Cade, Eddie and Jordan travel to the town of Hope to find out what has happened to a Raven Nation member and discover that everyone there is hiding a terrible secret.

The beauty of the Gua is that, in essence, they are merely little spheres of consciousness. This saves a lot of budget and also makes them far easier to kill if you get to them in time. Gua infiltrations of small towns have been done before, but this plays the angle a little differently as we discover humans pressed into service, with no Gua even appearing until the very end of the episode.

While the viewers sit back and try to work out who the Gua is, it's revealed that there is none and the townsfolk are obeying and following like sheep. While there's a little too much running around and accusing each of the locals of being a murderer, you do get to know the characters and how close the community is. It's been a while since First Wave did a story about the inherent evils of humanity, but this one works well, with a confrontation that doesn't take the easy route at the end and a person is killed.

Meanwhile, the lead triumvirate are pulling together well, with Jordan and Cade showing little signs of a frisson between them and Eddie getting in on more of the action as well. While Cade's method for solving the problem is unlikely to work and liable to bring more trouble to Hope, it's good to see a positive ending as Foster stops a major offensive before it starts. Despite the relatively small scale the episode plays out on, it's still a conflict on a larger scale being brought into careful focus, and it suits the nature of the show well.

****

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