- INT. CONNING TOWER - (EVENING)
- They climb, all wearing their stylish warm submariner crew-clothes with
winter jackets; Harry leads, with ropes
- And opens the top-hatch;--
DANIEL
- (half back unto hostess)
- That was delicious,-- thank you, Gwen: I wish we could have taken more than
two days' worth.
HARRY
- (half out; face down-in)
- While we're on liberty here in port, we can always return to the submarine
for more, Dan.
- INT. ICE CAVERN - DOCK - CONNING FLOODLIGHT (CONTINUOUS)
- Acoustically live decked with aluminum; floodlight swaying, the submarine
leans-and-bobs slowly at dock; Harry exits
- THE SUBMARINE CONNING MOUND
- Trots down
jumps to the dock
and runs the length of the submarine, tying
mooring-lines;
- Daniel out, watching Gwen climb out; Peter at her heels
DANIEL
- (mock-shivers)
- Yup-yes-sir-ee-bob: It's a co-o-old down-south to-day.
PETER
- (sniffs-up, steps out)
- Actually it seems rather warm in here: Must be a lot colder outside the ice
cave, in the wind.
- And he closes the top-hatch,--
- And spins the hatch-lock a full turn;
GWEN
- (espies, points)
- There's a doorway over there against the metal wall.
- They steady-step down the submarine's extended top
- THE DOCK
- And jump to, as Harry returns
PETER
- Gwen's spotted a doorway: You ready to explore, what's in-store?
HARRY
- (smiles bravely)
- I'm always ready for the big game.
- Looking about, they cross the CREAKING DECK, for the door
- And finally nearing, speak again, quieter:
DANIEL
- What if it's locked? Imagine coming this far, around the Earth, and the
door's locked
!
- Gwen jangles new keys.
DANIEL
- (over-emotes)
- Youu'rre kidding?!
GWEN
- These were in the Captain's Quarter desk.
- AT THE DOOR
DANIEL
- (tests the doorknob)
- Yup: Locked.
- Harry holds a flashlight to the keyhole in the wall next to the doorhandle
while Gwen tries her keys--
HARRY
- (snide)
- Looks like they do things a little differently down south, here.
PETER
- Okay, No jokes about southpaws
Some of my best friends are southpaws.
GWEN
- (tiny cutely)
- Mieuw.
- This key works,--
- The door CLICKS OPEN, to a dark entryway
- Harry first, they enter swinging their flashlights about
- INT. LABORATORY - ENTRY CORRIDOR - UNLIT (AS CONTINUOUS)
- Conning floodlight strafes-in as their flashlight spots skip across the
walls;
DANIEL
- (quietly)
- Wish they had lights in here.
- ALL-CEILING LIGHTS COME-ON full;-- They halt, squinting:
DANIEL
- (stifles)
- Yipes! Spoke too soon.
- Aluminum walls, floors, ceiling, corridors stretch to dim
GWEN
- It's huge.
HARRY
- Sure is.-- What exotic experiments could be stored in here?
PETER
- Let's explore;- Shall we?!
DANIEL
- I'm game.
HARRY
- Better check what's here before you say that
DANIEL
- Just crossing a frozen-rain ford
- They stroll on, looking about; doors, some figure-labeled
- And more corridors lead off figures-and-arrows at corners
DANIEL
- (ponders)
- A pedestrian could spend a lifetime opening doors
HARRY
- That's the nice part about science: It just keeps getting better,-- and
no-one is waiting for us.
DANIEL
- The cold chill,-- right!?
HARRY
- The lack of a reception party: This is the South Pole;-- They don't get many
visitors, to ignore.
PETER
- Okay, guys: Ease-up on the virtual protocols: Their summer is over.
- A LARGE LIGHTED RECEPTION AREA
- Animal artifacts; full-size glass-encased taxidermies of dinosaurs and
less-descript creatures, situated center;
- They spread:- Gwen wanders to a large diagram on the wall;
- Daniel diverts and routes to a piglike reptilian.
DANIEL
- (invents as reading)
- Piggo-potamus-rerun'y-sorish-wrex: Eats left-overs; Lounges on trendy
pre-Jurassic muck; Lays dark brown eggs with a curly tail and watches all-night
B-movies
- Harry (MCU) face-to-face in awe at a towering corpse-like fleet-footed
dinosaur taxidermy--
HARRY
- This big game, looks too realistic, with cracked skin, dried eyeballs
DANIEL
- Is there a date on it?
HARRY
- 18-61, if you want to believe A.D.
GWEN
- (invites politely)
- Here's a directory.
- They join-up at her proto-linguistic-worded directory
DANIEL
- (mock-dejectedly)
- It, figures: Foreign, language
GWEN
- The pictures help:-- We're here,--
- (traces a course)
- And this leads to another exit, And to a vehicle of some kind.
- She leads-off
they follow
into
- ANOTHER CORRIDOR
DANIEL
- Okay: So what do we find? A museum.
Wouldn't they move these objects to
some stateside, museum?
HARRY
- I've seen enough museums to know they didn't, haven't, or can't yet.
DANIEL
- Then we must presume these are not ordinary archaeological diggings.
HARRY
- We could presume they'd disorient the public, if exposed too soon.
DANIEL
- (counters)
- Or we might presume they aren't from this Earth.
HARRY
- (re-counters)
- Or, we might presume
No
- (reconsiders a beat)
- Makes no difference if they were found frozen only in the Polar ice.
PETER
- But that's the simpler explanation, Harry
With fewer presumptions the
better explanation-- Occam's razor.
DANIEL
- (grins, counters)
- If, we presume Occam's Razor counts as exactly one presumption, Itself.
HARRY
- (grins, rebuts)
- I always thought Occam's Razor was three, presumptions: First presumes there
exists a finite covering of presumptions on infinite reality,- lest we add a
finite to infinity.
Second presumes every equivalent system of explanation has
the same count of component presumptions.
Thirdly, presumes
- (quieter, more to Gwen)
- Think this is it?
- A WINDOWED ACCESS DOOR
- Gwen glances in, then relooks about
DANIEL
- (completes)
-
what I, meant: The third presumes reality itself is not simpler than every
explanation including Occam's Razor
lest we mis-take reality.
- (a withheld grin)
GWEN
- (looking in again)
- This must be it.
- She opens the door to the
- INT. CORRIDOR TO GANGPLANK, MISSILE SILO - (AS CONTINUOUS)
- Inside, they follow a narrow winding corridor to
- A GLASS-WRAPPED GANGPLANK
- And cross, looking out up-down the windows: an immense ten-story-deep
cavern, housing an equally-tall rocket vehicle
DANIEL
- (tilts head sideways)
- Whoa: This is no submarine --unless they found a way to tilt seawater
sideways, too
- (a beat)
- Try a rocketship, even to the moon.
HARRY
- No sign it belongs to NASA, nor the Russians,- And it must cost a
half-fortune more to launch from a Pole.
DANIEL
- None of this belongs to NASA,-- nor the U.S.A. Not even that submarine.
PETER
-
Did smell like international air.
- THE MOON ROCKET PORTAL
- Gwen opens it and steps sideways into a strait passageway
- And Peter last, closes the door behind.
- INT. MOON ROCKET, STRAIT PASSAGEWAY - (AS CONTINUOUS)
- POV: Walking sideways alternate-faced passing A SIDE ROOM:
DANIEL
- (mock-strains)
- N'w y've d'n'-it, Gw'n: Th't's one sm'll st'p f'r m'n,- 'nd one giant
squ'ze, f'r m'nk'nd.
HARRY
- (turns head to look)
- Maybe space aliens have one leg in front, of the other one behind.
PETER
- A real, Egyptian, hieroglyphicist.
- AT THE CONTROL ROOM
GWEN
- (stops)
- Here it is, guys: The control-room: With chairs and computers, Daniel.
- She enters directly, while they peer in
to follow
DANIEL
- (mock-space-cadet)
- Shall we beam-aboard the refrigerator first, Cap-ten?!
HARRY
- (mock-space-captain)
- Freeze it, Cadet: The landing party can wait: We have fresh game afoot.
- INT. CONTROL ROOM - MODERATELY LIGHTED (AS CONTINUOUS)
- Walls are block-padded white between wraparound windows. They enter and sit
reclined in cushion-chairs at consoles, semicircled with heads near: Harry,
Gwen, Daniel, Peter
- And prepare for launch momentarily:
HARRY
- (pressing buttons)
- I've got a, Sequence for launch: 1-hundred hesits, and counting down.
DANIEL
- (pressing buttons)
- Hecta-hesits: That's 2-hundred-16 seconds, or 3-point-6 minutes.
GWEN
- (touch-scans, monotone)
- System: Nominal
Monitor nominal
Response: Nominal
Load: Nominal
Telemetry: Nominal
Registration: Nominal
Power: Nominal
Support: Nominal
Function: Nominal
Ambient: Nominal
Exterior nominal
Sequence: Nominal
Go: Nominal.
DANIEL
- (side-eyes Gwen, mocks)
- Confidence: Nominal
Butterflies: Nominal
HARRY
- (a beat at Dan)
- Nominally, Nominal
?
PETER
- (pressing buttons)
- Exterior controls show green across-the-board
- (peers out-up)
- Opening the overhead silo cap, now.
- SILO CHAMBER BRIGHTENS slowly with indirect outdoor light
- EXT. SILO COVER OPENING - SNOW DRIFTS - POLAR DAY (CURRENT)
- Amid scant 15 deg. side-daylight, the BLAST DOORS OPEN
- Over the moon rocket deep inside.
- INT. CONTROL ROOM - (RESUME CURRENT)
- They latch and check their seat belts:
GWEN
- Is everyone comfortable?- Final-check your seat belts.
DANIEL
- (checking his seat belt)
- Thank you, Gwen, for showing some interest in our comfort.
HARRY
- (intending to Daniel)
- Ease-up, Dan: She knows more about these machines than we: There's something
innately, mathematical, about high technology: It's the razor-edge of science.
- (jerks to his display)
- Oh: And
10 hesits, and counting.
PETER
- (across to Gwen)
- Any reason for not, going, Gwen?
GWEN
- (keys)
- None.
DANIEL
- It's four-for-one and one-for-four!
- (intending to Harry)
- That one innate enough, as in nine?
HARRY
- (reading)
- It's a little closer to five for
[COMPUTER] (VO)
- (clips; 2.2 sec. pace)
- Fuenf.
- Vfeer.
- Drry.
- Tzvy.
- Rocket-engines build to ROAR TO RUMBLE in the depth, 4 sec.
- (00:00 - Beautiful Life/Ace Of Base)
- RELEASE-BOLTS EXPLODE:-- The silo creeps downward, inch-by-inch
to
foot-by-foot faster
5 sec. (to 2 g)
- A COLD DAY SKY above the polar glacial ice and snow flurry;
DANIEL
- (reports)
- We have lift-off
nominally.
HARRY
- (reports)
- 5 hesits into launch-sequence: Systems: Nominal; Telemetry: Nominal; Go-ing:
Nominal.
PETER
- (reports)
- Launch-pad cleared: We have a "Go" for the moon.
DANIEL
- (mock-serious)
- Okay, Break-out the chicken skin and white knuckular sandwiches
- (glee)
- A little mission humor there.
- Gwen's Earth-chart shows ICBM-launch red-dots as they rise rapidly through
snow-hazy clouds to clear sky
- Peter stretches back, folding hands behind his head;--
PETER
- Quite right, Dan: This mission is going to be an unimpeded cinch.
Let's
wait for zero-grav'-- and enjoy the ride.
GWEN
- (interrupts)
- We've got trouble on the horizon.
HARRY
- Hah: Spoke too soon
- (leans towards Gwen)
- What is it, Gwen?
- Slowly startled, the glares build around Gwen:
PETER
- (concerned)
- Gwen?- What is it?!
DANIEL
- (small askance at Gwen)
- Gwen
?
GWEN
- (slowly at first)
- Guyyys
- (a beat, somber)
- We've just started World-War-Three.
DANIEL
- (looks outside and back)
- Meaning
What
Gwen
Is this
?!
HARRY
- (dawns)
- Oh, myyyy,-- metal on the horizon: We've crossed the DEW line.
DANIEL
- (disconcerted to them)
- Pardon me for 7-percent ignorance: Does a do-line precede a did-line?
PETER
- (ponders absently)
- Distant, Early, Warning, system,-- installed since the early 50's to detect
nuclear I.C.B.M.'s crossing the poles: We had it looking over the Arctic, for
U.S.S.R. launches; There must have been something over the Antarctic,-- the
Australians,-- watching South America
Africa
- Sky is turning dark blue to black, 10 mi. up (at 2 g)
DANIEL
- (horrified)
- And, We just triggered a response!?
PETER
- Well, the Australians were just as worried,-- Ever see that cold-war movie,
On the Beach?-- Had a great rendition of Waltzing Matilda.
GWEN
- (somewhat urgently)
- Guys, They are coming this way.
PETER
- I.C.B.M.'s don't aim at each other: They're heading for some
- (half a beat)
- Military base or complex, or, city.
DANIEL
- (really bothered)
- They can, be recalled, or aborted!?
PETER
- Redirected: I hope so;- Anyway, not much for us to do, but stay away,-- far
away: They'll come looking for us;-- we can't return here.
HARRY
- (relieves)
- Then for the moment we're integral, 40 hesits into the launch-sequence.
PETER
- Right. Keep us posted: We don't want to do a near-miss over the Antarctic.
DANIEL
- (mock-exasperates)
- Moon or bust;- Aaack: Here we come!
- (--:-- -fade-)
- Sky is black with stars, 30 mi. up (at 2 g).
- INT. CONTROL ROOM - MOON WEST - BRIGHT (DAY LATER)
- The nearing moon, large and bright against the starry night sky; Gwen,
Harry, in stylish modern advanced space-traveler padded-alumina wear; Peter,
Daniel, still in their stylish warm submariner clothes; nap reclined, albeit
Harry half-watches a widescreen SatNewsNetwork background discussion of ICBMs,
simulations, launches, reentries, detonations, retaliations, curtailments,
international fast-re-peace
GWEN
- (stirs)
- How's it going, Harry?
HARRY
- Almost there
sure looks pretty
Think I'd like to take a stroll.
GWEN
- (leans across to his)
- What did you find here?
HARRY
- A weak H-D-T-V link from a news-satellite on the Earth's horizon-- a
sidelobe emission,-- compatible raster-scan, proper color, anyway.
GWEN
- Even compressed, video scans, have distinct statistical signatures,-- easy
to automatedly guess.
DANIEL
- (stirs)
- Oh-kay
Back to the refrigerator!
- (leans up)
- Space-cadets rocket on full stomachs.
- Gets up, grabs rails-- and wobbly float-walks back to exit:
DANIEL
- Woow-- not, used to mag'walking.
GWEN
- (leans back)
- I put leftovers in the micro, to thaw an hour ago: Just press start.
DANIEL (OS)
- (behind)
- Thanks!-- Conveniences to go
- (musically imitative)
- And another cow jumps,-
- And another cow jumps,-
- And another cow bites the moooon.
HARRY
- (a beat)
- Don't be too long, Dan: I don't think we can have a party this time:
Rendezvous with the moon is no easy task.
DANIEL (OS)
- (somewhat loud)
- 'S-okay, Harry: Parties are for Earth-women: Up-here it's, oh-gees, all the
way.
GWEN
- (reviews)
- E-T-A: 17-hundred hesits; Deorbit, at
It appears we have a backside
rendezvous
What'd be back there?
HARRY
- (cute)
- Man-in-the-moon backside hairdo:-- Now we learn whether the moon is male, or
female
GWEN
- (cute-dumps)
- Moon-rivers.
PETER
- (stirs, yawns)
- Far-side jokes
- INT. -SAME- BACKWARD (UPSIDE DOWN), MOON BACK - (NEXT HOUR)
- Daniel is reseated, his dinner tray set aside finished; The hilly mottled
terminator passes, close upward, 10 sec.
- RIGHTSIDE DOWN, LEVEL BACKWARD - (CONTINUOUS)
DANIEL
- Terminator; Lights, out, folks.
- BLACK MOON, a blotch of floodlight racing parallel below
HARRY
- Not quite, Dan:- Looks like someone's waiting for us
- (points out down-ahead)
DANIEL
- That's our exterior floodlight footprint.
HARRY
-
farther ahead of us.
- (points again down-ahead)
DANIEL
- (sit-up looks farther)
- Oh?- And uh-oh.
- Moon-port GUIDE-LIGHTS come into view from ahead-below
PETER
- It may be permanent or automated: Everything else has been
computer-controlled.
- FACE DOWN, LEVEL BACKWARD - (CONTINUOUS)
- The moon rocket ENGINES ROAR TO RUMBLE
- Moon motion decelerates to stop for vertical landing
GWEN
- (busy)
- Landing-sequence: Nominal; Thrust: Nominal; Telemetry-synchronization:
Nominal; Guide-path: Nominal.
- The moon apparent pitches down for landing,- sun above;
- The near moonscape rises to eclipse the far
sunset
- Then the lunar port-doors
- And out-gasses
and the dock column top
- And the rocket slows to land just inside.
- DISSOLVE
- FADE IN:
- INT. MOON-PORT STATION-CAVERN - CORRIDORS - WELL-LIGHTED
- Wide, aluminum construction. They enter, in padded-alumina wear with
astronaut over-jackets of various ranks:
HARRY
- (admires the halls)
- Looks permanently lighted.
PETER
- That'd be one way to ensure all the lights work.
DANIEL
- Wouldn't they wear-out after fifty years? -a century?- Fluorescents,
panelescents, even semiconductor luminescents and sonoluminescents?
HARRY
- And replaced.
DANIEL
- You think people have been here, recently?
PETER
- Why not? We're sure to meet aliens sometime, somewhere.
DANIEL
- Yes, But on our own moon!?
HARRY
-
Backside, Dan: If aliens came to Earth, -ever,- they'd surely land out of
view; refuel and do repairs here; They wouldn't want to be stranded on Earth:
Everything must work right when they leave here!
- A RAILED LEDGE
- Overlooking miles-deep cavern of stealth-black starships;
GWEN
- (long hushed awe)
- Wow
DANIEL
- (awed)
- Now, that's, a department store.
HARRY
- (looking over the ledge)
- It must be miles deep,- and full of spaceships.
- (ponders)
- And change the density of the moon:
- (brightens)
- I wonder if the whole moon is a giant space-depot:
- (Scriptural)
- A city set on an hill, and, unhid.
DANIEL
- This must be a main station for transport-transfer: But to where?- And where
are the people?
HARRY
- Maybe this station is abandoned-- for now.
DANIEL
- Incredible
but if the spaceships were working
where would they go?
PETER
- The planets,- Venus, Mercury, Mars, the moons of Jupiter, out to Pluto
the
Kuiper Belt
maybe the Oort-cloud, nearby stars, galactic arm
GWEN
- How would we pick a spaceship, Peter?
DANIEL
- (under breath)
- We're going, guys.
HARRY
- (points to one gigantic)
- How about that one, there: It's got ample room for long-distance: Might go
to the stars.
PETER
- Seems to be about the biggest
but maybe there are more caverns.
DANIEL
- "Biggers," can be choosy forever.
PETER
- (reconsiders)
- Then again this one is well-lighted and clean;- the other caverns could be
run-down, dusty, empty, smelly
DANIEL
- Or smashed and destroyed by comets.
GWEN
- (points near Harry's)
- There's an elevator, down the side.
- (walks to the elevator)
DANIEL
- (breathes big)
- This is it: We just sold our souls to the mammon's master-mentor.
PETER
- I thought Jews didn't worry about those New Testament Christian memes, Dan.
HARRY
- (aside)
- Mem is the thirteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
DANIEL
- Thanks, Harry.- I meant girlfriends and wives
- (mouth-open suspense)
- And we're going to have to create and finance a market for these spaceships.
- (smiles broadly)
- They proceed after Gwen,- noting A DISPLAY CASE containing a long six-legged
furry reptile, live:
DANIEL
- Curiouser and curiouser: This is getting ve-ry, alien.
HARRY
- I wonder what the people look like? Somebody, must feed it.
PETER
- (shrugs)
- Maybe they look like us-- there are no self-adoring bust portraitures.
- And hurry to catch her at
- THE GLASS-WALLED ELEVATOR
- They enter
And the door slowly closes
DANIEL
- (looks at the door-top)
- Harry: Did you remember which floor it's on?
HARRY
- (mock-exact)
- 1-hundred-27 thousand, 3-hundred-17: Women's par-fumes, maternity-suits, and
space-vehicles.
GWEN
- (chuckles)
- A one-elevator mind.
- The door is closed; --LOCKS--
- AND DESCENDS
- EXT. A PIER IN THE DEPTHS - ELEVATOR - (MINUTES LATER)
- The elevator arrives
DOOR OPENS
and they exit
DANIEL
- (sniffs snobbishly)
- I, don't smell any par-fume
.
HARRY
- (looks up his spaceship)
- This is, the right floor.
- THE STARSHIP: They proceed into the air-lock
- Gwen activates a panel:-- the DOOR CLOSES behind.
- INT. STARSHIP AIR-LOCK - (AS CONTINUOUS)
- Outer Door shut: REPRESSURIZATION HISS
DANIEL
- (looks about)
- I thought the air-conditioning was nice enough already.
PETER
- We can look around
or get going.
- Inner Door opens to pink AIRGLOW,-- Gwen walks-in
HARRY
- I guess science doesn't get any better than this-- until someone makes the
really big discovery.
- (wanders in)
DANIEL
- (shrugs)
- Feels like home already: It's such a letdown.
- (saunters in)
PETER
- (dumbfounded)
- A letdown
- (follows)
- Right:-- Sub-lunar.
- INT. STARSHIP COMMAND CENTER - (MINUTES LATER)
- 360-surrounded by the spaceport cavern; They enter
DANIEL
- This is getting so blasι,-- maybe we should just go back, to Earth.
HARRY
- We could take this ship to Earth
- (more to Gwen)
- unless it has an automatic program to some way-out deep dark space
.
PETER
- Earth, isn't going to be inviting.
DANIEL
- Quite
let's press-on: Life isn't all schoolwork
and we still have four
more days of Spring Break.
- Gwen walks to the Helm, left,- sits and activates;--
- SPACESHIPS REMOVE ABOUT,- clearing a path above
- Their Starship extracts
- And elevates
- Daniel sits at the Nav, right of Gwen.
- The overhead moon-doors open, as the Starship rises
- And up through the sparkly-pink AIRGLOW permeating the portal zone 100
meters, they feel wholly weighted-down:
HARRY
- (surprised, steadying)
- Hey,-- there's something passing through us,--
- (feels-about himself)
- From head to toe,- like a heavy weight
I feel suddenly full.
PETER
- (steadying)
- It's a plasma-trap-field for the sub-lunanean atmosphere
a type of
magnetohydrodynamic negative pump.
DANIEL
- (upright, gawks)
- Glad you, know what it is,-- is it safe enough for Earth people? Maybe we
should have waited outside.
HARRY
- (shivers arrow-upright)
- Too late for that remedy
I think we're surviving the strength of it.
DANIEL
- (arrow-erect)
- How does it work?
PETER
- (arrow-erect)
- Not too absolutely, but it might be efficient to replenish lost oxygen from
rock-decomposition
Probably ionizes air by laser illumination, and holds it
down by electrostatic attraction or by magnetic sweeping. Lost electrons are
replaceable.
- Above the pink air zone, Peter sits in the captain's chair behind middle;
Harry sits back-aside; while outside
- PORTAL LIGHT SPLATTERS the lunar landscape from low
- The moon-doors (OS) close, EXTERMINATING THE MOON BLACK, to a myriad stars;
Interior light is low soft from wall-glows; Large Soffit Displays monitor the
receding moon surface
DANIEL
- (more to Gwen)
- Think you're up to all this,-- or shall I assist the helm?
GWEN
- (smiles)
- Sure, Dan: A piece of gefilte fish.
DANIEL
- (laughs)
- Okay, Take the lead!
- (leans back)
- What's your pleasure?
- (gestures skyward)
- Mars? Venus? Pluto? Alpha Centauri?
- Gwen controls: the Starship ascends, without plume;
HARRY
- Seriously, Dan.
DANIEL
- (exuberates)
- Seriously Harry: Some of my best childhood friends have been dogs: Let's
check-in on the dogs' star.
HARRY
- (more to Peter)
- This ship is using something else for propulsion.
PETER
- Dan's levity
- (a beat)
- Mass-energy-coupling most likely
Dan, What have you got on starship
propulsion?
- Daniel leans to his Nav displays,- And keys
DANIEL
- No direct information;-- must be simpler than we expected.
HARRY
- Or proprietary.
DANIEL
- (mock-exasperates)
- Proprietary!? --Space-alien-- proprietary
Far-out venue for jurisprudence!
HARRY
- I only meant, The farther you go, the further you have to know about
everything else;-- That's why we study at the univers--ity.
- FADE TO:
- INT. COMMAND - NEARING JUPITER - (NEXT HALFDAY)
- Stars steady; but planet JUPITER and moons quick, in 4 min.
- Gwen, Helm; Daniel, Nav; Peter, captain's chair; Harry now standing awed,
adjacent to Peter
HARRY
- (and to Peter)
- Peter
This is incredible, speed!- We've been going half a day, and we're
already passing Jupiter!
PETER
- (noncommittal)
- Yes.
DANIEL
- Isn't this impossible?!- Where's the speed of light in this vector's
equation?
HARRY
- (counterpoint)
- Where're the collisions with space-dust?!- This speed is getting to be
unsafe for home use!
PETER
- (noncommittal)
- Yes.
DANIEL
- (to Harry)
- I don't, think he's listening: What about the speed of light?!
HARRY
- (to Daniel)
- 45 minutes from Earth,- no problem: We're doing quarter speed, which is
credible energy consumption for hot nuclear-powered alien spaceships.
DANIEL
- Okay
Still, I don't think he's really listening.
HARRY
- (to Peter)
- Peter?
PETER
- (delays, thinks)
- Yes
- (a beat, continues)
- At this rate of acceleration, --if it can be sustained,-- we should be
passing Pluto early tomorrow,-- approaching the speed of light.
DANIEL
- (relieves)
- Well, That is what I asked.
PETER
- What happens afterward, is a guess: an extrapolation of facts at hand: We
might exceed the speed of light.
DANIEL
- Well, That is not what I had believed:-- Where do we pay the energy cost?-
The speed of light requires a third of our mass: Are there interplanetary energy
beams?
- (small-cute)
- We're not, super-surfing zero-point energy on background neutrino-chop!
PETER
- We are traveling in some kind of conduit;-- I'm conjecturing it's an
aether-slipstream.
HARRY
- Shouldn't make a difference, -were such a thing possible,- we'd be limited
to the speed of light in the slipstream, aether.
PETER
- But not the speed-of-light through the cosmos,-- in a fast slipstream.
DANIEL
- Wouldn't an aether-slipstream be limited to the soliton speed of light;--
and we on top of that?
PETER
- The aether is the basis of the apparent coincidence of objects within the
mathematical measure frame of the cosmos:-- Massive objects, exist, as
aggregates of subatomic wavicles of the aether, traveling slower than the speed
of light waves in the aether because that is what wavicles are: little
eddy-waves convolved on themselves, that don't escape straight-photon
But the
aether itself may be a wave of sub-aether.
DANIEL
- And what's the speed of sub-aether?
PETER
- A blend of finite and infinite.
HARRY
- Zoom
You passed me on that one: Finity and in-finity don't mix very well.
PETER
- Conjecturally: Consider the common aethers, water, air, consisting of
innumerable molecules occupying, each a fraction of local measure-space, and
moving about freely,- constituting their aether
Energy-transfer is hard, fast
within each molecule,-- basically the speed of atomic orbiting electrons, a
tenth the speed of light,-- but, phonon, transport between molecules depends on
the mass, speed, collision rate, angle, spin, of molecules,-- and molecules in
collision go entropic routes, and convert kinetic energy with heat,- making
sound, overall, slow compared to electron, speed;-- a mix of slow and fast
finities.
DANIEL
- You're conjecturing an absolute bottom aether: Fast is infinitely fast, and
slow is arbitrary finite.
PETER
- Yes.
HARRY
- Still doesn't say just what the aether, is
infinitely hard molecules of
uniform size in a vacuous measure-space
?
PETER
- Mathematical integers themselves, perhaps: Each point in space may have a
transferable integer value associated with it, --a saturation value,-- presence
or absence, one or zero, positive-negative, used or unused, right-left
.
Integers are infinitely precise, so they'd be infinitely hard
. Unless we reach
a speed-limit and run for years to the next star, we might want to consider an
absolute bottom aether.
GWEN
- Peter: How would your aether theory give us a vantage over lightwaves?
PETER
- If some, means, were available to crystallize the aether, to remove its
natural entropic motion, align its point-to-point value-transfers: its velocity
would go off-the-scale -maybe hyperconducting in corridors through normal space-
mass might interact and might be controllable to some higher velocity
Well,
a conjecture for today: We'll see what tomorrow may bring.
DANIEL
- (as to outer space)
- Whatever happened to simple Space-Time Frame-Relativity, and
light-speed-relativistic contractions
?!
PETER
- Frame-time Relativity didn't decide whether the rear shrank toward the
front, or the front shrank toward the rear
It was relative nowhere: You
couldn't get there from here.
DANIEL
- (a beat, putting them on)
- A pity
I did so like its notion of infinite frames shrinking in a finite
cosmos warped back through itself:- You could have a trillion-light-year-long
space-train chasing its own caboose, and the faster it goes, the farther they
part
Would have explained a lot about all the Uncertainty Principles
circulating
And tensor calculus has a certain blitheness to its manual
dexterity.
GWEN
- Daniel, Do you have more than one, Uncertainty Principle?
DANIEL
- (plays unto Gwen)
-
Not really sure
HARRY
- (a beat, topping him)
- But Dan, Gravity and acceleration were indistinguishable, So if you'd sat
still for twelve months, you'd be traveling at the speed of light.
DANIEL
- (credibility breaking)
- Really
!?- I hadn't noticed that!
- They chuckle; Jupiter, rings and moons, have passed.
PETER
- (his own topper)
- And-- General, Relativity had the further, paradox, that time slows, down in
a gravitational field: Your feet would gradually lag your head!
DANIEL
- (credibility gone)
- 'Unghhh
' Sounds
Trippy
!
HARRY
- (half a beat)
- Not necessarily, Dan:-- Your feet exist in the immediate near-future: you
just think-ahead a step to land where your feet will be
.
DANIEL
- (half a beat)
- But time-lag is cumulative:-- After a few centuries your feet could lag a
day, behind
Your head may think to go somewhere else for the day
!
- Gwen has a bemused smile
- EXT. COMMAND - NEPTUNE SPACE - (HALFDAY MORE)
- SILENCE in outer space; They are in heated discussion.
- INT. COMMAND - (AS CONTINUOUS)
- B.G. stars steady; Gwen watches her displays intently; soffit displays
repeat hers: a RAPIDLY EXPANDING GRID emanating from a small sphere ahead, lines
alternating high-low binary-coded;
PETER
- (rebukes)
-
but we don't know that for certain,-- least not yet!
HARRY
- (clips to Gwen)
- What's E-T-A,-- our time?
- NEPTUNE and Triton, minuscule, majuscule, minuscule, 5 sec;
GWEN
- 14-hundred hesits:- fifty minutes.
HARRY
- (looks ahead)
- Six A-U
But, What is it?!
- Neptune and moon have passed, unmentioned; They ponder--
GWEN
- It still has no apparent existence: It is not Pluto: It doesn't show as a
planet. Its grid maps to the sun.
DANIEL
- A point, a dash, in space,-- might explain sunspots
but it can't be a
meeting-point with some alien spaceship: We're going too fast.
GWEN
- Point-98 speed-of-light, -relative to former astronomical positions,- and
accelerating constantly.
PETER
- Is it a relativistic trick? Are we seeing ourselves differently from the way
the outside-world perceives us?- Are we time-dilated?
GWEN
- Known pulsars should give us space-time.
DANIEL
- Right,--
- (consults his computer)
- silly me.
HARRY
- Real time,-- as real as inner time.
DANIEL
- The live-nautical-reference lists no ephemeris changes for two, three
pulsars, four
Not relativistic in the usual sense.
HARRY
- Do we have any choices? Options? Variables? Aborts? Anything but wait?
GWEN
- (shakes no, smally)
- None apparent:- It's locked-in.
PETER
- We've started this dive, Harry: We have to finish it: Gymnasium rules.
- INT. -SAME- (50 MINUTES LATER)
- (00:00 instrumental - Bellissima/DJ QuickSilver)
- The grids are filled ALTERNATING PINK AND WHITE, indicating zone-approach, a
hyperbolic passing course and continuously recalculating variances;
GWEN
- Still secondary zone; Point-99 speed-of-light; E-T-A: 10 hesits.
HARRY
- (excites)
- What, is, it?!
PETER
- (reassures)
- Easy, Harry: This ship's designed for this: We're along for the ride.
- The grids become SOLID-FILLED RED
GWEN
- Primary zone; E-T-A: 5 hesits.
PETER
- (checks, no seat-grip)
- Check your seat grips: This could be a quick redirection
We don't have
selt grips?
GWEN
- 3 hesits.
- (2 sec.)
- 2 hesits.
DANIEL
- (worries)
- We're going to be light-headed photons, before we arrive.
- (--:-- grinding squeal)
- The SKY FLIPS to head into the galaxy;-- the GRID CLEARS; STARS ACCELERATE
passing; the SKY ASIDE ABERRATES forward;
DANIEL
- Backwards?!
PETER
- Stellar aberration!
- They check their coordinates
Nav plots on a galactic grid as speed
ramps-up to 6.7 million;
GWEN
- (scans her controls)
- We're still here.
DANIEL
- (relieves)
- Thank the Lord of heaven.
HARRY
- (relieved)
- I think the designers knew, what they were doing,-- but where, are we? Did
we jump through a wormhole?
GWEN
- Not exactly: We've left the solar system-- for a different direction.
HARRY
- Did we reach the speed-of-light?
GWEN
- Not exactly reached: It no longer exists.
PETER
- How fast are, we going?
GWEN
- Astro-referenced skip-rate is 6-point-5, 6-point-3 -it fluctuates,-
6-point-7, million normal speed-of-light.
- (keys)
- And, we've got another re-direct coming-up.
- NEW GRIDS, filled pink and white, with a slight hyperbola:
- The grids become SOLID-FILLED RED, 10 sec.
- (--:-- 2nd grinding squeal)
- The Starship SKY FLIPS to a slightly new direction--
- Nav displays a new galactic course; Daniel rechecks for interstellar travel
data
None;--
DANIEL
- Figures: We've got to check the math.
PETER
- I think the mathematics will agree: We're not moving through space faster
than the speed of light: This corridor of space-aether is hyperconducting us.
What direction are we going?
GWEN
- Towards galaxy center, ultimately.
DANIEL
- Figures.
HARRY
- What did we pass back there,- a point of no-return?
PETER
- Could have been a black-hole,-- and we could have grazed its event-horizon:
using its gravity to both accelerate, and change direction.
DANIEL
- There's no obvious information in the computer: We're guessing on our own,
the rest of the way.
HARRY
- And what is this aether-slip corridor? No guess on that!?
DANIEL
- (proffers)
- Maybe it's a cosmic superstring!?
- (quickens)
- Or, hyperstring.
PETER
- Possibly: At ultra density it may hyperconduct photons.
HARRY
- Wouldn't that be noticeable mass? What if it passes through a planet or
star?
DANIEL
- It'd slice through easily.
HARRY
- Wouldn't that dump stellar junk into the corridor in front of us?
DANIEL
- Nothing at the line of contact with the hyperstring could survive the
deconvolution by hyperconductive evaporation: It'd be refracted to a harmless
photon storm, mostly reflected and a little conducted on the string surface.
GWEN
- (smiles at Daniel)
- Good, Dan: Your techno-linguistics is improving.
HARRY
- But how'd we survive entry?
PETER
- At the speed of light, we'd have been a Lorentz-contracted photon
ourselves,-- and once inside we stretched-out to normal.
GWEN
- Actually we're stretched over a thousand kilometers, front-to-back.
HARRY
- (gasps)
- How are we surviving the stretch?
DANIEL
- We're very intelligent.
HARRY
- Dan,-- seriously
DANIEL
- (humorous sincerity)
- Seriously.
Without intelligence, How'd you get-up in the morning without
leaving your rear-end behind!?
- (a beat, finishes)
- That wouldn't be very intelligent.
- (2 beats)
- Giant dinosaurs, had a brain-knot in the hip, just for that function.
PETER
- E-T-A?
GWEN
- E-T-A: 60 kilohesits-- tomorrow: a day and a half.
- The galaxy arm of STARS FLASH-BY
- FADE TO:
- INT. COMMAND - NEAR GALAXY CORE - (NEXT DAY)
- Stars denser, more passing rapidly; They wear avant-garde
black-white-gold-motif space-admiral formal suits;
- Gwen's display shows a grid around a center circle;
HARRY
- (confidently)
- It'll be a bigger black-hole-- 4-million solar-masses: 4-million miles
radius.
DANIEL
- (affects wistful)
- It'll fling us away-- somewhere
and we'll wander aimlessly among the
galaxies,-- maybe towards the center of the cosmos: Is that the biggest,
black-hole?
PETER
- E-T-A?
GWEN
- 1-hundred hesits:-- 3-point-6 minutes.
PETER
- And where do we arrive?
GWEN
- No destination.
PETER
- A fly-by?
GWEN
- Just no specified point in space.
DANIEL
- An orbit?
GWEN
- Could be, yes.
HARRY
- What could be in orbit around a black-hole, that's not, uninviting?
PETER
- An orbital station.
DANIEL
- But we're above light-speed when we pass near the hole: How do we slow to
orbit speed? Or, what kind of structure could remain in orbit so near an
event-horizon: without drifting inward?!
HARRY
- And without being shattered by cometary bombardment!
DANIEL
- (self-answers)
-
Electrostatic repulsion would require a billion coulombs of charge
regularly replenished to compensate relativistic drag
- (ponders)
- But that might be feasible.
HARRY
- Magnetic sweep might clear the area nearest the hole.
PETER
- Depends on your theory,- whether magnetic fields rotate externally to a hole
and so rapidly that they spiral and radiate like that around a pulsar,-- or
whether they spread equatorially outside their hole and just electrically
polarize space.
DANIEL
- That could accelerate, or push a conductive ring away: a huge ring, millions
of miles long.
- (eyes Gwen)
- Or should I say, 1-point-6-millions of kilometers?
HARRY
- (pondering)
- Pete,-- That's multilayer geometry: symmetric north and south latitudes
countering and flipping
radiating even from zero-point energy virtual
particles, with mad electromagnetic interactivity
A super particle
!
- Peter nods. Their speed begins decreasing rapidly
GWEN
- (alerts)
- We're changing modes
something new
attempting braking out here.
PETER
- That's impossible in superconduction.
GWEN
- (counters)
- 3-point-2 million normal speed-of-light
2-point-3
1-point-7
DANIEL
- Maybe the corridor is widening entropically.
HARRY
- Maybe we're running into photon flack.
DANIEL
- Photons pass through each other: That's the whole reason we first
accelerated to the speed-of-light.
HARRY
- I ponder whether photons suffer entropic scattering in passing.
PETER
- Prepare for orbit insertion.
GWEN
- 2-hundred-70 thousand speed-of-light
1-hundred-30
67
37
- Displays show a flashing pink zone within an expanding radiant grid of
lines; near stars slow rapidly, now amid a bright billion de-aberrated
fixed-stars b.g.
GWEN
- (a beat, resumes)
- 9 thousand
5
3
- (pauses)
- sub-thousands
5-hundred
3
- (pauses)
- sub-hundreds
70
40
25
15
- (views-out momentarily)
PETER
- We're arriving.
- (--:-- -fade-)
- Her display shows a red-centered expanding grid;
GWEN
-
2
1-point-4
1-point-1
1-point-0 speed-of-light
holding, at
1-point-0.
- (00:00 instrumental - Children/Robert Miles)
- A distant multiply-ringed 3Msun gravity-black-hole with luminous pole-jets,
approaches at light-speed, 20 sec.
DANIEL
- (affects)
- Thar
she blows
!
- Starship slips into orbit around its equator, and thence
- ASIDE A RING CITY splash-shimmering colors to the horizon;
- And slows
DANIEL
- (commercial)
- Wel-come, to, Gal-Axe-City: If you lived here, you'd better, be home by now.
- Closing to the side
HARRY
- (indicates Daniel)
- The comedian at the center of the Milky Way.
- And a dock
DANIEL
- (mocks conceit)
- We self-centered gravity-wells are naturally attractive.
- And slows closing-up to dock
and turns to it
PETER
- Dan: Haven't you heard of the aether-ripple -drag,- theory of gravity!?
- Docking attachment completes automatically
DANIEL
- (smiles politely)
- Yes: True gravity is such a sight-seeing detour
- Docked,- Gwen exits
but the guys get up more reluctantly;
DANIEL
- I was just trying to express a little unsinkable levity.
- (--:-- -fade-)
- DISSOLVE TO:
|
Petry System Family Wision USA