It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

topic posted Sat, January 5, 2008 - 7:01 PM by  Ms. Smart
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Happy New Year all

I am reading an excellent book - Paris to the Moon by Adam Gopnik
He has an interesting style of writing, takes a bit to get use to, very smart guy, he connects different kinds of things... excellent read!
posted by:
Ms. Smart
Los Angeles
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  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Sun, January 6, 2008 - 12:42 PM
    Hiya Ms. Smart, Happy New Year to ya!

    Tell me a little more about Paris to the Moon, please, knowing you were just in Paris, and why you are reading this?

    I as usual have a number of books I am currently reading, now and again, here are what I have a finger on:

    "The Charterhouse of Parma," by Stendhal
    "Interpreting the French Revolution," by Francois Furet.
    "The Old Regime and The Revolution: Volume II - Notes on the French Revolution and Napoleon," by Alexis de Tocqueville,...
    "French Salons," by Stephen Kale.
    • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

      Sun, January 6, 2008 - 4:33 PM
      As a result form my recent visit, I am possessed by all things Paris.
      French interiors, history, famous characters - surrounding the famous or artists or leaders, ideas...

      So I was seeking out one thing online about a French book and found a recommendation for this book.
      It is such a great read. to be savored. The way he connects different things, comparisons of American life to Paris life, is the best. There is a great chapter on Barney of all things and it is poignant and funny and right on and nicely written.
      • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

        Sun, January 6, 2008 - 10:28 PM
        I finally finished The Satanic Scriptures and Androphilia. Now I'm hitting The Marilyn Manson Murders again. Finishing up all these books I started and got sidetracked on. I just found one this morning in a thrift store in Arcata for 25 cents called The Power of Place by Winifred Gallagher. It looks pretty good. It's from 1993. The sub-title is "How Our Surroundings Shape Our Thoughts, Emotions, AND Actions." Has anyone read this one and if so what do you think?

        www.amazon.com/Power-Plac...ef=pd_bbs_2

        Here it is but mine has a different cover. ( That I think is better too. : )
  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Sat, January 19, 2008 - 9:02 PM
    eat pray love, Elizabeth Gilbert
    and ust finished ,Coraline, young adult book but quite frightening actually.
    • Unsu...
       

      Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

      Sat, January 19, 2008 - 9:09 PM
      "The cure for Death by Lightning"
      Gail Anderson - Dargatz
      • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

        Sun, January 20, 2008 - 8:30 AM
        Even though I'm not sure how I feel about Dr. Phil I started a book I got for a quarter at a garage sale. It's called Self Matters - Creating Your Life From The Inside Out. It came out in 2001. On one hand I kind of like him and on the other I think he's kind of a jerk. I was surprised to hear him calling someone a sissy on the radio for a commercial for his show a couple weeks ago. Must be the Oprah connection. On one hand I know she's a good person but on another she annoys the shit out of me. This book looks like it might be good though. I'll give it a chance.
  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Tue, January 22, 2008 - 7:18 AM
    Just finished The Witch of Portabella by Paulo Coelho and The Places Inbetween by Rory Stewart. The Places Inbetween is a really good read. Stewart is a historian from Scotland, he walked across central Afghanistan after the U.S. invasion and the book documents his journey. Currently I'm reading The Painter of Battles by Arturo Perez-Reverte. Reverte is one of my favorite writers, his characters are very human and very well developed. His accidental 'heroes' are flawed and conflictedand sometines even more anti-hero, his villians despicable but without losing their humanity and human vulnerabilities.
  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Tue, January 22, 2008 - 6:37 PM
    Update on, eat pray love. Highlt entertaining, personally insiteful, Very enjoyable reading so far, but I statrted spring semester so I'll be reading text books more than pleasure books the next 3 months.
    The book before this on was Freedom Writers Diaries. It the colleges book of the year. Optional reading but usually at the end of the term they have an author speaks nite and that is highly enjoyable.
    The Freedom Writers was definately and eyeopener.
  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Sat, February 2, 2008 - 9:09 AM
    i'm only about a hundred pages into "The Terror" by Dan Simmons. so far, it's goooooood. [here's hoping i just haven't jinxed it!]
    • Paris to the Moon

      Tue, February 5, 2008 - 7:43 PM
      I loved that book, it assisted me in getting myself there.

      Vanity Fair, excellent read, fantastic characters and the crazy thing is there are still these characters lurking around in 2008! Fantastic.

      Someone gave me Pope Joan, which I tried, and well...very churchy and the very male domination just didn't seem that interesting. The DVD Beowolf and Grindel was much better to grasp the era...within a century or two.

      I like reading How the Brain Reads, How the Brain Learns, and Principles of Neural Sciences. Reading lots of techincal and scientific material is pretty fun in 2008.

      Listening to And Then There Were None, attempting to find a "meaning" yet to find and sometimes listening to a Thousand Splendid Suns
      Still reading Middlemarch/George Elliot, the best of Fiction...ever
      • Re: Paris to the Moon

        Sat, February 16, 2008 - 8:32 PM
        The Age of Reason by Sartre
        ok, so I never would have read this if it wasn't being required in my philosophy class....but I love it! 3 days in the intertwining lives of about 5 people in 1930's Paris, the height of the intellectual bohemian cafe culture. very readable and modern as well. basically the main character's girlfriend is pregnant, they don't believe in marriage and are seeking an abortion. though really it is a book all about freedom. thinking i should have started a separate post on this.........
  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Wed, February 20, 2008 - 3:43 PM
    TWELVE MONKEYS

    An original screenplay by

    David Peoples
    &
    Janet Peoples

    Inspired by

    LA JETEE, a Chris Marker Film





    Production Draft
    June 27, 1994








    FADE IN:

    INT. CONCOURSE/AIRPORT TERMINAL - BAY

    CLOSE ON A FACE. A nine year old boy, YOUNG COLE, his eyes wide
    with wonder. watching something intently. We HEAR the sounds of
    the P.A. SYSTEM droning Flight Information mingled with the
    sounds of urgent SHOUTS, running FEET, EXCLAMATIONS.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: twenty yards away, a BLONDE MAN is sprawled on
    the floor, blood oozing from his gaudy Hawaiian shirt.

    A BRUNETTE in a tight dress, her face obscured from YOUNG COLE'S
    view, rushes to the injured man, kneels beside him, ministering
    to his wound.

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, flanked by his PARENTS, their faces out of
    view, as they steer him away.

    FATHER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Come on, Son --this is no place for us.

    YOUNG COLE resists momentarily, mesmerized by the drama.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: intermittently visible through a confusion of
    FIGURES rushing through the foreground, the BLONDE MAN reaching
    up and touching the cheek of the kneeling BRUNETTE in a gesture
    of enormous tenderness, a gesture of farewell, while the P.A.
    SYSTEM continues its monotonous monotone...

    P.A. SYSTEM
    Flight 784 for San Francisco is now
    ready for boarding at inmate number
    66578, Greely.

    INT. PRISON DORMITORY/FUTURE - ETERNAL NIGHT

    PRISON P.A. SYSTEM
    --number 5429, Garcia -- number 87645, Cole...

    COLE, late thirties, dark hair, comes awake in a bunk cage, one
    of many stacked four high along both sides of a long dim
    corridor. He blinks in the near dark, shaken, disoriented.

    Then, as he "recovers" from his very vivid dream, WE GET OUR
    FIRST LOOK AT HIS ENVIRONMENT...A WINDOWLESS UNDERGROUND WORLD OF
    ETERNAL NIGHT SOMETIME IN THE FUTURE...AN ALMOST COLORLESS
    "REALITY" OF BLURRED EDGES AND ECHOEY SOUNDS, MUCH MORE
    "DREAMLIKE" THAN HIS DREAM.

    Flashlights glare. In the half-light, COLE sees spooky figures,
    GUARDS, moving among the locked bunk/cages.

    COLE turns and whispers to the occupant of the next cage, JOSE...

    COLE
    Ssssst! Jose, what's going on?

    JOSE's face is almost lost in shadow. What there is of it is
    youthful. He's just a scared Puerto Rican kid!

    JOSE
    "Volunteers" again.

    JOSE immediately rolls over and feigns sleep as SCARFACE, a
    menacing guard with a jagged scar running down his cheek, looms
    close to COLE's cage and unlocks it.

    SCARFACE
    "Volunteer duty".

    The PRISONERS in the other cages watch silently with narrowed eyes.

    COLE
    I didn't volunteer.

    SCARFACE
    You causing trouble again?

    COLE
    (controls his temper)
    No trouble.

    INT. EQUIPMENT ROOM - ETERNAL NIGHT

    COLE's alone, struggling to get into what looks like a space suit
    in a room where suits hang like ghosts with blank eyes.

    TITLES BEGIN SUPERED OVER THE SCENE

    COLE has the torso of the suit on now and is trying to close it.

    OFFSCREEN VOICE (o.s.)
    All openings must be closed.

    COLE looks for the source of the voice, a tiny grate in the wall.

    OFFSCREEN VOICE (o.s.)
    If the integrity of the suit is compromised
    in any way, if the fabric is torn or a zipper
    not closed, readmittance will be denied.

    INT. SEALED CHAMBER - MINUTES LATER (ETERNAL NIGHT)

    COLE, wearing the "space suit" and a helmet with a plastic visor,
    steps into a tiny chamber, a kind of air lock. The heavy door
    clangs shut behind him. He's alone. COLE'S breath comes quicker
    now as he sucks oxygen from the air tanks on his back.

    On the opposite wall is another door with a huge wheel lock.
    COLE turns the heavy wheel, opens the door, steps through It

    INT. ELEVATOR - SECONDS LATER (ETERNAL NIGHT)

    COLE'S in an ascending elevator that groans and creaks. He looks
    down at a crudely drawn map he holds in his gloved hand.

    The map shows a series of tunnels and ladders.

    INT. SEWER PIPE - MINUTES LATER (NIGHT)

    COLE pans a flashlight, probing the filthy sewer he's wading through

    RATS flee the blade of light, scurry across islands of rusting junk.

    The flashlight beam settles on a ladder mounted in the wall.

    Reaching the rusted ladder, COLE starts to climb awkwardly.

    EXT. CITY STREET/FUTURE - MOMENTS LATER (NIGHT)

    A SCRAPING NOISE as a heavy man-hole cover is pushed up and moved
    aside. COLE'S helmeted head emerges from below.

    COLE'S POV THROUGH HIS PLASTIC-VISORED HELMET: a city in
    moonlight! A surreal image of abandoned buildings. No people
    anywhere. The only sounds are the WIND and COLE'S BREATHING.

    EXT. ANOTHER CITY STREET - MINUTES LATER (NIGHT)

    COLE'S light reveals abandoned vine-covered automobiles.

    Moving to the nearest car, COLE searches in the vines for
    something. Finds it. An insect.

    COLE takes the bug in his gloved hand. As he clumsily inserts it
    into a collection tube, something makes him turn.

    There's something across the street in the dark. Something alive.

    COLE points his flashlight and reveals...a BEAR! Startled by the
    light, the animal blinks, then stands on its rear legs and ROARS.

    ANGLE ON COLE, staring wide-eyed.

    Then, the BEAR sinks down onto all fours and, trying to avoid the
    flashlight, it pads quickly down the street.

    INT. SUBTERRANEAN PARKING GARAGE - NIGHT

    Using the flashlight to see, COLE reaches down to the cracked
    floor and gets another specimen. DOGSHIT!

    The only sound is COLE'S labored BREATHING.

    Then, a different SOUND. GRRRR! A dog. More GRRRRS. More
    dogs. Then, a YIP. Then, VICIOUS GROWLS. It's a DOGFIGHT!

    EXT. STREET - NIGHT (FIRST LIGHT)

    A giant OWL, perched on an overhead traffic light, raises its wings
    and lifts off...rising higher and higher into the brightening sky.

    Below, on the street, COLE trudges along, passing deserted
    buildings, windows broken, rusted signs dangling.

    INT. DEPARTMENT STORE - NIGHT (FIRST LIGHT)

    COLE'S light reveals a spider web just inside the store. A large
    SPIDER tries to hide from the light.

    COLE reaches carefully into the web and plucks the spider and
    puts it into one of his specimen tubes.

    Then, he shines his light all around the once elegant store. There's
    nothing but aisle after aisle of moldering consumer goods.

    EXT. DEPARTMENT STORE - DAWN

    As COLE comes out of the store, the first rays of the sun hit the
    building. COLE stops, squints into the light through his visor.

    COLE'S POV: spray-painted on the wall a long time ago is a stenciled
    logo of twelve monkeys holding hands in a circle. Over it is
    written, "WE DID IT!"

    COLE looks up.

    COLE'S POV: high up on a building across the street, a LION
    patrols a ledge, pauses, looks out majestically over his world.

    TTTLES END

    INT. FIRST UNDERGROUND DECONTAMINATION CHAMBER - ETERNAL NIGHT

    ROARING WATER, powerful torrents gushing from nozzles in the
    wall, pummel the still-suited COLE.

    INT. SECOND UNDERGROUND DECONTAMINATION CHAMBER - ETERNAL NIGHT

    Stark naked and shivering, COLE is being scrubbed with brushes on
    long poles (like the ones used to wash cars) wielded by two HULKING
    FIGURES in bulky decontamination suits, their personas lost in their
    windowed masks. It's a grim scene in a grim cement room with damp,
    dripping walls. From an unseen source comes an AMPLIFIED VOICE,

    AMPLIFIED VOICE (o.s.)
    Raise your arms above your head.

    COLE lifts his arms and the FIGURES start scrubbing his armpits.

    INT. TINY CHAMBER - SHORTLY (ETERNAL NIGHT)

    Still naked, COLE is seated on a stool while a MASKED TECHNICIAN
    in a less elaborate, less bulky decontamination outfit draws
    blood from COLE'S arm with an old-fashioned hypodermic needle.

    COLE glances toward a single, nearly opaque "window" of thick
    plastic in the rusty iron wall. VAGUE FIGURES seem to lurk
    behind the translucent aperture, studying him.

    The TECHNICIAN slips the blood sample through a slot in the wall.

    INT. ENGINEERING OFFICE/FUTURE WORLD - ETERNAL NIGHT

    Ushered in by two guards, TINY and SCARFACE, COLE looks around.

    COLE'S POV: wails hidden by old headlines, articles, maps, charts...
    a blackboard covered with elaborate, sophisticated formulae...surfaces
    heaped with cracked monitors, gerry-rigged computers held together with
    string, lasers lost in tangles of cable, ancient tube amplifiers, a
    dilapidated cardboard reconstruction of a city, stacks of moldering
    books and tattered computer printouts...and, seated at a long conference
    table, staring at COLE, six SCIENTISTS: an ASTROPHYSICIST, ENGINEER,
    BOTANIST, MICROBIOLOGIST, ZOOLOGIST, and a GEOLOGIST. They represent
    a "modern" science where brilliant new ideas interface with crude,
    outdated, patched-together technologies.

    TINY
    James Cole. Cleared from quarantine.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    Thank you. You two wait outside.

    SCARFACE
    He's got a history, Doctor. Violence.

    COLE'S eyes return to the walls.

    Headlines: "CLOCK TICKING! NO CURE YET!"

    SCARFACE
    Anti-social six -- doing 25 to life.

    ENGINEER
    I don't think he's going to hurt us. You're
    not going to hurt us, are you Mr. Cole?

    COLE'S head turns quickly to the ENGINEER.

    COLE
    No, sir.

    The GUARDS exchange a look, shrug, exit, closing the door.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    Why don't you sit down, Mr. Cole.

    COLE goes to the empty chair at the conference table, sits down.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    We want you to tell us about last
    night.

    COLE
    I went to the surface and I collected
    specimens like I was told.

    The SCIENTISTS don't say anything. They just study him carefully.

    COLE
    (worried)
    I mashed the spider, didn't I?

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    We'll get to the spider later, Mr.
    Cole. Right now, we want to know
    everything that you saw.

    INT. ENGINEERING OFFICE - AN HOUR LATER (ETERNAL NIGHT)

    COLE, starting to look very tired now, stands at the blackboard
    sketching a detailed map of exactly where he was last night.

    ASTPOPHYSICIST
    Where you collected sample #4, what
    street was that?

    COLE
    Uh...

    BOTANIST
    It's important to observe everything.

    COLE
    I think it was...I'm sure it was 2nd Street.

    As the SCIENTISTS start to whisper animatedly among themselves,
    COLE'S eyes drift across the newspaper clippings taped to the
    wall. One headline screams, "VIRUS MUTATING!" Another features
    a photo of an OLD MAN (DR. MASON, who we'll see again later on)
    and the words, SCIENTIST SAYS, "IT'S TOO LATE FOR CURE".

    ASTROPHYSICIST'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Close your eyes, Cole.

    Startled, COLE closes his eyes obediently.

    BLACKNESS. Like COLE, WE SEE NOTHING. But we HEAR their VOICES.

    ENGINEER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Tell us in detail what you've seen in
    this room.

    COLE'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Uh, in this room? Uh...

    MICROBIOLOGIST'S VOICE (o.s.)
    How many of us are there?

    COLE'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Six...seven, if you count me.

    ASTROPHYSICIST'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Tell us about the pictures on the wall...

    COLE'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Uh, you mean the newspapers?

    A MONTAGE OF OVERLAPPING VOICES (o.s.)
    Tell us about the newspapers. Can you
    hear my voice? What do I look like?
    What does he look like, the man who
    just spoke? How old were you when you
    left the surface?

    The VOICES blur into a cacophony and FADE INTO the droning P.A.
    SYSTEM at the airport.

    INT. CONCOURSE/AIRPORT - DAY

    THE DREAM AGAIN! But at an earlier moment. YOUNG COLE, flanked
    by his PARENTS, whose faces are out of view, is watching a PLANE
    land through one of the big glass windows that lines the concourse
    leading to the departure gates.

    P.A. SYSTEM (o.s.)
    Flight 784 now boarding at gate...

    Suddenly, a SHOUT, followed by raised VOICES, interrupts the
    monotonous airport routine. As YOUNG COLE and his PARENTS turn
    to see what's going on, a man we'll call MR. PONYTAIL, his face
    averted, hurries past them, bumping YOUNG COLE with a Chicago
    Hulls Sports Duffle Bag.

    MR. PONYTAIL
    WATCH IT!

    YOUNG COLE sees little more than the gaudy pants, the duffle, and
    the man's ponytail flopping as he rushes towards the gates.

    Just then, a WOMAN'S VOICE cries out, "NOOOOOOOOO!"

    YOUNG COLE turns back toward the Security Check Point just as
    TRAVELERS scatter madly, some diving to the floor, others
    running. A TERRIFIED TRAVELER, hitting the floor close by, looks
    up at YOUNG COLE with panicky eyes, and asks....

    TERRIFIED TRAVELER
    Just exactly why did you volunteer?

    INT. ENGINEERING OFFICE/FUTURE WORLD - (ETERNAL NIGHT)

    COLE comes abruptly awake. Seated now, he's facing the SCIENTISTS.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Wake up, Cole.

    COLE
    Uh, I didn't hear the...

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    (tapping a pencil on the table)
    I asked you, why did you volunteer?

    COLE
    Well, the guard woke me up. He told me
    I volunteered.

    The SCIENTISTS react, whispering urgently among themselves.

    COLE starts to nod off again, then comes awake with a start as
    the ENGINEER speaks to him.

    ENGINEER
    We appreciate you volunteering. You're
    a very good observer, Cole.

    COLE
    Uh, thank you.

    ENGINEER
    You'll get a reduction in sentence.

    COLE keeps his face impassive.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    To be determined by the proper authorities.

    ENGINEER
    You don't want to jeopardize that reduction,
    do you, Cole? Have it taken away?

    COLE
    No, sir!

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    We have a very advanced program, something
    very different, requires very skilled people.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    An opportunity to reduce your sentence
    considerably...

    ZOOLOGIST
    And possibly play an important role in
    returning the human race to the surface
    of the earth.

    ENGINEER
    We want tough minded people. Strong
    mentally. We've had some...misfortunes
    with "unstable" types.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    For a man in your position...an opportunity.

    BOTANIST
    Not to volunteer could be a real mistake.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    (tapping his pencil again)
    Definitely a mistake!

    COLE gives away nothing. He's in a box here. He has no choices.
    He stares at the tapping pencil.

    INT. ART GALLERY - NIGHT

    A strikingly "real" world of bright colors. Extravagant paintings
    adorn the walls. A POET, tiny and ruddy faced, squints over his
    glasses as he reads in a booming voice to an AUDIENCE of thirty
    seated on folding chairs.

    POET
    Still among the myriad microwaves, the
    infra-red messages, the gigabytes of ones
    and zeroes, we find words, infinitesimally
    small, byte-sized now, tinier even than
    science lurking in some vague electricity
    where, if we listen we can hear the solitary
    voice of that poet telling us,
    "We are no other than a moving row
    Of Magic shadow-shapes that come and go
    Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern hold
    In Midnight by the Master of the show."

    As the POET reads, we STUDY the audience, mostly YUPPIE CULTURE
    JUNKIES or BOHEMIANS. Among them, a light-haired woman of twenty-
    eight, soberly dressed, wearing glasses. She's KATHRYN RAILLY. And
    it's her beeper that suddenly BEEPS. BEEP! BEEP!

    POET'S VOICE (o.s.)
    "The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
    Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
    Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
    Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it."

    BEEP! BEEP! Scowling at the outrageous interruption, the POET
    looks up from the text just as RAILLY, tumbling, shuts off the
    beeper and rises, embarrassed. As she makes her way to an exit,
    the glaring POET continues...

    POET
    "Yesterday This Day's Madness did prepare;
    Tomorrow's Silence, Triumph or Despair:
    Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why:
    Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where."

    INT. CORRIDOR/POLICE STATION - NIGHT

    DETECTIVE FRANKI leads RAILLY past crowded holding cells.

    FRANKI
    -- so they get there and they ask the guy
    real nice for some kind of i.d., and he gets
    agitated, starts screaming about viruses.
    Totally irrational, totally disoriented,
    doesn't know where he is, what day it is,
    alla that stuff. All they got was his
    name. They figure he's stoned out of
    his mind, it's some kinda psychotic
    episode, so they're gonna bring him...

    RAILLY
    He's been tested for drugs?

    FRANKI
    Negative for drugs. But he took on
    five cops like he was dusted to the
    eyeballs. No drugs. You believe that?

    FRANKI pauses, indicating a tiny observation window of thick meshed
    glass in an otherwise solid door, and RAILLY looks through it.

    RAILLY'S POV THROUGH THE WINDOW: a MAN, his back to her, in
    strait-jacket and prison denims, examining the wall of the padded
    cell with the distorted intensity of a "mental case".

    RAILLY
    You have him in restraints.

    FRANKI
    Were you listening? We got two officers in
    the hospital. Yeah, he's in restraints, plus
    the medic gave him enough stellazine to kill
    a horse. Look at him! Still on his feet.

    RAILLY'S POV THROUGH THE WINDOW: the MAN in the cell turns, looks
    right at her. In spite of the cuts and welts, it's clearly COLE.

    RAILLY
    That would explain the bruises, I
    guess. The struggle.

    FRANKI
    You want to go in? Examine him?

    RAILLY
    Yes, please. You said he gave a name...

    FRANKI
    (unlocking the door)
    James Cole. That's everything we got. None
    of the James Coles on the computer match him.
    No license, no prints, no warrants. Nothing.
    You want me to go in with you?

    RAILLY
    (entering)
    No, thank you.

    FRANKI
    I'll be right here...just in case.

    INT. ISOLATION CELL

    COLE stares at RAILLY. The environment is intensely real...vivid
    colors...each sound, however slight, very distinct, almost loud...
    and yet she appears to him almost like a vision.

    RAILLY
    Mr. Cole? My name is Doctor Railly.
    I'm a psychiatrist. I work for the
    County -- I don't work for the police.
    My only concern is your well being --
    do you understand that?

    COLE
    I need to go now.

    RAILLY
    I'm going to be completely honest. I'm
    not going to lie to you. I can't make
    the police let you go...but I do want
    to help you. And I want you to trust
    me. Can you do that, James? May I
    call you "James"?

    COLE
    "James"! Nobody ever calls me that.

    RAILLY
    (frowns, studies him)
    Have you been a patient at County?
    Have I seen you someplace?

    COLE
    No, not possible. Listen, I have to
    get out of here. I'm supposed to be
    getting information.

    RAILLY
    What kind of information?

    COLE
    It won't help you. You can't do anything
    about it. You can't change anything.

    RAILLY
    Change what?

    COLE
    I need to go.

    RAILLY
    Do you know why you're here, James.

    COLE
    Because I'm a good observer. Because I
    have a tough mind.

    RAILLY
    I see. You don't remember assaulting a
    police officer...several officers?

    COLE
    They wanted identification. I don't have
    any identification. I wasn't trying to
    hurt them.

    RAILLY
    You don't have a driver's license,
    James? Or a Social Security card?

    COLE
    No.

    RAILLY
    Why not? Most people have some ID.

    COLE
    You wouldn't understand.

    RAILLY
    You've been in an institution, haven't
    you, James? A hospital?

    COLE
    I have to go.

    RAILLY
    A jail? Prison?

    COLE
    Underground.

    RAILLY
    Hiding?

    COLE
    I love this air. This is wonderful air.

    RAILLY
    What's wonderful about the air, James?

    COLE
    It's so clean. No germs.

    RAILLY
    You're afraid of germs?

    COLE
    I have to go.

    RAILLY
    Why do you think there aren't any germs
    in the air, James?

    COLE
    This is April, right?

    RAILLY
    July.

    COLE
    (sudden panic)
    July?!

    RAILLY
    Do you know what year it is?

    COLE
    What year is it?

    RAILLY
    What year do you think it is?

    COLE
    1995?

    RAILLY
    You think it's July of 1995? That's
    the future, James. Do you think you're
    living in the future?

    COLE
    (slightly confused)
    No, 1995 is the past.

    RAILLY
    1995 is the future, James. This is 1989.

    COLE looks stunned.

    INT. POLICE STATION CORRIDOR - MORNING

    COLE, bound tightly by the strait-jacket, heavy manacles on his
    ankles, is being escorted down the corridor by two surly POLICEMEN.

    COLE
    Where are you taking me?

    POLICEMAN #1
    South of France, buddy. Fancy hotel.
    You're gonna love it.

    COLE
    South of France?! I don't want to go
    to the South of France. I want to make
    a telephone call.

    POLICEMAN #2 smirks as he unlocks a heavy steel door.

    POLICEMAN #2
    Zip it, scumbag -- you fooled the shrink
    with your act, but you don't fool us.

    Then, POLICEMAN #2 swings the steel door open and sunlight
    overwhelms COLE, blinding him in a dazzling fury of white light.

    EXT. CITY STREET/MINI-VAN - DAY

    A Mini-van, the kind of vehicle used to transport a half dozen
    prisoners, crawls through a busy street. The Police Department
    logo is prominent on the side of the van beneath barred windows.

    INT. COUNTY HOSPITAL/SHOWERS - AN HOUR LATER (MORNING)

    Fierce spray recalls the decontamination in the future. COLE
    stands stark naked under the shower while two muscular attendants,
    PALMER and BILLINGS, supervise.

    As PALMER shuts off the water, BILLINGS hands COLE a towel and
    starts inspecting his scalp...

    BILLINGS
    Lemme see your head, Jimbo, see if you
    got any creepy crawlies.

    COLE
    I need to make a telephone call.

    BILLINGS
    (pulling Cole's head)
    Gotta work that out with a doctor, Jimbo.
    Can't make no calls 'til the doctor says.

    COLE
    It's very important.

    BILLINGS
    What chew gotta do, Jimbo, is take it
    easy, relax into things. We all gonna
    get along fine if you just relax.

    COLE gets the hint of menace in the message and submits to the
    lice inspection, only his eyes revealing his frustration.

    INT. HOSPITAL/DAYROOM - HALF AN HOUR LATER (DAY)

    COLE stands in the doorway, stunned by his first sight of the
    large room. His eyes go to the heavily-grilled windows where
    light pours in from outside. Then, to the TV, where a CARTOON
    COMMERCIAL makes raucous noises.

    PATIENTS, in K-Mart street clothes or ratty robes, stare gloomily
    at the TV, or play cards, pace, or just stare blankly.

    BILLINGS is at COLE'S side, beckoning to a patient, JEFFREY MASON,
    a twenty year old white youth dressed in khakis and a plaid shirt.

    BILLINGS
    Jeffrey. Yo! Jeffrey. This here is James.
    Whyncha show James around? Tell him the TV
    rules, show him the games an' stuff, okay?

    JEFFREY
    (with a sly look)
    How much you gonna pay me? Huh? I'd
    be doing your job.

    BILLINGS
    Five thousand dollars, my man. That
    enough? I'll wire it to your account
    as usual, okay?

    JEFFREY
    Okay, Billings. Five thousand. That's
    enough. Five thousand dollars. I'll
    give him the Deluxe Mental Hospital Tour.

    As BILLINGS walks away chuckling, JEFFREY turns to COLE.

    JEFFREY
    Kid around, kid around. It makes them feel
    good, we're all pals. We're prisoners, they're
    the guards, but it's all in good fun, you see?

    COLE nods and JEFFREY indicates card tables where PATIENTS are
    playing cards, checkers, chess, or working on jig saw puzzles.

    JEFFREY
    Here's the games. Games vegitize you.
    If you play the games, you're
    voluntarily taking a tranquilizer.

    COLE sees a partially completed puzzle of the well-known painting,
    THE PEACEABLE KINGDOM, depicting a serene world of animals in harmony.

    JEFFREY
    What'd they give you? Thorazine? How
    much? Learn your drugs -- know your doses.

    COLE
    I need to make a telephone call.

    JEFFREY
    A telephone call? That's communication
    with the outside world! Doctor's
    discretion. Hey, if alla these nuts
    could just make phone calls, it could
    spread. Insanity oozing through telephone
    cables, oozing into the ears of all those
    poor sane people, infecting them! Whackos
    everywhere! A plague of madness.
    (suddenly sly and confidential)
    In fact, very few of us here are actually
    mentally ill. I'm not saying you're
    not mentally ill, for all I know you're
    crazy as a loon. But that's not why
    you're here. Why you're here is because
    of the system, because of the economy.
    (indicating the TV)
    There's the TV. It's all right there.
    Commercials. We are not productive
    anymore, they don't need us to make
    things anymore, it's all automated. What
    are we for then? We're consumers. Okay,
    buy a lot of stuff, you're a good citizen.
    But if you don't buy a lot of stuff, you
    know what? You're mentally ill! That's
    a fact! If you don't buy things...toilet
    paper, new cars, computerized blenders,
    electrically operated sexual devices...
    (getting hysterical)
    SCREWDRIVERS WITH MINIATURE BUILT-IN
    RADAR DEVICES, STEREO SYSTEMS WITH
    BRAIN IMPLANTED HEADPHONES, VOICE-
    ACTIVATED COMPUTERS, AND...

    A woman orderly, TERRY, turns from the feeble PATIENT she's helping.

    TERRY
    Take it easy, Jeffrey. Be calm.

    Abruptly, JEFFREY stifles his hysteria, takes a deep breath and
    continues, completely calm now. But COLE isn't listening. He's
    mesmerized by the TV.

    JEFFREY
    So if you want to watch a particular
    program, say "All My Children" or
    something, you go to the Charge Nurse
    and tell her what day and time the show
    you want to see is on. But you have to
    tell her before the show is scheduled
    to be on. There was this one guy who
    was always requesting shows that had already
    played. He couldn't quite grasp the
    idea that the Charge Nurse couldn't
    just make it be yesterday for him, turn
    back time ha ha. What a fruitcake!!

    This last thought actually penetrates COLE'S focus on the TV and
    he turns to JEFFREY who's picking up speed again.

    JEFFREY
    Seriously, more and more people are
    being defined now as mentally ill. Why?
    Because they're not consuming on their
    own. But as patients, they becone
    consumers of mental health care. And
    this gives the so-called sane people work!
    (hysteria again)
    WHOOO! SHOCK THERAPY! GROUP THERAPY!
    HALLUCINATIONS! THERAPEUTIC DRUGS!
    IGGIDY DIGGIDY DIG! PERFECT! THE
    SYSTEM IN HARMONY LIKE A BIG MACHINE...

    TERRY
    Okay, that's it, Jeffrey, you're gonna
    get a shot. I warned you...

    JEFFREY
    (calming himself, smiling)
    Right! Right! Carried away, heh heh.
    I got "carried away". Explaining the
    workings of...the institution.

    Just then, TJ WASHINGTON, a somber-looking African American in a
    bathrobe, taps COLE on the shoulder.

    TJ WASHINGTON
    I don't really come from outer space.

    JEFFREY
    This is TJ Washington, Jim -- he
    doesn't really come from outer space.

    TJ WASHINGTON
    Don't mock me, my friend.
    (to Cole)
    It's a condition of "mental divergence".
    I find myself on another planet, Ogo,
    part of an intellectual elite, preparing
    to subjugate barbarian hordes on Pluto.
    But even though it's a totally convincing
    reality in every way...I can feel, breathe,
    hear...nevertheless, Ogo is actually a
    construct of my psyche. I am mentally
    divergent in that I am escaping certain
    unnamed realities that plague my life
    here. When I stop going there, I will
    be well. Are you also divergent, friend?

    The P.A. SYSTEM interrupts, startling COLE.

    P.A. SYSTEM (v.o.)
    James Cole. Report to Staff. James Cole!

    JEFFREY
    Staff! Whoo! Time for Staff. Now the
    geniuses cure you. Hallelujah!

    INT. PSYCH WARD CONFERENCE ROOM - MINUTES LATER (DAY)

    COLE is agitated, speaking forcefully.

    COLE
    This is a place for crazy people! I'm
    not crazy!

    RAILLY, four other PSYCHIATRIC RESIDENTS, including RAILLY'S best
    friend, MARILOU MARTIN, and their chief, DR. OWEN FLETCHER, sit
    around a beat-up conference table, watching COLE, who sits facing
    the doctors, with BILLINGS looming behind him. (Some of the DOCTORS
    bear a strong resemblance to the SCIENTISTS OF THE FUTURE.)

    RESIDENT #1
    We don't use that term..."crazy", Mr. Cole.

    COLE
    Well, you've got some real nuts in here!
    Listen to me, all of you -- I have to
    tell you something that's going to be
    difficult for you to understand, but...

    DR. RAILLY
    James...please. These are all doctors
    here and we want to help you.

    DR. FLETCHER
    Mr. Cole -- last night you told Dr.
    Railly you thought it was...
    (checking a file)
    1995. ... How about right now? Do you
    know what year it is right now?

    COLE
    1989. Look, I'm not confused. There's been
    a mistake, I've been sent to the wrong place.

    Suddenly, COLE reaches out and BILLINGS lunges forward, but COLE
    is just grabbing a pad and pencil.

    COLE
    Hey, I'm not going to hurt anybody.

    FLETCHER restrains BILLINGS with a hand signal.

    COLE
    (drawing)
    Do any of you know anything about the
    Army of the Twelve Monkeys? They paint
    this, stencil it, on buildings, all
    over the place.

    COLE waves a sketch of the dancing monkey logo we saw earlier.

    DR. CASEY
    Mr. Cole...

    COLE
    Right. I guess you wouldn't, this is
    1989, they're probably not active yet.
    That makes sense! Okay. Listen to me,
    three billion people died in 1995.
    Three billion, got that? Almost
    the whole population. Of the world!
    Only about one percent survived.

    DOCTORS exchange knowing looks. This is an old story, apparently.

    RESIDENT #2
    Are you going to save us, Mr. Cole?

    COLE
    Save you? How can I save you? It
    already happened! I can't save you. I'm
    simply trying to get some information for
    people in the present so that someday...
    (sees their eyes)
    You don't believe me. You think I'm
    crazy. But I'm not crazy. I'm a convict,
    sure, I have a quick temper, but I'm as
    sane as anyone in this room. I...

    COLE stops, sees DR. FLETCHER tapping his pencil. COLE'S seen
    that tapping before -- in the future! It disorients him.

    DR. RAILLY
    Can you tell us the name of the prison
    you've come from?

    COLE doesn't answer. He's staring at the tapping pencil.

    DR. FLETCHER
    Does this bother you, Mr. Cole?

    COLE
    (recovering, new tack)
    No! Look, I don't belong here! What I
    need to do is make a telephone call to
    straighten everything out.

    DR. FLETCHER
    Who would you call, Mr. Cole, who would
    straighten everything out?

    COLE
    Scientists. I'm supposed to report in
    to them. They'll want to know they
    sent me to the wrong time.

    DR. FLETCHER
    So you could talk to these scientists
    and they do what? Send you to the future?

    COLE
    No, no. I can't talk to them. It's called,
    "voice mail". I'm supposed to leave messages.
    They monitor it from the present.

    RESIDENT #2
    "From the present." We're not in the
    present now, Mr. Cole?

    COLE
    No, no. This is the past. This has
    already happened. Listen...

    RESIDENT #3
    Mr. Cole, you belong in 1995 -- that's
    the present, is that it?

    COLE
    No, 1995 is the past, too. Look...

    DR. FLETCHER
    These scientists, Mr. Cole? Are they
    doctors like ourselves?

    Two of the residents exchange quick knowing looks.

    COLE
    No! I mean yes, but... Look, I've been given
    a lot of drugs but I'm still perfectly lucid.
    You have to let me use the phone. One call!

    COLE looks desperately toward RAILLY, pleading eyes meeting hers.

    INT. LOW RENT APARTMENT - DAY

    Four little KIDS SCREAM and SQUABBLE while the phone CHIRPS
    insistently in the tiny, cluttered apartment and a harried MOTHER
    lunges for the phone, answers sharply...

    MOTHER
    Yes?
    (listens, frowns, then)
    Whaaaaat? "Voice mail"! I don't know
    what you're talkin' about. ... Is this
    a joke? I don't know any scientists.
    James who? Never heard of you!

    The MOTHER slams down the phone.

    INT. RAILLY'S OFFICE/COUNTY HOSPITAL - DAY

    A dismayed COLE still has the receiver in his hand. Sympathetically,
    RAILLY takes it from him.

    RAILLY
    It wasn't who you expected?

    COLE is clearly agitated, starts to pace, upset. Nuts?

    COLE
    It was some lady. She didn't know anything.

    RAILLY
    Perhaps it was a wrong number...

    COLE
    No. That's the reason they chose me --
    I remember things.

    RAILLY frowns, studying the distracted man with intense interest.
    It's clear COLE is becoming a special patient and RAILLY'S cool,
    detached demeanor is giving way ever so slightly.

    RAILLY
    James, where did you grow up? Was it
    around here? Around Baltimore?

    COLE
    (lost in thought)
    What?

    RAILLY
    I have the...strangest feeling I've met
    you before...a long time ago, perhaps.
    Were you ever...?

    COLE
    Wait! This is only 1989! I'm supposed
    to be leaving messages in 1995. It's
    not the right number yet. That's the
    problem. Damn! How can I contact them?

    RAILLY recovers her distance, her poise, as she takes a bottle,
    pours out some tablets, and holds them out to COLE.

    RAILLY
    James, take these.
    (watching him step back)
    Please -- I helped you like I said I
    would. Now I want you to trust me.

    INT. AIRPORT CONCOURSE - DAY (THE DREAM)

    MR. PONYTAIL races past the startled YOUNG COLE.

    MR. PONYTAIL
    WATCH IT!

    Was it JEFFREY wearing gaudy pants and a ponytail? It was
    definitely JEFFREY'S VOICE.

    TRAVELERS dive for cover as a WOMAN'S VOICE cries out...

    WOMAN'S VOICE
    NOOOOOOOOOO!

    The TERRIFIED TRAVELER looks up at YOUNG COLE, makes eye contact, but
    doesn't speak. The TERRIFIED TRAVELER looks a lot like DR. FLETCHER!

    Just then, YOUNG COLE is distracted by a running figure. It's
    the BLONDE MAN in the Hawaiian shirt, but he's not injured. He's
    sprinting toward the gates, glancing back over his shoulder, his
    moustache slightly askew!

    A sharp CRACK of a GUNSHOT rings out! Then, DAZZLING LIGHT.
    Everything goes white!

    INT. DORMITORY (PSYCH WARD)/COUNTY HOSPITAL - NIGHT

    COLE'S eyes blink awake, blinded by a flashlight.

    He's lying in one of thirty beds in a darkened ward. Disoriented.
    Which world is this? The room is full of BREATHING, SNORING,
    occasional MOANS. He can barely discern the shadowy figures of
    an ORDERLY and a NURSE, making their rounds, checking each bed.

    His eyes adjusting to the darkness, COLE watches them exit.

    He turns and sees a patch of moonlight coming in a barred window.

    With a quick glance at the sleeping PATIENTS, he slips out of
    bed, makes his way stealthily to the window, peers out.

    COLE'S POV: the moon, glowing in the sky, illuminating a single
    tree. Under the tree, in silhouette, a COUPLE embraces, kisses.

    ANGLE ON COLE, looking out the window, absorbed.

    VOICE (o.s.)
    It won't work. You can't open it.

    Alarmed, COLE turns, sees JEFFREY in the next bed.

    JEFFREY
    You think you can remove the grill but
    you can't. It's welded.

    COLE checks the grill anyway.

    JEFFREY
    See? I toldja. And all the doors are
    locked, too. They're protecting the
    people on the outside from us. But the
    people outside are as crazy as us.

    COLE has become preoccupied with a small SPIDER creeping along
    the window sill. He's staring at it when he's distracted by a
    sudden SOUND. Grabbing the SPIDER, COLE scrambles back into bed
    just as the door opens and an ORDERLY probes the dark room with
    the blade of his flashlight.

    ANGLE ON COLE, in bed, feigning sleep.

    The flashlight clicks off and COLE hears the door close.

    For a long moment the ward is silent except for BREATHING,
    SNORES, occasional MOANS. Then, COLE hears JEFFREY'S hoarse
    whisper, picking up right where he left off.

    JEFFREY
    You know what "crazy" is? "crazy" is
    "majority rules". Take germs for example.

    Although COLE is preoccupied with the SPIDER struggling to get
    out of his fist, he can't help reacting to the word, "germs"!

    COLE
    Germs?!

    JEFFREY
    In the 18th century there was no such
    thing! Nobody'd ever imagined such a
    thing -- no sane person anyway. Along
    comes this doctor...Semmelweiss, I
    think. He tries to convince people...
    other doctors mostly...that there are
    these teeny tiny invisible "bad things"
    called germs that get into your body and
    make you...sick! He's trying to get
    doctors to wash their hands. What is
    this guy...crazy? Teeny tiny invisible
    whaddayou call 'em?..."germs"!

    As JEFFREY warms to his subject, getting excited, COLE tries to
    figure out where to put the SPIDER.

    JEFFREY (cont.)
    So cut to the 20th century! Last week
    in fact, right before I got dragged
    into this hellhole. I order a burger
    in this fast food joint. The waiter
    drops it on the floor. He picks it up,
    wipes it off, hands it to me...like it
    was all okay.

    No alternative. COLE pops the SPIDER in his mouth and swallows
    it as JEFFREY prattles on...

    JEFFREY
    "What about the germs?" I say. He
    goes, "I don't believe in germs. Germs
    are just a plot they made up so they
    can sell you disinfectants and soap!"
    Now, he's crazy, right? Hey, you
    believe in germs, don't you?

    COLE
    I'm not crazy.

    JEFFREY
    Of course not, I never thought you were.
    You want to escape, right? That's very
    sane. I can help you. You want me to,
    don't you? Get you out?

    COLE
    If you know how to escape, why don't you...?

    JEFFREY
    Why don't I escape, that's what you
    were going to ask me, right? 'Cause
    I'd be crazy to escape! I'm all taken
    care of, see? I've sent out word.

    COLE
    What's that mean?

    JEFFREY
    I've managed to contact certain underlings,
    evil spirits, secretaries of secretaries, and
    assorted minions, who will contact my father.
    When he learns I'm in this kind of place,
    he'll have them transfer me to one of those
    classy joints where they treat you...properly.
    LIKE A GUEST! LIKE A PERSON! SHEETS!
    TOWELS! LIKE A BIG HOTEL WITH GREAT DRUGS
    FOR THE NUT CASE LUNATIC MANIAC DEVILS...

    PATIENTS are waking up as the NURSE and two ORDERLIES burst into the
    dorm and head straight for JEFFREY who's struggling to calm himself.

    JEFFREY
    Sorry. Really sorry. Got a little
    agitated. The thought of escaping
    crossed my mind and suddenly...suddenly
    I felt LIKE BENDING THE FUCKING BARS
    BACK, RIPPING OFF THE GODDAMN WINDOW
    FRAMES AND...EATING THEM, YES, EATING
    THEM, AND LEAPING, LEAPING...

    COLE watches the ORDERLIES grab JEFFREY and haul him away.

    JEFFREY
    You dumb assholes! I'm a mental patient!
    I'm supposed to act out. Wait til you
    morons find out who I am. My father's
    gonna be really upset. AND WHEN MY
    FATHER GETS UPSET, THE GROUND SHAKES!
    MY FATHER IS GOD! I WORSHIP MY FATHER.

    INT. WARD DAYROOM - MORNING

    ANGLE ON TV SCREEN/A VIDEO IMAGE OF A LAB MONKEY, convulsing
    pathetically, a victim of shocks from the numerous wires attached
    to his tiny, restrained body.

    ANGLE ON COLE, sitting, writing intensely in a magazine with
    crayon, surrounded by dull-eyed PATIENTS in pajamas and ratty
    robes, staring at the shuddering LAB MONKEY on the TV screen.

    JEFFREY'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Torture! Experiments! We're all
    monkeys

    COLE locks up, startled, as JEFFREY, one eye bruised black, takes
    the seat next to him.

    COLE
    They hurt you!

    JEFFREY
    Not as bad as what they're doing to
    kitty.

    ANGLE ON TV, showing a laboratory CAT turning in mad circles,
    eating its own tail, while a NEWS REPORTER narrates.

    TV NEWS REPORTER (v.o.)
    These video tapes were obtained by
    animal rights activists who worked
    underground as laboratory assistants
    for several months. Authorities say
    there is little they can do until...

    The video footage now shows LAB WORKERS watching the results of
    their experiments passively.

    ANGLE ON COLE, reacting angrily.

    COLE
    Look at those assholes, they're asking
    for it! Maybe people deserved to be
    wiped out!

    JEFFREY
    (startled, turning)
    Wiping cut the human race! That's a
    great idea! But it's more of a long
    term thing -- right now we have to
    focus on more immediate goals.
    (sudden whisper)
    I didn't say a word about "you know
    what".

    COLE
    What are you talking about???

    JEFFREY
    You know -- your plan.

    As COLE stares, befuddled, JEFFREY sees COLE'S magazine.

    JEFFREY
    What're you writing? You a reporter?

    COLE
    (shielding the magazine)
    It's private.

    JEFFREY
    A lawsuit? You going to sue them?

    Just then BILLINGS looms over COLE, extending a cup full of pills.

    BILLINGS
    Yo, James -- time to take your meds.

    INT. DAY ROOM/HOSPITAL - THIRTY MINUTES LATER (MORNING)

    ANGLE ON THE TV, a commercial playing: a beautiful couple romps
    in the surf in slow motion while an eager NARRATOR encourages...

    NARRATOR (v.o.)
    Take a chance. Live the moment. Sunshine.
    Gorgeous beaches. The Florida Keys!

    ANGLE ON COLE, very drugged, seated in front of the TV along with
    other drugged PATIENTS, staring at the screen.

    ANGLE ON THE TV, showing a picture of the Marx Brothers.

    TV AWNOUNCER (v.o.)
    We'll return to the Marx Brothers in
    "Monkey Business" following these
    messages.

    JEFFREY'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Monkey Business! Monk Key Business.

    COLE sees JEFFREY sliding into the next chair and smirking.

    JEFFREY
    Get it? Monk - Key. Monk!
    (big grin)
    Key!

    JEFFREY flashes his palm open for one quick moment. A KEY!

    COLE
    (groggy)
    What....???

    JEFFREY
    Wooooo, they really dosed you, bro.
    Major load! Listen up -- try and get
    it together. Focus! Focus! The plan!
    Remember? I did my part.

    COLE
    What...???

    JEFFREY
    Not, "what", babe! When!

    "When???"

    JEFFREY
    (pressing the key into Cole's hand)
    Now!

    VOICE/TV (o.s.)
    Let us guide you to the stocks and
    bonds that will enhance your portfolio.

    JEFFREY
    (leaping to his feet)
    YES -- NOW! BUY NOW! STOCKS AND BONDS!
    NO MORE MONKEY BUSINESS -- BUY NOW.

    ANGLE ON TV, almost mimicking JEFFREY with an ad...a BULL and a
    BEAR and a computer screen showing stock prices fluctuating.

    VOICE/TV (v.o.)
    A portfolio tailored to your specific
    needs and the needs of your loved ones...

    ANGLE ON COLE, dumbfounded, watching JEFFREY dance crazily.

    JEFFREY
    YES, YES. ENHANCE YOUR PORTFOLIO NOW!

    ANGLE ON BILLINGS, across the ward, reacting to JEFFREY, lets go
    of the OLD MAN he's helping as another orderly, TERRY, presses a
    beeper, calling for help.

    ANGLE ON COLE, flabbergasted, as JEFFREY cavorts around the room.

    JEFFREY
    BUY! SELL! SEIZE THE OPPORTUNITY!

    ANGLE ON A HAND, inserting the last piece into the PEACEABLE
    KINGDOM JIGSAW PUZZLE. Just then, JEFFREY'S HAND sweeps the
    puzzle off the table, scattering it into a thousand pieces.

    ANGLE ON JEFFREY, dancing away while the PATIENT who just
    completed the puzzle stares, very upset.

    Other PATIENTS are getting agitated, too, as JEFFREY avoids a
    lunge by BILLINGS and dances off, using PATIENTS as a shield.

    HEAVY WOMAN PATIENT
    I'M GETTING DIZZY. MAKE HIM STOP!

    SKINNY MAN PATIENT
    HERE THEY COME! THEY'RE COMING!

    OLD MAN PATIENT
    FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS! I GOT FIVE
    HUNDRED DOLLARS! I'M INSURED!

    JEFFREY
    OPPORTUNITY! DEFINITELY! A WINDOW OF
    OPPORTUNITY! OPENING NOW! NOW'S THE TIME
    FOR ALL GOOD MEN TO SEIZE THE MOMENT! YES!
    YES! MASTERCARD! VISA! THE KEY TO HAPPINESS!

    ANGLE ON COLE, realizing through the haze of drugs that JEFFREY
    is sending a message to him. COLE looks at the ward door.

    COLE'S POV: the WARD DOOR opens and two husky ORDERLIES enter.
    One locks the door with a key, one of many on a key ring attached
    to his belt, as the other ORDERLY rushes to join the pursuit.

    JEFFREY
    SEIZE THE MOMENT! GET RICH! NOW'S THE
    TIME! GO FOR IT!

    BILLINGS
    (missing a tackle)
    God damn you, Jeffrey, quit playing the fool.

    ANGLE ON COLE, hesitating. He locks at the door...blurring in
    and out of focus. He looks down at the key in his hand.

    ANGLE ON JEFFREY, being grabbed by the ORDERLIES. JEFFREY
    resists wildly as they struggle to overpower him.

    JEFFREY
    LAST CHANCE! LAST CHANCE! HEY -- OW!

    ANGLE ON COLE, moving to the door. He reaches it and tries to
    insert the key in the lock.

    ANGLE ON LOCK, as the key keeps missing the hole.

    ANGLE ON COLE, glancing nervously over his shoulder.

    COLE'S POV: ORDERLIES swarm over JEFFREY, don't notice COLE.

    ANGLE ON COLE, managing to insert the key. It won't turn.

    A PATIENT, close at hand, startles COLE, speaking into his ear.

    PATIENT
    Place to go would be...Florida. The
    keys are lovely this tine of year.

    COLE, unnerved, desperate tries the key again. It turns.

    PATIENT
    Be careful. J. Edgar Hoover isn't really dead.

    COLE pauses, stares, not understanding. Then, he opens the door.

    INT. CORRIDOR/COUNTY HOSPITAL

    Stepping through the door, COLE finds himself in an ante-room
    facing several elevators.

    A uniformed SECURITY MAN sitting at a near-by desk doesn't even
    lock up from the magazine he's reading.

    Barely daring to breathe, COLE steps toward the elevators so his
    back is to the SECURITY MAN. But he doesn't know how to control
    this elevator. What should he do?

    SECURITY MAN'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Two's not working today. Use one.

    COLE freezes, sneaks a glance over his shoulder.

    COLE'S POV: the SECURITY MAN continues his reading. He's a big
    guy with reading glasses perched on his nose. He looks exactly
    like the MENACING GUARD IN THE FUTURE...SCARFACE!

    ANGLE ON COLE, stunned!

    Just then, an elevator door slides open. The elevator's empty.

    COLE steps into it.

    INT. ELEVATOR/COUNTY HOSPITAL

    The door closes, isolating COLE in the elevator.

    COLE finds the down button, is about to push it when the elevator
    springs to life. The numbers on the indicator over the door
    start to rise. 7...8...9.

    Then, the elevator stops and the door opens.

    Two DOCTORS and an AIDE stand in front of the door, waiting.

    COLE hesitates.

    They look at him. They seem to expect him to exit.

    Avoiding eye contact, COLE exits the elevator.

    As they enter the elevator, the DOCTORS look back at COLE and frown.

    INT. RAILLY'S OFFICE - MORNING

    RAILLY has just arrived for work. She's slipping on her white
    doctor's coat when...

    DR. CASEY, one of the other residents, sticks his head in the
    door waving a crayoned message on a page torn from a magazine.

    DR. CASEY
    This was in my box, but I have a slight
    suspicion it wasn't meant for me.

    CASEY enters the room, reading the scrawled words dramatically.

    DR. CASEY
    "You are the most beautiful woman I have
    ever seen. You live in a beautiful
    world. But you don't know it. You have
    freedom, sunshine, air you can breathe."

    RAILLY
    (smiling)
    Cole. James Cole -- right?

    She reaches for the note but CASEY moves it out of her grasp.

    DR. CASEY
    "I would do anything to stay here, but
    I must leave. Please, help me."

    RAILLY
    Poor man...

    CASEY is handing her the note when another resident, DR. GOODINS,
    sticks his head in the door. He's upset.

    DR. GOODINS
    Hey, Kathryn, James Cole is one of
    yours, right?

    RAILLY and CASEY stare at him.

    DR. GOODINS
    He got out. Took off. Last seen, he
    was up on nine.

    INT. X-RAY DEPARTMENT/BASEMENT - DAY

    A PATIENT is being swallowed by a large tube, a CAT SCANNER,
    while a DOCTOR in a white coat speaks reassuringly.

    DOCTOR
    Just relax -- don't fight it. We have
    to know exactly what's there so we can...

    The DOCTOR stops, astonished, as the door bursts open.

    It's COLE! He stares at the PATIENT and the Cat Scanner.

    The PATIENT lifts his head up and stares at COLE.

    DOCTOR
    Eh, excuse me. Can I help you?

    COLE turns and rushes back out the door.

    INT. CORRIDOR/COUNTY HOSPITAL

    COLE steps into the corridor, turns to his right, freezes.

    A POSSE of SECURITY GUARDS is headed in his direction.

    COLE turns to his left.

    Four ORDERLIES are coming that way.

    COLE'S trapped. A beat. He attacks the nearest man. BILLINGS.

    INT. TECH ROOM/PSYCH WARD - SHORTLY (DAY)

    RAILLY prepares a hypo, turns to COLE who is strapped tightly on
    a gurney with BILLINGS and an RN standing on either side, tense
    for more trouble. One of BILLINGS' eyes is starting to swell shut.

    RAILLY
    It's just a shot to calm you.

    COLE
    No more drugs. Please...

    RAILLY
    I have to do this, James. You're very
    confused.

    RAILLY pushes the needle into COLE'S skin.

    INT. CONFERENCE ROOM/PSYCH WARD - LATER (DAY)

    DR. FLETCHER faces RAILLY across the conference table. DR.
    CASEY, DR. GOODINS, DR. MARILOU MARTIN are also there.

    DR. FLETCHER
    Don't be defensive, Kathryn, this isn't
    an inquisition.

    RAILLY
    I didn't think I was being defensive.
    I was just...

    DR. FLETCHER
    He should have been in restraints. It
    was bad judgment on your part, plain
    and simple. why not just cop to it?

    RAILLY
    Okay, it was bad judgment. But I have
    the strangest feeling about him -- I've
    seen him somewhere and...

    DR. FLETCHER
    (impatient, not interested)
    Two policemen were already in the
    hospital and now we have an orderly
    with a broken arm and a Security
    Officer with a fractured skull.

    RAILLY
    I said it was bad judgment! What else
    do you want me to say?

    DR. FLETCHER
    You see what I mean? You're being defensive.
    (to Dr. Casey)
    Isn't she being defensive, Bob?

    But just then, BILLINGS sticks his head in the door.

    BILLINGS
    Uh, Dr. Fletcher -- we got another...
    situation.

    INT. CORRIDOR/PSYCH WARD - MOMENTS LATER (DAY)

    DR. FLETCHER looks into an empty padded cell as RAILLY, MARTIN,
    GOODIN, BILLINGS, PALMER and the NURSE crowd behind him.

    DR. FLETCHER
    He was in full restraints? And the
    door was locked?

    BILLINGS
    Yes, sir. Did it myself.

    DR. FLETCHER
    And he was fully sedated?

    RAILLY
    He was fully sedated!

    DR. FLETCHER
    Then are you trying to tell me that a
    fully sedated, fully restrained patient
    somehow slipped out that vent, replaced
    the grill behind him and that he's wriggling
    through the ventilation system right now?

    DR. FLETCHER indicates an impossibly tiny vent high in the wall.

    INT. CONCOURSE/AIRPORT - DAY (THE DREAM)

    Seen through the glass windows, a 747 takes off, climbing into
    the sky as the airport P.A. System drones...

    P.A. SYSTEM
    Flight 784 to San Francisco now
    boarding at Gate 38...

    YOUNG COLE, watching the 747, whirls at the SOUND of a COMMOTION.

    MR. PONYTAIL bumps him.

    The BLONDE MAN sprints past. The WOMAN'S VOICE calls out!

    WOMAN'S VOICE
    NOOOOOOOOOO!

    TRAVELERS dive for cover briefly revealing the mysterious BRUNETTE
    running after the BLONDE MAN! But this time, YOUNG COLE catches
    just a glimpse of her face. She looks a little like RAILLY except
    for the dark hair, the make-up. and the flashy earrings. She
    calls out, her VOICE blending weirdly with the P.A. SYSTEM...

    BRUNETTE/P. A. SYSTEM
    The Freedom For Animals Headquarters
    now boarding on Second Avenue. The
    Army of the Twelve Monkeys...

    ENGINEER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Cole, you moron -- wake up!

    INT. ENGINEERING OFFICE - ETERNAL NIGHT OF THE FUTURE

    As COLE blinks awake, the digitized monotone of the P.A. SYSTEM
    continues to drone in an unearthly VOICE...

    UNEARTHLY VOICE/P.A. SYSTEM
    -- they're the ones who are going to do it...

    COLE'S eyes seek the source of the sound and find it on the table
    in front of the panel of disapproving SCIENTISTS facing him. It's
    a beat-up old tape recorder.

    UNEARTHLY VOICE/TAPE RECORDER
    I can't do anything more. The Police
    are after me.

    The tape ends, runs off the reel, flap...flap...flap...

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Well?

    COLE
    Uh, what?

    ENGINEER
    He's drugged out of his mind! He's
    completely zoned out.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Cole, did you or did you not record
    that message?

    COLE
    Uh, that message...me?

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    It's a digital reconstruction of a
    message, Cole, from a weak signal on our
    contact number. Did you make that call?

    COLE
    (angrily)
    I couldn't call! You sent me to the
    wrong year! It was 1989.

    SCIENTISTS
    1989!

    The SCIENTISTS react, exchanging looks, whispers. Then,

    ZOOLOGIST
    You're certain of that?

    GEOLOGIST
    (before Cole can answer)
    What did you do with your time, Cole?
    Did you waste it on drugs? Women?

    COLE
    They forced me to take drugs.

    BOTANIST
    Forced you! Why would someone force
    you to take drugs?

    COLE
    I got into trouble. I got arrested.
    But I still got you a specimen -- a
    spider -- but I didn't have anyplace to
    put it, so I ate it. It was the wrong
    year anyway, so I guess it doesn't matter.

    The SCIENTISTS stare incredulously, then turn, exchange knowing
    looks, huddle, start whispering to one another.

    Struggling to stay awake COLE sees, blurrily, the MICROBIOLOGIST
    staring at COLE intently. For one moment, the face belongs to
    DR. FLETCHER!

    COLE blinks hard...and the MICROBIOLOGIST has his own face, again.

    COLE'S head slumps forward now...and everything goes dark.

    GEOLOGIST'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Cole!

    INT. ENGINEERING OFFICE - ETERNAL NIGHT OF THE FUTURE

    COLE comes awake with a start. The room is dark now, except...

    a slide is being projected on a torn screen. It's a picture of a
    stenciled graffiti...the logo of The Army of the 12 Monkeys.

    ENGINEER
    What about it, Cole?

    ZOOLOGIST
    Did you see it?

    COLE
    Uh, no, sir. I...

    Another slide CLICKS into place. Youthful PROTESTERS, their
    placards featuring slogans and images of Animal Atrocities,
    confront POLICE in riot gear.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    What about these people? Did you see
    any of these people?

    Zooming in, panning, the SCIENTISTS emphasize the FACES of the
    PROTESTERS. The FACES are unfamiliar to COLE (though WE will
    recognize some of them later on).

    COLE (o.s.)
    Uh, no, sir, I...wait!

    The image pans back to a much enlarged blurry FACE among the
    PROTESTERS. In spite of the poor image, the expression of rage
    is clear, and it seems to resemble a somewhat older JEFFREY MASON.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Him? You saw that man?

    COLE
    Uh, I think so. In the mental hospital.

    MICRO3IOLOGIST
    (switching on the light)
    You were in a mental institution?!

    The SCIENTISTS MUTTER disapprovingly among themselves.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    You were sent to make very important
    observations!

    BOTANIST
    You could have made a real contribution.

    GEOLOGIST
    Helped to reclaim the planet...

    ZOOLOGIST
    As well as reducing your sentence.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    The question is, Cole -- "Do you want
    another chance?"

    COLE stares at them, trying to figure out what they mean.

    INT. CONCOURSE/AIRPORT - DAY (THE DREAM)

    The BRUNETTE runs up the concourse, her back to YOUNG COLE, as
    frightened PASSENGERS duck for cover, SHOUTING!

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Hey! Who's that?

    INT. CELL - ETERNAL NIGHT

    COLE opens his eyes. Where is he? Silence as he examines the
    tiny cell. Bare cement walls. High ceiling. Same color and
    size as the isolation room at the county hospital.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Hey, Bob...what's your name?

    COLE looks around frantically. Up, down. Where is the VOICE
    coming from? Maybe from that tiny vent high in the wall...

    COLE
    Where are you?

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    You can talk! Wah'dja do, Bobby boy?
    Volunteer?

    COLE
    My name's not "Bob".

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Not a prob, Bob. Where'd they send you?

    COLE
    Where are you?

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Another cell. ... Maybe.

    COLE
    What do you mean, "maybe"? What's that
    supposed to mean?

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Maybe. Means "maybe" I'm in the next cell,
    another "volunteer" like you -- or "maybe"
    I'm in the Central Office spying on you
    for all those science bozos. Or, hey, "maybe"
    I'm not even here. "Maybe" I'm just in
    your head. No way to confirm anything.
    Ha Ha. Where'd they send you?

    COLE doesn't answer.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Not talking, huh, Bob? That's okay
    I can handle that.

    COLE
    1989.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    89! How was it? Good drugs? Lotsa
    pussy? Hey, Bob, you do the job? D'ju
    find out the "big info"?...Army of the
    Twelve Monkeys...where the virus was
    prior to mutation?

    COLE
    It was supposed to be 1995.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Science isn't an exact science with
    these clowns. You're lucky you didn't
    end up in ancient Egypt!

    INT. LAB - ETERNAL NIGHT OF THE FUTURE

    COLE is strapped on a gurney. SCIENTISTS hover near-by,
    whispering. The walls of the gloomy chamber are damp, sweating.

    GEOLOGIST
    No mistakes this time, Cole.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Stay alert. Keep your eyes open.

    ZOOLOGIST
    Good thinking about that spider, Cole.
    Try and do something like that again.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    Just relax now -- don't fight it. We
    have to know exactly what's there so we
    can fix it.

    The gurney is being wheeled into a crudely welded steel tube...
    reminiscent of the cat scanner in County Hospital.

    COLE'S POV: a last glimpse of anxious FACES, then the chamber
    door is CLANGED shut.

    EVERYTHING IS BLACK. A HUM BUILDS. THE BLACKNESS VIBRATES, THE
    HUM REACHES A DEAFENING LEVEL, THEN DIMUENDOS. WE BEGIN TO HEAR
    BURSTS OF MACHINE GUN FIRE, VOICES SHOUTING IN FRENCH, A SUDDEN
    HUGE EXPLOSION! THEN...

    EXT. TRENCH/FRANCE - DAY

    DRIZZLING RAIN. And SCREAMS. COLE'S in a deep trench, naked,
    eyes wide with terror. What's going on? Where is he? SOLDIERS
    in gas masks push urgently past him rushing toward their injured
    COMRADES who've been ripped apart by the shell that just hit
    fifteen yards away. Muffled VOICES shout through gas masks...
    in FRENCH. COLE doesn't know it, but this is World War I!
    Suddenly, a SERGEANT confronts him, shouting in French.

    SERGEANT
    (FRENCH, subtitled)
    Where's your mask?! And your clothes...
    and your weapon, you idiot?!

    COLE
    What? What??

    COLE looks around desperately. A horribly WOUNDED MAN is being
    stretchered past them in the narrow trench. Machine guns chatter
    close at hand. AAK AAK AAK. A grenade EXPLODES. Reacting to the
    foreign word, the SERGEANT jams his bayonet into COLE'S ribs...

    SERGEANT
    (FRENCH, subtitled)
    Captain! A Kraut! We got a Kraut!

    COLE
    I don't understand. Where am I?

    The CAPTAIN hurries over, snapping at COLE in German.

    CAPTAIN
    (GERMAN, subtitled)
    How'd you get here, soldier? What's
    your rank? Where are your clothes?

    COLE
    I...don't understand.

    CAPTAIN
    (frowning, GERMAN, subtitled)
    German! Speak German! What are you
    doing here?

    VOICE (o.s.)
    (pleading in English)
    I gotta find 'em. I gotta find 'em.
    Please, you gotta help me!

    COLE turns, sees...

    It's his friend, JOSE, the Puerto Rican kid from the next cell in
    the "underground" time. He's being carried past COLE now on a
    stretcher, blood all over his torso, horribly wounded.

    COLE
    JOSE!

    JOSE
    Cole! Oh, God, Cole, where are we?

    JOSE reaches out to COLE just as a PHOTOGRAPHER takes a FLASH
    PICTURE of the kid being carried off on the stretcher. SUDDENLY,
    SHOTS RING OUT. COLE goes down. Hit in the leg!

    SOLDIERS in gas masks rush past him like giant insects.

    Looking to his left, COLE sees the CAPTAIN lying beside him, dead
    from a chest wound, his gas mask half off.

    COLE is reaching for the mask when...

    A SHELL HITS CLOSE BY WITH AN ENORMOUS EXPLOSION.

    EXT. COLLEGE CAMPUS - NIGHT

    Stunningly quiet. We are on a placid campus looking at the
    dignified architecture of Breitrose Hall. MOVING IN we FOCUS ON
    a large poster advertising "The Alexander Lectures, Spring 1995".
    WE SKIM the listings (Jon Else on The Nuclear Agony, Dr. Andrew
    Miksztal on Biological Ethics, etc.) until we SETTLE ON...

    DR. KATHRYN RAILLY
    MADNESS AND APOCALYPTIC VISIONS
    MAY 17

    INT. AUDITORIUM/BREITROSE HALL - NIGHT

    A large screen dominates the auditorium stage. On the screen is
    a slide of an engraving from the Middle Ages showing a MADMAN in
    apparent agony, his mouth shaped to a scream, as he is restrained
    by PEASANTS. The projector ZOOMS slowly in on the agonized FACE
    of this MADMAN as we HEAR RAILLY'S VOICE lecturing.

    RAILLY'S VOICE (o.s.)
    According to the accounts of local
    officials at that time, this gentleman,
    judged to be about forty years of age,
    appeared suddenly in the village of Wyle
    near Stonehenge in the West of England in
    April of 1162. Using unfamiliar words and
    speaking in a strange accent, the man made
    dire prognostications about a pestilence
    which he predicted would wipe out humanity
    in approximately 8OO years. Deranged and
    hysterical, the man raped a young woman of the
    village, was taken into custody, but then
    mysteriously escaped and was not heard of again.

    WE DISCOVER RAILLY, six years older now, standing at a lectern
    in a pool of light. She's dwarfed by the giant screen where the
    engraving is replaced by a series of slides of woodcuts showing
    scenes of pestilence in the Middle Ages as she lectures to an
    audience of mostly SCHOLARLY TYPES.

    RAILLY (cont.)
    In 1841, Mackay wrote, "During seasons
    of great pestilence, men have often
    believed the prophecies of crazed
    fanatics, that the end of the world was
    come." Obviously, this plague/doomsday
    scenario is considerably more compelling
    when reality supports it in some form,
    whether it's the Bubonic Plague, smallpox,
    or AIDS. In addition to these "natural"
    contagions, there are now technological
    horrors as well: besides radiation,
    consider our lurking fear of germ
    warfare and its close approximation,
    chemical warfare, which first reared
    its ugly head in the deadly mustard
    gas attacks during the First World War.

    ON THE SCREEN, a SERIES of SLIDES show images of WORLD WAR I
    SOLDIERS in gas masks, in death throes, etc..

    RAILLY'S VOICE (cont. o.s.)
    During such an attack in the French
    trenches in October, 1917, we have an
    account of this soldier...

    ON THE SCREEN, a slide of an old deteriorated photograph shows
    JOSE, the Puerto Rican kid, strapped to a stretcher, being carried
    by SOLDIERS through the trenches during an attack. JOSE appears
    to be ranting madly as the projector ZOOMS CLOSER on his face until
    the image approximates Munch's famous painting.

    RAILLY'S VOICE (cant. o.s.)
    -- who, during an assault, was wounded
    by shrapnel and hospitalized behind the
    lines where Doctors discovered he had
    lost all comprehension of French but
    spoke English fluently, albeit in a
    regional dialect they didn't recognize.
    The man, although physically unaffected
    by the gas, was hysterical. He claimed
    he had come from the future, that he was
    looking for a pure germ that would
    ultimately wipe mankind off the face of
    the earth in the year... 1995!

    The AUDIENCE gives a nervous CHUCKLE.

    ON THE SCREEN, a different old photograph of JOSE. This time
    he's in a military hospital, gaunt, haunted, very ill.

    RAILLY'S VOICE (cont. o.s.)
    Although seriously injured, the young
    soldier disappeared from the hospital
    before more data could be gathered. No
    doubt, he was trying to carry on his
    mission to warn others, substituting
    for the agony of war...a self-inflicted
    agony we call the "Cassandra Complex".

    As RAILLY continues, we SCAN the AUDIENCE and DISCOVER MARILOU MARTIN,
    RAILLY'S friend, and MARILOU'S HUSBAND, WAYNE CHANG, both listening
    attentively. Further away, another MAN listens intently. A MAN with
    shoulder-length carrot-colored hair. His name is DR. PETERS.

    RAILLY (cont.)
    Cassandra, in Greek legend you will recall,
    was condemned to know the future but to be
    disbelieved when she foretold it. Hence,
    the agony of foreknowledge combined with
    impotence to do anything about it.

    INT. RECEPTION ROOM - AN HOUR LATER (NIGHT)

    A stack of new books. THE DOOMSDAY SYNDROME, Apocalyptic
    Visions of the Mentally Ill by Dr. Kathryn Railly

    Surrounded by enthusiastic members of the audience, RAILLY is
    seated at the table signing books but DR. PETERS has her ear.

    DR. PETERS
    I think, Dr. Railly, you have given
    your alarmists a bad name. Surely
    there is very real and very convincing
    data that the planet cannot survive the
    excesses of the human race: proliferation
    of atomic devices, uncontrolled breeding
    habits, the rape of the environment, the
    pollution of land, sea, and air. In this
    context, isn't it obvious that "Chicken
    Little" represents the sane vision and
    that Homo Sapiens' motto, "Let's go
    shopping!" is the cry of the true lunatic?

    DR. PETERS smiles self-importantly at RAILLY as an elderly
    disheveled PROFESSOR elbows in front of him.

    DISHEVELED PROFESSOR
    Doctor Railly -- please! I wonder if
    you're aware of my own studies which
    indicate that certain cycles of the
    moon actually impact on the incidence
    of apocalyptic predictions as observed
    in urban emergency rooms and...

    As the PROFESSOR babbles, MARILOU MARTIN and her husband, WAYNE
    CHANG, appear and whisper...

    MARILOU
    You were great.

    RAILLY
    You're leaving?

    MARILOU
    The reservation's at nine thirty --
    it's getting late.

    DISHEVELED PROFESSOR
    Doctor Railly -- please -- this is very
    important!

    WAYNE CHANG
    (checking the professor)
    You sure you're gonna be all right?

    RAILLY
    (smiles, checks her watch)
    I'll be there in twenty minutes.

    DISHEVELED PROFESSOR
    Dr. Railly, I simply cannot understand
    your exclusion of the moon in relation
    to apocalyptic dementia...

    EXT. PARKING LOT/BREITROSE HALL - NIGHT

    A full moon.

    COLLEAGUES in a VOLVO pull out of the parking lot, calling,
    "Congratulations" to RAILLY.

    She waves back as she hurries to her black ACURA, one of the last
    cars left in the lot.

    The outside lights of Breitrose Hall go off.

    RAILLY seems to be alone in the lot as she fishes keys from her
    purse, unlocks her car door, starts to open it when...

    Suddenly, she's grabbed from behind in a choke-hold by a large
    shadowy MAN looming out of the darkness behind her.

    MAN'S VOICE
    Get in!

    Unable to scream, she writhes and kicks as he forces her into the
    front seat.

    MAN'S VOICE
    I've got a gun.

    RAILLY freezes, terrified, as he opens the rear door and
    scrambles in behind her.

    INT. ACURA/PARKING LOT

    Fighting to suppress the quaver in her voice, RAILLY says...

    RAILLY
    You can have my purse. I have a lot of
    cash and credit...

    MAN'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Start the car.

    Glancing in the rear view mirror, RAILLY sees penetrating eyes
    peering out of the shadows, no other features.

    Half-turning in the seat, she holds out the keys to him.

    RAILLY
    Here! You can have the keys. You can...

    He grabs her hair and yanks her head back hard, speaking fiercely
    into her ear, his face last in shadow.

    MAN
    START THE CAR! NOW!

    EXT. ACURA/PARKING LOT

    The engine STARTS, the Acura backs up, then heads for the exit.

    INT. ACURA

    Steering fearfully, RAILLY hears him speak more calmly now.

    MAN'S VOICE (o.s.)
    I don't want to hurt you. But I will.
    I've hurt people before when...when I
    had no choice. Turn left.

    As she makes the turn, RAILLY glances in the rear view mirror,
    sees him unfolding a tattered map. His face is lost in darkness
    but she glimpses ragged, torn clothing as he tries to read the
    map by the intermittent glow of passing street lights.

    RAILLY
    Where... where are we going'

    MAN
    I need you to drive me to Philadelphia.

    RAILLY
    (startled, horrified)
    But that's... that's more than 200 miles!

    MAN
    That's why I can't walk there. Turn
    here... I think...

    RAILLY obeys. She glances in the mirror again, hesitates, then
    boldly switches on the dome light, holding her breath fearfully
    for his reaction.

    He grunts appreciatively. Relieved, she looks in the mirror
    again, trying to get a better look at him, but now his features
    are concealed by the map.

    RAILLY
    If you make me go with you, it's
    kidnapping. That's a serious crime.
    If you let me go, you could just take
    the car and...

    MAN
    I don't know how to drive! We went
    underground when I was nine, I told you
    that. When you come to the corner,
    turn right.

    Startled, RAILLY whirls, looks right at him.

    He's lowered the map. It's COLE! Haggard, unshaven, dirty.

    RAILLY
    Cole! James Cole! You escaped from a
    locked room six years ago.

    COLE
    1989. Six years for you. There's the
    sign! Right here!

    COLE is indicating a freeway entrance.

    RAILLY turns the wheel sharply.

    EXT. FREEWAY - NIGHT

    The Acura veers up the ramp and onto the freeway.

    INT. ACURA/FREEWAY - NIGHT

    RAILLY glances in the mirror, sees COLE settling back wearily
    against the seat. She says carefully...

    RAILLY
    I can't believe this is a coincidence,
    Mr. Cole. Have you been...following me?

    COLE
    You told me you'd help me. I know this
    isn't what you meant, but...I was desperate...
    no money...bum leg... sleeping on the streets.
    I probably smell bad. Sorry about that.
    But then I saw your book in a store window
    with a notice about your lecture.
    (sudden pride)
    I can read, remember?

    RAILLY
    Yes, I remember.
    (a beat, then)
    Why do you want to go to Philadelphia?

    COLE
    It's the next step. I checked out the
    Baltimore information, it was nothing.
    It's Philadelphia, that's where they
    are, the ones who killed everyone.
    (pointing suddenly, eagerly)
    Zs that a radio? Does it play music?

    RAILLY turns on the radio and immediately WE HEAR the SOUND of SURF
    and the CRIES of gulls, background to an oozing baritone COMMERCIAL.

    COMMERCIAL/RADIO (o.s.)
    This is a personal message to you.

    COLE sits up, alert, listening intently.

    COMMERCIAL/RADIO (cont. o.s.)
    Are you at the end of your rope? Are
    you dying to get away?

    COLE'S eyes narrow, concentrating on this personal message.

    COMMERCAIL/RADIO (cont. o.s.}
    The Florida Keys are waiting for you.

    COLE frowns as the SOUND of breaking SURF and crying GULLS fills
    the car. It's confusing! He blurts out...

    COLE
    I've never seen the ocean!

    Observing his confusion in the mirror, RAILLY assumes her
    professional tone.

    RAILLY
    It's an advertisement, Mr. Cole. You
    do understand that, don't you? It's
    not really a special message to you.

    COLE frowns. He did think it was for him, but she's probably right.

    COLE
    You used to call me "James".

    RAILLY
    You'd prefer that? ... James...you
    don't really have a gun, do you.

    COLE
    (cynical laugh)
    Everybody's got a gun. In this city...

    He breaks off reacting to the RADIO MUSIC! FATS DOMINO singing
    "BLUEBERRY HILL"! COLE grins, mouth agape, eyes wide like a kid's.

    COLE
    Can you...can you make it louder? I
    love hearing twentieth century music!
    Hearing music and breathing air!

    As RAILLY cranks up the volume, she watches the mirror
    incredulously, sees him stick his head out the window into the
    wind, mouth open, "eating" the air hungrily.

    EXT. FREEWAY/ACURA - NIGHT

    "BLUEBERRY HILL" BLARES as the Acura, COLE'S head out the rear
    window, zips past a sign at 65 mph.

    The sign says, "PHILADELPHIA 233 MILES."

    INT. ACURA/FREEWAY - NIGHT

    RAILLY glances in the mirror at the nut in the rear seat with his
    head out the window. what can she do? Just then, while she's
    trying to figure something out, an ANNOUNCER'S VOICE breaks in...

    ANNOUNCER/RADIO (o.s.)
    This just in from Fresno, California:
    emergency crews are converging on a
    cornfield where playmates of nine year
    old Ricky Neuman say they saw him
    disappear right before their eyes.

    COLE pulls his head back inside with a frown, troubled now.

    ANNOUNCER/RADIO (cont. o.s.)
    Young Neuman apparently stepped into an
    abandoned well shaft and is lodged somewhere
    in the narrow 150 foot pipe, possibly alive,
    possibly seriously injured. Playmates claim
    they heard him cry out faintly but since then
    there has been no contact with...

    COLE
    "Never cry wolf!"

    RAILLY
    What?

    COLE
    My father told me that. "Never cry
    wolf." Then people won't believe you
    if...something really happens.

    RAILLY
    "If something really happens"...like
    what, James?

    COLE
    Something bad. Is that all the music?
    I don't want to hear this stuff...

    RAILLY glances at him as she scans stations.

    RAILLY
    Did something terrible happen to you when
    you were a child? Something so bad...?

    COLE
    Ohhhh, that one! Can we hear that one?

    It's IVORY JOE HUNTER singing, "SINCE I MET YOU, BABY".

    IVORY JOE/RADIO (o.s.)
    "Since I met you, baby,
    My whole life has changed...

    Ecstatic, COLE sticks his head out the window again.

    EXT. ACURA/FREEWAY

    COLE'S POV: the heavens, glittering with a million stars and a
    lover's moon as IVORY JOE croons the achingly romantic lyrics...

    IVORY JOE/RADIO (cont. o.s.)
    "-- cause since I met you, baby.
    All I need is you..."

    ANGLE ON COLE, wind in his hair, eyes shining, gulping air blissfully.

    INT. RAILLY'S APARTMENT - MORNING

    Two POLICE OFFICERS and an anxious MARILOU MARTIN listen to an
    answering machine's message while a hungry CAT cries plaintively.

    ANSWERING MACHINE
    Dr. Railly -- this is Palmer from Psych
    Admitting. There was a guy here this
    afternoon looking for you. He seemed
    very agitated. We tried to keep him, but
    he refused 'n I kept thinking, I know
    this guy. Then, just a few minutes ago,
    it came to me. It's Cole! James Cole.
    Remember him? The paranoid who pulled
    the Houdini back in '89. Well, he's
    back and he's...cuckoo...and he's looking
    for you. I thought you oughta know.

    The machine switches off. The POLICE OFFICERS exchange a look.

    MARILOU MARTIN
    It's just as I told you -- my husband
    and I had gone ahead -- she never
    showed. That's totally unlike her!

    OFFICER TWO
    (pulls out his notebook)
    Do you happen to know the make of her car?

    MARILOU MARTIN
    Um...Acura...'92 Acura. ... Also, that
    cat's starving! She would never neglect
    her cat!

    EXT. MOTEL - MORNING

    The ACURA is parked outside room 46 of the HIGHWAYS & BYWAYS
    MOTEL, which has definitely seen better days.

    INT. MOTEL ROOM 46

    The TV is on. A commercial is just starting. A catfood jingle.

    The sound of HEAVY BREATHING.

    ANGLE ON COLE, sweating, BREATHING HEAVILY, sprawled on one side
    of the double bed, sound asleep.

    INT. CONCOURSE/AIRPORT - DAY (THE DREAM)

    GUNSHOT! YOUNG COLE glimpses the BLONDE MAN staggering, wounded.

    The mysterious BRUNETTE races past him toward the BLONDE MAN, and
    YOUNG COLE again glimpses the resemblance to RAILLY, in spite of
    the dark hair, the make-up, the flashy earrings.

    Close at hand, YOUNG COLE'S FATHER, his face still out of view, says,

    FATHER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Son, it's important for your cat to
    have the nourishment necessary for
    healthy bones and a rich coat.

    INT. MOTEL ROOM 46

    COLE comes awake with a start. He stares, disoriented, at the
    CATFOOD COMMERCIAL on the TV.

    RAILLY'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Please untie me. I'm very uncomfortable.

    COLE turns to RAILLY, beside him on the bed, frightened and
    helpless, her jacket arranged to restrain her like a strait-jacket.

    COLE'S instinct is to free her at once, but he controls his
    impulse. He looks away, gets up, and, wincing, limps to the
    dresser, stepping around empty fast-food cartons. He pulls a
    razor and shaving soap from a paper bag, then goes into the
    bathroom, leaving the door open, and starts to shave.

    COLE
    You were in my dream just now. Your hair
    was different, but I'm sure it was you.

    RAILLY
    We dream about what's important in our lives.
    And I seem to have become pretty important
    in yours. What was the dream about?

    COLE
    About an airport...before everything
    happened. It's the same dream I always
    have -- the only one. I'm a little kid
    in it.

    RAILLY
    And I was in it? What did I do?

    COLE
    You were very upset. You're always
    very upset in the dream, but I never
    knew it was you before.

    RAILLY
    It wasn't me before, James. It's
    become me now because of...what's
    happening. Please untie me.

    Finished shaving, COLE re-enters the bedroom, toweling his face.

    COLE
    No, I think it was always you. It's
    very strange.

    RAILLY
    You're flushed. And you were moaning.
    I think you're running a fever. What
    are you doing?

    COLE is rummaging through RAILLY'S wallet, pulling out money.

    COLE
    I'll be back in a minute.

    He heads for the door.

    RAILLY
    No! Don't leave me here like this!

    Too late! He shuts the door behind him, leaving her alone.

    ANGLE ON THE TV SCREEN, where an ANCHORMAN sits at a News Set.

    TV ANCHORMAN
    And in Fresno, California...crews
    continue to attempt to rescue nine year
    old Ricky Neuman.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, twisting and struggling on the bed, trying to
    get loose, tears welling in her eyes.

    TV ANCHORMAN (cont. o.s.)
    The boy was playing ball with four
    other children when he literally
    disappeared off the face of the earth.

    EXT. MOTEL CORRIDOR - MORNING

    COLE puzzles over a junk food vending machine, inserts coins tentatively.

    INT. MOTEL ROOM

    ANGLE ON TV, the picture of RAILLY filling the screen.


    ----------------------- PAGE 52 MISSING -----------------------


    COLE
    My notes. Observations. Clues.

    RAILLY
    Clues? What kind of clues?

    COLE
    A secret army. The Army of The Twelve
    Monkeys. I've told you about them.
    They spread the virus. That's why we
    have to get to Philadelphia. I have to
    find them -- it's my assignment.

    RAILLY
    What will you do...when you find
    this...secret army?

    COLE
    I just have to locate the virus in its
    original form before it mutates. So
    scientists can come back and study it
    and find a cure. So that those of us
    who survived can go back to the surface
    of the earth.

    RAILLY maintains a professional deadpan, says nothing as they pass
    a pickup truck with a MOTHER, FATHER, and five KIDS in the back.

    COLE stares at the KIDS, a sad look in his eyes.

    COLE
    You won't think I'm crazy next month.
    People are going to start dying. At
    first the papers will say it's some
    weird fever, some virus. Then they'll
    begin to catch on. They'll get it.

    RADIO NEWSCASTER (o.s.)
    We interrupt this program with a
    special bulletin...

    RAILLY and COLE both react to the radio, suddenly alert.

    RADIO NEWSCASTER (o.s.)
    This report just in from Fresno,
    California. Naval sonar specialists
    who were flown to the site...

    COLE
    I thought it was about us. I thought
    maybe they'd found us and arrested me
    or something.

    RAILLY stares at COLE.

    COLE
    Just a joke.

    RADIO NEWSCASTER (o.s.)
    -- an hour ago have been unable to
    determine the location of the boy in the
    150 foot shaft...but a TV sound man who
    lowered an ultra-sensitive microphone into
    the narrow tube claims he heard breathing
    sounds coming from approximately seventy
    feet down...

    COLE reaches over and changes stations. MUSIC again.

    RAILLY
    Does that disturb you, James? Thinking
    about that little boy in the well?

    COLE
    When I was a kid I identified with that
    kid, down there alone in that pipe...a
    hundred feet down -- doesn't know if
    they're going to save him.

    RAILLY
    What do you mean -- when you were a kid?

    COLE
    Nevermind. It's not real -- it's a
    hoax. A prank. He's hiding in a barn.
    Hey, turn left here. Left!

    COLE quickly checks the map as RAILLY stares, then turns left.

    EXT. SKID ROW STREET/PHILADELPHIA - DAY

    An elderly EVANGELIST with long stringy hair, wearing a tattered
    bathrobe, stands on a Skid Row corner WAVING a worn Bible as he
    rants at disinterested DERELICTS, WINOS, and BAG LADIES.

    EVANGELIST
    "And the wild beasts of the islands
    shall cry in their desolate houses and
    dragons in their pleasant palaces: and
    her time is near to come, and her days
    shall not be prolonged."

    ANGLE ON RAILLY'S ACURA, crawling down the street, RAILLY driving,
    COLE, beside her, staring out the window.

    INT. ACURA/SKID ROW STREET

    COLE is scrutinizing the crumbling walls, boarded-up store
    fronts, tattered posters, decaying signs, miserable "RESIDENTS".

    COLE
    Where I come from we think of this as Eden.
    If we could just see the sun, eat sun-grown
    food. Eden! Look at them! They donut
    know what they have. They don't see the
    sky. They don't feel the air!

    COLE'S POV: a BMW speeds toward them, passes, its radio BLARING!

    COLE (o.s.)
    And the ones who aren't hungry are so smug
    they haven't a clue. WAIT! STOP!

    EXT. ACURA/SKID ROW

    On foot now, COLE pulls an astonished RAILLY to a wall covered with
    graffiti, a hopeless tangle of symbols, words, and crude pictures.

    Clueless, RAILLY stares at the wall, then at COLE.

    COLE touches a bit of red-stenciled graffiti hidden under gang
    insignias. We can just see TWELVE MONKEYS holding hands in a circle.

    COLE
    The Twelve Monkeys!!! They're here.
    (looks around)
    Somewhere. Come on!

    He pulls her along the sidewalk. No question, he's insane.

    At the next alley entrance, COLE stops abruptly. Then, still
    keeping a firm grip on RAILLY'S arm, he starts ripping down newly
    tacked-up posters announcing a Rap concert.

    RAILLY stares at him, then turns and is looking all around when,
    suddenly, COLE pulls her up tight and threatens...

    COLE
    Look, I'm warning you. You do anything,
    I'm going to go crazy -- hurt people!

    RAILLY
    I'm not going to "do" anything, I
    promise. But you need help, James.
    None of this is what you think it is.

    ANGLE ON COLE, not listening, staring triumphantly! He's found
    another partially obscured stencil of THE TWELVE MONKEYS!

    But just then, a raspy VOICE startles COLE.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s)
    You can't hide from them, Bob.

    COLE whirls, sees a derelict, LOUIE, leering at him, speaking in a
    voice eerily like the RASPY VOICE from the next cell in the future.

    LOUIE
    No, sir, Old Bob -- don't even try.
    (conspiratorially)
    They hear everything. They got that
    tracking device on you. They can find
    you anywhere. Anytime. Ha Ha!

    RAILLY looks from LOUIS to COLE, sees COLE'S stunned reaction.

    LOUIE
    (touches his back jaw)
    In the tooth, Bob! Right?
    (sudden triumphant grin)
    But I fooled 'em, old buddy!

    He opens his mouth wide. NO TEETH'

    COLE grabs RAILLY and pulls her into the alley and down it.

    COLE
    They're keeping an eye on me.

    RAILLY
    Who's keeping an eye on you?

    COLE
    The man...with the voice. I recognized
    him. He's from the present. He...

    COLE breaks off, freezes as he sees...

    there on a brick wall is a stencil of the DANCING MONKEYS

    And further on, another red stencil!

    EXT. VACANT LOT - MOMENTS LATER (DAY)

    CRACKHEADS huddle against a building, sucking their pipes,
    oblivious to COLE pulling RAILLY past.

    COLE scans the walls for messages in the confusion of graffiti.

    RAILLY is considering her surroundings dubiously when, suddenly,
    COLE pulls her toward the mouth of a dark and forbidding alley.

    RAILLY
    James, no -- we shouldn't be here!

    COLE ignores her, yanking her after him into the alley.

    INT. DARK ALLEY - DAY

    Two TOM CATS face off, arching their backs and HISSING menacingly.

    COLE avoids them as he pulls RAILLY into the gloom.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, seeing something alarming twenty yards ahead!

    RAILLY'S POV: TWO THUGS, standing over a MAN, kicking him.

    RAILLY tries to stop, but COLE, intent on the wall messages,
    doesn't notice the THUGS.

    The TWO THUGS turn and spot COLE and RAILLY moving toward them.

    These creeps have mean eyes, predator faces.

    RAILLY digs her heels in, forcing COLE to stop.

    RAILLY
    James! We have to go back. Those men...

    Too late. While COLE turns and stares at her, uncomprehending,
    the TWO THUGS are approaching.

    FIRST THUG
    Hey, buddy.

    Startled, COLE turns to face them.

    The SECOND THUG lunges for RAILLY'S purse, yanks it from her.

    COLE reaches to grab it back, but...WHACK! The FIRST THUG smacks
    COLE hard across the face with something metallic.

    Bloody-faced, dazed, COLE doesn't even have a chance to clear his
    head as the FIRST THUG shoves the hard object against COLE'S
    cheek. It's a cheap thirty-eight pistol.

    RAILLY turns to run, gets two steps before the SECOND THUG knocks
    her roughly to the ground.

    SECOND THUG
    Stick around, bitch.

    Looming over her, the SECOND THUG starts to unzip his fly.
    RAILLY looks over to COLE, SEES...

    COLE dropping to his knees, groveling at the FIRST THUG'S feet.

    COLE
    Please! Please don't hurt me!

    The FIRST THUG steps close, kicks COLE contemptuously, cocks his
    foot for a second kick when...

    COLE uncoils, lunging, rising, his strong arms around the bigger
    man's calves, lifting him mightily, high off the ground.

    The gun FIRES wildly as COLE staggers forward with the FIRST THUG
    in his arms and smashes the man into the brick wail behind him.
    The FIRST THUG goes down in a heap, dropping the pistol.

    Zipping his fly hastily, the SECOND THUG turns to deal with COLE
    but COLE attacks him....rocking him again and again with savage
    blows that come one after another with lightning speed. The SECOND
    THUG staggers back, bloody and dazed as RAILLY watches, amazed.

    Turning back to the FIRST THUG, COLE sees the MAN reaching for
    the dropped pistol.

    COLE kicks him viciously in the jaw. The FIRST THUG'S head whips
    back. SNAP! He collapses against the brick wall.

    COLE turns back to see the SECOND THUG retreating down the alley
    as fast as he can stagger.

    RAILLY stares up at COLE. He looks very dangerous. He glances
    in her direction as he pockets the pistol.

    COLE
    Are you hurt?

    RAILLY
    Uh, no. Yes. I mean, just some scrapes...

    As RAILLY gets to her feet, she sees COLE bend over the
    motionless THUG and quickly go through his pockets.

    RAILLY
    Is he...alive?

    COLE ignores the question as he pockets the man's wallet and a
    handful of bullets, then turns and snaps at RAILLY.

    COLE
    Come an. We're running out of time.
    You can't help him.

    As COLE yanks her roughly away, she looks back, sees the FIRST
    THUG'S sightless eyes, wide open...staring blankly.

    RAILLY
    Oh, Jesus, James! You killed him!

    COLE
    I did him a favor. Now come on.

    COLE, pulling her again, sees more "12 MONKEYS" on the wall.

    RAILLY
    You didn't have a gun before, did you?

    COLE
    I've got one now.

    EXT. SECOND AVE - DAY

    The EVANGELIST, spotting COLE and RAILLY hurrying past him,
    points urgently at COLE.

    EVANGELIST
    You! You! You're one of us, aren't you?

    But COLE has stopped and is staring at...

    A STOREFRONT OFFICE...its windows covered with posters. The sign
    over the office says, FREEDOM FOR ANIMALS ASSOCIATION.

    INT. FAA STORE - MOMENTS LATER (DAY)

    Earnest young activists, FALE, deathly pale, BEN, long haired,
    and TEDDY, muscular, are gathered around a counter collating
    leaflets that demand an END TO SPECIEISM. Behind them, a large
    poster proclaims, "ANIMALS HAVE SOULS, TOO". Just then, there's
    a tremendous CLAP OF THUNDER as the ACTIVISTS look up and see
    COLE and RAILLY enter.

    COLE looks startled. It sounds like torrential RAIN POURING in
    here. Maintaining a tight grip on RAILLY'S wrist, he looks
    around frantically for an explanation for the tropical downpour.

    Bookshelves line two walls. The front window is blanked cut with
    posters of Animal Rights demonstrations, newspaper clippings,
    photos of animal atrocities. The fourth wall features the
    counter where the three ACTIVISTS face COLE as a JUNGLE BIRD
    SCREAMS in the DOWNPOUR.

    FALE
    Uh, can we help you?

    COLE looks confused as the RAIN abates and an ELEPHANT trumpets
    an urgent warning.

    FALE
    Excuse me. You looking for something
    in particular?

    RAILLY
    It's all right, James -- it's just a tape.

    COLE'S eyes follow her look. It's a tape recorder underneath a
    sign advertising, "THE TRUE MUSIC OF THE WORLD".

    COLE
    I, uh, I'm looking for the, ah, the
    Army of the Twelve Monkeys.

    FALE glances at BEN and TEDDY. "We have a problem!" the look says.
    MONKEYS start CHATTERING on the tape as TEDDY comes around the
    counter, bigger than COLE, physically imposing, menacing.

    TEDDY
    We don't know anything about any "Army
    of the Twelve Monkeys", so why don't
    you and your friend disappear, okay?

    COLE backs away, a firm grip on RAILLY, as a LION ROARS.

    COLE
    I just need some information...

    TEDDY
    Didn't you hear me? We're not...

    TEDDY breaks off mid-sentence...freezes.

    COLE is pointing a pistol at them. A TIGER SNARLS.

    RAILLY
    James, no -- don't hurt them.
    (to the activists)
    Please, I'm a psychiatrist -- just do
    whatever he tells you to do. He's...
    upset -- disturbed. Please -- he's
    dangerous -- just cooperate.

    MONKEYS CHATTER wildly as TEDDY backs up.

    FALE
    What do you want -- money? We only
    have a few bucks.

    COLE is suddenly very much in charge and self-confident again. A
    BABOON HOWLS with laughter.

    COLE
    I told you what I want.
    (snaps at Railly)
    Lock the door!

    RAILLY
    James, why don't we...?

    COLE
    Lock it now!

    RAILLY hurries to the door to lock it as BEN says to FALE,

    BEN
    I told you that fuckhead Mason would
    get us into something like this.

    FALE
    Shut up!

    COLE
    Mason???

    RAILLY
    Jeffrey Mason?

    BEN
    Yeah, tucking, crazy Jeffrey Mason.

    INT. FAA STORE BASEMENT - TWENTY MINUTES LATER (DAY)

    The three ACTIVISTS are tied tightly together in the middle of
    the floor in this dimly-lit, windowless basement. They're very
    frightened, eager to cooperate.

    FALE
    Then, Jeffrey becomes like this...big
    star -- the media latch on to him
    because he's picketing his own father,
    a "famous Nobel Prize winning virologist".
    You musta seen all that on TV.

    COLE
    No, I don't watch TV.

    COLE, the gun next to him, rummages through boxes of papers while
    RAILLY watches helplessly. Suddenly, COLE finds something he
    thinks he's seen before. He holds it up.

    COLE
    Is this him -- Dr. Mason?

    It's a photograph of DR. MALCOLM MASON, being escorted by a
    phalanx of riot cops through a mob of raging activists.

    FALE
    That's him.

    BEN
    (very frightened)
    What are you going to do with us?

    COLE
    (stares at the photo, then)
    Tell me more about Jeffrey.

    FALE
    (a helpless shrug to his cohorts)
    Jeffrey started getting bored with the
    shit we do...picketing, leafleting,
    letter-writing stuff. He said we were,
    "ineffectual liberal jerkoffs". He
    wanted to do guerrilla "actions" to
    "educate" the public.

    COLE holds up a clipping showing horrified SENATORS standing on
    their desks as RATTLESNAKES slither along the Senate Floor.

    FALE
    Yeah, that's when he let a hundred
    snakes loose in the Senate.

    TEDDY
    But we weren't into that kind of stuff.
    It's counter productive, we told him.

    FALE
    So he and eleven others split off and
    became this underground..."army"

    COLE
    The Army of The Twelve Monkeys.

    BEN
    They started planning a "Human Hunt".

    TEDDY
    They bought stun guns and nets and bear
    traps. They were gonna go to Wall
    Street and trap lawyers and bankers...

    BEN
    But they didn't do it. They didn't do
    any of it.

    TEDDY
    Yeah, just like always, Mr. Big Shot
    sold his friends out!

    COLE
    What's that mean?

    FALE
    He goes on TV, gives a news conference,
    tells the whole world he just realized
    his daddy's experiments are vital for
    humanity and that the use of animals is
    absolutely necessary and that he, Jeffrey
    Mason, from now on, is going to personally
    supervise the labs to make sure all the
    little animals aren't going to suffer.

    COLE
    (holding up a rolodex)
    What's this?

    EXT. FREEWAY - AFTERNOON

    In the crawling traffic, WE FIND a battered FORD covered with
    bumper stickers and painted slogans. "I BRAKE FOR ANIMALS"...
    "FREE THE ANIMALS"..."WOULD YOU LET A MINK WEAR YOUR SKIN?"

    RAILLY (v.o.)
    You can't just barge in on a famous
    scientist. They'll have security guards,
    gates, alarm systems. It's insane, James.

    INT. MOVING FORD/FREEWAY

    A ROLODEX CARD with an address on "Outerbridge Road" for "Jeffrey
    Mason c/o Dr. Malcolm Mason" rests on a map spread across COLE'S
    lap. COLE is in the passenger seat, RAILLY'S at the wheel,
    maneuvering in heavy traffic.

    RAILLY
    If those young men don't get loose,
    they could die in that basement.

    COLE glances out the window, indicates the PEOPLE in passing
    cars...COMMUTERS, FAMILIES, TRUCKERS.

    COLE
    All I see are dead people. Everywhere.
    What's three more?

    RAILLY
    (a beat, carefully, a new tack)
    You know Dr. Mason's son, Jeffrey
    Mason, don't you, James? You met him
    in the County Hospital six years ago.

    COLE is studying the map again.

    COLE
    The guy was a total fruitcake.

    RAILLY
    And he told you then his father was a
    famous virologist.

    COLE is absorbed in the map, his finger tracing "Outerbridge Road".

    COLE
    No -- he said his father was "God"!

    EXT./INT. FORD/COUNTRY HIGHWAY - LATER (DAY)

    The RADIO BLARES a country song as the Ford zips along an open
    highway. COLE has his head out the window, sucking air, loving
    the music, but his bliss is feverish now -- he's not well. As
    the SONG ends, he pulls his head inside. An ANNOUNCER'S VOICE
    intones over the RADIO...

    RADIO ANNOUNCER (o.s.)
    This just in: police are widening
    their search for Dr. Kathryn Railly,
    prominent psychiatrist and author.
    Authorities confirm that Dr. Railly has
    been abducted by escaped mental patient,
    James Cole. The two are believed to be
    traveling in Railly's 1992 black Acura,
    license plate H-E-A-D-D-R.

    RAILLY glances at him, sees he's in pain. She feels so badly for
    him. She wants to help him. She says, tenderly...

    RAILLY
    This can't go on, James. You're not
    well. You're burning with fever.

    COLE, refusing to succumb, instead, leans over to check the gas gauge.

    COLE
    We need gas.

    RAILLY
    I thought you didn't know how to drive.

    COLE
    I said I was too young to drive. I
    didn't say I was stupid.

    RAILLY
    What's the matter with your leg?

    COLE
    I got shot. Look -- there's a gas
    station up ahead.

    RAILLY
    Shot! Who shot you?

    COLE
    It was some kind of...war. Never mind,
    you wouldn't believe me. Turn off here.

    INT. PARKED FORD/GAS STATION - MINUTES LATER (AFTERNOON)

    The GAS STATION ATTENDANT checks the oil while COLE and RAILLY
    remain in the car. She's pulling a gas card from her wallet.

    COLE
    You were going to run out off gas on
    purpose, weren't you?

    RAILLY
    No. I want you to turn yourself in, James --
    It'll go much better for you if you do
    -- but I'm not going to trick you.

    COLE
    (sees the credit card)
    That has your name on it. Give him cash.

    RAILLY puts the card back into her wallet and pulls out cash as
    the GAS STATION ATTENDANT slams the hood down.

    RAILLY starts opening the door. Alarmed, COLE tries to stop her.

    COLE
    Where are you going?

    She looks him in the eye, then indicates the tiny Convenience
    Store appended to the Gas Station.

    RAILLY
    You can come with me. I have to get
    some things. Scissors, bandages, some
    alcohol or whiskey. ... I have to look
    at your leg, James. I'm a doctor.

    COLE looks helpless, hesitant. She's in charge...for the moment.

    EXT. CLEARING/WOODS - AN HOUR LATER (AFTERNOON)

    The sun dazzles through the canopy of leaves. We HEAR the CAR
    RADIO but not the engine.

    RADIO ANNOUNCER (v.o.)
    Meanwhile in Fresno, where mining
    engineers continue their desperate
    attempt to sink a shaft parallel to the
    ant in which nine year old...

    COLE, in his underwear, leans back on a large rock beside the
    Ford, his pants hanging on the car's open door. He's staring up
    at the sun and the sky. RAILLY finishes bandaging his thigh.

    RAILLY
    You shouldn't put your weight on it.
    You need stitches and antibiotics.
    Lucky for you it was near the surface.

    RAILLY wraps the bullet in some gauze and sticks it in her pocket
    while COLE continues staring up at the sky.

    COLE
    I love seeing the sun.

    A beat. COLE tries to stand up.

    RAILLY
    Wait -- let me help you.

    RAILLY puts an arm around him and helps him to his feet. A beat.
    They're very close. They don't move. RAILLY looks like she can
    barely breathe.

    COLE
    (leans closer, shuts his eyes)
    You smell so good.

    RAILLY
    (trying to concentrate)
    You have to give yourself up, you know.

    A beat. The spell is broken. He reaches for his pants, then
    turns back to her, suddenly grim.

    COLE
    I have to do something now. Something
    I don't want to do. I'm so sorry.

    RAILLY reacts, sudden fear in her eyes. He looms over her. He's
    cold now, steeled.

    COLE
    I have a mission. It's important.

    RAILLY steps back...horrified, realizing she's going to die.

    EXT. MASON MANSION - NIGHT

    A SECRET SERVICE AGENT ambles vigilantly among the rows of luxury
    cars parked beside the brightly-lit rural mansion. Encountering
    another AGENT, he pauses.

    FIRST AGENT
    They find him?

    SECOND AGENT
    Who??

    FIRST AGENT
    That kid. The one in the pipe.

    SECOND AGENT
    You believe this? They're dropping a monkey
    down there with a miniature infra-red camera
    strapped on him and a roast beef sandwich
    wrapped in tinfoil.

    FIRST AGENT
    You're making that up!

    ANGLE UNDER A PARKED MERCEDES, where COLE is hiding, listening to
    the receding VOICES of the AGENTS.

    SECOND AGENT (o.s.)
    I shit you not. ... Man, life is weird!
    A monkey and a sandwich. Wonder who
    thought that one up.

    FIRST AGENT (o.s.)
    Probly give the sonafabitch a Nobel
    Prize!

    Quickly, COLE rolls to the next car and under it. He doesn't
    see...the pistol fell out of his pocket, under the Mercedes.

    INT. MASON MANSION/DINING ROOM - NIGHT

    A formal dinner for forty. Desert has been served. DR. MALCOLM
    MASON rises to the enthusiastic applause of the GUESTS.

    DR. MASON
    Would that I could enjoy this opulent
    dinner and this excellent and
    stimulating company for itself, with no
    sense of purpose. But alas, I am
    "burdened" with the sense that with all
    this excess of public attention and
    this cacophony of praise, there comes
    great responsibility. Indeed, I
    practically feel a soapbox growing
    under my feet whenever I stand for more
    than a few seconds.

    While GUESTS laugh at DR. MASON'S last remark, SECRET SERVICE
    AGENT #3 enters the room, scowling, looking for someone.

    DR. MASON (o.s.)
    The dangers of science are a time worn
    threat, from Prometheus stealing fire
    from the Gods to the Cold War era of
    the Dr. Strangelove Terror.

    AGENT #3 spots who he's looking for. JEFFREY MASON!

    DR. MASON (cont.)
    But never before, not even at Los Alamos
    when the scientists made bets on whether
    their first atomic bomb test would wipe out
    New Mexico, has science given us so much
    reason to fear the power we have at hand.

    ANGLE ON JEFFREY, as AGENT #3 whispers in his ear.

    JEFFREY
    What are you talking about? What
    friend? I'm not expecting anyone.

    ANGLE ON DR. MASON, reacting with irritation to the disturbance.

    DR. MASON
    Current genetic engineering as well as
    my own work with viruses has presented
    us with powers as terrifying as any...

    ANGLE ON JEFFREY, following the AGENT out of the dining room,
    grumbling loudly enough to disturb his father's audience.

    JEFFREY
    This is ridiculous. My father is
    making a major address.

    INT. HALLWAY/MASON MANSION

    The conversation continues as JEFFREY and AGENT #3 enter the hall.

    AGENT #3
    Normally if we caught a guy sneaking
    around like this with no I.D., we'd
    bust his ass, excuse the French, but
    this one said he knows you...
    (smirk, smirk)
    -- and, since you seem to have had
    some...uh...unusual...uh..."associates",
    we certainly didn't want to arrest one
    of your, uh, closest...pals.

    INT. LIBRARY/MASON MANSION

    COLE, smudged with dirt and car grease, sitting in the shadows in
    a wingback chair, looks up as JEFFREY and AGENT #3 enter the
    room. A FOURTH AGENT looms beside the wingback chair.

    JEFFREY
    (dismissing Cole casually)
    Never saw him before in my life. Go
    ahead and shoot him or torture him or
    whatever it is you do.

    COLE
    (rising)
    You do know me. You helped me once.

    JEFFREY
    (turning to leave)
    That would be totally out of character.
    Helping people is against my principles.
    (to the Agents)
    See, he definitely doesn't know me. Now,
    I'm going to go back and listen to my
    father's very eloquent discourse on the
    perils of science WHILE YOU TORTURE THIS
    INTRUDER TO DEATH.

    COLE
    I'm here about some monkeys.

    Halfway out the door, JEFFREY freezes. A beat.

    JEFFREY
    Excuse me -- what did you say?

    COLE
    Monkeys. Twelve of them.

    JEFFREY frowns, turns, considers COLE. Then, suddenly, JEFFREY
    rushes to COLE and embraces him.

    JEFFREY
    Arnold...Arnold.

    COLE is astonished. The AGENTS are, too.

    JEFFREY
    (stepping back)
    My God, Arnie, what's happened to you?
    You look like shit

    AGENT #3
    (dubious)
    You know this man?

    JEFFREY
    Of course I know him. What do you
    think -- I act like this to strangers?
    Listen -- you fellas are terrific. I
    thought you were pulling a number on
    me. What a terrible thing if you'd
    thrown old Arnie out. I owe you guys
    the big apologia! Mea culpa, fellas.
    (turning to Cole)
    Christ, Arnie, it's black tie! I mean,
    I said, "drop by," but, like, this is
    Dad's big "do"...vips, senators, secret
    service, and...and everything.

    JEFFREY throws an arm around COLE'S shoulder and starts leading
    him toward the door as the two AGENTS exchange narrow-eyed looks.

    AGENT #4
    "Arnie?"

    JEFFREY
    Arnold Pettibone. Old Arnie Pettibone.
    Used to be my best friend. Still is.
    What've you lost, Arnie -- forty pounds?
    No wonder I didn't know you. You hungry?
    Lots of dead cow, dead lamb, dead pig.
    Real killer feast we're putting on tonight.

    The AGENTS watch JEFFREY lead the limping, disheveled COLE out.

    AGENT #4
    These people -- all of 'em -- are true
    weirdoes!

    AGENT #3
    (moving to the phone)
    I'm gonna call in a description of this
    "Pettibone" character. You go keep an
    eye on him. Make sure he doesn't do
    one of the guests with a fork.

    INT. HALLWAY/MASON MANSION

    GUESTS pouring from the dining room into the hall meet JEFFREY
    and a very disconcerted COLE.

    JEFFREY
    Hey, nice ta see ya. Lookin' good! Hi,
    there. Yes, it has been a long time.

    In the b.g., too far away to hear them, AGENT #4 trails JEFFREY and
    COLE as they maneuver through the GUESTS toward the grand staircase.

    JEFFREY
    (whispers to Cole)
    County Hospital, right? 1989. The
    "Immaculate Escape" -- am I right?
    (smiling to guests)
    Why, thank you -- you look wonderful, too.

    COLE
    Listen to me -- I can't do anything
    about what you're going to do. I can't
    change anything. I can't stop you. I
    just want some information...

    JEFFREY
    We need to talk. Come on. Upstairs.
    (to a guest)
    I am a new person! I'm completely
    adjusted. Witness the tux. It's Armani.
    (whispers to Cole)
    Who chattered? Goines? Weller?

    COLE
    I just need to have access to the pure
    virus, that's all! For the future!

    JEFFREY studies COLE. COLE doesn't just talk crazy. He looks crazy!

    JEFFREY
    Come on, follow me. You don't lock so good.

    JEFFREY starts guiding COLE up the grand staircase as COLE, glancing
    back, spots AGENT #3 and AGENT #4, both keeping an eye on him now.

    COLE
    I don't have time to go upstairs. The
    police are looking for me. I need to
    know where it is and exactly what it is.

    JEFFREY
    (brightening suddenly)
    I get it! This is your old plan, right?

    COLE
    Plan? What are you talking about?

    JEFFREY
    Remember? We were in the dayroom,
    watching TV, and you were all upset
    about the...desecration of the planet.
    And you said to me, "Wouldn't it be
    great if there was a germ or a virus
    that could wipe out mankind and leave
    the plants and animals just as they
    are?" You do remember that, don't you?

    COLE
    Bulishit! You're fucking with my head!

    JEFFREY
    And that's when I told you my father was
    this famous virologist and you said, "Hey,
    he could make a germ and we could steal it!"

    COLE
    (grabbing Jeffrey)
    Listen, you dumb fuck! The thing mutates
    We live underground! The world belongs
    to the fucking dogs and cats. We're
    like moles or worms. All we want to do
    is study the original...

    AGENT #4'S VOICE
    Okay -- take it easy. We know who you
    are, Mr. Cole.

    COLE feels a firm grip on his shoulder, turns and sees AGERT #4

    AGENT #4
    Let's go somewhere and talk this thing
    over. Okay? Just come with me...

    JEFFREY
    You're right! Absolutely right. Me's
    a nut case, totally deranged. Delusional!
    Paranoid. HIS PROCESSOR'S ALL FUCKED
    UP, HIS INFORMATION TRAY IS JAMMED.

    AGENT #4 is wishing JEFFREY would chill out even as the THIRD
    AGENT is climbing up the staircase to help.

    COLE is like a trapped animal. He's being led down the staircase
    now with JEFFREY, right on his heels, yelling so EVERYONE can hear.

    JEFFREY
    YOU KNOW WHAT IT IS, THE "ARMY OF THE
    TWELVE MONKEYS"? IT'S A COLLECTION OF
    NATURE KOOKS WHO RUN A STORE DOWNTOWN.
    SPACE-CASE DO-GOODERS SAVING RAIN
    FORESTS. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH
    THOSE BOZOS ANYMORE. I QUIT BEING THE
    RICH KID FALL GUY FOR A BUNCH OF
    INEFFECTUAL BANANAS. SO MUCH FOR YOUR
    GRAND PLOT!

    COLE stares back at JEFFREY as both AGENTS hustle COLE down the
    stairs. It sounds true! JEFFREY'S so confident.

    AGENT #3
    Take it easy, Mr. Mason, we've got him.
    Everything's...

    JEFFREY
    MY FATHER HAS BEEN WARNING PEOPLE ABOUT
    THE DANGERS OF EXPERIMENTATION WITH
    VIRUSES AND DNA FOR YEARS. YOU'VE
    "PROCESSED" THAT INFORMATION THROUGH
    YOUR ADDLED PARANOID INFRA-STRUCTURE AND
    LO AND BEHOLD, I'M FRANKENSTEIN AND THE
    "ARMY OF THE TWELVE MONKEYS" BECOMES
    SOME SORT OF SINISTER REVOLUTIONARY
    CABAL. THIS MAN IS TOTALLY BATSHIT! YOU
    KNOW WHERE HE THINKS HE COMES FROM???

    Suddenly, COLE, catching the AGENTS by surprise, wrenches free,
    shoves them aside, and stumbles down the rest of the staircase.

    INT. FOYER/MASON MANSION

    COLE heads for the front door, but there's an AGENT there! COLE
    turns and limps madly toward the dining room, pushing his way
    through the crowd of amazed GUESTS.

    INT. DINING ROOM/MASON MANSION

    SERVANTS, clearing the table, look up astonished as two AGENTS
    burst into the room.

    AGENT #4
    Did a man just come through here...limping?

    INT. KITCHEN/MASON MANSION

    COOKS stare, amazed, as two OTHER AGENTS burst into the kitchen
    and look about urgently.

    INT. DEN/MASON MANSION

    A large projection TV is on and a knot of GUESTS is gathered in
    front of it...watching the spooky VIDEO IMAGES.

    TV REPORTER (v.o.)
    These pictures we are seeing are coming
    to us live from deep inside the pipe.
    You can just make out the metal wall
    behind those roots and I guess those
    must be spider webs.

    MRS. McCANN, a guest, watching the TV, expresses concern...

    MRS. McCANN
    Well, if you ask me, I think that monkey
    is going to eat the sandwich himself.

    Just then, two AGENTS burst into the den.

    The GUESTS turn from the TV, startled, stare open-mouthed, but
    the AGENTS have spotted an open window and are hurrying to it.

    AGENTS POV OUT THE WINDOW: the rows of expensive parked CARS.

    ON THE TV SCREEN, RAILLY'S photograph appears.

    TV ANCHOR (v.o.)
    This just in: Police say that the body of
    a woman found strangled in the Knutson state
    Park could be kidnap victim, Dr. Kathryn Railly.

    As the AGENTS run out of the room, a photo of RAILLY'S abandoned
    Acura comes up on the TV screen.

    TV ANCHOR (v.o.)
    Earlier in the day, police located
    Railly's abandoned car not far from a
    building where three animal rights
    activists were found bound and gagged...

    EXT. MASON MANSION - MINUTES LATER (NIGHT)

    Pistols drawn, AGENTS move cautiously among the rows of parked
    luxury cars, checking inside and under the vehicles.

    AN AGENT'S VOICE (o.s.)
    COME ON OUT, MR COLE -- WE'RE NOT GOING
    TO HURT YOU.

    INT. PARKED GREEN JAGUAR

    COLE, scrunched down on the floor next to the driver's seat,
    spots the key dangling from the ignition, then lifts his head
    slightly to study the shift mechanism, trying to figure it out.

    EXT. PARKED CARS/MASON MANSION

    AGENTS continue to move cautiously among the parked cars.

    INT. PARKED GREEN JAGUAR

    COLE eases himself into the driver's seat, tentatively slides the
    shift into "Drive", then turns the key. Nothing happens.

    Panic. COLE studies the shift again.

    EXT. PARKED CARS/MANSION

    AGENT #5 approaches the row where the Jaguar is parked.

    INT. PARKED GREEN JAGUAR

    COLE slides the shift from D (Drive) to N (Neutral). He twists
    the key again. The engine ROARS...SEVEN THOUSAND RPM!

    EXT. LAWN/MANSION

    AGENT #5 whirls at the sound.

    SMASH. The JAGUAR clips the Mercedes parked in front of it and
    accelerates right at him!

    AGENT #5 dives aside just as the speeding JAGUAR whizzes past
    him, slams into a parked Cadillac, bounces off, grinds between
    two other parked vehicles with a fierce scream of tearing metal.

    INT. MOVING JAGUAR

    Caught between two cars, COLE can only lean on the gas pedal.

    The JAGUAR comes free with a great SCCCREEEEECH...

    COLE sees the driveway ahead in the moonlight. Steering madly,
    he plows through shrubs and gardens heading for the driveway.

    EXT. MASON MANSION - NIGHT

    Lights off, veering wildly, the JAGUAR reaches the driveway.

    AGENTS are leaping into cars and a HELICOPTER is coming to life,
    its rotors whipping around.

    INT. SPEEDING JAGUAR/OUTERHRIDGE ?OAD - NIGHT

    COLE turns onto the road, careening crazily from one side to the
    other, unable to see ahead with no headlights.

    COLE
    LIGHTS! LIGHTS!

    He starts hitting switches. The wipers come on, the RADIO BLARES.

    RADIO REPORTER'S VOICE/RADIO (o.s.)
    ---when they pulled the monkey out, it
    was still clutching the tinfoil wrapped
    sandwich.

    Rounding a bend, an ONCOMING CAR heads straight at COLE.

    COLE yanks the wheel as the OTHER CAR, horn BLARING, just misses him.

    Recovering, COLE loses the road, speeds crazily along the shoulder.

    INT. FLYING HELICOPTER - NIGHT

    The PILOT, an agent, steers the chopper while the CO-PILOT pans a
    spotlight over the two lane road beneath them.

    Just then, the PILOT sees headlights below.

    PILOT
    There! He's showing lights.

    INT. SPEEDING JAGUAR - NIGHT

    COLE can see the road now in his headlights as the windshield
    wipers scrape frantically and the RADIO BLARES...

    RADIO REPORTER'S VOICE/RADIO (o.s.)
    We don't know what to think. They
    didn't locate him and they don't know
    how much longer he can last, that's
    assuming the boy is still alive.

    A spotlight hits the car and COLE hears the sound of the
    HELICOPTER as it lowers over him!

    EXT. OUTERBRIDGE ROAD

    The HELICOPTER maneuvers over the speeding JAGUAR.

    INT. SPEEDING JAGUAR

    COLE can see the underbelly of the HELICOPTER a few feet above
    his front windshield.

    Desperate, he yanks the wheel hard, veering off the road.

    COLE'S POV THROUGH THE WINDSHIELD: dense woods ahead.

    EXT. HELICOPTER/WOODS

    The chopper pulls up sharply, avoiding the trees, then levels out.

    INT. HELICOPTER

    The PILOT skims the top of the trees while the CO-PILOT rakes the
    forest below with his spotlight.

    PILOT
    Goddamnit! Where is he?

    The CO-PILOT gets a brief glimpse of headlights through the leaves.

    CO-PILOT
    There! Over there.

    PILOT
    Where?
    CO-PILOT
    Eight o'clock! He was right there.

    The headlights are gone. Nothing but darkness below.

    PILOT
    He musta turned his lights of if.

    CO-PILOT
    Couldn't drive down there without
    lights. We just can't see 'em.

    PILOT
    Maybe he's not driving!

    EXT. WOODS - LATER (NIGHT)

    A weather forecast BLARES from the radio of the steaming Jaguar,
    crumpled into a tree, the driver's door open.

    A POLICE OFFICER, pistol drawn, approaches the car cautiously, as
    OTHER OFFICERS and AGENTS stay behind trees, weapons ready.

    The POLICE OFFICER lunges forward, pointing his weapon into the
    Jaguar. He inspects the car, then turns and calls out...

    POLICE OFFICER
    He's not in here.

    EXT. WOODS/CLEARING - NIGHT

    Limping, bleeding from various cuts, COLE CRASHES through
    underbrush as he follows a stream through the woods.

    Suddenly, he sees what he's looking for.

    The FORD...barely visible in the moonlight, parked in the trees
    beside the stream. The car looks empty.

    INT. TRUNK/FORD

    Total blackness! The sound of keys in the lock.

    Then, the trunk swings open and COLE stands in the moonlight,
    looking down

    RAILLY is in the trunk, tears of rage and frustration in her eyes.

    RAILLY
    You bastard! You total bastard!

    EXT. FORD

    COLE backs away, as RAILLY scrambles out of the trunk, swinging.

    He slips, falls, and she starts kicking him as she rants hysterically.

    RAILLY
    I could have died in there. If something
    had happened to you I would have died.

    COLE is lying on the ground, looking up, his lip caked with blood.

    COLE
    I...I...I'm really sorry.

    Noticing his cuts and torn clothes, she stops kicking him.

    RAILLY
    What have you done? Did you...kill someone?

    COLE
    (getting to his feet)
    No! I...don't think so. I stole a car
    and they chased me. I hit a tree.

    RAILLY
    See -- you can drive after all!

    COLE
    Yeah, sort of, I guess. I...I'm sorry
    I locked you up. I thought...I thought...
    I think maybe I am crazy!

    She looks at him. Breakthrough? Very calm now, the doctor.

    RAILLY
    What made you think that?

    COLE
    Jeffrey Mason said it was my idea about
    the virus. And suddenly, I wasn't
    sure. We talked when I was in the
    institution, and it was all...fuzzy.
    The drugs and stuff.
    (horrified)
    You think maybe I'm the one who wiped
    out the human race? It was my idea?

    RAILLY
    Nobody is going to wipe out the human
    race. Not you or Jeffrey or anybody
    else. You've created something in your
    mind, James -- a substitute reality.
    In order to avoid something you don't
    want to face.

    COLE
    I'm..."mentally divergent". I would
    love to believe that.

    RAILLY
    It can be dealt with, but only if you
    want to. I can help you.

    COLE reacts to the sound of VOICES in the woods, dogs BARKING.

    COLE
    I need help all right. They're coming
    after me.

    RAILLY
    First, it's important that you
    surrender to them instead of them
    catching you running. Okay?

    COLE
    (brightening)
    It would be great if I'm crazy. If I'm
    wrong about everything...the world will be
    okay. I'll never have to live underground.

    RAILLY
    Give me the gun.

    COLE
    The gun! ... I lost it

    RAILLY
    You're sure?

    COLE
    (showing her)
    No gun!
    (looking up)
    Stars! Air! I can live here. Breathe!

    RAILLY starts around to the front of the car.

    RAILLY
    I'm going to attract their attention,
    let them know where we are, okay?

    RAILLY gets in the driver's seat...and starts to HONK the horn.

    RAILLY
    (calling out)
    They'll tell you to put your hands on top
    of your head. Do what they tell you. You're
    going to get better, James -- I know it!

    ANGLE ON COLE, spotting something on the ground. An insect! He
    reaches down to grab it, but, instead, grins, grabs some grass,
    stands, and starts rubbing it happily all over his face. The
    HORN BLARES as COLE looks up at the sky.

    ANGLE ON THE NIGHT SKY, the moon full, the sky rich with stars.

    ANGLE ON COLE, tears of joy running down his face.

    COLE
    I love this world!

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, in the driver's seat, hearing near-by SHOUTS
    from the woods. The police are almost here. She gets out of the
    car, starts around toward COLE.

    RAILLY
    Remember, I'm going to help you. I'll
    stay with you. I won't let them...

    She breaks off mid-sentence...stares, stunned!

    COLE is gone. Disappeared.

    INT. POLICE STATION OFFICE - MORNING

    RAILLY is being "debriefed" by POLICE OFFICERS and FBI AGENTS.

    RAILLY
    Then I said something to him about
    cooperating and he said he would do
    that, so I got in the car and started
    honking the horn. When I got out, he
    was gone.

    LIEUTENANT HALPERIN
    You lucked out. For a while we thought
    you were a body they found down state...
    mutilated.

    A COP enters, hands a photo to LIEUTENANT HALPERIN who studies it.

    RAILLY
    He wouldn't do something like that -- he...

    LIEUTENANT RALPERIN
    (interrupts, hands her the photo)
    This the man he attacked?

    RAILLY looks at the photo, an 8 x 10 of the FIRST THUG, slumped
    against the alley wall, obviously dead.

    RAILLY
    I'd like to be clear about this. That
    man and the other one were..."severely"
    beating us. James Cole didn't start
    it. In fact -- he saved me!

    LIEUTENANT RALPERIN
    Funny thing, Doctor, maybe you can
    explain it to me, you being a psychiatrist
    -- why do kidnap victims almost always
    try to tell us about the guys who grabbed
    'em and try to make us understand how
    kind these bastards really were?

    RAILLY
    (as if reciting)
    It's a normal reaction to a life-
    threatening situation.
    (suddenly animated)
    He's sick. He thinks he comes from the
    future. He's been living in a carefully
    constructed fantasy world and that world
    is starting to disintegrate. He needs
    help!

    INT. AIRPORT CONCOURSE/THE DREAM

    YOUNG COLE stares, eyes wide.

    He sees the BRUNETTE, cradling the head of the BLONDE MAN as he
    sprawls on the concourse...

    ASTROPHYSICIST'S VOICE (O.S.)
    Wake up! Wake up!

    GEOLOGIST'S VOICE (O.S.)
    I think we gave him too much.

    MICROBIOLOGIST'S VOICE (O.S.)
    WAKE UP, PRISONER!

    INT. SCIENTISTS' CHAMBER - ETERNAL NIGHT

    COLE blinks awake. All he can see are blurry faces hovering over
    him, hammering him with questions.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Come on, Cole, cooperate!

    GEOLOGIST
    Spit it out... you went to the home of
    a famous virologist...

    COLE
    (weakly)
    You...don't...exist! You're in
    my mind...

    SCIENTISTS (IN RAPID SUCCESSION)
    What? What's that? What did he say? His
    brain's fried. Give him another shot!
    SPEAK UP, COLE. WHAT DID YOU DO NEXT?

    INT. RAILLY'S APARTMENT - EVENING

    The TV shows film of RAILLY leaving the police station.

    TV REPORTER (v.o.)
    The kidnap victim seemed exhausted but
    apparently unharmed by her 30 hour ordeal
    as she left the police station in
    Philadelphia this morning. So far she
    has refused to make a public statement.

    RAILLY'S friends, MARILOU and WAYNE, are watching the TV.

    A door opens and KATHRYN RAILLY, wearing a robe, comes out of her
    bedroom. She still looks exhausted Followed by her cat, she
    enters the kitchen area and turns on the kettle as WAYNE hastily
    turns down the TV.

    WAYNE
    Sorry.

    RAILLY
    No -- I'm in a state of hyper-
    alertness. I can't sleep.

    MARILOU
    Did you take the sedative?

    RAILLY
    I hate those things. They mess my head
    up.

    The old mug shot of COLE appears on the screen and RAILLY remotes
    the volume up.

    TV REPORTER (v.o.)
    Along with the kidnapping of the Baltimore
    woman, James Cole is now also wanted in
    connection with the brutal slaying of
    Rodney Wiggins, an ex-convict from...

    RAILLY goes to the window, pushes aside the drape, and sees...

    HER POV: ACROSS THE STREET...A COP keeps watch.

    RAILLY (o.s.)
    Do they really expect him to come here?

    RAILLY returns to the kitchen area where MARILOU is getting the
    tea things out.

    TV REPORTER on air
    And in Fresno, California...

    RAILLY
    (glances sadly toward the TV)
    He's dead, isn't he -- that little boy?

    WAYNE
    He's fine. It was just a "prank" he
    and his friends pulled.

    CLOSE ON RAILLY'S FACE... SHOCKED.

    ANGLE ON THE TV SCREEN, showing footage of a sheepish nine year
    old boy being led out of a barn by the police. The cops look grim.

    TV REPORTER (v.o.)
    Authorities have so far been noncommittal
    about whether they will try to file
    charges against the families of the
    children involved in the hoax.

    RAILLY stares at the TV, stunned.

    INT. "HOSPITAL" ROOM - ETERNAL NIGHT

    VOICES! SINGING! COLE blinks awake, looks around, confused, then
    stares in disbelief....

    Crowded around COLE'S bed, the SCIENTISTS are concluding a
    ragged, out of tune, rendition of "BLUEBERRY HILL."

    SCIENTISTS
    ---found my thrills on Blueberry Hill...

    Seeing he's awake, SCIENTISTS break off the song and applaud.

    SCIENTISTS
    Well done, James! Well done! Nice
    going! Congratulations! Good for you!

    BOTANIST
    During your "interview," while you
    were..."under the influence," you told
    us you liked music!

    COLE, confused, looks around, sees he's in a one-bed windowless
    room adorned with cheap reproductions of 19th and 20th century
    landscapes.

    The BOTANIST responds to COLE'S obvious disbelief with a
    friendly smile and the others join in rapid fire, overlapping.

    ZOOLOGIST
    This isn't the prison, James.

    BOTANIST
    This is a hospital.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    But just until you recover your,
    uh,... equilibrium.

    ENGINEER
    You're still a little... disoriented.

    GEOLOGIST
    Stress! Time travel!

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    You stood up very well, considering...

    GEOLOGIST
    Superior work! Superior!

    BOTANIST
    You connected the Army of the 12
    Monkeys to a world famous virologist
    and his son...

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    Others will take over now...

    ZOOLOGIST
    We'll be back on the surface in a
    matter of months....

    GEOLOGIST
    We'll retake the planet.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    We're very close! Because of you!

    ENGINEER
    (unrolling a document)
    This is it, James...what you've been
    working for.

    BOTANIST
    A full pardon!

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    You'll be out of here in no time.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Women will want to get to know you...

    COLE
    I DON'T WANT YOUR "WOMEN," YOU
    BRAINLESS TWIT! I WANT TO BE WELL!

    Unseen until now, two guards, TINY and SCARFACE, suddenly break
    through the ring of SCIENTISTS, push COLE down, and tighten the
    loose restraints, already in place, but unnoticed before.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    (sympathetically)
    Of course you want to be well, James.
    And you will be...soon.

    COLE bursts into hysterical laughter.

    COLE
    YOU DON'T EXIST, YOU SILLY BOZOS!
    YOU'RE NOT REAL! HA HA HA! PEOPLE DON'T
    TRAVEL IN TIME! YOU AREN'T HERE.
    MADE YOU UP! YOU CAN'T TRICK ME!
    YOU'RE IN MY MIND! I'M INSANE AND
    YOU'RE MY INSANITY!

    INT. PSYCHIATRIST'S OFFICE - DAY

    CLOSE ON KATHRYN RAILLY, insisting fiercely to someone,

    RAILLY
    He not only used the word "prank" -- he
    said the boy was hiding in a barn.

    RAILLY's talking to her former boss, DR. OWEN FLETCHER, psychiatrist
    sitting across from her in his office, tapping his pen.

    DR. FLETCHER
    He kidnapped you, Kathryn. You saw him
    murder someone. You knew there was a real
    possibility he would kill you, too. You
    were under tremendous emotional stress.

    RAILLY
    For God sakes, Owen, listen to me -- he
    knew about the boy in Fresno and he says
    three billion people are going to die!

    DR. FLETCHER
    Kathryn, you know he can't possibly
    know that. You're a rational person.
    You're a trained psychiatrist. You
    know the difference between what's real
    and what's not.

    RAILLY
    And what we believe is what's accepted as
    "truth" now, isn't it, Owen? Psychiatry --
    it's the latest religion. And we're the
    priests -- we decide what's right and what's
    wrong --we decide who's crazy and who isn't. ...
    I'm in trouble, Owen. I'm losing my faith.

    INT. "HOSPITAL" CELL - ETERNAL NIGHT

    Alone in his "hospital" room, COLE struggles without success to
    free himself from his restraints.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    You sure fucked up, Bob!

    Startled, COLE freezes, then ignores the RASPY VOICE and
    continues his feverish struggle.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    But I can understand you don't want
    your mistakes pointed out to you. I can
    relate to that, old Bob.

    COLE looks around in spite of himself. Nothing to see but the
    walls and the landscape paintings.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Hey, I know what you're thinking. You're
    thinking I don't exist except in your
    head. I can see that point of view. But
    you could still talk to me, couldn't you?
    Carry on a decent conversation?

    COLE
    (blurting)
    I saw you! In 1995! In the real world!
    You were a bum! You pulled out your teeth.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Why would I pull out my teeth, Bob?
    They don't like that. That's a no-no.
    And when did you say you saw me?
    In...1872?

    COLE
    FUCK YOU!

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Yelling won't get you what you want. You
    have to be smart to get what you want.

    COLE
    Oh, yeah? What do I want?

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    You don't know what you want? Sure you
    do, Bob. You know what you want.

    COLE, agitated, rocks back and forth. Then...

    COLE
    Tell me. Tell me what I want.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    To see the sky -- and the ocean -- to
    be topside -- breathe the air -- to be
    with her. ... Isn't that right? Isn't
    that what you want?

    Completely shaken, COLE hesitates for a long moment. When he
    speaks, it comes out of him like air...a whisper.

    COLE
    More...than...anything.

    INT. RAILLY'S BEDROOM - MORNING

    RAILLY'S in bed, asleep, having a very bad dream. Suddenly, the
    bedside phone RINGS. Her eyes snap open. A beat to orient
    herself. RING. She reaches for the phone.

    INTERCUT LIEUTENANT HALPERIN'S OFFICE/RAILLY'S BEDROOM

    CLOSE ON HALPERIN, at his desk, talking into the phone.

    LIEUTENANT HALPERIN
    Dr. Railly? Jim Halperin, Philly P.D..
    Sorry to call so early but...

    CLOSE ON RAILLY, eager, concerned. into the phone,

    RAILLY
    You found him? Is he all right?

    CLOSE ON HALPEPIN, noting her reaction with raised eyebrows
    giving an "I told you so" look to the BLACK PLAINCLOTHES cop
    across his desk, then continuing into the phone,

    LIEUTENANT HALPERIN
    Au contraire, Doctor. No sign of your
    good friend, the kidnapper. However,
    the plot thickens. I have a ballistic
    report on my desk that says the bullet
    you claim you removed from Mr. Cole's
    thigh is an antique...and all indications
    are it was fired...sometime prior to 1920.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, reacting, stunned.

    ANGLE ON HALPERIN, continuing soberly now,

    LIEUTENANT RALPERIN
    So what I was thinking was, maybe if I
    sent a detective down there to talk
    with you, you could maybe revise or
    amplify on the circumstances....
    Hello? Hello? Dr. Railly?

    HALPERIN considers the dead phone, glances at the COP again.

    INT. RAILLY'S BEDROOM/STUDY

    Her hand still on the receiver, RAILLY looks shocked. Then, she
    hurries into her study and starts frantically pulling neatly
    arranged piles of papers and books from a bookcase until she
    finds a copy of her book. She leafs through it hurriedly,
    locates the picture of the Puerto Rican KID (JOSE) in WWI.

    Peering closely, she tries to see everything in the picture.
    Then, she turns and reaches for a research folder of old
    photographs and rummages through it until she finds...!!!

    RAILLY
    No!

    It's an uncropped shot of JOSE being carried on the stretcher in
    the trenches. And there in the corner with no helmet, no gas
    mask, and just a bit of bare shoulder showing...it's COLE!!!

    INT. SCIENTISTS' CHAMBER - ETERNAL NIGHT

    Clean shaven, clear eyed, COLE sits before the frowning SCIENTISTS.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    The food, the sky, the certain, uh,
    sexual temptations -- you haven't
    become "addicted" have you, Cole? To
    that "dying" world'

    COLE
    No, sir! I just want to do my part.
    To get us back on top...in charge of
    the planet. And I have the experience,
    I know who the people are...

    BIOLOGIST
    He really is the most qualified...

    GEOLOGIST
    But all that..."behavior"...

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    (to Cole, a little hurt)
    You said we weren't "real," Cole...

    COLE
    Well, sir, I don't think the human mind
    was built to exist in two different...
    whatever you call it..."dimensions."
    It's stressful, you said it yourselves,
    it gets you confused. You don't know
    what's real and what's not.

    MICROBIOLOGIST
    But you know what's real now?

    COLE
    Yes, sir.

    The SCIENTISTS start to confer openly among themselves

    GEOLOGIST
    He'd have to bone up, catch up to our
    research, the latest clues...

    ZOOLOGIST
    He's proved to be a quick study...

    The ASTROPHYSICIST fixes COLE with a sharp, penetrating look.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    You can't trick us, you know. It
    wouldn't work.

    BIOLOGIST
    And why would you want to? It'll be
    dangerously close to the end.

    COLE
    I understand. There'd be no point.

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    We're going to think about it, Cole.
    Among ourselves. We'll get back to you.

    INT. DR. MASON'S OFFICE - DAY

    Standing in front of a wall of glass in his office, overlooking a
    hi-tech lab below where WORKERS in white "space suits" work
    methodically, DR. MASON speaks angrily into a phone. His male
    ASSISTANT, whose features we don't see, stops writing a formula
    on a blackboard and listens.

    DR. MASON
    You have reason to believe that my son
    may be planning to do what?!!!

    INT. RAILLY'S APARTMENT/STUDY

    RAILLY, trying to stay calm, is talking to Dr. Mason on the phone.

    RAILLY
    Please, I know it sounds insane but...

    INT. DR. MASON'S OFFICE

    Dr. Mason on the phone.

    DR. MASON
    (into the phone)
    I'm afraid this doesn't seem very
    professional to me, in fact it's
    distressingly unprofessional for some-
    one who treated my son briefly (if
    indeed you actually are who you say you
    are) to take a sudden unsolicited interest
    in his mental health six years later,
    and to telephone a parent to express
    opinions that would be inappropriate...
    (breaks off, listens, then)
    I don't know anything about "Monkey
    armies", Doctor. Nothing whatsoever.
    If my son ever was involved in...
    (listens, then,)
    It would be doubly inappropriate to
    discuss matters of security with you,
    Dr. Railly, but if it will put you at
    ease, neither my son nor any other
    unauthorized person has access to any
    potentially dangerous organisms in this
    laboratory. Thank you for your concern.

    DR. MASON hangs up angrily and glares.

    DR. MASON'S ASSISTANT (o.s.)
    Dr. "Kathryn" Railly????

    DR. MASON
    The psychiatrist who was kidnapped by
    that man who broke into my house. She
    seems to have been suddenly struck by
    the most preposterous notion about Jeffrey.

    DR. MASON'S ASSISTANT (o.s.)
    I attended a lecture once...Apocalyptic
    visions.

    We see Dr. Mason's ASSISTANT now. It's DR. PETERS, the red-
    haired man who insisted to Dr. Railly you didn't have to be
    insane to think the world was coming to an end.

    DR. PETERS (cont.)
    Has she succumbed to her own
    theoretical..."disease"?

    But DR. MASON is lost in thought, not listening.

    DR. MASON
    Given the nature of our work, we can't ever
    be careful enough. I think we should review
    our security procedures, perhaps upgrade them.

    INT. SCIENTISTS' CHAMBER - ETERNAL NIGHT

    COLE is facing the BOTANIST who's using a pointer to indicate
    various fading photos and newspaper clippings tacked on the wall.

    BOTANIST
    Let's consider again our current
    information -- if the symptoms were
    first detected in Philadelphia on June
    28, 1995, that makes us know that...?

    COLE
    It was released in Philadelphia,
    probably on June 14, 1995.

    BOTANIST
    And it appeared sequentially after that
    in...?

    With a quick glance at the panel of SCIENTISTS staring at him
    from behind the long table, COLE replies like a good pupil,

    COLE
    San Francisco, New Orleans, Rio de
    Janeiro, Rome, Kinshasa, Karachi,
    Bangkok, then Peking.

    BOTANIST
    Meaning...???

    COLE
    That the virus was taken from Philadelphia
    to San Francisco, then to New Orleans,
    Rio de Janeiro, Rome, Kinshasa, Karachi,
    Bangkok, then Peking.

    BOTANIST
    And your only goal is...???

    COLE
    To find out where the virus is so a
    qualified scientist can travel back into
    the past and study the original virus.

    BOTANIST
    So that...???

    COLE
    Uh, so that a vaccine can be developed
    that will, uh, allow mankind to reclaim
    the surface of the earth.

    COLE glances nervously at the suspicious SCIENTISTS as the
    BOTANIST switches on a slide projector and projects...

    a magazine photo of wall graffiti: "ATTENTION!!! POLICE ARE
    WATCHING! IS THERE A VIRUS? IS THIS THE SOURCE? 3 BILLION DIE?"

    BOTANIST (o.s.)
    This is from a magazine printed in late
    September, 1995. The writer speculated
    that this graffiti might be related to
    the epidemic that by that time had
    already killed thirty million people
    world-wide and was getting worse. He
    says, certain people, unnamed, were
    questioned, but what came of that is not
    known. But it is a clue you should pursue.

    COLE stares at the picture.

    EXT. FAA STOREFRONT - DAY

    LOUD BANGING! The storefront window, completely covered with
    posters, quivers violently. Images of MONKEYS covered with
    electrodes, BABY SEALS being viciously clubbed, DOGS jammed into
    tiny cages quiver as somebody beats on the window. It's RAILLY.

    RAILLY
    IS ANYBODY IN THERE? HELLO? IS
    SOMEONE IN THERE? IF YOU'RE IN THERE,
    I NEED TO TALK TO YOU.

    INT. FAA STORE

    JEFFREY, BEN, TEDDY, and two of JEFFREY'S youthful cohorts, SANDY
    and KWESKIN, wait motionless beside a heap of cardboard cartons
    as FALE peeks out the front window through a slit between posters.

    FALE
    It's the kidnap woman -- the one who
    was with the guy who tied us up.

    BEN
    What's she doing?

    FALE
    She's drawing attention to us, that's
    what she's doing. ... I don't know what
    you're up to this time, Mason, but
    you're gonna get us in deep shit!

    JEFFREY
    Whine, whine, whine. What about walkie
    talkies? We used to have walkie talkies.

    EXT. FAA STOREFRONT

    From littered doorways, DERELICTS sneak peeks at RAILLY as she,
    seemingly mad, shakes the doorknob, then hammers on the door.

    RAILLY
    I SAW YOU! I SAW SOMEONE MOVING. I
    KNOW YOU'RE IN THERE!

    RASPY VOICE (o.s)
    Secret experiments!

    RAILLY whirls, sees LOUIE, the raspy-voiced toothless derelict.

    LOUIE
    That's what they do -- secret weird stuff!

    RAILLY
    You! I know you!

    But LOUIE is studying the pictures of the tortured animals now.

    LOUIE
    Not just on them. Do 'em on people,
    too -- down at the shelters. Feed 'em
    chemicals 'n take pictures of 'em.

    RAILLY
    Have you seen James Cole? The man...?

    LOUIE
    They're watchin' you. Takin' pictures.

    RAILLY follows his look.

    ANGLE ON AN OLD CHEVY, parked across the street, the PLAINCLOTHES
    COP slouched at the wheel, pretending to read a newspaper.

    RAILLY
    The police. I know. Listen, I need to
    talk to James, but he has to be careful
    how he contacts me. He mustn't get
    caught. Do you understand me?

    LOUIS
    Uh, yeah, sure. Uh...who's James?

    RAILLY
    He was with me, he spoke to you.
    Several weeks ago. He said you were
    from the future...watching him.

    LOUIS gives her a look that says, "I'm outta here!"

    But just then, RAILLY spots two TEZNAGE PUNKS surreptitiously
    "tagging" their way along the street with cans of spray paint.

    RAILLY stares at the PUNKS.

    INT. FAA STORE

    FALE watches JEFFREY go over a check list while KWESKIN, SANDY,
    and TEDDY organize materials, and BEN peeks out the small opening
    between posters at the front window.

    JEFFREY
    You get the bolt cutters?

    KWESKIN
    One dozen. They're in the van.

    FALE
    One dozen bolt cutters! Whadda you
    gonna do with one dozen bolt cutters?

    JEFFREY
    (grins)
    You really want to know?

    FALE
    No! Absolutely not. Don't tell me anything.

    BEN
    Hey! Do you know what she's doing?

    Everybody freezes, looking toward 3EN, who's peeking outside.

    Then, except for JEFFREY, they all crowd around BEN to get a look.

    POV THROUGH SLIT: a glimpse of RAILLY, spray painting the front
    of the store!

    TEDDY
    What's it say?

    BEN
    I can't see it.

    JEFFREY
    (erupting)
    WHY DON'T WE FORGET MY GODDAMN
    PSYCHIATRIST AND DEAL WITH THE TASK AT
    HAND. THIS IS IMPORTANT.

    FALE
    (spinning around)
    Your psychiatrist? Did you just say,
    "your psychiatrist"?

    JEFFREY
    Ex-psychiatrist! Now, what about
    flashlights? How many flashlights...?

    FALE
    That woman is...was...your...
    psychiatrist? And now she's spray-
    painting our building?

    EXT. FAA STOREFRONT/SECOND AVENUE

    ANGLE ON SLACK PLAINCLOTHES COP, across the street in the CHEVY,
    amazed, watching RAILLY spray painting. He shakes his head wearily.

    ANGLZ ON STREET TYPES, inching closer, watching RAILLY with
    amazement, too. They include...

    an IRISH DRUNK, white haired, red-faced, bloated...

    a NATIVE AMERICAN with tormented eyes and a mangled ear...

    an AFRICAN AMERICAN with one eye...

    the TEENAGED PUNKS...

    a WHITE MAN, shabbily dressed, joining the knot of ONLOOKERS,
    reacting at the sight of RAILLY. It's COLE! He pushes toward her.

    COLE
    Kathryn!

    RAILLY stops spraying, whips around at the sound of his VOICE.

    RAILLY
    James!

    With a quick glance toward the PLAINCLOTHES COP, RAILLY takes
    urgent charge of the situation.

    RAILLY
    James! That's a policeman. Pretend
    you don't know me. If he sees you...

    COLE
    (turning, looking)
    No, I want to turn myself in. Where is he?
    (placing his hands on his head)
    Don't worry -- it's all okay now. I'm
    not crazy any more! I mean, I am
    crazy, mentally divergent, actually,
    but I know it now and I want you to
    help me. I want to get well...

    ANGLE on RAILLY, desperately pulling COLE'S hands off his head as
    she tries to block the COP'S view of COLE.

    RAILLY
    James -- put your hands down and listen
    to me. Things have changed!

    ANGLE ON THE PLAINCLOTHES COP, checking the mug shot of COLE on
    his clipboard, then reaching for his radio mike.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, reacting to the COP speaking into his mike: she
    tosses the spray paint can aside, grabs COLE and tries to pull
    him along...but COLE isn't moving. He's staring at the front of
    the FAA Store with disbelief!

    RAILLY
    James, come on! We have to get out of here!

    COLE looks from the wall to the can rolling on the sidewalk,
    then back to the wall where RAILLY has sprayed the huge words:

    ATTENTION!!! POLICE ARE WATCHING!
    IS THERE A VIRUS? IS THIS THE
    SOURCE? THREE BILLION DIE?

    It's the graffiti COLE saw in the future, in the picture!

    COLE
    I've seen that...before.

    But RAILLY'S total attention is on their dilemma.

    RAILLY
    James, trust me. We're in terrible
    trouble. We have to run.

    Very confused, COLE lets her drag him along the sidewalk, past
    ONLOOKERS. She looks crazier than he does.

    ANGLE ON THE CHEVY, making a sudden, urgent u-turn, almost
    colliding with a passing car. BRAKES SQUEAL and a HORN BLARES.

    INT. FAA STORE - DAY

    ANGLE ON BEN, peeking out, reacting to the drama.

    BEN
    Wow, a guy in a Chevy is chasing her
    and some other guy I can't see.

    FALE
    Hey, no problem, it's probably just
    another kidnapping featuring Jeffrey's
    shrink, pardon me, make that ex-shrink.
    (indicating Jeffrey to the others)
    This is your leader, a certifiable lunatic
    who told his former psychiatrist all his
    plans for God knows what whacko irresponsible
    schemes, and now who knows what she's
    painted out there on our wall?

    JEFFREY
    WHO CARES WHAT PSYCHIATRISTS WRITE ON
    WALLS?
    (moves to Fale, jabs him with a finger)
    You think I told her about the Army of
    the 12 Monkeys? Impossible! Know why,
    you pathetically ineffectual and
    pusillanimous "pretend-friend-to-
    animals"?! I'll tell you why: because
    when I had anything to do with her six
    years ago, there was no such thing -- I
    hadn't even thought of it yet!

    FALE
    (triumphant)
    Then how come she knows what's going on?

    JEFFREY abruptly switches from rage to good humor, adopting a
    supercilious smile and a patronizing tone.

    JEFFREY
    Here's my theory on that. While I was
    institutionalized, my brain was studied
    exhaustively in the guise of mental health.
    I was interrogated, x-rayed, studied
    thoroughly. Then, everything about me
    was entered into a computer where they
    created a model of my mind.

    They all stare, mesmerized, at the strutting JEFFREY. Is he
    serious? Is he crazy? Doesn't matter -- he's charismatic.

    JEFFREY (cont.)
    Then, using the computer model, they
    generated every thought I could possibly
    have in the next, say ten years, which
    they then filtered through a probability
    matrix to determine everything I was
    going to do in that period. So you
    see, she knew I was going to lead the
    Army of the Twelve Monkeys into the
    pages of history before it ever even
    occurred to me. She knows everything
    I'm ever going to do before I know it
    myself. How about that?

    JEFFREY smiles smugly into FALE'S flabbergasted face.

    JEFFREY
    Now I have to get going -- do my part.
    You guys check all this stuff out and
    load up the van. Make sure you have
    everything. I'm outta here.

    JEFFREY exits. The others stare at the door.

    FALE
    He's seriously crazy -- you know that.

    EXT. SKID ROW ALLEY - DAY

    An overflowing dumpster squats near the mouth of an alley.

    The unmarked CHEVY crawls slowly past the alley, the PLAINCLOTHES
    COP'S eyes searching everywhere.

    Trash stirs in the dumpster and RAILLY'S eyes peer up out of the
    torn cardboard boxes, rotting food, and styrofoam litter.

    HER POV: the POLICE CAR passes from view.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, emerging from the refuse, hissing,

    RAILLY
    James! Come on.

    A confused COLE emerges from the opposite end of the dumpster,
    bits of lettuce in his hair.

    COLE
    I don't understand what we're doing.

    RAILLY
    (climbing out of the dumpster)
    We're avoiding the police until I
    can....talk to you.

    COLE
    (climbing out after her)
    You mean, treat me? Cure me? Kathryn,
    those words on the wall -- I've seen
    them before... I...I...dreamed them.

    But she's not listening. She's peeking out the alley entrance.

    RAILLY'S POV: across the street is a run-down skid row hotel,
    THE GLOBE, ROOMS WEEKLY, DAILY.

    INT. GLOBE HOTEL/LOBBY - MINUTES LATER

    The DESK CLERK, an old alkie who hates trouble but finds it often,
    stares across the counter suspiciously at RAILLY and COLE.

    DESK CLERK
    Twenty five bucks an hour.

    RAILLY
    An hour?!

    DESK CLERK
    You want quarter hours, go someplace else.

    RAILLY
    (catches on, pulls out her last bills)
    Here's ninety eight. For the night. Deal?

    The DESK CLERK squints warily at this turn of events. Then, he
    turns, gets a key, turns back and hands it to her.

    DESK CLERK
    Forty four. Fourth floor, turn right.
    Elevator's busted.

    RAILLY turns, COLE follows, and they walk quickly to the stairs
    passing the stares of gloomy RESIDENTS sitting on torn sofas
    chairs in front of an old TV with hideous color.

    ANGLE ON THE DESK CLERK, watching RAILLY and COLE climb
    stairs. As they disappear from view, he picks up the phone,
    punches a number, speaks into the phone.

    DESK CLERK
    Tommy? This is Charlie at the Globe.
    You know if Wallace has a new girl?
    Sort of a rookie type? Blonde?

    INT. GLOBE HOTEL ROOM 44 - MINUTES LATER (DAY)

    COLE sits on the lumpy bed in the dingy room, watching RAILLY
    pace back and forth like a mad woman.

    RAILLY
    Okay...you were standing there looking
    at the moon...you were eating grass...
    then what?

    COLE
    I thought I was in...prison again.

    RAILLY
    Just like that? You were in prison?

    COLE
    No, not really. It's...it's in my
    mind. Like you said.

    RAILLY
    You disappeared! One minute you were
    there, the next minute you were gone.
    Did you run through the woods?

    COLE
    I don't know -- I don't remember.

    RAILLY
    The boy in the well. How did you know
    that was just a hoax?

    COLE
    It was? I didn't...know.

    RAILLY
    James, you said he was hiding in the barn...

    COLE
    I think I saw a TV show like that when
    I was a kid. Where a boy...

    RAILLY
    IT WASN'T A TV SHOW! IT WAS REAL!

    COLE looks at her. She's really upset.

    COLE
    Well, maybe that kid saw the same TV
    show and copied it. Listen, you were
    right, it's all in my head. I'm mentally
    ill, I imagine all that stuff. I know
    they're not real, I can trick them, make
    them do what I want. I just worked on
    them in my head and I got back here. I
    can get better. I can stay here.

    RAILLY pulls a photo from her purse, shows it to COLE.

    It's the uncropped picture from her book, the photo of JOSE in
    WWI with a fuzzy image of COLE on the edge of the frame,

    RAILLY
    What does this mean to you?

    COLE
    ...I had a dream about...something
    like that.

    RAILLY
    You had a bullet from World War One in
    your leg, James! How did it get there?

    COLE
    You said I had delusions -- that I
    created a world -- you said you could
    explain everything...

    RAILLY
    Well, I can't. ... I mean...I'm trying
    to. I can't believe that everything we
    do or say has already happened, that we
    can't change what's going to happen,
    that I'm one of the three billion
    people who are going to die...soon.

    COLE stands, moves close to her.

    COLE
    I want to be here. In this time. With
    you. I want to become...become a whole
    person. I want this to be the present.
    I want the future to be unknown.

    RAILLY
    (sudden hopeful idea!)
    James...do you remember...six years
    ago...you had a phone number! You
    tried to call and...

    WHAM! The door flies open, kicked violently, the flimsy lock not
    holding. A menacing figure stands in the doorway. WALLACE. A
    wiry biker-type with jail house tattoos and mean eyes.

    COLE and RAILLY are too stunned to say anything as WALLACE looks
    them over coldly, insolently, then advances on RAILLY.

    WALLACE
    This is my territory, bitch!

    COLE
    (confused, turns to Railly)
    Is this real -- or is this one of my
    delusions?

    RAILLY
    This is definitely real:
    (to Wallace)
    Excuse me, I think we have a little
    misunderstanding here...

    WALLACE smashes RAILLY in the face. She flies back against the
    wall and onto the floor as WALLACE spins around to COLE who is
    stepping toward him, but WALLACE is now holding a knife

    WALLACE
    What're you -- some kind of tough guy?
    You wanna be a hero? You gonna try and
    mess with me? Come on...

    A beat. COLE puts his hands up placatingly as he backs around
    WALLACE and moves to RAILLY, whose eye is already swelling.

    WALLACE
    Now that's a smart boy. But you,
    honey, you think you can go 'round
    me and peddle your fancy ass in this
    part of town, you bet your life we got
    what I would call a major goddamn
    misunderstandin'.

    RAILLY reaches a hand up to COLE for assistance, but, he grabs
    her purse instead, swings it around, SMASHES WALLACE in the face
    with it, then grabs the pimp's arm and SNAPS it like it was a
    twig! The knife clatters to the floor as WALLACE yelps in pain
    and COLE slams him to the floor, straddles his chest, retrieves
    the near-by knife, and presses it sharply against WALLACE'S neck.

    RAILLY
    JAMES -- DON'T!

    COLE hesitates.

    WALLACE
    (eyes bulging)
    You...heard...her. Don't do it, man.

    RAILLY
    (gets up, looks around)
    Put him in the closet, ... But get his
    money first.

    COLE
    (amazed)
    You want me to rob him?

    RAILLY
    I...I...We need cash, James.

    A shadow. RAILLY turns toward the door and glimpses a FACE
    disappearing, then hears SHOUTS from the hallway...

    SHOUTS (o.s.)
    They're killing him! Call the cops.

    Being very careful not to move his neck, WALLACE reaches into his
    pocket and produces a thick roll of bills, which RAILLY grabs.

    WALLACE
    You two are crazy. I got friends. You
    put me in a closet, they're gonna be
    really pissed.

    COLE moves off Wallace and, keeping the knife close, yanks him to
    his teeth while RAILLY hurries to the window and looks out.

    HER POV: A fire escape leads down into an alley.

    RAILLY turns just in time to see COLE shove WALLACE into the
    bathroom, follow him in, slam the door behind them, and LOCK it.

    RAILLY
    James, no!

    INT. BATHROOM

    RAILLY'S VOICE (from the other room)
    (rattling the door knob)
    James, what are you doing?

    WALLACE cowers back against the shower stall.

    WALLACE
    I have friends, man -- if you cut me...

    WALLACE breaks off, bug-eyed, reacting to something we don't see!

    WALLACE
    What...the...fuck..are you doing???

    INT. GLOBE MOTEL ROOM 44

    RAILLY is pounding on the bathroom door now as, suddenly, it
    opens and COLE steps out, the knife in his right hand, dripping
    with blood.

    RAILLY
    Oh, my God, James. Did you kill him?

    COLE shakes his head "no" as blood oozes from his mouth.

    COLE
    Just...just in case. In case I'm not
    crazy...
    (holds up two bloody molars)
    That's how they find us. By our teeth.
    (a beat, eye contact)
    I don't want them to find me. Ever. I
    don't want to go back.

    RAILLY's astonishment turns to emotion as it dawns on her the
    choice he's made. Given up the future (if it exists, and it's
    looking like it does)! Risking his life to be with her! For
    this brief time! She's overwhelmed, lips trembling, tears
    welling in her eyes. But just then, the SOUNDS of SHOUTS and
    feet THUNDERING up the stairs snap her back to reality.

    INT. STAIRWELL/GLOBE HOTEL

    COPS' boots THUNDER up the stairwell.

    INT. ROOM 44/GLOBE HOTEL

    In between nervous glances toward the door, RAILLY supervises as
    COLE obediently blocks the bathroom door with the bureau.

    RAILLY
    Push it tight!

    WALLACE'S VOICE (from the bathroom)
    NO PROBLEM! I'LL JUST STAY IN HERE!
    DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME.

    INT. 4TH FLOOR HALLWAY/GLOBE HOTEL

    POLICE OFFICERS, led by the PLAINCLOTHES COP, make a cautious
    entrance onto the 4th floor, guns drawn.

    Seedy HOTEL RESIDENTS point to Room 44, then cower back into
    their doorways.

    EXT. GLOBE HOTEL FIRE ESCAPE/ALLEY - DAY

    COLE and RAILLY clatter down the fire-escape, COLE in the lead.
    They come to the end of the metal stairway. It's a long distance
    to the ground. COLE jumps down, turns, reaches up to her.

    She lets herself down to him. Their eyes meet. He holds her in
    his arms for a moment. Then, reluctantly, he puts her down.
    They start running down the alley.

    INT. GLOBE HOTEL FOURTH FLOOR - DAY

    The PLAINCLOTHES COP has his pistol out, his back to the wall
    alongside the open doorway to Room 44. The UNIFORMED OFFICERS
    are backing him up, weapons drawn.

    PLAINCLOTHES COP
    POLICE! THROW YOUR WEAPONS OUT AND
    COME OUTTA THERE!

    No response.

    INT. GLOBE HOTEL ROOM 44

    The PLAINCLOTHES COP charges into the room in a crouch, pistol
    extended in both hands. He pans the gun around the empty room.

    HIS POV: the open window...the blood on the floor.

    WALLACE'S VOICE (from the bathroom)
    HEY! ZAT THE POLICE! I'M AN INNOCENT
    VICTIM IN HERE! I WAS ATTACKED BY A
    COKED-UP WHORE AND A CRAZY DENTIST!

    EXT. BUS STOP/DOWNTOWN - LATE AFTERNOON

    A city bus disgorges a stream of PASSENGERS at a stop in the
    toney downtown shopping district. Among them, RAILLY looks
    furtively left and right, COLE on her heels. She's hidden her
    bruised eye behind sun glasses; he's holding a bloody
    handkerchief to his mouth.

    As he steps to the sidewalk, COLE is overwhelmed by the bustling
    city, the tall downtown buildings. His eyes go up.

    COLE'S POV: a building, towering toward the sky. A building
    with a ledge. The same ledge the lion prowled in the future!!!

    ANGLE ON COLE, shaken, as RAILLY ushers him into the recessed
    entrance to a store.

    RAILLY
    Wait here. I'm going to try that phone
    number. Let's hope it's nothing!

    Dazed by his experience and the flow of SHOPPERS, COLE watches
    her hurry to a pay phone twenty yards away, his view of her made
    intermittent by PEDESTRIANS streaming past him, their FACES
    looming frighteningly close.

    A BUSINESSMAN jostles COLE, forcing him back against the display
    window. Turning, he faces the angry jaws of a BEAR only inches away

    Recovering from a jolt of terror, COLE realizes the BEAR is a life-size
    toy in the display window. Relieved, he looks back at RAILLY.

    COLE'S POV: RAILLY, well out of earshot, speaking earnestly into
    the phone.

    ANGLE ON COLE, startled, as a BUSINESSMAN, mistaking him for a
    panhandler, shoves a dollar into his hand. Confused, COLE stares
    at the dollar, then turns to say something to the retreating
    BUSINESSMAN, but just then he sees RAILLY rushing toward him,
    eyes sparkling with happiness, LAUGHING, ebullient.

    RAILLY
    James! James! It's okay. We're
    insane! We're crazy!

    COLE doesn't know how to respond, but a PASSERBY gives them a look.

    RAILLY
    It's a Carpet Cleaning Company...

    COLE
    A Carpet Cleaning Company?

    RAILLY
    (laughing)
    No superiors! No scientists. No
    people from the future. It's just a
    Carpet Cleaning Company. They have
    voice mail -- you leave a message
    telling them when you want your carpet
    cleaned.

    COLE
    You... you left them a message?

    RAILLY
    (impishly)
    I couldn't resist. I was so relieved.
    Wait'll they hear this nutty woman
    telling them...they better watch out
    for the Army of the Twelve Monkeys...

    Looking at her laughing face, COLE is struck with horror as he
    realizes the truth! He starts to recite...

    COLE
    "The Army of the Twelve Monkeys --
    they're the ones who are going to do
    it. I can't do anything more. The
    police are watching me."

    Now she's stunned. She glances back and sees the phone booth
    twenty yards away.

    RAILLY
    You... you couldn't have heard me.

    COLE
    They got your message, Kathryn. They
    played it for me. It was a bad
    recording...distorted. I didn't
    recognize your voice.

    RAILLY'S eyes fill with horror as she grasps the meaning.

    ANGLE ON A UNIFORMED COP, staring out the window of a POLICE
    CRUISER as it inches along in the bumper to bumper traffic.
    Noticing something, he reaches for his radio.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, spotting the CRUISER, grabbing COLE, pulling him
    into the CROWD.

    RAILLY
    Come on.

    INT. DEPARTMENT STORE/MEN'S DEPARTMENT - 6:00 PM

    RAILLY, whose sun glasses don't really hide her bruised eye, adds
    a man's Hawaiian shirt to the pile of other men's things heaped
    on a counter in front of a very suspicious CLERK.

    RAILLY
    And this.
    (turning)
    Anything else?

    But COLE'S not here. He's a short distance away...staring.

    COLE'S POV: aisle after aisle of eager shoppers and a bounty of
    brand new consumer goods.

    ANGLE ON COLE, remembering another department store, dark and
    full of moldering merchandise.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, turning again to the CLERK.

    RAILLY
    I guess that's it.

    CLERK
    Shall I put this on your account, Ma'am?

    RAILLY
    (producing Wallace's roll of bills)
    No -- I'll pay cash.

    The CLERK stares at the huge roll of bills!

    RAILLY
    What floor are the wigs on, please?

    EXT. PEST CONTROL VAN - NIGHT

    Surrounded by stripped and abandoned vehicles, the VAN, with a
    PEST CONTROL logo on its side, is parked on a trash-littered
    street beside the massive pillars of a towering freeway.

    INT. PARKED PEST CONTROL VAN

    The VAN is packed with SIX ACTIVISTS, SANDY and KWESKIN among
    them, all wearing black. Some of them have climbing gear, tool
    belts, all sorts of paraphernalia. KWESKIN is telling his story.

    KWESKIN
    So then he goes into this incredible riff
    about how his shrink, like, replicated
    his brain while he was in the nut house.
    Turned it into a computer.

    WELLER
    And Fale believed it?

    KWESKIN
    Oh, you know Fale! He's like, "If you
    guys get nailed -- and I'm sure you will --
    I never saw you before in nay life!"

    LAUGHTER from all of them. Then, there's a sharp, rhythmic
    series of RAPS on the side door, a signal.

    POPE quickly slides the door open. It's JEFFREY...grinning.

    Three other activists, GOINES, ICHIOKA, and BRUHNS, stagger out of
    the darkness behind JEFFREY, lugging a huge, squirming GARBAGE BAG.

    The van occupants react with murmurs of "Awwwwwright" and "Far
    out", then they help maneuver the writhing bag into the van.

    Then, JEFFREY and the other three scramble in, too.

    JEFFREY
    Let's do it!

    EXT. VAN/FREEWAY

    The PEST CONTROL VAN lumbers up a ramp and onto the freeway.

    INT. PEST CONTROL VAN/MOVING

    The GARBAGE BAG squirms and grunts as JEFFREY holds a map under a
    flashlight and goes over "the plan" with the other ACTIVISTS.

    JEFFREY
    Okay, that's Stage One. In Stage Two,
    Monkey Four is over here...

    A loud GROAN from the bag distracts the others.

    GOINES
    What's the harm in opening the bag?
    His eyes are taped.

    SANDY
    Yeah, it's cruel leaving him like that.

    JEFFREY
    Ah, but cruelty is his specialty.

    ICHIOKA
    So why should we be like him?

    Shrugging cheerfully, JEFFREY tears open the garbage bag revealing
    DR. MASON, trussed up, duct tape covering his eyes and mouth.

    JEFFREY
    Want the full effect?

    Grinning wickedly, JEFFREY rips the tape from his father's mouth.

    DR. MASON
    Jeffrey? I know it's you, Jeffrey. I
    recognize your voice.

    JEFFREY puts his finger to his lips, silencing everyone.

    DR. MASON
    JEFFREY??? ... Very well. You're out
    of your mind, Jeffrey. I know all
    about your insane plan. That woman --
    your psychiatrist -- she told me.

    JEFFREY raises his eyebrows. This he hadn't expected.

    DR. MASON
    I didn't believe her -- it seemed too crazy
    even for you. But, just in case, I took steps
    to make sure you couldn't do it. I took myself
    out of the loop! I don't have the code any
    more. I don't have access to the virus. So,
    go ahead -- torture me, but you can't extract
    anything of use to yourself.

    The ACTIVISTS are all exchanging puzzled looks.

    JEFFREY
    What...virus?

    DR. MASON
    (spins his head toward Jeffrey)
    She knew about it, Jeffrey. She knew
    you were going to try this.

    JEFFREY
    What virus are we talking about, Dad?

    DR. MASON
    You're insane, Jeffrey.

    JEFFREY
    You "develop" viruses and you're calling
    me insane? Typical. What does this
    virus attack? Don't tell me, you sick
    fuck, it doesn't matter.
    (to the others)
    Have I ever "developed" a virus? Do I
    put helpless animals in cages and measure
    their reactions to electrical stimuli?
    Do I inject radioactive substances into
    living creatures and examine their
    bowel movements? Wow! And I'm crazy!

    DR. MASON
    Please tell me, Jeffrey, what exactly
    are you going to do? I don't have to
    tell you I'm afraid.

    JEFFREY
    THIS IS A FUCKING EXPERIMENT! YOU'RE
    OUR HELPLESS LITTLE TEST ANIMAL, DADDY.
    GOT THAT? NOW -- WHAT FUCKING VIRUS
    HAVE YOU COME UP WITH, YOU DEMENTED
    FUCKING MANIAC?

    INT. MOVIE SCREEN/THEATER - NIGHT

    Spooky BERNARD HERRMAN MUSIC, giant redwoods looming skyward.
    It's DAYTIME in Muir Woods. SCOTTY (JAMES STEWART) AND MADELINE
    (KIM NOVAK) walk toward a display of a cross cut section of a
    redwood tree. We're watching Hitchcock's VERTIGO.

    SCOTTY (up on the screen)
    Here's a cross section of one of the
    old trees that's been cut down.

    They look at the lines of the tree marked with cards that say,
    "BIRTH OF CHRIST", "DISCOVERY OF AMERICA", "MAGNA CARTA SIGNED",
    "1066 - BATTLE OF HASTINGS", and "1930 TREE CUT DOWN".

    ANGLE ON THE THEATER AUDIENCE, empty seats dimly visible in the
    flickering light, a few shadowy MOVIEGOERS scattered here and there.

    ANGLE ON THE SCREEN, MADELINE pointing, saying with profound melancholy.

    MADELINE (up on the screen)
    Somewhere in here I was born. And here
    -- I die. There's only a moment for
    you. You don't notice.

    ANGLE ON THE AUDIENCE, a shadowy COUPLE near the back of the
    theater. WE CAN'T REALLY SEE THEM, but we recognize their VOICES

    RAILLY
    Here, let me help you.

    The theater is briefly illuminated by a very bright scene on the
    screen, revealing enough of COLE and RAILLY for us to see she's
    doing something to his upper lip while he tries to watch the movie.

    COLE
    I think I've seen this movie before.
    When I was a kid. It was on TV.

    RAILLY
    (fussing with his upper lip)
    Shh -- don't talk. Hold still.

    COLE
    (moving his head to see the film)
    I have seen it, but I don't remember
    this part. Funny, it's like what's
    happening to us, like the past. The
    movie never changes -- it can't change
    -- but everytime you see it, it seems
    to be different because you're different
    -- you notice different things.

    RAILLY
    If we can't change anything...because
    it's already happened, then we ought to
    at least smell the flowers.

    COLE
    Flowers! What flowers?

    From the darkness, a MOVIE PATRON makes a SSSSHHHHH shound.

    RAILLY
    (whispering)
    It's an expression. Here...

    She's pulling something from a shopping bag at her feet, placing
    it on COLE'S head, adjusting it...

    COLE
    Why are we doing this?

    RAILLY
    So we can stick our heads out the
    window and feel the wind and listen to
    the music. So we can appreciate what
    we have while we have it. Forgive me,
    psychiatrists don't cry.

    There are tears in her eyes. They discomfit COLE.

    COLE
    But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe you're
    wrong. Maybe we're both crazy.

    RAILLY
    In a few weeks, it will have started or
    it won't. If there are still baseball
    games and traffic jams, armed robberies
    and boring TV shows -- we'll be so
    happy, we'll be glad to turn ourselves
    in to the police.

    SHADOWY MOVIEGOER
    SHHHHHHH

    COLE
    (whispers)
    Where can we hide for a few weeks?

    ANGLE ON THE SCREEN, where SCOTTY and MADELINE are in the foreground,
    the OCEAN behind them.

    RAILLY
    You said you'd never seen the ocean...

    EXT. GORILLA'S PEN/ZOO - NIGHT

    CLOSE ON A GORILLA, by moonlight, angry, a true nightmare vision.

    URGENT WHISPERS off screen, RUSTLING SOUNDS. Then, METAL ON METAL.
    Only now are we aware that the GORILLA is in an outdoor zoo pen
    with phony rocks. Stalking back and forth. Huge. Upset.

    CLANK. CLANK. METAL ON METAL. GRUNTS of effort, then, DR.
    MASON'S VOICE, plaintive, frightened.

    DR. MASON'S VOICE (o.s.)
    What are you doing to me? Where are
    we? Jeffrey, please...

    SANDY'S VOICE (o.s.)
    For God's sake, put the tape back on
    his mouth!

    The GORILLA bellows angrily, beating his chest.

    JEFFREY'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Forget the tape. The monkey's louder than
    he is. You gonna tape the monkey's mouth?

    EXT. PANTHERS' PEN/ZOO - NIGHT

    Under the full moon, PANTHERS pace back and forth, back and
    forth, uttering ominous guttural SNARLS.

    EXT. LION'S PEN/ZOO

    The KING OF BEASTS gives a deep, fierce ROAR. From the darkness,
    unseen ELEPHANTS TRUMPET their response.

    EXT. AVIARIES/ZOO

    A PANDEMONIUM of WINGS RUSTLING, the sharp metallic CLINKING of
    metal on metal, the MUTTER of HUMAN VOICES, then a cacophonous
    CRESCENDO of frenzied SCREECHING as PARROTS, COCKATOOS and other
    EXOTIC BIRDS careen madly in their cages.

    INT. MOVIE THEATER AUDITORIUM

    CLOSE ON COLE, dozing fitfully, as the SOUNDS of SCREAMING BIRDS
    continue. Suddenly, he comes awake with a start...sees the movie
    filling his field of vision.

    HIS POV: the MOVIE SCREEN. TIPPI HEDRIN, overwhelmed by
    screeching BIRDS in an attic in Hitchcock's THE BIRDS.

    ANGLE ON COLE, orienting himself, looking around. Empty seats on
    both sides of him. He's alone. He panics.

    COLE
    Kathryn?!

    INT. THEATER LOBBY

    A lobby poster boasts "Classics 24 Hours A Day" and "Hitchcock
    Festival". PANNING OFF the poster, passing a SNORING USHER, dead
    to the world in an old velvet chair, WE DISCOVER a BRUNETTE in a
    tight dress, just hanging up the lobby pay phone. Turning, she
    reveals heavy make-up, gaudy costume jewelry, and sun glasses.
    She's the BRUNETTE in COLE'S DREAM! Crossing the lobby toward
    the auditorium, it's a pleasure to watch her nice body undulate
    in the tight dress.

    Just then, the auditorium doors burst open and a BLONDE MAN in a
    Hawaiian shirt appears, the man from COLE'S DREAM, except this
    man's moustache is fixed firmly on his upper lip. The BLONDE MAN
    stops, stunned at the sight of the BRUNETTE.

    BRUNETTE
    We're booked on a 9:30 flight to Key West.

    The Brunette is RAILLY, no longer the frazzled professional,
    revealed now by her disguise as a sexy babe. The Blonde Man is
    COLE! He's confused.

    COLE
    You were in my dream just now. I
    didn't recognize you.

    RAILLY
    Well, you look pretty different, too.

    COLE
    I mean in my dream -- I didn't realize
    it was you. Then...I woke up and I...I
    thought you were gone.

    RAILLY
    (studies him seriously)
    I remember you...like this. I feel
    I've known you before. I feel I've
    always known you.

    Their eyes lock. Suddenly, she backs up, gently maneuvering him
    with her, past the sleeping USHER, to and through an unlocked,
    unmarked door, then closing it behind them.

    INT. STORAGE ROOM/MOVIE THEATER

    RAILLY and COLE are in a dimly lit cluttered storage room. She
    kisses him hungrily amid the brooms, plastic trash barrels, other
    janitorial items. COLE responds to her passion as they move
    deeper into the room, its walls covered with old movie posters.
    Tearing at each other's clothes, they collapse on a rolled
    theater curtain among stacks of ancient theater seats.

    EXT. SUBURBS - DAWN

    The red rim of the rising sun is just becoming visible beyond the
    silhouetted roofs of an upper middle-class suburban neighborhood.
    The early light is so vague that when a huge SIBERIAN TIGER pads
    across a neatly-trimmed lawn, he's more a shadowy vision than
    reality. Did we really see him at all?

    EXT. CONSTRUCTION SITE - DAWN

    The rising sun flares behind the towering silhouette of an unfinished
    building, deserted in the early morning light. High up, a MONKEY
    his head around a girder.

    Four stories below, other MONKEYS are climbing.

    EXT. SHOPPING MALL - DAWN

    Deserted in the first light of dawn, the stores face each other
    across a broad promenade with blank staring windows.

    Nothing happens. For a long moment. Then, an AFRICAN BULL
    ELEPHANT appears, turning the corner, lumbering toward us along
    the promenade, raising his trunk to TRUMPET triumphantly to the
    other ELEPHANTS trotting into view behind him.

    INT. TAXICAB/CITY STREETS - EARLY MORNING

    A fiftyish WOMAN CABBIE with white hair and a Southern twang is
    at the wheel of the cab.

    WOMAN CABBlE
    What time's your flight, friends?

    In the back seat, COLE, in the blonde wig and moustache, looks to
    his companion, the sexy babe in sun glasses and heavy make-up, RAILLY.

    RAILLY
    Nine thirty

    WOMAN CABBIE
    Might be tight.

    RAILLY
    (startled, checks her watch)
    Tight? My watch says 7:30.

    WOMAN CABBIE
    On your normal mornin', okay, plenty a
    time, but today, gotta take inta account
    your Army-of-the-Twelve-Monkeys factor.

    RAILLY
    What? What did you say?

    WOMAN CABBIE
    Twelve Monkeys, honey. Guess you folks
    didn't turn on your radio this morning.

    COLE and RAILLY exchange a quick look.

    WOMAN CABBIE
    Bunch a weirdoes let all the animals outta
    the zoo last night. Then they locked up
    this big shot scientist in one of the cages.
    Scientist's own kid was one a the ones did it!

    RAILLY and COLE stare at the cabbie, stunned.

    WOMAN CABBlE
    Now they got animals all over the
    place. Buncha zebras shut down the
    thruway 'bout an hour ago and some
    kinda thing called an "e-mu" it's got
    traffic blocked for miles over on 22.

    Flabbergasted, RAILLY'S eyes suddenly fill with hope.

    RAILLY
    That's what they were up to! Freeing
    animals!

    COLE
    On the walls -- they meant the animals
    when they said, "We did it."

    WOMAN CABBIE
    You can hear it on the radio all the
    stations...

    As the WOMAN CAEBIE switches on the RADIO, RA:LLY points and COLE
    follows her look.

    COLE'S POV: two CHEETAHS, sleek and magnificent against the
    cityscape, streaking past the cab at ninety mph!

    ANNOUNCER/RADIO (o.s.)
    In the meantime, numerous animal rights
    activists have joined the chorus
    condemning what they're calling the
    "loose canon" activities of Jeffrey
    Mason and his Army of the Twelve
    Monkeys.
    RIGHTS ACTIVIST/RADIO (o.s.)
    Can these fools seriously believe that
    releasing a captive animal into an
    urban environment is being compassionate
    to the animal? It's mindlessly cruel,
    almost as indefensible as holding the
    animal in captivity in the first place.

    RAILLY and COLE are watching FLAMINGOS cross the sky against a
    backdrop of skyscrapers in silhouette.

    RAILLY
    Maybe it's going to be okay.

    INT. TICKET COUNTER/AIRPORT TERMINAL - MORNING

    CLOSY ON copies of the mug shot of COLE and a photo of RAILLY
    while the airport P.A. SYSTEM DRONES in the b.g..

    REVEAL a DETECTIVE, giving the flyers to the uniformed SUPERVISOR
    at one end of the ticket counter.

    DETECTIVE
    Tell your people if they spot either
    one of them, not to try and apprehend
    then. They should notify us and...

    ANGLE ON RAILLY AND COLE, thirty yards away, entering the terminal.

    P.A. SYSTEM
    -- Flight 531 for Chicago is now ready
    for boarding at Gate Seventeen.

    ANGLE ON COLE, reacting to the P.A., stopping, seeing the
    bustling airport lobby.

    COLE
    I know this place! ... This is my dream.

    RAILLY
    Airports all look the same. Maybe
    it's...
    (turning, reacting)
    James! Your moustache! It's slipping.

    But COLE isn't listening. He's looking around, mesmerized.

    COLE
    It's not just my dream. I was actually
    here! I remember now. My parents
    brought me to meet my uncle. About a
    week or two before...before...before
    everybody started dying.

    RAILLY glances around nervously.

    RAILLY'S POV: two UNIFORMED POLICEMEN, strolling through the
    lobby, their eyes scanning the faces of TRAVELERS.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, pulling a small tube from her purse.

    RAILLY
    They may be looking for us, James.
    (placing the tube in his hand)
    Use this. You can fix it in the Men's Room.

    COLE
    (confounded)
    I was here...as a kid. I think you
    were here, too. But you...looked just
    like you look now.

    RAILLY
    (getting desperate)
    James, if we're identified, they're
    going to send us someplace...but not to
    Key West!

    COLE
    (snaps out of it, hand to moustache)
    Right! You're right. I have to fix this.

    RAILLY
    (indicating a sign)
    I'll get the tickets and meet you... in
    the Gift Shop.

    COLE follows her look, nods, then heads for the Men's Room as
    RAILLY, in sun glasses, gaudy outfit, high heels, starts clip
    clopping toward the ticket counter, her ass attracting admiring
    glances.

    INT. TELEPHONES/LOBBY - DAY

    BUSINESS TRAVELERS huddle over pay phones, talking earnestly, as
    COLE walks past on his way to the Men's Room.

    Seeing an unoccupied phone, COLE hesitates, considers it. Coming
    to a decision, he reaches into his pocket, pulls out some change.

    INT. TZCKET COUNTER/TERMINAL

    CLOSE ON the flyer of COLE and RAILLY taped under the counter,
    hidden from the customers, but in clear view of the TICKET AGENT
    who has just finished serving a PORTLY GENTLEMAN. The GENTLEMAN
    walks away.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, stepping up to the counter, smiling, looking
    nothing like the Railly on the flyer.

    RAILLY
    Judy Simmons. I have reservations for
    Key West.

    INT. PAY PHONES/TERMINAL

    COLE is speaking into the phone very low, very private, very intense.

    COLE
    Listen, I don't know whether you're
    there or not. Maybe you just clean
    carpets. If you do, you're lucky --
    you're gonna live a long, happy life.
    But if you other guys exist and you're
    picking this up -- forget about the
    Army of The Twelve Monkeys -- they
    didn't do it. It was a mistake'
    Someone else did it. The Army of The
    Twelve Monkeys are just dumb kids
    playing revolutionaries. It was
    someone else!

    COLE looks around nervously, catches a BUSINESSMAN at the next
    phone looking away quickly. COLE touches his loose moustache as
    he averts his face and speaks into the phone in an urgent whisper.

    COLE
    I've done my job. I did what you wanted.
    Good luck. I'm not coming back!

    COLE hangs up the phone, looks around, catches a few stares.
    Averting his face, he heads for the Men's Room.

    INT. TICKET COUNTER - DAY

    The TICKET AGENT is counting out a stack of bills.

    TICKET AGENT
    Don't see a lot of this... cash.

    RAILLY
    It's...a long story.

    TICKET AGENT
    (smiles, hands over the tickets)
    They'll begin boarding in about twenty
    minutes. Have a nice flight, Mrs. Simmons.

    Turning to go, RAILLY fumbles the tickets while trying to put
    them in her purse and they flutter to the floor. As she kneels
    to retrieve them, WE SEE the long line of waiting TRAVELERS from
    the waist down. WE SEE a familiar Chicago Bulls Sports Bag
    resting on the floor beside sneakers and gaudy baggy pants.
    we've seen this outfit before...in COLE'S dream...on MR. PONYTAIL!

    INT. MEN'S ROOM/AIRPORT - DAY

    The P.A. DRONES as CCLE, head down, lingers at a sink, washing
    and rewashing his hands while another TRAVELER finishes drying
    his hands, gives COLE a quizzical look, then leaves.

    Quickly, COLE glances around, checks the seemingly empty Men's
    Room, then takes the tube of adhesive from his pocket, puts some
    goop under the loose edge of his moustache and presses it firmly
    against his face as he leans close to the mirror.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Got yourself a prob, Bob?

    COLE whirls, looks for the source of the VOICE. Nothing! Until
    he spots shoes peeking from dropped trousers indicating an
    occupied stall. It must be him!

    COLE
    Leave me alone! I made a report. I
    didn't have to do that.

    RASPY VOICE (o.s.)
    Point of fact -- you don't belong here.
    It's not permitted to let you stay.

    A toilet FLUSHES in the "occupied" stall. COLE'S answer is loud
    and defiant.

    COLE
    This is the present. This is not the past.
    This is not the future. This is right now!

    A PLUMP BUSINESSMAN emerges from the "occupied" stall, gives COLE
    a wary look and a wide berth as he heads for a sink.

    COLE
    I'm staying here! You got that? You
    can't stop me!

    PLUMP MAN
    (high pitched voice)
    Anything you say, chief. It's none of
    my business.

    COLE looks dismayed. This guy couldn't be "THE VOICE"! And there
    are no feet showing under the other stalls. Did he imagine it?

    INT. TICKET COUNTER - DAY

    The Chicago Bulls bag! It's on the counter in front of the
    TICKET AGENT who's reviewing a stack of tickets in awe...

    TICKET AGENT
    Woooo-eeee. San Francisco, New
    Orleans, Rio de Janeiro, Rome,
    Kinshasa, Karachi, Bangkok, Peking!
    That's some trip you're taking, sir,
    All in one week!

    MR. PONYTAIL (o.s.)
    Business.

    TICKET AGENT
    (handing over the tickets)
    Have a good one, sir.

    INT. TERMINAL LOBBY

    COLE emerges from the Men's Room, shaken, paranoid. He glances
    around nervously. Then, keeping his head down, he starts walking
    toward the Gift Shop. Before he gets more than a few steps,
    someone suddenly grabs his shoulder from behind.

    FAMILIAR VOICE (o.s.)
    You gotta be crazy, man!

    COLE whirls, finds himself facing a Puerto Rican youth in an L.A.
    Raiders jacket, a sideways baseball cap, and mirrored sun glasses

    COLE
    Jo...Jose????

    JOSE
    Pulling out the tooth, man, that was
    nuts! Here, take this.

    JOSE tries to slip COLE a 9mm pistol. Astonished, COLE resists!

    COLE
    What? What for? Are you crazy?

    Frustrated, JOSE conceals the gun but keeps a grip on COLE'S arm.

    JOSE
    Me? Are you kiddin? You're the one!
    You were a hero, man. They gave you a
    pardon! And whadda you do? You come
    back and fuck with your teeth! Wow!

    COLE
    How did you find me?

    JOSE
    The phone call, man. The phone call.

    COLE
    The call I just made? Five minutes ago?

    JOSE
    Hey, five minutes ago, thirty years ago!
    Yes, that phone call. I been in training
    for this a couple a months now -- ever
    since I got back from that... "weird"
    war we were in. You remember that?
    (pressing the pistol on Cole)
    Here, take it, man! You could still be
    a hero if you'd cooperate!

    INT. GIFT SHOP/TERMINAL - DAY

    RAILLY takes a travel book on Key West from a rack, considers it,
    includes it with several magazines she's holding. She doesn't
    notice MR. PONYTAZL enter the Gift Shop behind her!

    The P.A. System DRONES flight info as RAILLY checks her watch and
    frowns. It's getting late and where's Cole? She turns, heads
    for the cash register to make her purchases.

    MR. PONYTAIL, seen from behind, is at the cash register already.
    He sets a newspaper on the counter and searches for change.

    The paper features a banner headline..."ANIMALS SET FREE" and a
    sub head..."PROMINENT SCIENTIST FOUND LOCKED IN GORILLA CAGE"
    over a photo of DR. MASON being released from the cage and
    another photo of a GORILLA perched atop a parked car.

    Stepping in line behind MR. PONYTAIL, RAILLY checks her watch
    again. Then, MR. PONYTAIL, having paid, turns to go and RAILLY
    looks up and sees his face. though it is not visible to us.

    Startled, RAILLY frowns. Does she know this man?

    MR. PONYTAIL pauses for a moment, considering the babe in the
    shades, gaudy earrings, the tight skirt, and high heels.

    RAILLY doesn't recognize the man, but we do! He's DR. MASON'S
    ASSISTANT, DR. PETERS...the man who attended RAILLY's lecture!

    Smiling, DR. PETERS steps around RAILLY and exits the Gift Shop.

    Still puzzled, RAILLY puts her purchases on the counter and the
    CLERK starts ringing them up as a DELIVERY MAN comes in and drops
    a bundle of newspapers at her feet.

    RAILLY'S POV: the front page shows a photo of three frightened
    GIRAFFES in freeway gridlock under a headline proclaiming, "TERRORISTS
    CREATE CHAOS". Further down are two more photos...DR. MASON in the
    gorilla cage and a file photo of DR. MASON in his lab.

    CLOSE ON THE SHOT OF DR. MASON in his lab. There's someone else
    in the picture. It's a man wearing a lab coat and a PONYTAIL!

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, reacting, suddenly remembering!

    MEMORY FLASHBACK! INT. RECEPTION ROOM/BREITROSE HALL - NIGHT

    RAILLY looks up from the book she's signing and sees DR. PETERS.

    DR. PETERS
    Isn't it obvious that "Chicken Little"
    represents the sane vision and that
    Homo Sapiens' motto, "Let's go shopping!"
    is the cry of the true lunatic?

    INT. GIFT SHOP - DAY

    RAILLY, stunned, stares in the direction PETERS/PONYTAIL went.

    RAILLY
    Oh, my God!

    P.A SYSTEM
    -- flight 764 for San Francisco is now
    ready for boarding at Gate 36.

    INT. LOBBY - DAY

    In the confusion of TRAVELERS streaming in different directions,
    COLE hurries toward the Gift Shop while JOSE struggles to keep up.

    JOSE
    Coma on, Cole, don't be an asshole.
    (then, blurting it out)
    Look, I got orders, man! You know what
    I'm sposed to do if you don't go along?
    I'm sposed to shoot the lady! You got
    that? They said, "If Cole don't obey
    this time, Garcia, you gotta shoot his
    girlfriend!"

    COLE stops in his tracks, blown away, too stunned to speak.

    JOSE
    I got no choice, man. These are my
    orders. Just take it, okay?

    COLE accepts the gun this time, resigned now. They've got him.

    COLE
    This part isn't about the virus, is it?

    JOSE
    Hey, man...

    COLE
    It's about obeying, about doing what
    you're told.

    JOSE
    They gave you a pardon, man. Whatdaya
    want?

    COLE
    Who am I supposed to shoot?

    Just then, RAILLY rushes up to COLE, not even noticing JOSE.

    RAILLY
    James! Thank God! I thought you'd
    disappeared. Listen, I think I know
    who it is! I saw him! It's Dr. Mason's
    assistant. An apocalypse nut! The next
    flight to San Francisco leaves from Gate 38.
    If he's there, it has to be him.

    JOSE, having heard this, steps back into the crowd as RAILLY
    grabs COLE and pulls him toward the Security Check Points.

    COLE
    I love you, Kathryn. Remember that.

    She doesn't hear him or see the look of doom in his eyes.

    RAILLY
    Maybe we can stop him. Maybe we can
    actually do something.

    INT. SECURITY CHECK POINT/TERMINAL - DAY

    A young boy of nine passes through the magnetic arch grinning.
    YOUNG COLE! Exactly as he appears in the dream!

    He joins his PARENTS, who are only visible from their chests
    down, and they continue along the concourse. WE LINGER and
    DISCOVER two DETECTIVES watching TRAVELERS as they pass through
    the magnetic arch and retrieve their bags from the X-ray machine,
    comparing their faces to photos of COLE and RAILLY.

    ANGLE ON A SECURITY OFFICER, watching the x-ray monitor.

    ANGLE ON THE MONITOR, showing the X-RAY IMAGE of a sports bag moving
    along the conveyer belt. The bag contains some strange objects.

    ANGLE ON THE SECURITY OFFICER, reacting.

    SECURITY OFFICER
    Excuse me, sir. Would you mind letting me
    have a look at the contents of your bag?

    ANGLE ON DR. PETERS, coming through the magnetic arch, reacting.

    DR. PETERS
    Me? Oh, yes, of course. My samples.
    I have the appropriate papers.

    INT. END OF LINE/SECURITY CHECK POINT

    RAILLY AND COLE arrive at the very long suddenly stalled line of
    TRAVELERS waiting to pass through security.

    RAILLY
    Oh, God, we don't have time for this.

    ANGLE ON THE SECURITY CHECK POINT, where DR. PETERS unpacks his
    Bulls bag, pulls out six metal cylinders along with a change of
    clothes and a Walkman.

    DR. PETERS
    Biological samples. I have the
    paperwork right here.

    DR. PETERS produces a sheaf of official papers while the SECURITY
    OFFICER examines one of the tubes, turning it over in his hands.

    SECURITY OFFICER
    I'm going to have to ask you to open
    this, sir.

    DR. PETERS
    Open it?
    (blinks stupidly, then)
    Of course.

    DR. PETERS takes the metal cylinder and starts opening it.

    There's a SOUND of VOICES RAISED behind them. DR. PETERS pays no
    attention, but the SECURITY OFFICER turns toward the NOISE.

    SECURITY OFFICER'S POV: RAILLY, trying to explain something to a
    SECOND SECURITY OFFICER.

    ANGLE ON THE TWO DETECTIVES, nearby, showing interest in the
    commotion.

    ANGLE ON DR. PETERS, oblivious to the fuss, pulling a closed
    glass tube out of the metal cylinder.

    DR. PETERS
    Here! You see? Biological! Check the
    papers -- it's all proper. I have a
    permit.

    SECURITY OFFICER
    It's empty!

    Indeed, it looks like a sealed clear glass tube with nothing in it.

    DR. PETERS
    Well, yes, to be sure, it looks empty!
    But I assure you, it's not.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, at the end of the line, arguing with the SECOND
    SECURITY OFFICER.

    RAILLY
    Please listen to me -- this is very urgent!

    SECOND SECURITY OFFICER
    You'll have to get in line, ma'am.

    TRAVELER
    We're all in a hurry, lady. What's so
    special about you?

    ANGLE ON DR. PETERS, producing the glass tubes from the other
    metal cylinders as the SECURITY OFFICER examines the papers.

    DR. PETERS
    You see! Also invisible to the naked eye.

    A beat. OR. PETERS grins suddenly, opens one of the glass tubes,
    and waves it under the SECURITY OFFICER'S nose!

    DR. PETERS
    It doesn't even have an odor.

    The SECURITY OFFICER glances up, sees what DR. PETERS is doing,
    and smiles as he hands the papers back to the scientist.

    SECURITY OFFICER
    That's not necessary, sir. Here you
    go. Thanks for your cooperation. Have
    a good flight.

    Hastily, DR. PETERS snatches up all the tubes and cylinders and
    shoves them back into his gym bag.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, raging as the SECOND SECURITY OFFICER jabs her
    with his finger.

    SECOND SECURITY OFFICER
    Who are you calling a "moron"?

    COLE
    Get your hands off her!

    The SECOND SECURITY OFFICER stiffens for trouble.

    ANGLE ON THE DETECTIVES, watching the fuss, ready to get
    involved. Suddenly, the FIRST DETECTIVE frowns.

    FIRST DETECTIVE9S POV: COLE'S moustache is slipping. COLE
    senses it, reaches up to touch it, catches the DETECTIVE'S look.
    For half a second their eyes meet, then COLE looks away.

    ANGLE ON DR. PETERS, hurrying away.

    SECURITY OFFICER'S VOICE (o.s.}
    HOLD IT! JUST A MOMENT.

    DR. PETERS freezes, turns, ashen.

    The SECURITY OFFICER is retrieving a pair of jockey shorts from
    the floor beside the search table. He waves them at DR. PETERS.

    DR. PETERS hurries back for his underpants.

    ANGLE ON COLE, trying to keep his head turned away as he
    confronts the SECURITY OFFICER.

    COLE
    I said, get your hands off her. She's
    not a criminal. She's a doctor...a
    psychiatrist.

    RAILLY looks alarmed at that.

    ANGLE ON THE DETECTIVES, coming this way. The FIRST DETECTIVE
    has the photos in his hand.

    ANGLE OW DR. PETERS, bagging his jockey shorts, then starting
    hastily down the windowed concourse toward the gates.

    ANGLE ON RAZZLY, suddenly spotting DR. PETERS!

    RAILLY
    THERE HE IS! HE'S CARRYING A DEADLY
    VIRUS! STOP HIM!

    ANGLE ON COLE, following RAILLY'S look, seeing MR. PONYTAIL, THE
    MAN FROM HIS DREAM!

    ANGLE ON DR. PETERS, frightened, glancing back, walking faster.

    RAILLY (o.s.)
    PLEASE, SOMEBODY -- STOP HIM!

    ANGLE ON DETECTIVES, reaching RAILLY and COLE.

    FIRST DETECTIVE
    (raising his badge)
    Police Officers. Would you step over
    here, please.

    ANGLE ON COLE, spotting something behind the DETECTIVES!

    COLE'S POV: SCARFACE, dressed like a "businessman"! He gives
    COLE a cold look.

    A beat. COLE lunges at the SECOND DETECTIVE, knocking him off
    balance, then sprints toward the magnetic arch and through it.

    The ALARM goes off!!!!

    The FIRST SECURITY OFFICER tries to stop COLE, but COLE knocks
    him aside like a rag doll.

    ANGLE ON DR. PETERS, fifty yards up the concourse, glancing back.

    ANGLE ON COLE, pulling his pistol.

    ANGLE ON THE SECOND SECURITY OFFICER.

    FIRST SECURITY OFFICER
    HE'S GOT A GUN!

    ANGLE ON THE FIRST DETECTIVE, raising his pistol at COLE.

    FIRST DETECTIVE
    STOP OR I'LL SHOOT!

    ANGLE ON COLE, gun in hand, sprinting along the concourse toward
    DR. PETERS as frightened TRAVELERS SCREAM and dive for cover.

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, standing at a concourse window, watching a
    plane land, flanked by his parents whose faces we don't see.

    IT'S SUDDENLY AS IF THE DREAM IS HAPPENING IN REAL LIFE!!! THE
    SAME MOKENTS INTERSPERSED WITH "NEW" MOMENTS FROM THE POV OF
    YOUNG COLE who, hearing the commotion, turns just as DR. PETERS
    hurries by. DR. PETERS bumps into YOUNG COLE and reacts by
    pulling his Bulls bag close to his body and calling...

    DR. PETERS
    WATCH IT!

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, wide eyed, watching...

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: a BLONDE MAN. dashing up the concourse, his
    moustache slipping over his lip, a pistol in his hand.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: the FIRST DETECTIVE aims, looking for a clear
    shot in the crowded passageway.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: a BRUNETTE in flashy clothes, gaudy earrings,
    high heels, and sun glasses SCREAMS...

    BRUNETTE (RAILLY)
    N0OOOOO0O!!!!!!

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: the FIRST DETECTIVE, firing! CRACK!

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: the BLONDE MAN, shuddering, staggering, falling.

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, stunned, as his PARENTS try to shield him.

    MOTHER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    My God! They shot that man!

    Mesmerized, YOUNG COLE watches the BRUNETTE rush to the BLONDE
    MAN, kneel beside him, minister to his bloody wound.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: the BLONDE MAN, fatalistically reaching up
    and tenderly touching the BRUNETTE'S cheek, touching her tears.
    (WE'VE SEEN THIS EXACT IMAGE IN COLE'S DREAM, A POWERFUL MOMENT,
    UNFOLDING UNNATURALLY SLOWLY, OPENING LIKE A FLOWER.)

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, not able to hear their words, but he can see
    emotion as the BLONDE MAN tries to tell the sobbing BRUNETTE something.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: PARAMEDICS, breaking the spell, pushing the
    BRUNETTE aside as they crouch beside the BLONDE MAN.

    FATHER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Come along, son, this is no place for us.

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, as his FATHER'S ARM drapes over his shoulder,
    steering him. YOUNG COLE turns to look back as he's led away.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: the PARAMEDICS, exchanging glances, shrugging
    helplessly. It's too late. The BLONDE MAN is dead.

    YOUNG COLE sees the BRUNETTE, her face streaked with tears,
    suddenly turn and look around, scanning the crowd, searching for
    something. POLICE OFFICERS approach her, say something to her.
    Even as she responds, her eyes continue to scan the concourse.

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, being hurried toward the lobby by his PARENTS
    (whose faces remain out of view). He can't help sneaking another
    look back.

    YOUNG COLE'S POV: POLICE, handcuffing a distracted, unresisting
    RAILLY. Even now, she continues to look around almost frantically.

    Suddenly, her gaze falls on YOUNG COLE and she reacts...she's
    found what she's looking for!

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, reacting to the intensity of her look.

    ANGLE ON RAILLY, her eyes speaking to the boy across the crowded
    concourse.

    ANGLE ON YOUNG COLE, overwhelmed by the look.

    FATHER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Hurry up, son.

    With a last lingering look toward the mysterious BRUNETTE, YOUNG
    COLE turns away, tears welling in his eyes. WE MOVE IN...CLOSE...
    CLOSE...CLOSER...on his eyes. WE WANT TO KNOW WHAT THE TEAR MEANS,
    BUT THERE IS NO WAY TO TELL. WE DON'T KNOW WHAT HE IS THINKING,
    BUT WE KNOW VERY WELL WHAT HE WILL REMEMBER!

    MOTHER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    Pretend it was just a bad dream, Jimmy.

    INT. 747 CABIN - DAY

    DR. PETERS closes the door to the overhead luggage rack
    containing his Chicago Bulls bag and takes his seat. Next to
    him, a FELLOW TRAVELER, unseen, says...

    FELLOW TRAVELER'S VOICE (o.s.)
    It's obscene, all the violence, all the
    lunacy. Shootings even at airports now.
    You might say...we're the next endangered
    species...human beings!

    CLOSE ON DR. PETERS, smiling affably, turning to his neighbor.

    DR. PETERS
    I think you're right. sir. I think
    you've hit the nail on the head.

    DR. PETERS' POV: the FELLOW TRAVELER, a silver haired gentleman
    in a business suit, offering his hand congenially. DR. PETERS
    doesn't know who this man is, but we do. It's the ASTROPHYSICIST!

    ASTROPHYSICIST
    Jones is my name. I'm in insurance.

    EXT. PARKING LOT/AIRPORT

    As YOUNG COLE'S PARENTS (seen only as sleeves and torsos) usher
    YOUNG COLE into their station wagon, the boy hesitates, looks
    back, watches a 747 climb into the sky.

    FADE OUT:

  • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

    Thu, February 21, 2008 - 9:38 AM
    am i the only one who finds Exodus' posting obnoxious? Moderator: can that be deleted?
    • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

      Thu, February 21, 2008 - 7:13 PM
      agreed
      • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

        Thu, February 21, 2008 - 7:25 PM
        I am with Sean.
        I am reading up on Orisha and Jambalaya by Luisha Teish. And I just bought her book of poetry.
        But I have a bunch of unread books, just now I cannot make up my mind which one to start.
        I am also halfway through Pallieter by Felix Timmermans, but I have read it so many times that I can read it in chunks.
        • Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

          Fri, February 22, 2008 - 7:04 PM
          yeah get that out of here
          takes up all our room

          please remove it

          dude - exodus - send a link to your work if you want to share it , darn it
          • Unsu...
             

            Re: It's 2008 baby - what u reading?

            Fri, February 22, 2008 - 7:50 PM
            haha...
            I saw the full exodus posted here....and thought it would be awful if *everyone* on this tribe decided to add such huge posts.
            Anyway....saw that Chris Marker movie, and thought it was the most insufferably pretentious shit I had ever sat through.
            Perhaps I am not intellectual or artsy enough to *get* it.
            Yeah...delete the damn thing......

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