“New Gods for Old” is episode five of season five of Sliders.
The Sliders are running away from people; it seems Rembrandt said he was a believer and they took it badly. They are cornered with a few seconds left, and manage to slide out, though Mallory gets shot in the back. They arrive on another, similar, world, but without the attacking mob. Diana finds Mallory on the ground with a smouldering patch on his back.
Mallory finally comes around the next day and says he feels fine. Then that he can’t feel his legs. He isn’t going back to that. They have time to find a doctor and Maggie and Rembrandt go to look. Mallory isn’t going to go back in a wheelchair. So, naturally they return with a wheelchair. And a Doctor Krislov, who was leading their pursuers in the previous world.
Maggie says this world looks like the B.I.R. world but there’s no Bureau of Internal Reconstruction. Diana says they are moving through a cluster of similar worlds all branching off from the same set of choice points. On this world, the B.I.R. was overthrown and they’re still recovering from the war.
Krislov takes a look at Mallory and says he hasn’t seen a wound like that in a long time. Those weapons were supposed to have been destroyed. The Sliders claim they encountered bandits. Krislov says Mallory’s spinal cord has been scorched. He doesn’t have the technology to help, but with physiotherapy, Mallory will recover some of his movement. Krislov is asked who does have the technology. He warns Mallory not to do anything stupid. According to him, the war left thousands maimed, just like Krislov himself. Mallory just wants to know who can help him walk again. The Believers. But there’s a terrible cost; Mallory won’t be himself.
They go to an encampment that seems more like a hippie place than healers. Mallory is told, by a young woman who was calling for their death in the last world, that with the blessing, he can walk again. Rembrandt wants Mallory to take it slow. Mallory does not. Inside one of the tents, Diana wants to take a sample. Mallory is offered water, but Rembrandt is still concerned. He wants Mallory to wait until Diana can analyse the water. Maggie will stay.
Krislov, when given the water sample, shows them that it contains billions of biological nanotech engines. They link up inside like a network. Diana suddenly realises the network isn’t limited to one person. Krislov confirms that. Above a certain threshold, it becomes self-aware, one big mind. Those who use the technology become merely cells in a larger community
Mallory is apologising to Maggie saying there’s no harm in waiting for Diana to check. Maggie explains that she may not have been in a wheelchair herself, but her husband was for the last year of his life. Mallory gets Maggie to check for the other two, and drinks the water whilst she’s distracted.
Krislov is explaining that it was supposed to be a medical breakthrough, an end to human suffering. They did create an off switch, light operating at certain key frequencies. But he doesn’t know anyone with the device, as if he did, he would have healed himself long ago. The others realise the lights the B.I.R. men carried worked like that. Krislov says they were all destroyed. He asks if they met a girl, Jill, with the Believers. His daughter. If he had the light, he’d get her back. Don’t let Mallory drink.
When they return, Maggie fills them in. Mallory is now walking again, and dressed like a Believer. He now feels like his body is only a part of something larger. There’s only a few minutes left before they slide, but Mallory doesn’t want to. So, they take him anyway.
It seems that the Glow, as it’s called, is very attractive. Certainly, the others can see the appeal when Mallory describes what it’s like. The only price is to give up yourself. The question is if that’s a price worth paying.