Category: Invasion

Russell goes to check out his ranger station, and finds a man, near death, in a diving suit. Russell takes him to Homestead Hospital, and when the man’s perfectly intact diving suit is cut off, doctors discover a series of nearly symmetrical puncture wounds from his neck to his waist – roughly corresponding to the placement of the tendrils along the body Dave recovered from the swamp. Russell goes back to his station and finds military dog tags, but can’t seem to find out – even from Sheriff Underlay – anything about a U.S. Air Force diver named Paxton. Dave, still hospitalized for his injuries, goes to visit Paxton, who can only dazedly moan “Don’t let them in” while Dave tries to take pictures of his wounds – moments before Underlay appears out of nowhere to confiscate the camera. Larkin tracks Paxton’s wife down and goes around the sheriff’s road blocks to reach her, but she thinks her husband is on a mission overseas and refuses to say anything more. Larkin returns to work with what she’s found out, but is informed by her news director – one of the many like Dr. Mariel Underlay who were found naked after the storm – that Paxton has died, and that the story isn’t worth chasing. Jesse and Rose, staying with the Underlays, come back to Russell’s house; Rose is upset that her mother and stepfather were both gone overnight. In addition that, though, Russell and Dave are worried about another disappearance – the intertwined human and alien remains hidden away in the trunk of Dave’s car have vanished. But Russell does still have one alien souvenir – a spore-like object that Mariel pulled out of Paxton’s head.

written by Shaun Cassidy
directed by Lawrence Trilling
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Holmes Osborne (Mayor Littles), Nick Cokas (Paxton), Veronica Cartwright (Valerie), Kimleigh Smith (Admitting Nurse), Michael Mitchell (Derek), Jake Richardson (Gage), Nathan Baesel (Deputy Lewis Sirk), Cirroc Lofton (Reed), Anne Dudek (Katie Paxton), Ivar Brogger (Father Jeffrey Scanlon), Reggie Jordan (Reporter #1), Elisa Llamido (Reporter #2), Ruth Silviera (Nurse Adrianne), Jennifer Wilkerson (Nurse)

Notes: Cirroc Lofton was a member of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s ensemble cast for all seven seasons, starring as Jake Sisko; he played Larkin’s co-worker and seems to have taken after his DS9 co-star and mentor Avery Brooks in shaving his head.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Jesse and his stepsister, Sheriff Underlay’s daughter Kira, are walking home with containers of gasoline when they see an overturned RV trailer in the floodwater. They swim out to it to make sure no one is trapped, but while inside, Jesse sees something glowing in the water, and when he investigates closer, it lashes out at him, injuring him severely. Kira runs to get her father, but finds Russell at her house instead, babysitting Rose. Russell rushes back to the scene, recovers Jesse and takes him to the hospital, where Mariel hovers between parental concern and total disinterest in her son’s fate. She donates her own blood to Jesse, but instead of stabilizing him, it nearly kills him. Elsewhere, despite the five-mile quarantine radius around Homestead imposed by Sheriff Underlay, Larkin and her cameraman catch what looks like a military convoy going through town. When she confronts Underlay about it, Larkin gets a canned explanation and then demands the truth, which Underlay then tries to tell her involves the recovery of Airman Paxton’s helicopter. But when Larkin points out the radiation-suited hazmat teams near the crash site, it appears that even Sheriff Underlay doesn’t know the whole story. Nor can Russell explain why Mariel’s blood now resembles the blood of a marine animal more than it does that of a human being…

written by Becky Hartman Edwards
directed by Michael Dinner
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Kimleigh Smith (Admitting Nurse), Melody Butiu (Nurse Karlen), Armin Shimerman (Josh Breims), Joshua Gomez (Scott), Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Leslie Carrera (Mrs. Hernandez), Jean Sincere (Mrs. Lowell), Ewan Chang (Doctor), Barry Wiggins (General Turner), Joshua Harto (Greg Ogilvy)

Notes: Once again, a member of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’s ensemble features in the guest cast, this time Armin “Quark” Shimerman as a cautious jewelry store owner.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Weeks after the hurricane, Homestead is still under a quarantine that has the forceful backing of Sheriff Underlay. But at the next routinely scheduled press conference, which is increasingly becoming a forum for residents to voice their concerns as well, Russell challenges Underlay’s quarantine declaration, and once he voices that objection, others speak up too. Underlay backs down and opens the city to the rest of the world. Russell goes to check on a ranger station that hasn’t checked in, and finds it manned by a corpse – a diseased one by the look of it. That particular station monitored primates in captivity, and all of those specimens have escaped, possibly carrying the disease. Russell and the sheriff uneasily team up to track down the recapture them, but even then, the disease has spready among other people in Homestead – and has possibly already achieved epidemic status. And without the quarantine in place, there’s nothing to stop it from spreading further.

written by Juan Carlos Coto
directed by Sergio Mimica Gezzan
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Deputy Lewis Sirk), Lisa Jane Persky (Disheveled woman), Jeff Perry (Terrence Gale), James Carraway (Roger Weeks), Christine Healy (Dr. Bates), Holmes Osborne (Mayor Littles), Jim Cantafio (FPL manager), R.C. Shivers (COC woman), Jake Richardson (Gage), Michael Mitchell (Derek), James Sharpe (Frank Riegert), Peggy Dunne (Dottie Petrie), Kimleigh Smith (Nurse Kim), Katy Yeakey (Feverish girl), Bob Morrisey (Lawrence Burley), Joshua Gomez (Larkin’s cameraman)

Notes: Writer Juan Carlos Coto is the younger brother of Manny Coto, creator of Odyssey 5 and executive producer of Star Trek: Enterprise’s last two seasons.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Rose runs home from playing at the water’s edge to tell Russell that she’s seen another of the glowing lights in the water. Russell and Dave go to look, but find nothing; their reaction, however, is telling to both Jesse, who finds it more difficult each day to trust either of his increasingly secretive parents, and Larkin, who wonders why Russell hasn’t brought this potential story to her attention. Larkin has been considering calling on an old flame at the local Air Force base to see if she can catch another glimpse of the containers she and Sheriff Underlay saw being removed from the water, and Russell’s continued secrecy only intensifies her resolve. Carl McKittrick, an old friend of Russell’s, appears in the midst of all this activity to confide some marital difficulties to Russell, but when Russell doesn’t have time to talk, McKittrick instead breaks into a gun store, arms himself, and when Sheriff Underlay arrives on the scene, shots ring out – and McKittrick is killed. Russell vows not to let the matter drop, and when he goes to see McKittrick’s wife, discovers that she was another of the hurricane survivors who was found unharmed in mysterious circumstances after the storm. She and other survivors, including Mariel, Kira’s boyfriend Derek, and the local priest, have formed a support group of sorts, meeting at the priest’s church to discuss their shared experience. And Sheriff Underlay is there too.

written by Michael Berns & Shaun Cassidy
directed by Thomas Schlamme
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Matt Ross (Vince Teracoma), Sylvia Kelegian (Lucy McKittrick), Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Veronica Cartwright (Valerie Shenkman), Jake Richardson (Gage), Stephen Lee (Carl McKittrick), Michael Mitchell (Derek Culie), Robert Dickenson (Newscaster), Jake Eberle (Man), Alexis Ryan (Woman), Saida Rodriguez Pagan (Newscaster #1), Reggie Jordan (Newscaster #2), Matt Sigloch (MP)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Russell and fellow park ranger Mona Gomez find an old Cuban man adrift in the Everglades, stammering about how he has lost his family to “the lights.” Larkin confesses to Dave that she thinks she’s been followed since she managed to sneak into a top secret hangar at the Air Force base, shortly before Dave and Jesse join Russell to go hunting for one of the glowing creatures in the swamp. Strangely changed after his own experience in the water, Kira Underlay’s boyfriend Derek is stopped by Sheriff Underlay and warned to stay away from the sheriff’s daughter. Derek suddenly decides that he’s more interested in Mariel – despite the fact that this will surely set an even more direct confrontation in motion with the sheriff. Russell tags one of the glowing creatures with a radio device that he can track, but when he follows the signal, he discovers that these creatures can apparently take over human bodies. And Larkin finds that she is indeed being followed, though her attempt to outfox her pursuers puts her in even more danger.

written by Becky Hartman Edwards & Shaun Cassidy
directed by Lawrence Trilling
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Matt Ross (Vince Teracoma), Sylvia Kelegian (Lucy McKittrick), Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Veronica Cartwright (Valerie Shenkman), Jake Richardson (Gage), Stephen Lee (Carl McKittrick), Michael Mitchell (Derek Culie), Robert Dickenson (Newscaster), Jake Eberle (Man), Alexis Ryan (Woman), Saida Rodriguez Pagan (Newscaster #1), Reggie Jordan (Newscaster #2), Matt Sigloch (MP)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Convinced that someone from the Air Force base has been trailing her since she slipped into an unauthorized area, Larkin takes a sudden detour to get away from her pursuers, and winds up rolling her SUV. When she doesn’t report to work and misses a live broadcast, Russell and Dave set out to search for her. Larkin, injured in the wreck, manages to free herself and tries to find help or transport; the first car she finds is occupied by the decomposing body of its driver, impaled through the chest by an airborne tree branch during the hurricane. Even when she overcomes her revulsion enough to remove the body from the car, Larkin can’t get the car to start. She flags down a truck and demands that the driver take her to the hospital so she and the baby can be checked out, but the driver, a man who claims to be a Haitian fisherman, has other plans. And when Russell and Dave find that Sheriff Underlay insists on helping in the search for Larkin, they can’t help but wonder what his plans are as well.

written by Michael Alaimo & Juan Carlos Coto
directed by Rod Holcomb
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Joshua Gomez (Scott), Allan Louis (Gerard), Jake Eberle (Man)

Note: The legend at the beginning of the episode notes that, at this point, only 14 days have passed since Hurricane Eve struck in the pilot episode.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Russell finds an infant in a cooler and takes the baby to the hospital, and Sheriff Underlay later introduces him to a woman and her frantic mother, who says the woman has lost her newborn child. But when Mariel performs DNA matching tests, the baby and the woman don’t appear to be related – the woman has never even given birth. But she was also one of the many people who was found in a dazed state after the hurricane, just like Mariel, her mother reveals – and when Mariel goes to talk to the young woman about her experience later, she finds the woman’s mother laying dead nearby, brutally murdered. Mariel goes to the jail to talk to her fellow hurricane survivor, only to find that the woman has apparently received an unusual pep talk about her destiny – from the sheriff. When Mariel follows the woman’s advice and goes into the water near where she was found after the hurricane, Mariel comes back questioning who she – and her husband – really are.

written by Julie Siege
directed by Ernest Dickerson
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Lee Garlington (Helen), Elisabeth Moss (Christina), Ron Butler (Coroner)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Obsessed with what she saw in the water – her own body, decomposing – Mariel demands that her husband and his deputies begin dredging the water to find what she saw. She’s just about to speak about her unnerving experience at one of the hurricane survivors’ support group meetings at the church when she spots Dave wandering in the door, and abruptly shuts up. Dave later visits Mariel at the hospital, apologizing for making her feel uncomfortable and promising that he’s not there to spy on her for Russell. Russell, in the meantime, abruptly ends a romantic picnic with Larkin when he sees one of the ponds in his jurisdiction has been poisoned. Russell barges into the nearby home of a known drug dealer and accuses him of dumping poison in the park; when the dealer’s wife draws a gun, Russell manages to get it away from her and holds both of them at gunpoint. A horrified Larkin calls the police, and after they arrest the dealer, Larkin looks into Russell’s past, and finds a criminal record with far darker secrets than she ever expected to find there, calling their trust and their relationship into question. And when Russell performs a necropsy on a poisoned alligator he recovers from the pond, he realizes that everything in the pond died as the result of something far more exotic than the manufacture of drugs.

written by Jill Blotevogel and Reed Steiner
directed by Michael Nankin
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Jeff Doucette (Bob Hemming), Meera Simhan (Connie / Pria), Ron Butler (Coroner), Leigh Kelly (Carla Hemming), Joyce Fessides (Woman in church), Rocky Carroll (Healy), James Carraway (Roger Weeks), Anthony Richardson (Scuba diver)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

In the wee hours of the morning, Dave is kidnapped dragged off to an unknown location; when his captors remove the hood from his head, Dave sees a man he’s never met before – and a woman who has repeatedly spoken to him about his blog at the local internet cafe’. Russell discovers that Dave is missing, and finds Dave’s tape recorder. Russell learns from the internet cafe’ owner that a woman has repeatedly asked Dave to accompany her to an abandoned shipyard, but Dave has never taken her up on her invitation. When Russell hears the sound of Dave’s kidnapping on the tape, he doubles back to check out the shipyard himself, and pulls a gun on Dave’s captors – only to be taken by surprise himself. The man, who calls himself Healey (but admits that’s not his real name), tells Russell and Dave about similar incidents in Central America and South America, usually after hurricanes, where people who survived under mysterious circumstances were never the same. And in those cases, Healey says, those survivors committed suicide or killed one another, and the attempt at an invasion never took hold – making it important to find out why the transformations seem to be relatively uneventful in Homestead. In the meantime, Deputy Lewis Sirk, Sheriff Underlay’s right hand man who lost his left arm while serving in the military, probes further into the mystery of the body found underwater by Mariel – and he discovers far too much for Underlay’s comfort. But Underlay’s discomfort is intensified even more when he tries to sacrifice Sirk to the underwater beings – and they return him not only possessed, but with a new arm.

written by Shaun Cassidy & Juan Carlos Coto
directed by Steve Shill
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Rocky Carroll (Healy), Meera Simhan (Pria), Robert Peters (Craig), Kamal Marayati (Pria’s husband)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

When an angry husband tries to snatch his wife away from the support group of people who were found in an altered state after the hurricane, the other survivors gather around him and attack viciously, almost killing him. Mariel cuts the attack short and demands that someone call 911 – and finds no one willing to do so. Later, Russell and Dave confront Mariel with the human remains they’ve found – the remains of Sheriff Tom Underlay, with the remains of an unidentified creature wrapped around him. Mariel storms away, accusing Russell of trying to wrest custody of the children away from her. But the revelation unnerves her enough to demand answers from Tom – or at least who appears to be Tom. After convincing him to cut off his own new arm, Tom insists that Deputy Sirk should recuperate at the Underlay household, but he lies to Kira, telling her that Sirk is recovering from a gunshot wound. When Tom tries to explain Mariel’s situation to her, she threatens to leave him unless she gets the whole truth; she later meets Russell and admits to some very confused feelings, and Russell returns home equally confused. But when Russell learns that Larkin dropped his children off with Tom, he rushes to the Underlays’ house to find the children gone, Tom gone, Sirk gone, and Mariel in shock.

written by Shaun Cassidy
directed by J. Miller Tobin
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Tammy Trull (Alma Tredwell), Scott Michael Morgan (Randy Tredwell), James Carraway (Roger Weeks), Nicole Garz (Emily)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

After revealing the truth about Tom Underlay to Mariel, Russell fears that his children may pay the price – Tom has taken them on an unannounced trip, leaving no clues as to where they’re being taken. Where the children are concerned, Tom promises a fun weekend getaway, but Jesse is immediately skeptical, relentlessly questioning Tom about where they are, and why there’s a sheriff’s department boat tied to the dock. Jesse can’t seem to get Rose or Kira worked up about the situation, though. Worked up barely begins to describe Mariel and Russell’s state of mind, and worse yet, Larkin suspects that Russell may be spending time with his ex-wife for reasons that have nothing to do with their children. Russell decides it’s time to tell Larkin everything he knows about the hurricane survivors who have banded into an unusually insular group, and even tells her about finding the body of the real Tom Underlay. But he doesn’t know what Larkin will do with the information – she could discard it as a flimsy excuse, or she could decide to make a news story out of it. And all the while, Tom is calling Mariel and giving her only the most cryptic answers about her children’s well being. To ensure their safety, however, she’ll have to reaffirm her loyalty to her husband – despite knowing that he’s no longer human.

written by Becky Hartman Edwards & Reed Steiner
directed by Lawrence Trilling
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Elisabeth Moss (Christina), Mark Colson (Deputy Munger), Colin Fickes (Deputy Palmateer), Michael Mitchell (Derek Culie), Scott Klace (Stevie)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

After his latest heated argument with Mariel about what information he’s holding back from her, Tom Underlay finds himself alone at home, but moments later he is shot by an intruder. Struggling to summon help, he experiences a flashback to the plane crash nine years ago that killed his first wife and led to his first encounter with the glowing aquatic beings…and his first fateful meeting with one Dr. Mariel Varon. Even when he’s taken to the hospital, Underlay is fading fast, his blood no longer compatible with that of any human, until he receives a transfusion from Mariel, whose blood isn’t even the same type as his – or at least it wasn’t when they were both fully human. Russell is confronted by Healy, the man who let him in on the secret of the failed alien incursions in the past, who tells him that Underlay may not be the problem – but whoever shot him most certainly is, and it may be someone competing to be the alpha male among the hybrids. But as sinister as Underlay’s agenda has seemed, can Russell bring himself to believe that there might be a worse alternative? Even if he does come around, Russell may not be able to stop Larkin from revealing the presence of alien life on her next news broadcast.

written by Michael Alaimo
directed by Bill Eagles
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Veronica Cartwright (Valerie Shenkman), Rocky Carroll (Healy), Bob Bancroft (Dr. Feld), Monica Garcia (Past nurse), Stephen Alvarez (Reporter #1), Kate Emerick (Kira, age 7), Ewan Chung (Dr. Frances Cao), Lisa Harrison (Reporter #2), Carter Evans (Reporter #3), Jennifer Weston (Present nurse #1), Joshua Gomez (Scott), Pia Artesona (Deputy Sanchez), Mark Colson (Deputy Munger), Kimleigh Smith (Present nurse #2), Meera Simhan (Pria)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

When she thinks she sees someone outside the house watching her, Larkin finally admits that recent events have left her scared to remain in Homestead. Fresh out of the hospital, Sheriff Underlay asks the hurricane survivors’ support group if they know the whereabouts of Deputy Sirk, who is considered a prime suspect in the attempt on Underlay’s life. After the meeting, one man comes forward with a tip that leads Underlay to a campsite near the water, where he finds Sirk. He also finds that his daughter Kira has been staying there with Sirk, though both insist that they haven’t been sleeping together. But when Kira is able to provide an alibi for Sirk’s whereabouts, Underlay is left looking for a new suspect, and his next stop is at Russell’s house. Russell lets Underlay in on the information that he might have a rival for the leadership of the hybrids – but even when Underlay insists, Russell won’t divulge where he got the information. Dave looks for signs of whatever is stalking his house, and finds that it seems to have a fixation with him – it’s been getting into the house and stealing everything from his records to his beer. When Rose spots it at the house again, Dave follows it out to the shed and finds that it has a disturbingly familiar face.

written by Michael Foley
directed by Harry Winer
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Nathan Baesel (Sirk), Ivar Brogger (Father Scanlon), Bill Quinn (The Creature), Mark Colson (Deputy Munger), James Geralden (Deputy Ramsden), Jennifer Wilkerson (Nurse), Juan Carlos Cantu (Survivor / Javi), Sylvia Kelegian (Lucy McKittrick), James Carraway (Roger Weeks), Pia Artesona (Deputy Sanchez), Reggie Jordan (Reporter #1), Saida Rodriguez Pagan (Reporter #2), Becca Battoe (Intern)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Frustrated that no one can or will tell her about “what happens in the water,” Kira Underlay decides to find out for herself, but only finds trouble. Her ex-boyfriend Derek and a young woman named Christina appear, claiming to have swum to Homestead from an island camp set up by Kira’s father. Kira reluctantly goes along with them as they introduce her to petty shoplifting, but when they break into a beachfront house and then Christina stabs the owner to death when he comes home, Kira wants no part of it – but she has no choice, as Christina holds her hostage. Even Derek, who has become a hybrid himself, is unsettled by Christina’s behavior. As Sheriff Underlay begins trying to track Kira down, Russell and Mariel get together to find out exactly how much becoming a hybrid has changed her, but the results of their tests only open more questions. Kira’s questions about what’s in the water lead her away from her captors and into an encounter with one of the glowing aquatic life forms.

written by Shaun Cassidy & Julie Siege
directed by Lawrence Trilling
music by Jon Ehrlich & Jason Derlatka

Guest Cast: Michael Mitchell (Derek Culie), Elisabeth Moss (Christina), Ruben Garfias (Albert Moldiva), Scott Klace (Stevie), Patricia Bethune (Ellen Paymer), Nathan Baesel (Sirk)

LogBook entry by Earl Green