Sometime during the summer between Season One and Two, I got to whiling a way a rainy lunch hour by playing with an image I couldn’t get out of my head – namely, what if Colin Mochrie was one of the Oceanic survivors? Being a fan of his improv, I thought it would make for great humor. So I pictured a chorus character, tossed in some other characters, and included a bunch of cheeky nods, winks and Lost-like easter eggs – and came up with a character and situations I fell in love with. So much so, I even wrote a sequel.
(Fan film treatment)
DEWEY
by Tom Tennant
July 22, 2005
Open on a close-up of an EYE. Pull back to reveal that it is the EYE OF UMBERTO ECO, the famous Italian author, from a picture printed on the back of a paperback novel. The novel is caked in dried mud.
A hand reaches into frame and digs the novel out of the dirt. Brushing it off, we see our hero for the first time, DEWEY. Dewey is an older guy, a bit unassuming, a little like Colin Mochrie. Dewey looks over the book – it is a copy of FOUCAULT’S PENDULUM.
Satisfied, he places the book into a BLACK gym bag. The gym bag is loaded with reading material – books, novels, magazines, newspapers – some half burnt, others in good condition. Throwing the gym bag back over his shoulder, he trudges onward through the jungle.
FLASHBACK
Screeching tires, ripping metal. A younger Dewey, working the streets as a Parking Enforcement Officer, rushes to the scene of a TERRIBLE CAR ACCIDENT.
In the first car, an SUV, Dewey discovers a 16-year-old girl, crying, in hysterics. Dewey tells her to stay calm. She keeps screaming, “My back! My back! I can’t move my legs!” Dewey hurries to the second vehicle, a sports car. The driver is motionless, obviously dead. Dewey is taken aback at first. Then he signals for someone to attend to the girl.
Dewey stares at the man for a long time, obviously in a bit of awe. Then he notices something lying on the floor on the passenger’s side. It’s a box, thrown open. Pages from a BOOK MANUSCRIPT are spilt on the floor.
RESUME ISLAND
A skinny survivor, DOUG, digs through Dewey’s black gym bag. “Fiction, right?”
Dewey is deep into his own thing, scribbling notes on a pad of paper. He sits near three other gym bags, two black and one white. Dewey nods. “These three are fiction, the white one’s non-fiction and periodicals.”
Doug pulls out a copy of PERELANDRA by C.S. Lewis. “I’ll take this one,” he says.
“Just sign it out, would you, so I know where it is?”
“That’s new,” says Doug.
“Never got my copy of A Wrinkle in Time back,” he says.
Doug scribbles on a pad of paper. “You hear about that pregnant woman and Ethan?”
Thinking, Dewey says: “Ethan … Yeah, Ethan … he’s reading Silence of the Lambs …”
“He’s dead.”
“Dead?”
“That VHI reject popped him with a BB gun.”
Surprised. “No.”
“Yeah. He kidnapped the pregnant girl.”
“I liked that guy …”
“Nice guy. Quiet. Kept to himself. That’s what they say about every killer.” Doug shuffles off.
FLASHBACK
Inside a posh penthouse office. Dewey, dressed in a wrinkled suit, sits in front of a heavy, oak desk. A SLICK YOUNG PUBLISHER sits across from him.
“It’s amazing, you know,” he says. “And totally unexpected from a first-time author.”
Dewey smiles sheepishly.
“Reads a lot like Jamb Jars. You ever read anything by him?”
“Some.”
“Died about four years ago in a car crash. Used to keep every book secret until he was ready to publish. No one knows for sure if he was working on something or not. Though everyone thinks he was. Kind of an enigma, that guy.”
Dewey nods, shuffles in his seat. He’s nervous, but the young turk takes it as impatience.
“Anyway, cut to the chase, right? I don’t need to be wasting your time. We want to publish it and we’re willing to offer six figures – plus a nice signing bonus and a media tour. What do you think?”
Dewey’s eyes brighten.
RESUME ISLAND
Waves crash on the beach. Dewey sits alone watching the rolling surf. He’s holding on to a long rope, fashioned from bits of plane debris – nylon roping, belts, what-have-you.
There’s a tug on the rope and Dewey gets a firm grip on it. It goes taught. Dewey stands up, digging his heels into the sand. Has he caught something?
We follow the makeshift rope out into the ocean. Soon, we see what’s caught on the other end: a young, redheaded woman, MILL. She pulls herself from the ocean, carrying a small spear and a bag. She has a snorkel wrapped around her head. Once she’s knee-deep, she’s able to jog up to Dewey.
“Thanks, Dew.”
Dewey shyly nods. He’s got a bit of a crush.
“I bet that’s the same undertow that caught poor Joanna,” Mill says.
“Wow, hope she’s okay,” says Dewey.
“She drowned, Dewey.”
“What?”
“That doctor guy tried to save her, I think.”
“She was so nice … Just recently?
“More than two weeks ago.”
Mill reaches into her bag and pulls out a giant fish. “Good dinner tonight!”
Dewey gives her a half-hearted smile.
FLASHBACK
Inside a radio studio. Local NPR host MELINDA FONDLO sits across the board from Dewey. Melinda’s voice is smooth – and it mesmerizes Dewey. She is a redhead as well.
Dewey wears headphones that are much too big, and keep slipping off his head.
“It’s lunch time and welcome to Around Noon. Joining me today is Dewey Labduck, author of Ornery Quint.”
“Hi, it’s a pleasure to be here.”
“Ornery has received accolades from around the globe, Dewey, mainly for its twists and turns, and the way it skates along the edge of science and pseudo-science. Quite a feat for a first-time writer.”
“I guess it was just good fortune. You know. Right place. Right time.”
“Interesting observation. That’s what a lot of critics have said of your hero, Quint. That he truly finds himself in the right place – but always at the wrong time. And the decisions he makes influence the way the other characters react to unexpected situations. How they react to issues and how they resolve conflicts. And, ultimately, the way world history is written.”
Dewey’s out of his league. He nods, mostly, and tries to act his way through the interview. “If you say so.”
Melinda stares him down. Then she cracks a long a smile.
“Letting the readers interpret for themselves, then, huh?”
“Uhm-hmm.”
“Which makes you more like Quint than I originally thought.”
“I suppose.” Dewey is sweating.
Melinda sends the show to commercial and then mutes the studio. Only Dewey can hear her.
“I have to tell you, I’m in love with Quint. If you know what I mean.”
Dewey’s headphones fall off his head.
RESUME ISLAND
Dewey, Doug and Mill sit around a small fire eating the fish Mill caught earlier.
“So, let me get this straight,” says Dewey. “The pilot was killed by some kind of mysterious beast. Some of the other survivors went hiking and discovered some kind of transmission. Joanna went fishing and drowned. There’s a woman who speaks German … “
“French.”
“… French living somewhere in the jungle. Ethan not only kidnapped the pregnant woman, but he wasn’t even a crash survivor, he was some, I don’t know, other man.”
Mill, through a mouthful of fish: “Yuhp.”
Dewey scratches his head, scrunches up his nose. “Where the hell have I been?”
FLASHBACK
Sydney Airport. A young DRIVER greets Dewey, putting his bags in the back of a trunk.
“Welcome to Australia, Mr. …”
“Dewey,” Dewey says, shaking the driver’s hand.
“Mr. Dewey! Loved your book!”
“Why, thank you.”
RESUME ISLAND
The next morning, Dewey makes the rounds. He’s talking to as many survivors as he can. And as he does so, he makes notes on a yellow legal pad.
As he visits each new survivor, he makes an exclamation. It’s the only bit of dialogue we hear from these encounters:
“Polar bear?!”
“Mysterious cable?!”
“Adam and Eve?!”
“Whispers?!”
“Cursed numbers?!”
Back at his shelter, he dives into all the different books he’s collected and starts charting all the different stories he’s collected. He starts making elaborate maps. Does some calculations.
Then he gives up. He can’t make heads or tales of ANY of it. Kicking and screaming, he makes a mess of his shelter. In the midst of all of this, he trips, and strikes his head on a rock, knocking him unconscious.
FLASHBACK
Darkness. The sound of WHISPERS. We can just make them out:
“They’ll hear.”
“It’s okay.”
“No, no, that’s not it.”
“Here?”
“Just about.”
“I could just …”
“Ouch!”
“Sorry!”
A closet door swings open. Loud PARTY SOUNDS flood into the little room. A PARTYGOER notices two figures hidden among the coats.
“Dewey? Dash?”
Dewey, blushing, nods. His companion, a young woman, DASH GUTHRIE, who looks remarkably like Kathy Greenwood, tries to hide behind him.
“Just … ah … looking for my coat,” Dewey says.
Our scene shifts to the streets of Sydney, late at night. Punch-drunk, Dewey and Dash, arm-in-arm, stumble down the street.
“Your book was fabulous,” Dash says. “So … erotic.”
“Really?” Dewey responds, a bit surprised, almost as if he didn’t even know that about his book.
“Even the title. Ornery Quint. Oh my.” Dash runs her fingers over Dewey’s chest.
Dewey, noticeably uncomfortable, mutters: “Uh, can I tell you something?”
“Tell me later … in bed.”
Dewey – totally taken aback by Dash’s forwardness – snorts with nervous laughter.
Dash joins him – courteously.
RESUME ISLAND
Early morning. Dewey stumbles along the beach, carrying his white backpack with him. He rubs the back of his head. Then he stubs his toe on something buried in the sand. Dewey hops about, grabbing his throbbing toe.
He scans the ground to see what he hit. It’s another hatch, similar to John Locke’s.
Sweeping the sand aside, Dewey stares at it. He searches about for a handle … for anything. He tries to get his fingers into the sides, bangs on it, all of that.
He gets up on his knees, scratches his head. Then, an idea percolating in his brain, shrugs his shoulders. Why not give it a try?
“Open, sesame.”
Escaping air and a low metallic groan slithers across the beach as the hatch pops open.
Dewey looks around for other survivors, but he sees no one.
Shrugging his shoulders again, he climbs into the hatch.
FLASHBACK
The hallway of a posh hotel. Down the hall, on the left side, a door opens. Dewey, dressed only in Gilligan’s Island boxer shorts, stumbles backward into the hall.
The room door slams shut.
Dewey stands bewildered for a long time. Then: “What’d I say?”
RESUME ISLAND
Dewey turns on a key chain flashlight. He finds himself in a long, man-made tunnel. It’s dark, very quiet. He starts walking down the hall. As he does, he passes several doors. Each door is marked with a sign:
“Room 004 – Black Rock”
“Room 015 – Adam and Eve”
“Room 042 – Life, The Universe, and Everything.”
And so forth … Dewey tries the doorknob on each one, but everything’s locked.
Finally, Dewey stops at a door marked: “Room 023 – Library of Answers.” When he tries this door, he finds that it’s unlocked. He steps inside.
Instinctively, he search for a light switch. And within a moment, he’s found one. He flicks it on.
The first thing he sees is a skylight and, through the skylight, high above, a BLOODIED MAN staring back at him.
It scares the bejeezus out of him and he cries out, stumbling backward and out of the room. He drops his little flashlight.
And, in a scene similar to the previous hotel scene, the door slams shut and Dewey is left locked outside again. This time, in the dark, save for the small glow from his flashlight.
Quickly, Dewey drops to the ground and feels for the flashlight. When he finds it, chills roll down his spine. The glow from the flashlight shines on a weather-battered – and occupied – tennis shoe.
FLASHBACK
Dewey is in his hotel. As he talks on the phone, he quickly packs his suitcase.
“At the party. We met at the party. She was a writer, too.”
A woman’s voice on the other end of the phone: “But you told me you weren’t a real writer. That you had help on your novel.”
“I said I’m more of an idea man.”
“And that you sometimes just end up in the right place at the right time. By accident.”
“But I have a talent.”
“You do … if luck is a talent.”
“I’m a famous writer.”
“Look, Dewey, you may be famous. That’s true. But you’ve been calling me for eight months. And the way you describe your fantasies? Well, even I know you’re not a real writer.”
“Helen! C’mon! How was I supposed to know that she was Jamb Jars’ daughter?!”
There’s a long pause.
“Seems a bit like this could ruin your career.”
“Oh, yeah, ya think?”
The phone line goes dead.
“Helen?”
RESUME ISLAND
Mill hurries down the beach. She’s racing toward Dewey, who sits very still in the sand.
“Dewey!”
She approaches him, but he doesn’t acknowledge her.
Mill realizes he is whispering something. She leans in:
“Computer science, speeches, bliographies, personnel administration, no longer used. Computer science, speeches, bliographies, personnel administration, no longer used. Computer science, speeches, bliographies, personnel administration, no longer used.”
FADE OUT
Dewey or Don’t He?
by Tom Tennant
(Sometime during Season Two)
Dewey’s eyes itched. And not for lack of moisture. For certain, what the island lacked in amenities, it more than made up for in wetness and hotness and – let’s be honest – loneliness. But even that wasn’t for lack of people running around like mad bandits.
Dewey was one of 48 survivors of Oceanic Flight 815, a roundtripper from Sydney, Australia, to Los Angeles, California. The plane, carrying a couple hundred people, by Dewey’s count, bumped, banged, broke apart at 30,000 feet, and then crashed on a remote jungle island in the middle of the Pacific.
The last 50 days had gone from horror to rebirth to terror to aggravation for Dewey. Horror at surviving such an unbelievable crash. Rebirth, as Dewey, a parking enforcement officer turned famous author turned dethroned plagiarist was given the chance to start over once more as just plain Dewey. Terror at stumbling into an access tunnel to “the Hatch,” as fellow survivors were calling it, and encountering a mysterious man living down there. To aggravation, as he learned that his supposed friend, Doug, had sold half his book collection to another survivor for a stashed sleeve of Little Debbies.
The book collection had taken a lot of effort to procure. Dewey had searched every little bit of the fuselage, before they turned it into Stephen King’s barbeque, and a half-mile down each side of the beach for every scrap of written material. He’d collected books, magazines, pamphlets, brochures. He’d even become the island’s self-professed lending library, loaning his books to the likes of that shaggy haired con-man who’d ventured off on the raft and the cute, blonde bombshell that hooked up with the British-accented Iraqi guy.
Not that they ever gave his books back.
Best to do something about that, Dewey thought. That’s when he collected his three remaining sports duffels – all jammed with books – and traipsed off into the jungle to hide them from the thieves and scoundrels he called fellow survivors.
Kicking and hacking his way through the undergrowth, Dewey had stopped to catch his breath when he heard the whispers. He couldn’t quite make them out at first. They were low, barely audible, but coming from just above his head.
When he glanced up into the trees, the powder hit him. It washed under his eyelids and seeped into his tear-ducts. And, just like that, he was blind.
“Son of a -- !”
“Betcha you’ve never heard a sound system quite like this one, eh?”
Dewey’s face was scrunched up in a tight wad. His eardrums were throbbing so terribly he was sure they’d pop like overstretched balloons. Instinctively, he snatched at the car radio’s volume knob and turned the radio down.
“What, you don’t like Zwan?”
“No, not really,” Dewey said. He’d hitched a ride to Tustin’s lower east side, a notorious haven for double parkers, with Jane Flameen, a skinny, young woman with beautiful green eyes, a long nose, and jet-black, straight-as-an-arrow, cropped hair.
“Yeah, me neither,” Jane said, punching a pre-programmed button on the radio. “After Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, who really gives a rat’s ass, you know?”
“I’m not even sure I know what you’re talking about,” Dewey responded, turning his attention to the ebb and flow of the chain restaurants and franchise mega-shops outside his window.
“Good god, people, do you know what day this is?” blared the radio announcer. “It’s freakin’ Friday morning! That means only one *bleep*in’ day of work before we can get our *bleep*in’ *bleep*es to KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleep*in’ Bash!”
“You know, I really would love to go there,” Jane said. “It’ll be a helluva blast, I’m tellin’ you what. People get all wacky and hepped up and crazy.”
Dewey rolled his eyes. Is this what his life had been reduced too? He’d been a promising young physics student at the University of Michigan. But then came the accusations and assumptions. And if that pretty-girl “star pupil” hadn’t led the charge to completely blackball him from the scientific community, where would he be today? If he just hadn’t opened that lab door …
“I’ll probably end up dancing half-naked on the pool tables again!” Jane laughed, making a turn down McDougall and cutting across a parking lot to Lodge.
The sound of scrunching vinyl was hidden only by the incessant talk of the morning DJ as Dewey turned his body – a bit squishy in the middle, to be honest – toward Jane. You know, he thought, Jane is a bit cute. “So why can’t you go?”
“Ah, just couldn’t get tickets. They’re sold out.”
“Oh, really, cause,” Dewey started, knowing full well that he was about to walk into a complete and utter lie, “I’ve got two tickets and no one to go with.”
“Really?” Jane said, her attention completely averted from the road. “Are you, like, asking me then?”
Dewey, his heart racing and picking up the pace, nodded. “Uh, yeah, I guess I am.”
“Awesome!”
“Just bring your dancing shoeewwwARGGHHH!!!!”
The call of the birds sounded like screeching tires. But Dewey couldn’t hear them over his own agonizing screams.
He was totally blind, the powder dropped on his face burning his eyes like charcoal embers. The only thing keeping him still was the cool sensation of water streaming over his face and across his eyeballs.
What troubled him was that he didn’t know who was doing the pouring. By touch, he could tell his head was resting in someone’s hand. And by the steady rhythm of the water that it was from a container regularly refilled by Mister – or Missus – Mysterious.
“Hold still a bit, brother.” Okay, it was Mister Mysterious. “I’ve about got it all out.”
His vision was slowly creeping back. A splotch here. A shadow there. Things up close were relatively clear, but he was having a terrible time with distance.
“What the hell’d ya do that for?” Dewey grumbled, sitting up on his elbows.
“Thought you were someone else,” said Mister Mysterious. His voice warbled with a Scottish brogue.
“You seem really familiar,” Dewey said, squinting his eyes and trying to bring the outline of the man into focus. “Have we met before?”
“I’ve been a lot of places. I was in a race around the world.”
“No, that’s not it. And who’d be so stupid as to race around the world. What a waste of time.”
“It was for the sense of adventure, brother.”
“Yeah, lotta good that did you, huh.”
“You can say that again.”
“I said, ‘Lotta good that …’”
“I heard you the first time.”
Dewey stood up, his legs a bit wobbly, and searched the ground for his duffel bags. He found one, the white one, stuffed to capacity with non-fiction fare. Another he found tucked under some nearby brush. It was dark, so he assumed it was one of …
“That’s my bag there,” said the man. Dewey felt his muscled hand reach around the backpack’s shoulder straps. The unexpected tug spilled the contents onto the jungle floor. Mister Mysterious immediately started gathering the items.
“Sorry about that,” Dewey mumbled, bending over to help pick things up. Through his blurry vision, Dewey found a vial of what appeared to be medicine, marked CR-4815-1623-42. He pocketed it. Then he found a book, “The Third Policeman.” Hmmm, Dewey thought, pocketing that as well.
Then he found an empty plastic container, no bigger than a salt shaker. The label was in black and white. Dewey had to bring it up to his nose to read it: “Cayenne Pepper: Dharma Initiative.”
“Hey!” Dewey growled, turning on his heels. He got the man’s fuzzy outline in his eyesight. “Did you dump cayenne pepper in my eyes?”
“Yeah. Bit like pepper spray. Sorry ‘bout that.”
“Nevermind the bullocks,” Dewey said, waving off the apology. “Do you have food?”
“Well there was a lot of it back in the hatch. Kinda wish I’d’ve packed more of it. Left in a bit of a haste.”
Hatch? Hatch! Dewey stomped over to the man and thrust his nose into his face. There, he could get a better look at him. “You!”
Mister Mysterious stepped back. “What?!”
Dewey poked the man in the chest. “You’re the guy that scared the bejeezus out of me in the hatch the other day!”
“Yeah, but you’re the one that spooked me! If you hadn’t taken off screaming like you lost your head, I might have had to do something about it, too.”
Dewey gritted his teeth. But the man was right. He had entered the hatch, about two days before Doctor I’m-So-Cool and Box-Company Nutjob blew the living tar out of a opening deep in the jungle. Made him think he probably should have told them about the beach entrance and its easy accessibility. And, truly, he was the one intruding. Not this guy. “Yeah, didn’t mean to scare you.”
There was a quiet moment while the two sized each other up. Then the man extended his hand, “Desmond.”
“Dewey.”
“You know, you could be the spittin’ image of Colin Mochrie.”
“I get that a lot.”
Desmond laughed. “If you’re looking for your other two duffel bags, they’re right beyond that tree.”
A smile crept across Dewey’s face and he darted for the tree. Those books were precious to him. He wasn’t sure why, but they felt important. “Hey, thanks, I thought I’d lost them for gooooARRRRGGHHHH!!!!”
What had happened was this.
Jane, thrilled to the moon about going to KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleepin’* Bash, had not paid attention to the traffic signal in front of her. Dewey caught the pleading yellow caution light just before it blinked to ominous red.
Her foot found the brake pedal long before the inevitable kiss of metal on metal, but Jane still spun the other driver in a circle when front-end met back-end. The result: three injured commuters, Dewey collecting the most bruises.
The passenger side door had popped open in the crash. Dewey hadn’t realized that he was wearing a defective seat belt, which unclasped at the most inopportune moment. When the crash happened, Dewey felt his tan chinos slip free from their spot on the bucket seat. He remained in the exact position he was in when Jane ran the red light – seated, facing her – until he landed chinos first on the hard asphalt of Lodge Avenue.
Ample padding in the hindquarters – the result of an eight-year desk job– protected his spine. But his tailbone snapped like a Thanksgiving wishbone.
Quickly turning onto his belly and raising his butt in the air, Dewey watched as Jane leapt out of the car to check on the other driver, a middle-aged, balding man sitting behind the wheel of a red Volkswagen. Though her collarbone had broken, Jane ignored the pain. And the other driver was fine, save for a lap full of hot coffee, which he couldn’t stop ranting about.
“Geez, man, you need anger management classes,” Jane grumbled under her breath.
“I’m in anger management classes,” the man hollered back. “Look, my father stole my kid-…”
Tuning the nutcase out, Dewey watched as Jane spun on her heels and sprinted over to him. “Are you okay, are you all right?” she said, dropping to one knee.
By now, several cars had stopped and Dewey could hear a man speaking on the phone to what was most likely a 9-1-1 operator. “Oh, I’ve been better.”
“Man, I am sooo sorry.”
“No big shakes.”
“Think you – you know – broke your butt?”
“Oh, with luck, probably.”
By now, sirens were squealing in the distance. At least, Dewey thought, this would solve the little problem of not actually having tickets to the KJGM show.
“I hope this doesn’t mean we’re not going to the show tonight.”
“Naahhhh.” Dewey said, before he could think. And just like that, he was back to square one – a date with a cute girl and no tickets as-promised.
“Awesome,” Jane said. “Because if you were lyin’ to me, I’d probably break your butt myself!”
Dewey let out a long sigh. Once more, Dewey had found himself in a precarious position.
Hanging by one’s foot 10-feet up in the air was one of the more unique precarious positions Dewey had ever been in. But when you tossed in Mister Mysterious – now dangling 10-feet in the air and about five feet to Dewey’s left – that made this particular event, well – eventful.
“This is a fine mess you’ve gotten us into, brother,” Mister Mysterious grumbled, fishing through his clothes for something.
“Me!? Me!? You didn’t have to follow me,” Dewey said, crossing his arms and growing red in the face. Of course, that was more because he was hanging upside down than anger. But the rush of blood accentuated the point.
“No need t’ get nasty, now. We’ll manage to get out of this one way or ta ‘nother.”
“Quiet, both of you.”
The voice had come from above, in the trees, and spooked them both. Mister Mysterious went rigid, only his eyes moving. Dewey reacted just opposite. He flung himself in a great arc, spinning on the end of his rope, turning his head like a hyperactive owl. Dewey’s vision was growing better by the minute, but he couldn’t find the source of the voice.
“Don’t move, stay still, they’ll hear,” said the voice, raspy, coarse, and tinged with French.
“You mean – them?” whispered Mister Mysterious.
“Yes, them,” responded the voice.
“Giant ants?” Dewey said.
“Shhhh!!!”
Then he heard it. Rustling in the trees. Murmurs. Whispers. And, Dewey thought, the unmistakable sound of the Slinky jingle … “What walks down stairs, alone or in pairs, what makes a Slinkidy sound?”
Slinky? Dewey wondered. What would a slinky have to do with …
His thoughts were cut off by a sudden jolt in his rope and the rapid reintroduction to gravity. When he hit the ground all he saw were stars, their pattern matching that of the Southern Dipper.
“There is no Southern Dipper,” said Chuck. Dewey knew this was Chuck by the nametag on his paramedic jacket.
“There is, too,” said Dottie. Dewey couldn’t see Dottie’s nametag, since her back was facing him, but he could see her license, tacked to the dashboard ahead of him. Dewey was lying on a gurney with his derriere still a foot in the air. Chuck had placed icepacks on the offending region, but they really weren’t doing much good.
“Nah, there isn’t. It’s just colloquial,” Chuck said, dismissing Dottie’s argument.
“Look, Chuck, I studied Asian Astrophysics at the University of Michigan for four frickin’ years,” Dottie returned, growing angry. “I think I know what I’m talking about.”
Chuck leaned back and folded his arms. “Dot, c’mon, we’ve gone through this about a million times. There’s nothing called the Southern Dipper. Unless your talkin’ about a new appetizer at The Roadhouse.”
Chuck guffawed, deep and throaty. It annoyed Dewey. The whole conversation annoyed Dewey. But the guffawing. Well, that just turned Dottie crazy.
She slammed on the brakes.
Everything in the back of the ambulance tumbled forward, including Chuck, who ended up sprawled against Dottie’s back seat. Dewey’s crash cart unlocked and rolled forward, knocking over a backpack and spilling its contents – including two tickets to KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleep*in’ Bash.
“You and me, outside, right now!” said Dottie, throwing the ambulance into park and kicking open her door.
“You got it, babe!” Chuck growled, stepping over Dewey and flinging the ambulance’s back doors wide.
Almost immediately, Dewey could hear the muted scuffling of his dueling paramedics. And regarding the missing tickets to that evening’s rock concert? Chuck and Dottie were none the wiser.
The French lady’s pad was all right for a hole in the ground. But compared to Mister Mysterious’ palatial underground hatch – well, it left much to be desired. To be fair, Danielle’s place – they’d all finally introduced themselves to one another – was a little too “torture chamber” for Dewey’s tastes. But then Desmond’s bunker was a little too – heavily armed.
The three were sitting around a dilapidated set of table and chairs. Danielle supplied them with a deck of cards, each card printed with a cover from Cahiers du cinema. “J'aime le verite de cinéma,” she whispered. “Quelle exposition anormale,” Dewey thought.
“Let us play a game,” Danielle said, dealing the cards. “Pinochle.”
“You’ve been here 16 years,” Dewey said, eyeing Danielle across the table.
“Yes,” she said. “I call clubs.”
“Wow, hey, you know, that’s a long time,” Desmond said, a little too wonderously. Desmond handed out Apollo candy bars. They tasted like crusty, stale marshmallow nougat.
The night continued on. Dewey, having lost several hands, grew exasperated. He took his frustration out on his companions.
“Never tried to build a boat?” Dewey said, turning to Danielle.
“No, much too dangerous.”
“But living alone in the middle of the jungle?”
“Not as dangerous.”
“You’re nuts.”
“No need for calling names, brother,” Desmond said, easily winning the hand.
Dewey threw his cards on the table and his hands in the air. He hated losing. “And what about you, anyway?”
“What about me?”
“Locked up in a hatch for who knows how long. And is it true about this button every one’s talking about?”
“Your friends were right to keep up the tradition,” Desmond said. “Hearts.”
“Yeah, yeah, don’t tell me about it. I’m supposed to be on duty tomorrow,” Dewey grumbled, tossing a card into the pile. It landed upside down.
Desmond motioned to it. “You have to lift it up.”
“What?”
“The card. We don’t know what it is. Lift it up.”
Dewey flipped the card over. A two of diamonds.
“Bah!!”
“Don’t be a spoil sport!”
“Gimme a break! You two may be all comfy cozy with this freaky deaky island, but it’s giving me the willies!” Dewey said, standing up.
“He’s getting a bit hysterical, don’t you think, hon?” Desmond said, looking at Danielle.
Danielle, who had said very little during the game, looked up at him with surprise and admonition. Dewey caught the glance. Something was wrong, here.
“’Hon?’” Dewey said. “Do you two know each other?”
The force of the blow was so powerful, not only did Dewey black-out, but a low-pitched ringing thumped rhythmically in his ears.
KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleep*in’ Bash featured a number of bands, not one of which Dewey recognized. He missed the groups of his era. The Beatles. The Stones. Herman’s Hermits. It didn’t seem that long ago that those bands were around. Or, at the very least, relevant.
Well, the Beatles still were, anyway, as evidenced by the young British band that had the sweaty hordes of twentysomethings jumping and gyrating and generally making fools of themselves.
While the band screeched in electric glory, Dewey hobbled his way through the crowd. He’d lost Jane soon after they first arrived. The young traffic enforcement officer had kissed Dewey on the forehead and offered her sincerest thanks – then bounced off onto the dance floor.
He didn’t spot her until the British band burst into its hit song. Dewey didn’t know the title of it, but it was familiar enough. “You’re A Gravy Bunny,” is what it sounded like to him. And that’s what he’d sing at the top of his lungs whenever it came on the car radio.
Jane, by the way, had tied tongues with a gargantuan man whose skin blistered with tattoos. Dewey thought it best to leave them some privacy.
Ah well, he thought, and tried to dance a bit to the music. The band was coming to the chorus and Dewey opened his mouth to sing –
-- And that’s when the elbow hit him, right across the bridge of his nose.
Before he blacked out, he saw a beautiful redhead look down at him. The concern in her eyes was pleasant to see. He heard her boyfriend, who Dewey recognized as the guy from the car crash, call her “Helen”. He smiled. Helen smiled back.
Then everything went black as Dewey muttered, “You’re a gravy bunny.”
You’re a gravy bunny, indeed.
When Dewey awoke, a beautiful redhead was holding his head and dabbing his nose with water. This redhead he knew well. His friend, Mill, the free diver from Mount Vernon.
“Now what happened,” she asked him.
Dewey had been dragged back to the edge of the beach camp during the night. His duffel bags were next to him, as was a handwritten note.
It read: “Pinochle, next Wednesday, 8:15 p.m.”
Dewey folded it up.
“What’s that?” Mill asked.
“The first piece of a big puzzle,” Dewey said, putting the note in his pocket, collecting his duffel bags, and shuffling off to his tent on the far end of the camp.
by Tom Tennant
(Sometime during Season Two)
Dewey’s eyes itched. And not for lack of moisture. For certain, what the island lacked in amenities, it more than made up for in wetness and hotness and – let’s be honest – loneliness. But even that wasn’t for lack of people running around like mad bandits.
Dewey was one of 48 survivors of Oceanic Flight 815, a roundtripper from Sydney, Australia, to Los Angeles, California. The plane, carrying a couple hundred people, by Dewey’s count, bumped, banged, broke apart at 30,000 feet, and then crashed on a remote jungle island in the middle of the Pacific.
The last 50 days had gone from horror to rebirth to terror to aggravation for Dewey. Horror at surviving such an unbelievable crash. Rebirth, as Dewey, a parking enforcement officer turned famous author turned dethroned plagiarist was given the chance to start over once more as just plain Dewey. Terror at stumbling into an access tunnel to “the Hatch,” as fellow survivors were calling it, and encountering a mysterious man living down there. To aggravation, as he learned that his supposed friend, Doug, had sold half his book collection to another survivor for a stashed sleeve of Little Debbies.
The book collection had taken a lot of effort to procure. Dewey had searched every little bit of the fuselage, before they turned it into Stephen King’s barbeque, and a half-mile down each side of the beach for every scrap of written material. He’d collected books, magazines, pamphlets, brochures. He’d even become the island’s self-professed lending library, loaning his books to the likes of that shaggy haired con-man who’d ventured off on the raft and the cute, blonde bombshell that hooked up with the British-accented Iraqi guy.
Not that they ever gave his books back.
Best to do something about that, Dewey thought. That’s when he collected his three remaining sports duffels – all jammed with books – and traipsed off into the jungle to hide them from the thieves and scoundrels he called fellow survivors.
Kicking and hacking his way through the undergrowth, Dewey had stopped to catch his breath when he heard the whispers. He couldn’t quite make them out at first. They were low, barely audible, but coming from just above his head.
When he glanced up into the trees, the powder hit him. It washed under his eyelids and seeped into his tear-ducts. And, just like that, he was blind.
“Son of a -- !”
“Betcha you’ve never heard a sound system quite like this one, eh?”
Dewey’s face was scrunched up in a tight wad. His eardrums were throbbing so terribly he was sure they’d pop like overstretched balloons. Instinctively, he snatched at the car radio’s volume knob and turned the radio down.
“What, you don’t like Zwan?”
“No, not really,” Dewey said. He’d hitched a ride to Tustin’s lower east side, a notorious haven for double parkers, with Jane Flameen, a skinny, young woman with beautiful green eyes, a long nose, and jet-black, straight-as-an-arrow, cropped hair.
“Yeah, me neither,” Jane said, punching a pre-programmed button on the radio. “After Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, who really gives a rat’s ass, you know?”
“I’m not even sure I know what you’re talking about,” Dewey responded, turning his attention to the ebb and flow of the chain restaurants and franchise mega-shops outside his window.
“Good god, people, do you know what day this is?” blared the radio announcer. “It’s freakin’ Friday morning! That means only one *bleep*in’ day of work before we can get our *bleep*in’ *bleep*es to KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleep*in’ Bash!”
“You know, I really would love to go there,” Jane said. “It’ll be a helluva blast, I’m tellin’ you what. People get all wacky and hepped up and crazy.”
Dewey rolled his eyes. Is this what his life had been reduced too? He’d been a promising young physics student at the University of Michigan. But then came the accusations and assumptions. And if that pretty-girl “star pupil” hadn’t led the charge to completely blackball him from the scientific community, where would he be today? If he just hadn’t opened that lab door …
“I’ll probably end up dancing half-naked on the pool tables again!” Jane laughed, making a turn down McDougall and cutting across a parking lot to Lodge.
The sound of scrunching vinyl was hidden only by the incessant talk of the morning DJ as Dewey turned his body – a bit squishy in the middle, to be honest – toward Jane. You know, he thought, Jane is a bit cute. “So why can’t you go?”
“Ah, just couldn’t get tickets. They’re sold out.”
“Oh, really, cause,” Dewey started, knowing full well that he was about to walk into a complete and utter lie, “I’ve got two tickets and no one to go with.”
“Really?” Jane said, her attention completely averted from the road. “Are you, like, asking me then?”
Dewey, his heart racing and picking up the pace, nodded. “Uh, yeah, I guess I am.”
“Awesome!”
“Just bring your dancing shoeewwwARGGHHH!!!!”
The call of the birds sounded like screeching tires. But Dewey couldn’t hear them over his own agonizing screams.
He was totally blind, the powder dropped on his face burning his eyes like charcoal embers. The only thing keeping him still was the cool sensation of water streaming over his face and across his eyeballs.
What troubled him was that he didn’t know who was doing the pouring. By touch, he could tell his head was resting in someone’s hand. And by the steady rhythm of the water that it was from a container regularly refilled by Mister – or Missus – Mysterious.
“Hold still a bit, brother.” Okay, it was Mister Mysterious. “I’ve about got it all out.”
His vision was slowly creeping back. A splotch here. A shadow there. Things up close were relatively clear, but he was having a terrible time with distance.
“What the hell’d ya do that for?” Dewey grumbled, sitting up on his elbows.
“Thought you were someone else,” said Mister Mysterious. His voice warbled with a Scottish brogue.
“You seem really familiar,” Dewey said, squinting his eyes and trying to bring the outline of the man into focus. “Have we met before?”
“I’ve been a lot of places. I was in a race around the world.”
“No, that’s not it. And who’d be so stupid as to race around the world. What a waste of time.”
“It was for the sense of adventure, brother.”
“Yeah, lotta good that did you, huh.”
“You can say that again.”
“I said, ‘Lotta good that …’”
“I heard you the first time.”
Dewey stood up, his legs a bit wobbly, and searched the ground for his duffel bags. He found one, the white one, stuffed to capacity with non-fiction fare. Another he found tucked under some nearby brush. It was dark, so he assumed it was one of …
“That’s my bag there,” said the man. Dewey felt his muscled hand reach around the backpack’s shoulder straps. The unexpected tug spilled the contents onto the jungle floor. Mister Mysterious immediately started gathering the items.
“Sorry about that,” Dewey mumbled, bending over to help pick things up. Through his blurry vision, Dewey found a vial of what appeared to be medicine, marked CR-4815-1623-42. He pocketed it. Then he found a book, “The Third Policeman.” Hmmm, Dewey thought, pocketing that as well.
Then he found an empty plastic container, no bigger than a salt shaker. The label was in black and white. Dewey had to bring it up to his nose to read it: “Cayenne Pepper: Dharma Initiative.”
“Hey!” Dewey growled, turning on his heels. He got the man’s fuzzy outline in his eyesight. “Did you dump cayenne pepper in my eyes?”
“Yeah. Bit like pepper spray. Sorry ‘bout that.”
“Nevermind the bullocks,” Dewey said, waving off the apology. “Do you have food?”
“Well there was a lot of it back in the hatch. Kinda wish I’d’ve packed more of it. Left in a bit of a haste.”
Hatch? Hatch! Dewey stomped over to the man and thrust his nose into his face. There, he could get a better look at him. “You!”
Mister Mysterious stepped back. “What?!”
Dewey poked the man in the chest. “You’re the guy that scared the bejeezus out of me in the hatch the other day!”
“Yeah, but you’re the one that spooked me! If you hadn’t taken off screaming like you lost your head, I might have had to do something about it, too.”
Dewey gritted his teeth. But the man was right. He had entered the hatch, about two days before Doctor I’m-So-Cool and Box-Company Nutjob blew the living tar out of a opening deep in the jungle. Made him think he probably should have told them about the beach entrance and its easy accessibility. And, truly, he was the one intruding. Not this guy. “Yeah, didn’t mean to scare you.”
There was a quiet moment while the two sized each other up. Then the man extended his hand, “Desmond.”
“Dewey.”
“You know, you could be the spittin’ image of Colin Mochrie.”
“I get that a lot.”
Desmond laughed. “If you’re looking for your other two duffel bags, they’re right beyond that tree.”
A smile crept across Dewey’s face and he darted for the tree. Those books were precious to him. He wasn’t sure why, but they felt important. “Hey, thanks, I thought I’d lost them for gooooARRRRGGHHHH!!!!”
What had happened was this.
Jane, thrilled to the moon about going to KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleepin’* Bash, had not paid attention to the traffic signal in front of her. Dewey caught the pleading yellow caution light just before it blinked to ominous red.
Her foot found the brake pedal long before the inevitable kiss of metal on metal, but Jane still spun the other driver in a circle when front-end met back-end. The result: three injured commuters, Dewey collecting the most bruises.
The passenger side door had popped open in the crash. Dewey hadn’t realized that he was wearing a defective seat belt, which unclasped at the most inopportune moment. When the crash happened, Dewey felt his tan chinos slip free from their spot on the bucket seat. He remained in the exact position he was in when Jane ran the red light – seated, facing her – until he landed chinos first on the hard asphalt of Lodge Avenue.
Ample padding in the hindquarters – the result of an eight-year desk job– protected his spine. But his tailbone snapped like a Thanksgiving wishbone.
Quickly turning onto his belly and raising his butt in the air, Dewey watched as Jane leapt out of the car to check on the other driver, a middle-aged, balding man sitting behind the wheel of a red Volkswagen. Though her collarbone had broken, Jane ignored the pain. And the other driver was fine, save for a lap full of hot coffee, which he couldn’t stop ranting about.
“Geez, man, you need anger management classes,” Jane grumbled under her breath.
“I’m in anger management classes,” the man hollered back. “Look, my father stole my kid-…”
Tuning the nutcase out, Dewey watched as Jane spun on her heels and sprinted over to him. “Are you okay, are you all right?” she said, dropping to one knee.
By now, several cars had stopped and Dewey could hear a man speaking on the phone to what was most likely a 9-1-1 operator. “Oh, I’ve been better.”
“Man, I am sooo sorry.”
“No big shakes.”
“Think you – you know – broke your butt?”
“Oh, with luck, probably.”
By now, sirens were squealing in the distance. At least, Dewey thought, this would solve the little problem of not actually having tickets to the KJGM show.
“I hope this doesn’t mean we’re not going to the show tonight.”
“Naahhhh.” Dewey said, before he could think. And just like that, he was back to square one – a date with a cute girl and no tickets as-promised.
“Awesome,” Jane said. “Because if you were lyin’ to me, I’d probably break your butt myself!”
Dewey let out a long sigh. Once more, Dewey had found himself in a precarious position.
Hanging by one’s foot 10-feet up in the air was one of the more unique precarious positions Dewey had ever been in. But when you tossed in Mister Mysterious – now dangling 10-feet in the air and about five feet to Dewey’s left – that made this particular event, well – eventful.
“This is a fine mess you’ve gotten us into, brother,” Mister Mysterious grumbled, fishing through his clothes for something.
“Me!? Me!? You didn’t have to follow me,” Dewey said, crossing his arms and growing red in the face. Of course, that was more because he was hanging upside down than anger. But the rush of blood accentuated the point.
“No need t’ get nasty, now. We’ll manage to get out of this one way or ta ‘nother.”
“Quiet, both of you.”
The voice had come from above, in the trees, and spooked them both. Mister Mysterious went rigid, only his eyes moving. Dewey reacted just opposite. He flung himself in a great arc, spinning on the end of his rope, turning his head like a hyperactive owl. Dewey’s vision was growing better by the minute, but he couldn’t find the source of the voice.
“Don’t move, stay still, they’ll hear,” said the voice, raspy, coarse, and tinged with French.
“You mean – them?” whispered Mister Mysterious.
“Yes, them,” responded the voice.
“Giant ants?” Dewey said.
“Shhhh!!!”
Then he heard it. Rustling in the trees. Murmurs. Whispers. And, Dewey thought, the unmistakable sound of the Slinky jingle … “What walks down stairs, alone or in pairs, what makes a Slinkidy sound?”
Slinky? Dewey wondered. What would a slinky have to do with …
His thoughts were cut off by a sudden jolt in his rope and the rapid reintroduction to gravity. When he hit the ground all he saw were stars, their pattern matching that of the Southern Dipper.
“There is no Southern Dipper,” said Chuck. Dewey knew this was Chuck by the nametag on his paramedic jacket.
“There is, too,” said Dottie. Dewey couldn’t see Dottie’s nametag, since her back was facing him, but he could see her license, tacked to the dashboard ahead of him. Dewey was lying on a gurney with his derriere still a foot in the air. Chuck had placed icepacks on the offending region, but they really weren’t doing much good.
“Nah, there isn’t. It’s just colloquial,” Chuck said, dismissing Dottie’s argument.
“Look, Chuck, I studied Asian Astrophysics at the University of Michigan for four frickin’ years,” Dottie returned, growing angry. “I think I know what I’m talking about.”
Chuck leaned back and folded his arms. “Dot, c’mon, we’ve gone through this about a million times. There’s nothing called the Southern Dipper. Unless your talkin’ about a new appetizer at The Roadhouse.”
Chuck guffawed, deep and throaty. It annoyed Dewey. The whole conversation annoyed Dewey. But the guffawing. Well, that just turned Dottie crazy.
She slammed on the brakes.
Everything in the back of the ambulance tumbled forward, including Chuck, who ended up sprawled against Dottie’s back seat. Dewey’s crash cart unlocked and rolled forward, knocking over a backpack and spilling its contents – including two tickets to KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleep*in’ Bash.
“You and me, outside, right now!” said Dottie, throwing the ambulance into park and kicking open her door.
“You got it, babe!” Chuck growled, stepping over Dewey and flinging the ambulance’s back doors wide.
Almost immediately, Dewey could hear the muted scuffling of his dueling paramedics. And regarding the missing tickets to that evening’s rock concert? Chuck and Dottie were none the wiser.
The French lady’s pad was all right for a hole in the ground. But compared to Mister Mysterious’ palatial underground hatch – well, it left much to be desired. To be fair, Danielle’s place – they’d all finally introduced themselves to one another – was a little too “torture chamber” for Dewey’s tastes. But then Desmond’s bunker was a little too – heavily armed.
The three were sitting around a dilapidated set of table and chairs. Danielle supplied them with a deck of cards, each card printed with a cover from Cahiers du cinema. “J'aime le verite de cinéma,” she whispered. “Quelle exposition anormale,” Dewey thought.
“Let us play a game,” Danielle said, dealing the cards. “Pinochle.”
“You’ve been here 16 years,” Dewey said, eyeing Danielle across the table.
“Yes,” she said. “I call clubs.”
“Wow, hey, you know, that’s a long time,” Desmond said, a little too wonderously. Desmond handed out Apollo candy bars. They tasted like crusty, stale marshmallow nougat.
The night continued on. Dewey, having lost several hands, grew exasperated. He took his frustration out on his companions.
“Never tried to build a boat?” Dewey said, turning to Danielle.
“No, much too dangerous.”
“But living alone in the middle of the jungle?”
“Not as dangerous.”
“You’re nuts.”
“No need for calling names, brother,” Desmond said, easily winning the hand.
Dewey threw his cards on the table and his hands in the air. He hated losing. “And what about you, anyway?”
“What about me?”
“Locked up in a hatch for who knows how long. And is it true about this button every one’s talking about?”
“Your friends were right to keep up the tradition,” Desmond said. “Hearts.”
“Yeah, yeah, don’t tell me about it. I’m supposed to be on duty tomorrow,” Dewey grumbled, tossing a card into the pile. It landed upside down.
Desmond motioned to it. “You have to lift it up.”
“What?”
“The card. We don’t know what it is. Lift it up.”
Dewey flipped the card over. A two of diamonds.
“Bah!!”
“Don’t be a spoil sport!”
“Gimme a break! You two may be all comfy cozy with this freaky deaky island, but it’s giving me the willies!” Dewey said, standing up.
“He’s getting a bit hysterical, don’t you think, hon?” Desmond said, looking at Danielle.
Danielle, who had said very little during the game, looked up at him with surprise and admonition. Dewey caught the glance. Something was wrong, here.
“’Hon?’” Dewey said. “Do you two know each other?”
The force of the blow was so powerful, not only did Dewey black-out, but a low-pitched ringing thumped rhythmically in his ears.
KJGM’s All Rockin’ Hallow’s Eve *Bleep*in’ Bash featured a number of bands, not one of which Dewey recognized. He missed the groups of his era. The Beatles. The Stones. Herman’s Hermits. It didn’t seem that long ago that those bands were around. Or, at the very least, relevant.
Well, the Beatles still were, anyway, as evidenced by the young British band that had the sweaty hordes of twentysomethings jumping and gyrating and generally making fools of themselves.
While the band screeched in electric glory, Dewey hobbled his way through the crowd. He’d lost Jane soon after they first arrived. The young traffic enforcement officer had kissed Dewey on the forehead and offered her sincerest thanks – then bounced off onto the dance floor.
He didn’t spot her until the British band burst into its hit song. Dewey didn’t know the title of it, but it was familiar enough. “You’re A Gravy Bunny,” is what it sounded like to him. And that’s what he’d sing at the top of his lungs whenever it came on the car radio.
Jane, by the way, had tied tongues with a gargantuan man whose skin blistered with tattoos. Dewey thought it best to leave them some privacy.
Ah well, he thought, and tried to dance a bit to the music. The band was coming to the chorus and Dewey opened his mouth to sing –
-- And that’s when the elbow hit him, right across the bridge of his nose.
Before he blacked out, he saw a beautiful redhead look down at him. The concern in her eyes was pleasant to see. He heard her boyfriend, who Dewey recognized as the guy from the car crash, call her “Helen”. He smiled. Helen smiled back.
Then everything went black as Dewey muttered, “You’re a gravy bunny.”
You’re a gravy bunny, indeed.
When Dewey awoke, a beautiful redhead was holding his head and dabbing his nose with water. This redhead he knew well. His friend, Mill, the free diver from Mount Vernon.
“Now what happened,” she asked him.
Dewey had been dragged back to the edge of the beach camp during the night. His duffel bags were next to him, as was a handwritten note.
It read: “Pinochle, next Wednesday, 8:15 p.m.”
Dewey folded it up.
“What’s that?” Mill asked.
“The first piece of a big puzzle,” Dewey said, putting the note in his pocket, collecting his duffel bags, and shuffling off to his tent on the far end of the camp.
