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TRIUMVIRATE (Installment One) By The Host
(Part one. This is the first draft, slightly cleaned up from its original release in August. Following installments will come about twice a week until the final, complete, reedited screenplay appears on Christmas Day. This is in almost-proper format -- I can't be bothered formatting the margins quite correctly. The following represents the first nine minutes of the film.)
HOLD BLACK FOR SEVERAL SECONDS
CUT TO:
CLOSE-UP: JACK DAVIES
A bead of sweat slowly crawls down the left side of JACK DAVIES’s face, leaving a snail trail of moisture from jowl to brow. The young, handsome man stares forward, eyes wide. He blinks, breathes in, wipes his mouth with a gloved hand.
INT./EXT. SPACEFIGHTER COCKPIT -- MOVING
A NEW ANGLE reveals his cramped cockpit; sleek instruments at weird angles and everything ten shades of black. Space streaks by but his wingmen remain constant. Jack glances down at a computer display, then quickly forward again. The glowing lines of his HUD reflect back onto his face. He sniffs. His hand again shoots up and wipes his nose and is back on its allotted instrument in a flash. Mr. Davies is tense.
ROBERT JOHNSON (O.S.)Jack, you scared?
DAVIESNo. (His voice cracks; he exhales strongly) Shitless.
Davies smiles slightly but doesn’t look back. Behind him and slightly above, in the vessel’s gun pit, LIEUTENANT ROBERT JOHNSON, older and taller and lankier and more aristocratic than his flightmate, smiles too.
JOHNSONDon’t be. If we screw up, we’ve got twenty-nine thousand nine-hundred ninety-nine of our friends to clean up after us.
DAVIESWhat if they all think the same way?
JOHNSONWha-?
DAVIESWhat if they don’t care and they all screw up too?
Johnson considers this, and smiles. Davies, chuckling, ventures a quick glance back. Then, gaze forward again, the earnest tension strays back to his features.
FROM OUTSIDE
The nine sleek fighters of Davies’ flight wing fly through space in a perfect v-formation.
SUPER OPENING TITLES
Not far behind Davies’ wing flies another flight group, and behind that another, and another, and several all around: above, below, to the left and to the right and far ahead. Then a massive capital ship speeds by, unbelievably complex, its engines glowing, its hull pierced by innumerable pinpoints of light flickering through portholes and windows. It is pulled by a dozen tiny tugs, each one attached to the larger vessel by its own tenuous umbilical.
Then, after these massive ships, follows open space, but only for a moment. Hundreds of bulkier fighters form a wide, gently curving protective screen around a vast grouping of even larger capital ships. Swift small gunships sweep through and around the circle, roughly orbiting and protecting the fleet’s flagship, the USS Glory. Emblazoned with a simple white cross, it dwarfs all the vessels around it: the gunships are mere mosquitoes to this interstellar cow.
Another narrower screen of fighters takes up the rear, and then we see from a NEW ANGLE the fleet in its entirety: not thirty thousand men but thirty thousand ships. The forward fighters form a three-dimensional pattern like the teeth of a saw, pushing forward before the medium capital ships, and behind all trails the well-protected flagship and its supporting vessels. As the dense swarm of steel falcons passes on, we see that their destination is a planet – a gas giant, its surface swirling a rich shade of scarlet.
INSIDE HIS COCKPIT, Davies’ face is drenched with sweat. His breathing is faster, shallower; his heart pounds.
DAVIESI feel sick.
JOHNSONDon’t puke in here, Jack. With my luck the arti-grav’d be first to go.
Jack Davies weakly chuckles. His voice is thin and warbling, wobbling on the edge of tears.
DAVIESThink I can get out of here now?
JOHNSONI suppose you could, but shut the door on your way, will you?
Davies chuckles again, lightly, and gulps. He flinches as a droplet of sweat streams into his right eye; he squints and rubs it with his hand.
JOHNSON (CONT'D)Jack.
DAVIES(Staring straight ahead) Um-hm?
JOHNSONIt’ll be okay. Don’t worry. Hell, they’re at least as bad as we are. The last time anybody was in a battle was... (Shaking his head) ...I don’t know. (No response) Anyway, look, I know I’m not gonna die, so I’d say your chances are good.
Davies smiles.
JOHNSON (CONT'D)Still scared?
DAVIESYeah, but not shitless. I think, the opposite.
JOHNSONOh, that explains the smell!
Davies laughs aloud this time, goofishly, catching a sob in his throat.
DAVIESWhat passes for wit when you're about to die.
JOHNSONLook, Jack. If you’re scared you’ll get us killed.
DAVIESNo, I won’t, I’ll be more cautious. It’s good to be scared.
JOHNSONDon’t argue with me. Oh, you can see the gun emplacement up ahead.
Davies turns suddenly grave. He leans forward, searching.
DAVIESWhere? You see it?
JOHNSONThere.
THE FLEET MOVES THROUGH SPACE toward a distinct line of twinkling lights set against the atmosphere of the blood-red planet, which now looms near.
INSIDE DAVIES’ FIGHTER the Heads-Up-Display triangulates on the line and highlights it; it slowly pulses with light flanked by the words: GUN EMPLCMNTS (DIST. 0.768… CP) AX7-0cY 0.11 OK.
Davies looks back to Johnson.
DAVIESHow far out do you suppose the outer patrols would be?
JOHNSONThis far!
Davies swings around in time to see a vessel fly perilously close to his and then explode into a ball of flame. Davies inhales deeply and suddenly, suppressing a shriek. Wingman DANIEL O’SHEA appears on one of the computer monitors, speaking from his own cockpit.
DANJesus, Jack, are you paying attention?
DAVIES(Tapping a button on a computer display) Sorry, Dan.
Davies breathes heavily as Dan’s face is replaced by that of WING COMMANDER HARTLEY, whose deep voice reverberates throughout the cockpit.
HARTLEYI don’t know how that one came in, boys, but don’t worry, it’s a rare stray. Outer patrols are pretty light and we’re well-fenced in here, so I wouldn’t worry. What worries me is them guns up ahead. By the time we get to ‘em there’s likely to be no one left between us and them. We’re gonna need fast flyin’ and faster shooting, and take out what you can, but we wanna pass through if we can, that’s priority, then turn around and open on ‘em from behind. That’ll be tough, with fighters swarming on the other side, but we’ve gotta take those guns out before the caps arrive, they’re what’s important.
JOHNSON(To Davies) We’re bloody expendable.
HARTLEY (CONT’D)We’re the last line of defense, really. The bastards behind us have to concentrate on the fighters on the other side, but first we’ve gotta clear the rest of the guns. Good shooting and good luck. We’ll be there in fifty seconds.
Hartley disappears. There is a moment of silence. The line of lights moves discernibly closer.
DAVIESJesus. Fifty seconds. The front lines’ll be there any second.
JOHNSONLet’s hope they do their job.
Davies slowly moves his hand from one instrument to the next, staring ever forward. He licks his lips, then rubs them slowly with his gloved hand.
THE GUN EMPLACEMENTS are bulky, squarish objects bristling with weaponry. Most prominent on each is a single large gun, mounted on a pivot which is itself attached to a track that circles the gun platform so that the gun can move from front to rear.
THE OUTERMOST SHIPS approach the regular pattern of guns with blinding speed. They draw nearer, nearer, ever nearer, but still the guns do not open fire. The forward vessels launch a volley of missiles, nearly simultaneously; these are tracked by the guns and shot down by the farther ones, but the nearest gun emplacements cannot wheel around in time and the projectiles slam into them, exploding the objects in furies of fire.
JACK DAVIES watches dozens of tiny explosions in the distance, almost blending into the planet’s tumultuous surface.
DAVIESIs that us or them?
JOHNSONThem, I think. I’m sure it’s them.
The vanguard of assault fighters are upon the guns now, and altogether suddenly a clash of laser beams opens up, and a hell of fire. The gun emplacements spit out deadly laser beams at an incredible rate, the turrets wheeling and spinning to match the advance of the fighters. Almost all of this first wave of attackers is destroyed instantly, in dozens of stunning fireballs, charred debris flying in all directions, but still several are able to take out a gun and some others two before they themselves are destroyed.
DAVIES can see the melee ahead, near, too near, and ever nearer. His jaw is set, his face grim and grey.
DAVIESYou ready?
Johnson says nothing, just fingers the controls of his gun turret.
Up ahead Davies clearly sees a ship explode. The guns are still there – dozens, maybe hundreds of them, angry inhuman sentinels. Davies’s chest heaves but he remains silent and set. Another fighter explodes, this one closer. Then the forward ship in Davies’s wing explodes; a piece of flying debris strikes the forward window with a shriek of metal against glass.
DAVIESShit!
And they’re faced now with no man’s land and the line of guns, laser blasts streaking all around them and Davies’s numb hands shaking as he flies directly ahead. Johnson spins and whirls, shooting furiously at the gun emplacements around him; Davies keeps the vessel steady and straight, unflinching. The ship nearest them peels away and is shot; it about-faces and slams into a fighter behind it, both exploding in a peal of flame. Davies’s own ship continues ahead in a straight line, now somewhat ahead of the others. A laser blast scathes one wing of the fighter. Johnson, still firing intently, shouts to Davies.
JOHNSONJesus, Jack, do something!
DAVIESDo what?
JOHNSONI don’t know, turn!
Davies suddenly pulls up and away right, jarring his shipmate, and finds his nose pointed straight at a gun emplacement, frighteningly close.
JOHNSON (CONT'D)Not that way!
Davies’s hands fumble; he finds a trigger and his ship’s forward gun shoots rapid-fire just as the big gun turret ahead swings around and fires at Davies. Now Davies acts quickly; he dives under the fire, deftly missing the emplacement itself, and as they pass Johnson shoots at it from his place. It explodes behind them. Davies is ecstatic. He turns to Johnson smiling widely.
DAVIESDid you see that?
JOHNSON(Breathless) Yeah.
Davies looks forward again, turning the ship towards another emplacement.
DAVIESThat was great!
Davies fires this time without hesitation, as does the gun emplacement. Before Johnson can get off a single shot Davies pulls the ship into a wild corkscrew, his trajectory still toward the gun emplacement ahead. He pulls away at the last possible moment, just as the gun explodes, rattling his cockpit.
JOHNSONWhat the hell was that?
DAVIESBasic pilot training.
JOHNSONThey taught you that in flight school?
Davies smiles broadly and careens toward yet another gun, but it doesn’t work this time, he can’t hit the gun, and he barely pulls away from a barrage of fire. When he pulls up he sees the next gun in line explode before him – victim to a wingman’s missile.
JOHNSONKeep ahead. This gun shield is wide and dense but it’s not thick. We must be almost out.
DAVIESAnd then what?
DAVIES’ FIGHTER loops around the floating wreckage of a mostly-intact ship, keeps going, jinks out of the way of enemy fire, and passes the last gun platform. Johnson heaves with effort and relief; Davies smiles still. The fighter is in the outer fringes of the planet’s atmosphere, glowing with the heat of entry and scarred by the heat of battle. Tattered red clouds lay ahead of them, the planet’s murky whirlpool in that direction will soon engulf them.
So that's it. It took me much longer to write and format that then it will take you to write a brief comment. Please, if you read that, whether you liked it or not (and whatever your policy might be on 'waiting for the story to be completed before commenting' -- because you'll be waiting a month), I implore you to please make a comment. It'll tickle me pink, make my day, etc., etc.
I hope you're looking forward to the next installment.
-The Host
11/25/2002 2:03:04 AM
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