Shadow 19

SHADOW 19
Jon Spaihts
917-855-5421
June 30 draft (rough)
jon@spaihts.com

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FADE IN:
EXT. SATURN ORBIT - FAR FUTURE
Saturn swims against the stars, its rings slicing the night.
DIONE, a pale moon, looms in the foreground.
SUPER: DIONE, MOON OF SATURN
A battleship crosses the moon’s disk. On its hull: the name
HIGHLINE - and the symbol of a red hawk.
INT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE (IN FLIGHT)
CAPTAIN CONRAD VANCE of the Offworld Marine Corps prepares
for combat. He is a rugged man of 40, calm and focused. In
his massive ARMORED SPACE SUIT he looks superhuman: a half-
ton war machine. His rifle is big as a cannon.
Technicians swarm around him, checking systems.
Nearby, more technicians tend to ELEVEN OTHER MARINES: elite
soldiers in their late 20s and early 30s.
Vance is first on his feet. He steps free of his prep station
and walks the line, inspecting his men.
Motors hum as he walks. His footfalls shake the deck.
One of Vance's men catches his eye - MOX, a seasoned soldier.
MOX
What do you think, Cap?
Vance shrugs - a massive movement of armored shoulders.
VANCE
The ammo load is armor-piercing, so
whatever we're fighting, it's big.
VOICE (O.S.)
That's right.
Silence in the room. The Marines turn to the man who stands
on a raised deck above them: their commander, COLONEL COBURN.
Coburn wears an ordinary uniform and a headset. He frowns in
concentration, listening and talking at once.
COBURN
The Hegemony has heavy tanks
advancing on the Dione Colony.

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2.
VANCE
The Colony has anti-ship guns. How
did they land tanks?
COBURN
They dropped 'em weeks ago on the
far side of the moon. They crawled
all the way around, right under the
radar.
MOX
What crawled all the way around?
COBURN
Four D-Class tanks. And a mystery
target. Something bigger.
VANCE
Bigger than a D-Class?
COBURN
Something new. Target's designated
“Colossus”. We've got destroyers
inbound, but they’re six hours
away. Right now you’re all we have.
The Marines become grim. This is a desperate action.
COBURN (CONT'D)
Six thousand people live and work
in the Dalton Mining Colony. Maybe
they’ll be rotting in prison ships
tonight. Maybe they’ll be free. You
decide it now. Lock in.
The Marines step into metal drop capsules. The capsules close
and sink into their launch tubes.
EXT. DIONE
The DIONE COLONY, an industrial city, sits rooted to the
rock. The red hawk symbol is painted on its walls.
Around the city, the mines lie silent: digging machines
abandoned in their trenches.
MISSILES swarm over the horizon toward the colony. The
colony’s GUNS blast some from the sky. Other missiles
detonate against the city walls.
A digging machine EXPLODES in a weird airless fireball.

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3.
Smoke clears. Across the valley, four D-CLASS TANKS climb
over the ridgeline. They are three stories high, painted with
the blue interlocking circles of the Hegemony.
The colony goes turtle: withdrawing its towers, it closes up
and hunkers down against the rock.
EXT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE (IN ORBIT)
The Battleship's guns begin to fire in a cycle of terrible
violence: pounding at their targets on the moon below.
Twelve DROP-CAPSULES launch. Rocket toward the surface of
Dione.
EXT. DIONE - DALTON COLONY BATTLEFIELD
The battleship’s bombardment hammers the tanks. Near-misses
and hits. Their armor is damaged but withstands the assault.
The tanks launch flares and interceptor missiles.
A drop-capsule rockets down and shatters, revealing Vance in
full armor. He vaults from the impact crater - as a missile
explodes where he just landed.
Other drop capsules hurtle down, OTHER MARINES emerge. They
take cover in rocky terrain chaotic with explosions.
ATHENA’S VOICE
All troops down safe.
VANCE
Marines! Give me a battle line,
twenty meter spacing. Athena.
Tactical.
The electronic voice of his armor's battle computer answers
him - feminine, calming.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Tactical.
Vance’s visor lights up, painting the terrain around him with
data: enemies, friendlies, ranges and velocities.
Each Marine is tagged in Vance's display with his name and
status. Vance watches his men move into a battle line.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Four D-Class tanks incoming. Target
“Colossus” out of range.

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4.
The four tanks loom closer. Behind them, Vance’s visor
display indicates the Colossus, hidden behind the ridge.
VANCE
Advance on me. Fire as you go.
Vance moves toward the D-Class Tank at a run through the
broken terrain. The other Marines join in seconds later,
their rifles blazing.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Incoming fire.
From the tanks, energy beams flash toward the Marines. Vance
cartwheels off the ground, JUMP-JETS flaring from his boots.
He arcs through space, firing all the while.
Behind him Marines take evasive action on their jets.
VANCE
We're not breaching the armor.
Let's get close and do some
demolition.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Fatality. Sergeant Holder.
Vance charges a tank. Enemy fire rakes the ground around him.
INT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE - COMMAND COCKPIT (IN ORBIT)
Onscreen, Colonel Coburn watches the battle unfold below.
A fatality marker throbs where Sergeant Holder fell. The
eleven remaining Marines charge toward the enemy.
EXT. DIONE - BATTLEFIELD
Vance reaches a tank: gets in under its guns and keeps going,
right between its gnashing treads and under its armored body.
From a pod on his thigh he pulls a series of powerful mines.
Plants them on the belly of the tank.
VANCE
Athena. Detonate on my mark.
On the underside of the tank, belly hatches open. ARMED
TROOPERS drop out. Their gunfire ricochets off his armor.
Vance hurls a mine into an open hatch. Fires his jump-jets.
Cannonballs through the troopers into the clear.

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5.
VANCE
Now!
Behind him the tank EXPLODES spectacularly.
Vance scans the battlefield - two of the D-Class Tanks burn
furiously. Marines concentrate fire on the other two.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Fatality. Lieutenant Carver.
Vance looks up, and gapes in awe. The COLOSSUS climbs over
the ridge: a tank twice as big as the D-Class machines. A
fortress on the move.
VANCE
I see the Colossus. It’s a monster.
COBURN (V.O.)
We are hitting it now.
A barrage of shells from the orbiting Battleship. Explosions
march across the lunar surface and pound the Colossus.
When the smoke clears, the Colossus is battered but intact:
still coming.
Its mammoth guns rise to point toward the stars.
VANCE
Heads up, Command! Colossus is
returning fire...
A thunderous concussion shakes the ground. Flames leap as the
Tank's heavy guns all fire at once.
EXT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE (IN ORBIT)
Gunfire from the Colossus far below tears into the
Battleship, triggering a chain of EXPLOSIONS.
INT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE - COMMAND COCKPIT
Colonel Coburn, shaken badly, watches damage reports stream
in from the Battleship’s burning sections.
COBURN
Marines. We are hit. Highline is
disengaging.

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6.
EXT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE (IN ORBIT)
The Battleship veers away from Dione.
EXT. DIONE - DALTON COLONY BATTLEFIELD
All four of the D-Class Tanks are burning hulks. Marines
emerge from the smoking wreckage to advance on the Colossus.
Vance watches in horror as the mighty guns of the Colossus
lower to engage in the surface battle.
VANCE
Rapid advance! Move! Move!
The battle line breaks into a run: the Marines sprint toward
the Colossus, rifles flashing...
The HEAVY GUNS of the Colossus open fire. The Marines take
evasive action - but one by one soldiers are BLASTED into
oblivion.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Fatality. Sergeant Markhart.
Fatality. Sergeant Chan. Casualty.
Lieutenant Drake.
Vance roars in rage.
VANCE
Cover! Take cover!
The Marines dive for shelter as the guns shake the earth.
VANCE
(under his breath)
Too many. Too many.
He stares at the Colossus, scanning the giant war machine
with telescopic vision.
His gaze settles on the anti-personnel gun turrets that
protrude like steel barrels from the tank's hull.
VANCE
McGrath! Get to Drake. Run a med-
check. Everybody else, fire from
cover on my order. Target the
sensors. Eyes and ears. I want that
monster blind. Ready...
(gathers himself, poised
to sprint)
Fire!

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7.
Vance explodes from cover, racing toward the Colossus. Around
him, the Marines blast away at the Colossus's sensors with
precision rifle fire.
Vance is half running and half flying, his jump-jets blazing.
The Colossus pounds the battlefield with haphazard firepower,
but Vance weaves and leaps and the gunfire doesn’t touch him.
He gets in past the guns. Leaps onto the Colossus. Clings
magnetically beside a gun turret.
A plasma torch extends from his forearm. He aims at the seam
where the turret meets the hull and lights up.
Blinding light from the contact point. His visor darkens.
White-hot liquid metal gouts down the side of the tank.
He plants his feet, wraps his arms around the gun and heaves.
The motors of his battle-suit WHINE.
ATHENA’S VOICE
Warning. Critical strain.
VANCE
(through clenched teeth)
Override!
With a SCREECH, the entire turret tears out of the tank. A
GUNNER spins to the rock below. A BLAST of escaping air.
Vance swings into the hole.
INT. COLOSSUS
Vance bulls down a passageway. He barely fits. The shoulders
of his armored suit scrape the walls.
His visor’s heads-up display streams with data as ATHENA maps
the inside of the tank.
VANCE
Hold your fire. I’m inside the
Colossus.
MARINE (V.O.)
Inside?!
A TANK CREWMAN rakes Vance with bullets that bounce off his
armor. Vance blows him away with a single shot.
Vance reaches a ladder-well leading upward. He starts up -
and his shoulders CLANG against the well rim. He doesn’t fit.

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8.
Vance heaves. The ladder rungs bend under his hands. With a
shriek of metal, the walls of the ladder-well give way.
COLOSSUS - BRIDGE
The COMMAND CREW does damage control: drivers wrestle with
controls...gunnery officers search for targets. They wear
light vacuum suits.
Behind them, the ladder-well emerges from the deck plates.
A ROAR. The bridge is shaken by an unseen force.
Vance BLASTS out of the ladder-well on his jets, SMASHES into
the ceiling. Lands on his feet in a shower of scrap metal.
The deck crew spins in alarm. Two crewmen pull pistols and
fire. Bullets ricochet wildly.
Vance’s rifle comes up.
EXT. COLOSSAL TANK
An explosion blows out the Colossus’s command bridge. Jets of
flame billow into space.
The Colossus goes dark. Churns to a stop. A hailstorm of
shrapnel pelts the battlefield.
Vance lands on his feet in the dust - armor dark with soot.
INT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE (ON DIONE)
The Marines gather again in their ready room. They are
transformed: armor pitted and blackened, faces smeared with
sweat and blood. Only seven men remain.
Technicians lift their helmets off, open up their armor. Two
men are wounded: medics rush to help them.
The Marines gather around Vance, slap his shoulders in grim
celebration: they are mindful of their losses.
MARINE #1
This was all you, Cap.
VANCE
This was the fighting two-ten, best
platoon in the Corps.
MARINE #2
But the big kill was yours.

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9.
VANCE
The kill belongs to the men we
lost. When we get inside the
Colony, we drink to them.
COBURN (O.S.)
We won’t be seeing the inside of
Dione Colony.
The men turn. Coburn stands above them on his command deck.
COBURN
We lift as soon as our casualties
are aboard.
The Marines murmur in protest.
VANCE
Back to Mars already?
COBURN
Earth. Special orders.
Sudden silence.
MARINE #3
What’s it about, sir?
COBURN
I don't know. Captain Vance has
been called home. We’re just along
for the ride.
The men’s eyes turn to Vance in surprise.
COBURN
(to all the men)
I wish I could grant you some shore
leave. You've earned it. But I have
orders.
(points at Vance)
You. In my stateroom.
INT. BATTLESHIP HIGHLINE (IN FLIGHT) - COBURN’S STATEROOM
A luxurious cabin by spacefaring standards but still cramped.
Colonel Coburn sits reading an electronic slate.
The engines rumble. Saturn’s rings slide past the porthole.
Vance enters in regular uniform, hair damp. He looks wary.

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