"The person you are matters more than the place to which you go; for that reason we should not make the mind a bondsman to any one place. Live in this belief: I am not born for any one corner of the universe, this whole world is my country."
FADE IN:
EXT. APOCALYPSE GARDENS – DAY
Trees and grass being VIEWED through the veil of time or a dream. Coloured smoke wafts through the scene: a kaleidoscope, a rainbow.
8mm family video footage, stuttering frames of children running around a garden, dancing under water sprinklers.
Music begins quietly, suggestive of the era, of this era, every era. Perhaps LET IT GO from FROZEN or THE END from The DOORS.
Now MOVING through the FRAMES are the silhouettes of cars, not that we could make them out to be that.
Joining the cars are fast moving silhouettes of camper vans, caravans and lorries. Then a car BURSTS into the centre of the scene and pushes the happy family to the background and appears to come out of the screen, like a shark in one of those old 3D movies.
The scene becomes ghostly again.
DISSOLVE TO:
INT. APOCALYPSE HOUSE – DAY
A CLOSE SHOT, upside down of the stubble covered face of a young man. The unmistakeably chiselled features of APOCALYPSE DADDY. His eyes open, he stares intently at the SLOWLY ROTATING ceiling fan. Each turn of the fan sounds like the blades of a helicopter slowly turning.
EXT. IMAGES OF CARS – DAY
They continue to move slowly along a three lane motorway. The image looks like an acid trip. Multi-coloured and slow, the cars melting into leaf like fractals.
INT. APOCALYPSE HOUSE – DAY
The camera moves slowly across the living room of Apocalypse House… and we see Apocalypse Daddy standing at the window looking out at a busy street scene below.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Home… shit. I’m only at home. Every time I wake up I think I’m gonna be back on the road.
Apocalypse Daddy moves back to the sofa, sits down and nervously
turns over an empty coffee capsule in his fingers.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
When I was home after my first road trip it was worse. I’d wake up and there would be nothing. I hardly said a word to my wife. The kids just ignored me. When I was there I wanted to be on the road and when I was on the road I wanted to be anywhere but the road. All I could think of was the motorway. Service stations and food encrusted on the seats. The constant screaming. The constant…constant… screaming. Every minute I stay in this room is a minute you gotta add to the journey. A minute spent here is eight minutes on the road.
He gets up, naked, and starts doing yoga. Moving slowly, in time with the slow spinning ceiling fan.
FADE OUT:
FADE IN:
INT. HALLWAY – DAY
Apocalypse Mommy stands at the door dressed in a power suit. Her lips pursed. She looks worried, but it’s difficult to know for sure. She takes a breath and opens the door.
INT. LIVING ROOM – CONTINOUS
Apocalypse Daddy sits on the floor in a sea of chaos. Luca is going through the bookcase taking each book one by one and throwing it over his shoulder. He’s laughing like some kind of drunk crow, cawing as he stumbles over the very books he threw on the floor. Apocalypse Daddy can’t move because Alice is drawing on his face with indelible pink marker pen.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a tour, I wanted to drive. And for my sins, I got what I wanted.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
What happened to your face?
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
It was a real choice mission, and when it was over I’d never want another one.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
You’re bleeding, are you alright?
APOCALYPSE DADDY
What’s it look like? Is it bad?
ALICE
Daddy, can you sit still please I’m painting a flamingo on your left temple.
Luca throws down an anniversary edition of The Jungle Book, it ricochets off a second hand dumper truck bought at a flea market in a Moroccan street market and smashes Apocalypse Daddy in his right temple. He CRIES out in agony.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
I have some bad news. Now seems like the time to deliver it.
Apocalypse Mommy takes out a letter from the inside pocket of her power suit. She holds the letter up in front of Apocalypse Daddy so he can see it. He looks through an eye full of blood. We see the words, “Team Building”.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
I can’t come on the road trip.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
I see.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
You can’t can you? You’ve got blood in your one eye and Alice is now painting your other eyelid green.
ALICE
It’s a crocodile Mommy.
Apocalypse Mommy and Alice laugh hysterically. They sure do find this funny. Luca continues his library reorganisation. He isn’t aware of the Dewey Decimal System.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Luca, can you organise those books in alphabetical order?
He turns back to Apocalypse Mommy.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
I see. It’s England for me?
Apocalypse Mommy nods.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Alone.
Apocalypse Mommy nods.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
I’m not feeling too good.
Apocalypse Mommy nods.
Luca stumbles over and pushes a copy of ZOG into Apocalypse Daddy’s mouth, laughing, laughing, laughing.
CUT TO:
INT. BATHROOM – DAY
Apocalypse Daddy stands under a freezing cold shower, his gaze fixed.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
The summer of 2020. It was always going to be a strange one. Right then I didn’t know how strange. I was going to the worst place in the world and I didn’t even know it yet.
CUT TO:
INT. BEDROOM – DAY
A large suitcase is on the bed. Apocalypse Mommy and Apocalypse Daddy are packing it. Clothes lay piled up all over the floor. During the scene Luca and Alice both try to help pack the suitcase. They bring toys and books and saucepans. Things from the kitchen, things they find on the floor. Nothing useful. Nothing you can actually take on holiday.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Thanks sweetheart. That’s really helpful. We won’t be taking a sieve on holiday. No, no, no nor will we be taking your dolls house or a metronome.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Weeks away and thousands of miles of untamed concrete wilderness snaking up the country like some kind of yellow brick road. Only I was going alone. Apocalypse Mommy couldn’t come, orders from work. On a good day, with no kids in the car it was a seventeen hour drive. I had a toddler and four-year old megalomaniac. And the baby seats were facing forward.
ALICE
Daddy, can I take my microphone and my recorder in the car please? Before Apocalypse Daddy can answer.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
That would be great sweetheart.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
She only knew one note on the recorder and it was high-pitched. I wasn’t sure the recorder or the microphone was going to last very long.
Maybe as long as my patience.
INT. KITCHEN – NIGHT
Apocalypse Mommy and Apocalypse Daddy stand, wine glasses in hand, over a map of France. The map, spread out on the kitchen table, is surrounded by little green soldiers and toy tanks. It looks like a war room.
APOCALYSE MOMMY
Your first stop will be here.
She places a tank on the map.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
What about this?
Apocalypse Daddy surrounds Paris with tanks and puts an army of toy soldiers on the Champs Elysée.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Stop messing around, this is serious.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
So was the invading German army.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
(ignoring the bad jokes)
They should sleep through the first few hours. They’ll wake up with the sun in time for breakfast and your first nappy change. Zero nine hundred hours.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Right, the A26 snakes its way up France. I stop here.
He indicates the first tank.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Then it’s a nice four hour drive up and around Paris. He places another tank on the map, just left of the city of lights.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Be careful up there, the road slows, winds. The traffic increases. The locals get agitated when they see foreigners. The kids will get anxious, grumpy, they’ll start to argue.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
They’ll start to argue after eight hours? Apocalypse Mommy was living in a different world. Her mind was focused on her team building trip to Italy. Not the hell I was about to embark on. Out there, on the road, things get confused. Power, irritability and the long hours take their toll. The kids’ minds disintegrate, become detached from their already loose grip on reality. Time plays tricks on the young mind. Time plays tricks on every mind.
Apocalypse Mommy places a tank on Calais.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Northern France. The border. If you make it there the worst is behind you.
Apocalypse Daddy looks from Apocalypse Mommy to the map and back again.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
I can do this.
APOCALYSPE MOMMY
You got this. Your mission is to escort Alice and Luca to their grandparents in England. Follow the A26 to the border, cross over under the cover of night. Keep the children safe, well watered and fed and change Luca’s nappy as needed. And don’t let them kill each other.
CLOSE IN ON APOCALYPSE DADDY, thinking about the mission, thinking about the road trip.
CUT TO:
INT. CAR – 6 HOURS LATER – PRE-DAWN
The car is full to overflowing. Toys piled up on the back seats, bags of food and nappies and books. Clothes pushed down the cracks between suitcases and balls. Water bottles, crisp bags, hula-hoops, bananas, half a bike and an old beat up box with square, round and triangular holes in the top.
EXT. CAR
Apocalypse Mommy stands on the pavement outside Apocalypse Mansion as the car pulls away. Alice leans out of the window waving, Apocalypse Daddy waves, smiling apprehensively.
INT/EXT. CAR
Apocalypse Daddy looks in the rear view mirror as Apocalypse Mommy fades from view, still waving.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Every man has a breaking point. You have them and I have them. How many miles had I already done? How many times I had I been in the car, on a road trip with a toddler? Never like this. Where was my breaking point? If we all have them, where were they?
We see an OPEN ROAD stretching out before us.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
There are two intersections where you can get onto the A26, they’re both traffic magnets. It was already nearly twenty degrees; mosquitos flew in through the open window.
He takes a chewing gum from the dash and starts chewing. He eyes Alice and Luca in the back seat, sleeping soundly. He looks at the clock.
5.34 a.m.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
If Apocalypse Mommy was right then I had three hours of peace and quiet before they woke. I had to get some kilometres under my belt, make hay while the sun comes up.
ALICE
Daddy, what are you eating?
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Had the hallucinations started already?
He looks in the rear view mirror and sees Alice, asleep. He moves the mirror to see Luca, asleep. He moves the mirror back to its central positioning. There is Alice, asleep. He looks back to the road.
ALICE
Daddy, what are you eating?
BACK to the mirror. Alice has one eye open and a menacing look on her face. She seems to be saying “look, I’m awake, it’s 5 a.m. and you’re eating sweets. You give me one or I wake the baby up.”
APOCALYSPE DADDY (V.O.)
At first I thought I had the wrong mission. I couldn’t believe this was happening. Who takes two small children on a twenty seven hour road trip? I had heard of such things being done, but never seen the proof.
Alice started to raise her voice.
ALICE
Daddy
Luca stirs in his sleep. Is he even asleep? Was this planned?
APOCALYPSE DADDY
I have sweets. Adult sweets. I can’t give you one. Why don’t I put on some nursery rhymes?
Suddenly we hear a RUMBLING sound. Like faraway horses galloping. It gets LOUDER and LOUDER.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
What’s that?
ALICE
Traffic Jam.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Not possible. It’s too early.
ALICE
You said everything is possible if you try hard.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
We had done three kilometres and I was already getting backchat. I could still turn back. I had done this before Yes, but not alone. I had a whole squadron with me last time. A medi-copter, supplies. We had supplies to last weeks. And a team. Apocalypse Mommy. Nobody would undertake this mission alone.
Rising HIGH into the pre-dawn sky is a red GLOW, like a fireball exploding. Brake lights stretch as far as the eye can see. Horns BLARE. The car rolls slowly to the back of the queue. The car in front slams on the horn. Apocalypse Daddy sets the rear view mirror at an angle to see Luca. He sleeps soundly.
Alice starts turning the pages of a book, singing along to ‘The Grand Old Duke Of York’.
Apocalypse Daddy slumps down into his chair. He glances once more into the rear view mirror.
We see what he sees:
APOCALYPSE DADDY POV: Luca opens his eyes like a lizard.
Lightning quick. Zero to 200 in the blink of an eye.
FLASH CUT TO:
INT/EXT. CAR – DAY
Throughout the following scenes we hear loud nursery rhymes by some Australian Disney Club because you put Spotify on nursery rhyme radio. Because that seemed like a good idea after 15 seconds in a traffic jam.
From high above we FOLLOW THE APOCALYPSE CAR as it drives erratically in the slow lane. All around cars barrel past at incredible speeds; lorries thunder past in the middle lane, caravans over take. Dutch, German, French, Polish, Spanish, Czech, British, Romanian.
As the camera gets closer to the car the children’s stories gets softer, replaced by the butchery inside the car. Apocalypse Daddy has one had on the steering wheel, he leans back over the headrest trying to take a car out of the hand of Luca. His eyes go back and forth from the rear seats to the road. Luca is crying uncontrollably but has a vice like grip on the toy. Alice is almost horizontal in her chair, her back arched back in sheer anger.
ALICE
(screaming)
It’s mine. It’s mine. It’s mine. It’s mine. It’s mine. It’s mine.
LUCA
(Screams inaudibly.)
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Luca, give the car back to Alice. You have seventeen there in your chair.
LUCA
(Inaudible groans.)
ALICE
(screaming louder)
It’s mine. It’s mine. It’s mine. It’s mine.
Her whole body contorts like that girl possessed by the devil in the Exorcist.
A car slams its horn on, the sound lost to the Doppler Effect as it streaks
ahead.
Tears stream down Luca’s face.
Alice continues to scream as we lose all sound and the scene goes MUTE.
As Apocalypse Daddy talks, the chaos continues.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
We were somewhere due east of Lyon when the craziness really took hold. We had been on the road for six hours and we were already seven hours behind schedule. How is that even possible? After the initial roadblocks and traffic jams (caused by everyone else having the same idea and leaving early to beat the rush) we sailed on in relative calm. I managed to feed them some banana, half a packet of biscuits and bribed them to shut the hell up with made up stories, loud music and jokes.
But that will only get you so far.
The sound comes back with a JARRING EXPLOSION, like waking up from a dream on airport runway as Dreamliner lands on your face.
Screaming.
Car horns.
Inaudible groans.
ALICE
It’s mine, its’ mine, it’s mine. It’s mine.
We see a SERVICE STATION off to the right: A sanctuary of calm. The car turns off the road and comes to a stop in the parking bay of an ESSO garage.
CUT TO:
EXT. CAR
Alice is off. Running, running.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
(shouts) It’s still a road.
APOCALYSPE DADDY (V.O.)
A toddler in the car, a four year old running around a service station somewhere due east of Lyon. After planning the route the night before Apocalypse Mommy and I had watched The Vanishing. It’s a movie about a woman who gets kidnapped from a French service station and murdered.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Damn. Where is your sister?
Luca hands Apocalypse Daddy a toy car. The toy car they had been
fighting over minutes earlier. He smiles, proud.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Thanks mate.
ALICE
I’m hungry Daddy.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
You’re back. Great. You didn’t get kidnapped. Or hit by a truck.
LUCA
Caca, caca, poo.
ALICE
I’m hungry Daddy.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Stay close Alice. This is dangerous, enemy territory we’re going into. Three of us are going into the service station, three of us better come out.
ALICE
You need your mask Daddy.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
I didn’t have a mask. And I didn’t fancy my chances without one. The air was full of dense water droplets. Airborne illnesses; some kind of virus.
CUT TO:
INT. SERVICE STATION
ANGLE on Apocalypse Family. Apocalypse Daddy has a jumper wrapped around his face. Luca has food all over his face, as if a layer of green baby food is going to protect him from the microbes. Alice is nowhere to be seen.
BEAT
A SMALL HAND places a Peppa Pig magazine, a pack of crayons, two bottles of Orangina and a industrial sized bag of sweets on the dining table.
ALICE
Daddy, can I have this?
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Do you mean ‘these’. Where did you get those?
ALICE
You said ‘these’.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
You’re a smart cookie you know. But don’t get too smart.
ALICE
Over there.
Alice points to the shop.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Take those back sweetheart. You can’t just take things.
A MAN (early 20’s, casual, uninterested) comes over.
MAN
Sir, your daughter just stole these. I’m afraid I must highlight your incompetent parenting skills and take back the magazines and sweets.
Alice starts crying.
Luca throws some of his dinner at the man. Bullseye. Right in his face.
Alice bursts out laughing and the man walks off. Apocalypse Daddy gives Luca a high five.
LUCA
Caca, Caca, Poo.
CUT TO:
INT/EXT. CAR – DAY
The car looks like a cluster bomb has gone off. The windows are
smeared with grease, so much so you can barely see out. Luca is sitting in a pile of crumbs and broken sandwiches and toys and shit. His clothes are half on, half off. He is whirling a car around the air like a jet plane. Happy. Alice is sleeping like a drunk, dribbling.
CUT TO:
INT. MOTORWAY SERVICE STATION – SUNSET
A MONTAGE:
Apocalypse Daddy changing Luca’s nappy. Alice running around the service station. Horrible food dribbling off a fork.
Luca throwing food. Laughing like a psychopath. Apocalypse Daddy changing Luca’s nappy.
A “restaurant” bill is placed on the table: €78
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
I only had cold chips, yoghurt and a raspberry slice.
Apocalypse Daddy running around the service station carrying Luca. Apocalypse Daddy changing Luca’s nappy.
CUT TO:
EXT. PETROL STATION FORCOURT – LATER
The sun is setting. Apocalypse Daddy fills the car up.
CLOSE UP: Petrol pump: €78.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Motorway prices.
He looks through the window of the car.
POV APOCALYPSE DADDY: Alice and Luca, sleeping soundly. Each holding tightly to the others favourite toy.
CLOSE UP on: Apocalypse Daddy smiling.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
There it was. The calm. Why parents do what they do. Maybe the journey would be worth it after all. They would be so happy when we go to their Gran’s house, the tribulations of the road trip forgotten in an instance. I wondered what they were dreaming about.
CUT TO:
INT. CAR – NIGHT
POV APOCALYPSE DADDY: The car headlights on the road, the white lines zipping by.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
Seventy five clicks to go… The night was long… Too long… I acted like a soldier and got ambushed just outside of Paris by two very tired children. Should have seen it coming… But after seventeen hours I was frazzled. I think the kids would have killed each other if we hadn’t taken a detour fourteen clicks from Reims and got some hugs and some stories… I thought I might be insane. Or going insane. I tried my best but I didn’t have the supplies, we pitched up and shot flares at the sky and tried to make for run for it. We were running low on fuel… Supply lines had been cut at the border. So I did it my way.
CUT TO:
EXT. HIGH ABOVE THE PORT OF CALAIS, FRANCE – EARLY
MORNING
The RISING SUN glints off the English Channel as it breaks the horizon. From this high up we can see the shores of England, 27 clicks north. The first ferries of the morning are getting ready to set sail.
Huge tankers and lorries and the early dawn tourists scuttle around the loading lines.
We SWOOP DOWN and away from the coast. Inland. Following the motorway. Almost empty.
CUT TO:
INT. CAR
CLOSE UP: APOCALYPSE DADDY hands gripped on the steering wheel, eyes bursting out their sockets. Fixated on the road.
He momentarily takes his eyes off the road and with one hand opens the glove box. He fishes inside and takes out a half-eaten banana, brown.
He puts it in his mouth and continues rummaging in the glove box.
Takes out a broken soldier. Reflects for a minute. Then rummages one
last time and takes out a CD.
With one hand he deftly takes the CD out of the case and slides it into the CD player.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
The things about kids and cars and road trips is that for all the pain and anguish, all the tantrums and the devaluation of your car, for all the ground in mush in the seats and the incessant demand for toilet breaks and stops and the bickering and the arguing and the boredom and the shouts. For all of that. There is only person driving the fucking car. And at five a.m. as the sun comes up twenty three hours into a hell ride in some godforsaken foreign country, you’re the driver. And you choose the fucking music.
Apocalypse Daddy presses play and turns the volume all the way up.
APOCALYSPE DADDY
See you how you like this kids.
Wagner’s “THE RIDE OF THE VALKYRIES” Blasts out of the car speakers as the car accelerates towards the coast.
CLOSE UP: LUCA bursts awake. CLOSE UP: ALICE bursts awake. EXT. CAR
The music BLASTS through the windows. We see: a couple in a car in
the next lane, looking into the chaos, mouths open, shocked.
CUT TO:
INT. CAR
Luca is screaming, Alice is screaming. Apocalypse Daddy is singing the melody.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
De de la deeerrr der, du de la derrr der, dud de la deeeeeer durrr, de la durrrr
Alice and Luca stop suddenly and STARE at their father. Then they look at each other. Then back to Apocalypse Daddy, then back to each other. Shellshocked. Then they laugh. Their father keeps singing.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
De de la deeerrr der, du de la derrr der, dud de la deeeeeer durrr, de la durrrr
EXT. CAR
We see cars slowing down, getting into queues. Apocalypse Daddy weaves through the traffic, looking for space, looking for magic, looking to jump the queue.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
De de la deeerrr der, du de la derrr der, dud de la deeeeeer durrr, de la durrrr.
CLOSE VIEW ON ALICE: Calm, composed. CLOSE VIEW ON LUCA: Drinking from his bottle.
CLOSE VIEW ON APOCALYPSE DADDY: Demented.
FADE OUT:
FADE IN:
Darkness.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O)
I’ve seen horrors … horrors that you’ve seen. But you have no right to call me a bad parent. You have a right to criticise me. You have a right to do that … but you have no right to judge me. It’s impossible for words to describe what is necessary to those who do not know what horror means. Horror. Horror has a face … and you must make a friend of horror. Horror and a twenty-seven-hour-road-trip are your friends. If they are not, then they are enemies to be feared. They are truly enemies. I remember when I was without kids. Seems a thousand centuries ago now. We went on a road trip to Greece…
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Woah, woah woah. Stop there cowboy. Stop there. Can someone turn the lights on?
We hear small feet scurry across the floor. Then larger feet.
ALICE
I want to do it.
Luca starts screaming.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
You can both do it.
BRIGHT LIGHT floods the room.
Apocalypse Daddy averts his eyes.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Are you really comparing your road trip with the kids to the atrocities of the Vietnam War?
APOCALYPSE DADDY
No.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
Funny, because it sounded like you were.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
It needs this scene. The horror. The horror.
APOCALYPSE MOMMY
I get what you were trying to do. I just don’t think you should be doing it.
APOCALYPSE DADDY
Too much?
SNAP CUT TO:
INT. GRANDMOM’S HOUSE – TWO WEEKS LATER
Apocalypse Daddy wakes up from a nightmare. Sweating.
APOCALYPSE DADDY (V.O.)
It wasn’t a dream. I was just half way. We had to drive back. And this time the wind was against us. But we were a family. A family filled with love, we had strength, the strength of ten divisions of men. We could ride the Valkyries till the sun came up. Drive to China via Siberia in a Transit van if need be. I didn’t know at the time, but do you know what a Valkyrie was? They were female helpers of the God Odin. They chose who died in battle and took them to Valhalla. They rode horses. We were in a car. Twenty-seven hours to go.
SNAP CUT TO:
Darkness