EXT. SOUTH DAKOTA COUNTRYSIDE - DAY
Two Lakota/Sioux men run down a rutted dirt path edged with tall goldenrod. The YOUNGER MAN is in his mid 30s, long-haired, muscular, in denim and cowboy boots. The OLDER MAN is in his 70s, thin, spry, with long white hair. He’s dressed in deer hide and moccasins.
The men pull away a tarp on the ground, daylight floods into small chasm below carved into the dirt. Lying at the bottom is a Lakota/Sioux TEENAGER. He’s skinny, almost boney, and wearing only plaid boxer shorts. His eyes are swollen shut behind black plastic-frame glasses. He waves his arms around in a blur as if he’s swatting at a bee.
TEENAGER
Get me out!
OLDER MAN
Looks like he’s allergic to bees.
TEENAGER
Uhhhhhh . . . it wasn’t just bees!
The men help the teen up out of the pit. The Younger Man picks him up and cradles him in his strong arms.YOUNGER MAN
I was afraid you’d say that.
Another Lakota TEEN runs toward them. He’s a few years older, with long hair and wearing a dirty T-shirt and torn jeans.
LONG-HAIRED TEEN
Is Lee dead?
They all head off toward a 1970 Olds Vista Cruiser station wagon parked on a ridge nearby. The jagged dirt towers of the Badlands hover in the distance behind it.OLDER MAN
Of course not. Can’t kill a Wichasha Wakan that easy.
FADE OUT.
TITLE ON DARK SCREEN READS: THE WAKINAYN
EXT. NEW ORLEANS, FRENCH QUARTER AND MISSISSIPPI - DAY
It’s a wide, very high view of most of the old French Quarter and the newer-looking riverside park and walkways. There are people and tourists around, but in the middle of it all, set apart from them, is a lone man in black standing on the sidewalk, facing wide, green Mississippi.
CLOSER TO:
The lone man in black . . . this is LEE WAKINYAN. He’s serious looking, with a black buzz haircut, wiry physique, and wire-rim glasses. His features are Plains American Indian, with high-cheekbones and a distinctive nose. He’s wearing a crisp black shirt, white clerical collar, black slacks. The ghostly, elegantly-spired Saint Louis Cathedral looms behind him across the manicured green of Jackson Square.
EXT. SAINT LOUIS CATHEDRAL - MOMENTS LATER
Lee walks toward the front of the Cathedral. Among passers-by - tourists with backpacks, and a couple of families with strollers - a white-haired tattooed man sits on a stool playing slide blues on a chrome Dobro. The guitar case at his boots has a few dollar bills in it.
Lee stops to watch, listens, liking it . . .
Suddenly, someone nearby cuts into the music:
Lee looks. It’s a MAN with leathery, ebony skin. He has one open eye, the iris chestnut, the whites exploded red. His head is cocked sideways, his arms are bent upward at the elbows to palsied hands. He’s wearing a white ruffle shirt, a cream-colored silk vest and matching, battered tuxedo pants.“VOICE” (O.S.)
Skue me, Fatha.
MAN
Sorry to bother you, Fatha.
LEE
That’s okay.
MAN
Say, can you spare some walk ‘round money?
LEE
Not really, man. Sorry. Wish I could.
Lee looks at the Man closely for a moment, the slide blues guitar surrounds the scene.MAN
Ahhh . . . You in the same sinkin’ boat as me, then.
ON LEE’S HAND:
He pulls a $5 bill out of his dress pants pocket.
BACK ON THEM:
The man takes it gingerly in a bent hand.
Suddenly, the Man, with a huge grin, holds the bill right up to Lee.MAN (CONT’D)
You very kind, Fatha!
And we see it’s a crisp new $100 with the big Ben Franklin.
The Man pockets the bill in his tuxedo pants.LEE
(happily bewildered)
Hey, how’d you do that?!
MAN
The good news spreads, you know. Like you folks been sayin’ all along. But say, Fatha . . . I’m lookin’ at you . . . you know what?
LEE
(grinning)
Er . . . what?
Pause. Lee watches a huge crow land on a branch in the live oak behind the Man, and the bird seems to be looking over his shoulder right at Lee.MAN
I think you an Indian.
LEE
Well, I am, actually.
MAN
Good. I’m an Indian, too. What kind are you?
LEE
Lakota-Sioux from Pine Ridge, South Dakota. How about yourself?
With his bent arm, the Man pulls something from his tuxedo pants pocket.MAN
African an’ Choctaw. Right on here . . . New Orleans . . . since the dawn of man.
Lee takes what the Man hands him.MAN (CONT’D)
Say, Fatha, since we both Indians, you give me some walk around money, I give you this . . .
ON LEE’S HAND:
It’s a little skull in Lee’s palm. Two miniature eye sockets stare out at us. The skull has a smooth gray forehead, and a dark hole of a nasal cavity. There is no lower jaw. No teeth.
BACK TO THEM:LEE (O.S.)
What!
The man is smiling wide. He’s scary, but his good eye is bright and alive.
A pause. Lee just stares at it in his palm.MAN
It’s your tunka.
The huge crow lands on the Man’s shoulder. The Man pats its head.LEE
(whisper)
Tunka?
MAN
You’re gonna need your tunka.
LEE
My tunka?
BANG!MAN
(nodding at Lee)
That right . . . Wichasha Wakan.
SPARKS!
There is a cloud of tiny sparks in the air - like a bunch of 4th of July sparklers going off. They HISSSSSSSS . . .
MAN IS COMPLETELY GONE.
And Lee stands there, totally bewildered, skull in his hand. He stares at the sparks until they fade away.
The blues keeps playing, people walking by don’t seem to react that anything strange has just happened, and the crow is now high above him, yelling down at him from a clear blue sky.
FADE OUT.
TITLE ON DARK SCREEN READS: ST. MARTIN’S NOVITIATE
INT. OLD JESUIT NOVITIATE BUILDING - DAY
Lee sits across a big oak desk from two other men in a paneled office with a window framing some huge live oaks outside.
Lee is wearing a crisp black shirt, the two other Jesuits are in black robes. One Jesuit is dour, in his seventies, with a mustache, goatee, and droopy, watery blue eyes. This is FATHER MAJOR SHAFFER. Next to him is FATHER MAGUIRE. Maguire is a trim, lively-eyed man with a shock of gray hair and beard. A big plaster bust of Jesuit Pedro Arupé and an Iroquois false face mask look down at them from a shelf in the corner. Another shelf nearby has a row of round-bellied African fertility statues, and a big ivory Buddha. Directly behind Maguire is a ceremonial Lakota spear with draping eagle feathers.
FATHER MAJOR SHAFFER
God be with you, Brother Lee.
Father Major Shaffer glowers across the desk at Lee.LEE
Also with you, Father Major Shaffer . . . Father Maguire. What . . . . what did you want to see me about?
FATHER MAJOR SHAFFER
This is an account of conscience, this meeting. You’ve been wandering the Quarter.
LEE
Uh . . . yes Father.
The other Father, Maguire, looks at Lee much more compassionately.FATHER MAJOR SHAFFER
And that’s actually what you’ve been doing at the Novitiate all along, isn’t it? Wandering about, here and there.
FATHER MAGUIRE
Well . . . Father Major Shaffer, Lee’s been doing work at the shelter in the Quarter all this month . . .
Lee looks flustered.FATHER MAJOR SHAFFER
That’s not what I’m talking about. Brother Lee’s deeds are not under scrutiny. It’s his soul. And it’s wandering around in a daze. I’ve seen it before. You’re a case study of the conflicted man.
Father Major Shaffer stands up abruptly.LEE
Father Major Shaffer, I . . . that’s pretty much why I’m here, isn’t it?
A view of the whole office, and it’s actually full of statues and totems of “the other” world.FATHER MAJOR SHAFFER
We’re here for you, and you need to be here. That is what I want you to ponder. You’ve got the weight of two worlds on you. A conflicted Jesuit doesn’t serve the order. It brings it down. You’ve always been smart enough to know this. And smart enough to cover it up.
Shafer walks out and leaves the door open. Lee gets up, goes over and closes it, comes back to his seat.
Long pause.
Father Maguire SIGHS and glances back at the feather draped Lakota spear behind him.LEE
Wow. That was scary.
FATHER MAGUIRE
It always is, isn’t it?
LEE
What’s this really about, Father?
FATHER MAGUIRE
It’s about money, I’m afraid. Part of it. Brother Petersen saw you in the Quarter. He said you were giving our money to a homeless man, and then seemed to be in a trance and didn’t answer him when he came over to you.
LEE
Oh, I . . . I guess I don’t remember that. Anyway . . . did Pete say what the homeless man did with our money?
FATHER MAGUIRE
There is more to this story?
LEE
I did give five dollars to this poor guy. This was a very good trick, actually. He turned my five into a hundred and . . . er . . .
(then quietly)
. . . walked away.
FATHER MAGUIRE
Ha! Then perhaps this man should be working with us!
LEE
He’s sure working for somebody. I still don’t really know what this means . . . he gave me a tunka.
Lee reaches into a black satchel on the floor next to him.FATHER MAGUIRE
Tunka . . . is this rock in Lakota?
Lee hands Father Maguire the tunka skull.LEE
Yes. In this context, tunka is a rock spirit. Only this one is in a little skull.
FATHER MAGUIRE
Ghastly. It feels real. It’s bone.
(rolls around in his hand)
It’s bone carved to look like a skull.
LEE
That’s what I felt. Too small to be ... uh, human.
FATHER MAGUIRE
Did the homeless man say this was a tunka?
LEE
The strangest part of this is this is exactly what he said. And he referred to me as a Wichasha Wakan.
FATHER MAGUIRE
He knew you were raised a Lakota Shaman, then. He knew you from the shelter?
LEE
I don’t think . . . I don’t think so. Not with . . . No.
FATHER MAGUIRE
What about the trance, then?
LEE
Well, that must have happened, because he seemed to have disappeared into a cloud of sparks.
Lee SIGHS.FATHER MAGUIRE
Interesting, Lee! Very! I do find myself wondering what Nightdog would think of this.
Pause.
LEE
Oh. I don’t know. We’re still not really talking.
FATHER MAGUIRE
The state of your relationship with your father has a direct impact on the sate of your work here, Lee. Drop him a line about the homeless man, the tunka, will you?
LEE
I will.
FATHER MAGUIRE
Now, onto some business. I think this will redeem us both in the Father Major’s eyes. A delicate situation has come up I’d like you to help with . . .
(hands Lee a folder)
It will be counseling with a couple that lost their newborn. Read this, and we can meet before if you have any questions.
LEE
Okay, Father.
FATHER MAGUIRE
Tread lightly on this, Lee, it could go wrong quickly. I’m afraid it already has . . . with me.
***
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