A sledgehammer comes down hard onto a wooden stake, driving it several times into the cold, hard earth.
Jonah pulls off one of his gloves and places a small metal tack on top of the wooden stake.
His radio squawks.
GUNNER
(radio)
Right just a little. Little more. All right, good. Let’s shoot it there.
Jonah adjusts the tack as instructed and taps it into the top of the stake with his hammer. He pulls his glove back on and grabs the surveyor’s prism rod. He places the spear-like tip of the rod onto the concave head of the metal tack and holds the rod level and steady.
GUNNER
(radio)
Shooting—
He waits, his breath steaming in the cold, both hands concentrated on the surveyor’s staff.
GUNNER
(radio)
Got the shot. And— Good!
Jonah paces out a new distance, hiking over the hard-packed earth and counting out paces under his breath. The surveyors are at work, running a circuit out on a cold and bleak landscape. A large field has been razed for development. Nearby houses rise from the frozen mud and sprawl into the countryside.
Sue sits in the warm truck running numbers over his engineering charts with a pencil and an old calculator. Still separated by the truck window, Gunner and Sue communicate over their radios like astronauts on a lunar outpost.
GUNNER
(radio)
Okay, next set.
SUE
(radio)
Hang on. Gimme just a minute here.
Jonah pauses out on the field and considers the landscape about him, an arid enclave of brand new haunted houses, silent and brooding in broad daylight.
Gunner sips at some coffee and also observes the frames of houses in various stages of construction. Inanimate windows stare back at him, some empty and hollow, others darkened by new glass.
Sue works at his charts and numbers with pencil and calculator. Gunner interrupts him over the radio.
GUNNER
(radio)
Sue.
SUE
(radio)
Yes, Gunner.
GUNNER
(radio)
You ever get uneasy out here?
SUE
(radio)
Out here where?
Gunner shoots him a look and raises his voice, emphatically, not bothering to use the radio.
GUNNER
Here.
Sue rephrases, obligingly.
SUE
(radio)
How do you mean, Gunner.
GUNNER
(radio)
I mean where in the hell is everyone? For example.
SUE
(radio)
Who?
GUNNER
(radio)
All these fucking people.
SUE
(radio)
They’re obviously not here yet.
GUNNER
(radio)
Either way, I don’t know how in the hell they live like this. I’ll tell you one thing, you unplug the mainline on these goddamn people and they wouldn’t last two seconds out here all frantic and helpless like little poodle dogs.
SUE
(radio)
That’d be a sight, wouldn’t it. Now just give me a second here.
Gunner kicks at the dirt and does his best to keep his mouth shut, his trigger-finger fiddling on the radio.
One window seems oddly placed on the side of a house, a single window on a wall of siding. A single dark eye.
Gunner lays back into the radio.
GUNNER
(radio)
I just think it’s pretty fucking weird that all of a sudden there’s twice as many houses as there was five minutes ago.
SUE
(radio)
All right, Gunner, let’s cut the chatter. I need to concentrate for a minute.
GUNNER
(radio)
But who are these people? What in the hell-God’s-name do they all do?
SUE
(radio)
They work, just like you and I do.
GUNNER
(radio)
No they do not work just like I do. They breeze into their little cubicles in forty dollar socks and write little memos about which interstate gets to run through whose family farm.
Jonah scribbles notes into his notebook, overhearing their conversation on his radio.
SUE
(radio)
All right, Gunner, I get the point. Now shut it.
GUNNER
(radio)
No, you do not get the point. The point is that—
SUE
That’s enough!
Sue shouts from inside the truck, muffled like an angry bumblebee in a glass jar.
Out in the field, Jonah looks up from his notebook—
And Gunner fires right back at Sue.
GUNNER
Hey! I was from here! And I think I oughta know what I’m talking about. I was from here and now it’s all one big fucking cemetery.
SUE
I know where you were from! What I’m wondering is if it’s possible for you to keep your fat mouth shut for two fucking seconds!
Gunner moves aggressively toward the truck.
GUNNER
Well those are pretty big words coming out of a little girl, mister.
Sue fumbles with his paperwork and locks the door just as Gunner reaches out to grab the handle.
Gunner leans into the window and talks low, muffled and filtered by the truck window.
GUNNER
Sissy. You’re always sitting in the truck with the heat on. Why don’t you come out here with the elements and do a man’s job for a change.
Gunner glares at Sue with wild animal eyes, steaming on the glass with his snout like a bear on a tourist vehicle. Sue watches Gunner, almost intimately, from behind the safety of the aquarium. He parts his lips as if to say something but then stops himself.
GUNNER
That’s what I thought.
Gunner turns his bear ass around and walks away from the truck. Sue gets in one last dig, calmly speaking over the distance of the radio.
SUE
(radio)
Fuck off, Gunner.
Gunner turns and hurls his paper coffee cup at Sue. It explodes coffee all over the truck window.
GUNNER
Church coffee!!
Sue looks out from inside the truck window, coffee running down the glass.
Gunner goes back to the scope on the surveyor’s gun and sights up Jonah in the crosshairs. Jonah stands across the site, quietly writing in his notebook. Gunner observes him and then speaks to Sue over the radio again.
GUNNER
(radio)
What in the hell is this guy always writing down?
But Jonah can hear him over the radio. He looks across the field at Gunner, directly down the scope of the surveyor gun as if they’re looking eye to eye through a telescope.
Gunner pulls quickly away from the scope and snaps off his radio.
GUNNER
Dammit.
He walks back over to the truck and speaks to Sue. From opposite sides of the window their conversation sounds muffled and bubbled.
GUNNER
Roll down the window.
SUE
Leave me alone, Gunner.
GUNNER
I need to talk to you.
Sue thinks it over.
SUE
All right, back away from the truck.
GUNNER
Oh, come on.
SUE
Go on. Back away.
GUNNER
Jesus Christ.
SUE
Well go on.
Gunner backs up a few steps. Sue cracks the window.
GUNNER
What is he always writing down?
SUE
Who?!
GUNNER
Him.
Sue squints over his dash and across the field at Jonah.
SUE
I don’t know. I never noticed.
GUNNER
Well I have. The guy never says shit and every second he gets he’s always writing something down in that little notebook.
SUE
So what?
GUNNER
So I don’t trust him, that’s what.
SUE
Oh, will you quit being paranoid.
GUNNER
I’m not being paranoid. I’m observing is all, and what I’m observing is one more thing I don’t need in my workday.
SUE
Gunner, we are not going to invent problems where there aren’t any, so just lighten up.
GUNNER
Now that is just exactly what they want us to do. Just go along with the whole goddamn thing.
SUE
What whole thing? What are you talking about?
Gunner looks back out at Jonah. Jonah gestures with his hands as if to ask, “What’s going on?” Gunner looks over at the new houses, searching for an answer.
SUE
Can we get back to work now?
GUNNER
It’s just something I think you should know about, that’s all.
Sue rolls up his window and goes back to his numbers.
Gunner darkens…
GUNNER
(ominously)
Suit yourself.
He lingers for a moment at the truck and then goes back to looking down the scope of the gun.
***
A long pink corridor of concrete block and fluorescent tube lighting, frighteningly institutional and empty.
Around a corner at the far end of the hallway, the sound of a metal cart approaching, clanking and rattling through the industrial complex…
Simone rounds the corner, pushing a cart full of salt and pepper shakers vibrating on metal trays. She rolls down the long hall, attentive and focused, pink walls flowing by on either side. Then an invading awareness sweeps across her face like a passing cloud, furrowing. She slows down and stops.
She looks at a couple of doors, unsure. She gazes down the long receding hallway, and back up the route she has just traveled.
She listens to the building, deathly quiet but for intermittent clanking off in the distance, as if there isn’t another soul for miles.
She listens to herself, the invisible map inside her, of whatever country that is. She flexes her hands around the handlebar of the cart and looks down at the salt and pepper shakers gathered on the tray like a clutch of extraterrestrial spores.
Then she turns her cart around and pushes it back down the hallway, taking another turn and disappearing down another corridor.
***
A clumsy, familiar melody in the air of the neighborhood. The invisible song floats down a quiet new street.
The ice cream man!
Samson rounds a corner and slowly navigates the glacial streets. Deserted sidewalks, lifeless windows, winter lawns, the strange empty spaces between houses— Somnambuland. The ache of a phantom limb. Out here the ice cream man is king. The truck brings a luminescent glow to the neighborhood, a white-hot cauter beneath the overcast.
Sam rounds another corner in the labyrinth, trolling for action. Suddenly a front door explodes open. Bingo!
A small boy wearing a silver snowsuit and a space helmet rockets out of the house. He sprints across his front lawn and launches out into the street. All engines, maximum warp speed. He chases Sam’s truck down the center of the street.
Sam sees the boy in his side mirror and grins rakishly, watching the boy run… Then he pulls over.
The space boy looks up at Samson through his space helmet.
Samson beams down at him, radiant.
SAMSON
Hello there!
SPACE BOY
I’m in outer space.
SAMSON
You most certainly are! How may I assist your mission today?
SPACE BOY
It’s cold.
SAMSON
Yes it is. But it can get very hot in outer space under certain circumstances like suns, supernovas, red dwarves, and Big Bangs. Then there’s heat shield failure during reentry and other misfortunes. You’re familiar with all this, of course.
Space boy is focused.
SAMSON
How about some hot chocolate?
SPACE BOY
Hot chocolate!
SAMSON
All right then. One hot chocolate coming right up… Here you are, sir.
Samson hands the boy a steaming cup of hot chocolate. Space boy holds out some change in his little hands.
SAMSON
Oh, I’m sorry, but your currency is no good on this planet. Save it. No charge.
SPACE BOY
Thank you.
SAMSON
You bet.
A sickly woman emerges from a house and stands in the front doorway in her bathrobe. Sam nods to her and she disappears back inside, leaving the door ajar.
Sam climbs out of the back of his truck and walks up the front walk with a doctor’s house-call bag. He enters the house and shuts the door behind him. The sullen beige house glooms in the flat midday light.
The woman is lying on the living room couch in her bathrobe and an afghan. She’s looking into the daylight filtered through thin, gauzy curtains.
Sam enters and approaches the couch. He moves a box of Kleenex out of the way and sits down before her on the ottoman, obstructing her from view.
From behind the couch we see him speaking to her softly, backlit by the light coming through the curtains. We can’t see his actions, or her, but we hear her quiet replies.
SAMSON
Is there anyone you would like me to contact for you?
SICKLY WOMAN
No. Just the bank.
SAMSON
I will certainly do that.
SICKLY WOMAN
Thank you, Sam.
SAMSON
You’re going to feel a little prick here.
SICKLY WOMAN
Ah—
SAMSON
It’s okay.
SICKLY WOMAN
Sam…
SAMSON
It’s okay.
SICKLY WOMAN
Sa—
SAMSON
It’s okay.
Sam waits another quiet moment and then exits. Through the pale veil of the living room curtains we see him take a real estate lawn sign from out of his truck and put it up in the front lawn.
Sam fires up the melody maker and pulls away.
The sign on the front lawn reads: FOR SALE.
***
Robert is curled up like a baby on top of the covers.
The dresser, the mirror, the night stand. A clock ticks over the silence, surgically counting another day away.
A tiny, tempting melody creeps into the bedroom and dances around his head like a swarm of drunken mosquitoes.
Robert opens his eyes.
He descends his driveway and waves Samson down. Sam pulls over and leans out the window like a thousand-watt bulb.
SAMSON
Howdy.
ROBERT
Hello.
SAMSON
What can I do for you?
ROBERT
Well… I’m not exactly sure.
SAMSON
Hot chocolate is pretty popular this season.
ROBERT
I’ll bet. What else do you have?
SAMSON
What else are we in the market for?
ROBERT
I’m not sure. Something a little stronger, I guess.
Sam considers him.
SAMSON
You a cop?
ROBERT
No. Do I look like a cop?
SAMSON
Yes. Do I look like the ice cream man?
Sam opens up the rear of the truck and leads Robert inside.
ROBERT
Holy smokes.
The interior seems oddly and deceptively bigger than it could possibly be. Part laboratory, part showroom, the ice cream truck has been perceptibly re-sized and retrofitted as a state-of-the-art medicine wagon.
SAMSON
As you can see, I’m able to offer just about anything that you might be looking for. So. What is it that you’re looking for?
Hundreds of bottles and jars are beautifully displayed on glass shelves—a dazzling rainbow of pills, powders, capsules, and exotic plants.
ROBERT
Gosh. Something for pain, I suppose.
SAMSON
What type of pain?
ROBERT
A general sort of pain.
SAMSON
Physical or mental?
ROBERT
Well I guess it’s sort of that gray area.
SAMSON
I see. Are you taking any medication, currently?
ROBERT
No, not really. Vitamins. Aspirin. Coffee, I guess. If that counts.
SAMSON
It depends on the quantity, of course. Can wreak havoc on the adrenals, but it’s my weakness too.
How is your mortgage situation?
ROBERT
Fine. Paid off, actually. That’s one thing I’m not worried about. Why?
SAMSON
Just a stress indicator.
ROBERT
What’s this?
Inside a solitary medicine cabinet, behind a glass door, there is a vessel containing a silver metallic liquid.
SAMSON
Ah, that’s just a novelty item.
ROBERT
It looks like mercury.
Robert leans into the glass to gaze upon the curious, attractive substance.
ROBERT
It’s very beautiful.
SAMSON
Isn’t it?
Sam moves to the work counter and begins working with a mortar and pestle and some herbal greenery.
But Robert can’t take his eyes off the silver vessel. The shimmering liquid reflects a fish-eye view of the room.
ROBERT
Well, is it?
SAMSON
What?
ROBERT
Mercury.
SAMSON
Quicksilver, actually.
ROBERT
Oh… What’s the difference?
SAMSON
Semantics.
ROBERT
What do you mean?
SAMSON
Exactly.
Robert draws a blank.
SAMSON
It depends on how you look at it.
ROBERT
Uh huh. What’s it for?
SAMSON
It’s not for anything.
ROBERT
Then why do you have it? What does it do?
SAMSON
It does have some therapeutic properties.
ROBERT
You just said it’s not for anything. Mercury is poison.
SAMSON
Sort of. In a way, yes.
ROBERT
So you poison people?
SAMSON
Why would you say that?
ROBERT
Because that’s what it is.
SAMSON
(more firmly)
Like I said, it depends on how you look at it.
The Quicksilver glimmers and glistens.
SAMSON
Many naturally occurring substances with poisonous properties also have therapeutic uses. This is called the law of similars, or, if you like, homeopathy.
ROBERT
So what does it do, then?
SAMSON
It’s different for everyone.
ROBERT
You’re not answering my questions.
SAMSON
You, sir, are momentarily in my charge and this substance does not concern you, except perhaps as an object of caution. Now I suggest we focus on the issue at hand or terminate this engagement.
ROBERT
I see. And what is the issue at hand?
SAMSON
Your condition.
ROBERT
Which is?
SAMSON
Chronic boredom. A pervading sense of uselessness. Loneliness, isolation, malaise. Textbook depression. Anxiety. General physical nervousness. Circadian inversion characterized diametrically by compulsive napping and insomnia. Regret. Remorse… Repressed anger resulting in self-deprecation, passive aggression—
ROBERT
All right, that’s enough.
SAMSON
Denial.
ROBERT
Thank you.
SAMSON
Contempt. Bitterness.
ROBERT
Yes, I get the picture.
SAMSON
Impotence.
Robert glares at him, impotently.
SAMSON
Now what I would like to suggest is a very basic protocol—
ROBERT
I think I’ve had just about enough of your suggestions and amateur diagnoses. I don’t believe you have any idea what you’re talking about and I’ve half a mind to seek out a regulatory board or business bureau on behalf of the safety of the neighborhood.
Stand-off. Samson speaks calmly and confidently without a shred of doubt as to the accuracy of his knowledge.
SAMSON
The Quicksilver is a profound therapy in which the patient, having exhausted all other options, is injected with the element. Whereby, a neurological transaction occurs such that the benefit and the cost are relative, and terminal. The patient undergoes a complete psychological rehabilitation, the prognosis of which can, paradoxically, only be described as both highly personal and transcendentally impersonal. But in so achieving this level of catharsis, the patient trades his or her life.
ROBERT
That doesn’t sound like a novelty item.
SAMSON
No. It’s very special.
Robert considers this, briefly.
ROBERT
I’ll take it.
SAMSON
I’m sorry?
ROBERT
You’ve sold me.
SAMSON
Oh, I apologize, but there’s been a misunderstanding. The Quicksilver is not for sale.
ROBERT
But this is exactly what I’m looking for.
SAMSON
Yes, of course it is. It’s what we’re all looking for.
ROBERT
Then name your price.
SAMSON
Listen, I think this conversation is quite premature. Now why don’t we take our time and think this over—
ROBERT
I don’t have any more time. Look at me. I want the full deal while I still have a chance.
SAMSON
I am sorry.
ROBERT
But why?! I don’t have anything to lose!
SAMSON
Because you don’t deserve it! If you don’t have anything to lose, then you don’t deserve it. Now I recommend that you go back inside your house and think about what you really want for the remainder of your short time here on earth before you mess around with irreversible consequences. Perhaps you may find that you do indeed have something to lose.
Robert is speechless. Defeated.
Sam places a hand on his shoulder.
SAMSON
Listen. Let’s start out with something reasonable. On the house.
He offers Robert a nice fat joint.
SAMSON
Warm comfortable clothes. Nice hot cup of ginger-lemon tea. Relaxing music. Some yard work. And a long walk around the block. You’ll feel like a new man. Won’t even recognize yourself.
Robert takes the joint, cautiously.
SAMSON
And call this number. It may benefit you. Just make a reservation.
Sam hands Robert a black business card embossed with silver letters. It reads: Event Horizon.
Robert hesitates a moment longer.
ROBERT
(sheepishly)
How do you know?
SAMSON
How do I know what?
ROBERT
If it kills you, then how do you know what it does? Before that, I mean.
Samson grins.
SAMSON
Now that would be something of a conundrum, wouldn’t it?
***
The surveyor’s Chevy Suburban travels down a cold country road on its way to the next job site.
Gunner drives. Sue rides shotgun and fusses with the radio, searching for a station. Jonah sits in the backseat, looking out the window at the passing countryside and making notes in his notebook.
Gunner adjusts his rearview mirror.
GUNNER
You sure don’t say much, do you?
SUE
What?
GUNNER
Not you, Nancy. It’s no wonder you don’t have a girlfriend.
From the backseat, Jonah sees Gunner looking at him in the rearview mirror.
JONAH
What?
GUNNER
Are you guys deaf?
SUE
Leave him alone, Gunner.
GUNNER
I’ve noticed that you’re always writing stuff down.
JONAH
Oh? Yeah, here and there. Just making some notes…
GUNNER
That’s what I just said.
Gunner watches him in the mirror.
GUNNER
What are you writing?
JONAH
Aw, I don’t know. Just thoughts, observations. Poems. They’re kind of difficult to explain.
GUNNER
That doesn’t sound so difficult. Give it a shot. We like poems, don’t we, Sue? We’re not completely stupid.
SUE
Yeah, sure. I mean, no.
JONAH
No, I didn’t mean it like that. I’m just not sure how to explain them.
GUNNER
Well why don’t you read something for us?
SUE
Oh, Gunner, would you leave him alone.
GUNNER
I’m just making conversation.
SUE
Well, quit being an asshole.
GUNNER
I’m not being an asshole. He said he writes things down. I’m just curious what he writes down.
SUE
Did you ever think that maybe it’s none of your business?
GUNNER
If it were my business then I wouldn’t have to ask about it.
SUE
Well maybe if you weren’t such an asshole to begin with—
Gunner slams on the brakes. Sue slams into the dash, spilling coffee all over the windshield as Jonah slams into the back of Sue’s seat. The truck screeches to a halt in the middle of the road.
GUNNER
There. Now I’m being an asshole. I wanna hear what he has to say. It’s not gonna kill us, is it? Now read.
JONAH
But it’s just, uh…
Jonah reluctantly flips through a few pages.
Gunner turns around in his seat.
GUNNER
I said read, goddammit. Read!
Jonah quickly chooses a passage and in his smooth Midwestern drawl, reads.
JONAH
—from a singularity on that line dividing silence from complexity. It came like a great tide, sweeping them away. A continual, invisible explosion of white heat particles twinkling and glittering in the ether between entropy and determination. Suspended and informed somehow, and brutally awake. A throbbing nerve node. Arced-mass breathing in the curvature of space as if released from its cage of flesh and skull in one precise flash. Titanium veins pounding with incandescent armies of nano-teleology. Bursting vessels of—
SUE
(cutting in, quickly)
Well I’d say that is a little different. No offense. Gunner, would you mind if we kept moving here?
GUNNER
Read some more.
Sue huffs and rolls his eyes. Jonah glances nervously between the two men and then continues.
JONAH
In the zone of twilight between the deep past and the deep future, we are living our deaths and dreaming our lives. Across the ecstatic memory of the present how could it be otherwise? Hunt like a swallow in the last cavity of evening light because dusk is forgiveness and the fire in the tree is burning down heaven.
The men are quiet. The radio snows a soft flurry of static. Jonah shifts uncomfortably. Gunner gently switches off the radio.
He clears his throat.
GUNNER
Say that last part again.
JONAH
Um… the fire in the tree is burning down heaven. Beauty and cruelty are so close together that they can’t see each other. For this we should be grateful that they are so close together. Death is laughing.
The truck is quiet.
Jonah reconsiders the last line—
JONAH
(to himself)
Hmm.
—and makes a note in his book.
GUNNER
Get out of the truck.
SUE
What?
GUNNER
You heard me. Both of you get out of the truck. Now.
SUE
What the hell for?!
GUNNER
(fiercely)
Get out of the goddamn truck!
SUE
All right, all right! Criminy!
At a loss, Sue climbs out of the truck in a passive aggressive fit. Jonah follows.
SUE
Good lord, Gunner, what has got into you?
GUNNER
Move away. Over there.
SUE
Hell…
They move away from the vehicle and stand in the gravel on the side of the road, kicking at the cold stones. The truck idles.
Gunner sits in the driver’s seat, staring down at some buried consideration. He looks up and through the windshield.
The road stretches out before him in a long line that eventually disappears into the trees. Just up the road a deer-crossing sign shifts slightly in the light breeze. A murder of crows shouts out across the winter field.
Gunner looks out the driver-side window, across the road, across the winter cornfield, and way out in the middle of the field, he sees himself, as a mud man, standing naked and covered in pale mud paint, staring back at himself.
GUNNER
All right, let’s go.
Jonah and Sue hesitate, not so sure.
GUNNER
Well, come on.
They climb back into the truck and Gunner pulls away.
The fields beyond the road are empty, quiet, and still.
***
A small storage room is filled with droning fluorescent lights. Thousands of salt and pepper shakers are lined up on metal shelves from floor to ceiling.
Simone stands at her cart, filling salt shakers with salt. The room is deathly quiet, so quiet that the sound of pouring salt is quite loud.
A flickering fluorescent light interrupts her and she stops to watch it. Then she returns to work. Salt pouring like sand through an hourglass.
***
A country road runs through a stretch of trees.
The Chevy Suburban pulls over and parks on the side of the road. Jonah, Gunner, and Sue hop out and unload some gear from the back of the truck. The winter woods are naked and still. The men are pensive and quiet before the landscape.
Sue scopes out the area and then speaks.
SUE
All right, we’re gonna run a line through these woods and out the other side. Gunner, we got an existing elevation somewhere so let’s find that and set up here. Visibility shouldn’t be too bad with the leaves down so you just head straight out in there about a ways and then give us a call.
JONAH
How far?
SUE
(irritably)
I said about a ways. Couple hundred yards.
Jonah heads off into the woods with his surveyor’s rod.
The trees are bare of leaves but the forest is thick with brown winter brambles and vines.
Jonah tramps through the undergrowth, blending in with the wintry foliage in his brown construction coveralls. He counts out paces under his breath, slowly ducking and weaving through the brush, pushing branches aside, stepping over downed trunks, and crunching across a layer of frozen fallen leaves.
When he reaches his count, he stops and slowly waves the red and white striped prism rod back and forth above his head. He speaks into the walkie-talkie.
JONAH
You got me?
GUNNER
(on the radio)
Hang on. Yeah. Got you.
He drives his surveyor’s rod into the ground.
GUNNER
(on the radio)
Shooting.
Jonah waits. The trees are quiet. He scans the forest. A woodpecker taps on a walnut tree.
He looks in another direction and is surprised to discover an animal very close to him, only a few yards away. A buck deer is lying quietly on the ground. Strangely, the buck is just watching him, either unafraid, or unable to move.
Jonah slowly walks away from the surveyor’s rod stuck in the ground and approaches the deer. It struggles to its feet, wounded. A bullet wound leaks blood from its side.
Jonah carefully creeps toward the deer. He reaches out a hand. Closer…
And then his radio erupts with a burst of static—
GUNNER
(on the radio)
All right, got the shot! Hang tight.
Jonah quickly silences the radio but the buck takes off, disappearing into the forest.
***
Robert pours himself a hot cup of tea and sits down at the kitchen table. He wears his favorite jogging suit.
He examines the joint that Samson gave him. His cup of tea steaming quietly on the table. He lights the joint with a match, and inhales, and coughs horrendously.
Then he relaxes a little and smokes some more. He sits back in his chair, smoking. He rubs his face and loosens up his neck muscles. He takes a sip of tea. And he smiles a funny little smile.
He examines the black and silver business card which reads Event Horizon and a phone number. He goes to the phone and dials the number. It’s a brooding 1970s push-button wall phone.
ROBERT
Hello? Yes. I would, uh, I’d like to make a reservation, please. Uh huh. Robert Adams. Yes. Adams. Okay. Uh huh. All right. I see. Okay. Thank you. Goodbye.
He hangs up the phone and stands there for a second, lost in the face panel of the old phone. He lifts the phone off the receiver just an inch or so, floating it, listening to the dial tone. Then he floats it next to his head, listening to the dial tone arcing invisibly between the handset and his ear.
He holds his other hand up before the keypad and positions his fingers to dial. He slowly probes in the air with his fingers, searching like a spider for a number to dial.
But there is no one to call. He hangs up the phone and sits back down next to the kitchen table. He stares at the floor, at an odd angle, nursing a little paranoia, and settles back into the horrifyingly infinite quiet of the kitchen.
He remembers his tea and takes a sip, but he inadvertently snickers and almost forces tea out his nose. He snickers again, struggling not to spit out his tea when— CHIRBONK.
Robert hears a sudden sound at the window. He swallows his tea and listens attentively.
THUNK. FFFFLLLLLLLKUNK.
He goes to the kitchen window to have a look. BONK! Startled, he recoils as something hits the window. He looks again, cautiously. WHAM. Something is flying into the window
He goes to another window. SLAM. THUNK.
Red birds are flying into his windows.
Robert crosses into the other room. He opens the curtains at the large window. Nothing. Then—
THUNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK…
The house is under assault. A storm of kamikaze cardinals. Hundreds of red birds hurl themselves into the windows.
Robert stumbles backward, falls over the couch and hides behind it, covering his head and ears.
THUNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK UNK.
Then, like a bag of microwave popcorn…
THUNK. THUNK UNK. THUNK.
The storm stops.
Robert opens the front door and cautiously peeks outside. The coast seems to be clear. A dead cardinal is lying on the front steps. Then he sees the rest of them.
Looking down from above, the house is surrounded by a moat of red. Red birds are piled like roses, circling the house. The house sits inside a ring of red, a square inside a circle.
***
Jonah moves quietly through the trees, deeper into the woods. He counts out paces and finds his next point. He shoves the surveyor’s rod into the ground and jockeys with the radio.
JONAH
You got me?
GUNNER
(on the radio)
Hang on. Wave it around a little.
Jonah waves the surveyor’s rod slowly back and forth.
GUNNER
(on the radio)
All right, got it. Let’s shoot it.
He holds the rod steady.
GUNNER
(on the radio)
Shooting. All right. Got the shot. Coming to you.
Jonah releases the rod and waits. He has another look at the forest. Bare branches compose themselves in black fractal patterns against the sky. Roots crawl across the tapestry of earth and fallen leaves. Micro-canyons of bark and crisscrossed timbers. Evergreen needles.
He spies a pinecone lying on the ground. He picks it up and examines it. It’s a nice one. Big and full and complete. He turns it in his fingers, admiring the perfectly irregular radial symmetry.
Suddenly the pinecone releases an electrical charge, shocking him, and he drops it.
***
The fluorescent lights of the Convention Center flicker on and off over Simone’s head in the small industrial room. She looks up from her salt and pepper shakers.
***
Baffled, Jonah watches the pinecone lying inertly on the ground.
He picks it up again. The pinecone comes alive, pulsating with electric-blue light, like a bug-zapper. Now it has him with its current and he can’t let go. He reaches out with his other hand and grabs the metal surveyor’s rod stuck in the ground.
The entire forest around him comes alive, exploding with electric-blue light. Tendrils of electricity arc across roots in the ground, spiralling up the trunks of trees and then crowning. The current jumps from tree to tree until the entire canopy of branches is humming, buzzing, and crackling with radiant blue light.
***
BZZZT— The lights go out completely and Simone is in the dark.
***
Gunner and Sue are tromping through the undergrowth, dodging brown branches and briars. Sue is marking trees with a can of orange spray paint.
SUE
Gunner, listen. I know this has been a hard time for you. I want you to know that I am truly sorry about the farm. I know how much of a blow it was and I know it isn’t any easier considering the nature of the work we’ve been doing.
TSSSST. He marks another tree with paint.
SUE
But we’ve got good jobs. We get to work outside, not in some sterile office. That’s who we are. We’re outside dogs. And I think it’s kind of exciting. We’re out here on the frontier, cutting trail. We’re drawing the map and I think that’s kind of neat—
Gunner stops abruptly and Sue crashes into him.
SUE
Whoa! Sorry…
Gunner holds up his hand to silence Sue.
SUE
What’s the matter?
GUNNER
Quiet.
SUE
(whispering)
What? What is it?
GUNNER
Do you hear something?
Sue listens.
SUE
No.
GUNNER
Do you smell anything?
SUE
Like what?
GUNNER
Some funny smell.
Sue smells, delicately probing the air with his nostrils.
SUE
I don’t think so.
GUNNER
Well do you or don’t you?
SUE
Well, I don’t know! What kind of smell is it?
GUNNER
Something burning. It smells like something’s burning.
Gunner moves on and Sue follows on after him.
***
Jonah stands at the center of the brilliant blue spectacle with one hand on the surveyor’s rod and his other hand unable to release the pinecone. He quivers and shakes, conducting the massive electric current as it contracts his muscles, fries his nerves, and lights up the entire woods.
By the time Gunner and Sue arrive at Jonah, he’s standing in a funny position with the surveyor’s rod in one hand and a pinecone in the other. His eyes are rolled back up in his head. Otherwise, the forest around them is calm and normal. They watch him for a moment and exchange glances with each other.
GUNNER
What are you doing?
Jonah drops the pinecone.
From Jonah’s perspective, the network of electric blue current evaporates from the forest. He snaps out of it, startled and dazed.
JONAH
Oh— Wow. What?
GUNNER
What were you doing?
JONAH
Um. Nothing. I mean— Just having a look around.
GUNNER
Huh.
SUE
Well let’s keep moving.
JONAH
Yeah. Yeah, let’s keep moving.
Jonah grabs his surveyor’s rod and takes off into the trees.
Sue watches after him, dubiously, and Gunner examines the pinecone.
***
The fluorescent lights come back on in the salt and pepper room. Simone is standing at her cart of salt shakers. She looks up at the long bulbs.
She steps out into the hallway and looks in both directions. The long pink corridor is empty. A fluorescent light flickers way down at the end of the hallway.
She steps back into the room and returns to her work at the salt and pepper station.
MR. STEVENS
How we doing down here?
Simone nearly jumps out of her skin. Mr. Stevens is standing in the doorway. He holds a lit cigarette at his side.
SIMONE
Omigod you scared me. The lights went out.
MR. STEVENS
Yes, there seems to be some problem with the power.
SIMONE
Yeah… Um, how many of these are we going to need?
MR. STEVENS
I imagine we better hit all of them, just to be on the safe side.
SIMONE
Oh. Okay.
MR. STEVENS
Super. Thanks again. I know this isn’t glamorous work.
SIMONE
Uh huh. Hey I was also getting a little curious.
MR. STEVENS
About what?
SIMONE
How long is it that we’ve been here?
MR. STEVENS
How do you mean?
SIMONE
How long have we— I’m sorry. I mean, today.
How long have I been working here. Today.
Stevens draws a blank on her.
MR. STEVENS
You know the rule, Simone.
SIMONE
Yes, I know, but where is everyone? Else.
MR. STEVENS
I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at with this line of questioning.
SIMONE
Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?
MR. STEVENS
I’d be delighted.
SIMONE
Do you have children?
MR. STEVENS
Of course not. We’re all going to die. After all.
They stare at each other poker-faced and Mr. Stevens takes a drag off his cigarette. The radio in the salt and pepper room snows between stations.
SIMONE
Okay, well, actually I was wondering if I might be able to take a short break today.
MR. STEVENS
You bet. Whatever you need to do.
Mr. Stevens abruptly checks his watch, causing Simone to jump again—
MR. STEVENS
Well. Gotta run. Just hit as many of these as you can. Thanks again.
Simone catches her breath.
***
The three surveyors are moving steadily through the quiet afternoon trees.
Gunner and Sue are tromping as a pair. Gunner hauls the tripod slung over his shoulder. Sue carries his clipboard and can of spray paint, occasionally pausing to mark significant trees.
Jonah hikes out ahead of them, moving through the bare winter forest, nimbly pushing branches aside, ducking and weaving slowly through the brush.
Patches of snow here and there. Chickadees chattering and blue jays caterwauling.
***
Robert is raking dead cardinals into a large red pile in the center of his front lawn. He claws at the grass with a leaf rake. He stops to wipe his brow and scans the neighborhood to see if anyone has noticed the odd manner of yard work.
The neighborhood is entirely empty and Robert is alone with his large pile of dead red birds.
***
Jonah is standing in a small clearing in the trees. Before him lies a large mound of earth about waist high, rounded smooth and covered with healthy green grass.
Light shines through the sparse canopy, illuminating the mound of bright green grass, out of season amid the drab surroundings.
Gunner and Sue emerge from the trees behind Jonah and stand next to him at the odd land-feature. Gunner observes the mound for a moment and then takes off his hat in a gesture of solemnity.
Somehow taking the cue, Sue speaks in a quiet voice.
SUE
What is it?
GUNNER
Indians.
SUE
(momentarily fascinated)
Oh—
Sue hesitates, unsure how to proceed, shifting back and forth uneasily. Jonah looks up at the light coming through the trees while Gunner is fixated on the green mound.
Then Sue takes the cap off his can of spray paint. He shakes the can, steps forward and quickly marks the mound of earth with an orange X.
TSSSST— TSSSST.
Jonah and Gunner both shoot him an incredulous look.
SUE
(defensively)
What?
Spooked by his irreverence, the men look superstitiously back down at the Indian burial mound.
***
Samson rolls through a sector of new streets on the fringes of the housing development. A construction zone of exposed foundations, housing frames, and dirt yards.
Cruising slowly, looking for signs of life, Sam spies a small ghost standing inside one of the open skeletal houses—literally, it is a young child wearing a white sheet with cut-out eye-holes gazing back at him. Then he sees another child, climbing up from an open basement. Another dropping down from some rafters. Another, running between two houses. And another, crossing the street in his rearview mirror. The children look quite young to be playing in a construction site.
But there are children everywhere! Coming out of the woodwork like rats.
A boy wearing a homemade superhero cape runs out ahead of Samson’s truck. He sprints around a corner, his cape flying behind him, screaming a high-pitched alarm at the top of his lungs.
SUPER BOY
Ahhhh!!! He’s coming!!!
Samson slowly follows the child around the corner. Little kids line up on the street curb, clapping and cheering.
At the end of the street a cul-de-sac reaches out into a field. The circular dead-end is filled with children coloring on the pavement with street chalk. Outfitted in winter gear—snowsuits, mismatched layers, and a hodgepodge of ragtag accessories—the kids are down on the pavement covering the street with colored chalk. Their little hands are moving furiously, gripping the large pieces of chalk in their fists, around and around, the sound of circling chalk creating a swooping, sweeping rhythm.
Samson pulls into a driveway, jumps out of his truck, and announces gloriously—
SAMSON
HOT CHOCOLATE!!!
The children cheer and surround him like a pack of wild dogs. Sam sets out a self-service thermos and some white Styrofoam cups. Then he wades through the children and walks across the cul-de-sac toward a house.
The skeleton frame of a house sits at the end of the street. The dirt lawn is filled with furniture. A couch, a recliner, coffee table, lamp, television. A family of contemporary Native Americans is bundled up and gathered in the front yard, watching TV
Samson steps over the curb and up onto the dirt lawn.
An ancient woman relaxes in the easy chair in front of the television. She smokes a gentleman’s pipe and when she sees Samson she regards him and motions to a small boy who takes off running into the house. Then she looks up into Samson’s mirrored shades, gestures at him with her pipe, and speaks to him in Wyandot, an Iroquoian language.
A younger man in the family translates for Samson.
WYANDOT TRANSLATOR
She says that the Devil is a curious crow, and crafty too. Since he could not be God, he became God’s mirror, and now we are not so sure who is who.
The boy emerges from the frame house and crosses the yard, struggling to carry a pair of gallon milk jugs. The jugs are filled with a bright Tang-orange liquid.
WYANDOT TRANSLATOR
But really it is easy. When we make a deal with the Devil, we go to the Devil’s paradise. And the Devil is the only one who makes deals.
The boy places the jugs at Samson’s feet. Sam pulls an envelope of cash out of his coat pocket and hands it to the translator who tucks it inside the blanket draped over his shoulders.
The old woman thanks Samson, smokes her pipe, and smiles.
WYANDOT TRANSLATOR
She says that the Big Scioto is frozen, but it’s a good day for ice-fishing!
Out in the street, a child is scribbling furiously and methodically with chalk on the concrete. Around and around his chalk goes… Beyond him, many more children are scribbling in circles. The sound of chalk circling on the concrete creates an overwhelming rhythmic, circling, scraping sound.
The entire street is ringed with children, drawing circles.
Pulling back and looking down on the cul-de-sac: incredibly, the children have filled the entire cul-de-sac with colored chalk, creating a circle-based drawing. Smaller dots form bigger dots, which in turn form large circles. Hundreds of concentric circles resonate harmonically like colored raindrops on a concrete pond.
The drawing resembles a giant aboriginal painting.
Pulling back even farther and ascending above the neighborhood, the street drawing continues. Unconsciously, the children have created an image as the result of their collective circular scribbling: a long green snake slithers down the street and into the neighborhood…
In the cul-de-sac, the snake’s mouth opens around an orb of colored dots and circles as if it is consuming an Easter egg.
Ascending higher, the neighborhood is only a piece of a greater patchwork, a quilt of fields and suburban clusters. Ohio. The Great Lakes, and the Eastern Seaboard arcing across the turning planet. The Northern Hemisphere. Planet Earth hangs in the vacuum of black space. And the Sun, radiating fission, solar flares, swirling gaseous hurricanes, and light.
***
Dust particulates floating in a stream of bright sunlight.
Sunlight on Simone’s hands.
Simone stands at a large window on the upper mezzanine in the lobby of the Convention Center. She is a lone, organic figure within an otherwise cubist and off-worldly architecture. Golden afternoon light spills over her. She closes her eyes like a cat in the window, basking in the warm, much-needed sunlight.
***
A gorgeous oak tree stands alone at the center of an empty winter cornfield. Bare black branches extend like gnarled fingers from the thick, centenary trunk of the tree.
Jonah, Gunner, and Sue emerge from the woods and stand at the edge of the field as though taking in a vista. They look out across the field, faces awash in the magic light of an early dusk. Sue breaches the moment.
SUE
All right, let’s just set up somewhere here. We can tag this one and then get outta here.
GUNNER
What are they gonna build here?
SUE
Oh, I dunno… Let’s see…
He flips back a couple pages of his clipboard.
SUE
Event Horizon… A Convention Center.
GUNNER
Huh.
Gunner continues watching the tree.
SUE
(to Jonah)
Well you know what to do. Head on out there.
(to Gunner)
Gunner, let’s see if we can get this in one shot. Then we can all go home.
Jonah starts off into the field.
Gunner then momentarily sees the tree and the entire field completely inverted and upside down.
GUNNER
(stopping Jonah)
Actually, I think I’d like to call it a day.
SUE
Just one more run. Then we’ll call it.
GUNNER
Nah, it’s getting cold and I’m hungry.
SUE
Me too but we’re all the way out here and I’m sure you got it in you to take one more shot.
GUNNER
Nope. I don’t think so.
JONAH
I can do it, if we have to.
GUNNER
You stay where you are.
SUE
Oh come on, Gunner. Don’t be ridiculous. Help me out here.
GUNNER
I’m pretty sure I’ve made up my mind.
SUE
Don’t make me pull rank here, Gunner.
GUNNER
Do what you have to do.
SUE
Well then I will.
GUNNER
I’ve got the keys to the truck.
Sue glares.
SUE
Gunner, now I’ve just about reached the end of my rope with you. If you’re not gonna take this shot then I’ll pace out the distance and mark it myself.
He allows for a response but he gets none. He marches off toward the tree with his can of surveyor’s spray paint, counting out the paces passive-aggressively.
Gunner’s eyes turn wild and set and he calls out to Sue.
GUNNER
I’m gonna have to ask you not to do that.
SUE
(shouting over his shoulder)
And if you leave me out here, then you can just forget it.
Gunner begins moving toward Sue as they shout at each other.
GUNNER
Put the paint down, Sue.
SUE
What is the goddamn matter with you?
GUNNER
I said, put the paint can down.
Sue keeps walking.
GUNNER
Sue!
Gunner runs at Sue. Sue takes off and Gunner chases him across the field. He catches up and tackles Sue to the ground. Sue struggles and kicks but he is no match for Gunner and Gunner wrestles the can of spray paint away from him.
SUE
Gunner?!?!
GUNNER
I said, put the goddamn paint can down! Now how do you like it?!
Gunner holds him down and sprays orange paint all over him as Sue tries to shield himself. Then Gunner sprays paint into the air until the can is empty.
GUNNER
It’s time to go home and there’s nothing we can do about it!
He hurls the empty paint can across the field and grabs Sue by the collar, pulling him up close and eyeing his partner with ferocious intimacy.
GUNNER
It’s coming, Sue. It’s coming.
Gunner drops him and walks away. Utterly bewildered, Sue watches him go.
Gunner marches aggressively toward Jonah. Jonah nervously steps aside as Gunner plows right by him, disappearing into the trees.
Out in the field, Sue gets on his feet, like a plucked chicken, ridiculously covered in orange paint.
The old lonely tree stands above him in the field.
***
Gunner walks alone, methodically moving through the trees as if pulled by some force.
Somewhere off behind him, Jonah and Sue haul their gear, stomping through the underbrush. The forest is dimming and quiet but for the sounds of the men pushing through the branches and brambles.
Gunner speeds on ahead, urgently heading toward the truck, huffing, sniffing, and crashing, branches whipping at his face and thighs until he breaks out into a dead run and is running for his life.
***
Simone is curled up on the mezzanine floor, asleep in the warm, diminishing pool of light. Curled up like a cat, dreaming.
***
Gunner is sprinting through the trees with complete terror-stricken abandon.
He careens down a slope, spills out of the woods, and stumbles into the middle of the road. He folds over and braces himself on his knees, panting and heaving, alone in the road.
Shortly, Jonah and Sue emerge from the trees, catching him in his moment of desperate recovery. They load up their gear while he stands in the center of the road catching his breath.
When they’re finished loading, Jonah and Sue get into the truck and wait.
Gunner stands in the road looking at the truck for an odd extra minute. Then he climbs into the driver’s seat, starts the truck, and drives away.
Gunner drives, Sue rides shotgun, Jonah sits in the backseat. The men are silent as the truck cruises down the wooded winter road.
Sue finally breaks the ice as they pass a deer-crossing sign.
SUE
Gunner. Well, I’m just sorry that things have come to this—
A deer suddenly leaps in front of the vehicle. Gunner slams on the brakes, but the truck hits the buck head-on. The deer flips onto the hood and careens toward the windshield—
Nothing but white light and a high-pitched chord, like wine glasses feeding back—
***
Long banquet tables are covered in white tablecloths. Jonah is sitting alone at a table, hunched over his notebook, writing. He is wearing a cater-waiter’s tuxedo uniform.
Simone is sitting a few tables away. She is looking at him. Oddly, both of their faces are covered in Kabuki-style white face paint.
Jonah looks up from his notebook and sees her—
***
The engine is idling. Thick, foul exhaust steams from the tailpipe. The Chevy Suburban sits in the middle of the road.
Jonah stumbles out of the truck and staggers on the blacktop.
The prize buck is dead.
And so are Gunner and Sue. The buck is lying across the hood. Its head has gone through the driver-side of the windshield and pinned Gunner to the seat. His arms are hung up in the antlers and one eye has been gored. His jugular has been fatally lacerated.
Sue has been thrown over the dash and smashed through the passenger side of the windshield. His head is mounted like a wild boar on a wall of shattered glass, face splattered with orange paint, eyes wide to eternity.
A pool of blood runs across the hood of the vehicle and drips to the cold, cold road. Jonah wavers on his feet, absorbing the shock of the grotesque still-life. He manages to check his watch. It is still ticking.
Gunner suddenly spasms into a burning, primal grimace. He rages against the dead animal and the void, clenching its antlers in a terminal grapple. Then he surrenders, seeing it, and blasting out his last long breath like a blown steam valve. His foot slides off the brake pedal.
The truck rolls, creeping by Jonah like a ghost ship.
As the truck passes, a strange figure is revealed. A white mud man is standing on the other side of the road. Jonah gazes at the primitive apparition of himself.
The truck crawls down the road and rolls into the ditch.
Jonah is held in place, magnetized and paralyzed, fighting to run, but unable. There is nowhere to go, and he faces himself, the mud man, painfully, slowly collapsing. He sinks to the ground, brought to his knees.
The two figures sit on opposite sides of the road, gazing into the ghostly, mirrored images of each other.
Jonah quivers and shakes, fighting something mean.
Blood running from their noses.
Staring it down.
