IDEATION ACOMIC THRILLER BY Aaron Loeb ‘Ww Playscripts‘Cast of Characters HANNAN, in her early 405, carries the aura of authority, easily seitching from laughing at jokes t telling others what to Tho She thes projecting haw overworked she is to gamer Ghunputhyand show what a hard worker she is. She runs this lfice where people hardly ever show up. She's in charge Ui the finances, HR, afd all other operational clements Technically, she is he buss as she js the most senior person in theron, hnh in thiscontextit' er jebas boss to facilitate, hot control She hasan MBA and is 38 expert in logistics and finance. She runs the office whore the consultants are based. She does not usually consult herself—she's “back office ROCK, ahackslapper.1ale30s,early Mh, Wearsa collegering Played football in the Ivy League. Good looking, avuncular, a Tittle ‘it sadistic. Brock is an MBA and an expert in organizational structures, Brock isthe team leader of the three consultants just returning from Crete, TED, in his late 40s, early 50s, He's been a road warrior for many years Family man. Sends Christmas cards with a. family Photo on the cover Lives ina yer’ Tange suburban house. His Telghbors alt hn hin. Hes from eas, very faintaccent, Te jaar tivi engineer and an expert in transportation processes SANDIHE late 2s the youngest of the consultants, a ecent PRD. He Ise upon Delhi ina elt, highly educated family. Fe has lovely Finglshy nian accent. Completely assimilated, perhaps versmipernating, Hee projets arrogance and gentleness with fujal frequency, Sandeep is a PAD in industrial engincering an espe in maneiacturing processes, ‘SCOOTER eatly 20s getting his MBA. He'sin an entry-level position, working for Hannah. When he finishes his grad work, he will peta jb like Sandeep’s 1. (Voiceover), the CEO of this company. He has. severe attitude, projects briliance an scorn, His aces never seen. Setting The Confrence Rooms, | conference roam ina gleaming office sleaming ofice somewhere, Itis modern. A beautiful conference room table, Aeron chair, video-conferencing, system. The upstage wall dominated by a wisiteboard, [Now The Present, Not the future, There should bea hint af sc." Production Notes ‘he actor paying Scooter ean double for J.D. "he ines about Concepeién can be changed to amore recentquake— sul nolanger than five years efor time when he lyIDEATION by Aaron Loeb (The canforoce room) (At rise, SCOOTER is sitting dounstage ooking atthe vidcon sytem, He looks very “at home." On the tale are notepad, pens, std a bundle ofetchord mavkers al pled up. Ewer HANNAH, lamin, happy. As she enters, SCOOTER jsp and sterts to ext She sfops hamming, surveying the ce bore her. She frowns, goed mod ruined) ‘OOTER, (Exiting) Yo. [was just about to got some coffee. get \ycup=you want aml, to sugars ight? HANNAH. Hey! Wait Can you~ Scootet! Stop! OOTER, Yeah. Whats up? HANNAH, The guys are gonna be here soon and youre getting ‘olf. You know? asked you to set this place up— COOTER, —Yeah, Dude, Iset the place up, HANNAH, Don't call me dude, AcOOTHR, fe. Sony What eae do you need? HANNAH, Fsoctly what fold you Eneeded an hour ago, Make sure Nhe fon fae everythin they might need at thet Fingertips. A pad {6 pap vo pes ard a bottle of water a every seat fresh ite Font marker in the tray and am easel pad—wheres the easel pad? (SCOOTER ss coe koe shat she means. Enter BROCK, HD, SANDEET, BROCK md TED weit shoulder laptop bags SANDEEP with a fwhjake They all des col, eae salts Fah of them asa Starbucks) WHOCK, the boys re bck in town! Hey, Hannah, HANNAH, Wel, bello. Scooter, your mind fnishing up? Thanks, nth flowin, st gets he, nding and stig fo BROCK, TED and HANNA hg. She borely acknostedges SANDEEP) THD, Hasy like Sunday mornin: | brought back some local firewater oe you ai rian 1’ oh, whoehamacalli, ah, retsina I’son your HANNA, Aw, thank you, Ted. So, how was Crete? WHOCK, ul of cretins‘Aaron U (TED, BROCK, and SANDEE thre hack thei heads and “fake Fang This the 400% tie BROCK his ald this joke. TED land SANDEEDP po! ther bags ay, SCOOTER stops ooking: Ines thor ea HANNAH, Very lever ... But seriously BROCK. We killed t, Hannah, Killed it The clients over the moon, naturally. And we return with many, many drachma, SCOOTER. Greece is on the euro (Beat. The bys stare at SCOOTER ) BROCK. I'm so sll. OF course Greece ison the eure. (ie directs this to HANNAH, gfoing hero foo, or even mowshing of Who the fuck i tis?” HANNAH shakes her head SCOOTER ges the notepnds and markers ad continues a hale as jubof setting up) BROCK, You're gonna be so prove!’ your boys, Sandeep found, ‘licioncies in prodtction that increased yield by 10 percent— SANDER, =11.3~ BROCK.11.3 percent, Which isa lot more olive ol Ted figured outa ‘way to reduce transportation coats to paint of distro by— TED, -No, dit BROCK, Sure you did. Come on. Don't be so modest. (SCOOTER stops again.) “TED. I had the ides, Brock did all the work. Made a new deal with {he unon—thisis good. I saw they had guys—our client was paying for three guys to maintain their rucks. Brock convinced the union that should be done at the munieipal Ievel-at the pert, right? A froup of central... love this... What did you BROCK. —Regional Maintenance Technicians. The port should be paying fora group of gus to make sureall the trucks ar, you know, ‘whatever, maintained fo port standards with some modest charge backs because the whole thing gets underwritten— ‘TED, 1 love this, [seriously do. T wanna iss this man— BROCK. [tall gets underwritten by the local government in the {guise of uh, you know. business driendly environment, t cetera, 0 our cient saver and the union gets more heads funded by the {government borrowing money they cartt pay back but, you know, ‘who are they going to cll when that Blows up in their faces? Us. dentin 3 HANNAH. Nice! SCOOTER. How do you know they'll call us? BROCK, Because they'll remember—wait, who and what are you? HANNAH. He's your note— SCOOTER. ~Scooter Hl. Good to meet you, Brock. Hi HANNALL. He was ust setting up the room. SCOOTER. Yeah, I as just setting up the room. But how do you now {SCOOTER rows some zitebond pens in the tay and joie the toys: HANNAH sees is tks deep breath and decides > ji ings: She takes exer his work) NDILP. They will ce that our client is thriving while they are sll, But waita minute... Justa year ago, two, our cient was in il thom this, what wil they conclude? COOTER, That you tricked them, KOCK, Idi tick anyone. They'll conclude that we know how li pos lailties down the line. Because we passed our clients Habit wo thee SOOT sey ak for neh Yo paste abit 1 HANDIE Wout your HD le an ve tig soo Tne oa nly ight HANNAH. Oy go Did they make if regional? THD, Thoy ai WANNAN. Lok at you, proud papa, Okay, well et’ get you aut in Mie forthe gore Treo ant ready Scoot? AEOOTER. Yooh! Atl set So, how ssoulel you da i? Pass om the Aaivniy BANDINE, (fo HANNAH Are we. uh. sorry, do you need say help? HANNAH. Nah. Alms BROCK, Seems pretty obvious. Privatize the port, Long-term lease Jaye the debt Probably unload ito the Chinese BANDILP, That would work Thank you4 Aaron Loeb HANNAH. Excuse me BROCK. I know, Not bad fora guy with et lag, uk? (HANNAL i nef to work around the boys fo get the holepads distributed) SCOOTER, Oh was just gonna go ome coe, You guys eed (TED, BROCK, ond SANDEEP hold up their cafe cps) SCOOTER. Oh, yeah. Right, (ExtSCOOTER) HANNAH, (Calling fer SCOOTER) Hey! I wouldnt mind... @ cup SANDEEP. Il get you a cup. How do you like? HANNAH. Ub. ill two sugars SANDEEP.So.... brown and sweet (eat, HANNAH soles) HANNAH, You are such an as. TED. [ike it brown and sweet, to, (GANDEEP sinks af HANNAH and exts) HANNAH. Guys, dont encourage Scooter. BROCK. You keep telling me I need to be nicer to the junior staff HANNAH. He’ just a work-study. A gift rom J.D. ‘TED. The CEO is hiring your interns now? HANNAH. His daddys on the board. ‘TED. Well, glad to hear J.D. doesn't have anything more important todo than stafing, especially with our stock in the tele. BROCK, Seems like he did a pretty good jab setting up the room. Walt... wheres the easel pad? HANNAH, He's useless, And now he's your problem 100. BROCK. No way! Better no hands than useless ones. Can him! HANNAH, Brock, dost turn this into a thing, We need someone taking notes— eatin 5 BROCK. —Wete on a Top Secret job this week, Ifthe kid sucks, Jot want him theroom fr the ideation. You shouldr't encourage 1D. draping his trash on you and this fice. HANNAH Lot me give you a bitof coaching, Brock. You area great litle earner for this firm. But the reason Thave the fancy offce— the one with all hose windows-is that [ve leamed ta go with the ROCK. Go with the program? HANNAN. You should try it sometime. J.D, wants Scooter here | cel somone the firm trusts to take notes. This way, everyone's happy: Why would Trisk making waves when Ican keep everything, » SCOOTER out SANDEEP with fie mugs fron the nn-not Steueks, SCOOTER has is ows. HANNAH SROCK go sent, SANDEEP gies a coffee fo HANNA, Dring the flowing, TED goes #0 the sfeboord end begins rity At the top of the Board, he writes “Project Senna.” Underneath, "Roles: 1 No BPT*; "2. Assine te sors"; "3. No N Won He also draws syste diagram: "1D. => Collection > Containment Liquidation > Dispos”) BANDA, Mostar, HANNAN, Why, thank you. BANDEN, very thing at righ HANNAH. Yoo, obsolutely. (She tes @ sn) Mama . . . Warm, awn ant sweet Exactly how THe ACOOTER. On Hannah, did you want cofee? HANNAH, Yo ACOOTHRK, Why dido’t you say something? I wouldve gotten you fy Oy so, Feo vou were saving you'd privatize the port Thi respectfully 1 theres not enough revenue to justify the mew Fiona! minienance technicians in the rst place, isn’ that Habiity Wet gong to catch up with clients? (lle, BROCK lonks to HANNAH. She sles amd nods) WHOLK, Whereid you go to school, Scoots? Mind if I call you HEOOTHR, Scoot Is... Sure, Brock, I got my BS in Industrial Bigineering at Cat16 Aaron Loeb (SCOOTER enjoys the followings the rossing makes him one of the boys) BROCK. A BS in engineering from Call Wow! Didn't get into Be school, hak? SCOOTER. No! | mean, yes actually, getting my—Just finishing ‘up my MBA from Haas now. BROCK, —Haas, A fine school, A fine, lite school, Let me lay the stone of wisdom pon your chest, young Scoot, If you're in the ‘workplace, and people call you Scooter rather than Mr, Whatever- Yyour-nameds, it shobld likely eccur to you that you're n some sort {flees than” or 38 ike to call, junior” postion. Does that sound Fight Sandeep? “Junior” position? SANDEEP. That's what they called it when [went to Bschool. BROCK, That wasat Harvard, right? SANDEER. Thats right, Brock, Harvard, The one in Cambridge BROCK. I's Haas, but il do SANDEEP: Hrvard was just my MIB I think inthis case my PRD In Iiusirial Engineering is more germane. I's fom Georgia Tec. The one in Go BROCK. Thonk you, Dr. Krishnamurthy. Now, Scoots, when you're {ina junior” postion and you leave the room to get yourself coffee, nnd your boss whom you asist-does not have one, yet you return ‘with your evn coffe, mmm... Ident quite knew what toca that, What would you eal that Doo? SANDEEP. (Rolls “r') A rookie move BROCK. A rookie move, Now, Iam left supposing they don't teach such things at Haas Ts that right Scoots? SCOOTER. Uh SANDEEP. That’ a no TED. (Turning from the whiteboards he's ready) Okay, guys— BROCK. —1m left supposing at Haas, they teach you that if you ‘work fora lady, you can ignore her and just hang out with the boys SCOOTER, What? Ijust—what am | supposed to do, read her mind? She didn't ask. HANNAH. I think Ted is ready BROCK. She should have to ask, Sete. Scoot” with eomtemp) You've heen here for about a minute, and you'e thinking, “I am dertion v ter, hear me roar. [am king ofthis place. And this here boss hal is jasta glorifed secretary. Tm not gonna take notes for het Thats woman work” (Pewse) HANNAH. Okay, Lets SCOOTER, Wait are you kidding? TED. Yes Int that a kee-slapper? Now come on, Brock. We have Het time, Cutt KOCK. —Thereare a thousand kids from better school lining up ind the block to get your job and respectfully? You blew it Tit tht ea. Fsay whol on the project and you're out NANDEEP. Wait, what? Really? KOCK, Yes, realy, Get out NCOOTER. Thisis. You cant kick me out. I dant even work for You! T work for Hannay HANNALL You do... more or less. So does Brock, But if you want Wo olverve ther work, you have to eam their fast COOTER, —How am supposed to do that if PHD. (J) ROCK) We should start now, You are throwing a Aemnper tantra HOEK, I he n't even get the boss a cup of coffee, he’s certainly fol faking notes on any project of mine. Gresce ison the euro, He Hjought that hist detail might have eseaped my notice for the entire Iiwonl we spent in Crete’! Can you imagine him chiming in every five mine ACOOTER, 1 ont HOCK, — Too late I would like you out of my sight HANNAH. Ohay that’s not entirely your call WHOCK, Meaning what, exactly? HANNAH. Lets (lle HANNAH aned BROCK stare a eachother) FER, Okay, Lou just ike to poi out— HANNAH, =Scvoter, do you mind giving us the room? coo! IR. No. I think should be part of the discussion,8 Aaron Loeb HANNA. Well Im the only person ith a vote, So, how about you sive usa minute? There's plenty of fling you can catch up en SCOOTER. [said no. If you need someane to da your filing, get 8 tomp. Tm hore to take notes. And I dat think my father of | D. ‘would appreciate you sending me out ofthe roam. Okay? (Pause. EVERYONE is floored by SCOOTER’ audacity) HANNAM. As you know, Scooter your employment with us is at ‘will As such, we have determined at this time that our relationship iso longer mutually beneficial. We'll mail you your lat cheek ar, ‘any personal items from your desk. May Thave your security card? SCOOTER, What? HANNAH. Your security card, please, SCOOTER. Why? BROCK, She's firing you. SCOOTER. She's firing me? BROCK. She's firing you SCOOTER. You'e fring mer! HANNAH, Our relationship is no longer mutually beneficial, a8 1 sald take no pleasure inthis It was a difficult decision and one T assure you wespenta great deal of time on, SCOOTER. You-vait, you just decided just now! HANNAH. As I sig, it was a difficult decision, Your security card, please (Bext, SCOOTER produce his cand—peraps he tas saving i bina loan) HANNAH. Best of luck in all your futore endeavors walk you (Ee exits, united, felosed by HANNAH. Bet) ‘TED. You got your way. You win! Meant body's time. Happy now? BROCK. Hey, Sandecp helped— SANDEEP. —Lewe me out of this, ‘TED. —Hannah could have gotten the kid to sit ima comer, but you just ad to keep pushing. Why in the hell did you do that? le, you've wasted every- eation 8 ROCK. 1 dunno, Ted. Why does anyone do anything? Because we wos? Bocatse we could? Because he deserved i? Besides IE { acso efal why didnt you stop me? TD. ie BROCK. Did you, Ted? Did you, really? (HANNAH enters) HANNAH. HRS been notified, and you boys are taking your own os, Brook, you and I il discus this after. [NKOCK. You gave me the nod! HANNAH. To haze him alittle, not to fre him— ROCK. Hey, lust kicked him out. You the one who fired hit! THD. Forthe love ofall that’s holy, can we please dig in? (teat) HANNAH). D’sassstant emailed me this morning to letme know Uhl he expects 2 presentation of early concepts in $0 eninutes HD, What! We're not ready for that. Theres no way welll be= HANNAH, —He wants to hear your ideas on the back half of the sv Fight aivay fo see if he likes the direction you're taking. He unt andl see if you'e on the righ track, Don panic THD, om» not going oJ D. with my dickin my hand. HANNAH, For the record: neither am I Lets get started. (OCK, “Lots. uh. Are you staying in the room? HANNAH. Givon the project’ importance, JD. has asked me to Join yous arepresentativeof senior lendership. Let me be clea, this Je colloborativeTim just part ofthe team, (HANNAH and SANDEEP share a Took) SANDITE. Wehaven'thad achance to work with you since Helsink, How exciting? eat) KOCK. Yes. Very exciting. Welcome tothe team. FL uh... kick then, We hal a chanes to discuss thejob back in Crete. Thank Thokore, for iting dawn our notes #0 fr. THD, Some chologcally torturing ate be had (© do some work while you were, uh, wor year-old» Aaron Loeb BROCK. (Hepuints othe witebuad. To HANNAH After the kickoff call with you and J.D, sve ad time to set three ground rules before we hopped our flight rst and foremost, due to the secrecy of out assignment, we wort be using PowerPoint. We want no digital les associated with Senna, all Kleaton sto be dane onthe whiteboard and erased. Results wil e recorded to memory. Any notes recorded to, gasp paper. Second, when we design, we assume the worst and design systems of scale Third, no using then-word. That one is self explanatory: Now; because of thenature of thejob ee were unable to discuss iton the plane, but Ym sure we've all been thinking through, ‘oar assignments, Tm tackling identification or, wh, diagnostics, a= wall as containment. Sandeep is working on the liquidation system itself And Ted was meant to take on collection into the facilites and osal, Given that]. wants to hear about the back half, let's uh, Jey startat the end and work our way backwards, right? We'll lock down as many ofthe hig concepts as we can before our fist check Jn Sound good? (ALL nod) BROCK. Okay, then, Let's dive info Ted's concepts for disposel Namely, what are we going todo with all the bodies? (Bent) Te? (TED stonds up, ges to whiteboond. BROCK sts do) ‘TED. Okay, so, Ive, uh, ve been doing some early eating and T have foar proposals for our disposal system. First, cremation. The problem is obvious: the build out of crematoriums necessary to Incinerate that many bodies is... would be... enormous— BROCK. —Crematori ‘TED. Huh? BROCK, The plural of Yerematoriuen is “crematoria,” you iterate redneck, (HANNAH pulls other phone and types something ind is) ‘TED. Pretty sures “crematorivms, BROCK. Yes, you would be. Primarily because your Uncle Billy Jais also your Pappy: But also because you've nan toa bright. ‘TED. Hannah, can you please...uh HANNAH. (Leoking ufos herphone) Do you want me to fire hin {Gnpersonating BROCK:) There's a whole line of kids from bet schools aut that door who will take your jb, you lite shit bird— eaten a NROCK. =I did not cll him a shit bir MANNAH, No, but I bet you wish— (Gluncing dwn at her phone) (Ob Here . «Youre both right, “Crematoriums “cremetoria” i EE lar") Fither SANDEER. (Pronounced A/-thur*) Ws pronounced, “lther,” actually (HANNAL flips SANDEEP aff) ROCK. tm pretty sure it's crematoria ANNAN. ("EE-thur") Well the internet says is either, and the Inornet is never wrong, 11D. ik fit) The bulld out of crematertums would be daunting, \inpovsibie todo in secret, requirea massive, wh, massive work effort lh hundreds or thousands of workers, And that just assumes ‘hens ly one location ehereall hecremationis performed, which noah landing bodes onto cargo Mights and shipping them to that fmm cach liquidation facility. If we da that, ete exposing vple propleand Wehicls tothe bodies, which potentially creates he problems, righ? (EVERYONE nods, sage) THD, Alternatively, the, uh, the crematorkums could be built at every al each liqaidation facility, but this means even: more ‘allenges in keeping the facilites secret, But that’s not all!Once the Fnlles ore cremated, by whatever, uh... you know «--centealized Uh localize effort wee sil eft withthe ashand bone, in mary ‘ges whi also have to be disposed of. NWOCK. Right. Crematoria are out ofthe running, THD. ist say that. They may be a erappy option, but they may also be the best thecrappy options. Disposal method numero dos We. An ok favorite: Presents many probleme, First of al it's iierespec it tothe dead, obviously. Secondly, is likely to, uh, to vere sometime, eight? And part of the—well, wee trying ut howto leave no, uh. ace, righ? So, tome, this ules Mae grave out right ave. HANNAN. 1 outs HANNAN, Go ahvad HMOEK, No, you HANNAL. No, please. 1m just part of the team like everybody ‘i BROCK. Well, does2 ‘Aaron Loeb (TED ond SANDEEP stare at eal offer: “Oh boy.” BROCK ows hs heal to HANNAH, “so aes) HANNAN. I was just going to say, yes, t seems that mass graves arenttan option BROCK. Oh. Okay. But, ub, ifthe graves are remote enough and covered say, incancrete— ‘TED. —Yeah, I thought about that But the problemi the facilities are meant to be secret. Depending on the ntber of bodies, the graves Would be clesty visible no matter how remote~—you get the picture BROCK, ~So wil satellites, ‘TED. Buatly: Bactly. Now, my next idea is well litle more out there, bt maybe, y'know Option three: urial at sea SANDEEP. Come on TED. Itsn option. SANDEEP, Wete going fo bury up toa million bodies... | mean, ‘maybe more right? We've ageeed this has to be scalable, You car possibly imagine burying bewies at ea to be secretly and efficiently Soa TED. —With enough foreplanning, yes. SANDEEP, Well, color me incredulous, BROCK. Ovoey I like that. That will be the title of Sandeep’ first solo album. Color Me heredulous HANNAH, With his number-one hit, “You Can’ Bury That Many Bodies at Sea, (TED, BROCK, HANNAH laugh, SANDEEP looks do) ‘TED. Will, Isay you can. And if you'l direct your attention to the board, Il show ya how it done SANDEEP. Do you think... Tm not sure its appropriate to make jokes on an assignment like this BROCK. What? ‘SANDEEP. It just... it seems disrespectful to laugh. I know I was doing it too, but I think we shouldetjoke— ‘TED. ~Sandeep, all due respect, we don’t have time to talk about ‘our feelings today twas just jokes. Get over it. SANDEEP. Yes, Ofcourse, Hein (SANDEEP,cealyofened, sts, HANNAH ses his distress, levies ignore it) HANNAH. 1am curious about issues of scalability though, Tee KOCK. Hey, you two remember a fee years ago when the Chilean Folorales called us in after the big quake in Concepeiéin? HANNAH. What? THD. Yea why? We didet try burial a sea in Chile— KOCK, just humor me. Sandeep wasnt there. 4D. (Ting SANDEEP the story) Sure. The job was, uh, creating a nples model for the rescue teams, There were, uh people alive slr the rubble across the city. No way to get to them all in time. ROCK, Right, Analyzing how many inches of concrete ean we Hi tough a second owe much rable can we cet We re inising the wore of the reste teams fo sae the ment people le lore te lock an ext and anvone let underground as ot was al ace again ne who lve who di foe sea Wolfs lt of fetingsand'n ine fo talk aout then eat) iy way one night we were taking a break, drinking and laughing vething and someone says “we shouldnt laugh.” And @ Wise old man—emphasis on the old—says, (Soutern aes) “Laugh shout ry about the ab’ stil the job” lt) SANDEE. Alright, Let’ throw some dead bodies inthe ocean (They laugh nctedng SANDEEP) HANNAN. Walk us through the proposal, Te. THD... okay (lees fo the whiteboard, das act, soies nit “TERM.") the bodies atthe termination facilites, right? KOCK. Which ts? Liquidation or termination? HANNALL. For gous sake, Lwant ta hear this HNOCK. —Nomenclature mattes! For a project of this scale, we {cal everything by three different names, Which isi HANDULP. Wed established liquidation PHD, Vine, Gotita Aaron Loeb (He onses “TERM” ad writes “LE ach liquidation facility, uh. loads (ie demos an ares fom “LP ta new circle he drs ad labels TRANSPO.) Un... transports the bodies to a central location. This has the same, ‘uh, challenge as the crematoriums—or one of them, right? Were exposing transportation personnel and vehicles... You get what, Tm saying? Anyway the transpo goes to the central storage facility sma port ty (Beat as he des an arrow fom “TRANSPO toa new cle he ‘des and Ines “STORAGE,” From thie ice, he draco another Arm tana circle, “SHIP.” He drs arr ooping eso “SHIP” and “STORAGE.") ‘See? From the port the ships can take multiple trips—limiting the reed for informed parties The warehousing-—the storage of the bodies s accomplished in an already built already, uh, already, you Know, a commercial setof warehouses. Nothingto draw prying eyes. Andi of course, this allows for multiple termination, hy liquidation falitis a foel into the system, right? (He dems more cise a Se beginning, fils the ins “LE ‘and points aroes fom them tothe “TRANSPO” ciel) Again, suboptimal, but logistically it may be the best solution BROCK. Did you even think this through? TED. 1 i BROCK. Ted, Teddy. Come on. Fist off, each body would need to be weighted Bodies Hoa, That's a high-louch process If we're going to dispose of upward of amuilion—hell let’ go crazy, two million bodies, thats tho million bodies someone has to wiap up with a weight. That's also, what? A hundred million pounds of weights weld need to somehow produce in secret and, why store at these \warehoases? This has to bea lighttosch, or o-ouch process. (emakesthe "Palin Salute" anda raspherry tik ina Flt fl) ‘That's what Thave to say to your burial at sea. Come on. ‘TED. I think it’s very easy to find edge cases on this thing SANDER. —Letit go, Te. HANNAH. It certainly does seem credible, (TED Lets di settle in. He's clenly embarassed, Best) tion 3 TD. Oka \ Option four. Combine liquidation and disposal. HANNAH, How 50? {1HD. this method has strong disadvantages... uh ..on the moral SANDEEP. The mo axisas it were? What does 11D, Essentially occured tome that this is the primary partot Us jess in whieh we ean node eciencie Sandeep doesnt "em design forthe liquidation sytem eso. what i we bin igudation and disposal KOCK. Yeah Td, Were follwing, How? THD, Okay, so, fs option could come up with is ai, Sandeep kiss termination chambers figudation chamber where ih subjects fei The chamber is then flooded with some Kin i soe agent: Aer hat ied with hy, highly concentrate Irth ci eo chelates with clean, sot woul cally Invsk loner some ol ofthe bone (eat. Everyone ese 8 quiet) 11D. It... mean, of course, there isthe problem of clean up and Ihe cost of generating that much acid, There are stability issues with iid this powerful. HANNAH. They would wake up, Ted. Wouldnt they? 1 mean, we kin use medical-grade anaesthesia. That be too —whatd-your vIHi™high touch? This should be. gentle. You can'— THD. As I said. it has moral problems. But, if we ean figare it ll left with some kind of wh. . toxic bio-ludge that will hive no tmce DNA, $0 even i e's uncovered a a later time... We fon ist bury iti the desert. MOCK. Hike HANNAH. Seriously? t's Jeffrey Dahmer on a national scale THD, Well... Guys... ¢omeon, Dont wh SANDER, Don't wha THD, Don't try to, you nove... make me feel guilty or somethin for having thought ot efrey Dahmer Itsnot- * HANDEER, —Fimnot— IHD, We haven't been hited to model out the works biggest Jiigiing machine, have we? T mean, ub, did T miss that inthe brief Hip? Rainbows and, wh, anicorns% Aaron Loeb HANNAH, Okay, Tet ‘TED. Imean, thisis...Do you think lenjoy coming up ... modeling this Stuff? Even if i al jst, you know, theoreteal=1 don't need you to make me fel like Im a piece of shit for trying to figure out frow this gets done, okay? SANDEEP. No one is saying you'e a plece— Ted that’s not... Its not that HANNAH. It's just litle horrifying. ‘TED. I can't believe you'e just figuring that out now, Hanna, HANNAK. Ials0 seems, you know, impractical, How are you going to get al these people to just wale into a chamser that Roods with acid? I mean, wont they start to notice that others go in andl never, uh ‘TED, Containment is Brocks job! He'll explain how we get people to center the chamber! We're fut focused on disposal right ta for my presentation Te'sjstfoeus-can we please al jst focus? Please? SANDEEP, But you are not merely focused on disposal— BROCK. —Okay, maybe we should keep ideating, Maybe none of will wor TED, ~It will work f you would al ast lok att on its own merits and stop tying to figure out new and different ways call me a HANNAH. No one's calling youa monster, Ted— TED, ~Yall know the parameters of the job just as well as T do, What if someone unleashed @ designer virus, 10 percent kill rte, remains dormant long encugh to spread effectively, incredibly, ‘contagious, A fotal extinction event. We have to figure out How t0 segregate the infected fom the uninfected and we must I repeat, ‘must have provisions to keep the facilites operating if they start to get overcrowded, That means liquidation. This is about the survival ‘of the species. So, you know, stop looking at me like that because 1 Suggested acd, Can you just ook at this idea on ts own merits rather than through the lene of your own goddamned squveamishnes? Is that too much to ask? Because we don't have time on this gig to get sentimental (Beat) BROCK. Hey, how about we take a break, okay? Ted, come on. Lemme buy you a cup of coffee. A litle—a nice litte walk Starbucks clear the hee righ?” dation a (ost TED nods.) 110. Hike theie petite scones, KOCK. Who doesnt love their petite scones? Come on, papa beat. Jot get vou out of here fra it (TED and BROCK cleor out, SANDEEP and HANNAH sit silence. Finally) SANDEEP. think about you when I touch myself (HANNAH trusts out ging SANDEEP foo, SANDEEP ‘osses lo HANNAH. They ae out, She pushes hin sway afar ‘moment HANNAH. 1 told you Helsinki was the Ja ong this, time, We can't keep (Ste ses hin apa, His as on wpe highs. She tps hin) HANNAH. Not here. IF Brock or Ted— SANDER, They already know: MANNAH. They know?! Did you tll them? SANDFEP, OF course not. But the hiding it by joking about it Hinlogem in working oot, They ask me about ital the time. Ideny Ii but those guys are not xenow'ned fo their stupidity HANNAN, jesus. Shit Have they ald anyone? Anyone in corporate? SANDEEP. I don thinks, If hey have, theres nothing we can do, Yu eannot unzing a bell madam. HANNAH. You canvt be so casual about this. If corporate found ui, they fire me—theyd be right to. And les not forget the shitty Vins they'd do to you. Your work visa? Gone. I’ back to Delhi, SANDED. Delhi is beatiful this time of year HANNAH. Iowobald end my marriage, Sandeep, SANDER. Ise that wat you want? You don't love him anymoze— HANNAL. You dont know that— SANDELP. —1 know that. could tel that in Helsinki, even if you "been drunks Even if you hadn' told me. everything. You Voth know that you hope well get caught, HANNAH. What? Why would T want that? HANDLE. Because you cannot choose between the pesfect life you Have and the one you actually want. Butif you are discovered in my ris the decision wil be made for you.2 Aaron Loeb HANNAH. You are such a kid SANDEEP, Our age difference does not matter= HANNAM. Doesrit it? You think there's a choice to be made here because you live in a one bedroom with a couch and an empty refrigerator. [ have a mortgage! And joint bank accounts and le insurance poiciesconnections to another human being that make 4 real, grownup life. You don't. Sandeep, you donit have any friends: SANDER. [have— HANNAN. —I mean, not ral friends who have been with you for decades. You can do anything you want, Brian and [have shared. ‘everything for twenty years. My closest friends are his closest friends. ‘The kind of human carnage you imagine could so bithely inflict just walk away from him=from them-from all of it because, hey, hone ofthat matters compared to how [feel when fm with you? Oni Aachild who doesnt even have a cat that depends on hin could think that way. SANDEEP. know yous, You don't want any ofthat anymore. HANNAH, do. And I don want both, SANDER. You will have to choose, Hannah, You cant, Tear HANNAH, —Shut up. (Sle grabs the hair on the back of his head and pulls hie to her Freely. Thay make out) SANDEEF. Look... weave to... wehaveto stop. Thisis... won't beable to work if HANNAH. Yeoh, SANDEEP. im staying at the W. HANNAH. Yeah? SANDER. Maybe. tonight? HANNAH, Are you going to try to convince me to blow up miy lif? SANDEEP, We might not talk at all, (Beat. Se sles) HANNAH. Ted has regionals, so maybe we both snetk out of here carly? Assuming J.D. likes your initial concepts on liquidation, that ‘SANDEEP. need fo, uh. ..goto the bathroom and ...you know take cae of samething? Would you care to come with me? destin » HANNAH. Save it for tonight (They tis) HANNAH. Have you thought about... mean. .. what they ever ve tv use the dosign? Or, ub, what if SANDER. I've been thinking about i ince the call with .D, HANNAH. God, me too, SANDER. 1 believe in what we are doing and I understand why ‘ivr shoula be a plan—must be a plan ike this do, But. what 1? You know? What if instead it were for brown guys named onaenmed™foreigners or... People who look Like me, People ike ANNAH. Or women who cheat on their husbands, SANDED. Joking) You don't deserve to be put in a death camp, HANNAH. I never said I i. Jesus, (ent) SANDEEP. What if you were one of thea? One of the infected, oul you oak back on your life before the termination chamber | hink, "yeah I played that just right” Or would you regret. now? Would you wish youd told Brian about me? HANNAH Dont ask me that SANDED. Because you don't want to think about HANNAL. Because Ive already given you the answer (eat) SANDER. Yeah, No. gett HANNAH. And because I don’, uh... don't want to think about NANDIEP. Think about HANNALH. ~Youknow...the,uh_..thecamps—the liquidation whatever: wont beable to work if star thinking about people, uh ‘pie spending their last. (Ste sighs. Silence) Wejost. you know? SANDER. Yean, HANNAH. Yeah?ed Aaron Loeb SANDEEP. No. Of course (Best, Suey there i aloud ringing. The wicon systems ie ‘hiring, They Boh juny. HANNAH looks at the sytem.) HANNAH. Ifs}.D. SANDER. Whal? HANNAH. [have to take this, ‘SANDEEP. Oh Right. Okay lust... are you coming to my room tonigh®? (The videon rings. 15 really daaned loud wud obnoxious) HANNAH. Yes, Sandeep. Yes, SANDEEP. Then Im going to, uh. go fora walk. (Exit SANDEEP. HANNAH asters the vidcon, The widen sera i 0 dhe fourth wall, so HANNAH stares out the tnudionce, with lights representing hat she see) J.D. Waiceover} Hannah, HANNAH. Hi J.D. We're uh... Did Thave the time wrong? Thad, ‘our first checkin down for an hour from now. J.D. (Useewser) Ate you alone? HANNAH ED. HANNAH. You mean Scooter? I di, yes, Uh. ..yox? ve) ve heen informed that you've et Perry Hermann go. J.D. (Voiceover) Why? HANNA. Isnt this alittle below your pay grade, J.D? J.D. (Voiceover) 1 asked you a question. HANNAH. He was inscbordinate, disrespectful and, ub, fonda ‘mentally tribe at his jb. J.D. (Voiceover) Bat you're not. We had agreed held he in the roam taking notes! HANNAH, Why vas Scooter taking notes so important to you? J.D. (Voiceover) Goddasanit, Hann, after a blonder like this, fn ‘concerned about your future here, HANNAH, My foture...J.D, that's— J.D. (Voiceover) —Thave to wonder if can tust you. Can I rust you, Hannah? Mention 3 MANNAH. Of course you can, Yes J.D. vinomer) Eneed you to make suse the guy's do their work over The nest few days, okay? Ineed a complete design. No matter what, HANNAH. A. .. Of course. That's why Ii here! hp. sroer) No, you're net listening to me (Enter TED and BROCK, foudly, HANNAH i all sites the tome she hears them ender) ROCK. Hannah, this is genius. HANNAH. Hey, guys. 've got J Don the videon ROCK. | D. Did wehavethe wrong time? Im sa sarry! Wewerent— J.D. (Voiceover) No, nothing like that. 'm locking forward to your nil ideas. Tak to you in an hou, gang. HANNAH. Uh, ean Ieall you back from my’ desk justo finish |. b. (Voiwoer) Sorry, Hannah, Schedule’s jammed up, Gotta fan, (The videon ends, HANNAH stares it, Beat) ROCK. What was that about? MANNAH. What I, uh.eant discuss it KOCK, Wy not? OKI Was it about Scooter? Didert figure J.D. ‘sould hear about ts soon, What did you tll him? HANNAH. Inot only cant tell you, Im net going to tall you KOCK. Aro— Did you tell him Tired him? Because I didnt HANNAH I ean nether confirm nor— KOCK, —Jast admit—at east admit he was calling about Scooter Wo know it as about Scooter, IVD. tock, vou eat go through life needing towin everything, all Hite: You suffer from “Excessive Winning” WROCK, I dont need your, uh... your “make yourself better” Innement consultant bullshit (Enter SANDEEP) 11D. We'e management consultants! HANNAH. Gang’sall here 11ND. Okay! if wecan get back toit then... First off, sorry about my Hie, you know2 __Aaron Loeb SANDEEP. -Noneed to apologize Te. This is... Its okay. TED. So. Brock and I had this genase on the walk from the Starbucks—actualy wasat the Starbucks but we BROCK. ~ Shipping consiners TED, Asshole [BROCK. You were taking oo long SANDER. Shipping containers. Please, uh... you know HANNAH, Use more words (TED wes the dig onthe witeoad to state hie) ‘TED. the bodies from the liquidation chamber are loaded neo Eibinagd mane Theyte the tried aad te hae Storage facilites and folded into regular shipments. Mid-ocean, they're pushed overboard. The containers sink with the bodies BROCK. Good, right? It serves multiple Functions, We dont have {weight the bodes and no one has to touch them ever again once they leave the liquidation faiity: We need to prepare for many titferont kinds of virus, righ? Some viruses woud resul in seeping, bodies that are contagiogs: Others would have inert bodtes. This Works ineither scenario, eontaining the body and the virus in lined containers and preventing any dawnstream infections (eat) HANNA, Itcould work. SANDEEP. What about the shipping manifest? ‘TED. The, ub... huh Shit Yeoh. Tshoulda thought of that, BROCK. What? ‘TED. Ifa whole shipping container goes missing mid-shipment, i ‘would set off all kinds of red flags: Drug smuggling, weapons they don't search each individval container, but they, uh the inventories of cantainers are prety exact. SANDEEP. Supposing... okay, it doesnt... its not dispositive BROCK. Right I'S harder to do because of the manifests, but maybe you have key people inon the plan— HANNAH. —Ted, you're up already: Can we just... Let's just list ‘everyone who would need tobe invelved, everyone who would have to know about the facilities in order to make this work. Maybe maybe oven if there would need to be some kind of coverup Heation x uscsary to make the containers disappear, that cover-up could be, ‘sh lined tothe people who already ve to know about the entire ‘poration. $9, you have the people atthe liquidation facility who howe what's going on (TED writes “LF Saft") {PD. ~And they call ahead to the folks atthe porto say, "There's four hpping containers coming your way that need to disappear” $0, ricone a the port authority the shippers carrying the containers vil the handlers.on the vessel who have to dump the things (TED writes doen "PA staf” “Shippers,” and “Handns.”) SANDEEP. This brings the port autharity people into the min but ther than that, everyone else was already in oni HANNAH. Right. Yes. IF we're entertaining any “burial at sea” ‘nario, we Will have to involve the shippers and the handlers, no ster what KOCK, Wait, Would we? Sure, te folks at the liquidation facility val to know what's going on, but the shipping personnel the ickers the railroad fos, the shipping company. they couldjust ‘how they'e shipping biohazard, They won't open the containers, they don't have to know anything about their contents. HANNALL They're going to just shove containers of biohazard into KOCK. Sure, You grease palms to get everyone to look the other vay. You pay the handlers to push them overboard and not ask jwstions Youpay theportautherity people to makethem disappear the manifest. Hell the guys earrying the containers from the ios othe port dant even have to knove anything at alll SANDER. They will know the locaton of the liquidation facilites, Ihowover And those area secret. TD. tat they cont know what's in the facilities So, i’ oh, kind of J sound order of confidential... you know? Second order of, wh~ KOCK. —Yeah, yeah, Shit right, yeah. Okay, so let's say theres tier- ‘ye hnowledge The people who know evers thing that’ going on in the (wilities ana then people who know a litle Biter two-then Jule eho know nothing, tier three. And let's label each, uh, le’s— us kno? That way, we ean Figure out who needs to know shat ske the shipping containers disappear. Maybe ifs not, uh... you ‘ow, maybe its smaller lst than we were thinking, The people yorking a the liquidation facility aze er one (TED writes "I" and civles it nex 0 "LE Sta")34 Aaron Loeb 'SANDEEP. No, they/re not. (TED erases the “I” inthe circle, poised to write something ese Slowly, over the following, he realizes he oon’ write anything tls, and lok aisle dicppointed he nso a rol) BROCK. How do you igure? They have 1 know everything— SANDEEF. —They have to know what they have to know. They’ hhave to know that they are running a liquidation facility. They have to know people go into a chamber alive and that they come out lead Anel inthis scenario, they have to ow that they load those bodies into shipping containers, then that they Iie ta the truckers about whats in them, BROCK. Or... in other words... everything? HANNAH. Thats not... He's right. That's hardly everything, 'SANDEEP. They do not have to know that there are other facilities They do nat have to know what happens to the bodies. They donot have to know why those people are dying inthe chambers. They do not have to know for whom they are working at why, We have to Know all ofthis because we are designing the system. TED. Okay, so they're tier tw (Ue orites 2" and circles it ext fo "LE Staf.") BROCK. No, We cant say what ter they are (BROCK, SANDEE, aud HANNAH look at exc ote, al realising somthing TED dees at) TED. Jesus. Weare in the weeds, guys. (erases the 2." caps tha po a sit doaen, Now he notices) What? SANDEEP.If we are having this conversation now HANNAH. Someone had it before us. And maybe someone before them. We only know what we know: SANDEEP. More precisely, we only know what we need to know to design the system. HANNAH. So, what tier are we? (Paue) BROCK. Weear't, uh... We can't know, Can we? Itcould be that we now everything, Mention 35 SANDEEP. I could be thot there are layers upon layers of secrecy » thousand tiers. And we may be atthe bottom, or the middle, Beat) this thing? ROCK. Okay, this is... wecan figure this oat Right? MANNAH. How? ROCK, By, h by, yoah—we startby provingordisprovingthat ‘ware ter one: IF we logically separate all of the possiblities into Hiv supersets Scenario A, i which we are tier one and Scenarios 8 Vivoogh, ub, “Zed in which we ate tet two SANDEEP. ~Or three, Or four (Some occurs tons. Until he speaks, he scribbles on apa) KOCK. Okay, right, multiple supersets by ter ID. Why? Why do any ofthis? Thatient the job, We're not being vid to igure out what ties we're on. The obis to design the system, ‘il we have to present to] D today. Hannah? (tet) HANNAH. want to explore bi 1D, Really? He basically ust spitballing— koCK. -UR— HANNAH. =I get i But given the, wh, nature of Projet Senna, f sont to give this some time. Well constrain our exploration of the lop dont wane to ear about scenarios C through Z, but, ah is have a bakeff. Ted, you argue were ter one: Scenario’ A. Dock. that were not: Scenario B ID, Fine. The burden of evidence is on Brock. The simplest, anc. Niswotore most likely scenario, i that we know everything that’s Joinyvon and everything ie have boen tld is true. Scenario A. KOCK. More ike Scenario Wishful Thinking, Hannah, how many Ions are working om this job? HANNAH. As far as we know, only us HKOCK. As far as we know. So, if Ian prove that there are more loans working on this then Scenario A i false, THD. You can't prove that WROCK. Of course Fean,36 ‘Aaron Loeb (ie emses the whiteboord and draes “VISION” at he top and tile) Let’ imagine the virus is real TED. Oh, fr god's sake— BROCK. —No, think about i, Ths isthe Vision Holder, the true Vision Folder. Tier one. And he-she-it~Im going with “t”—knows {hata deadly virus is about to go global. 1's not hypothetical. That’ why we had to rush back from Crete and start right awa. Thats why we only have 90 minutes hefore frst check-in. Vision Holder is {trying to contain the virus and needs plans to cover every possible exigency It has created a tree, right? A tree of knowledge with ‘multiple branching assignments for "n” teams, ll competing with fone another based on diferent, ul... information sets, righ? (BROCK sae far tnes coming off "VISION." He then drs cirls a the end ofthe Bs and fills heme "1,° "2." "3." ) So, this team, les say thats us. we think we're designing a secret, system to deal with a hypothetical virus possessing a slow infection pattern, and that team over there thinks i’ dealing with, is been, Told fo hanale a fastspreading virus and an international panic Right? Vision Holder wants different plan f word ofthe virus gets ‘out and itbecomes harder to get people to the facilities HANNAH, —And this way, Vision Holder gets a rich set of plans from which ican pick and choose based on conditions, ‘TED. [reject the premise BROCK. Why? TED. This is a secret mission! You cant spin up multiple teams, ‘There'd be too much chance of leaking. The juice wouldn't be worth the squoeze: word gets cut about the virus and starts a mass panic, ‘Youtd find one team, The perfec team. Scenario A BROCK. Okay. Right. Ah! But if we buy into vour premise that there canonly be ne team on earth working on this problem, its unlikely tobeus ‘TED. How do you figure? BROCK. Ii you're going to design a massive, people-moving system. |. the very paragon of efficiency? We are very good at what ‘we do, but theres one ring to rule them all and inthe darkness bind! them. ‘TED. They would never take the job, Come on! ection Bd HANNAN. For the good of humanity, they would. For a problem hth they'd be Your firstcall. Nobody knows more about moving lone of people into a facility every day and millions of tons of osteo every might 18D. There isn’t chance in a million that. guys, Disney would \ sign Imagineers to create death camp! ROCK, If Scenario A is that Vision Holder has hired one and only hve loam to save the human race, youd get them before you'd get ‘i. Ted Lam capable of considerable sel regard as you well know, \ the more I think about this. Scenario A is unlikely because init. mean, werecertainly, you know, Restround draft picks, HANNAH. He’ right Tt would bea tear, uh, you know, a team at thw Pentagon. Ora hand-picked dream team. Or... if thisis a plan love the human race, would you really bet tall some guys wha fist pot off plane from Crete? No offense, INROCK. None taken, Because no one rational would bet the fate of Iie world am us, we are not the only team! Because that was never Viele tous, we are not tir ane! QED! (Bent) ED. Shit, This in no way makes our work less important, but I sale. I's Scenario B. Now what? HANNAH. I'm not sure. Scenario B is worrisome because we're Ising Hed to ROCK. —No! Scenario B is awesome because wee being led tot Hat means Vision Foder is lying tothe other team to. This s an von proposal, righ?” Knowing that, we can reverse engineer ‘he assighment=provide the best, most custom ft solution To the pwoblen HANNAH. Right KOCK. The team with the winning idea will he given, Lmean, if | vere runing tthe winning team would be hired to manage the ‘ovation ofits proposal ta contain the virus budget, staffing SANDEEP, =No, (GANDEEP stands up suey, He sts back doen.) HANNAH. Whats? (SANDEEP shat his head. Beat. He gts up agi and walks to the board He begins to dre wa om his mola, eh does, eaters do nok speak. They just etch, Hewerites a subscript28 ‘Aaron Lock "next to “VISION” i the top cnc. He then dravs two more tires atthe same lect. Those labels “VISION, “VISION,” Fron ack circle, he dos downerd ines and cies a heen, like the orginal structure. When this done, he des a cite ‘boo the others and puts question mark init. He hs his ile point with tines foeach ofthe "VISION" cices) ‘SANDEEP. The flaw in your thinking is that what we know bears ‘any similarity whatsoever tothe real purpose ofthe plan If this is real. this s how you were realy stuctaring ths .. something ‘of this scale? You wouldn't et just one cell come up with the plot and you certainly wouldrt et one cell execute i, Why would You? Weare just lke the truck driver atthe camp, Why would you let him ‘now iwhat's in the truck? Why seould you let the people who ran the centers know that there are other centers? Why would you let us know what the plan is fr? (He writes “VISION, = Plan’; "VISION, = Bull “VISION Execute” He Xs ou he ell that wepresets this team) [we hal the best plan for, say, disposal, you'd simply take itand say, “Thank you for this excellent plan. We hope well never have fo use it” Then you pair it with another teams design for liquidation, and ‘another's for containment. You would piece opether the best plan and ‘hen spin up cells under Vision-su-two to Bld from the resulting specications. They would build it in pacts, Cell one assembles the trucking fleet. Cell two buds the centers Cell hree builds the actual ‘hamber—or, rally, reultiple cells build the parts ofthe chamber. A slifferent cll of trained mechanicians who dont know what it docs Piece it together. cell fr warehousing. A cel just forthe shipping ‘containers that can hold bodies without leakage, A cell fo assemble {the chemicals for dissolving bone. Fach one paid fr is werk, thank ‘you very much, and then on fo the next job Finally, you spin up a ‘ew set of cells to execute the pla, each one told-na each one hand picked to believe whatever is old. A cell of people whose loved ones Ihave died of cancer picked torun the chambers an to that these are volunteers this i all to finda cure. cell of people whose families hhave been killed by terrorists hited to guard the eamps, tld, "hese are terrorists” And wito knows? Perhaps you put the members of Vision-sub-one and Visionsub-two through the camps frst just fo make sure no onefinds out And when if ll done (He puts as" taongh he whole thing) You burn ital down Ifyou are preparing to outdo the Nazis in the media age, that is how you would do it Every cell given a hand- picked story, everyone kept in line by thet financial interest helt personal prejadices— Heaton 2 ROCK. ~Comne on, Sandeep, We all agreed net 9, you know. Nol to use the word. Heb. Thisishard enough SANDEEP. believe we are past worrying about ROCK. —Look ,.. Maybe this is what it looks like. Maybe its ‘en more complicated than this, Maybe this is a conspiracy we ‘nt even—1 mean, with all our knowledge and considerable, uh, horsepower, maybe even we cant fathom the—the-the depths fight! Or--- maybe not TED, Right. Yes. ROCK, Maybe its exactly what we've been told. 1D. Exactly. Thank you! Can we all—tet’s just... lets remember What we've been asked to do here. Protect the human race from ‘tinction. Survival ofthe species, people NROCK, Yes. There is a virus, And we know two things about weryone who has it 1) they will diy and 2} half the people they tuner will dle #0. SANDEEP. No such virus exists, TWD. Not yet. ROCK. Or, maybe it does. And Ta say Jnntno such conspiracy exists either, SANDEEP. Or, maybe it does (Pause) Hoye counting on us keeping this seret, HANNAH. Who's they? SANDEEP. Fort to work—for something like this to work, everyone ld have to keep it secret until. until it’ too late. I mean that’ roblem with something like this hsterically isi? To execute inching of this scale—its impossible to keep i secret. And if Josie kes, someone would stap them — HANNAH. —Stop them from what? SANDEEP. From using it From ding VANNAH. Butif theresa virus— SANDEEP, —That isnot my point, Hannah, and you know i (eat) you know, Id point out0 ‘Aaron Loeb ‘As you and I discussed easier Against dissidents, Against people ‘who look ike me. Against Mexicans or gays or whomever they want fo use it ogainst, in the name of whatever they are doing things in the name of. Country? Profit? God? Well... those ate the big thee, arent they? BROCK. Deep... you'e starting to get ridiculous, SANDEEP. Am I Ithas happened. I didavt make that up, did P It Ihas happened many times inthe history of the world Ist that you ‘think Americans are so uniquely good that they would never use such a plan? ‘TED. Well... yeah ‘SANDEEP. Even if that were true, our firm is multi-national. Why dio you believe were building this for the American government?” (Pause) Because that is what J.D implied but never said? Because ifs what {you wont to believe? Scenario A is a team in the Pentagon? Why is it not just as likely in your minds that we are building this for Kashi? Asa way to finaly cleanse it of ts inconveniant Muslims? (Or perhaps its for Chechnya. Or oil companies in Nigeria taking BROCK. =I know J. D.L mean, not ineredibly closely, or looked hin in the eye on this project TED. —Me too. We all have. Through a video teleconferencing system, sure, but [ve known J. D.a long time and he would never sign up to design and execute a genocide SANDEEP. If he even knows. If he ist just asin the dark as we are. In order to do something like this and get away with it they ‘ill need to keep i quiet Which means eventually getting id of everyone wha knows, HANNAH, What ate you saying? SANDEEP. I dont know! I don't... suppose Lam telling you that weareall going tobe killed, BROCK. Woah! That is over the line, Deep. And a huge logical Jeap—how da you get there? SANDEEP. If we do what they expect, if we, uh, follow the rules then we plan it, go on with our lives, not suspecting we were part of anything noteworthy. Likely we start dying individually by ‘unrelated means... Acarcrash. Cancer. Choking to death, Whatever iil be BROCK. This is science fiction at this point. ation 4 SANDEEP. Its the most remarkable thing about you... About \nericans You are so entirely trusting while at the same time ing so profoundly paranoid about the wrong things. You think very Tite thing will kil you, every new group is out to get you, ‘sl meanihile you allow yourself to be poisened=in your food, in ‘our water, in your informtation—and when someone points i out, ‘i eal it Sienee tion. I do not know how you do i At least in Inia, we know everything we are told isa fe (Beat) cone needs to be told, Someone neods to tell, "PD, You cant be serious. Deep, ne one will believe yout ROCK, And if they dd, that’s even worse! Think about it, No one will hire us again—not just the four of us, mean, yes, the four of us Ibe well and truly fucked, but the whole company’. The Street ‘destroy us. Hannah, forthe love of god, get hit fo SANDEEP, —The Street! You've worrying about the stock price? Have you heard nothing have said? Tam trying to. Jf Tam right this HANNAH. ~Sendeep! Don't SANDER, Don't what? HANNAH. Dont put me in this postion, SANDEEP. I haver‘t put you in any positon. The company’ may be hing us to be part oF something unthinkable. We must—ve have tosopie (Beat. They tare a eachother} HANNAH, May remind you that as an employee ofthis company, Jin have signed a whole host of non-dislostre agreements: The vinsequences of breaching those agreements will be severe and Will belliflong, You are very well compensated for your time, Your Inyenuity and for your discretion. The company has sponsored ‘ur work visa and your application for permanent residency. That ponsorship will be revoked immediately upon termination for ‘use: Do ot. dant test our reslve SANDEEP. Our resolve? Our? Hannah, Ijust want to keep you safe. eup Ted and Brock safe MANNAL. Blowing up our careers... our ives... based on a wild \icory?I’sakell of way'to show you care, Now, we have], Din SANDEEP. ~Inneed to g0 for a walle2 Aaron Loeb ‘TED. Weneed your design of the chamber. SANDER. Dont worry, papa bear. I figure it out, Il be back in just... Ineo to stretch may—noed some ait~wvhatever can I fust HANNAH. ~Sandeop SANDEEP. —Dor't—! Hannah, you cannot threaten me with one breath and say my name ike that withthe next. [just (Beat) Sorry. Sorry guys... You are of course right: lappeartohave, ub. Thave overreacted. This is jst one theory of mainy and there is no eason to... The stress... May T please fst g0 for walk? lam not going to tll anyone (HANNAH nods, small, SANDEEP exis, Bot) BROCK, Come on, Hannah. Go after him. HANNAH. Why would I? (BROCK sd TED lok at eh other) TED. No reason. Just, maybe... you know, Net that Fm saying BROCK. —No. No one is saying TED, =I’ just you were kinda hard om him there and maybe. HANNAIL Jesus. Does everyone know? TTED. Know what? (HANNAH exits. Pause) BROCK, Okay. That was fuckel up. ‘TED. I's none of ous business BROCK. (Pointing atthe boar) No, not Sandeep and Hannah—the Vision-sub-one thing, ‘TED. Come on. I's like you sai: ).D. would know if this were some kind of holocaust typeof stl right? Ii this were BROCK. —, Dis not, uh, you know... he's not Zeus. He's not ‘omniseient—he's just a CEO, Maybe he's being led to ‘TED. —Deepisjst letting his imagination go wild, Why do you dive {into every rabbit hole? Deep’ last it Mave on, BROCK. You always do this! Try toh, railroad ws into— TED. -Ido not— Heston 43 ROCK. —Yes, you do. You myopically fous on one solution, and hen beitle anyone who disagrees with you, If Deepis idea Is 30 sy, lets disprove it TED. Why? Why would we waste time— am not myeplet We have «prelim in under an howe! ROCK, Yes, but what if Sandeep is righ® Wont that affect our vjyroach to the prelim? Let's just take five minstes— 11D, —What has happened to this team?! Has time ost all meaning? Al how seould you even disprove a nonfactbased supposition Hike thie ROCK. By starting with facts and builingfrom—thisisjust eating 'clephan, right? We do it ike we always do it! One bite ata time. Toki (He ras 1 de boord, erases al the “VISION” circles, writes FACTS.") hot (ance, He con’ think of amy. Than, suddenly) \We wore hired for this job! Fact: "Wwe" in this case is Deep, you, me, Nonna 11D, et! Fm not going along with this. ROCK, Fact! We were briefed by J.D. (He writes"). D. Briefing”) 1D. Fact You're gonna take all day with facts that broad, KOCK, (Luring TED it) Oh! Fact: we were in Crete, (He vite Crete") ».Come on! You're using the model wrong, You have to get tothe Is that aren obvious and stare proving them out. ROCK. Really? What’ an example? TD. Like fac: Hannah had a conversation with JD. before we di KOCK. Do we know that? THD. We don’t But we know she could have, I mean, we were in Cito, working together 2477 KOCK, =I wasnt 24/7, THD. Okay it wasmt, but we were in Crete and we both found out vou the job atthe same time. From Hannah and. D- And haw shea Aaron Loeb found ont about it? We dont know, but it stands to reason she had a por conversation with D, BROCK. True. Okay, so now you‘te saying that even within our Hey, there's a kind of variable knowledge st. We can assume Harinah is ina diferent knowledge set~one where she may know exactly what ‘we know—ah ah ah, yea I gti right! S0~s0—e0~s0~ Ii Deep is right and there isa conspiracy, we could quantify our knowledge of that conspiracy. Like, let's say what you and I know is represented by the variable “k’—get me? ‘TED, Can we stick to one model at time? We were listing facts— (BROCK writes ecrcte ad puts “BROCK + TED HANNAH” sud above i, "& x 2.” Under "BROCK + TED" he toits “9 = 1° this shouldbe mostly water the "BROCK part) BROCK. —No no no no, lock at this, papa beat: This works. We know "Kk" about what’ going on here. We capture the degree 19 which other tiers know more orless than wed through the variable “vIn ourcase, v equals one. For Hannah, ifs unquantifiabe at this point but TED. —No i'snot unquantifiable, She knows at leastas muchas we do, right? (TED writes “02 1" der “HANNAH TED. V fs greater than or equal o ane. That’sa stat. BROCK. Okay. Yeah. Good. Right, And what does v equal for]. D2 (Or Sandeep? Or Scooter? Think he knew anything? TED, think, uk everyone ee gets thelr own esther own“ We should work through on senseyace“I ean cnet Deep Fe knows what we da Sor Deep equals one Breseonceeer ‘greterthanor oslo era (As'TED falls, BROCK tries “DEEP "in rn of “BROCK TED" Then fe writs chetere on he feat. De oe ‘scooren’} BROCK. That's no ight. Thay know about Senna. ov 6 green than ar. TED, You fired Scooter before we started BROCK, I ddet fc hin. Hanna i big el and i all herself. For Scooter, v is greater than zero. a TED. Okay. Tre. Art ls than one BROCK. We dont know that Heaton 45 Te. Wecertainly know that Scooter knows less than us. ROCK. No, we don't, What fhe, whatever, the client pretending Iw the kid ofa beard—achat if hes the true Vision Holder? "ED. (Sereastic spooked out) Yeah. You'te right. What if he tricked 1 into fing him so he could leave the room? Oh my god! What {Ine secrtly poisoned our coffee and soan he will reveal that we ny have the howrs to finish our design or he wort give us the vidoe? ROCK. rm no saying he the Vision Holder, jst what it ID, —We don't know if there even isa Vision Holder! And if there Is Scooter taint! NROCK, Are we entertaining al the possibilities or not? T mean, I 1 han-wave and make assumptions too, if we want to just hal vs this thing. The only thing we know for certain is that for all ws, ws greater than zero, (BROCK writes “» > 0° under "J.D." and “SCOOTER. He Stops tak ar looks a he Board) NROCK, Is this right? Can we really lump you, me and Deep wer? TED. What do you mean? INROCK. Like I said it wasnt 24/7. mean, what if you had, you ‘ow midnight meeting at the Acropolis with Deep Throat or sting What if they goto you? 1D. That silly. What f they go to you? IWOCK. They did 11). Oh, well I dont know that. See how this works? Lets not get aon KOCK, The entie point of this five-minute exercise is to get tis THD. No, its not IF the point of the exercise is paranoia, it loses ny set delineation between fact and fantasy. You can just start dsvorting anything you want in the name of paranoia. m the Vision Hole! Hanmaly really works forthe Pentagon! For J.D, ¥ equals KOCK. No. Yourargioentunrad absurdum aside, Tear’ put anything | vant in the model: We know vis mst likely fess than one for}. THD. No, we dont46 Aaron Loch BROCK. He doesnt know about the shipping containers! He dest know about the discussion we're having right now! TED. Oh but doesnt he? I mean, here is he ls hired by some secret ‘organization to design death camps and secrecy is paramount Wouldn't he want to know exactly what we were working on and saying atall ies?! BROCK, Ofcourse. He(@haveus under constant. uih,..constent (Pause, TED and BROCK took at each other and then, stating perfectly still as though they ae afd to move ook around the rom. From tir faces, we car tll hey ee aging cameras ecergohere. Enter HANNAH) HANNAH. Guys, I think something really bad might be going on bere— (Ste oka the bond. Her demesnor sift, suspicious of ROCK nd TED) What... why are our names on the board? BROCK. Its nothing, Hannah, Just trying to figure out some stu. But we realized everything is fine and we are happy to get back to work, TED. Yeah, We gota litle loco there or a moment, butal’cleas! We "ought something bad might be going on, too, but --- nope! BROCK. Nope! HANNAH. No, somethings seriously wrong, When Igot downstairs just now, [asked Mike the doorman if hel seen Sandeep go, and ‘Buys, Histon, T think the building might be under surveillance or Something because Mike saw BROCK. —No! Nope! Stop talking now, please. Because, uh, because, well because, uh, Because his, wh his name is Ike Unless he changed it eat) HANNAH. No its Mike I's been Mike this whole time. And— BROCK. ~Seriously? 've been calling him Ike for, lke five year Tm such'an asshole. Les talk about that HANNAH. —Not nove! Mike told me he saw Sandeep, out ofthe omer of his exe geting nto a Back towncar ar then the at BROCK. So? He called an Uber, Okay! Back to work! laeation 2 TED. Right. Wete—Hannah, we're almost out of time. He called a cat That al HANNAH. No. It was the second after Deep walked out of the building, like it was waiting for him. Mike thought he might have seen someone helping him into the ear. What if that was actually someone pushing him? Tve been, uh (Ske pulls out Her ell phone and dials tas she spots. 15 on speaerphone) 1 boen calling him and calling him and there's no answer. Ringing, Voicemail) SANDEEP. (Voiceover) You have reached the voicemail ofSandeep— (hehangs up) HANNA. You see what I'm saying? I think maybe... maybe “nwone kate he wae leaving and they grabbed him, But how could vivone have known he was leaving? Unless this room is under thunder (Now she loos around the roo, freaked ont. TED and BROCK Took at her, "yen, git?” Beat) WKOCK, Hoyt I want to Listen to musket Ted, play some music on Your=off your Phone, right like muse THD, Yeah! Music HANNAH. (tilted ext) Yes Play that song we all ik, Ted, and Joie to play stata high volume because that’s what we do when we work, (TED pals his shone out an plugs into weapon ack Fe ikl presses play his muse. very contemporary pid fet py sang esl te specs confer on Exanples of the gh nd of song are she curr emuialent 7 "Oaps Did Again” of “Cal Me Maybe Tt should be nl popular a he He the play is being performed onder place the ation at RIGHT NOW. BROCK loks at TED th in fori si hoe. TED shrugs) TD, (Vllng ove te music) My daughters love this song! (0 tree hae. They speak, but we can't ear over the baring HANNAH points at te Board. TED end BROCK x they've conaded © must equal one for J. D. They ‘platy debate pa ofaction totes the ikeitond they're lle srvllonc Very suddenly, the re of them spring ito They rapiy ad Franecaly sears the conference roomAaron Loeb They lok ener the ae, oper ap lcs Hi psi try took tend the stead, eal on te fle ek all They do ely or fo ge st sold wo eo ie a gy profesional bg sep. iy sl te pop soig ens, Pace) BROCK. Nothing. TED. Nothing. HANNAH, Me neither But f the sooms not bugged what happened to Sandeep? sind (Ste dia agin, Viena. Best) ‘TED. I think we nave to assume the most likely scenario: we're just ‘overreacting, This gig is exactly what we've been told. Sandeep called a car: We need to get back to work. HANNAH, If he called a car, then his phone works. If his phone works, why isnt he answering me? BROCK, Maybe you told im not to? eit) HANNAH. What? BROCK. Let's just say, you know, Tim just saying for sake of argument, what if you put him in the car. What #f you know full ‘well where he is and why he isn’t ansvrering? Just for the sake of argument TED. Youcant be seriously BROCK. —'molferinga hypothesis. We dontknow whathappened: seban you et this rom. We didnt se yu talk wo Mike=i that HANNAK. Ive told you exactly what happened— BROCK. ~Did J.D. bret you before he beefed us? HANNAH. No. learned about the ob the same time you di, TED. Okay, s0-v equals one BROCK. Does it? TED. Yes HANNAH. If knew something, why wouldn't tell you? BROCK. I don't know, Hannah, Why woulda’ you? What did J say when he called earlier today? Why were you so secretive abi that conversation? 2 Iaeation HANNAH, He was calling to make sure the job gets done anel to yellat me about Sovter. wasn't really eager to share. BROCK. What clo you mean to make sure the ob gets donc? HANNAH, He seid no matter what, he needs a design. BROCK. And you didn’t think this was worth mentioning anti HANNAH. No. Because it the Kind of thing J. D. says all the ime! "Teed this job done, no matter what" It's what passes for {Inspirational oratory with him, BROCK, You're awfully comfortable keeping secrets from us Maybe he also told you what's really going on. Maybe thas why owt joined us inthe Foom, out ofthe Ble. Maybe you and Sandeep ze inan the secret~ Maybe he's the tue tier ene. Mayle he got nto the towneas and crave away because st was his towncan Maybe he's Keyser fucking Séze! I mean, here we ate, putting him in our ter Thu maybe that whole thing with the Vision-sub-one was just him ‘ising with us ike rats in a maze. What about this? (BROCK goes to the sna rites "o> 1" ander “DEEP” and erases he" afer es nae) What if is greater than one for Sandeep? Wha iit’ this? (BROCK erases the +" behaeen “BROCK + TED” and series fone befewen “TED” and “HANNAH”, He then removes the ‘alfonso ider "TED + HANNAH” i aye "0> 1.) |so't Know swhae’s in any’ of your heads, What if everyone knows ‘suas wally going on but me? What if this isa massive conspiracy HANNA. tien HKOCK. Isnt? HANNAH. No. BROCK, Prove it TD tock... some things can'tbe... Gravity isjusta theory, righ?” iy! we dont enter into every design asking, “okay, what da we do IV suit starts falling up?” Sandeep is not the client I don’t know ‘yy thiny moze than you. Hannab isnt IMOCK, —How do we know— |ANNAH. —V equals one, goddammit! V equals one! For me, for sleep for Ted! T know exactly as much or as little as you do, Brock, Yue veally pissing me off at this point, actually. Sandeep‘Aaron Loeb has disappeared! And it may be completely innocent ot may be titer tater, and we cannot turn on each other right ow based ‘mn vaidom accussions. You have absolutely basis to sspct el (Bet) BROCK. Sor: HANNAH. Now ... We have twat for Saag to call me back, fied we have to say here incase he returns. While we wall we fave to conser anther serous ye we have). fess than fal an hour-Given the possibly Sandeep has bee abducted tyebyby-Vsionslb-one or you know». what do we tll Min? Fie capedting preliminary Hew on iguaaion ard disposal ana think we consi gree TED, —Wecan' dothat, HANNAH, Precisely. We cnt risk aking part in mass murder TED. —No! We can't do that because were down an engeet. The Tguidation system was Sandeeyrs design. Nome of us are qualified toereatea HANNAH, —Wete not going iodesign a hidation syste! ‘TED. [just su tht! But we can plan ut the rest ofthe sytem, HANNAH, Were not designing ay port of hi Te, We art take therisk ha they ze ‘TED. —On people witha deadly virus who will wipe outhumanity? We cant take tat risk? We cant ik ting good at ou bs and ting something amazing to save humaris”? Why no? BROCK. Dorit bean asshole, Tha’ not what she was going to sy fn you know TED. 1 knw it wasn’t what she was going to say and T sas not tring an asshole And shy are you tock to being, uly Mi, Hania Defender ll of suken? A minute ago you were accusing her of bing nom conspiracy BROCK. Iwas sayed By logis Te “TED. No you werent. You have abandoned logic. BROCK. You were looking fr bugs tot TED. Logic iciates that we dispssionately exsmine all the Friis to determine what we do nex HANNAH. No, it doesnt. The possiblity that Sandoep has been Kido iss esol at fat ctweighs ay other eatin 51 TED. —No, i doesnt You've created an anchor bas on the worst case scenario! {mean if someone tell you thy “hey theres one ‘ne-thousanath ofa percent chance tht the shampoo you tee you know, poisoning the groundwater and will ipeout ne human ce” do you stop washing your ha? HANNAH, That terse analogy: We are designing an actual death chamber You were igring oat howto dissolve bones in ac TED. Okay, Tue. Butits sla good analogy If theres this uh, tiny chance you'e poisoning the groondsraes, youd wash Your hae Snyway. If thetes 0 50 percent chance, you wouldnt Clean hale ‘nouldtbe woth the ie BROCK. Were talking about shampoo! What is happening? TED. Is there a5 percent chance Sandeep is right shout the Vision Holder? 10 percent? 1 percent? " HANNAH, Wecarttsy. And any chances oo high TED. Noi! BROCK. Wy no? TED, Bocuse saving all of mani logically is» higher good anesterminatings bse ef humanly eanevit SS (Pet) We havet ist all the potential scenatos here and all our posible reactions Fromthere wecam optimize ou path toa good cuore. (TED goes t the ft ond emseseergting. He writes Genocide.") iii ‘ HANNAH, —Optimizaon? Youte seriusly talking about cptinizing— TED. <1 am trying to weigh all the posses! Ym being “ispessonatel Scenario ona! This an elaborate plan to commit geod with competing bi roms competing am, al of whom ‘il be killed een the flan i putin afece Ohay? Scenario tea tract what we've been fold, svar virus (eres: "2 Vis tho rts", Poy Test” | suppose the only ater option s that this is some kind of psych experiment righ? Wee beng monitored to sec how we'll deal wth beings to design something, you know BROCK. Of, like, uh ike tht thing with the button and the screaming and people kept pressing Right. Theres so ferent Kind of fest thai A test thet se howe conti we beAaron Loch with something out of the bos, ight? Maybe someone wants ts fo take on a weird job and thisis their way of seeing if well do what it takes and go off the dep end when the job requires. (TED writes 4. Bie Te”) HANNAH. That an awfully expensive test, BROCK, Like Lalways say, CREDWS. HANNAH. What? BROCK. Crazy Rich Fuckers Do Weird Shit, That's it seit? W's the only thing that makes sense. I's test. HANNAH, How is that any more likely than scenario ane of 0? BROCK. Occam's Razor, Everything else is ust too... you know? “My gut says this turns out tobe atest ‘TED. Okay: Brock’keen gut instinct aside, any other options? (Paue) Good. Now, what we need to do is decouple cur actions and the HANNAH. Explain, ‘TED, Imagine each of these scenarios is equally probable, and we have no way of knowing which ane is real—with me so far? (BROCK an HANNAH nod) TED. Then. we just have to choose the best action to produce the highest probability of a good outcome if any ofthese scenarios tar cut to be true. Our possible ations are 8) agree to participate or B) refuse to participate, Right? (TED creates agri next fo he for Sears and labels the tp rowo“A) Agiee” and ”B) Refuse") BROCK. Right HANNAH, Wrong We could pretend to portcipate but hedge against scenario ane, Sabotage the chambers so they don'tso they ‘won't work. That would be a less dangerous action than outright reel ‘TED. Okay. Right Action G, sabotage (TED creates a ied Jae, "C) Sabotage") BROCK. But we're not building the chambers. How do we sabotage them? Heaton HANNAH. By designing a system that coms, on the sirfac, tobe a good idea, but is actually impossible a crete or impractical to execute BROCK. Oht Right. Yeah! Like, okay, so, for instance, and I'm just spitballing here, lamethrowers, TED. What? BROCK. Flamethrowers? You gather up the infected and, wh (He makes the sound of firing wp a flamethrower) ‘TED. So, you think in about 15 minutes we get on a call with J.D, and suggest the centerpiece of our pan Is flamethrowers BROCK. I's supposed to be credible bat impractical. I's just test. four answers area little lame= ‘TED. ~Test or not, J.D. can sil fre ws for being idiots HANNAK. -I was thinking maybe more technically difficult to ‘execute, lke perpetual motion machine oe something BROCK. Elaborate? HANNAH. Well, like, something that sounds om the surface, wh, you know, seems really flashy, but then when you actually have 1 ‘excoute the plan, . Oh! Oh, uh... SelFserve mass graves, BROCK. ke the sound of that HANNAH. Right? So, you have a system sehere the infected, okay, you tell them they're infected and convince them— BROCK. ~Oh ot oh right! For the good of humanity— HANNAH, ~Right! For the good—they have to climb into the mass graves themselves and, you know, ub. gee done, TED. Why would they go along with that? Why wouldn' they hold ‘out fora cure or demand! 0 see their kids ane last time of HANNAK. ~That’s the point. Some ofthe infected—maybe even :most—woulnt go along with it, which means you'd need a whole host of falafes, making the whole idea utterly impractical BROCK. Nice! So, if we want fo sabotage, we suggest seléserve mass graves. ‘TED. Okay, Great, Got that out of your systems? If ean direct your attention back to the board, lets say we do what Tm proposing, Which i, you know, just for shits and giggles, get back to work, dO ‘our damn jobs, and design the facilities. In this model, Tin calling that “Action A” What are the possible outcomes for that action based on these scenarios: genocide vis, psych test, business test?Aaron Loeb BROCK. Pt uh uh up arzve next othe ones that are good rnd uhefo, fuck that staple, Jast let me We're talking Sout sconavioe 1A, 2A, 38, aed A. Righ? Fach scenario paired wrth Action ‘As taing, BROCK ety ar robs mares) ike this. Yes Yes. Sy whats the otcome for coh? (Pe puts ed fry fc ingrid poston 14 and green sey Jost 24, 38,9) Uf we participate andi a genocide, 1A, weve helped il innocent people Women Children. Hoo! Fro face. I we participate and Eee people 38! Sly face we participate and dea good jon we paw ether text a HANNAH, Posing he fests oF not passing the tests is neutral BROCK. How do you figure? It demonstrates eur psychological Souninescr gts the company 358 HANNAH, Neither of which ae morally relevant when compared tba genocide ora speies-fevelling virus! BROCK, But both of which are good for us personaly Ths, smiley foc. TED. The model doesn't contemplate the moval ais It =ssomes all good outcomes are of equal value HANNAH. Which renders the model ivali! Wecan' equate moral food with seleinerest inthis instance ‘BROCK. Right! We need new actions. TED. Haw so? BROCK. Actions AB and C assume we ct asa team. If we¥e going {0 introduce this new complexity of selanteres, maybe tere are Scomarofaton pairings eta a siey fae for one of us ard 8 frowny face forthe others. Right? HANNAH, Brock, es not do this again— BROCK. -No,I kno ¥ equals one. Bu listen. Action D: conspire. (Meee eco “D) Cony” on the grid) Inaction, oneofussecretlycontacttheclient or theadenistratrs the test and say, "Tin one of you Tm down with genocide and Titelp you get te other to go song" ation D, oe of us makes Tre he ore sine mo mater hs, while he rest of us are pot through the camps Thats 1D Tim talking about Hon 8 (Pause) HANNAH. Are you saying that’s what you've done, Brock? BROCK. No! not saying—thisisjust...I’s logical right? This is ‘one ofthe actions. And fo all we know, Sandeep is playing out 1D ready, And for all I know, one of yo is considering it right now, (Beat. TED puts down the whiteboard marker) ‘TED. Kinda puts a dampeneron the spirit of collaboration, BROCK. You wore the one saying weld abandoned logic Te. TED. Yeah, and continuing to float wild hypotheticals that turn us against each other doesnt help matters, BROCK. t's not—it'sa logical scenario in which one of us maximizes his or her seleinterest atthe expense of—I cant be the only ane who sees this. Imean, Tim beginning to think you guys are pretending. to be bothered. You're just pissed because Tve said what you were already thinking? HANNAH. No one else was thinking of this, BROCK. Werent you? I mean, if this isa test, maybe were each getting fete on individual performance. Maybe youze each trying to figure out how to score mare points than me HANNAA. Yeah. That's precisely what Im doing. BROCK. And in the unlikely scenario that’s nota test... mean, Tim the only one here with nothing to lose but my job and ny life. You'e probably sitting thore trying to figure act how to protest Brian. How to protect Sandeep—theugh maybe you're a litte tor ‘on that ane, because he was just a fling and got too close, but now he's maybe in danger, and you arent sure what to think. And youre probably trying to igure out how to keep the whole thing secret from Brian and from FQ, You havea let to lose here. Maybe Action Dis just what the dactar ordered! Make a lit, uh keep your perfect Title ife ranning smoothly. HANNAH. Screw you, Brock. BROCK. A fine rebuttal. And what bout you, Ted? You've gotta be sitting here thinking “what if Deep isright? What will hey do to my wife? To my daughters?” What possible moral good could compare to them killing your Kis?! ‘TED. Are you threatening my kde? BROCK. No, 'm saying you're worried that they'll da something to your kids i56 Aaron Loeb TED, —Which is exactly hove yould obliquely threaten my family if ‘you wore working for them! You'd say "bos, if there is a conspiracy, ‘you must be awfully worried akoutyourkide.” Who are you working for really, Brock? BROCK. Im not working for anyone but mel All I'm saying is that youd turn on usin a second if you thought it— TED chucks on ota eraser at BROCK. 1 hits Be board) BROCK. Hey! You (BROCK tous 0 whiteboard marker back at TED. TED ducts 1. They begin fo sow whatever i handy at each other—papers, pens. Occasionally something connects, and Hey shout “OW"") ‘TED. Motherfucker! (Tie 0 ofthe ras at eech ether and actully start weresting, at fist ately inefesualy, Buti furs nto ra violence. One of ‘thom gh lly get hart. Te effet shouldbe one of going from aro frightens HANNA pounds othe conference root tate) HANNAH. Stop it! STOP TT) (Suddenly, HANNAH coll phone starts ringing. They stop, Bent Everyone starsat the phone) HANNAH. Oh my god. Its Sandeep, (Ste scrambles and grabs the hone. She enswers if. TED and BROCK step axny from each other and wuts her) HANNAH. Sandeep, where are you? Sandeep? Hello? What is can't... SANDEEP2?1 BROCK. What ist? Whats he saying? TED. Putit on speaker (Ghe does. We host either someone bung seated or just ‘an onary pocket dl 1 nnpossbet tll) HANNAH, Sandeep?! Can you hear me2!? (They all gather around the phone) ALL. SANDEEPY (Pause. They go sient. Wehear the ole nos on teeter ne. They Tok at each other, Click. The phone goes dond, HANNAH sits down hard, eal. he inmadatly reals, 1 goes steht ta voicemail. They all ear, Took at each aer. She das again Voicemail. She hays ip. They al stare at eaclrother Pause) Seaton = ‘TED. Iwas just a pocket dal. BROCK. ‘That wasntt—didn’t you hear him? Something's hhappentingsomebody’s doing something to him ‘TED. Sandeep is fine twas a pocket dial, BROCK. 1 think hes trying—maybe they have him somewhere and he's trying to get us a—he' trying to warn us and TED. ~It was. pocket dial, Brock, HANNAH, Itreally sounded lke a pocket dil. BROCK. tt sounded like he was being hurt! "TED. You'e freaking out! BROCK. You should be too! He was—that was—they’te hurting him! HANNAH. Im calling |. D. ‘TED. What? Why? HANNAH, Why?! Because Sandeep may be=I don't know=—that sounded like @ pocket dial but if i wasnt... we have to find aut ‘whats really going on. ‘TED. We are a mess! We have no presentation! No idens— HANNAH, —Well tell him wete behind. We have to get more sata ‘TED. —You are wasting time! Inthe precious minutes we have left, Wwe should be potting together our ideas for the call, This model is good. It works I we brute ferce it out, you will see that Acton A yields the highest probability of positive outcomes, Participating. Doing our jobs, Fiannah, you're supposed tobe the groven-up in the oom. You realy want to call. D.=ivth next to nothing o show for theday? Especially after he told you to make sure we got toa design, no matter what?! This sa bell ofa way to demonstrate he can trst you=showing him you've completely lst contro of this room. HANNAL. I have not ost contol of this room. This proposal is complex and could net beslapped together in ninety minutes ‘TED. ~Think about the optics! Youre one ofthe most highly placed women in this firm. You know the guys at corporate wonder if you're really tough enough for the job. And you let a junior team !membera team member you're sleeping with, Tmight add—get in your head? We've torn up the office and wasted our time and naw were going to look like incompetent assholes in Inont of the CEO) and. Hannah... Let’ get back to work.s Aaronboce (Beat) HANNA. | appreciate your thoughtful input, Ted. We'calling LD. ‘TED. Fine, Do whatever you want.1 dont want my name associated with it! Im getting coffee HANNAH, You can‘ leave this office! No poing to Starbucks. ‘TED. Why the hell not? BROCK, When Deep let, he got snatched... maybe, There's no telling what could happen ‘TED. —Fl tell you what will happen, Nothing, You are delusional Now if you'll excuse me, Im gonna go get some goddamned petite (TED storms out. Beat.) BROCK. How's this going to work? HANNAH. [dont know. Tel him Sandeep left... seehow he reacts? BROCK. That’ it? HANNAH. Got anything better? (Pause. BROCK shes his hd. She dias the oideon. I rings tend rings, BROCK glass tthe oad, uses tot, emesis ‘Aor a dozen rings he hangs up) BROCK. He's ducking us. HANNAH. you know; hes busy-Orhe's walking othe conference oc for our eal ina few minutes. Or he's in the bathroom. BROCK, Or he's ducking us, Did he say anything to you before? Anything that might help us figure out what he knows? HANNAH. No just what [told you (Bent, Ske suddenly makes a horrifying realization) (Om my goa. OF BROCK. Wat? HANNAH. [never never old you guys JD. sald he din't—that he wondered if he could trust me, Bu just nov, Ted sid, he sid, “his isabel of away ta prove he can trust you” How die he know J. De hha said that to me? BROCK. That could just bea thing he said—a coincidence! HANNAH. Or it could be just lke you said It could be Action D. ‘They threatened his kide— eatin 3 BROCK, ~Or it’ just—just, you know, “how can]. D. trust you" HANNAH, ~The exact words! He used— BROCK. ~Thiss Ted we're talking about! He grew me from a see ‘They got to him? Get) 1 was right Tha’ why be attached me. do you think-how ln do you think he's been working for them? bas * (Ener TED) BROCK. Ob, hey TED. (ie cam tll somhng’s wrong) Hey. How was [,D? BROCK. He wast there. WS almost asif he knew weld cal TED. Well sory to hear it HANNAH. Areyou? TED. uh. 1 dont know gues? Listen, guys, ve got some good news Some very good news found afd oF ours inthe iby (HANNAH juonps up, ce aight) HANNAH. Oh, thank god! Where the hell has he been? (Enter SCOOTER, footing shxpish. HANNAH is crashed. SCOOTER ths chonged clothes since she beginning of the ply sand now wearing gloves) SCOOTER. Hey: HANNAH. Scooter SCOOTER. I came byt uh, you know, apeogi? Maybe gta TED. Lan into him downstairs trying to get buzzed up. HANNAH, And you brought him in here Why?! BROCK. What the hell she doing here, Ted?! SCOOTER. Hey I gett vasa crappy assistant and so you red ‘ne. Bot my da go this job for me and it atlersa Ll Ni oo Trealized when f got home sell choald have teed harder Sou know, to, uh... whatever... to not get fired by you. Sa, sorry? * (Boat) HANNAL. (To TED) [want answers. Now, TED. Okay, okay. Calm down, Tel them what you told me.o ‘Aaron Loeb SCOOTER. Oh, yeah. Ted was asking me if knew anything ‘TED. —Inemembered that you sai .D-sent him to you, sol figured maybe lhe knew something about Senna, SCOOTER. I wasn’ supposed to say anything, but). D.and my dad, told me to keep an eye on you guys because there was some kind of test coming up. Listen, Hannah, Ican sce you're stil pissed at me, [but was thinking about the filing and ir you still— BROCK. ~Yeah yeah yoah. What kind of test? SCOOTER. Didnt sa: Just to tell them what I saw. How you guys reacted, ‘TED. We never considered this, (TED goes to owned and wortes "5. Loyalty Tes") {An internal test fo see how weld react to something completely ‘uiside the norm, ana possibly terrible BROCK, Godlammit, [knew it was atest Hold you guys! ‘TED. You did, You told ws BROCK. Have other teams been through 1? SCOOTER. I don't know. BROCK. Do they do this al the time? I've been here for ten years, tnd Ive never heard ofthis HANNAH. Neither have A loyalty test? TED. Look, we can get pissed off about it later, but for now, this [tle guy is the answer fo all our prayers. God only knows where Sandeep has gone, but now we have anether engineer to help us sign the liquidation chamber— HANNAH. —What' the point? It's test, why bother? BROCK. How do they rank the results? I mean, what are the parameters we're being tested on? Are we being ranked against ther teams? HANNAH, Who cares? We just tll .D. we knouw isa test, Unless, you know. what if he's lying? What if youre lying? SCOOTER, Sorry? HANNAH, You coming in here and saying its atest doesn't prove anything, does i? I just means We know youre saying its ates. ‘That doesn’t make ita test. Or what if}. D. was lying to you? ‘TED. Hannah ... at some point, you've got tolet goof sation a HANNAH. —Why are you wearing gloves? SCOOTER. What? HANNAH. Ifs not cold, What re you hiding? Letus see your hands SCOOTER. They're just gloves, HANNAH. Where's Sandeep? Was he trying to call me? What were they doing to him SCOOTER. Doingtohim...Idont~tjustcameupheretoapologize and try to get my job back and Ted grabbed me. That's it I dont ‘know about Sandeep. Seriously. Youre acting like Ive threatened Io hurt you or something. Have I threatened you? HANNAH. No, SCOOTER. Have I threatened Brock or Ted? Or Sandeep? Or your husband? HANNAH. Why are you asking me that? SCOOTER. I just want to make ste wee all close here, All did ‘was walk into the room. I didrit threaten anyone. Sol don know why youre treating me lke Ive threatened you. ‘TED. Guys, we have J.D. in ik, five minates, What are we going to present? SCOOTER. How sbout I step out and grab you a coffee? I can tell you need te talk. Milk and two sugars, tight? Gat) HANNAH. Yes that’s right, (Hoexts) ‘TED. The kid can help us pull this out ofthe tilt and pus the test. And [can get io Emily’ game. Regionals. This has been the worst goddamned day we've ever had asa team, [realize that. But can we jst do this presentation, pretend none of this ever happened. and {get on with our lives? HANNAH. I don't now if we'll ever be able todo that. ‘TED. Well, you don't know until you ty right? (eat) ‘Whatisit? Why are you looking at me like that? BROCK. We thought you were in on it. Apparently you repeated something JD. said to her, (Ste looks at BROCK horrified.)2 ‘Aaron Loeb BROCK. Whai? Now that we know isa test youcantstillbelieve (TED sighs an sits next fhe He holds her hands in his She looks frightened He lots in ke eves) ‘TED. Hannah... swear on the lives of my children that v is equal to one, [know nothing more about any ofthis than you do. Now you have to ask yourselt—i fm in on ie Scooters inom it... why are ‘we sill ere? If were serving some shadowy Vision Holder, why do they care whether Youre in ornot? HANNAM. I dont knows: They need the team. TED. Wig? (Rex) “There's no god answer besuse it doesnt make ay sense (ist) HANNAH. Where Sandeep? ‘TED. Thea wo sa hm, Hanna though we were desing {eth emp for sme hy tery conspiracy d= ate 0 $27 thissbut you kinds tested fo have him deported. Why wuld Ie take your eal? Hes probaly hiding somevnhere, ron the Sst lane oat of the county. You know what I ting he thew his one out to Keep, uh, Big Brother fom tracing him down. The eke il mights been afomeless guy playing wiht HANNAH tes tt? TED. sates. HANNAH ifs jast so har to tive You wah ot of the oom ane ‘ms tuck wth the exact answer sv wanted to hea: Scooter heard Strava et from Day? TED. Tha what happened HANNAH. Why is he wenting gloves? BROCK. Because he lke glove! Jno! It's est ike I tld you, ‘And weate going fa HANNAH, You know what? I hope youre right and that weve failed alzendy. I hap thay tell eo one ele has ever gone pst thet five tute andthe lnger you lst the wer your sore Tope they ask us: Why did you ast ran oto the room? Wy ait you keep ping” (Bet ToTED) sation 63 Bat I don‘ think—I don’t know if tsa test... An I don't know if you really beieveitis orf you're just saying its orf someone made ‘you tellus that orf maybe even you came up with the whole story BROCK. —its Ted! The same Ted that walked in that door this ‘morning, The same Ted we've both known fora decade I's just Ted and some kid from Cal geting coffee HANNAH. Is i? TED. Yes! BROCK. And ether way, we have a cal n one minute, Less. get foute word tout imaginary peopl in inaginary death compa int T need you fo facut on real people now of yoursell You ned tofu go withthe program HANNAH. How can P How ean you? BROCK. What the alernative? Thera alemative? Tel JD. you refuel partipae in ie genocide) HANNAH. wold say tht way, Weean makea plan— BROCK. —We have 30 seconde, What's the pln? Refuse to present in he answers your questions abo! Sandeep? Demand afower? Bontusy eytnings What HANNAH. [dont know! TED. Ofcourse you doi! Thensn0~ BROCK. ~You have o consider what happens itis loyaly test If we don't present right now, they'llinvestigate why. Thay find ot about the sf. Bean wil dou, They wil desioy You Hannah and then hey turn thir ateton ope, We tet ot contol ofthe root on tis Bagel importa Jo, They reverts of gui Our carers wll beover Yul us Eth Why would yo de that toe” HANNAH. Becase we have to consider=I have to consider the onsbiythat hielo nota test BROCK, ivy? Becsuse Scooter i wating loves? Because Ted ssid something thatsounded ike something said nee Beene Stndoep go inact? Are thos good enough reason tvow aay eterything? Hannah pose (Brer SCOOTER sith cf. He places He apn front HANNAH.) " Gomes SCOOTER. Here you go. (Beat)6 Aaron Loeb LHANNAK. If we present, what would we even— ‘TED, Il describe the shipping containers idea a for liquidation, uh BROCK. We say Deep got called away. Family emergency. But Scooter jumped in and has a bunch of great leas. Early stat ‘TED, Do you think you could design seléserve mass graves? SCOOTER. What? ub ... what kind of projects this? BROCK. Oh! Wait! Do you think you could design a system where ‘people kill homsolves inside shipping containers? ‘TED, Make the shipping containers the mass graves? That's genius SCOOTER. I guess. mean... . why would people—do the people ‘want to =Is this fr suicidal people or something? (The videon starts to ving, Flurry of acticity, putting om jackets tnd straightening the oom as tl as Hey Gt) BROCK. Shit, Thats]. D. Ifsjustatest,Scooter. Can you do it or now? SCOOTER. | think Iean, Brock, Lots of edge cases but sure, BROCK. Atta boy: Hannah, are you in? Itbuys us time, (Bent. The dco rings again. Ard wpa.) HANNAH. Yes, Okay. We present (HANNAH goes tothe vifeon) BROCK. Thank god. HANNAH, I'l give a quick intro, tell]. D. were a man down but very excited, thon throw to Brock. Keep ithigh level (SCOOTER sets HANNAH tas let her coffe as he's Straghtening up. He brgs to ker) SCOOTER. Don't forget your coffee [ made it how you like it brownand Sweet BROCK. Okay. Here we go (de reaches answer the videon, HANNAL stops hin) HANNAH, Te, why did you suggest we go with seléserve mass raves? ‘TED, —Just something to get us started HANNA, But that was supposed to be— TED. —Hannah, We're out of time. ation 6 HANNAH. Wait (TED answers the vidcon) J.D. (Voiceoter) Good afternoon, team, TED, SCOOTER, BROCK. Good evening, JD, J.D. (Woicwer) So, Hannah, what da you have for meso far? (ALL tok of HANNAH. Pause. She oo at BROCK and TED, so eager. She picks up the coffer ig, then looks st SCOOTER, song at er, She puts the mg dow vito drinking. She looks 4 TED, sng fatherly but tie sad. Then BROCK, staring at her as though exerything i gent. Iti mpossibie to decide what todo) (Bleckout) End of Play