Same Old, Same Old

An unused SPACE CASES script
by Peter David and Bill Mumy
Story by Myrna David
as published in issues #189-199 of Comics Buyer's Guide
Copyright © To Be Continued, Inc.
Reproduced With Permission

ACT ONE

Interior:
Team Room -- The kids look up in shock as they see --

Insert (on wall screen):
An image of the Christa blowing up, as per the end of the teaser.

Back to interior scene:
As the kids stare at each other, the doors to the room open slightly, enough for us to see Davenport's face.

Davenport:
What in --

With a sigh of frustration, she shoves the doors open. She walks through and they almost slam on her.

Davenport:
What in the world is going on h --

She looks up at the screen and gapes. The following is done rapid fire.

Davenport:
Another warning form the future?

Harlan:
If we'd blown up, how could we send a warning?

Bova:
Alien transmission?

Catalina:
It's only an internal monitor.

Radu:
Hallucination caused by a virus?

Rosie:
I just did a med sweep yesterday. Ship's clean.

Harlan:
OK, then it's probably a mechanical screw-up we shouldn't worry about.

Goddard:
(Filtered and on cue) Attention all hands, this is Commander Goddard -- do not be alarmed.

Interior:
Command Post -- A wide-angle establishing shot of Goddard and Thelma, who are looking at the screen. Thelma is standing at the command console.

Goddard:
I was having Thelma run stress simulation visuals on the Christa to evaluate our shield strength. See how much of a pounding we could withstand before we...(opts not to go into detail) At any rate, she's just informed me that an odd energy glitch cause the picture to appear throughout the ship.

Thelma:
I hope it did not cause any undue stress to ship's personnel.

Interior:
Team room with Davenport and the kids. We see, just for a moment, that Davenport is seated with her head between her legs, hyperventilating. Harlan steps into frame, looks down at her, and shakes his head. She looks up at him, but he's exited.

Davenport:
Mr. Band --

She heads out after him --

Interior:
Corridor. Davenport stops Harlan sternly.

Davenport:
Do you have a problem, Mr. Band?

Harlan:
It's nothing. Well, look, with all due respect, I just knew you were going to do that. That when faced with danger, you'd start to panic.

Davenport:
I never panic! I'm just -- calm-impaired. Anyway, this isn't about me; it's about all of you. What were you all bickering about?

Harlan:
Aw, it was stupid stuff. I think the real reason is we're bored.

Davenport:
Bored? With everything that's happened to us, how can you say that?

Harlan:
Nothing's happened in weeks. It's been chores, studies, more chores, more studies.

Davenport:
Be grateful.

Harlan:
Seven more years of this? We'll go crazy! We need challenges to keep us on our toes -- and not just the same old, same old. Something new!

Davenport:
With all due respect to you, Mr. Band -- if you find constant threats of death preferable to routine -- you already are crazy.

Harlan shakes his head and walks off.

Davenport:
I think I'd best have a little chat with Commander Goddard.

Goddard (voice-over):
Miss Davenport tells me you people are bored.

Interior:
Engine room -- Wide establishing shot of Goddard and Catalina. Goddard is running a detection device along the circuitry. Cat is doing a similar thing on the other side.

Catalina:
I guess a little, yeah.

Goddard:
Well, that's nothing new for space travelers. I remember one time, back when I was in the Stardogs, we were on a star-mapping assignment. We were so bored out of our skulls we decided to stay awake. No reason. Went 73 hours without sleep. That's when we invented the unofficial Stardog salute.

Demonstrates a bizarre "Woof Woof" salute. Cat stares at him.

Goddard:
Ahem! I guess you had to be there.

Catalina:
I feel like that was our main problem at the Starcademy. We were tagged as "misfits", but we were really just bored with the routine of -- (glances at her instrument) Ah! Commander, I think I've got a reading on tracing that circuitry glitch. It's piping through to (looks at him significantly) -- to the deck just below us.

Goddard:
Oh, no -- not again -- not --

Rapid zoom in on Goddard, and musical sting accompanying as he says:

Goddard:
The Haunted Corridor.

Exterior:
The Christa flyby (stock shot)

Davenport :
I'd like you all to be brutally honest with me.

Interior:
Command Post -- Davenport, Radu, Rosie and Bova are on monitor duty.

Davenport:
It is important to me that, as your teacher, I command a certain degree of respect. To that end, no matter how difficult it may be for you -- I need your candid opinion on how I'm perceived as a contributing member of this crew. Do you believe I panic easily?

Bova:
Yes.

Radu:
Absolutely.

Rosie:
No question.

Davenport:
But in a stressful situation, I can be of some help?

Bova:
No.

Radu:
Not a lot.

Rosie:
But we like you.

Davenport:
Well, that is going to change.

Rosie:
We're not going to like you anymore?

Davenport:
I mean, if that's how you see me, then I'm going to change that. No more anxiety attacks from T.J. Davenport. It's simply a matter of willpower. Mind over panic.

Suddenly, an alert goes off. The kids immediately scramble to their stations.

Davenport:
(Incredibly chipper) Ah! Already a test of my new resolve! I welcome the challenge!

Radu:
Screen on!

Rosie:
Shields up and holding!

Bova:
Scanning for -- Got it! We've got a quantum singularity, coming in fast!

Davenport:
(holding her chipperness) A quantum singularity! That would be a field of anti-stellar residue which, if it wraps itself around us, can slice us up like three-day-old cheese, even through our shielding. Ohhh, this will get the old excitement juices flowing, eh?

Radu:
Thelma!

Thelma steps into frame, overlapping.

Thelma:
Yes?

Radu:
Take navigation. I'm going to maneuver us through the singularity.

He moves quickly to helm, takes control.

Exterior:
The Christa with the singularity (computer-generated). The singularity is basically and intertwining strand of colored bands, similar to a strand of DNA. It's pulsing and closing around the Christa, tightening. The Christa is maneuvering very carefully so as not to come in contact.

Interior:
Command Post -- Radu, Rosie, Bova, Thelma, Davenport. Davenport still appears in control of herself.

Thelma:
Another 20 degrees to port.

Davenport:
So what can I do to help?

Radu:
(Concentrating on steering) Nothing.

Davenport:
Ah, I see. Nothing. So I need only stand here and -- and -- (losing it) -- and wait to be cut to molecular ribbons! We'll never make it! We haven't a prayer!

Insert:
The singularity on the screen, tightening around them.

Radu:
Hold on! This is going to be tight!

Davenport:
We're going to die! We're all going to die!

Exterior:
Space -- focus on the Christa and the singularity. The singularity collapses in on itself, but, a split second before it does so, the Christa shoots out the top of it to safety.

Interior:
The Command Post -- everyone and everything as it was before the exterior shot. Davenport has collapsed, her back against the command console, her head between her legs. And then Harlan slides in through the Jump Tube. He looks around.

Harlan:
Don't tell me: We ran into something that could have destroyed the ship?

Bova:
Right.

Harlan:
We got away from it? Just barely?

Radu:
Right.

Harlan:
Miss Davenport panicked?

Rosie:
Right.

Harlan:
(nods, he knew it) Same old, same old. Nothing different ever happens around here.

Davenport softly starts thudding the back of her head against the command console.

Interior:
Haunted Corridor entrance -- an establishing shot on Goddard and Catalina. They are standing at a doorway at the end of a corridor. Goddard opens the door, and it slides open, giving us a forced perspective angle of The Haunted Corridor -- lit darker and more menacingly than the normal corridor and seemingly going on forever. Catalina is holding her detection device outward in the direction of the corridor -- and moans softly.

Goddard:
Let me guess: We lost the lock on it.

Catalina:
Yup. It seems as if every time we have some sort of power glitch, we wind up tracing it down here to this bottom-level deck and then we lose the track.

Goddard:
I've come to expect that from -- The Haunted Corridor.

Musical sting.

Catalina:
You keep calling it that, but you don't really believe it's haunted, do you, Commander?

Goddard:
Legends of gremlins botching the workings of vessels go back centuries, Catalina. To say nothing of poltergeists and... (pauses for a beat) All I know is, Thelma's got no clue what's down here, and I'd just as soon steer clear of it, energy glitches or no. From now on, this section of the ship is forbidden to all personnel.

Catalina:
Aye, aye, sir.

He walks away. Catalina peers in and then we close in steadily on her, as she hears a long, moaning howl (sound effects). Clearly disconcerted, Catalina quickly ducks back, and the door slides closed.

Exterior:
Space -- the Christa flies by (stock shot)

Rosie (voice-over):
I would love to check out The Haunted Corridor.

Interior:
Galley -- Rosie, Bova, Harlan, Radu, and Catalina are having breakfast. Harlan and Radu are in the process of preparing their breakfasts by dropping fluid onto the foodpogs.

Catalina:
No, you wouldn't -- if for no other reason than that Commander Goddard put it off-limits. Going down there would mean disobeying a direct order. You're too nice for that, Rosie.

Rosie:
Thanks, I guess...

There's a flash from Radu and Harlan's plates as they drop the liquid on them. Both plates now contain food. Both Harlan and Radu make faces of extreme disgust. Then they swap the breakfasts.

Harlan:
It mixed up our breakfasts again. What is that?

Radu:
Raw narf intestines.

Harlan:
Why can't you eat something normal, like scrambled eggs?

Radu:
Ah, you mean cooked unborn baby chickens?

Harlan is about to respond, then looks at his breakfast again and slides the plate aside, having completely lost his appetite. Bova pulls the plate over unhesitatingly and starts chowing down.

Davenport (voice-over):
Since you all seem so bored lately...

Interior:
Classroom -- a wide establishing shot takes in Davenport and the kids, whom Davenport is teaching.

Davenport:
...I thought we would discuss one of the frequent outgrowths of boredom: the practical joke and how it applies to science.

Harlan:
I thought science was pretty -- you know -- serious.

Davenport:
Oh, there are some very famous hoaxes. Screen on.

The screen comes on, and we see the famous fuzzy photo of the Loch Ness monster.

Davenport:
For example, one day in the 1930's, a bored reporter in Scotland claimed, as a joke, that there was a monster in a local body of water called Loch Ness. Scientists spent decades trying to find it.

Catalina:
(sarcastically) On my world we also heard rumors about strange monsters. They were called "Earth men".

Davenport:
And then there was the time in 1912 when Charles Dawson, an amateur naturalist, claimed he's found the fossil bones in Piltdown, England, belonging to the so-called Missing Link.

The image shifts to a picture of Piltdown Man's skull.

Davenport:
The Piltdown Man, as it was named, was supposed to be the evolutionary step between ape and man. Scientists accepted it for 40 years, until fluorine testing found it to be just a man's skull and the jaw of an orangutan: a forgery.

Radu:
Early 20th-century Earth had a lot of hoaxes.

Harlan:
People were bored. They had nothing else to do. Even then, it was...

Harlan and Davenport (together):
Same old, same old.

Davenport:
(continuing) Yes, Mr. Band, you've more than made your point. It's rather intolerable when someone keeps repeating something.

Harlan:
Like if they keep saying they're not going to panic any more?

Davenport:
(chagrined sigh) Yes. Rather like that.

Exterior:
Space -- the Christa flies by (stock shot)

Interior:
Girl's bunkroom -- Catalina and Rosie. Cat is endeavoring to study, but Rosie isn't letting the earlier conversation drop.

Rosie:
When you say I'm "too nice", what do you mean, really?

Catalina:
Boy, you and Miss Davenport -- you're both really concerned with what others think of you lately.

Rosie:
Could you please just answer the question?

Catalina:
I don't know. Too nice as in -- too nice. Too eager to make people happy. You'd never want to stick your neck out and make Commander Goddard mad at you.

Rosie:
I snuck aboard with the rest of you onto this ship, didn't I?

Catalina:
That's because you didn't want to make us mad at you.

Rosie:
So you're saying I'm a coward. I'm gutless. That you guys are better than me because you're not worried about stepping out of line.

Catalina:
You're making too big a deal of this. I said what I said, OK? No more, no less. Take it however you want.
(Indicates compupad) Now can I get back to this, please?

Rosie:
I'll show you I'm no coward. I'll...I'll spend the night in The Haunted Corridor.

Catalina:
Commander Goddard said to steer clear of it.

Rosie defiantly grabs her blanket, pillow, and several stuffed animals.

Rosie:
Well, when you're someone who puts it on the line, you don't always do what Commander Goddard says.

She marches out.

Interior:
Corridor outside girls' bunkroom -- Bova, Rosie and Cat. Rosie marches out and passes Bova, who's walking by.

Bova:
Where are you going?

Rosie:
Nowhere.

Bova:
Been there.

She exits without reply. Catalina steps out into corridor.

Catalina:
She's heading down to The Haunted Corridor.

Bova:
The Haunted Corridor?

Catalina:
Yeah.

Bova:
(considering this) Hunh. Well, good for her.

And he walks off leaving Catalina looking with a degree of concern after Rosie.

Interior:
The Haunted Corridor with Rosie standing at the entrance. We hear a steady "Ooowwwwoooo" wafting through it. Rosie stands there, on the brink, ready to step through, and we fade out.

END ACT ONE

Special thanks to ZaBaGaBe@aol.com for reproducing this story from the issues of Comics Buyer's Guide in which the story originally appeared.