SALMON PLAY

PART 1

DEEP CARMINE PLAY

GREY PLAY

KHAKI PLAY

PART 1

PART 1

PART 1

They* (Daniel, Gill, Kath and Simon) stand outside of the box, in front of the window looking in. Inside it is dark, but ‘others unknown are inside’.

They* start to talk to each other, one at a time, as if passing telephone whispers.

This short-repeated action is orchestrated to seem casual, yet their approach is forced and tired. It may repeat 5 cycles.

After the first cycle of telephone whispers, a speaker inside and outside plays a voice track.
The voice (sounds a bit like Alexa) speaks (slowly blandly with no emotion) below.

Taxi, Taxi, Taxi

Hey Taxi,

Taxi, Taxi
Can you give me a hand?
Escherstrausee
Was?
Ah Escherstrausse
Ja, Ja
Has it been raining this hard for long?

After the cycle of passing telephone whispers and the voice track have ceased.

They enter the gallery/space/box stand against a wall and start whispering what they can remember from their conversations outside.

Simultaneously the voice track is played loud.

Then silence.

Gill, Daniel, and Simon stand in the corner of the room each holding one edge each of a rectangle of stiff grey plastic (approx. 40x60). Kath sits underneath wearing cheap foam headphones that are attached to a portable radio, which she holds in her hands..

Gill: OK?
Kath listens and shakes her head.
Daniel: Ummmmmmm.
Kath listens and mouths silently ‘no, nothing’
Simon: Try this?
Simon bows his head towards the plastic until his lips touch it
Simon: (lips touching the plastic) Better?
Kath listens and then nods
Daniel: I like that!
Kath shakes her head. Gill looks at Daniel and shakes her head.
Daniel: Oh sorry.
Daniel bows his head towards the plastic until his lips touch it
Daniel: (lips touching the plastic) Sorry, I mean sorry.
Kath listens, smiles, and nods and mouths silently ‘better’

Gill bows her head towards the plastic until her lips touch it
Gill: (lips touching the plastic) OK now?
Kath: Yes.
Kath twiddles with the nobs on the radio and makes a radio crackle noise with her mouth. This makes her laugh. Daniel also starts laughing
Daniel: (lips still touching the plastic) That’s really good!
Gill and Simon also start giggling and making the crackling noise, lips still touching the plastic.

They all move together, giggling and crackling, lips on plastic, until they have left the space.

A dark empty gallery space in London. Four figures inhabit the space. Daniel, Gill, Kath and Simon. Four small narrow cone like objects are fixed to the wall, just over half way up. Each cone has a wire that runs from it that seems to connect them all. A communication system of sorts.

In the upper corner of the space a small red light flashes and the four figures each head towards a separate cone, placing their ear next to it.

They listen.

We, the invited, watch them. We hear nothing of what they hear.

Their faces have different degrees of interest in what’s being said, differing degrees of agreement.

Daniel places his mouth close to his cone and speaks into it. Again we don’t hear what he says but we do feel a gentle vibration in the room which stops when he stops speaking. He places his ear back to the cone. Kath and Simon exchange glances, worried.

They all continue to listen. Again differing degrees of interest and agreement.

Daniel seems to get agitated, disagrees, and quickly moves his lips to the cone. He speaks aggressively into it. The room vibrates, more strongly this time. Still, we the invited hear nothing of the communication, but we feel it when he speaks.

On the glass gallery door is a poster advertising Viddy Horror Show. It has a film still from Opening Night, a women’s head bowed against a red carpet wearing a blue dressing gown.








Brian (Daniel) greets the audience as they enter the gallery. It’s not necessarily a pleasant greeting more like a nod as if he’s just going through the motions but is really here for some other, more important reason, that’ll perhaps reveal itself later. He wears a Viddy Horror Show t-shirt. He drinks bottled beer. He holds a VHS box by his side.

The space is set up for what is about to happen. Sound equipment and some chairs.
In the gallery is a broken flatscreen monitor. It makes a distressing noise.
There is an empty shelf on the facing wall.
The audience enter still.
An anonymous visitor (Gill) enters wearing black clothing with a medical head-brace and stands on the periphery.

All of a sudden, as if being cued from somewhere else, Brian picks up a microphone, coughs into it and taps it with the VHS box to be sure it’s working.

Brian: (to the assembled) “Lets just get started shall we?”

Brian holds up the hand holding the VHS box and looks around the room until everyone is silent. He slowly closes his eyes and breaths deeply for quite some time. He holds the microphone to rest on his lips so we hear his breathing. After a while his breathing stops and we hear a voice, not his, speaking from his lips.

Brian: ”I’ve got a thing on inside this box. It’s a VHS box. It’s roomy like everything was in the 1970s. They took the tape out so I can wander about. Make it my own. Just try stuff out.

Pause

It’s a black box - black brittle plastic with rounded corners on the rims on the outside. It’s good for making mess because of how slidy it can get. Tina from Three Tinas did a thing where she was in it and she just tried to open the lid up and then close it again and we watched from outside on the shelf. She’d put all olive oil on the floor so she kept slipping onto her arse and the box juddered about whenever she fell.

Pause

I’ve got an invited audience coming in for a sharing and feedback. Tommy from transgressive cinema, Bryn who likes Gummo and his sister who runs Speacial in Swindon which is getting massive. Also Jessica who organises it with her dad who never comes to anything. The acoustics are really bad unless I put my lips right onto the walls and hum my words so that’s what I’ll do.

Pause

Bryn is gonna run the post-sharing chat. We call it a chat but it’s more aggressive than that - real challenging “just change everything and do it different”. That’s the framework we use. Last time Sibylle, who does more dance related stuff TBH, got banged bad by a flat screen telly which wasn’t even part of it. Bryn, who was the one that threw it at her said it was just something he was thinking about. More about his work really, to be honest, but I dunno, maybe useful. Bryn’s sister asked if it was somehow connected to Dario Argento but Sibylle didn’t know who that was. “It’s a fucking Suspiria video box we’re in dickhead” I’d offered, but Jessica pointed out that the words and images on the VHS box cover had worn away and they were aiming to keep it more ambiguous, more open, as a space.”


Brian slowly opens his eyes. He takes out a remote control and turns off the sound from the broken monitor. He looks at the assembled audience.


Brian: “So let's just get started shall we?”

PART 2

PART 3

PART 2

PART 2

The sudden sound of torrential rain is heard through the wall. We hear traffic and street noise beyond. And then the voice of a woman shouting:

Voice of Gill: “Taxi, Taxi, Taxi
Hey Taxi,
Taxi, Taxi

(We hear a car stopping in the rain)

“Can you give me a hand?
Escherstrausee”

Voice of Taxi Driver (Daniel): “Was?
Ah Escherstrausse
Ja, Ja”

Voice of Gill: “Has it been raining this hard for long?”

Gill enters the space and puts her phone away in her pocket. She carries a long microphone on a stand. She sets it up on the floor on the floor facing the wall from where the sound is coming. Her high shoes and feet are soaking wet. She places a black foam rubber disk on the wall.

Voice of Gill: “I said, has it been raining this hard for long?”

Gill takes out a pen and writes in a small notebook she has.
We hear the sound of the taxi door closing and in a moment the sound of the taxi driving away into the rain.

Gill twiddles with her pen and writes again in her notebook. She looks around and places the pen somewhere so that it is hidden. She looks at the audience.

PART 3

The space is still semi-dark.

Gill wears a lipstick tube from a chain around her neck. She takes the top off and paints her lips red.

She uncovers the front of a small five sided white cube. Outside the cube we see small red electrical wires that it needs to be able to work. It is illuminated inside by a tiny red light.
The vibrating sound of the gallery space stops and is replaced instantly with the same vibrating sound coming from a speaker inside the small white cube. The five sided cube starts to vibrate violently.

Gill leaves the space to become Donna.

PART 3

A green screen is rolled down at the back of the space.

The audience/visitors are asked to turn their back on the screen to watch a now working monitor. They are requested not to turn around, (by Brian)

The monitor plays the actions that have taken place in the space behind them.

Daniel. Kath and Simon and Gill stand in front of the screen, behind the audience.

The monitor plays a pre-record sequence filmed in the space using a green screen.

Pre-recorded action/sequence.

Orange sponge balls are thrown at the (green) screen.

The superimposed images/sequences are of the outside space (walls specifically) at various times of the day, intercut with scenes of generic images of New York in the 1970.






The images are not allowed to linger, they are edited in a quick, almost frenzied sequence. which climaxes in a slower sequence filmed from the back of a NY taxi.
During the taxi journey sequence/end

flashes insistently on the screen

The monitor plays image only, no sound.

Space (live)
The only sounds that can be heard are from Daniel, Kath, Simon and Gill quietly preparing the space behind the audience.

This preparation includes placing orange sponge balls on the floor.

And unrolling a text banner which says

this should be left on the floor as if discarded

The audience/visitors have been asked not to turn around. They should ‘sense’ presence but not actually see who is there.

Once the space is prepared, Daniel, Kath, Simon and Gill leave the space, exiting loudly.

Brian reappears and suggests the audience/visitors are free to move as they wish.

PART 3

The space is still in semi-darkness.

Donna sits, her back against the wall. (She doesn’t enjoy the possibility of being crept up on)

Donna: ‘Go’
She says it out loud into the space as if to someone, but the room is empty.
The small red light in the upper corner flashes on.

She attempts to smirk. To laugh. It’s a gentle laugh. Seems delicate after her straight faced sternness before.

The gentleness drops instantly from her face.
Donna: ‘Stop’
The red light goes off.

She sits and thinks for a moment.

Suddenly.
Donna: ‘Go!’
The red light flicks on.

She starts with the smirk again, this time she seems transformed, the smirk of a teenage boy. Then erupts into a breath gasping laughter, fully consumed by it. As if something is genuinely hilarious.

The laughter snaps to a stop. Her face drops, becoming straight, stern almost.

Donna: ‘Stop.’
The red light goes off.
Donna: ‘That’ll do.’

PART 4

The portable radio lies abandoned in the middle of the space. The cheap foam headphones lie next to it but disconnected now.

A jingle begins playing from the radio.

The jingle finishes and the perky voice of a female radio presenter takes over.

RADIO PRESENTER: ‘Welcome to Physics in the Real World. An introduction to all things physics for both those in the know and those in a black hole’.

The Radio Presenter does a pre planned laugh at her own joke.

RADIO PRESENTER: ‘So, for today’s session I’m here in a community square in the centre of a new build with prof Nachikita Tiwari, who is veeeeeeery happy to be back with us to discuss Acoustics. More specifically sound transmission. And more specifically still, sound transmission through walls. So please put your hands together to welcome Professor Nachikita Tiwari.

We hear the live audience of the radio show clapping. We also hear capping coming from the square outside of the actual space. (But if we were to look outside we would see 3 female teenagers roller skating around the community square of a new build, we wouldn’t see any clapping.)

PROF. NACHIKITA TIWARI (the voice from SOURCE 2 Video): Hello again. In uhh today's lecture we will be using some of the concepts which we have developed in previous lectures, specifically the transmission line theory and use this approach to figure out what happens when sound, as it propagates through medium, it hits a wall. How does sound gets transmitted across a wall? And to solve this problem we will use uhh the transmission line theory. So what we will analyse is first uhh transmission of sound through a wall when the incident angle of the sound as it hits a wall is 90 degrees. That is the first uhh problem we will solve and then subsequently what happens if it is hitting at all sorts of random angles and uhh then uhh using this approach we will figure out how sound gets transmitted across….

There is a mass commotion in the background of the radio programme. Shouting. Screaming. A car. It’s getting louder as it seems to get closer to the Radio Presenter and Prof. Nachikita Tiwari. They’re panicking. Shouting too. Screaming. The car crashes into the wall. Then the sound of piercing microphone feedback. A split second later there is a transference of sound. The microphone feedback spilling into the room. Almost unbearably loud from the main system speakers in the space.


The room falls to a near silence.

PART 2

Three characters enter through the door from the toilet wearing baseball caps so we can’t tell who they might be. They are watching their phones as they walk. They are each sucking on a pen and have lots of black ink all around their mouths. They stand with their back to the audience. The audience can see the live images they are watching intently on their phones. Each one a different version of three cameras circling the square outside. There is suddenly a raucous laugh from each of the phones and the image falls to what should be the floor but it has been replaced by three skies. At the same time the three female cyclists in the square fall from their bikes. There is near silence and as the cyclists begin to get up the laughter starts again on the three phones but with the three wearing baseball caps lip-syncing to the voices like three Greek Furys.

PART 4

The room is empty.

The giggling and cracking from the end of part one starts to come through the speaker, muffled and quiet at first then clearer, but never very loud.

Kath enters with three baseball caps and the grey square of plastic from part 1. She has a bumbag on, from which she pulls a black sharpy. She uses the brims of the caps as templates to draw three large fingernail shapes onto the plastic. She pulls a stanley knife from the bumbag and cuts out the nail shapes. She pulls gaffer tape from from her bumbag and tapes one to each hand.

Voice from speakers (integrated into the giggling and crackling): So please put your hands together to welcome Professor Nachikita Tiwari

Kath places her hands together and walks towards the window, where she scrapes the nails on it up and down.

Daniel’s voice from outside of the space: That is really good!

Kath leaves, leaving one ‘fingernail’ on the floor.

PART 5

Brian observes the audience/visitors. He quietly encourages whatever actions they take saying ‘that’s really good’.

Gill brings him a pen and paper. The pen is black and leaky. Gill joins in the audience’s activity.

Brian draws the audience’s actions with the pen and paper. He gets ink all over him.

Kath enters and attempts to collect up the balls. Simon comes in with an orange sponge and water and attempts to clean the ink from Brian’s top whilst Brian giggles.

PART 4

Simon removes Brians now soaking wet top and puts it on. Brian has a black stain on his bare chest where the ink has soaked through.

Kath, still on her knees, discretely hands Simon a coloured ball. Simon holds it up to show ‘Brian’. With his other hand Simon holds a microphone to ‘Brians’ mouth.

Daniel Brian: “I really dislike that colour”

Simon Brian: “That’s really good”

Simon drops the ball on the floor and Kath hands him another one. Simon holds it up to show ‘Daniel’, still with the microphone being held to his mouth.

Daniel Brian: “I really dislike that colour”

Simon Brian: “That’s really good”

Simon drops the ball on the floor and Kath hands him another one. Simon holds it up to show ‘Daniel’, still with the microphone being held to his mouth.

Daniel Brian: “I really dislike that colour”

Simon Brian: “That’s really good”

Simon drops the ball on the floor and Kath hands him another one. Simon holds it up to show ‘Daniel’, still with the microphone being held to his mouth.

Daniel Brian: “I really dislike that colour”

Simon Brian: “That is really good”

Simon drops the ball on the floor and Kath hands him another one. Simon holds it up to show ‘Daniel’, still with the microphone being held to his mouth.

Daniel Brian: “I really dislike that colour”

Simon Brian: “That’s really good”

Simon drops the ball on the floor and Kath hands him another one. Simon holds it up to show ‘Daniel’, still with the microphone being held to his mouth.

Daniel Brian: “I really dislike that colour”

Simon Brian: “That is really very good”

PART 5

Gill places the pen in the pocket of her dark-coloured coat. She walks around the perimeter of the space. At each corner (4) a baseball hat has been placed. When she reaches a corner she picks up a hat. Holding the hat she searches for Kath, who is trying to hide from her sight. Gill continues to move around the space, the pen leaking a taupe fluid, staining the coat pocket. Simon confronts Gill and takes the first baseball hat and moves to the radio booth. Gill moves to the next corner collects the baseball hat and holds it under her arm while trying to write on the wall with the broken dripping pen – She tries to write the words LEAVE BUILDING CAR PARK FOREST. It is uncertain if the words can be seen. Daniel collects the other two baseball hats, places one of his head and takes the other one to Kath who is now standing by the radio booth with Simon. An audio track fills the space. A recording of sounds which shift between laughing or crying or laughing/crying - it is uncertain what we are listening to.
Gill leaves the space and waits outside by the door staring at Kath, Simon, Daniel and the space.

PART 4

Donna’s head drops in thought. She takes out a pair of mirrored sunglasses and puts them on. Slowly she walks to the other side of the room and raises her hand to touch the wall as if touching someone else’s hands.

Romantic piano music plays. Donna mouths “hello” to someone who may be standing on the other side of the wall.

[Knock at the toilet door)

Donna looks embraced as if caught looking at a dead person in a mirror when she shouldn’t be. She turns round quickly. The door opens and Simon stands in the frame and looks round the room quickly nodding briefly to Donna.

Donna: What’s up?

Simon leaves and Daniel slowly enters, walking two steps into the room. He is wearing a hat made of feathers.

Daniel: May I sit down? (pause) There’s no sense in us being enemies. But I can't be your friend… if I have to contend with your retirement.

Donna: Oh, I don't think we'll ever be friends.

Daniel: Well, we'll just have to live with that. (pause) You know, that was a very good point you made about hope. Made me realize that you're not completely stupid. People change... physically.

PART 5

Simon enters wearing a black wig, blue denim shirt and black fleece jacket. Around his eyes are painted dark brown like two holes. He is carrying a large stone. He places it on the floor. He looks at the baseball cap nail. He picks it up and replaces it with another one that has been painted beige. He exits.

Simon enters again and places a sign on the wall saying WHO ARE THEY?

Suspenseful music plays for quite sometime…

Simon waits in an awkward manner - maybe he has heartburn or some condition he is trying to conceal. As the music finishes he touches his forehead briefly and that allows him to exit, bumping into the doorframe as he goes.

Simon drops the ball. lt makes a loud bang using sound FX through the speakers. Kath pauses and looks at Simon, then at Daniel. Daniel walks away from the microphone.

Daniel: Sorry. Now there is a solid stone in my chest and its pushing outwards. I think it’s growing. And sort of melding with the inside of my ribs.

Gill taps her rib cage.

No, the fleshy bit, not the bone.

Daniel pinches some flesh on his torso.

Gill pinches the same flesh on Daniel’s torso. Kath and Simon pinch the same area of flesh on their own torsos.

Gill: But the fleshy bit is too thin.

Simon: Too thin.

Kath: Too thin.

Gill pinches Daniel again.

Gill: Where have my lungs gone?! Where is my heart?

Daniel: That’s me, not you.

Gill: Yes. Right. Pinches harder. Who are they? (Gestures to Simon and Kath)

Daniel: Ow! … um Bryn? Or Brian? or one might be Jessica I think.

PART 6

Gill re-enters with a pot of taupe paint and a pot of beige paint and a large paint brush. She paints a circle around the words ‘LEAVE BUILDING CAR PARK FOREST’ with the taupe paint. She then uses the paint brush to make it ‘rain’ beige paint around the room. Simon, Daniel, and Kath protect themselves with the hats.

When the floor is sufficiently covered, Gill uses one of her finger nails to write out the word ‘taxi’ in the paint on the floor.

Simon says ‘change!’

Daniel says ‘was?’

Simon says ‘everything! Change!’

Daniel leads them all out through the exit. Outside the door they converse in muffled irritable voices about ‘disliking that colour’ and ‘who is gonna clean up’?

PART 5

Kath starts wrenching.
Something is caught in her throat
She wretches and wretches and wretches and wretches.

The three look on.

Kaths wrenching becomes more and more violent, more and more unpleasant.
It takes over her whole body.
Her body convulses, becoming more and more animalistic.
She is trying to remove something, some hair from within the depth of her throat.

The sound of an aeroplane is heard overhead.

PART 7

Almost darkness. The red light in the corner flashes on and off continuously. Seems to have a life of its own.

When it’s on we start to make out two figures standing next to each other facing the wall. Their hands are raised, both flat against the wall in front of them. God knows how long they’ve been there. It’s Donna and Daniel.

As our eyes get used to the darkness we start to make out some movement. Their rib cages are moving. It looks like a microscopic dance. Almost like they are writing the alphabet with the inside of their rib cage.

It goes on and we start to notice that it’s not pleasurable for them. Their hands pinned to the wall. It seems that they are hunting for something on the inside of their chests but without any hands to help them find whatever it is.

It continues.

A moan comes from Donna with the effort.

The four cone like devices on the wall start to vibrate, each has a different rhythm of vibration pulses, you feel as if each has a different intention.

Daniel looks over his shoulder at the room. Then at each cone. His hands still placed firmly on the wall. A pained grimace on his face.

DANIEL (desperate) : Who the fuck are they?

As he speaks the room vibrates, much louder or stronger than the cones were. When he stops speaking there is silence and stillness.

PART 6

Kath re-enters the space wearing a beige fur coat and high heeled shoes.

She takes twenty steps through the mess to the far wall, looking around her, as if expecting someone to be there.

She turns and walks seven steps as if into another room, looks round then turns around and walks nine steps and looks around. She takes another three steps and looks around again.
Slow jazz music starts playing.

She thinks she can hear someone and slowly walks back for ten steps. She stops and looks around. Her hands in the pockets of her coat.

“Hello?”

“Where are you?”

She sighs.

‘You know it’s not your fault?”

“You’re only 18”

She turns away, her head lowered.

“It’s not my fault either. I’m an actress. I have to…”

She puts out her hand as if to hold something and a s soon as she does is thrown to the floor by an unseen force. She staggers up and looks down panting to where the person that has fought has supposedly also fallen. She stares at the floor horrified. She then turns, grabs her left ribcage and runs fearfully out of the space again to rejoin the other three outside.

The music stops.

PART 6

PART 7

A trestle table is in the middle of the room. Six seats around it. Some bottles of beer on it. The smashed telly screen is on a stand at the head of the table facing it.

The four, already in the room, sit down around the table. It feels like they’re taking a break. Daniel immediately gets back up, goes out into the radio kiosk and comes back with a fake fur rug. He lays it on his seat before sitting down again.

The smashed telly screen comes on. A close up of a woman in her mid fifties. Tears roll down her cheeks but her face doesn’t show it. She’s picking clusters of jewels up from something out of shot we can’t see, a pile on a table? And is placing them into her mouth and eating them. She doesn’t seem to know she’s being filmed. But seems to be performing the act to someone.

The four around the table watch. Daniel drinks from a beer bottle. Simon doesn’t.

Gill: Who’s that?

Simon: Jessica, I think.

Simon to Daniel: Is it Jessica?

Daniel: I think so. Yes. Yes! It’s Jessica. I think.

Jessica (if it is in fact Jessica) swallows another cluster of jewels. She slowly looks at the camera as her teeth deliberately crunches the jewels inside her mouth.

As she does she wipes away her tears.

She swallows and waits. Her head, almost unseen, convulses and as it does these words begin to come from her mouth:


“…beneath my weight, the stale scent of vinyl and dust filling the confined space. I recalled the nurse's chilling tale, a winter's night etched in memory. A howling wind rattled the skeletal trees, a mournful dirge echoing through the nursery chimney.
She spoke of a hollow pit, a place of dread and forbidden curiosity. A young girl, defiant and reckless, ventured into its depths, emerging unscathed, even triumphant. Her reward? A collection of illusory jewels, each more dazzling than the last. Green grass as emeralds, red stones as rubies, and white stones as diamonds.

A chilling realization struck me. The girl's journey into the abyss mirrored my own descent into the automotive underworld. The thrill of the crash, the intoxicating blend of fear and desire, was the ultimate jewel, a prize beyond compare as the road unwound beneath me. A dark ribbon snaking through the night. The rain lashed against the windshield, distorting the world into a watery blur. A memory flickered, a story told in a hushed voice, a winter's night.

"There was a pit," the voice then echoed, "a place of fear, a void. A girl, reckless and defiant, descended into its depths. They warned her, pleaded with her, but she would not be deterred. She emerged, transformed, adorned with the spoils of the abyss. Emeralds, rubies, diamonds, forged from the nothingness. A mockery of wealth, a testament to the power of the void."
The car jolted, the tires hydroplaning on the slick pavement. The world outside dissolved into a chaotic dance of light and shadow. The story, once a distant echo, now resonated with a chilling proximity. The girl's descent into the pit mirrored our own descent into the night, a journey into the unknown, the dangerous.

We were the reckless ones, I thought, seeking the thrill of the crash, the ultimate release. The road, a twisted labyrinth, leading us to our inevitable doom. And as the final impact loomed, I could not help but smile, a macabre echo of the girl's defiant laughter as I traced the worn steering wheel. Outside, the neon lights blurred into streaks, a hypnotic dance of red and blue. I thought of the nurse's tale, a relic from a bygone era, a time when fear was a tangible thing.

She'd spoken of a hollow pit, a place of dread and forbidden knowledge. A girl, defiant and curious, had ventured into its depths, emerging transformed. Adorned with the treasures of the underworld, she had defied convention, her laughter echoing through the silent night.

Now, as I hurtled down the concrete artery, I felt a strange kinship with that girl. This metal beast, a vessel of both power and destruction, was my hollow pit. Its sleek, dark interior, a sanctuary where I could indulge in the thrill of the unknown.
The road stretched out before me, a ribbon of asphalt leading to oblivion. I accelerated, the engine roaring in my ears. The wind whipped past the windows, a cacophony of noise that drowned out the world. I was alone, adrift in a sea of neon and concrete.
And as I pushed the car to its limits, I couldn't help but laugh.
And as I did the worn leather creaked beneath my fingers and I traced the worn steering wheel. Outside, the rain lashed against the windshield, blurring the neon-lit streets into an abstract canvas. The engine hummed, a steady pulse echoing the rhythm of my thoughts.

I recalled the nurse's tale, a chilling story for a winter's night. A hollow pit, a place of fear and darkness. A girl, defiant and curious, ventured into the abyss. She returned, transformed, adorned with treasures plucked from the void. Emeralds of grass, rubies of stone, diamonds of starlight.

The rain grew heavier, the city lights reflecting off the wet pavement. I pressed my foot to the accelerator, the car surging forward. The world outside blurred, a kaleidoscope of colors and shapes. The road ahead, a dark tunnel leading into the night.
As the speed increased, a sense of exhilaration took hold. A thrill of danger, a desire to push the limits. The car became an extension of myself, a vessel for escape. The nurse's tale, a metaphor for the unknown, the allure of the forbidden.
The windshield wipers slashed back and forth, clearing the rain-soaked glass. A momentary glimpse of the city, a chaotic ballet of lights and shadows. Then, darkness again.

The engine roared, a primal scream. The car hurtled forward, a missile of metal and glass. I was lost in the moment, a passenger in my own creation. The road, a ribbon of asphalt leading to oblivion and a feral beast clawing at the windscreen. The rain lashed against the glass, each drop a tiny missile, a harbinger of the impending crash. I gripped the wheel tighter, knuckles white, as the road blurred and twisted before me.

Nurse’s tale echoed in my mind, a macabre lullaby. “A hollow pit, a place of fear. A girl dared to descend, to confront the unknown. She emerged, transformed, adorned with the spoils of the abyss. Emeralds of grass, rubies of stone, diamonds of starlight.”
The car veered, a sudden swerve into the oncoming lane. My heart pounded in my chest, a frantic drumbeat. I corrected the wheel, the tires squealing in protest. The world outside was a chaotic blur of lights and shadows.

“She laughed,” Nurse had said. A chilling laughter, a defiant cry against the darkness.

The road ahead was a yawning maw, a black hole promising oblivion. I accelerated, a desperate embrace of the inevitable. The crash was imminent, a collision of metal and flesh, a final, violent release.

As the world imploded, I thought of the girl in the pit, her fearless laughter echoing through the darkness. And I laughed too, a twisted, cathartic sound, as the car hurtled towards its doom.

The rain lashed against the windshield, a relentless drumbeat that echoed the pounding in my temples. Outside, the world was a blur of gray, a chaotic dance of headlights and taillights.
I thought of the nurse's tale, a chilling story for a winter's night. The hollow pit, a place of fear and superstition. The brave girl who dared to descend, only to emerge transformed. Her reward: emeralds forged from grass, rubies from stone, diamonds from starlight.

A crash echoed through the night, a distant collision that mirrored the turmoil within. The girl's laughter, once innocent, now seemed a macabre echo, a twisted promise of transformation through destruction.

Then the road stretched out before me, a dark and winding path leading to an uncertain destination. As I gripped the wheel tighter, a strange sense of anticipation filled me. Perhaps, in the chaos of the crash, I too would find my own transformation.
But as the worn leather creaked beneath my weight as I slumped lower. The hum of the engine, a steady, rhythmic pulse, filled the confined space. Outside, the world was a blur, a streak of neon and asphalt. A memory flickered, a story told by a nurse, a winter's night, the wind a howling beast.

"There was a pit," she'd whispered, her voice a chilling echo. "A place of fear, a forbidden abyss." A young girl, defiant and curious, had dared to descend into its depths. She returned, unchanged, yet adorned with treasures beyond imagination. Emeralds fashioned from grass, rubies from stone, diamonds from starlight.

A crash. The world jolted, a sudden surge of adrenaline. The car, a vessel of desire and destruction, responded to my touch. A metallic symphony, a dance of steel and glass. The road, a ribbon of danger, stretched out before me, an invitation to oblivion.
I pressed the accelerator, a silent prayer. The wind whipped through the shattered window, a cold caress. The future, a blur of headlights and darkness. A final laugh, a defiant cry against…”

PART 8

PART 9

Daniel looks ahead, frozen in fear.

Donna opens her mouth and takes out two brown garnet earrings. She puts them on slowly, not taking her eyes off Daniel. She fixes her hair and moves over to stand behind him, now looking at the assembled audience in the room.

With one swift movement Donna removes Daniels trousers - like in a male strip act. She walks backwards with them and then joins the audience, amongst whom Simon and Kath are also standing but in disguise.

Daniel stands motionless, still frozen in fear and now wearing only a rough jockstrap of thick bear fur.

Still without moving Daniel starts to urinate copiously down his legs and into a pool on the floor. We hear it pour for too long, a thick brown urination that was going to leave a stain.

PART 6

PART 7

Again, almost darkness. The red light in the corner flashes on and off continuously. It’s regimented in its timing, on and off for the same length of time. Every time it flashes on we see Daniel standing, still motionless in the middle of his brown piss puddle. He’s shivering with extreme cold and fear. He resembles something from an interrogation room film. God knows how long he’s been there. Time has jumped forwards.

There’s a knock at the toilet door. Simon opens the door, Kath enters. Simon enters behind her. He crouches against the wall where Donna sat earlier. A chain dangles around his neck, a lipstick hangs from it with no lid on. He stares at Daniel, terrifying.

Kath goes to stand besides a wall cone behind Daniel. Daniel’s too afraid to look at either of them.

This time the red light flashes on and it stays on.
Kath places her ear next to the cone and listens for some time.

Finished, she goes over to Daniel and whispers into his ear. Her whispered voice is loud in the room. Almost like a child’s voice, a gentle storytelling voice. As she speaks the room vibrates.

Kath: ‘Sometimes they would make me swallow their jewels. Large emeralds and quartz’s. Make me swallow really hard. Make me whimper.

I’d see their hands, more jewels waiting. Clutched in their throbbing fists. Blood under their nails. Both of them, but especially the one.

I would swallow hard. And then imagine them falling down into my empty belly. The big empty foodless cavity. Painfully empty before, but now, beautiful, lots of room for the jewels to fall. Glistening, like a waterfall.’
The light flashes off. Kath steps away from Daniel and the vibration stops.

She moves back towards the wall cone.

The red light flashes back on. She places her ear to the cone and listens again. Short this time.

She goes back to Daniel and again whispers to him as the whisper fills the room with vibration.

Kath: ‘I always knew who they were. I always knew who he was.’

The red light goes off.

Simon enters with sweet tea in a polystyrene cup. He looks around for Kath, and then spots the person who she was fighting. He beckons to the door and Daniel and Gill enter. Together they prop up the fallen person into a sitting position. Simon pours the tea into the person’s mouth, gently and slowly, like sips. It goes all over the floor but no one acknowledges this.

When the tea cup is empty we hear Kath coughing and the music starts again.

Kath: “Is that Jed again?”

Simon: “Jeddic?”

Kath: “Jeddica?”

Daniel: “Jessica.”

Gill: “It’s Catherine Wheel”

Daniel: “Catherine Will…?”

The image of Jessica (if it is Jessica) fades out on the telly and is replaced by live footage of Kath and Simon and Daniel and Gill.

Kath: “What’s this? I don’t like it”

Kath carefully removes a piece of broken glass from the broken telly. The footage stops.

Simon, referring to the glass and the broken telly: “Wait, I think that’s part of it”

Kath: “Well I don’t like it.”

Gill: “I think that’s part of it too”

Daniel nods in the same way he nodded at the audience as they entered.

Simon to Kath: “Just put it back”

Kath puts the piece of glass back. The film fades in again. It’s still Kath, Daniel, Simon and Gill, but this time it’s not live, it’s Kath swearing at them all. Real life Kath does a sort of expressive spinning dance to the Swearing on screen. Real life Daniel, Simon, and Gill drink beer and ignore her.

PART 10

PART 8

“dumb-ass dumbass dyke faggot father-fucker fatherfucker father-fucker fatherfucker fuck fucker fucker fucking god dammit goddammit God damn god damn goddamn Goddamn god dammit goddammit God damn god damn goddamn Goddamn goddamned goddamnit godsdamn hell. Hell holy shit hell horseshit in shit jackarse jackarse jack-ass jackass Jesus Jesus Christ fuck Jesus Harold Christ fucker”

As Kath-on-the-screen continues to intone her liturgy of swearwords Kath-in-the-room spins faster and faster. Her head is bent back in wonder, her mouth open, half mouthing the words of her onscreen self.

“mother fuckermother-fucker motherfucker pigfucker pigfucker pigfucker pigfucker prick piss pussy shit shit ass shite sibling fucker sisterfuck sisterfucker slut son of a bitch son of a whore spastic sweet Jesus twat wanker wanker wanker wanker wanker arse head”

Daniel finishes his beer and produces a bunch of flowers. He puts them in his beer bottle and goes over to the TV and places it on the top on the TV. Gill opens another one. She drops it onto the floor as she attempts to hand it to Daniel.

“arse arsehole ass ass hole ass hole ass hole ass hole ass hole asshole bastard bitch bloody bollocks boll ocks cocks brotherfucker bugger bullshit child-fucker shit sucker”

The door of the gallery opens and an Amazon driver enters with a parcel to deliver. He looks round the space. Kath stops spinning but Kath keeps swearing. Kath and the driver look at each other for a tiny moment. Mat comes out from behind the bar. The driver suddenly swings round and hands him the parcel.

“Wait”

he says and takes out his company phone to photograph Mat holding the parcel. He turns and leaves.

“cock sucker wanker pig fucker cock cock cock cock cunty Catherine Willsoon”

Mat bows his head to look at the panel he is holding. Kath, Gill, Daniel and Simon also slowly lower their heads and quietly close their eyes. The parcel explodes with a deafening cacophony and fills the gallery instantly with black smoke.

PART 11

Simon lies on the floor and puts his head face down in the puddle of tea.

Daniel stands on the back of his head, his weight pushing Simon’s head deeper into the tea/floor. He whimpers. Daniel swallows hard and jolts his weight suddenly to submerge the head deeper.

Daniel whispers “Don’t let them out of your sight”

We hear a muffled reply, as if from a small underground water chamber, but do not understand what is being said.

There is a long pause.

Daniel suddenly whispers “where are you?” and begins to look anxious, his eyes wide, his fists clenched at his side.

There is a long pause as they wait.

Gill looks at her jewelled watch and, as if recognising something, screams. “It’s not my fault I’m the actress.”

Kath re-enters wearing a neck brace and the slow jazz stops.

PART 8

In the darkness of the black smoke, the lights go out. Pitch black now.

The radio starts playing loudly, coming from the tv. It sounds like a radio is playing in a car. The sound swells, seeming to come from the whole room now. It sounds / feels like we are in the front seats of a car late at night. The sound rewinds. Plays again. Scratches through a couple of different radio channels, then back to the first. A song plays. American girl.

The song finishes and the tv flickers back on. Footage of the room; Daniel, Simon and Gill still sat at the table, Kath standing where she’d stopped spinning. All four heads bowed still, as if in prayer. The amazon parcel (in pristine condition) sat on the middle of the table.

In the light of the tv screen we see that the rest of the room is empty.

PART 12

Kath, as before, takes twenty steps through the mess to the far wall, looking around her as if expecting someone to be there. She has to turn her whole upper body now, her neck braced.

She turns and walks seven steps as if to another room, looks around then turns around and walks nine steps, stepping over Simon who is lying face down in the tea. His face is half submerged through the floor. She doesn’t acknowledge him at all. She is looking forwards as if expecting to see someone, then once she arrives she looks around. She takes another three steps and looks around again.
Slow jazz music starts playing.

She thinks she can hear someone and slowly walks back for ten steps. She places her hands in the pocket of her beige fur coat. Hiding them. We see her hands through the fur, grabbing at the inside of the pockets.

Her eyes widen, someone unseen is in front of her.

She puts out her hand as if to hold something, and grabs for dear life.

She leans forward and screams into its face.

“GO TO YOUR HOLLOW PIT!”

GO ON, GO! IF IT’S SUCH A BAD PLACE, GO!

Raging.

“I’ve been. And there’s nothing. Nothing. Grass and stones and fuck all else.”

“GO! FUCKING GO!”

She opens her hand and watches as the someone unseen falls to the floor. The volume of the jazz goes up.

She turns, grabs her left ribcage again and runs fearfully from the space. She mutters under her breath.
“It’s not my fault either. I’m an actress. I have to…”

PART 9

On the screen, in the half-light, we see Kath collapse onto the floor by the side of the table with a sigh.

Still seated, Daniel slowly opens the lid of the Amazon parcel.
Gill, who wears a small gold torch on a chain around her neck, turns it on and shines it into the box.

Gill and Daniel stand and look down into the box. The camera on the tv screen rises and moves over the top of the box to film down into it and show its interior.

The floor of the box is illuminated by Gills torch light and we see a tiny woman staggering. She shields her eyes from the torchlight.

We hear Simon say “It’s Catherine Willsoon. She’s finally arrived”.

The torchlight picks up particles of dust in the box that look like dead stars swirling around the diminutive Catherine Willsoon….

PART 13

In the room we hear outside noise, as if surveillance style microphones are set up outside somewhere. It’s crisply clear. We start to place the sound as being from the square outside. Three people skating around. One sings in the way you do when you have headphones on. We listen.

The wall to the window side of the room starts to move. A hatch in the middle of it slides back, opening a window sized frame through which to see the square.

The sound shifts. By the time the window is open the sound from the outside has faded and in its place the suspenseful music returns.

Three teenage girls sit on a concrete block. Two still have their skates on and sit perched on the edge, twisted towards the third who sits cross legged on top of the block. Her skates lie strewn on the floor, she has crocks on. Their bodies seem moulded to the concrete. They’ve sat here a lot. A small gaggle of three. They laugh and chat amongst themselves.

One has a massive sippy cup with straw. Another has a large Starbucks disposable cup. She’s fiddling with the plastic lid clipping it on and off repeatedly as she chats.

After a while the one sat crossed legs looks directly at us.

She takes a string of jewels from her pocket, letting them hang lengthways in front of her face. She gently swings them before delicately winding them upwards till they disappear into her clutched fist. The other two seem oblivious and continue chattering on.

She picks up a small square piece of plastic and places it to her lips. We see her laughing, and then we see her lips move as she speaks directly to us.

Gill (whispered): Why can’t we hear her?

Kath (whispered): Headphones?

Daniel goes to pick up the headphones, reattaches them to the small radio and places them on.

We see the teenager place her mouth to the plastic and mouth the words again.

Daniel laughs.
Daniel: Yeah good. Really good.

The window slides shut.
Daniel’s laughter continues to bubble along. For himself. Seriously tickled.

PART 7

Kath disappears.

Daniel still stands in the pool of brown piss. Still shaking with either cold or fear.

The room is still vibrating slightly from Kath’s whisperings.

It is rattling.

Daniels dresser enters the room carrying a plastic box. She is a small elderly woman wearing a short curly wig and a grey trouser suit with a colourful flowery shirt worn open like a cardigan. She walks with quiet confidence. She clearly knows her job.

She goes up to Daniel and opens the box. She takes out a bottle of J&B whiskey. She stands on the box and after slowly forcing his mouth open she pours the brown liquid down his throat.

His pissing resumes.

He swallows hard, his adam’s apple rising and falling.

Daniel quakes. The room vibrates.

The dresser opens the box again and takes out a second bottle of J&B. She mounts the box again and forces the drink into his throat again. She stands back on the floor and observes Daniel with a curious intent. After a while she opens the box again and takes out a smaller second cardboard box. She opens this box, the inside is padded with silky acetate, and takes out a pair of clearly fake emerald dangling earrings. The sort they use on stage.

Daniel continues to quake.

The dresser mounts the first box again and reaching, clips the two earrings onto Daniels ears.

Daniel seems to sink into the pissy pool carpet slightly under the weight of the earrings.

The dresser stands next to him observing both the trembling earrings and the sodden sloshing of the fur between his legs.

Daniels quaking causes the glass earrings to tinkle, glass on glass, reverberating into the vibrating room.

The dresser stands observing Daniel with further intent and when she sees that he has seen her she laughs and leaves, efficiently finishing off the bottle.

PART 9