I Am The Night (Whole screenplay)

I Am The Night.1

Scene 12

(There are no sounds to the screams, to the horror, to the destruction that is being handed out; citizen to fellow human. Bodies on the streets, the police shooting wildly at anyone who come near them, darkness falls over the cities of the world as it nears its end. Cars, buildings and roads are destroyed, streets wiped off the face of earth and anything breakable is or will be broken and smashed into tiny smithereens by people, who in their last seconds of freedom and civilisation decide to take others. Planes dropping out of skies and into the distance, soldiers raping and pillaging……those who are trying to escape, find it blocked; their bid to get away from the madness that has engulfed their surroundings.3

As the camera floats over the streets of a small urban area of Washington DC, alight with fire and chaos it then drops into the living room of one house. The house in question is burnt out and crumbling, we see three dead bodies slumped. One, of a girl, is against a wall with massive lacerations, another is on a sofa, which is slowly igniting and the last one, the head is leaning on the table in front of he/she…..blood dripping through the wooden floorboards. Then as we follow the drips of blood, from the head it’s leaving all the way to the floor that it seeps under, cue the song that starts playing *Birth of a penguin parts 1 & 2 – Danny Elfman*4

We follow the blood as it trickles downwards, underneath the floor boards and into the foundations. From there we go up a little bit and look into a pipe and follow the length of this cobwebbed Victorian era lead piping downwards and more so, as if the viewer is holding the camera and filming their drop. Eventually we come to the large underground sewer system. Here, we witness a youth splashing about in the less-than-clean water in the pitch dark with a torch in one hand and a bundle of something in the other. The bundle lets out a loud gurgle, so we can assume it’s a baby she’s holding. The splashes and the odd stopping on her travels to try and remember the directions to take plus the occasional loud noise from above does little to reassure her of what she is doing. Still she perseveres and the camera starts to follow her more intently, we don’t see what she looks like, we see her shadow on the circular tunnel like sewer walls and we see she is wearing tight jeans, a hoody and a cap. It’s so dark that none of us can make out the colour, at this point the vision is one of black and luminous white (the torch and the shadows it gives off). 5

As another loud noise makes an impact, a rumbling sensation that echoes through the sewers, beating the walls, we hear the baby cry a little and she tries to hush the bundle back to sleep. What she is doing with the baby, who she is and where she is going remains a mystery to the viewer, it is up to them to decide now or make their judgements later on. The music will obviously start picking up a little, the tempo becomes more serious and as it becomes more fluent and aggressive we see her, jumping from a ledge to another to avoid a watery death for her and the baby, many, many storeys down below. The camera also cuts away from her and though we still hear her trying to reassure the young baby, possibly newly-born we follow some rats making their runs in a different part of the sewer system, slowly we see a bend in the sewers and it leads to a junction and we catch sight of the girl and the baby going right with a bright light seemingly beckoning them on from that direction. We hear more crescendos of thundering noise and rumbles and as we close in, inch by inch on the girl we discover she is now only knee depth in the water and that she must be close to her destination as the water level starts dropping dramatically. The last we see of them is actually when the camera view goes black and all we hear is the baby gurgling and voices of many people muttering about all sorts of stuff in different languages.6

It is when the music is about to stop that we see the title of the script appear in a bright green colour, which then fades away as the narrator starts.)7

Narrator: The year was 2031…..nuclear war had destroyed the world and anyone that survived met a designated place. New York City. From the ruins of earth and New York, survivors lived in the sewer system, going up into the light and the land of death to create a new city, a place for humankind to live, to be the last bastion of it’s evolutional self. The new city; Metropolis, was built upon the old New York City as a whole. Subways are no longer used after the knife crime and the criminal gangs that came to dominate this beautiful but ultimately grim city are in power. Corruption and death are commonalities; cloning is being pushed through the legal processes and Metropolis, as a bustling city itself, is the size of ten London’s. Hundreds of millions of people reside here, trying to rebuild something out of the dust and disaster. They are never knowing what to expect: another day alive, or one in a box……This is Metropolis, 2050.8

(Then the screen opens up again and we see a child, in the underground sewers looking directly at us. No expression on his face, possibly five years old just looking straight at the camera and the viewers, we see his grotty face, his grotty small body. The mal-nutritioned young boy who his eyes we focus on. Besides him is noise, people crowding around him and electrical buzzing can be heard, but he ignores it all. We hear three paramedics that are surrounding him, covered in frightening shadows; he lets them do what they need to do to him. We catch a glimpse of a robotic hand being passed from one to the other and then the camera darkens again.)9

Scene 210

(At University during a History lesson, the main character; John Michael Creed, now nineteen years of age is sitting in his plastic and cheap chair, biting his pencil and balancing his thoughts on the subject and the ones on the girl nearby: Jilly Darwin. He occasionally looks at her while she’s writing notes down, scribbling furiously and taking a real interest….while he isn’t really. John is one of those students who is clever and knows what he’s talking about, however when it comes to work and school, he’s a bit shy on the more boring side of educational learning. Behind him and in front of him, to all sides of him….people are working, putting their opinions across and generally being what he would call ‘teachers toads’ however unfair that could be. Jilly, can do no wrong though. He’s known her for years……11

At this point, we see a flashback of them both as kids, maybe ten or twelve years of age. Jilly at the time has long blonde hair flowing in the lame wind. The street is dusty, deserted and in ruins. No building is standing, more like crumpled silhouettes making shadows of a reminder of the past. The city is obviously in the middle of being rebuilt into Metropolis. This scene is in black and white, making the surroundings grim and deathly. The street is long, doesn’t stop. Makes one feel that it doesn’t stop because it wasn’t a street in a first place- the destruction made it so. 12

Jilly is laughing, cuddling something in her hands as she runs towards this derelict section of the land they are trying to prosper on. They, the kids do not understand that life can be taken in an instance when carelessness and curiosity become mixed up with the mindset of a young person. She’s shouting at someone; John. He can’t be bothered to run and walks towards her, his shoulders all forward and his face dirty. His hair is matted, near jet black. His clothes have holes in them and his shirt is ripped. He stops and shouts to her, he saw something. A sign! People have been to this area before, they realised it wasn’t for the ordinary human who had no knowledge in exploring potentially radioactive sectors. He keeps pointing, he knows she’ll see his reactions first rather than make him shout. He can’t. He’s never spoken to someone before in his life. He gurgled, cried, screamed, but never knew how to communicate properly.13

His big blue eyes look at her, freezing in on Jilly as she keeps walking back, cuddling whatever it was in her hands. She’s playing a game with him, taken something off him to get his attention and then ran off with it to make him play with her. She senses he won’t walk nearer and she looks at him, face slightly screwed up in disappointment.)14

Jilly: If you don’t come here John, You won’t get your paper! (She dangles it at him, he stands there.) Oh come on John! (Her voice getting more high pitched and whiney) John! Just play a game with me will ya?? (She turns around and runs off, ignoring the sign which reads in bold black ‘NO GO AREA. POTENTIAL RADIOACTIVE RISK.’)15

(He keeps pointing frantically. John was obviously told when he was a lot younger what that sign meant and why it’s implemented in places. She still carries on into the street, he wants to scream at her….she’s doing something terribly wrong and he wants to get her parents but doesn’t know where they are, let alone how far away they are from the base. He keeps waving his pointing finger at the sign but she keeps giggling and takes no notice of him as she skips backwards, rather slowly, almost teasing him to go across and get her or even catch up with her and play in this ‘new and exciting’ playground of adult fun.)16

Jilly: COME ON JOHN! (She giggles again, her smile as wide as the half moon, her small teeth glistening and so white. She urges him on again.) COME ON JOHN! 17

(He still doesn’t move and with good reason too. Amongst the sticks, stones, cobbles, marble and other broken pieces of debris, she steps among he spots something.)18

Jilly: John? (She says timidly, sussing something’s up finally.)19

(Before she can realise, a huge lump of a brick wall, hanging onto the doomed structure of a building for many years collapses and hurtles downwards towards her. The dust springs to life and as she looks up, almost in slow motion her mouth opens in astonishment; in a pre-death welcoming of surprise and wonder. With hardly anytime to react, she crouches waiting. The brick wall, a large hulking mass with it’s shadow engulfing her small body comes towards her at a rapid speed and as it makes her way to her, John is there. 20

In an instant, he has somehow travelled fifty or so metres in a matter of a nanosecond and he pushes her to the side falling away from her. She bumps onto the floor heavily and starts moaning out loud, her legs and arms are cut. However, John is nowhere to be seen.)21

Teacher: Erm….John, you there? (Clicks his finger at John, who immediately sits back up and stops looking into space.)22

John: Um, yeah sir. (He tries to smile a little) Why wouldn’t I be? (He shrugs and quickly turns and looks at Jilly, who in turn looks back and smiles, possibly because she’s trying not to laugh at him being a twerp.)23

Teacher: Ok then John. Tell me about the starting ideology behind the Supreme Courts of Metropolis and what they stand for and their beliefs. You should…..and it’s a hint John….have this all written down. (His eyebrows raised a little, knowing full well that John will try and cuff it.)24

(The holographic writing board hovers next to John, where, with a holographic pen, is expected to write the answers or so he believes, onto the board in front of the class. They all look and stare, most with amusement.)25

John: (Stands up next to board with pen in hand) well um….that’s a real good question sir! I think I should ask the audience for some ‘teasers’ don’t you think? (He smiles confidently)26

Teacher: (Frowning in disbelief) No John. The class won’t give the answers away. You’ve got this ALL written down, so use your notes. 27

John: Ok…… (He looks at Jilly, who once again, is looking straight at him. Her blonde hair, more of a dirty blonde colour now then it used to be is tied back. She’s wearing a tight fitting white t-shirt with some writing on it, possibly about left wing politics. Dark black tight fitting jeans hug her hips and her legs very well, showing off a good figure which by no means is perfect, but close to. She keeps smiling at him as a bit of sweat runs down his forehead and finds his predicament quite funny.)28

John: Well, sir……Um…..29

Teacher: (Staring at John over the top of his thin rimmed glasses) you weren’t listening were you John?30

John: No.31

Teacher: Why do you even bother turning up John? (Sniggling from the back of the class can be heard and Jilly takes a deep breath and bows her head down so she doesn’t look at the humiliating experience.) Sometimes I really do wonder John.32

John: Ok. (Turning slightly red and agitated.) Can I sit down now? 33

(The teacher says nothing and John takes it as a sign to sit down and avoid eye contact with anyone in the room, except Jilly who he glances at quickly every now and then but this time gets no response. She seems embarrassed for him. Then his nightmare is overturned when the bell rings and everyone starts getting up and bustling out of the classroom as quickly as possible, hoping to get some reprieve from school learning.)34

Teacher: John. (He said sternly and John walks to the teachers’ desk.) I don’t know why you bother John. Tell me…..what did you write in that lesson? (As John is about to answer he is interrupted.) I’ll tell you John…..nothing. That lesson will have answers and theories important for the exams that will be coming up in less than three weeks and all you can be bothered to do is turn up, make eye contact with a blonde girl and mess about! (Getting angrier but remaining very calm.) You waste of space John. GO.35

(John, refusing to look at the teacher walks off rather defeated and sorry for himself about the whole experience. He opens the door slowly and walks out, holding his books in one hand, grappling with a door in another as he makes his way through the corridor. Electronic lockers, by voice procedure open every few seconds at the extremely busy university/college that he attends. People running about everywhere, faces of every different kind and bags containing texts and stationary barging into anyone who gets in their way.)36

John: (Mumbling) John Creed.37

(Locker door opens. Inside are various sports teams banners and pictures of people regarded as great heroes of his modern society. The triumphant Statue of Liberty, which stood firm through the nuclear war and chaos afterwards, is pictured in his locker, in Central Park. It was moved there to showcase the worlds new beginning of liberty and freedom.)38

John: Freedom and liberty….. (He mutters to himself and as he shuffles some books back into his locker, Jilly comes along and taps him on the shoulder. He doesn’t look at her, but rather, carries on doing what it is and talks to her.)39

Jilly: So, how are we after what happened? (She says teasingly.)40

John: A little…. (Shrugs) you know….41

Jilly: It’s always happening to people John. You’ve lost interest in a subject that no longer excites you.42

John: I like history. I mean, I know what he’s saying and stuff, in THAT dull and monotonous voice of his. It’s kind of hard to focus on him and his ideological nonsense. Like listening to some cheesy boy band who declare their love for some woman, in every single song they sing. (He smiles a little.)43

Jilly: Well, ok…..so who are you focusing on then? 44

John: It doesn’t matter Jill. Just drop it yeah? (He says it in a harsh tone, with meaning behind it, like something deep inside is bothering him.)45

Jilly: Ok. Fair enough. (She steps backwards and John slowly turns and faces her, both looking at each other in a deep way.) Why have you always been so harsh on me John? I’ve never understood. (She flicks her long blonde hair out of the way.)46

John: I don’t Jill. What happened, happened. Just a pity our families can’t sort out the differences. 47

Jilly: Obviously Kelly still hates me, even from when I was a kid. 48

John: (Defending Kelly he stands firm and moves his head away slightly.) Maybe some people like to hear the word ‘sorry’. 49

Jilly: (Slightly aggravated at the bringing up of such a sensitive topic within the confines of their friendship raises her eyebrows and a catty look about her face forms when she’s angry.) Yeah well I’ve said it a million times John. I’m not gonna’ keep saying it.50

John: Defiant are we or just stubborn?51

(She is about to start arguing with him when he interrupts her slow-building rant and pent up frustration with him.)52

No, don’t worry about what I’ve said. I’m sorry Jilly. What was done was done. It was an accident. It doesn’t affect me anymore anyway.53

Jilly: (Said meekly) I know. I’m happy for you babe. 54

John: It’s out of my system . (He then turns around and closes his locker and then focuses on Jilly again.) Both what happened and the radiation. So don’t worry a sweat. 55

(John then strokes her chin really gently and she smiles, looking up towards him. She focuses in his eyes, looking and staring into those cold green eyes of his. They invite love, they invite mystery and they invite trouble she thought. Jilly knows she can’t, it’s forbidden.)56

Jilly: So um…I gotta’ go now. (She says really quietly, looking past his shoulder and smiling slightly.)57

John: Oh ok, well erm…same here. I got to go work the store again ya’ know?58

Jilly: Yeah sure. (She starts walking away a little and then stops.) Look John, there’s a show being held at the Metropolis Zoo. It’s a charity and because dad works on behalf of them, you know….he’s a true geek when it comes to animals and fossils dating pre-2031 I was wondering if you would accompany me to it. (She shakes a little in her hands, hardly noticeable and hunches her shoulders forward as she feels nervous and uncomfortable.) 59

John: Yeah I’d love to go. (A non-plus expression on his face)60

Jilly: Would you? (Shock)61

John: (Grinning) yeah why not? Is your dad going to be there though?62

Jilly: Oh don’t worry about him! (Laughs in an over-reacting manner, one of nervousness overtaking the sensibilities of the mind.) No, he’ll be well far away from where we’ll be. (Regains composure) anyway, I’ll phone ya’ (making hand phone signal) and tell you about the arrangements and stuff. 63

(She starts walking off hurriedly, almost skipping, but making sure she keeps a calm decorum about herself as John looks on.64

Then we, the camera see them as small kids again.)65

Jilly: John? (Moaning and with a few tears in her eyes, she gets up. Covering her elbow with one hand she snivels and looks around. The dust of the debris is still around, bustling all around shapes and sizes it can attach itself to.) John?? (She calls again. Though this time she is more frightened than anything.) John??66

(Silence except the whistle of the wind.)67

*Artibeus- Hans Zimmer*68

Jilly: John…….?? (She wanders forward about ten metres and stops. She see’s a dark hole in the ground and puts the pieces together slowly. Her face drops dramatically and she peers down there, looking still.) John……I’m gonna’ get our mums and my dad! (She says with a lump in her throat she starts shouting for the parents as she runs towards the way that they had come from, the direction from which she led John.)69

(The camera goes black again and we can assume we’ve travelled into the tunnel, a ragged and sharp black hole in the ground that John must have fallen down when he pushed Jilly out of the way of the falling wall structure. We can feel the motion ourselves of the drop onto the cave/tunnel floor, the traverse is over ten feet and the feet should tingle. Silence for at least ten seconds and a brief pause makes for an intended unsettling feeling. The camera moves forward slightly and a small light can be seen. The camera focuses on the light, aiming onto it; we zoom in carefully and see that it’s a hand, surrounded by radiation. We see dead insects lying around the dirt of the tunnel. Mud everywhere, the hand covered in it but still the small bright light is next to the hand, the tip of the thumb is the apex for the light, as it lingers off it. 70

We see a general darkness surround the hand, but then something happens. We hear a murmuring, a slight grumble of childish mannerisms and we discover that in the blackened area of the screen is where the small, dumb John lies. Possibly frightened, possibly not actually conscious enough to know what is going on around him, we still focus on the light. The viewer should feel a pang of frustration at not being able to see the matted black hair and cute face of John, a vulnerable child if there was ever one. The hand is coming more into focus now. We see the light, keep looking at it. The camera wants the audience/the viewer to look at this bright, coloured green sparkle that is hovering above the thumb of John. It seems to be attracting particles, maybe dust particles but green specks can be seen slowly being drawn towards the light. The screen is covered in them after twenty seconds. The music still sombre enough to make anyone realise something is about to happen here and it will change John’s life forever, that he will never be the same ever again. We see the hand twitch, as the light becomes bigger and obviously starts having some sort of influence on John. The dust particles start clouding around his hand and wrist and start slowly seeping in, contaminating him. The tunnel slowly lights up with John sitting up, checking himself over. We see no green stuff near him, we think we’ve gone mad. We haven’t.71

For as soon as he touches his wrist and hand, we realise he’s going to be in trouble any minute. He touches his left hand with his right, pressing into his wrist area, checking that the robotic limb is still working ok. He plays around with it for a minute, pretending to grasp things and moving the tips of his fingers. The robotic hand, so advanced in technology was given to him earlier on when he was five, its more than just a prosthetic limb, it doesn’t feel like its fake and it reacts as fluently as any other limb attached to someone through sensors, veins and blood that pump around in the robotic limb. He’s dirty, covered in a dark looking material and as he keeps playing about with his hand he feels a strange sensation. A tingling vibrating sensation that leaps into his body. The contamination has begun! We see him shake as we witness the shudders ripple through his arms, into his small chest, up into his head and spreading all over his body. We switch to his back and see luminous green sparkles wrap themselves around his spine and then sink in aggressively, making him arch in pain. He lets out a horrifying gasp and his fingers are outstretched and as he tries to control his body the camera delves into his skin goes underneath and we watch the blood cells of his body getting wiped out and smothered by these strange green speckles. They take over his robot hand and wrist, they twist themselves into his body, making him arch again and hold his head with his right hand violently. We see him shake, twist himself mercilessly and spasm, his knees smashing against the ground, his feet twitching and his eyes-wide open. We look again into his body and see that layers of the green pecks have formed within his skin, contaminating the blood flow, his blood cells, his heart and major organs and then as we take a step back and see John in this pain. Everything stops and he passes out.72

When he wakes up next he’s cradled by a tearful Kelly, who by then is a little older than she was when we first witnessed her at the beginning with John as a small baby. He means the world to her, a reminder of hope. She pines on this boy. She holds him tightly. At this point, her anger towards the small girl, Jilly is also a sign of weakness. She depends on this young boy more than he probably depends on her and it shows. She has unconditional love for him, whilst he being a boy, just wants attention and reassurance. In Kelly also being angry with Jilly, it shows that she is still immature and vulnerable herself. Kelly at this moment in time is still a teenager.)73

Kelly: (Crying for John, who lays in her arms exhausted and passed out from radiation poisoning.) Oh my god……what has your daughter done?? (Spitting anger at Jilly’s parents.) 74

Jilly’s Dad: She’s a little girl, just like he’s a boy! They are supposed to explore Kelly!75

Jilly’s Mum: We’re so sorry! (Crying and kneeling next to Kelly) We’ve got the specialists coming here as soon as possible Kelly. 76

Kelly: (Crying even more.) He’s gonna’ die isn’t he! (She rests her head against his cheek.)77

Jilly’s Mum: No! He won’t! (Rubbing Kelly’s back, trying to assure her) He won’t!78

Scene 379

(We cut to John at the shop he works at. A part-time employee and badly paid, he still enjoys what he does. It’s a hover board and gadget shop which he helps runs four afternoons a week. It helps give him a distraction and he can play with ideas in his head, think about the day and try to improve on the next. John is surprisingly a man who would rather think then act upon anything, a reluctance to get involved in anything that could put him in dangerous places and situations. Metropolis is an easy place to get killed and to make enemies. A high murder rate and so many criminals run free that one wonders how desperate humanity must be to still want to stick in one clustered area with so much decadence and grime. The shop owner; Rafa a Spaniard who speaks very fluent English and is rather intelligent loves fixing and modifying gadgets, happy in his life, the bloated, braid haired mid 30’s wannabe-entrepreneur is a symbol of Metropolis himself. He waddles around, greedy but a fair man, likeable but also reputedly unscrupulous and a failed experiment of ‘the dream’. 80

He makes his way through the shop. No one is in yet, hasn’t been for a few hours and it’s reaching 10pm at night. Out of the shop window smog and dirt and many other forms of pollution can be seen as well as the constant barrage of the pod noises and the loud music played on the streets by gangs who would rather stab you then actually take your money. John is playing around with a hover board that is just new in. These trendy things are the latest thing to have. Easy travel, no pollution and variable to the extent that pods are. Very expensive though. He fiddles with a green one, with blue lightning striking the front and the underside of the board, the outline is black and from a few metres away would be very distinct. He smiles at himself and his temptation of wanting one.)81

John: (Smiling cheekily, looking at the hover board, sat on a chair next to the counter.) So how much?82

Rafa: How much to what John? How much is the hover board? How much to cost you entry to Vaudevilles? How much for a life? Given or taken? (Sighs)83

(Rafa waddles to the window of the shop and looks out. He see’s many things but we don’t. The outside world is blurred for the viewer.)84

John: What’s wrong Rafa?85

Rafa: (His face gently pressed against the window looking out.) The world my friend. The world had given me an opportunity and I failed to grasp it. Only those ruthless enough in life, can take what they stole to their deaths my friend. Yes, (he looks still) they surely can.86

John: (Smiling) what are you on about Rafa? Sometimes you come out with this stuff and it freaks me out you know??87

Rafa: (Laughs quietly) Yes John, I’m just trying to remember the days before I made mistakes. The days when this place was a new-born, like a baby. When it was innocent. When….people had a choice in life.88

John: (Looking at Rafa) what do you mean?89

Rafa: This place John, (He holds his arms up and goes 90 degrees) needs someone who will stand up to the men in grey suits who get protection money….for what exactly? We need someone who will stand up to the mobs, who will shine a light in the faces of innocence and take us on a journey of redemption. This place John, this city my friend….needs someone who will save us all. 90

(John looks at him speechless with what he’s coming out with.)91

John: Pfft, well um…..how much is the hover board again?92

Rafa: (Shakes his head) you don’t understand. It’s ok. (He walks away into the back area of the shop.) I’ll be fixing something in the back ok??93

John: No problem Rafa. (Shakes his head and laughs a little.)94

(Still no one comes into the shop. Time starts to fly by and all John does is sit there. He doesn’t think about getting his homework out and start writing up the essay for university. He just wants the world to pass him by. He hears Rafa fixing something; it’s making loud noises like metal scraping itself against metal. He grimaces at the noise, but still carries on staring at the shop door, hoping someone will come in. Communication to end his boredom.95

Then, whilst typing on the store computer wildly, to look at the latest Metropolis news his left arm starts quivering. He feels it gently rocking itself. John stops and sees his arm is twitching a little more violently. He keeps looking, in part amazement, because the only other time this ever happened was years ago. His fingers start tapping to themselves and he quickly grabs hold of his hand and squeezes the wrist, trying to cut off the blood momentarily between the prosthetic limb and his arm. It doesn’t work. Panicking slightly he sticks his hand in a pocket in his jeans and still feels the vibrations the hand is inviting on him.)96

John: (Shaking) Jesus…..what’s going on?? 97

Rafa: You ok out there? (Shouting from the back.)98

John: Yeah, listen….can I go now?99

Rafa: Sure thing dude, see ya!100

(John stumbles out of the shop having bumped into shelves violently, wrecking displays and falling onto the floor twice. He holds onto the shop door, trying to push himself off it desperately. He feels so weak, the shudders have spread now and he can see that people are looking at him.101

Across the road is a small roundabout for the pod-cars. On it though is a gang of youths, all dressed alike in leather, with dark denim and exotically coloured hair. One of the youths is holding a radio from a few years back and they are all cheering the pods as they go past, insulting the timid police as they drive past, knowing they lost this area a long time ago. One of the youths keeps watching John as he stumbles and every now and again, limps away from the shop very slowly. He needs to get home, or get somewhere so he can find out what’s wrong. The youth whispers to another of the gang and soon four or five are watching him like eagles, ready for prey. 102

John feels eyes watching him, his dark hair is getting in the way of his vision, but he’s struggling for air as it is, so it doesn’t matter to him. He spots a dark alleyway, motions towards it and the gang are starting to get up slowly from the flowerbed wall they were sitting on. One of them spits on the floor and then rubs it into the ground with his dirty worn out shoe and clicks his fingers. They are ready.)103

Random: You ok buddy?? (A man comes up to John and tries to huddle him to a bench.)104

John: Yeah...I’m (coughing up green bile) I’m fine!105

(John carries on stumbling and stumbling. The man tries to get to him again.)106

Random: Buddy…you are far from… (As he looks over John, he is horrified when John looks at him aggressively, almost trying to warn him away. His eyes are glowing green, his mouth is drooling the green bile and his temples have visible veins in them, almost wanting to pop out. He waves him away and his warning has served the helpful passer-by well. The passer-by is freaked out and aghast, he walks away very quickly, looking intensely at John as he holds himself up against the brick wall corner of the alleyway.)107

John: Oh…my god. What’s happening to me? (He clutches his shaking chest, he can feel his heart wanting to burst out and he slaps his hand across it so it’ll stay in. He crashes into some bins, knocking the smelling rubbish onto the floor and gripping onto the walls for dear life.108

The five gang members are slowly stalking out John like Lions to a Gazelle. He can see them following him; he drops his glasses, broken. He doesn’t, he can’t and he is unable to pick them up. Cats make screeching and hissing noises at him as slowly, he starts to get closer to the dirty puddle ridden ground. He starts crawling, his knuckles seem to be bursting out of his hands, and his face is wet with sweat, foaming at the mouth with the green bile. The camera is focusing on him; as he see’s the shadows follow him, they come even closer. He rests himself upon a pile of pallets and turns around slowly, confronting the youths.)109

John: What…what is it you want? (He gasps for breath) I saw you following me! 110

Youth: We want your credits, cards, phone and clothes. Give. (Holds a gun up) Now.111

(The youths surround him and as he looks around he see’s no viable exit, the only one being where he came from. They look menacing, all possibly about eighteen years old, some maybe two years younger. Streaks of black paint running across their faces, like a tribal war paint, the dark denims on, the leather jackets with rips and tears in them and the angry, young faces. The violence and ruthlessness can be seen in their faces. The camera shows this briefly, the eyes, like a ring of fire in them, give off that they are indeed serious.)112

John: (Ignoring what they said, possibly because of the state he is in.) He-lp…me, please!113

Youth: Help you?? (His face contorted, he bends down to John’s level and looks him square in the eyes.) Help you?? 114

John: (He points his finger in the direction they have just come from.) G-O…please!115

Youth gang: (Laugh)116

Youth: No, you have the wrong idea. You… (Raises his gun at Johns head) Help us…117

John: I can’t… (He knows what is going to happen; he kneels looking up at the pistol pointing right between his eyes.)118

Youth: Oh…you can, believe me, you can and you will. (They start laughing. Then as he turns away slightly he rushes the gun at John’s hand and shoots it off.)119

John: (Screaming in agony) D-arghh! Pfft! Arghh! (He starts crying, coughing up the bile and also fumbling with his other hand for the one just shot off. Blood is leaking all over the dirty cobbled floor as the wound just gushes open and his eyes widen in shock and disbelief. He then gets held straight back on his knees again.)120

Youth: Give… (Shoots other hand off mercilessly) the stuff we wanted, then (John is flailing about, no hands, even the prosthetic is lying on the floor, mutilated and unworkable now. The fingertips and the hand on his normal one are useless; hardly anything resembles his limbs anymore.) THEN….I wouldn’t have to do this! (The youths start laughing as he lets off four rounds into the chest of John, who arcs back in a deathly position, his body now ridiculously spewing blood….more rounds are shot off in the abdomen as the screaming becomes unbearable. Passer-bys can hear but shuffle on slowly, the noises with them forever, they know.)121

The Credits now huh? (He waves the pistol in front of the death-stricken face of John, who can no longer speak. He is covered in blood, wretching it out along with the green bile. He spits and goofs constantly, his brow wet with cold sweat and his lips turning more blue and purple every second. His eyes stare into the eyes of his killer and his accomplices and then he slumps. His head lolls onto his shoulder and the two holding him, throw his body back onto the floor like a rag doll who has been savaged by dogs. The camera still focuses on John as they leave, spitting at him and satisfied with their stolen goods they are soon nowhere to be seen. *Eptesicus- Hans Zimmer*122

As the music starts to play, the camera closes in on the slumped and mutilated body. John lays there, slumped, the blood being washed down a drain from the heavy thunder and rain. His body parts that were shot off have gone cold, layered in different places of the alleyway; he lays there, lifeless, dead. Rats trundle past the body but not before sniffing at it and then trotting off. The lower class of people who live in Metropolis just walk past. Tramps and petty criminals search the body for anything else more valuable and the ordinary citizen turns a blind eye to the visible body of a young adult lying in the middle of an alleyway.) 123

Scene 4124

*Eptesicus- Hans Zimmer*125

(He just lays there, the rain pouring on his face. Soaking him, his dark long black hair is pushed back against the ground by the amount of rain. Hours pass by, till it’s about 4 in the morning, then his eyes start twitching. Violent shudders reverberate across his body, his mangled self. One of his eyes twitches violently and opens; it’s green! The whole eye is green! The camera is focused on his face, stained and crusted with the foam and blood. His other eye flitters manically as well, gradually opening and that too is green. His eyes are an illuminating green colour, no white in them. Then, to the horror of the viewers, while he is still half-dead, his heart is not beating, he is still not moving, but the skin on his forehead starts disintegrating slowly, replaced with the same kind of green colour that’s in his eyes. His hair has gone; his scalp now a glowing illuminated bright green. The skin on his face starts to go as well; gradually his lips change to green and the camera slowly follows the cracks in his skin, all over his body we can witness running cracks with the radiation forming and replacing his skin. His chest, his legs, his feet, his arms all turn green. A glowing sensation around him forms, but the most shocking thing we see is that the black liquid that replaces his blood, seals up his wounds. The bullets within him start to pop out really slowly, like as in a rewind of the bullets trajectory they pop out and fly a few metres away into the rubbish that hugs the alleyway walls. We see them land in the heaps smoking, the radiation burning them. His wounds start healing rapidly now and as the camera moves to his arms, we see them regenerating. What looks like a small stump forming slowly starts to resemble a hand. We keep watching, surely fascinated as his right hand spouts out fingers and the distinction of them. The Left one however spurts some liquid which circulates within the prosthetic limb and ignites life into it. He’ll need to get a new one though, as fingers are missing from the brutal attack.126

Then, as we watch the rain soak him, we notice that it creates a smouldering effect, with steam being let off. The camera zooms in a little more, studying tiny movements in his body, the clothes melted off, completely consumed in green radioactive layers of skin. His eyes start to move side to side, they blink and then they blink again. He sits up really slowly, looking at his transformation, aghast maybe. We see a tear from his left eye, burning into his cheek, the smoke being let off. We hear heavy breathing; we see a burnt mark from where his body laid as we watch him stagger upwards onto his feet. He looks at his hands and follows the path of his veins and notices distinct differences in the way his body is shaped, let alone the new muscles he has gained. Then we see sadness across his face, the first real impression we’ve seen since he morphed into this figure of green, this frighteningly looking creature- a human who is different, the radiation didn’t go. It was there all the time, holding onto the human body that had hosted it. All those medical experts got it wrong, so badly wrong. The treatments he got and the therapies he had didn’t get rid of it at all, it just laid in his body, strengthened itself, sleeping until it needed to burst out. 127

John’s face screws up in pain and anger, his face contorted. His eyebrows are non-existent, the only way it can be told if he is frowning or not is by the skin, albeit radioactive that was underneath, like anyone else’s. More tears start to trickle out slowly, the burning sensation in his face is again letting off steam. The marks of tears then disappear slowly and get replaced by a new layer of skin. He looks down at his naked self, he see’s no definition in his feet, there are no toes, all the gaps closed together. John leans against a wall, collapsing against it through the tragic emotions he feels right now.)128

John: No…no…no…no…no…no…NO!!! (He starts saying it in disbelief and then cries it out, screaming.) Why? Why me? (He thumps his fist against the wall. Then he drags himself rather slowly into a rubbish bin and scuffles through it. Fighting the rubbish in anger, he finds a mirror.) What…do…I look like?? (He says it in mixed horror and anguish as the mirror reflects what we have seen him transform into. He smashes it violently, the glass shards bouncing off the brick wall and flying off in different directions. He shakes himself off rapidly, noticing the burn marks all over his body by the rain, which like his tears, are quickly regenerated again.)129

John: I need…130

Kelly: Wake up… (She says it really softly)131

John: Huh?? (He sits up instantly, shocked and baffled. It feels like only minutes ago that he was in an alleyway half-dead. But there he is, lying in his bed, at their home. He covers his body, maybe thinking that for some reason he’s still green. That he will expose what is now a terrible secret. He just sits up, looking at her through blurry eyes, and we hear him sniff a few times, through his view, the camera looking through his eyes we see Kelly sitting on the end of his bed and twiddling a little with the green duvet. She looks beautiful, possibly 34/35. Brown eyes, thick lips, a darkened tanned look, brown hair that curls as it gets longer. Her face is something to behold in a way of beauty. She’s wearing a police uniform. The white blouse, with a black tie all neatly ironed out along with the black trousers with a crease down the middle of each leg. Her belt has a holster on it along with a pocket for the mobile and an attachment for the truncheon. She holds her black jacket which on the back, with a white stripe across the middle says emblazoned in yellow ‘MPD’ or ‘Metropolis Police Department’.)132

Kelly: You ok? (She looks at him.)133

John: Umm… (Looking around at his surroundings) yeah I think so.134

Kelly: You got home late honey. I’ve covered for you don’t worry. I phoned college and told them you’re ill. (As she speaks John tries to but he only opens his mouth and can’t get a word in.) Just don’t do it again ok? This place isn’t a barn, so yeah, you know…135

John: Hu-argh, my god what a headache I have. Kelly, I swear now that I wasn’t out or anything. I just must of finished work late that’s all.136

Kelly: Don’t lie to me! (She points her finger at him.) Rafa phoned me at midnight last night and told me you went off from work early. So where were you then?137

John: I was just, ya’ know? (Shrugging his shoulders, not really knowing what to say)138

Kelly: Well, I’m not impressed Johnny. 139

John: (Mock sneering.) Neither am I! 140

Kelly: Listen, I don’t want you out late at all now for the rest of the month ok? Oh and whatever happens, do your homework yeah? (Looking serious) Your teacher person rang me after school and said about you and his classes…141

John: I just get bored that’s all! (Yawns) I can’t help it if he’s a boring old man!142

Kelly: Just do it ok!! (Gets up and leaves, leaving the door open and opens the sliding front door open.) Have a good day Johnny! (She shouts as she makes the start of her journey to go to work.)143

John: Ok, love ya’! (Scratches his head and relieved that she didn’t notice what happened to him, let alone his prosthetic hand.144

He gets up slowly and the song *No one knows- Queens Of The Stone Age* starts playing as he observes himself in a mirror to check he is all fully human. What shocks him more though is that he has a ripped body!) Where’s that come from John-boy? (He checks himself out, slowly getting used to it by making poses and feeling his newly developed six pack.) I certainly didn’t get that from eating pizza four times a week, nor did those biceps come from a gym. (He looks at his arms, chiselled, veins showing from the top of his shoulder running to his wrist on his right side, he gets annoyed by the mangled sight of his prosthetic hand and puts it to one side. Not only that, but how does he explain he no longer needs glasses anymore? His vision is perfect seemingly the powers bestowed upon him as a young child have come to fruition.)145

(We then follow him as he walks into the kitchen, yawning and adjusting his boxer shorts. John then starts making himself some cereal only to realise he’s melting the bowl with his hand.)146

John: For heavens sake! (He says angrily as a tap melts in his hand as he goes to get himself a drink.) Is nothing touchable here? (As he gets angry, his hand lights up and a green fireball appears just above it, causing another expletive and shock) Woah! What the?? This is getting too much; I’m having a damn shower. Breakfast is called off today. (Even in the shower he finds he has some problems he needs to deal with. Firstly the water just steams off his skin, even if it is the normal human-type. Then he also has to contend with the fact that as he went to turn it off in frustration at not having a productive wash he accidentally sent a fireball through the wall in the bathroom and it travelled and went through four other walls that got in the way.) Ah, that’s bad.147

Rafa: So what you are saying to me my friend is that somehow your hand just got a hole in it? (Not entirely convinced here.)148

John: Well, yeah! That’s the one! (Puts on a smile and clicks his fingers in Rafa finally saying it.)149

Rafa: I would say what I really think at the moment, however I won’t. (Johns face drops.)150

John: Well, the hole was created by me falling over very badly and somehow impaling it on a very sharp object that was on the floor! (On the other side of the counter of Rafa’s shop.) Come on Rafa, just help me fix the hand ok? (Almost begging)151

Rafa: (Raised eyebrows) only because you are a friend. I consider you an employee and a good friend Mr John. Please don’t lie to me; I am not stupid like you may think I am. I come from Spain, I lived in Madrid and believe me, there was some bloody liars over there, in Europe in general my amigo! Bloody liars! (Slams hand on table, making John jump) Er…yes (Regaining composure) just don’t lie to me ok? Mrs Kelly won’t be pleased if she found out you have, what you say ‘a retarded hand problem’ yes?152

John: (Looks at Rafa and wonders why he has to put up with him.) Yes, can we just sort out my ‘retarded hand problem’ yeah?153

Rafa: What do we need to fix it then?154

John: Well, you’ve got most of the materials already Rafa. A bit of short circuiting wouldn’t do any harm and…155

Rafa: (Interrupts him) the skin? Where do we get that from John?156

John: Ah, yes. Good point, trust me here yeah? (Making it up as he goes along.)157

Rafa: I’m all ears…158

John: You get a knife and slice some off me. 159

Rafa: I do what? (Horrified) you want me to do what with a knife? What was that? I heard something about your skin and a knife. 160

John: (Clearing throat and trying to look serious.) Yes Rafa, you (points at him) cut some skin off me and we’ll put it on my limb yeah? (Waves limb about to show Rafa.)161

Rafa: Whereabouts are we talking?162

John: Trust me on this, anywhere. 163

Rafa: What? Even…164

John: No! Not there!165

*Gimme Shelter- The Rolling Stones*166

(The camera screen opens up again with the sizzling noises made in the back and slight anguished pains coming from the back of the shop as Rafa gets some skin off John. Then we see both of them fixing his limb with an assortment of fuses and wires and metal layers being put into it. When it’s finally done, John re-connects the blood system into his limb and they high-five each other with John kissing Rafa on the forehead, to which he looks shocked and backs off very quickly! Then Rafa notices something. Then the song ends.)167

Rafa: (Pointing) what is that green thing on your hand Mr John?168

John: (Nervously he looks down and see’s a green fireball in his hand again.) That is a radioactive fireball Rafa. It’s another reason why I need my left hand so much, because it can’t conjure these up. (He nods to the fireball) They are kinda’ dangerous as well, like, I threw one earlier and it went through a rooms easily, (Rafa looks astonished) what? It was an accident!169

Rafa: So…you are still radioactive?170

John: Yes, very.171

Rafa: You can make things like that just appear?172

John: No, for some reason it just happens. I need to control them otherwise it could happen in the wrong place at the wrong time. You know?173

Rafa: (Looking sweaty and rather freaked out) I seriously am considering whether or not to start a travelling circus with you my main freak attraction Mr John…however, I do indeed have something to help you.174

John: You do? (Brightens up.)175

Rafa: Hold just there. (The porky middle aged Spaniard runs into the back and after some rummaging, minutes later he appears with a glove.) Here…try this.176

John: (Doesn’t know where to put himself.) It’s a glove Rafa. This fireball here, will burn through that glove in nanoseconds. This stuff is all over me Rafa, anytime I could turn into some big green mass and start accidentally blowing stuff up. I’m a nuclear disaster; call me a by-product of the third world war. I’m a freak, one of the only people to survive radiation poisoning of this magnitude. I can melt things like taps and showers with a finger. For god’s sake Rafa, the only thing I do know is that I can control the times of when I can go to the toilet. Anything else at the moment is a risk and that glove won’t last at all. 177

(A stunned silence as Rafa tries to take that all in. They both look away from each other, John realising he said too much and Rafa not quite knowing what to say next.)178

Rafa: I think you should try it on, you know? (He hands the glove over to John.)179

John: Yeah. (John gets the glove and puts it on, expecting the fireball to melt it in no time. Instead, the glove has extinguished it and stayed intact.) Wow. What…what…what material is this??180

Rafa: It’s illegal that’s all my friend.181

Scene 5182

(Flashback: The camera invites us into the architecturally decadent and gothic looking Metropolis Incarceration Centre way back in 2042. The place smells of grot and grime, the weeds of the walls spreading to cover the brick and mortar that it was built with. The prison itself is astonishingly big, possibly six or so miles long and maybe more in width. It was built five years before the flashback when crime and depraved acts deemed wholly inappropriate by the judges of the government and senior police of the new city decided to act upon the constant criminal activity. Though it did act as a deterrent along with harsh sentences, corruption and bribery has made sure the real kingpins of the world stay free and sentences are often halved by the dubious parole system put in place. Criminal activity in Metropolis is still amazingly high, so high that as John found out, no one is safe.183

The inside of the prison is practically made up of many floors of cells, the traditional looking barred effect. No windows since they learnt that people may try to escape from them and normally it’s up to five prisoners per cell, with the long corridors of cells and inmates almost endless. They mix murderers with burglars, petty thieves with gangsters. There is no separation system except for the deeply insane. They have their own ward, their own sector. People in there are kept in there for a reason and will stay until their lives are over. An approximate guess of 2.5 million prisoners is give or take, but that’s the closest number you’re likely to get, from guesses and government run organisations. As we follow the camera to ‘Floor 13’ we see blood-stains on the floor, all crusted and dry, the red has turned violet colour and we hear prisoners talking, wardens keeping order and walking around making sure nothing is going on. The camera only focuses on the noises, the wardens feet are the only thing we can see, apart from the floor. It’s almost as if we are crawling with a camera on us. Then we stop, the camera turns left and looks up, focusing on two people in a cell.184

We meet two men. One is a middle aged man, greying hair, bald at the crown with a grey moustache and a stomach that grows, even in prison. His clothes, just like all other prisoners is the same. Orange jumpsuits with a choice of white or black vest on underneath the jumpsuits are shoddily made with stitches coming undone all the time. He is sitting on a bed watching proceedings, which to him, are much more entertaining then what has happened so far the last couple of years he’s been in prison. Boredom is the biggest killer in the Incarceration Centre. 185

The other man is dressed smartly. A black suit, with coat-tails, a white shirt on underneath with a red tie and black trousers that are loosely fitted but very smart anyway, the outfit looks cheap and probably was, supplied by the prison supply section it’s a dead certainty that the suit and all the things that came with it were from a charity shop down the road. His hair is slickly gelled so a parting runs down the left hand side of his head. His dark grungy blonde-brown hair is of a medium length and combed behind the ears. Not a single hair is out of place and the man is a perfectionist in every sense. His shaven skin has broken out in a few isolated spots and a rash at the bottom of his neck. His charming eyes are dark grey, with a pointy but average sized nose and his lips are rather thin. He stands at about 5’11 but possibly looks taller due to the shoes he is wearing at the moment. His name is Victor Redding, most likely mid thirties. He’s obsessively packing and unpacking his suitcase, tearing clothes out and then after a few seconds satisfaction having packed everything he then puts it all back together.)186

Prisoner: Man, why don’t you just stop going over the damn stuff in your bag?187

Victor: I just… (He looks around to the prisoner who is lying on his bunk bed) need to ok? I’m not coming back here so I need to make sure everything’s packed and ok.188

Prisoner: Well…that’s what they all say. (He laughs and shakes his head.)189

Victor: What do you mean by that? 190

Prisoner: Just that most people, born a criminal, always a criminal that’s all.191

Victor: Well I’ve got to stay clear you know? (Looking at himself in the mirror again.) My family haven’t seen me for a long time. 192

Prisoner: We all know why as well.193

Victor: Yes we do. My family are excited just as I am, it’s been hard on us all and I need to fit into a city I hear everyday, but has passed me by without blinking. I need to fit in and seize my second chance at life. (He turns and smiles.)194

Prisoner: You really think you’ll be staying out o’ here don’t you! (He slaps his hand across his knee and laughs) I’ll tell you, the boys in cells 1 and 5 are betting on how long before you end up back here.195

Victor: The one who bets ‘never’ is the guy who’ll win then right? I’ve learnt my lessons.196

Prisoner: Gonna’ get a job are we? (Almost sneering)197

Victor: Hopefully.198

Prisoner: What like mob enforcer like last time? 199

Victor: (Turns around slightly disgruntled with a comb in his hand.) No. I’m legit now remember? I’ll work hard for hardly any money if I have to. If it’s the choice of murder and lots of credits or work hard and hardly a credit to my name, then I’ll be choosing the latter any day. (Clicks his finger) FACT.200

Prisoner: Ok, if you say so Vic. 201

Victor: Why are you always so negative? I wonder. (He carries on combing his hair, looking at himself and brushing himself down all the time.)202

Prisoner: Be careful of the outside world that’s all. It might not be what you want it to be. (He rolls over and starts sleeping. His comment makes Victor think, he stops for a little bit and looks in the mirror at himself, wondering what exactly lies ahead.)203

Victor: Believe me my friend (He says quietly, maybe to himself or to the mirror) the world changes and so does everything that is within it.204

(A tap on the bars of the cell grab his attention. He turns around and see’s his wardens, who’ll escort him out of the prison and literally shove him out to the big wide world without a goodbye. The warden who made the tapping nods at him and smiles meekly his baton in his hand occasionally tapping the bars with it. The other warden is standing there just looking at Victor, making him feel ill at ease and almost as if he is looking just straight through him.205

The electronic cell opens up and as one keeps an eye on the sleeping prisoner in the bunk bed, another warden steps forward and almost marches to Victor Redding. He takes a step back, unsure of the moment and unsure of what is going to happen. The warden then searches his suitcase rather pathetically, shoves it into Victor’s chest and walks back out of the electronic cell standing and waiting for Victor.)206

Warden #1: Ok now, time to leave Vic.207

Victor: Yes, yes it is. (He seems sad at leaving. He walks out of the cell and the bars go up again and connect together. Then the old prisoner turns around and with his smile shows his yellow teeth.)208

Prisoner: I bet ten credits by the way! (Chuckles loudly to himself)209

(Victor looks at him, expressionless and he can’t be bothered to respond. One warden practically grabs him by the arm and tries to push him forward, but stops just short of doing so.210

He starts walking a little faster, only because the eyes that focus on him from the other cells are leering and full of hate, anger and jealousy mixed in with sprinklings of sorrow. He looks a little each way but is afraid of people’s reactions, so instead he concentrates on the back of the head of the leading warden who walks very fast and the gangway is full of passing wardens who look at Victor and then look back on. One less maybe?211

The gangway is clanging; the metal vibrations can be heard from five minutes away. He looks up and within the dingy and dark prison; he spots people with automatics on the balcony overlooking any misdemeanours by prisoners but none would anyway, so the job is said to be worthless. They near the end, where the security gate towards the lift is and where the gate guard is situated. Every gate is guarded, all of them with different keys fitted, so it’s a new key everytime.212

The warden with a thin moustache turns around and stops Victor right next to the gate guard.)213

Warden #2: Would you like to go to the men’s Redding? (He points to the right hand side where the toilets are.)214

Victor: Good idea. I want to look smart and perfect for the wife back home.215

Warden#2: Let’s go then. (He signals the other warden follows as well, as they make their way into the tile walled lavatories. Not exactly clean but more likely black, nonetheless Victor goes to a urinal.)216

Warden#2: Woah there Vic, got something for ya’.217

Victor: (Turns around as he was about to go to the toilet.) Oh yes? What is it Warden?218

Warden#2: Your family Vic… (long pause, then a sick smile appears across his face) are dead Victor. DEAD.219

Victor: (Taken aback.) What?220

Warden#1: Here, let this cool you down grass! (The warden appears so quickly and fast that Victor has no time to react as a bucket of acid is unleashed upon him. We watch in slow motion the acid jump out of the bucket and fly into Victor, full frontal and all over his arms and body. The camera looks at him as he stumbles backwards in pain, crashing into the urinals, holding his face with both hands uncontrollably and clutching his face in a desperate bid to be able to open his eyes.)221

Victor: ARGHHHHH!!!!MY GOD!! HU-URGHHHH!!!! (He falls to his knees and starts shaking, about 90% of his body is covered in acid which is burning his skin so badly that he could die from the shock. One of the wardens kicks him in the face, his steel capped boots crashing into his hands and sending Victor backwards, whom is still tearing at his face, trying to rip the skin off as it burns so badly and goes through the skin into the blood system. He huddles into a corner and itching his face and feeling the acid burn his clothes onto his body makes him scream even more.) OH MY GOD! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE????? (He starts breathing heavily, rocking his head backwards and forwards.)222

Warden#1: This my friend is for the Pachino gang. You know the ones you grassed for a shorter sentence!?! (He spits on Victor) Boss Mario says hi!223

(The second warden walks up calmly and gets a lighter out.)224

Warden#2: We promise this won’t hurt. 225

(He gets the lighter, flicks it alight and drops it on the floor, right next to the trace of acid that leads up to Victor.)226

Victor: NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! (He says in a begging manner as the flame rushes towards him and engulfs his flammable body, setting him on fire and leaving him in a mess of disgusting proportions. We can hear his blood-curdling scream as the camera catches the full sight of him on fire, the flames picking him off inch by inch, scarring him like the acid but hundreds times worse. The wardens look at each other and satisfied their job has been done they calmly walk out of the toilet area, never to be seen again.)227

Scene 6228

(The screen opens up again to a room where many people are sat down. The tables are a dark wooden colour; hardly able to be seen in a cellar where light is a luxury. On the chairs are the top dogs of the underworld criminal gangs and riff-raff of Metropolis. The chairs seem to be in their hundreds, everywhere it seems, someone is sitting down, thankfully, the cellar is rather large and more like an underground conference room. The dank and stinky room has aggravated many, who wonder why they are here in the first place. Their bodyguards eye each other closely, staring at each others movements. Most of these gangs have been at war with each other for some time, so to sit in the same room; even if it is only a dark one at that is nothing short of a miracle. The floor is marble, as are the stairs which go off to the side, so it’s quite hard to see anyone coming down them. 229

Some of the gang leaders and mob bosses are wondering why they are here in the first place. They heard the rumour, they heard the calling. Word had gotten to the streets that their employees operate on; the word was that something is going to happen and it’s going to be big, that they all need to converge at this designated place and talk about it. So they came, most reluctantly, as criminal gangs these days aren’t bothered about turf wars so much anymore. They’re more bothered about the certain law enforcer who is making their lives and very existence unbearable. They heard this something had to do with that. So with baited breath and interest, they all came...one after the after, like black sheep walking in blind to shadows that didn’t show themselves. They are nervous, this could all be a trap, but most doubted that. Some took some teams of mob enforcers with them and put them out and about, on call if needed. 230

The lantern that lights the stairway is rocking slightly; the draft from the wind is shaking it. The flame flickers very slowly, then dramatically regenerates itself and carries on.)231

Mob boss#1: Whoever it is (looks at Rolex gold watch) is late. I ain’t too impressed ya’ know?? (He speaks to another and he nods in agreement.) I thought you’d agree with me.232

(Then, suddenly, we hear a noise from upstairs. It’s a slow painful noise and the camera focuses on it, squaring up to the entrance of the stairs, looking around and we see the leaders of the criminal fraternity all silent, awaiting this meeting they were called to. We hear one foot step, then another. We then hear another foot step, followed by one more and then silence.233

A click can be heard, a subtle noise of a weapon and a bullet is realised from the pistol into the lantern, breaking it and the light dies alongside the shards of glass that cover the entrance. We hear alarmed murmurings from the gang leaders and their bodyguards, some are getting ready to cock their weapons and others are calming down their dubious employers. We then sit there in darkness awaiting something but not sure what. The anticipation is raw and heavy with dread and curiosity filling the air.234

Another footstep followed by heavy breathing. Then a clunk on the floor, we hear metal spin a few times on the cellar floor. Heavy breathing again as another foot step is taken.)235

Voice: Put your weapons away. That was mine.236

(He or she then gets to the bottom of the staircase and turns quietly. The camera is following the shadow in the darkness, we can hardly make out the frame of whoever this is, let alone recognise him/her. He leans against a table, propping against it for added support. Heavy breathing again, a sniff and then silence.)237

Mob boss#1: Lateness is something we do not tolerate. 238

Voice: Punctuality should not judge a man.239

Mob boss#1: Not showing up on time shows disrespect. Tell me, are you disrespecting every gang leader in here?240

Voice: I have a limp. Sometimes it takes me longer that’s all. If you want an apology, get out of here now… and never come back.241

(He clears his throat. The camera can see him a little clearer, but his hands are covered in gloves and his face is covered by a loose hoodie jumper that he is wearing. The front row of gangsters try to, futile in many ways, try to see what he looks like. We are looking at him from behind, he seems perfectly normal.)242

Three years ago, people like him wouldn’t be causing the trouble they’re causing now. They have become an inconvenience yes? I guess they have. It’s why you are all here. You want the heat off you right?243

(Slight shuffling and whispers can be heard.)244

Mob boss#1: Yes we do, you’re right there. (Twitching his moustache) How would you solve us our problem though?245

(More gangsters lean forward hoping to catch a word of what he says.)246

Voice: The moon is darkening, the shadows are blending and the night is mine.247

Mob boss#1: What are you going on about? (Raised eyebrows and in a preposterous tone of voice.) Make sense now.248

Voice: First, you pay me lots of money. (Points to the table and taps it fervently, his whole body shaking. His hunchback shoulder looking stance, with them slumped forward gives the impression of him being nervous.)249

Mob boss#1: How much? 250

Mob boss#2: How do we know that whatever job we are paying you for…that you will complete and not fail?251

(Other mob bosses and leaders start nodding and shaking their heads in agreement, some are getting quite rowdy in their agreeing. It slightly unsettles the weird man we see from behind. Not in a good way either. He clears his throat even more.)252

Voice: You pay me how much you think the job is worth paying… Then… (He carries on regardless of the interruption.) You give me men. I want men to help me. I don’t care how many. They will probably die anyway.253

Mob boss#1: Never in my life have I come across someone with such nerve. You impress me; however you still haven’t answered our questions. 254

Voice: I won’t fail. I can’t fail. Do any of you know what happened to Boss Mario? (His breathing gets heavier, we see him wipe his face under the thick hoody. 255

They all sit there, in a silence. Wondering what he is going to do or say next.)256

I’ll tell you then shall I? I walked into his home and killed him. Not just him though. I killed his mother, his seven sons, his young daughter, his wife and his ten bodyguards. (Heavy breathing.) But I saved the best till last because if you can’t recognise his body in the morning, it’s all thanks to a little thing called ‘revenge’. Just a little bit of acid… (We hear anger in his voice a little, violent shaking) and a little of this! (Holds up a lighter.)257

(Silence again. Stunned silence from the crowd. They give off a sense of shock, while some give off a sense of dread.)258

You wonder what kind of maniac you’re talking to? 259

Mob boss#1: (His voice trembling.) You killed Mario? You killed a respected man? A made man? (His voice still trembling.) Do you know what you have done? Do you know that we are all made men?260

Voice: Shut up. He wasn’t respected, cos’ I never respected him! (Slams his hand on the table) I know what I’ve done, I know the rules. (Breathing heavily again.) Don’t ever ask me questions like that again. 261

I feel some of you aren’t convinced, possibly thinking I’m exaggerating? Would I be exaggerating if I was to tell you I became the nightmare of his before I dropped the lighter onto the acid? Well let me tell you what I’m gonna’ do. I’m gonna’ take back this city for you lot. For a price, you decide that, I don’t care how much, just make it good. The young Captain of the police will be killed. I will systematically turn this town into a rubble and fuck me…I’m gonna’ enjoy it. 262

(A silence across the room yet again.)263

So who is with me then?264

Mob boss#3: Who the hell do you think you are? 265

Voice: I am the night…I am… (Takes his hoody off and everyone peers for a look, but soon, it’s a look of fright and disgust. They don’t know where to turn, where to go. What to do. It’s frightening; it’s something they’ve never seen before. The camera denies us a clear look of his face, but we see his hair, which is in tufts; some at the front, other clusters of hair to the side and the back.) I am…Jack In A Box…and I’m gonna’ give this place a party. MWAHAHAHAHAHA!266

Scene 7267

(Flashback: The camera invites us to follow the long winding road to the insanity wing. All sorts of loose and unsavoury characters live in this rotting place. The smell is putrid, the walls covered in brown mould, the jail bars are rusty and leaks drip onto the floor. A certain someone, sitting on a wooden bench, accommodated next to his bed is staring at the water dripping onto the floor, creating the smallest of puddles possible. His eyes just look; as if they are staring at something else, staring right through that puddle, as if they are thinking about something else entirely different. His shoulders twitch a little, left one first and then the right one and they repeat themselves every so often. It makes him stretch his jaw out a little, trying to make it click. He does all this whilst still staring at that damned puddle. Amazing concentration from a man that has been doing this sort of thing for years, maybe the puddle is annoying him.268

We can only see his shoes at the moment, still no clear look at whom this person is nor whom they look like. We see that he is wearing a straitjacket, because of the white clothing on his shoulders. We look back down at his feet again, this nervous tapping that they make. A warden walks by, it catches his attention. The feet tapping goes silent, his focus on the warden is utmost. The warden looks at him, casually gripping his baton but not unsheathing it. He looks this person in the eyes and see’s a maniacal look, where everything means nothing to him, this anarchical view of the world that brings down civilisations and destroys people’s lives, for his was destroyed long ago. The warden withdraws; he keeps looking to his left as he walks on.)269

JIAB: Am I something to behold Mr Warden? (He mutters as the warden walks off. The Warden promptly comes back.) 270

Warden: What was that wacko? (He laughs to himself.)271

JIAB: You see me, am I something to behold? Is that why you look…at me? (He gestures at himself as best as he can whilst his arms are restricted by the straitjacket. The camera now follows up to his face. What we see is shocking. Here is a man who has been altered by the acid that was thrown on him, let alone that fact he was set alight as well. His left eye is closed shut; he has long, curly orange/black hair which looks greasy. It hangs above his shoulders, twirled naturally. He has boils all over his face and arms mainly, but some also on his body. These boils were a natural reaction of the burns he got and the acid that took his skin off, burning into his system and infecting his blood. His right eye bulges out a little and looks maddening, a pinpointed pupil. His nose is only noticeable by two holes that were once his nostrils existing just above his mouth. His actual nose was burnt right off at the time. The right ear is intact while the other is a small burnt off mound and closed up. The left eyebrow is singed and pulled back a little causing a look of tight, dry skin. The mouth is partially closed, skin formed over the top of part of it while he was recovering years and so that means he can only speak out of the corner of his mouth, but he’s done so well at it that it doesn’t affect him or others when they hear him. 272

A scar that is so deep that it weeps blood runs between the corner of his mouth to the side of his chin, while dry stagnant skin powder covers his face and arms. Not a very good job has been done of it though with patchiness and blackened parts suggesting his most prominent and difficult to hide scars. His white face is visible to the warden in a darkened cell.)273

Warden: Just stop tapping your feet and sleep or something.274

JIAB: (Looks saddened.) Won’t one not even put some more powder on me??275

Warden: Is it that time already? (He looks at his watch. As the prison is afraid he might harm himself due to his insanity they, the wardens are tasked with putting the powder on his face. The warden pulls some latex gloves on and starts to unlock the cell door. A slight smile on JIAB’s face appears.) Ok, let’s get this over and done with.276

(The warden enters the cell and with a torch lights the place up a bit more. He reaches for the powder, on a rotting and three-legged table and advances towards JIAB whom is still sitting down. The warden looks at JIAB and with mixed emotions bends his legs a little till he is at the same height as JIAB. He starts shaking the powder out of the tube and rubbing it in gently to his face, creating a white virginal appearance of a man.)277

JIAB: My arms? (He asks as he puts his head back while the warden applies some more to his chin and neck.)278

Warden: What? They’re in the jacket. (He dismisses such a suggestion, but as he does so it’s his final one. JIAB flicks a pen-knife open in his hand and stabs through the material creating a rip. It happens all so quickly, that the warden is taken by complete surprise. His stomach is knifed as JIAB thrusts it upwards, creating a hole in the clothing for his arm to get out of. The warden gurgles still bent over JIAB, blood dribbling out of his mouth and seeping through his uniform. Calmly pushed to one side JIAB gets up and knifes a hole in the other arm of his straitjacket. Both of his hands now free as he limps a little to the cell door. He puts his finger up against the ID machine but it refuses him access, saying it does not know his ID. He looks around and thinks.)279

JIAB: Ah, clever me! (He walks towards the dead warden, and throws his pen-knife in the air, catching it with his other hand. As he does so, he bends down and swiftly but quite jaggedly cuts off the index finger of the wardens’ left hand. It looks almost as if he is grimacing as he holds the finger up but then he, grotesquely kisses it with his lips.) My key to freedom huh? He he he! (Presses finger against the machine. The camera focuses on his face as it is identifying the dead warden’s print. Eventually the cell door opens and a sick grin appears on his face. He gently walks out, smelling dank air.280

The camera opens up again in a CCTV positioning, at the corner of a wall where we watch JIAB just getting out of a lift. He starts skipping slowly, laughing sadistically and howling his glee, not caring if he grabs the other warden’s attention. He then stops and looks up at the camera, peering at us as he treads through puddles from the leaks. A wave and then more skipping and jumping as he tosses his rag-tag straitjacket about whilst it’s still on him. We see moments later from another CCTV camera position two bodies of dead wardens lying about as he laughs uncontrollably whilst he jumps in the puddles, flicking himself with the water, his powder coming off on some parts of him. 281

Another flick to a CCTV camera, this time at the reception area where we see JIAB creep up behind a warden sitting down and having a snack to eat. It’s his last one as JIAB sticks his knife into the mans throat and then slams his head onto the control panel, shutting down all cameras and opening the front gate up: his bid for freedom. His laugh echoes.)282

Jilly: Hey John! (She runs to him as he crosses the University park to the front entrance. It’s a sunny day and that means most people are wearing their summer clothes out, you’d be lucky to find a girl in a suit! She’s wearing a floral dress all in one which goes down to around her knees. The bright flowers and white background make her look perky and stunning. He looks on, slightly amazed as she bounces towards him smiling.) How you been? You were ill the last few days weren’t you?!? What did you have? 283

John: Woah there! All these questions! (They both laugh and she keeps smiling. She’s in love with him, but afraid to say anything, but whether or not the feeling is mutual we don’t know. 284

Birds swoop down on the path before them as she tugs at him continuously, in a really hyper mood and people are lazing on the grass or reading the newspaper on a park bench, what happens on most campuses when its nice and hot and the ice cream flows, along with the water fights.)285

Jilly: So, you ok?286

John: I’m fine! What’s with all the caring and stuff?287

Jilly: Just want to know that’s all! Don’t want my ball partner (Nudges him in the ribs and laughs) being ill and not coming do I!288

John: Hey, it’s all cool. You don’t see me for a few days and you go mad for me. Half the time we argue! 289

Jilly: I should stop making it so obvious shouldn’t I? (She looks down at her feet.)290

John: I know what you mean Jill; you don’t have to say anything. It’s real nice and everything but you know…291

Jill: I suppose I do yeah. Your ‘mum’ wouldn’t let me anywhere near you. (She says it as if she is spitting something rotten out of her mouth.)292

John: She’s my sister Jill. I don’t have a mum, not like you. (As she realises what she’s said he puts his hand up to stop her apologising. They walk through the corridor, towards the cafeteria.)293

Jilly: Can I say? There’s something different about you ya’ know? (John stops and looks at her, wondering what she’s going to say to him.) I’m trying, I’m just trying to figure it out and I can’t. I mean, do you normally only wear one of those gloves? (She nods to the fingerless glove he’s wearing on his right. He shuffles backwards a little.) You look bigger John. You been weightlifting or something? (Her eyebrows rose, possibly not believing she just said something like that when it comes to him.) No, I just don’t know. (Just then she spots some of her friends hanging around near one of their lockers and turns to him.) Anyway, got to go and chat about the latest and all that. Take care John. (She leans in to kiss John on the cheek, but he moves suddenly and quite dramatically, bouncing onto some lockers.) Oh…It was only the cheek I was after! (She laughs to save herself from embarrassment and his face goes bright red.)294

John: What’s the matter with me? (He says to himself as he walks on, nodding towards Jilly and her group of friends. He hears one of them say ‘Look how big he is’ in an amazed tone, mixed in with the ‘I want that body’ voice that some teenage girls get when they see ripped bodied guys nearby. He opens the cafeteria double doors and all around is the legions of students like him, eating, fighting, gossiping, staring, throwing food and other objects and queuing. His biggest dislike about the cafeteria was the queue never seemed to end. He quietly joined it, whilst some people he noticed, whilst not necessarily looking about, knew they were staring at him. It was true, he had got significantly bigger in muscle and his shoulders had broadened a bit. His shirts were tighter fitting then they used to be and he wasn’t wearing the glasses anymore. He looked attractive all of a sudden to many of the girls in the cafeteria. As he moved up in the queue the camera focuses on him, flitting on his widening smile of self-satisfaction and the girls that are talking about him and can’t stop looking.) *Start Me Up- The Rolling Stones*295

Oh I’m liking this.296

(As he turns around moments later, he starts walking down the aisles between the benches and chairs full of students. He keeps walking down, balancing his lunch tray and nodding at girls looking at him and then giggling, his smile not wearing off for a second. He starts to swagger a little, winking at some of the ‘lucky ladies’ and decides to sit with some very pretty looking girls who offer him a seat. To many, the geeky skinny boy has had a miraculous transformation.)297

Jilly: Did you just see that girls? (Sitting a few tables away, her gob smacked face is soon replaced with one of jealousy and brewing hatred of men.) Did you lot just see them girls making eye sex with him? (They all nod and carry on eating.) Then, he started winking and bulging those flipping bicep thingies at them! What makes it worse is they were all swooning for him! 298

Girl: He’s not your boyfriend Jill. (She carries on eating her sandwich with Jilly’s face looking like thunder and biting her lips.)299

Bully: Hey pint-size! (He shoves John in the back, his face narrowly meeting his spaghetti bolognaise. The girls he sits with look in with mixed horror and glee. It’s an ex-boyfriend of one of theirs.)300

John: (Gets up and stands toe-to-toe with the huge guy, twice the size of him anyhow.) What was that for?301

Bully: That’s my girlfriend there. (He points at the pretty brunette, who was sitting opposite John.)302

John: Well that’s nice for you. If you wanted to sit next to her you could have asked me to budge up rather than try and give my face a spaghetti makeover. (He doesn’t back down.)303

Brunette: I’m not! He’s my ex… a dick! (She says it with hatred for him. The Bully blocks it out and glares straight at John, who stands firm.)304

Bully: So what were you doing messing with my girl?305

John: I was having lunch with them that’s all. You jealous or something? (He looks around and smiles and catches the look of Jilly, who has stopped eating and looks horrified at the event unfolding.)306

Jilly: Oh god girls…why does he do this to… (We hear a thumping noise and immediately she stops eating again. She doesn’t look but by the gasping by the crowd we guess that John was smacked in the face pretty hard and put on the floor.) I knew that would happen… (She turns around and goes to see what’s happening. Amazingly though, John isn’t on the floor, he’s still standing and the bully/thug is nursing his hand rolling around on the floor in tears.)307

John: Punch me again I dare you. (He says to the bully who looks at him from the floor. As he turns around to sit back down again he see’s a bunch of the bully’s friends running up to him and covering the fallen guy.)308

Bully friend: You take out my friend huh? (He strides towards John with his fist clenched and his teeth gritted. John pushes him away and he goes flying, smashing into a trolley of food that was going by, tumbling over the top of it and getting covered in the leftovers on the trolley. The crowd start laughing and John looks serious, whilst the brunette is suitably impressed and Jilly is still looking on.)309

Brunette: My gosh…you wanna’ be my boy? (She flusters in amazement and gushes)310

John: No thanks. (He walks off and leaves the cafeteria and the trail of destruction that he made with just one hand two guys who tried to push him about.)311

Jilly: Wait up John! (She gets up and dashes off to find him, but it’s too late. He ran out of the university campus horrified at what he had done to two people, even though they probably deserved it, it still doesn’t mean he should have done what he did.)312

John: Christ! Jesus! Christ! (He says to himself as he runs down the pathway of the campus park pushing people out of the way at first and then blatantly overtaking them. To his shock and to many he doesn’t even realise he’s going faster then most pods that are driving about and soon he realises that apart from a dosage of significant strength that he gained from his transformation, that speed and agility have also been improved. He stops running when he reaches a desolate and deserted district of Metropolis some hours later. 313

Its night and he sits on top of a rooftop of a crumbling old building from the pre-war years. He looks into the night sky, it seems darker to him then it did the previous night. The camera closes up on him, showing him looking at the sky and twiddling about with a bit of grass in his mouth, catching his breath and finding peace from all the chaos that has engulfed him the last couple of days.)314

Rafa: Ah, thought you might be around here Mr John! (John swivels around and finds Rafa sitting next to him having a smoke.)315

John: You should quit you know. Get cancer and all that. (He says quietly.)316

Rafa: I should? Cancer these days can be cured. We’re not in the old pre-war years. (He puts out one and lights up another.)317

John: Anyway, how did you know I’d be here?318

Rafa: It’s where you’re little accident happened all those years ago isn’t. That’s how I know Mr John. I know a lot more about you than you think. (He smiles, puffing away.)319

John: See that hole Rafa? (Points at a large hole in the ground about 25 metres away from where they are on the rooftop.) 320

Rafa: Yeah? (Peers to have a look)321

John: That’s the baby I fell down. I’ll never forget that day. Never. (Tears start forming up in his eyes.)322

Rafa: You regret what happened? (Looks at John)323

John: Sometimes I wonder whether I should have been that stupid.324

Rafa: Stupid? Stupid?? (He says it louder) Stupid??? John, you are not stupid! (John looks up at him.) You saved a young girls life! You put your own before god and came away alive!325

John: (The tears start burning into his skin.) But look what I’ve become! I’m a freak! I can’t do anything now without some consequences…326

Rafa: I know, I heard. Jilly told me about what happened. (He pauses as he takes a big puff.) She loves you John. 327

John: I know she does. 328

Rafa: Then do something about it. She doesn’t care that you might have something wrong with you! Probably the only girl I know that wouldn’t care if you didn’t have a head! (He laughs to himself.)329

John: What about Kelly?330

Rafa: Kelly is not your mother. She can never be your mother, no matter how hard she tries, or wants to be. She needs to let you go and spread your wings…and your seeds. (They both laugh a little.) She won’t like it, but she’ll put up with it. Don’t be afraid of what people will think of you John! She is an over-protective sibling who cares too much for you. 331

John: I suppose you’re right… (Flicks grass in the air to the ground.) 332

Rafa: Here, you heard about that man that escaped from the Incarceration Prison District?333

John: (Looks at Rafa weird.) Why are you changing the subject Rafa?334

Rafa: These powers of yours Mr John were given to you for a reason. Use them.335

John: (Jokingly laughs.) Oh no way! No way! I’m not doing some vigilante stuff here with you Rafa. No way! That’s pretty illegal!336

Rafa: So is the glove Mr John. (Nods at the glove)337

John: It’s still a ‘no.’338

Rafa: (Getting serious.) I don’t think you understand Mr John. 339

John: Understand what? I’m not doing that vigilante type thing. I just want a quiet life.340

Rafa: This man killed his way through an escape. 341

John: So?342

Rafa: We’re talking about twenty wardens got it.343

John: Why are you telling me all this Rafa? I’m still saying no.344

Rafa: Tell that to the families.345

John: The police will get him.346

Rafa: No they won’t John! Half of them are corrupt and the other half are too afraid to arrest someone important in case their friend has to kill them for ruining a good payday! This city is crumbling beneath our very feet! You can fix it! You can be something that the city needs! It’s dirty, it’s rotten! It needs cleaning up!347

John: No. End of. (He walks away before an exasperated Rafa.)348

Rafa: You gonna’ walk away from everything in life John? You gonna’ disown your powers? How will you do all that? How will you get away with doing all of that? Ask yourself John… ‘why do I have these?’349

(John turns around and looks at Rafa, straight in the eyes and see’s something in them. The scene blackens out before we open up again.)350

Scene 8351

John: Ok… just out of pure interest. (He feels he needs to explain to himself.) Lets just see what I can do. (He takes his glove off and sticks it in his jean pocket. The camera shows the most beautiful view of the world he lives in. John is standing on top of the Statue of Liberty in Central Park, District 1 ‘The old New York.’ He looks around and see’s a 24 hour city, brimming, neon lights flashing from close up and afar. Decadence on his doorstep, people talking to each other, people getting arrested, people sleeping and eating, just doing what they normally do. The Statue towers above anything in ‘The Old New York’ now a breeding ground for poverty and criminals. He senses it would be good to see what he can do in this place, when it’s all quiet. The Sun is rising.)352

Right! (He feels a fireball form up from his palm and it engulfs his hand, becoming one with it. He doesn’t feel any pain, it feels normal to him. He spots a building nearby, maybe 50 metres away, a long jump. He eyes it up and takes a few steps back and confidently turns around to confront it.) *Spiderman theme- Danny Elfman*353

I hope I make it. (He starts running towards the edge of the Statue of Liberty and then gracefully he leaps, feeling the air brush against him, as it seems he’s in mid-air forever and ever till he realises one thing. He isn’t going to make it.) Oh god no!! (Screaming as he plummets down really quickly he puts one hand over his eyes as he prepares for the inevitable and the other stretched out in front and to his amazement and the viewers, a huge green concentration of a beam flies out of his hand and starts smashing through the pavement down below. It’s so powerful it starts to slow his freefall down and he lands on one knee a bit awkwardly. Looking around to see if anyone witnessed what he had just done he brushes himself off.354

He’s determined to see what else he can do, just for his own purposes. The camera opens up with him standing before some glass bottles put atop a brick wall. He starts aiming at them with green bolts of fireballs, realising that as soon as one is thrown at an object, another one replaces it. Soon he starts knocking them down, getting the target first time.355

Next the camera opens up to him confronting his past demons. The hole in the ground that he fatefully fell into. He looks into it and see’s its pitch black, so John leaps down there with bated breath. As he hits the dirty, muddy ground a couple of metres down below, he can see the green specks of radiation floating about, becoming attracted to his body. They start to mould into his skin and he doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t feel afraid anymore, because he knows that it can’t hurt him anymore. In a weird way, he feels as if the green particles floating about in the air, all around him are actually a part of him. A part of his DNA makeup. He closes his eyes and his hand lights up again as he feels relaxed, confident and maybe finally happy with his powers. The specks in their millions floating about around him in a big circle, encompassing him and attaching themselves to John, who just stands there, letting it all happen. He breathes it in, he tastes it, holds them in his hands, rubs them across his skin. They can’t do him any harm; they can’t do what they did to him when he was so young and vulnerable. He is exactly like those radioactive particles that are attracted to him; strangely he feels invulnerable.356

Captain Kryzios: Today, I have called this rather impromptu press conference so that we can catch a very dangerous criminal. (He’s standing atop of a stage, his stand has multiple microphones on it and behind him is a big screen TV, which he points to and shows JIAB’s face when he was in prison.) This man is Victor Redding, mid thirties, medium height; his natural hair colour is unknown as is the colour of his skin. What we do know though is he is very much a man that was involved in the mafia of Metropolis. In fact he was one of the original underground criminals that were caught and thrown into jail. 357

Reporter#1: (Specs, blonde hair, red lips, wearing a business suit with a skirt.) Captain!358

Captain Kryzios: Yes?359

Reporter#1: How did he escape? We thought the Incarceration facility was somewhere that criminals couldn’t get away from? How many others have escaped then? (She says all this within a plethora of noise from other reporters who are desperate to get their questions across.)360

Captain Kryzios: This man killed many wardens that night. (He says darkly, bows his head a little further down to the microphone.) I don’t think anyone could have stopped him even if they wanted to. He showed no remorse in what can be described as savage, brutal murders of some of our finest citizens in the law enforcement arm of Metropolis. 361

(A stunned silence before a reporter puts her hand up and asks a question, amongst the small talk, the flashes of cameras and the television crews all present.)362

Reporter#2: Is there going to be a reward on this mans head? 363

Captain Kryzios: No. We would advise all citizens to stay well clear and if they do find him, to contact the local police district as soon as possible. We don’t want vigilantes on our streets, next question.364

Reporter#3: Talking of the law enforcement departments like you mentioned earlier, what are the latest figures on crime and the seemingly huge rise in the old New York district?365

Captain Kryzios: Figures haven’t been released yet and that’s not why I called the press conference. (Smiling)366

Reporter#4: Is Victor Redding part of a criminal gang? Could he be taking shelter with, for instance… (Shrugs shoulders) Boss Mario?367

Captain Kryzios: Redding only cares about escaping at the moment. Any criminal gang that is found or known to shelter him will be dealt with in the harshest manner possible. As for Boss Mario, we haven’t heard any crime activity from him or his gang for the last couple of weeks now.368

On that note, are there anymore questions on the escaped prisoner? (He looks around and see’s a hand float up.) Yes?369

Reporter#5: What about the alleged sighting of a bright green shape around the Statue of Liberty?370

Captain Kryzios: (Laughs) I’m no expert on UFO’s… on that note, have a good day. (He steps off the platform and with his many senior police officers, they walk down the aisle which is straight down the middle of the conference meeting, with many cameras flashing and lots of mumbling in the background. Nick Kryzios is of Greek heritage and a dark tanned man with the black hair and rather thick eyebrows to go with it. His height is one of about 5’11, in his mid-thirties, wearing the dark blue ceremonial uniform of a Captain. He alone is responsible for the police force of Metropolis and has ruthlessly climbed the career ladder from the lowest rung to the very highest in a very short manner of years. As they get out of range of the press he swipes his hat off and ruffles his receding hair line a little.)371

Glad they didn’t ask about the corruption scandal.372

Lieutenant: I think we all are Captain.373

Captain Kryzios: Its one thing that many of the officers in our police force are turning a blind eye to organised crime, its another that they are being paid for it and some even taking part in the crimes.374

Lieutenant: What will you do about it?375

Captain Kryzios: There’s not much I can do Lieutenant. No matter how much highly spoken of I am by the press or the people, I am just a human who is chief of a corrupt, rotting law enforcement agency. 376

Lieutenant: By doing nothing, you’ll be openly encouraging people to take bungs.377

Captain Kryzios: The guys on the ground Lieutenant, (he stops and turns around pointing his finger a little and getting rather passionate.) do not get enough credits in the first place. That is why they turn to the bung that is why we, the guardians of the law are becoming overshadowed by those who wish to flesh this city with their immoral ways!378

(From a distance away, on top of a skyscraper JIAB looks over at the whole city, putting his pair of binoculars away and standing on the edge of the building. He leans next to a gold statue of a Lion roaring, its mane beautifully sculpted and from far away it may as well look real. Some bits of rust and mould are visible as one gets closer. We see the back of JIAB standing next to the Lion, overlooking the city, its bright lights and the dark ground, along with the smog contrast with the beauty of it. He takes a heavy breath and sighs.)379

JIAB: So that’s him then huh? (Talking to himself or the Lion?) My target! (He strokes the statue mane.)380

We shall see if I’m as easy to pull back in as they think. (A rather large flick knife is pulled out and the blade shows.) We shall see indeed… (Husky with a quiet voice.) We shall see.381

Scene 9382

(The camera opens up to a marble-arched bank with credit signs on the windows and the gothic monolithic architecture suggesting it’s grandiose and the profits it probably makes. It’s on the corner of a busy street with many people walking in and others naturally walking past it to somewhere else. A big park lays opposite to the bank and as it’s another sunny day loads of people are enjoying the weather while they can. Pods are seen flashing by, beeping at each other and people waving their fists and shouting about the congestion at each other. So much is happening on this one street that no one notices the odd looking man also known as Jack-in-a-Box stroll towards the said bank with eight cronies, all dressed in black suits with white ties apart from him. Wearing a grey overcoat in the weather, with black gloves on and a filthy white silk shirt on with tiny rips in it along with the pinstripe trousers.)383

JIAB: Ladies, Gentlemen… (The main entrance double door made out of wood is smashed open.) Girls…Boys, this is a bank robbery! (Amongst the screams we can see him laughing out loud as he wipes his curly fringe coloured hair to one side of his face) Don’t put up a fight (He shoots a security guard who was fumbling for his pistol, which then makes more people scream.) Get down on your fronts and you will not die! Hehehehehehehe!384

(His cronies start taking over the bank as he stands there in the middle standing tall amongst those cowering on the floor. He smiles, a huge grin on his face, opening up the cut from the corner of his lip to his chin once again. The patchy white powder on his face is glistening and some has dried up and come off because of the heat. He turns around and see’s one of his gang members fill a security guard up with bullets before he slumps down the flight of marble stairs. JIAB’s shoes clip-clop on the marble surface of the bank and he looks down at the Persian rug on the floor that customers stand on in the queue. He then looks up again.) 385

Anyone else wanna’ be a hero?386

(He walks up to a cowering teenage boy who is sobbing uncontrollably.)387

Come on, surely someone is gonna’ take me on? 388

(He puts the gun away and pushes the sobbing teenager onto the floor.)389

Ok… maybe not!390

(He looks around and spots the massive circular steel and titanium safe. A smile runs across the horribly scarred face of his and he walks ever so slowly towards it as more gunfire can be heard from the floor above them. Two of his thugs keep an eye on the hostages and another is seen sprinting past him towards the busted double doors to keep an eye out for the police. He gets to the safe and finds a dead security guard slumped up against the wall, his blood spatter all across it. Two of his men are there desperately trying to break into it with the blowtorches, TNT, safe decoding electronic devices and just sheer brute force.)391

JIAB: So this is the honey trap? (He says slowly, looking up at it and then down taking in its size and fiddling with his fingers.) Boys… how’s the work going? 392

Thug#1: This thing is gonna’ be difficult to break into. We don’t know the code and no matter how far we drill into it or anything, without the code, we aren’t going to have the credits boss.393

(Sparks and drilling noises come from the equipment as JIAB looks on. He turns around and clicks his fingers.)394

JIAB: Surely, in our time of technology and whiz-kidderry, (he slips his gun out again and juggles with it in both hands) surely, surely, surely, surely… someone who works here (He emphasises the last couple of words and a few people gasp when they see the gun in his hand as he looks over at the cashiers) must know the safe code hmmm? Shall we see? (The look of terror in the cashiers and accountants faces is unimaginable as he walks ever so slowly towards them, menace in his eyes and glee in what he’s saying.)395

You boy! (He points at a youngish looking accountant whose hands are held up high behind the bullet proof windows of the cashpoints. He looks a bit shaken and as a thug kicks the door down and drags him at gunpoint outside of the office and onto the floor in front of JIAB, whom then starts laughing like a madman.) 396

Tell me, young man, you good soul! Tell me! (He slaps the cheek of the accountant playfully) Come on dear boy!397

Accountant: How would I know?398

JIAB: WRONG ANSWER ARSEWIPE! (He shouts aggressively and puts his scary and scarred face up against the accountants.) Hehehehehee…399

Accountant: I wouldn’t know. 400

JIAB: (Whispering into the accountant’s ear as he grabs his collar) Oh but you would, oh but you do hmmm?401

Accountant: I… (He starts mumbling and flapping and as he does so JIAB aims the pistol right up against his forehead.)402

JIAB: Even if it’s made up you can pretend it isn’t can’t you? (He says innocently, dropping the gun from the forehead of the terrified accountant, pouting.) We can pretend that I don’t know that you’re making one big fat stinking white pure lie! CAN’T WE? (The Accountant starts blubbering again.) Do you know why dear boy? (Whispers again into his ear) Its luck! Life is one big fat straw out of many in a rusty old gold pot! HA! 403

Accountant: Ok…404

JIAB: So you will tell me a lie?405

Accountant: Um, yeah? (He looks unsure of himself.)406

JIAB: Good! Give me the ‘code’ then brother! (He does the quotes signal with his hands as he says the word ‘code’.)407

Accountant: 5…1…7…5… (He grabs onto JIAB’s leg for balance as he carries on blubbering away.)408

JIAB: Boys? Did you get that? (He signals to the two thugs at the other end at the safe. Laughing away at himself he stands there waiting patiently as they start typing it in. They look at each other confused and start typing it in again. Nothing happens. One of them turns around. The hostages look around and seem amazed at the action that’s going on.)409

Thug#2: Wrong code boss!410

(JIAB swivels around and looks at the young accountant, smiling slightly out of the corner of his mouth and rubbing the other end as well, the skin that the overlap on his other side is irritating and he scratches it as he ponders.)411

JIAB: God, I hate liars. (He starts walking away and as he does he whips around and with precise aim shoots the accountant, execution style, almost unrepentantly and coldly. The lifeless body falls back on itself, what remains of his head is dashed across the marble floor.) Oh dear! Looks like someone is gonna’ need a new dress! (He says laughing out loud as he points his gun at a middle aged woman who is sobbing loudly amongst the gasps and outcries. Her dress is covered in his brains. He swiftly removes her from the equation by shooting her several times rather wildly.) Screamers! Liars! Anything else here!?!412

(He looks at the other five horrified accountants and looks at three of his thugs. He smiles out of the corner of his mouth and they draw out their machine guns. On his third count they unleash a torrid spray of armour piercing rounds through the windows into the accountants, whose bodies flail in different directions, flapping and twitching with every hit. The noise stops, everyone is still. Some are sobbing a little but aren’t making any loud noises because of his violent and random tendencies. His thugs reload and scarper in different directions. He doesn’t even need to say but they know he wants the bank manager.413

Outside the bank, people have realised what is happening and pandemonium is striking the street and nearby ones. Traffic is at a standstill as people start running about like headless chickens and the camera see’s a women contact the police.)414

JIAB: Joy at last! (The bank manager is shoved in front of him.) So you must be the sole employee of this bank then yes? (The bank manager looks around and his mouth opens a little when he see’s what happened to the others and the dead security guards. However he stands firm. His wavy cropped ginger hair, the specs he wears are taken off as he rubs them on his shirt and he calmly looks JIAB in the eyes.)415

Bank Manager: Who do you think you are?416

JIAB: Don’t try and be a psychologist! I’ve had three before! (He pulls out his gun again and aims it at the bank manager.) You’re ginger, that knocks five seconds off the time I’m giving you to give me the code! (A perverted smile comes across one side of his face.)417

Bank Manager: I don’t have it on me.418

JIAB: Ten seconds…419

Bank manager: It’s upstairs in my office…420

JIAB: Eight seconds…421

Bank manager: You think I carry that information on me everywhere?422

JIAB: Time is running out! HOO-HOO! (He giggles to himself.)423

(Just then, amongst the panic and strife outside the street the bank is on, Kelly Creed so happens to be the nearest officer to the scene. She starts seeing all this panic and opens up her armband, which has a radio/intercom on it that she can speak into. She starts jogging very slowly towards the bank from the left.)424

Kelly: This is officer Creed, finance district, suspected disturbance coming from Metropolis bank on Parkway road. Over. (She says on her intercom.)425

Intercom operator: Hello, this is 5321. Take care and proceed with caution. 426

(As the intercom message comes through, two loud shots are heard and they ring through the bank and the street it’s adjacent to. More panic and screaming. The camera follows Kelly as she reaches the crime scene and takes cover in a corner, outside the bank, near to the double doors.)427

Kelly: (To intercom operator.) Ok, two loud bangs. Sounds like gunshots. Suspected bank robbery. I need back up, get me back up! (She peers around the corner and can’t see anything.)428

JIAB: Am I killing too many people today? (He asks one of the thugs as the bank manager lies on the marble floor in a slump, blood trickling out of him, just like his life.)429

Thug#3: No boss! 430

JIAB: Get the transport ready chap. We’re making an exit! (He walks towards the thugs at the safe who’ve been waiting patiently. He grabs one of their kit bags and throws them each a bundle of highly explosive TNT. They look at him clueless.) Boys! We’re gonna’ blow ourselves a hole! HAHAHAHAHAHA! (They start sticking the bundles of TNT out of the kitbags around the safe walls. Another thug gets his machine gun and aims it at the glass ceiling, making a gaping hole.) 431

Dear citizens! A dead hostage is never as useful as a live hostage, so I’m sparing you all! Count yourself lucky that you have proper jobs and that you did as I said! Now, hand me over your jewellery, fine watches, fake earrings and more importantly, your cold, loving credits. All of it. NOW! (He pumps another bullet into the air. A thug starts collecting it all in a bowler hat given to him by JIAB.)432

Thug#2: Boss! Sirens! (We can then hear sirens screeching from a distance. *Stuck in the middle- Steel wheelers* starts playing as we see JIAB’s face light up like a total maniac, revelling in the chaos he wields. The song is supposed to be ironic from the point of view of the scene, which has been very serious and dark.433

We then hear the distant sound of a gunship coming to their rescue. Their getaway transport obviously.)434

JIAB: (Sniffs the air) Mmmm, the sweet smell of destruction… Heheheh! (He walks towards the front of the bank, along with the other thugs who join him and he gets out his detonator.) Now everyone, hope you all have ear protection! (Gasps and screams as he presses the button and the TNT lets rip and blows apart the bank wall which the huge safe was connected to, we switch to Kelly who see’s a rush of smoke and dust come out of the bank doors and more screaming and panicking.)435

YES! YES! YES! There is a god! (He proclaims as he walks towards the safe which is no longer protected by the wall, which has disappeared into rubble and dust. The massive safe, which is a circular room unto itself, is untouched though. No marks on it.436

I would just like to remind all of you that though I’ve let you all live; it doesn’t mean it was my intention! Let’s show Metropolis how Jack-in-a-Box does things here! (His thugs start slapping TNT bundles all around the bank as horrified and crying people look on, some are shouting to be spared but JIAB has gone way beyond that now.)437

Thug#1: Boss! It’s here! (The camera as well as JIAB looks up and we see the armed helicopter/gunship hovering above the bank, one of the men on it drops numerous amounts of chains down which clank onto the marble floor.)438

JIAB: Three minutes! (* Stuck in the middle- Steel wheelers* ends.)439

(Elsewhere though, Kelly has crept into the bank and at the front entrance, just before the double doors which are inside after a hundred metres or so, she sneaks up on a thug and pistol-whips him. He falls down in a crumpled heap and she carries on creeping up into the bank, towards the busted double doors. 440

The thugs start hurriedly connecting the chains and wrapping them around the sphere like safe. JIAB turns around and as he’s about to ask how many cops are outside he’s confronted by Kelly.)441

JIAB: Huh?442

Kelly: Put it down Redding! (She says with a hissing authority.)443

JIAB: If… you say so… (As he’s about to drop his gun and hold his hands up, a security guard that was upstairs and wasn’t killed comes bounding down with a double barrel.)444

Security guard: Who do you guys think you are huh? (Two thugs look around and get blown away as he pumps the lead into them.) Do you guys know who you’re messing with? (Marching towards JIAB as the thugs start cowering, from the shots he aims at them, JIAB slips and scarpers behind the side of a nearby table.) Huh? Who do you lot think you are? (Kelly is distracted and as she realises where he’s gone, she see’s a gun pointed straight at her.)445

JIAB: Unlucky. (He says coldly as he point blank shoots her three to four times. Her body slumps against the corner of the doors. The security guard wonders what happened and as he fumbles frantically to reload, JIAB rushes from cover and shoots him in the gut. The security guard falls like a ton of bricks. JIAB looks down at him, expressionless and walks on. A signal is given and the Helicopter/gunship starts pulling away; the safe moving inch by inch out of the rubble and dust and finally it’s off the ground a little bit. Thugs start clambering onto the safe so they can escape.)446

Thug#1: Boss!447

(JIAB looks at the timer, a minute and a half to go. *Vespertilio- Hans Zimmer/James Newton Howard* starts playing as the camera goes to ground and we see his shoes, walking towards the fallen security guard, whom is gasping desperately for air but the more he struggles, the less life he has in him to live.448

JIAB kneels down beside him.)449

JIAB: (He says quietly) who do I think I am? It’s a good question. I had a name… I’m still called by it, I still respond to it, but it’s not me anymore. You know? (He looks at the fallen security guard who looks back at him, his face pale and sweaty. JIAB shakes his head, as if to agree with himself.) It’s not what your name is my friend, it’s not who you are… (He pulls the detonator out of his pocket which now reads twenty seconds.) It’s what you’ve done… (He looks around at the mess and destruction he’s made, the bodies lying everywhere, the hostages all cowering. He pats the security guards head with a handkerchief to wipe the sweat away and then teasingly as he places the detonator just inches away from his hands, he gets up and goes. The camera then watches the security guard try in vain, as the seconds count down before the viewer to get hold of it. We hear in the background the helicopter fly off.)450

MCPD SWAT: This is the SWAT team! Hands up! (Thirty guys rush the bank, looking around with their huge semi automatics for the criminals, but it’s all painfully late. The timer is now on five seconds and as the guard’s fingertips reach the top of the detonator, we realise that JIAB left it there on purpose because he knew that these guys were outside ready to burst in. It was a significantly clever trap pulled off, even though he had got what he wanted, the death and destruction gave him more joy.)451

TV Reporter: Police are outside the bank in numbers and… (Looks around, with the huge crowd watching) They’re going in the bank… (Then a loud explosion followed by several others as the bank blows up and a huge fireball engulfs it and anyone inside and nearby. The TV reporter screams as she runs in the opposite direction along with the hundreds civilians that were watching the siege, the camera gets shaky as the cameraman starts running as well filming the chaos and as he films the huge multiple explosions which blows debris far and wide and anything else, we spot the helicopter with the safe moving away in the distance. 452

Scene 10453

(The scene opens up with John being comforted by Rafa, crying into his chest, with two policemen and Captain Kryzios looking on. John is being nursed, sitting on a work table as he was told the news of what happened to his older sister Kelly. We don’t hear any of this; we just watch the scene of turbulent emotions unfold before us. Kryzios takes his hat off and runs his hand down his face, upset with the loss of a good police officer and now that John has no family left. The two policemen look uncomfortable but we can be forgiven for thinking they haven’t done this before. One shuffles towards the door while the other watches on, coldly. John, as he cries looks up at the one watching him with his arms folded and nothing can come to him about this man’s emotionless stance and poise towards him. He see’s that man as cold as ice, while Kryzios explains to him what they think had happened and how they think she might have died. Rafa continues to cradle John in this time of feeling like he’s been punched in the stomach so hard; that he gasps for breath and will never get any ever again.)454

Captain Kryzios: Right, if you excuse me, I must go now. (He bows his head slightly to John and Rafa and begins to walk out of the back of the shop with the two police officers to await his escort again. *Eptesicus- Zimmer/Newton Howard*)455

John: Who…did it? (His eyes are red from the tears; he stopped them from rolling down his face though with the tissues scrunched up in his hands. He asks the question, swallowing really hard and gulping for air.)456

Captain Kryzios: (Turns around and looks at John.) I cannot say John. You know that.457

John: Why? (His mouth trembles a little, Rafa looks on.) 458

Captain Kryzios: It’s the law John. We have an idea as to who it is. We’ll find that scumbag and we’ll haul him in front of a court and get his ass half nailed to a coffin, because believe me, I will not let a cop-killer get away with it.459

John: (He gets up.) Just tell me. (He walks towards Kryzios a little.)460

Captain Kryzios: Tell you John? Then what?461

John: I’ll go and kill the bastard that did this.462

Captain Kryzios: Revenge? You wanna’ be a vigilante John? You go ahead and be a vigilante and find this nut job, you kill him and then what? Exactly! You don’t know. Well let me tell you John what happens to vigilantes: they become extreme in their beliefs because they feel that they are right no matter what. Their reasoning goes beyond the pale and then we have a psychopath on the loose. How many will you end up killing? What if you kill someone that was innocent of something, but to you was guilty of a crime you believe needs to be upheld? The justice system is impartial because of those reasoning’s, it’s why we have law enforcement, it’s what we have to hold onto.463

(John walks up to him and stops just short of being nose to nose with Kryzios. He looks him in the eyes and starts trembling. Kryzios grips one of his shoulders as he looks down on the floor and remains silent.)464

See…I’m right. Leave it to us John. It’s more dangerous if you know, than if you don’t.465

Narrator: It’s then that after he took in those words of wisdom from Captain Kryzios that he realised that the anger in him would stay there forever, that it would never be released because he can’t tell his sister that he loves her anymore, that he has lost the only person in his family has become a mortal blow to the morals and feelings he holds dear within him. He sits and watches as the policemen leave and get into their car-pods and go. Rafa watches him as he carries on pottering around the shop, he just watches John, who in turn just sits and looks at the world go by. The very possibility it could move on and leave him behind is as dangerous as the anger he feels. 466

Scene 11467

(We hear the rain splat against the camera face as the screen opens up and we watch the proceedings of Kelly’s funeral. It’s a quiet and small occasion. Six men in police ceremonial uniforms stand to attention with rifles bared across their chest, clutched tightly. Opposite them to their left is Captain Kryzios and his small entourage of staff, some friends of hers and some people that knew her through her job. On the right hand side of the six man parade, are John, Jilly and Rafa. All dressed in black. John is wearing an overcoat that’s become shiny from the rain, his shoes are polished and his feet are damp. His tie is waving about in the blustering wind, the sea remains relatively calm but the rain thrashes against the walls and their heads are bowed while the priest in his darkened garb proceeds with the ceremony.468

They all stand back and look on as the coffin, with the flag of the MCPD draped upon it, is lowered slowly into the cold water of the Endless Ocean of The New World by six pallbearers all wearing MCPD ceremonial uniform as well. A few tears are visible from people’s faces, with Kryzios looking solemn about the whole affair but it seems nothing can make John cry. He just stands there watching it all through, squinting a little as the sun rises up for a new day, a new beginning. The silhouettes of the skyscrapers and the wavering sea are the setting for what is possibly the saddest day of his life. The coffin slides into the sea ever so slightly, bobbing up and down as the current slowly starts to take Kelly away from her brother; John. All he can think about is that he’ll never see her again. 469

*Corynorhinus- Hans Zimmer/Newton Howard*470

Starts to play as the coffin becomes harder and harder for him to see. Now, life will be different, there is no Kelly to wake him up, wash his clothes, do his ironing or cook his dinner. It’s just him now and he can’t depend on her anymore, not like he has done ever since he was small and vulnerable. 471

Jilly looks at him glancing quickly so he doesn’t catch her staring at him; she watches the coffin go too but see’s no emotion from him except the cold look he is giving it as he watches it intently, not keeping his eye off the coffin. She slowly takes her left hand out of its glove and so gently, with the true intention of friendship and love, she shows how much he means to her by slightly pushing her hand against his. Their knuckles rub slowly against each other, she won’t try to hold his hand though, she fears he’ll reject the offering and it’ll make him uncomfortable as well as upset. He notices and places her hand in his, clasping it softly, rubbing the top of her knuckles with his thumb, rubbing them in a circular motion. They both look at each other and to him, maybe she can give him some comfort, just what he needs right now.472

The priest finishes with what he has to say, closes his book and tucks it under his arm. The six man parade start an eight shot salute into the air in a regimented, old fashioned military way, with onlookers witnessing the end of the funeral. Slowly, everyone starts to walk away, many offering their condolences but John says nothing back and its left to Jilly to thank them for their support as he looks down onto the ground, staring at a bottomless pit, that very place he wishes he could hide in, where he could be left alone. It starts pelting down with rain and his soaked hair runs down onto his face, the gel no longer there to keep his smart appearance up.)473

Lawyer: Hello Mr Creed. (He tries to shake John’s hand but he doesn’t get the mutual offer back so he clears his throat as a welcome distraction.) Anyway, I just wanted to say that being the family lawyer, I was always told that in the case that Mrs Creed… (He stops just short.) Then you were to get her pension, life insurance, the four years pay scheme and live in the apartment. It’s all been sorted out for you. (He smiles a little but realises that he isn’t getting any back.) So come see me one day and we’ll sort it all out…474

(As the screen opens up again, we watch John staring right at us. No remorse in his face, no inkling of emotions, let alone a tear in his eye. The camera works its way behind him and we witness that he’s looking out of the shop window, watching what everyone is doing. Still soaked to the bone by the rain he doesn’t take his coat off or any of his clothes. He just stands there, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders slumped and he can’t understand how the world just keeps on living life without people.)475

Rafa: Would you like to watch a film? There’s a good one coming on now. (He says peering around the corner of the back door of the shop.)476

John: Rafa, not now. (He turns his head and then looks back again, carrying on with whatever he was doing. The sadness in his voice persuades Rafa to leave him alone.)477

(The camera then opens up again, the pitch black fading away as we watch John in a dirty dressing gown, with stains all over it, a cigarette in one hand and a glass of vodka in the other looking out of the windows of his apartment. The bridge which is near by, is full of traffic, with the sun slowly melting away into its usual sunset conundrum and the statue of Liberty in the distance causing a beautiful skyline when you mix the other buildings and the neon and bright lights of a grimy city together. It seems he hasn’t been out for a while and with boxes laying all over the place, his ruffled hair looking like he’s just got out of bed and with the TV on rolling news channels, he has become obsessed with watching what’s going on in a world that he doesn’t want to be a part of. We look around the living room/lounge area of the apartment and photos that contained Kelly in them are face down, her books are nowhere to be seen, her wardrobe is emptied, anything that belonged to her has been relocated somewhere, so he doesn’t have to remind himself of his loss. We hear the TV and the report it’s giving out, the camera zooms in on the back of John as his ears prick up to listen to the news.)478

TV Reporter: As today nears an end, once again it’s all about the most dangerous man in Metropolis; Jack-in-a-box. Ever since he introduced himself to a terrified public almost a month ago, everyday has been another of murder and lunacy from a man who is dangerously and clinically, according to many criminologists, a murdering sociopath who is making it big in the town. Fast becoming more dangerous than any criminal of recent history he has in just the last two weeks robbed several banks, supermarkets and department stores; killing over two-hundred and sixty-five people along the way, seventy three of them cops.479

Jilly: You ok? (She walks in, puts her handbag on the table, along with a small pile of notes and letters. He still looks out. She realises what’s on the television and turns the volume down.) I suppose you’ve been living like a hermit John huh? (Still no response) Me and Rafa are concerned about you John, it’s why (She tries to think of something to say) it’s why I’m here. Just wanted to check up on you. I know you said you wanted some space, so we’ve given it to you; it’s just that you haven’t spoken to anyone or gone out of this room in over two weeks. (She’s looks at all the takeaways lying about on the floor, adding to a pungent smell to the room. She waves the smoke away from his cigarette as he takes another puff.) I see you’ve been eating healthily then John…480

John: What did you want?481

Jilly: To make sure you’re ok. (She starts picking up the rubbish and pushing it into the bin in the kitchen.)482

John: Well, I’m fine.483

Jilly: John, you haven’t even taken any of the exams at campus. I’ve wondered, when I’m sitting there opposite your table, thinking ‘where is he?’ and I know, but I hoped you would make an appearance and try to do some. Don’t waste your life away in sorrow John. It’s not a good thing.484

John: It’s your opinion. I can’t go back there at the moment, it just doesn’t feel right. (He takes a gulp of the vodka, winces for a second and then carries on looking out, not turning around to see Jilly.)485

Jilly: The tutors said they understand what you’re going through. (She expects a response but doesn’t get one.) They said that when you feel ready during the mid-year break then feel free to go there and do the exams. (She rifles through a bag and puts some fresh blue flowers on the table.)486

John: (Softly spoken.) I don’t need your sympathy Jillian.487

Jilly: (Purposely ignoring what he just said.) I’ll…go put these in a pot or something, make sure they have some water huh?488

John: No…they’ll only die.489

(She stops, watching John as he turns around, a full on black beard and matted, greasy hair, smelling of smoke as he walks very slowly to the last remaining picture of him and his sister in her police uniform posing for a photo. It hangs on the wall, he looks at it and in a fit of a rage throws his drink over it.)490

BASTARD! BASTARD! BASTARD!491

(He then tears the framed photo down, opens one of the sliding windows and throws it out of the apartment with a ruthless casual attitude that stuns Jilly. He takes a deep breath and turns and looks at her.)492

Jilly: (Feeling slightly frightened.) I…see that you’ve become captivated by the news.493

John: He killed Kelly.494

Jilly: What?495

John: (Raises his voice a little) He killed Kelly!496

Jilly: Well…497

John: (Throws the glass across the room and it smashes, the shards can be heard peppering themselves around the vicinity of where the glass landed.) He did! All those cops getting killed! It must be him!498

Jilly: Calm down John. (She edges closer a little towards him as he starts waving his arms about in exasperation, tears finally rolling out of his eyes.)499

We’ll find out when the police do John. (She steps closer and he moves to hug her, sobbing loudly, his voice coarse, in a drunken state, his weight pushes against her and she sort of stumbles back at first but in the awkward moment of help and comfort that he’s finally admitted to himself that he needs, she’s there for him.)500

John: We won’t (Crying still) they pretty much said so.501

Jilly: (Hugging him tightly.) Don’t isolate yourself John. (He looks at her, tears burning through his cheeks, the steam created bemuses her as well as puzzles her, but she mentions nothing of it.) You need to be with people you love… (She pushes herself slightly against him, her forehead close to his.) People…who love you. (She looks up at him, as he looks back.) You going to come back to mine? Stay with me…502

(They both subconsciously move in for the kiss, but then, John stops just short.)503

John: I need…to find my sisters killer Jilly. (He moves away a little, wiping his eyes. Jilly is frustrated and momentarily loses her cool. *Vespertilio- Hans Zimmer/Newton Howard*)504

Jilly: John! You can’t! (She starts frowning at him.) Some guy is running around killing people like there’s no tomorrow, the city has been plunged into darkness even more than it was when we were kids! You go looking for him and he’ll wipe you out…505

John: (Looking into her eyes.) Your point is?506

Jilly: My point is that you should look at the bigger picture. This place is suffering, we need a damned miracle. Just when the police were winning the war on the mobs, they go and get more power. They get that power because this lunatic is being paid by them. They knew full well what they were letting themselves in for when they gave him that contract. That’s the kind of people we have to deal with, right across the spectrum John, this guy is injecting fear… (She starts to walk away towards the door and then turns around to carry on.) It’s contagious, just like corruption…spreads from the top to the bottom. You think you can go looking for a guy like that? Then carry on. See ya’ later John. (She walks out, the door stays open and he looks on, thinking really hard about what she’s said. For once, to him, she was right.507

A few days later, back at Rafa’s shop John swallows hard; he walks back in and squeezes past some of the customers to get to the front desk where Rafa and his till are.)508

Rafa: Ah, John! There you are! Haven’t seen you for ages! (He and John shake hands and he pats John on the back affectionately, also pulling him gently behind the front desk.) Jilly saw you huh? 509

John: Yeah she did, she kind of made me think though.510

Rafa: Think about what exactly John-boy?511

John: I need to do something for this world we live in…512

Rafa: (Looking terrified and slightly worried at what John is saying.) Maybe John, to put this nicely, you should do something for yourself rather than putting all these people first hmm?513

John: (Speaks quietly) Maybe they need someone who’ll put them first, I don’t need to look after myself anymore…514

Rafa: (Interrupting) You’re just saying that because you’re grieving John.515

John: Thing is, I don’t think I am grieving anymore. I’m fed up of looking on the past Rafa. (He looks at Rafa in the eyes.) It’s time to look to the future and act on the mistakes of the past right?516

Rafa: (Speechless, the camera looks at him and then turns to John who is still looking down on the floor but he’s started to smile.) Ok John, I don’t know what to say anymore. You’ve stumped me now. (He starts laughing) You really have got me. What are you getting at?517

(John puts his rucksack on the floor; he undoes the zip on the camouflage rucksack and out comes the latest edition of Metropolis Herald. He holds it up in front of Rafa’s face who looks baffled and slightly concerned at what the customers may think, but they’re too busy mingling in the shop.)518

John: Seen today’s latest Rafa?519

Rafa: No I haven’t. Is this it? (Grabbing the newspaper off John)520

John: Look at the front page. Look at the headline. (He points Rafa in the right direction. His eyes follow John’s index finger which stops at the headline. It reads:521

‘VICTOR REDDING IS THE TERROR OF METROPOLIS’522

Then as Rafa looks at the first couple of lines he understands finally what John was going on about:523

‘The criminal mastermind terrorising the streets of Metropolis has today been named as Victor Redding, a human being so badly disfigured and psychopathic he was kept in the notorious ‘Dark suite’ wing of Metropolis incarceration centre. It’s revealed the mass murder spree that was committed in the incarceration centre before his escape was pre-meditated!’524

Rafa hands back the paper.)525

Rafa: I know what you’re thinking. Empty yourself of all those thoughts. 526

John: All those weeks ago, I had a chance to capture him, like you said and I didn’t because I was afraid. Look at what he’s ended up doing. All those deaths…527

(John rushes into Rafa’s workshop at the back and there he finds the board. He gets a pin, some scissors and a marker pen. Before Rafa’s eyes we see John rapidly cut out parts of the newspaper. The camera closes in on his strained expression, still hiding that tonne of grief and anger, both mixing into revenge. He wipes his fringe to the right hand side as he carries on cutting rapidly. We soon see that he’s cutting around the picture of Jack-In-A-Box , a facial ID photo-fit supplied by the MCPD, he then cuts out paragraphs that he highlighted earlier and tearing through the paper he gets to the tenth page where a small article, crammed into the top left about Kelly’s funeral and the MCPD ‘mourning her death’ is described in usual tabloid fashion. He tears this bit out with his own hands and places it on the wall as well, pinning both near each other he draws a red line with the marker between both. Rafa just stands there amazed at what he’s seen.)528

Rafa: (In a quietly spoken Spanish accent.) You should not blame yourself because of the decision you made. 529

(John turns towards the board, a piercing glare fixated on the manic laughing picture of JIAB and the small article that summed up Kelly’s life in less than three hundred words.)530

John: Kelly would probably still be alive. (A tear runs down his cheek; a lone tear which burns into his face. He tries to wipe it away but it doesn’t work.)531

Rafa: You didn’t know that would happen Mr John.532

John: If there’s one thing I’ve realised… (He pauses for a moment, they hear the counter bell go off, a customer wants their attention.) That consequence’s affects everyone from the decisions people make. You don’t realise how much one decision you make could affect all the people surrounding you. It’s ridiculous. 533

Rafa: Then you may have to live with that guilt forever. I need to go and serve a customer… keep the business going you know? (He laughs a little and then looks serious at John.) John, please don’t let it eat you up. (He carries on looking at John who still looks away from him.)534

John: Tell me… how much is the most expensive hover board we have in stock? I can’t remember.535

Rafa: Why’s that? (A surprised look on his face which is undisturbed even though the constant ringing of the bell is getting to him slightly) I’d say about four thousand credits.536

John: Cos’ It’s now mine. (He turns to Rafa and hands him a wad of credits and his signature on a credit cheque to make sure such a large value is carried through by the Metropolis banking system.)537

Rafa: (Sighs) Oh god, I’m rich. I might need to sit down… (He points to the woman in the shop and tells her to go away.)538

John: Close the shop Rafa, I’m going to need you to help me put some modifications on the damn thing.539

Rafa: My friend, I’ll do anything you want.540

John: Good, cos’ we’re going for him, starting from the bottom of the pyramid right to the jugular. (He slams his palm on the picture of JIAB firmly and slowly removes his palm from it, looking up at it with revenge in his mind.541

As the scene opens up again we watch from the cameras point of view Rafa at a metal workshop table with his goggles on and a blowtorch and John sitting down with one part of the hover board in his arms as he frantically starts screwing mini propulsion jet engines onto the hover board. Two are on either side of the hover board while another would be nearer to the front of the V-shape of the board. Rafa stops for a minute and wanders over, curious as to what John is doing.)542

Rafa: Just making a small observation amigo, but why are you tinkering?543

John: So I can put propulsions on Rafa. (He looks and smiles. A few sparks appear from the friction when he aggressively starts putting another onto the underside of the board.)544

Rafa: (Taking his goggles off and looking at John sternly.) the propulsions will be very noisy you know. 545

John: It’s what I want. I want the scum of this city to feel fear when they hear the screeching noise of this delight roaring down the street coming to get them. (He starts waving his tool in his hand flippantly at Rafa) Also, this will be so fast that no law enforcement vehicle will even be able to touch me when I’m on this.546

Rafa: So you’re gonna' stand and be counted for? (Looking even more concerned)547

John: Yeah. Metropolis needs hope. I need hope. 548

Rafa: (Sighing and trying to pass down some wisdom to a young, angry man such as John.) We all need that. I just hope this isn’t about revenge.549

John: It’s not. (The camera looks at his face and deep within it, we can tell he’s lying. He wants to kill JIAB and destroy anyone associated with him, because in his eyes, they helped the disturbed, murderous freak kill his sister. No matter how small a part they may have played in it, he wants them all dead.)550

Rafa: I was wondering Mr John. Have you thought of a name? 551

John: A name? (Looks surprised.)552

Rafa: Yes. You need a name that the bad people of this city will mutter in dread and ultimately, contempt. (He looks at the hover board, the mini propulsion jets that are newly attached and we see his face light up. A genius spark has just hit him.) I don’t know… maybe something like, Green Lightning? (He shrugs his shoulders as he says it, baying for approval.)553

John: (Says it in almost an unbelieving tone.) Green Lightning?554

Rafa: Yeah. (John nods his head in approval.555

Then sometime later as the camera opens up again we watch Rafa spray paint the board a luminous green colour, which would show up in the night like a beacon. The board, hanging up on the wall so he can spray paint it with better direction and accuracy is slowly turning into the colour as he goes over it methodically, taking some sort of pride in his work. John watches in a sort of marvel at the work being done before his eyes and he walks up to it with his mask on to protect himself from the fumes the paint is giving off.)556

John: So I can light up the sky… (He touches it gently, feeling the metal body through his fingertips.) It’s almost beautiful. *Corynorhinus 03:19 – 05:04, Zimmer and Newton Howard* 557

(Next scene we see Rafa playing about with one of the gloves he ordered in and promptly modified. They’ve been working through the day and afternoon to try all the new equipment out, most of which they’ve fitted for their purposes. The glove has five nodules on it, each on the end of a respective fingertip, with elastic material that stiffens when it feels movement through the sensors. Rafa gives it to John, who replaces his old one with the new version. He tries it on and starts trying to play about with it.)558

Rafa: (Notes to John) the new glove, the sensors will react when… your natural talent appears. They won’t restrict any of it when you need to use your ‘powers’. (As he says that, John, with a little concentration on his face, rips a fireball through and it hovers just above his hand, with the glove on it. They start smiling at each other, in the sense that it’s another objective completed and another thing they’ve achieved.)559

John: How illegal was this one then? (He asks smugly.)560

Rafa: We’re talking a lot of years.561

John: So if I get caught, then I can blame you? (He says jokingly.)562

Rafa: I’d prefer you didn’t (Smiling back. He can feel he’s doing something important. Yet underneath, he still fears the real objectives of all this.)563

Scene 12564

(At midnight we see a creature/figure on the Empire State Buildings rooftop, overlooking the smog from the pollution of the city. The camera rotates around this dark, lonely figure of the night, who just stands there almost waiting, metaphorically circling his prey; his prey being the whole city, to rid it of the rotting flesh that’s contaminating society. As the camera rotates around him three times, all 360 degrees rotational angles, we can see down below the heavy traffic in this twenty-four hour city, bursting at the seams. We can hear distant horns going off, the sirens from hundreds of metres down below going off, but up there with him is silence; the silence before his campaign of revenge takes place. The neon lights shining upwards reflect off the glass of the building and onto him, his luminous green colour shining brightly amongst the darkness of the night. He can observe everything around him, he can see how many lights are on in the skyscraper apartments, he can watch the ordinary people go to work in their office buildings, he can look at the stars and judge the night by the moon. John is no longer himself, in his real being, he is Green Lightning, his one purpose in life is to destroy the men and anyone associated with them for killing his sister, no matter how tiny the involvement they had in the process.565

His hover board is strapped to his back which has a clip on it near his chest which he can easily detach. The whole of his body is a bright green; he wears black boots with steel caps and extra padding, tightly strapped onto his feet, bulging muscles that are chunky rather than ripped and his metal long baton, which flicks open to four feet long and a metallic silver colour to it. The dark, gloomy world he lives in is about to find itself amidst a war.566

In the next camera shot we see a silhouette walking slowly towards a window in a dreamy suburb, many miles and presumably, many districts away from the bustling streets of the inner centre districts. As he follow the silhouette, we also find two dogs on the ground, outside this rather expensive looking well-to-do house with blood seeping out of their ears. Whomever it is that is invading someone’s property, stalking them as they sleep, this person has ruthlessly dispatched with the dogs, two growling heavy lumps of Dobermans, viscous with chains attaching the collars on their necks to a small metal ring buried deep inside a brick near the front door so they protect the owners most obvious entrance to the house. Crickets can be heard buzzing through the night, frogs, can be heard making their unique sound and the fluttering of wings by birds is also noted as the camera focuses on all these species while never letting the silhouette out of its sight. The sprinklers are on, watering the dry grass trying to make it stay as green as possible. The silence is almost unbearable. 567

An old man, in his late sixties is lying in bed, the air conditioning is fierce with as the camera zooms out a little from the focus of this mans wrinkled and battle weary face we see to the audiences horror; three young girls, all under-age in the same bed with him, all naked, with only the covers to keep them decent. Their young hair waves in each others faces as the air conditioning units in the house blows it. They, like him only have the bed to protect their naked bodies. 568

Slowly, the old man starts to turn over and as he begins to wake up, starts playing with a young girl’s hair. She tries to move away gently but he tightens his grip of her long wavy hair and whispers something in her ear, possibly vulgar. He then opens his eyes fully and a large gasp out comes out of his jaw-dropped expression.)569

Chief Justice/Paedophile: What?570

(Before he can even come to his senses, he’s picked up out of the bed and tossed across the room. His head hits the door frame, a little cut forms underneath a tuft of grey and receding thin hair. He stumbles, his old body not used to that. He tries to run out of the room but as he attempts to get away, forgetting his nudity, his sagging, old body is tripped over by a long pole, which the camera only shows the tip of, while the audience is left to guess who it is. The darkness in the room doesn’t betray who it is that is seeking this old man, rather it only shows the outline, a vague outline where we have to keep guessing.)571

Green Lightning: Who do you take bribes off? (Heavy breathing through gritted teeth, his nostrils flaring in anger, he pins the old man up against the wall and lifts him up grabbing his throat with all his weight, pinning him.)572

Chief Justice/Paedophile: What? Who, (fear in his voice, as he starts trembling.) Who do you think you are? 573

(The shadow gets even closer, his face looking upwards at the terrified old man.)574

Green Lightning: TELL ME! (He roars out, the angry voice rippling through the house.)575

Chief Justice/Paedophile: (He says feebly and truly out of fear) I’m the Chief Justice, you can’t do this to me! Let go!576

(Then there is a sudden silence, all that can be heard is the stirring of the girls in the bedroom, the darkness still overpowering on the screen. The whimpering of the old man, who is also the Chief Justice, a man with considerable power who is in charge of all the Judges in the city and also a politician on the board of the government. He starts trying to wriggle out of the iron-grip that is around his throat. Then, we see Green Lightning’s angry, frightening face appear out of the dark. The old man looks absolutely terrified, he starts snivelling.)577

Green Lightning: TELL ME DAMN IT! (He shouts again in a powerful, husky voice.)578

Chief Justice/Paedophile: You’ll… wake them up… (He laughs uncontrollably out of fear rather than defiance but soon knows he has made a mistake and said the wrong thing as the tightening grip around his throat becomes unbearable and as the life begins to suck out of him, when he feels like his head might explode through lack of oxygen, the grip is lessened and he’s dragged into the bathroom, in a room just down a marble corridor. Here is where Green Lightning loses any sort of control and sets about brutalising the old man. The camera stays out of the bathroom but from the door which is where we see everything happen, we can tell that the old man is going to get a beating. His refusal to say anything productive has led him down this way and he only has himself to blame. 579

Green Lightning, unashamedly slams the old mans head against the curve of the sink; his head bounces off with a sickening thud. Then, as this happens, Green Lightning grabs a towel, wraps it tightly around the poor old mans throat, still hanging onto either end and without second thought starts smashing his head into the mirror that the vanity driven Chief of Justice likes to prune himself in front of. The glass cuts his forehead open in various slashes, blood running down his face in a furious fashion as his head then meets the sink again and still controlling the flopping movements of him, Green Lightning then drags his sorry carcass to the toilet, making him scrape his knees against the fallen glass and destroyed shards of the sink and dips his head violently into the sink. He keeps it there for thirty seconds, watching the struggle of the old man as he bids for oxygen but only gets toilet water instead.)580

Green Lightning: Feeling clever now are we?581

(He raises the old mans head out of the toilet. Already beaten, bleeding, his blood mixing with the toilet water making a claret mixture, his face wet and soaking with glass in his skin and blood trickling down it, he struggles to breath. As no answer comes out of his mouth, Green Lightning forces his head near the toilet and he finally starts to blabber and talk. The camera still looking on from the door, hopefully the audience feels a mixture of shock and joy at the disputed hero doing what anyone else would have probably done to a paedophile. It’s not what he’s there for though.)582

Chief Justice/Paedophile: Ok! Ok! (Tears run down his cheeks.) I’ll tell you! I swear I will!583

Green Lightning: I know you will.584

Chief Justice/Paedophile: The… (Regaining vital oxygen) The Borelli’s! 585

Green Lightning: WHO ELSE!586

Chief Justice/Paedophile: Ummm… (Crying and sobbing)587

Green Lightning: Write them down now! I want to know all the scum that pay all the judges! (He drags the sorry body of the Chief Justice into the kitchen and throws him on the floor. Blood dripping off his head, he just lays there, beaten to an inch of his life he can’t stand up, he doesn’t have the energy. A pad and a pen are thrown at him and he starts to write down the names, exhausted scribbling. Silence throughout this period is only broken by the distinct sound of sirens being heard from about two and a half miles away. The old man looks up at him.)588

Chief Justice/Paedophile: They’ll be coming… for you (He starts laughing through a croaking voice. Green Lightning calmly picks the paper up, folds his baton/sabre stick up and stares at the quivering and broken man.) *Batman Begins End Credits 00:00-01:34, Zimmer and Newton Howard*589

Green Lightning: (He says quietly.) I doubt it; I was the one that phoned them. (His face has no expression except a dark look on his face; in his pupils we can see the terrified and head-shaking old man look defeated. The sirens get closer and when we look around to see Green Lightning we notice he’s gone, vanished into thin air. He has what he wants; he did it violently and with no shame.590

With the music carrying on, the screen blacks out and opens up again within a few seconds as the camera has transported us to the other side of the city to the Southside Dockyard, a notorious place of criminal activity where drug deals are common and western style shoot-outs are everyday occurrences. The Police are constantly down there for crime scene investigations. The wind blows gently against the rattled and broken metal barbed wire fences and a few wild dogs can be seen scuffling along, making noises at each other and fighting over pointless territory. However, a hunched shadow appears and before we know it the camera has shown us it’s Jack-in-a-Box. His hunched stature and menacing looks, along with faded powder on his face makes him look archaic and nasty. The frizzled hair, curly and bleached is pushed back, white dandruff on his collar and bits on the upper shoulders of his suit. He walks alone into the dockyard and we witness, along with him a drug deal going on. He carries on walking up to the meeting, which is hosted by two very minor families. The Baggio family, a small time Italian outfit that specialises in cheap drugs and the Zhirkov family who own warehouses across the Southside, supplying the drugs; It seems like a relaxed atmosphere, hardly anyone with weapons, these two families clearly know each other well and trade together a lot. Two policemen in their uniforms, to them untouchable and uncaring if anyone see’s them undertake ‘extra duties’ stand by and watch. They get a share of the drugs and therefore make money selling them on; possibly to prison wardens or people they know on the streets. 591

He carries on walking slowly, until a heavy of the Zhirkov family, all dressed in black, this man in particular has a black leather jacket on and a baseball bat in his hands nods his head, a signal that someone other than the cronies is watching. The camera looks at the two representatives of the families look around and see to their mixed horror and surprise that hunched maniac watching it go on. He walks up calmly.)592

JIAB: So… what’s all this stuff then? (He points towards the crates and the forklift, all near the river. He gets no response.) I was just erm, walking about, taking in sights of the city, at night of course, when the city is at its best and sleaziest and look what I’ve come across! A drugs deal! (He stands there smirking, wiping his greasy hair around his ear.) So I’ll tell you what, how about all of these drugs (Looks down at the crates) are now mine and I’ll let you all leave and get on with your lives. Fair that?593

Baggio rep: (Showing restraint) you weren’t invited to the meeting. Please leave now.594

JIAB: Oh I’m sorry… I didn’t know invites were handed out. I suppose two coppers got invites and I didn’t? I’m saddened, I really am! (He starts smirking at the two cops who start feeling uncomfortable.)595

Zhirkov rep: Do you not know how disrespectful it is to muscle in on deals? (He says with a hiss.) Your business if I remember Mr… (Looks at JIAB with his nose turned up) whoever you are, is to kill Nick Kryzios, the Police Chief of the MCPD, not to steal from the families who are paying you graciously!596

JIAB: Ok, ok, ok… point taken boys. (He starts walking away but then he stops and we hear a slight childish giggle as he gets a lighter and throws it onto a three-stacked high load of crates. The family representatives and the two cops look horrified as the crates start burning very quickly, along with the drugs inside them. They look astonished and as the Zhirkov family representative draws out a pistol JIAB turns around and looks straight at him.) Oh, so you want to shoot me do you? (He looks up onto the roof of the warehouse and we see three of his cronies, all with automatic weapons aiming at the small time gangsters, he invites them to look fifty metres or so to their left and we see two of his cronies also with powerful automatics aiming and ready.) You took a pistol to a fight with automatics… (He walks up to the representative and slaps the pistol out of his hand. JIAB kicks it away into the river. He turns around and focuses on the representatives.) 597

Baggio rep: You’re making a grave mistake. Turning on those that employ you! You fucking psycho! (His face full of contempt)598

JIAB: Me? Employed? No! (He gets a piece of paper from his pocket and in front of them rips it in half and then fritters away the pieces, smiling on the side of his face that he can like a lunatic.) I’ve broken my contract as so to speak. I no longer associate myself with the dregs of criminals like you lot.599

This town deserves some anarchy an’ I’m gonna’ hand it to everyone on a silver platter. (He starts twiddling his thumbs as he walks up close to the reps.) I’ve got more distracting things to do ya’ know? (Five more of his cronies appear out of a van, all rush out of it with small arms, noticeably AK’s) 600

You now work for moi. Get it? (He speaks to the cops and the reps, along with their gang members that they took along with them for the meeting.) 601

Baggio rep: I wish the Mario family had done a better job and sent you back to your whore of a mother’s womb! (He spits on JIAB’s face. JIAB doesn’t flinch and he doesn’t wipe it of.)602

JIAB: (He gets right up close to the annoyed rep and whips his lighter out in one hand and the rather large flick knife he carries around with him in the other. His forehead wrinkles a little as he makes an animated expression.) Well thank you for the compliment, however, lets see how much of a fan you really are (He waves his flick knife precariously close to the body of the rep, who doesn’t flinch) when I cut your face up real nice and feed you to the dogs out the front hmm? (As two cronies manhandle him and take him away for dealing with later the two cops make their excuses and now know who they work for. The Zhirkov rep is slightly frightened and sensing that fear JIAB turns on him.)603

You… go back and tell your small time hoods who they work for. (He gets up close and personal and makes the rep back off a little.) Tell them if they have a problem with it that they should come and find me and I’ll show them a good time! (The Zhirkov rep backs off, walking away as he hears the curdling scream of the Baggio man as his torture begins for his insolence and ultimately for JIAB’s pleasure. Both he and Green Lightning are on the rise from now on. JIAB, with his knife ready starts to walk towards the warehouse where the torture will begin) 604

It’s all about accumulation. No more false economics. 605

Scene 13606

(Nick Kryzios sits down at his work desk in the Apple-Dear building, where most of the police department HQ’s are based at. It’s all centralised, everything flows back to one place. He sits there with a glass of wine, the finest made and available. He ponders, wonders what’s going on in the world. It’s been a bad day for him; the man he appointed as Chief Justice has been involved in a huge scandal which threatens to explode and thrust him into it. So far the crime-busting famous face of the MCPD and ‘untouchable’ of the law enforcement of Metropolis is feeling very weak in his position of power. He has that and the rise of JIAB on his hands. A frankly terrifying force of a sociopathic monster that is ripping through the town, smiting anyone who gets in his way, its early in the morning now, possibly about three am and whilst the traffic noise has calmed down, sirens can still be heard, his huge screen windows are there for him to look out upon his world, this world of growing chaos. He sinks his head into a newspaper he’s reading.)607

Green Lightning: (Whispers) Getting that bad for you huh? 608

Captain Kryzios: Whoa! (He spins around from his chair grabbing his revolver and can’t see anyone; Green Lightning’s hiding in the shadows, teasing Kryzios.) Who the fuck is this? I’ll damn well shoot! (He hears a noise behind him and turns around but is confronted by the broken wine glass from which he was drinking earlier on.) Who is it?609

Green Lightning: Someone who knows what’s going on. (He whispers to Nick Kryzios, who swivels around again and then pushed back into his chair, his revolver kicked out of his hand and a viscous palm shot is smacked into his forehead to daze him a little bit.) 610

Captain Kryzios: You want to help me or kill me? (Recovering from the assault)611

Green Lightning: Believe me, I need you alive. (He still stays in the shadows of the spacious new age looking office.) 612

Captain Kryzios: I’d like to know what this is all about.613

Green Lightning: I have some interesting information Captain. If you shut up, I might tell you.614

Captain Kryzios; Why should I listen to someone who… (Smiles a little, trying to look around and figure out where this person is) I can’t see?615

Green Lightning: If you saw me, you’d think I was another freak in a city that’s brimming with them.616

Captain Kryzios: (Shrugs his shoulders) Fair enough. 617

Green Lightning: Jack-in-a-box is sweeping the board with the smaller gangs Nick.618

Captain Kryzios: (He sits up on his chair.) I know, I heard. 619

Green Lightning: Then you’d also know that means that any cops that were working for… say; the Del Maro gang, taking their pay, participating in shall we say, less than law abiding activities are now working for him. (Silence from Kryzios) It means that the bigger players are getting desperate and becoming weak. I can help you.620

Captain Kryzios: (Laughs a little.) You’re telling me they’d work for a maniac so beyond the pale?621

Green Lightning: It’s the pay packet Nick, you know it and so do I.622

Captain Kryzios: Not necessarily.623

Green Lightning: Oh it is. (He says in a convincing manner. He still carries on circling Kryzios, keeping to the shadows as he does it.) Which means you’re going to be next after he squeezes the life out of the mobs… they’ll become one of course, trying to fight off this guy who is breaking every single rule out there concerning Mafioso and brotherhood and so forth. Then, he’ll crush them, he has his own army now Nick. He’s more powerful then you could ever imagine. (He slides a piece of paper on the floor and it ends up near Captain Kryzios’ feet. He picks it up and reads it, squinting to make out the names on the paper.)624

Captain Kryzios: Judges… who pays them… who wrote this? Did you? (He asks suspiciously)625

Green Lightning: A former political ally of yours did. Gregan Fauber, Chief Justice if I recall. Also a paedophile, he wrote those names down after I had persuaded him to. He took some convincing.626

Captain Kryzios: God. Even he was taking payments. I wonder sometimes if everyone does.627

Green Lightning: I’d start assuming everyone does. That’s just a copy; I have the real one with me. I’m giving you the heads up that there’s a judge on that list that is now being paid by Jack-in-a-box and he probably doesn’t even know it. He isn’t making it public that he controls so many gangs; they just all work for him. He can do what he wants. If those gangs owned anything on the market, well now it’s his. You get the idea?628

Captain Kryzios: Working it all behind the scenes, upping the stakes. What you gonna’ do?629

Green Lightning: I’m gonna’ do what I did last time.630

Captain Kryzios: Somehow persuade someone in such a position of power to give up on ‘the take’? (He raises his eyebrow at such a feat.)631

Green Lightning: Maybe. Or maybe I’ll just go to the gang who pay him through Jack-in-a-box and cross them off. We need someone clean to put away the ex-Chief of Justice and then they can start putting jail time on the mob and anyone else. 632

Captain Kryzios: Clean up the streets…633

Green Lightning: (Whispers and then disappears) something like that.634

(Nick Kryzios then realises he’s gone when he hears the distant sound of footsteps and smashes the alarm bell on his table which sets off the security procedures for a suspected breach of the building. He sits back down, wondering what it was all about, clasping the bit of paper. He reads to himself the names as the piercing sound of the alarm rings through the building and can be heard around the block. He knows who he’s going for. He knows what this man or thing is up to and realises he may have an ally in this. He doesn’t know who he looks like or who his name is but one thing he knows is this: The guy is determined to bring down Jack-in-a-box and is going right to his doorstep to do it. Cleaning up the Judges and winning them over again will mean that criminals in high positions will no longer have that invincibility they’ve always assumed they had. Gangs would be getting destroyed at an alarming rate by the police force, headed by Kryzios who would sweep the board with overwhelming evidence against the gangs who got away with everything for decades. 635

The thought of taking on all the gangs in JIAB’s power and crossing them off the map of Metropolis for good is a nice thought but it means that JIAB will inevitably cause even more chaos as a retaliation. It’s becoming a war of escalation.636

*Vespertilio, Zimmer and Newton Howard*637

As the screen opens up again, we watch Green Lightning fly through the air on his hover board speeding past skyscrapers and the bright lights from below, the smog can be made out, clouds of pollution strangling the city, the dust up in the air. This world is going to get more shocks. The night is still not over. Not yet. Green Lightning knows his new found alliance to Captain Kryzios is fragile. If he does what he sets out to do though, then he’s cemented it a little more for his purposes and intents. The screeching noise of his hover board is awesome; the speed at which he cuts through the air upon the city is astounding. His modified equipment is truly awe-inspiring. His name describes him well. 638

The next thing we see is a drugs deal going on in an open street, which is deserted. Downtown all that can be seen is the lights in houses and the odd cat that passes by. Three cars are on one side, all of them parked up in a curved shape across the four lane road while six purple cars are on the opposite side, all from another gang. The two people talking have about fifteen people between them roughly and unknown to them, someone is about to have serious words with them.)639

Drug dealer: So how about two thousand creds for every one hundred grams man huh?640

Kruger boss: (Winces at a weird sound, a screaming sort of noise that is piercing the air, getting nearer and nearer.) What the fuck is that noise?641

Drug dealer: I dunno (He notices it as well. Then, he looks up and in a half mixed look of unbelieving and shock he points at this bright green figure in the sky swooping down towards them on a jet powered board.) Holy mother of god... what the shitting hell is that? 642

Kruger boss: I don’t know. (Gets his baseball bat out and orders his boys to get their weapons out.) I really don’t know.643

(Two missiles are fired off from the hover board as he whips his baton out. The two missiles blow the road in front of them and behind them, so they have no viable means of escape by vehicle. He then jumps off the hover board as it gets closer to them, swooping down on his victims with his anger and vengeance. He lets the goons, all armed with knives and bats and other rudimentary weapons encircle him before he starts battling all fifteen of them at once. Turning and hitting, block, hit, block, take down, hit, turn, lift and throw and one by one the goons are being knocked to the floor, smashed through car windows, staggering on the floor, moaning and groaning in helplessness and terrified. The drug dealer and the boss of The Kruger gang just stand there watching. Wetting themselves in utter horror at something they can’t imagine witnessing. Something so real yet hallucinogenic is walking towards them, leaving a trail of destruction behind him, the flames from the missiles that smashed the road up either end are getting worse and they truly are in a hopeless position.644

Green Lightning pushes the Kruger boss away from him and he smashes into the side of the van, the wind taken out of his stomach and slumps to the floor. Then, as the drug dealer starts to beg and plead by kneeling on the floor, tears seen in his eyes Green Lightning picks him up and knees him in the gut. An over the top gasp is heard and then a savage headbutt is then followed by him being pushed to the floor, crumpled up in a heap.)645

Kruger boss: What? Who are you?646

Green Lightning: I’m Green Lightning and I’m busting your outfit.647

Kruger boss: You can’t! (His nose trickling with blood, Green Lightning grabs Kruger and looks into his eyes. He then pauses for a bit before dropping him back down on the floor and going off again. The sirens can be heard.)648

*Plecotus 00:00-01:31, Zimmer and Newton Howard*649

(Meanwhile, the very judge that he’s going after, to intimidate so that he goes clean again and can be used to openly prosecute the gangs and anyone that has had that invincibility about them in the years previous, is enjoying a couple of drinks down a bar with his friends and associates. All of them greying, old men that have nothing to do but moan about the state of the world they live in, forgetting that half the people in the bar are probably on the gangs pay anyway and are in actual fact helping the demise of a rotten society. He gets up to bring another round in, this particular judge has a habit of taking injected drugs and cheating on his poor, suffering wife. Some women towards the far end of the bar he waves at in a lecherous manner, they know how powerful he is and he knows he can get what he wants and when he wants it. He starts to put the order in for the drinks at the rustic old bar, while outside Green Lightning is screaming ahead on his hover board, cutting an angry, determined figure, doing hundreds of miles per hour, so fast that he all that can be seen is a green streak gracing the sky in all its beautiful, darkened glory. The camera focuses on the green streak in the sky, while we hear the laughter and noise from the bar. 650

We then see up close to the hover board that two missiles are primed and ready. Without any warning whatsoever, some grey smoke starts to fizz out from the back of them and as they start getting warm and they start locking onto their targets, they fizz a little more, before exploding out of their holding bays on the board. They race off, dancing and whirling in the cold air towards their target. One is the car that he gets driven about in by his ‘security’ and the other one starts moving away from direction the first missile is going in and starts whizzing towards the bar roof. The second one has a timer on it though. Delayed by twenty seconds so the first one goes off and then with everyone panicking and in shock, the second will then go off creating a gaping hole for him to dart into and grab the judge.651

One explosion happens as his nice car-pod is blown to smithereens by the missile, killing two of the gangsters inside the car-pod. Its tyres go flying towards the camera, which shakes a little bit with the vibrations of the explosion. A reddish fireball mushrooms up from the impact and the destroyed vehicle. The people in the bar including the target all start running behind and underneath furniture. Isolated screams from women but silence reigns until, the judge’s ears prick up on a loud beeping noise, coming from the wooden rooftop. His face frowns as he tries to figure out what it is and as he does, the roof is blown upwards by a ferocious amount of energy that’s been unleashed by the exploding red and black missile. The rooftop shatters, sharp objects rain down on the people inside it, many getting struck down and injured. The judge scurries between tables like a whimpering dog but as he tries to get to another for relative safety, his legs is pulled and soon he find himself face to face with our vigilante. Our hero of the moment who pulls him up and lifts him by the scruff of his neck up to his height; the short, fat judge has never seen something like him before and starts screaming for help as Green Lightning, still on his hover board, dangles him off the ground by about two hundred metres.652

Green Lightning: YOU LISTEN TO ME! (Sirens and screams can be heard as people start gathering and can see what’s going on up there where Green Lightning is the only thing that is keeping the judge alive by holding onto his collars with his hands, clenched in a fist like grip.) Your pay Judge Friedrich is now the law enforcements! Starts doing the job you’re supposed to be doing! (He roars at him with a violence deep within.)653

Judge Friedrich: Put me down! I’ll do anything! Let go o’ me! (Starts pleading and crying for help.)654

Green Lightning: You’ll be the judge that puts the Kruger gang down for twenty years, every damn one of them. 655

Judge Friedrich: But…656

Green Lightning: It’s why you work for the law now. (On his hover board directs it to calmly float towards a balcony on an apartment block nearby and he throws Judge Friedrich over the balcony railings before looking at him one more time and leaving.)657

Scene 14658

(The next day, we open up again to JIAB and his cronies all around a table. He approaches them, his hunched appearance horrifying to those who have only heard of him, but never witnessed him in person. His intimidating figure cuts a scary pose, as he walks towards his seat, consumed in his own wellbeing, he gets his powder box out and starts dabbing his face very gently with the powder that keeps it moisturised. He slowly puts it back in the box, dabbing his hands and lower arms methodically, everyone just watching on waiting for him to say something. His curly, bleached long hair is stringy and out of control; parts of his fringe are meeting his left eye, other parts tucked around his ear, the one he has anyway. In a pleasantly lit up room, where a deserted kitchen is in the background, giving off the impression of an old cafeteria, he decides to notice everyone. He smiles sadistically and sits on the end of the table, scratches from pupils of the old deserted and dilapidated school. He places one hand on the table, sitting on it facing his cronies and business partners on the other end.)659

JIAB: I remember, many years ago, when I was just like you lot, how hard it was to climb the ladder and get the respect I needed to earn. (He looks at them all.) Sometimes I wonder if it’s been all too easy this second time around. How right I was huh?660

Assosiate#1: Are you talking about that novelty act?661

JIAB: He needs to be stopped people. (Starts playing with one of his fingerless gloves)662

Assosiate#1: He’s wiping us off the map with the judiciary system. All the judges are going clean after what happened to ‘Fat Friedrich.’ How do you suggest we stop him Jack?663

JIAB: (Wipes the remnants of his nose with the palm of his hand, some powder like dust springs into the air, JIAB turns his attention to the question finally.) We find this Green thing that’s destroying our plans, putting our guys away and I slit his throat. We kill him and then we have no more opposition. The police (He smiles sadistically) aren’t even in the equation. We own half of them. (Scoffs at the worries)664

Associate#2: Kryzios won’t let you get away with it all ya’ know.665

JIAB: Kryzios? Accumulation! Accumulation! I’ll show the world my vision. Let’s introduce some panic. I guarantee when the shit hits the fan and it all starts to fly, when people have no one to blame, watch the body bags start to pile up. (He starts laughing to himself.) It’s all gonna’ be fun from here!666

(As the screen turns to a dockyard that JIAB has obviously taken over as he aggressively expanded his power throughout the city, illegal immigrants who work for one of his partners have started to unload huge brown crates of something from a speedboat, trading with the Vietnamese drug dealers some of the product that has been made in the warehouses. This is a regular pastime in Metropolis; drugs are sold cheap with almost every single type full of poisonous chemicals that will kill the taker within months, or weeks. The streets are flooded with the stuff and half of the dealers are the very people who should be trying to prevent it from ever going near them. We watch the end of the trade between the two parties beneath a bridge near the dockyards, watching car-pods go by and people walk on, not even contemplating to report what’s going on. The sky is a burgundy red, the sunset going down very slowly and the red glow infecting everywhere in the city, making it look bright and young, rather than the decrepit mega-city of humanity that it really is.667

A couple of days after he busted a big gang and persuaded Kryzios to become an ally and a judge to become a man of law again; Jilly wakes John up. He’d left his door open to his apartment and it’s been left untidy and messy for the last week or so, his escapades during the day and night are proving to be taking a small toll on him. He’s half naked, the covers twisted around his legs, the pillows have gone flying, somewhere on the floor, amongst all the old newspapers and glasses left on the floor. She walks over to the curtains near his bedroom and opens them, the sun flashing in and he stirs, wriggling about aggressively, trying to avoid his eyes contacting the sun. She gets down on one knee and starts collecting all the rubbish around his bed, stuffing them in a black bin bag, held by a robot cleaner called ‘K-Clean’, a medium sized robot which can speak but most of the time chooses not to. It hovers about to travel and doesn’t have an ‘on’ or ‘off’ switch, once its activated it stays like that unless you order a elimination service from the company, who basically kill it off. She smiles and hands him a glass of vitamin shake. Her hair is wavy today, blonde highlights at the fringe and through to the back of her hair. Diamond earrings and a necklace made out of sea-shells and such. A red low cut top, with a black skirt, black tights on underneath.)668

Jilly: Did you not realise Mr Creed that you were supposed to have gone to one of you final exams? 669

John: Hmmm? (Wiping the dribble off his face, battering his eyelids)670

Jilly: (Muttering to herself.) Sooo unattractive. 671

John: I had an exam today? (Looks at his digital watch.) What day is it anyway?672

Jilly: Wednesday. You had the History paper.673

John: I’ll get dressed in a minute and go up there, tell them why I didn’t attend.674

Jilly: Yeah, I’m sure saying something along the lines of ‘I fell asleep after a late night of partying, I’ve done no revision and I’m late for my exam, can I still do it?’ I suppose that will really make you popular. They’re running out of patience with you John. (She hands him the glass, he slurps from it and as he sits up, out of the covers and looks around, downs the drink as well and some of it dribbles down his chin.) I see you’ve also lost the ability to drink like a human being as well.675

John: God, you’ve got a moaning head on haven’t you? (He ruffles his hair for a minute.) What’s that? (He points at ‘K-Clean’ in a caveman sort of way.) What is it doing with my rubbish? (He looks around his apartment and realises that she’s cleaning the place.)676

Jilly: That’s ‘K-Clean’, it’s a housekeeping robot, just does the basics like cleaning up and stuff.677

John: I suppose the name gives it away. So what shall I do then?678

Jilly: Don’t worry about the final exam. I’ve phoned them up and got them to move it next week…679

John: You’re an angel Jilly. What would I do without you? (He cups her cheeks with both hands and he starts thinking about kissing her, but soon that thought vanishes when she wriggles out of his grasp and starts telling him off.)680

Jilly: You wouldn’t go far that’s for sure. Lock your door as well next time you decide to go out and spend your sister’s money John. (He looks shocked at what she’s saying.) What’s got into you lately John? If one minute you’re a total recluse then the next you’re being a total playboy frittering money away for the wrong reasons.681

John: Right, stop there Jilly. (He gets up and stands in front of her, in his tight white boxers.) firstly, you have the wrong idea about me, secondly it’s none of your business what I do with the money she left me or what I do with the payouts I’m getting. So don’t start trying to mother me or tell me what to do Jilly because I’m telling you now, it’s not going to happen. (He speaks to her really firmly.)682

Jilly: I didn’t come here for an argument. I just came to see how you were that’s all. I feel like we’ve grown apart that’s all. (She looks down a little and he holds her chin up with his thumb gently pushing her lips towards his. She gets onto her tiptoes, urging him to carry on. She pushes against him at the same time as he pushes her backwards against a door. They knock the switch for the garage which is downstairs, below the apartment and he can hear the door next to the bathroom start to slide open.) What’s that? (She says as she tries to kiss a distracted John’s chin.)683

John: (Forces her away a little, making her content with holding his hand.) You want to know what I’ve been spending my money on Jilly?684

Jilly: Well is it in the garage? Is it a car? (She shrugs, not sure where this is all going.) I wasn’t that bothered, I was just making a point.685

John: Come on. (He drags her by the hand towards the door near the bathroom and they walk down the dark, steep stairs. As the camera opens up again in the garage, we see him turn the switch on for all the lights and we watch in amazement as one by one the lights go on but we also see all his gear that he uses as Green Lightning. The missiles, all colour coded and all in order are hung on the wall, with sharp metal grapplers holding them in place, thousands of the missiles stretch across two-thirds of the garage walls. Next we see the hover board, with its strap attached to it as well. Three sabres all lined up, all in their boxed form on a table. Four pairs of gloves. The face of Jilly is one of jaw dropping.)686

This is where all the money is going. 687

Jilly: What…wha…I don’t understand John. (She looks around the place in marvel; she notices that Kelly’s car is actually still in the garage. An expression of sadness scrawls over her face as she looks at John, who doesn’t understand her reaction and what she once saw, this innocence and maturity in a young adult, she now see’s violence and darkness.) What is all this John? Why?688

John: (Still standing at the bottom of the stairs, observing Jilly look around the garage.) This is what I am Jilly. 689

Jilly: (Turning around to him.) All I see is violence… 690

John: No Jilly, (He goes towards Jilly, his hand going between her hair, he looks at her and tries to convince her.) what you see here… that’s just a small part of me. Who you’re talking to now; is me. (Jilly gets a newspaper she had picked up earlier and put in her handbag and pushes it in his face. Along the front page and most of the first ten pages it shows stories and witness accounts about Green Lightning.) Green Lightning is a different part of me Jilly…691

Jilly: You’ve been blessed with special powers John. I hoped you would have used them for good. 692

John: I am! (Pleading) I’m not a vigilante; I just want to confront this powder wearing murdering scumbag who killed my sister.693

Jilly: You are a vigilante John. Even the newspapers are saying so. The public are as scared of you as I am right now.694

John: I don’t care about them! 695

Jilly: (Angrily) well you should! I don’t like what you’ve become. If you were thinking I would be impressed or something then you’re so wrong! Yeah this city needs cleaning up but it doesn’t need someone who has an angry, violent, persona to do it! (She moves away from him, disgusted.)696

John: This part of me doesn’t consume me Jilly. It doesn’t make me any different to who you know right now. 697

Jilly: It actually really does! The John I knew didn’t have a missile collection that would have made the third world war seem insignificant…698

John: You don’t understand. My sister died. I’m over grieving, but I have to move on. The only way to move on is to sweep away all the filth that was connected to her death. Afterwards, I’m done. This (Points at all the weaponry) will all be gone when I’ve finished my work.699

Jilly: No it won’t John. You’ll become consumed. You’ll end up just like all the other guys driven by the same thing. (She walks off, goes upstairs and out of the apartment. He looks on, doesn’t bother saying anything more to her and wishes she could understand. But she doesn’t.700

*Barbastella 02:48 – 04:45, Zimmer and Newton Howard*701

We move to later on that night. On top of the Apple-Dear building, where it overlooks the central building, the darkness of the night overwhelms the people who live in them. Nick Kryzios is there at the rooftop, having a cigar and drinking some more wine like he did the previous time he met Green Lightning. The neon lights of the city stretch to endless limits, further than the eyes can possibly see. A calm expression on his face denies us of the reality that he is concerned about many things, all putting small strains on him which will eventually build up.)702

Green Lightning: You gotta’ stop drinking that stuff Captain. 703

Captain Kryzios: (Smirking to himself he turns around and is greeted by the luminous sight of Green Lightning.) Jesus, health warnings from you buddy? 704

Green Lightning: I’m a man of many contradictions. 705

Captain Kryzios: So what do we call you then? (Puffing on his cigar in his left hand)706

Green Lightning: I’m Green Lightning.707

Captain Kryzios: You could have introduced yourself a lot earlier you know?708

Green Lightning: I know. Thought the news coverage was good though.709

Captain Kryzios: Been getting pressured by the judiciary board and the politicians to find and arrest you... some are saying that you’re an extreme vigilante, as much danger to the new world as Jack-in-a-box. Some are saying that you used violence against anyone and everyone that got in your way. What’re you gonna’ say about that?710

Green Lightning (Standing on the ledge, looking at Kryzios and the skyscrapers behind him, observing the world moving on while he stands still.): It means my methods are working. 711

Captain Kryzios: I’d advise you to calm down a bit though…the gangs will retaliate. They aren’t quite sure who to fight though. Jack-in-a-box has acquired a huge slice of power in the last two months and then there’s you, invading the Chief Justice’s home, beating him to a pulp, wiping out an entire mob and frightening a judge half to death while nuking the bar he was in…712

Green Lightning: I’ll only calm down when Jack-in-a-box has gone down. I’ll walk away after that. 713

Captain Kryzios: I think you’re maybe a bit… (Turns around as he was walking about talking to Green Lightning and finds that’s he’s gone, vanished into thin air. 714

The next time we see Green Lightning, the camera watches him on a street that that breaks off into another, it’s a representation of what he’s feeling now, justice or bloody revenge. As he looks on, we watch three people, all Jack-in-a-box’s cronies start running into a dark alley with suitcases full of money that they’ve stolen from the department store called ‘For him And Her.’ They scarper down the alleyway, laughing to each other about how easy it was and how they could get away with doing this all the time, when suddenly, two of them are taken out in the shadows by a long flick-out baton. They both go down like a sack of potatoes, both out for the count. The third one is clearly frightened now, instead of feeling victorious. He gets his gun out and as Green Lightning goes down to swoop on him, he fires three shots off wildly. Taken down and beaten with several elbows to the face, the man is terrified, his gun across the alleyway now. His forehead cracked open and his mouth with broken teeth seeping through along with the blood, he gasps for air until Green Lightning wraps his hand around his throat and kneels beside him.)715

Green Lightning: You work for him? (He shakes the thugs head repeatedly.)716

Thug#1: Yeah! (Trying to recover his senses, Green Lightning puts another beating into him, several times his fist goes flying into the head of the thug, who remains helpless and then yelps out what he knows.) He… he… he’s gonna’ be at some sort of ball thing for all the guys that run the city. (Green Lightning looks at him with an icy stare.) It’s something like the Zoo Ball Auction or something! I don’t know anymore, just stop hitting me! 717

(He starts sobbing and Green Lightning lets go, turns around and vanishes. He now knows it was all a set up, he knows that he fell for Jack-in-a-box’s little distraction and that precious time has been lost. He must get to the Auction Ball and kill Jack-in-a-box, Jilly is there as well! What if she gets killed or something? All these images float in his head, as he races off on his trusty hover board through the city, the screaming noise from his jet propulsions can be heard from miles and miles around the place, people looking out of windows and cheering him on, the very people sick and tired of society and believes it needs a clean up the only way; the violent way.)718

JIAB (Voiceover): I have the power. I own everything; judges, the police, the gangs, politicians, the dealers, the banks... I’ve infiltrated every level of society in this rotten carcass of a city and I’m gonna’ burn this palace of filth down. It’s all going down. 719

(As the voiceover continues, we witness JIAB’s thugs start taking over the auditorium, the open-air theatre stadium where it’s all happening. We see his men dressed up as police, we see his men running through the corridors, dispatching with anyone that gets in their way. Security cameras cut out; the mains supply it’s connected to has been specifically targeted. Vans parking into the car parking area of the auditorium, then as the doors are let out, about ten of his thugs jump onto the ground, all armed and all mean looking. We watch from the bottom floor, as the lift goes up on its wires and levers that someone is in there that means some sort of importance to us.720

Everyone except Green Lightning is unaware of what’s happening. The screen then splits in two, one half showing the rapid and aggressive takeover of the auditorium by JIAB and his army of criminals, the other showing Green Lightning travel at break-neck speed to reach the place on time and stop JIAB carrying out whatever it is he’s planning. We would focus primarily on the attempted heist and hostage situation that’s going on. 721

As the auction starts, with people bidding ridiculous amounts of money, all of high society waltzing and laughing, drinking the best champagne in the world, flirting and making deals on anything and everything, we watch the lift entrance eagerly. Everyone in the audience will know who’s in there by now. The lift makes a loud noise to announce its arrived at the floor of its destination and as Captain Kryzios looks around to see where it’s coming from, a small choke grenade rolls out, black and yellow in colour. Smoke starts puffing out of it and as people start choking and running away, his thugs burst in, including the ones dressed up as policemen, they all start shouting and shooting into the air as people choke on the fumes and stumble about.)722

JIAB: And tonight’s winner of the booby prize is all of you! (Pushes an antique vase on the floor and watches it smash before he carries on limping towards the centre of the huge open-air ball. People are pushed away by his cronies; JIAB holds his knife casually as he keeps moving towards the centre of the ball.) Now then everyone lets all hope the new kid on the block comes along very quickly… ha ha! 723

(Captain Kryzios looks around and see’s no one putting themselves forward to speak to Jack-in-a-box and looking at Jilly, who looks terribly uncomfortable and quite timid, he decides to pluck up some courage.)724

Captain Kryzios: Why don’t we negotiate? (He shouts out at the top of his voice. Gasps and sighs ring around the arena as the thugs look at Jack-in-a-box for clarity and an answer.)725

JIAB: Negot-iate? (Mockingly choking on the words, he whips out his knife and limps towards the area of people where it was said. His hunched stance, wobbles a little just like him when he limps along.) Negotiate? (Pursed lips and a sarcastic expression on his face) What is there to negotiate? 726

(The path to Captain Kryzios is cleared by thugs; he stands tall, not letting on his fright or fear of JIAB. In his black tuxedo with the Captain rank slides on the arms, a red bowtie and a blazer jacket with coat-tails hanging. In the background we can see his thugs clearing the tables of anything valuable, gold being taken, antiques being smashed; people have their jewellery and watches yanked off them.)727

Well, if it isn’t Nick Kryzios, Captain of the MCPD and a rising star of the stupid, shitty, rotten (He starts spitting the words out, emphasising the mouth deformation he has, spitting and dribbling out of the corner of his mouth, his blackened lips accentuate this) fucking dog-house of a city. You wanna’ negotiate right? 728

Captain Kryzios: I don’t see why not.729

JIAB: (Stands right before him, a smaller man by about four inches, he looks up and starts laughing to himself, silently, we can see his shoulders lift up and down as he keeps laughing. A scream in the background can be heard, we don’t know who it is though.) I’m sorry, I don’t quite catch that. I’m a bit deaf ya’ know? (Rubs the ear that’s closed up and a small little bobble on his face, he stands on his tip-toes a little and randomly walks back and smashes five wine glasses off a waiters silver tray. The waiter stumbles back and is then checked into place by a thug, who roughly butts him in the face with his weapon. JIAB walks forward a little, having made Kryzios jump a little and everyone else.) Still not scared? (He asks with all seriousness on his face and leaning into Kryzios.)730

Captain Kryzios: Never… (JIAB stays silent for a moment, looks around and as he takes a 360 degrees turnaround he grabs Kryzios by the throat and holds his knife to his mouth.)731

JIAB: You wanna’ play hard man with me do ya’? Well come on then? (He drags Kryzios by the shoulder and throws him on the floor in the centre of the ball/arena.) So then people! It comes to this! (He kicks Kryzios in the face, the crowd look astonished.) 732

So we all have to depend on a vigilante to rescue us do we? Tell me (Kicks Kryzios again) what’s the point of the MCPD?733

Who here knows the bogie boy huh? (Kicks Kryzios in the gut this time, Nick Kryzios rolls away in pain.) WELL COME ON! (Kicks him again in the gut, making Kryzios gasp for air and shield his ribcage desperately.) COME ON! (He shouts angrily.) 734

I’ll settle for anyone… (He says rather creepily.)735

Jilly: I do! (She says stepping forward. Two thugs walk towards her.)736

JIAB: Oh hello! (He limps towards her, Kryzios is left on the floor and given another boot or two by the thugs dressed up, ironically as policemen.) You must be his dame or something yeah?737

Jilly: No.738

JIAB: Why not? (He stops just short of her, his knife close to him now.) ‘Heroes’ always get the dames don’t they pretty woman?739

Jilly: I’m no dame mister. (She says angrily. JIAB is initially shocked that someone who is shaking and looking terrified has said that to him. He gives a ‘what the fuck did you just say to me’ look, shakes his head as if to imagine he didn’t just hear that and then pushes her to the floor. He walks towards her, kicks her handbag away and then grabs her by the arm, leaving imprints in it, pulling her up to face him.)740

JIAB: I dare you to be a cocky bitch again. I really dare you dame. I really do. (Holds the knife to her throat.) So where is he huh?741

(JIAB starts walking around in a big circle, his hands behind his back, flittering madly, his twitch in his eye is going berserk. Jilly feels encircled by Lions, ready to pounce and kill her immediately.) 742

This isn’t Spartacus ya’ know woman. You pretending to be just like him gets you just where it got the good Captain. So tell me now!743

Jilly: (Satisfaction on her face.) You’ll have to make an appointment asshole.744

(He limps towards Jilly really fast and launches towards her, his knife held up towards her. She slaps him, he stumbles back and smiles with a huge grin on his face. Wiping the weeping blood coming out of the scar near his lips with a handkerchief he advances a little more.) You just slapped my scab off… a feisty one aren’t you? (He signals for her to be held by the thugs as he gets a can of petrol off another and starts pouring it all over her wildly, the diesel splashing across her and onto the floor, where he makes a small trail leading up to him. Around fifty people are then randomly rounded up and they too are splashed in something flammable of some sort. They start screaming and some of the women start quivering, smelling and having this horrible liquid put on them.)745

This is where the fun really begins… (Then, we hear the screaming noise of something familiar. JIAB looks up in the sky, over his shoulder and grins manically.) He’s here… (Turns around and confronted by Green Lightning standing in between him and Jilly.)746

Thug#1: What shall we do boss? (All the thugs start looking up in the sky, but can’t see him.)747

JIAB: (Clicks his fingers and points at another group of people.) Let’s see what he’ll do when I light you up real good and burn your skin off yeah? (He Leers towards Jilly who steps back a little, drenched in a flammable liquid. JIAB gets his trusty old lighter out and flicks a flame.) Don’t forget your sun cream…748

Green Lightning: Ok then. (Kicks JIAB in the groin area, which makes him bend over in absolute agony, then the lighter that JIAB had taken out is smashed out of his hand by Green Lightning. JIAB falls back onto the floor, his eyes wide in pain and shock.749

The lighter goes spinning near to a table leg on the opposite side of the ball. Green Lightning is attacked by four thugs. He takes a defensive stance, Jilly behind him. Screaming and general mass panic takes hold of the masses and the few that are brave enough to fight the other thugs are soon overpowered and then either shot or beaten half to death. One thug swings for Green Lightning, who ducks, trips the thug over and as he does so, gives him a huge uppercut to send him sprawling onto the floor. Another two charge him and as he flicks his four foot baton out he holds it horizontally. They grab hold of it to take it off him but to their surprise and complete bafflement, he lets them, then flips over still holding it and yanks it back towards him, taking them out as they flip over and underneath it, smashing their heads. 750

Jack-in-a-box starts crawling towards the lighter that he lost, towards the table leg and whilst he does that Green Lightning advances towards two other thugs who both start spraying machine gun fire at him. He jumps out of the way, diving to the left and knocking chairs and tables flying as he gets some cover behind a corner. He looks up at a chandelier and throws a greenish, yellow fireball at it, burning the wire that connects it to a metal stand that holds other chandeliers as well. The golden chandelier, worth thousands of credits comes smashing down on the two thugs who get crushed underneath it. Jack-in-a-box gets hold of the lighter, while Nick Kryzios shoots a thug in the chest and hides behind a pushed-over table.751

Green Lightning looks around for JIAB and finds him directly to his centre, standing up with a lighter in his hand.)752

JIAB: Hey girl (Jilly looks around at him.) You need to darken up a bit. (He throws the lighter onto the floor and immediately a small spark turns into a huge flame as it travels towards her, eating up the trail of flammable liquid as it races towards her. Green Lightning pushes her through a huge window, carrying himself forward too as she just avoids being burnt to death. The shards scatter, as they land on a balcony. Flowers in their way, she looks up at him lovingly, she goes to touch his cheek but he gets up and races into the top floor auditorium again.) 753

Oh, try saving this lot ok? (He shrugs his shoulders looking for an explanation as he calmly drops the lighter and to Green Lightning’s horror, it flickers into a human fireball as forty odd people are set alight and the screaming, the violence of the burning, the people running about to try and save themselves somehow. We watch one woman throw herself out of a window to her death, rather than die of burns. Nick Kryzios looks on in horror, his mouth open, aghast.)754

JIAB: HA HA HA HA! (He cackles triumphantly, his laugh like a jackal. The camera and Green Lightning turn around and we see he has Jilly, who is limp and badly bruised from her rescue by GL. JIAB has dragged her by the hair and near the edge of a balcony. Green Lightning storms over, filled with so much anger and hate for JIAB he will destroy him if he has to.) One more (He notes at Green Lightning coming too close) she goes over the top. HE HE HEEEE! You see Green boy, never mess with a man two strawberries short of a cheesecake!755

Green Lightning: You wouldn’t dare… I’ll kill you… (Tries to compose himself)756

JIAB: I wouldn’t dare what? (Says animated like) Wouldn’t dare do this? (He stabs Jilly in the fleshy bit underneath her ribcage, twists the knife really quickly and then pushes her body over the balcony. Green Lightning pushes him out of the way, diving over the balcony.) That’s right… you go and stop her redecorating the pavement… (He starts laughing to himself a little, walking away clapping to himself as he makes his escape.757

The lights of all the floors of the surrounding buildings flash past him as he dives, headfirst, his left hand outstretched to grab Jilly, who is fast tumbling downwards towards a grisly end. As it gets nearer, he starts picking up some more pace as gravity brings them down more aggressively. Within seconds of her falling and him jumping over the balcony to try and save her, his hand touches the tip of her foot a little before he makes an attempt to grab it. He fails so uses his other hand as well and with both grabs her legs and then quickly jolts her upwards towards him so he can hold her limp arms. The ground fast approaching, he starts firing long amounts of radioactive energy into the ground below, breaking the pavements and people scattering about. Sirens flashing can be seen from about three blocks away, where an army of police pods are racing towards the scene. As he keeps the energy beam flow going, their joint descent becomes slower until they touch the ground. She lies in his arms, her head tilting backwards.)758

Green Lightning: Stay calm Jilly. Don’t move… (He tries to reassure her as he nudges a button on his belt which calls his hover board over to his position. The hover board races over in about five seconds flat and as the police pods just arrive he races past on it with Jilly in his arms dying a slow death. ) 759

VOICEOVER: Please Jilly, stay with me. Stay alive… come on…760

(The scene opens up again as Green Lightning, still carving through traffic looks into her eyes, which are slowly starting to shut, her grip is lessening and as they stop momentarily just beside the still-destroyed bank that Kelly was killed in, he gets off the hover board, she still lays in his arms. 761

*Macrotus 00:00 – 02:05, Zimmer/Newton Howard*762

He looks into her face, then travels down her beautiful dress and watches the full extent of her injury. The amount of blood she’s lost means it’s too late no matter what. No matter how fast his board was or anything, a solemn look comes across his face as she starts turning very pale, her lips start to very slowly turn the colour blue and the blood which was trickling out of her mouth, just like her grip, holding him for dear life has lessened, begun to stop. Her hair starts waving about in the wind.)763

Jilly: I didn’t… know I could find you so beautiful, the way you are now (She looks up at him touching his face, her palm running from his forehead down to his nose, feeling his eyelids, to his cheeks and those lips she has always wanted to kiss. Her fingers linger there for a few seconds.) 764

Green Lightning: I’m so sorry Jilly. (He cradles her in his arms as she looks at her hand and notices the burn marks on her palm and fingertips.)765

Jilly: I’m sorry for what I said… (Sighs and looks down at her wound, looks towards him and then she passes away.)766

Green Lightning: I love you Jillian. (Starts crying a little, tears in his eyes forming as she takes her last gasp of air and then it’s all over. He places her body on the pavement, outside the bank which is being slowly reconstructed. He looks at her crumpled body and his head bows down, he hears nothing, his eyes close, he can see nothing, he feels nothing no more. The darkness that engulfs him now, two loved ones lost to the same man. Forty or more people he failed to save. His fists start clenching, he keeps his head bowed. He collapses finally from emotion, steam coming from his body as he aches in pain and distress. His head arches back and in the middle of the night all people can hear miles and miles around is the desperate cry, the cry that someone makes when their loved one dies in front of them. The screen turns to black and goes.)767

Scene 15768

(Rain lashing against the wires that help hold up the bridge that connects the centre island of Metropolis and Golden Hill, is quiet in the early hours of the morning for once. The world, well the one that everyone lives in; Metropolis is recovering from its sobering experience, the villain and terrorist of the last bastion of human hope has committed many horrendous crimes since he arrived on the scene, but none as bad as what he did at the open top theatre auditorium which held a charity auction just a couple of blood-soaked hours ago. His manic laugh can be heard echoing in John’s head, as he sits on a railing looking out towards a world covered in darkness and unknown. None of the surviving humans who came to make Metropolis out of the rubbles of New York know what is beyond their city gates or beyond the horizon where the sea keeps going.769

He just sits there, drenched in rain, his nose has a drop forming on the tip of it as he looks out towards the horizon and wonders what’s going on in the world at the moment. He can’t imagine how bad it is for Jilly’s mum and dad to be coping with the loss of their youngest child. He scratches his face a little where he’s forming a bit of shaving rash and wipes his eyes lazily of any dirt inside them. He can’t cry, its’ too late now.770

Flashback: It was at a party they had both attended a few months ago, she was sitting at the opposite end of the table and they were with all their friends and her family, who didn’t and would never approve of Jilly and John as an item, so he had decided to go out with a guy called Kent Hatcher, a guy who competed in the seasonal Ultimate Man competition. It was an event where the supremely fit at all the school’s, academies and so forth entered five participants each into a big event where they had to run thirty six kilometres, go through a obstacle course which was the length of five and a half kilometres and then to top it all they had to run a further ten kilometres and then get to the top of the Statue of Liberty and light a flame which signalled they had finished and were the winner. Kent was the favourite to win and he was a great sportsman. He remembers that night well. John had gone outside and had started feeling ill, looking at the beauty of the city covered in some sort of mist. While her friends partied away on the dance floor to cheese music, some sort of song that was popular during the days of 2007 she notices him taking a break and walks over in her flattering high heels and low cut dress, lilac and black. Her hair is loose as always, she hardly ever has it up.)771

Jilly: What’s the matter hun? (She says a little drunkenly, putting her hand over her mouth as she leans on the railings as well outside the nightclub.)772

John: Oh nothing. (He smiles at her.) Just I feel a bit hot that’s all. A bit under the weather right?773

Jilly: Headaches or something?774

John: No, no, no… (He pats her on the back.) My hand is hurting that’s all. (Shows her his hand which has turned a slight greenish colour) See?775

Jilly: (Hand over her mouth again, to stop a hiccup or something similar.) Oh yeah I see! (She giggles excitedly.) That’s broken isn’t?776

John: No! That’s shocking Jilly. You should know that it would be either a dark shade of black or purple if it was! I’m worried you want to be a doctor. (She giggles again and looks into his eyes purposefully. She slides over to him a little more as her skirt begins to lift up a little in the wind. He keeps looking at her as well, inviting her towards him and she parts her lips, waiting for him to move closer to her. She laughs a little, fluttering her eyelids at him and as he starts thinking about kissing her, Kent; who is very drunk shouts over to her when he’s on the dance floor, demanding she goes back in and dances with him. She looks around and smiles back at John, her hair was dyed black with purple streaks in it at the time, it contrasted with her pale colour of skin perfectly. She isn’t the prettiest of the girls around but the freckles on her face, her youthful looks and the way she dresses mesmerises everyone. He keeps calling, stumbling about on the dance floor like a drunken idiot. The moment is further ruined by a couple who might have just met, the man dragging the woman to the wall and snogging her aggressively. She responds by hooking her legs around his waist, clamping to him. Jilly and John both laugh about it quietly to each other and then she stops, looking serious.)777

Jilly: (Glancing at John, her mouth pursed open, her fingertip playing with his bottom lip, guiding itself along the entire length of it. He doesn’t do anything, he just lets her.) Do you think we’ll ever be like that? (John frowns a little and looks quickly at the couple. The woman desperately trying to take the man’s tie off in the background) I mean, do you think we’ll ever kiss? (She stops leaning against the railing and rubbing his hair gently, messing it up a little she whispers something in his ear and then walks off to join her drunken boyfriend. It was months ago now. Flashback is now over.)778

John: (Speaking quietly to himself in the back of the shop with Rafa, standing upright against the doorframe so he can see if any customers come in as well as provide an ear for John.) It’s… all my fault. (The camera focuses on him, rotating around slowly as he is sat on a wooden chair, his arms folded tightly, his head looking down and his feet on the table. He notices Rafa shuffle a little and disagree with him, nodding his head. He won’t say it though.)779

If I had controlled myself, acted like any normal person would and got on with my life then none of this would have happened. (Rafa encourages him to carry on.) If… (John loses his thoughts for a second and rushes his hand through his long, windswept hair, trying to soothe his mind and energize his brain.) At one point, my anger had faded away…780

Rafa: And now Mr John? (A look of concern comes across his face.)781

John: Maybe you can see what I’m up against. (He looks up at Rafa.) This man has no rules. He doesn’t value life at all, not like you, me and the majority out there. I can’t see people living in safety unless he’s dead…782

Rafa: So it’s returned again? 783

John: I don’t know anymore Rafa. I don’t know anymore what I have to do to stop him. (He shrugs his shoulders with all the effort he feels he can muster.) It’s getting worse… 784

I’ve asked myself constantly ‘Am I to blame for all those that died?’ To think there’s any doubt in my mind, means that I should stop trying to be a hero for the people. Even they are afraid of me…785

Rafa: (His lips emphasise his accented English.) To walk away, Jilly would have died for nothing! 786

John: Jilly died because of me Rafa. She stood up for me against him even though she disagreed with what I was doing. She said I would be consumed by this creature that inhabits me. I should walk away.787

Rafa: He wins! You lose! It’s a game to him Mr John. He enjoys playing one big nasty game and its people like him that we need someone to stand up to and defend us anyway they can! People like him just don’t care about morals or anyone; they’d watch the world implode on itself. 788

John: (Standing up, arms folded in a defensive manner. His hair touching his eyebrows, his eyes looking down so no one can look into them and see what he might be thinking in that dark mind of his.) To defeat him, I have to become like him. I don’t know if I can do that Rafa.789

Rafa: If you don’t, no one else will.790

(The screen goes black, before it opens up again we hear Jack-in-a-box’s voice again.)791

JIAB (Voiceover.): The hunter truly becomes the hunted.792

(Screen opens up again. This time it’s a press conference. Held before hundreds of journalists and writers, all standing up crowding around with news teams reporting live, Nick Kryzios, his ribs bandaged tightly beneath his smart, black uniform, his hat is off, showing his rapid balding head, which has turned a silver black hair colour. He stands there ready to give a press release.)793

Nick Kryzios: (We look around briefly and see thirty policemen all in normal uniform, dotted closely around the impromptu held conference outside on a nice day. He doesn’t let on about his injuries, not wincing in pain or anything.) I stand here before you today, as the Captain and Chief-in-Command of the MCPD. Two days on since the terrorist attack on our citizens and still this lunatic breed’s evil across our streets. He (We hear coughing and the flashing of cameras) won’t hand himself in and as a result we must stand firm, carry on with our daily lives and mourn for those that died two days ago and for those that have died in his reign of terror.794

Reporter#1: Just a question; how do we mourn for these people killed so ruthlessly when he’s out there now, killing more? 795

Nick Kryzios: (Starts talking slower than usual because of the pain in his ribs? Or because he wants to emphasise what he’s saying?) We are holding a state funeral service for all sixty-three people that were killed next week. (Leans forward) We must try and carry on. To stop what we are doing and cower is to hand him the streets and let him control us! We shall not bow to crazed madmen such as him! (He slams his fist on the podium.) 796

Reporter#2: (High-pitched female voice amongst the crowd. Her question sparks some grumbles.) Does Green Lightning work for you? Is he on the payroll? 797

Nick Kryzios: (Bites his lips a little.) Green Lightning is a vigilante. We do not have any of them in the MCPD and never will. They have to answer to the laws of the land, whether or not their intentions are the same as ours, which is capturing Jack-in-a-box and putting him in a court of law.798

Reporter#2: (Asks in a surprised manner, to try and get across his point, it’s almost a ‘you said what?’ sort of antagonistic approach.) So you would put away Green Lightning, even though he’s the cities only hope? (He laughs along with a few others.) The MCPD don’t seem to be capable of capturing such a criminal mastermind.799

Nick Kryzios: Like I just said (Getting a bit uncomfortable) He needs to answer to the laws eventually. The MCPD will get their number one target and I can guarantee it. (He says matter-of-factly. Flurries of questions are thrown at him because of his response but he carries on talking, ignoring them and holding his hand to his eyes a little as the flashes go off from the cameras and the lighting equipment.) 800

(Searching for sombreness amongst the baying press and trying to ignore other potentially risky questions being asked) I know that a lot of the public are scared of Green Lightning right now; I know that given the choice they’d want to see him in a court of law too. He has no right to take the law and re-write. (Looks around the media circus that surrounds him) If we let one vigilante off then soon we’ll have truckloads of them.801

Reporter#3: Captain! (She waves to get his attention.) Although the public are scared of both of them, isn’t it a bit extreme to class him as bad as Jack-in-a-box?802

Nick Kryzios: No. Not at all. (He says firmly)803

Reporter#3: But he has done more to clean up the streets than the MCPD could ever do right? The facts are there. (Nodding her head in clear apathy at his suggestion and in clear disbelief at what he’s saying)804

Nick Kryzios: (Laughing at the challenge made by a reporter.) What facts? If he has done anything then it’s that the darkness that cripples our streets is dominated by these two outlaws, where innocent people die and where millions of credits worth of damage is caused. I completely dispute your argument. The MCPD do not need vigilantes to catch terrorists, which is why we’ve set up our own taskforce to catch these two men… 805

(As Nick Kryzios starts telling them all about his plans on making the city safer; the camera turns to a man hunched up a little, making the effort to straighten his shoulders out a bit and with long greasy hair combed over to one side. He’s sitting in the corner, frittering credits away like a mad old man on a park bench doing something completely bizarre. He then looks up at the huge widescreen that sits directly opposite the Apple-dear building where MCPD HQ is and then starts giggling to himself quietly as unsuspecting people walk past knowing nothing.806

A little bit of litter tumbles across his view of the press conference and with the raised voices getting louder, a smile appears underneath his top hat that he’s wearing. Jack-in-a-box gets up, with a walking stick in his right hand, leaning on it a little, watching the press conference taking part. He stops a little further down the plaza, allowing everyone to walk past him without noticing who he actually is. 807

A lorry-pod is trundling by innocently and as it nears the Apple-dear it viscously, out of the blue smashes into a smaller car at the corner of the plaza causing noise and initial mayhem. As some people, including a few policemen run past JIAB to try and get to the scene, he just stands and watches. He fiddles in his greying overcoat pocket, stains on it from the fluid that initially went on his body all those years ago. He stops messing about, gets a remote-control out and eyeing the situation, the distracted press conference and looking at Nick Kryzios watching the small accident, he presses a button shakily and less than two seconds later, BOOM! A huge explosion rips through the lorry-pod, scattering bodies everywhere, people ducking for cover and Nick Kryzios jumping to the side of his podium to avoid any glass or sharp fragments. 808

Screaming and sirens are almost immediately heard along with shouts for help and more people running onto the scene trying to help out. JIAB marvels in the chaos, we just see him from behind, we can tell he loves this little distraction. Once again he shows up the law enforcement and makes them look weak and disorganised. Dropping the walking stick on the ground, he takes his hat off in a bowing-like manner and turning around slowly and observing Nick Kryzios’ movements he walks off, his little mission completed to full satisfaction.809

*Macrotus 00:00 – 02:04, Zimmer/Howard*810

Meanwhile, later on in the night, the wind blowing through the curtains, rattling and the bed in a mess, John is asleep, rolling over every now and then. The camera is above him, watching over him as John struggles to sleep properly. He ruffles the bed sheets again and rolls over once more before saving himself from falling out of bed. He wakes, we stare into his dark crystal eyes, heavy gasping, trying to control himself as lucid memories invade his mind. He sits up, sweating a bit and birds tweeting away. John looks across his apartment and with his head in his hand tries to regain some sort of composure. His lips chatter away furiously as he closes his eyes now and again to shake the memories out of his head.811

The next time the camera shows us John, he’s walking through the city dark at night, the smog covering the depths of the Metropolitan world he lives in, people still walking by, women in barely anything that resembles clothes are at street corners, trying to earn a living, dirty old men trying to get something off them in return for the credits. This city is poor, in the hands of maniacs and he can’t do anything about it. Smaller gangs at certain hang about their territories, shouting abuse at the innocent bystander that dare to shoot a quick look to see what the youth of the generation is doing: wrecking the city and turning it upside down, but it’s no longer just them. The bigger gangs are being squeezed by the man, full of hate and chaos deep within himself who has caused so much pain and thought provoking issues in John. He doesn’t know what to do anymore, he wants to help but every time he does he becomes looked upon as a terrorist, a rogue vigilante. Though he did start out as one, he became a symbol of hope for a city with none, the last remnants of humanity and now, Nick Kryzios has even turned against him. He just watches, the world will slowly burn itself into a cinder and no one will care.812

Scene 16813

(A man, with a small knife in his left hand, a recognisable greying coat on, with the spatters of acidic material on it and burn marks is standing in the middle of the street for his ride. The bare audacity to do so when so many people know who he is, is quite unbelievable yet he hasn’t, somehow been recognised and spotted. A hunched stance, his coat tails waving about a little in the wind but his stance is unfaltering, just a bowed head, his greasy hair overlapping the collar of his aged suit and a knife in his hand is all we can see apart from the traffic and the noise created by a busily populated street. Our view is somewhat restricted however by the upwards camera shot taking place, solely viewing him and his movement, no one else’s. The traffic light goes green, he stops to make sure and with a slightly over-exaggerated limp starts to cross, all the pod-cars waiting for this slow, hunched man to get on with it and let them pass. It seems that for all the death and terror he is bringing no one for some reason can figure out who he is. 814

The camera shot still focusing on him, we watch him cross to the other side of the road before a large pod vehicle which is white with black writing on it passes by obstructing our view of the person we are following for only a few seconds. We then follow the white vehicle, ignoring the limping man who we no longer know where he went or what he was doing and turn the corner just as the vehicle does. It turns again, just a few metres into the new street and enters a security area. As the vehicle enters the security area a man in a bullet proof vest with sunglasses on comes up and taps on the vehicles window. The two people in the front, whose heads we can only just make out by the fuzzy camera work become clearer. We can’t see who they are or what they are doing but we can only hear the voices. They mutter something to each other quickly before unwinding the window.)815

*Why so serious? Zimmer/Howard*816

Security guard: Right then guys, passes? (Has a notepad and pen in his hand, gun holstered away.)817

Van driver: Um, yeah sure… (As both start rustling for their passes, the driver whips out his silencer instead and calmly shoots the security guard in the head. He drops backwards and we hear the sound of him hitting the ground.) There you go.818

(Three guys jump out of the back of the vehicle, all wearing police outfits, dressed as SWAT from the elite MCPD unit and one of them rushes into the guard room and with a circuit breaker key opens the barrier and lets the vehicle pod go through slowly. Another SWAT thug drags the body of the dead security guard away towards the rubbish and piles some rubbish bags over him, disguising his body. The third one walks quickly towards the parking bay for all security pods, like the one they are getting through, looks to his right and spots another security guard. Without hesitating, he aims and coldly shoots the security guard walking about in the parking bay about four times and we see a blurred figure make a slight noise and dropping to the ground.)819

SWAT Thug#3: Clear. (The vehicle pod soon goes past him and he keeps walking on, picking up the pace as the other two SWAT thugs run past him.)820

SWAT Thug#1: Ok, let’s go. (The other two guys, the ones that were in the front of the vehicle pod have parked it near the back entrance of the building that leads into the parking bay. They have gotten out and joined the three that secured the area for them. They walk, weapons raised to their hips instead of weapons down, towards the next security guard who is patrolling at the back entrance. With it is a code that they need to access to get into the building. He walks up to the security guard.) Hey there. Care to let us in?821

Security guard: (A little suspicious) you guys don’t normally come about that much. Getting something valuable are we?822

SWAT Thug#1: Yeah. Something like that. (The security guard checks all their passes very briefly, paying lip service to them and then pushes in the code. The door slides open and as he still has his back turned, the SWAT Thug sticks two bullets into his neck and middle of his back, killing him instantly. He falls against the wall and then collapses very slowly.823

The five guys then walk in, knowing full well they could have been under surveillance by the security guards in the CCTV room, however, they got told to take the day off and spend their ‘well earned’ money, so surveillance was off today. They approach the reception area where a beautiful blonde haired female is sitting, reading a magazine about men and their philosophies. To the right hand side of her is two more security guards, a small queue of people and some cashiers behind some old fashioned wooden counters all adjoined to each other and not with bullet proofing or anything like that. Inside the office down the far bottom is where the bank manager is discussing something with an old man and what seems like a rather tall, muscular black man standing up watching over things. )824

Excuse me, we’re here to transfer some credits downtown to the treasury. You have us booked right?825

Secretary: Um, let’s just have a look. (She looks down in the opened appointment book and then closes it.) Oh no, we don’t. You sure you were supposed to come today? (The two security guards look over briefly.)826

SWAT thug#1: Certain… (Gets his silenced pistol out and shoots her three times. She falls back off her swivel chair and some cries and gasps ring out. The two security guards, completely taken by surprise and out-numbered hold their hands up in surrender and are pushed roughly onto their knees by two SWAT thugs. The bank manager notices the disturbance and the man he is chatting to and his bodyguard look around. The bodyguard makes ready his sub-uzi and the magazine clicks.)827

SWAT Thug#1: We don’t want to hurt you. We just want the credits and then we’ll be gone. (He says calmly as the other thugs secure the area quickly and safely. All accountants are dragged over the counters and thrown onto the floor, holding their hands up above their heads just like the few customers and two of the SWAT thugs take all the credits out of the cashier points.)828

Bank manager: Who the fuck is doing this? (He sits on his chair looking out of his office through the tinted windows.)829

Don Borrelli: We’ll go and check for you. We don’t want no bother being done to our banks do we Sal? (He loads his pistol as he talks and then looks up at the bank manager who nods.)830

Bank Manager: Stay here Mr Borrelli. There are five of them…831

Don Borrelli: Punks wouldn’t dare touch me. I own more places then their mothers wombs have invited strangers… (He gets up and nods at his bodyguard who opens the office door.) 832

WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU EH? (He shouts down the hall towards the SWAT thugs, who turn around and spot a greying man, in his late forties strolling towards them with a loaded pistol and a black bodyguard with a semi uzi ready to go.)833

WELL COME ON THEN YOU LITTLE SHITHEADS! (He shoots the pistol up in the air and a few people move about a little jumping from the gunshot noise.) I’m Don Borrelli. Who the fuck is you lot eh? (In his strong accented Italian dialect. The SWAT thugs look unsure what to do.) Since when did the fuckin’ coppers start robbing my banks? I pay half you fuckin shmucks! (His face is reddened with anger and rage at the blatant criminal attempt of bank robbery on his own doorstep.834

A figure at the entrance of the bank stands there.)835

JIAB: I own them. My muscle, Don Borrelli. (He limps forward a little, towards Borrelli’s right hand side.)836

Don Borrelli: (Staring at him like dirt on the ground.) You fuckin’ wantin’ a war with me are ya’ hey?837

JIAB: Now, now, now… tis’ hard to stare at those with features less chiselled than yours Borrelli. (He smiles out of the gap in his mouth.)838

Don Borrelli: You break the code of the brotherhood, you break the contract, you take over hundreds of districts and you reduce the Mancini family into grabbing a spare credit from the bins and shit on the streets (Turns his nose up at JIAB and spits in his face.) You shithead! 839

JIAB: You flatter me too much. I’m sick of all you little gangs and their old, decrepit bosses moaning about me being the new boy taking over. You should want to embrace me right? I’m uniting the criminal underworld under my banner! (He laughs a little, the SWAT thugs stand still and watch.) So don’t think its ruthless expansion, it’s just me bringing life into your stupid, set ways… cos’ when this place goes down Borrelli, credits won’t be worth squat. So join me now…840

Don Borrelli: FUCK YOU! (He draws his pistol out and aims at JIAB but the SWAT thugs open fire on both him and his bodyguard and they get riddled with bullets, their bodies twitching between standing up and dropping to the marble floor with blood spewing out, splashing anything near by. We concentrate on watching the life fade away from this fatally wounded man, hearing the delayed clip-clopping sound of footsteps come up to him. A hand, gloved up grabs his collar, covered in blood and his head starting to loll a little bit is dragged upwards, inches away from JIAB.)841

JIAB: Tough luck old man, but I’ll leave you my calling card. (He places a lighter on the chest of Don Borrelli as he pushes him back down again, who groans a little as his life is slowly seeping out of him. The timed lighter detonates and to peoples horror, Don Borrelli, who no longer had the strength to say anything is now a human fireball, his skin melting in the flames, burning up as the fire eats anything in its way. Cries and screams and gasps ring out from people’s mouths as he limps off, execution style killing made, him and his thugs have just walked off with millions of credits and one less gang member to consider a threat.)842

Scene 17843

(Rafa’s shop is just about to close, the lights have been turned off, the displays finished for the next day and the money has just been counted up. He looks down the street and watches some kids, maybe about fifteen years old to twenty years old playing about, knocking an old bust stop with bats and spraying it with their logo and gangster signal. Laughing can be heard down the road, it’s eerily quiet at this time of night. He grunts to himself and shuts the door, locks it, hesitates for a second when he starts to walk away towards the back of his shop which doubles up as his workshop and house and whilst setting the alarm, hears a clanking noise in the back.)844

John: It’s me, don’t worry. (Rafa had gone into the back.)845

Rafa: I haven’t heard from you for a couple of weeks now John. (A sigh of relief comes over him that it was John and not some dubious character.) 846

John: I know. I’m sorry. (He looks red-eyed, scratch marks on his face, dirty, unwashed.) I’ve been exploring.847

Rafa: What exactly? 848

John: I’m not sure. (He looks down at the floor.)849

Rafa: You don’t make any sense to me anymore John.850

John: I’ve been looking around, watching people go about their normal lives, being themselves. I have envy, hate all inside me because I can’t escape what I am.851

Rafa: (Sitting down with John looking at him, his arms folded outstretched on the table.) I know you wanted to stop being Green Lightning because of Jilly… (He stops for a moment and observes John as he said that name. Nothing happens, immune to it now.) But it’s not that easy John.852

John: I know. (He says quietly. He puts his rucksack on his lap and starts digging around inside it looking for something, finally getting out a CD he has, it’s wrapped in soggy newspaper wrappings and he slaps it on the table.) 853

*Vespertilio, Zimmer/Howard*854

Rafa put this on please.855

Rafa: (Reaches for the newspaper wrapping and holds the CD up. Observing it slightly, he gets his shirt that he’s wearing and rubs some smudges off it.) What’s on it?856

John: I don’t know, but I found it outside my door. (Rafa looks at him sort of shocked and puzzled.) 857

Rafa: You think…858

John: I don’t know. (He snaps as Rafa loads it into the machine and on the television screen they have which is thirty inches, they keep looking. Suddenly like a bat out of hell, the black and white recording of JIAB appears out of nowhere. He sits down with his face smothering the camera recording on the CD and starts cackling, taking them both back a little bit.)859

JIAB (Recording.): Hello? You there? (Knocking at the camera screen) I’ve been looking for you. (He stops, gets his knife out and waves it at the camera screen slowly and then imitates a throat-slitting motion.) 860

You’re gonna’ be lying in a pool of your own blood John… Michael… Creed (taking extra delight in saying his full name.) I’m waiting for ya’, cos’ you wanted some so badly, don’t tell me that when I killed your little bitch (he spits the last few words out with venom) you suddenly wanted to walk did ya’? It’s only gonna’ get worse, you know where I’ll be! HA HA HA HA HA! 861

(The CD goes blank. John just sits there and stares at the screen.)862

Rafa: What are you gonna’ do now then?863

John: Looks like I don’t have a choice anymore. 864

Rafa: He knows who you are now, how much longer before he knows who your friends are or where they live? (Rafa asks quietly.)865

John: Putting him away is no longer the option that I can use. He knows who I am which means the only thing I can do is kill him. Putting him away won’t let him forget who I am or where I live…866

Rafa: John. He wants you to find him.867

John: I will.868

(At midnight, on top of the Apple-dear building, Nick Kryzios looks out towards the sea, wishing he was in a world away from all this trouble and death and destruction. He drinks some more red wine, slushing it around in his mouth, dipping his hand into some fish and chips too, which lay on the edge of the building. He looks down and smog is all he can look at.)869

Green Lightning: Why did you call me a terrorist? (He asks in a whisper. Nick Kryzios stops what he’s doing and turns around a little and faces Green Lightning.) 870

Nick Kryzios: You come back? You haven’t been seen for weeks.871

Green Lightning: Borrelli getting flamed got my attention... among other things.872

Nick Kryzios: (Starts drunkenly pointing at Green Lightning.) To me, you’re a violent, aggressive freak of nature who needs to be stopped. I can’t have both of you running about the city, destroying lives and trying to kill each other.873

Green Lightning: I am the night. (Nick Kryzios looks at him baffled by what he just said.) I am the night… I’ll help you, because I need to. You’re the saviour of Metropolis, I’m not, I never will be, I never intended to be… I can’t look after this place forever. I know that. All I’m asking is that you don’t get in my way.874

Nick Kryzios: It’s gone too far now.875

Green Lightning: You’re the face of hope Nick. I will never be untouchable or popular like you and I don’t intend to be. I just can’t figure out why you want me sent down with him.876

Nick Kryzios: You’re stepping on my toes son.877

Green Lightning: No, I’m helping you more than you could ever imagine… (He looks surprised, moves in a little closer.) Get it outta’ your system. (He knocks the glass out of Nick’s hand and it smashes.) I’ve got issues, but you don’t see me flashing them about. (Nick steps back a little bit.)878

Nick Kryzios: Tomorrow… why?879

Green Lightning: Don’t worry about it. (He gets his board out and jumps on it, looking at Nick Kryzios all the time. Nick stares at him, his glass breaking in his hand, a slow cocktail of drink, anger and jealousy is taking over him.)880

Scene 18881

(Green Lightning stands atop the Statue of Liberty, looks around and wonders. This is a city that never stands still, has too much going on but Green Lightning feels that he’s being left behind. He doesn’t know what to do, how to deal with Jack-in-a-box and the camera shows it in his eyes as we take a close look at the burning, luminous eyes of his. Inside them are haunting memories, reminders from the past that stick in his head, affecting his judgement. 882

The camera zooms around the figure of Green Lightning, showing the crumbling, rusting old Statue of Liberty, no longer in it’s former glory. We see lurid memories of him jumping off it and discovering his powers and limits. They zip in and out, seconds of frames and stills from the previous scene they were in, like injection shots into the brain he holds his head. The bright lights look dull to him now. Metropolis is no longer.883

He has realised that Jack-in-a-box has all the power and wealth in this city that anyone could possibly want, he’s created an empire and now wants to destroy everything in his sight.884

Meanwhile, the scene switches to Nick Kryzios, in his police uniform looking at himself in the mirror. He stands there, looking deep into his own reflection, he loosens his tie a little, starts playing with his fingers and then in a fit of rage, his face screws up and then suddenly he bangs the wall to the side of him in almost contempt and self-pity. He can’t stand this green freak taking his job away from him. He feels worthless, he knows he’s becoming an alcoholic, he wants Green Lightning dead, he wants JIAB dead and he wants the city to be his again. He looks down at his knuckles, bruised and reddened. His ego seriously damaged by these two and their war across Metropolis. People baying for his blood, politicians wanting to remove him because he’s ‘incompetent’ and suddenly he gets a knife and cuts himself along his hand, slowly, deeply. 885

Bright red blood seeps from the hand-wide cut he’s made. He looks down on it and then instinctively sucks the blood. Leaning against the wall heavily and sucking in air from his lips, he tries to calm himself down and ends up using the same fist he cut to smash his mirror up. Repeatedly he punches into the shards, the glass spraying all over the bedroom. After a few minutes of watching the shocking and unbelievable fall from grace of Nick Kryzios, in his own personal space, we watch him lick the blood off his hands and clothes, ripping the buttons off his shirt and wiping his left hand onto his bed sheets. He looks up, at the camera, a look of mournful regret with something else deep inside of him. Outside, he peers through the curtains in his apartment and watches the smog emerge again, he hears the pods go by, the day is beginning again and it’s another one which will bring death and destruction to many.)886

Rafa: So… 887

John: So what Rafa? (Looking around briefly as he fits some more missiles onto his board in his garage)888

Rafa: Do you know what you will do after all of this?889

John: Just be me again. I can work in your shop again right? 890

Rafa: (Walks up to him and watches the fitting process.) Maybe. (He smiles widely.)891

John: I’m hoping that Kryzios will help the city get back on its feet again. They need him a lot more than they need me…892

Rafa: (Shrugging) don’t mean to put a dampener on things but…893

John: What? (Looks up and pulls his goggles off his face.)894

Rafa: What if Kryzios doesn’t want to do that after all of this. Then you’ll be stuck as Green Lightning.895

John: The time is coming Rafa, when that choice will hit me in the face and I’ll have to face the responsibilities I’ve been trying to hide away from. (Gets up and starts walking away, leaving Rafa to finish off the job.)896

Scene 19897

(The city, even though it’s mid-evening the sky looks black as midnight. We go down onto street level, spotting a convoy of unmarked grey vans making their way through the myriad of streets and traffic lights. It turns right, then, zooming past a few slower pods, turns into a one way street, turning again about fifty metres down into an alleyway. About ten men get out of the van-pods after they park them up and with AK 47’s they stroll around into a destitute car park, walking towards a huge warehouse which looks like it hasn’t been used for about twenty years. Scaffolding poles and pallets scattered before the main entrance, a rusty double metal door only held up by a few hinges. A bulky looking, tall and muscular man opens the doors with one hand, palming them away. The ten men shuffle in there, with what we find astonishing. 898

The camera looks over the staircase leading from the door and we see chemicals being poured into vats, huge stoves with fire leaping out of them and people with white facemasks on and white protective clothing on walking about making what seems to be packages of small blue and white crystals, then patting them gently to make sure all the air is out of the plastic freezer bags they’re put in, resealed again and then put away into a container which already holds hundreds of the packages.)899

JIAB: You see, production is so far ahead, that when these little performers reach the streets, there is nothing the law can do. (He comes out from the shadows; his face is stained with the powder, dirty and blotted.) Varko: you know where they’re heading?900

Varko: Yes boss. (A huge bulky Siberian, who doesn’t speak very good English and has a heavy Russian accent, his presence is what matters more than anything. He translates what JIAB said to the counterparts who all nod and smile.)901

JIAB: What did they say Varko?902

Varko: Er… when is they going to be ready? (He says painfully in his accented, broken English.)903

JIAB: (Poking Varko with his walking stick.) Tell them they can have three tonnes of the stuff now…904

Varko: (Translating what was said but this time the mood dips a little and Varko looks scornful of what they said.)905

JIAB: (Walking up to one of the foreign counterparts and holding a gun to his neck, putting his face against his.) Well let’s see how much you love money when I burn this damn city down huh? Cos’ money won’t be around by the time I’ve sorted this place out! (Steps back a little and dusts his face off a little.) Don’t be so petty ok? (Foreign drug barons look a little intimidated.)906

Varko: (After translating JIAB’s threats, he gets a hurried reaction which sounds positive after the squirms made just a minute ago.) They say yes…907

JIAB: Alright! HA HA HA! Let’s ship in a revolution people! HA HA HA! (He shouts out to the people making the product who then all look up and cheer for him.) Let’s bust this town! (He swings his tick wildly in the air in jubilation.)908

Rafa: (In the shop with John, who is at the counter waiting for people to come in, boredom starting to settle in.) Ok John, I’ll be back in about an hour. I’m going to drop some stuff off to a few customers… (Holding four packages under his arm)909

John: Yeah sure. Don’t worry about the place, get some fresh air. (He rests his head on the palm of his hand, looking tired and out of this world. Rafa leaves when we hear the door close, slowly we start to zoom in onto John’s face a little more and a little more, gradually reaching into his pupils, when in their glassy reflection we see the door open again. The bell makes the noise informing us that someone has walked in and he gradually shakes himself out of his self-induced daydream to welcome the customer.) 910

Hey, welcome to ‘Rafa’s Electronics’ how can I help… (As he looks up, we see that he is looking directly at the cold face of Jack-in-a-box, along with four thugs, all armed with automatics. His powdered face is nearly giving way to the horrible scab and burn marks that dominate his face, the red lips he has have turned a little brown. His hair is still bleached a little and his face still full of anger. This time though, he looks smug.)911

*Vespertilio, Zimmer/Howard*912

JIAB: I’ve found you… at last. (A sense of achievement in his voice, he is quietly spoken.)913

John: Jack-in-a-box…914

JIAB: That’s my name, don’t ever forget it. (Smiles widely in the corner of his mouth)915

John: I knew that you’d come. (Comes around from the counter and faces him by only a few feet away.)916

JIAB: Our quarrel end tonight Green boy. This is where the revolution starts.917

John: Your insanity has clouded the judgement of what used to be a normal man right inside you. (Almost pleading)918

JIAB: No. I saw how rotten this place was from behind bars. It just took a little transformation. Believe me, I tried to forget this all happened, (runs his hands over his face and through his hair. His thugs encircle them) but it’s kinda’ hard to forgive and forget you know?919

John: You can’t judge humanity on what happened to you Victor.920

JIAB: No, you’re wrong, cos’ my people have become part of everything that’s essential to this corpse of humanity. I have people in the MCPD, I have wardens in my services (a split-screen quickly shows every prison cell in the Incarceration Centre being opened electronically by a few wardens with AK 47s. Prisoners start walking out of their cells, all two and a half million of them.) I’ve destroyed the economy (a screen showing all the stock market goings on, with hundreds of people in the financial centre looking on, phoning their bosses and such, all of a sudden its wiped off the screen, just like a huge rubber had got to it and erased everything off the screen, every single one of them. People start shouting, screaming and gasping in horror.) Everything is worthless John… (His thugs start trashing the place, knocking out the shop windows.)921

You see, this city doesn’t deserve a future, it ruined mine, it ruined millions of people through corruption and idleness and thanks to me, it’s all gonna’ change. (He smiles as the screen shows the parliament in showing and a grenade, attached are ten other small bomblets being rolled into the parliament hall where judges and politicians preside over matters.) That’s all gone now. Anarchy is the way forward now John. 922

John: We all have dreams…923

JIAB: HA HA HA! (Laughing dramatically.) Look where they got you huh? Your sister, dead! (Makes a smoking gun impression.) Your love of your life, she rejected you because of who you are; I mean… she even went out with an alcoholic called Kent, rather than you… I KILLED HER. (He laughs and giggles a little more, John biting his lips a little.) Nick… he’s gone a little on the mad side. It’s all down to you again…924

Does it sadden you John? (He gets a little closer) I wonder; how lonely you must really feel… (Steps back a little.) 925

John: You will pay for the actions you’ve done, not just against me but against everyone in Metropolis. 926

JIAB: The thing is, I really won’t. That truck out there has the nuclear bomb to finish this act off so good day to you John. (Gets a gun out and shoots John in the head with it, blood spatter slapping against the walls and over the counter. The thugs carry on tearing the place down and then they run off, JIAB slowly hobbling towards a large truck-pod, climbing up it, he shoves his stick inside and starts the engine up. 927

As it starts to make its way towards the Statue of Liberty, we see widespread rioting and murdering and looting on an unprecedented scale. Two men ganging up on a woman, another man is stabbing another to death, prisoners running into the streets, some attacking civilians as soon as they see them, others are smashing shop windows and stealing as much as they can. We see a glimpse of Nic Kryzios looking out of his apartment balcony holding a shotgun as flames dominate the night skyline, his eyes watery. His face is stone cold. 928

We focus on John, his body transforming into Green Lightning, a darker shade of green this time, his eyes awaken, his face full of determination.)929

*Like dogs chasing cars 00:00-03:37, Zimmer/Howard*930

JIAB: HA HA… HA HA HA! (His jackal laugh screaming at the top of his voice as he drives the truck-pod like a maniac, an alcoholic, hardly keeping it in one lane, it swerves, smashing other cars out of the way, sending them spinning out of control into the long line of MCPD cop cars chasing him and calling for non-existent backup. The world is going to be lost.) I love this job! HA HA HA! (Gasping for air because he’s laughing so much, he lets go of the wheel, waves out of the window at the police cars and leans out, feeling the air brush against him at high speed.)931

Oh god, I wish this was a full time occupation… (He says as he carries on leaning out of the window.) Get off the road old boy! (He smashes a car-pod out of the way, which unfortunately had an old man driving it at a relatively slower speed.) Jeez, I need to teach a few people how to drive a bit better! HA! (He slaps the steering wheel as his head rolls back laughing at his own crass and nasty jokes to himself.)932

Car cop#1: We need back up immediately! Any available units! (He shouts down to his radio while the truck-pod swerves dangerously ahead of him.)933

Radio: There ARE no available units. They’re all trying to stop the mass breakout. Over.934

Car cop#1: Jesus! (He slams the radio back into its hold, as he does so he notices a huge shadow above in the sky. 935

*And I thought my jokes were bad, Zimmer/Howard*936

He looks up out of his window quickly along with a few other cops and to his utter amazement he see’s a huge hover board darting towards the truck-pod, with what looks like carved out metal falcon wings, talons on each side of the board, making it look like a huge bird of prey from above. Standing tall on top of it is the new, darker, Green Lightning, who looks down at the large trail of destruction and then the ten cop cars following the erratic truck-pod and then he darts off again.)937

Ok actually, don’t bother with back-up, we’ve found some. (He says really deadpan.)938

JIAB: (Looking at the mirror and seeing Green Lightning jump onto the truck-pod.) Ah, looks like I’ve got company. Why does he always… (Swerves the truck pod, making Green Lightning stumble over and grip onto the canvas of the truck-pod) have… (Swerves again) to disrupt my plans hmm? (Swerves the truck-pod once again, though he can’t see Green Lightning in the mirror)939

Green Lightning: Hi. (He smashes the window door open and dives inside the drivers cab, elbowing JIAB in the face and gaining control of the steering wheel.)940

JIAB: Back off! No truck-jacking today you freak! (He smacks Green Lightning who then stumbles into the passenger seat.) That’s right, you get a front-row seat of what I’m gonna’ do with the fireworks yeah? (He carries on punching Green Lightning, who is defenceless and still weak from the gunshot earlier. Blood trickling from his mouth as the fist rains down on him, the truck-pod swerves even more, smashing up parked car-pods and going past some truly horrendous rioting.) 941

Since… you decided that you want to stop me AGAIN might I add (He says wistfully, whilst Green Lightning is slumped in the passenger seat having his life strangled out of him with the metal cane that JIAB carries along with him, who has forgotten about steering the huge vehicle he was in control of. Instead he is atop of Green Lightning killing him.) Then I’ll detonate the bomb right…now… (As he is about to, Green Lightning burns through the stick, grabs JIAB’s hand with his, burning him viscously with radiation and the shock sends JIAB flying into the drivers seat, the detonation stick somewhere in the drivers cabin.) JESUS SWEET MOTHER! ARGHH! (He cradles his hand as he tries to regain control of the steering wheel. 942

He looks around and see’s that Green Lightning has vanished. Smiling widely to himself, thinking that he fell out of the truck-pod, he rushes his hand everywhere trying to find the detonation stick and does so eventually. At the same time, unknown to him, as they were crossing over a bridge, Green Lightning tore back the canvas off as he stumbled out of the seat, saving him he gripped onto the side and the sheer force of the speed and him hanging on ripped it apart as the bomb fell out of its holding bay, onto the canvas and then gently plopped into the sea, its use voided by the water.943

Unbeknownst of what has happened, he looks up as he presses the red button on the detonation stick but nothing happens. His facial expression of confidence and victory turns into shock and soon a bitter sour expression comes across his disfigured face.) 944

What the hell… (He looks out of the window and to his utter contempt and anger finds out what has happened.)945

NO! NO, NO, NO! NO! NO! NO! (He scratches at his face in pain and disbelief, he shoots the windscreen in retaliation as the glass flies about.) WHY?? 946

(As he starts to think about what to do next, he notices that Green Lightning is now standing in front of the truck-pod about eight hundred metres away. He smiles, knowing it’s their last battle now. It’s too late for Green Lightning to rescue the rioting, ripping itself apart world he’s a part of. Now it’s just them two.)947

Ah, look who it is… (He puts his burnt and crisp looking hand to one side, concentrating on driving one-handed. Green Lightning doesn’t move, in fact we see him get his large flick baton out and watch it unfold.) 948

Oh you wanna’ piece of me do ya? Well I’ve give you some! I’ll give you some! HA! (He starts muttering to himself manically, concentrating on his target that is getting a little nearer.)949

WELL COME ON! I’m coming for ya’! I’m gonna’ give you what you’ve wanted! (He says passionately.)950

Green Lightning: This’ll be for my sister, for Jilly, for anyone else you’ve hurt and destroyed… (He says quietly as the loud, distant rumbling of the truck-pod gets a little nearer each second.)951

JIAB: He won’t know what’s hit him! HA! (The truck-pod starts getting faster now, we look at the dial and it’s past its safety limit. The hurtling truck-pod is going straight for Green Lightning.)952

I’M GONNA’ SWOT YOU OFF MY WIPERS LIKE A FLY! (He starts banging the steering wheel with jubilation and a lunatic sense of self-belief that exists within him.953

Meanwhile, Green Lightning gets on his hover board, with its new wings folded back in. He reverses back about a hundred metres and then looking straight at the truck-pod which is now getting closer than ever, he starts the hover boards run up. His baton in both hands, extended fully.)954

JIAB: I’M GONNA’ MAKE YOU ROADKILL! COME ON! (He screams at the top of his voice as finally both of them are only a hundred metres or so apart. He’s going so fast that when Green Lightning dodges to the left slightly, he shoves his metal baton into the axel of the front wheel and a violent jolt occurs where the other three wheels are carrying on but the front left one is skidding and not moving.)955

Ah. (The moment of realisation, as the truck-pod skids on its side, then flips over and carries on skidding into a department store, smashing straight through it and a huge amber fire breaking out as soon as the truck-pod stops moving. For a few minutes, the film would then focus on the trail of destruction left by the truck-pod, the cop cars stopping and them getting out of their car-pods looking on in amazement at what they saw.956

We watch, smoke billowing from the rubble and the destroyed department store, still with half a truck-pod visible amongst the debris. Green Lightning, his powers fading, we see his green muscular body, with only his neck and head human, the rest radioactive. A huge cut on his forehead is bleeding heavily, his lower lip is pulp and blood trickling out of his mouth, bruises and grazes cover his face and forehead. He searches through the rubble, desperately looking to see if there were any survivors in the department store. Tossing large pieces of rock away but then having to gather himself as his injuries are slowing him down. The emergency services are on hand and doing the same, pulling people out of the rubble.) 957

*The Finale part 1, Elfman*958

(Some of the civilians are amazed that Green Lightning is actually a human, voices can be heard saying things such as ‘that’s him mummy’ or ‘my god, he’s just like us’ or ‘get him some help he’s injured.’ But no one does, the people are too afraid to do anything, they don’t know what to do, but one thing is for certain, the MCPD won’t arrest him. The cops who were chasing JIAB stand from afar, not going near him.959

Jack-in-a-box, his arm shattered and burnt, blood trickling from his mouth, his face half burnt off, more than previously, his hair straggled and tinged, flopping over his face, his cane gone, struggling to get out of the drivers cabin, stands up and staggers towards a unknowing Green Lightning.960

As he gets to within a few metres of Green Lightning, he turns around and finds Jack-in-a-box standing before him, dangling like his life, almost on a piece of string)961

JIAB: Me… you, you… can’t exist (Coughing blood up) without me... (Blood pouring out from his abdomen area, his clothes ripped and burnt, he stands there, looking at Green Lightning who stares straight back at him, defenceless. JIAB rips out his knife and to his dying horror; he finds the blade snapped off. He holds it in front of Green Lightning.)962

Bollocks. (Then he collapses onto the floor, dead. Green Lightning looking at the dead body of his nemesis. No tears in his eyes, no reaction, no remorse. The scene closes.)963

Scene 20964

(At Jilly’s grave, in Central Union Park, near the Statue of Liberty, John, in a sweater, with blue jeans on, along with Rafa walks towards the cemetery made, dedicated to the victims of Jack-in-a-box and his year of terror. Thousands of gravestones line up in rows upon endless rows. John finds Jilly’s grave, pointing it out towards Rafa, who opts to stay behind, reading some of the other gravestones and who the victims were. It’s raining, but they don’t bother with an umbrella, it’s just a passing moment of a trip they are making, a small detour on their way to the prospective building site. 965

They’ve been scouting where to build their new business together, with John an investor into the new electronics shop. The city however, still hasn’t recovered, with millions of escaped convicts still out there, the economy still renders everything worthless and the MCPD still corrupt and the government totally destroyed. With no government, Nick Kryzios has been put in temporary governorship of the city, until elections can be held. No politicians or judge survived the bomb attack that happened. The police therefore, can shoot anyone they like they suspect of being a criminal since there is no justice system at the moment. 966

John puts a small red rose next to her grave but then senses something wrong. He looks to his left hand side and finds that the turf has just recently been dug up. He looks about, sensing something, he looks at the willows that grow, thrashing about in the small wind and for a minute, as if he was bordering on stupidity, wonders if Jilly is out there.)967

Rafa: You ok? (He shouts over as he notices John’s weird behaviour.)968

John: Um, yeah fine. (He looks at the signs of exhumation at Jilly’s grave and dismisses it.) Her parents are probably putting flowers in here or something… (He shouts back to Rafa, who falls for his pretend assumption.969

They walk away, out of Central Union Park and he looks back, magnetised by her grave.)970

Nah… (He dismisses his thoughts one more time and walks off, watching him though we see the back of a ginger-blonde young woman, we see her hand rubbing her abdomen a little, but that’s all we see, as the film closes.)971

THE END.972