Arthur Passing Through

Arthur Passing Through By Henry J. Baugh

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EXT. COUNTRY ROAD - DAY Burning hot out. And, it isn’t helped by the atmosphere, out here. It looks empty - there’s few, if any structures in eyesight, save for what looks like a ranch in the distance. There’s a speck, getting larger, taking shape as it gets near. It’s a man - walking down the middle of the road. As he gets closer, the details start to fill in. He’s dressed in what looks like what used to be a clean shirt. But, not anymore. It’s covered in grime, from days or weeks without wash. He’s wearing a wide brimmed sun-hat, his eyes hidden beneath pince-nez. This is ARTHUR HARRIS. As he passes us, we follow. After a couple of moments, he stops. CUT TO Down the road, sitting askew on the side of the road, there’s a slightly beat-up looking car, driver’s side door open. There’s a guy sitting in front of the car, on the ground. Head slumped, unmoving. CUT TO Arthur, just before he moves out of frame. INT. CAR - DAY Arthur sits still in the driver’s seat. His eyes roam around - searching the dashboard, the seats. The floorboards. There’s a bottle of whiskey, down there. He pulls it up, unscrews the top. Sniffs it. Takes a long drink - several gulps go by. Sniffs. EXT. COUNTRY ROAD - DAY The car moves down the road, and past us. CUT TO FROM THE FRONT OF THE CAR (CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

2.

...as the road curves in front of us. CUT TO INT. CAR (MOVING) There really isn’t much out here. Out in the fields, there’s a few silos dotted here and there - broken, gnarled wire fences on either side of the gravel road. Arthur keeps his eyes on the road, bending every so often to look under the sun visor. His eyes go to something o.c., narrowing after a moment to clarify. Off a ways, just on the crest of the road, there’s a thin trail of smoke building into the air. CUT TO EXT. COUNTRY ROAD - DAY As the car crests the hill, it jerks to a stop. Way down and off the road, there’s a small house among the grass, door ajar - and, in the front yard, there’s a BURNING HEAP of what used to be a compact; a real fireball. The van starts moving, a bit more rapidly now. INT. CAR (MOVING) ...as Arthur nears the wreckage. The car slows, and Arthur moves quickly, his eyes roaming the seats and floorboards. Backseat. Front seats. His eyes alight on a small length of open-ended metal pipe, half-rusted. The car stops. He opens the car door, stops, and grabs the whiskey bottle, holding it by the nose. EXT. THE HOUSE - DAY ...as Arthur rounds the front of the car, passing the burning wreck and toward the front door. There’s a hand sticking out the passenger-side window.

3.

INT. THE HOUSE - DAY Arthur stops a minute, just behind the foyer wall - and someone’s rounding the corner, and - WHACK! The metal pipe cracks squarely on that someone’s face, and they collapse onto a wooden table - the sound alerts the two others in the living room, ONE over by the entertainment center and the OTHER in the kitchenette just to his left. The One by the entertainment center, he’s the first to come a-runnin’ - he’s got his knife out, and he’s saying something we can’t hear, but for the percussion - Arthur picks up a small wooden stand that sits by the couch, and hits him dead-on, first in the stomach and then once again the head - throws the stand down, and the guy’s reeling, but only for a moment. And, the guy from the kitchenette’s starting to get his groove going - the pipe again, and hard on the wrist. Again on the leg, and in the back of the head. And, the other guy’s right behind him, and - he turns around, and SMASHES the whiskey bottle right across the guy’s face. The guy gives a small shriek, and falls to the floor, clutching at his face. But, there goes the first guy, running toward the door. Arthur takes off after, and out into the sunlight, catching up quickly. He still has the broken nose of the bottle, and grabs the guy by the shoulder. Shoves it into his leg, and twists. It’s a bit more sloppy than anything else he’s done, so far. The guy starts to scream, and ramble. And, his arms are flailing. GUY You FUCKING - you-you SON of a WHORE, you - Christ, man But, he’s already started heading back toward the house, by this time. In the living room, the guy who’d been hit with the whiskey bottle is still screaming his mouth off ("I’m blind, you bastard! I can’t see!"), and the other guy is lying face down over by the window. The air is calmer, but behind it all there’s still the voices of the two who are still awake. CUT TO (CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

4.

The guy outside slowly trying to pry himself up off the ground without upsetting the glass too much. CUT TO THE BEDROOM DOOR ...there’s nobody there. CUT TO THE SECOND BEDROOM DOOR ...or there, either. Arthur mulls this over, for a minute. He looks back, into the living room. CUT TO The burning car in the front yard, now slightly extinguished, and the hand that’s caught in a claw-grip onto the paint of the door. And, the silhouettes in the backseats. Arthur notices this, finally. And, there’s a sigh. Stands still for a minute. Then, his head looks past the car - the other guy’s gone. He steps out EXT. THE HOUSE - DAY - and past the wreckage, looking out into the road. There’s a whimper, coming from the other side of the wreck. Arthur follows it - to the guy, resting his head on the metal. The guy gives him a look, and then turns away, his eyes wrenched shut. It was a lot of glass. CUT TO INT. CAR Breathing slowly, but hard on, Arthur holds his right hand up to the light - he hadn’t even noticed it during the moment, but there’s a nice-looking gash that’s about four of five inches long, winding around from the side of his palm and onto the back of his hand. And, it’s not looking too pretty. (CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

5.

The newspaper down on the floor. He grabs it, and looks it over for a second, for any sign of anything that might lead to an immediate infection, and on the front page there’s the headline: ’Dallas Police Arrest Fourteen In Connection With November 2017 Atrocity Exhibition.’ He takes off his glasses, and puts them on the dash - begins to rip the front page into large strips. Something hits the window, clack. And outside, the guy’s begun picking up rocks and throwing them at the car. CUT TO INT. CAR (MOVING) Arthur, sans sun-hat and glasses, back on the road again. Dejected. Disappointed. Hot. CUT TO FROM THE FRONT OF THE CAR ...it’s night, now. Emptiness on all sides, save for the two small circles of light directly in front of us, and the white lines. CUT TO INT. CAR (MOVING) - NIGHT Arthur’s face, out of darkness for a moment. We can see the bare outline of his arm, reaching up to flick on the top-light - and, it’s green. The lines in his face become far starker. His eye shoots o.c., and he inclines the wheel thusly. CUT TO FROM THE FRONT OF THE CAR as the auto takes an off-ramp onto the service road, the light slowly escaping from the frame. FADE OUT.

6.

EXT. HOTEL Lights fade in from all sides, taking the shape of leering neon letters and fluorescent back-lighting, advertising television service, and air-conditioning. INT. HOTEL LOBBY Still a-light, there’s an older guy behind the counter with a long, dangling beard that’s splayed out in a wide pattern, and he’s doused in black-light. The front door opens, and Arthur steps in - stops, and gives the place a quick look. The clerk looks up from his dinner plate of meat. Arthur proceeds, and bends his head forward. The two talk motions here and there, gestures. They reach some sort of agreement, and the clerk slides pulls a key-card from under the desk, slides it over to Arthur. CUT TO INT. HOTEL ROOM - MORNING Morning light pours through the blinds. Arthur lies on the bed, hat over his face. There’s a knock on the door. Then, once again, louder. Arthur shambles awake, rolling onto the floor lazily, and making his way toward the door. Looks out the eyehole. INT. HOTEL LOBBY The clerk and Arthur (now dressed) move past the counter, toward the back room - the clerk motions toward something we can’t see, and then upward. Arthur nods CLERK Alright? It’s eight, now. Give it three minutes. It’s re-routed, and he knows that, but still - don’t take too long. He closes the door behind him, and walks back around toward the front door. THE BACK ROOM

7.

Arthur moves toward a table with a phone situated just so, and takes a seat. EXT. HOTEL The clerk walks along the row of rooms, and off toward the border of the parking lot - looking out onto the road and the empty fields just beyond. CUT TO INT. HOTEL LOBBY THE BACK ROOM Arthur holds the phone up to his ear, listening to the dial-tone. CUT TO EXT. HOTEL There’s a pin-prick approaching fast on the edge of the road - and, as it gets nearer, it turns out to be a bulky-looking white van, nondescript save for the fact that it stands out against the landscape all by it’s bare-self. The clerk sees it. Watches it as it trundles on by, seeming not to notice him. Then another follows, and another - ! The clerk reacts - that’s certainly unusual - paces out into the road, and looking out, as the vans bare down on the road. And, then quiet. The clerk looks behind him, but nothing’s coming. CUT TO INT. HOTEL LOBBY THE BACK ROOM Arthur’s scribbling something down frantically with a nubbin of a pencil. He grunts in response to something said on the other end -

(CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

8.

ARTHUR Mmmm-mmm. Hmmm. Ahoy hoy. He pulls the phone away from his ear, waits for a minute, and hangs up. CUT TO EXT. DOWNTOWN DALLAS - DAY It’s raining. On the other end, there’s a guy in a hooded sweatshirt standing next to a payphone. Can’t see his face all that well until he turns around, moving over into the crowd - under the hood, the top half of his face is covered in a bright, bright red skull-cap that extends down over his nose, and where his eyes should be, there are only two glassy orbs. This is ANANSI. He stops to look into the streets, as two of those ubiquitous white vans turns a corner across the intersection. Starts to walk toward the street light INT. HOTEL LOBBY THE BACK ROOM Standing up from the chair, Arthur takes a quick look at his scribbled notes, and stuffs them into his pants-pocket. He steals a glance into the outside lobby, and looks around. Alights on a pack of cigars just by the door, and flirts one out - holding it between parted teeth, he produces a lighter from inside his jacket - there’s the clerk, just now. Stops at the front door for a minute for a last look out at the street, and then proceeds inward. He stops, and pulls an eyebrow over the cigar in Arthur’s mouth, who takes it out and gives it a quick tip. There’s something a little familiar, there. CLERK Listen, I think you might want to wait at least a few hours before you set out.

(CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

9.

ARTHUR Mmm? CLERK Yeah, it’s the strangest thing they’re never out here, usually. But, I’m standing out there and not one but three of them just came barreling past, off’n the direction of Whitney. ARTHUR Huh. (beat) Well, I do wonder what that’s all about. Hope it’s nothing sinister. He heaves a slight sigh. Looks to his left. EXT. HOTEL - EVENING Arthur, moving back out toward the car in the parking lot the clerk looking on from the pavement in front of the front door. EXT. COUNTRY ROAD - EARLY NIGHT The car pushes forward, steadily. There’s wheat and dark green brush on either side, and we’re going through a slight curvature on the road INT. CAR (MOVING) - NIGHT Arthur in the green-light, face now obscured by the smoke of the cigar, now worn down to half it’s original length. EXT. COUNTRY ROAD - LATE NIGHT There’s some calamity approaching, up the road. Another car, taking up half the lane, splayed across the road. Arthur’s car slows only the tiniest bit - in the headlights, we glimpse - there’s a young woman, dressed nattily in what looks like whatever she could find, and she’s looking frightened out of her mind, sitting close to the surface of her car. She looks like she’s been smacked around a few times.

(CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

10.

Her car light’s on, and there’s someone rooting around in there - he emerges, a skinny guy dressed in a white muscle-shirt and trousers, wearing what looks like a Punch ’n Judy mask over his face. He’s carrying a shot-gun, brandishing it about while he throws his head back, whistling and laughing. He takes his time, getting to her. Arthur’s head-lights are off. INT. CAR - NIGHT Arthur sits still for a minute, in the green-light. Then, he puts his hand onto the floorboard, grabbing the metal rod. Turns off the light above. EXT. COUNTRY ROAD - LATE NIGHT The guy’s screaming something at the girl, only in half-jest. He bangs on the car door with the butt of the gun - points it at the window, blows it out. And, there’s somebody approaching him, as he makes merry. The metal rod comes down suddenly, on the back of his head. And, then again. The guy stumbles against the car - and, then onto the ground. Arthur gives the women a look for a second, and then proceeds back toward the car. Gets in. Starts to drive off. INT. CAR (MOVING) - NIGHT The green-light’s back on. Arthur picks the cigar back up out of the ash-tray, and takes another pull CUT TO EXT. FREEWAY - MORNING The car’s started to encounter some real traffic, by now. CUT TO We’re right behind it, as it passes under an overpass there’s a faint rain starting to kick up all around. And, behind all of this - there’s Dallas in the background, getting ever nearer. And, now we’ve hit a rise - moving gradually upward, and onto one of those highway ramps of ungodly height. (CONTINUED)

CONTINUED:

11.

And, begins to descend... BLACK.