Summary: By James Patrick Kelly Cast: Becca- AB Kovacs Sam- Pamela L. Quevillon Mel Gibson- John Cmar Discuss on our forums. An Escape Pod Original! All stories by James Patrick Kelly All stories read by AB Kovacs, Pamela L. Quevillon, John Cmar Appropriate for older teens and up due to erotic imagery and war criminal comeuppance. Bad Dogs Escape By James Patrick Kelly /SFX/ CLOCK TICKING, FADE TO /SFX/ DOGS BARKING IN DISTANCE SAM: Like? BECCA: Like. SAM: (growls like a dog, sexy) BECCA: Like? SAM: Like. /SFX/ DOGS BARKING IN DISTANCE BECCA: Lick? SAM: (giggles) Like. BECCA: (howls like a dog) /SFX/ DOGS BARKING CLOSER SAM: They’re busy today. BECCA: Man’s best friend. (SAM and BECCA laugh) MEL: (in distance) Help! SAM: Uh-oh. BECCA: Company. /SFX/ DOGS BARKING, CLOSER MEL: (outside) Open up. Help! /SFX/ PANICKY KNOCKING ON DOOR MEL: (outside) For God’s sake, let me in! SAM: Already with God. Leave him. BECCA: No, let’s take a look. I could use a laugh. /SFX/ FOOTSTEPS. WINDOW SLIDES OPEN. SAM: Good enough to eat? BECCA: You’re bad. /SFX/ DOGS BARKING MEL: I can see you in there. Hurry. Please. BECCA: Where’s the controller? SAM: You’re not letting him in? /SFX/ DOGS BARKING /SFX/ MORE KNOCKING BECCA: This’ll be fun. Is the taser charged? SAM: Let’s see. /SFX/ TASER ZAP SAM: Yep. BECCA: I bet nine minutes. SAM: Not fair. You can see him. /SFX/ GARAGE DOOR OPENING BECCA: Nine is my bet. Yours? SAM: Way too quick. Ten minutes. No, eleven. BECCA: Done. (calls to Mel) It’s an overhead door. You have to crawl. MEL: (outside) What? They’re coming fast. SAM: Crawl under! /SFX/ CRAWLING, GRUNTING MEL: Shut it, shut it now! /SFX/ GARAGE DOOR CLOSING MEL: Thank you, thank you, thank you. You saved my life. /SFX/ STANDS, MORE GRUNTS, DUSTS HIMSELF OFF MEL: But who are you? BECCA: Me, Becca. She, Sam. You? SAM: Mel Gibson, maybe. BECCA: Our road warrior. (SAM and BECCA laugh) MEL: (confused) No, my name is Fish. Robert Fish. You can call me Bob. SAM: Or I can call you Mel Gibson. MEL: I beg your pardon, but that’s not my name. My name is Bob. SAM: Mel. (beat) Gibson. BECCA: You’re bad, Sam. (beat) So Mel, you must be from the vault. MEL: The vault? BECCA: The big underground storage thingy. All the fatcats snoozing away. MEL: You mean the Cultural Preservation Facility? That was top secret back when … but I suppose you must know all about it by now. BECCA: Not all. SAM: Something about your old government. BECCA: You people wasted everything. And then millions died. SAM: Billions. MEL: We tried. We tried very hard. It wasn’t as if we couldn’t see what was coming. The droughts, tornados, the economy going south. But it didn’t happen all at once. Then the Raccoon flu, the antibiotics were useless. The wheat crop failed two years in a row. Then came riots, cities on fire, madness. When we lost control we gathered the best — scientists, economists, engineers, architects into the CPF …. SAM: CPF? MEL: The Cultural Preservation Facility. The vault. The Congressional Committee selected a hundred volunteers to enter suspended animation pods to sleep through all the disasters. Wait, how long has it been? SAM: Since when? MEL: I mean, what year is this? SAM: Pick one. They’re all available. BECCA: My mom never kept a calendar. Did yours, Sam? SAM: You met my mom. BECCA: Right. So anyway, Mel, you decided to snooze while the world went to the dogs. MEL: Everything was flying apart. We tried to save what we could. But something went wrong. SAM: You think? MEL: No, I mean in the CPF. The main power was rated for fifty years, then if nobody woke us up the backup was supposed to kick in. But for some reason, it’s only running at half power. Whole sections are shutting down. I was lucky, I just barely escaped being d[...]
