“The Last of Eden” is episode sixteen (originally shown as episode twenty) of season three of Sliders.
Wade jolts awake after a nightmare. Rembrandt asks what’s wrong; she tells him she’s had recurring nightmares since that underground world. Wade says that Rembrandt never said what happened to him and the professor on that world. Nor did Wade say what happened to her and Quinn underground. Wade didn’t want to relive it. Rembrandt suggests talking might stop the dreams. (This scene was apparently tagged on to avoid a continuity problem.)
A party of people with bows and glowsticks are hunting at night a creature like the one from Wade’s dream. It gets away.
Daytime, and the Sliders arrive. Rembrandt lands in some thorny bushes; the professor helps him get out. Both get scratched. Wade points out the sky; there are a couple of other planets up there by the looks of it. It’s suggested they’re in synergy with this Earth and its Moon. Wade asks if that’s good or bad. It depends. It might mean no more than abnormally high tides.
They find a group of people. Spears, no guns, and having a barbecue. The four decide a barbecue sounds nice and come forward. The leader of the night party comes forward to question them when the ground starts to shake. A crack opens and a woman and a baby fall in. Wade also tumbles; Quinn grabs her but she slips out of his grasp. The people leave and the crack closes again.
The three try to dig, but they need tools. Quinn goes after the others and asks for help and tools. He’s told that no-one digs the earth. The leader doesn’t want to help. Another does, but the leader tells him the gineers said no-one digs the earth or goes beyond the bounds.
Wade has landed on a girder in a clearly artificial underground complex full of machinery. She’s okay. The woman who fell is dead. The baby is missing.
Quinn returns and tells them there’s no help coming. They’ll have to take some tools. They set off and see a large skyscraper very much out of keeping with everything else.
Underground, there’s another shake and the dead woman falls.
The Sliders find the leader and the second man talking. When Keegan leaves, Quinn tackles the other and demand his help. The man wants to help; it was his sister and her daughter who fell. He will take them to get some equipment. Another watches them go.
Quinn tells the man, Brock, that they come from another world. Brock asks if the gineers made his world too and if his world is perfect. And why did he leave? Quinn says he wanted to see what’s out there. Brock does too. They won’t dig; there’s another place that will be faster. Which is an enormous vent in something called the forbidden zone. Reassuring. The lid of the vent is removed. The professor seems to be having a reaction to the plant that scratched him.
Brock hands Quinn what he calls sun stalks – glow sticks – they grow here. The gineers made them. Quinn is lowered into the shaft. Whilst he’s down there, Keegan and others arrive. Quinn is calling up about what he’s found whilst Keegan is saying those who disobey and travel to the forbidden zones die, cutting the rope.
Wade is wandering underground. There’s a creature following her from above.
Quinn returns to consciousness. He removes a grate and heads through to look for Wade.
The professor and Rembrandt are in a room in the skyscraper. The professor believes the gineers are engineers who built the place. His rash is getting worse. He’s scratching when he stops and calls Rembrandt. There look to be thorns growing under his skin.
Quinn has found a seismic shock column, built in 1972. And bones from someone who fell from above. He takes a bone for a weapon and finds tracks left by Wade. A creature is following him.
Rembrandt is calling for help. Brock would, but Keegan stops him. They argue. Keegan says it will get better if they wait. Brock doesn’t think so. Everyone else has left. Keegan says that’s ten years ago and none have returned. They’re safe here. Brock does not feel safe.
Wade and Quinn are stuck underground in a vast complex filled with creatures that eat people. It’s pretty clear that the episode takes a lot of inspiration from The Time Machine. Though the Morlocks in this lack the knowledge and skills of the ones from the novel.