ACT 1
SCENE 1
We open on SPYGOD's room in The B.U.I.L.D.I.N.G. It's early afternoon, January 29th, and he's sitting on his bed. He has a can of beer in his hand, and there are several empties around his feet. His cat, BEE-BEE, is sleeping next to him, on an AK-47. He reaches out to skritch her ears and she snorts threateningly, so he jerks his hand away, and goes back to drinking his beer.
SPYGOD: Nice to spend some time with you, too, you little !@#$.
SPYGOD downs the beer, and throws the can across the room in such a way that it bounces off two walls and falls to his feet to join the others.
SPYGOD: See? Look at that. I got !@#$ talents. I can bounce a can of beer off the wall and land it at my feet. Every !@#$ time, like clockwork. I can shoot the head off a fly three miles away. I can kill a man with my come. I can fry people's brains over the !@#$ phone. I can even listen to the stars !@#$ talk to one another, all the way out there. So why is it I can't hold on to what's really important, huh? Why Why am I sitting here, drinking, when I should be out there shoring up support and getting the !@#$ President back on the side of the angels, huh? Or my side, at least.
Bee-Bee snorts and rolls over.
SPYGOD: Yeah, I don't got nothing, either. If they gave out college degrees in self-destruction I'd have a !@#$ PHD by now. I could run a department. Have a decent salary. Company car.
SPYGOD lies back on the bed and locks his hands behind his head.
SPYGOD: That's probably why he hasn't called. He probably realized he climbed into bed with Mr. !@#$ Self Destruct. Magic alien love god penis or no, there's limits to how much you want to get !@#$ over just to get a good !@#$. Nah, he's probably up there, now, wondering how to break it off. And I don't !@#$ blame him. Don't know why I bothered, really.
SPYGOD sits up, reaches for another can of beer. Opens it.
SPYGOD: Twelve cans of this !@#$ and I'm not even buzzed.
SPYGOD downs it, throws the can at the wall, and watches it bounce twice to land at his feet again.
SPYGOD: See? Now that's a talent, Bee-Bee. I could market that. I could leave this !@#$, go into hiding, set up shop in Bangkok betting tourists and sailors I can bounce a can off two walls and have them land by my feet each and every !@#$ time. Then maybe suck their !@#$ for beer money. Would that be so bad? Just chuck it all in, walk away?
Bee-Bee gets up, stretches, looks at SPYGOD contemptuously, and then, dragging the gun away with her tail, jumps down off the bed.
SPYGOD: Well sorry to interrupt your !@#$ beauty sleep! Jesus, can't a man ask his kitty some questions when he's having a midlife crisis? Midlife. Later life. Whatever the !@#$ this is. Who !@#$ wants to live forever, anyway?
VOICE: That's the question, isn't it?
SPYGOD whips out a gun and shoots at where the voice came from. A large blast gets torn out of a wall.
SPYGOD: Buddy, you picked the wrong !@#$ to try and !@#$ sneak up on. Drop the screen. I can hear you breathing.
VOICE: That isn't breathing. That's... something else.
SPYGOD: I'm going to !@#$ shoot that something else through the wall and over to !@#$ Trenton if you don't make with the ID, pal.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER appears on the bed, next to SPYGOD, posing languidly. He looks like a long-haired man straight out of a Renaissance painting.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Is this sufficient?
SPYGOD: It'll do. Who the !@#$ are you and what the !@#$ do you want?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: I have many names, (REDACTED), but they're not important. The real question is, what do you want?
SPYGOD: A straight answer.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Now there's irony for you.
SPYGOD: Better than steel jackets through the brainpan.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: It's always violence with you, isn't it?
SPYGOD: Only when I'm drunk, sober, or somewhere inbetween. Guess where I !@#$ am now.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: In bed, with a gun, threatening someone who's trying to help.
SPYGOD blinks a few times, and then puts the gun away.
SPYGOD: Great. You guys again.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Ah, yes. I thought it'd come to you, eventually.
SPYGOD: And I thought, after last time, we had the understanding that you shouldn't come to me, ever !@#$ again.
SPYGOD gets up and walks across the room, looking for something on his dresser.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Well, that was someone else. He's been reassigned.
SPYGOD: Hopefully someplace warm.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: And the one before that was demoted. Savagely, I might add.
SPYGOD: Yeah, well, I think by the end of the conversation I kind of tempted him.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: If you're looking for the rosary your friend gave you, it's by the bedside.
SPYGOD looks up, and then over to the side of the bed.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: I won't stop you getting it. It won't really do me much harm.
SPYGOD: I don't need it to deal with you.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Then why were you looking for it?
SPYGOD: I was looking for something else.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: You're a terrible liar.
SPYGOD: No, I'm an excellent liar. I'm a terrible drunk.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Are you scared?
SPYGOD: Should I be? This is the third time around with you !@#$. You didn't talk me into a deal, then. Why would now be any different?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Things have changed.
SPYGOD walks over to the side of the bed, gets the rosary out of the jar, and sits down on the bed. BEAUTIFUL STRANGER looks at it like one might look at a handful of dog !@#$
SPYGOD: Some things never change. I think you should leave.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Won't you hear me out?
SPYGOD: Whatever you're selling, I'm not !@#$ buying.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: You seem rather assured of that.
SPYGOD: I am. I've been around long enough to know about the buyer's remorse that tends to follow your deals.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: It's usually just sticker shock.
SPYGOD: Besides, I don't have what you're looking for.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Who says you don't?
SPYGOD: I think it was eaten up when I put the eye in.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Is that what they told you?
SPYGOD: That's what your competitors said.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Oh, they'll say anything, (REDACTED). It's part of their charm.
SPYGOD: This is where you tell me you aren't interested in those sorts of things.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: This is where I say that you're right. All such things are ours, automatically, unless you do that one, little thing and mean it.
SPYGOD: And I'm not selling to them, either.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Which brings us back to what we're really buying, here.
SPYGOD: And what's that? Last time, it was... oh, what did you want me to do. Look the other way a few times? Let a few human monsters loose for you?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: It was a good deal. They got loose, anyway.
SPYGOD: And since I had the option, I shot their !@#$. Repeatedly.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: And before that, all you had to do was bring us your colleague, so as to take his hand from that doddering wreck you called a President.
SPYGOD: And that doddering wreck was one of the greatest men who ever sat in that office, !@#$face. And that colleague is my friend.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: (laughs, cruelly) Is that what you think you are to him? A friend? No, my dear (REDACTED). You are a tool to him. An asset, just like those fools you spent all those years cultivating in all those groups you're eliminating, now. You are a mole, fed with favors and occasional pieces of advice. And one day, when they no longer need you...
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER reaches over, takes the rosary from SPYGOD's hand, and tosses it off onto the floor. His skin smokes and bubbles but he makes no sign of being in pain.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: ... you're gone.
SPYGOD: Okay, that was !@#$ impressive.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: I told you it wouldn't do me much harm. I am rather high up in the organization.
SPYGOD: So they brought out the rainmaker, this time?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Only the best for you, (REDACTED)
SPYGOD: Do us both a favor. Leave. Now.
SPYGOD gets up, crosses back to the dresser, and gets a half-drunk bottle of something strong. He downs half of what's there as BEAUTIFUL STRANGER gets up and stands behind him.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Are you scared of what I'm selling, then?
SPYGOD: I'm just not interested, really.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: I think you are. I think you've spent the last day or so wondering you could do to fix this mess, and not finding a good answer. I think you know I'm going to offer you that solution. And I think you know you won't be strong enough to say no, this time.
SPYGOD: !@#$ off.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: In fact, I will make a bet with you.
SPYGOD: !@#$. Off.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: I will bet you that, should I fail to convince you, my organization will never, ever bother you, ever again.
SPYGOD turns and looks at BEAUTIFUL STRANGER, incredulous.
SPYGOD: Never again?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Never ever.
SPYGOD: Is that because if I say no, the world ends and it's a moot point, anyway?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Well, that would be rather tricksy of us... but no. We have no interest in armageddon or apocalypse. Everything we do we do to keep the status quo, with a few minor adjustments, of course.
SPYGOD: Business as usual, huh?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: And business is good.
SPYGOD: But I say no, and you !@#$ off for perpetuity?
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Yes. Cross my non-existent heart and hope to never be allowed to assuage my torment by ceasing to exist.
SPYGOD: Well then, you are !@#$ on.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER reaches out a hand to shake, and SPYGOD smacks him across the face with the bottle. It shatters and booze flies everywhere, but BEAUTIFUL STRANGER is neither cut nor fazed.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Feeling better, now?
SPYGOD: Like a million bucks, !@#$bake. Make your sale.
BEAUTIFUL STRANGER: Gladly. Right this way.
SPYGOD and BEAUTIFUL STRANGER vanish in the wink of an eye. BEE-BEE leaps on the bed, dragging the gun behind her. She looks around a moment, and then snuggles back up on the gun and goes to sleep, apparently uncaring.
(SPYGOD is listening to Poison Arrow (ABC) and having a Devil's Pale Ale)
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