From: johnsd2@jec316.its.rpi.edu (Dan Johnson) Subject: Storming the Pearly Gates, Ch 6 Date: 7 Mar 1994 01:24:50 GMT Here is the long (at least 12 hours!) awaited Chapter 6. I do hope it's all obvious enough. I'm afraid it may be a bit labored. Ah well, I'll do a better job with the next Chapter. Chapter 6 Stick in the Mud [Fade to a swamp, looking very.. swampy. What else? Camera pans up to look at the sky. We see a speck.] Speck: [faintly] "....aaaaaaaa!" [Hmmm.. camera zooms up after it] Speck: "aaaaaAAAAAAAAA!" [getting louder and closer] [The speck drops past us- it's Scott Sauyet, learning the True Nature of the Force of Gravity, the hard way.] Sauyet: "AAAAAAAAaaaaaaa....!" [drops away from us] [Definitely a scoop. Let us zoom down after him.] [We stop to avoid getting splashed. Seems like Sauyet has made contact. He swims to shore and drags himself out.] Sauyet: "Wow! I guess that seraphim was right. That first step *IS* a doosy. I must do him a kindness some day." [Sauyet sits down, produces a blow-dryer, and begins drying his clothes] Sauyet: "You know, there's something very odd about this place.. I get the feeling..." Figure in a Tree: [Faux-Grover voice] "Yes? Feeling?" Sauyet: [spin around to face the Figure] "Like I'm being *WATCHED*! What are you doing here? How do you find me so fast? How do you managed to grow enough food to eat in this sludge?" [The figure, a skinny, muddy, part-cherokee man in a dark blue robe, covers his face with his arms] Figure: "Away put your logic! I mean you no harm!" [A pause, looks out past his arms] "I am wondering.. why are you here?" Sauyet: [looks at Figure suspiciously] "I'm looking for someone." Figure: "Found someone you have, eh?" Sauyet: [tolerantly grinning] "Yes.. I suppose so. I was kind of looking for for the Holy Ghost, though.." Figure: "I know him! Yes! Take you to him, I will!" Sauyet: "Oh? How did you managed to befriend the All Powerful, Ever Present, All Knowing, etc, Holy Ghost?" Figure: "*AWAY* put your logic, said I! Get hurt, someone might!" Sauyet: "Sure..." Figure: "All fun and games is it, until looses an eye someone does! Yes!" Sauyet: "Oh, very well. But what is your name, anyway? I can't just call you 'Figure'?" Figure: "Stowell, call me!" Sauyet: "And can you *please* talk normally." [But Stowell ignores this and leaps out of the tree. Then He and Sauyet trudge deeper into the swamp.] [Fade out, and fade in to the Main Force, approaching a large stone wall across the road. It's rough masonry, but at least 300 feet tall, and at least 10 feet across, and perhaps 20 feet deep] Dan Johnson: "Damn! Just what we needed, a wall." Arturo Magidin: "No problem! Let's climb!" Ray Ingles: "I have it! Let's go.. *AROUND*!" Dan Johnson: "Good thinking!" [and all begin to troop around the barrier.. except Magidin] Magidin: "Hmph. Dan.. you know what I always say. If there's a complicated, long and difficult way of doing it, why do it the easy way?" Dan Johnson: "Ummm.. perhaps because we don't want to spend three hours here?" Magidin: "Time well spent, though!" [Magidin starts scaling the wall] Dan Johnson: "This must be some strange new use of the word 'well' that I was unaware of." Magidin: [pausing] "Now, Dan, no using other people's copyrighted lines!" Dan Johnson: "I think that one is the least of our problems." Magidin: "Whatever you say." [resumes climbing] [And as the Main Force yells and rants below about wasting time, Magidin scales higher and higher.. [Fade back in to a plastic tent, deep in the swamp. We zoom in a bit, then cut to the interior. Stowell and Sauyet. Stowell is rummaging around for something.] Sauyet: "I don't see why we can't go find the Holy Ghost now!" [Stowell stops rummaging, turns and offers a granola bar to Sauyet] Stowell: "Patience! For the Ghost it is time to eat as well!" [Sauyet sulkily tries to eat the tough granola bar, with little success] Stowell: "Anyway, something there is you must learn, before the Holy Ghost you find." Sauyet: "Huh? Whazzat?" Stowell: "Stand a chance you will not! Learn the ways of The Script you must!" Sauyet: "Actually, I just couldn't parse your grammar. But do go on about this 'Script'.." Stowell [produces a small pile of paper] "Yes! All things follow the script! You, me, the rock, the tree, everything!" Sauyet: "Hey, believe what you want. There's no all powerful force controlling *MY* destiny! It's all a lot of simple tricks and nonsense." Stowell: "No! No! In character you must stay! No more Han Solo stuff! Written out you must not be! The 42d to last chance are you!" Sauyet: "How do you know that?" Stowell: [brandishes paper] "Through the script, things you will see. Old jokes, long gone. Stuff like that." Sauyet: "Don't you mean: 'that, stuff like'!" Stowell: "Good! Yes! Taken into a larger world your first step have you!" Sauyet: "I have a feeling this isn't going to be any fun." Stowell: " Fun. Feeling. A comic craves not these things!" Sauyet: [rolls eyes] "So, what lies ahead for me, eh, oh one so wise in the script." Stowell: "Difficult to say. Always being rewritten is the future. Past too, these days. Damn annoying." Sauyet: "Enough! Lemme see that." [grabs the script] [Sauyet reads for several minutes, then..] Sauyet: "It would plan such a thing? It would do such a thing? Incredible!" [Stowell smiles] Sauyet: "But, wait, if this controls everything.. *THIS* is the Holy Ghost! This must be it! I've figured it out! Hah!" Stowell: "Unexpected this is... and unfortunate." Sauyet: "Unfortunate that I know the truth?" Stowell: "NO! Unfortunate that you rushed to understand.. that incomplete was your training.. that unready for the burden were you!" Sauyet: "I have to get this back to the main force- this is hot stuff! They don't know what happened in the forest, and what's going on with the metropolitan angels... they'll be crushed!" Stowell: "If you go now, help them you could.. but you would destroy *all* for which they have fought and suffered." Sauyet: "Toodles!" Stowell: "You must not go!" [But Sauyet is gone already..] [Fade out]