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INT. OSVALDO’S – NIGHT
Toozie takes a boneless wing, dips it in sauce, and takes a healthy bite.
TOOZIE
This photo disappeared from the web by the next day, but not before it got preserved on my hard drive. And the metadata point right to your Oikos Galenou warehouse on the day of the terrorist attack.
(takes a generous swig of wine)
Do you happen to know what this creature is, Joe? Or who is going down its…gullet?
JOE
(visibly sweating)
I don’t know what you’re talking about.
TOOZIE
You lie badly, Joe.
JOE
Why are you doing this?
TOOZIE
Joe I assure you that I am not a journalist, a cop, or a blackmailer. I have a very different motive.
(takes another bite of chicken)
These wings really are tasty. You should try them.
JOE
I’m not that hungry, all of a sudden.
Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.
Single panel: Helicopter view of the RV Seagoon, plowing through turquoise sea against the backdrop of a brilliant tropical sunrise. The RV Seagoon is a good-sized vessel, with an extended midsection that appears to contain some sort of giant tank. There is also a crane of sorts on deck.
CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (1): What is it that Professor Eustace Turpentine is proposing that so disturbs Captain Drummingdale?
Translation (1): Kion Profesoro Eŭstaco Turpentine proponas kaj kio tiel perturbas Kapitanon Drummingdale?
CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (2): Only one of the strangest and most significant scientific adventures yet recorded.
Translation (2): Nur unu el la plej strangaj kaj signifoplenaj sciencaj aventuroj iam okazintaj.
CAPTION – PSEUDO-NARRATION (3): And we document it here for you for the first time!
Translation (3): Kaj ni dokumentas ĝin por vi tie ĉi la unuan fojon!
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INT. OSVALDO’S – NIGHT
Toozie hands the phone back to Joe. It has the Gynophage photograph Toozie found before.
TOOZIE
Most of the art is pretty crudely drawn, but this isn’t anyone’s illustration. It’s a photograph, taken from life. Probably taken by a cop with a cellphone. Why it got posted I have no idea. Maybe someone was trying to leak something. Or maybe they guy was just the right kind of pervert with something neat to show to his friends.
The Bartender brings a bit plate of boneless wings and sets it between Joe and Toozie.
BARTENDER
(with forced cheer)
You enjoy these now.
TOOZIE
The camera that made this picture encoded metadata into it that included both the date and time of the photograph as well as G-P-S coordinates for where the photo was taken. Very handy if you want to keep your photo collection organized.
Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.
Panel 1: CAPTAIN IVAN DRUMMINGDALE (“Drummingdale’) stands at the bow of his ship, the RV SEAGOON. Drummingdale is a gaunt, tall, naval-looking man. He wears a short-sleeved white shirt with captain’s epaulets and a seaman’s cap. It is dawn in the tropics. Drummingdale is staring out to sea and speaks without turning around.
Drummingdale (1): You’re up early today, Professor Turpentine.
Translation (1): Hodiaŭ vi frue ellitiĝis, Profesoro Turpentine.
Panel 2: Drummingdale stands on the rail next to PROFESSOR EUSTACE TURPENTINE (“Turpentine”). Turpentine is a short, fat man with a white mustache and a white fringe of hair around a head which would otherwise be bald. However in this panel he is wearing a pith helmet and a twin-pocketed shirt. He looks relaxed. Drummingdale, still staring over the rail out to sea, looks anything but.
Turpentine (2): It’s a big day for us, Captain Drummingdale. Our first attempt.
Translation (2): Ni havos grandiozan tagon, Kapitano Drummingdale. Nia unua provo.
Drummingdale (3): Oh, aye.
Translation (3): Ho ja.
Panel 3: Close-up on Drummingdale’s face. His jaw is clenched.
Drummingdale (4): Can’t say I approve of what you’re going to put those girls through.
Translation (4): Mi ne povas diri, ke mi konsentas kun tio, al kio vi submetos la knabinojn.
Panel 4: Close-up on Turpentine, though not quite as close up as on Drummingdale in the previous panel. Turpentine’s expression is one of jolly unconcern.
Turpentine (5): They both signed the release, Captain.
Translation (5): Ambaŭ subskribis la dokumenton, Kapitano.
Turpentine (6): They understand what they’re doing.
Translation (6): Ili komprenas tion, kion ili faros.
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INT. OSVALDO’S – NIGHT
Toozie takes her phone again and taps through a number of screens.
TOOZIE
Do you know what “vore,” is Joe?
JOE
(lying badly)
Uh, no.
TOOZIE
It’s a kind of porn that appeals to a set of peculiar fetishes, either the fantasy of eating someone, or the fantasy of being eaten by something.
JOE
That’s…kinda disgusting.
TOOZIE
I would say it’s something of an acquired taste. In any event, you can find a lot of art on the subject on the Internet, if you know the right place to look. And one night, when I was looking in the right place, I found this.
Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.
COVER: Same Fabulae Atroces Fausti logo as appeared on “She’s the Ransom,” over another bit of neo-pulp, in this case a young woman swimmer in a 1940s-style swimsuit and hairstyle being menaced underwater by tentacles coming up from the deep. There some be if feasible some bubbles to emphasize the underwater.
CAPTION (title) (1): “Bait”
Translation (1): “Logaĵo”
CAPTION (author) (2): Written and produced by Iago Faustus
Translation (2): Verkita kaj produktita de Iago Faustus
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INT. OSVALDO’S – NIGHT
Joe leans forward conspiratorially toward Toozie.
JOE
Why do you say you know what goes on where I work?
Toozie reaches into her purse and pulls out her smartphone. She taps a few keys and then hands the phone to Joe to see.
It show a picture of Rosalie. Joe blanches.
TOOZIE
In case you’ve forgotten, that’s Dr. Rosalie Quisp. I believe she was a colleague of yours.
The bartender sets a glass of white wine in front of Toozie. She takes it and takes a sip.
TOOZIE
She was killed in some sort of industrial accident — unclear what kind, all the news media I could find were very vague about its nature.
JOE
It was tragic. We all liked Rosalie. What’s your point?
TOOZIE
Well, interestingly enough only one week after Dr. Quisp’s untimely demise, Oikos Galenou patents a compound that turns out to be the biggest medical miracle since penicillin.
Joe puts Toozie’s phone back on the bar.
JOE
A fortunate coincidence.
TOOZIE
Perhaps, Dr. Tucker. And a few years go by, and then there’s a terrorist incident, a really bad one, takes place. Something like six security guards were killed before the terrorists themselves were wiped out by a SWAT team. To this day no one, either from Oikos Galenou or law enforcement has been willing to comment in the news media about who these “terrorists” were or what they wanted.
JOE
Sometimes people play rough in industrial espionage.
TOOZIE
Yes, well, after that incident a mysterious artificial intelligence called the Mediatrix appeared. She…it?…let’s call her “she” puts her services to use solving an atrocious and long-running conflict.
JOE
I don’t see what you think that has to do with us.
TOOZIE
I would have thought nothing, until she gave that weird news conference prior to deactivating herself. She made a strange and possibly inappropriate set of references to sacrifices being made and how the long-suffering land of Stradanya was now in the “house of Galen.”
JOE
So that’s just weird.
TOOZIE
“Just weird,” until you think about the fact that “house of Galen” in Greek is Oikos Galenou.
JOE
Look, Toozie…
Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.
It is with great pleasure that I can announce a new appearance on The Moustachioed Podcastio with Daniel Segura as we spent an intense time discussing Luis Valdez’s 1981 Zoot Suit, a musical that takes off from real historical events in wartime Los Angeles (the Sleepy Lagoon Murder and the Zoot Suit riots) and becomes something truly extraordinary and complex. You can get a sense of how complex by listening to Daniel and me wrestle with it for nearly 100 minutes. It stars, among others, the awe-inspiring Edward James Olmos as “El Pachuco,” who’s either protagonist Henry Reyna’s projected alter ego, an allegorical representation of Chicano consciousness, or perhaps an Aztec deity. Aren’t movies great?
You can access the episode via Daniel’s links page or just load up “Moustachioed Podcastio” in your podcast app of choice.
Our custom episode art is by Lucy Fidelis, a long-time contributor here at Erotic Mad Science, showing El Pachuco projecting in front of a 21-st century Los Angeles. You can find out more about Lucy by visiting her website.
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Part of a sequence in which artist Dark Vasili imagines what Toozie was imagining when she had to leave the monster-movie Cheesefest (a sequence that in main continuity begins at Storyboard 033.
If you support this artist on patreon as I do, you can get access to the artist’s galleries of exquisitely-rendered (some of it very NSFW) work.
Please do not reproduce this image or its associated storyboards or screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.
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INT. OSVALDO’S – NIGHT
Osvaldo’s is a slightly more louche version of an American chain restaurant, the sort of place where twenty- and thirty-somethings congregate after work to drink and hook up.
There are televisions over the bar, at least one of which is tuned to a cable news channel.
Joe, dressed much like the rest of the clientele, sits at the bar nursing a beer.
Toozie, dressed as if she is out on a date, carrying a small purse, sidles onto the barstool next to Joe. She places her purse on the bar.
TOOZIE
Hello, Joe.
JOE
Toozie.
The BARTENDER approaches.
BARTENDER
Anything for the lady?
TOOZIE
Glass of white wine, please.
BARTENDER
You two want anything to eat?
JOE
(to Toozie)
The boneless wings here are pretty good.
TOOZIE
Okay.
JOE
(to Bartender)
Double order of boneless wings, extra hot-sauce on the side.
The Bartender nods, then shuffles away to get Toozie’s drink and put in the order.
Please do not reproduce this storyboard or its associated screenplay text without permission from Faustus, who may be contacted here.
