PROTAGONIST (CONT'D) Ground zero for an underground nuclear test. Sir Michael Crosby told me about a detonation at Stalsk-12 on the 14th – the dead drop is at the bottom of the hypocentre. That explosion seals up the algorithm.
IVES:
Then we’d better pull it out of that hole before the bomb goes off.
INT. TURNSTILE, ICEBREAKER – DAY Soldiers in respirators file into the turnstile. Through the proving window we see them ‘back’ into the exit... The Protagonist checks his gear at the back of the line. He sees Kat watching from the airlock. He goes to her.
INT. AIRLOCK – CONTINUOUS The Protagonist pulls off his respirator.
KAT:
Where’s Neil?
PROTAGONIST:
He must’ve already gone through...
KAT:
I didn’t get to say goodbye – this is goodbye, isn’t it?
PROTAGONIST:
Today’s the 14th. Offshore of Siberia – time for us to go. You keep going back another day, give you time to make it to Viet Nam.
KAT:
Who gets me back on the yacht?
PROTAGONIST:
I’ve got somebody good lined up.
I’d like to say you don’t have to do this, but...
KAT:
I once told you I didn’t need redemption. But the chance to save my child? You can’t know what that means to a mother.
No.
PROTAGONIST:
KAT:
The worst thing Andrei ever did to me was that offer – to let me go if I never saw my son again. I shouted, swore –
INSERT CUT:
Kat FLINGS a crystal BOWL OF RASPBERRIES, SMASHING it on a wooden deck... KAT (CONT'D) But he’d seen it on my face – just for an instant.
Kat looks at the Protagonist. Who says nothing.
KAT (CONT'D) I don’t know if I hate him more for the things he’s done, or because he knows that about me. You’ve killed people you hated before?
PROTAGONIST:
It’s not usually personal.
KAT:
He’s dying, anyway. It might not even count –
PROTAGONIST:
It always counts. You’re not there to kill him – you’re the backstop.
If we haven’t lifted that algorithm and he kills himself, he takes us all with him, instantly.