Sanitation Run

Chapter 11: Revelation

LIVING ROOM, BRUCE’S APARTMENT, CITY (MORNING)

Something wet slaps up the hallway.

Bruce ignites his lighter. The light is marginal, just enough to aid his search for a flashlight.

Valerie backs away.

Someone tries the handle on the front door and resorts to POUNDING.

VALERIE: Bruce...

Bruce’s face snaps out when he shuts his lighter. A flashlight beam rekindles the living room. Inhuman shadows crawl over the walls, the ceiling. They snarl and sputter in response to the light.

DVDs fall off the shelves in response to the POUNDING. The Big Bad Wolf is going to break the whole complex down.

The devil you do or the devil you don’t [know].

BRUCE: Go!

HALLWAY, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

Bruce (rifle in one hand, flashlight in the other) pushes Valerie down the hall through a gauntlet of wet shadows.

An earsplitting CRASH signifies the front door caving in.

Bruce doesn’t shoot. He pushes Valerie into:

GIRL’S BEDROOM, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

and shuts the door.

Valerie inadvertently kicks a doll and sends it crashing into the dresser.

All the light is from Bruce’s flashlight until he throws the curtains and reveals a city in utter WHITEOUT, frost on the glass.

Neither are dressed for the indomitable winter outside.

Liquid shadow oozes through the cracks around and under the door. Heavy footsteps tromp up the hall.

Bruce lifts a pillow to his face as if savoring the final redolence of a memory and lets it fall.

VALERIE: What do we do?

Bruce aims the rifle at the door.

BRUCE: Hold out.

The puddles of shadow at the foot of the door start to swell into tumorous growths approximating something human.

Bruce clicks the safety off.

Valerie starts at something in her pocket. The phone is emitting a misty pink aura.

BRUCE: What’s going on?

The doorframe splinters.

VALERIE: It’s--it’s the phone.

She pulls out the phone, drops it. She crouches down to pick it up and when she does the shadows forming inside the bedroom door wink out.

TEEN GIRL’S BEDROOM, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

The shadows are gone, the doorframe no longer splintered and falling inward, and the (now BLUE) curtains are closed.

Bruce pulls the curtains open on a snowless autumn day. The room is the same but no longer that of a young girl but a teenager:

Band posters with emo frontmen adorn the walls. The linens are now blue. A picture sits in a frame on the dresser: a girl in a tasseled cap and gown sandwiched by her parents--notably Bruce in suit and tie.

Bruce rests the rifle. He looks around, disbelieving.

BRUCE: This... I’m dead.

VALERIE: Not so long as I’m here. People die alone, Bruce. I thought you knew.

BRUCE: (investigating the picture) I’ve never worn a suit a day in my life.

VALERIE: It’s you?

Bruce listens before opening the door into:

HALL, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

Bruce looks both ways and steps out. No one’s home.

BRUCE: This is bizarre.

They pace up the hall toward the living room. This time framed family pictures line the walls. The throw rug is different.

They enter:

LIVING ROOM, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

The same TV and couch as before occupies the room, but the curtains have changed. A vase of fresh flowers sits on the end table, the product of a formerly absent feminine touch.

Valerie observes a calendar.

VALERIE: Same month.

BRUCE: Different days. We’re years in the future.

VALERIE: How do you know that?

BRUCE: My girl... she would just be entering high school.

VALERIE: I saw the pictures. Graduation.

BRUCE: Supports my hypothesis. Temporal coherency.

VALERIE: But she’s alive.

BRUCE: Do you believe in alternate dimensions?

VALERIE: Am I supposed to?

BRUCE: What’s your phone say?

VALERIE: (checking her phone) Nothing. But I have service.

BRUCE: So someone’s paying the bill.

Bruce crosses the room into:

KITCHEN, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

Bruce stands over the kitchen table, eyeing a shopping list.

Valerie peeks inside the fridge.

VALERIE: Whoever lives here has developed a taste for tomato juice.

BRUCE: Wife’s orders no doubt. (holding up a hand) Wait.

They listen to the sound of footsteps mounting the apartment stairs.

BRUCE: We can’t be here.

The doorbell rings.

VALERIE: Answer it? (whispering) You live here.

Bruce readies the rifle and walks to the:

ENTRYWAY, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

Bruce crouches down, rifle trained on the door. He motions for Valerie to check the window.

VALERIE: (whispering) It could be your daughter!

The doorbell rings again.

Valerie glimpses a postman through the window toting a large box. She waves Bruce off as the postman calls through the door:

POSTMAN: Parcel post!

No sooner does the postman turn to leave than a black-clothed figure swoops down from the next flight of stairs and lights the place up with SUBMACHINE GUN FIRE.

The postman is perforated by a dozen bullets and crumples, box falling from his hands. Bullets tear up the front door and ricochet off kitchen appliances.

Valerie dives behind the couch as something breaks the window and lands in the corner of the living room.

BRUCE: (taking cover) GRENADE!

All Valerie can do is plug her ears and hope she’s out of the blast radius.

The TV and neighboring shelves explode, sending shards of debris through the air and igniting the curtains.

Bruce is on Valerie at once, helping her to her feet and up the:

HALLWAY, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

There’s no time to check for injuries as they scramble up the hall.

A series of kicks liberates the front door and the assailant is in.

They (panting) burst into:

MASTER BEDROOM, BRUCE’S APARTMENT (CONTINUOUS)

The curtains are open, but the theme is dark: dark curtains, dark bedspread. A small flatscreen tops the dresser. An armoire owns the corner. Two sets of pajamas lie across the bed: a man’s and a woman’s.

Bruce eases the door closed.

VALERIE: There another way out?

BRUCE: You’re holding it.

Rather, she was holding it.

VALERIE: Umm...

BRUCE: Right?

VALERIE: Kitchen table.

Bruce shows teeth but not in a smile.