The City on the Edge of Forever (28 page)

THE END

APPENDIX

2nd Revised Final Draft 12/1/66
 

PROLOGUE

FADE IN:

1 ESTABLISHING SHOT—INT. McCOY’S LAB—ENTERPRISE

CLOSE ON ALIEN CREATURE. It is a small creature. It is silver-blue, with a lot of hair, with bright, beady little eyes, maybe even with antenna. Something like a Yorkshire Terrier with a big furry head and a scrawny hairless blue body. It looks alien, but not outlandish. (Cast it to suit yourself.) The hands of DOC McCOY are in the frame, taking a blood sample of the little dingo. We HEAR the VOICE OF CAPTAIN JAMES KIRK OVER:

VOICE OF KIRK (OVER)

Ship’s log: star-date 3134.6. What began as a routine mapping expedition has turned into the darkest enigma of all our flights.

CAMERA PULLS BACK to show McCoy with MR. SPOCK and two ENTERPRISE CREWMEMBERS (male and female optional). The dingo is wired in to the metabolic panel on the wall. They are all intent on what’s happening to it.

MCCOY

It’s growing younger. Little by little. Reversing the aging process.

The blood sample has been fed into whatever instrument McCoy utilizes for this purpose. The Crewmember hands it back.

MCCOY

There’s poison here. It wasn’t present when we took this pup for specimen on Spahfohn. The radiation’s doing it.

CUT TO:

2 INT. ENTERPRISE BRIDGE—CAPT KIRK—(MEASURE)

CLOSE ON KIRK as CAMERA PULLS BACK to show us WHAT HE SEES in the view-screen. A strange silvery planet under a wan and dying red ember of a sun.

VOICE OF KIRK (OVER)

The magnetic radiation that has drawn us here to this desolate Rim of the Galaxy…the radiation that has somehow set our chronometers to running backward…is having a strange effect on all of us…

There is an O.S. BLEEP from an intercom.

3 INTERCUT—THE INTERCOM

as it flashes for Kirk’s attention.

4 KIRK—MED. CLOSE

as he flips the switch and the face of Spock appears on the intercom screen by his control chair.

KIRK

Yes, Mr. Spock?

SPOCK

Dr. McCoy has taken samples from each of the zoological specimens. They are growing younger.

KIRK

Conclusion?

SPOCK

So are we.

Kirk pauses a beat in perplexity. Troubled, deeply troubled. Strange things are happening.

KIRK

What is it that can reverse machinery
and
human beings?

SPOCK

Was that rhetorical, Captain?

KIRK

Unless you have some facts for an answer.

SPOCK

Do you believe in magic, Captain? Alchemy? The power of the supernatural?

KIRK

No.

SPOCK

Then I have no answer. There aren’t any in science, not for this. It’s the radiation, of course, but more than that—

5 FULL SHOT—THE BRIDGE—TILT/ANGLE

as a HIGH KEENING WHINE erupts in the chamber, the very air is suffused with a crimson glow, the banks of equipment begin running wild, fire breaks out in a shower of sparks on one panel, the ship rocks and bucks and SOUND PHASES UP AND DOWN the sonic scale.

SULU

(from controls)

Radiation intensity just jumped, Captain! Bang, we’ve got overload!

KIRK

(sharply)

Mr. Sulu, lay-in that parking orbit! Let’s not get any deeper into this radiation…

6 thru 9 SERIES OF SHOTS—HAND-HELD & TILT/ANGLE

MED. CLOSE on Kirk even as he delivers the preceding line. The ship rocks and bucks so violently, suddenly, that Kirk is thrown out of his control chair.

SMASH-CUT TO:

ANGLE ON BRIDGE as other crewmembers are tossed around like loose peas. The SCENE GOES RED again, eerily.

SMASH-CUT TO:

TILT/ANGLE IN CORRIDOR as the ship heaves and people are dumped, crashing into one another. Red haze.

SMASH-CUT TO:

INT. McCOY’S LAB as the shock wave hits and flasks shatter on the shelves, racks of equipment tumble and crash. McCoy and Spock are thrown against one another and both of them are thrown against the specimen table.

10 XTREME CLOSE SHOT—McCOY & BEAST

as the red effulgence fills the room with more of the radiation. McCoy is shoved against the little beast they were examining, and with the speed of a raccoon, the alien creature strikes, in panic. It sinks its tiny fangs into McCoy’s hand.

11 CLOSE UP ON McCOY

as he screams, his eyes squinch shut in pain, and he pulls his hand away from the creature, suddenly thrusting it against his mouth to stop the pain. But we see on the back of the hand, in that fleshy area just behind and between the thumb and first finger, three tiny flaming red dots where the beast has bitten.

MCCOY

(strangled)

The poison…

12 WIDER SHOT—FAVORING SPOCK

as the
Enterprise
stabilizes. The red glow is still there. McCoy stumbles, begins rocking back and forth as though he is in terrible anguish. Spock tries to help him, but McCoy turns away. His back is to us, and he is twisted over as though shot in the stomach. Then he straightens up sharply, and as Spock moves toward him again he suddenly grabs a long-necked retort from a table and swings it in a whistling arc, crashing it against Spock’s temple. Spock is hurled backward and goes slamming into a bulkhead, hits and falls face forward. The two
Enterprise
Crewmen, who have, for the most part stayed in the b.g. or moved to assist Spock, now go for McCoy. They grab him from either side, and with startling agility he pulls his arms free and clubs them together. They go down and McCoy turns SUDDENLY TO FACE CAMERA as CAMERA ZOOMS IN on his face:

He has been changed. Not Jekyll-Hyde. More subtle than that. Spots of color, flaming in his cheeks, his eyes quite mad, whirling discs dilated and dark. A very indefinable
something
wrong that tells us very simply and directly that the poison is in his system and he has gone berserk. He STARES INTO CAMERA several beats, to give us a good look, then PLUNGES INTO CAMERA and

FRAME TO BLACK:

13 ANGLE IN CORRIDOR—McCOY

as BLACK FRAME becomes McCoy RUNNING AWAY FROM CAMERA down the corridor. ALARMS SOUND OVER AND OVER.

14 REVERSE ANGLE—CORRIDOR—McCOY

as he comes DASHING TOWARD CAMERA and CAMERA PANS WITH him as he turns sharply and the door before him sighs open, and he rushes inside. We HEAR Sulu’s VOICE OVER intership comm system:

VOICE OF SULU

(filter)

Security Alert! Find and restrain Dr. McCoy at once. Security Alert!

(repeats this over and over

as action proceeds)

CAMERA HOLDS on the door through which McCoy has vanished as it sighs shut. Then CAMERA TILTS UP SLIGHTLY to read the plate near the door: TRANSPORTER CHAMBER. CAMERA HOLDS a beat on the plate and then very smoothly PANS LEFT to SHOOT DOWN CORRIDOR as we see, at the other end, Kirk and Spock and SEVERAL OTHER CREWMEMBERS of the Security Force as they plunge toward us. CAMERA PULLS BACK as they come abreast of the Transporter Chamber. One of the SECURITY MEN points to the door with anxious words ad lib that he has seen McCoy enter. The door slides open for them and they rush in as CAMERA FOLLOWS.

15 FULL SHOT—INT. TRANSPORTER CHAMBER

as we see the TRANSPORTER CHIEF lying unconscious by his machinery. And on the beaming stage, the last tell-tale flickers and sparkles of the TRANSPORTER EFFECT that tells us McCoy has gone. CAMERA IN CLOSE on Spock and Kirk in 2-SHOT.

KIRK

He’s beamed down…

(scared)

…
there
.

SPOCK

He’ll be dead in two hours.

CAMERA HOLDS CLOSE on their faces locked in horror as we

FADE OUT.

END OF PROLOGUE

ACT ONE

FADE IN:

16 EXT. PLANET—ESTABLISHING—DAY

CLOSE on booted tracks as CAMERA ANGLE WIDENS to show us a rocky defile, obviously on an alien world. The tracks lead out of the rocky defile. A burnt-out sun hangs dolorously in the cadaverous sky. A dead world, even from what little we see here…as if some cosmic god had flicked an ash and it had grown into a planet. We HOLD on the SCENE for a BEAT as we HEAR the VOICE of KIRK OVER:

KIRK’S VOICE (OVER)

Ship’s log: star-date 3134.6. The deadly radiation that drew us to this desolate Rim of the Galaxy, has thrown the
Enterprise
into chaos.

As these line are SPOKEN OVER we see the tell-tale shimmering of the TRANSPORTER EFFECT as Kirk, Spock, Yeoman Janice Rand and two enlisted crewmen appear. VOICE OVER CONTINUES:

KIRK’S VOICE (OVER)

Somewhere on this nameless ash of a world, Dr. McCoy is wandering, the poison in his blood giving him less than two hours to live. We are transporting down with an antidote.

(beat)

Can we track him down in time?

As the preceding lines are SPOKEN OVER we see Spock indicating tracks to Kirk, pointing in the direction they vanish. They move forward as VOICE OVER CONTINUES and we:

LAP-DISSOLVE THRU:

17 thru 19 FULL SHOTS—THE SCENES

the Patrol moving through random sets of alien terrain (whatever is most economical to convey feeling of covering distance on this planet, without exorbitant set-ups) as VOICE OVER CONTINUES as indicated above.

CONTINUE LAP-DISSOLVES
 
THRU TO:

20 EXT. PLANET—ANOTHER ANGLE—MED. CLOSE SHOT

PAST Yeoman Janice Rand in f.g. as she turns her head sharply to look just PAST CAMERA. A tricorder, a simple black case, hangs over her shoulder. A HUM grows stronger from tricorder.

RAND

Captain: there’s the source of the radiation.

CAMERA PULLS BACK RAPIDLY to show Kirk, Spock and the rest just behind her, and as CAMERA FILLS we see mountains that rise up into the sky, till they become vague and whispy.

SPOCK

The tracks…straight for the mountains.

CAMERA MOVES BACK IN and TO THE LEFT to come in CLOSER on Kirk, and past him, as if they were miniatures right over his shoulder, the mountains, with a strange glittering on one far, distant peak.

KIRK

(almost dreamily)

Mr. Spock: do you see a great city up there?

SPOCK’S VOICE O.S.

It is there, Captain.

KIRK

Like a city on the edge of forever.

CAMERA HOLD as Kirk moves away and the others move with him. CAMERA HOLD on the gleaming city, seen almost in opaque dimness as we