EVEN UNARMED, LANGDON STARTS TO MOVE FORWARD, JUST AS --

-- the sliding door on the fountain side of the van SLAMS open

-- revealing the figure of the FOURTH CARDINAL, wrapped in chains

and with manacled hands and feet. He thrashes against the iron

links, but the chains are too heavy. One of the links bisects

his mouth like a horse's bit, stifling his cries for help. Mr.

Gray hovers over him.

Langdon GASPS --

-- and Mr. Gray shoves the bound figure roughly out of the van.

The Cardinal rolls, falling into the fountain with an enormous

SPLASH. His weighted body sinks immediately to the bottom.

There is a moment, frozen in time, in which Langdon locks eyes

with Mr. Gray, still hunched in the back of the van as the clock

tower continues to BONG, the only sound we can hear.

Langdon looks at him, then down at the body in the fountain, then

back up at Mr. Gray--

-- who salutes him ---

-- the van door SLAMS shut, and the van tears ass out of there.

Langdon looks from its receding taillights to the idling police

car, its door hanging open, he could jump in and give chase, but

then his eyes go back to the fountain, where the drowning cardinal

must not have much time left, and it's really no decision at all.

Langdon covers the distance to the fountain in two quick strides

and leaps in.

IN THE FOUNTAIN,

the water is waist deep and like ice. Steady streams of bubbles

rise up from the bottom, churning it.

Langdon reaches the body of the Cardinal, plunges in --

UNDERWATER,

-- and struggles to get both arms underneath the drowning man.

Through the watery haze, we can see the man's bare chest, branded

with the final ambigram:

WATER.

96.

Langdon struggles to lift him, but the weight is too much, he can

barely get him a few inches off the bottom of the fountain, much

less all the way to the surface.

Langdon, running out of air, bursts to the surface and -- ON THE

SURFACE,

-- takes a deep breath, then plunges back --

UNDERWATER,

-- but he still can't move the Cardinal.

He makes eye contact with the dying man, who seems to be accepting

his fate, maybe even welcoming it.

Langdon changes his grip, strains like hell, and actually gets him

a few inches higher this time, but nowhere close to the air

supply.

But with the new position, his eyes fall on something behind the

cardinal -- a plastic tube, six inches across, streaming bubbles

into the fountain.

He goes back --

ABOVE THE SURFACE

-- takes another breathy and sees the fountain of bubbles rising

up to the surface just above the tube. Air!

Several PASSERS-BY notice the commotion in the fountain as Langdon

dives back under the water.

UNDERWATER,

Langdon drags the body of the Cardinal a few feet across the

bottom of the fountain and RIPS the tube free from its mooring,

pulling it to the Cardinal's mouth.

He clamps it down over the man's lips, and the Cardinal sucks a

few greedy breaths from it. Enough to keep him alive.

Langdon takes the tube and draws a couple breaths of his own, then

digs his hands back underneath the Cardinal to lift him, but this

time --

-- SIX MORE HANDS come in from all sides.

Several Passers-by have jumped into the fountain to help, and as

they all strain together --

97.

ON THE SURFACE,

-- the Cardinal's bound body breaks the surface and he GULPS deep

lungfuls of air.

He is saved. Langdon sags against the side of the fountain,

exhausted and freezing, as the others pull the Cardinal's body to

safety.

In the distance, SIRENS.

Langdon, gathering himself, goes to the Cardinal, speaks in rapid

Spanish, subtitled.

LANGDON

Cardinale Guidera?

CARDINAL GU

Si...si...

LANGDON

The Church of Illumination. It's

where you were being held, isn't it?

Guidera nods weakly as, around them, it seems like everybody

arrives at the fountain -- Carbinieri, Swiss Guard, Vatican

Police, paramedics -- car after car after car.

LANGDON (cont'd)

(still to Guidera)

Where is it?!

CARDINAL GUIDERA

Castel... Sant'Angelo...

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Date: 2015-12-18; view: 715