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Morning at the Horizon Motel. Birds chirping and all that nonsense. The door to the office opens and Frank walks out.
Frank:
This time of year, yeah. It’s the off season. In a few months there’ll be a bunch of skiers on their way up the mountain.
Frank:
Skiing? It’s a universal law of nature. When there’s a big thing there will be, inevitably, a portion of the population that wants to go very fast down the side of it.
Frank:
I notice you don’t have a car. I’m going to run into town for some supplies, do you need us to pick you up anything?
Frank’s truck comes speeding up the driveway into the parking lot. June jumps out of the driver’s seat. She’s on the phone.
June:
Uh-huh... Oh no... Oh God that sucks... And you looked everywhere?... Uh-huh. I’m so sorry. (To Frank.) Edgy Steve.
June:
(Back to the phone.) Well, we haven’t seen anything but we’ll keep our eyes open, okay... I’m sure he’ll turn up... okay.
June:
Well, of course it is, Frank, it guards the house of a drug dealer. Drug dealers all have terrifying dogs, it’s the law.
Frank:
I’m kind of stumped. It’s been three days now and they just hang out in their room and occasionally come outside and roll a cigarette.
June:
Okay. Hey, Verge. If anyone wants to check in can you just tell them to pick a room, key’s in the bedside table, we’ll deal with them later?
Breakfast rush at the sheep’s eye. Frank and June are sitting outside. Deidre brings them their order.
Deidre:
Well, everyone’s working really hard to explain it away. Celeste is saying it was some sort of government experiment being conducted on us. What’s “MK Ultra?”
Frank:
It’s not great, so if you’re going for a walk or something, I guess take your bear spray with you?
Frank:
Why does she have to come back to town right now? Of all the people I don’t want to deal with.
June:
There are weird things afoot in town though. Might be nice to have the perspective of a... whatever she calls herself.
Frank:
The last thing anyone needs right now is her drawing some sort of summoning circle in the middle of town to focus the spiritual energies or some bullshit.
Frank:
I don’t know. Look, I wake up in the morning, I look in the mirror, it’s me. I’m not growing roots or something, I’m not turning into a werewolf. It’s me.
Flat Doug:
No, he hates going outside. You practically have to drag him behind you when you walk him.
Flat Doug:
My Dad’s dog is wandering around out there while Steve’s insane monster is roaming the streets?
Frank:
Doug we’re all going to keep an eye out, okay? Rambo probably took off into the woods to bring down an elk or something.
Frank:
Everybody... Everybody listen up... Thank you. You may have heard that Rambo has gone missing. Now, while that presents it’s own problems, seeing as how Rambo is a fucking psychopath, Baron Munchausen is also missing. I need to know right now if anyone else is missing a dog or if you’ve heard of anyone else that is missing a dog... Anybody?
Celeste:
We all remember what happened a few days ago. We were visited by, what can only be described as, a time traveller. An old west outlaw by the name of Relentless Rick. While not all of you subscribe to my theory that we were all drugged as part of an experiment by the nearby secret military base-
Celeste:
-Agree to disagree. You may not all agree with my theory. But now there’s missing dogs. And I think we can all agree that these dogs are being stolen by the local secret military base and being experimented on.
Celeste:
For now. For now it is, but look at Frank here. Look at him. If this wasn’t something for us to be worried about, Frank wouldn’t be making a speech about it, would he? Would you, Frank?
Edgy Steve:
Hi everyone. Sorry to interrupt, I’ve got some fliers here, everyone please take one, my dog has gone missing, you can see a picture right there. He can be a little irritable, but he’s a good boy-
Edgy Steve:
I’m just making sure, okay? Trying to stay busy, can’t help but think about him being injured out there.
Frank:
Steve, your dog is a fucking monster, okay? It is what it is, we will still help you find your dog, but let’s not pretend we’re talking about Lassie okay? You’re dog is four-legged horror movie.
Frank:
Okay, y’all, focus up please. Obviously making this little announcement was premature, I didn’t mean to alarm anyone. We’ve got a couple of missing dogs. No big deal. Nothing to panic about. Let’s all just keep our eyes out for Rambo and Baron Munchausen. We’ll find them and then everything can get back to normal.
Deidre:
That was Jessica Shelton on the phone. She needs to know if anyone’s seen her Greyhound, Kimbob?
Flat Doug:
Don’t tell me not to panic, Frank, there’s a fucking dog rapture happening right here in town.
Frank:
We’re going to figure this out, just like we did with Relentless Rick the other day. Why don’t we make a list of everyone in town who has a dog and start making some calls-
Frank:
Guys. I appreciate that we’re taking this seriously but just, real quick, I know we all had an unofficial election a few years ago and elected TJ’s dog, Sparker, as the mayor. I just need verbal confirmation that we all know that Sparker the Dog is not the actual mayor.
June:
Okay, everyone. Lots of great ideas, so glad we had this meeting. SO glad nobody’s panicking. How about we make a list of all the dogs in town and then we’ll split up the list, when you’re done with your list, give us a call at the Horizon, okay?
Edgy Steve:
And, real quick, everyone, if you happen to see Rambo just remember not to run, okay? He loves that. Also, to get him to release after he bites down, the command word is “Scheherazade.”
We move to the parking lot of the Horizon motel later that evening. The phone is ringing inside the office. June is on her cell phone.
June:
Okay... Okay wow. Both of them?... Just gone... Oh boy... Alright, me and Frank are making a list right now, I’m so sorry Rita.
Frank:
So tomorrow we’re just going to, what, Scooby Doo our way through the woods looking for them?
Trinkett:
I need to be more focused when we talk and I just got off an airplane and I need to clean that experience off of me before we talk.
Trinkett:
... The work I was doing was very important to me. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t feel it was necessary... Something... has shifted. I don’t know what it is, but I’d like to speak with you about it.
Trinkett:
Thank you... The energy in town is very strange right now, is there anything strange going on?
Frank walks into the office as a car comes up the driveway and stops. Deidre gets out with Sparker the Dog.
Deidre:
Yeah. Lots of people come here in the winter but this is my favorite time of year. So quiet.
Deidre:
Oooh. That sounds nice. I went backpacking through Argentina after college. No itinerary, when I wanted to move on I moved on, it was nice.
Deidre:
... Um, hey, if you’re going to be in town for a while you should come by the Sheep’s Eye. I’m the bartender, first drink’s on me.
Frank:
I don’t know. Take any group of people and, given enough time, eventually someone will become the one everyone complains to.
Verge walks inside their room. Another deep sigh from Frank. After a long moment, there is the sound of something in the trees.
Slowly, Something massive moves from the trees into the parking lot, each step makes a thud on the pavement. It has four legs and breathes heavily. Frank doesn’t move.
Rambo raises his head to the air and lets out a blood curdling howl that echoes across the mountain. The door to the office opens.
Rambo roars. Verge draws their plasma pistol and fires several shots. Rambo howls in pain and verge advances on him, firing shot after shot, walking towards the monster in the parking lot as they shoot. Rambo finally gives out a death rattle and drops to the ground with a massive thud. Everything is quiet.
Rambo’s body explodes, pieces of him flying everywhere. After the dust settles, we hear dogs barking.
Frank:
Verge, uh, thank you? Uh... We’ve got to deal with this right now so... Breakfast tomorrow? We can all tell each other some interesting stories, okay?
Verge walks into their room. After a moment they laugh. Inside Verge’s room we hear “ Eldin”, their Tangle.
Verge:
Eldin, I don’t suppose it’s a common occurrence on Earth for a bunch of dogs to combine into one big dog and then split up again into a bunch of smaller dogs, is it?
Leif:
(Through the Tangle.) Hey... Please don’t delete this... I uh... I have no idea where to start with this message so I’ll just start talking and I’m sorry if some of it sounds like nonsense... Every time I’m in a place that looks enough like home, I send off this message to your usual message relay and hope that you get it... I hope you’re okay... In fact I hope you’re more than okay, I hope you’re... I don’t know, I hope you finally went sailing... I don’t know how much you know about what’s going on with me but it’s... it’s an interesting life. And in that interesting life you see some interesting things, go to some interesting places... There’s this place I came across the other day and uh... I don’t know, I thought of you for some reason... If you’re still always on the lookout for good places to hide for a while, I may have found one for you... It’s a nice place. It’s weird, but it’s nice... Of course what I really hope is that you somehow managed to stop running... that somehow life is different for you... you deserved a different life... Anyway, I think you’d like this place. I think it might hold your attention. Earth always felt like a prison for me but for you... who knows? The coordinates are embedded in this message, I’m assuming you’ve still got my encryption key... I hope I get to see you again someday. Until then... Give it a shot, Verge. You never know when something’s going to be exactly what you’re looking for.
Verge:
... I hate it when you’re right... Eldin, deploy a sensor dome on this location, play some nice music and wake me up in seven hours.