CHARLOTTE, ASH and EMMA have 1 ticket to the Resettlement Zone. 

 

Charlotte has convinced her colleague DARREN to buy her a ticket by promising to go with him to the Zone. A promise she does not intend to keep.

 

Ash, not trusting the Zone and threatened by Darren’s presence, has taken assertive action and sold their first two tickets. 

 

Charlie thinks they have 3 tickets. Ash knows they have one.

 

He has flipped over whether to own up to what he’s done, or try to convince Charlie not to go to the Resettlement Zone and go with him to CORNWALL instead. 

 

Heads. Ash will keep his secret.

 

First, he has to buy some time. 

 

Downstairs, Charlie has finished packing. She’s ready to go. But no, Ash doesn’t think it’s safe. They should wait to be collected.

 

Is he mad? The danger outside is all the more reason to go. And they’re on borrowed time. Darren is waiting for her! 

 

Ash begins his fabrications. His parents are at the Pick Up Point and they’ve told him not to come. There aren’t enough buses. Social media was full of reports about it. That’ll be why the government shut the Internet down.

 

Eventually, Charlie agrees to wait while they do a bit more digging. But not for too long. He should contact his old schoolmate CURTIS, find out what he knows.

 

Ash borrows CHARLIE’S PHONE - his is still IN RICE. He sends a message to Darren saying Charlie needs to work on Ash. She’ll get him to sleep and meet Darren at the Pick up Point in a couple of hours.

 

Then he looks at Charlie’s phone. Pauses for a second. Then stamps on it. It’s safer if she doesn’t have it. He wakes Emma, provokes her to make a fuss and then calls Charlie up for help. Tells her Emma broke the phone. 

 

Ash heads down to the living room and hears a voice on the landline. It’s a HELPLINE OPERATOR. She is very helpful and presses him for his details. He mentions that his wife didn’t get a ticket; the Operator suggests that might be a mistake - she could look into it? She might be able to get them ANOTHER TICKET? Ash panics and ends the call.

 

There’s a voicemail from the TEEN SON of LAUREN (the CORNWALL COTTAGE’s cleaner), replying to the MESSAGE he left Lauren. The son is a total wreck - he’s discovered both of his parents dead of some mysterious illness in their kitchen. He warns Ash not to come to Cornwall. 

Ash unplugs the landline and puts it in the wheelie bin outside. He tells himself Lauren could have died of anything. 

 

This is the beginning of a monstrous transformation for Ash. It might even have something of the arc of a monster-horror movie like The Fly. 

 

The atmosphere will be tense. Ash’s POV will feel claustrophobic. This chapter will not be a comfortable watch for our viewers, as Ash is forced to lie and manipulate Charlie as he digs himself deeper and deeper and becomes more desperate.

 

As Ash heads down a dark path, terrorising Charlie, we wonder: can Charlie escape the monster? Can Ash overcome his monstrous impulses?

 

Over the course of the next few hours, Ash employs more and more underhand and brutal tactics to convince Charlie of what he thinks is right - faking emails from Curtis advising them not to go to the Zone, undermining Charlie’s decision making, removing items from her suitcase to make her think she’s forgetting things - that she needs him. A long, drawn out, sinister version of THE CONFRONTATION, with Ash eventually well and truly in charge. He ignores the signs that he’s leading them into danger. He plays on her guilt about Darren. He even reveals he knows about the kiss, and plays on her anxiety surrounding it. He uses his relationship with Emma against his wife - her relative discomfort with their daughter. And all the while, he makes her tea.

 

11:30pm A LOOTER breaks in, and Ash surprises them all by overpowering him - forcing the intruder out of the house with uncharacteristic strength and rage. He finds strength in his need to prove himself.

 

12:20am They hear an almighty disturbance from next door, as a group of YOUNG WHITE MEN attack the SMITH’s house. Ash uses this to frighten Charlie as much as possible. 

 

1:15am PRIVATES WILSON and BLAKE arrive outside MARK NEWMAN’S HOUSE. Ash sees this and hides it from Charlie. They take MARK away in their jeep. 

 

2am Charlie is severely weakened by Ash’s behaviour, and we see our protagonists taking the opposite positions we might expect from them. Ruthless Ash has used every tactic he can to save himself. He’s lost sight of his once noble intentions. He just needs to be in charge. And Charlie’s confidence has been severely reduced by Ash’s mind games.

 

She is also drowsy. We flashback to Ash lacing her tea with sleeping pills.

 

Charlie jolts awake. Looks at her watch. It’s 5:05am! Past their pick up time! She rushes to Ash in a panic. Have they missed the pick up?!

 

Ash is waiting by the door. The soldiers have just left. The Resettlement Zone has fallen. They won’t be taking anyone else tonight.

 

A flashback to Ash changing the clocks. Charlie has only, in fact, been asleep for a short time. But she can’t know that.

 

Ash is now able to get what he wants. There’s seemingly only one option left. They have to go to Cornwall. 

 

Charlotte agrees. But the sleep has worn off a little of the effects of Ash’s manipulation. What he’s saying doesn’t quite add up. She grabs his phone from the rice as they leave.

 

In their ELECTRIC CAR, Ash refuses to have the RADIO on.

 

As they drive through the wreckage of the city, Charlie tries repeatedly to get his phone to turn on in her pocket.

 

Eventually, she feels it vibrate.

 

Charlie, now scared of her husband, has to trick him into stopping the car so she can read the message. It’s Curtis. A text sent after the email he showed her earlier. After he destroyed her phone. Replying to her message. Saying they must come to the Zone. Believe the leak. 

 

What leak?! 

 

Ash’s lies start to unravel for Charlie, but she’s aware that her options are limited now.

 

What choice does she have? Does she have the strength to find out the whole truth and fight for her safety? Or does she continue down this path, too tired to fight?

 

Out comes the coin.