V:
[Disguised as William Rookwood, meeting with Inspector Finch] Our story begins, as these stories often do, with a young up-and-coming politician. He's a deeply religious man and a member of the conservative party. He is completely single-minded convictions and has no regard for the political process. Eventually, his party launches a special project in the name of 'national security'. At first, it is believed to be a search for biological weapons and it is pursued regardless of its cost. However, the true goal of the project is power, complete and total hegemonic domination. The project, however, ends violently... but the efforts of those involved are not in vain, for a new ability to wage war is born from the blood of one of their victims. Imagine a virus - the most terrifying virus you can, and then imagine that you and you alone have the cure. But if your ultimate goal is power, how best to use such a weapon? It is at this point in our story that along comes a spider. He is a man seemingly without a conscience; for whom the ends always justify the means and it is he who suggests that their target should not be an enemy of the country but rather the country itself. Three targets are chosen to maximize the effect of the attack: a school, a tube station, and a water-treatment plant. Several hundred die within the first few weeks. Until at last the true goal comes into view. Before the St. Mary's crisis, no one would have predicted the outcome of the elections. No one. But after the election, lo and behold, a miracle. Some believed that it was the work of God himself, but it was a pharmaceutical company controlled by certain party members made them all obscenely rich. But the true genius of the plan was the fear. A year later, several extremeists are tried, found guilty, and executed while a memorial is builterected to canonize their victims. Fear became the ultimate tool of this government. And through it our politician was ultimately appointed to the newly created position of High Chancellor. The rest, as they say, is history.
Finch:
Can you prove any of this?
V:
Why do you think I'm still alive?
Finch:
Right. We'd like to take you into protective custody, Mr. Rookwood.
V:
Oh, I'm sure you would. But if you want that recording, you'll do what I tell you to do. Put Creedy under 24 hour surveillance. When I feel safe that he can't pick his nose without you knowing, I'll contact you again. Until then, cheerio.
Finch:
Rookwood. Why didn't you come forward earlier? What were you waiting for?
V:
For you, Inspector. I needed you.
Jessica:
You don't appreciate the chaos and absurdity of life on this planet. You don't understand irony, or ethnicity, or eccentricity, or poetry, or the simple joy of being a regular at the diner on your block. I love that. You don't drink coffee or alcohol. You don't over eat. You don't cry when you're alone. You don't understand sarcasm. You plod through life in a neat, colorless, caffeine free, dairy free, conflict free way. I'm bold and angry and tortured and tremendous and I notice when someone has changed their hair part, or when someone is wearing two very distinctly different shades of black or when someone changes the natural temperment of their voice on the phone. I don't give out empty praise. I'm not complacent or well-adjusted. I can't spend fifteen minutes breathing and stretching and getting in touch with myself. I can't spend three minutes finishing an article. I check my answering machine nine times every day and I can't sleep at night because I feel that there is so much to do and fix and change in the world, and I wonder every day if I am making a difference and if I will ever express the greatness within me, or if I will remain forever paralyzed by muddled madness inside my head. I've wept on every birthday I've ever had because life is huge and fleeting and I hate certain people and certain shoes and I feel that life is terribly unfair and sometimes beautiful and wonderful and extraordinary but also numbing and horrifying and insurmountable and I hate myself a lot of the time. The rest of the time I adore myself and I adore my life in this city and in this world we live in. This huge and wondrous, bewildering, brilliant, horrible world.
[Larry in is bed with his wife and Steve, the dog at the end of the bed. Larry turns off the light and as everyone's getting ready to sleep, Larry says... ]
Larry Cummings:
I was just thinking about how lucky we are to have a kid, ya know? Just take it for granted. It's a miracle when you think about it. This whole birth thing. I mean, what happens, I unload a whole batch of these little reproductive things into your, uh, ya know, miracle bucket, and 9 months later, Milt comes out, ya know? I mean, for me it's got it's own inspiring mystique about it, as like... [Steve, the dog interrupts Larry by turning on the bedroom light]
Steve:
For God sakes Larry, people are trying to sleep around here.
Jesse:
Do you remember when I told you that I was 104 years old? [Winnie nods]
Jesse:
Well... it's the honest truth. [Winnie looks confused]
Jesse:
I'm gonna live forever. I'm never gonna change. The same with Miles and Tuck and Mae. Something happened to us. I mean, as far as I know, I... I'm gonna be 17 until the end of the world. It's the spring, Winnie. Something's wrong with it. It stops you right where you are, if you'd had a drink of it today, you'd stay just like you are... [Both hear a rustling noise. They turn around to see Miles]
Miles:
Don't you wish he'd told you... before you kissed him? Did he tell you that immortality isn't all the preachers crack it up to be?
Jesse:
Hey, leave her alone, Miles!
Miles:
Well, now, you wanted her to hear it Jesse-boy. She's the first person you want to tell the truth to.
Jesse:
You just don't want me to have what you lost.
Winnie:
Stop this... both of you. Tell me... the truth... I wanna know.
Miles:
[Miles nods and walks over towards Jesse and Winnie] We all had a drink. Except for the cat, and that's important. [the rest of the monologue is told in flashbacks of what Miles is saying]
Miles:
The water tasted like... heaven. It floated over your tongue like a cloud. Tuck carved a T in the trunk and we moved on west to find a place to settle down. We put up a house for Mae and Tuck and a little shed for Jesse and me. That was the first time we figured there was something... peculiar. Jesse fell thirty feet and landed on is neck. He was up on his feet before Mae could work up a good cry. Didn't hurt him a bit, no broken bones... nothing. But that's not all... not by a long shot. Things began to happen. Some brush-poppers mistook Mae's horse for a deer. Thing is, the bullets didn't kill hime. Barely even left a mark. Then Tuck got bitten by a rattle snake, and you know what... he didn't die. [laughing]
Miles:
But the cat did, of old age. [Somberly, touching the ring on his finger]
Miles:
And Miles got married. [Whispering]
Miles:
Bo. Little Anna. [Out loud]
Miles:
Tuck figured it early on. It was the spring. We all drank from it, even the horse. It had to be... the source of our changelessness. I begged her to come back... to me and find the spring and drink from it. The children, too. It was our only hope... to be together. She'd made up her mind that I'd... sold my soul to the devil. And she left me. She took my babies with her. [Angrily, with tears in his eyes]
Miles:
Everyone... pulled away after that. There was talk of witchcraft... and... black magic. I went lookin' for wars to fight... and I saw brave men die at Vera Cruz. And then Gettysburg. Thousands of them in the blink of an eye. [Crying]
Miles:
But not me. I couldn't die. Like Little Anna. The influenza took her before she was fifteen. And Bo. He'd be almost eighty now if he were still alive. And my sweet... my sweet young bride. She died in an insame asylum. Old and alone. But I'm still here... I'm still here. [Unable to say any more, he just cries. We turn to Winnie, who is also crying. The screen fades to black]
Choking with dry tears and raging, raging, raging at the absolute indifference of nature and the world to the death of love, the death of hope and the death of beauty, I remember sitting on the end of my bed, collecting these pills and capsules together and wondering why, why when I felt I had so much to offer, so much love, such outpourings of love and energy to spend on the world, I was incapable of being offered love, giving it or summoning the energy with which I knew I could transform myself and everything around me.
Salim Abu Aziz:
[his message to the United States] You have murdered our women, and our children, and bombed our cities from afar, like cowards, and you dare to call "us" terrorists?Now, we have the ability to strike back at our enemies. Unless "you" "America" pull all military forces out of the Persian gulf area, immediately, and forever, Crimson Jihad will rain fire on one major U.S. city each week, until our demands are met. First, we will detonate one nuclear weapon on this uninhabited island as a demonstration of our power. But, if these demands are not met, Crimison Jihad will rain fire on one major U.S. city each week.
Boris Yellnikoff:
[to audience] Why would you want to hear my story? Do we know each other? Do we like each other? Let me tell you right off, ok... I'm not a like-able guy. Charm has never been a priority with me. And just so you know, this is not the feel good movie of the year. So if you're one of those idiots who needs to feel good, go get yourself a foot massage.
Boy on Street:
Mommy, that man's talking to himself.
Boy's Mother:
Come on, Justin.
Boris Yellnikoff:
[to audience] What the hell does it all mean anyhow? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nothing comes to anything. And yet, there's no shortage of idiots to babble. Not me. I have a vision. I'm discussing you. Your friends. Your coworkers. Your newspapers. The TV. Everybody's happy to talk. Full of misinformation. Morality, science, religion, politics, sports, love, your portfolio, your children, health. Christ, if I have to eat nine servings of fruits and vegetables a day to live, I don't wanna live. I hate goddamn fruits and vegetables. And your omega 3's, and the treadmill, and the cardiogram, and the mammogram, and the pelvic sonogram, and oh my god the-the-the colonoscopy, and with it all the day still comes where they put you in a box, and its on to the next generation of idiots, who'll also tell you all about life and define for you what's appropriate. My father committed suicide because the morning newspapers depressed him. And could you blame him? With the horror, and corruption, and ignorance, and poverty, and genocide, and AIDS, and global warming, and terrorism, and-and the family value morons, and the gun morons. "The horror," Kurtz said at the end of Heart of Darkness, "the horror." Lucky Kurtz didn't have the Times delivered in the jungle. Ugh... then he'd see some horror. But what do you do? You read about some massacre in Darfur or some school bus gets blown up, and you go "Oh my God, the horror," and then you turn the page and finish your eggs from the free range chickens. Because what can you do. It's overwhelming! I tried to commit suicide myself. Obviously, it didn't work out. But why do you even want to hear about all this? Christ, you got your own problems. I'm sure your all obsessed with any number of sad little hopes and dreams. Your predictably unsatisfying love lives, your failed business ventures. "Oh, if only I'd bought that stock! If only I-if only I purchased THAT house years ago! If only I'd made a move on THAT woman." If this, if that. You know what? Gimmie a break with your could have's and should have's. Like my mother used to say, "If my grandmother had wheels, she'd be a trolley car." My mother didn't have wheels. She had varicose veins. Still, the woman gave birth to a brilliant mind. I was considered for a Nobel Prize in physics... I didn't get it. But, you know, its all politics. It's like every other phony honor. Incidentally, don't think I'm-I'm bitter because of some personal setback. By the standards of a mindless, barbaric civilization, I've been pretty lucky. I was married to a beautiful woman who had family money. For years we lived on Beekman Place. I taught at Columbia. String theory.
