Fox Hunt: A Screenplay [FICTOID]

VAST COUNTRY ESTATE – A MISTY MORNING

Ancient manor, ancient wealth.
Beautiful horses, immaculately tended.
Beagles, baying, eager, barely held in check.

Fox hunters mount up.
Elegant red velvet coats.
Long black dresses.
They laugh, they flirt.
They want the hunt.

Trapped fox.
Nervously pacing in its cage.
Turn it loose.
In terror it runs into the fogged cloaked woods.

Give it a sporting chance.
Wait thirty seconds.
Then loose the hounds.
Spurs to flanks.  Horses gallop off.
The hunters laugh, loving this.

 IN THE WOODS

The fox runs full tilt.
She knows she will be torn to pieces.
Run.  Run!  RUN!!!

 The beagles pursue, baying loundly.

The hunters on horseback follow.
Their expressions almost orgasmic.

The fox zigzags.
Under branches.
Across streams.
Through hollow logs.
But the dogs close in.

Closer…
Closer…
Closer…

A HOLLOW IN THE WOODS

The fox dashes across the leaf covered ground.
The beagles close in, inches away.

Whoosh!
A net hidden beneath the leaves scoops the dogs up.
They yelp in alarm.

The hunters on horseback arrive a heartbeat later.
They halt, puzzled.
How put the net there?

 IN THE BUSHES

…something moves…

A crossbow aims at the hunters.

Twang!
A hypodermic dart hits one of the horses.
It whinnies and topples over.

The hunters look alarmed.
They’re ready to flee.
Dozens of crossbows fire around them.

The horses go down.
The hunters stagger to their feet.
Terrified to be on the receiving end.

More crossbow darts.
One by one hypodermic darts his the hunters.
One by one they go down.

 FADE OUT.

FADE IN.

IN ANOTHER PART OF THE WOODS

The hunters gradually awake.
Dizzy.
Disoriented.
Naked.

They panic.
Something is terrible wrong.
It shouldn’t be like this.
It should never be like this.

The bushes around them move.
Figures step out.

At first they seem to be paramilitary.
Then the hunters see the masks.
Fox masks.

The fox leader points off to the deepest, darkest part of the woods.
Go.
The hunters look terrified.
One hunter shakes their head.

Twang!
Another crossbow dart.
This one isn’t a hypodermic.
Solid metal.
Right between the eyes.

The defiant hunter goes down.
The fox leader pulls out their knife.
Skins the dead hunter.

The other hunters scream, run into the woods.

The fox leader keeps skinning the corpse.
The other foxes chase after the hunters.

As the fox leader peels the skin, screams come from the woods
Several terrified hunters.
Then just a few.
Then just one.
Then silence.

FADE OUT.

FADE IN.

The fox the hunters pursued sniffs the ground.
Comes up to the skinned corpse of the first hunter.

The trees around the skinned corpses are draped with hunters’ skins.

The fox looks at the skins on the branches.
Looks at the skinned corpse before it.
Pisses on the corpse.

Runs off to freedom. 

THE END