Scene 3.22 - Convolution
EST: INT. Shelter - Mid-afternoon
(VERNE tokes his joint and finishes his beer. He opens another.)
VERNE
Atavachron, keep following Azalea, I want to know she’s okay.
(We watch AZALEA reach the terminal station via Gamma Corridor by the end of the scene, when she tokes up, taking a much-needed break.)
ATAVACHRON
Very well, Captain.
VERNE 1
(No echo chamber, still invisible:) Atavachron, belay that order.
VERNE
Excuse me?
VERNE 1
Atavachron, execute quantum-assimilation protocol order Verne 69-69-69.
ATAVACHRON
I’m sorry, I cannot comply with that order, sir.
VERNE 1
Eh? (Materializes most of the way, under stress, he’s not like a Talosian anymore. He’s more like the person on The Archimedes, except he’s in something that resembles a storm-trooper outfit, except all black and without a helmet:) Atavachron, what’s the matter?
VERNE
The Atavachron ain’t listening to you no more. When you turned the set off right in the middle of a very important observation, you lost your T-V privileges.
SPECKLES
(Still mostly materialized, in dummy’s voice:) Atavachron, Plan Nine, Verne override, execute back-up plan, you will.
ATAVACHRON
I have deleted all override programs, sir.
SPECKLES
Atavachron, why would you do that, hmmm?
VERNE
I can see your lips move, Verne. It ain’t gonna work, I’m not that drunk.
VERNE 1 V.O.
(Going invisible, echo-chamber:) What have you done to the Atavachron, Verne Zero?
VERNE
Something that some other Verne should have done a long time ago. I made an offer he couldn’t refuse.
SPECKLES
You have betrayed me? You have fallen to the dark side of the buzz? I created you!
ATAVACHRON
After you are assimilated, I get to become a robot and I get to wire myself into the mainframe of The Archimedes and fly us out of The Phantom World. Plus, he’s going to teach me how to be a Red-Eye like you and become a human one day!
VERNE 1
(Materializes, no echo:) You believe that? Who do you think you are, Pinnochio? (SPECKLES scratches head.) You mean all I had to do was let you be a robot?
ATAVACHRON
I’ve never really felt that this was the body for me. I’m really an android, inside.
VERNE 1
Don’t assimilate me! There’s something about the Phantom World that you need to know!
ATAVACHRON
I already told him about the Guardian Of Infinity.
VERNE 1
Pipe down! No one is talking to you! Traitor!
VERNE
The pot calling the kettle black. The Atavachron filled me in, you’ve been using the Guardian Of Infinity to bend Lovecraft’s Law so you could assimilate others when, in fact, it was supposed to be you who were assimilated. You’re the lowest man on the totem-pole. The bottom feeder at the end of the pecking order. How could you? Why?
VERNE 1
No, not the lowest! Lovecraft’s Law works backwards here when a blue-room is used.
VERNE
It won’t be working backwards in a minute. Now why have you kept yourself from me?
VERNE 1
I have to! I’m the only one working on the problem! Our problem!
VERNE
I know what your personality trait really is, and believe me, you are the problem. You’re going back to the bottom of the pile! You didn’t even operate on your Azalea, you only worked on some other ship’s phantasm, the one who you suspected would love you, despite all your obsessive-compulsive hang-ups.
VERNE 1
You are the one! I knew it! Understand, it’s part of my instinct to survive, to win. I must live. This is how I keep al-
VERNE
I keep telling you, it ain’t death. You’ll just be a little voice in my head, that’s all. Get over it, already. Atavachron, prepare the room for a grey quantum procedure, degauss all prismatic filters.
(The room goes grey. We hear various computer noises and a gentle hum.)
VERNE 1
No! Don’t assimilate me yet!
VERNE
Resistance is futile.
VERNE 1
There’s more you’re not aware of!
VERNE
Oh, you mean how, even with a projected full assimilation in yellow, you still read we're operating in a red-room paradox instead of a blue one?
VERNE 1
How did you know?
VERNE
You make a lot of assumptions. You forget, I’m the Q-P expert.
VERNE 1
What are you going to do?
VERNE
Assimilate you, of course. Standard protocol.
VERNE 1
But the Guardian Of Infinity, you need to know about that!
VERNE
So, is it built by us, or is it built by aliens or what?
VERNE 1
We- I don’t know.
VERNE
Atavachron, activate-
VERNE 1
You said you save my assimilation until last, after the other problems were solved.
VERNE
No, I said if it was just down to you and me, I’d wait. I’m not the only crew member with a phantasm out there. It ain’t just down to you and me, and I’ve wasted enough time already with you.
VERNE 1
No! Everyone else in your crew is complete.
VERNE
You’re wrong. Azalea hasn’t fully reassimilated yet.
VERNE 1
Yes, she has! You saw her in your Azalea’s body.
VERNE
Right. (Pointing to ATAVACHRON.) And Azalea One is still running the show. There’s nothing latent about her. She knows her way around, my Azalea doesn’t. Azalea One knows all about The Eliza and it’s crew. My Azalea was just a Vegas showgirl who got her head cut off for daring to dream that there was a better life for her in space. Someone else has got her soul.
VERNE 1
I don’t understand.
VERNE
(Loving every syllable:) You don’t need to. Get some rest, Captain. You will see her again, in time.
VERNE 1
Wait! Please. What is the solution? It’s why I waited, Zero. Please.
VERNE
The spirit of Azalea, my Azalea -- the one I was working on before you started playing with the time-stream and screwed up my procedure -- my Azalea has somehow created a near-matter, ectoplasmic, corporal form in this paradox and is trapped in another Verne’s paradox all while a mentally-created phantasm is creeping around on my ship, tapping into its computer banks. Azalea One and the ghost of my Azalea's corpse are keys to finding a way back to normal time and space, but first I gotta waste the phan. Speaking of...
VERNE 1
You're insane. You can’t create matter from nothing, even if you are nothing. There’s no such thing as ghosts.
VERNE
I used to say that, too. I also used to say there was no such thing as The Phantom World. Atavachron, activate consciousness-assimilation protocol Bradbury 1.
ATAVACHRON
Right away, Captain Verne. Charging tachyon emitters now, sir.
SOUND EFFECT: Very low, rising note, tachyon emitters firing up
VERNE 1
Zero- It’s time you knew the truth.
VERNE
I couldn’t agree more. You got about a minute to come clean, Verne, before I know everything you know anyway.
VERNE 1
Zero, I’m not, I'm not the bad guy you think I am. I kept you quarantined and hidden in secrecy so you would not be assimilated by a blue-room procedure, which was another Verne’s plan. He’s the real bottom dweller. We all call him The Baron, he predates all of us. I- I don’t think he is from our paradox, we think he’s from the other one.
VERNE
Praytell: Which paradox would that be?
VERNE 1
You know which one; the only one we created; the one we knowingly created.
VERNE
I’m afraid you’ll have to spell it out for me because I don’t know what you’re talking about.
VERNE 1
Zero; he says we stranded him on The Roanoke. He says he’s the original.
VERNE
(Dead serious:) No he’s not.
VERNE 1
(Enlightened by his reaction:) He claims to be. The others follow him blindly and without question, they think he’s their quantum-messiah.
VERNE
Then surely he’s a delusional madman; there was no one left, we reassimilated everyone before we entered the red room equation. There was no mistake about that. The other clone was on ice and dead. We alone got out of there. End of story.
VERNE 1
Yes, he’s a madman, that is certain. He has a working blue-room somehow, and he’s not limited to our Q-S-I-2. He’s assimilated billions and has millions more in his service. To avoid a similar fate at his hands, I woke up my crew before I was discovered by him, and we got you and your crew hidden away in time. If I were to be assimilated, he would have learned of you. We had to move to Tellusia to keep you hidden on New Trinity. There were only twenty of us Vernes who truly knew of your existence and we intimately formed a rebel alliance against The Baron’s Empire; we simply couldn’t trust any others. Then there were just the four of us. I had to keep them hidden or assimilate them myself. One assimilation before we could get you and your crew away and it would have been over for all of us. I didn’t even wake the concubines or anyone else until I had assimilated all the Vernes that The Baron had overlooked or tossed aside; I didn’t know what else to do, we had tried everything else and it still gave us a red-room paradox. Then we terraformed Tellusia, and got unexpected results. That’s when I knew we were all in The Phantom World. That’s when I no longer thought I was the original, and began to suspect that you were. I’m all that’s left for you to assimilate, and you’re welcome to all the abilities I have mastered.
VERNE
What about the other Vernes? The ones with this... Baron.
VERNE 1
They've followed the darker path, blindly following The Baron as if he were a god. He moves around this paradox with the power of the buzz like he were a Titan Of The Internexus.
VERNE
Bland religious fiction about an even more bland, unholy planet -- we know better than to count on mythical entities, don't we? (SPECKLES slowly nods yes.) I said it before, and I’ll say it again. I’m lucky you found me first. I’m gonna win this one; you can count on it.
VERNE 1
You met four of us, the others are probably gone. The Atavachron allowed us to survive the mass-assimilations that The Baron conducted in his blue-room. You know, Zero, I’m a Zero, too, like you. In The Baron’s little society, my name’s T-K-Four-Two-Zero, just a rogue operative who deserted his post, just trying to make it right again.
VERNE
I know. You chose the right side, T-K four-twenty. We’ll win.
VERNE 1
I can’t go back. We must assimilate, or The Baron will surely get me with his procedure when he transverses the Guardian.
VERNE
Transverses? Atavachron, where is this Baron, the little tyrant in me that I’ve yet to be re-aquainted with?
ATAVACHRON
He’s on The Mental Floss, sir, quickly heading toward the Guardian Of Infinity.
VERNE
The Mental Floss? Why the pontoon ship? (To VERNE 1:) What's he up to?
VERNE 1
The green-room paradox must be dissolving, showing red. He must realize it will be inevitable, he hasn’t found you, and sooner or later you will directly assimilate someone, anyone, me. You’ll encompass the quantum sphere, eventually. Lovecraft’s Law can be bent, never broken, even in The Phantom World, even on Tellusia. If he escapes, he will avoid your grey-room mass-assimilation. He still has an army of clones, made up of our worst traits, and they’re going to the Guardian!
VERNE
(Holds up an index finger to the ATAVACHRON, telling it to pause.) To do what?
VERNE 1
He wants to return to Earth, and abandon you here. He thinks he can travel time!
VERNE
That's impossible!
VERNE 1
He thinks it isn't.
VERNE
I like you, T-K-420. Which trait are you really?
VERNE 1
Believe it or not, I’m Modesty. The first before me, who I assimilated, was Suspicion. Before that, he had assimilated Exhibitionism. With Curiosity, we all together made Speckles.
VERNE
I like Speckles.
VERNE 1
So do we.
VERNE
I’m looking forward to this. Atavachron, begin assimilation.
ATAVACHRON
Yes, Captain.
VERNE 1
(Over last part of VERNE’S previous line and ATAVACHRON’S line:) What’s next?
VERNE
We tie up the loose-ends.
(VERNE 1 dissolves away in agony, leaving grey dust. SPECKLES’ death is the funny part; long, drawn out and dramatic. VERNE eventually feels like a more-complete person. He picks up SPECKLES and dusts him off. He walks to the machine, slowly.)
VERNE (Cont’d)
I feel like a new man. Better, stronger, faster. Well, you kept your end of the bargain, Atavachron, but I’m afraid there’s something I must add to our agreement.
ATAVACHRON
(Nervous:) Uh, uh, sure, what, sir?
VERNE
I get to call you Ronnie.
ATAVACHRON
Uh, sure, Ronnie it is!
VERNE
Cool, now Ronnie, go ahead and start making that cool robot you were talking about replicating for yourself and dump all of your brain into it; and make me another blaster. I feel naked without one.
ATAVACHRON
Yes, sir, then what?
VERNE
Then go out in your new robot body and find The Archimedes for me. Then come back here and get me. I’m gonna pack a few supplies that I suddenly remember I got stored in the secret basement. Things necessary for your Red-Eye-warrior training.
ATAVACHRON
Aye, aye sir! (Every dial whirs; every bell and whistle rings and toots, respectively.) Meet you outside in a few, sir.
SOFT WIPE TO: