Judas Is A Good Kisser (3) Oedipus, Schmedipus, so long as he loves his mother PACO I suppose that's every patients favorite fantasy. SHRINK Making love to your mother? PACO Giving your analyst AIDS. CUT TO: INT> AFTER HOURS CLUB (STRICTLY FILM NOIR) PACO hobbles in. HIS back is killing HIM. HE sits down at the bar. THE BARTENDER is named FIDEL. PACO Dos Equus. FIDEL No beer, bad for your kidneys, or should I say "kidney". You'll never get out of the toilet. Maybe, I should serve it to you there and avoid the rush. PACO Something tells me I've lost respect around here. FIDEL That too. 36 PACO I gave my brother a kidney. Is there something wrong with that? FIDEL He took it away from you. PACO It's half of what I gave him. FIDEL What's the other half? PACO I want to tell you a story. FIDEL I heard it. PACO It's about a championship fight. FIDEL Go on. PACO Henry VIII. He's the king, he can have any woman he wants, but this tavern maid says no. He says: You have to because I'm the king. FIDEL So? PACO So, she goes out and deliberately catches syphilis before giving herself to her king. FIDEL He catch it? PACO He died of it. FIDEL Takes a woman to be that spiteful. 37 PACO All his children too. Like Queen Elizabeth. She had these hideous sores on the inside of her thighs. She had to walk bowlegged. But she was the queen so, everyone else had to walk bowlegged too. FIDEL Another success story, that's what we all love, so what? PACO So, before donating a kidney to Captain Jesus, I went out and caught AIDS. FIDEL Holy Mary, Mother of God. How do you know you caught it? PACO I was exposed to it. FIDEL The only sure way is a blood transfusion, you do that? PACO No. FIDEL Then everyone's got some kind of a chance. INT> TENEMENT (NIGHT) CHULO He's down there dead drunk and bragging that he gave you AIDS. JESSE There was a test, you think I'm stupid? CHULO The test is for antibodies. They dont show up for weeks or months. He went out and deliberately caught AIDS before he donated a kidney. 38 JESSE I didn't know he had that kind of class. CHULO I dont think you understand. JESSE I understand I'm on cyclosporine. It prevents organ rejection by turning off the immune system. I'm paying good money to get an artificial case of AIDS, what more can he do to me? CHULO So, you stop taking the drugs. JESSE I do and the kidney rips it self out of my back and runs straight to the nearest grave yard. Hey, I'm not going to live long enough to die of AIDS. I bought a few years, that's all. CHULO You dont understand. JESSE There's more? You're still talking? CHULO You dont got years. You got maybe an hour and a half, you're an embarrassment. You're not scary anymore so you're dead. Verdad? JESSE Yeah. CHULO You got to kill him, you got to kill everyone who knows. 39 JESSE You just told me he's bragging about it, there's a bar full of people who know. CHULO That's right, a bar full of people. JESSE Do it. CUT TO: INT> CUBAN-CHINESE RESTAURANT. (BRIGHT) Cafe con leche and 2 LATIN COPS LATIN 1 You heard? LATIN 2 Yeah, he can be got to. He's vulnerable. The magic is over. We do it now before he can disgrace his shield LATIN 1 Dont you want to wait to find out if it's true? LATIN 2 Dont matter. Saying it makes it true. If he denies it, that only makes it more real. LATIN 1 He'll think of something. LATIN 2 He'll think of words. Like any form of combat, police work is mostly intimidation. We lose respect, we're fucked. We got to deal with it now. CUT TO: 40 EXT: AFTER HOURS CLUB (NIGHT) JESSE, CHULO AND MACHITO are coming up the alley behind it. CHULO sets a thermite grenade against the jamb of the metal door. JESSE Wait till you hear us. JESSE AND MACHITO walk around to the front. Another heavy metal door and frame and the windows are covered by metal grates. JESSE forces THE DOORMAN inside at gun point then throws in a white phosphorus grenade and slams the door shut. JESSE drops a sticky thermite grenade and the door is welded to the jam. A whooshing sound says that the same thing happened at the rear. THE CLUB is sealed and then the phosphorus grenade goes off. THE CLUB explodes in flame. PEOPLE are screaming and clawing at the window gates. JESSE is watching THEM die. HE's bored and a little embarrassed at the noise THEY make.The glass breaks from the heat but the flames and screaming faces stay on the glass as though it were painted on. Behind it is roaring darkness. JESSE I wonder if perhaps, I've lived life too fully. CUT TO: INT> AFTER HOURS CLUB (DIM) PACO sees what's happening and runs back through the kitchen. HE's looking for a knife, but all He can come up with is a meat thermometer spike. HE reaches the back door just as the 2nd bomb goes off. HE runs back. PACO is in the men's room when the fire breaks out. There's no exit. There's one window covered with heavy bars. 41 HE braces HIS feet against the wall and grabs the bars with both hands trying to pull them out. The bars hold, but HIS feet push through the bricks into the back yard and HE does a skid into the trash cans. HE tries to climb a fence, but the pain in HIS side wont let HIM. HE's bleeding again. Using HIS legs causes too much pain. HE builds a pyramid of trash cans and climbs up using only HIS arms. HE tumbles out into the street just as the whole block goes up. HE turns the corner, sees JESSE, then slowly hobbles away. MACHITO sees HIM and starts to give chase, but HE's cut off as all the fire engines in the world roar up in front of the club and block HIS view. HE starts talking fast to a portable phone. CUT TO: EXT> STREET (NIGHT) JESSE hangs up on HIS mobile phone and climbs into a cop car. HE punches on the radio and talks into the mike. JESSE Breaker, Breaker. Siciliano, are you there anywhere. It's Jesse. There's a grunt on the speaker. JESSE It's my brother. Paco, that brother. He torched an after hours club. More grunts and stammers. Yeah, the fire department is here, all of that. I'm telling you it's taken care of. He's running, seal the island. Dont let him out, dont give him a chance to start talking. He knows I cant say no to him. Shoot on sight, there's got to be an end to this. Do you copy? 42 V.O. (whispering) Yeah. CUT TO: EXT> STREET (NIGHT) PACO is being chased by PELE and THE KING OF THE TANGO (KOTT). HE's chased down 5th Ave. INT> MEAT LOCKER NAKED MEN are hanging on meat hooks set into the wall. THEY've been skinned expertly, but still alive and twitching, trying to talk, to signal, to negotiate. The stomach and chest cavities have been opened and the internal organs hang from the ribs like Christmas tree ornaments. PACO walks through THEM impassively then turns back for a moment. PACO I'm sorry, but I cant allow personal feelings to interfere with business. HE dives through a side door to the street and finds HIMSELF on the street surrounded by COPS pointing guns at HIM. HE smiles and flashes a gold detective shield (courtesy of JESSE). PACO The basement's clear, check the roof. THE COPS rush past HIM into the museum and PACO oozes up to a COPCAR and glides away. EXT> STREET (NIGHT) PACO drives downtown. HE tries the Midtown Tunnel, but there are police checks at the bridges and tunnels, at the bus and train terminals. PACO keeps going. 43 There are police road blocks on the West Side Highway. HE takes off crosstown at 34th St. 2 COPS IN A SQUAD CAR make HIM and phone in. THEY take off in pursuit. PACO drives up on the sidewalk to get around a delivery truck. HE makes it, THE COPS dont. THEY didn't see the fire hydrant coming. CUT TO: EXT> 34TH STREET HELIPORT (NIGHT) PACO parks and walks up to the terminal. PACO Next shuttle is? ATTENDANT 10 minutes, to Newark. PACO sits down to wait. Sirens in the distance getting louder, police copters getting closer. ATTENDANT I wonder what that's about. PACO The usual. A PHONE rings. THE ATTENDANT answers it, makes some guttural noises and hangs up. ATTENDANT The flight's canceled. They're sealing Manhattan. THE OTHER SHUTTLE PASSENGERS complain and wander off. PACO flashes a detective badge. PACO I know, but I think he's gone. I'll see if I can head him off in Newark. The copter warms up. PACO gets on. HE's the only passenger. The machine takes off. Sirens are getting louder and there is the sound of gigantic machines getting closer. 44 INT> CUBAN CHINESE RESTAURANT (NIGHT) LATIN COP 2 Not another drive by. LATIN COP 1 No, we're not trying to impress him, we're trying to kill him. LATIN COP 2 And no more exploding cars. It looks like we're imitating TV it loses respect. LATIN COP 1 Yeah. LATIN COP 2 So, what do you want to do? LATIN COP 1 We poison him. Maybe, we'll get a reputation for being intellectuals. LATIN COP 3 He dies in the line of duty with an Inspector's funeral. He's a hero. LATIN COP 1 Like how? LATIN COP 3 Like right now. Maybe, he'd like some coffee. HE drops rat poison, the kind that causes internal hemorrhages, into a container of cafe con leche. Bring it to him, he'll drink it cold. CUT TO: 45 INT> COPTER (DARK AND ROMANTIC) THEY're flying toward Newark. They're soon overtaken by 2 police copters. THE COPS try shooting at THEM. THE COPTER PILOT cant believe it's happening, but HE easily evades THEIR fire. PILOT This got something to do with you? PACO 37 parking tickets. THE PILOT tries bobbing and weaving and PACO The Bronx Zoo. PILOT Ganze mischuga. PACO That's Jewish. PILOT I learned it from my accountant. I like it. Ganze Mischuga, yeah! There's still one police copter in pursuit. THE PILOT starts a bumping contest with it, as THEY spiral upward and try to gain the advantage of height. HE tries slashing at the police copter with HIS landing skids, trying to nick its gas tank with HIS rotor blades. HIS skids rip the stabilizing propeller off the rear of the cop copter. In accordance with Newton's 3rd law of motion, it begins to spin lazily out of control in the opposite direction to it's rotor blades. It spins to the ground like a maple seed. The other COP COPTER closes in. By this time THEY're over the Bronx ZOO. PACO Set it down. 46 PILOT That's the tiger pit. PACO That's right. THE PILOT brings the COPTER down in the tiger preserve. PACO jumps out and the COPTER spins away into the night sky. One tiger wakes up and snarls like thunder. PACO Bad Pussycat! The tiger yawns and, honor having been satisfied, goes back to sleep. The other tigers ignore HIM. They've been fed and are more pussycat that predator PACO climbs the pylons of the monorail and walks off along it into the night. 45 The COP COPTERS flies too low over the African elephant preserve. An elephant grabs the landing skids with its trunk and pulls it down. The elephants play soccer with it, butting and rolling it end over end with the hoist of their tusks. A COP's hand shakily tries to open a COPTER door and climb out. An elephant brings his foot down decisively, stomping the COP COPTER with a huge crunch of metal. The sound track is Coltrane playing AFRICA. CUT TO: INT> GORILLA HABITAT (ASTROTURF) A GORILLA WEARING PINCE NEZ is lecturing PACO 47 GORILLA A gorilla has an IQ of about 80, smarter than most of the people on the subway with you. The elephants are a lot smarter, IQ about 120, bright normal. But consider man: A chimpanzee with muscles that hardly bulge at all is 7 times stronger than a man. Man is this pathetically weak bald ape, almost deaf, almost blind, hopelessly unsuited to any environment. You had to invent civilization to survive, but the elephants, the gorillas, they were on top of their environment, they had no natural enemies. Civilization is your pride, but prof of your inferiority. PACO Except that: you didn't invent language. GORILLA What do we have to say. What does anyone have to say? No one has anything to say, ever! PACO It's so true. CUT TO: EXT> MONORAIL (NIGHT) PACO walks out of the zoo along the rail. HE passes the walrus pond. A JUBILANT PENGUIN goes by towing a helium balloon on a string; the balloon is shaped exactly like the penguin. PACO That says it all. CUT TO: 48 LONG SERIES OF SHOTS of PACO making HIS way back downtown by subway, bus and stolen car. CUT TO: INT> JOEL"S OFFICE (SAD AND SEEDY) PACO staggers in, exhausted, and slumps down in a chair. JOEL Dont leave just yet. PACO I wasn't leaving. JOEL I tried to get you in on it. PACO What? JOEL So, like they say, you piss half as much but twice as often? PACO Yeah. JOEL You look tired. PACO Yeah. JOEL Murray just doesn't like you. Besides which, you got one kidney. PACO Is that important? JOEL I mean, you could hurt yourself. 49 PACO Doing what? JOEL Besides which, there's the loss of respect. PACO You respected my kidneys? JOEL I mean, being had that way, Anyway, Murray just doesn't like you. PACO So, what is it? He caught a girl jumper and you're going to gang rape her before turning her in. JOEL Well, yeah. She's a jumper, that's the bottom of the ladder, nobody's going to listen to anything she has to say. ZOOM IN: TV SET ON THE WALL ABOVE HIM. INT> DUNGEON (ROMANTIC) CHAINED GIRLS IN 4 1/2 INCH HEELS AND MICRO-MINIS. Descriptions are too tedious, I'll bring some pictures. ZOOM OUT: INT> JOEL"S OFFICE PACO How romantic. JOEL But dont leave just yet. PACO I'm wasn't leaving. 50 JOEL Have a little something to eat first. There's a spread of deli take out. PACO Dont you get tired of this? JOEL Like the Chinese say: There are five great cuisines, Cantonese, Mandarin, Peking, Shanghai and Kosher Jewish Deli. PACO Right. JOEL Anyway, you're losing a kidney but gaining a friend. Your brother owes you now. PACO That's for sure. JOEL He has to look out for you. A perp gets busted in his precinct, a cop sticks your card in his pocket and says this is your lawyer. PACO Right. JOEL You'll be a rich man. You can buy back a kidney. You'll be able to afford a new kidney every 6 months. All different colors. PACO I gave him AIDS. 51 JOEL Who? PACO Captain Jesus. There's a knock on the door, guns appear and THE 2ND MURDERER enters. 2ND Councillor, I'm glad I found you here. PACO How did you find me? 2ND Your secretary told me. PACO I dont have a secretary. 2ND There was this woman in your office. She said you'd be here. PACO Oh, her. Yeah, what is it? 2ND Yeah. Well, no. I figured I got all the way to Mott Street that I come back to tell you because I like you. PACO I appreciate that. 2ND They're waiting for you outside. PACO They? 52 2ND Captain Jesus and associates. He axe me if you were still there and I said sure go on up and he said: No, he'd wait. Well, I didn't know. PACO It could happen to anyone. 2ND So, I figured I tell you. I owe it to you because I like you. PACO Thank you. 2ND
Copyright © 1999 Victoria King |