Friday 4 July 2014

A World To Watch The End Of Time

Start Trek: Coelacanth
SE01E15

EXT. THE LABYRINTH OF NIGHT
The USS Coelacanth drifts the hypnotic swirls of the Labyrinth Nebulae.

VOICE OVER: SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
These, are the voyages of the Star Ship Coelacanth. Our mission: to patrol the Labyrinth of night, to de-crypt strange worlds and doomed civilizations, to boldly go from whence none have returned.

The Coelacanth glimmers like a bruised pearl as swoops through the enfolding tendrils of Summerdust, Tochzal, Ochaar and Adat.

VOICE OVER: SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER (CONT’D)
Captain’s log, star date 03072014. Whilst seeking rumours of a Star-Grool, the Coelacanth has clipped the radio emission shell of an unknown civilization.

CUT TO:

BRIDGE OF THE COELACANTH
Space Captain Jenny Hammer leans forward in her command chair, her body curled into a glyph of suppressed action.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Coils. Alive?


Manu Coils, Science Officer, scans the para-translation of the emission shells unfolding tableaux, his eyes flicker madly and his fingers skitter through his consoles shadow field as he smiles.


MANU COILS
Ngh accountingcultureflux, past time, beyond, decay decay translanalysis blue and falling.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Coils!


BOOMER DOGS
(All of these worlds are dead)


MANU COILS
Captain. Rapid analysis of this cultures transmission forms as we move deeper into the shell of its thought, strongly suggest a world moving rapidly towards either death or singularity. We burrow through an ethereal past towards a core of dead tomorrrows. I recommend we resume out search for the Grool.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
We’ll see about that Coils. Boomer, how long?


BOOMER DOGS
The Coelacanth’s making good speed Captain. The nebulae here is mainly Sessurea and Ochaar. Minimal resistance to the ships hull penetrating this space, scanners are operating near maximum. Should be any second now.
The voice of the ships computor Serenity Kong, sounds over the intercom.


SERENITY KONG
Excession. Strange World emerging.


Space Captain Jenny Hammer leans forward, her eyes search the folds of the Nebulae. Silver semi-transparent Sessura and blue-black Ochaar.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
There. Look.


A Strange World burns in the deepness of space, like something between an honeycomb, the folds of a brain and a heat exchange, but with a strange ab-symetrical beauty, and on a planetary scale.


MANU COILS
Intriguing.


JADE CONDITION
It’s like some impossible sculpture..


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Only nothing is impossible Lieutenant.


MANU COILS
Scans confirm Captain, this is a world, its fundamental makeup matches that for a planet of this type. And its total mass is correct.


JADE CONDITION
It’s been hollowed out..


MANU COILS
Simply transformed.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
But into what? And why? Boomer, can the Coelacanth get inside that thing?


BOOMER DOGS
Negative captain the..
Boomer suddenly notices, from the corner of his eye, the omni-angled form of an Alien Ghost, invisible to all except him.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Boomer?


BOOMER DOGS
Sorry captain. They outer apertures might be big enough, but the interior is fractal, its like that all the way to the core. Scans come back scrambled. Its a kind of three-dimensional maze.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Could you get us through in the Lemniscate?


BOOMER DOGS
I..


Boomer locks eyes with the Alien Ghost. Shadows unfurl like petals from its undulating limbs.


BOOMER DOGS (CONT’D)
Not me captain. It would take a genius.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Or a madman. Coils, can you do it?
Manu Coils stares enraptured into the pixel-dot matrix arising from his consoles shadow field.


MANU COILS
The symmetry. Yes.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Meet me in the shuttle bay. Lieutenant Condition, order the Lemniscate prepared for launch. You have the con till I return.


JADE CONDITION
Captain, Star Fleet regulations discourage a captain leaving the ship during..


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Fuck that. Don’t break my ship while I’m out Condition.


JADE CONDITION
Yes captain.


CUT TO:


INT. SICK BAY
Doctor Pug Tyler carefully assesses a hideous coagulated mass. Watching him is Quinn “Fear Itself” Books.


DOCTOR PUG TYLER
Perfect. Would you recommend a red wine, or white?


QUINN “FEAR ITSELF” BOOKS
I think feasting on the baked remains of an alien super-tumour suggests wasting good wine on you might be a mistake.


DOCTOR PUG TYLER
Spirits then.


Doctor Pug Tyler dashes back a tumbler of alien gin.


DOCTOR PUG TYLER (CONT’D)
You sadden me Quinn. This lozenge of corruption threatened the existence of an inter-stellar megafauna. Now, removed, by me, baked and anointed in sauce, it shall provide a tasty meal. From death I bring forth life.


QUINN “FEAR ITSELF” BOOKS
Life is more than a procession of nightmarish risk Doctor.


DOCTOR PUG TYLER
Is it?


Doctor Pug Tyler pours himself a strong measure of alien gin and begins to tuck a handkerchief into his collar.


DOCTOR PUG TYLER (CONT’D)
Any life not close to death seems death to me.


Tyler starts to carve the alien tumour.


QUINN “FEAR ITSELF” BOOKS
I think risk taken in some cause might be a finer spice.


Tyler pauses with the gobbet of cooked alien flesh on the end of his fork.


DOCTOR PUG TYLER
Ah, but they are few, and who has time to wait?


Enter Space Captain Jenny Hammer.


SPACE CAPTAIN JENNY HAMMER
Doctor. A word. Books.

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