~ A Keeper's Tale ~

He stands on the wide galleon's aft deck staring through the scope.

Captain - "She still gains ..."

Morgan stands at the bow of the approaching smaller craft, looking back through her own scope, torches lighting the deck.  Drums begin to pound from within.

 

Germaine - (Voiced over scene) "Ah ... the Renaissance.  Pretty pretty dresses and the gilded everything ..."

Captain - Lowers the scope. "Wake the bastards."

A deck bell rings with calls, the galleon's crew wakes and gather arms, "All hands !  All to deck and filled !  She approaches !" 

Germain - "And the ladies one could just spend hours peeling out from their finery ..."

The men fill the deck and aim toward her approach.

Captain - Focuses closer, "Where's the deck crew ?"

Germaine - "Except it wasn't like that at all, was it ?"

Two unlit black schooners glide silently from either side crisscrossing in front of the galleon as it's crew gathers at the back. The masts are lined with musketeers who clear the galleon deck loudly as they pass, then silence again.

Morgan boards the craft and opens the hatch to the crowded slaves.

Germaine - "It was slavery."

She cuts the main iron to drop the chains.

Germaine - "Piracy."

Lights go out on all decks as the people distribute between the ships, wounded to care in the lowers and healthy to deck.

Germaine - "Genocide."

The four ships whisk silently away.

Germaine - "And America."

Morgan looks through her scope and lowers it, "But there was still a tiny beautiful thing among it all."

The four ships approach another as Morgan's torches light, the drums pound within.

"It was also the dawn of modern magic."

A Keeper's Tale

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Morgan sits in a modern café, dressed normally for here and now, sipping coffee.

Germain - Sits at the table, "Captain."

Morgan vaguely remembers him in a series of events, a salesman, a beggar, times and places and then a pickpocket.

Morgan - "You !"

Germain - "Borrowed !"   He slides a small bag across.
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Morgan stands digging in her pockets (dressed as previous tales in myth) before what appears to be a giant demon in a cavern, surrounded by fire.

Demon - "So where is it then ?"
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Morgan (café) - "You still owe."

Germain - "Your girlfriend's life or a friendship which will likely save the world.  Take your pick or have them both.  I've already given them to you freely."

Morgan - Stares at him a moment, then to the counter and back.  "I want that tart."

Germain - "The tart."

Morgan - "Sure !   Get me the tart and were good !  Otherwise I'm going to shoot you under this table.  Right through the balls."

Germain - "You're serious."

Morgan - "I want that fucking tart."   She sips with one hand while a heavy gun thumps the table's underside.

He rises slowly, walks watching to the counter watched as he buys the tart and puts it on a plate.  He brings it to her and sits, raising his brow.

Morgan - With a mouth full of tart, "So you mentioned my girlfriend ?"

Germain - "No I'm fairly certain I didn't."

Morgan - "Hm.  Well thanks for the tart.  And that in with the keeper.  I think you might be right about that."
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Morgan (historical) dressed as for Roanoke docks, passing two well dressed white men, she slips them a note and a small sack.  Coins, the note a shopping list of basic supplies and arms.  The men head toward the markets, Morgan casually wanders toward the boats, then met by the crew's first hand.

Mambathu - "What did they do ?"

Morgan - "What they always do.  Prepare the light craft."
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Morgan (modern) enters the keeper's throne room.  Attendants disappear behind pillars as she approaches the throne, keeper staring with excitement.

Keeper - "You impress me Captain.  Where others have feared and fled my promised parley, you arrived.  Tell me why ?"

Morgan - "They say you're a threat.  I heard your deeds ... but they didn't sound personal.  I thought I'd give you a chance to tell me otherwise."

Keeper - Excited giggle, "And in your mind do we then become friends ?  I think in my mind I would like that.  But Captain, I am a threat.  To everything.  Not just to the things you care about, but to the ones you don't."

Morgan - "Thought so ... but sometimes it's just nice to be wrong."

Keeper - After a pause ... "Is that why you're here ?  To shoot me dead in my fathers chair for my crimes ?  I killed him, you know.  Right here.  I didn't wash the chair."

Morgan - "That part actually makes sense.  Did he fight ?"

Keeper - "Oh no.  He just bled.  And then he cried a bit, but he was a bad man, so you needn't worry about that.  And then I heard the rattle."

Morgan - "A bad man ?"

Keeper - " ... I lie.  My father was a great man and I admired him very much."

Morgan - "That's why she trusted him with the book."

Keeper - "Yes.  My father never once abused his power, not even to protect himself from his own daughter."

Morgan - "That wouldn't make him a great man though would it ?   Just a good father.  But when it came time he didn't actually do what he swore to do.   You killed him for his weakness."

Keeper - A slow smile of excitement.  "You do understand ... I knew you would.  He knew I was like this.  And now it's too late.  The world is lost because he loved me.  No good man could love evil so much as he adored me.  He was no worthy keeper."

Morgan hands her a slip of paper which the keeper reads and looks up with excitement.

Keeper - "This is from ... do I understand this ?   He paid you to kill me ..."  She smiles and looks to the skies holding the note close, "My father was a great man !"

...

She looks coldly to Morgan as a bag of gold hits the floor.

Keeper - "But you didn't do it."  She stares, planning in her eyes with an occasional short laugh.  "Thank you Captain, for restoring my father's honor."

Morgan - "You can keep the contract too."

Keeper - Smiles briefly then cold. "But you understand this changes everything. You're the betrayer.  You're the one who allowed the book to fall to evil.  Keep up that gold captain.  You've still got a job to do."

Morgan stares at the keeper, watching her shaking with heavy adrenal breathing. Rage.  Morgan grunts and kicks the bag of gold scattering it as she turns walking out.

Behind, the keeper begins a slow screaming madness.
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From a river in the wood ~

Prospero - In the distance, "Miranda !"

Miranda pokes her head from the water.

Prospero - "Miranda come Quick ! MIRANDA !"

She dives under and leaps out to a tree hanging over the river, catching with hands as her tail-fin becomes legs with which she continues to leap from tree to tree.

Miranda - Landing behind Prospero, crouched and breathing heavily, "Yes father !"

Prospero - Turning from the clay oven on the shore, "Ahh ... just in time ..."  Smelling the bread on the pallet, "And did you remember ... the caviar ... ?"

She exhales, rolls her eyes and leaps back through the trees toward the river, while he smiles smelling the bread.
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The Keeper and Morgan sit across from each other, again modern. Morgan smells her tea particularly.

Keeper - "I look forward to when that's no longer a concern."

Morgan - After a sip. "We're not there yet.  You fought well today."

Keeper - "As did you."  She smiles, "I don't know how I could have predicted a taxi cab."

Morgan - "You ... do tend to stretch the imagination."  She takes another sip.  "This is very good tea."

Keeper - "I'm very glad you like it.  Most truly.  And I have something for you."

Attendants spin from behind pillars and present the keeper with a long box, unclear which would have been holding it and back to other pillars.

The keeper slides the box across the table.  Morgan sets down her tea and opens it.   A golden long barreled revolver with a full blade mounted beneath, golden shine dulled to Morgan's predicted taste.

She removes it from the box and stands, feeling weight and swing, pointing carefully at nothing.

Morgan - "This is amazing ..."  She attaches the scope from the box and checks it.

Keeper - "An alloy from my father's gold.  I forged it myself.  This is what I want you to kill me with.  If you can."

Morgan - She pulls her own sword and slides it across.  "My father's blade."  She looks with seriousness into the keeper's eyes, "I loved him."  Holding the gun-blade close, "And I'm so sorry I insulted you with this."

Keeper - Smiles, "And I'm very sorry I once expected you to stoop for it."
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At a table off the river shore ~

Miranda - While smearing fish eggs on her bread, "The pirates are moving soon.  I saw them sneaking."

Prospero - "Oh ? The island boats ?"

Miranda - "Yes. They'll be up the river tonight.  Their leader is special I think."

Prospero - "Special how ?"

Miranda - "She responds according to information which isn't present."

Prospero puts down his bread and stares smiling.

Miranda - "What ... ?"

Prospero - "Your mother is very proud of you."

Miranda - Smiles looking at her bread, "I know."

Prospero - "Yes.  Her name is often Morgan and she is special.  Shall we look her up ?"

Miranda - "Yes !"  She spins around the table to next to him as he plops down 'The Book of Names.'

Prospero clears his throat to the sound of flipping pages, narrating the scenes.

Prospero - "Ah !"  Flipping pages ... "... wait a minute ..."  More flipping, "Aha ! There we go.  It doesn't start with her at all but with some guy named ... 'Vortigern' ?"
__

Morgan stand atop a hill over looking the construction of a tower in the distance, with hooded cloak and smoking her curled pipe.

She draws her sword and sits on a rock, pipe clamped in her teeth.  Dusk settling in she watches and sharpens while the tower falls down, the workers scrambling in the shout.
__

On the table near the river a tower design comes alive in fire over the book's open pages, sweeping past to the hill where Morgan sits sharpening.  An overall of the field, fading to an altered map with two dragons fighting in the Earth.

Prospero - "Hmmm ..."

Miranda - "Dragons ..."

More flipping ...

Prospero - "Ah.  There we go.  Merlin."

Miranda - "Don't we already know that one ?"

Prospero - Flipping ... "Apparently not ..." flipping " ... oh. Oh ... ! OH !"

Miranda - "Tell it ! Tell it !"

Prospero - "Well ... apparently 'the merlin' wasn't a name ... but a title. And this is a tale about how she beat a bad one down."

Miranda - "How old is she ?"

Flipping flipping ...

Prosper - "Dʿmt"

Miranda - "What ?"

Prospero - "Dʿmt. Ethiope."

A burning globe rises from the pages. He spins it with his hands, the fire clinging without burn.

Prospero - "There.  Just south of Arabia ..."

Spinning and falling to a flat map across the page,

Prospero - "Across the sea ..."

Subtle changes in the map arrange the cities and it burns into the page titled 'Mʿrt'n'.

Prospero - "Twenty five hundred years and some change."

Miranda - "Wooow ... How old are you ?"

Prospero - "... seventy five ... ?"

Miranda - "And how old am I ?"

Prospero - Looks to the side ... "Twenty five.  She's a hundred times older."

Miranda - "Wooow ... two and a half thousand ... wait how old was mother ?"

Prospero - Looks to the other side and down ... "Huh."  Flips through the pages ... "Older than the naming."

Miranda - "So forever."

Prospero - "Yes.  She is forever."  He smiles thinking of her, leaning back.

Miranda - "Father.  You're distracted.  Tell the tale."

His chair slams forward before the book from near fall back, "Oh !"
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~ Miranda drifts in the water lazily on her back in the later night, looking at the stars and remembering.

Prospero - At the table with the book, "Then let us be crows and see for ourselves."  He waves his arm as all around them burns down into a different forest where they, as crows, fly to the nearest tree over a path.

Voiced over as the merlin walks down the path.  He pauses distracted and suspicious by the sound of their wings.

Miranda - "Do we avoid interference ?"

Through their eyes they see he walks with a demon.

Prospero - "There is nothing we can do to time which time did not see coming."

The merlin pauses his scan of the surroundings on Morgan sitting in the tree over him.

Morgan - "Carry on, traveler."

She looks away, catching an exchanged glance with the demon.

The merlin grunts and carries on, whispering to his unseen demon.

Merlin - "That one's trouble."

Demon - "She's going to kill you one day."

Merlin - "Figures."

~ Miranda stares at the stars, a boat almost strikes her head, sending her diving under, many small hulls passing over, followed by larger.