Total Recall Page #32

INT. SERVICE SHAFT

Party's POV, looking up: ladders, platforms, catwalks, bundles of

fiberoptic lines linking the components of Achorpoint's computer

mainframe, drifting smoke. The bundles loops of fiberoptics have a

faint, pearlescent glow. Hicks, as usual is last up the ladder.

INT. LADDERS IN SERVICE SHAFT -- VARIOUS ANGLES

The party, climbing. Halliday still has the ragdoll. Hicks up last.

INT. PLATFORM IN SERVICE SHAFT

The Marine guard from Ops emerges through a narrow opening, Spence and

Halliday follow -- and an Alien strikes from the shadows, ripping out

his throat. Spence drives for his rifle as it skids across the

platform. Screams from the ladder below. The gun slips through her

fingers, over the edge -- gone. Halliday cringes in a corner, cradling

the ragdoll in her arms, as the Alien butchers the dead Marine,

slashing the corpse to ribbons with its tail. It HISSES, turns its

head. Spence freezes.

INT. LADDER IN SERVICE SHAFT

Hicks is desperately trying to fight his way past the others, climbing

over them --

INT. PLATFROM IN SERVICE SHAFT

Spence snatches a drum of cable from a service cart and hurls it at the

Alien, distracting it from Halliday.

The beast springs toward Spence, bet she's already scrambling out along

a

fragile-looking catwalk that quakes with her passage. The Alien pursues

her into the forest of cables with a hideous agility. Hicks clambers up

through the opening, too late. Spence and the Alien are out of sight.

INT. FIBEROPTIC FOREST

Spence flattened against the mainframe, heart thumping, terrified.

Takes a breath, look out between two glowing trunks of cable. Sees the

Alien's back, fifteen feet away. She bites her lip and slips out,

runs. It SCREECHES behind her. She blunders into another wall. A

ladder. Up the rungs, fast. Into a short narrow space lit by a single

blue emergency light. No way out. She moves forward, hands sliding

over a jumble of containers. SOUND of the beast swarming up the

ladder. She's below the blue bulb now, looks down at her hand on a flat

plastic case stenciled "COLONIAL TRANS AP-49 FLARE SIGNAL OXY-

ATMOSPHERIC 20MM." She tears at the catches --

The beast is almost on her.

She turns, bringing up the huge flare-pistol, and FIRES. The beast is

blown backwards, off its feet, the igniting magnesium flare a white-hot

chemical star burning in its guts as it flips back over the edge.

INT. PLATFORM IN SERVICE SHAFT

Hicks and the Lab Three see the burning Alien's fall as a weird pulse

of light through the translucent cables.

LAB TECH What -- ?

HICKS (yells) Spence! Yo! Spence!

Hicks crosses the catwalk, followed by the Lab Tech.

Halliday stares after them over the head of her ragdoll.

INT. PLATFORM IN SERVICE SHAFT

The others have climbed up now. They watch Hicks, the Lab Tech, and

Spence recross the catwalk. Spence has the flare-pistol around her neck

on a lanyard.

JACKSON (checks her watch) Okay, people! Gotta move it now. Start

climbing!

HICKS Halliday!

She rushes to the spot where we last saw Halliday. The ragdoll lies on

the deck. Spence grabs it up, flings it instantly away at the touch of

slime.

SPENCE (screaming) No! No!

Hicks pulls an olive-drab aerosol unit fro his medical pack and

drenches her hand with spray.

HICKS Jackson's right. We gotta move.

Rosetti is already starting up the ladder.

INT. ELEVATOR SHAFT

Bishop, climbing. He has his web belt cinched tight around his left

thigh. The splintered bone is out of sight; the leg of his fatigues,

below the belt, is soaked with fluid. He uses his arms and right leg

to climb, the left leg swaying free -- grotesquely, in too many

directions, like the limb of a broken puppet.

He shows signs of stress. The right knee might break at the next

rung... He places it carefully, taking up most of his weight on his

arms.

He checks his watch.

EXTREME CLOSEUP:
2140 HOURS.

BISHOP'S POV -- UP THE SHAFT

It looks like forever.

INT. SERVICE SHAFT

Jackson uses a pistol-grip power-driver to unscrew a ventilator grill.

Hicks shines his light into the opening, then crawls in. Jackson

follows, then Rosetti...

INT. DUCT

Hands and knees, single file and barely room for that. Hicks has his

flashlight clipped bayonet-style to his rifle. Jackson behind him, her

cap reversed.

HICKS How we doin'?

Jackson stops crawling; flips open her map, her features visible in the

glow of the tiny screen.

JACKSON Looks like another ten meters. Then we're into K-58-A and

straight to the boat bays.

ROSETTI (V.O.) (hollow echo) Move! Hurry!

HICKS Yes, sir.

They move forward.

INT. CORRIDOR -- DUCT EXIT

Hicks and Jackson prepare to pull the others one at a time from the

waist-high opening. It's evident that the duct, at this point, slants

sharply down from the opening; it's round and smooth and difficult to

climb.

INT. DUCT

From below, members of the party wedge their way up with knees and

elbows.

INT. CORRIDOR -- DECT EXIT

Hicks and Jackson pull Rosetti from the duct, both his hands locked

around his pulse-rifle; then the Lab Tech; then Spence; they reach the

Tatsumi...

SCREAMS and frenzied BANGING from the duct. Tatsumi's eyes pop wide

open and he screams. Hicks braces his boot against the wall and hauls

him out -- with the jaws of a freshly-transformed new beast locked on

his leg. Hicks whirls his rifle like an axe, the butt slamming into

the thing's head. It HISSES and twists back into the duct.

INT. DUCT -- POV OF THE TRAPPED FIVE

as the beast slides toward them down smooth steel.

INT. CORRIDOR -- DUCT EXIT

Rosetti thrusts the barrel out of his pulse-rifle past Hicks, into the

duct, and FIRES on full auto, emptying his magazine. Jackson drives for

the gun as Hicks snaps him off his feet with a roundhouse punch. The

back of Rosetti's head slams against the opposite wall and he slides

to the deck.

Jackson's on him before he can recover, practically jamming the muzzle

of the pulse-rifle down his throat.

JACKSON Y'know, always been part of me wanted to kill one of you

motherfuckers...

Rosetti looks up at her.

ROSETTI Go ahead.

Very quiet. No sound at all from the duct. Tatsumi whimpers between

clenched teeth as a wisp of acid smoke rises from his torn trouser leg.

Hicks shines his light down into the duct.

HICKS Oh man... Forget it, Jackson. Anyway, it's empty.

He tosses her a fresh magazine.

SPENCE Hicks! The light!

She and the Lab Tech are crouching beside Tatsumi, slitting his pantleg

with a knife, exposing the wound.

SPENCE (continuing) Watch out, it's on the cloth...

The Lab Tech yelps as a droplet of acid touches his hand. Hicks unclips

his light and passes it to Spence.

SPENCE (continuing) On my God...

The Alien has taken a bite the size of a small grapefruit out of

Tatsumi's calf; flesh and muscle are blackened, charred by the acid.

HICKS (unclipping a flat plastic kit from his harness) What's his name?

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