The Rewilders Page 8
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
But the Minister says everything will work out in the end, Professor.
CLOSE-UP - T.V. INTERVIEW CONTINUING
ALLY (VOICE-OVER)
(filtered over T.V.)
But I'm worried it could be one particular re-introduction that ends up tipping the balance. It could be a predator, whose food runs out so it starts to attack humans, or algae, or disease in some exotic species, eaten by an indigenous species, spreading a new virus up the food chain.
RETURN TO SCENE
The whole team has moved together into one big group hug.
ALLY (VOICE-OVER)
And there are complications, where Mankind is now too close to nature, disrupting natural biology, causing more of the herbivores to become omnivores.
INTERIOR - OFFICE/MINISTER PROCTOR (SAME TIME)
Yes, Proctor is watching the very same interview!
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
Those eat both plants and meat?
Proctor has a brown paper lunch bag and its contents are spread out on his desk before him.
ALLY (VOICE-OVER)
Yes, or even become carnivorous, or the carnivores that normally just eat other animals, turn on Mankind. We could lose our position at the top of the food chain!
PROCTOR
(shakes head)
Oh, Ally. What a worrywart!
He twists his head, closing one eye, trying to get his mouth around an overflowing sandwich, with meat slices and lettuce and tomato sticking out, bits of it dropping to his lap.
CLOSE-UP - PROCTOR'S T.V. - THE INTERVIEW IS OVER
Hold on CLOSE-UP of Ally, her expression very, very solemn, in spite of her silly hair pointing out to the sides.
Battle of the Beavers
INTERIOR - UNDEFINED FUTURE RESIDENCE - NIGHT (TWILIGHT)
Back to the storytelling Mom and her children. The girl is sucking her thumb, and the candles have burned down a bit.
BOY
So what happened next, mother?
MOM
Well, remember the beaver? The one they called "King Beaver"?
BOY
Mmm-hmm.
MOM
See, the government tried to control where King Beaver and his friends could live, but the beavers began to think differently.
GIRL
(removes thumb)
What?
MOM
So there began a great battle, and the beaver led his many, many thousands of friends, against a big army of Man soldiers.
The kids go saucer-eyed and cuddle up closer together.
EXTERIOR - STREET CORNER - DAY
We're at the storefront where a T.V. plays in the window. Every few seconds, the picture goes to static.
CLOSE-UP - T.V. REPORT - GRIM NEWSCASTER
NEWSCASTER (VOICE-OVER)
The beaver hordes moved West... whelming the Fifth Squadron on the outskirts of Edinburgh... looks like... British troops will mak... last stand in Northumberland... at week's end -
The T.V. goes blank. No more electricity.
The distant thumping sound of battle suddenly ratchets up.
DISSOLVE TO:
EXTERIOR - BOG - DAY (DUSK)
We jump right into the Great Beaver War!
(This War Correspondent will be intentionally melodramatic!)
Under a constant roar of explosions and animal exclamations, amidst misty bog, soggy moors, thickets of pine, and bull rushes as tall as men, the battle is well underway.
Beavers, lynx, foxes, elk, muskoxen, mice, and boar, all led by King Beaver, with his spot in the middle of his forehead, swarm the knolls and ford the streams. Overhead, thousands of geese and hawks dart through the sun-setting sky.
Positioned to the south, three British Army battalions are equipped with jeeps and APCs, among H.Q. tents and portable loos. Snipers and artillery pieces and mortars blast away.
The trails of bombs arching across the dusk sky are lit by the faint sunshine and the flashes from ground detonations, so they resemble towering, gray paint-strokes on a canvas.
The noise is sensational! From one side: Honks, squeals, barks, growls. From the other: Unintelligible commands intersperse with shots, mortar booms and artillery thumps.
EXTERIOR - BOG/OVERHEAD (SAME TIME)
A squadron of Typhoons arch across the treetops. With the smoke from the artillery explosions marking the enemy target, the jets initiate a synchronized napalm release.
EXTERIOR - BOG/DOWN BELOW
As the trees and brush light up, ten thousand critters dive into streams, puddles and muck, to safety.
The mighty combustion up above envelops the horizon. It powers into the air. More artillery lands, but only one in three explodes. The others plop into the mud and disappear!
CLOSE-UP - KING BEAVER, STANDING ERECT ON REAR WEBBED FEET
Waving its paw, as if inspiring its troops onward, the King lets loose its familiar, whiney call, HOOT-HOOT-HOOOOT, to its thousands of brethren creatures coming up the rear.
EXTERIOR - THE BRITISH FRONT LINE
With artillery and mortars launching all around, a SERGEANT races over to a CAPTAIN raising his binoculars.
EXTERIOR - THE HORIZON/NORTH (MATTE SCOPE)
Creatures large and small stream toward them, over hills, through valleys, across ponds, and through the air.
CAPTAIN (OFF-SCREEN)
Good God!
EXTERIOR - THE BRITISH FRONT LINE
SERGEANT
Captain, we got silly civilians coming up the rear!
CAPTAIN
What's this?!
He spins around. Raises binoculars. His jaw drops.
EXTERIOR - THE HORIZON/SOUTH (MATTE SCOPE)
Rushing in from a road, right up to the line, protesters swarm the jeeps and equipment, scuffling with the soldiers.
The protesters carry a big banner stretched across the road:
"The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement" http://www.vhemt.org
CAPTAIN (OFF-SCREEN )
Love o' the Almighty!
Other protesters, chanting, wave smaller signs:
"Moratorium on Human Breeding"
"Humans = Parasites"
And an image of a man in a circle, with a slash through the center
EXTERIOR - THE BRITISH FRONT LINE
Ten yards from the front, the beavers chew through trees, toppling them onto fleeing soldiers, entangling vehicles and tipping over artillery barrels.
EXTERIOR - BOG/STREAM
Here, the beavers chew through a vast beaver dam they'd constructed. It breaks, releasing a veritable tsunami.
EXTERIOR - THE BRITISH FRONT LINE
The waist-deep deluge shoves military equipment and tents aside. The water is full of beavers, rats and waterfowl going along for the ride into the now mostly-evacuated line.
EXTERIOR - THE BRITISH REAR LINE
As troops flee through the VHEMT protesters, and the leading edge of the ankle-deep flood reaches them, chants start up:
PROTESTERS
Only by peacefully dying out will Mankind relieve the Earth of his ecological destruction!
EXTERIOR - BOG/OVERHEAD/BEAVER REAR LINES
Humanity launches a counter-attack!
Paratroopers float down, occasionally pecked by fowl in the air, behind the rear-most, beaver-led brigades!
Large boxes come down in separate parachutes. The troopers now on the ground open the boxes, unravel other equipment from satchels, and race behind the unaware creatures.
EXTERIOR - BOG/OVERHEAD/BEAVER REAR LINES (MATTE SCOPE)
The Sergeant watches the same scene through his binoculars.
Dozens of huge nets are thrown over hundreds of creatures. The troopers drag their quarries into large lorries and begin driving them away.
SERGEANT
The beaver lines are broken, Captain!
CAPTAIN
We're getting the better of the little buggers!
SERGE
ANT
Retreating on all fronts! See? Good old man-made technology beats 'em every time!
INTERIOR - MACGILLVRAY HOUSE - DAY
As usual, the MacGillvray's are glued to their T.V.
CLOSE-UP - T.V. REPORT ON THE SCENE OF THE BATTLE
REPORTER (VOICE-OVER)
(breathlessly)
Well, the Great Beaver War seems to have been won!
There is a rising wave of cheers OFF-SCREEN. The Reporter swats a bug on his face, as he's handed a paper.
REPORTER (VOICE-OVER)
And the Minister just spoke on it! Here's what he said:
(reads)
"The menace of the castor mortis has been defeated. Once again, the fiend is relegated to the Scottish Bog from whence it came!"
The Reporter directs his cameraperson to the battle that is receding and quietening in the BACKGROUND.
The narration of the storytelling Mom and Kids takes over.
BOY (VOICE-OVER)
But the war wasn't over, was it, Mother?
MOM (VOICE-OVER)
No, dear, it wasn't...
The T.V. goes into static, and then goes dead. If you squint hard, you can see Evey and Harry in its reflection!
The War is Lost
INTERIOR - POWER PLANT/GLASGOW (SAME TIME)
Workers flip huge switches to shut off the power generators, and punch their time clocks to leave for the day.
WORKER #1
Night, Leo!
WORKER #2
Same time tomorrow, Nate!
EXTERIOR - THE NEW BRITISH FRONT LINE
All the electricity to feed the war machines dissipates.
Every light in the camp goes out. The hum of the electrical fences surrounding captured animals goes quiet. Crackle from radio sets fades to silence.
On come flashlights, one after another, accompanied by assorted human grumbling and moaning. The Captain and Sergeant, from before, are joined now by a PRIVATE.
SERGEANT
Oh, blimey, it's nineteen hundred hours!
P.A. ANNOUNCEMENT (VOICE-OVER)
Conserve! Conserve! Lights out!
CAPTAIN
We know that, already! Somebody get me H.Q.!
PRIVATE
Sorry, sir, our remote units don't have any power! Everything's gone dead!
CAPTAIN
Blimey! Anybody got a satellite phone that works?
SERGEANT
Here you go, Captain!
The Captain receives a handset and punches buttons.
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
(filtered over radio)
Yeeesss?
CAPTAIN
Dammit, Minister, what's -
INTERIOR - OFFICE/MINISTER PROCTOR (SAME TIME)
Proctor shovels papers into a briefcase, readying to leave.
PROCTOR
Power Conservation Edict Number Forty-Nine "C". You know the rules, soldier.
EXTERIOR - THE NEW BRITISH FRONT LINE
Subtly, the sweet cries of the beavers gets louder and louder, and are joined by honks, barks, hoots and growls from all the other animals as their attack renews.
CAPTAIN
But Minister, the electrical -
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
Use the solar arrays.
CAPTAIN
Minister! It's night time!
INTERIOR - OFFICE/MINISTER PROCTOR (SAME TIME)
Proctor checks his watch. Slams briefcase shut.
PROCTOR
I'm sorry, Captain. Can we pick this up in the a.m.?
EXTERIOR - THE NEW BRITISH FRONT LINE
The radio clicks to silence. The Sergeant and Captain slump. The Private slaps his forehead.
PRIVATE
Damn! Beaten by an outsized rat.
As the three of them turn to the horizon, from behind, OFF-SCREEN, dozens of soldiers' voices, high or deep, begin to squeal:
VOICES (OFF-SCREEN)
Retreat! Run for your lives, while you still can!
Vehicle engines crank OFF-SCREEN but refuse to turn over.
VOICES (OFF-SCREEN )
Stalled out! It's the damn soy gasoline! Withdraw! Run for your almighty beaver-kicking lives!
DISSOLVE TO:
An Overgrown, Overrun World
MONTAGE - THE NEW WORLD
Nature's conquest of Civilization proceeds tout de suite:
SUPERIMPOSE - "Six Months Later"
A) Abandoned cars litter expressways. Schools, libraries, offices are shuttered. Racoons, deer and cheetahs saunter through the avenues, rummaging and nibbling.
B) Inside stores, shelves are empty, with only a few tins strewn about the floor. Mice abound, scavenging.
On a T.V. somewhere, a male reporter interviews Proctor:
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
Minister, can you comment on the situation in Great Britain?
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
In Britain? The continent, too! World wide! The re-introduction of near-extinct, threatened, and at-risk animal, insect and plant species has been a huge success!
C) An alarm goes WHOOP WHOOP WHOOOOOP, before being muffled. Inside a large public address speaker atop a building, a mother eagle stuffs straw for a nest into the horn.
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
But what about Humanity, Minister?!
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
The birds in the air! The animals on the land! The bugs under the Earth! Rejoice, my good man!
D) People peek from behind their window curtains at a canal, down an embankment, now filled with crocs and herons.
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
But Minister!
E) Subway platforms and city streets are empty, except for wolves cowering before a herd of elephants, while a dozen zebras gallop happily around the track in a stadium.
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
The causes of natural animal depopulation, extinction, if you will, and of habitat loss by climate change, pollution, hunting and natural phenomenon - all of these have been reversed! Oh ho!
F) CLOSE-UP at an intersection, a green "Conserve!" sign is stomped on by a hoofed animal sauntering by.
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
Yes, for the animals, but -
G) From churches, synagogues and mosques come prayers OFF-SCREEN. Everywhere, there are signs of vandalism - spray painted slogans and theft, but not destruction from the animals.
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
Everything is going according to plan, my boy!
H) A solitary animal control vehicle creeps through garbage-strewn streets among curious bison and prowling hyenas.
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
But what about us?!
I) In a police station lot, a baboon sits at the wheel of an abandoned patrol car, playfully poking at the controls.
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
Earlier challenges in specific ecosystems and habitats, such as clear cutting of forests and overfishing in our oceans, and resource depletion -
J) At a power station, a gauge reads 10 percent. Cobwebs cover the computer keyboards and mice skitter from holes.
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
But Minister -
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
Has all been eliminated! Joy joy!
INTERVIEWER (VOICE-OVER)
Do you not have anything to say to reassure the citizens?
PROCTOR (VOICE-OVER)
The noble citizens? Who love our environment and sacrifice to conserve it? Who follow the laws?