“The Villain Saga” – Episode 8, Part 1

(Table of contents) (See previous)

FADE IN.

EXT. ??? LOCATION – EARLY EVENING

The episode opens on a foggy day—but not near Erewhon Prison. No, this is in a land far, far away from that rocky outcrop in the middle of a vast ocean. Tall grasses sway with the weight of dew in the evening fog, and the sound of sheep can be heard in the distance.

A young boy sits in the field, playing a tune on a fairly simple, small recorder, stopping every few notes to jot down in a notebook with a piece of charcoal. It’s only got a few pages, which have been written over back and front and in every blank area. It looks as though he made it himself with whatever he could find.

BOY

(singing)

Once, in a faraway land…

(He plays his flute a bit, then stops to scrawl a few rudimentary lines of musical notes.)

…there was a young lad.

(Plays a few more notes)

A fallen family, a simple farm…

(He stops, thinking about the next lyric)

And the knowledge…of…knowledge of…

He’s bumped in the back, and he turns around to see a young black sheep, looking at him curiously. The boy snatches his notes away before it can take a bite from the paper.

BOY

Fiend! This is the only one I have!

(Con’t)

I need to leave a song for my family, it will finally be something great for us to be remembered by!

A woman’s voice calls over the hill, from a small house near a group of trees.

WOMAN

Agravain! Tell your brother to come eat!

(She coughs)

AGRAVAIN

Yes, Mother!

The boy, AGRAVAIN, stands and puts his notebook, charcoal, and flute in his pockets. He walks, further away from the house, towards the line of ocean on the horizon. The little sheep follows him. Dotted around the land are simple stone houses, homes for the peasants of the kingdom.

He reaches the shore, where there’s another boy, around his age if not a couple years older, drawing a quite advanced diagram on the sand, sitting next to some wet and rotted boxes. AGRAVAIN gets close, stopping just before he could accidentally mess up the drawing.

AGRAVAIN

What are those?

The other boy points at the box without any words. Inside are strange contraptions—all things the audience would recognize as radios, house lamps, and basic electronic accessories.

???

These came ashore a few nights ago…

AGRAVAIN

…Ah, the things the king’s men don’t like us to collect.

(Con’t)

They don’t look…useful.

???

Give me a bit more time…I think…if I could only see those diagrams.

AGRAVAIN frowns.

AGRAVAIN

…from the family laboratory? You know that it is still sealed, right?

???

The “curse” is nonsense!

(Con’t)

These are supplies nonexistent to our kingdom—they may be the missing piece to make our ancestor’s ideas work!

AGRAVAIN sighs, not in the mood to argue.

AGRAVAIN

All right…remember to come home soon, and cover those before you do…

The boy drawing in the sand finally turns away to look at his brother, and we see his face. It’s nearly unrecognizable, but he wears a gold scarf around his neck, and there’s a familiar intelligent, determined expression, and this time two sharp green eyes instead of only one.

AGRAVAIN

…Mordred.

The scene suddenly switches back to the prison, in BINARY BARD’S dark cell. A red glow emits as he wakes, not afraid but uncharacteristically confused. He’s sitting in a chair at his desk, still surrounded by half-finished cybernetic experiments.

The door opens. He looks ahead, his grin appearing again as DR. JUPITER steps into the room.

BINARY BARD

…what have you done now?

JUPITER

I’m coming because I don’t like how you’re spreading rumors about a certain prisoner.

The camera looks outside the cell briefly, at the hall. A screen attached near the ceiling flashes briefly with a digital poster of BLACK WIDOW, notifying all of her “escape”.

JUPITER

I know you’re the one spreading rumors that the Black Widow is somehow still here. I don’t need any more fear-mongering among the prisoners than there already is.

BINARY BARD

…Am I wrong?

JUPITER’S silent, which merely confirms BARD’S thoughts. His smile widens.

BINARY BARD

I thought so.

JUPITER

Now—

BINARY BARD

Now, before you ask anything more of me, how about you explain what you did?

(Con’t)

That “quick procedure” was some fib. I rarely sleep, and I know this was your doing…You, an intelligent man, at least by “normal” standards, should know not to expect me to simply follow along.

JUPITER grabs a chair, sitting across from BARD at the desk.

JUPITER

She put up a fight too, Mordred. All of you might, but it won’t change a thing.

(Con’t)

But I’ll let you know some details, and I won’t bother lying because I know you will know.

BINARY BARD

Ah, but you think you can get away by omitting truths?

JUPITER scowls. He doesn’t like being in corners like this—of course, if push comes to shove he could simply do with this man like he did with WIDOW, simply knocking them out. But before he goes to that extreme, there’s a few things he wants to know…

JUPITER

Tell me about Arturus.

CUT TO MOREAU and D., in their own office. DIRECTOR D. is doing some work on his computer, and the sound of papers being shredded can be heard in the background. He turns away, looking at MOREAU as she puts more of WIDOW’S documents into the shredder.

DIRECTOR D.

(sarcastically)

Wow, you sure aren’t one to give up fast on your patients, Dr. Lesser.

MOREAU

She’s gone, no point in keeping them.

(Con’t)

If she somehow managed to escape, I think she’ll make sure there’s no chance of them finding her again…if she survives!

(She puts another stack into the shredder)

Not that these notes were ever useful to us.

DIRECTOR D. gets up from his chair, walking to the shelf she’s pulling documents from. He reaches for a binder near the top, opening it.

DIRECTOR D.

Well, if we are supposed to be psychiatrists, maybe we should pay a little more attention to these.

An item falls from the binder, startling both. MOREAU picks it up, inspecting the small black object.

MOREAU

Look at this.

DIRECTOR D.

A cassette tape?

(He takes a closer look at it)

It’s new. Why would anyone use that?

MOREAU

It’s on the Binary Bard, by the doctor here before us.

She hands DIRECTOR D the tape. He digs through some dusty drawers, and manages to find a radio with a tape player. He places it in, and the crackling audio comes to life.

During this, a flashback of an obscured man holding a clipboard can be seen, sitting at the same desk D. was using. His hair is black and long with a streak of white, although his voice sounds fairly young.

CASSETTE TAPE

This is a confidential recording, left only for Dr. Jupiter and whatever poor soul is my replacement. If you’re not one of those people…I honestly don’t know what you are doing here. My name is Dr. Morrigan, and I’m recording this on my last day before I am sent back to the mainland.

(con’t)

This is my full, final analysis on prisoner Mordred LeFay, and I’m including some notes he told me…none of which are present in any other records, not here, and not anywhere except his homeland.

CUT TO BINARY BARD’S cell. JUPITER and BARD are sitting across from each other, with the moonlight from the window illuminating their silhouettes.

BINARY BARD

Arturus?

(con’t)

Hah! That place–it’s worthless. They know nothing of progress, nothing of the truth behind their royalty.

JUPITER

And you think you have the right to rule?

BINARY BARD

Ah! Just like all the rest–you are just as foolish as they.

(He leans in, grin widening, but his face darkens)

I do not think, nor do I presume. I know. Arturus is founded on lies, and their “king” is merely the beginning of them.

CUT TO DIRECTOR D. and MOREAU’S office again. They’re listening to the crackled tape intently. A light storm begins to form outside the prison walls.

MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

Mordred Le Fay, or if we’re using aliases, the Binary Bard, is the closest thing I’ve seen to the definition of “insanity” as a person.

Show the Erewhon guards, in specialized space gear, entering through a portal. Ahead is BINARY BARD’S castle, his interstellar home and prison, raised on a platform surrounded by a dry, thorny wasteland.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

I know many in my field would view writing complicated behaviors off as “insanity” as somewhat crude and antiquated, but it’s the best way I can describe the man. He’s intelligent–this seems to be common knowledge, but not many seem to understand how unnaturally smart this man is. I’ve yet to get him to comply with any testing, but he’s quite possibly the closest any person has gotten to having a quadruple digit IQ.

In the flashback, MORRIGAN exits the shuttle behind the guards, cautiously looking ahead. They’re on a mission to finally retrieve MORDRED. In his hand, MORRIGAN holds a strange, glowing green orb.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

But no matter how smart he is, he insists on repeating the same actions over and over, expecting a new result…

(con’t)

Sabotaging everything in the hopes of putting his life back together.

A man exits the castle, dressed in familiar purples and golds but looking quite different. His skin isn’t a pale, sickly tone, with a bit of a beard as well, and wearing more “normal” clothes compared to a jester outfit. On his neck hangs a piece of red glass, and he stares down from the balcony at the Erewhon staff.

The illusion flickers, then the man changes, back to how we see BINARY BARD now. He looks very disheveled, with bits of dark hair growing from his head where the skin is undamaged.

BINARY BARD

I ne’er thought I would see another face again!

In the flashback, MORRIGAN raises his voice.

DR. MORRIGAN

Please don’t resist, Mordred—we’re here to take you back home. The radiation levels on this planet aren’t safe for long-term—

BINARY BARD

Quite late for that!

The guards get into formation, waiting on orders. BINARY BARD stays at the edge of the platform, keeping his gaze on DR. MORRIGAN. The flashback continues as they surround the castle, climbing the platform.

BINARY BARD makes no effort to resist.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

We managed to release him only with an energy source he had created, back in Arturus. It took a lot of back-and-forth to even gain access to it, and it took an even longer time to convince them that we needed it to keep them safe if Mordred were to escape.

(Con’t)

Although, I think that distant planet only reached through a portal is more secure than any prison here.

In the flashback, BINARY BARD’S gaze travels away, towards the foggy and dusty sun. The scene slowly shifts to the wheat fields of his old home.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

Mordred brought rocket science and technology that rivals our own to a kingdom with a basic, barebones understanding of mechanics and science. Throughout his teen years and early adulthood, Arturus was transformed in every way possible.

The flashback moves to YOUNG MORDRED, sifting through papers in a secret, underground bunker. To the side is another young boy—AGRAVAIN, from earlier, watching his brother’s back in case anyone comes.

We cut to JUPITER and BINARY BARD in the present as this scene continues.

JUPITER

So you have a brother?

BINARY BARD

Had. I doubt the curse would have let him live so far.

JUPITER

Curse?

BINARY BARD

(Ignoring Jupiter’s question)

His name was…Agravain. Yes. He wasn’t blessed with my own genius, for whatever reason, although he was still granted the ingenuitas of all Le Fays.

Back to the flashback, where AGRAVAIN looks at a dusty journal while his older brother sifts through simple blueprints. We hear MORRIGAN’S voice from the tape once again.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

Of course, I should make clear this wasn’t entirely Mordred’s doing.

(Con’t)

The man himself admitted it to me, although he made it quite a point that he did most of the work—he says.

There’s a short vision of a monk walking through a library in the sunset, covered by ancient books unseen to any outside the island. In a dark corner, a group of old blueprints is placed and sealed away.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

Apparently all of the Le Fays before him were dark horses, if you will. Most had an intelligence and ambition like his own, and they laid down the foundations over decades to allow him to change Arturus forever.

We cycle through flashbacks as MORRIGAN continues.

DR. MORRIGAN (AUDIO)

…unfortunately, the Le Fay’s have a…strange history. They called it the “Le Fay curse”. It seems any members of the family, even those who married into it, never lived past the age of 35, usually because of illness or strange accidents. Many are said to have lost their minds.

(Con’t)

I could not figure out the cause of this, and the Binary Bard admitted to knowing little either. He doesn’t think he has any surviving family left in the kingdom, and at the age of 48, he’s currently the longest-lived in the family’s known history…I can’t help but wonder if this was related to his extensive body modifications, though.

CUT TO MOREAU and DIRECTOR D., back in the office. MOREAU frowns as this part continues.

MOREAU

A curse? I’m surprised such a man of science could entertain that idea.

DIRECTOR D.

…stranger things have happened.

---

We’ve hit both a lore dump chapter (where this series starts to really branch into it’s own “canon”) and the beginning of the end for season one.

Castori honorem ~ Smart Bubbles