7
SAN ANGELES ALLEY
John is behind a shiny silver building. Prying up a grate. "No front door, no welcome mat, what's with these people? How you supposed to show up and kill somebody?"
He loves his own jokes. Climbs down in. Starts down a long ladder welded onto the side. Shuts the grate behind him.
The 2042 skyline glistens. Tiny cars zip along.
.
.
Jack stares in amazement at Ianto as he prattles on a touch embarrassed; with a schoolboy crush "I've been an enthusiast of your escapades for quite some time. I have, in fact, perused some actual newsreels of you at the Schwarzenegger library. The time you drove your car through that..."
"Back up." Jack interrupts "The Schwarzenegger library..."
Ianto nods "Yes, the Schwarzenegger Presidential Library. Wasn't he an actor when you..."
"Stop... He was President?"
Ianto confirms "Even though he was not born in this country, his popularity at the time caused the 61st Amendment which states..."
Jack moans "I don't want to know..."
They drive in silence for a while, Jack staring out the window at 2042 passing by. Then he says to Ianto "I keep looking around, thinking about my daughter growing up in a place like this. I'm afraid she's gonna think I'm some kind of disgusting primate from the past. As much as I want to see her, I almost don't wanna know. I'm not gonna fit into the picture very well."
Ianto reaches for the car terminal; thrilled with this small mischief. "It would be a minor misuse of police powers but I could do a search for you."
Jack reaches over, stops his hand. Shakes his head "no." There's a moment between the two of them. He remembers he shouldn't touch him. Lets go. Ianto doesn't seem to mind.
Then; changing subjects Jack asks "So, what's with this Cocteau guy?
He thanks me for saving his life … which I'm not sure I did … invites me to dinner, and where does he take me... Taco Bell. I
mean, hey, I like Mexican but come on..."
"Your tone is quasi-facetious. You do not realize Taco Bell was the
only restaurant to survive the Franchise Wars. All restaurants are now Taco Bell." Ianto scolds gently as they pull up in front.
It is unlike any Taco Bell we will ever see. Holographic images hover in the air in front of the marble entrance. A row of jacketed valets stands ready. One rushes up.
As they enter, a periscope pipe pops up, looks around, disappears. No one notices it.
Taco Bell is sparse, elegant and Melrose-dark. As Ianto and Jack enter a mariachi band takes their place in the corner. Ianto and Jack walk up to a sultry future version of a Taco Bell order counter. Jack is trying to assimilate it all when the counter girl breaks the ultra-cool character of the restaurant to give him a typical fast food happy face. "Hi! May I help you?"
"Uh, I'll take a Burrito Supreme and a shake?" Jack looks at the menu board with open suspicion.
"Will that be for here or to go?"
"Ah. The eternal question... Here." Jack decides.
She does a perky fast food spin to the station behind her and whips back a silver tray holding an ornate china set. "Burrito Supreme. Shake. Be well."
Jack looks down to a miniscule cylinder of pressed kelp topped with a dab of salsa and small sesame-seed-type bits. The tiny shake is in a thimble-sized frost-covered glass. Jack sarcastically mutters "Oooh. Yum... Good thing I'm hungry."
The mariachi band launches into the Mexican hat dance song as Jack and Ianto, carrying their trays, are escorted by a maitre d' to a table set in a secluded section of the restaurant. Cocteau and Associate Bob wait for them. Cocteau stands "Jack Harkness, the hero of the hour. I congratulate you."
"Greetings and salutations, I am Associate Bob. We met before, ever so briefly but I was grovelling in fear in the humus at the time. You have had quite the exciting first day in San Angeles. Imagine, chasing a real criminal."
Jack said while sitting down "Imagine. Could someone pass the salt?"
Ianto leaned over, whispering "Salt is not good for you. Hence it is..."
Jack glares him quiet, pokes at his Burrito Supreme. A beat. Cocteau muses "So, Jack Harkness, tell me, what do you think of San Angeles, 2042?"
"I guess, considering the way things were going when I went in … I thought the future would be a sick, decaying pit of suffering and hate with a thick, foul stench." Jack said pleasantly.
Cocteau gloats. "You should consider visiting New York/Jersey after this."
Jack is brightening "You mean nothing's changed?"
Associate Bob roars in appreciative empty laughter. Think Ed McMahon. Jack looks at him. It wasn't funny. Pokes at his burrito. Ugh.
Cocteau scoffs "Look at you, Jack Harkness, pouting for the old cheeseburger – the flesh of dying animals covered with cholesterol laden butterfat. You miss the bad old days."
"Yeah, maybe." Jack agrees, and then says "Look, I like vegetables. I even ate tofu a couple times. But I got to choose when I wanted it."
"You think we've gone too far? You weren't here for the fourth and fifth riots" Cocteau is harsh "Civilization tried to destroy itself. People just wanted the madness over. And when I saw the chance to make things right, I grabbed it. San Angeles would not be here. It would be your pit of stench."
"Yeah? Maybe you can book me a flight to New York when this is done."
Ianto is shocked. Cocteau's not thrilled with his attitude either. "For your crimes Jack, you would have surely rotted and died in jail by now. Even you have to appreciate the persuasively tranquil humanity of the Cryo-Prison system..."
"I don't want to piss on your parade, pal, but my 'cryo-sentence' wasn't a sweet lullaby. I had feelings - I had thoughts - a 44 year-old bad dream about thirty people in a burning building - about my wife, beating her fists against an ice bucket. It woulda been more humane to stake me down and leave me to the crows."
Ianto is horrified "You were awake? A person would go insane."
Jack stares out the window. Across the street he sees a scragly SCRAP on a sputtery patched together motor bike in front of a large food store across the street.
Cocteau splutters "I am saddened and stunned. If there's anything I can do..."
Jack goes back to staring out the window. Two, three, then four Scraps loitering, looking around, they've done nothing yet, but to Jack's eye it's clear they're up to no good.
The food truck approaches. Jack says as he is standing "Just call for back-up. I'll be across the street."
"But, Jack, why... How, wha..." Ianto is spluttering now.
"One of those hunch things again. Bad guys about to do bad things..." Jack is calling out; as he leaves … And Jack is gone...
The court of stores are located outside the restaurant. Jack steps past the holographic images toward the food store. No one can mistake him for an exiting patron. He radiates attitude. Jack picks up his pace. The food truck is just pulling in. The Motorcycle Scrap sees him, Revs the bike in a ferocious swerve towards Jack.
Jack looks around. Beside him is a street Sign Murmuring "Third and Alemeda, Third and Alemeda, Third..." Jack rips it from the ground.
.
.
Ianto, and the rest of the restaurant gather at the window to ooh in fear. Cocteau scowls angrily at the Scraps.
.
.
The Scrap on the motorcycle has no time to dodge as Jack stands his ground, jousts him clear out of his seat. The motorcycle skids by, barely missing him, hits the curb, somersaults and explodes through the holograms. Jack doesn't even flinch.
Still clutching the pole, Jack makes a swift kempo-swing into the three other attackers. And then, all hell breaks loose.
EXPLOSIVE DEVICES EXPLODE the concrete inside nearby stores. Scraps come pouring out. Sewer COVERS are BLOWN asunder followed by chain and nun chuck wielding Scraps.
An alarm screams strangely and melodically. The food truck is swarmed. Inside the food store ten, twenty, thirty Scraps attack and loot. Jack sees there's a lot of them here. A whole lot.
"Great, they brought the whole team." Jack huffs.
Three more Scraps come charging out of the store. Clutching packages. They hurl explosive devices towards Jack to make their escape.
.
.
Ianto leads a round of giddy gasps. Cocteau is not pleased with any of this.
.
.
Jack dodges the blast, looks around, and takes stock of the whole situation. An oncoming trolley comes around the corner into the complex. "Now if we can just get them to stay and play..."
Jack dashes to the trolley car. He bounds up to the driver.
"BE well...?" the driver squeaks with alarm.
"Be gone." Jack tugs the driver along with him out of the moving trolley. He javelins a mighty thrust with the street sign into the back wheels of the trolley.
.
.
The patrons grow dead silent in anticipation.
.
.
The TROLLEY teeters into a savagely awesome derail. It goes into a SQUEALING, sparking SKID right into the food truck. The slamming-to-a-stop trolley neatly angles into the truck trapping Scraps out front and inside.
.
.
The patrons unbridle themselves into actual cheering.
.
.
Jack bursts forth from the trolley into the melee. "You're all under arrest."
The Scraps freeze for a moment. This guy means business in a way they've never seen before. But Jack is distracted for a moment by an excited yell -
"Protein! I've found protein!"
This doesn't sound like hardened criminals to Jack.
More Scraps rush over to help him carry this booty away. A scrap appears beside Jack, swinging a pair of nun chucks made from two knobby table legs. Jack wearily warns "You're going to regret this for the rest of your life. Both seconds of it."
Nun chuck Scrap thwaps Jack. Jack just looks annoyed, not hurt. Slams him again. Still no reaction. Jack latches onto a nun chuck in the air as it comes toward him. Yanks it forward as he shoves the Scrap backward into the food store window. The Scrap bounces off the window like a nerf ball, not remotely cracking it. Jack frowns to himself.
"Maybe I'm losing my touch."
Two other Scraps attack him. Jack fends off one, Shot-puts the other into the wndow, this time shattering it completely.
"Better."
Up on the truck, Payne, under an enormous load of food, appears. Takes quick stock of the situation. He sees Jack. Has no idea who this guy is, but he's trouble.
They exchange a look.
"We're outta here!" Payne yells.
.
.
Cocteau smoulders at the sight of Payne.
.
.
The hurled scrap stumbles out of the window wreckage, falling to his knees. As Jack considers what the hell is really going on, and should he deck this guy, a bunch of cans of quirky food cascade out of the Scrap's jacket. There is genuine pleading "Please... don't..."
Jack stops. Backs away. Watches oddly as the Scrap escapes. He lets them go. Steps back away as the others escape. They don't know why he changed his mind, but they're not staying around to find out.
Ianto and the restaurant patrons rush up to give him a blast of adulation. Jack's attention stays on the fleeing Scraps.
"Such a reckless abandonment!" Ianto is bouncing with glee "Looks like there's a new shepherd in town!"
"Sheriff" Jack corrects distractedly "... Who were those guys?"
Cocteau explains "We call them Scraps. Voluntary outcasts, they cower beneath us in sewers, abandoned tunnels..."
"They're nothing but thugs and hooligans." Associated Bob agrees.
Cocteau nods appreciatively; Bob is echoing some previous statement of his. In the background, a team of uniformed engineers are patching up a hole in the ground using a set of steel planks, laser welders, giant cement spurting pastry bags.
Ianto gushes to Jack "You are even better live than on laserdisc. Oh, and the joy-joy way you paused to make a glib witticism before doing battle with that strangely-weaponed Scrap it was so, so..."
Jack is almost losing it "Hey, this isn't the Wild West. The Wild West wasn't even the Wild West. Hurting people is not a good time. Well, sometimes it is... but not when it's just a bunch of guys who want something to eat. You know, I think I liked it better when we were all supposed to fry in a nuclear holocaust."
Cocteau doesn't look pleased about any of this. Jack storms off. Ianto, letting out a shocked breath, gulps and follows after him.