{ INT. SANDWICH SHOP — AFTERNOON }
Cables are hanging down from the ceiling, sparking ever so often. Debris and dust cover the shop surfaces and floors. On the wall there is a poster of a man grinning ear to ear with his hands strangling a wrap, from which a rainbow of foods is exploding. A dark sludge is splattered across it, dripping onto the ground. WOMAN OF WONDER and QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST are in the middle of this scene, lounging in one of the shop’s booths.
WOMAN OF WONDER
It is such a relief that we saved our home once again.QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
Indeed! I feared for a moment we wouldn’t—but now we can finally rest!They are eating from two piles of gritty paste. One is light, sand-colored. The other is an ominous dark. The sounds they make while savoring the food are orgasmic.
QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
Wow! I never knew hummus could be this chocolate. You’ll have to give me your recipe—whenever I get in the kitchen, I always manage to burn everything.Womp womp wommmmp.
The audience laughs.
WOMAN OF WONDER
It is a recipe that has been passed down in my family since the very first human being made hummus.QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
Hey, I thought you were a Themyscirian not a human!The audience laughs.
WOMAN OF WONDER
Oh my, you are so silly.She tries to laugh, but her face doesn’t make that expression easily. Instead, she looks like she’s crying.
WOMAN OF WONDER
I owe you at least a recipe. We were lucky today, that the enemy didn’t have the means to fight you and your powers.QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
It doesn’t take a neurobiologist to know that they needed food to survive.The audience laughs.
QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
Anyhoo, don’t sell yourself short—I’m sure we could have got ‘em with just your artillery.WOMAN OF WONDER
(adjusting her stars and stripes top)
I had some help. And hey...I was thinking...QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
(scooting closer to the WOMAN OF WONDER)
Yeah?Without saying anything else, WOMAN OF WONDER surges forward to press her mouth against the mouth of QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST. For several moments, they drily rub their mouths against each other. The audience oooohs and aaaaahs. They pull away from each other, completely placid.
QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST
Wuh-wuh-wowza! What took you so long?The audience laughs.
WOMAN OF WONDER
(smiling)
We had a war to win and a city to save.The camera pans outside the shop.
Everything is gray. It takes a moment for the eye to focus on any one thing. The first thing is the hollowed-out buildings and the piles of rubble around them. Each former apartment, former bedroom, former kitchen, former closet, former bathroom, former doctor's office, former ICU, former NICU, former emergency room, former classroom, former church, former mosque, former synagogue, former museum, former shop, former restaurant, former records room, former studio, former storeroom, former shelter is screaming out around whatever remains of the building's bones. The shop the WOMAN OF WONDER and the QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST are in is the building which has received the least damage.
Once the eye has adjusted to this, it next notices that the piles of rubble have some moving parts. People. People are shifting through the rubble, digging for each other, scrabbling through the rock to find whatever may remain of their loved ones. They are filling plastic bags with body parts. They are carrying bodies, with no place to put them down, to bury them. They are stumbling. They are coughing. Their cheeks are caving in. The eye closes, looks elsewhere. This land. This land is ruined, no, has been ruined. When the WOMAN OF WONDER and the QUIRKY NEUROBIOLOGIST staked out this land in ACT ONE, it was vibrant. Now, like everything else, it is gray. The eye shuts. The eye opens. The eye shuts. The eye opens.