Luminary
[MLM-212 (5C12)]
Written by Chip Johannessen
Directed by Thomas J Wright
Edited by James Coblentz
U.S. Air Date: 23 January 1998
[Transcribed by Libby]
[A beautiful wooded area. Blue sky, trees, a river, water running over small boulders, haunting music. Up on a bank of the river a bundle covered with branches and leaves starts to move down towards the water. The bundle is a body.]
EMMOLAK WILDERNESS, ALASKA
VOICE OVER: I never thought it would end like this. To tell the truth, I never thought it would end at all.
[The body, clad in jeans and an orange jacket, falls into the water way below. It is carried down the river.]
[fade to black]
[fade up]
FRANK: I'm still not to sure what this is.
WATTS: Don't worry, you'll be fine.
[They are walking down a corridor.]
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON
FRANK: I'd do better if you'd given me a little bit more warning.
WATTS: Ah, well. Between you and me that's the way they like it. No advance warning.
FRANK: They?
WATTS: We. The Group.
FRANK: Yeah.
[They stop. Watts gestures Frank on.]
WATTS: Good luck.
[As Frank continues walking:]
WATTS: Hey! Just , be yourself.
[Watts rests up against the wall.]
[Frank enters a wood-paneled room. There are ten Millennium people there, sitting in a circle, an empty chair in the middle.]
INQUISITOR: Please, sit down, Frank.
[Frank sits.]
INQUISITOR: A number of us here have planes to catch, so I'd like to get right into this.
FRANK: Please.
MEMBER: Tell us, who founded the Millennium Group.
FRANK: I'm not sure.
INQUISITOR: Please, turn and face him.
[Frank turns to face the Member.]
FRANK: I'm not sure who founded the Group. I was told that I would learn when the time is right.
FINLEY: And did you?
[He turns to face her.]
FRANK: Apparently not.
INQUISITOR: Why are you here?
FRANK: Mike Atkins brought me to the Group. He, uh, helped me understand the nature of my gift and convinced me that I could be of service again.
FINLEY: Is that important – to be of service?
FRANK: Of course …
MEMBER: No platitudes. Do you believe it's important.
FINLEY: Frank. About two months ago you stabbed a suspect to death in a case the Group was investigating.
FRANK: The Group wasn't investigating. So I did.
MEMBER: Is that how this works? Now you're with us, now you're not.
INQUISITOR: Let me state our concern. The Group has a history and a purpose that is alive in everyone in this circle. This purpose demands from us a certain strength. Now, with your personal problems – the estrangement from your wife, your lapse into ultra-violence, with these things clouding your gift as you call it – do you still consider yourself a viable candidate?
FRANK: I don't consider myself a candidate. I consider myself a father and a husband.
MEMBER: How? Your family left you.
[Frank looks at the Member and sighs, then turns back to the Inquisitor.]
FRANK: You know, I could have quietly retired from the FBI, and I'd be a father and I'd have a wife, a family, but I sacrificed that for the Group. I have done everything the Group has asked me to do.
INQUISITOR: [leaning forward] Didn't the Group in fact ask you to wait before you rushed in there and killed that man.
[Frank is getting a little exasperated.]
FRANK: You know, this is what's commonly known as a trick-bag. And if you think I don't recognize it, you're very mistaken.
[Frank gets up, swings the chair round and leaves. The questioners sit there looking at the swiveling chair. Frank walks down the corridor to Watts. He stands for a second looking at Watts, sighs, and walks off down the corridor. Watts remains where he is and looks at the door Frank has just exited.]
[The voice over continues as the scene fades into showing the body continuing down the river.]
VOICE OVER: There are forces acting on us. With or without our consent. Forces sure of themselves as gravity. I thought knowing myself with the same certainty would keep me safe. But – surprise! As they say, what a long strange trip this has been.
[fade to black]
[main titles]
"LUMINARY"
[polaroid fade up]
[A Planetarium. Graphics showing the solar system are displayed while a Lecturer provides a commentary.]
LECTURER: To us on earth, the stars are fixed and the planets sluggish. From the stars' perspective, our solar system is a hurricane of activity, a maelstrom that refutes any mechanism …
[The audience, including Frank, Jordan and Catherine, are seated in tilted-back seats.]
FRANK: [whispering to Jordan] I think he said the same thing when I was in the second grade.
JORDAN: [whispering] Daddy, please! Ssssh!
[She puts her finger to her lips. Frank mouths "OK" back at her.]
LECTURER: ... our corner of the universe is host to the commotion of the fiercest comets, raging on all sides, great clouds of fire that we call nebulae ...
[Frank's pager buzzes. He takes it out and looks at it. Jordan looks at him and gives a very big sigh.]
LECTURER: Closer to home, surprising variations within the planets of our own solar system. Centuries sped up to minutes, we see Pluto changing places with Neptune then returning to its rightful position as the outermost planet, in time for the coming Millennium. Just as it has for every millennium before.
JORDAN: Mommy, what's "millennium"?
CATHERINE: Sssh.
LECTURER: ... and find out soon. The time is near.
[Outside the lecture room. Frank, Catherine and Jordan walk out into the foyer.]
CATHERINE: If we could enroll Bill Gates' kid, we wouldn't have to go through all this.
FRANK: Now you're talking.
[Catherine laughs.]
FRANK: Hey.
[His pager buzzes again.]
CATHERINE: It's OK, you can get it.
FRANK: I know what it is.
[Jordan spots someone. She runs off to a couple and a young boy.]
JORDAN: I'll be right back.
CATHERINE: I haven't seen her this happy in a while. [They smile at each other.] I think she likes having both of us around.
FRANK: Maybe it's young love.
[Jordan and a young boy.]
CATHERINE: Oh, no, that's the family that I told you about, whose son disappeared. We've had them over at the house a couple of times.
[The couple, boy and Jordan start walking towards Catherine and Frank.]
CATHERINE: They know about your work. Want me to intercept?
FRANK: It's OK.
CATHERINE: Hi. Hi, Molly. This is my husband Frank and this is, I'm sorry …
BILL: Bill Glaser. And this is Ian.
FRANK: Ian.
[Molly, Bill and Frank exchange glances. Catherine turns to the children.]
CATHERINE: Hey you guys, you know what horoscopes are? Let's go see what the stars hold for us, OK?
JORDAN: OK.
BILL: See you later.
MOLLY: See you.
FRANK: Cute kid.
BILL: Yeah. I gather Catherine's told you.
FRANK: Yeah.
MOLLY: We understand you're with the FBI.
FRANK: Was. I'm a consultant now.
[At the Astrologer's booth.]
ASTROLOGER: Taurus. The bull. Absolutely.
[She's talking to Ian. Catherine is amused.]
ASTROLOGER: [to Jordan] Leo. The lion. That's some mane.
CATHERINE: That's very good. Did they give you the school birthday roster?
ASTROLOGER: [to Catherine] You. Cancer.
CATHERINE: Aquarius.
ASTROLOGER: Sun sign, sure. I meant your moon sign. Sit down. What's your birthday? February?
JORDAN: The sixth.
ASTROLOGER: Oh, thank you.
[Catherine sits down, Jordan on her knee. The astrologer is working on a chart.]
CATHERINE: Nineteen sixty-three.
ASTROLOGER: You have a great spiritual sensitivity. An almost psychic sixth sense.
CATHERINE: Maybe my husband.
[They look over to where Frank, Bill and Molly are talking.]
ASTROLOGER: Scorpio. The investigator.
[Catherine looks uncomfortable.]
CATHERINE: Well, it's been fun. [to the kids] Let's go over there.
ASTROLOGER: You're in a very difficult transition right now. You're not together, are you. Your family.
[Catherine has ushered the children away, but remains seated.]
[Frank, Bill and Molly continue their conversation.]
BILL: I know Alaska is a big state. But all they would say was: we've done everything we can.
MOLLY: They flew a helicopter back and forth a couple of times, maybe.
BILL: Yeah, I offered to write a check for a bigger search but they got all huffy, like it was a bribe. Look, um, I'm not used to asking for favors, certainly not from strangers, but …
MOLLY: He's alive. [beat] I know it.
[The astrologer and Catherine.]
ASTROLOGER: You were born with Neptune overhead, and your husband had Pluto opposite. The tug of these two planets on each other is the great conflict of our times.
CATHERINE: At the planetarium they said that Pluto and Neptune cross paths.
ASTROLOGER: Every five hundred years a great clash, a spiritual force with earthly power, out of which comes a new era. In the past the birth of Christ, King Arthur's court, the Renaissance.
CATHERINE: And this time?
ASTROLOGER: This time the great conflict is also your conflict. The two of you.
[Catherine is about to respond but is interrupted by Frank.]
FRANK: Catherine.
[He nods to her. Catherine turns back to the astrologer.]
CATHERINE: Um. [hesitates, then turns to Frank] I'm ready.
[The astrologer hands her the charts. Catherine goes off with Frank.]
[A photograph of boy, a tent, belongings. Frank, Bill and Molly are in Alex's bedroom.]
BILL: I guess we went a little overboard – GPS, solar computer, emergency transmitter, but, Alaska's a long way away and he had this thing about going alone.
MOLLY: When Alex graduated High School, all his friends wanted sports cars. He just wanted to go back.
FRANK: Go back?
BILL: Yeah, we did some Alaska cruises a couple of years ago. I mean, completely different. We barely got off the boat. But what are we going to say, though. He's a great kid, honor roll, nice friends …
[Frank has been looking at the photograph of the smiling Alex, now he has a vision of the aurora borealis.]
BILL: … varsity miler, no drugs, doesn't even like beer.
MOLLY: He never really asked for anything before.
FRANK: You mind if I keep this.
BILL: No, go ahead.
MOLLY: Um, we put together this list that we thought might help, drivers license, birth date, credit cards. It doesn't say on there, but he'd be a freshman now, at Tufts.
[She starts to cry.]
[Through the window the night sky shows the full moon, which is being looked at through a telescope by the young boy, Ian.]
BILL: Alex had it since he was a kid. He was teaching Ian the constellations before he left. Asked Ian to watch it for him till he got back.
[Bill picks up Ian.]
MOLLY: Ian says he'll see Alex with it. Maybe if they got a call from you …
FRANK: No. [pause] I'm going to Alaska.
[Frank's bedroom. Frank is packing while talking on the phone.]
FRANK: All I need is a standard briefing package, that we normally get from law enforcement.
WATTS: [on phone] Frank, you have no authority to accept work on behalf of the Group, especially after that review. I must have paged you ten times today.
FRANK: Are you going to help me or not?
WATTS: So how does this work – you get uncomfortable, you walk?
FRANK: I've always made the assumption that this was a two-way street.
[With Watts is another man – we don't see his face – he shakes his head at Watts.]
WATTS: I'm sorry. You're on your own.
[Frank ends the call and throws the phone into his bag.]
[Alaska. Small single-engine plane comes into land on a lake.]
STEBBINS, ALASKA
[The plane is neatly taxied up to a wooden jetty. The pilot gets out and tethers the plane. Frank exits.]
[Stebbins Sheriff's office.]
SHERIFF: So, here's your damn prints.
[He hands Frank an arrest sheet with photograph of Alex who is smiling even though his face is bruised.]
FRANK: Thank you.
SHERIFF: I hate it when they smile.
[The arrest sheet shows Statement of Officers: 21.1.98. Includes "drunk and disorderly", "street".]
FRANK: Drunk and disorderly.
SHERIFF: Can't lock 'em up for being irritating. Between us, I stashed him in there.
[Points to cells.]
SHERIFF: Mostly for his own protection.
FRANK: Protection from whom?
SHERIFF: A long list. Didn't your Group tell you anything?
[Frank opens the door to the cells.]
FRANK: I left Seattle without a briefing.
SHERIFF: Look, some teenage millionaire wants to buy a few rounds with a singing doll, no-one's gonna object, but he's giving expensive crap to people's wives. Wives who are lucky if they get new boots at Christmas. Now that's gonna generate some animosity.
FRANK: Oh, yeah.
SHERIFF: Huh, I've seem some bar brawls in my day but this one was special. Saved his ass that time, but it was pretty clear he wasn't gonna last up here.
[Frank is looking under the mattress.]
SHERIFF: Oh, after all that, he forgets his swank watch under that mattress. I've seen the ads, five grand. What a little pissant.
[There are shouts from outside.]
MAN: John, you here?
[The man comes in – he is dressed in yellow waders.]
MAN: John, the boy, the one you were looking for? They found him.
[Outside. A winch is landing a fishing net full of fish. Someone pulls away some fish to reveal a horribly decomposed corpse. People groan.]
SHERIFF: Like I said, he wasn't gonna last.
[Frank looks at the corpse and again sees vision of aurora borealis.]
FRANK: That's not him.
[Frank walks off as the sheriff looks at him quizzically.]
[fade to black]
[polaroid fade up]
[The Morgue. The body is lying on a metal table.]
CORONER: Nature ain't a dainty eater.
[He presses record on a tape recorder.]
CORONER: Barry Nolan, acting Coroner. Conducting autopsy on Alex Glaser.
FRANK: The dental match is inconclusive.
SHERIFF: Well, what do you want? Half the jaw is missing.
FRANK: I'd prefer we designate him a John Doe.
CORONER: [sighs] Conducting autopsy on John Doe.
FRANK: Thank you.
CORONER: Height five foot eleven, like Alex Glaser. Shoe size ten, like Alex Glaser. Estimated age eighteen, like Alex Glaser. Connective fascia …
[As he inserts a scalpel, Frank looks away.]
CORONER: … severely degraded. Two or three weeks under water.
SHERIFF: Like Alex Glaser. I'll notify the parents.
FRANK: And tell them what? About the brutality of this man's death, about his crushed skull, with no evidence that this is their son.
[Frank picks up a pair of tweezers and extracts a leaf from within one of the wounds.]
FRANK: Conifer.
SHERIFF: Three hundred million cedars in this state, about as unusual as antlers on a moose.
[A photocopy machine. Frank has photocopied the conifer leaf. He sits down at his laptop and puts the photocopy in a scanner.]
FRANK: Do you know where the trawler fished the body out the water. I can factor in the currents to determine where he entered the water.
[The laptop screen shows that the modem is dialing. "Host negotiating. Host accept. Socket enabled."]
FRANK: The conifer is very generic but with the knowledge we have – who knows.
SHERIFF: I know this – someone didn't like his charming ways, though most of your wet ones are D and D.
[Frank looks at him questioningly.]
SHERIFF: Drunk and drowned.
FRANK: Alex didn't drink.
SHERIFF: He sure was on something the night he spent in that cell.
[The laptop has connected. Frank speaks into the microphone.]
FRANK: Soylent green is people.
[The Sheriff doesn't seem to know what to make of that.]
[The screen shows: "Access denied. Connection terminated. Socket closed." Frank is surprised.]
FRANK: [to Sheriff] Probably the phone lines.
SHERIFF: Yeah. They're what-you-call-it, fiber-optic.
FRANK: Oh.
[Astrologer's charts. A book, chapter: Pluto and Neptune, The Cosmic Insemination. Catherine is looking through the book. Prints: lions feasting on a priest, figures looking at a bright star in a dark sky, a horseman attacking, a red-robed man seated and looking at a book. The latter picture has underneath: The Renaissance, Receiving Wisdom on Mt. Ventoux. The phone rings.]
CATHERINE: Hello.
FRANK: [on phone] Hi. Did I wake you?
CATHERINE: No, I was just paying some bills.
[Frank is using a payphone.]
CATHERINE: How are you making out?
FRANK: Fine. Except I've got a computer glitch. Is there any chance you could go over to my place and check it out for me?
CATHERINE: Sure. [pause] Frank?
FRANK: What.
CATHERINE: I was just thinking about you, that's all. Um, I'm pretty sure that Jeannie's in across the hall, I'll see if she can watch Jordan.
FRANK: Thank you.
[Frank's house. Catherine is using the phone on "hands free".]
CATHERINE: This was worth it just to check out your new lifestyle.
[Catherine is using Frank's computer. There's a desktop icon: "Ladies of the night" with a cartoon figure high-kicking.]
CATHERINE: Ladies of the night?
FRANK: Oh, that's just a CD-ROM. It's about owls.
[Catherine laughs.]
CATHERINE: Yeah, sure. [moves cursor to a different icon] OK, Millennium Group, hitting it now.
[Screen: Please initiate voice authentication.]
FRANK: [into phone] Soylent green is people.
[Screen shows: Access denied. Communication terminated.]
CATHERINE: Access denied. You want me to give Peter a call?
FRANK: No, no, let's go outside the Group. I want you to open up an icon marked "plastic".
[Catherine does so. It opens a connection. Screen: Dialing host. Host answer. Connecting. Remote granted. Then: Plastic V 0.975. Please enter credit or account numbers. Pin Number, Inactive Accounts, International Banks, IRS database.]
CATHERINE: Wait a minute. You can find out what anyone's charged. You've done that to me, haven't you.
FRANK: Yeah. Four one nine zero one one six zero three five one two two six.
[Catherine enters the numbers. Screen shows: FTP server, downloading data.]
FRANK: Should be …
CATHERINE: … Alex Glaser. The only entry from Alaska is a general store, Monroe's.
FRANK: That's where I am.
CATHERINE: Five hundred and eighty seven dollars, and thirty eight cents.
FRANK: Five hundred and eight-seven dollars. For what?
CATHERINE: Just says merchandise.
[Catherine hears someone trying to open a door.]
CATHERINE: Wait a minute. There's somebody outside.
FRANK: What? Catherine?
[fade to black]
[end credits]
Music by Mark Snow
Editor: James Coblentz
Production Designer: Mark Freeborn
Director of Photography: Robert McLachlan
Executive Story Editor: Michael R Perry
Associate Producer: Julie Herlocker
Associate Producer: Kathy Gilroy-Sereda
Associate Producer: Jon-Michael Preece
Consulting Producer: Chip Johannessen
Consulting Producer: Darin Morgan
Co-Producer: Robert Moresco
Co-Producer: Paul Rabwin
Producer: Thomas J Wright
Co-Executive Producer: Ken Horton
Co-Executive Producer: John Peter Kousakis
Written by Glen Morgan & James Wong
Directed by Thomas J Wright
Executive Producers: James Wong & Glen Morgan
Executive Producer: Chris Carter