Scene 10.07 - Settling The Score
EST: INT. - Water Well Dive Bar, ISIS Station Sub-Hub-Level
(VYLENCIA is in her element. A small, seedy, smoky basement whose walls are adorned with hubcaps, vintage metal signs and nude pin-up posters. Boys murmer in the shadows, playing dominos and drinking fortys; no faces are clearly seen except for CAMEO 23 and VYLENCIA, seated at a small round table under a hanging lamp. CAMEO 23 has his hands together, fingers interlocked and elbows on the table. VYLENCIA is leaning in, under the light, joint in one hand, shot glass in another, cigar in ashtray -- which adds a distinct cherrywood-horse-dung aroma to the ambiance of the dinky, danky basement. CAMEO 23 is chewing tobacco and is 39/40 in hitting the spitoon near his right foot, located squarely between SALVATORE'S open, seated legs. STEPHEN is between VYLENCIA and SALVATORE, dimly seen in the shadow, observing with cold interest. VYLENCIA betrays a bead of sweat. It drips from her cheek and she catches it with the shot of whisky. She downs the shot and repeats her offer.)
CAMEO 23
Only a ton. It takes a year to replace a ton, and it we hafta re-seed it if'n we drain it too far.
LUNATIC
([CAMEO 9] Phrophesizing; muttering in a corner, unnoticed except by the camera.) Osiris was cut into eight pieces; dead for a night. Isis: Savagely cut into many parts, yet her sex remains.
VYLENCIA
Okay: Limited rights for proceeds from the tourist park and a fair cut of royalties from the museum gift shop at The Sea Of Tranquility. (Beat. Nod.) And yes: One-dollar-a-year rent for Moms' furnished upscale Brightside retirement condo on the six-hundred block of Aldrin Street from today to a hundred years from today. Okay, I shouldn't ask; but what more could you possibly ever want than what I'm offering you now?
CAMEO 23
I want assurance. Ava is the most sought-after drug known, and you did right to come to me. Moms is the only source of it and everybody knows that. I get it direct. You can get it watered down somewhere else, but it's pure from me. You want a ton, you gonna affect the market, my market. Moms' market. You gotta be in like the other cartels; if'n you sell it, you gotta sell it at what Moms tells you it's worth.
VYLENCIA
I don't plan on selling any of it; half of it I'll trade for favors and the other half I'll keep for a rainy day. That stuff is more valuable than gold. I know the importance of keeping an commodity's value at a fair-but-profitable price. Like I said, I'm only giving the stuff away -- hopefully over a long period of time. Kinda like Christmas gifts and birthdays and what-not. In the arena of politics, having something everybody wants gives you a power of negotiation hardly found elsewhere.
CAMEO 23
Don't I know it. We gots a deal then. We gots to finalize it with Moms. Itemyz'n it and such.
VYLENCIA
It ain't the kind of thing I'll put to paper, an' it sure ain't gonna be sealed with a kiss.
CAMEO 23
I'll give you all I got here for all them tokens your boy's got and we can all walk away happy.
LEONIDAS
(Leaning in:) I ain't her boy; boy. Don't forget that I knew your Moms before you were even itchin' in your pappy's pants but my Auntie said you th' pick o' the litter so we stay tight and we deal, okay? I'll take your... two-'n'-a-half pounds?
CAMEO 23
Two-point-six-seven. Plus, three ounces of Pure Motherlode Hashish, but who's counting?
(They trade. LEONIDAS inherits a backpack full of paraphenalia and sacks of AVA. It's a light blue-and-dark-blue-flecked powder; like laundry soap, or Martian food, or something.)
CAMEO 23
(Caressing rolls of tickets:) I'm rich...
LUNATIC
The Children Of Isis are naked; a wolf at the door. Mother Owl cannot protect them alone.
HEINLEIN
Damn, this is nearly pure!
CAMEO 23
No, not almost. It is pure. As for you, Moon Queen, you want a ton, you gotta see to it to get it yourself. Personally.
VYLENCIA
I gotta extract it? Why am I going through you, then? I could just pay off security...
CAMEO 23
Nah, we already got those bases covered. Nah, you just gotta be there to see it done; so you know what you're getting and so everyone walks away happy - 'cludin' Moms. You can ship it in one of our crates or one of your own but we guarantee it til' it lands wherever you want it: Down South on Earth, or on Luna, where it's legal everywhere; either way we're done.
VYLENCIA
Well, the moon's getting their cut, too, so I'll need two crates -- mine, and about three hundred pounds for the moon. Is the moon a cheaper rate? It's way closer... and I've kept it legal there for a reason.
CAMEO 23
Scarce there as everywhere else that isn't here. Gotta charge for two drops all the same, but you're gettin' bulk price, so feel good 'bout it. Usually, it takes more than words to seal the deal, but Moms gave the O-K, and I don't go 'gainst Moms.
VYLENCIA
Sounds like you're smart enough to run her business someday.
CAMEO 23
I'm really all she's got and she's all I got. You got the moon, I got Moms.
SALVATORE
How did you get the moon? I've been wonderin' too long already.
VYLENCIA
This ain' the best time, Sal. I really don't want to go into it...
CAMEO 23
We're on your time. You've exceeded my sales quota for the year. I'm sure I'm gettin' a bonus outta this somehow.
(The men about VYLENCIA had been smoking AVA in little foil-ey boats, burning it like meth. They finally pass a straw and loaded boat to VYLENCIA, who doesn't hesitate in the least. Domino players and the Lunatic drop by and squeeze-in a hit and everyone shares freely until everyone is lit.)
LUNATIC
The eclipse is nigh, while lips breathe stardust and Isis devours the innocence of her young... Queen Luna will save us all and free the children of the night.
SALVATORE
Seems that everyone gets the skinny except those she calls her friends. Even Lunatics know she's the Moon Queen.
VYLENCIA
Ahhhhokay... I found an auction listing for it, or so it seemed, on an obscure government website where they hold surplus buy-outs. Everyone and their grandmother thought they were bidding on the moon itself, and I think Harvard Rassmussen topped them all with his trillon-five bid. What none of them bothered to read was the terms and conditions of the website before they joined their secret secular suck-off circle or they would have realized that mandatory job postings were also on the menu. You see, they weren't asking how much I wanted to pay to own the moon, they were asking how much I wanted as compensation to negotiate assuming the lifetime position of Lunar Executive Officer, a sovereign entity protected by treaty and of an authority that is exceeded only by the United States President and the U-N kinda-sort-of-not-really, but is most-definitely a lifetime post because they all went through rubber-stamp hell creating the job in committee and sub-committee and task-force surveys and kept a million unrelated amendments off the bill and not a swinging cock or a flappin' clam thought it anything but suicide to offer up their own non-partisan lamb for the post, so they all jumped at the chance when I volunteered and agreed to run it all for just a buck off the top. (Pause. Hit.) Believe me, I had considered that if I did get the post, I'd never be the same, and you know what? I sure the hell was right. Right as rain. The girl I was before seems like a long lost dream now. I'm the richest woman in the world not cuz I got money; it's cuz I got clout; in spades. I'm the smartest woman in the world not cuz I run the moon efficiently, which I certainly do with patience, prowess and endless tolerance, and it's not because I never abuse my power, which I never do because of ethics, empathy and tireless endurance, it's really cuz I never let myself or the moon ever go into debt. Never. I'm the wisest woman in the world because I know instinctively that even if a person doesn't need power to get ahead, a person still needs it to stay afloat.
LEONIDAS
This is some good stuff...
SALVATORE
You said it.
STEPHEN
Uoommmm...
CAMEO 23 (Cont'd)
It ain't cut like on Earth, Moms is the source and she always sells it pure so you know whatchoo gettin. Let's go see Moms personally, somethin' none get to do cept you. She'll have to seal this other deal and the sooner it's done, the better.
VYLENCIA
I understand.
CAMEO 23
I'm not sure you do.
VYLENCIA
What do I need to know?
CAMEO 23
Moms is family. I ain't really her son. None of us are. (Smiling:) She likes you white chicks.
STEPHEN
(Sharply looking about, like a baby-bird that just got fed the worm at the bottom of a bottle of liquid-methamphetamine.) Vy - I think...
CAMEO 23
Yo! It should be kickin' in hard by the time we get over there, so if annyall gonna freak out or start trippin' do it now an' don't wait until Moms' house to do it so I know who to look out for, ai't? Lemme know if you're buggin' cuz I got some tasty herbal pills in my stash that can help you come down... or at least, level-off a little...
STEPHEN
Is this the only reality? Are we not truly gods, of varied personas, play-acting in a game?
SALVATORE
(Looks at CLARKE.) It's kickin' in. Let's go before the first crash. Keep them pills handy.
(The men saunter up the small stairway, stowing the evidence of their latest rush.)
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. SHADOWY CRAWLSPACE ABOVE ROOM C-A-1127
(DAVE rests within a nook of a metal crawlspace, leading off in three directions, seemingly toward infinity. He peers downward through a large and elaborate vent cover. A floor to a room lies twenty feet below. It is elaborately tiled in a geometric shape representing a hypercube. ASIMOV is working feverishly across the keyboard of an odd lap-top looking device with a large holographic screen, providing the only light in the tight crawlspace, save the dim light from the room below, pouring through the large vent cover spanning several feet of the floor of the crawlspace. A hot CANDY appears on the screen.)
DAVE
Candy, yew ear me?
CANDY
Of course, Professor. We're all here, anxiously awaiting your next command.
DAVE
Kin yew ix is ze log deeta if diss sheep wizzouzey hep from zey Rim Eye-Oh peart off it?
CANDY
Oh, we don't need Romeo. He's still wandering around in here somewhere. We can access any library from any terminal on the ship.
DAVE
Kin yew do it on ziss?
CANDY
Of course, Professor. This hack terminal is as good as the others. Whacha wanna know?
DAVE
I vant all ze V-D-O if win Miz Lee in me vere inziss rewm belew me.
CANDY
Searching. Four instances found from primary camera bank A-S 1324-A and secondary camera banks A-D 1561, series A through G, totalling sixty-nine minutes, seventeen seconds. Hmmmm... They were placed in a locked file; it took two sweeps to find them.
DAVE
Inte wristing. Vey gud. Pliss ply thim new.
CANDY
Clip One; twenty-six minutes, thirteen seconds.
MS: CLIP ONE
POV: Ship security cameras, various angles and focal lengths.
(DAVE enters the room. NANCY is centered in the room, 3/4ths-atop a 16' foldable ladder and watering the lush, verigated and viney hanging plants that break the view of the ceiling from below. A large brass tea-kettle-looking thing dominates one wall of the room, while a large chrome door with a large unblinking eye dominates another. DAVE enters via a small, swishing red door next to the 38' kettle and walks by the long-and-wide porthole adorning yet another wall and strides boldly to the final wall, across from the brassy vat. It is a simple gray wall with a yellow-tinted window and a plain white door leading to a security bay. A large computer terminal is mounted in the space between the window and the door. DAVE makes a bee-line to it, checks something off his clipboard, replaces his pen within the confines of his plastic pocket-pen protector within his white lab coat breast pocket and uses a latex-gloved hand to adjust his white hard hat and horn-rimmed glasses. He sets his clipboard onto the pop-out shelf at the bottom of the terminal and feverishly begins to type commands into the terminal. As he walked under the ladder, NANCY wondered if this lad was even aware of her presence, much less the superstition of not walking under ladders. She clears her throat.)
NANCY
(Huh-hmm!) Excuse me... who are you, how did you get in here and what do you think you're doing?
DAVE
Von mimmint pliz! (He types in a few commands, turns a dial and some weird logo pops up on the screen and varied computer squelchy sounds emit from the terminal speaker. He retreives his clipboard, snaps the shelf upward to cover the terminal buttons and secondary monitor displays and turns to address the girl, who is dressed in black leather and a white, unbuttoned lab coat, very similar to ASIMOV'S, yet far more fashionable.) Vat is it?!?
NANCY
Who in the hell are you, how in the hell did you get past that door, and what in the hell did you just do to that terminal?
DAVE
Seary. I dead nought say you ipzere. I am Divid Dinneld Divis from ze Hub Engineering sex shun ind Eem chicking all ze terminals in ziss corridor tew see efzere verking pripperlee!
NANCY
I see. Does being a Hub engineer allow you access to this room freely or just when you gotta do that thing you just did?
DAVE
(Near the bottom of the ladder.) Hee hee -- E hivv acess to every rewm onziss sheep; vy, I desinned hiff if ze ip greeds! Vy shiddint E?
NANCY
(Starts to descend, slowly in her high heels.) Sir, these are like private quarters; in fact this whole corridor is owned by the DreamTek corporation. You need an escort to be walking through here. You can't just come in here like you did. There are industrial secrets to protect and there are safety concerns-
(She slips from the ladder and falls, letting the water pitcher fly. ASIMOV drops his clipboard and rushes to catch her. Both fall to the ground, her on top of him.)
DAVE
Are yew alright?
NANCY
I could have broken my neck! You! You might have saved my life! Are you okay?
DAVE
Yew shiddint be vearing zose heelz; kifful! E meet nyet be aruined tew kitch yew nixt tim!
NANCY
(Adjusts strap.) I love my shoes. Perhaps I need to keep you around for a next time. (Standing, brushing off. Super-sweet:) My hero.
CU: A BLUSHING, SMILING DAVE, ADJUSTING HIS HORN-RIMMED GLASSES.
CUT TO: A FROWNING DAVE, LIT WITH DARK COLORS FROM THE LAPTOP SCREEN
DAVE
Candy, shew me ze nixt von.
CANDY
Clip two, Six-minutes and nine seconds.
DAVE
Yew dent nid tew till me all zat, just ply eat, pliss.
SWISH!
MS: A drunken couple, making out, fall into the darkened room via red doorway. It is ASIMOV and NANCY, dressed in 1920s garb and drinking Champagne. It was a Roaring Twenties-themed party, apparently.
NANCY
(Laughing.) You fiend! Computer, lights! (Glaring white light removes every trace of shadow within the room.) No, computer, not so damn bright! Candlelight setting! (A romantic and low-light ambiance fills the room. He kisses her neck repeatedly.) Oooh yeah. I'll give you an hour to stop doing that. Come, make love to me, here on the floor. No one can walk in on us here.
(DAVE puts a hand under her dress and continues to kiss her neck.)
DAVE
Thiss leetl peegie vent tew merkit...
NANCY
Whooo!
DAVE
Ind thiss leeltl peegie vent home...
NANCY
Oh! Oh!
DAVE
Thiss leetl peegie hid wristed beef.
NANCY
Ahh... beef...
DAVE
Ind this leettl peegie hid nin!
NANCY
Ah, ha, huh, wow!
DAVE
Ind thiss leetl peegie vent, "Vee! Vee! Vee!" -- allza vay home.
NANCY
Oui! Oui! Oui! Oh, baby... Baby, whip it out for me I wanna taste... taste your nougat.
DAVE
Me nugget?
NANCY
Oh yeah, your nougat... I wanna coat this beaded dress with... what's wrong, baby?
DAVE
(Looking-off while being pulled closer.) Is nyet reet. Vy is zat eye gluing leek thit?
NANCY
What? That eye?
DAVE
Yiss.
NANCY
Forget about it, kiss me some more.
DAVE
It looks leek it's steering eat me.
NANCY
Forget about it! It's just a hatch cover! Come on!
DAVE
Vy ease ze eye gluing leek thit?
NANCY
The lights are on the candlelight setting, it sometimes glows now and then. So what?
ECU: STOIC, STARING DOOR WITH DIMLY GLOWING CORNEA
DAVE
Ee dint leek eat. It licks leek eats vatching me.
NANCY
It's not; it ain't real. Uncle Huey just made it that way; he had a flair for the odd.
DAVE
Whooz Inkle Huey?
NANCY
Hugo Genaistenex -- we call him Uncle Huey at DreamTek. He built this computer a very long time ago... that eye is just a super-con tank for the computer's C-P-U. That hatch doesn't open.
DAVE
Zere's a kimpitter in zere? Veally? Limme zee!
NANCY
Look, I'm gonna lose my mood. (Swigs.) Let's skidaddle to the security bay. There's comfy sofas and no cameras in there and no one's gonna see us; not even Uncle Huey's ghost.
CU: Great Unblinking Eye
SILENCE
MS: The lovers exiting through the other door across the room
DAVE
Yiss, Eye sink zats bissed.
CU: DAVE WATCHING HOLOGRAM
DAVE (COnt'd)
Candy, pliss move on...
CANDY
Clip three...
(NANCY strides into the room, determined to walk across it and through the security bay, away from ASIMOV, who, following her, causes her to stop in the middle of the room and confront him. NANCY is wearing her unbuttoned lab coat. ASIMOV is dressed casually.)
DAVE
Nancy, vait! Hivv you hid E sickened up in yon?
NANCY
And a third and a fourth and a fifth... Look! I thought if I told you, you'd be a little more understanding about it. I'm just being fair to you by telling you. This isn't about you, tho.
DAVE
Sicks minths? Zats nussing bit a dith sintince! No! Nyet! Nein! I von't axipt eat!
NANCY
I've accepted it, that's what matters. I've known for a year now. You wanted to know why I got sterilized, and rather than lie to you, I felt it was best you know: I'm dying, Davey.
DAVE
Tilling me you sink you're ginna die isn't-
NANCY
I don't think I'm gonna die, I know it. I've seen the pictures. A fat lump lodged in the middle of my brain. Sooner than later, all my organs are going to stop working and you'll have to move on to finding another nice girl who... loves you... as much as I do...
(He embraces her. She cries on his shoulder.)
NANCY (Cont'd)
I'm sorry I didn't tell you before. I was selfish.
DAVE
Dent bee seary. I've bean inly sinking if meself, Eam ear fir yew.
NANCY
I love you, Dave.
CUT TO: CRAWLSPACE
CU: An irritated DAVE watches the small, three-dimensional holo-display.
DAVE
Candy, eeniff. Not ziss von, ply ze last von; zats ze ownlee von I vant tew rilly see.
MS: A slightly static-filled screen with less varied shots; also, only two-dimensional
DAVE (Cont'd)
Sweetz, kin yew clean zat ip a beat?
CANDY
Sorry, Professor, the recording's integrity has been compromised, it's as good as I have.
DAVE
Kimprimeezed, hawh?
(NANCY stands nude in the center of the darkened room; DAVE enters from the red door. The porthole dimly provides mostly-blue-hued starlight.)
ASIMOV
Nancy, yewer sleepwalking, kim bick te bid, beeb.
NANCY
He's waiting for me. He's here.
ASIMOV
Dearling, kim bick te bid, yewer steal dreaming.
NANCY
He's in there...
ASIMOV
Whoo? Whooz in there?
CU: THE GREAT EYE
(A dim blue light from within the cornea of the unblinking eye emits, growing stronger, eventually flooding the room in white light with a blueish color temperature.)
MS: Large tubes from the tea kettle become transparent and show a glowing blue substance boiling within and churing into-and-out-of the kettle.
VIDEO SQUELCH
CUT TO:
STILL: A face shot of ASIMOV, pixelated, as if a thumbnail photo was increased in size.
(To a sound technician, it is obvious the various words of the subsequent audio clips are pieced together from other clips, as the background noise fluctuates and the tempo and emphasis sounds out-of-joint when examined closely and using digital enhancements and headphones and such. However, this particular nuance was initially missed by DAVE, his defense lawyer and the jury; who considered it to be yet another conclusive piece of evidence, as it is common knowledge among most laymen the irrefutability of holo-logs, as no one living is seemingly capable of tampering with goverment-issue log recorders.)
NANCY V.O.
What's the gun for? Dave?
DAVE V.O.
Eef I kint, hivv you, zen no von kin. Kinsidder ziss, a merci keeling... Nancy...
VIDEO SQUELCH
LS: Now a darkened room. Blue starlight from a porthole caresses a stoic statue of a nude woman and we see a silhouette shrouded in dim yellow light from a small open doorway
MS: Two dark figures -- one nude female remains standing in the center of the room while another remains at the open red door, frozen at the threshhold. The silhouette of ASIMOV stands at the doorway, and levels what appears to be a handgun at the porthole and shoots.
SOUND: GUNSHOT.
(DAVE quickly exits the room as the statue topples to the floor, trailing a stream of red.)
SOUND: SWISH.
(Air and small glass shards slowly rush from the porthole and the porthole begins to crack, then suddenly... WHOOSH! ROAAAR! Everything not nailed down or affixed tightly to a wall quickly shoots from the room outward into starlit blackness -- to include NANCY, whose entrails gush from her bullet wound.)
ALARM SOUNDS
COMPUTER V.O.
Warning! Decompression and hull breach detected in room C-A-1127, all station personnel report to duty stations for emergency lock-down instructions. Civilians, please remain where you are until your safety can be assured. Warning! Decompression and hull...
CU: DAVE, perplexed. He does a cut-throat gesture and the transmission ceases.
DAVE
Bit... thit's... nyet... how it hippined!
FTB