FALCON'S POV - PREDAWN

Dismal and dim, nothing can be made out clearly. It might be the desert. Then again, it might not.

A light flickers and vanishes. Then again a little ways away. Then again. . .


EXT. EAST VALLEY RD. - DAWN

(Closer)

Below, a crossroads with thin radiating spokes, gloomy and stark.

There are luminescent patches of tule fog that dot the meadows of Emma's Farm like sheep. Mountains to the right and ahead are shadowy and still draped in blackness.

Headlights approach. A car crests the last rise before the crossroads.

NEW ANGLE - CROSSROADS

A 1996 white Ford Taurus slows as it approaches the crossroads. On its door is a gold embossed "SHERIFF" emblem. There is an emergency light-bar on the roof, but no containment screen across the back of the front seat. No visible weaponry, no shotgun mounted on the top of the dash.

The Taurus slows and turns right.

A mangled road sign, half-missing and faint with rust, reads "COUNTY W.". The remainder of the sign is wrinkled and illegible.

EXT. SHERIFF'S CAR (MOVING)

On the meadow side of 'County W'., one particularly thick finger of fog extends toward the road ahead.

INT. SHERIFF'S CAR

A half-eaten jelly doughnut is on some wax-paper on the passenger seat. The light from the radio flickers. The car's occupant remains UNSEEN.

A short burst of STATIC, then the last bar of 'SILENT NIGHT' is HEARD.

                                VALLEY ANNOUNCER (OS)
                        That's it, valley birds. A little peace and
                        quiet if you're just in from the barn chores.
                        Yeah, right. Until your kids come charging
                        down stairs to tear into their Christmas presents.
                        How do they know. . . well, nevermind.
                        Let's get to the hog report. Chicago Stock
                        and futures will be closed today through
                        New Year's in observance of the new
                        millennium. Sounds like those boys plan to
                        do some partying. At county seat, record
                        sales. . . .

The sheriff reaches over and turns off the radio. A Masonic ring is SEEN on his finger.

SHERIFF'S POV - REAR-VIEW MIRROR

The falcon continues to circle on a morning thermal.

BACK TO SCENE

The sheriff is in his mid-fifties, good-shape, face weathered and lined. He is relaxed, but alert. This is not a social call.

NEW ANGLE - ROAD AHEAD - MORNING

The structure of Barrow Creek Bridge is an uncertain mirage shrouded in dense tule fog. The meadows on the left appear ghostly and surreal.

Beyond the bridge, low pasture hills gently slope away to the right, towards the dairy, UNSEEN beyond them.

EXT. - BARROW BRIDGE

The sheriff's car slows and eases onto the bridge. Its thick oaken beams yield under the tires with a dull soulful sound. The car plays a low-register xylophone dirge across the bridge surface.

The road on the other side narrows. The car pulls onto a shallow dirt turnout by the pasture fence. The engine shuts off.

NEW ANGLE ON CAR

The sheriff adjusts his pager hooked on his belt and scans the near surroundings as he walks back toward the bridge. He is not wearing either a gun or a stick.

Near the bridge, a couple of strips of black cloth hang on a lower strand of the post&wire fence. A remnant and knot of red rag hangs on a higher strand. In a weedy ditch below, the rest of the red rag lies next to an empty wicker creel.

A faint TRAIN WHISTLE blows in the distance.

EXT. ON THE BRIDGE

A gray, bleak morning. Fallen trees and long branches stick up out of the tule fog along the creek like the masts of lost ships.

At the center of the bridge the sheriff stops and leans on the oak railing. He gazes into the dark water below.

SHERIFF'S POV

Dull shapes and an occasional glint of silver can be SEEN passing by in the fog shrouded water.

EXT. BARROW CREEK

As the creek flows over a deep trough near the bridge, its surface becomes more placid.

The bloated, rotting bodies of fish float by. Their dull milky eyes stare skyward.


ANGLE UNDER BRIDGE

Dead fish and rotten parts litter the banks and catch in the sedge and weed. One fish, with a distended belly and a large swollen blister on its side, drifts to the bank and catches in some grass. The blister breaks and a SIGH of escaping gas is HEARD.

As black puss BUBBLES from the fish's open wound, a loud CRACK! Shatters the soulful spectacle of death.

BACK TO BRIDGE

A solid looking, 3" bridge rail snaps under the weight of the sheriff's arm. The sudden noise wakes him from his day dreaming. He walks back to the car.

NEW ANGLE

Above and behind the sheriff, the falcon still circles in the weak light of morning.

INT. SHERIFF'S CAR - MOVING - WINDSHIELD VIEW

The car continues on, rising gradually along the edge of the low hills that skirt this extreme end of the meadow.

The sheriff makes a sharp S-turn with one hand and reaches for the radio button with the other. Brakes SQUEAL, tires skid. The front grill of the car is pressed up against the shanks of a cow. Its head protrudes over the hood of the car. Its breath partially steams the windshield. It has a dazed mean look about it. The lower jaw foams with mucus and pus.

EXT. SHERIFF'S CAR

A momentary standoff. The cow gives it up and trots away on unsteady legs over the hilly pasture toward the dairy. The Sheriff gets out of the car, watching the cow lope away.

A sudden CRACK! breaks the sheriff's concentration.

ANGLE ON HILL

Above him, on the hill, the hind-side of an old sow is SEEN sticking out of the brush around a small stand of trees. The pig rears and twists, trampling the brush around it until most of the interior clearing is exposed.

(Closer)

The pig continues thrashing, demolishing an exposed lean-to, benches, fifty-gallon drums and other equipment of OREY's still. The sheriff waits, wary and alert. The pig is dangerous.

(Closer)

Orey's still is a mess. The pig has demolished everything. The Sheriff looks around. He picks up a torn bloody work-shirtsleeve and examines it. The Sheriff pokes in the brush a little and then scans the nearby hills. They are empty and silent. He returns to his car.


INT. SHERIFF'S CAR - (IN MOTION)

The mountains ahead are dark and uninviting as the road crests the hill shanks and then slopes back to the valley floor. Ahead, at the mountain's foot it turns sharply to the left.

        
EXT. FARM APPROACH

The wooded fens on the car's right look foreboding and dark. The car sloshes through some shallow puddles on the gravel road, then follows the road around to the left and onto the back entrance to Emma's farm.

Glimpses of a large barn can be SEEN through small stands of trees that line both sides of the road.

INT - SHERIFF'S CAR - EMMA'S FARM

The sheriff pulls into a clearing at the back of a large well-painted and well-kept barn. The barn doors at both ends are open. One of them is hanging strangely akimbo by its upper hinge.

EXT. BARN

The sheriff stops, gets out and SCANS the fenced field to his right. There is a gaping hole at the near end of a long corral fence that runs along the side of the barn. Broken fence rail dangle from posts or lay scattered in the field beside the corral. The boards are freshly splintered.

A dead calf, its body badly broken, lays half-covered in some tall weeds by the fence-break. Flies are drinking at its eyes.

ANGLE ON SHERIFF

The sheriff walks toward the barn. Through the open doors a clearing some ways beyond the other end of the barn can be SEEN. A large crow is pecking at something on the ground. It looks up in the sheriff's direction and flies off. The sheriff continues walking around the left side of the barn and calls out.

                                SHERIFF
                        Em! Emma!

There is no answer. The sheriff walks down the outside length of the barn approaching the back of a stone farmhouse to his left.

The sheriff stops by the nearest of two curtainless windows at the back of the farmhouse.

SHERIFF'S POV

The view through the dining room to the kitchen window is empty. The inside is dark and quiet. No lights are on.

BACK TO SCENE

The sheriff moves around to the front of the house.

                                SHERIFF
                        Emma? Emma! Are you there?

Still no answer. The front porch is empty. A crow sits on the back of an over-stuffed sofa. It looks at the sheriff and flies off. A brief gust of wind blows.

To the sheriff's right, at the edge of the large clearing out in front of the barn and beyond some chicken coops, a piece of white cloth rolls a little on the ground.

The sheriff walks to where the cloth is, picks it up and EXAMINES it.

SHERIFF'S POV

A torn strip of white leather is in his hand. Some of its elaborate bead-work still clings to the ragged edges. Dark stains cover much of the rest.

The sheriff closes his hand around the material. Blood bubbles from the cloth and squeezes between his fingers. He opens his hand. It is dripping with wet blood.

More scraps of cloth and small clumps of organic looking matter lay nearby.

BACK TO SCENE

The sheriff walks over to some gooey-looking mass about the size of a fist. He kneels down to examine it. A shadow passes by.

EXT. THE CLEARING - (IN MOTION)

The clearing is strewn with small pieces of organic matter and fabric. A crazy follow-the-dots pattern of white stuff, gray stuff, matted stuff that becomes denser near the center. A shadow passes over the clearing. The pieces are not very large, unrecognizable and scattered among a confusing mosaic of hoof-prints, meat-scraps and cattle diarrhea. Another shadow passes along the ground.

LOW ANGLE ON BLACKISH CLUMP

At the far side of the clearing a blackish clump moves, a reddish eye blinks. The crow looks up and then returns to picking at something pinned beneath its claws.

From behind, OUT OF SHOT, a small stone is thrown. It whizzes past the crow's head. The bird looks up and then resumes picking.

                                SHERIFF (OS)
                        Get off there! Go on!

BACK TO SCENE

The sheriff looks in the direction of the bird. He cocks his arm to throw again.

                                SHERIFF
                        Get away! Get away from_

The sheriff throws. The bird makes a startled flutter and flies off.

                                SHERIFF

                        _her.

The Sheriff scans the clearing. His eyes close a moment. A shadow passes nearby. He opens his eyes and looks at the sky.

ANGLE ON THE SUN

Across the clearing and above barrow hill, the sun hangs dull and dirty looking. Blank and pitiless.

BACK TO SCENE

The sheriff looks down at the cloth in his red, wet palm. The shadow passes again. The sheriff looks nearly overhead.
He tightens his grip on the bloody cloth.

                                SHERIFF
                                (agonized)
                        Oh no.

SHERIFF'S POV

The falcon makes one more circuit of its climbing spiral and then flies off.

BACK TO SCENE

The sheriff continues to stare at the empty sky.

FREEZE SCENE

RUN TITLE AND OPENING CREDITS OVER SCENE

To The Previous Day's Rushes

To The Next Day's Rushes

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