THE GORGE screenplay (9 page)

Clara dangles her arm over the stone. It comes up wet. Water is all around her and rising.

CLARA

(whispers)

You’re not getting my baby.

One of the goregoyles
SKEEEE
s in response, then a few others squeak and titter.

CLARA (CONT’D)

(shouting)

You’re not getting my baby.

From the mouth of the cave, Ace shouts.

ACE (O.S.)

Clara!

The goregoyles flutter and stir, restless.

CUT TO:

EXT. BABEL TOWER LEDGE. NIGHT.

Dove secures the other line and tosses it over the side, rappelling down beside Raintree. Farrengalli retreats to the cave, knife in hand.

The Castle-thing launches into Raintree, vigorously tearing into his flesh.

DOVE

Robert, hold on!

Dove dangles from the rope and with one hand beats at the Castle-thing with the pick-ax. The creature rams its fangs into Raintree’s neck. The pick punches a hole in the goregoyle’s skull—the Castle-thing trembles and falls into space.

Dove climbs farther down and talks to the delirious Raintree.

DOVE (CONT’D)

Come on, dammit. We can die waiting or we can die climbing.

RAINTREE

I’ve seen what I came to see.

DOVE

You can’t quit now.

RAINTREE

Take the cell phone.

DOVE

No, you can make it.

With the last of his strength, he grabs her arm. She’s near tears but trying not to show it.

RAINTREE

Did you love him?

DOVE

Who?

RAINTREE

Bowie.

FARRENGALLI (O.S.)

(from cave above)

Grab the phone and come on. He’s meat.

Dove touches Raintree’s face, wipes the blood from his eyes.

DOVE

(softly)

They’re all meat.

She wrestles the cell phone from his belt and begins climbing back up. Raintree looks out over the gorge and shuts his eyes.

CUT TO:

INT.CAVE. NIGHT.

AceVision: the cave below Ace slopes away, the floor filled with lava. Clara is visible on the stone altar, and she is glowing, beatific, like a madonna. The angels are circled around the altar, perched on ledges in a semicircle.

The interior of the cave is lit with fire, and from the back of the cave, lava bubbles up.

ACE

(loud)

She’s not a virgin.

He holds his backpack to his chest and wades into the lava, looking down at is pools around his ankles and then knees as he moves deeper.

CLARA

They want the baby, Ace.

ACE

They come down from heaven a little too early. This world ain’t been washed in enough blood yet.

Ace wades deeper, the angels getting restless. Something bubbles and a liquid rumble comes from deeper within the cliffs.

CUT TO:

EXT. MOUTH OF CAVE. NIGHT.

At the mouth of the cave, Bowie waits, watching Ace enter. He glances up at the sky. The clouds erupt in rain, the river swelling again. As he turns, his foot kicks something. A pile of bones, both animal and human, ring the outside edge of the cave.

BOWIE

No redemption.

He opens the revolver, checks the chamber—three bullets.

BOWIE (CONT’D)

One for you, one for me, and baby makes three.

He enters the cave.

CUT TO:

EXT. BABEL TOWER LEDGE. NIGHT.

Farrengalli emerges from the cave and goes to help Dove up the rope. She’s having a hard time climbing because she’s holding the cell phone. Farrengalli reaches down to her.

FARRENGALLI

Give me the phone.

DOVE

You did this.

FARRENGALLI

You asked for it, babe.

DOVE

You’re nothing—

SKEEEE
. The Castle-thing slams into her, flailing, uncoordinated, but determined. Farrengalli jumps away. Dove screams as fangs and claws tear into her flesh. The cell phone drops from her hands to the rocks far below.

FARRENGALLI

Women.

CUT TO:

INT.CAVE. NIGHT.

Ace is waist-deep in the water, moving forward. The creatures are even more restless.

ACE

Don’t you angels read the papers? I got something for you. I got something for all the babykillers.

One of the goregoyles swoops down toward the altar and Clara rolls off the side into the water. The MagLite beam casts a rippling line of light as she pushes away underwater.

ACE (CONT’D)

Ye shall know them by their works.

Ace pulls out the C-4 explosive, rigged with wires, a timer, and a plunger. Clara bobs to the surface and a goregoyle homes in and heads for her.

BOWIE

Get underwater! They can’t see you.

Clara slides back under the dark water as the goregoyle misses her and flies over the surface, confused, unable to locate her.

Another one soars toward Bowie, who ducks as its knobby limbs brush his body.

ACE

Come out, Michael. Gabriel. Joshua. Hell, even Lucifer if you’re here and you’re not too chickenshit.

Ace is almost to the altar, the creatures still not attacking him, though they are growing restless. The water is almost covering the altar as Ace starts climbing onto it, still holding the explosive.

Bowie sees Clara’s Maglite beam underwater, she comes up for a quick gasp and is down again, swimming toward him. He eases into the water and meets her, drags her toward the mouth of the cave.

BOWIE

Come on, the place is flooding.

CLARA

Ace?

A couple of goregoyles swoop toward them. Bowie fires the revolver at one and the sound melds with the rumble and trembling rocks. Ace is now on the altar, kneeling, holding up the explosives like a sacrament.

ACE

Deliver us from evil!

He triggers the detonator—

KA-WHOOM
.

Bowie and Clara are propelled out the mouth of the cave as water gushes out, boulders and rocks tumbling around them. The water pushes them away from the avalanche, though small stones bounce off Bowie’s back as he tries to shield Clara.

They are dragged under the water, but Bowie hangs onto her, flailing and stroking as the current pulls them into the open air.

CUT TO:

EXT. BABEL TOWER LEDGE. MORNING.

Farrengalli crawls out of the cave, exhausted, clothes rumpled. He’s wary as he slinks onto the ledge and checks out the gorge below. The storm has passed and the river is still swollen, but the sky is tranquil and sunrise is bloody but peaceful. Below, Raintree’s corpse still dangles upside down. Dove is nowhere to be seen.

He checks the rope that Dove had secured, then eases down it. As he passes Raintree, Raintree’s limbs begin trembling. Raintree’s face is gray, he’s in mid-change, his body trying to reanimate.

FARRENGALLI

Sucks to be you, Chief. Guess ProVentures will need a new spokesman now.

Just as Farrengalli starts rappeling down, Raintree’s milky eyes snap open.

RAINTREE

Skeeek.

He swings out a claw but Farrengalli is already out of reach, hurrying down the rope. Raintree tries to fly but he’s too tangled in the rope. He plays out the slack and is yanked, and he slams back against the cliff. He tries it again. Same result. He’s pissed, skeeking and hissing his undead rage.

FARRENGALLI

Don’t worry, you’ll still get some publicity.

He heads down the cliff face.

CUT TO:

EXT. RIVERBANK. MORNING.

Clara and Bowie are safely below the jumbled cave-in, resting, Bowie scratched and bruised, Clara looking fresh.

CLARA

Why didn’t they attack Ace?

BOWIE

I don’t know. Maybe he really was a messenger.

CLARA

He was crazy.

BOWIE

Prophets are only crazy until they’re right.

CLARA

Well, don’t be expecting any virgin births.

BOWIE

The river comes out at a lake eight miles or so down. There’s a little town there.

CLARA

I can’t walk that far.

Bowie scans the sky.

BOWIE

Let’s go to the camp. We hid a kayak there.

CUT TO:

EXT. CLEARING IN WOODS. MORNING.

Farrengalli jogs into the camp where he’d left Castle. The makeshift canopy is still in place but sagging, the campfire dead. He runs to the place where he’d propped Castle, feels around in the bushes and pulls out a backpack.

He opens it, rummages, pulls out Dove’s camera.

FARRENGALLI

Yeah, baby. Ticket to the stars.

He shoves the camera back in the backpack, then goes into the woods and emerges, dragging the inflated Muskrat.

FARRENGALLI (CONT’D)

Last man on the island.

(shouts)

Hear that, losers? It’s only fucking natural.

He heads toward the river with the kayak.

CUT TO:

EXT. RIVERBANK. MORNING.

Farrengalli is putting the kayak in the water when Bowie and Clara appear. Farrengalli is momentarily surprised, then sees the gun in Bowie’s belt.

FARRENGALLI

Hey, Chief. Good to see you.

Bowie glances around the camp.

BOWIE

Where are the others?

Farrengalli wipes his index finger across his throat in a cutting motion.

FARRENGALLI

They’re meat, man.

BOWIE

Dove?

FARRENGALLI

The crazy injun took her up the tower. I heard the screams.

CLARA

Have they come back yet? Dead, I mean?

FARRENGALLI

Vampires don’t come out in the sunlight. Didn’t you know that?

SKEEE
-explosion of motion as the Dove-goregoyle soars out of the treetops and with one extended claw rakes Farrengalli’s throat open as she swoops by. Farrengalli falls to his knees, clutching his throat, blood spurting, as Dove-goregoyle banks and swoops again.

Bowie draws his gun as she approaches, she peels her lips back, a gray grin full of teeth and he aims. The struggle is big on his face. He can’t shoot.

The Dove-goregoyle slams into him and knocks the gun away. For a moment they are tangled in a sick parody of intercourse, Dove going for his throat as Bowie struggles to fight her off.

Clara picks up the revolver and fires twice, the bullets smacking into Dove’s torso. Gray fluid oozes out of the wounds.

The third time Clara pulls a trigger there’s a cold click. As they struggle, Bowie pulls a piton from Dove’s belt and jabs it repeatedly into her stomach, her torso lurching with the plunging motion. Bowie crawls on top of her, and for just a second her eyes are no longer milky.

Bowie pauses with the piton in a two-handed grip, staring into her eyes.

CLARA

She’s dead, Bowie. Do it.

Dove’s eyes go blank again and she hisses in anger, blood and drool spraying from her mouth.

BOWIE

It was never real.

Bowie rams the piton into her skull and she quivers and falls still.

CLARA

That was no angel.

BOWIE

Nobody’s perfect.

CUT TO:

EXT.RIVER. DAY.

Bowie paddles the Muskrat away from shore. In the camp, Farrengalli’s and Dove’s bodies are on a bonfire of dead trees and limbs. Oily smoke rises in the air.

BOWIE

First rule of the outdoors: leave no trace.

CLARA

What’s the second rule?

Bowie stops paddling and secretly touches the gun crammed in his belt. He scans the sky.

BOWIE

God doesn’t care.

They head downriver. From above, soaring POV up, up, to take in the gorge, the cliffs, a long stretch of river and the tiny raft below.

Soaring, soaring, full speed toward the cliff, toward a small dark crevice, inside into blackness—

SKEEEEEEE

CUT TO BLACK

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About Scott Nicholson
:

I have written 13 novels, including the #1 bestseller in Mystery & Suspense
Disintegration,
The Skull Ring
,
The RedChurch, Speed Dating with the Dead, As I Die Lying, Drummer Boy, Liquid Fear,
and
Forever Never Ends
. Other electronic works include
Burial to Follow, Transparent Lovers, Crime Beat,
and the story collections
Ashes, The First, Head Cases, Murdermouth, Gateway Drug, Curtains,
and
Flowers.
With J.R. Rain, I wrote the urban fantasies
Cursed!
and
Ghost College
, and, as L.C. Glazebrook, I wrote the paranormal romance
October Girls
. I live in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, where I play guitar, raise an organic garden, and work as a freelance fiction editor.

Come to the
Haunted Computer
, become a Spooky Microchip, and help me build my next book. You’ll also find free fiction, prize giveaways, and survival tips, as well as comic-book art.

I welcome your e-mails at
mailto:[email protected]
. If you enjoyed this book, please tell your friends and give another Nicholson title a try. If you hated it, why not try another one anyway? What doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger, and what
does
kill you is probably lurking in my next book.
Read on for more
.

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Table of Contents

###

Try these other thrillers by Scott Nicholson:

LIQUID FEAR

By Scott Nicholson

When Roland Doyle wakes up with a dead woman in his motel room, the only clue is a mysterious vial of pills bearing the label “Take one every 12 hrs or else.”

Ten years before, six people were involved in a secret pharmaceutical trial that left one of them murdered and five unable to remember what happened. Now the experiment is continuing, as Dr. Sebastian Briggs wants to finish his research into fear response and post-traumatic stress disorder. He’s backed by a major drug company and an ambitious U.S. Senator, but he also has a personal stake in the outcome.