Mortal Lock (27 page)

But none of that matters. Truth is truth, no matter how it is dressed. People are on this earth not to question the gods, but only to serve them.

The doctors do not call in the helicopter until just before the end of their stay. The removals must all be done before crossing the border—in other countries, harvesting children is against the law. But it is not against the law to fly the harvested parts to the waiting hospitals, and the village of La Corazón is always proud to be true to its name.

Only the shamans know if what is said is true, but the People of No Colors believe it, every one.

The shamans call the orchid
Renacimiento
. It grows only in the place where the jungle is always dark. Its petals are flames of orange, and its center is pure white; so white it stuns the eyes, as if staring directly into the sun.

And like the sun, the orchid renews.

The orchid will return whatever you have lost. It cannot create, but it can restore.

So, if you were born to blindness, the orchid could not make you see. But if you once had sight, and later lost it, the orchid could make your eyes work again.

The orchid has power only if eaten on its stalk. It cannot be preserved, and it will die if transplanted.

Many seek the
Renacimiento
. Some are deaf, or blind, or crippled. They come in groups, with hired guides; but they never find
the orchid. Perhaps this is because, as the shamans say, he who seeks
Renacimiento
must come to it alone.

Of those who make the journey alone, most seek sex. Predators who can no longer prey, venturing deep into the jungle to have their power restored. Such men always go in alone. The villagers say none has ever returned.

More dangerous men come. They listen to the warnings. But they do not hesitate to follow those who have gone before. Liars trust no one.

Not all call the orchid by the name the shamans have given it. The orchid takes whatever name it is called by its seekers. Some think it is a fountain. Others believe it is in the powder made from the horn of a beast, or that it lies just past the barrier of a virgin girl-child.

Those are all lies, told by merchants.

There is a rumor. Or a myth. Or a legend. That, in the deepest depths of the jungle, there is a tribe no outsider has ever seen. The villagers call its people
Los Renacimientos
.

But all that is truly known is this: the jungle where
Renacimiento
grows is ever nourished by the blood of those who seek it.

In the season of the gods, a woman called Sosima was told her child had been selected for harvest. Sosima offered herself instead, but the doctors explained that only children were acceptable. And the priests said this was as the gods demanded.

The villagers caught Sosima trying to escape into the jungle with her son. She fought so viciously that three strong men died, but, finally, she was overcome. The villagers left her body in a clearing.

They took her son back to the convoy. As his heart was harvested, the village elders decreed Sosima’s half of the prize would be forfeited to the families of the men she had killed.

After the convoy was gone, the villagers returned to the clearing
to bury Sosima. But her body was not where they had left it. Perhaps a jaguar had hauled the corpse away, one villager said.

The others shuddered. A jaguar big enough to drag a woman away, a jaguar with a taste for human flesh …

There is another border, a border not of governments. It lies between the known jungle and a forest so dense that its only light is said to come from the orchid sought by the dangerous men. In that forest there is a beast of terrifying power. No man can describe the beast, for to see it is to die.

Some say the beast is the jaguar who took the body of Sosima. They say that the beast eats the
Renacimiento
, so that even if it could be wounded, it can never be killed.

Villagers sometimes find men at the edge of the forest. The men cannot speak. They do not eat or take water. And they soon die.

The shamans say their hearts have been harvested.

Sometimes, the rebels go into the forest of the
Renacimiento
, to hide from the soldiers. Sometimes, the soldiers are ordered to follow. But what they find cannot be known, because neither the rebels nor the soldiers ever return.

Now there is a new legend. A legend of a tribe of children. Children born of Sosima and the jaguar. Children who now harvest to keep their own hearts.

None knows if this is true.

But the convoys no longer come to the villages. Children are no longer taken. And yet, the villages live.

for Rose Dawn

EXT: The remains of an industrial park. Most of the buildings have collapsed, some have a wall or two standing, some have no roof; most have no windows
.

CLOSER TO:

EXT: A primitively fortified building. It has been shored up solidly: concrete walls repaired, with large solar panels covering the roof. It vaguely resembles an educational institution … with barbed wire replacing the ivy. Armed guards—male and female—are patrolling the area. Beyond them, a dog pack sleeps in the bright sunlight. Farther out on the perimeter are what look like mini-Edmontonia (armor-plated dinosaurs) only with unusually large eyes, rhino-type horns, and fearsome teeth. These beasts appear to be invulnerable to anything but high explosives. Each one is also “patrolling,” moving within what seem to be strictly defined territories, although no fencing is visible
.

A distinctive high-pitched humming noise spills out of the building. The sound fades as the camera approaches.…

BUILDING INT: A vaguely churchlike setting, but absent any religious references … even the stained-glass windows are clearly intended as works of art. The ceiling is the roof, so about as high as a three-story structure. Inside, rows of straight benches, irregularly constructed from scrap wood, but well maintained. At the front of the large room is a height-adjustable podium, built of tubular metal, behind which is an acoustic cone large enough to encompass several people. The auditorium is full. The crowd ranges from infants to the elderly. All races are represented, but scattered randomly, as if there is no significance to any individual’s color
.

A woman steps to the podium. She is neither young nor old, with long hair worn in two thick braids, clad in a simple denim garment
.

A very serious-looking boy, vaguely Asian in appearance, suggesting mixed blood, stands. He is young, but tall for his age
.

She steps aside as the boy takes the stage. He adjusts the podium height, places an open book on it. Then he stands very still and closes his eyes. (Beat) He opens his eyes and faces the audience
.

As Lincoln Su begins to speak we …

FADE OUT (on visual of his lips moving)

OPEN ON: UNDERGROUND

EXT/INT:

NOTES: In Underground, all “exterior” shots are still “interiors,” as within an encapsulated area. The degree of illumination varies from blazing white to total blackness, but the change is controlled … either by individuals or by location, not by passage of time. This is
not
a sci-fi or “futuristic” setting. The tools, the technology, the furnishings, etc., are all salvaged, recycled, or simply holdovers from an earlier time. Clearly, it took many, many years to
construct
Underground, using sophisticated machinery and manual labor to dig the many tunnels … but equally clear that Underground itself has been around a long time. The terminology may have changed—e.g., the “blasters” referred to in the opening sequence are a motley collection of conventional pistols—and some new things have been invented—e.g., fabrics—but this is not a Matrix-type set: no robots, no computers running people through a “program,” no SFX, no teleporting.…

IMPORTANT! DIRECTOR’S OPTION

AT
ANY
PLACE WITHIN THE SCRIPT WHEN A CHARACTER IS UTILIZING V/O OR INTERIOR MONOLOGUE, THE ACTION DESCRIBED MAYBE
SHOWN
 … EITHER AS A “SILENT MOVIE” WHILE THE CHARACTER IS “SPEAKING,” OR AS A SEPARATE STAND-ALONE SCENE.

ESTABLISHING:

Vaguely resembles a subway station, but the “ceiling” is as tall as a twenty-story building, hidden somewhere behind a complex gridwork composed of tubing thicker than redwoods interlaced with those of smaller diameters, the narrowest of which emit a barely discernible pale green glow. The platform is antiseptically clean, very wide, with numerous “stands” of varying sizes running its full length, placed a uniform distance from one another. A Times Square–size flat screen hovers over the station, visible from both sides. It is constantly scrolling, text only. This is the Info-Board
.

PAN LEFT TO:

Seven young men, all dressed alike in orange jackets with white sleeves. The collars of their jackets are turned up, showing that the underside is
white. The jackets are clearly expensive, custom-made. These are the Game Boys
.

An old man staggers toward them. He is wearing a ragged coat; his hair is long: greasy and matted. He is holding what obviously is a bottle in a soiled paper bag. In today’s terms, he would look “homeless.”