Starship Iris 3.03 Review

3.03.01 RADIO

JUNIPER

So, if you don’t mind me asking.

SANA

Sure, that’s what we’re here for.

JUNIPER

We are in the middle of a conflict where the other side has more and better weapons, more and better ships, and an organized military command.

SANA

Succinctly put. We do have the numbers, at this point. By a lot, last time I checked.

JUNIPER

Okay, but they’ve seeded all of human-occupied space with their armed drones. You have to admit that tactically, they have the upper hand. 

SANA

For now.

JUNIPER

What keeps you going? 

SANA

I love my people. And I mean “my” in every sense, and “people” in every sense, too. My old crew, all my friends in San Ramos, all the folks who have helped us in any way they can. It’s dizzying if you think about it too hard. I can’t let them down. I just can’t. Talking with them, connecting with them, that’s what fuels the engine.

JUNIPER

What about the days when you feel alone? When you’re doing this for yourself, what does that look like?

SANA

I’m so sorry, I don’t think I understand the question?

3.03.02 INT. ESCAPE POD. SPACE. 

FX: TRANSITION

FX: WARNING SIRENS

NON-ELLA PLEASANT VOICE

Autopilot is not operational.

FX: FRANTIC TYPING

NON-ELLA PLEASANT VOICE

Long-range comms are not operational. Airlock is not operational. Engine overheating stage 2. Windshield wiper fluid is low.

FX: TYPING

NON-ELLA PLEASANT VOICE

Navigation is not operational. Life support systems running low. Engine overheating stage 2.

SANA

I can’t fix you from in here! (INHALE, EXHALE) (TO HERSELF, A LITTLE MANIC) How about the captain’s log, is the captain’s…yep, we’re recording, hello.

FX: THE ENTIRE SHIP BEGINS TO SHAKE

NON-ELLA PLEASANT VOICE

Stabilizers are not operational. Remote storage is offline. Engine overheating stage 3.

SANA

No point putting this off. Uh, hi. My name is Sana Tripathi. If you can hear this, a number of unlikely things have happened. That said, I’ve seen a space squid made of alien nanobots, so. What’s unlikely, really?

FX: STARSHIP IRIS THEME

FX: SIRENS CONTINUE. THE VARIOUS WARNINGS LOOP IN THE BACKGROUND

SANA

Okay, I— hang on. I can’t focus with all these…what would Arkady do?

FX: A WIRE IS YANKED UNTIL IT SNAPS. THE WARNING MESSAGES CUT OFF MID-WORD.

SANA

Oh hey, it worked. I guess that is what she’d do. (PAUSE) Hope you didn’t have anything important to say. (PAUSE) That might’ve been a mistake.

One fire at a time. The engine’s overheating. Overheating engines like to explode, so.

FX: A SWITCH IS FLICKED. IF THERE ARE ENGINE SOUNDS, THEY CEASE.

SANA

(TO HERSELF) Give it a short rest. Momentum’ll keep us going for a bit.

Okay. So. I’m gonna do something foolish and assume if you’re hearing this, you’re friendly. I just. If not, what’s the point? This ship doesn’t even have remote storage anymore, so the only way you can get this audio is if you’re physically touching the headset containing these logs, and the only way you can do that is if we wind up in the same place, and either I hand it to you, or you, um. Retrieve it. From my—from me. Why act like we’ve already lost, you know?

Maybe if I’m even luckier, you’ll find a way to get in touch with Arkady Patel, or Brian Jeeter, or Krejjh, or Dr. Violet Liu, or RJ McCabe or Juniper Liu or Dr. Sylvia Robinson. Or Ignatius Campbell, or Jin Seon Park. If you can give this recording to one of them, all of them will have it.

So I’m gonna go out even further on this branch, and I’m gonna say, Arkady, if you got my message about where to go and Brian, if you decoded it, I’m so sorry. I won’t be there. That’s one of few things I know for sure right now.

Four hours and forty three minutes left on the countdown. And I don’t even know how much battery this recorder has. Not more than an hour, I’d guess. I should probably…conserve.

FX: RECORDER IS SWITCHED OFF. RECORDER IS SWITCHED BACK ON.

SANA

It’s too weird, with myself, the silence. On the Rumor, and then the Iris, Irises. You always had the option of walking into another part of the ship and finding company, a new perspective, new energy. Losing yourself in the back and forth.

And in San Ramos, there’s always people around. Looking for Campbell, or looking for me. Wanting advice on fixing a filter or getting a generator working again, or getting along with whoever else is in range of their bomb shelter. A lot of young people too old for the kids’ evac just needing someone to see them, listen to them. Those were my favorites. 

Scanners are—nothing’s tailing me yet, but any second now…I should turn the engine back on, and uh, hope it won’t immediately fry me.

FX: SWITCH FLICKED. IF THERE WERE ENGINE NOISES, THEY RESUME

SANA

Hang on, my side’s bleeding, right through my very makeshift bandage. I should really…I should do something about that. Um.

FX: SANA RUMMAGES IN THE SHIP FOR SOMETHING TO BANDAGE HER WOUND.

FX: RUMMAGING CEASES.

SANA

Only thing back here that might help here is the emergency landing parachute. That’s not good. But it does look like there’s a layer in here that’s at least a little absorbent. Hang on.

FX: PARACHUTE RIPS.

FX: SANA WRAPS HER SIDE WITH THE PIECE OF PARACHUTE AS SHE TALKS.

SANA

I realize it doesn’t sound great that I might’ve compromised the only parachute in here, trapped in a spaceship racing through the void, but I took a piece off the edge and besides, given how little I know about where I’m headed, better to avoid any exposed blood.

Campbell, I need to tell you right now, because I’m sure it’s on your mind and I should’ve said it sooner but I think (LAUGHS SLIGHTLY) I might be in a tiny bit of shock—it wasn’t that you made a mistake on the IDs. Your work was inspired, as always. You know that. You know, and I love that about you. I wish I could spend this whole recording on nothing else but things about you that I love. 

FX: RUMMAGING

SANA

The med kit has a needle and thread, I could stitch up my bandage. 

FX: MED KIT OPENS.

SANA

Ow, my thumb. How do I thread this thing? Why would you make a needle eye this small?

Three hours and fifty-two minutes left. Where was I?

The lucky thing is, I don’t think the people who turned me in realized who I really was. Other Violet is serious about “need to know basis” and now I guess I see why. I was almost sent to a general prison. The only thing they really had me on was travel without a permit. 

Unfortunately, um. Campbell, I don’t blame you. I want to make that clear. You did your best, and why would you do anything else? But the fact that my documents were so good, so professionally done when I was somewhere I had no clearance to be, alerted the authorities that I was probably someone with strong ties to the underground, and so they sent me to a place even you have never heard of, because most people don’t know it exists. A prison called Slateston. On Cresswin Landing.

And I know, if you’re hearing this, you have a lot of questions. But I’m not—I’m not ready to answer yet. 

I’m giving up on the needle. Threading this thing is like trying to find the nose on a gnat and my hands aren’t exactly—and anyway, I probably shouldn’t waste stitches on cloth when I might, um, need them for skin. Maybe. Maybe not. The not-knowing is the worst, you know? Or—not the worst-worst, but. It’s up there.

On top of everything else, God did it hurt to see another prison built on Cresswin. The Landers, especially all the kids who were born there, had fought so hard to become a free planet, an independent body, and then the Regime came in and said, “the only way we’ll honor the treaty is if you turn over a corner of this rock back to us, let us use your land to torment people.”

So the thing about Slateston—one of the things about Slateston—was that they threw everyone together, and I mean everyone. Regime soldiers who had killed their siblings-in-arms in a brawl? Send ‘em to Slateston. People who were too violent for the army, y’know? There were artists like my friend Lupe, there were—there were aging scholars like Imani. The youngest person I met at Slateston was 17. Winnie. Daughter of a Lakota couple who were sent to Cresswin 20 years ago for protesting. She lived through the uprising, saw Cresswin come to run itself, picketed the construction of Slateston, and got thrown in there herself.

Winnie was something. Really funny. You might think someone who’d been through what she’d seen would be permanently spent, but she lived to crack a joke. Lived to make us laugh. And she had such a clear idea of what she wanted from life, y’know? And that’s—

Is the air getting thinner?

Okay, kiddo, keep it together. Deep breaths. 

But not that deep, ha.

Was life support one of the automated warnings I shut off? I can’t remember. What does the dash say? Find the…life support icon…

FX: RUSTLING

SANA

Oh. Damn. Um. 

FX: A SNICK AND A METALLIC GROAN AS SANA PRIES OFF THE PANEL OF THE SHIP, A CLATTER AS THE PANEL DROPS TO THE FLOOR.

SANA

This is easy, just divert the power from something else. What else is there that still even works? What else…

Seat warmers. Don’t need those. 

FX: SANA PULLS OUT SOME WIRES, RECONNECTING THEM. IF LIFE SUPPORT HAS A SOUND, IT IMPROVES A TINY BIT HERE.

SANA

Emergency distress beacon. (HESITATES) Don’t need that.

FX: SANA PULLS OUT SOME WIRES, RECONNECTING THEM.

SANA

“Scanners.” This is ridiculous. I need those. How am I supposed to survive if I don’t even know what’s following me? I can’t fly blind, I can’t…(PAUSE) You need to breathe, kid. You need to breathe more than you need to see.

FX: SANA PULLS OUT SOME     WIRES, RECONNECTING THEM. IF LIFE SUPPORT HAS A SOUND, IT IMPROVES NOTICEABLY HERE.

SANA

Is that better? I think that’s better. 

(BREATHES FOR A MOMENT)

Aaand the life support icon says…fifty-seven minutes of breathable air left. Gotta land this sucker in under an hour. Crash-land it. But that was always my best hope. The longer I’m out here, the more I risk getting pinged by a nearby ship or a drone, and it’s not like I can hide in this pod. Thing’s too small to lie down in. The planet where I’m headed will have cover. Whatever else, it’ll have cover.

(BREATHES)

How do I even know the life support icon is working? Nothing else in this glorified bottle rocket is—that’s not useful. I feel 20% less likely to pass out, and as Brian would say, we are grading on a curve right now. One helluva goddamn curve. 

Brian wouldn’t say that.

It helps, to remember you. My friends, and Campbell, and Jin Seon. It helps to remember.

FX: IN THE BACKGROUND, SOFT ALARM SOUNDS

SANA

Coming back to Cresswin was beyond strange. I went through some of my lowest points there, but it was the first time I really was part of something bigger than myself. And I know it’s an old story at this point, but damn did that help.

Cresswin the second time was…

FX: THE ALARM HAS BEEN GROWING LOUDER

SANA

Hang on. A lot of…um…a lot of lights are blinking really hard right now. Krejjh would know what to do. They would look at this cockpit, created by a different species than them, programmed in a language they only learned in recent memory, laid out with a thousand assumptions from our cultures and our histories and our bodies, and they would still—hm.

“Danger: SPCI.” SPCI. Sensational People Cope Internally. Some Pigs Can Improvise. What are the odds the ship manual actually—

FX: ROOTING AROUND IN A SMALL COCKPIT. A GLOVEBOX OPENS. A PAPER MANUAL TUMBLES OUT.

SANA

“S”...

FX: FLIPPING THROUGH PAGES

SANA

“SPCI. Sudden Planetary Collision Imminent.” 

The ship’s crashing. I can’t steer and we’re crashing. (PAUSE) (RAGGED LAUGHTER)

Okay, no. No no no. Would Arkady give up? No. She would, uh. She would say “We’re in the goddamn shit now” and then she would buckle down and fix it.

That planet’s really—coming at me fast.

And then Krejjh would look at the instrument panel, and they would—they would see what still works, and they would fly us out of this mess. “Rear thrusters.” We have: up, down, left, right, and center.

If I disable everything, we’re—not floating, exactly, we have too much momentum.

So we wait until the gravity pulls us in and we land. That was the plan anyway. That was the plan once we realized—

I’m so mixed up. Hang on. Whew, hello planet.  I can see your land and your oceans, that’s— a lot. No sign of settlements. Okay. We’re definitely being pulled in now. Thrusters off.

FX: BACKGROUND SOUNDS DISAPPEAR

SANA

How else can I slow the—with the parachute you just ripped up. 

Free-falling. Damn, there is a long way to go. Okay. Okay. Stay calm.

I don’t—I don’t blame the people who turned me in, the second time. Well, no. I shouldn’t blame the people who turned me in. (DEEP BREATH) I’m trying not to blame the people who turned me in. They had a kid, y’know? A six-year-old.

I should’ve considered this and I didn’t because I’d been traveling for 72 hours straight and their bonafides checked out and they were friends of a friend and I just needed somewhere to sleep. (RAW LAUGH) Still do.

I don’t want anyone to come and ruin that family’s lives because of what they did to me. Or you know, I shouldn’t want that, and that’s where I’m at right now. All the same, um, I’d say don’t send anyone from our side to stay with the Catsby-Smiths of Durlam City in Yerald, Ordiny. 

“Don’t trust these people,” what lousy last words.

If we’re at the end, I should—I wanna say—

If we’re at the end, nobody will hear this.

That doesn’t help. Last words matter, even if no one else will ever—last words matter, even if it’s only for me. 

Listen. I love you. I love you.

(SANA BREATHES HARD, THEN HOLDS HER BREATH)

FX: RECORDER SHUTS OFF.

3.03.03 ESCAPE POD. LANDED IN WATER. 

FX: RECORDER TURNS ON AGAIN.

FX: THE SHIP IS BOBBING IN WATER.

SANA

(EXHALE) 

Look at that, still in one piece. What’re the odds?

This planet, I genuinely don’t know if it has a name or not. I know that when Cresswin was first founded—I mean when they were trying to build a resort for rich people, before they took history’s hardest pivot—they chose a spot at the edge, where most of the nearby planets hadn’t been settled yet. Something about a more exotic vacation. Explore by day, bask by the hover-pool at night. 

Do you remember, back when charting the heavenly spheres was the latest trend for trillionaires? Campbell, you might. All those planets and moons with the most ridiculous names. Embarrassing. The locals would always call them something else, though. There’s a certain poetry to that, I think.

Imani loved poetry. Imani, they were the elderly professor-type I told you about before. The guards at Slateston had us breaking up rocks for at least twelve hours a day, doing it the old-fashioned way with these pickaxes, and sometimes under the noise of metal hitting stone, you could hear Imani reciting something to themself.

That annoyed me at first, I’ll be honest. I was working on a plan, or trying to, and it was just close enough to conversation to split my focus.

My plan, my grand scheme. Nobody patrolling the yards at Cresswin was supposed to have anything on them that could transmit off the planet, but uh. You can imagine, of course the guards did. Arkady, I used every trick you’d ever taught me and I lifted a device off one of them. Broke rocks for twelve hours, went back to my cell, keyed in my transmission, my song to say, “I’m here” you know. “Come and get me.” The signal was weaker than a newborn kitten, I didn’t have time to see if it even came through. Honestly, connection speed was so slow, it’s possible that the message is still out there, bouncing around space, meaningless until the right person hears it. If the right person ever does. It’s possible you may never know any of this. None of you. That’s…

FX: RECORDER TURNS OFF.

FX: RECORDER TURNS ON.

SANA

It’s okay. I’m okay.

I destroyed the device I stole. Smuggled it out of my cell piece by piece in case they searched me, searched the—”room” is very generous, but you know. 

And then. The guards played us against each other whenever they could, but you smash rocks with someone all day, you get to know them a little. Lupe, Imani, Winnie and a few others were already tight before I came along. I think it comes from being friends with you, Brian, that once I could give it my full attention, I realized that Imani’s poems had a code in them, and that the code meant they were planning to escape.

I’m still getting ahead of myself. But first I need to catch my bearings. Catch my bearings, find land, warm up a little, figure out —it’s okay, I don’t have to think about the next part yet. One fire at a time.

FX: SANA UNBUCKLES HERSELF FROM HER SEAT AND STANDS.

SANA

Open the skyroof…

FX: SANA STRUGGLES WITH THE SKY ROOF.

SANA

C’mon, please…

FX: SKY ROOF OPENS. SANA DRAGS HERSELF UP SO SHE’S PEEKING OUT OF THE ROOF.

FX: SPLASHING ON ALL SIDES. A FAINT INSECTOID BUZZING.

FX: SANA DROPS BACK ONTO THE COCKPIT CHAIR.

SANA

Water in all directions.

What now? What’s your plan? 

Calm down, kid. You need to calm down.

“TNO,” that’s, uh (FX: PAGES FLIPPING) “Thrusters Not Operational.” Must’ve been damaged in the water landing.

No thrusters, we need an oar. Brian has those stories about going to camp as a kid, tooling around on a raft with improvised paddles, so I just need to—improvise some paddles.

Find a paddle, find a paddle…we’re really up a creek, now, huh?

(DEEP BREATH IN, DEEP BREATH OUT)

C’mon, c’mon. “Despair is a luxury and we are broke.”

FX: RUMMAGING

SANA

We have…most of a parachute. The headset recorder I’m wearing. 

FX: MORE RUMMAGING.

SANA

A lighter. A stopwatch. A paper manual like it’s 2105. A metal bottle of water. A fold-out knife. A very basic med kit with a very hard to thread needle. A thumb drive containing a folk-rock song. One standard issue military ration, unfortunately meat-based.

Less than three hours and thirty minutes until I’m screwed.

A broken, broken, broken escape pod from a ‘89 Coluga.

Wait.

So broken that it doesn’t really matter if I…

FX: SANA THUNKS THE BOTTLE OF WATER ON EACH CORNER OF THE PANEL’S GUTS.

SANA

…use the bottle of water to loosen what remains of the panel, which is only dangling by a thread anyway, see what’s underneath.

(SANA HUMS TO HERSELF)

No, no, nnnno—hmm.

SANA

(EFFORT) Thank god this ship is such a piece of—

FX: THE PIECE OF SHIP ENGINE POPS FREE.

SANA

There we go. Okay. Let’s rock and roll.

FX: SANA CLIMBS BACK UP THROUGH THE SKY ROOF. WATER SHUSHING, INSECTOID HUM.

SANA

Moment of truth.

FX: AN OAR PUSHES THROUGH THE WATER SUCCESSFULLY.

SANA

We’re moving, we’re moving! Look at that! Woo! (COUGH) Sorry, there was a whole cloud of bugs. Nope, nope, nope, they’re in my teeth.

Okay, next step is to figure out where to go.

Think. Does the onboard compass still—you smashed the instrument panel to make the oar, kid. Anyway, it’s not like I learned much about the terrain on my way down. Not like I know anything about this place, other than it was the only habitable planet in range when things went sideways.

(A PAUSE. SANA LISTENS TO THE WATER.)

All that water…it’s beautiful. In a sort of terrible way, but I missed nature. Even the terrible kind.

Hang on, where did the bugs come from? If they weren’t water bugs, how long can they really fly? 

“Follow those insects.”

FX: SLOSHING AS SANA ROWS HER IMPROVISED OAR.

SANA

Okay. Got a lot of rowing ahead of me, gonna power down for a bit.

FX: RECORDER IS TURNED OFF, THEN ON AGAIN.

Where was I?

It was bad, at Slateston. I was also very lucky, in nearly every way imaginable compared to most of the people locked up there. I keep rolling those two thoughts over in my mind. It was bad but I was lucky. I was lucky but it was bad. I’m not sure which one I can—

FX: DISTANTLY, AN ALIEN BIRD CALLS. SANA STOPS ROWING FOR A SECOND

SANA

…was that a bird?

FX: LESS DISTANTLY, ANOTHER ALIEN BIRD ANSWERS.

SANA

(HUSHED) There’s a bird flying maybe twenty meters away. I can’t see it too clearly, but the way it moves, it’s beautiful. The way dancers are beautiful.

It’s soaring down— (FX: DISTANT SPLASH) and pulling out—I guess that’s a fish?—from the water. Bad day to be a fish, or a fishlike thing. Good day to be—is that a bird? It might be more of a bat…type guy?

Sorry, I sound like the least informed nature documentary right now.

Could be worse. The Regime’s got all these new regulations about what to do if their officers come face to face with extraterrestrial life. A priority two, if you can believe it. There’s a huge bonus if they can take it down, get it logged. I guess they’re hoping for another Vree Chel Noke situation. Something they can force to hurt us.

FX: SANA CONTINUES ROWING.

SANA

It’s a nice…morning, I guess. Comfortable temperature, breathable air, probably within a day’s work from land. I’m lucky. I’m lucky.

FX: AT THE SAME DISTANCE AS THE SECOND BIRD, A SLOW AND THEN MASSIVE SPLASH AS SOMETHING HUGE SHOOTS ITS HEAD OUT OF THE WATER.

SANA 

(HUSHED) Some kind of whale…snake just stuck its head out of the water.

FX: THE BIRD SCREAMS. THE HUGE SOMETHING DUCKS ITS HEAD BACK UNDERWATER.

SANA

Okay.

FX: SANA ROWS FASTER.

SANA

(SHAKEN) The whale just ate the bat. The whole thing, in one bite. The bat was the height of a whole person away from the surface, and the whale…the snake…just. Reared up and bridged the distance, so. Less talking. 

FX: CLOSER THAN BEFORE, A SLOW AND THEN MASSIVE SPLASH.

FX: THE WHALE-SNAKE SCREECHES.

SANA

Agh!

FX: SANA DROPS BACK DOWN INTO THE SHIP AND POUNDS THE EXIT HATCH CLOSED.

SANA

What are the odds, really, that the whale snake knows how to crush through a layer of spaceship?

FX: THE WHALE SNAKE COMES AT THE SHIP TEETH-FIRST.

SANA

It’s trying! Okay. Hatch secure?

FX: SANA THUMPS THE HATCH FROM INSIDE THE SHIP

SANA

Hatch secure. Great. Once it realizes it can’t eat metal, it should lose interest.

FX: TEETH COLLIDING AGAINST THE SIDE OF THE SHIP.

SANA

So once I was in Slateston, I had no hope of going incognito. But in a way, that almost worked to our advantage, because—

FX: THE WHALE SNAKE HEADBUTTS THE SHIP STRAIGHT DOWN.

SANA

WHAT—

FX: THE SHIP SUDDENLY DROPS FIFTEEN FEET INTO THE WATER AND HITS THE ROCKY SEA FLOOR. THE SHIP SPLASHES UP TO THE SURFACE AGAIN.

FX: THE WHALE SNAKE HEADBUTTS THE SHIP STRAIGHT DOWN AGAIN. AS BEFORE, THE SHIP ZOOMS UNDERWATER AND SMACKS HARD AGAINST THE ROCKS OF THE SEA FLOOR.

SANA

The creature is trying to smash us against the rocks. That’s—kind of amazing, really, it must be smart.

FX: THE WHALE SNAKE DOES THIS MOVE A THIRD TIME. PART OF THE SHIP CRUNCHES JUST A LITTLE.

SANA

Okay. Okay, that’s actually—I can’t let this happen. If I electrify the outside of the escape pod somehow—but that could cook me, too.

What’s the loudest sound the ship can still make?

If I, uh. Reconnect this to here—

FX: ATTEMPT NUMBER FOUR TO SMASH THE SHIP. BAM!

SANA

(YELPS)

FX: WIRES BEING YANKED, SIZZLE OF ELECTRICITY.

SANA

Maybe this like this—

FX: MORE WIRES, MORE SIZZLE.

SANA

Put this up to max…

FX: A LEVER IS PULLED.

ESCAPE POD EMERGENCY BROADCAST

(PLAYS “GOING TO FALL” BY TAIL LIGHT REBELLION)

SANA(SLOW EXHALE) Are we okay?

We’re okay. But just in case, let’s keep the music going for a few. 

Boy, sure would be nice to have WORKING SCANNERS right now. 

Who are you talking to?

The problem with telling you about the escape is the same problem with telling you about how I got taken in the first place. There are things the Regime doesn’t know yet, things they can’t know, and as much as I wanna hold out hope that you, listener, are a friend, I can’t know who will hear this.

But I’ll tell you what they already know, or what I’m sure they’ve figured out by now. The move that got us out of Slateston. 

After the device went missing, a lot of guards were watching us closely, especially during rest shifts—that’s what we got instead of night. We weren’t granted the luxury of darkness. Anyway. One rest shift, I started acting suspicious as I could without quite raising the alarm. Real careful movements, y’know? I got as many eyes on me as I could. And then, when nobody was watching them anymore, one of my comrades slipped a shiv to this one prisoner, a former soldier. Angry.

D’you know anything about prairie management? Violet, I think you were telling me about it at one point. What we did was basically a controlled burn. This guy caused a huge ruckus—attacked a pair of guards, and that set off a whole chain—the eyes slipped off me for a few seconds, and that gave us the space to move.

Uh, in the brief period of time we broke into the guard tower, one of my comrades, I’m pretty sure it was Winnie, thought it would be funny to blare this song from the speakers as we escaped, that’s why I have it. 

Not a bad song, really. Two hours, thirty seven minutes left. 

The escape, though. 

So me and—how much does the Regime know, really? Me and five to ten other prisoners—made it out of our cells, reached the West guard tower, deactivated the cameras, and diverted the comms to this song. Then we stole one of the guards’ ships. 

The total time the Regime had me, and knew who I was, was probably less than three weeks, although again, I can’t be sure because there were no windows and the lights were never off, and time crawls when you’re—yeah. I said I’m not gonna talk about what happened in there. Arkady and Jin Seon can guess, and the rest of you don’t need to know.

…do you think the whale snake is gone? How long do I wait? We can’t just bob around forever, I’m still operating on a countdown here.

Okay, listener. Wish me luck.

FX: SANA CLIMBS UP AND OPENS THE ROOF HATCH AGAIN.

SANA

I think I see land? I think that’s…on the edge, there, see? (A BEAT) Obviously you can’t. But I think…I really think. I hope. 

FX: RECORDER IS TURNED OFF, TURNED BACK ON.

3.03.04 EXT. ESCAPE POD. APPROACHING LAND. 

FX: ROWING, INSECTOID BUZZING

SANA

So we escaped. That’s the important thing. We blasted that song and then we—Krejjh would say, “we got the heck out of Dodge.” We’ve all heard the stories of how hard the Regime is watching even its own people now. So when we first realized something was tailing us, something we couldn’t shake no matter how we moved, I thought they’d installed some kind of tracker on the ship, besides the bugs we’d already weeded out.

So we searched the cruiser—I combed every inch of that engine, found nothing. 

And that’s when I remembered our adventure on the Rumor, and Violet, I know if you’re listening, you’ve probably been yelling the answer. The tracker wasn’t in the ship. It was in one of us. So we searched ourselves, and there right below my ribcage— I don’t know when the guards even got it that deep under my skin, but I was out more than once. 

The point being, the chip. Once we found it, we realized what it was, thanks to my time with Dr. Robinson and Violet. A hemodynamic implant. Invisible to most bug detection because it’s powered by the heat of your blood. Every five hours, it automatically sends headquarters your temperature, your blood oxygen levels, and what they care about, your exact location. So I took the escape pod, figuring I could at least draw the Regime off the rest of my colleagues.

I know the exact time the Regime ships swerved to follow me, so I know how much time I have left before the next ping, at which point I need to get this thing out of me and get rid of it. That countdown is now telling me I have nineteen minutes left. Nineteen minutes to do this so the Regime doesn’t figure out what we figured out, that I ditched it, and that I’m—y’know. Alone. 

(CAREFUL BREATHING)

I’d cut the chip out of me and chuck it in the ocean, except then it’ll probably stop moving, or stop moving much, and they’ll know I got rid of the thing. Can’t do that. Can’t fall back on my old standby, stick the tracker on someone else’s ship…

I just had such a bad idea. Dr. Robinson—Doc—I almost can hear you telling me I shouldn’t do it. Almost. But not quite.

Do all ocean predators sense blood in the water, or is it just sharks? Violet would know. 

Violet would also think this is a bad idea.

But. It’s worth it. I need to believe it’s worth it. “The only way out is through.” Through the lie and into the shit.

No, that’s. That’s not me. It’s not. I need to believe I’ll see you again. I need to believe it. I need to believe it, so I will. (SHE DOESN’T.) I—I do. 

I’ll dodge the Regime agents that are definitely coming, I’ll dodge them all somehow, and I’ll—I’ll steal a device off them again, uh, somehow. I’ll steal a device and it’ll have better connection way out here, somehow, and I’ll send another message to my people, to my crew. And it’ll tell them not to go to Cresswin, not to mount an assault on—Slateston has so many more forces than Cresswin used to, even in its heyday as a prison, if you head there without anyone on the inside to help you, you’ll definitely—I mean your chances if you got my message really are zero, but.

(DEEP BREATH) You won’t. The Regime will leave without me, and you’ll get my new transmission, the one with my exact coordinates, which I will know, somehow, and the Regime won’t intercept it, and you’ll come here. 

You’ll come here, and you’ll find me in time, before anything can—before I—in time. You’ll find me, and I’ll be okay, And I’ll say…something cool, something light and funny so you know not to worry. I’ll say. I’ll say “Arkady, you owe me twenty bucks.” And they’ll—you’ll laugh, beclause it’s funny. And Park, you’ll smile at me, that slight little smile that still somehow includes your eyes. And Arkady will say— (A PAUSE. SANA IS STRUGGLING TO PRETEND.)

FX: RECORDER TURNED OFF

FX: RECORDER TURNED ON.

SANA

Arkady will say, “Hey, you okay? What the goddamn hell happened to you?”

And I’ll—I’ll say. I’ll say. “We need to get to the ship right now, I need to tell you. My contact, who couldn’t stomach the Regime’s latest bombing campaign”—I’ll use that person’s name, I’ll say the name out loud, which I’ll be able to do because it’ll just be them, you, it’ll just be my side, nobody else listening. That’s who’s gonna find this. Nobody else will ever hear it. And even my people won’t need to hear this recording, thank every god, because I’ll be right there and I’ll be able to tell them. I’ll be able to say that maybe sixty seconds before I was apprehended, I learned that my contact had successfully done their bit and keyed the Regime’s drone missile targeting software to respond to my biometrics, to a full retina scan. We’ll scan my eyes and open the window for the rest of our forces and everything will—

Everything is—

(DOES NOT BELIEVE THIS) Everything is gonna be okay.

I’m stalling. I’ve got the knife in my hand and their chip in my side and I’m stalling.

One fire at a time. Okay. Let’s break this down into steps.

FX: A MEAT RATION IS RIPPED OPEN.

SANA

Open the meat ration. 

FX: BANDAGE IS REMOVED.

SANA

Remove the bandage. Okay, now. Uh. Cut out the chip. I’m just gonna—you don’t need to hear this.

FX: RECORDER IS TURNED OFF, TURNED BACK ON

SANA

(GRITTED TEETH) Now, just — Let some of the blood land in the water.

FX: BLOOD DRIPS.

SANA

Row away as hard as you can.

FX: ROWING HARD

SANA

(PAIN SOUND) Oh, uh. Rebandage the wound.

FX: BANDAGING

SANA

Rebandage the wound and hope against hope that eel-snake-whales are attracted to blood. Fold the chip into the meat.

FX: NEARBY, AN EEL SURFACES AND SCREAMS.

SANA

Throw the meat!

FX: THE MEAT LANDS IN THE WATER. IT’S A LITTLE TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT. FRANTIC ROWING.

SANA

Row! 

FX: THE EEL DEVOURS THE MEAT. FRANTIC ROWING.

SANA

Row!

FX: RECORDER IS TURNED OFF. RECORDER IS TURNED BACK ON. ROWING. INSECTOID BUZZING IS LOUDER.

FX: A STOPWATCH GOES OFF.

SANA

And that’s my stopwatch. We just hit zero. The monitor has sent its coordinates, from the belly of that whale-snake creature, to the Regime. They’ll waste however long on tracing the signal through the water, then they’ll find it and they’ll be hunting me. I’d estimate I have three hours. So. New countdown.

FX: THREE HOURS ON THE CLOCK

I can see the outline of land. Trees. I think they’re trees.

Wow, I wrapped that parachute as well as I could but the blood feels really…persistent.

Now I just need to, uh. Get to shore. Build a fire. Cauterize my cut. Hide from the Regime. Find food. Figure out a way to get word back to anyone that might help me. 

And it’ll all— either way, something will have to happen.

What if I just rested my eyes for a…

No. No. Hi. Hello.

AVERY

(A STATICKY TRANSMISSION)Hello?

SANA

What was— I could’ve sworn I just heard—

(PAUSE. NOTHING BUT ENVIRONMENTAL SOUNDS)

No. C’mon. You saw yourself, long-distance comms are down. The only thing still running is the local radio and that’s got such a short range, the only way anyone could transmit, they’d have to be down here with me.

Great, now I’m hearing things. You spend enough time talking to yourself, someone is bound to answer. This would be the worst possible time to start—hallucinating or—

AVERY

Hello? 

SANA

Please stop. Please, please—

Hang on. I’m just gonna…play back the last few seconds.

FX: RECORDER IS TURNED OFF. RECORDER IS TURNED ON.

AVERY

Hello?

SANA

Holy shit, there’s someone here.

CREDITS MUSIC

JESS

This episode features

RAE

Rae Tay as Juniper Liu

RUKHMANI

Rukhmani K Desai as Sana Tripathi

PHILIP

Philip C as Pleasant Voice

BRANDON

Brandon P Jenkins as Avery

JESS

Written by Jessica Best

ELLA

Directed by Ella Watts

AMBER

Dialogue cut by Amber Devereux

ELEANOR

Production Coordinator Eleanor Hyde

JEFFREY

Sound design by Jeffrey Nils Gardner

JESS

Opening credits music is “Fear for the Storm” by Jessica Best and S.E. Winters, performed by Chiron Star with Erin Bauman on vocals and harmonies arranged by Jamie Price.

JONNY

“Going to Fall” is written and performed by Tail Light Rebellion. It was exclusively created for The Strange Case of Starship Iris, and will be the lead single off their upcoming album.

AMBER

The closing credits music is “Rocket Science” by Amber Devereux of Tin Can Audio