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Hawker40

Eddie Willers: Good Morning, Sir.

Victor Morrow: Ed, I gave you the day off.

Willers: I was called in.

Morrow: Who and why?

Willers: Security called me. He came out.

Morrow: Who did? Galt? Already? I was sure the jerk would wait a decade.

Willers: No, sir, the Recon teams watching the Gulch spotted him, and called in a Mars team to make the capture. They’re bringing them in now.

Morrow: Oh, joy. Any injured?

Willers: They tell me Ragnar was badly bruised resisting.

Morrow: Of course he was. Have them sent in as soon as they arrive.

Willers: They’re here, sir.

Morrow: That was quick.

John Galt: Morrow! I should have known!

Morrow: Galt, you arrogant ass, you should have indeed.

Galt: Have your men release me. We’ve got to be allowed to rebuild after the collapse.

Morrow: Excuse me, what collapse? The one you attempted to cause with your deliberate sabotage of the industry and the government of the United States? Please, John, you knew about my project. I told you what my plan was.

Dagny Taggart: John, who is this man?

Morrow: Why, John, you didn’t tell anyone about me? Didn’t inform them about the project? Of course not, no one was as smart and clever as you are. Why, I was just talking to Kearny and Fuchida about you…

Galt: Those two incompetents are here?

Willers: Not only are they here, Mister Galt, they completed the motor you abandoned.

Morrow: Which is only fair, since they did most of the work on it.

Galt: They stole my work!

Morrow: YOUR WORK!? It was Kearny’s theory, and Fuchida’s engineering that made it work. You did one part of engineering, and tried to take the credit from the team, and threw a temper tantrum when they wouldn’t let you steal their work! A temper tantrum that almost caused the collapse of civilization!

Taggart: John, who is this man?

Willers: Sorry, Ms. Taggart, Dagny Taggart, Victor Morrow, head of the Phoenix Project. Mister Morrow, Ms. Taggart was the head of Taggart…

Morrow: Ed? I know who she was. Mike?

A voice from above: Yes, Mister Morrow?

Morrow: Formal, Mike? Notify the head of Taggart Lines that his sister has been ‘found’.

Mike: You do have guests, Vic. And while we’re on the subject, should I notify Her Majesty’s Embassy that the dread pirate Ragnar has been arrested?

Morrow: Of course! Who’s the Royal Navy’s duty officer?

Mike: Commander Fleming.

Morrow: Excellent! Mister Fleming and I share a special bond.

Ragnar: Arrested? On what charge? By what right…

Morrow: By right of being a civilized man, jerk. Piracy is a crime, and the Royal Navy is pissed at all the aid shipments to the United States and Canada you intercepted. Count yourself lucky I’m turning you over to the Royal Navy, if I were a barbarian like you I’d just drag you into Brooklyn and announce who you were and let the mob have you!

Taggart: Brooklyn was destroyed with the rest of New York! We saw it!

Morrow: Really? Mike, raise the shades.

Taggart: Is that… The Empire State Building? We must be…

Reardon: In the Chrysler Building. Facing north. But how?

Morrow: Well, I liked the view, so I leased a few floors.

Galt: But how did we get here? We were put in your paddy wagon, and arrived here in a hour.

Morrow: You really don’t’ know what Kay and Eff’s motor could do. You thought you had the perfect automobile engine, but you had the key to unified field theory. Taking a “paddy wagon” as you so crudely put it, put the motor in with the right attachments, and we flew you out here in…

Mike: One hour, seventeen minutes, thirty two seconds.

Galt: Who is that voice?

Mike: I am Mike, the artificial intelligence invented by Gerrold and Asimov. I am Mister Morrow’s assistant.

Morrow: And a very able one.

Taggart: But New York was destroyed…

Morrow: Give us some credit, Ms. Taggart. The Project was originally intended to restore civilization after a nuclear war. Dealing with an economic collapse was child’s play. It was touch and go, but using Kearny and Fuchida’s motor…

Galt: MY MOTOR!

Morrow: That motor was the work of a team lead by Fuchida, using Kearny’s theory, Galt. Your work on that project was useful, but by no means critical.

Taggart: They couldn’t have finished it without John!

Morrow: That’s funny, they did, in spite of Galt’s sabotage of the databases. Luckily, I was able to recruit the entire team minus the saboteur, plus Kearny’s notes were safely at the University of California.

Galt: They stole…

Morrow: Nothing you arrogant jerk! Don’t you get it yet? You’ve failed, civilization drives on, minus you and your sabotaging 'so called' "Men of the Mind". For every ‘top man’ you recruited, there were a hundred who could do the same job, and ten who could do it BETTER once you and yours were out of the way.

Galt: But without the ‘men of the mind’…

The voice of Julie Andrews comes from the speakers above: “They can still rule with land without you. Windsor Castle will stand without you. And without much ado we can all muddle through without you. Without your pulling it the tide comes in, without your twirling it the Earth can spin, Without your pushing them, the clouds roll by,”

Morrow: “And if they can do without you, ducky, so can”… the rest of us. Thank you, Mike. You’re welcome to return to your exile, Galt, and take you friends except Ragnar. I owe him to the British Crown in return for the generous loans they made. If you ever come out again, I’ll turn you over to law enforcement to face a judge for your crimes.

Galt: What crimes?

Morrow: I’d have Mike print you a list, but we’d be buried in paper.

Mike: The New York Metropolitan Library still wants their copy of ‘The Once and Future King’ back.

Galt: You have no right to force me into exile!

Morrow: You’re right, I don’t’. Under the law, I should turn you over. That’s your choice, Galt. Exile or judgment and execution. And I hope you choose judgment; unlike Reardon you won’t be able to bribe a jury to find you not guilty. I’ll make sure of that! Choose soon, the Constitutional Convention in Philly is going to put out an announcement this afternoon and I don’t want to miss it.

Willers: I have your speech already written, sir.

Morrow: All five hours of it?

Willers: Three minutes. I timed it.

Morrow: Well done. Mike, arrange a bonus for Ed. And overtime for today. You know Galt; I want to thank you before I ship you off. The country was going to hell, what with all the rich jerks buying the laws they wanted and refusing to pay their share. Then the socialist over-reaction was only to be expected. But it went too far, mainly because of you and your pushing, Galt. So I needed the government to collapse so I could fix it. But I didn’t want to cause the collapse, for two reasons. First, because I’m not an amoral asshole who gets off at contemplating the death of millions, and second because it would be easier to fix the collapse if I weren’t blamed for it. You made an excellent lever to move the world with.

Taggart: How did you do it?

Morrow: We had the ability to take a common tractor-trailer, and make it fly faster than the speed of sound. With no sonic boom. Shipping from the farms to the cities was easy. Once that was in place, I was the “man who saved the world” and could do anything. So I took over the government. I acted as a benevolent tyrant for six months, then called for a Constitutional Convention. Refused a seat on any of the committees, but made some suggestions

Taggart: Really. Then what?

Galt: Dagny?

Morrow: Well, they should publish the results in a week, hold a plebiscite (on July fourth of course), elections on the first Tuesday in November, and I’ll hand over power next January. The trick to being remembered as a good leader is to hold an orderly turnover before anything goes wrong.

Taggart: Brilliant.

Morrow: Ms. Taggart are you flirting with me? Button up your blouse, I’m a married man.

Willers: It’s true, I’ve met his co-husband and his wives.

Morrow: And we aren’t looking for a fourth wife.

Mike: Mister Morrow, Commander Fleming is here.

Morrow: Ian! How’s your wife and my kids?

Fleming: Very droll, sir. Ragnar Danneskjöld, you are under arrest for…

Willers: Lookout!

Ragnar: Aarrgh!

Fleming: If you do anything like that again, I shall break your other arm.

Morrow: I told you he’d try it. I guess I should have warned you that Commander Fleming is a member of the Special Boat Service, and probably part of MI6.

Fleming: MI6 doesn’t exist. As I was saying, you are under arrest for piracy on the high seas. Do you need a receipt, Mister Morrow?

Morrow: Since he was never officially in my custody, no. The rest of you, make your choice. But do it outside my office. Ed, once they’re on their way back to Colorado or to Rikers Island, go home. Mike, close the shades, I’m taking a nap.

Galt: You’ll never get away with this!

Morrow: Galt, I “got away with this” six months ago. I could… what’s the word?

Willers: Defenestrate, probably.

Morrow: Thank you, Ed. Toss you out the window and only be fined for littering. A fine that the judge would probably pay for me. And once they found out that I had thrown John Galt out a seventieth floor window, they’d probably give me a medal. I’m the greatest hero alive, Galt, and will be remembered as such. And you will go down in history as the villain. Now get out. And take Ms. Taggart with you before she throws herself at me.

Taggert: Eddie?

Willers: You made your choice, Ms. Taggart, you’re stuck with him.