Short story / film treatment
"This is a suck assignment and you know it, Bull. Three people will read it! I'm an investigative reporter." Zig tells his editor.
"Then investigate it," Bull Bulner doesn't back down, not even for hotshot reporters the likes of Zig. So Zig attends the National Conference on Industrial Safety.
His keen ear and quick eye take a holiday during the proceedings. For Zig, heaven walks on high heels. So most of the time his eyes rest on this tall, sleek, tailored blonde with a tight tailored hair-do that makes her stand out in this crowd of heads saying nothing Zig hears. "Or is this just one of those situations where beauty is relative?" he muses. "Like when you're in an elevator and the prettiest girl there looks good, but put her in a different crowd and she's just plain."
"No. This girl is exotic. Different. They're breaking up, it's over! God....., I didn't catch a word. Better pick up that literature at the door or it's no story." He races to beat the crowd to the door, grabs a hand-out and is out to his car, leaning against it, watching the crowd pour out into the parking lot.
''These guys are doing okay. A lot better than reporters. Look at all the Porsches. Hey, here she comes. No, that's not her...it's a guy! Tall, thin, blonde, the same tailored, plastered-down hair cut. Hmmm. Porsche owner. Weird cat. Must have been suckin' too much industrial fumes. Needs one of those inhalators. Price of the good life. Where is she? Maybe I missed her, watchin' that freak. There's another one of those hair-cuts. In brown. Get in a Porsche now. He is!!!!! Oh, oh, there she is. Definitely not a man. Hmmmm. She is exotic. I can imagine what kind of equipment you got. Let's see what kind of wheels you're using. God.......! Porsche.''
He runs up ahead for a straight shot at her down a row of cars. She gets in. She slides her backside down in the leather bucket. Then the long legs come up and around. He records it with his eyes -- in close-ups. Her hand goes for the glove box. Comes back with something she puts up to her mouth. It's an inhalator. Zig runs around to catch the plate number. He's got it. Also an insignia or car club medallion. 'GNP.'
He runs down another row of cars. Stops on another Porsche. GNP. He takes the plate number. He runs to another row of cars. Stops on another Porsche. No GNP. Fat guy getting in. He runs again. Porsche GNP. Plate number. Thin guy. Slicked down tailored hair. ''Watch him. Watch him. He's taking off. No inhalator? No. The hand's coming up to his mouth. There it is. What's goin' on?'' Zig counts 4 more GNP Porsches. He knew he didn't get them all, either
An exhaustive search turns up no sports car club with the initials, GNP. And no business association either. Bull can't believe Zig wants to pursue a series on industrial safety. From the looks of the story Zig turned in, it didn't warrant it. But he knows Zig wouldn't go after a dud. Zig goes after an interview with the tailored lady in the GNP Porsche.
Now Zig was a pretty good-looking guy - a real charmer with very few strike-outs with the ladies. He strikes out with this lady. She is a cool one. Cold. She gives him nothing. Not a blink. And he's charming full throttle. This is the first time he's really been uneasy around a woman. If he wasn't suspicious before, he is now. He had his teeth in this one and he wasn't going to let go.
He traces all the Porsche plate numbers he recorded. All biggies in industry. He shadows some of them. ''No contact between them. Even at the conference they didn't. I didn't notice much there, but I would have noticed that -- a gathering of tailored skinnies with plastered hair. Would have noticed that if I was sleeping. Wait a minute, those sports car nuts get together on weekends, don't they?''
He sticks close to blondie on the weekend. ''Where's she going? God awful long way. I hope she's not going to Michigan. Wait a minute, another Porsche. GNP! GNP!''
The drivers glance over at each other, but they avoid each other. ''Okay. Okay. Not too conspicuous, Zig.'' They're swinging on to Route 80 toward Gary. The Porsches, with Zig in pursuit, get off the highway and turn down an industrial road. The air is thick with steel processing fumes and Zig has to roll up his windows. The Porsche drivers are rolling theirs down and pointing their noses out the window. He can swear they're inhaling the stuff. They make a turn toward the mills. It's really getting thick now. There they are! Maybe 25 or 30 Porsches in the red-gray mist. Windows down, two abreast, barreling down the industrial corridor, exhausts adding voice to the puffing stacks of the mills.
''Better park this thing and watch from a distance.'' He is high enough to see the line of cars snaking through the corners of the rusty roads, 30 Porsche exhausts singing in the smoke. He cannot comprehend. He can comprehend even less when the singing stops and they all get out , standing next to their cars. He grabs his long lens camera. He pans them. Shooting away. He can't hear them, yet he can, sucking the steel air into their lungs. Gasp after gasp. It makes Zigs throat hurt just watching them.
Zig gets out of there, but not till he shoots a bunch of faces -- and license plates to go with them. ''You freaks better have a good reason for these shenanigans 'cause this reporter's going to find it all out.
Zig focuses on details he has gathered over the weeks since the gathering of Porsches. It's his M.O. See the details in close-ups. ''Every one of these people is a high-ranking industry official or owner. Every one of them controlling potentially hazardous polluting products or services. Every one of them with outstanding records on safety. Going out of their way to make sure their companies have no industrial accidents. Every one of them keeping a low profile. Every one of them avoiding contact with each other except for the Sunday at the steel mill 'breather.' Perhaps risking this one public ritual as a means of holding themselves unified in purpose. Obviously their skinniness and dress and hair styles (he sees all this in close-ups) cars and logo, even the inhalators, are some kind of signal to each other that they are trusted members of the organization: GNP.''
But they haven't been able to avoid all accidents. In Zig's head TV news footage of numerous industrial disasters play against their concerned faces...their thin, pale, tailored, slicked-down-haired faces. ''These breathers of polluted air. What the heck were they breathing out of those inhalators? If they had trouble breathing in relatively clean air, why were they down in Gary sucking up that crud in their lungs without those aspirators? I gotta get one of them. Where's that old article I did on chop shops? Here it is. Yeah. A steel band with a hook cut out of it. Cops use it to open your car for you when you leave your keys in them. Car thieves use it to steal your car. No problem.'' He knows where to get one.
''Hope they don't take those things up in the house with them. It's come to breaking and entering again has it Zig?'' He's at a GNP Porsche in a dark parking lot. He gets in. Opens the glove box. He grabs the inhalator, hesitates then brings it up to his mouth. Takes a puff and chokes on it. "God......, they must be suckin' sulphur dioxide."
''Okay, folks...time for a little in-depth look in your closets.''
Zig, using the guise of editor for an industrial trade magazine, sets up an interview with a colleague of one of the Porsche owners on his list, a Mr. Waters.
A Porsche pulls up at a large industrial complex. The executive driving it uses his breathing apparatus and gets out of the car. Goes in the building. Gets some coffee and goes to his office. Zig is behind him. Zig tracks him with his eyes and then lets him go, moves on to his appointment.
Zig interviews the executive about chemical manufacturing apparatus. Then eases into the subject of plant safety. Pumps him for information about the executive in charge. He finds out a lot about Mr. Waters.
Zig sees it in close-ups as his interviewee reveals it. Mr. Waters is a tough boss. At a recent encounter with some of his employees he discovered that there was a leak in one of the large chemical holding tanks. The man in charge told Waters that they didn't get to it yet, but there was no hurry. It would be very costly to repair and the EPA could be put off at least another 8 to l0 months. Waters blew up. ''Get it done right now!,'' he yelled as he stormed out of the room. Zig couldn't get anything on Water's personal life. He didn't socialize much after work hours.
The same guise works at the company owned by another one on his list. John Crasden owns a chemical shipping business. Zig digs up the fact that at a recent encounter with Crasden's employees, it is revealed by a supervisor that the transporter tank lids needed new seals for EPA compliance. Crasden told them not to worry about minor things, but to make sure all drivers are always fully awake on the job, sober, cautious, and running gear is always in top condition. ''We don't want any accidents, big spills. Any drivers caught speeding will be fired on the spot.'' Again no info on Crasden's personal life.
As Zig leaves he sees his target walking to the parking lot. Getting into his Porsche. Cautiously easing all that power out into the street.
Several more interviews turn up striking similarities. ''Except for their peculiar idiosyncracies, these people could be construed by the outside world as model citizens. Successful industrialists keeping one eye on industrial safety and one eye on profits.''
''That's the connection.'' Zig is back in his apartment. Back to his typewriter. Back to his close-up thoughts. ''GNP! Gross...National...Product. Those freaks believe the Gross National Product is tied to the quantity of wastes developed -- that it's a barometer of profitable production. Cut it back, cut back the GNP. That's why they're watching the disaster rate. Too many and the people and the feds come down hard. Hold the major accidents down and they can keep on dumpin'. Keep the GNP going up.''
Now he watches the typewriter keys printing his words: The mentality here has to be that they see themselves beyond mortal. That they, like the vehicles they've selected as symbols of their quest, far exceed the average in power and ability. That they could survive, even flourish, in any atmosphere their race for profits produces.
He stops typing. The close-ups of his words mix with the close-up pictures in his head. ''They're conditioning themselves to the air with those inhalators and trips to the mills! Either that or they're aliens getting our planet ready for a takeover of sulphur dioxide breathing skinny freaks with tailored hair. Ha! I got your skinny, demented asses now. Just how far has this gone? Just Chicago? Let's get the rosters of the New York, New Jersey, L.A., Atlanta, Cincinatti, Cleveland, Pittsburgh Safety Conferences. Porsche owners. Descriptions.''
Zig is on the horn with his New York stringer. ''They're all from out of town, right? None of them native to the town they work in. Where do they come from?'' The stringer: ''I don't know, but they're all single, too. Yeah, single. Check 'em on your end.''
The stringer sends photos. All people about 6 feet tall and about 160 pounds or less. ''God....., they're all over the country. And none of them are from the town they work in. All single. I'm going to stick on blondie like glue. Something's got to give.''
This night there's a Porsche parked in front of the blonde's condo. Not hers. Zig is in an apartment across from hers looking at her through his long lens. ''Are all those parts real baby? Come on, show Ziggy something, you smoke-suckin' ice cube.'' She's at the mirror. ''Goin' to spruce up that hair-do that never gets a hair out of place? Holy mother, it's a wig! She's slick as cue ball under there. God, what are those markings on her head? She looks like she's from Mars. Mother of Christ...are her eyes glowing?''
Now the guy, must be the owner of the Porsche downstairs, comes into the room. He is bald with markings similar to hers. And glowing eyes. Zig clicks away with the camera. They stand there and disrobe. All he can see are their tops. They are both smooth as silk, hairless. She is quite flat with slight round curves for breasts. They come close, but not real close. And perform a strange ritual of caressing. All over. Like a mutual massage. There seems to be a climax. It's all over. Mouths and flesh never touch.
He sees it all now. His imagination fills in all the missing pieces. In close-ups. ''They're preparing the atmosphere so their people can breathe it. They're keeping the gradual increase in pollution insidious. Evenly spread out over the land. All the chemicals on lawns, farms, auto exhaust, industrial exhaust, toxic wastes. These are the outputs 'they' try to preserve, increase gradually. The others, the major release accidents, the ones that make the news, they try to contain. What we don't see can't hurt us. And when the atmosphere's just right, they'll invade. God...., I gotta get 'em. But who in their right mind's going to believe it? It would have to be front page for the police or the FBI to even look into it.''
''Then it'll be front page.'' He goes to the paper during the graveyard shift and struggles with the computer to get his story set in type. He outputs a negative. That's where Zig started. Setting type, stripping negatives. Zig slips the night shift graphics guy a ten to get his photos on film. "Wow, kinky stuff, Zig," he snickers while scanning Zig's slides of the blonde's and the other skinny's heads. Zig works feverishly stripping negatives and getting the printing plates made. Without the pressman seeing, he swaps the plates for the front page of the early news with his 'Porsche Plot' story.
The police and FBI have a hard time swallowing it, but can't refute the headlines of this big city paper staring at them. They haul in a number of the GNP Porsche owners. But not the blonde or the guy she was stroking. Zig goes for the hair of one of them. It doesn't come off. Another one. It doesn't come off, either. They just scream when he pulls on their hair. "Where's the blonde?" Zig panics.
Cop: ''Out getting her hair glued on. I don't know. We didn't get her.''
They all threaten to sue, but then back off. Say they don't want to give this reporter the obvious publicity he's after. Zig is a laughing stock. All the skinnies are let go. Everybody's on Zig's case.
''They did me. They did me. They set me up. Don't you see? Now no one will believe a word I say about them. Okay, I was wrong about the alien thing, but it's still a plot. Don't you see, it's the GNP. Gross National Product.'' They laugh as they throw him out.
Zig can't sell the story to his editor, Bull, either.
Finally he gets someone to listen, and publish it. One of those sensationalist rags, which is the only place he can write for these days. They like his brand of journalism.
The GNPs disappear off the cars. Only oval shapes where the paint faded around them remain. The slick hair-dos go. The Sunday 'breathers' at the steel mills are no more. But the air out there still sucks, groans and gasps.
Close-ups on the blonde in her condo. She's washing her bald head. The weird markings running down the sink drain.
Another close-up, later. Her hair is growing out..
Another close-up, later. Her hair is long, fluffy, curly. She brushes it out. She puts down her brush, reaches in her hand bag, brings her hand up to her mouth and takes a long breathe on her inhalator.
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