Scene 8.14 - Perfection Has A Price
INT. U.S.S.S. Roanoke, Oblivion
(HEINLEIN and SIMAK are busy at the ship's controls. VERNE is insane and in the captain's chair, toking the last of a mondo joint, flipping switches and powering-up panels via remote control.)
VERNE
Safety-schmafety. We're wasting time.
(JYNX enters.)
JYNX
Farewell, Cleo.
VERNE
You always surprise me. Farewell. (Arm clasp.) Sorry we can't take you, Jynx. You've got your Universe to haunt, and we got ours.
JYNX
Mine has long been destroyed; and I have no need for yours. Creating Utopia has taught that I have plenty enough problems in my own head without ever having to seek out some new Universe to "try on" for size. No love is ever lost. Good luck, Cleo.
VERNE
It's been real, it's been fun.
JYNX
You're right, it has.
FX: Smoke and dissolve
MS: JYNX
(Exhales and disappears, his smoke from his exhale is all that remains.)
VERNE
Helm, prepare for lift-off.
SIMAK
Aye sir.
(ZERO enters.)
ZERO
I wanted to get here sooner, but I've been real busy. I can't let you all go anywhere without me.
HEINLEIN
Holy Sh-
VERNE
It's you!
SIMAK
Captain!
ZERO
(Smiles.) In the flesh.
VERNE
You marooned me here! Are you out of your mind? You know I want to kill you, right?
ZERO
Uh yeah, but you know death don't mean jack here so let's save the pleasantries for later, shall we? (Postures.) I gotta prep.
(He's immediately in a surgical gown; pristine.)
VERNE
(Changes into a suit that goes well with the sandstone tatt ensembe:) Why don't you want to... assimilate?
ZERO
Wait... There's yet another.
(The BARON enters.)
ZERO (Cont'd)
(To THE BARON:) I'm not screwing around -- Relax.
THE BARON
(Beat.) Sorry I'm late, I got hung up in a fantasy.
HEINLEIN
How is this possible, sir?
SIMAK
Aye, how do you got three clones in ye presence without being all one now?
ZERO
Your observation is pointless.
THE BARON
Clue us in.
VERNE
Inquiring minds just got to fricking know...
ZERO
It's kinda like that joke: It's always my day in the b... (Pause.) So, what, is there a quarantine against dank aboard this vessel?
VERNE
(Tries to produce a blunt. The chair ain't working. Pounds it. Nothing.) You're lucky I didn't kill you.
To VERNE
I know. Pretty cool of you, but then again, consider the source.
(HEINLEIN and SIMAK look to one another, jones'n for another captain-sized blunt as the clones complete their circle-jerk.)
THE BARON
(Agrees:) True that.
VERNE
(Almost on top of ZERO'S line.) Oh, don't we know it!
ZERO
You rigged the Roanoke? What is this, The Flight Of The Phoenix? You think it will work, Bad Sickle?
VERNE
(Short:) 'Sickle' will do.
ZERO
Right, right. I know you know I know you both know that I know you're both clones of me who want to come home to papa, but understand that I don't want to reassimilate either of you just yet. You're both perfect just the way you are -- for now.
(ALL blaze up their meager emergency stashes. After everyone gets a sample through rotation, all eyes slowly go to ZERO.)
ZERO (Cont'd)
(Producing a blunt.) Yeah, that's some pretty good stuff alright. Try this.
(It is the only true, non-cloned, 100% Simolean Spice Blunt appearing in this book. A hybrid of Starry Night and Mona Lesbo strains, it is the rarest of rare strains growing among the cosmic canniboids. Produced from two Necronomicon mules, germination seldom occurs and repeated cloning is impossible, as the parental strains are clones themselves. The existence of the double-s au-naturale is mostly unheard of and found only through fantastic stories, bardic ballads and campfire songs. Mouths go agape, eyes widen, joints get dropped to a floor that catches things well. ZERO sparks and passes. Rotation: HEINLEIN, SIMAK, VERNE, BARON, ZERO.)
ZERO (Cont'd)
Quite a bridge you have here. We never got a chance to see it when we were stationed here.
VERNE AND BARON
I know.
ZERO
I'm glad you kept it, B- Sickle. I figgered this Universe would be kinda like... a parting gift to you.
VERNE
You tricked me.
ZERO
I corrected and also explained myself. Here we are. I said I'd be back. You still sore at me for that?
VERNE
Yes.
ZERO
Well don't be. You're like a bottle of Cognac, kinda like some special reserve blend or something. I can't live without you, man.
VERNE AND BARON
I know.
SIMAK
Aye, are we going to talk or pass now?
HEINLEIN
I'm still confused about where we are and where in the hell we're going from here. What's the answer machine say, hmmmm?
THE BARON
Does it matter?
VERNE
Probably not.
ZERO
We're going my way.
THE BARON
What's that?
VERNE
My way or the highway.
THE BARON
No, I wasn't disputing you, I was asking-
HEINLEIN
I don't understand, sir.
SIMAK
Aye, me neither.
THE BARON
Lost me!
VERNE
(Musical. Twily finger around the temple:) Psy-cho!
ZERO
(To CLONES:) Look you fart-faced sunzabitches, and you, fellow men, you all have been doing a lot of travelin' round, doin' what ever in the hell you want to do -- (To VERNE:) Well, not you, you ain't been goin' anywhere, but you still do whatever in the hell you want to do around here, so this point applies equally to the lot of you. I am in charge, make no mistake, fellas. I am the only one who has got this figured out because I alone chose not to deviate from protocol. I did screw up once in the white room, true, but that was an error by omission and not commission. You both think my blowing up the Universe somehow warrants more attention than being lost in time -- but does it? You see, even with Azalea, I didn't screw it up in the red room no matter what you may believe, I can't screw it up. I know cuz I made it so I wouldn't!
VERNE
Azalea? How do you know Aza-
ZERO
Quiet; I've heard plenty from you and you got me here; so let me have your attention; undivided.
HEINLEIN
Go on, Captain. Where are we going from here?
ZERO
I can take us anywhere, because I haven't ever really gone anywhere. I'm actually still in the red room, and you three are going to help me make this perfect again. We were split for a purpose, perhaps a higher, more noble purpose -- and I'm gonna hafta find out what that is.
THE BARON
You've lost me completely.
VERNE
Me too, but I still wan't to know more about how you know Azale-
ZERO
I'm Verne Zero; the A-hole who put you here, the one who tricked you out of reality, the soul of the meat in the twain.
VERNE
I feel I should kill you, for you truly are the evil one.
ZERO
That's why I'm telling you that if you even blink in a fashion I don't dig, I'll totally waste you and come up with a whole new plan that doesn't need to include any of you S-O-Bs.
THE BARON
What in Hades' House of Hermaphrodite Hookers are ya talking about now?
SIMAK
Aye, Sir, what plan? A camping plan now?
(ZERO passes, sparks another.)
ZERO
(Tokes lazily and deeply.) The blunt reality. Any of you do so much as twitch in my presence in the next 13 hours will answer to my blaster, Capiche?
ALL
(Ad libs. JYNX'S response is faint and echoey:) Aye, Captain. Understood. Not quite. Yes, brother. Yes.
ZERO
Say goodbye to Oblivion.
ALL
Goodbye, Oblivion.
ZERO
Hello, red room.
CUT TO: Red room
MS: A surgical table, bloodied. Two dead naked chicks all cut up and messy.
(AZALEA is exactly what a body that was freeze-dried in a sardine can and chucked into space only to be sliced by a laser and subsequently-radiated-and-cooked by cosmic rays would look like. CHAPTER ONE VERNE is frozen over the body, motionless and in the middle of doing something miraculous with his quantum scalpel and his spanner. TK-420, over an exact duplicate body [AZALEA 1], is parroting the movements of CHAPTER ONE VERNE and is startled when the group arrives. He eyes the group nervously.)
ZERO
Don't stop what you're doing. Follow my lead instead.
(He produces a spanner of his own and slides the bloody-and-gory tray of corpse-meat out from under the watch of the seemingly-motionless CHAPTER ONE VERNE and looks upon it like a glutton at a seven-course feast.)
ZERO (Cont'd)
You assume that the procedure is unknown; that you're covering virgin ground. That, my dear former selves, is why you all fail. I'm the Q-P expert; I know what in the hell I'm doing. We've already succeeded; and thinking otherwise gets you nowhere...
SOUND: Electric tool gearing up to do its work
MS: ZERO
(A spray of blood.)
ZERO
See, this is how you go about it, lads -- no pussyfootin' 'round...
MS: CREWMEN BEHIND ZERO AND CORPSE
SOUND: Bone saw going to town on a skull held with a vice
(He cuts into AZALEA'S head. HEINLEIN and SIMAK visibly-react to the out-of-frame gore.)
FTB