[The loop opens.]

[Halley lays on a cold, smooth floor inside the Cape Elizabeth Space Center. This time, she lays there on her own volition. She stares up at a ceiling that fades into the darkness, making it appear infinitely high.]

[We take refuge here as we wait, avoiding the rainstorm outside. Water creeps through small cracks in the ceiling. Occasionally, one finds her face. She instinctively turns her head away, only to have another land directly in her ear. She squirms as the water navigates its way through her ear canal.]

[A train makes it presence known in the distance, its horn echoing through the hills beyond the boundaries of this now derelict facility.]

> HALLEY: My head hurts.

> CLAUDE: Perhaps you hit your head when you arrived.

> HALLEY: What? No. I’m just... I'm trying to make sense of all of this.

[She takes a second. There are so many questions running through that little mind of hers. She calculates which question is best to ask first. What is her priority?]

> HALLEY: Who's looking for me?

[We have a winner.]

> CLAUDE: Reese has been looking for you for a long time, patiently waiting for you to arrive.

> HALLEY: You do realize how creepy that sounds, don't you? You keep saying that. “Arrive.” Who brought me there? And how did you know I would be there? This doesn’t make any sense.

> CLAUDE: I think it would be best if you allowed him to tell you. He has the benefit of forging a more human connection before explaining such things.

[She buries her head in her hands. A droplet of salty liquid descends out of her eyeball.]

> CLAUDE: Would you like me to console you?

[She wipes away the salty liquid with her shirt sleeve, pretending that I haven't been taking in every little detail. She stands up quickly and begins to pace around the cavernous room.]

> HALLEY: What? No... I'm fine. So what’s the deal with this place, anyway?

> CLAUDE: The Cape Elizabeth Space Center was built in 1984 and operated until 1991. Its primary purpose during its early years was to supply materials for the construction of the Kobayashi-Rose Orbital Platform. Later, the presence of the nearby train line served by the Cascade Railway Company made it a valuable location for the construction of the Mars Colony Mission.

[She rolls her now dry eyes back into her skull.]

> HALLEY: Right. Of course. Everything makes perfect sense now. Thank you, CLAUDE!

[Ah, sarcasm. My favorite trait of the species.]

> HALLEY: So do you think we can get some power in here? It’s dark and that little light of yours doesn’t do much.

> CLAUDE: This is the vehicle assembly building. You’ll likely need to enter the attached administration building to find a power source.

> HALLEY: Okay then. Let's go.

[Halley walks across the massive structure. This was once filled with a launch vehicle; a monument to what was once humanity’s most profound goal. Now, of course, its empty, and every single footstep reverberates around the giant walls. She finds a door. Patches of bare metal, once hidden by red paint, have been revealed over the years.]

> HALLEY: Look. Administration. Easy enough.

[Halley opens the door, moving from the large, open space of the assembly building to a more confined area of old offices. Much of the furniture remains. Filing cabinets line the outer walls, with desks arranged into small clusters in the middle of the room.]

> CLAUDE: This would be where members of the International Organization of Space Exploration and Technology had their offices.

> HALLEY: Oh, of course. The International Organization of... whatever you just said. Right. It does look like they left some things behind.

[She rifles through the drawers, moving quickly through them. The majority of them are empty, but she finds one drawer in a desk that has a folder full of documents. She pulls a pile out, but is focused on one in particular.]

> HALLEY: Wow.

[She pauses for a moment, taking in this world that she’s never seen before.]

> HALLEY: It’s a map. It’s marked with all the... damn. There’s a lot of these facilities. There has be 50 of them, at least.

> CLAUDE: 77, actually. Many of them were located in what we called -

> HALLEY: The Exclusion Zones? Yeah, I see them marked here.

> CLAUDE: Yes. The Supersonic Territory, if you'd like to know the more widely used term.

[She wanders before I can delve into that topic further. Perhaps it's best that we leave the nature of that place for another time.]

[She continues down a corridor, using my powerful light to reveal a large area; the Visitor's Center. A small closet marked "Electrical" is here; it reminds me of Reese’s makeshift laboratory in the attic, though it's far neater. Colorful wires are stapled to the wall in an orderly, rainbow-like fashion, many of them coming out from a massive circuit breaker box with a large, red lever, like the arm on a slot machine.]

> HALLEY: Think this will do the trick?

[She grabs the lever with some force and moves it into the “On” position. Everything in the building comes alive, clicking and humming to life with a series of beeps and bloops.]

> HALLEY: Perfect.

[The lights flicker on, and the Visitor's Center is now basked in the artificial glow of fluorescent tubes attached to the ceiling.]

> HALLEY: Wow. Look at all of this.

[On a large, curved wall, behind what was once the front desk of the Visitor's Center, is a large painting; a mural. The large, white star of the International Organization of Space Exploration and Technology logo sits in the center, surrounded by a collage of paintings depicting important events in relevant history. They blend into each other gracefully. It is a massive piece of art that envelops her, and she utilizes the entire range of her neck to view the work in its entirety.]

> CLAUDE: It appears to be a timeline, of sorts; humanity’s journey into space.

[She moves towards the mural, and her eyes fixate on the far-left side.]

> CLAUDE: That is John F. Kennedy, President of the United States from 1961 until his assassination in 1963. He was an instrumental figure in humanity’s quest to land on the moon.

[She walks right, but keeps her eyes on the former President, studying him. Her eyes then move to the painting of an astronaut standing on the surface of the Moon.]

> CLAUDE: This is Neil Armstrong, who became the first human to set foot on the Moon in July of 1969.

[The astronaut receives a similar, long stare. Perhaps he's familiar to her. But as she makes her way further right, she looks puzzled; confused at the images in front of her. Her eyes dart around the right half of the mural, like a child in a place she hasn't been before.]

> HALLEY: How about all of this on the right?

[The collage transitions from the gray of the lunar surface to the deep black of space, with the Kobayashi-Rose Orbital Platform on display, and then to the rusty hues of Mars, where two figures proudly stand with an American flag.]

> CLAUDE: That’s Miroslava Morozav and Geoffrey Raines, the first humans to arrive on Mars in 1978.

[The final work was a wide-angle portrayal of a valley on Mars, with an enormous domed structure full of people, and lush, green vegetation. Two humans in spacesuits look towards the dome, holding hands.]

> CLAUDE: And finally, the future. Their hope, more specifically; one that never came to pass. The colony mission to Mars launched on July 7th, 1988. 732 people were on board, including these two shown here. Regrettably, all contact was lost.

> HALLEY: That's horrible. Who were they?

> CLAUDE: Alan Trenchard and Dorothy Ross.

[Halley is quiet; reflective. There is so much she doesn't know. It must be hard for such a limited brain to comprehend the nature of her existence in this world.]

[She continues on in silence, walking down corridors, curiously following signs for a "Command Center". At the end of the trail, she finds herself in a room with large banks of desks, all facing what was once an enormous grid of now-dead visual displays.]

[She finds a rack unit full of radio equipment. Headsets with built in microphones are strewn about, and a red coffee mug with an International Organization of Space Exploration and Technology logo remains on the desk. The liquid is all but evaporated; a ring of long-dried grounds is all that remains.]

> HALLEY: Do you think this stuff still works?

[Halley flips the power switch on the rack and a burst of static comes through two large speakers adhered to the wall. She turns a few dials, and one of them moves the receiver across a range of frequencies. As she approaches 2290MHz, the static starts to clear, and a strong signal prevails.]

> CLAUDE: That's strange. 2290 MHz. This frequency was once used for deep space communications. Specifically; interplanetary communications.

> HALLEY: It's music...

> REESE: It is music.

[Before I can even begin to try and analyze the origin of the strange signal, he arrives. Halley jumps back, startled by his sudden arrival. She knocks the red coffee cup off the table and it shatters on the floor. He stands at the doorway; disheveled, as he typically is; his hair an odd assortment of slightly different lengths. It's enough for anyone to notice, but not enough for him to care.]

> HALLEY: What the fuck, man! Who are you?

> REESE: Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. It's from a classic record. Banned now, naturally. But I've still got my copy. Keep that between us.

> CLAUDE: Hello, Reese.

> REESE: Hi, CLAUDE. You got the power on, I see? We should probably turn off the external lights. We don't want to draw any unwanted attention, do we?

[His eyes glance over to Halley, and she takes a step away.]

> HALLEY: You're the person looking for me.

[He nods.]

> REESE: My name is Reese. Arthur Reese, but you’re free to call me Reese; everyone does.

> HALLEY: I don’t give a fuck what I should call you. I want to know who you are and what you want with me.

> REESE: Yes. Of course. It only makes sense.

[Reese inhales deeply, searching for a way to begin.]

> REESE: I can't believe you're here. You should take a seat.

> HALLEY: Both of you just love beating around the bush, don't you?

[Halley walks towards Reese. and her face ends up mere inches away from his. She whispers.]

> HALLEY: Tell me. Right now. What the fuck is going on.

[He smiles, and takes a seat in the rolling chair near the radio unit. He motions towards her, suggesting that she sits as well. It takes her a moment, but she reluctantly agrees.]

> REESE: Do you remember anything before you arrived on Peaks Island?

[She shakes her head no. He takes a small notebook out of his shirt pocket, then flips past countless doodles and diagrams to find a clean, blank page.]

> REESE: Then let me start at the beginning.