CUT TO: INTERIOR MESS HALL - NIGHT
Christie, Call, St Just and Johner are still at their all night poker game, stacks of bills,
peanuts and liquor scattered the table.
They are in a tense hand, the pot impressively high.
JOHNER
I'm in.
CHRISTIE
All right.
ST JUST
Raise you two hundred.
JOHNER
Oh, fuck you!
CALL
That's it. I'm out. I'm fucked.
She throws down her cards, takes a swig of Johner's patented moonshine. It tastes horrible.
CHRISTIE
That takes me down, too. Johner?
JOHNER
Uh, Uh, fuck it. I fold.
(to St Just)
What do-you got?
St Just calmly shuffles his cards back into the deck.
ST JUST
You'll always wonder.
JOHNER
You asshole.
CHRISTIE
Johner, your deal.
CALL
Deal me out. It's not my night.
She tries to stand up, takes a spill over her chair. The others laugh.
CALL
Jesus, Johner, what do you put in that shit, battery acid?
JOHNER
Just for coloring.
ST JUST (producing a small vial)
I got something that'll take the edge off that.
CALL
Thanks, I'll walk it off.
She stumbles out of the room. Johner shuffles the deck.
JOHNER
Bitches should not play with the boys, they will get cleaned out.
(dealing)
Eight card throwback, fuck your sister and the sevens are wild.
CUT TO: INT. HALL
As soon as she is out of sight, Call straightens up, completely sober. She looks
around her and takes off toward the restricted areas.
She comes to the door and making sure no one is around, star punching in code on the keypad.
CUT TO: INT. CELLBLOCK - MOMENTS LATER
As Call pads silently down it, looking for one cell.
TO: INT. RIPLEY'S CELL - CONTINUOUS
The cell door opens silently. Call hesitates a moment, then slips in, shutting the
door behind her.
Ripley is sleeping, still in the squatting position in the middle of the room.
Call approaches.
She stares down at Ripley a moment. A shadow passes as a guard walks above them,
Call tenses till he is gone. Look's back down at Ripley -- still sleeping.
Call extends her hand, flexes her wrist. The meanest lookin stilletto you've ever seen
extends from out her sleeve. it, gotta be a foot long, and sharp enough to shave with.
She lifts back her arm, the better to punch it through Ripley's heart.
Ripley shifts slightly. Call stops.
ANGLE: RIPLEY'S CHEST
Her shirt is open enough to show a good portion of the scar. Call hesitates, staring,
realization flooding her face.
RIPLEY
Well?
Call starts, moving back a pace.
RIPLEY
You gonna kill me or what?
CALL
There's no point, is there?
A flick of her wrist and the stilletto whips back up her sleeve. Ripley sits up.
CALL
It's already out of you. Christ... Is it here? Is it on board?
RIPLEY (smiling)
You mean my baby?
CALL
I don't understand. If they've got it , why are they keeping you alive?
RIPLEY
Curious. I'm the latest thing...
CALL
Those sick fucks.
She raises her arm, the stilletto gliding out again.
CALL
I can make it stop. The pain... this nightmare.. That's all I can offer you.
Ripley holds her palm up, presses it against the point of the blade.
RIPLEY
What makes you think I would let you do that?
Ripley pushes her hand out -- the blade goes RIGHT THROUGH HER PALM .She keeps pushing
her hand out slowly, a good five inches of the blade sticking out the back of her hand
before she stops. Call stares at her.
CALL
What are you?
RIPLEY
Ripley, Ellen, Lieutenant first class, number 36706.
CALL
Ellen Ripley died two hundred years ago.
Ripley pulls her hand back suddenly, grimacing at the pain.
RIPLEY
What do you know about it?
CALL
I've read Morse -- I've read all the banned histories. She gave her life to protect
us from the beast. You're not her.
RIPLEY
If I'm not her. What am I?
CALL
You're a thing. A construct. They grew you in a fucking lab.
RIPLEY
But only God can make a tree.
CALL
And now they've brought the beast out of you.
RIPLEY (smiling)
Not all the way out.
CALL
What?
RIPLEY
It's in my head. Behind my eyes. I can hear it moving. The beast.
The smile is gone, some real vulnerability showing through. Call softens, trying
a different tack.
CALL
Help me. If there's anything human in you at all, help me stop them before
this thing gets loose.
RIPLEY
It's already loose.
Call's expression changes. Those words terrify her, but she's not sure if Ripley
means what she thinks.
Ripley raises her hand at Call's head -- Call flinches but Ripley stops a few inches away.
Then touches her forehead gently, almost sensually.
RIPLEY
Once the thought .... the hope for it ... . grows here.... it has found its way.
It will come, because... man will bring it. Bring it forth.
CALL
You want that.
RIPLEY
I've come to terms with the fact of it. It's inevitable.
CALL
Not so long as there's breath-in me.
Ripley LASHES OUT and GRABS CALL'S THROAT. Call swings wit the blade but Ripley
has her arm pinned before she can connect. Ripley squeezes the girls neck.
Ripley looks at the girl with a world of sadness.
RIPLEY
I can... make it ... stop...
Call's eyes are pleading, terrified. Ripley finally lets go and she drops to the ground
gasping for air.
RIPLEY
Go. They're coming for you.
As soon as she can move, Call scrambles up and heads out.
CUT TO: INT. HALL - CONTINUOUS
Call comes out and before she can move a RIFLE BUT hits her the head. She goes down but
not out as two guards grab her. Wren is with them and three more.
WREN
I think you're gonna find that this was ill advised.
(to the men) Where are her friends?
GUARD
Mess hall, most of them.
WREN
Sound the alarm. I want them rounded up. Now!
TO: INT. MESS HALL - MOMENTS LATER
ANGLE: THE CARD TABLE
Being kicked over.
Elgyn, Hillard and Rane are pushed into the room, sleepy and confused.
Christie, St Just, and Johner are all being herded in by soldiers.
Call is thrown into the group as well.
ELGYN
What the fuck is going on here?
CHRISTIE
Looks like a doublecross, boss.
WREN
Where's th
e other one? With the chair?
JOHNER (to a soldier)
Get your fucking hands off me!
ELGYN
Do you mind telling me what the fuck you're up to?
WREN
Shut up!
(to,a guard) Get the general. Wake him up.
ELGYN
Look, if there's a problem tell me what it is. we can work this out, there is no
need to get emotional ...
St Just is silent, standing in the same position he was when Ripley attacked Johner.
Hands behind his back.
ANGLE: BEHIND ST JUST'S BACK
As Elgyn speaks, two guns..slip out of his sleeves and fill his hands.
CALL
They got nothing to do with this, Wren.
ELGYN (to Call)
To do with what?
WREN
I don't give a fuck. It's way too late for that. You're all looking at a firing squad.
You hear me?
ELGYN
I do. St Just?
With lighting precision, St Just raises his hands and blows of the guards away.
He takes out a third to his left without even looking that way.
One guard gets off a shot with his burner, frying Rane before Hillard's elbow knocks
his teeth well into his throat.
Christie tackles the next as Johner presses a latch on the bottom of his thermos --
the top half flies off, revealing handle of a gun inside .He grabs it and another
guard runs . Johner doesn't have time to pull the gun-out of the the so he SHOOTS
right through it, sending the guard flying..
CUT TO: INT. ALIEN OBSERVATION LAB - CONTINUOUS
Alarms, flashing red lights. Gediman looking in a video monitor.
GEDIMAN
What the fuck... You three! Go! Sector two.
All but one of the guards rush out to investigate. Gediman works the surveilliance screen,
trying to see what's happening
CUT TO: INT. MESS HALL - CONTINUOUS
When the smoke clears, There are two guards still standing. They point their weapons
inneffectually. St Just a has gun to wren's head and a gun on the guards, who are also
covered by Johner.
ELGYN
Nice and easy, boys ...
Call starts to take off.
CALL
I'm gonna finish this.
Elgyn grabs her by the hair, roughly pulls her back.
ELGYN
You're going nowhere, Annalee.
CUT TO: INT. OBSERVATION LAB - CONTINUOUS
ANGLE: IN THE PEN
The three aliens have picked up the energy. are stalking back and forth like tigers
in the dim light of their pen.
ANGLE: THEIR POV
We see Gediman and the guard, their backs t o us. The aliens-stop pacing. One of them,
to the right, looks at the one on the left. Something passes between them. They look
back at the humans. At each other.
They SET ON the middle alien, TEARING IT APART. It lets out piercing, insectile SHRIEKS
as they tear it limb from limb.
Gediman spins in terror, the guard bringing up his weapon .Gediman hits the lights inside
the pen and as they blink to shocking brightness we see:
The remains of the third alien on the ground as a giant pool its blood EATS A HOLE IN THE FLOOR.
GEDIMAN
Oh, God
He bolts for the failsafe but it's too late as the blood eats all the way through
- the two aliens DIVE through the hole. just as Gediman hits the button -- freezing gas
fills the chamber but there's nothing to freeze.
GEDIMAN
No no no!
He hits another sequence and the door slides open. He rushes in, kneels by the hole and
looks down.
ANGLE: HIS POV
Ther blood has already eaten through two levels.
GEDIMAN
Christ. They could be anywhere.
He looks up at the guard -- and an alien FLIES UP at him through the hole.
It was hanging on the ceiling below and it pulls him through before he can breathe
a decent scream.
The guard just stares, shaking.
CUT TO: INT. MESS HALL
The mexican standoff is getting even more heated.
CHRISTIE
Who gives a shit! We have to get out of here.
ELGYN
If Call's got something going here I want to know what it is!
WREN
You brought her here
Two more guards rush in. Johner shoves' his gun in Wren's mouth.
JOHNER
Drop them! I'm not fucking with you!
CHRISTIE (indicating the dead soldiers)
Boss, we got bodies here. It doesn't matter what Call's up to, we're all fucked now.
CALL
I have to stop him. If I don't we'll all die.
WREN (pulls his mouth away)
Elgyn, tell me what you know. If she's alone in this
HILLARD
In what?
Johner puts his gun to Call's temple now.
JOHNER
Does anyone want me to make this simple?
Far away, a SCREAM . Everyone stops. Wren turns slowly in the direction it came from.
WREN
No...
CUT TO: INT. HALLWAY BY LABS
A technican RUNS screaming just as an alien LEAPS on him from behind. The CAMERA
RUSHES AWAY, frenzied as the scene, to pick up a guard in the next hall firing wildly at
the ceiling as an alien dissappears up an airvent. There are three bodies lying dead
before us.
ANGLE: IN THE PENS
We see that the aliens have been freed. Smoke, dead bodies, the plexiglass partition
to one 1 cage is cracked and open.
CUT TO: INT. RIPLEY'S CELL - CONTINUOUS
Ripley sits in the dark, the noise of Chaos just beginning filter in. And she just can't
help herself.
She is LAUGHING.
CUT TO: INT. PEREZ'S QUARTERS CONTINUOUS
He is mostly dressed, still shaking off sleep. He stands at the command console,
bringing up visual. Everything on the screens is smoke and noise.
PEREZ
Ensign! Damage Report! Ensign!
Nothing. On one of the screens, an alien is briefly visible. Perez stiffens at the sight of it.
He punches up a different sector. The labs, and here is a badly wounded lieutenant.
PEREZ
Status!
LIEUTENANT
Containment is impossible, sir... I think they swept the barracks.
PEREZ (to himself)
A military strike.... Christ Jesus ...
After a beat, he starts punching in the emergency override codes.
CUT TO: INT. BARRACKS - CONTINUOUS It's worst here -- the aliens have taken out a dozen men in their sleep, and everyone
awake is screaming. One soldier runs for the weapons cabinet -- an alien hits him from
behind and SMASHES him into it, falling in a tumble of guns.
Over the chaos, the emergency lighting comes on, floor light like an airplane's
indicating the nearest exit. Father's voice is excruciatingly calm:
FATHER
Emergency. Initiate evacuation procedures immediately. All hands. This is not a drill.
One soldier gets a bead on an alien with his burner - fries italong with two of his friends.
They're out of commission, but the alien is hurt only momentarily. It bounds forward,
takes out his face.
FATHER
Emergency. Initiate evacuation procedures ...
CUT TO..
INT. HALLWAY BY ENGINE ROOM - CONTINUOUS
The noise is too far above to be hea
rd down here, but Fathers droning voice and the
emergency lighting are on.
Vriess wheels slowly into the hall, concerned. He spins slowly, checking out his surroundings.
ANGLE: DOWN THE HALL
There is nothing.. Just the floor lights pulsing in succession towards the exit.
Vriess follows their lead, wheeling out.
CUT TO: INT. NEXT HALL - CONTINUOUS
Nothing here either. But Vriess's fur is up -- he moves slowly, carefully.
And was that a noise? He looks around, up at the ceiling.
A drop of alien blood is eating through right above him. It drips down -- and he rolls
out of the way just in time, back up as the blood plops to the floor, eating casually through.
CUT TO: INT. LIFEBOAT BAY ONE - CONTINUOUS
Men are rushing into one of the lifeboats. They sit facing each other in the tiny vessel
and strap themselves in. Pere is here, hurrying the soldiers in, pushing back the few who try to crowd in after.
PEREZ
Bay three! Go!
The late soldiers make for the next boat as Perez seals the hatch. He hits the eject
button and steps back.
CUT TO: EXT. THE AURIGA - CONTINUOUS
As the lifeboat FIRES out of the side of the giant craft.
CUT TO: INT. BAY THREE - CONTINUOUS
Men crowd into this one too -- it's nearly full and an alien suddenly LEAPS into it..
starts feeding on the men strapped down - they are screaming.
Perez runs in as a soldier outside the lifeboat fires his burner, hitting the alien,
the men, the controls -- a shower of sparks as the alien-turns, about to spring on the
soldier as he rolls in a grenade . The doors shut and and a soldier hits the eject button.
TO: EXT. AURIGA - CONTINUOUS
The second lifeboat comes shooting out and moments later. EXPLODES.
CUT TO: INT. MESS HALL - CONTINUOUS
The noise of the explosion - and of a few inside as well - is all around the group.
Father's voice still urges evacuaticion
WREN
NO!
(to Call)
What have you done?
CALL
Nothing. Not a goddanm thing. You thought you could control it.
ELGYN
All right. We make for the Betty. Can he walk?
He is pointing at Rane, who nods, standing.
HILLARD
Betty's all the way across the ship! Who knows what's in between?
CALL (indicating Wren)
He does.
One of the soldiers steps forward. DiStephano.
DISTEPHANO (to Wren)
Sir, we have to go.
(to Elgyn) Let him go. No quarrel.
ELGYN
You can have him when we're off . Not before.
They start out, dragging Wren along. Guns still on Call and the soldiers.
What about Vriess?
Terry Bisson Page 3