tour. Her friends are welcome, if she’d feel more comfortable. Maggie thinks there’s no need. Mallory is trying to impress some pirates with tales of his motorcycle jousting in “Easy Rider”. Brice is not impressed.
Though the Sliders are now back on land, they are still about a hundred miles outside the sliding radius. Which means they need to get back. And Maggie is getting a little too interested in Paxton.