Untraceable Page #21

She turns her head aside and swings the handle of her gun at

the passenger window. It shatters, showering her with cubes

of glass. Her cat howls in the back of the truck.

106.

Marsh sticks her gun in the pocket of her windbreaker,

pockets her Treo, and climbs out the window into the storm.

EXT. HIGHWAY SHOULDER -- MOMENTS LATER -- RAINY NIGHT.

Marsh, drenched, runs across the overpass until she spots an

illuminated Call Box.

EXT. HIGHWAY SHOULDER -- MOMENTS LATER -- RAINY NIGHT.

Marsh runs up to the box, lifts the phone. It rings.

OPERATOR:

Call Answering Center.

MARSH:

I’m an agent with the FBI and I’m

stranded on the I-50! I need you

to connect me to the FBI headquarters

in Riverton! It’s an

emergency! The number is-

OPERATOR:

I’m connecting.

It rings. Marsh looks back at her dark SUV, sitting fifty

yards away, barely visible through the downpour.

MALE OPERATOR:

FBI, Riverton.

OPERATOR:

Bill, it’s Jennifer Marsh. I need

you to connect me to Detective Box

from the task force. At home.

Hurry.

.

MALE OPERATOR:

Hold on.

Aching seconds pass. Water drops from her lashes. Her eyes

can the road, looking for any sign of trouble. The phone

rings. Rings again. Three times.

BOX (O.S.)

Hello?

MARSH:

John...Owen tried to kill me! He

hacked into my Northstar! I’m on

the highway!

BOX (O.S.)

Where are you?

107.

MARSH:

The I-50 overpass! Where his

father died!

BOX (O.S.)

Don’t move! Just wait for me!

Just wait!

EXT. HIGHWAY -- LATER - RAINY NIGHT.

Marsh, exhausted and drenched, trudges back to her car. A

car approaches, its headlights blinding. It slows down.

Marsh freezes, reaches into her jacket pocket for her gun.

FRAT BOYS, out on a drunken spree, lashed by the rain, shout

at her from their open windows, as they pass.

Shaking her head at their stupidity, she walks on then stops

dead. Her car’s headlights are on. She starts to run.

INT. MARSH’S SUV -- MOMENTS LATER -- RAINY NIGHT.

Marsh jumps in. The radio is playing again. Her Treo beeps

back to life in her pocket. She exhales heavily. Thank God.

Suddenly, her cat leaps from the back seat to the front,

scaring her half to death. She sits there, gasping waiting

for her heart to settle. Then she reaches to puts the car in

gear-

OWEN:

Jennifer?

Marsh freezes, looks up slowly, ever so slowly, at the

Northstar.

Then from the shadows of the back seat, Owen rises up,

sopping wet and touches his Taser to her cheek. Marsh

screams and spasms and falls.

.

DARKNESS.

FLASH. Marsh, hands and feet bound with Ethernet cable and

her mouth gagged, is being dragged by her hair across a

cement floor.

As she is brutally dragged up two stairs, she sees the spot

on the wall where a lawn mower hangs -- its dirty outline

visible on the wall --but it’s not there.

Abruptly, she realizes that it’s her own garage! She screams

into her gag, kicking, wriggling, resisting with all her

might.

108.

Owen drops her to the floor. Her head cracks against the

cement. Blood drips from her scalp. Owen’s shadow lengthens

across her body. Her eyes beg him not to hurt her. He

touches the Taser to her face.

DARKNESS.

FLASH:

INT. MARSH’S BASEMENT -- LATER -- RAINY NIGHT.

Marsh’s eyes open to pure horror, as she tumbles down the

steps with Owen descending behind her. She hits the cement

bottom, bloody and unconscious.

DARKNESS.

.

FLASH:

Marsh’s eyes open. Bleeding from the mouth and head, she

sees sound-proofing panels on the windows.

Marsh tries to free herself. Owen, ten feet away, toting

something, regards her with his dull eyes.

He sets down what he’s carrying, then removes his Taser from

his belt and shoots her. Twin probes, bearing fish hooks,

fly out of the gun and hit her squarely in the chest.

DARKNESS.

FLASH:

Marsh’s eyes open. The cable around her ankles is connected

to a long chain that Owen has tossed over a sewage pipe

running along the ceiling.

She follows the longer chain with her eyes. It travels down

from the pipe and connects to the rusty iron spool of a

garden hose. Owen has fastened a crank to the spool. He

turns it with great effort. Lying on the floor at his side

is her Glock.

Marsh, dazed, doesn’t understand why, but then slowly her

feet begin to rise off the cement floor.

Frantic as she rises higher, upside down, she looks and sees

flashing computer equipment everywhere. In the other

direction, her eyes bulge when she sees a video camera.

She wrestles violently, shaking the chains, making the pipe

overhead pull on its supports. Owen doesn’t like the look of

those supports.

109.

He stops his work and presses the trigger of his Taser. She

spasms, screams, and stops struggling.

DARKNESS.

A distant sputter, then a muted roar, then the roar grows

louder and louder, until it explodes into hideous life.

.

FLASH:

Marsh’s eyes open. She is hanging upside down, staring

straight down into the whirring blades of her own lawn mower,

which has been rigged onto its back and attached to a fuel

pump and gas can. A plastic tube attached to the engine,

carries the exhaust into the open door of the dormant boiler.

Eyes bugging, Marsh looks over and sees the camera pointed at

her. Then, suddenly, to her horror, its red light pops on.

INT. TASK FORCE COMMAND CENTER -- SAME -- RAINY NIGHT.

Wilks is alone, retrieving some files. Right behind him, on

five computer screens, the creepy music of killwithme plays.

Deaf, Wilks can’t hear it.

Then, right behind him, the screens flash with a still image

of Marsh hanging upside down over the blades. Then the

screen goes black.

Wilks turns around, sees nothing. Goes back to his work.

The screens flash another image of Marsh. Then they flash

faster and faster until the mosaic of viewers kicks in, and

it becomes a continuous moving image.

The text crawl:
The more that watch, the sooner she’s

sliced...the more that watch, the sooner she’s sliced...the

more that watch, the sooner she’s sliced....

As Wilks walks out of the room, oblivious, he realizes that

he has forgotten his coffee. He turns back to get it and

sees the screen. He reacts, then races for the door.

.

HOLD ON THE VIEWER COUNTER, only at 39,350, but spinning far

faster than ever before. The Estimated Time of Death plunges

down from 24 hours.

INT. BOX’S CAR -- SAME -- RAINY NIGHT.

Box pulls up to the I-50 and sees no car. Alarmed, he isn’t

sure what to do. Then he sees something. He gets out of the

car.

110.

EXT. HIGHWAY SHOULDER -- CONTINUOUS -- RAINY NIGHT.

Box runs over and looks down at the shattered glass all over

the gravel.

He remembers something. He looks over the edge of the road.

There, far below, at the spot where Owen’s father’s body

landed, is Owen’s VW bus, parked under a rainy streetlight,

Box races back to his car.

EXT. MARSH’S HOUSE -- SAME -- RAINY NIGHT.

The rain falls harder, lashing the roof, swaying the trees.

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