The Abyss Page #24

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INT. CONTROL MODULE 213

TIGHT ON LINDSEY as she grips the microphone. Her voice has become a hoarse

whisper. Her eyes are intense, focused on a point far beyond the walls of the

room.

LINDSEY:

... and you lit another candle and put it beside

mine and said "that's me"... and we stared at

the two candles, and then we... well, if you

remember any of it, I'm sure you remember the

next part. Bud, there are two candles in the

dark. I'm with you. I'll always be with you.

EXT. THE ABYSS 214

A tiny flickering light moves down along a vast black wall. Bud falls on in

dream-like solitude, a candle in the dark.

INT. CONTROL MODULE 215

Catfish gently takes the microphone from Lindsey's hands and leans close.

CATFISH:

How you doin', podner? Still with us, come-back?

Talk to us, Buddy boy.

They watch the screen, expectantly.

Nothing. Hippy and One Night start checking the equipment. Lindsey tried

unsuccessfully to keep the terror our of here voice.

LINDSEY:

Bud? You hangin' in there? Talk to me, Bud.

Are you okay?

There is an agonizing pause, then the letters appear slowly: SHAKING STOPED.

FEEL BETER. SOM LITE BELOW.

LINDSEY:

What kind of light?

LIGHT EVYWHER. BEAWTIFULLL

MONK:

He's hallucinating badly.

EXT. THE ABYSS 216

Bud is no longer in pain. His expression is rapt.

LOOKING DOWN, past his to a ghostly landscape. His last flare sputters out,

but there is light. Bioluminescent algae carpet the walls of the canyon

below him. And he's right... it is beautiful.

The water is so clear we can see down 500 feet past Bud's tiny, silhouetted

figure, to a vast landscape faintly revealed in spectral pastels. Barren as

the moon but exquisite, serene. Changeless. A place unseen by human eyes.

Like a firefly below, the lights of Big Geek are visible. Bud descends toward

the ROV, which has grounded on a narrow shelf. Below the shelf, the wall

slopes out, suggesting we are near the bottom of the canyon but can't see it.

ONE BIG GEEK/MIRV, sitting there like a dumbshit. Bud's feet thump into the

sediment next to it, stirring it luminous particles. Touchdown... three and

half miles of water over his head. Bud leans over the warhead in a swarm of

fireflies.

INT. CONTROL MODULE 217

AT GEEK prints out. Monk takes the headset gently from Lindsey.

MONK:

Okay, Bud, we'll go step by step. Take the

cover plate off the firing box.

A long pause. Then... PLATE OFF

MONK:

All right, Bud, you have to cut the ground wire,

not the lead wire...

EXT. ABYSSAL LEDGE 218

Bud is peering into the detonator unit. How bad is he? We can't tell.

MONK (V.O.)

It's the blue wire with the white stripe, not...

I repeat... NOT the black wire with the yellow

stripe.

Bud is staring. Blinking. The two wire look big as sewer pipes, and they're

miles away... way down there where his hands are.

The only light he has left is a CYALUME STICK. He pulls out the little

plastic tube. Breaks and shakes. It starts to glow, a tiny wand of green

light. He fumbles with his tool pouch, takes out a pair of side-cutters.

CUTING NNOW he types to them. He reaches into the detonator.

DETAIL, THE WIRES... in the green Cyalume glow, the look identical. The

cutters go over on wire. A long beat. They withdraw, then go over the other

wire...

He cuts--

INT. CONTROL MODULE 219

Everyone is frozen. Waiting. It's very quiet.

LINDSEY:

Would we see the flash?

MONK:

Through three miles of water? I don't know.

They're holding their breaths. Then... STILL HERE

A cheer goes up. Rebel yells.

CATFISH:

Quiet, quiet! Save you air, goddamnit.

MONK:

Bud, give me a reading off you liquid oxygen

gauge.

TEN MINUTES WORTH ID SAY. Lindsey does white.

HIPPY:

It took him over an hour to get down there--

It's hopeless. Lindsey grabs the headset from Monk.

LINDSEY:

Drop you weights and start back now! The gauge

could be wrong...

EXT. ABYSSAL LEDGE 220

Bus is one his knees beside the dead warhead. His expression is enigmatic.

He looks around slowly at the luminous canyon. Starts to type.

INT. CONTROL MODULE 221

The message comes in: NO. THINK ILL STAY A WHILE. BEAUTIFUL HERE. WORTH

ADMISSION:

LINDSEY:

No! You can make it! You hear me? Drop your

weights... you... can breathe shallow... you...

it could be wrong--

Lindsey's voice has twisted into a sob. She begins to weep, quietly.

LINDSEY:

Oh God, Virgil, please...

DONT CRY BABY:

A pause. Then the words...

WE KNEW THIS WAS A ONE WAY TICKET WHEN I PUT THIS THING ON. BUT YOU KNOW I

HAD TO COME.

Lindsey sobs at the mike. The others look away. The signal is weakening.

One Night boosts it and the screen clears briefly.

LOVE YOU WIFE.

She stares at the printout.

LINDSEY:

Love you.

There is no reply.

CUT TO:

EXT. THE ABYSS 222

A tiny figure lies slumped beside the inert ROV, an Indian dying with his

horse in the desert.

Bud's eyelids close. His chest barely moving.

A strange illumination bathes his face and his eyes open. He blinks. Weakly,

he raises his head, facing the source of the radiance.

BUD'S POV... A glowing figure hovers before him, like a vision. It seems to

be an angel. Seen closer, as it drifts toward him, we see that it is an

extraterrestrial being, bioluminescent like some deep-sea fish. Its body

and limbs are transparent, and it resembles a figure made of blown glass. A

delicate mantle or veil billows out around its like a corona, which pulsates

gently, propelling the being with the hypnotic grace of a Spanish dancer. The

head is refined and strangely anthropomorphic, with large eyes that convey a

cold, dispassionate wisdom.

It is stunningly beautiful.

The creature settles toward him. Unafraid, Bud extends his hand.

Its slender, blown-glass digits grasp his bulky glove. It pulls him up from

the benthic ooze and they glide together down the slope, deeper into the

abyss.

At the limits of visibility we see faint, glowing forms moving below. They

resolve into NTI ships. Tiny ovoids, like the little scoutship that Lindsey

nearly collided with at the Montana wreck. The larger manta-ships. And

others, strangely configured, moving in the darkness below like luminous fish.

Suddenly the darkness explodes with light. A vast, reticulated pattern of

brightly glowing lines, like some enormous circuit diagram, appears below

them, covering the floor of the abyssal trench. It sweeps outward from the

center, as if the light were surging through channels. The NTIs are revealing

their home to Bud. The ships move among the spires like air traffic over a

major city.

EXT. N.T.I. STRUCTURE 223

Bud and the creature descend until, between the lines of light, we see a dark

surface of inhuman design. The shape extends beyond the limits of visibility.

Towers hundreds of feet high stretch upward from the curving surface. It

dwarfs their figures as the descend toward it, approaching an opening that soon

yawns like a vast mouth.

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