11x07 - The Sentinel

[bunniefuu]

WHITELY: It's funny the things
that you remember from school.

One of my history teachers told me

that after the Indians k*lled Custer,

two squaws shoved needles in his ears

so that he'd learn to listen
better in the afterlife.

You should've listened better.

♪ ♪

(CAT YOWLS)

- Hey.
- Hey.

Where is everyone?

"Everyone"?

You're supposed to call
the station, bring backup.

Trust me when I tell you, Gino,
they would not have come.

Do you have my g*n?

Is this the place?

It's right down there.

All right.

Okay, what are you doing?

What are you talking about
what am I doing?

No, this is not how it works, Gino.

Okay, I can handle this. You stay here.

Excuse me, that fucker tortured me.

I'm gonna be a part of this.

No, you're not.

I am coming with you.

And the longer you sit here
and think about it,

the more likely it is that Henry
is gonna get k*lled.

Jesus f*cking Christ.

GINO: You want to be
f*cking Rock Hudson?

You're not going in without
Susan Saint James.

♪ ♪

Jesus.

What are our lives gonna be like

when we're not hunting serial K*llers?

Boring and pointless.

Eating pasta every night and
watching Hollywood Squares.

- (CLATTERING NEARBY)
- That sounds kind of perfect.

♪ ♪

Oh, sh*t.

Okay, okay...

All the sudden,
I'm starting not to like this.

PATRICK: Oh, come on, Gino.

You're a reporter.

Treat it like one of your stories.

Somehow, in journalism school,
I missed the course on

breaking into the m*rder*r's lair.

- (SCRAPING NEARBY)
- What's that?

(CLACKING IN DISTANCE)

GINO: Is he alive?

Yeah, he's still alive.

(MACHINERY WHIRRING)

(CHAINS CLANKING)

Jesus.

f*cking holy mother of God.

(GRUNTING)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

(GRUNTING)

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

(YELLING)

Damn it.

I can't believe this is happening.

Got to get out of here.

Well, there's an idea.
I hadn't thought of that.

We should get out of here.

(MUTTERING QUIETLY)

Patrick!

Don't. Don't do that.

It doesn't help.

Also...

He's too young for you.

What?

I'm just saying, in my opinion,

a gentleman of your élan
should be with someone

who's a more suitable,
sophisticated life partner.

I-I should've listened to him more.

I shouldn't have been so unforgiving.

God, this lament.

Oh, why couldn't he have
taken my other ear?

GINO: f*ck!

f*ck!

f*ck.

WHITELY: Thank God you're alive.

I didn't think you were coming back.

I'm sorry about the tenderizer.

I just... I had to have something
that would work really fast.

I-I gauged my swing so I
wouldn't tenderize your brain.

And the gag, I-I don't like
hearing people scream in pain.

That's not why I do this.

I wanted to get you alone
so we could talk.

I just have to tell you...

I'm a fan.

I admire you so much.

Must be hell being in that precinct.

What you go through on a daily
basis, I can only imagine.

And even though we're kind of
working at cross purposes,

I made a little change of plan.

I already gave him a heart.

But it's a heart from someone
of no consequence.

But a sentinel,

a beacon of hope
for the entire community,

deserves better...

Don't you think?

So, I'm going to give him your heart.

A noble, b*ating heart.

I hope you realize
what an honor this is.

But please bear with me first.

I've got to correct a mistake.

(SQUELCHING, CRUNCHING)

(LAUGHING)

What could you possibly be laughing at?

That's a viscera chart.

Look.

That chart, it shows all
the parts they threw away.

That's what this room was for.

That's why he put us here,
what he thinks of us.

GINO: f*ck.

(CHAINS RATTLING)

(PAINED GROANING)

What are you doing?

Destroying my hand is what I'm doing.

It's really gonna cut down
on my self-love.

(AGONIZED GROANING)

(YELLING)

Oh.

Jesus, you did it. You f*cking did it.

Shh, shh, shh.

Not so quick, Tinkerbell.

Oh, this other one is too tight.

It's not gonna loosen up. God.

Then get something to get us free.

Keys, on the wall.

And these tables don't move.

Try to find a-a small Kn*fe,
something to pick the lock.

Who am I? Houdini, suddenly?

Jesus.

(STRAINING)

Yes. Yes. Yes.

(LABORED BREATHING)

Hurry.

These tools aren't sharp enough
to cut through this metal cuff.

Oh, I don't want to do that.

Ooh, g*dd*mn it,
I don't want to do that.

GINO: Wh-What are you talking about?

Do what?

Oh, f*ck it.

I guess I deserve it.

No. No, no.

None of us deserve this.

I could've stopped this fucker
a long time ago.

Deep down, I knew it was him.

But I just buried my head in the sand.

I just decided that it didn't affect me,

and so I let people die.

My people.

Our people.

Well, this is where...

... I give something back.

Henry, what are you doing?

Henry?

Henry, what are you... ?

No, Henry.

No.

No!

(CRUNCHING)

Hey.

Hey!

So, you're making a beacon
of hope for our community.

You really love our community, huh?

It's all I care about.

PATRICK: Yeah?

How many of us do you have to butcher

to make that... thing?

The Sentinel has to come from us.

What would you have me use? Straights?

Some sacrifices were necessary.

The deaths of our unfortunate
brothers proved something.

Yeah, what?

That no one cares about us.

That no one cares what happens to us.

Especially the police.

I think I proved my point, don't you?

You really think this ugly
lump of dead meat

is going to make a difference
to anybody?

He won't be dead.

You've heard stories about people

who've fallen beneath the ice

and survived for minutes
before being revived?

Right now he's being kept
fresh by embalming fluid,

but once your heart is in place,

I'll drain the fluid,
transfuse some of my blood,

an injection of adrenaline

and a hit of the paddles...

The blood will flow,
the heart will pump,

and he'll live again,

ready to take his place among the world.

It's all very exciting.

(GROANING)

Hey.

There we go.

Out with the old...

(GROANING)

... and in with the new.

(PATRICK GROANING)

(CHAIN SAW REVVING)

Get back, you sick f*ck!

I said get the f*ck back!

You should've k*lled me while
you had the chance, Whitely.

(CHAIN SAW REVVING)

Right?

We're gonna make you pay

for what you did to those people.

They d*ed for the greater good.

I'm doing something glorious,

something that will change the world.

How did shoving needles
under my fingernails

help you to change the world?

WHITELY: I wasn't torturing you,
I was testing you.

It's like that man in the leather bar.

I just knew right away he wasn't worthy.

And-and the parts that I didn't use,

I left for the police to find.

To show how powerless they were,

and how little they cared for us.

You're going to tell me
that you didn't get off

on all that just a little bit?

I have my demons.

I faced them that night

you hired me to cut up that boy, Henry.

I confess, I enjoyed it.

And that's the part of me that
needs to get b*rned away.

(g*n CLICKING)

No.

All of you needs to be b*rned away.

The Sentinel is our salvation.

He will save us.

He will show the world our
suffering and will redeem us.

The only one who needs
redemption is you, buddy.

But you don't get it.

(g*nsh*t)

♪ ♪

(CLAMORING)

REPORTER: Officer Read,
how's it feel to be a gay cop?

(CLAMORING CONTINUES)

MULCAHEY: I'm just
as shocked as you are.

But what can you expect from a...

"department that treats gays

like they don't exist,

or worse, that they shouldn't exist".

You know, you surprise me, Mulcahey.

Because I'm reading a f*g rag?

PATRICK: No. I didn't know
that you could read.

I would offer to clear out my desk,

but I'm pretty sure that's painted shut.

I don't need your badge, Detective Read.

Give it to someone who does.

Would you hang on a second?

Have a seat, would you?

There's nothing left to say.

Oh, yeah, that-that's
the truth right there.

You pretty much said it all.

Made us sound like
a lost division of the SS.

You know, believe it or not,
I get where that comes from.

Some of these guys, they, uh...

Well, I don't need to tell you.

Just wish you hadn't gone to the press.

You know?

Doesn't mean you're getting fired.

What makes you think I'm not quitting?

Well, I hope you'll stick around
and help us fix this mess.

Relations with your, uh, community.

You know, you can head up
a sort of outreach.

You must be getting a lot of
heat from upstairs, huh?

Look, whether I am or not,
I'm sincere about this.

"Sincere".

Why don't we start with
reopening every single case

you swept under the rug because
one of the victims was gay, huh?

And I'm just thinking off
the top of my head here.

How about that poor teenage boy

who was b*at half to death in the Bronx?

Or the couple who were kissing in public

and got pelted with bricks
in the street?

Or the assholes who turned up
with baseball bats

to a private party and
smashed the place up?

And where are we, huh?

Where the f*ck are we with the
gay bar fire investigation?

No?

Not that sincere?

f*ck you.

f*ck this whole department.

Detective Read.

Nah, it's not "Detective" anymore.

No, sir.

It's just Read now.

Hey. Sorry about the wait.

Had a little issue upstairs.

So, uh, like I said, this is...

This is going to be extremely difficult.

You sure you want to do this?

I'm ready.

All right.

Let's go.

There is, uh, considerable damage

to the postmortem of these bodies,

so I'm really not
expecting you to identify

any of your friend's remains.

But, uh, we got to take a sh*t.

What did he do to them?

He was taking them apart

and using the pieces to
make his own creation.

Targeted intellectual guys
for the organs,

and beautiful men for
the physical features.

Nothing about this is gonna be easy.

- You ready?
- Yeah.

You, uh, you know,
you're very good to do this.

Would you believe we've
only ever had one family

come forward to identify remains?

Guess they preferred their sons
dead than gay, huh?

You just described it to me, but...

I still can't believe it.

How could... ?

How could anybody
do something like this?

What the f*ck is wrong
with people in this city?

PATRICK: Take your time.

♪ ♪

I don't see anything of Sully here.

If he's here,

or anywhere, I...

I can't tell.

You tried.

That's all we can do.

How many men are a part of this thing?

We think maybe seven bodies.

Well, there are a lot more murders

and missing guys than that.

Where are they?

ADAM: Could it be fatal?

HANNAH: It's hard to
say. Whatever this is,

it's now affecting
our platelets and T cells.

And the others?
Are-are you tracking them?

Half of my patients with these
same symptoms have disappeared.

What?

I couldn't legally disclose
this before, but now

that we know that Sully wasn't
a victim of the Mai Tai k*ller,

I feel like I have to tell you.

- Sully was one of my first patients.
- What the f*ck, Hannah?

When I first heard he went missing,
I assumed he went home

to be with his family because
he was sick and...

Sully would've told me that.

He...

He disappeared in the park that night.

I'm just as confused as you are, Adam.

No.

This doesn't make sense.

How could this illness be related

to all of these disappearances?

I don't know.

And I don't have
the resources to find out.

I'm sorry. I wish I did.

Oh, my God.

LITA: Have you tried contacting
any bigger labs or companies

- that could help?
- unanswered phone calls.

Even my university colleagues
won't touch this.

Without funding, no one gives a sh*t.

I wish I were surprised.

And the worst part is
it's not just one illness.

What Adam and I have is viral,

but what KK has
is a bacterial infection,

similar to the deer on Fire Island.

It's the ticks. I told you,
it's biological warfare.

Probably the CIA.

We should write an article about this.

Put it in the Pride issue,
start building interest now.

Absolutely.

There's still too much research
that needs to be done.

Insect bites, rashes,
fevers, disappearances.

It's all just too convoluted right now.

We'll only print the facts.

Let the readers make up their own minds.

We can't trust the public

to come to a rational
conclusion on their own.

Half-baked science always
leads to conspiracy theories.

ADAM: Sully didn't go home
to his parents. I checked.

I hate to say it, but I
think that there could be

more victims of the Mai Thai k*ller

that just haven't been found yet.

Or there's another k*ller out there.

Do you hear yourself?

There's a leather daddy
who's stalking people

with blood disorders?

I mean, this is crazy.

We caught the k*ller.

It's over.

I'm not crazy, okay?

I know what I saw.

And there is space, here,

for an article about this,

even if it's just a little blurb.

Adam.

Before all of this took over our lives,

Patrick and I put down a deposit
on a Fire Island rental

and it comes up this weekend.

I refuse to let it go to waste.

So why don't you join us?

Take a break from all of this insanity.

We're trying to get on with our lives

and-and I think that you should, too.

(SCOFFS)

I can't.

Theo and Hannah are helping me
reignite the search for Sully.

I-I can't just... leave.

Bring them with you. It's a big house.

I think the ocean air
will do us all good.

♪ ♪

(DOOR CLOSES)

(PATRICK SIGHS)

- Hey.
- Hey.

GINO: You okay?

- Uh-huh.
- Good, good.

I'm exhausted. I think the beach
is gonna do us both good.

PATRICK: Right.

We are not gonna
allow this to destroy us.

- It's destroyed us already, Gino.
- No.

- It's broken.
- We just got to get somewhere

- away from these four walls.
- Barbara d*ed.

- GINO: I understand.
- She's a good person. It's my fault.

It's... Patrick, it's not your fault.

- It is my fault.
- It's not.

She knows it. I just saw her, Gino.

You saw who?

I saw Barbara.

I saw Barbara on the street, just...

What?

Oh, my God, I'm going out
of my f*cking mind.

GINO: Hey. Hey. Hey.

I'm going out of my f*cking mind, Gino.

Hey, no, no, no. Shh.
Come on, breathe. You're safe.

It's okay. It's okay.

- We're gonna be okay.
- It's not okay. It's not okay,

Gino, we're not gonna be okay.

Look at our f*cking lives.

Look at our lives.

Every day,

something terrible is gonna happen.

You're safe, you're safe.

I'm not.

And we're not safe, Gino.

♪ ♪

You're safe.

(SIREN WAILS OUTSIDE)

(COUGHS)

(EXHALES)

(GRUNTS SOFTLY)

(DIAL TONE)

(LINE RINGING)

ADAM: Hi. You've reached Adam and Sully.

Leave a message.

(BEEPS)

Adam, it's me.

Uh, I'm not gonna be able
to make it to Fire Island.

The way I'm feeling right now,

I'm just too g*dd*mn pregnant
to handle that ferry ride.

I'm really sorry. Rain check?

(DIAL TONE)

(DIALING)

(LINE RINGING)

Hey, Mom. It's Hannah.

I know we haven't talked in a while,

but I just really needed
to hear your voice.

There's this disease going around

and I'm afraid that I have it.

It's my immune system.

My white blood cell count is really low.

I don't need to get
into the details, but...

I'm just really scared, Mama.

I was wondering if
it'd be okay if I came

and stayed with you for a little while.

(SIGHS) Okay.

Okay.

I love you.

I'll see you soon.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

(KEYS CLACKING)

GINO: Pride.

What does the word mean
in the face of so much death?

Pride is a construct,

something we summon to unite us

when we feel tired and weak.

Pride takes work,
but death comes easily.

Death is an old friend,

someone every gay person
has known their whole lives.

As we walk the streets,
in our jobs, and in our homes,

we have seen how
quickly the world's hatred

towards us can escalate to v*olence.

In a glance or in a kiss,

death is always lurking
around the corner.

Some of us drown out death's
low roar with sex,

some drown it out with
dr*gs or food or work.

But no matter our vices, when
that low roar grows to a rattle,

and when that rattle ruptures,

we can no longer ignore
the seismic terror

of our daily dance with death.

Something is coming,

something evil on the horizon.

GINO: Yes, the Mai Thai
k*ller was a sick man.

But was there some
ounce of virtue in his impulse

to build a Sentinel,

to protect the very people he hurt?

Was this his Pride?

For those of us on the outskirts...

the unseen, the abused, the demeaned,

and the impoverished...

the terror of our mortality

leads us to destruction.

We lash out,

we hurt ourselves,
and those who love us.

We lie, we steal,

and if we are driven to it, we k*ll.

Who am I to judge those who
have gone down this path?

Aren't their impulses the same as mine?

Isn't their rage justified?

Did they simply choose death

because it was closer
than Pride could ever be?

The hypocrisy is untenable.

h*m* must be
treated like criminals.

GINO: What if we found
value in our trauma?

Listened to it, rather than ignored it?

Could the force of our collective anger

actually become our savior?

As I laid bound to the table
of the k*ller,

looking death in the eye,
I didn't see evil.

I saw suffering created
by the world who gave a man

no other choice but to destroy.

Imagine if we enlisted our
gay rage as our Sentinel.

If, rather than sinking
into the abyss of our despair,

or painting over our wounds with Pride,

we used anger as our compass.

Where would it lead us?

What could it do for us?

I saw a man who become a monster

because it's who the world
expected him to be.

(WHIMPERS)

It's time we acknowledge
that this monster

has been implanted in all of us.

And the only way to release him

is to release society's expectations

of who and what we should be.

This is our freedom.

This is our way out.

This is our Pride.

This is our Sentinel.

♪ ♪