Morning Star Page #13

---

ABRAXAS (CONT’D)

Soon we will walk the sands of the

Vale together. The meaninglesshuman words “sand” and “Vale” will

fall away like a bad dream.

Webber turns, impulsively extends his hand toward her. Shereflexively pulls her hand back. Abraxas quickly correctsherself and clasps Webber’s hands but that moment happenedand he saw it.

ABRAXAS (CONT’D)

I’ll make the commitment to younow: Keep your division runningaround in circles for one more week

and I’ll bring you home.

Webber grins lopsidedly to himself, then raises his head toher and nods. He lets go of her hands.

62.

EXT. PARIS STREET, NEAR SEINE -- EVENING

A JAMAICAN WOMAN, a lone protestor with a sign, gesticulatesat a MILITARY CONVOY rolling down the boulevard.

STREET PROTESTOR

Wake up! These are not “exercises”,

this is war! This is death...

Walking past, Webber attaches a device to his phone. Itblinks GREEN. He dials. Oscarsson picks up. MUMBLING.

WEBBER (INTO PHONE)

Are you drunk?

INTERCUT - OSCARSSON’S APARTMENT

Oscarsson sits up, bleary-eyed-

OSCARSSON (INTO PHONE)

Only medicinally.

WEBBER:

There’s a good chance mycounterpart is about to set offArmageddon. Thought I owed you aheads up, for old time’s sake.

OSCARSSON:

You talked to Abraxas?

WEBBER:

Yes. She assured me I’d be rapturedbefore it went down. She even gaveme a date. A week from now.

OSCARSSON:

But we don’t believe it?

WEBBER:

By next week, this planet will be acinder. There are still doves

inside the Hex desperatelyscrambling to arrange peace talks.

If these others want to be certain

of starting a war, they have tostrike now- she didn’t respect meenough to craft a convincing lie.

OSCARSSON:

What are you going to do?

63.

WEBBER:

I’m going to hunt down my “brother”

and kill him. What else?

OSCARSSON:

If you stop him, you may save thisplanet, but don’t expect gratitudefrom the humans. You have onlyenemies now.

Webber hangs up, looks at the war machines rumbling by.

BEWLEY (PRE-LAP)

We IDed the hotel Anders card key

came from.

INT. HQ - CONFERENCE ROOM -- DAY

A projected surveillance image: two men smoking on a balcony.

One is much shorter than the other.

BEWLEY (O.S.)

It’s a residential hotel.

Ethnically diverse, low income.

We’ve identified three occupants ofone room as Xeno infiltrators.

Webber, Gast and the others, receiving a briefing fromBewley. Photos of THREE MEN are laid out in front of Webber.

One old, one baby-faced, one short and slender.

GAST:

Two come and go. This ratherdiminutive man, seems to stayinside. There’s also a suitcase in

there, identical to the one from

Salzburg.

On the screen:
an infra-red photo of an object on a table inthe room. Live readings of temperature, GPS positioning etc.

BEWLEY:

No radioactivity. Our best analysisis that it’s something chemical, orbiological. If it is a weapon.

GAST:

Whatever it is, they’re sitting onit, waiting for instructions. Whichmeans Morningstar will contact themat least once more.

64.

BEWLEY:

And we have full-spectrumsurveillance in place when he does.

Webber studies a wall of still surveillance photos. He notessomething in a photo of the short man on the balcony. Herefers to other photos on the table. What he sees: a wateringcan has appeared on the ledge in this most recent photo.

WEBBER:

I want to take the nest now.

This draws disapproving looks from everyone. Webber holds upthe surveillance photo he was looking at.

WEBBER (CONT’D)

Those are plastic plants. What’sthe watering can for? It’s a signalfor Morningstar to stay away.

They know they’re being watched.

Gast, annoyed he missed that, nods his assent.

EXT. MARSEILLE -- DAY

In sight of the harbor, FRENCH POLICE fan out across atenement roof, train their weapons on the squalid buildingacross the street. A DRONE hovers nearby.

Gast, waiting with a FRENCH PARAMILITARY TEAM by a back door,

watches on a remote video set-up.

INT. TENEMENT BUILDING -- DAY

Webber and Bewley, wearing flak-jackets, follow PARAMILITARYFRENCH COPS down a shabby hall with rippled wallpaper andworn carpeting. ARABIC MUSIC, a baby CRYING. They stop infront of the door of the “nest.”

Bewley anxiously raises his AK-like weapon. Webber looksover, notes something’s off. He releases the safety onBewley’s gun. Bewley looks ashamed. Webber gives him a littlesmile, a nod.

A French Cop prepares to hit the door with a BATTERINGDEVICE... but just before he does, the door opens and an OLDMAN emerges- the elderly Infiltrator from the surveillance.

The Old Man looks around casually as the French officerslevel their weapons at him. Slowly, a grin spreads across hisface, wide and nearly toothless. He raises his hands.

65.

WEBBER:

Take him.

Now the Old Man opens his palm. It holds what looks like acluster of red berries. Before anyone can react, he lets itdrop.

The object splits into millions of tiny, red pieces as ithits the floor. Each fragment acts as if alive, multiplyingincredibly. The Old Infiltrator is reduced almost instantlyto bone and sinew.

The closest cops just have time to register that the red tideflowing toward them is made up of millions of ANT-LIKEINSECTS before they’re devoured too.

EXT. TENEMENT BUILDING -- CONTINUOUS

On the video monitor, Gast watches the red tide spread in awide circle, taking out cops. He draws his weapon...

INT. TENEMENT BUILDING -- CONTINUOUS

Webber, Bewley and the last few French cops retreat as thered tide stops just in front of them, like a spent wave.

There’s no time for relief, though, as the Baby-FacedInfiltrator OPENS FIRE from the open doorway of the “nest”.

The last French cops go down. Webber and Bewley RETURN FIREbut the shooter’s already retreated back behind the door.

TENEMENT BUILDING - STAIRWELL

A door BLOWS inward and a FRENCH SQUAD, accompanied by Gast,

charges in, heading upstairs... near the landing, one of theFrench officers’ shoes trips an almost invisibly thin wire.

An IED unleashes a SHOWER OF THAT CAUSTIC YELLOW SUBSTANCE.

The French Cops ahead of Gast scream, flesh visibly melting.

TENEMENT APARTMENT (“NEST”)

Webber and Bewley burst in through the door, firing. Baby-

Face is hit several times, dies screaming.

Webber and Bewley warily searching for the third Infiltrator.

The “nest” turns out to be a litter-strewn suite of abandoned-

looking rooms. Bewley takes the one on the right.

66.

Bewley finds a lone occupant: a terrified LITTLE GIRL in adirty dress, curled up in a corner, hiding her hand behindher back. A captive?

BEWLEY:

It’s alright. I won’t hurt you.

In the first room, Webber kicks down a door. He finds himself

looking into a bathroom. A HUMAN SKIN, slack like an emptymask, lies discarded on the floor. FLIES hovering around atub caked with blackish dried blood.

WEBBER:

One of them jumped his skin.

Bewley now understands what he’s looking at. The “littlegirl” lets fly what she’s hiding behind her back. An ALIENINSECT- a larger, more scorpion-like species- that attachesitself to Bewley’s face.

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes