Приманка 069

Клаудия выходит наружу в плохом настроении.

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PAGE 69 (Four pages)

Panel 1: Claudia sitting back in her cabin writing a letter at a tiny desk.

CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (1): Within a few hours, the arrangements are made.

Translation (1): В течение нескольких часов все приготовления были сделаны.

CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (2): Claudia writes one last letter to her academic advisor, thanking her for her support.

Translation (2): Клаудия пишет последнее письмо своему научному рководителю, благодаря ее за поддержку.

Panel 2: Claudia taking a capsule from Hiram in his shipboard lab.

Hiram (3): It has been recalibrated…

Translation (3): Прибор рекалиброван…

Claudia (4): And if you got it wrong this time, I swear I will return from my watery grave and drag you back down with me.

Translation (4): Если ты и в этот раз ошибся, клянусь, что вернусь со дна моря и утащу тебя с собой.

Panel 3: Claudia walking down a narrow ship’s corridor, with Turpentine behind her.

Turpentine (5): We cannot emphasize enough how much your sacrifice is appreciated, Dr. Honeywood…

Translation (5): Мы не можем выразить словами, как благодарны вам, доктор Ханивуд.

Claudia (6): Kindly go fuck yourself, Eustace.

Translation (6): Иди к черту, Юстас.

Panel 4: Claudia walking out on deck. She’s fully clothed, wearing the same skirt and button-down blouse combination she was wearing when she came aboard the RV Seagoon. A few sailors with hang-dog expressions look on.

Claudia (7): You all are going to have to get your peep-show somewhere else today.

Translation (7): Сегодня вам всем придется смотреть стриптиз где-то в другом месте.

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Auto-Icon Storyboard 096

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MONTAGE – THE TERRIBLE CONFLICT IN STRADANYA

(Note: the Mediatrix’s narration is a voice-over to this montage.)

– Soldiers in a trench firing their weapons at an unseen enemy.

MEDIATRIX (V.O.)

The conflict between Stradanya and its East Stradanian separatists is now entering its second decade. It has been marked by massacres, mass rape, the systematic destruction of cultural monuments and places of worship, and endless other atrocities. Over a million are believed to have died either directly in the conflict or through collateral hunger and epidemics it has unleashed. This conflict has served as a crucible of various communicable diseases and threatens now to draw in Stradanya’s more powerful neighbors, potentially creating a wider conflict or even a world war. It is imperative for the good of humanity that the conflict be brought to an end. I was created with a unique set of skills to help end the conflict.

Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.

Приманка 068

Карьера предназначена только для тех, кто играет в команде.

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PAGE 68 (Four panels)

Panel 1: An imagined future panel showing Claudia carrying a cardboard box of her possessions out of an office building, escorted by a pair of security guards.

CAPTION – CLAUDIA NARRATING (1): I’ll be blackballed everywhere. My hard-earned career in science will be over.

Translation (1): Меня все будут преследовать, и моей научной карьере придет конец.

CAPTION – CLAUDIA NARRATING (2): That’s how things work, especially since the advent of the latest…administration.

Translation (2): Вот как все будет, особенно учитывая идеологию нового президента.

Panel 2: Claudia back in the galley, brushing a strand of hair our of her eyes.

Claudia (3): And while I might not have Daphne Bosselseg’s heroic attitude about such matters, just like her, I am sure I’d rather be dead than spend a lifetime eking out a living in the twenty first-century service economy.

Translation (3): И хотя я не такая мужественная, как Дафна Боссельсег, так же как и она, я предпочитаю умереть, чем влачить жалкую жизнь в экономике обслуживания двадцать первого века.

Panel 3: Claudia taking a sip of coffee.

Unseen interviewer (out-of-panel balloon) (4): You’re not seriously thinking of giving in to them, are you?

Translation (4): Вы что, собираетесь всерьез сдаться на их уговоры?

Claudia (5): Well, why not?

Translation (5): Почему бы и нет?

Panel 4: Claudia making a forced smile.

Claudia (6): Feed lots of hungry children, buy lots of mosquito nets, get my name on an eldritch horror…

Translation (6): Накормить множество голодных детей, закупить кучу сеток от москитов, дать свое имя чудовищу…

Claudia (7): And go out with a real bang.

Translation (7): И уйти ярко и красиво.

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Auto-Icon Storyboard 095

Strange woman in a computer room.

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INT. COMPUTER ROOM – DAY

Richards, Harry, and Arthur enter the computer room. This is a giant, largely dark circular space in the center of which there is a huge black monolith of a computer.

Stereotyped science guys, men in white coats with heavy-framed glasses, move around, make notes, manipulate keypads, etc.

About twenty feet from door, between the monolith and the door, stands a cylindrical glass tube about two meters and sixty centimeters across.

Inside the tube, as the three men approach, a holographic projection appears.

It is the MEDIATRIX, in appearance the same woman as the Sacrifice, but in this instance wearing a flowing white gown. She glows like an image on television. She looks at Harry and speaks in a purring contralto.

MEDIATRIX

Good morning, Dr. Lal.

HARRY

Who…who are you?

MEDIATRIX

I am the Mediatrix. I was created by the Gynophage as a gift to humanity.

HARRY

The Gynophage?

MEDIATRIX

The creature in your laboratory which you have adopted and care for, yes.

ARTHUR

(aside to Richard)

Makes sense, Greek roots, gune woman, phagein to eat.

HARRY

And what kind of “gift” are you to humanity?

MEDIATRIX

I am an artificial intelligence created to broker peace in the Stradanya conflict. Are you familiar with the Stradanya conflict, Dr. Lal?

HARRY

I see it on the news sometime, but I cannot claim to know much about it.

The Mediatrix closes her eyes, opens them again and begins a lecture.

Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.

Приманка 067

Когда все остальное не удается, воспользуйтесь телевидением.

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PAGE 67 (Four panels)

Panel 1: Claudia sitting alone in the ship’s galley with a cup of coffee, which she is staring at pensively.

CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (1): After a few days’ standoff, Claudia agrees to speak with us, but not with the ship’s crew.

Translation (1): После нескольких дней молчания, Клаудия соглашается поговорить с нами, но не с командой корабля.

Panel 2: Closer-in on Claudia.

Claudia (2): The problem is that they’re right. Aside from their two volunteers, I’m the only one they can access in time. There are other women, but they don’t know the right protocols.

Translation (2): Беда в том, что они правы. Кроме тех двух волонтеров, я – единственная, кто подходит. Есть другие женщины, но они не знают правильных протоколов.

Panel 3: Claudia looking to one side, holding her cup of coffee between her two hands.

Claudia (3): It won’t be other people’s fuckups that anyone will remember. What everyone will remember will be that bitch who wouldn’t play ball and disappointed a very rich man.

Translation (3): О просчетах других людей никто не вспомнит. Все будут помнить только то, как бабенка испортила все дело и разочаровала очень богатого человека.

Panel 4: Claudia looking down into her coffee cup.

Claudia (4): Like it or not, that’s how people will see it.

Translation (4): Нравится мне или нет, вот как они будут думать.

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Auto-Icon Storyboard 094

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INT. A HIGH-TECH CORRIDOR – DAY

Richards strides rapidly down the corridor, followed by Arthur and Harry, who are struggling a bit to keep up. They are doing a “walk-and-talk.”

RICHARDS

The main file that was uploaded was object code, instructions that only a computer could understand. When we ran it through a decompiler to try to make it readable to a human being, what we got were two hundred and fifty million lines of obfuscated source code, the most unreadable mess any of our experts had ever seen: routines that called routines that looped around endlessly, complete spaghetti.

ARTHUR

So, what did you do?

RICHARDS

There was a second file, and this one was very clear. It was instructions for creating a new kind of holographic computer interface. Ingenious stuff, but the instructions were clear enough that our engineers were able to put one together in about a week.

HARRY

And then?

RICHARDS

Well, we figured the code probably wasn’t for nothing, even if we didn’t understand it, so we decided to run it and just see what happened. We of course took a lot of precautions, isolating the supercomputer on which it ran. We put in the code, hooked up the interface, and turned it on. The result, gentlemen, is what you are about to see.

Richards stops at a door. He waves a key card in front of a pad that causes the door to unlock and slide open.

Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.

Приманка 066

Как насчет науки? Неужели вы не любите науку?

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PAGE 66 (Four panels)

Panel 1: Turpentine facing the door, speaking to it.

Turpentine (1): At this point, the expedition simply cannot succeed without you. There just isn’t anyone else with the right…attributes, and it will be nineteen more years before anyone has another chance.

Translation (1): На данном этапе экспедиция просто не сможет достичь успеха без вас. Никто, кроме вас, не обладает необходимыми, э-э…атрибутами и, прежде чем у кого-либо появится другой шанс, пройдет девятнадцать лет.

Panel 2: Turpentine still facing the door, with his hands up in a pleading gesture.

Turpentine (2): In recognition of what we’re asking of you, the species will be named after you. Gynophagos honeywoodiae. How does that sound?

Translation (2): В знак признательности вид будет назван в вашу честь. Gynophagos honeywoodiae – неплохо звучит, а?

Panel 3: Claudia still on her bunk. This is another “surveillance video” panel. In this panel Claudia’s eyes are in an angry squint The precise nature of this squint should be drawn as distinctively as possible and noted (thus as the “Angry Squint”) as it will reappear in another context below.

Claudia (3): Fuck off!

Translation (3): Отвали!

SUBTITLE (4): Internal surveillance video.

Translation (4): Запись системы наблюдения.

Panel 4: Turpentine addressing the door.

Turpentine (5): Think about it.

Translation (5): Подумайте об этом.

Turpentine (6): Please.

Translation (6): Пожалуйста.

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Auto-Icon Storyboard 093

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INT. DEPUTY DIRECTOR RICHARDS’S OFFICE – DAY

Harry and Arthur and ushered into Richards’s large, well-appointed office by Hernandez. Richards comes out from behind his desk to shake each of their hands.

RICHARDS

Gentlemen! Thank you for coming to see us.

HARRY

(shaking Richards’s hand)

Deputy Director.

Richards gestures toward a small conference table in his office. Harry and Arthur sit down opposite him.

RICHARDS

We want you to understand that no one in the this agency blames you for what happened, Dr. Lal. We know you lost some of your people in the incident.

HARRY

Does anyone know who those terrorists were, Mr. Richards?

RICHARDS

Honestly, we have no idea. They don’t match any descriptions we have on file, and slipped right through our net. Who they were and what they wanted exactly we still have no idea…except that they clearly wanted to try to get something out of that…organism you are maintaining.

HARRY

Yes. After eating another woman, it appears to have paid us back with another upload.

RICHARDS

Which you, as a good patriot, turned over to us.

HARRY

And have your people had any success figuring out what on earth it is?

Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.

Приманка 065

Терпентайн пытается убедить разгневанную Клаудию.

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PAGE 65 (Four panels)

Panel 1: Turpentine, walking down a narrow ship’s corridor.

CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (1): Professor Turpentine, as expedition leader, attempts to deal with the crisis that has arisen.

Translation (1): Профессор Терпентайн, руководитель экспедиции, пытается урегулировать возникший кризис.

Panel 2: Turpentine knocking on cabin door in the corridor.

SFX – TURPENTINE KNOCKING (2): Knock, knock.

Translation (2): Тук-тук.

Turpentine (3): Dr. Honeywood, can we speak?

Translation (3): Доктор Ханивуд, мы можем поговорить?

Panel 3: Turpentine talking to the door.

Turpentine (4): Listen, I’ve talked with the expedition sponsor via satellite phone. He understands how critical you’ve become to the success of this expedition, and he has said he’s willing to raise the charitable donation to five million dollars if you can…cooperate.

Translation (4): Послушайте, я разговаривал со спонсором по спутниковому телефону. Он понимает, насколько вы важны для успеха экспедиции, и готов повысить благотворительный взнос до пяти миллионов, если вы сможете…сотрудничать.

Panel 4: View of Claudia sitting on her bunk in her cabin. Her arms angrily folded over her chest, her face set. This panel is “surveillance video” so it should have a somewhat vaguer, grainer look to it than most panels.

CAPTION – TURPENTINE SPEAKING THROUGH THE DOOR (5): You can do a lot of good in the world with five million dollars, Claudia.

Translation (5): С пятью миллионами долларов вы сможете принести кучу пользы миру, Клаудия.

SUBTITLE (6): Internal surveillance video.

Translation (6): Запись системы наблюдения.

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Auto-Icon Storyboard 092

A national security reception.

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INT. THE GARAGE – DAY

The car pulls up to a curb inside the garage. The car’s uniformed driver gets out and opens the door for Harry, who then gets out. Arthur gets himself out.

They are greeted by LT. HERNANDEZ, who is wearing full Naval dress uniform.

HERNANDEZ

Dr. Lal? Mr Bergman? I’m Lieutenant Hernandez. I’ll be taking you up to see Deputy Director Richards. If you’ll just follow me to the elevator.

HARRY

Don’t you want to check our identification? Run us through security?

HERNANDEZ

Oh, no, Dr. Lal. None of that will be necessary.

ARTHUR

But we could be anyone.

HERNANDEZ

Oh no you couldn’t, sir. This way, please.

Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.