Undertow - 5.0 - Poseidon’s Reach
TO REAP THE UNTENDED HARVEST
EPISODE CREDITS:
Luke Alphonso as Waylon Grant
Abigail Turner as Jonny
Alexander Doddy as Nick Ballard
Sarah Ruth Thomas as Jillian Hart
Bianca Skinner as Derby Bell
Kenneth Faircloth Jr. as Various Dark Fathom Agents
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Dan Boud as the Narrator
Written by Damian Szydlo
Direction by Amanda Hufford
Sound Design by Chris Henry
Script Editing by Jupiter Sanders
Show theme by Doug Maxwell
TRANSCRIPT
FADE IN
[The scene opens with the sounds of spinning underwater propellers as the small submersible craft powers its way deeper and deeper into the ocean]
NARRATOR
The deep could do things to you. Force your mind to places both past, present and yet to be. She could feel it: pushing against her psyche as she sat upon the floor at the very back of the one man submersible… As far away as she could get from the vessel's command seat while she mentally prepared for what was to come. Fortunately for her, autopilot routing had been set to navigate ‘Home’ by its original passenger… and just as well, Derby Bell had little desire to watch the endless darkness of the ocean slide over the cockpit. It was still there though, vast and unfathomable… whether it was beyond that big window or less than a metre behind the rearmost wall of the watercraft.
It was easy to get lost in thought down here. She couldn’t help but wonder if this was the end of the world as they knew it. Or at least as humanity expected it to be. If they’d come far enough for Kraken to expose the fragility of the window they’d all been looking through. That it might come crashing apart in her lifetime.
Hubris, fatalism, and narcissism were most certainly the sort of cocktail that might allow a mere mortal such as herself to glimpse the inner workings of it all from where she sat, many leagues beneath the sea. To imagine she could see ‘the plan’ as it were... or perhaps the edges of one. Had she been given a glimpse of divinity become manifest in the body of an old android? Revik… Could that thing have had a soul? Was her daughter a piece to this puzzle or did her mystery belong to another one altogether? Had they all just provoked the whims of chaos too many times as a species? Meddled where one was not to do so. Stirred the proverbial pot?
Was it that simple? Could be. Except the pot had already been stirred, hadn’t it? Before they’d even started. Before anyone had the nerve to look up in search of the stairway to God's throne; already built. Sitting there, empty, waiting for Kraken to find it. Or at least that was the narrative. Derby had found that one could follow behind, if you were ambitious enough. Perfecting body and soul. Submitting to surgery that expanded the mind, opened it to wield psychic power that bent and twisted the hum and rhythm of what was ‘possible’. Became better at it than anyone ever had.
So yes, she’d climbed long enough to know that there was no going back. If one had the wherewithal they might hazard to peer behind them… back the way they’d come. To see things the way they had been at the bottom… now that you were out of it. See how the pieces shifted around down there. It was nothing more than a hive; filling it’s time with incessant, instinctual toiling. People doing their little jobs. Drunk on distraction that might span the entirety of their lives. Eating, sleeping, and fucking. Oblivious and as such, completely inconsequential.
That was, of course, the measure of it. Of fate, she had decided. It was neither force nor magic. Certainly not out of the control of man or ascending God. Rather, it was a systemic, layered plan where the higher you might climb, the bigger you’d become… growing away from the mobs you’d been surrounded by. All those you’d been tested against. You’d see it, eyes wide open for what might feel like the first time - realising that you’d been blind to the sight of it since the moment you’d meant anything at all. Only then could you possibly find the space to deal yourself into the game - The confines of the board outgrown at last as the turns continue to play out. Just as they had all your life. She’d caught a glimpse of its sublime motion long ago. Saw the gears line up in a single colossal effort to push the hand on the clock just one minute closer to the last move it’d ever take.
RADIO CONTROLLER
[interrupting her thoughts]
“Hijacked Submersible SSM-362, identify yourself and stand down.”
NARRATOR
With a smirk, Derby stood up from her place on the submersible's floor, embedding the tip of her blade into its surface as she seemed to simply switch off the existential dread she’d been entangled with only moments before. This was a different creature than the one who’d allowed themselves a moment of vulnerability in the face of the deep. With a flick of her eyes she navigated the menu on her battle suit to extend and initiate its built-in breather. Her smile only grew behind the mask as she accepted the invitation for dialogue with Posieden’s Reach.
DERBY BELL
“Rebel Control. Have you ever had a moment of paralysis? One where you were alone. Standing under the shade of the most impenetrable darkness - real or imagined, and felt that little tingle? Your instincts screaming as if to warn you that you're not actually alone at all? That someone or something has their eyes on you and if you spend even a single moment longer in the shadow… well, you’ll just never find your way back up to the light?
I could declare that you speak now with Derby Bell and that I’ve come to collect my daughter… but that wouldn’t be fair nor would it be the whole truth. No. That’s not our dynamic. The reality is that you and all your terrorist friends have been in the dark for far too long now and it is I who have been watching… ever so intently. The bigger fish, mouth wide open… summoned as a result of your untended harvest. What you took from me… and I’ve come to reap what you have sown.”
RADIO CONTROLLER
“Stand down!”
NARRATOR
Their move was obvious, Derby thought to herself as she playfully rounded her way back to the aft of the submersible… and to the sword she’d left lodged in the floor. Without a doubt they’d rigged this boat to blow on command. There’d be no warning shot, and they’d probably pop this pod whether she stood down or not. In her line of work, it was imperative to remain one step ahead of procedure. To act in a way they wouldn’t expect. Furrowing her brow at what was to come, the assassin pushed down hard enough on the blade to cause a gushing torrent of ocean water to swell up and into the newly breached hull of the vessel. With a quick tug, she freed the sword from the rupture, sheathing it on her back before returning to the cockpit of the compromised watercraft just as it sealed itself off; separating quickly from it’s wounded body.
This was the lifepod function of the craft, and the start of her plan to weaponize it. She found herself smiling again as it suddenly shot away - into the deep. Just as she’d hoped.
You see, the automated system naturally had only two choices when securing the life of its passenger. In the event that no safe beacon existed it would find its way towards the surface. That was the most common reaction the safety algorithm took. In the event, however, that a signal belonging to a ship or facility large enough to accommodate the rescue was active… the pod would find its occupant into the waiting hands of those who could handle the emergency. In this case, it’d seek out Poseidon's Reach and dock itself into a secure holding cell.
They would come for her… rifles in hand and orders to kill, but it wouldn’t matter. They’d only be the first to die. She’d send terrorist after terrorist to their maker until she found her daughter.
[Sound effects as Derby’s pod arrives, stepping out of the pod before drawing her sword, ready to start killing.]
[SCENE TRANSITION TO JONNY’S GROUP, WITH JILL HART, ARRIVING AT THE REACH]
WAYLON NARRATOR
For every league that passed us by, that stood between our ship and Poseidon's Reach… was in all likelihood another life sacrificed in this… in ‘my’ crusade gone too far. I couldn’t shake it, the feeling of the line I’d crossed in letting all of this happen. The pressure… bearing down upon me. So close to collapse. It is, of course, what I deserve. I’d unleashed Derby Bell upon hundreds of armed guards that would have found themselves standing between her blade and the prize she coveted. How many of those men and women were slaughtered by now… What were we about to walk into?
It wasn't long before Commander Hart’s ship was hooking up to the Reach’s autodock, the impending action in our near-future doing little to settle my mind. I know better than most the sort of hole that is left behind when someone dies. I’ve felt it… running through me. Changing me each time. I’ve read the last moments of dying men, the regrets of the lost. Things… impossible things… left undone. Dreams unfulfilled.
I had always been the witness. The detective. This time, it was I who was responsible whether anyone would ever know it… and I would have to live with that knowledge. With what is to come and the choices I’ve already made.
JONNY
“Looks like we’re late to the party.”
JILLIAN HART
“Shit. They didn’t have a chance. She docked and just… cut through the pressure door like it was nothing.”
WAYLON
“Her blade. A Caprican prototype: Monofilament edge. This door was meant to act as a seal, not a cell.”
[walks out into the hall]
“She met coordinated resistance here. Their bullets couldn’t penetrate her telekinetic defences. A bubble… she redirected the bullets… I sense… another… in her wake.”
JILLIAN HART
“Keep on moving. We have a lot of ground to cover before we get to your Alex.”
[into her holocom]
“This is Jillian Hart: All remaining battle ready hands converge on the heart. She’s here to take our guest home. It remains imperative that this does not happen.”
UNKNOWN REBEL
“Good to hear your voice, boss. We’ve got problems on the bridge. Everything’s going, well, haywire up here. Some sort of old school virus bouncing around our closed system. Can’t flush it out like we could up on the open grid. Don’t know how long we can hold things together without your overrides. Third and seventh decks are already flooded. We need you.”
JILLIAN HART
“Hold tight… I’ll be… I’ll be right there.”
“Fuck.”
[directed again at the group]
“Ballard. You and your group need to hold this ground. You can’t let her escape and I’m needed elsewhere. Do you understand?”
JONNY
“Not going to happen, sweetheart. We’re goin’ in. Besides, can’t see as if your bunch fared any better than this lot.”
JILLIAN HART
“This isn’t a game. If you help… if Alex gets out of here… That just can’t happen. You need to trust me.”
NICK BALLARD
“So you’ve said. Still haven’t heard a good reason why.”
JILLIAN HART
“God-damn it. There’s something… under the city. Beneath even Posiden’s Reach. She’s tapped into it somehow. As far as we know, she’s the only one who can, not even Kraken has the key. Maybe that’s because ‘she’ is the key, I don’t know. What I do know, though, is that we’ve been keeping her subdued. Asleep.”
WAYLON
“Imprisoned. You’ve kidnapped and imprisoned her.”
JILLIAN HART
“We can have this little human rights debate after we get the assassin out of my Aquacology, Mr. Grant. Until then, we did the only thing we could do. Now, I need to get to command or else we’re all going to be sitting at the bottom of the ocean, and by my count you’re the only one who’s got gills. [turns back to Nick] Hold the line, Nick. Don’t fuck this up over some misplaced sentiment.”
[Jill leaves the scene]
JONNY
“So… obviously we’re ignoring that order, yeah?”
NICK BALLARD
“Obviously. Or at least you and Waylon are. I’m going to stay here for the time being. In case she gives you the slip, is all. If Jill’s right about anything, it’s that Derby can’t be permitted to leave with that girl. Not till we figure this out.”
JONNY
“Oh? You’re going to stop her all by yourself then? Mix her a drink from that case you’ve got there and have a wee chat?”
NICK BALLARD
“The thought had occurred to me, but no. This case here is actually an old friend of mine. As you’ve rightly assumed; it does contain a small, travelling inventory of spirits… [sets case down and clicks a button - starting the deployment of a turret that anchors itself into the ground] though its primary function is to act as my own little gun for hire. Afterall, we both know I can’t shoot for shit. Never leave home without a good turret watching your back, I say.”
JONNY
“Impressive.”
WAYLON
“Jonny, we need to go…”
JONNY
“You [short pause] be careful? If she gets past us… just don’t take any risks with Bell is all, do you hear? You owe me that promise we made at the Albatross and I’ll pull the service from your fuckin’ ghost if I have to.”
NICK BALLARD
“And here I thought you were fixin’ to get all sentimental on me. Go on then, get a move on. Ms. Bell’s probably been through half of Dark Fathom by now.”
JONNY
“At least. Come on, Waylon.”
WAYLON
[stalls one final moment]
“Mr. Ballard… Thank you. For seeing this through.”
NICK BALLARD
“Yeah, well… a man’s got to own his mistakes. Ain’t anybody out there that’ll go and atone on your behalf. Now go on, would you? I’ve only got so many kernels of wisdom to hand out.”
NARRATOR
The path Derby Bell had taken wasn’t one that would prove all that hard to follow. It was clear that Dark Fathom meant to resist each push the assassin made into the heart of their underwater complex with force. Jonny had stood opposite to her in a fight before and walked away both times. Barely. Dark Fathom's security, trained in guerilla warfare rather than traditional defensive countermeasures, was proving far less formidable if the state of the bodies she’d left behind was anything to go by. There was a difference to this massacre though, the merc knew that Waylon could feel it too. That killer Jonny’d known had enjoyed a good fight, relished it even. She’d been the sort to play with her food… but not here. Not this time. The dead she’d left behind were killed with a brutal efficiency. There was no flare in this, no playful cunning or display of vanity. Though she hated to admit it… if this had been the Derby Bell that Jonny had fought on the Breakwall last year… well that fight would have played out in an entirely different way.
ELLIOT
[Over speaker]
“You’re going after her, aren’t you?”
JONNY
“Who’s that? Who’s speaking?”
ELLIOT
[Elliot is more sad now, world weary but still idealistic]
“No one of… any value. Or consequence, I guess. At least not to them. Not anymore. [pauses a moment] She doesn’t deserve to be here, you know.”
WAYLON
“You’re talking about Alex, aren’t you?”
ELLIOT
“Is that her name? I… never knew it. We were kept in different sections. When I realised I was more of a prisoner than a guest… well, they stopped letting me walk around. Before then… I used to roam a lot. I imagined that this is what a hive might have felt like to my bees.
The woman. The one you’re after. She’s following Alex’s song… but that’s not the quickest way to the heart. That’s where they keep her…
I can’t leave the Biodome… but I can get you where you need to go. If you hurry, you might be fast enough.”
JONNY
“Why are you helping us? What’s in it for you?”
ELLIOT
“I… I’ve tried to do the right thing all of my life. Nothing ever worked out the way I hoped. Maybe this time will be different. We can’t just stop trying because bad things happen. That girl… she doesn’t deserve to be trapped in this place. Please. Follow my voice… you don’t have much time.
[FADE OUT]