THE CHARACTERS
Bobby Lightfoot: Mentioned in Cycle One as a kid who went missing a few years before Sheldon and was likely murdered, Bobby, age thirteen, believes he has fallen into a rift in time and space. He is lost in The Middle Reaches, but he has a strong imagination, a singular purpose, and a long, long way to go.
Heather Park: Heather, a young college student, was Bobby’s babysitter a while before he disappeared. Uncertain about the popular assumption that Bobby was an early victim of the Acton Way killers, she becomes fixated on learning more about Bobby’s fate.
Janet Fillion: Glad that Heather is still willing to spend time with her younger friend from high school, Janet becomes interested in the Acton Way killings and in Bobby Lightfoot’s disappearance because Heather is. However, she doesn’t lack self-interest.
Max Gracey: Max, sixteen, wakes up between the two Acton Ways with almost no memory. He knows his name and that he’s supposed to help someone about a kid named Bobby Lightfoot. He also knows there’s something wrong with him.
Sheldon Vere: Read Cycle One. Cycle Two narrates from his perspective, developing aspects of his character others might not have perceived or that might have appeared after he began his stay in The Middle Reaches.
Gordon Marks: Fifteen and a multiple murderer, Gordon and his brother Steven killed two kids in the basement of their house on Acton Way (Sweetwater Creek runs behind it). Gordon likely killed other kids in the neighborhood. After the killings, he and Steven escaped into The Middle Reaches.
Steven Marks: Twelve-year-old Steven doesn’t have his brother’s appetite for violence, which makes the partnership they must form after years of harsh sibling conflict even more strained. Worse yet, Bobby was Steven’s best friend…
EPISODE GUIDE
Episode Sixteen, “The Man in the Grinning Mask.” (6/12/23) Bobby Lightfoot flees a boogeyman from fantasies he used to share with neighborhood kids, while his former babysitter Heather Park talks with her friend Janet Fillion about Bobby’s disappearance as well as tales of the murders on Acton Way. Meanwhile, the reputed murderers, Gordon and Steven Marks, find themselves in The Middle Reaches.
Episode Seventeen, “What Happened to Bobby Lightfoot?” (6/19/23) Bobby remembers fragments of events that led to his displacement in time and space, and Heather and Janet’s interest in Bobby’s disappearance deepens. A mysterious young man appears between the Acton Ways, and a familiar character strengthens connections to Cycle One.
Episode Eighteen, “Trapped in the Rift.” (6/26/23) Steven and Bobby confront some of the terrors of The Middle Reaches while Sheldon, Heather, and Max get closer to understanding where their senses of purpose are leading them.
Episode Nineteen, “Kind Strangers of the Strangest Kind.” (7/3/23) Max visits Heather and Janet, and they have a potentially violent face-off as he makes a bizarre proposal. Bobby and Sheldon meet and try to determine if they are friends or foes while getting to know one another.
Episode Twenty, “Tales of the King.” (7/10/23) Sheldon and Bobby envision going to the world beyond The Gate, and Adam Mortimer’s terrifying role in story becomes clearer. Janet, Max, and Heather enter The Middle Reaches, where hunters await.