The Krell

EXT. SPACE — OUR SOLAR SYSTEM

A recognizable view of our solar system comes into focus as the Krell scientific vessel approaches Earth. The ship quickly passes, surveys, and catalogs each planet as it travels through the solar system: Pluto, Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars.

INT. KRELL SHIP — BRIDGE

The KRELL crew the bridge. Each has a head larger than a human’s, set atop a bulbous body. Several tendrils serve as arms and legs alike, trading roles in continuous, fluid motion. A prehensile tail curls behind.

EXT. SPACE — EARTH ORBIT

The ship slows down as it approaches Earth’s moon, coming to a stationary orbit above Earth.

INT. KRELL SHIP — BRIDGE

The KRELL COMMANDER turns to the crew. As it speaks, its tendrils gesture, and a subtle shimmer of color ripples across its skin.

KRELL COMMANDER

(in Krell; subtitled)

Find sentient life. Gather data and specimens for study.

SERIES OF SHOTS

Small research landers leaving the mother ship.

A Krell lander descends over Africa.

Another sets down on Antarctica.

A third lander sets down in North America.

A fourth lander descends over Asia.

A fifth lander arrives in Europe.

A sixth lander touches down near Uluru / Ayers Rock in Australia.

The last lander touches down in South America.

EXT. JUNGLE — DAY

The Krell lander arrives at a large watering hole in the dense jungle. A TIGER enters the clearing, and the other animals quickly back away.

The lander’s hum fills the clearing. Some of the animals flee. The tiger, at the water’s edge, takes a defensive posture and snarls.

Two KRELL SCIENTISTS descend to the watering hole.

KRELL SCIENTIST

(in Krell; subtitled)

Secure new species. The location identification number is 6XB137-3. The species identification number is 6XB137-3-1399ZYT7. Subdue and capture. Genetic identification to follow.

The scientists target the lone tiger and raise their slender rods. A single, soft pulse ripples out, and every animal in the clearing slowly sinks to the ground. The tiger is levitated onto a large floating table and carried into the ship.

INT. KRELL LANDER — DAY

The KRELL COMMANDER touches the tiger’s coarse fur, then pulls back. A shimmer of discomfort ripples across its skin.

KRELL COMMANDER

(in Krell; subtitled)

Mark this one for captivity. Locate a suitable mate for transport.

WIPE TO:

EXT. RIVER VALLEY — DUSK

A cold river winds through a valley of pine and birch. Beneath a limestone overhang, a band of NEANDERTHALS, a dozen or so, broad-chested and wrapped in hides, tend a fire. Children huddle close to the flames.

A low hum rolls down the valley. The adults rise as one.

A Krell lander settles onto the far bank, firelight sliding across its hull. A ramp lowers. Three KRELL SCIENTISTS glide down on rippling tendrils, tails balanced behind them.

The Neanderthals push the children deeper under the overhang. Their LEADER lifts a wooden spear and steps forward, planting himself between the strangers and his people.

KRELL SCIENTIST

(in Krell; subtitled)

Humanoid. Catalog number 6XB137-3-2207HQD5.

The leader hurls the spear. It cracks against the lander’s hull and falls into the shallows. A flush of color shivers across the scientist’s skin.

The band surges forward with stones from the riverbank, hand axes, and burning branches pulled from the fire. Rocks hammer the hull. A torch arcs through the dusk and hisses into the river.

SPLIT SCREEN — THREE PANELS

A WIPE sweeps in from the right, pushing the river valley into the left third of the frame. A second WIPE follows. The screen settles into three panels.

CENTER PANEL — EXT. FOREST EDGE — DAY

A clan of HOMO ERECTUS, lean and long-limbed, abandon their camp as a lander touches down. Elders herd the young into the trees. Hunters hold their ground, jabbing sharpened sticks and stone choppers at the air.

RIGHT PANEL — EXT. SAVANNA — DAY

On open grassland dotted with acacia, a small group of HOMO SAPIENS freeze as a lander settles into the grass. Most scatter. One YOUNG WOMAN lingers, stone-tipped spear raised, watching. She’s afraid, but curious. Then she runs too.

END SPLIT SCREEN

A WIPE clears the center and right panels. The river valley fills the screen.

EXT. RIVER VALLEY — DUSK

The lead scientist raises a slender rod. A soft pulse of light ripples outward. One by one, the Neanderthals slow, stagger, and sink to the gravel, asleep. The leader is the last to fall, still reaching for his spear.

The color on the scientist’s skin fades to calm.

KRELL SCIENTIST

(in Krell; subtitled)

Subdued. No injuries. Transport for study.

EXT. SAVANNA — DAY

Tall grass. The young woman crouches, hidden, breathing hard.

A Krell scientist glides into view a few paces away: GAMMA-7, smaller than the others, its tendrils moving with unhurried care. Behind it come a second scientist and the lander’s leader, a BETA.

The young woman doesn’t throw her spear. She sets it down in the grass.

She stares at the shimmer moving across Gamma-7’s skin. Then, slowly, she lifts a hand toward it.

Gamma-7 goes still.

Then, just as slowly, a single tendril extends toward her.

Her fingers, its tendril: they stop a breath apart. Neither moves.

A soft gold shimmer blooms across Gamma-7’s skin. Warm. Nothing like the commander’s recoil from the tiger.

Gamma-7 raises its rod, and stops halfway.

BETA

(in Krell; subtitled)

Gamma-Seven. Subdue it.

Gamma-7 doesn’t move.

The second scientist steps past it and raises its own rod. A soft pulse of light. The young woman’s eyes close. Her lifted hand falls, and she sinks into the grass.

The gold shimmer on Gamma-7’s skin dims to gray.

INT. KRELL SHIP — LABORATORY

Three figures lie asleep on examination tables: the Neanderthal leader, a Homo erectus hunter, and the young woman. Beams of light pass slowly over each, building translucent images of skulls, hands and brains. Above each table, two columns of Krell symbols rise and settle, measuring intelligence and aggression side by side.

The KRELL COMMANDER enters. The lead scientist gestures over the tables.

KRELL SCIENTIST

(in Krell; subtitled)

Three species. One genus. All primitive. All aggressive, and aware.

KRELL COMMANDER

(in Krell; subtitled)

Threat assessment.

KRELL SCIENTIST

(in Krell; subtitled)

Aggression alone, we contain. The predator is already aboard. But aggression joined to intelligence cannot be contained. The greater the mind, the greater the threat.

KRELL COMMANDER

(in Krell; subtitled)

Too dangerous for relocation?

KRELL SCIENTIST

(in Krell; subtitled)

Or captivity.

The scientist stops beside the young woman.

Gamma-7 moves to the young woman’s table. Her intelligence column rises higher than the others and holds.

GAMMA-7

(in Krell; subtitled)

This one measures highest of all. The greatest threat, and the greatest promise. It reached toward me. The others only fought. Given time, this species may become what we are.

The commander studies Gamma-7 for a long moment, then the young woman. A slow shimmer of color passes over its skin.

KRELL COMMANDER

(in Krell; subtitled)

Record it. Mark this world. Return them unharmed.

INT. KRELL SHIP — GAMMA-7’S ALCOVE — NIGHT

A small, curved space. Through a narrow port, the blue curve of Earth turns slowly.

Gamma-7 settles before a glowing panel. A tendril touches it, and the panel pulses: recording.

GAMMA-7

(in Krell; subtitled)

Survey log. Third world, system 6XB137.

It pauses. Its shimmer flickers, uncertain.

GAMMA-7 (CONT’D)

(in Krell; subtitled)

Today, a primitive reached for me. Not to strike. To touch. I could not answer.

(beat)

We have crossed the stars asking whether anyone is out there. Today, someone was. And we put it to sleep.

The tendril lingers on the panel. Then it lifts the tendril and studies it, as if it might still find something there.

A faint gold shimmer returns, and fades.

SUPERIMPOSITION MONTAGE — THE CATALOG

Images layer and dissolve over a turning Earth as the survey continues. Catalog numbers flicker across each one, climbing higher and higher.

— Tendrils lift beetles and dragonflies from a forest floor into glowing containers.

— A school of fish spirals into a beam above a coral reef.

— Seabirds wheel around a lander on the Antarctic coast as penguins waddle up its ramp.

— A herd of deer is guided gently into a lander’s hold.

— A second tiger, a female, is lifted aboard beside the first.

— WOOLLY MAMMOTHS trudge across a frozen steppe, scanned by a hovering lander.

— A DODO waddles curiously toward a Krell scientist on an island beach.

— A SABRE-TOOTHED CAT snarls from a rock ledge in North America as a pulse of light drops it.

— A core of layered rock strata slides out of a cliff face.

— A lander hovers over an erupting volcano, sampling the lava below.

The images blur together. The numbers climb into the millions.

FADE OUT.

EXT. ENT AIR FORCE BASE — NIGHT

A clear, cold night. A 48-star flag snaps in the wind atop a tall pole, brilliantly lit. Three powerful spotlights at its base angle upward, their beams meeting high above to form a pyramid of light that rises over the sleeping city.

Beyond it, Pikes Peak looms black against a sky thick with stars. Crickets. The low hum of a generator. The flag line clinks softly against its pole.

COLONEL NELSON, fifties, stands outside a low cinderblock building, hands in his jacket pockets, gazing up past the beams at the stars.

COLONEL NELSON

(to himself)

I love nights like this. It’s so peaceful.

He takes one last look, then heads inside.

INT. ENT AIR FORCE BASE — RADIO ROOM — CONTINUOUS

Steel desks, glowing vacuum-tube receivers, overflowing ashtrays. A round oscilloscope screen pulses green. A reel-to-reel tape recorder turns slowly. A strip chart recorder scratches a thin ink line across rolling paper.

From a speaker: beep … beep … beep …

STAFF SERGEANT KAMINSKI, forties, Chicago-born, a cigar clamped in his teeth and a five o’clock shadow that showed up around noon, leans back in his chair. Across the room, AIRMAN FIRST CLASS BOUDREAUX, early twenties, Louisiana Cajun, hunches over a brand-new experimental receiver, headphones pressed to his ears.

KAMINSKI

There she goes again. Ivan’s little tin can. Ninety-six minutes around the world, and all it knows how to say is “beep.”

Boudreaux doesn’t answer. He slowly turns a tuning knob a hair to the right. Frowns. Turns it back.

BOUDREAUX

Sarge. There’s something under it.

KAMINSKI

Uh-huh. Like last month’s “coded transmission from Moscow”?

BOUDREAUX

That was different.

KAMINSKI

It was the colonel’s electric razor.

The door opens. Colonel Nelson steps in. Kaminski straightens, barely.

COLONEL NELSON

What’s he got this time, Sergeant?

KAMINSKI

Little green men, sir.

BOUDREAUX

Sir, it’s not Sputnik. Same frequency, forty megacycles, but listen to the pitch.

He pulls the headphone jack. The speaker fills the room: Sputnik’s steady beep … beep …, and beneath it, faint and slightly higher, a second sound. Blips.

BOUDREAUX (CONT’D)

Sputnik’s tone sits right here. This one’s riding maybe fifty cycles higher. You’d never catch it unless you were listening for it.

KAMINSKI

Or unless you wanted to.

The colonel raises a hand for quiet. Sputnik’s beeps fade as the satellite drops toward the horizon. The higher blips remain.

INSERT — STRIP CHART RECORDER

The pen jumps. Once. Pause. Twice. Pause. Three times.

BACK TO SCENE

Boudreaux counts under his breath, then out loud.

BOUDREAUX

One. Two. Three. Four …

The others lean in despite themselves.

BOUDREAUX (CONT’D)

… eight. Nine. Ten.

Silence. Then a single blip. The pattern starts over.

KAMINSKI

(a beat too late)

… Could be some ham operator playing games.

BOUDREAUX

I checked every station from Denver to Albuquerque. Nobody’s on this frequency. And it isn’t Sputnik. Sputnik’s below the horizon. This is still coming in, clearest I’ve ever heard anything, bouncing in off the upper atmosphere.

COLONEL NELSON

Bouncing in from where?

Boudreaux hesitates. He’s been laughed at before.

BOUDREAUX

Not from anywhere down here, sir.

The colonel looks at Kaminski. For once, Kaminski has no joke. He takes the cigar out of his mouth.

COLONEL NELSON

Play it back.

Boudreaux rewinds the reel. The blips play again. One. Two. Three. All the way to ten.

COLONEL NELSON (CONT’D)

That’s counting.

KAMINSKI

(quietly)

Yes, sir. It is.

He sets the cigar down in an ashtray. Forgotten, it slowly goes out.

The colonel stares at the pulsing oscilloscope for a long moment.

COLONEL NELSON

Nobody says a word about this. Not to your wives, not at the mess hall, not to your mothers. Understood?

KAMINSKI / BOUDREAUX

Yes, sir.

COLONEL NELSON

Keep that tape rolling.

He picks up the phone.

SPLIT SCREEN — PHONE CALLS

Nelson on the left. On the right, in turn:

— The BASE COMMANDER, woken from sleep, fumbling for his glasses.

COLONEL NELSON

Sir, I’m sorry to wake you. You need to come to the radio room. Now.

A WIPE —

— A DUTY OFFICER in NORAD’s combat operations center, maps and plotting boards behind him.

COLONEL NELSON

I need to know if anything of ours is transmitting near forty megacycles tonight. Anything.

A WIPE —

— A night-shift OFFICER at the Pentagon, a cigarette burning in the ashtray.

COLONEL NELSON

Department of Defense, the Secretary’s office. This can’t wait until morning.

A WIPE —

— An ANALYST at the National Security Agency, Fort Meade, already reaching for a pad.

COLONEL NELSON

We’ve recorded a signal. It isn’t ours, and I don’t think it’s theirs.

END SPLIT SCREEN

INT. ENT AIR FORCE BASE — RADIO ROOM — LATER

Nelson hangs up the last call. Cold coffee. The reel still turns. Kaminski’s cigar sits dead in the ashtray.

BOUDREAUX

Mais, sir …

The strip chart pen jumps. A single blip. A rapid burst of three tones. A single blip. A burst of four. Two blips.

Boudreaux looks up, pale.

BOUDREAUX (CONT’D)

It’s not counting anymore.

FADE OUT.

EXT. THE PENTAGON — DAY

The massive five-sided building sprawls under a gray autumn sky. Its parking lots are packed with rounded, two-tone 1950s sedans. Officers in overcoats and civilians in fedoras hurry up the steps. A black staff car pulls to the curb; a general climbs out, briefcase in hand, and strides inside without a word.

INT. THE PENTAGON — CONFERENCE ROOM — DAY

Wood paneling. A long table under a haze of cigarette smoke. A wall map of the world, the Soviet Union in red. On the table, a reel-to-reel tape recorder.

Around it: an AIR FORCE GENERAL, square-jawed, ribbons stacked to his collar; an ARMY GENERAL, older, heavy-lidded; a NAVY ADMIRAL, silver-haired, tapping a pen; and a CIVILIAN from the Secretary’s office, bow tie, legal pad, the only one taking notes.

An AIDE presses play. Blips. One. Two. Three … all the way to ten.

The aide stops the tape. Silence.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

That’s Moscow. Two weeks ago they put a beeping ball over our heads. Now they’re counting at us. Counting down, maybe.

ARMY GENERAL

It counts up, Curt.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

Up, down, it’s a countdown either way. They’re telling us they can.

He stands and crosses to the wall map. His finger lands on the Soviet Union.

AIR FORCE GENERAL (CONT’D)

We’ve got B-52s sitting on alert at a dozen bases. Fueled. Loaded. Give the word and they’re over the pole in hours. Hit them before they hit us. Ask questions later.

The admiral stops tapping his pen.

NAVY ADMIRAL

And if it isn’t the Russians?

AIR FORCE GENERAL

Then who in God’s name is it?

No one answers.

ARMY GENERAL

(dry)

You want to start the Third World War because somebody counted to ten.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

I want to win it.

The civilian sets down his pen.

CIVILIAN

Gentlemen. Only one man in this country can order that strike, and he’s a general who’s seen more war than everyone in this room combined. He won’t send a single bomber because of a tape recording.

The Air Force general’s jaw works. He sits back down.

NAVY ADMIRAL

Then what do we do with it?

CIVILIAN

We find out what it is. Quietly. This doesn’t leave the military. Not the press, not Congress, not the scientists at the universities. Fort Meade gets the tapes. Today.

The army general nods slowly. The admiral resumes tapping.

The Air Force general stares at the tape recorder as if it had insulted him.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

And when it turns out to be the Reds?

CIVILIAN

Then you’ll have your war, General. With the President’s signature on it.

The civilian lifts the reel from the machine himself, slides it into a canister, and tucks it under his arm with his legal pad.

CIVILIAN

I’ll brief the Secretary.

He leaves. The door clicks shut behind him.

A beat. Then the Air Force general leans back in his chair and mimics him, prissy and nasal.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

“I’ll brief the Secretary.”

The army general snorts.

AIR FORCE GENERAL (CONT’D)

A bow tie and a legal pad. That’s what’s running the country now.

ARMY GENERAL

He was in college when we were wading ashore at Normandy.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

If he was anywhere near a war, it was with a bad knee and a good lawyer.

Laughter. The Air Force general rises, opens a wooden credenza and pulls out a decanter of bourbon. He tips a generous splash into his coffee, then into the army general’s.

AIR FORCE GENERAL (CONT’D)

That man has power the way a parking meter has power. Somebody else built it, somebody else empties it, and all it does is stand there and tell you when your time’s up.

More laughter. He offers the decanter to the admiral, who covers his cup with his hand.

NAVY ADMIRAL

He’s right about one thing, Curt. It’s Ike’s call.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

Ike.

(scoffing)

The Russians put a moon in the sky and Ike went out to play golf. Five stars on his shoulders and he’s gone soft as a Sunday ham.

He turns to the AIDE, who has been standing silently by the door the whole time.

AIR FORCE GENERAL (CONT’D)

Captain. Get me SAC headquarters. I want every alert crew kept within ten minutes of their aircraft. No leave. No passes. Nobody sleeps in his own bed until I say so.

The aide hesitates.

AIDE

Sir … the gentleman from the Secretary’s office said this doesn’t leave the military.

The general smiles slowly.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

And it won’t, son. It won’t.

The aide swallows and leaves.

The army general lifts his spiked coffee.

ARMY GENERAL

To fake power.

AIR FORCE GENERAL

To fake power.

They drink. The admiral’s cup stays untouched, his hand still flat over it. He watches them, and says nothing.

INT. NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY — ANALYSIS ROOM — DAY

A large room that still smells of fresh paint. Half-unpacked crates line one wall. ANALYSTS, men and women, sit at long tables wearing headphones, surrounded by reel-to-reel decks. IBM punched-card machines clatter in the corner.

A chalkboard dominates the room, covered in columns of ones and zeros:

1 = 1

2 = 10

3 = 11

4 = 100

The LEAD ANALYST, bow tie, sleeves rolled, taps the board with chalk.

LEAD ANALYST

If the blips are binary digits, ten blips is one-zero-one-zero. Ten. It still comes back to ten.

ANALYST #2

(a woman, headphones around her neck)

Then what are the bursts? Three quick tones, then four. They don’t fit any binary scheme we’ve tried.

LEAD ANALYST

Stop bits. Parity. Some kind of Soviet framing we haven’t seen.

ANALYST #2

Sputnik went dead three days ago. This hasn’t missed a beat.

Silence. The punched-card machine clatters on.

At the back, a young analyst, the GENIUS, feet on the desk, flips through a thin, cheaply bound paper.

GENIUS

You know what this reminds me of? Some girl at a university published this.

(reading the cover)

“Cyrillic Script and the Mathematical Forms of Language.” Self-published, naturally. My old professor used it as a doorstop.

Chuckles around the room.

GENIUS (CONT’D)

Says every language is just math wearing a costume. Maybe we should hire her.

More laughter—except from HANS SCHMIDT, fifties, German-born, black suit, black tie, fedora, the posture of a man who has never once slouched, who has been standing silently by the door. He crosses the room and holds out his hand. He speaks with a clipped German accent.

SCHMIDT

May I?

The genius hands it over. Schmidt reads the first page, then the second. He doesn’t laugh.

INT. GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY — PROFESSOR’S OFFICE — DAY

A cramped office lined with books. Behind a large desk sits PROFESSOR WHITMORE, sixties, tweed, pipe. In a corner, at a small typing table wedged beside a filing cabinet, sits SAMANTHA JACOBS, thirties, sharp-eyed, pencil behind her ear, typing his correspondence. Beside her, a small chalkboard is crowded with her own equations, half-erased and rewritten.

A knock. Schmidt and a second AGENT enter.

The professor rises, buttoning his jacket, delighted.

PROFESSOR

Gentlemen. I assume this is about my monograph on Old Church Slavonic?

SCHMIDT

No, Professor. We would like a word with Miss Jacobs.

The professor blinks.

SCHMIDT (CONT’D)

Alone, please.

PROFESSOR

(sputtering)

This is my office.

SCHMIDT

Yes, sir. It is.

The agent holds the door open. The professor gathers his pipe and his dignity and leaves. The door closes.

Samantha hasn’t moved from her typing table.

SAMANTHA

If this is about the paper, Professor Whitmore already told me it was nonsense.

SCHMIDT

It may be. We would like to find out.

The agent sets a portable reel-to-reel recorder on the professor’s desk and unrolls a long strip of chart paper beside it. Schmidt presses play.

Blips. One. Two. Three. All the way to ten. Then a single blip. A rapid burst of three tones. A single blip. A burst of four. Two blips.

Samantha listens. She takes the pencil from behind her ear.

SCHMIDT (CONT’D)

Our people believe it’s binary. Some sort of encoded framing. We have had twenty mathematicians on it for a week.

SAMANTHA

It isn’t binary.

SCHMIDT

You haven’t seen the work.

SAMANTHA

I don’t need to. You’re overthinking it.

She steps to the chart paper and taps the first marks with her pencil.

SAMANTHA (CONT’D)

One mark. Two marks. Three. It’s not a code. It’s counting, like tally marks on a cave wall. And this …

(she taps the burst)

is a symbol. One, then this symbol, then one, then that symbol, then two.

She writes on her little chalkboard: 1 + 1 = 2

SAMANTHA (CONT’D)

It’s not hiding anything. It’s teaching.

Schmidt and the agent exchange a look.

SCHMIDT

Miss Jacobs, how soon can you travel?

SAMANTHA

Travel where?

SCHMIDT

I am afraid I cannot tell you that until you say yes.

She looks at her cramped typing table. At the professor’s big desk. At the blips on the chart paper.

SAMANTHA

I’ll need my coat.

EXT. GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY — DAY

A black government sedan idles at the curb. Samantha walks down the steps between the two men, coat on, a single bag in hand.

From a second-floor window, the professor watches, pipe unlit.

She climbs into the back seat. The door shuts. The sedan pulls away into traffic.

FADE OUT.

INT. NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY — ANALYSIS ROOM — DAY

The door opens. Schmidt enters with Samantha, her coat over her arm, her single bag in hand.

Conversation dies. Every head turns.

The genius rises from his desk, her paper in hand, and strolls over, taking his time.

GENIUS

Miss Jacobs. Welcome.

(holding it up)

I believe this is yours.

SAMANTHA

It is.

GENIUS

Do you want to know why I remembered it? Out of every paper I ever read?

She says nothing.

GENIUS (CONT’D)

My professor kept it on the floor of his office. It held the door open for three years. Every student who came to his office hours stepped over your name to get in. Some of us read the first page while we waited.

(beat)

Nobody ever got to the second.

A few men chuckle.

He drops the paper on the desk in front of her.

GENIUS (CONT’D)

Welcome to Fort Meade.

Samantha’s face burns. She opens her mouth, and nothing comes. She closes it again.

She looks to Schmidt. He says nothing, and watches her with no expression at all.

SCHMIDT

Your desk is there.

He points to the corner: a small typing table, wedged beside a filing cabinet.

She picks up her paper, crosses to the typing table, and sits.

INT. NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY — ANALYSIS ROOM — LATER

The chalkboard still holds the analysts’ binary columns: 1 = 1, 2 = 10, 3 = 11, 4 = 100. Beside them, in fresh, neat chalk, Samantha has written:

1 + 1 = 2

1 + 2 = 3

2 + 2 = 4

She sets the chalk down and turns to face the room.

We MOVE slowly across it. One analyst sits with arms crossed. Another stands, jaw tight. One has a foot propped on a chair; another perches on the corner of a desk. The LEAD ANALYST stands at the far end of the board, beside his binary columns, chalk still in hand.

Every face says the same thing: disdain.

Silence.

SAMANTHA

Well … do you agree or disagree?

No one answers.

Schmidt steps forward from the doorway. Black suit, fedora still on.

SCHMIDT

Miss Jacobs. It does not matter what they think. You are here to move this project along. Make your stand and continue. Do not wait for them.

The lead analyst’s jaw tightens.

At a side table, ANALYST #2 and another woman, ANALYST #3, exchange a glance, hiding their smiles.

Samantha picks the chalk back up.

SAMANTHA

Then I’ll continue. Play the reel, please.

INT. NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY — ANALYSIS ROOM — LATER

The room is assembled. Schmidt stands at the front beside a small table holding a typed document, a fountain pen and a Bible. Samantha faces him. The men line the walls, unhappy. The two women stand near the front.

SCHMIDT

Raise your right hand.

She does.

SCHMIDT (CONT’D)

Do you swear never to reveal, by word, by writing, or by any other means, any information concerning this project, for the rest of your life?

SAMANTHA

I do.

She signs. Schmidt blots the signature, folds the document and slides it into his jacket.

SCHMIDT

Your name will not appear on any record of this work. You will need a codename.

(turning)

Ladies. What do you think it should be?

The men scoff. Someone mutters under his breath.

The two women look at each other. A long moment. Then Analyst #2 speaks, a little too fast.

ANALYST #2

Hypatia.

SCHMIDT

Why Hypatia?

ANALYST #2

She taught in Alexandria, sixteen hundred years ago. Philosopher. Astronomer. Mathematician. The greatest teacher of her age. Men traveled across the known world to learn from her.

The men’s expressions shift: surprise, then something close to awe.

SCHMIDT

Done. Codename Hypatia.

(to Samantha)

Now we need a title. What do you think, Miss Jacobs?

Samantha considers. Her eyes drift to the chalkboard: the numbers, the symbols, the language underneath.

SAMANTHA

(quietly)

Philologist.

SCHMIDT

Done!

He turns to the room.

SCHMIDT (CONT’D)

Gentlemen. As of this moment, every one of you reports to the Philologist.

The lead analyst’s chalk snaps in his fingers.

A door opens. A COURIER enters with a sealed canister of tape.

COURIER

From Ent, sir. New transmission. Came in last night.

Schmidt hands it to Samantha. She threads it onto a reel-to-reel deck herself and presses play.

The familiar blips. Three. A burst of three quick tones. Then something new: a burst of five tones. A single blip. A burst of four. Two blips.

The room goes still.

ANALYST #2

Five tones. That’s new.

Samantha is already at the chalkboard.

SAMANTHA

Three. Plus.

(she pauses)

… Something. One. Equals two.

She turns, eyes bright.

SAMANTHA (CONT’D)

Three and something-one makes two. It’s taking one away. They haven’t given us a symbol for taking away. They’ve given us a negative.

She writes: 3 + (−1) = 2

The tape plays on: eight, plus negative three, equals five; ten, plus negative four, equals six. She writes each one as it comes, never missing.

SAMANTHA (CONT’D)

Simple numbers. Nothing above ten, nothing below one. They’re being careful with us. They’re teaching.

The lead analyst stares at the board. At his binary columns. At hers.

LEAD ANALYST

(barely audible)

Damn … She’s right.

Samantha picks up the eraser and, in one long stroke, wipes the binary columns away.

FADE OUT.

INT. SOVIET TRACKING STATION — NIGHT

A bare concrete room. Vacuum-tube receivers. A portrait of Khrushchev on the wall, a samovar steaming in the corner.

A young SOVIET RADIO OPERATOR, headphones pressed to his ears, sits very still. Before him, a strip chart pen jumps. Once. Twice. Three times.

SOVIET OPERATOR

(in Russian; subtitled, whispering)

Odin. Dva. Tri …

A SOVIET COLONEL enters, greatcoat dusted with snow.

SOVIET COLONEL

(in Russian; subtitled)

Sputnik is dead. Why are you still listening?

The operator pulls the headphone jack. Blips fill the room: one, two, three … all the way to ten. Then a single blip, a burst of three tones, a single blip, a burst of four, two blips.

SOVIET OPERATOR

(in Russian; subtitled)

Because something else is talking on our frequency, Comrade Colonel.

The colonel stares at the jumping pen.

SOVIET COLONEL

(in Russian; subtitled)

The Americans.

SOVIET OPERATOR

(in Russian; subtitled)

Then the Americans can count.

(beat)

And add.

The colonel takes off his hat and reaches for the phone.

SOVIET COLONEL

(in Russian; subtitled)

Get me Moscow.

FADE OUT.