79 INT. KAGAN LIVING ROOM—CLOSEUP BLACK CAT F.G.—DAY
With room in perspective angle: we are up-looking from the cat bulking huge in f.g. to the action taking place at the far end of the room in b.g. At the open door stand Kagan and Qarlo. The soldier fills the doorway, and despite the fact that the people at that end of the room seem small in comparison to the cat, it is obvious Qarlo towers over the group. Greeting Kagan and Qarlo at the door is Abby Kagan, Tom’s wife, a handsome woman who is a trifle too sophisticated and warm to be considered the Momma type. With her are Toni Kagan, an extremely-attractive 20-year-old girl with long hair and a fine figure, and Loren Kagan, 13 years old and very wide-eyed. They stand in a semi-circle, awkwardly, as Kagan allows Qarlo to enter the room before him.
KAGAN: Qarlo, this is my wife, Abby; our daughter, Toni, and the little one is Loren. He’s—
Qarol has not been listening. He ignores the people, stalks between them and comes to camera, kneeling down to look directly at the cat and camera. He talks to the animal. The cat tenses. Qarlo speaks in future tongue.
QARLO: See-Oh! Kwahr-loe Klo-breg-knee, pryte, sihz-fi-wun-oh-too-too-nyne. Reporting.
The cat stares. Qarlo looks as though he is expecting the animal to answer. It bolts and runs away. Qarlo stares directly into camera and we see his face, which has been hard, crumble. He is lost. He has expected something to happen, and it hasn’t, and he is mystified by this new world once more. He starts to rise as the Kagans come toward him from across the room.
80 GROUP SHOT—ON QARLO
as he rises, and the family comes up to him. All but Kagan himself are looking at Qarlo strangely. Kagan is confused, but there is curiosity and a desire to understand in his face.
KAGAN: Cat. remember? The book? What did you want from the cat, Qarlo?
QARLO (bitterly): Nothing’s same.
KAGAN: Cats are different where you came from?
QARLO: Different. C.O. prowler thinkspeek.
KAGAN: I don’t understand that, Qarlo. The Commanding Officer, the C.O., uses cats?
QARLO: On patrol, troopers, cats tied together by think-speek; cats do prowl, spot the Enemy, troopers jump.
The family is attentive, but their eyes widen at the strangeness of what Qarlo is saying. Kagan explains to them.
KAGAN: I think what he means is that somehow, by some technique we don’t even suspect, wars in the future are fought by men and animals…the cats used to do reconnaisance work, and by telepathy, they relay their messages.
LOREN (excited): And…and he thought he could get in touch with his Commanding Officer by talking through Macbeth!
KAGAN: It makes sense. What a fine patrol prowler a silent cat would make (beat, to Qarlo): It’s not like that here, Qarlo. Macbeth is just a cat.
QARLO (wearily): Nothing’z here are like war zone.
ABBY: But we’ll do our best to see that things are pleasant for you here, Qarlo.
Abby moves to Kagan’s side, puts her arm around his waist. Qarlo instinctively makes a movement toward her. She shrinks back as Kagan stops Qarlo.
KAGAN: No, Qarlo. It’s all right.
QARLO: Why does she touch you? There is Enemy and not Enemy…which is she?
KAGAN: Wife. Family unit, female C.O. Mother. Like your mother.
Qarlo stares at him oddly.
QARLO: Mother? My mother?
TONI: You have a mother, don’t you?
Qarlo looks superior for a moment, then recites:
QARLO: Clobregnny. Creche Hatchery 559. I am the State, the State is All.
They look at him uncomprehendingly. All but Kagan, who goes white, and who looks as though he may be sick.
KAGAN: Loren, take Qarlo up to his room.
Loren looks bugged, but turns and smiling indicates Qarlo should follow him.
They climb the stairs to the upper floor as camera holds past Kagan, Toni and Abby to their passage. Kagan turns to his women when Qarlo is gone.
81 THREE SHOT—ON KAGAN
as he wipes a hand across his forehead. There is infinite sadness in his face.
KAGAN: Now I understand why he didn’t respond to a film I showed him of a mother and child. He has no mother, he never knew a mother. (beat) A creche is a day nursery, a foundling hospital. He’s a product of artificial birth…he has no real parents…he was born and raised in a hatchery, like an egg.
TONI: And that, about “the State”…?
KAGAN: The State: his mother, his father, his everything.
ABBY: How pathetic.
KAGAN: He knew about the position of the stars, because a foot-soldier always knows how to navigate by the stars…but he never knew the most elemental kind of love…
ABBY: Tom, can we help him…he seems so…so, lost, so confused. And from what you’ve said, he’s capable of—of—anything.
KAGAN: We can help him.
ABBY: But are you sure, Tom. Loren and Toni—
KAGAN (intensely): We’ve got to help him, Abby. And not just for him, either.
He turns and walks toward the stairs as camera holds on the faces of his wife and daughter, following with their eyes. They don’t understand, but they think they should.
82 INT. KAGAN DINING ROOM—NIGHT
Qarlo sits next to Kagan, who is at the head of the table. Loren sits across from Qarlo, and Toni next to Loren. The young boy obviously is enthralled by the soldier.
LOREN: Hey, Qarlo, in the future they got baseball and football and the World Series, huh?
KAGAN: I don’t think Qarlo under—
QARLO: Don’t you know there’s a war on?
He has said it almost by rote, as though it were an explanation of everything.
LOREN: Yeah, I know. But I mean, when you ain’t fighting.
KAGAN: Aren’t fighting.
LOREN: Aren’t fighting. Huh, Qarlo?
QARLO: Why do you peep me drumdum questions?
LOREN: Peep? Drumdum? Huh?
KAGAN: “Peep” is a slang word for ask, or show, or anything that informs him. Drumdum means just what it sounds like…I think your word is “square” or “dopey.”
LOREN: Hey! That’s wild! Peep and drumdum. I gotta use that.
KAGAN (smiles amusedly at Loren, turns to Qarlo): Isn’t there a time when you aren’t at war, Qarlo? It isn’t drumdum of me…I just don’t grasp…I want to know.
As Qarlo speaks, Abby comes in from the kitchen, with a tureen of something steaming. She stands listening for a long moment, worry on her face.
QARLO: When I had not as many time as him—(points to Loren—My Drillmaster gave me my first weapon. I had twelve by the time I killed my first Enemy. (beat) The War has been fighting from before my hatch-time. One hundred eighty.
TONI: Years? The war has been on for one hundred and eighty years?
Qarlo nods. They are thunderstruck. Abby brings the tureen, sets it down in front of Kagan, next to Qarlo. Before Kagan can ladle out the soup from the tureen into the soup bowls stacked beside him, Qarlo seizes the bowl and shoves away from the table. He smoothly walks around the table, and into the living room. The sound of him going upstairs lingers in the room as they stare open-mouthed.
TONI (ruefully): I’ve heard of lousy manners, but that’s a bit much.
KAGAN: I forgot. In his time, it’s considered obscene to eat in front of anyone else. Not so strange, really; there are primitive tribes that have the same custom. And when you think about it, watching some people eat is rather sickening.
ABBY: That’s grand, just grand. But what do we do for soup?
KAGAN: I’ll talk to him. We can pass on the soup tonight, and I’ll have a long talk with him about table manners…but I suspect he’ll think we’re terrible boors.
They stare at Kagan wide-eyed. He grins, enjoying the reversal of social protocol.
83 LIVING ROOM—CLOSEUP—LATER THAT NIGHT
on an alarm clock. Camera pulls back to tight two shot of Qarlo and Kagan sitting across from each other at a small table, the clock on the table between them. Voices o.s. first.
KAGAN’S VOICE (o.s.): Do you know what this is?
QARLO’S VOICE (o.s.) I saw a thing like it, once.
KAGAN’S VOICE (o.s.): We call it a clock. It tells us where we should be from hour to hour. Do you know “hour,” Qarlo?
QARLO: Sure! Whaddyathink, I’m drumdum? Attack hour, sleeptime, feedtime…hours.
KAGAN: Yes, that’s right. But you don’t have clocks?
QARLO: Don’t grasp why I need “clock.” When it’s time to jump, the C.O. tells me…(taps head)…in here.
KAGAN: Does the C.O. regulate everything you do?
QARLO: Hey, Kagan. I’ve peeped my warzone to you, but tell me, peep me, your—
He makes vague hand-movements, indicating the world at large. Kagan grasps his meaning.
KAGAN: My world? You want to know about my world? Qarlo nods. Kagan looks troubled.
KAGAN: I don’t know what I can tell you…
QARLO: Peep me the little one, the one you call “son.”
KAGAN: Loren?
Qarlo nods silently.
KAGAN: He’s thirteen years old. He goes to school—you grasp the “school?”—good. He goes to school, where he learns about this world. Perhaps you can go to Loren’s school, some time, and they’ll peep you about this world completely (idly hits fist on table): Confound it, I shouldn’t be doing this alone…I need a good philosopher, a semanticist, a mathematician, a sociologist…
QARLO: I don’t grasp.
KAGAN: Nothing, just thinking out loud.
QARLO: My time, think out loud, C.O. investigates. Drumdum thoughts are monitored; all thoughts are monitored, on Thinkspeek.
KAGAN: There are people in this world who want to police thoughts, too, Qarlo.
QARLO: No monitoring here, none?
KAGAN: No. None. You can think anything you want, and it belongs only to you. Private. You grasp “private?”
QARLO: No.
KAGAN: All your own. No one else can have it, or use it, if you say no.
QARLO: Execpt the C.O.
KAGAN: No, not even the C.O. Just you.
QARLO: That’s treason. State owns everything. I am the State, the State is me. Your “private” is a treason thing.
KAGAN (sadly, nods): There are some in this world who think just like you, Qarlo…
Camera holds on the two men as we
84 INT. KAGAN HALLWAY AND BATHROOM—NIGHT
Toni, in bathrobe, stands with toothbrush in hand, by the half-open door of the bathroom, talking to Abby, Camera med. close on them as they talk softly.
TONI: Mother, you’re getting hysterical. Daddy would never have brought him home if he thought we were in danger.
ABBY: Your father was born type-cast as the trusting scientist. All he knows is that—that creature may give him clues to the future.
TONI: Oh, I don’t know. He’s not Tony Curtis, but in a way he has a certain charm…
ABBY: Charm?!!
TONI (another suggestion): Sex appeal?
ABBY (trapped): I’m beginning to wonder who has what to fear from whom!
TONI (lightly): I’m just a jazz-mad baby, livin’ a life of sin.
Abby throws up her hands in exasperation, turns and goes into another doorway, obviously a bedroom. Toni grins, and opens the bathroom door. Camera shoots past her as she thrusts open the door suddenly and Qarlo spins around, his arms upthrust as though to strike her with a vicious karate chop. She gasps, falls back against the wall.
85 INT. BATHROOM—ON QARLO TO TONI
The water in the sink is running, and his face is wet, as is the floor and the front of his metal suit. His hands drop water as he speaks.
QARLO: Get out!
She doesn’t get out. Her fear drains away and is replaced by temper and surprising verve.
TONI: I’ll do no such thing. I live here, too, you know.
QARLO: Sleeptime is for aloners.
TONI: I feel the same way about it, friend, but I still have to brush my teeth, and right now you’re blocking the water. (beat) Say, what’re you doing?
QARLO: Drinking.
TONI: Haven’t you ever heard of a glass?
Qarlo stares at her uncomprehendingly. Obviously he hasn’t.
TONI. (continuing): Forget it.
They stare at each other silently for a moment. The girl is obviously appraising him, and Qarlo, for his part, is intested, but suspicious. Very suspicious.
TONI (continuing): Anything I can help you with?
QARLO: Help me?
TONI: Yes, do you have a towel, a wash cloth…a partridge in a pear tree?
QARLO (suspiciously): What do you want from me?
TONI: What do I want from you? Oh, brother, how it saddens me to know men haven’t changed a bit, even eighteen hundred years from now.
Qarlo backs away from her. He becomes wary.
QARLO: You’re a one more danger to me than Kagan. What do you want from me?
TONI: Don’t you trust anyone? Can’t you even see we’re trying to help you? Didn’t you ever want to get near someone, talk to someone?
QARLO: That isn’t possible. We can’t close to each other, anyone can’t. Thinkspeek comes best, not to touch.
TONI: You don’t know what you’re missing, friend. (then, soberly) What a lousy, lonely life you must lead.
QARLO: That’s my world. It’s fine.
TONI: Mm-hmm. Just fine. And I guess if you’re blind from birth you don’t miss the color red.
QARLO. I don’t grasp.
TONI: Forget it.
QARLO: Fret it.
TONI: I’ll do that little thing.
He stares at her a moment, passes her and goes out. She stands tipped onto one hip, tapping her toothbrush against her palm. She shakes her head wearily.
CAMERA COMES IN on Toni. Closeup.
TONI: You’ll never make it, Tiger. I hope…but I don’t think so.
CAMERA HOLDS on Toni as we
86 INT. LOREN’S BEDROOM—CLOSEUP LOREN—NIGHT
as his eyes widen and he looks about to shout something loud and nasty. Camera pulls back to wide angle as he speaks.
LOREN: Hey, what’s this?
WIDE ANGLE OF ROOM shows all the furniture jumbled and piled in one corner. There is a desk and several chairs and a toy box and all manner of other kid’s things on the bed, leaving a wide empty space in the middle of the room. The walls are pennant-covered, teen-style. Qarlo is lying in the middle of the floor, and as Loren comes in through the door, and speaks, Qarlo rises up, a heavy brass bookend ready to smash.
LOREN (anxiously): Hey, hold it, stop, wait a minute!
QARLO: Sleeptime’s for aloners.
LOREN: I just came in to get a comic book. They got me bunkin’ in with Toni, I didn’t mean to disturb you.
QARLO: Get out!
LOREN: Sure, sure…(interested) Hey, how come you’re sleepin’ on the floor? And all the stuff piled outta the way?
QARLO: Clear the perimeter. No Enemy gets past. Troopers can jump.
LOREN: Hey, that’s cool. You sleep on the floor in the future?
QARLO: Sleeptime is anywhere. When a trooper hasta jump…he jumps!
LOREN: That figures. Geez, you must have a great time, just soldier’n all the time. But don’t worry, Qarlo, there ain’t—aren’t—isn’t any Enemy here. You’re in the past now, remember?
He smiles, grabs a comic book from a stack, and leaves, shutting the door behind him. Qarlo sinks back down, with the bookend in his hand, as camera comes in for closeup.
QARLO: No. No Enemy here. Another time…a past time. No Enemy.
His face seems to relax. He shoves the bookend away, and lies down. His eyes close as we
87 EXA. STREET—NIGHT
(Same set as was used for Qarlo’s appearance) The street is very nearly deserted. One pedestrian walks through. When he is gone, the Enemy is seen stalking in a darkened alley (or areaway). He starts to enter the street as a policeman saunters by. He quickly draws back until the cop is gone. Now, he enters. We hear the beep beep from the electrical impulse machine on his arm. He listens to it carefully, obviously sensing the direction it is leading him. Meanwhile:
HELMET VOICE (o.s.) Find your enemy! Find your enemy!
Grimly, he drifts off into the shadows and disappears.
88 INT. KAGAN LIVING ROOM—CLOSEUP KAGAN—DAY
using a tape recorder, speaking into a microphone. He is reading from notes. A phone sits near at hand on the desk. Through an archway we can see Loren and Qarlo throwing darts at a dartboard, and we can catch o.s. remarks, ad lib from the boy (e.g.: “Hey, you got a good eye, Qarlo! Bulls-eye! That’s your ninth one in a row! Gee, it’s great havin’ you here.” etc.) Kagan looks up from time to time, and smiles.
KAGAN: I have asked the subject about his world, our future. His knowledge is incredibly limited. He knows war and soldiering, but little else. Comparison: if an Australian bushman were thrown into the future, his image of the world today would be one of barbarism. The situation is comparable with the subject Qarlo. (beat) The words love and hate still seem to have no meaning for him. However, subject provided a clue to his conception of honesty by laughing when a man on television returned some food dropped by another actor. Subject’s remark was: “Drumdum. He gave away free food.”
PHONE RINGS. Kagan picks it up.
KAGAN: Hello? (beat) Paul! How are you? I was just preparing the weekly for you. (beat) They what?
89 INTERCUT—PAUL TANNER
He sits behind a desk, receiver in hand.
TANNER: They’ve made a dispensation in Qarlo’s case, Tom. Two weeks are up. They feel he’s made as much progress as can be expected…(beat) I know that’s for you to decide…but the papers have gotten wind of the experiment, and there’s a chance there’ll be repercussions—and they’ve been talking about Civic Obligations and Danger to the Community…(beat) I know, I know! But they won’t listen to that. All they know is he’s a psychopathic killer by our standards, and he’s on the loose.
90 SAME AS 88
KAGAN: So what have they decided?
TANNER’S VOICE (filter): He’ll be remanded to my custody, and be put under protective surveillance in a maximum security pri—
KAGAN (cuts him off, furiously):—prison! A bloody prison? The man hasn’t done anything, Paul! He’s merely bewildered, lost, out of joint with his Times. That’s no crime, no sin…he didn’t ask to be warped into the past.
TANNER’S VOICE (filter): I’m sorry, Tom. That’s the way it is.
KAGAN (defeated): When?
TANNER’S VOICE (filtered): As soon as possible. Tonight; at the latest tomorrow. Can you get him ready?
KAGAN: Physically…or emotionally?
TANNER’S VOICE (filter): Tom, don’t take it out on me, for crine out loud, I’m only—
KAGAN (bitterly): I know: you’re only doing your job! That’s rapidly becoming the slimiest alibi of our times.
He slams the receiver down on the deskset, buries his head in his hands for a moment, then rises.
91 TRUCKING SHOT—WITH KAGAN
as he walks across living room to edge of archway, watching Qarlo and Loren shooting darts. Qarlo is expert with them, but he does the act with little comprehension of competition. He might as easily be emptying garbage or tying shoelaces.
LOREN: Gee, you’re good, Qarlo!
QARLO: Drumdum, throwing these.
LOREN: I thought you were having a good time. You’re winning.
QARLO: Don’t grasp “winning.” War?
LOREN: No, not winning a war. It’s like we were having a little war, you and me, and the one who throws the best, he wins the war.
QARLO. Drumdum.
LOREN: Yeah, maybe. I don’t know. (beat) Gee, it’s great havin’ you here with us. It gets lonely out here sometimes, y’know, cause all the kids live nearer into town…
Kagan smiles softly, turns and walks away. They have not seen him there. He walks back to tape recorder.
92 INT. KAGAN LIVING ROOM—ON KAGAN
Abby comes into the room. He turns to her. Camera into two shot.
KAGAN: They’ve decided to put him away. Tonight or tomorrow.
ABBY (mixed emotions): I can’t say I’m sorry, Tom. It’s been terrifying.
KAGAN: Abby, cut it out. You’re dramatizing again.
ABBY: You see what you want to see, only what you want to see. And not that Toni has been spending more and more time with him…that Loren is beginning to idolize him…that…
KAGAN: Isn’t that what we wanted, for him to fit in, to adjust, to learn what caring means?
Abby is getting worked up now. There is a note of hysteria in her voice.
ABBY: But he doesn’t care! He’s just as he was when he came here. He’s playing with us, Tom. Letting us think he understands, that he wants to make the best of it.
KAGAN: I think you’re seeing shadows.
ABBY: From the future, Tom. Shadows from the future. That man is a killer…he was trained from birth for only one thing! To kill! Do you think two weeks with us is going to erase all that?
KAGAN: I hoped it would…
ABBY: I’m afraid, Tom. Afraid of him…and afraid of the future he comes from.
Kagan turns to the window. His voice is filled with sadness as, back turned, he speaks to her—and himself.
KAGAN (distantly): Dr. Jung (pronounced: Yoong) once said: “The only thing we have to fear on this planet—is man.”
CAMERA HOLDS on Kagan’s back, and Abby staring at him with helplessness, and the sounds of Qarlo and Loren playing darts as we
93 EXT. CITY STREET OR ALLEY—THE ENEMY—NIGHT
Extreme closeup on the electrical impulse machine. It beep beep beeps for a moment then begins to crackle as though being jammed by interference. In the distance we hear the sound of an airplane approaching—the roar of the motor gets louder and louders. Camera pulls away and rises rapidly to high spot of enemy standing in shadows of an alley. He spins around as though looking for source of airplane sound. Suddenly he stops and looks up.
94 EXT. SKY—STOCK—POV—NIGHT
A large plane, its night lights blinking, is flying low as though approaching an airfield.
95 EXT. ALLEY—CLOSE SHOT THE ENEMY
He spots the plane, raises his rifle in its direction and fires beam.
96 EXT. SKY—STOCK—NIGHT
Beam hits the aircraft and it sizzles out of the sky—gone—
97 BACK TO ENEMY
looking in the direction of the kill. He is satisfied as the beep beep on his impulse machine resumes. The voice from his helmet produces an evil smile on his strange face.
HELMET VOICE (o.s.): Find your enemy! Find your enemy; Kill…Kill…Kill….
He stalks out of darkened alley toward lighted street in search of his prey.
98 INT. KAGAN LIVING ROOM—NIGHT
Kagan and Qarlo sit talking.
KAGAN: They’ve decided you can’t stay here.
QARLO: Who? Who has decided?
KAGAN: Some men who make decisions for the rest of us, because we let them.
QARLO: C.O.?
KAGAN: In a way, yes. They’ve decided you might hurt someone…that you have to be…sent to a place.
Qarlo’s face suddenly goes cold and hard. This he understands.
QARLO: Pee-owe-dubbel-yoo. I peeped that’d happen. I knew you troops would jump.
KAGAN (hastily): Not a prisoner of war camp, Qarlo. Nothing like that. It’s a—a—
QARLO (intensely): Liar!
KAGAN: It wasn’t my idea…I tried to keep them from doing it…but these men, they—
QARLO: Qarlo Clobregnny. Private. Six five one oh two two nine.
KAGAN: Listen—
QARLO (bitterly): Where I come from, it’s true, it’s right. No two ways. Us and them. The Enemy. We know who they are, they know us. No two-ways troopers who jump sometimes one way, sometimes the other.
KAGAN: It’s better here, Qarlo, if you could only understand…if you could only grasp…
QARLO: Grasp? Your words, your drumdum empty words, love, hate, dog, mother…?
KAGAN: Yes, yes!
QARLO: No! I want my time, my world.
KAGAN: It’s better here, now, Qarlo. We don’t have the War…
QARLO (sneers): Better? In my world we don’t grasp these love, hate, all of them. We never know, so we don’t want. Here, you peep love…then take it away.
KAGAN (dawning realization): Qarlo…do you…feel sorry to be going away from us—?
QARLO: I don’t grasp your “sorry.” In this time, like my time, there’s Enemy, and not-Enemy. You aren’t Enemy…
KAGAN: But you’re not sure I’m a friend, is that it?
QARLO: Don’t grasp “friend.”
KAGAN: Not-Enemy.
QARLO: Yes. You aren’t Not-Enemy. So I can stay here. But the others…the ones who put hands on me…
KAGAN: Qarlo, you can’t let your other life ruin it for you here. You’ve got to live here…if they have to touch you…
QARLO: (hard): They won’t. (beat) And you…two-way jumper. One way or the other.
Qarlo turns, starts to stalk away. Macbeth, the cat, lies there. Camera shoots past Qarlo to cat as he pauses, and with a gentle, pathetic tone, he speaks a question, expecting no answer.
QARLO: C.O.…?
No answer. He leaves the room. Camera moves in on the eyes of the silent cat as we
99 INT. TANNER’S OFFICE—CLOSEUP TANNER’S BACK—DAY
He is sitting behind his desk, in a swivel chair, facing a large window looking out over the city. Suddenly he spins around, smashing palms flat on desk.
TANNER: Now listen, Kagan, don’t chew on my ear. I haven’t any control over what they’re doing.
CAMERA PULLS BACK to show Kagan leaning over the desk, arms wide and tensed on the desktop. He is furious.
KAGAN: But you didn’t fight them…
TANNER: Fight them? Say, what’s the matter with you, boy. I work for the government, for the Bureau; I’m not some free-lance hot-rock they call in like The Lone Ranger.
KAGAN (contemptuously): Company man.
TANNER: Oh, ha ha. Fancy phrases for all occasions. Instant mirth, merely add Kagan. (beat) I did fight them, if you’d like to know. I batted my head against the wall for almost two weeks while you sat out there playing ABC’s with King Kong.
KAGAN: Paul…you’ve got to…
TANNER: Got, got, got. I don’t got to do anything, but come pick up that big ugly piece of furniture, and take him where my bosses tell me to take him.
KAGAN: I need more time. He’s coming around. He’s adapting to the family unit.
TANNER: Adapting how? Has he offered to wash the dishes or make the beds? What have you got out there, Kagan, the perfect scullery maid?
KAGAN: I’ve learned a million things about his world, Paul. You can’t cut off a source of information like that. It’ll never happen again.
TANNER: You can always talk to him in a cell.
KAGAN: Don’t be ridiculous. Put him away, and he’ll revert. He’ll get surly, silent, we’ll be worse than when we started.
TANNER (wearily): Oh, Kagan Kagan Kagan, what’m I gonna do with you? How do I make it clear that my hands are tied?
KAGAN: Listen…if you gave them some new things about the future I’ve learned, would that quiet them?
TANNER: I don’t think so.
KAGAN: Perhaps another week…?
TANNER: I—I don’t think so.
Kagan pulls a spool of tape out of his pocket. He hands it to Tanner.
KAGAN: Here, play this…
Tanner opens a desk drawer, and a tape recorder lifts up. He drops on the spool, starts it playing. It is Kagan’s voice.
(NOTE: this speech may be cut to any length sufficient.)
KAGAN’S VOICE: Subject’s world of the future. Divided into two warring camps, with children raised from birth on special war-islands devoted to nothing but training. When they reach early teens, they are sent into battle so brain-washed that the C.O.—the Commanding Officer—and his orders are the closest thing to God they know. (beat) There is no marriage, no family unit, no entertainment as we know it. The society is rigidly structured into classes, among which are The Factory Workers at the lowest level and what the subject calls The Purple, or Ruling Body, at the top. Qarlo has never seen one of The Purple. He talks about them as though they were mystic, almost holy, creatures. Apparently, so ingrained is the concept of “security,” of keeping the Enemy from learning anything about battle plans or—in fact, anything at all about the state of war on Qarlo’s side, that no one speaks to anyone else for fear of being tagged a spy. This has brought about a culture in which every man is literally and totally alone. (beat) Further than these facts, Qarlo is unable to go. Asked about other areas of the culture, he shakes his head or makes comments that indicate he has never been in contact with any area of his world outside training, battle and allied subjects. He has social “tunnel vision,” trained to do a job and not consider the rest of the world in which he lives. He is, in every sense of the word, crippled.
Tanner slaps the recorder off. He rubs his eyes as though he hasn’t slept in weeks.
TANNER: Okay. I’ll try again. They’re starting to wonder whose team I’m on, and when they start wondering that, the old bread line ain’t far off.
KAGAN: Thanks, Paul.
TANNER. Don’t thank me. If I’m out dancing for dimes on the Avenue, just toss me a few coins and pat my monkey on the head. (beat) Now get outta here so I can go lose my job.
Kagan smiles, Tanner looks bemused, shakes his head.
100 EXT. KAGAN HOUSE—ESTABLISHING HIGH SHOT—STOCK—NIGHT
A VERY HIGH SHOT looking down on the house. A dark, moonless night. Lightning splits up the sky every few seconds. Thunder rolls in the distance. A night for witches to think twice before mounting brooms. Camera comes down slowly as we
101 INT. KAGAN DINING ROOM—NIGHT
In the f.g. is the empty end of the dining table. At the far end, the head, sits Kagan himself, Toni to his right, Abby to his left, Loren next to Toni, nearest to us. Qarlo sits across from Loren.
Macbeth, the cat, lies on the chair at the empty end of the table. It seems to be sleeping.
KAGAN (to Qarlo): And so, that’s how an automobile works, Qarlo. We call it internal combustion.
QARLO. Very not-work-well…uh, unproductive. Light beams drive tanks, scout cars much more smoothlier, no “gas” and no noise.
LOREN: Honest? You got cars that run on just light, like sunlight? Honest?
TONI: Do you have a car, Qarlo?
QARLO: For what? Troopers foot it.
TONI: Well, what do you take your girl out for a ride in?
QARLO: I don’t grasp.
ABBY: Don’t you have women in your time; ones that you can be with?
QARLO: I don’t grasp. Troopers get service.
ABBY (eyes widen): You mean, you—?
KAGAN (cuts in ruefully): Uh, I think that’s enough of that topic. But suffice it to say, I think this age has some distinct advantages over Qarlo’s time.
102 ON QARLO—CAT OBVIOUS ON CHAIR NEXT TO HIM
Toni and Qarlo reach for a basket of rolls at the same moment. Qarlo makes a sharp move to grab it, Toni senses it, but at that instant Qarlo draws back, lets her take it. Nothing is said about the interplay.
LOREN: Whaddaya think, Qarlo, wanna stay here with us for always?
KAGAN (quickly): That may not be possible, Loren.
LOREN: Why not?
KAGAN: Well, there are others who—
QARLO (interrupts): I want to jump back. I want to find my war zone.
LOREN: What do you wanna go back for? I thought you liked it here, I thought we were friends?!
QARLO: Not-Enemy. You’re Not-Enemy. But my way is best, my time is best for me…I want to go back…at sleeptime I think what Kagan calls “private” about it. I hurt for it.
LOREN: But why? Why do you wanna go to that place where everybody kills everybody?
QARLO (can’t explain): My time is the best! For me! I need to jump. Find my unit, my C.O. Don’t you know there’s a war on, boy?
LOREN (disillusioned): I think you were lyin’ to me…you aren’t my friend…
Qarlo’s jaw muscles jump. There is silence. No one knows what to say. There is concern on Kagan’s face.
KAGAN (softly): He’s a child. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t understand.
LOREN: I do too! He was just pretendin’ to like it here…
QARLO: He grasps more than you, Kagan. He knows. He knows what I am.
KAGAN: It isn’t true, Qarlo. You’ve seen it for yourself, in just the short time you’ve been here, you’ve changed tremendously…
QARLO (firmly): I am what I am. He knows, and I know. Why do you dream, Kagan? I know how to do one thing, be a trooper. I’ll do it again…you know that’s true.
KAGAN (fervently): Dear God, I hope not…if that’s all we have to look forward to, then the future is lost!
At that moment Macbeth yowllls and jumps up on the chair, hair stiffly erect on his back, eyes turned toward the blank wall of the dining room facing onto the street; the wall to which Qarlo sits. Qarlo leaps erect at once.
QARLO: C.O.?
The wall suddenly begins to blacken, as though great heat were being applied on it from the other side. Qarlo throws back his chair. The family jumps up, and Loren moves next to Qarlo.
103 ANOTHER SHOT—THE SCENE
as the wall suddenly vaporizes, a gigantic hole appearing as though by magic. And through the hole we see the dark, rainswept, lightning-filled night. Thunder rolls. As Abby and Toni scream, the Enemy leaps through the hole in the wall, his hideous face alert, his teeth bared, the rifle starting to tilt up. Loren is directly in front of the line of attack. Qarlo bodily hurls him to the side, moves a step toward the Enemy. We hear the soft beep beep beep of The Enemy’s tracking machine and the helmet voice saying “Kill! Kill! Kill!”…as he advances a step.
As the Enemy begins to level the rifle, the cat, Macbeth, yowllls again, louder. The Enemy’s glance is diverted. He looks at the cat. He seems about to speak to the cat, as…Qarlo launches himself at the Enemy. The Enemy brings up the rifle just as Qarlo plunges into him, clutching him tightly around the chest with both arms, so that the rifle is imprisoned between them. There is a sharp crackling zzzzzing sound, a flash of light as the rifle fires between them, and in the burst of light…they are gone.
The room is empty at that end. Just a dark burned smudge on the rug. The family stands wide-eyed in horror at the death of the two men, they can’t move. But as camera comes in for closeup of the sooty smudge on the rug. Macbeth leaps down off the chair, and begins sniffing at the spot. Camera pulls back, up and up and up as narration over:
NARRATOR: From the darkest of all pits, the soul of Man, come the darkest questions: in the end, did the soldier kill to protect those he had come to care for…or did he revert to his instincts. (beat) Questions from the dark pit. But no answers. For answers lie in the future. Is it a future in which men are machines born to kill, or is there time for us. (beat) Time. All the time in the world…but is that enough…? CAMERA PULLS BACK UP AND UP as the family stands huddled silently together, as the cat sniffs the spot of death and we