Two Winters Past

EXT. EMPTY HIGHWAY. EVENING.

BARABAS gives LOGAN a noose made of bailing twine. The rope is coarse, wild with split ends and fibers.

AIDEN: Logan, no. Don’t. Let him be.

LOGAN: We need this big ape’s throwing arm, but he needs to understand we can’t just go attacking anyone we want. We ain’t animals, we got law. Moses gives us that.

AIDEN: Look man, we’re not going to fight you, okay? Just stop hurting people, we’ll come with you.

LOGAN: (Menacing AIDEN) Don’t think I don’t know who you are from TV.

AIDEN: I’m not anyone anymore. I don’t even have a guitar, I don’t play music...

LOGAN smashes AIDEN to the ground.

LOGAN: Hellfire and Satan-praise! You call that music? What is wrong with you, Aiden Quartermass? As far as I can tell, you called the hellfire down on us. Now you gonna make good on it. By right we should string you up by a music string from the front of our castle to let the Devil know what is coming for him. I got a feeling the Preacher will have a new song for you, now all a you get your ass up, you hear me?

TIFF: Are you from a church? We’re all Christian.

LOGAN: Ain’t none of you is Christian. No one ever was. Not you, not me. Not Jesus, but he came pretty close. In the end, he accepted he had to die like a man.

LOGAN hands noose to another BARABAS.

LOGAN: Put it over that tree. What we don’t need is another sobbing bitch.

TIFF: (Frantic.) No! No! Stop! We understand! Please! We understand!

LOGAN kicks MJ again. She wails.

LOGAN: String her up.

2 BARABAS lift MJ and another puts the noose around her neck.

Rope is thrown over a hanging tree branch. It takes 2 tries.

TIFF: (crying) No! No! Stop!

MJ is crying. HOLT tries to rise, but BARABAS kick and beat him.

LOGAN: (To TIFF) You still got a chance to not be hanged, but this ape has got to learn.

MJ is lifted off the ground. She chokes and claws at the rope.

BARABAS back off HOLT. He crawls to get close, but is weak. TIFF and AIDEN are blocked.

TIFF is crying.

MJ dies slow.

LOGAN kicks HOLT in the ribs.

MJ sways back and forth with the fading momentum of her struggles.

LOGAN: Tie her off, let the bears get her.

BARABAS: That’s good rope.

LOGAN: And a better warning for any sinners that may come along this way.

HOLT is allowed to rise. He runs to where MJ hangs. He is still tied, but rubs his face against her legs, sobbing.

HOLT: Mary Jane, no. Nonono no. Talk to me.

LOGAN: You weren’t even married! She told me! What you did–what all of you did–has marked you. This girl got what was coming to her.

HOLT rushes LOGAN, but is punched down by a BARABAS.

LOGAN: You all–WE all–deserve no less, but we have a chance. We can make up for it. You are going to make up for it. I’m not giving a choice.

LOGAN kicks TIFF and HOLT.

LOGAN: Get up!

LOGAN moves to kick AIDEN.

AIDEN: Stop! Just stop!

AIDEN raises on his own.

LOGAN beats him viciously.

AIDEN does not fight back, but will not fall for half a minute, until LOGAN has hit him so savagely his face is torn and bleeding.

AIDEN falls first to his knees, and then down on his face. 

LOGAN: Do I have any more questions?