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Alien 3 (1992) by William Gibson. Revised first draft screenplay, from a story by David Giler and Walter Hill. More info about this movie on IMDb.com FADE IN:
DEEP SPACE - THE FUTURE
The silent field of stars -- eclipsed by the dark bulk of an approaching ship. CLOSER.
ANGLE ON THE HULL
A towering cliff of metal, Sulaco.
INT. SULACO -- HYPERSLEEP VAULT
TRACKING down the line of empty, open capsules. Frozen twilight. The final four capsules are sealed, lids in place.
ANGLE -- INSIDE CAPSULE
NEWT, then RIPLEY. HICKS next, his head and chest bandaged. Then BISHOP in his caul of plastic. But the lid of Bishop's capsule is misted with hothouse condensation.
CLOSER
A tear of fluid streaks the condensation.
An alarm SOUNDS.
A monitor begins to scroll data.
TIGHT ON MONITOR
TROOP TRANSPORT SULACO CMC 846A/BETA MISSION/LV-426/RETURN STATUS RED TREATY VIOLATION REF: #99AG558L5 CAUSE: NAVIGATIONAL ERROR
Bland feminine voice of the ship's computer, as the alarm continues to SOUND.
COMPUTER Attention. Due to failure of navigational circuitry, Sulaco has entered a sector claimed by the Union of Progressive Peoples. Auxiliary systems are now on line. Course corrected. Hardwired protocols prevent, repeat, prevent arming of nuclear warheads in the absence of Diplomatic Override, Decryption Standard Charlie Nine. On present course, Sulaco will exit the U.P.P. sector at nineteen hundred hours fifty three point eight minutes.
EXT. SULACO
The ship slides past beneath us. A U.P.P. interceptor descends INTO FRAME, matching course and speed with Sulaco. The interceptor settles on Sulaco like a wasp.
INT. INTERCEPTOR
Three commandos climb into spacesuits. The Leader opens a hatch in the deck, revealing one of Sulaco's airlocks. FIRST COMMANDO, a young Vietnamese woman, scrambles down and attaches magnetic units to the airlock. SECOND COMMANDO studies a monitor, tapping out a sequence on a keyboard. First Commando gestures from hatch: no good. Second Commando tries again. A grating SOUND as Sulaco's airlock begins to open.
INT. SULACO -- CARGO LOCK
Darkness. Armed commandos climb through opening and descend a ladder. Reaching the deck, they fan out, weapons ready. Their leader examines the damaged dropship. First Commando gestures urgently. She's found something.
Bishop's legs, broken, grotesquely twisted, still in fatigues, the white android blood clotted into powder. First and Second Commandos exchange looks through their faceplates.
COMPUTER Attention. Integrity breach, Cargo Lock 3. Security alert. Integrity breach, B Deck...
INT. HYPERSLEEP VAULT -- LEADER'S POV
The chilly aisle of capsules.
Commandos move down the line, guns poised. They peer in at Newt, Ripley, and Hicks, but the lid of Bishop's capsule is pearl-white. The Leader tries the controls at the foot of the capsule, where green and red indicators glow. Nothing happens. He opens a panel, finds an emergency lever, tries it. The green indicators wink off. The lid rises. A dense pale mist flows out, spilling over the edges of the capsule, revealing the ovoid of a gray Alien egg. Rooted in the center of Bishop's synthetic entrails, the egg instantly ejaculates a Face-hugger, which strikes the leader's faceplate in a spray of acid. He screams, blinded by the acid, grappling with the thing as it begins to force its way into his helmet, its tail lashing furiously. Clawing at it, he plunges blindly back down the aisle, stumbling, smashing into the empty capsules. He vanishes through the entranceway, his screams giving way to frenzied gagging SOUNDS.
The First Commando scrambles after him.
INT. CARGO LOCK
The Leader writhes on the deck beside the main cargo lock. First Commando rushes in, crouches beside him, takes careful two-handed aim with her sidearm -- she FIRES, attempting to kill the face-hugger without hitting the Leader. The face-hugger EXPLODES in a gout of acid; ragged holes burn through the side of his helmet. First Commando frantically works the lock controls. As the inner lock opens, she shoves the leader over the edge with her foot.
EXT. SULACO
Helmetless, headless, trailing a cloud of blood and acid, the Leader tumbles through space.
INT. CARGO LOCK
Eyes of the First Commando through her faceplate. Beat. Something moves, behind her. She spins, bringing up her gun. Backlit in the entrance to the vault, a black, multi-armed figure. The beam from her lamp finds it -- the Second Commando, with Bishop in his arms.
DISSOLVE TO:
IN DEEP SPACE -- VARIOUS ANGLES
A station the size of a small moon, and growing; unfinished sections of hull are open to vacuum. A vast, irregular structure, the result of the shifting goals of successive administrations.
MOVE IN on hundreds of windows -- most of them dark. A light comes on in one of the windows.
INT. ANCHORPOINT -- TULLY'S SLEEPING CUBICLE
A phone is RINGING. The cubicle, terminally sloppy, resembles the nest of a high-tech hamster, not much larger than a berth of a train. The walls are plastered with a wistful collage of posters, ads, photos torn from magazines: beaches, desert, the Grand Canyon, redwoods, blue sky -- a hedge against claustrophobia and the emptiness of space.
TULLY, sitting up in bed, knuckling sleep from his eyes, wincing at the light; he slaps the phone console and the glum face of OPERATIONS OFFICER JACKSON (female) appears. She wears a nylon baseball cap with a computer light-pen attached to the bill.
JACKSON 'Morning, Tully.
TULLY Morning? Jesus, Jackson, it's the middle of my downtime...
CLOSE ON THE CONSOLE SCREEN
ANGLE
The room behind Jackson is Achorpoint's nerve-center, the Ops Room.
JACKSON None of us up here in the Ops Room have seen downtime for a while, Tully. A Marine transport came in on automatic sixteen hours ago.
She bobs her head as she speaks, using the pen on her cap to move a cursor on a screen in front of her.
JACKSON (continuing) The Sulaco. Departed gateway four years ago with a compliment of fifteen. A dozen marines, an android, a company representative, and the former warrant officer of a merchant vessel...
TULLY So?
JACKSON So, the bio-readout gives us the warrant officer, one -- count him -- marine, and a nine-year-old girl. Makes you wonder what happened out there, doesn't it?
TULLY So ask 'em. Wake 'em up and ask 'em. Them, not me.
JACKSON But that's the good news, Tully. Three hours before Sulaco turned up, we docked a priority shuttle out of Gateway. Two passengers. Milisci, Tully. Weapons Division.
TULLY
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