Horatio Week 41: Author! Author!

The New Adventures of Horatio
Week 41: Author! Author!

A donut shop. Horatio and Shakespeare sit in a booth.

SHAKESPEARE
The advance on the movie version of the zombie thing is eight million, of which I'll cut you an initial check for fifty-five large.

HORATIO
Hundred?

SHAKESPEARE
Thousand. Jesus.

HORATIO
Just say 'thousand' like a normal person.

SHAKESPEARE
Shakespeare doesn't do normal, honey. Normal doesn't go to Broadway where Hollywood options it. Incestuous royals, bear massacres on distant shores, that's what keeps the larder full. Speaking of which, yes, you can have my bearclaw, just stop looking at it like it's taking its first steps.

HORATIO
Thanks. You're still a whore.

SHAKESPEARE
I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you over my immense wealth and success.

Now, Mister Principled. Mister Fugitive. Mister Two Pennies To Rub Together. Are you here to deal or did you only come out of hiding for the pastries?

HORATIO
You can have the rights.

SHAKESPEARE
Good. I've already written a draft- the zombies work better in prose than pentameter, I think, but the rest of it really flows-

HORATIO
Not the zombie thing. Every adventure. My drive across America, the civil war in England- I'll tell you everything that's not classified.

SHAKESPEARE
Every-? I could write a series. We could both retire with private harems on merchandising alone.

HORATIO
Keep the money. You're going to do a favor for me.

SHAKESPEARE
Yes?

HORATIO
This last year of my life. This conspicuously eventful year that I'm having.

SHAKESPEARE
Yes...?

HORATIO
It's being written by a man named Sullivan.

SHAKESPEARE
I see.

HORATIO
I doubt that, Willy.

SHAKESPEARE
William.

HORATIO
I highly doubt you marched into hell and cut your way through seven afterlives to pierce the final veil of our universe only to find some prick with a laptop on the other side.

SHAKESPEARE
Oh, Horatio. I've seen this. You get out more than Hamlet did, I think that's why your mind kept longer, but you can hardly fight the entire Danish government for months and not crack up.

HORATIO
...you made how much money off the Hamlet story?

SHAKESPEARE
They ran out of zeroes.

HORATIO
So you'll humor me.

SHAKESPEARE
Oh yes.

HORATIO
Here's what I need. This Sullivan guy is responsible for every screwy, hateful thing that's happened to me since I left Denmark. Maybe going back even further. You can guess where this is going, it's an oldie but a goody.

SHAKESPEARE
Revenge.

HORATIO
Now I don't think he's the type to do the Grant Morrison thing and write himself into his own work. If I want to take him out, I have to do it from in here.

SHAKESPEARE
From inside the story.

HORATIO
Can we do it?

SHAKESPEARE
Characters exert a tug on the writer. When in a fit of inspiration, I write with a sense of channeling a river not of my making.

HORATIO
Tell me how he thinks.

SHAKESPEARE
We can deduce things. He's probably about your age, since he seems to identify enough to use you as a recurring character. Educated. Reads comics, since otherwise he wouldn't have written that Grant Morrison reference just now.

HORATIO
I saw forty play scripts on the other side. He's been writing at a rate of about one a week. The stage direction I saw put us here, which means within the next few minutes-

A Lieutenant in the Danish army bursts in, bleeding from multiple bullet wounds.

LIEUTENANT
Take me to Horatio or Scandinavia will burn!

HORATIO
I need a faster watch.

LIEUTENANT
Fortinbras is massing Norse and Danish troops on the Swedish border! He's going to start a war to end all wars! I heard the resistance hero Horatio was here!

HORATIO
Distraction.

SHAKESPEARE
What?

LIEUTENANT
I stole their battle plans but they're right behind me!

HORATIO
Sullivan. Don't take the bait.

The Lieutenant spots them and hobbles over.

LIEUTENANT
There you are! Your face is on wanted posters all over Denmark, sir. Only you can stop this.

HORATIO
You have me confused with someone else.

LIEUTENANT
He could give the order to attack any second! You have to come with me. We can warn-

HORATIO
You lose your hearing during live fire exercises? I'm not interested.

LIEUTENANT
Huh. Guess I'll just sit here for a little while. Getting pretty drowsy.

He sits in the booth next to them, dripping blood awkwardly.

LIEUTENANT
You're sure you don't want to come have a-

HORATIO
No.

Thunder.

HORATIO
Oh, subtle.

SHAKESPEARE
What are you doing? A war's about to start!

HORATIO
How do you act when you can't get one of your characters to do what you want?

SHAKESPEARE
I used to go Cosmic Golfing with Kit Marlowe, but of course he had to have a bad trip and put a golf tee through his eye.

HORATIO
Before you were obscenely successful. When it seemed like the well might dry up for good.

SHAKESPEARE
Tiptoeing drunkenly around my typewriter when it's midnight and we're the only two in my flat. Muttering bad dialogue at tube stations. Intense self-loathing, tiredness at the workplace, decline in hygiene. Porn. Despair. More porn.

HORATIO
That's what Sullivan's going through as long as we refuse to play his game.

More thunder. The Lieutenant coughs and drips.

SHAKESPEARE
What's to stop him writing "And then a Danish super-soldier kicks in the door and drags Horatio out by his hair"?

The door flies open, kicked in by Kaptajn København. He wears a red and white uniform with a cape, all modeled after the Danish flag.

HORATIO
You're a little too good at this.

KOBENHAVN
Leaping lingonberries! You gave us a scare, there, Lieutenant. Let's get you home.

LIEUTENANT
Kaptajn København. They sent the best.

KOBENHAVN
You stole some pretty important battle plans.

LIEUTENANT
If you want to take me you'll have to go through Horatio himself!

HORATIO
Hold on.

KOBENHAVN
Horatio!

LIEUTENANT
Horatio! Who drove the Chief of Secret Police mad just by looking at him! Who sunk half the Navy on the cliffs of England! The rebel hope of Denmark!

KOBENHAVN
It'll be an honor and a privilege to take you down, son.

HORATIO
Sullivan, you bastard.

Kaptajn København punches Horatio across the room. Horatio spits out a tooth.

HORATIO
Pagh! No need to get up, Willy. I'm fine.

SHAKESPEARE
You said sit this one out.

HORATIO
I'm trying to!

KOBENHAVN
A family tragedy's no excuse for turning your back on your country, chum.

LIEUTENANT
He fights to free Denmark, Norse stooge!

HORATIO
Shut UP!

SHAKESPEARE
Plenty of conflict now.

HORATIO
I know.

SHAKESPEARE
Bet his hygiene's improving.

HORATIO
You shut up too.

Kaptajn København punches him again.

LIEUTENANT
Fight back, sir! Use your flaming fist attack that slayed the Red Giant of Detroit!

KOBENHAVN
You don't have a chance. I've been given the strength and speed of ten Horatios and a chip in my brain is playing the new Dano-Norse national anthem on a continuous loop. Keeps me righteous!

He throws Horatio through a table. Stands above him, his fist raised.

HORATIO
GO AHEAD, SULLIVAN! KILL OFF YOUR MAIN CHARACTER!

København moves towards the Lieutenant, who is wobbling to and fro with blood loss.

KOBENHAVN
One threat to pan-Scandinavianism at a time.

HORATIO
Get out now, LT! He's coming for you!

LIEUTENANT
You'll...save me...

SHAKESPEARE
He won't! He's lost it! Save yourself!

LIEUTENANT
Have to...be here... Something...bigger...than me...

HORATIO
All right. Kaptajn! I surrender to the Dano-Norse superweapon.

KOBENHAVN
Sensible fellow.

HORATIO
But first, I must know where the great fighting hope of pan-Scandinavianism comes from! You're from Copenhagen?

KOBENHAVN
Obviously.

HORATIO
Where in Copenhagen?

KOBENHAVN
The..ah..the corner of Købmagergade and Landemærket.

HORATIO
The heartland! I'll bet a patriotic kid like you grew up eating plenty of the Danish national dish!

KOBENHAVN
You know it!

HORATIO
Which is what again?

KOBENHAVN
F...frikadeller meat balls with cabbage in white sauce.

HORATIO
I'll bet your favorite animal's the Danish national bird! The, ah....

KOBENHAVEN
The, the, the mute swan!

Shakespeare has come up behind Horatio. Whispering:

SHAKESPEARE
What's this doing?

HORATIO
Sullivan's not from Denmark. He has to research all this...

The lights flicker.

HORATIO
...at the cost of maintaining the world.

SHAKESPEARE
Brilliant!

HORATIO
I'll bet your Mom hummed the Danish national anthem to you every night. Sing it with me?

KOBENHAVN
Now?

HORATIO
How does it begin...you must know the words by heart.

KOBENHAVN
Der...der er et yndigt land...

HORATIO
I'll bet you can translate it into Norse extemporaneously!

KOBENHAVN
...et står med brede Beeches
nær salte østlige stranden...

HORATIO
Swedish! Alternating the words!

KOBENHAVN
Den... bugter... själva... i fack, dal,
det... stater... gamle... Danmark...

The lights flicker again. The wind howls.

LIEUTENANT
He's weakening!

HORATIO
Throw in some German!

KOBENHAVN
...og... es... er Freya sa...rüstung...

Thunder.

HORATIO
Favorite anecdote about Hans Christian Anderson! Go!

Kobenhavn collapses.

KOBENHAVN
Don't...have the strength...to stand!

HORATIO
That was the hope.

KOBENHAVN
Lieutenant, carrying you alive back to base doesn't look like an option. Looks like I'll have to sever your windpipe like a kid picking a daisy.

HORATIO
Like hell!

He slams the Kaptajn's head down on a table, knocking him out.

LIEUTENANT
Saved me...

HORATIO
Let's not jump to conclusions.

LIEUTENANT
...knew you'd...save us all...

He pulls a blood-stained military briefing from his jacket.

HORATIO
Hey, don't...I don't want this.

LIEUTENANT
Joined the army over a girl. Tell her...I took ten of them...with me.

The Lieutenant dies.

HORATIO
Not one more, Sullivan. I swear. Did you even give this poor guy a name?

SHAKESPEARE
Despite efforts to the contrary, you've saved the day and advanced the plot. His story's nearly done.

HORATIO
How do we derail it?

SHAKESPEARE
Do something completely out of character.

Horatio grabs Shakespeare and kisses him on the lips. Complete power outage. Lightning. Windows shatter inward and a cold wind blows through the shop.

HORATIO
Sullivan! Get a dog! Volunteer at a soup kitchen! Join a gym! I don't care what you do, just get up from the laptop and back away!

He kisses Shakespeare again.

HORATIO
I WILL RUIN YOU!

SHAKESPEARE
STOP IT!

HORATIO
Not until he's gone!

SHAKESPEARE
How will you know?

Say he quits. What then? You wink out of existence? The universe grinds to a halt?

HORATIO
I go back to being a free agent. Like I was before he butted in.

SHAKESPEARE
Were you?

HORATIO
I remember it. Me and Dad reenacting Viking battles at Bisnap. The chalkboard in geometry class when child services came- there was a trapezoid on it.

SHAKESPEARE
He didn't write all that for you?

HORATIO
No.

SHAKESPEARE
You can ask questions like these forever, if you want to. Do you?

HORATIO
I can't unsee it. Like this donut shop! No one came to refill our coffee, no one's yelled at us about the damage-

SHAKESPEARE
The staff ran out the back!

HORATIO
It's not a real place!

SHAKESPEARE
A super soldier kicked in their door! What would you do?

HORATIO
Were they here when we came in? What did they look like?

Shakespeare slaps him.

SHAKESPEARE
Listen to yourself!

HORATIO
That's. Ha. That's him telling him to listen to himself. Ahaha.

Shakespeare points to the dead Lieutenant.

SHAKESPEARE
You tried to save that man! Why bother if he's not real?

HORATIO (With mounting horror.)
Because that's the Horatio they'd rather read about.

SHAKESPEARE
Never mind what they want. You want free will? Do you?

You can be crazy. Or you can live in this world with the rest of us. Choose.

HORATIO
Okay.

SHAKESPEARE
Okay?

HORATIO
I chose. You can let go.

Horatio walks over the the Lieutenant, puts a hand over his eyes.

HORATIO
I have a war to stop.

SHAKESPEARE
Donuts are on me.

Exit Horatio. Shakespeare calls after him.

SHAKESPEARE
And if you ever tell anyone about that kiss, I will personally ensure that Carrot Top plays you on the TV series.

The End