Arctic Blue Page #13

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Corbett uses snow and the squirrel's fur to wipe the blood

from his face, then wipes the knife off and lays it, open,

next to his leg.

ERIC:

I'll hold onto that.

With a wry smile, Corbett pushes it back over to Eric.

While Eric eats his dinner, Corbett listens to the STORM and

watches him eat.

CORBETT:

Sure love to know where you fit

in up here.

ERIC:

I'm here to do my job.

CORBETT:

You want to fool yourself about

that bullshit job, fine. Damn

shame you have to drag your

girlfriend along. You think a

woman like that will be happy

making moose stew for a man

-more-

(CONTINUED)

113 CONTINUED:
(2)

CORBETT (Cont'd)

making your salary? Look, I'll

give you five grand. Take the

money and go home where you both

belong.

ERIC:

Don't f***ing insult me.

Corbett smiles -- maybe he's beginning to understand Eric.

CORBETT:

Folks come to Alaska for a real

short list of reasons: Money.

Adventure. Solitude. Those

cover most everyone. But

frontiers also draw another type

of man. One with a demon in his

gut. He comes to the edge of the

world to face that demon, and lay

it to rest.

ERIC:

Yeah?

CORBETT:

Yep. Sometimes they do, but

usually they end up crazy or

dead.

Eric ponders Corbett's words as he eats.

114 INT. THE TURTLE - NIGHT

Anne Marie is frantic with worry. She has the AM/FM RADIO

on for company.

RADIO (VO)

...This is "Tundra Topics" on

KFAR. Remember, as the nights

get longer, be sure to stay on a

regular sleep schedule. The

depression from the coming of

winter that doctors call

'Seasonal Affective Disorder' --

or 'Arctic Blue' to us lay folk

-- is preventable.

Anne Marie tunes the radio to "Pipeline of the North" on

KIAK.

(CONTINUED)

114 CONTINUED:

RADIO (VO)

(continuing)

...John Byers was hospitalized in

Fairbanks today for an infection

in an abscessed tooth. Mr. Byers

had a toothache and attempted to

remove the tooth himself with a

pair of pliers...

Suddenly, a BUMP rocks the Turtle. Someone is outside.

Startled, Anne Marie turns the lights off and looks out the

window.

No sign of a vehicle or a person. As she pulls on her

parka, she glances at the big rifle leaning against the

wall, but doesn't touch it.

115 EXT. THE TURTLE

Her visitor, whoever it is, is behind the Turtle. Anne

Marie cautiously rounds the corner and stops dead.

NEW ANGLE:

A foraging GRIZZLY sniffs around, attracted by the smell of

fresh carrion -- Wilder. Eight feet tall and eleven-hundred

pounds, it's used to having its way. Right now, it's

hungry.

With a casual swipe of its paw, its massive claws puncture

the Turtle's aluminum skin, popping open the door of the

utility compartment. The bear pokes its head inside, and

Wilder's body slumps out into the snow. The bear pushes at

the corpse with its snout. Salivating, it prepares to dig

in.

Anne Marie looks around, wondering what the hell to do nEXT.

Wilder's snowmobile is a few yards behind her, parked

against the side of the Turtle. She inches toward it.

Testily, the bear looks up, SNIFFING loudly.

Keeping her eyes on the bear, Anne Marie feels for the

snowmobile ignition keys. They're not there. She feels

around inside the saddlebags and finds three emergency road

flares.

Anne Marie IGNITES the flares. They illuminate the area

with an eerie reddish glow. She YELLS at the bear, wields

the flares like Excalibur and moves forward.

The bear, reluctant to leave so hearty a pre-hibernation

meal, GROWLS and c*cks its head back and forth to assess the

threat. As Anne Marie inches ahead, the bear stands on hind

legs to its full height to meet the challenge.

(CONTINUED)

115 CONTINUED:

Anne Marie tosses a flare toward the bear. It grunts when

the flare hits it, and shuffles backwards. Anne Marie

throws another flare. With a ROAR from hell, the bear

charges. Anne Marie falls back. Still holding the last

flare, she's forced into a crawl space under the Turtle.

ANGLE - UNDER THE TURTLE

Anne Marie tries to squeeze out the other side, but she's

pinned in by the unevenness of the hard ground. The bear

swipes at her, its huge paw inches away. Anne Marie jabs at

the paw with the flare, but that only makes the bear more

quarrelsome.

She twists around, looking for a defense. Above her is the

cabling from the generator to the circuit box for the

Turtle's electrical system. She tugs at it, but it won't

budge. The bear SNIFFS at Anne Marie with its big wet

snout. Anne Marie notices warning a sign on a control

valve:

? DANGER!!

? BLACK WATER

? UNTREATED SEWAGE

Grimacing, she tries to turn the valve. After much effort,

it SNAPS and opens, releasing a stream of fetid sewage.

WIDER:

The bear gets a muzzle full of the stuff. HOWLING

unhappily, it backs away, GRUNTING and SNEEZING. Greatly

offended, its appetite gone, it lopes into the forest.

Anne Marie squirms out from under the Turtle and, gagging

from the horrible smell, pulls off her wet parka.

CUT TO:

116 EXT. WOODS NEAR THE TURTLE - SERIES OF SHOTS - NIGHT

Wearing one of Eric's coats, Anne Marie stands in the center

of three similarly-sized trees. A FLARE supplies the light.

The big Remington rifle leans against the tree closest to

her.

She tosses one end of a hundred feet of nylon rope over a

sturdy tree branch twenty-five feet from the ground. Then

she throws the other end over an opposing branch and

stretches the rope like a clothesline.

(CONTINUED)

116 CONTINUED:

She attaches a second length of rope perpendicular to the

first and throws it over a third tree branch, midway between

the other two. She kneels and ties something BELOW FRAME to

the cross-length rope.

Pulling mightily on the perpendicular rope, she hoists

something heavy to the level of the branches. The flare

burns out, plunging the area into darkness.

Anne Marie wraps the rope around the tree trunk and

nervously tries to LIGHT another flare. As she does, the

forest seems closer, sinister, filled with lurking ogres.

Seized with an instinctual fear, she grabs the rifle and

runs back to the Turtle.

FADE TO:

117 EXT. ENDICOTT FOOTHILLS - DAY

The storm has passed, leaving a fresh covering of powdery

snow in drifts like sand dunes. Eric and Corbett trek

toward Devil's Cauldron through the ever-thickening forest.

Corbett has made them snow goggles by cutting slits in

strips of tree bark worn like sunglasses. Eric, using a

tree branch as a walking stick, still limps on his sore

ankle. For the first time, he keeps the magnum stuck in his

waistband.

CORBETT:

There's a cabin, maybe twenty

miles south of here.

ERIC:

(kneels to adjust his ankle

wrap)

Too bad we're heading west.

CORBETT:

There's a snowmobile. Inside a

day we could be on the Yukon. I

got money there. Remember that

five thousand? Make it ten. Be

smart. Take it and walk away.

ERIC:

(bristling)

You don't get it, do you?

Corbett takes advantage of Eric's poor peripheral vision

from the visor by kneeing Eric in the face. Eric falls

backwards into the snow. Corbett takes off like a

jackrabbit. Eric spits out some blood, shakes the stars out

of his eyes and yanks the .357 from under his coat.

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