Clockwork Angels: Comic Script (13 page)

But she might have been.

PANEL 5

Owen and the Commodore give each other a heartwarming farewell embrace.

PANEL 6

Big panel, Owen walks away into the wilderness. At the side of the panel, the Commodore watches him go. He has a tear in his eye.

CAPTION (OWEN)

On my way at last …

PAGE 7

PANEL 1

Big panel. On top of a ridge, Owen shades his eyes and looks down the slope across the vast and amazing desert wasteland. I want this to have the same feel as the view from Grandview Point from the Island in the Sky in Canyonlands National Park, a spectacular and seemingly infinite expanse of red rocks. Google for reference.

CAPTION (OWEN)

The Redrock Desert. I’ve never seen anything so … Big.

CAPTION (OWEN)

A man could lose himself in a country like this …

PANEL 2

Owen walks along the canyons, passing tall slickrock formations, hoodoos, arches. Use Canyonlands, Arches, Moab for reference and inspiration.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Back in Albion, I never dreamed there were places without steamliner rails or roads.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Now I wish I could see so much as a footprint.

PANEL 3

Owen looks up at the ceiling of an overhang cave which sports tall, interesting petroglyphs. Use the “Grand Gallery” in the Horseshoe Canyon Unit of Canyonlands as an example, BUT also include the squiggly curve with arrow from the roadsign on the
Snakes and Arrows Live
album.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I know that people were here once, maybe the people who built the Seven Cities. But they’re gone now.

PANEL 4

Low angle to the ground, show Owen’s footprints trailing up to where the small figure of Owen keeps walking away.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I have more time to think than I ever did before. But I mostly think about nothing at all.

PANEL 5

Owen, alone, stands juggling rocks for his own amusement.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Just like Francesca taught me.

PANEL 6

A crow on a dead mesquite branch stares at him.

PAGE 8

PANEL 1

Narrow shot of the blazing sun in the sky

CAPTION (OWEN)

So hot during the day

PANEL 2

Nighttime, Owen huddles over a tiny fire of twigs with a blanket over his shoulders, pack leaning against a rock. He is in a place of hoodoos, for a very creepy feeling. See Goblin Valley State Park for reference. He is trying to read his mother’s book by the wan firelight, and he looks miserable.

CAPTION (OWEN)

So cold during the night …

OWEN

Not much wood for a fire … barely enough light for me to read my other-mother’s book …

PANEL 3

Owen staggers along the open rocky wasteland.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Wandering aimless. No clocks … no schedule … no plan.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I’ll have water, food, rest, and good company as soon as I find the Seven Cities.

PANEL 4

Owen looks up and ahead (maybe best if his back is to us). He sees/imagines a shimmering, indistinct, but magnificent golden city in the distance, a skyline with towers and domes, everything all gold and glowing. Think Shangri-La.

CAPTION (OWEN)

It will be as magnificent as I imagine …

PANEL 5

Small panel, Owen rubs his eyes.

CAPTION (OWEN)

If it’s real at all.

PANEL 6

Owen reaches the shore of a powdery white dry lakebed, like a man on an ocean beach—but this is just salt crystals. Color palette is white and washed out.

PANEL 7

Owen drops to his knees, digs his hands into the crumbling powder.

OWEN

The lake between the sun and the moon! It has to be! I must be close.

PAGE 9

PANEL 1

Big panel, top third of page. Owen stares across the dry lakebed (which sparkles like a Twilight vampire in the sunlight) at a towering mesa dead ahead that rises out of the desert on the other side of the dry sea.

CAPTION (OWEN)

The Seven Cities are on top of that mesa! If I can get there.

PANEL 2

Owen staggers across the powdery dry seabed. White puffs of crushed salt are stirred up in his footprints. He is surrounded by translucent ghost images of Francesca, the Anarchist, Tomio, Commodore Pangloss.

OWEN

Don’t trust what I can see … but I was brought up to believe.

PANEL 3

Reaching the other side of the dry lake, Owen climbs among boulders, big slabs of rock that have slid down from the side of the mesa. Sheer cliffs tower above him.

OWEN

And I
believe
the Seven Cities of Gold are up there.

PANEL 4

Owen climbing the cliff, crawling up a crack, barely balanced on a ledge.

OWEN

A beautiful paradise, with treasure, and people to welcome me …

PANEL 5

A bedraggled Owen finally reaches the top of the mesa, crawls over the edge. We are looking back at him and the sheer drop off with the distant sprawling desert behind him. We don’t yet see what he sees on the mesa.

OWEN

We get what we deserve …

PAGE 10

PANEL 1

It’s just a grassy, flat prairie with the crumbling ruins of some modest pueblo-style buildings.

OWEN

Not … quite … what I imagined.

PANEL 2

Owen walks among the low stucco buildings; most of them are one story, with a few two-story structures. He calls out.

OWEN

Hello? Is anyone here?

OWEN

I’m Owen Hardy from Barrel Arbor! In Albion! I’ve come to see the Seven Cities of Gold!

PANEL 3

He stops at an open window, peering into the shadows. A lizard scurries down the wall.

OWEN

Anybody? I’ve come a long way …

PANEL 4

Finding a tilted basin outside one of the abandoned buildings, Owen greedily splashes rainwater into his face and mouth.

CAPTION (OWEN)

At least there’s rainwater …

PANEL 5

Stepping through the door of one of the crumbling pueblos, he sees scattered corn cobs on the floor. Small mice scurry away.

CAPTION (OWEN)

And a little food …

PANEL 6

In dismay, Owen slides down against the inside wall of the dim, empty hut. He puts his head in his hands, miserable. A shaft of golden sunlight streams through an open window, but Owen doesn’t notice it.

CAPTION (OWEN)

But nothing else.

CAPTION (OWEN)

All is for the best? How can that be?

PAGE 11

PANEL 1

Owen stands outside the buildings again, the modest adobe village, but he again imagines the ethereal golden and fantastical city around him with unusual architecture, studded with gems. Use art effects so that it shimmers and is transparent, just a dream. The imaginary city is much fainter now.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Where did all the people go? Did they pack their treasure and leave? Is this all that’s left of a great civilization—ruins and legends?

PANEL 2

Owen puts his hands on his hips, determined.

CAPTION (OWEN)

But there are
Seven
Cities of Gold. I can’t give up after finding just one.

PANEL 3

Close-up, Owen holds the intricate dreamline compass in the palm of his hand.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I know where I should be … and where I should be going.

PANEL 4

Owen heads off across the grassy mesa top, following a thin, rutted track that was once a main road but is now overgrown. [Can combine panels 3-4. I like the close-up of the intricate compass in Owen’s hand for visual variety, but we can have just one panel of him looking at the compass as he walks along.]

PANEL 5

Owen arrives at another abandoned adobe city, which looks like an empty Anasazi ruins. It looks similar to the first one, but the art should make it obvious that this is a different city.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Five days later I found the second City of Gold. And it was as empty as the first.

PANEL 6

Owen stands at a crumbling old building inside the city. Nearby, for a different perspective and visual interest, add a cricket on a cracked adobe wall near Owen. Can use forced perspective to make the cricket the focal point of the image.

CAPTION (OWEN)

And a third city. And a fourth.

PAGE 12

PANEL 1

Lounging against one of the buildings, Owen stretches out his legs, rests his head on his pack. Relaxing.

CAPTION (OWEN)

So silent, so still …

CAPTION (OWEN)

Even though they’re empty, these Cities of Gold have another kind of treasure … solitude and peace.

PANEL 2

With a makeshift broom made of dry grass lashed around a stick, Owen sweeps debris out of one of the adobe huts.

CAPTION (OWEN)

And that is something I need. I’ve had enough of the world …

PANEL 3

Goofing around, Owen is on top of one of the fallen-in roofs, walking across a support beam like a balance beam. He has his arms out to the side for his balance.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Back home in Albion, the carnival is still making its rounds …

PANEL 4

With a stick for a hoe, Owen has plowed a furrow and is planting seeds. Beside him, a neat line of new shoots pokes out of the ground to show that he’s been here a while. His hair is longer.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Back home in Barrel Arbor, my father will be working the apples by himself, without an Assistant Orchard Manager … delivering fresh cider to the Tick Tock Tavern …

PANEL 5

Owen looks up to the wide open sky, seeing only a few wispy clouds.

CAPTION (OWEN)

And Commodore Pangloss is still making his airship runs … but I’m much too far away to see it.

PANEL 6

Owen walks off again, following a faint trail along the edge of the mesa, with the Redrock Desert and all the amazing distant pinnacles and formations extending to the horizon.

CAPTION (OWEN)

But solitude and peace only last so long, and I can’t stop thinking big.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I still have three more lost cities to find. Maybe the people will welcome me.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I could use some company …

PAGE 13

PANEL 1

Owen reaches another empty city.[Nick, it’ll be a challenge, but try to put these villages in different settings, different arrangements, so that they look like different ruins; the captions should make that clear enough.] The skies are gloomy and gray, hinting at snow.

CAPTION (OWEN)

But the next ruin is also empty

CAPTION (OWEN)

And so is the next. The Seven Cities of Gold exist only in tales …

CAPTION (OWEN)

Can I rewrite the story?

PANEL 2

Owen trudges along, away from the empty city, head bent, as the wind blows and snowflakes whip all around him.

CAPTION (OWEN)

I’ve been searching for months … and all I’ve found is winter.

CAPTION (OWEN)

But my optimism won’t fail me. I can still cling to hope. There’s one last city—I’ll find it.

PANEL 3

Big panel. Owen stands at the edge of the last city, a similar ruin, this time frosted by an inch of snow. Nothing stirs, and there are no people. It is late afternoon and the sun is low in the sky. Owen’s shadow is long on the snow.

This village has two tall stone pinnacles very close together, like Stonehenge stelae. The stone itself is laced with quartz veins. See novel for detailed description.

CAPTION (OWEN)

At last I found the seventh city, days later.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Sometimes the Angels punish us by answering our prayers …

PANEL 4

Close-up, a tear trickles down Owen’s face.

PANEL 5

The sun is orange, setting lower, falling exactly between the two tall stone monoliths.

PANEL 6

Like an orange wedged between the two stones, the setting sun is swollen, light flares out, like a sunflare on a camera lens. Something magical is happening!

PAGE 14

PANEL 1

Glorious! Big panel: The setting sun caught between the stone pinnacles reflects on the quartz veins and spills golden light EVERYWHERE, flooding the silent snow-covered city with molten gold. It’s breathtaking!

CAPTION (OWEN)

Gold! The last rays of the setting sun! The winter solstice! The quartz in the rocks.

PANEL 2

Owen stands with his arms outstretched, a look of joy on his face, reveling in the treasure he has found. He shouts.

OWEN

There
is
gold here!

PANEL 3

Close-up of Owen’s face, filled with wonder and joy.

CAPTION (OWEN)

Better than any treasure I expected, a kind of gold I don’t know that I would have noticed before. A gift, a reward …

CAPTION (OWEN)

We get what we deserve.

PANEL 4

High shot. As the sun sets and the sky turns a deeper orange with intense sunset colors, Owen sits on a boulder, just reveling in the view. Owen can be small figure, silhouetted.