Day 11 Assignments

[Eric Humble]

Eric Humble’s Outline Draft One

Title: Unarmed Black Men

Genre: Thriller

Concept: A Black doctor suspected of murder will only treat a wounded Black man if the White cop who accidentally shot him proves the doctor innocent.

Logline: Robert, a rookie detective, must reinvestigate a murder under the nose of an older, revered cop in order to get D’Quan, the chief suspect, to treat an innocent man Robert has accidentally shot.

MM1:

INT. YOUTH CENTER – NIGHT

Opening: D’Quan is at the computer lab, about to put a thumb drive in the computer… when his strung-out brother Kareem bursts in, furious –

D’Quan is here to stop Kareem from revealing… something… to some sort of authorities. He pulls a gun on Kareem. Kareem blames this place for his relapse. Doesn’t know how D’Quan can be so blind. He’s right in the center of this and he doesn’t even know it.

They struggle… and the gun goes off, high and wide —. D’Quan darts his head in the direction of the shot…. except Kareem slumps. Dead. Mutters something unintelligible. D’Quan takes off running. The glass door swings shut behind him – the glass is clear.

EXT. STREET – NIGHT

D’Quan calls 911, tells them a man’s been shot. Dispatcher asks if he saw the shooter. He hesitates. The dispatcher asks if he shot him with an accusatory tone. He just tells them to hurry.

INT. POLICE GYM – DAY

Robert works out to the news detailing the manhunt for D’Quan and the growing protests across the neighborhood. At the newsbreak, a commercial about real estate conglomerate Steinhauer; it has properties all across the globe.

Robert talks to his wife over his earbuds as he lifts weights; he left early because he’s working his nerves out – less nervous about his first day as a plainclothes detective than about working with the living legend Markway… who walks in behind him and spots him as he’s lamenting having to live up his standards.

INT. CAR – EVENING

Robert and Markway drive into the neighborhood – it’s all hands on deck until D’Quan is caught – and Markway assumes he’ll return to the scene of the crime: the Youth Center that Markway is a founder of.

Robert disparages the neighborhood as a hotbed of crime and drug use. Markway tries to change his perception – it’s an epidemic, not a choice. Robert doesn’t buy that – someone makes a choice to use drugs. They may not choose to be addicted, but it’s not rocking anyone’s world that heroin is super addictive. You’d need someone to supply the whole neighborhood with a buttload of drugs, like laced in the water or something for him to believe this happened without anyone’s knowing consent.

INT. YOUTH CENTER – NIGHT

They enter the closed Youth Center… and Markway disappears into a locker room, searches around in the dark. Robert gets anxious waiting in the darkened lobby. Finds a locked drawer at the front desk… then discovers a key. Opens it to see nothing but a cell phone.

He’s startled by a video that pops on of an old guy, O’Reilly, a veteran cop, limping up to the screen and welcoming everyone to the Youth Center. Markway returns; he was just looking for the light switch. He explains O’Reilly’s limp is a result of being wounded in the leg years ago which progressed to him needing a wheelchair.

Markway gives Robert a tour, proudly showing him how The Youth Center protects at-risk youths from the streets where they can fall prey to drug dealers. Evenly-spaced portraits of prestigious cops on the Board, most of them retired – the chief among them is O’Reilly, who recently died. Markway’s portrait is set off from the others. Markway self-deprecatingly claims it’s because he’s in the dog house more than his predecessors. He regales him with their services – a flu shot clinic with doctors coming from the hospital every other day to perform “house calls,” like a makeshift urgent care, even a pool of drivers from the neighborhood who shuttle people to and from the hospital – a necessity since Steinhauer bought and subsequently razed the old hospital in this neighborhood.

A sound puts them on alert – someone is here, runs for it. They split up –

EXT. STREET OUTSIDE – NIGHT

Robert inches around back. Spots a condemned property across the street – a sign declares that it’s soon to be a Steinhauer condominium. Graffiti on the sign: Gentrification = Dead Blacks; We are the Diaspora; Where We Supposed to Go?

Someone moves suddenly. Keyed-up, Robert draws his gun – shoots the unarmed man, Standish. Robert searches Standish, no wallet or ID. Robert takes Standish’s phone.

Markway calls and Robert acts like nothing has happened – but D’Quan has witnessed the shooting from the shadows, and drags Standish off.

MM2:

INT. CRIME SCENE – NIGHT

Markway shows Robert around the crime scene. The glass has a bloody handprint – from which they’ve identified D’Quan.

Robert, trying to keep it together, walks through the casefile, which he knows by heart – Security video showed the argument, the gun. They wander off the camera. Blood spatters the wall and the body hits the floor in frame. Then D’Quan runs back into frame looking panicked and runs out.

INT. CLINIC – NIGHT

D’Quan breaks into the clinic with Standish. Standish seems like just a guy from the community, infuriated that a White cop shot him just because he’s Black. D’Quan gathers supplies to treat his wound… but stops short of doing so.

INT. CLINIC/INT. YOUTH CENTER – NIGHT

D’Quan calls Robert over Standish’s number – he’s got the man he shot. The wound will be fatal unless D’Quan treats it… but D’Quan will let him die unless Robert does exactly what he says. Robert expects a ransom or a demand to be let off the hook, but D’Quan, pained to say it, asks him to start by examining the spatter pattern of his brother’s blood on the wall… and they’ll go from there.

MM3:

INT. CLINIC – NIGHT

Standish calls out D’Quan – he’s not really going to let him die, is he? Standish even knows some of the first steps he could take – which D’Quan casually refutes with a description of the complications.

D’Quan goes to the computer and accesses a medical charting system… but runs into a security screen blocking him.

INT. YOUTH CENTER – NIGHT

Robert gets Markway out of the crime scene area by claiming he heard a sound. Better if one of them goes around the perimeter to sneak up behind the “intruder.”

He looks over the marked position of the body against the spatter – angle of the shot looks off. He calls D’Quan to ask what his game is and to demand that he take the first steps of treating Standish…

INT. CLINIC/CRIME SCENE – NIGHT

While talking on the phone, D’Quan inserts a thumb drive that starts running a decryption code…

He admits he shot his gun… but in response to a second shot. Robert finds a second bullet hole covered by the picture of Markway whose location has been rehung where it doesn’t belong… but the shell has been dug out of the wall. Scuff marks on the floor, brown leather, from where someone chased after D’Quan. There was a third person there.

But Markway is in the corridor, idly tapping on the pipes in rhythm to a song he has a habit of humming… and Robert can hear the pipe reverberating over the phone from D’Quan’s location.

INT. CLINIC – NIGHT

The decryption works – D’Quan is in the system…

…when Robert breaks in! Throws D’Quan to the floor, cuffs him. But Markway is heading this way. D’Quan reminds him he’s got a dying man there with Robert’s bullet in him. And he lists the things he needs to do immediately to save him. Won’t get him to a hospital in time. Can Robert do those things?

Markway is near. They all have to take cover. Robert releases D’Quan, but keeps his gun on him… but goes into a bout of PTSD.

INT. CORRIDOR – NIGHT

Markway halts as he discovers blood by the back door where D’Quan brought Standish in through.

MM4:

INT. FRONT OFFICE – NIGHT

But Markway pulls him out of it. D’Quan and Standish are gone without a trace. Markway just got a call over the radio: this case is setting the neighborhood on edge, Blacks in the neighborhood versus cops hunting D’Quan. They have to wrap this up, fast, before a riot breaks out.

INT. WOODWORKING SHOP – NIGHT

D’Quan has moved Standish and sets about doing some rudimentary treatment on him. He laments the looming gentrification of what used to be a thriving Black neighborhood for the past fifty-odd years. Standish asks him why he’s doing this – what does he really want that White cop to find? He admits that this isn’t about his own freedom; he needs to make his brother’s death mean something—to affect social change.

But while he’s talking, Standish hits him and runs. Makes it to a phone… calls and identifies himself as a cop… only to realize the line is dead. It’s an area still being set up. But in the attempt, his wound takes a turn for the worse.

INT. BATHROOM – NIGHT

Robert goes to wash up and calm himself down. There’s a message scratched on a bathroom stall… “Don’t Go Sky High. Get Out.”

Robert asks if the word Cardinal means anything to him. Markway recalls the Cardinal Corporation – a shipping company that was busted for smuggling heroin into the country. The heroin went missing from the evidence locker two years ago. Robert vaguely remembers whispers about it when he was a uniformed officer. But Markway is suspicious – what brought that to mind?

Markway is eyeing him suspiciously… when they hear the noise of Standish’s escape. Robert distracts him from checking on it by suggesting something’s off about the casefile.

INT. SECURITY OFFICE – NIGHT

The computer system is Steinhauer trademarked. Robert asks if they’re selling this place to Steinhauer. Markway comments that sooner or later, the whole neighborhood’s going to get bought by Steinhauer. The bloody handprint that clearly shows D’Quan’s fingerprints isn’t on the tape – he came back later. Why?

Markway doesn’t bite – hints that there’s something Robert isn’t telling him. Robert keeps his composure – doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Markway, unreadable, regards him a moment… then goes along with it. You’re thinking whoever did this is a cop; the bullet pulled out of the wall, the place is run by cops… Markway then gets passionate: if a cop did this, it’ll break the floodgate – but we’re going to nail that bastard to the wall. Cops don’t get to kill people – it’s on us to show this neighborhood we’re going to hold them accountable. Robert is ever more nervous he’ll be found out.

A call comes in to the Youth Center after hours asking to be transferred to the clinic next door – it’s another doctor from the hospital, a White woman, following up on a patient they both see.

Markway hears a disturbance outside. Wants to go outside to check it out.

INT. SECURITY OFFICE/WOODWORKING SHOP – NIGHT

Robert calls D’Quan, who tries to keep the panic out of his voice as he examines Standish’s worsening wound. Robert wants to know why he’s pretending to be a doctor. D’Quan is a respected MD, worth $300,000 per year and has a history of helping addicts kick the habit; this wasn’t a squabble between two addicts over money.

As D’Quan struggles to stabilize Standish, he presses Robert on the police track record of shooting unarmed Black men – and lumps Robert in with them in light of him shooting Standish. Robert refuses to help anyone hostile to the police, refuses to accept that he now stands in the ranks with corruption and racism. D’Quan refuses to acknowledge or help anyone who assumes he’s an inherent criminal simply because he’s Black.

EXT. YOUTH CENTER – NIGHT

Meanwhile, Markway goes down the corridor and checks out the blood on the rear door – follows it outside, sees the blood on the corner where Robert shot Standish. Now, he searches the parked cars, finds a car with a straw hat in the back. He breaks the window, searches the glove compartment – gets the registration for Standish. Considers this… when sounds of an approaching riot get his attention.

INT. SECURITY OFFICE/WOODWORKING SHOP – NIGHT

Robert presses D’Quan on what Kareem was into. D’Quan paints a portrait of a troubled soul, always on the lookout for a get-rich-quick scheme to get out of the neighborhood. And who died for more than something pathetic like another fix. But he doesn’t know exactly what he was into. Just that Kareem said something after he was shot. “Cardinal.”

INT. SECURITY OFFICE – NIGHT

Robert puts it together – he came back later to treat Kareem… but he was dead by then and the APB was out.

Then, he notices the program running in the background of the system. Calls an IT investigator to find out what it is –

– when the power goes out! The riot is out there somewhere close by.

INT. BASEMENT- NIGHT

Robert looks for the backup breaker room, trying to raise Markway – but he’s not responding…

In the darkness, all the exit signs go off – but Robert sees a sliver of moonlight. An exit. It’s not moonlight – it’s the light from a freezer. D’Quan has just lured him into a small room where they’re storing the body of a drug OD victim.

MM5:

INT. BASEMENT – NIGHT

Robert reevaluates his values system elevating the police above all else and his inherent racial bias.

The backup generators kick on – thanks to Markway, who returns with news the riot knocked out a transformer. Robert and Markway examine the body – heroin OD seems likely. But why do they have a makeshift morgue here? Robert searches the file cabinets.

More names… and then, in one drawer, a jacket and bag in one of the filing drawers – a note: Today I’m going to the Sky High Club. If I don’t make it back, take these possessions to my aunt and cousins. I want them to have them. What the hell is this place?

Suddenly, Markway has a gun in his hand – he wants Robert to hand over his gun.

INT. CLINIC – NIGHT

D’Quan has Standish stable and conscious again, but he needs a hospital… yet D’Quan is combative. He doesn’t buy Standish’s claim he’s a cop – if he was a cop, Robert would have recognized him. Standish admits he’s IA – and proposes a deal with D’Quan – if he doesn’t want to go down as accessory to the shooting of a cop, he’ll do what Standish says, starting with calling the guy who shot him.

INT. COUNSELING OFFICE – NIGHT

Robert, tense, tries to brush this off as if he’s confused – but Markway isn’t having it. Someone’s been shot, outside, tonight…

Suddenly, a cell rings in Robert’s pocket. Markway repeats the order to hand over his gun. As he’s doing so, Markway reaches into his pocket, takes out the cell. Answers it on speaker…

…it’s the IT guy. The program Robert saw running is a back-door program to hack into systems that have unchangeable notes features, i.e. insurance and medicine. The police and the medical system here all run the Steinhauer system, so he’s able to access what it was trying to get into: whoever was running this is trying to get into the medical records system to delete prescription notes. Looks like opioids for dozens and dozens of patients, way over the regulated limits. You got yourself a rogue pharma drug dealer. Dr. D’Quan Brown.

Meanwhile, Standish’s phone lights up silently in Robert’s pocket. He silences it.

Markway draws a conclusion – D’Quan is here, and the guy he shot is an undercover cop named Standish. Markway noticed the coded sign of a hat in the back seat to indicate he was working.

Markway knows where he is – somewhere in the east wing, where the shop classes are held. He followed a trail of blood right before the power cut out. He sealed the area off with the master lock. They’ve got to find him before he strikes again, but Robert is to consider him armed and dangerous… approach him with gun out and up. He checks Robert’s gun – it takes the same clip as Markway. He gives him an extra clip, hands it back.

Markway’s plan involves Markway himself going in while Robert keeps watch on the screen. He gets Robert’s agreement… then heads out.

Robert checks the message on Standish’s phone, from D’Quan: Meet me at the woodworking shop. Now.

INT. SECURITY ROOM – NIGHT

Robert watches Markway advance on the screens, calls D’Quan, frantic – Markway’s right on you. D’Quan interrupts – Standish has gone into shock; he needs Robert to get an epipen from the area outside the East Wing, by the clinic. Tells him where to find them, but he’s got to hurry.

INT. CLINIC – NIGHT

Robert races to the clinic, finds the fridge. Unlocks it with the combination D’Quan is giving him – only to discover a brick of heroin inside amid the epipens. No time to absorb it, though, because D’Quan is spurring him on – Standish is going to die if he doesn’t stabilize him! Robert pockets the heroin, goes to leave, but Markway is advancing in the corridor. There’s no way to get around him without being seen.

D’Quan is at a loss… until he remembers a subbasement that’s supposed to run underneath the whole place and connects up – he never knew about it until they did some work on the pipes a few months ago.

INT. SUBBASEMENT – NIGHT

Robert accesses the subbasement – where he’s attacked! An assailant tries to kill him – with a syringe filled with uncut heroin. They overcome him, jab him in the jugular… but D’Quan is there! Fights off the assailant before they can lower the plunger. The assailant runs off.

D’Quan has brought Standish, but he needs the epipen – they give him the shot and stabilize him for the moment.

INT. SKY HIGH CLUB – NIGHT

Robert and D’Quan examine the place – D’Quan realizes it’s the Sky High Club… and is quietly devastated that this is what Kareem meant – he relapsed here.

Robert, meanwhile, discovers many pill bottles with D’Quan’s name as the prescriber. Accuses him of running it. D’Quan admits to prescribing opioids, hundreds of them – but to help people get through withdrawal without having to resort to buying on the street where they could get killed with whatever’s laced in the heroin. He’s heard of this place, but didn’t know it existed in the Youth Center. Robert called him out on being here that night for the same reason he came back tonight, to erase his tracks.

Robert says he thinks Kareem was killed because he had something on whoever runs this operation. He wasn’t trying to blow the whistle on them, he was trying to shake them down.

Robert looks at the brick of heroin. They established this place to create the demand that’s eating the neighborhood alive. But this is uncut heroin – you don’t get this anywhere outside a major cartel. This is part of something big.

Then he hears shots fired!

INT. CORRIDOR – NIGHT

He runs up to see Markway struck in the head, having just shot twice. He spurs Robert on to chase the assailant. Robert does so – but has lost him. The riot is advancing outside. Robert calls for backup, but it’s a no-go. The riot has them cut off from anyone and they’ve got their hands full trying to get it under control.

MM6:

INT. STAFF LOUNGE – NIGHT

Robert treats Markway’s head – all Markway saw was that the guy was Black, but is convinced it’s D’Quan. Robert feels compelled to defend D’Quan – they need to maybe change the focus of this investigation.

They look at the brick of heroin. Millions in street value. Robert wants to know about the Cardinal bust. But Markway calls him out on his secrets – come clean.

Robert ignores it, presses him. Markway details how the Cardinal bust went down. O’Reilly and the others were heroes. O’Reilly got hit in the leg, but wouldn’t stay in the hospital overnight – because he wanted to be in court to meet Cardinal’s legal team head-on by testifying in front of a judge.

Markway returns to the subject at hand – someone was shot outside tonight. Standish is in the area but they haven’t heard or seen him. And there’s a bullet missing from Robert’s mag.

Robert wants him to continue. He does – but then, a DEA agent who wasn’t directly involved showed up at the precinct with some additional evidence to be logged. It was irregular, but he was allowed back into the evidence locker – and the heroin was discovered missing the next day. The name the agent gave was revealed to belong to a dead agent. No one could identify the man who came in… and all the cops in

the precinct were transferred to out to other precincts in the following week. Robert takes that to mean whoever did this had some pull high up.

Markway, incensed at the insinuation this had something to do with his heroes, presses him again – Standish is IA. If he’s been shot or God forbid killed, and Robert is in any way involved, he’s going down hard. And Markway won’t back him up… unless he comes clean, here and now. If a mistake has been made there’s a path to redemption, but only if he comes clean on everything. Now – including what made him ask about Cardinal in the first place… well before he came across this heroin.

Robert decides to conceal it further: he just had an intuition. Something about this place, about seeing O’Reilly on the screen, must have triggered it. As for his gun, he was at the range this morning – he knew this would be a big day and he was antsy.

Markway wants them to go on the offensive – D’Quan or no, they’re not alone here and whoever else is here, he’s armed. But he’s weak, and his gun has jammed. Robert barricades the office and, reluctantly, to go along with the act, gives him his gun – he’s going to get him some more wrappings from the clinic and some meds if they have any.

INT. SKY-HIGH CLUB – NIGHT

Robert confers with D’Quan. Standish needs a hospital. It’s a moment of decision for both of them. Robert tells D’Quan he can trust him – he’s going to see this through and protect him. D’Quan looks over Standish – if he goes in with a bullet from Robert’s gun in him, they’re both going to be sharing a cell. But Robert has a plan – Standish is IA and he was already here. He’s been looking into this place because he knows all the cops and ex-cops who run it are into the drug trade. All they need is to get him better and he’ll be on their side.

INT. CORRIDOR – NIGHT

As they bring Standish on one of the heroin den stretchers to a side exit, Robert calls the cop who was in charge of the evidence locker and grills him on the theft – only for the cop to warn him off this path. “If you have a family, drop it.” Robert takes this to mean the cop is threatening him – when the cop hints that he’s the one under threat. But when Robert brings this up, the cop tells him he’s frightfully naive. These people are more powerful than just a couple of thug DEA agents. Cross them and there’s no place on this earth you’ll be safe.

Robert pleads. Anything you can give me. The “DEA Agent” who came to the precinct was in full combat fatigues and mask over his face… but he had a limp. Robert assumes it was O’Reilly… who had been shot and didn’t stay in the hospital that night.

They reach the side exit – but it’s a war zone outside – first they have to get him through the riot to a hospital.

INT. LOBBY – NIGHT

Robert returns to the lobby – following D’Quan’s suggestion that they need Black faces to get through that crowd. Anything official, even an ambulance, is subject to attack out there. They need people from the neighborhood – and there’s a list of people who shuttle people to the hospital. They can get someone who can sneak him through…

But suddenly, he remembers the cell phone in the drawer. Thinks it’s Kareem’s. He can’t unlock it with the footage the brother’s face – but the portrait of one of the founders does the trick. There’s one number in it, no files. He calls – and gets a tense voice asking what this is about.

He introduces himself as the police… and the voice acts like this is obvious. “Yeah. And…?” The phone gets locked out. He goes to unlock it on the original portrait – but another beats him to the punch. He locks it and tries the next portrait. One by one. Each of the founders’s faces can unlock the phone. Whatever’s going on here, they’re all involved.

The riot has reached this building. They have to back away. Robert flicks off the light… and recalls that he discovered that phone when they first arrived… when Markway was gone looking for a light switch, even though one is obviously right here. What was he doing in the locker room?

INT. LOCKER ROOM – NIGHT

Robert searches the lockers, when suddenly Markway bellows out – he’s on his feet, gun in hand, taking aim at them. Not seriously injured — he’s been tracking Robert.

Robert and D’Quan duck. Robert gives D’Quan the phone list, tells him to get back to Standish and call a ride. Markway chases him. Robert tries to intervene, but Markway hits him out of the way…

Markway skids while chasing D’Quan and makes the same marks from the crime scene… Markway was the third man there, the killer!

M7:

INT. CORRIDOR – NIGHT

Standish comes to as D’Quan is calling a man to give them a ride out. Standish tells D’Quan he’s investigating Markway – he has an unreported track record of shooting unarmed Black men.

Standish is fading. D’Quan has to keep him talking. Standish says that his parents and siblings disowned him when he joined the police force.

INT. LOCKER ROOM – NIGHT

Markway stalks Robert through the lockers. Robert discovers a locker with a sticker of a cardinal on it – forces it open to find an mp3 recorder. Kareem’s evidence: a recorded conversation, business people dryly discussing creating an addiction epidemic. O’Reilly is mentioned by name. The recipients include everyone on the board. But the speaker is nameless.

Robert goads Markway to talk: why anyone would do this? Markway challenges him to be a detective, put it together. Robert notices out the window the sign on the condemned slum across the street: soon to be a Steinhauer Condominium. Steinhauer is planting the seeds to buy and gentrify the neighborhood within the next decade. They’re clearing the field and devaluing the properties.

Markway sells it to cut Robert in so he doesn’t have to kill him, too…. as he’s closing in on him. Robert tricks him and gets away.

INT. WOODWORKING SHOP – NIGHT

Robert, unarmed, goes into the woodworking shop where there are power tools he can use as weapons against Markway. Markway kills the power – revealing that he’s the one who shut it off before. All Robert is able to retrieve is a nail gun at low charge.

INT. CORRIDOR – NIGHT

Robert gets turned around in the dark, reaches a dead end. Has to double back… when Markway attacks him, disarms him of the nail gun. Reveals that he’s the assailant who tried to OD him earlier. He zip ties him to a pipe and takes the mp3 player from him. The good thing about riots, all he has to do is pin his police badge to him and throw him to the wolves. But D’Quan he’ll have to take care of himself.

INT. SKY-HIGH CLUB – NIGHT

Markway is headed for D’Quan. He calls for SWAT reinforcements – the focal point of the riots is D’Quan and a rogue cop – cut off the head of the snake and the body dies. Use the choppers and get here.

INT. CORRIDOR/INT. LOBBY – NIGHT

Robert manages to get himself free. Gets to the lobby and retrieves the cell phone from the locked drawer – calls the number. It reaches the Steinhauer CEO. He tells him who he is, that he knows everything – and that his man, Markway, has gone rogue. He’s got an audio recording he’s going to make public that implicates them all. But Robert will take care of him for a small fee… when he hears a chopper and a spotlight sweeps the windows.

INT. SKY-HIGH CLUB – NIGHT

Robert lures Markway into confessing everything on record as they play cat-and-mouse, acting like he’s giving into the temptation – he’s ready to give up D’Quan for execution staged to look like self-defense… but he’s got an open phone, which D’Quan is playing for Standish to overhear…. As the car arrives through the crowd.

Markway gets wise, destroys the mp3 player.

INT. CORRIDOR/EXT. ALLEY OUTSIDE – NIGHT

D’Quan can’t move Standish outside – there’s a SWAT team surrounding the building. They’ll cut them to pieces. Standish gives D’Quan his badge, tells him to hold it high – they won’t shoot a cop. D’Quan hates the idea… but does it anyway to get them in the car.

INT. SKY-HIGH CLUB – NIGHT

Robert gets Markway talking… it was one of the old-time founders of the Youth Center, a retired cop, who went in to get the heroin, wasn’t it? How did he sell him on this scheme? Markway again challenges him to use his detective training—no such thing as coincidence.

EXT. CAR – NIGHT

D’Quan, badge high, wheels Standish to the car, gets him in with the help of the Black driver… both of them in the gunsites of SWAT officers. D’Quan is about to get in… but hesitates. Standish warns him – they’ll kill you, brother.

INT. SKY-HIGH CLUB – NIGHT

Robert deduces—this was always the plan even stemming back to the heist. They were supposed to steal the heroin during the bust but the DEA got involved. They had to wait until the heroin was “in house” at the precinct and under their control.

But Markway has backed Robert into a corner, emerges, ready to shoot him. Offers to do it quick here, rather than have the SWAT team take him out and make a whole public thing of it.

But D’Quan comes up behind him with the syringe and plunges it into him. ODs him. As Markway goes down, the SWAT Team bursts in!

But an order is coming in over the radio to stand down – it’s Standish, clinging to consciousness as the car drives him through the crowd to the hospital, identifying himself by name and badge number – stand down. This is an active undercover investigation, and they are to defer to the detective on site – Robert. We see that the phone has been recording it all.

The SWAT team cuffs D’Quan as Robert and he share a look. Robert pledges he’ll be alright, he’ll stand by him. He’ll clear him of all charges.

INT. JAIL CELL – NIGHT

… but D’Quan is still railroaded for tampering with medical records. Gets three years and loses his medical license. The system still favors White people.

INT. STANDISH’S OFFICE – NIGHT

Standish, recovering, calls Robert into the IA office. He can’t save D’Quan from his fate, and, surprisingly, tows the company line regarding Markway…

…by offering Robert a promotion on the condition they keep everything quiet about Markway. They’re going to palm it off on the dead cop, O’Reilly. It’s better to mend community relations by keeping Markway a venerated hero.

Robert resigns instead.

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SOLVE THESE:

-What are Standish’s injuries and what are the actual medical procedures D’Quan has to perform?

-How does Standish injure himself worse while trying to escape?

-Why are the supplies he needs in the Youth Center?

-Work on where Markway, D’Quan, and Robert are at every scene