Prayers to Broken Stones
Page 20
Louis is staring at the doctor. He manages to nod.
DR. HUBBARD
(flushed, chewing on his pipe to calm down)
Good. Now Mr. Winters is having his radiation treatment about now. The same sort of treatment your mother will be receiving in a few days. Would you care to see it?
Still staring, Louis nods again.
DR. HUBBARD
Fine. Now you have to try to be sensible. No more nonsense about cancer vampires.
(he smiles)
It could upset Mr. Winters and the other patients on the floor.
Louis nods again.
DR. HUBBARD
Excellent. Then I’ll go see if we’re ready to start his treatment. We’ll send an orderly up for you.
(he realizes that the pipe is in his mouth, removes it, and smiles)
Now, don’t you feel better, Louis?
Louis nods a final time. Then, in a very tight shot, from Louis’s P.O.V., we are in E.C.U. of Dr. Hubbard’s face: his mouth is slightly open, showing white teeth, healthy gums, and a hint of tongue. From beneath that tongue comes first the fleshy antennae and then the green-gray body of a tumor slug. It moves farther out and then withdraws, as if burrowing from the light.
FADE OUT
FADE IN on: ACT III
8. INTERIOR. RADIOLOGY TREATMENT AND CONTROL ROOM. DAY.
Louis has been wheeled into the Radiology Control Room in a wheelchair but now he stands to peer through a thick window into the Treatment Room where Jack Winters lies on the treatment couch under the overhanging eye of a massive supervoltage cobalt 60 machine. Jack Winters looks small and frail and terribly vulnerable as he lies on the treatment couch—parts of his body shielded by lead “molds”, his upper torso bare with a target outline drawn on his upper chest in bright dye, an unsubtle + centered where the powerful X-rays will penetrate. We can see Jack breathing rapidly, shallowly, his emaciated chest rising and falling, his skin offering almost the only color in a vast Treatment Room which is mostly white machinery and black and white tile fading into black shadows. Dr. Hubbard is in the Control Room with Louis and a RADIATION THERAPIST who stands next to the complicated controls.
DR. HUBBARD
This will be Mr. Winters’ next-to-last session. We believe that the tumors are responding very nicely to treatment.
(glances at Louis)
Radiation treatment and chemotherapy have come a long way since the days of your father’s illness.
The therapist taps controls while watching his monitors and the massive machine above Jack Winters hums, moves, and lowers its ominous “eye” to a firing position just above the + on the old man’s upper chest. A light from the machine snaps on and illuminates the target area.
LOUIS
(clearing his throat, obviously impressed and a bit frightened)
How much radiation does Jack have to receive to beat the cancer?
DR. HUBBARD
We estimate that seven thousand rads should be sufficient to sterilize this tumor.
LOUIS
(turning away from the window)
Seven thousand rads? That sounds like a lot. How much is a rad?
DR. HUBBARD
Well, to give you an idea … a regular chest X-ray … such as you received when you were brought in after your accident the other day … would expose you to about five millirem … that’s a total of about five thousandths of a single rad.
LOUIS
My God … and Jack has to receive seven thousand rads … a million times as much.
(he looks back through the window at the waiting man)
How can he take it?
DR. HUBBARD
In small doses. A single dose of seven hundred rads would be fatal to about half the people who received it. So we parcel it out … a bit at a time … and still there are side effects.
(quickly, to avoid Louis dwelling on the negative)
But the principle of radiation treatment is well-proven, Louis. The benefits are well-documented.
LOUIS
(lost in thought as he stares at Jack alone in the other room)
And my mother will be receiving these treatments?
DR. HUBBARD
Depending upon post-surgical recovery and results of other biopsies … yes.
(he nods to the radiation therapist)
We’re ready …
The radiation therapist throws the switch. Louis is startled as violet radiation fills the window, bathes his face in light.
LOUIS
I see it!
DR. HUBBARD
The actual radiation is invisible, of course.
The radiation is visible. Visible to Louis, at least. We share his altered vision as the Treatment Room is filled with a brilliant violet radiation, centering on the cobalt 60 machine’s lens but arcing and pulsing in wild geometries as the radiation leaps from the machine to Jack. The others see none of this but we CLOSE ON Louis’s startled face, painted violet in reflected light, and see the sudden shock and revulsion as the TUMOR SLUGS begin to slide out of Jack’s chest.
LOUIS
Look! The …
(he bites off his exclamation before tipping off Dr. Hubbard)
DR. HUBBARD
What, Louis?
LOUIS
(attempting a smile)
Nothing. Nothing at all.
The tumor slugs emerge, attracted by the bright light from the cobalt 60 machine. First one, then a second, then a third … They emerge from Jack’s chest—some completely, some only partially—as if they are drawn irresistibly to the glow. The radiation therapist throws a switch. The hum disappears and the explosion of violet light fades and dies. The tumor slugs that emerged completely have shriveled and died … the survivors burrow back into flesh once again.
LOUIS
(unable to contain himself)
There wasn’t enough time … not enough radiation!
DR. HUBBARD
(checks a dial)
Twenty-eight point six seconds. Precisely enough for this treatment.
Louis begins to explain but sees Dr. Hubbard watching him carefully. Louis shuts up. He is thinking quickly.
LOUIS
What … what is the source of the radiation?
RADIATION THERAPIST
In this case, radioisotopes of Cobalt 60.
LOUIS
Can I see them?
The radiation therapist glances at Dr. Hubbard and the oncologist nods, still humoring his young patient. The therapist goes to a wall safe, casually runs through a brief combination—we see Louis watching carefully and we also catch the numbers, 17-right, 43-left, 11-right—and then the therapist dons ridiculously thick gloves, opens the thick vault door, and removes one of several heavy lead storage cylinders emblazoned with the international warning symbol for radiation hazard.
LOUIS
Are those the isotopes?
DR. HUBBARD
These are their shielded lead storage units. The actual isotopes are tiny … but dangerous. One isotope would power the cobalt 60 machine for many hours. Each … unshielded … would deliver several thousand rads at once.
LOUIS
How are the isotopes loaded into the machine?
DR. HUBBARD
Very, very carefully. Remote mechanical handlers. Lead aprons. Lead shielding … it’s quite complicated. Have you seen enough?
(he nods for the therapist to return the isotope to safe keeping)
Louis looks through the window at Jack. The old man is shivering slightly from the cold. He turns his head toward the window and smiles. The dead and blackened tumor slugs are still visible on his bare chest.
LOUIS
(to himself)
Yes … I’ve seen enough.
CUT TO:
9. INT. NIGHT. LOUIS’S HOSPITAL ROOM
Louis comes awake with a start. It is dark. From somewhere down the hall comes a soft chime and the squeak of rubber-soled shoes on tile. But it is a closer sound which has
awakened Louis. The SLURPING is coming from behind Jack’s curtain … an even louder, ruder noise than that of the night before.
LOUIS
(groggily, still half asleep)
Jack?
Louis slides back the curtains. Jack is dead, mouth agape, fingers curled into rigid claws, eyes wide and staring. The SLURPING, SLIDING noise comes from tumor slugs sliding on and around his body … his pajamas writhe and ripple from their movement and some are spilling from the gaps in his pajama tops. A cancer vampire squats over the corpse, head lowered, proboscis deep inside Jack’s chest like some nightmarish mosquito drinking its fill. The SLURPING is very loud.
LOUIS
Ahhh …
The cancer vampire lifts its face. Tumor slugs drip from its long snout … one slides up the opening with a RASPING sound. The cancer vampire looks directly at Louis, its caked, yellow eyes peering myopically.
LOUIS
Uh-uh … uh-uh …
Louis fumbles on his littered dinner tray, finds a knife, and throws it with all of his strength. It strikes the chest of the cancer vampire with a soft, rotten sound, but instead of sticking it sinks into the pulpy flesh like a dropped utensil floating in a pool of mucus. The cancer vampire idly extracts the knife with long fingers and casts it aside. It has not been hurt. It raises a hand toward Louis.
LOUIS
No … uh-uh …
Louis stumbles out of the bed backward, knocking over the IV stand, crashing into the tray table and sending the vase of flowers flying as he edges along the wall, staying as far away from the cancer vampire as possible while heading for the door. We MOVE IN on the cancer vampire’s yellow, blind eyes, its head turning, as we hear Louis’s footfalls receding down the empty corridor.
CUT TO:
10. INT. NIGHT. RADIOLOGY CONTROL ROOM.
Louis staggers into the dark room, remains panting at the doorway for a moment. There is no pursuit. Looking around, he snaps on a single low-wattage lamp above the control board. The adjoining Treatment Room is in total darkness. He looks around wildly, sees the safe with the radiation symbol, and takes deep breaths to calm down. He knows what he has to do. He fiddles with the dial. In E.C.U. we see 17-right, 43-left, 11-right. The safe door swings open and Louis steps back, shocked at how easy it was. Inside the safe, the lead storage cylinders sit like small bombs. Louis glances over his shoulder, then looks around until he finds the heavy gloves. Donning them, he removes the cylinders and sets them carefully on a table.
DISSOLVE TO:
11. INT. NIGHT. RADIOLOGY CONTROL ROOM.
Louis is crouching by the table so that only his head and shoulders are visible. The storage cylinders rise in front of him. The rest is darkness. Still wearing the heavy gloves, he fumbles with the complicated latch and lid on the first cylinder.
LOUIS
Damn.
He tugs off his gloves, easily breaks the seal, flips the latch, and removes the lid. A fierce violet light illuminates his face. The glow becomes even brighter as he shakes the radioisotope into his bare hand. The pellet is small but incredibly brilliant—a point source of blazing light. He lifts it with both hands.
LOUIS
(whispering)
There’s got to be another way.
(beat)
But I don’t know what it is …
Louis takes a breath and lifts the isotope higher with shaking hands. There is an element of the sacramental to his motions—a radioactive Communion service. He swallows the cobalt 60 pellet, struggles to keep from gagging, and keeps it down.
LOUIS
Ah, God …
He opens another storage cylinder, lifts the isotope. The light in the room begins to fade …
DISSOLVE TO:
12. INT. NIGHT. LOUIS’S MOTHER’S ROOM.
We see a close shot of Louis’s mother—her head on the pillow—as she moans in her sleep, turning fitfully, perhaps on the verge of coming out of the sedative-induced sleep. We move down her shoulder to her arm, her hand. Suddenly a huge, misshapen form comes into the frame and clumsily enfolds her hand. It is Louis’s hand, again in the heavy radiation glove. We PULL BACK and see Louis as he sits by her bedside, holding her hand in the dark room. Lightning ripples soundlessly outside the window.
LOUIS
(very softly)
I remember once when I was a kid … it must have been just after Dad died … I woke up on a stormy night like this and found you sitting on the edge of my bed … like you were protecting me from the storm.
The lightning illuminates the room again. Louis quickly looks around. There is no sign of the cancer vampire.
LOUIS
I pretended I was asleep, but I wanted to tell you that nobody could protect anybody. Not from the storm … not from what killed Dad …
(beat)
I wanted to tell you then that all a person could do was run … run from the people you loved the most … run so that it didn’t hurt so much when you couldn’t protect them.
Louis squeezes her hand.
LOUIS
Well, Mom, maybe I’m through running for a while.
He looks around again.
LOUIS
I could see those … things … the cancer vampires … in almost every room I passed on this floor.
(shivers)
White blurs in the dark rooms. Waiting. Waiting to feed on the people there …
He takes a deep breath.
LOUIS
It’s time, Mom. Time to see if it’ll do any good.
Louis removes one of the heavy gloves. His hand blazes with violet light. He removes the other glove and the glare from his two hands throws wild shadows around the room. He raises his hands, staring at them.
LOUIS
This won’t hurt, Mom.
He lays the palm of one glowing hand an inch from flesh just below her throat. We wait a second and then see the ripple as a tumor slug slides up toward the light. Louis grimaces but does not remove his hand as the slug emerges from her skin, tests the air with its moist antennae, and then slides into Louis’s palm. A second one follows, enters Louis’s hand. A third. Louis holds his hand there a moment longer but no more emerge.
LOUIS
(gasping, close to fainting)
I think that’s all.
He lifts his hand and we can see the turmoil under the violet-hued flesh of his bare forearm as the slugs curl and writhe in their new home. Louis shifts sideways in the chair and lowers his head almost to his knees, hugging his arm to his chest.
LOUIS
OK, Mom … now … now we … wait.
The lightning flashes soundlessly. Behind and above Louis, high on the wall, the head and shoulders of a cancer vampire emerge from the solid wall like a predator pressing its way through its own amniotic sac. Louis can not see it behind him. The thing makes no noise as it pulls its arms through, finds purchase on the wall with its impossibly long fingers, and pulls itself out like a swimmer emerging from a pool. The cancer vampire slides down the wall, as silent as a lizard, and disappears behind the hunched-over Louis. Louis’s mother moans in her sleep and Louis stands, whirls, and knocks the chair aside.
LOUIS
(to the thing, his voice tremulous)
Hey! Here … here I am … damn you.
The cancer vampire was crouching over Louis’s mother but now it rises, lifts long fingers and its funneled face toward the glow that is Louis.
LOUIS
Here … that’s right … food.
Louis extends his hands in the motion that is, once again, vaguely sacramental. The cancer vampire flows toward him, lowers its terrible face toward the outstretched, glowing hands.
LOUIS
That’s right … take … eat.
The thing’s proboscis seems to extend right into the flesh of Louis’s open palms. Louis’s forearms writhe with the motion of tumor slugs. We hear the SLURPING, SLIDING. Finished, the thing suddenly pulls its head back and begins jerking, spasming.
> LOUIS
(triumphantly but in a whisper)
Tonight, Death,… you die.
The cancer vampire spasms and convulses. The violet glow increases as the radiation spreads. There is a HISSING, BURNING sound as of acid burning through thick paper. The cancer vampire collapses, curls into itself, and seems to shrivel while the HISSING continues. Its long fingers close slowly … like the legs of a dying spider. Louis staggers to his mother’s bed, collapses on the edge of it, and pulls on the heavy gloves.
LOUIS
I’d like to stay, Mom. See if Dr. Hubbard can help me … be around when he tells you that your tumors are gone …
We see a close-up of his mother’s face—she is resting more comfortably. He again takes her hand, pats it clumsily through his heavy gloves.
LOUIS
I’d like to stay … but I can’t … I can feel the burning inside me. So hot …
(he clutches his stomach, bends over, then straightens)
There are all those other people in the ward, Mom … all those other things … waiting.
(glancing toward the door)
I’m scared. But at least now I know what I should do …
In E.C.U. we see her hand twitch, possibly a random movement, possibly squeezing his in affirmation. Louis stands, looks toward the dark hall.
LOUIS
(whispering)
I only hope that I can feed them all.
Louis touches his mother’s hand a final time and walks to the door, pausing before stepping into the darkness there.
LOUIS
I love you, Mom.
Louis steps out and is gone. We watch and listen from a low angle near his mother’s sleeping form as his footsteps recede … for a moment there is silence … and then the SLURPING, SLIDING, RASPING begins, grows in volume, builds to a chorus. But with the noises comes a promising violet glow, growing brighter down the corridor, filling the doorway, filling the entire room with its warmth, as we …