The Conclusion
See part IX
Dalton and greenman-suited Charlie Kelly trudge through the
brush on their way towards the clearing and the Cornucopia.
“Oh man, can you even see me right now or are am I, like,
completely camouflaged?” Charlie giddily asks his companion as he frolics
through the woods, his arms waving like a giant, blow-up, dancing man at a used
car lot.
“I can see you, Charlie,” says an exasperated Dalton.
“Hey, bro, sorry your lady died, or left you, either way”
Charlie says sympathetically towards Dalton, misinterpreting the bouncer’s
frustration with Charlie’s own antics for heartbreak. Kate had, though, left unceremoniously last
night. After they had made camp around
nightfall she had wandered off to find water and simply never returned. Dalton felt sure that she was not foolish
enough to be caught off-guard by any other competitors but he was also
surprised that she would simply abandon him with Charlie…on second thought,
perhaps Dalton could empathize…
“It’s ok, Charlie, let’s just stay quiet until we make it to
the clearing,” Dalton says placidly.
“I know what’ll cheer you up, bro. Me and Frank play this game called
‘Nightcrawlers,’ you’re gonna love it! I’ll show you tonight. Y’know…” Charlie
says now, in a shrill voice (somehow even louder than he’d been before), “I
thought there’d be more corn at the Cornucopia.
I’m really more a man of the law than science, bird-law to be precise,
but I’m pretty sure a Cornucopia is a corn-tree, right? Where does the corn grow off the Cornu…”
A ninja star flies directly over Charlie’s head. “Whoa!!”
Charlie exclaims.
“Run! The clearing
should be just ahead,” Dalton shouts to Charlie as both take off.
Before they can make it to clearing they see where the ninja
star came from, Dwight is engaged in a vicious battle with Boo and Kevin
(sitting on Boo’s shoulders, controlling and commanding him like Hannibal atop
an elephant). As the groups merge, each
recognizing the other’s presence, all freeze.
Then, instantly, a battle ensues.
Fists and feet are flying as the tributes assail each other. They’re all entangled in a furious storm of
blows now at the edge of the forest.
Carried by the momentum of the fight, the group bursts through foliage
and into the clearing near the Cornucopia.
They all stop, realizing where they are and momentarily taking inventory:
Dwight, his glasses askew, his mustard yellow-shirt looking more honey than
deli from the sweat; Dalton, slightly out of breath and shirtless (obviously);
Charlie, looking near (or more near than usual) to death, clearly having
alcohol and inhalant withdrawals but miraculously alive; and Boo Radley with
KMac on his shoulders, an unlikely team.
They stare at each other for a few minutes, eyeing each other up now in
the clearance, no one daring to make the first move…none sure of what that
would even look like.
“I think we’re the only ones left,” Dwight says
finally. They all look around silently,
the non-response confirming Dwight’s statement.
They had all been too busy or hungry or scared to listen for any more to
the death-announcing cannon blasts, but the silence in the group now feels like
an unspoken agreement that they are likely the final competitors.
“I’m glad we are all able to meet, face-to-face, here in the
open,” comes a voice from the woods suddenly.
The group turns to see Nic Cage emerge from the dark vegetation, his
countenance calm, his appearance demure, un-cinematic. He walks toward them, stopping in the middle
of the group (who had formed something of a circle after emerging from the
woods). “I’m glad we could meet now that
the Games have ended.”
“Cage…” Dwight says darkly.
“What do you mean, ended?” asks Dalton, skeptically.
“Yes, ended…if they ever really began,” Cage responds
enigmatically. “Let’s just say that a
survivor has emerged.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Dalton asserts, his eyes
piercing into the heart of the mysterious man before him.
“Don’t you see? I’ve
already won…” Cage seems to gaze off into another dimension.
“What?! How have you
won?” Dwight demands.
“I said I’d take your face off, Dwight, and now it’s time,” Cage
says to the paper salesman, strangely calm.
Dwight reactively semi-crouches in a karate stance and glowers at Cage,
ready for his advance, when Cage turns from him and addresses the group,
rotating slowly as he speaks. “No,
Dwight, I’m not going to hurt you, I don’t need to. It’s time to unmask you…all of you, to take
your fictional faces off and expose you to the truth.”
“What are you talking about, man?! Did you find alcohol
because you better not be holdin’ out on us!” Charlie rages, pulling down his
Greenman mask inelegantly to address Cage, “and who ARE you?!”
“I’m you Charles,” Cage responds, even-toned. “And I’m you Dwight, and you Dalton, and you too Boo,” Cage says, turning
to address each Tribute respectively, “or rather…you’re all me. This is how I’ve won. You’re all more than flesh and bone standing
around me…or perhaps you’re less…you’re fictional characters. You have been forged in the fires of human
emotion, pain, joy, regret and victory.
You represent part of an invisible reality. You are spirit as much, or more, than body
here before us. There are aspects of
each of you that define and, in fact, effect, who you are more so than
physicality. And I…I have been in more
movies, played more characters, than is calculable by any means known to the
world today, and in that, I myself have been in-grafted with your very
essences. Don’t you see, Dalton? In Con-Air I was a tough guy by necessity,
just like you. I hated to start a fight
but I didn’t hesitate to end one…and I too had a dark past from violence. And in National Treasure I was a leader of
men, also like you. And you, poor
Charles, I too know the horrors of alcoholism, as a man drinking himself to
death in Leaving Las Vegas (“Well, you’re throwin’ out some accusations here,
man…” – Charlie). And Dwight, I was a
socio-path in Face-Off. Even you Boo, I
was Boo Radley in a high school production of To Kill a Mockingbird, I was…magnificent… But I digress, you see, my countless movie
roles have melded me with the invisible qualities that compose your fictional
beings. Don’t you see? I, myself have even started to resemble a
fictional character. I have forced my way into both worlds. I can’t help but be the ultimate winner, the
ultimate survivor…I am fact-become-myth, that through the dying of all, I may yet live.”
Everyone is shocked, spellbound, unable to speak. The silence is thick when Kevin McCallister
speaks up, “what about me?” “Ah, Kevin,”
Cage turns slowly toward him and moves closer, looking kindly upon the boy’s
face, “Kevin there’s more of me in you than anyone else here…I’m your father,
Kevin. Don’t you see? Can’t you all see how this ends?” Cage says now turning around to address the
whole circle. “No matter who wins, Nic
Cage lives, he lives because he’s in each and every one of you whether you like
it or not. Nic Cage is bigger than
me…Nic Cage is bigger than all of us...”
“WHAT?!,” Kevin finally breaks several moments’ silence,
“how are you possibly my father?”
“Do you really not understand…Macaully Culkin…” Cage says
kindly. “You and I are kindred spirits
but at the opposite end of the spectrum.
You, Kevin McCallister, were so large, so luminous, as a fictional
character that you begin to encroach upon reality. You have joined Macaully in another
dimension…We are the fence-crossers, Kevin.
You and I, father and son, we blur the once indelible line between
reality and fiction…”
“Wait…” Dalton says, his eyes narrowing in intense
concentration. “But if we are really
ideas, concepts brought into life to reflect some single or small collection of
unseen realities…then we can’t really die at all…we would simply cease to
reflect those invisible truths in the form that we currently do, at least until
we are again imagined as such…we, actually, are larger than you.” The tension
is beyond palpable amongst the group now as Dalton continues. “You may live on
through us, but because you forced your real self into our mythical world,
you’ll enjoy a terribly meager existence, you’ve gone the wrong way over the
fence and you’ve spread yourself too thin, Cage.”
“Like Voldemort!”
KMac shouts out excitedly.
“Shhhhh! Don’t say his name…” Dwight cautions, his head
instantly on a nervous swivel.
Dalton presses on, “a single human can’t be in-grafted into
all of the fictional characters in existence, each one representing some small
space on the map of ultimate reality.
You can’t start off as a mortal man and then spread yourself out like
that, that’s like an upside-down funnel!
Fact-become-myth devolves into non-existence...into a lie…”
Suddenly
a horn blast envelopes the crowd. While the others cover their ears
defensively, Dwight sees an opportunity to strike and attacks Cage with a pair
of nunchucks. Cage, whose hands cover his ears more out of annoyance than
fear, suddenly bursts into a flaming skeleton and begins to choke Dwight with a
chain.
As
Dwight slowly chokes to death, the rest of the group looks up to the top of a giant
hill on the north end of the clearing several hundred yards away; the noise
seemingly emanating from the crest. A blindingly bright figure
slowly appears. While they can't make out who or what it is, the group
notices Kate Austen standing atop the hill next to the source of the sound and
light, dressed elegantly in a light blue dress. She looks like she has
never even seen the arena, let alone been stranded for days. As Kate and the light move slowly down the
hill towards the group the glare from the bright figure dies down and the group
sees a gargantuan lion standing before them.
"Hello,
friends," the lion speaks.
"Are
you kiddin' me!? Who slipped me acid again?" Charlie stuttered,
collapsing to the ground. "That thing sounds like Liam Neeson! Nic Cage AND Liam Neeson! What is going on in
here?..." Charlie asks no one in particular, pointing to his head with a
wild glint in his eye.
"I
am Aslan. I've come to lead you out of the Games" The booming
yet soothing voice of the lion permeates the arena and cuts through the
surviving tributes' tension like a knife through butter. “It’s just over the crest of the hill, if
you’ll follow, Kate can lead you now...and I’ll meet you there soon,” his eyes
shift for an instant towards Cage.
“We
been over that hill before and we didn’t see no way out over there…sir"
Boo says timidly while he and Kevin both tremble in awe of the talking beast.
"You haven’t been with me before,” Aslan responds.
“Is there something
new over there?” Kevin asks.
"It will be
new when I meet you there,” the lion almost smiles, “come and see.”
“It won’t be
comfortable going up the hill,” Kate says to the scared duo, “but you won’t be
alone, and once you’re over you’ll never have to hide or set traps again.”
Boo, still carrying
the injured KMac on his shoulders walks over to stand by Aslan and Kate, ready
for the journey.
"Come with us,
Dalton!" Kate beckons to the bouncer.
Dalton, who still
holds a karate stance, eases up and stares at his former ally. "Why
did you disappear?"
"I saw the
talking lion last night and I thought to myself, 'this could make for an
interesting love triangle'." Kate's honesty brings a smile to
Dalton's face. “But once I met him I
couldn’t help but follow over the hill, come with us.”
Before he can make
a decision, Dalton turns to face his arch nemesis. Cage, who has returned to
human form after taking out Dwight, stares back blankly. Both men clinch
their fists together, ready to fight. "I
hope you find your peace, Cage," he says stoically. He eases his
fists, turning his back on Cage, and joins Kate and the others.
"Wait, wait,
wait just a minute here--" Charlie says excitedly. He faces
Aslan. "Is there alcohol where we're going? I could use some
glue too..."
"Charlie,
where you are going, you aren't going to need drugs," the lion responds.
"Uhh...yeahh...that's
cool and all...but...uh...I'm gonna need some brews to ease my nerves a
bit. At least this dude Cage seems to have a stash of poppers or something. Or maybe you could, like, teach me some of
those sweet skills you used in Taken?
That would be pretty sweet…"
The lion
sighs. "The Waitress is waiting for you."
Charlie's eyes
light up as he thinks of his long unrequited love. He doesn't even
acknowledge Cage, but pulls on his Greenman hood and scurries uncoordinatedly
over to Kate. “Go ahead with Kate, I’ll
meet you there. You’ll know when I
arrive,” Aslan says authoritatively to the group who subsequently turns and
begins moving towards the large hill.
“What about me,”
says darkly, the group now well behind them, “am I welcome?”
Aslan turns,
addressing Cage, "Nicholas, I’m afraid you couldn’t survive over there…not
in your condition," he says sadly. “And yet, if you’ll follow me up the
hill…if the trek doesn’t kill you, all may not be lost yet…”
Cage laughs
maniacally. "You obviously underestimate me, you fool. I'm Nic
Cage; I'm above you." They stare
into each other's eyes, reading into each other's souls. "You can't win, beast," Cage
hisses. "Haven’t you heard? I
can’t die."
“I’m afraid,
Nicholas, that Dalton was closer to correct…you cannot live...not as you are.”
"You’re
nothing but a talking lion. I have seen and conquered things much scarier
than you…I’ve stolen the Declaration of freakin’ Independence!"
"This is a
mistake, Nicholas. I can summon anything to end you. Travolta, MegRyan, a hoard of bees..."
"Not the bees!" Cage hisses, slightly taken aback, but quickly regaining his venom,
"this is the last good fight you'll ever know..."
Both Aslan and Cage
pounce.
------
THE END
