Blackthorne Episode 132

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 Blackthorne

Cinemagenic 132

Aftermath

“Someday we’ll remember so much that we’ll build

the biggest goddamn steam shovel in history, and

dig the biggest grave of all time and shove war into

it and cover it up.”--Ray Bradbury.

1(sound cue) snare drum and guitar.

2(overhead drone shot) Buck riding hell for leather,

thick dust kicked up in his galloping.

3(sound cue) the mare’s hooves, deep breathing,

and the snap of the reins against its flanks.

4(drone shot descending) toward the rider, until

they fill the frame.

5(cut to a medium wide shot) at ground level, as

Buck gallops toward the camera, overtakes it

and runs past.

6(cut to slow motion) the big man leaning forward,

as the mare’s muscles rippled.

7(cut to normal traveling shot) The mare was a 

sprinter. After five miles she began to cave in. Buck 

let her slow to a canter. He turned northeast running 

down the dark shoulders of ridges, through shadow-

laced arroyos, long dewy grass and tall sage. He rode 

for 45 minutes and then reined up at the edge of some 

timber. It was still early and damp, and the sun was 

without heat. Buck stayed in the saddle.

8(sound cue)  violins and cello over harmonica.

9(medium close up) Buck could see no one was

following him. Posses did not form themselves, and

with the deputy dead and the sheriff wounded, chaos

swirled in the streets. He pushed his hat back onto his

back, the leather strap tight under his chin. He

smoothed his sweaty hair, and stretched his tense

shoulders.

10(medium wide shot) He pulled his black hat back on

and loped north. He kept to the thick timber, staying off

the main road. 

11(medium close up) He stopped every few minutes 

and scanned his back trail. He didn’t see a sign of 

anyone. Sonofabitch, he thought, Not even Bronson 

had sent out riders. He had poked a hornet’s nest, and 

folks had to deal with their stings.

12(sound cue) violin fiddling with banjo.

13(medium wide travel shot) He rode up a steep

hogback, picking his way around a stand of swelled-

butt jack pine, sitting tall in the stolen saddle,

and he and the mare could still feel the chill of 

the morning in their lungs. He stopped in a

tiny glen, and dismounted. The stock of his

Sharps stuck up out of the rifle scabbard like

a hand brake on a wagon, like a rudder on a

boat. Watching the mare munch a hasty

breakfast of sweet grass, he suddenly felt

hunger wrapped in anger, and anguish masked

with adrenalin. He took a long piss, and steam

rose off the stream and the puddle in the dust.

14(close-up) His face.

15(sound cue) His inner monologue, playing out

in voice over, as the camera captures the halcyon

moments in the glen--flitting birds warbling and

choking tree branches, butterflies winging in

swarming squadrons over multicolor thatches

of wild flowers, a pair of squirrels chattering at

him from halfway up a pine, and the thick sweet

scent of pine needles in the air.

Could I be more fucked? I doubt it. Antlered Buck

is burned down, and with it the demise of horses

and dreams. Death has rode roughshod, and He

is not done with me yet. Salina will be beside 

herself with worry. Joe Hop is not going to cut me 

any more slack. I have stolen a horse, and had 

another shot out from underneath me. I broke out 

of jail just as a U.S. Marshal is expected. Bronson 

holds the aces. He avoided a meeting with me. I 

shot up his saloon, and I don’t know if Joe Hop 

determined the assholes who attacked us at the 

ranch were actually sent by Bronson. My Appaloosa 

stallion is beyond reach, and some motherfucker 

shot my dog. Christ in a wheel-barrow.

16(medium wide shot) He swung up into the saddle,

stood up in the stirrups, and raised clenched fists

to the heavens. Settling into the leather, he patted

the mare’s neck, nudged her with his knees, and

galloped straight into the sun, down into a deep

canyon.

17(sound cue) castanets and coronet.

18(cut to overhead drone shot) rising slowly up from

the rider, higher and higher, until Buck was just an ant

riding a beetle, scurrying out of sight. 

Glenn Buttkus

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