EXT. BOSTON --
ESTABLISHING -- NIGHT
Lighted
skyscrapers reflect off choppy bay waters, buoy-bells TOLLING.
EXT. FRANKLIN
PARK ZOO
A black wolf
paces his cage, GROWLING. Yellow eyes glow fierce. He suddenly lunges
forward with a viscous BARK, jaws gnashing, then blackness.
EXT. BLACK
JAGUAR -- SAME TIME
The XJR Series
sedan glides down a dimly lit street. Ahead, an old woman bundled
against the cold strolls the sidewalk alone. The car slows.
INT. BLACK JAGUAR
The driver,
MAKEC (80), addresses his back-seat passenger, SORIN TOROK, a
400-year-old vampire.
MAKEC
You must
feed, Sorin.
SORIN
Not
until I find a daughter.
Makec watches
the old woman as the car passes her by.
MAKEC
You're
getting more pale every night.
Sorin leans
forward, his pallid but handsome face visible in the flash of passing
street lamps. He wears a black suit coat and red tie.
SORIN
Nevertheless,
Makec, we keep looking.
MAKEC
I'm
afraid you won't find her out here, mostly drunkards, vagrants,
and addicts at best. Shall we try the university campus?
SORIN
Students
are too easily missed.
Makec makes a
right turn onto a side street.
SORIN
A normal
girl, that's all I want. Is that too much to ask?
MAKEC
Not at
all, no sir.
The car
approaches a club lit up in red neon. The Coven.
MAKEC
Perhaps
this place will be more to your liking.
In the blink of
an eye, Sorin is now sitting in the front passenger seat, his attention
on the club entrance.
SORIN
You
think the young women inside are unworthy of me.
MAKEC
You know
my thoughts as if they were your own, but I'm sure some punk
rocker cannot replace Patrice.
With a SWISH,
Sorin turns in his seat to face Makec.
SORIN
Do not
speak of him! My son was a mistake.
MAKEC
But he's
still your son.
SORIN
(reflective)
I'll
have a daughter this time, yes, to carry on the Torok crest.
Unlike Patrice, she will be easier to mold into the perfect
vampire.
The look of
disdain on Makec's face speaks volumes.
MAKEC
She
won't be your redeemer, sir.
Sorin's eyes
turn into glaring red coals of fury.
SORIN
Don't
speak to me this way.
Makec levels a
steady gaze on his master.
MAKEC
What can
I say, that I'm afraid of you? After sixty years in your
service, I think not.
SORIN
I ask
your support in this, not your criticism. Besides, our argument
is old, and I always get my way.
MAKEC
But that
doesn't mean you're always right.
Sorin GRUMPS,
looks out the windshield, sees a goth chick approaching the club. She
wears her purple hair spiked, a heavily studded jacket, and knee-high
black boots.
SORIN
What do
we have here?
The chick enters
the club.
INT. THE COVEN
-- CONTINUOUS
(OVER) loud
MUSIC by The Damned, she makes her way through the crowd of gothic
rockers. Candles flicker from all the tables. Pale faces, pierced in
every imaginable way, watch the chick as she passes. She joins a group
of rockers standing by a table where two gothed up chicks nurse drinks
in short glasses.
ALINA (25) looks
like a typical goth rocker in her low-cut black dress made of leather
and lace. Her black hair is cropped off short and spikey. The black
lipstick, thick mascara, and morbid eye shadow contrast starkly with her
chalk white skin. A scar rakes across her left cheek from eye socket to
upper lip. She has to shout over the music.
ALINA
My
boyfriend's late ... as usual.
The REDHEAD
sitting with her swirls ice cubes in a glass.
REDHEAD
Mine,
too.
Alina sips her
drink.
ALINA
What is
it with men, anyway?
REDHEAD
Subspecies.
They share a
look of disdain.
REDHEAD
Don't be
so bummed.
ALINA
It's not
just my boyfriend. It's my boss too. He fired me today.
REDHEAD
Bummer.
ALINA
(flatly)
I
wouldn't give him any pussy.
REDHEAD
Oh. I
see--
A punk arrives,
turns a chair backward and sits next to the redhead. This is TONY (26).
He wears a stud in his nose, silver rings in his eyebrows, and sports a
Mohawk. Both women appear happy to see him.
ALINA
Tony.
You're late.
She reaches out
to touch his arm, but the redhead blocks her hand and purrs to Tony.
REDHEAD
Why do
you keep me waiting so long?
Alina pulls
back, glaring.
ALINA
What's
going on here?
REDHEAD
(sly
smile)
Seems we
have the same boyfriend.
TONY
(to
Alina)
Gotta go
with the flow, babe.
ALINA
You
cheating bastard!
TONY
You had
your chance last night.
Alina jumps to
her feet.
ALINA
I said
no because I want it to be special, not in the back seat of your
dad's car.
TONY
(to
the redhead)
She's a
fuckin' virgin. Gave me blue balls, the bitch did.
The redhead
looks up at Alina, flutters long lashes.
REDHEAD
So, I
see. Should'a screwed your boss, kept your job. Should'a screwed
Tony, kept your boyfriend. I always
get what I want. What do you got, Alina? Nothing!
Alina's face
turns red with rage.
ALINA
I'd
rather have nothing than be stuck with the wrong man.
(indicating
Tony)
Like
this jerk! You can
have him!
She storms off,
pushes through the crowd to the door.
EXT. THE COVEN
-- CONTINUOUS
The club door
BANGS open. Alina rushes out. She must be freezing in that skimpy dress,
torn fishnet stockings, and high heels. A bus pulls up to the corner,
brakes SQUEALING. She bolts for the bus, hugging herself against the
cold, when something stops her. A dog, mongrel and unkempt, is moving
toward her, sniffing the ground, obviously not a threat, but Alina is
paralyzed with fear. She touches the scar on her face.
FLASH CUT TO
a girl running from a GROWLING Doberman. A fence blocks her escape. She
turns. The dog leaps at her face with toothy, snapping jaws. A SCREAM.
The stray dog
finds a scrap of pizza and runs off with its prize. A HISS comes from
the bus as the doors close. Alina runs, waving. CRACK, the heel of her
right shoe breaks off. She stumbles, catches her balance, hops on one
foot, tries to remove the shoe. The bus ROARS away. Shoulders slumped,
she starts to CRY. Black mascara tears streak her face.
INT. BLACK
JAGUAR -- SAME TIME
Sorin eyes the
young woman standing lopsided on one shoe.
SORIN
That's
her. My daughter.
MAKEC
She
looks like a mess, sir.
Sorin glances
left and right, sees a deserted street, then shape-shifts into a mist
that seeps out the door seams.
MAKEC
(under
his breath)
I hate
it when he does that.
He watches the
mist sweep toward the woman.
EXT. THE COVEN
Alina is
shivering, holding her broken shoe, and crying so hard it takes her a
moment to notice the encroaching mist. Her expression changes from
frustration to fear.
The mist eases
over the curb and swirls around her feet. She steps back, but the mist
curls up her legs and climbs her dress. She GASPS, tries swiping it off
her breasts, but the relentless mist grows into a ghostly image of
Sorin's face, his vampire fangs glistening so near to her neck.
ALINA
No.
Please--
With a forceful
lunge, he bites down. Every muscle in her body tenses. Her memories pour
out to Sorin.
SERIES OF SHOTS
A) (OVER)
SOBBING, a little girl watches her mother with a man standing at the
door. He's dressed in desert combat fatigues. One last kiss and he's
gone.
B) (OVER) a
bugle playing TAPS, there's a flag-draped coffin, twenty-one gun salute,
mother and daughter wearing black.
C) (OVER)
SCREAMING, a scruffy man wearing a sleeveless shirt beats her mother.
Alina tries to stop him, gets backhanded.
D) (OVER) loud
MUSIC, Tony says, "SHE'S A FUCKIN' VIRGIN!"
BACK TO SCENE
Alina goes limp.
Sorin retracts his fangs, licks the puncture wounds in her neck, healing
them instantly.
SORIN
She's
perfect.
INT. BLACK
JAGUAR
Through the
windshield, Makec watches the mist and the young woman as Sorin's voice
comes to him.
SORIN(O.S.)
She's
perfect.
The mist rises.
The woman's body collapses on the sidewalk.
SORIN(O.S.)
Her name
is Alina.
The mist
shape-shifts into a black bat fluttering above the downed woman.
SORIN(O.S.)
Take her
home. Get her ready.
EXT. BLACK
JAGUAR
Makec gets out,
rushes to Alina, gathers her up, and carries her to the car. He puts her
in the back seat, jumps in behind the wheel, and speeds off.
EXT. THE COVEN
-- MOMENTS LATER
A bat enters
through an overhanging eve.
INT. THE COVEN
(OVER) loud
MUSIC a woman SCREAMS. A bat swoops down on Tony. Already the redhead is
bleeding from a gash in her face. Tony flails at the bat, knocks over
tables and candles. Fire flares up. Punks panic, push for the exits but
trample each other into a writhing pile of bodies. Thick black smoke
obscures the bat.
EXT. THE COVEN
The building is
engulfed in flames, roof and walls collapsing into a hellish inferno.
A wolf HOWLS in
the distance.