Video Start

The video opens to show Director Smith smiling down at the camera feed. His head obscures the sun above him as he takes off his helmet and extends a hand towards Ishii. Transparent walls covered in etchings of the Site-207 crew dying in various ways rises from the ground around them. The walls converge in a dome over the two and the director taps on the visor of Ishii's helmet before it melts away.

Smith: Well, this is a pleasant surprise.

The feed moves away from Director Smith as Ishii scoots backwards until he is pressed against the far wall of the construct.

Smith: Your fear is quite impotent, Ishii. You are going to expire again soon. You were just lucky to die on impact all the other times. Or maybe you just stayed home. Then again, knowing me, you might just be a punching bag I fathomed up to sooth myself. I've had a lot of time to realize that those distinctions don't matter. In the end, you are just bags of meat tied to the immortal engine that is me.

Ishii: Then why not grow your own flowers? Why chain us to this?

Director Smith points towards a row of stationary lights above him.

Smith: Ask them. Ask them why we aren't good enough. I've been ramming my head against this divine cinder block for... it probably isn't good for my mindset to actually contemplate that number. Let's ask the audience!

Director Smith materializes his spear and points it towards Olympus Mons behind him. The director trembles in silence for four seconds before breaking out into laughter.

Smith: Never good enough. Never enough death, enough development, ENOUGH OF A DAMN TO PULL FROM THEM! (The director hiccups during the ensuing fit of giggling) Have you ever heard of nominative determinism?

Ishii: What?

Smith: Nominative determinism. The theory that people naturally gravitate towards roles fitting their names. I am named after a character from a book, a human raised on Mars and brought home to spread the Martian word as its prophet. You are named after a yodeling chicken man.

Ishii: What?

Smith: A god put this mountain here, humanity put itself upon its summit, and inadequacy put me on its foothills. I don't intend to disappoint such a despondent patron. I don't care what shades of asinine I have to color myself, I will be their mutual canvas. So I mix the Foundation's bloody hues on this rusted pastel, I set myself atop a god's easel, and I remain blank. Every. Single. Time.

Ishii: Are you going to kill me again?

Smith: Eventually. By blood this mountain was made and by blood I will know its purpose. It is here for a reason, Takeo. A god never acts without one. I know those four didn't. So yodel and cluck up the mountain while I strut about its summit like a peacock until I tantrum this planet to pieces again.

Ishii: I'm not your clown.

Smith: Of course not. We are in the court of a god looking to anoint a fellow and gods don't have jesters.

The walls of the enclosure crack and escaping air comes over the audio.

Smith: They have saints.

The dome breaks open and a gasp comes from Ishii before the vacuum creates silence.

Video End