The Feng Shui Do?

The corner store was practically empty, except for the cashier who stood behind the counter glancing up at the television in the corner, as Maggie walked through the door. Chimes rang out drawing the attention of the cashier who just gave a quick glance at the lady at the door, and then back onto the television set.

Maggie paused at the door, scanning for what she was looking for. She saw the coolers in the back and made her way there.

The cashier was focused on the game on the screen. He had good money on his team and they were behind.

The cooler was cool and comforting, and the chilled air rushed out to greet Maggie as she opened the door. She reached for a Ginger Ale and as her finger touched the cool glass the chimes jingled.

Maggie turned in time to see three men enter. All of them hands in pockets and scanning the place; two of the men noticed her standing by the cooler while the lead walked up to the counter, taking something small and dangerous from his pocket and pointing it at the cashier.

"Why can't I just have a moment just to enjoy a soda?" Maggie muttered to herself. "That's all I'm asking."

Flashforward

I am who I am.

The fall of Saigon was nothing compared to this. His head swimming with a current of alcohol. He wasn't sure what was going on but he knew that his mind was quiet and foggy like a pre-dawn London.

Max lay in the motel room, naked and sweating, watching the ceiling fan rotating around and around and around and around. He felt like Martin Sheen filming his part in a Francis Ford Coppola movie before the big bug out.

Am I mad?

His attention diverted as an naked woman strolled from the other room. Max looked up at the ceiling fan again.

This must be hell.

In the other room he could hear the sounds of lust emanating from a half-open door. Some girl was telling some guy that she loved it like that. Max closed his eyes, his mind drifting millions of realities away.

"Yo Max."

Max's eyes flickered open. Momentarily lost in the void, he was laying on a couch with the remote in hand.

"Yes?" Max questioned Frank.

"I'm going out to grab a java, wanted to know if you wanted one?" Frank asked. He was slipping into his loafers.

"Java?" Max said; he was still trying to grasp the scene change. "How long was I here?"

"All night bud," Frank replied; he stood up and grabbed his jacket. "You want anything?"

"Ummm," Max began, he swung his feet onto the floor. "I'll think I'll tag along."

The Boots are the Thing

The next thing Goner saw were stars and then he fell flat on his ass. The one punch was a world of pain, full of force and harmful intent. It staggered him a bit and left him momentarily stunned before the ground called to him.

The room turned from jovial to an icy cold silence and everyone turned to see what was going on. Max paused the game he was playing and made no move to intervene.

Maggie stood over Goner, looking down upon him, her right fist clenched and the look of anger in her eyes made Goner cringe like a frightened child. He had never Maggie this angry before and he didn't want to set her off again.

"What did I say?" Goner asked. He was rubbing his jaw and he spat out a little blood.

"Bitch boots!" Maggie said. "Do not say those words one more time because they are derogatory and have serious implications."

On that note Maggie turned around and walked out the door wearing long leather boots; the soles of the boots on the hardwood floor were the only sound everyone could hear.

Flip The Cube

The Messenger Summoned

FADE IN:
INT. PARKING GARAGE - NIGHT
 
The garage has several luxury cars in the bays. MAX is leaning up against a pillar that has a No Smoking sign on it. A cigarette dangles from his lips. He glances at his chronometer: 9:13pm.
The sound of a car pulling in from the entrance. Max sees a black sedan pull up in front of him. It stops and a GUARD from the front passenger side gets out and opens the back door. 

CONTROL (V.O)
Come now Mr. Cube, we don't have much time.

MAX
I'm here as requested.
 
MAX steps from the shadows to reveal his face.
 
CONTROL
Ah Max. It's good to see you again.
 
CUBE
It's been awhile. But I gather we're not here to discuss old times are we?
 
CONTROL
Alright then. Let's cut to the chase.

CUBE
Let's.
 
CONTROL
A shift is in process and I need you to relay a message to me once it does.
 
MAX shuts his eyes in pain.
 
MAX
Please ...
(looks at Control)

CONTROL
It's something that needs to be done. The fates of otherwhens depends on this.

The Possible Way

Clank.

The sound of metal on stone echoed throughout the the area. It made me cringe because that meant that we were being followed. Max expected that would happen, but we didn't know by whom.

A rat scuttled by my feet. There were a few of them scampering about, more defiant than their cousins topside. I had tied the handkerchief over my nose and mouth, hoping that the would stop the stench.

"You coming Frank?" Angst asked. She was just a few steps ahead of me and she had this joyful glee about her. Who'd of thought that a girl like her would dig doing stuff like this.

"No. Just breathing hard," I quipped.

"You wish you old fart," Angst replied with a faint flirty tone.

"Cut the chatter back there," Max said. Though, I really couldn't understand why he said that since he'd been humming a show tune as we made our way through the sewers.

"Yeah right," Angst told Max.

Clank.

There was that sound again off in the distance behind us. Sounding much closer. Whoever was following us had picked up the pace.

Here we were beneath the city, walking through sludge trying to find a key. The old man had given Max a riddle, and though I am not to clear about it myself, Max and Maggie came to the conclusion that the answer lay in the sewers.

Clank. Clank.

"Max," I said; I drew my glock. "I think we have company."

Max paused; he held the blue cube in his hands and turned to me. He looked very sinister in the pale green light, as if he had discovered the Loch Nar and was about to morph out into a zombie like in the end segment of that Heavy Metal movie.

I guess Angst noticed that as well and she chuckled.

Like a Starless Night

His world was in a state of chaos, his head swimming with glitches of images of other people's lives. Max staggered through his room, his head a black hole sucking in the hopes and dreams of those around him.

Get out, Max ordered the random patterns that were making his mind feel like a swiss cheese omelette. He caught his foot on the corner of a chair and stumbled as a drunk would onto the floor. His head catching the corner of the wall with such a sickening thud that Max didn't feel the impact.

He welcomed the coming darkness to swirl in and end the visions of millions.

"Max!"

His eyes flickered opened. His face down and in congealed blood. He brought a hand to his head and he felt a gash there, and he knew that he had lost a lot of blood. The good thing about it was that there wasn't the millions of voices crying out to him, but the question remained was who was the one voice that shouted his name?

"This is candy compared to what I've been through already," he muttered. He tried to pick himself up and it was a slow process, like a dinosaur dying in a bog. He chuckled at the imagery of a dinosaur; it could mean a metaphor for what is to come.

The phone rang, sending a signal right to the core of his brain. The feeling of ice on a sore tooth, and he cringed. He steadied himself as he got up and he looked at the blood on the floor (it wasn't the first time... nor would it be the last time) and it made him feel queasy that he had lost a lot.

He made it to the phone after the sixth ring and picked it up.

"Hello?" Max said into the receiver.

"Good Afternoon, is the man of the house in?" a voice said at the other end. Max could hear other voices as well trying to sell things to people who didn't really want them in the first place.

"No."

Max hung up the phone.

God Complex

God Complex

Max jumped from the rooftop, over the alleyway, and landed on the roof of the hardware store. He rolled and came up on his feet.

Glancing around quickly, he headed for the door. He gave it a quick tug to see if it would open, but luck was against him.

He took out his gun with a silencer on it and shot the lock. The door didn’t resist…

MORGANFOKKER SAYS THAT THE REAL REASON THINGS ARE NOT CHANGING IS BECAUSE YOU ACTUALLY DO NOT WANT THEM TO

When I Close My Eyes

> M in Plureality

Dan shook his head, the wind whipping across his neck. His head was pounding and the sirens and flashing lights were not helping. He tried to focus on the scene, his arm weighing heavy, looking down to the black megaphone in his hand. The spotlight gliding across the night sky, stopping on a rooftop some ten stories up. He could make out the shadow of a figure.   

“Max!” an officer yelled at him. “The chopper will be here soon. She’s agreed to let you and only you come up. Let’s get you connected and cabled - you are being dropped in, no weapons…” 

“Wait a minute-” Dan stammered, trying desperately to wrap his head around what was happening…  

*whomp whomp whomp*  

He heard the bird coming before he could see it, the dust flying around, stinging his eyes, the pounding in his head almost unbearable. 

“Ready to go, Max,” the young officer yelled over the growing roar of the chopper.  

“Wait a minute…my name’s…” 

Soon there were hands all over him hooking up the harness. He felt the clang of the safety buckles, he felt the tug on his waist, and soon his feet were off the ground. Watching the city grow smaller in the night sky as the chopper took him up hovering just above the rooftop, then slowly lowering him down. “Release, release,” he heard the officer in the chopper yell down to him. 

Not sure what to do, Dan tugged on the line hanging just to his left and he felt himself begin to fall, dropping with a thud onto the rooftop below him. “Wait!” he called, looking up and watching as the chopper disappeared. “What the fuck is going on?” he thought to himself.  

“Don’t come any closer,” the voice called out to him. He could make out her figure now, short woman, blackish brown hair. He could hear her crying.  

“My name’s…” He stopped for a minute… Thinking back to everyone calling him Max… Officer Max…  

“I am going to do it, Max!” she cried, turning...“What the hell?” she stammered, catching her first look at him… 

“Dan?” she asked. 

“xxxxxx?” he asked back.

Teaser for a Beginning That Never Was

FADE IN ON:

SHADOWS

Parts of the screen slowly lightens to reveal what appears to be silhouettes on a graffiti-filled wall. The shadow of figures thrown onto the wall by firelight.

A figure comes into focus to reveal CONTROL. He's walking towards the camera from the shadows, a smile upon his face showing his pearly white teeth. He's heading to the firelight.

MAGS is sitting by a campfire; she is leaning back on a log and sipping some whiskey from a bottle. She sees CONTROL walking into the light. She takes a swig from the bottle and then hands it to CONTROL who takes a long pull from it and then hands it back to her.

CONTROL
Magriel.

MAGS
Control.

MAGS looks at the bottle and then places it down beside her.

CONTROL
Here we are at your request.

CONTROL looks around and nods.

CONTROL
How fitting of a place. This is where it began, didn't it?

MAGS nods.

MAGS
Something needs to be said.

CONTROL
That it does.

The Devil You Say?

EXT. A JAIL IN MEXICO - DAY
It's early morning as a patrol car pulls up into the parking lot. It parks beside a couple of other cars. The camera pans with the OFFICER as he exits his car, goes to the trunk and takes out a small box. He then heads towards the JAIL HOUSE.

A young boy steps out and salutes the OFFICER.

BOY
Hola, Sir

OFFICER
Morning.

INT. JAIL LOBBY - DAY
The Officer enters the lobby, he places the box on a desk. Taking out a small brown paper bag, he walks over to one of the cells.

OFFICER:
Yo Rubiks Cube. You got mail.

Officer tosses the brown paper bag onto the bed.

INT. JAIL CELLS - DAY
MAX is sitting in a lotus position in the center of the cell. Stripped down to his boxers. His body is covered with many scars; bullet wounds, claw marks and what looks like several blades as well. He is covered in sweat and his eyes are closed.

INT. JAIL LOBBY - DAY
The Officer returns to his desk, takes a coffee mug from it and heads for the coffee machine. Where a lovely woman is sitting on a bench at the moment and filing her nails.

OFFICER:
How long has he been up?

NAILS:
According to Manu, he's never been to sleep yet.

OFFICER
How come we get the American weirdos?

INT. JAIL CELLS - DAY
Max opens his eyes. He reaches for the brown paper bag and opens it up. He takes out a cellphone and looks at it, and then places it beside him.

EXT. EAST TEXAS RANCH - DAY
A gorgeous, bikini-clad woman is sitting by a pool. Tanning. A long slender drink is at the table beside her as well as a cellphone. She is lying there with her eyes closed, and then her watch begins to chime. She picks up the cellphone and dials.

INT. JAIL CELLS - DAY
The cellphone rings. Max reaches for it, and snaps it open.

LUCY (V.O.)
Hola Max.

MAX
(into phone)
Ms. Morningstar. What the hell do you want after all these years?

EXT. EAST TEXAS RANCH - DAY
LUCY is sitting up in her chair. She has a servant who hands her another drink. She takes it and dismisses the servant.

LUCY
(into phone)
It's been a long time. We've got a lot of catching up to do. I heard that you were in the region and I figured I'd give you a call.

MAX (V.O)
I'm touched.

LUCY
(into phone)
It's one of the reasons why I called you.

MAX (V.O.)
And you couldn't take time out of your schedule to pay me a visit?

LUCY
(into phone)
Well, I've arranged for you to get an early release.

MAX (V.O.)
That's mighty nice of you.

LUCY
(into phone)
Any second now it should be.

EXT. JAIL - DAY
A black sedan drives up to the jail, parking beside the police car. Two gorgeous ladies in black suits step out. One carrying a briefcase.

INT. JAIL CELL ­- DAY
Max walks to the barred window and glances outside.

MAX
(into phone)
Damn.