THE THING II
treatment written by Garry A. Piazza
based on characters created by John W. Campbell, Jr.

- - -

	It's spring 1982 and U.S. Outpost #31 lay in ruin. Overhead, a
	reconnaissance jet makes an assessment of the damage and moves on to
	the next outpost. Upon discovering the same carnage over the Norwegian
	post, a startling discovery of another kind is made by our
	unsuspecting air crew. They discover, half-exposed in the ice below,
	the carcass of the UFO that once made its journey to Earth to deliver
	a creature ominously fierce enough to be called The Thing.

	The air crew immediately dispatches the news that will prompt a rescue
	effort for the destroyed compounds and a salvage effort for the
	crippled UFO. The entire effort is the sole responsibility of one man
	-- CIA agent, Roman Dorn. Malevolently obnoxious and evil, Dorn's bunk
	operation will prove to be more than just a rescue and salvage effort.

	Upon arriving at the scorched remains of U.S. Outpost #31, Dorn's
	agents discover the frozen stiff body of R.J. MacReady. MacReady's
	body is peeled from the ice with a bottle of J&B stuck to his frozen
	hands and is sent to the cryogenics facility at the Mcmurdo military
	base near the coastline. There, his body is thawed and revived and
	remains comatose while machines monitor his vital signs.

	As MacReady lies in deep sleep, Dorn has built a massive dome over the
	half-buried UFO and is running the operation under the guise of an
	atmospheric research facility (ARF). It's primary objective is to
	sample air quality of volcanic emissions for the purpose of reporting
	ozone depletion information and feed reports back to the United
	States. That's what Washington hears anyway.

	Armed with an array of worker bees, Dorn begins shoring up the craft
	and breaking the ice away from underneath its frozen belly. Months
	pass, Dorn's reclamation effort nears completion. His vision of
	possibly making the craft functional becomes an obsessive desire of
	the ridiculous kind. Dorn is met by one of his agents, Agent Darrel.
	Darrel has managed to open a key part of the craft, the bridge, and is
	given Dorn's full support and compliment of men to satisfy the
	reclamation effort in his area. Blinded by his evil intentions, Dorn
	fails to see the suspicious nature of agent Darrel's ability to figure
	things out with regards to the craft. Could Darrel be the missing
	Childs mutated into one of his own men?

	It's six months later and Dorn receives a phone call from one of the
	medical technicians at Mcmurdo. Mac has awaken from his coma. Dorn and
	his clumsily inept cohort, Reginald Chase, meet with the medical team
	at Mcmurdo. Dorn introduces himself to MacReady and promptly offers
	him a position to work with them on the project. He tells Mac that his
	help would be of great importance to the operation and to their
	understanding of what went on last winter. Mac refuses, concerning
	himself with the whereabouts of the only other living person who was
	with him when the compound was destroyed -- Childs.

	Dorn tells Mac that no other bodies were found at the site. Mac
	becomes hysterical, threatening Dorn with promises of an infiltration
	in his operation. He admonishes Dorn, "You will die, all of you. Now
	that Childs is loose, anyone is fair game." Dorn soon realizes that he
	is not going to get any help from MacReady. MacReady makes one request
	before ending the conversation: to be transported off the continent
	and sent back to the states to resume his copter chartering business.
	Dorn agrees...sort of.

	While boarding the helo to be transported off the continent, Dorn
	offers Mac the position one last time. Mac refuses, stating, "You guys
	do need help, just not mine." Dorn's grin is as sinister as it gets as
	he watches MacReady's helo leave the helo pad for what he believes is
	the last time Mac will see the light of day. Dorn's plan to have
	MacReady whacked while Mac makes his way off the continent is foiled
	though, because...

	In comes Gotha. He's a blood-thirsty alien bounty hunter who has been
	in pursuit of The Thing for many years. Gotha is just the ticket Mac
	needs to survive Dorn's plot. Upon recently entering Earth's
	atmosphere, Gotha settles his craft in under the Ross Ice Shelf and
	monitors the situation topside, looking for any signs of the creature
	he pursues.

	Aboard Mac's helo flying above the Ross Shelf, Mac senses something
	strange about the whole situation. He decides to ask the air crew
	where their taking him. The pilot indicates a bingo with the U.S.S.
	Kittyhawk. Dorn told Mac that it would be with a different vessel all
	together.

	Mac has an unsettling feeling wash over him and decides to try to ask
	the pilot to turn around. The pilot refuses. Enraged, Mac decides to
	fight his way into the controls of the helo. He manages after
	struggling with the air crew but his efforts are much too late. The
	craft begins to descend out of control over the Ross Shelf and over
	Gotha's submerged craft. Upon splashing down into the icy waters, Mac
	tries to administer aid to the dying pilot who now floats half-
	conscious in the cold sea. The pilot's only words to Mac before
	passing on are, "Dorn...kill you." Mac begins to freeze. He uses the
	pilot's body to help warm his. With hypothermia near and little energy
	left, Mac is surrounded by a bright yellow glow from under the surface
	of the water.

	Swoosh! Mac's body is sucked under the cold abyss and is transported
	through a protective tractor beam. On Gotha's ship, Mac's body is spit
	through a membrane that separates the ship from the water. He slams
	into the cold bay deck plates and curls into the fetal position,
	shivering and shaking. Upon looking up, he notices a monolith of a
	figure. Standing before him in leather-strapped metallic boots is
	Gotha. All seven feet of him.

	Taking interest in Mac only as a food source, Gotha has Mac fighting
	for his life. Mac uses some of his sly wit and cunning digress to
	force Gotha to spare his life. Mac informs Gotha (English speaking of
	course because of his onboard technology), that he can help him with
	what he's looking for. He proves to Gotha that only he has seen the
	Thing close enough to know who it is and how to get custody of it. All
	lies of course but it does offer Mac the time to regroup and figure
	out how he's going to survive.

	As Mac makes a deal with Gotha, Dorn is busy at the ARF dome with the
	find of the century. Inside a laboratory deep within the dome's walls,
	Dorn's team of hungry scientists isolate a deformed and half-mutated
	creature found at the site of US Outpost #31. Dorn, informed by a tape
	made by MacReady and found in his ruined quarters at the outpost, has
	instructed his scientists to try and control the mutation process.
	This control would allow Dorn to have a weapon never before thought of
	in the real world. While Dorn's scientists plug away in the lab, a
	mutation process of Dorn's agents is underway right under his
	unsuspecting nose.

	Mac's last great effort to save his ass works as he convinces Gotha
	that he can be of great help. Gotha has informed Mac that all he needs
	to neutralize the entire organism and it's communication string is a
	tissue sample from one of the mutated bodies. Knowing fully that Dorn
	has some of these cadavers in his dome, Mac makes plans with Gotha to
	infiltrate the dome and retrieve the necessary tissue sample. Simple
	enough, according to Mac; or so he thinks.

	Gotha prepares Mac with the necessary equipment and hardware to reach
	the shore undetected and protected from the harsh cold of the
	surrounding sea water. Once on shore at the Mcmurdo station, Mac
	begins assessing the threat of being discovered. Under the cover of
	night, he incapacitates the base camp by disabling the utility
	generator. He is soon discovered however and must fight off the
	onslaught of confused occupants. Once the camp is cleared of people,
	Mac hijacks one of the resident helicopters for the ride to the ARF
	dome.

	Mac plants a cloaking device on the helo and makes his way across the
	frozen landscape virtually invisible to radar. Only a mile from the
	dome, Mac sets the helo down. Once down, the snow beneath begins to
	give way to an unforeseen crevasse. Mac barely makes it off the helo
	alive before it is swallowed up and wedged deep within the ice pack.
	Frustrated, Mac has no choice now but to proceed with the plan.

	At the dome, Mac takes out two of the guards and steals one of their
	uniforms. Inside the dome, he moves around above the shoring operation
	on a mezzanine above the floor level. One glance below with a
	specially equipped visor -- courtesy of Gotha's arsenal of goodies --
	reveals a workforce that has been almost entirely consumed by The
	Thing. Mac moves stealth-like through the dome, blending into the
	surrounding workforce but looking a little suspicious.

	Mac finds his way to the lab and waits for the two lab technicians to
	leave before entering. Once inside, he notices a half-mutated cadaver
	lying on a table sealed inside a Lexan room. He sneaks his way to the
	room and makes his way inside. Mac finds a scalpel and a shell vial
	container. He begins cutting tissue from one of the bodies and is
	startled by the sound of the lab door opening. He ducks below one of
	the gurneys and waits for the intruder to leave. His hopes of that are
	dashed because the young lab technician, Bogle, walks into the sealed
	room and discovers Mac. Mac quickly silences the young technician and
	passes the sample duties on to him.

	With the sample nearly in the container, the clumsy technician drops
	it on the floor. At the same time, the doors to the lab open and in
	walks the senior lab technician, Dr. Ryan. Mac makes a break for it,
	pushing the young technician out of his way and darting past the lab
	doors. The alarm is sounded and soon Mac is followed by an army of
	agents eager to bring him down. In the main tunnel Mac finds himself
	overwhelmed and is beaten into submission and taken back to Dorn's
	office. Once inside, Dorn gives Mac the proverbial treatment, drilling
	him on the situation at hand. He goes on to give Mac a tour of the
	facility before finally stopping back at the lab.

	Inside the lab, a table is prepared for Mac and he's strapped to it.
	Dorn instructs Dr. Ryan to inject Mac with cells from one of the
	mutated cadavers to try and force a controlled mutation on a living
	human. With the syringe loaded and Mac fighting the straps, Dr. Ryan
	brings the needle closer and closer to Mac's arm. Mac screams and
	squirms as the needle tip just touches the skin, then...

	The roof in the center of the lab implodes in one, big BLAST. Everyone
	ducks for cover. Two agents with the guns are crushed under the heavy
	concrete rubble. Dorn and chase escape the explosion and run back into
	the concrete tunnel away from the lab. Dr. Ryan manages to hide behind
	one of the shelves next to the wall. Bogle covers his head, scurrying
	away from the destruction.

	Mac can do nothing but watch, amazed. Gotha jumps through the hole in
	the ceiling, pouncing into a squat on the hard concrete floor. He then
	stands tall. The snow dust and debris clear away from his body. A
	perfect rescue.

	Gotha manages to get Mac out of the dome and back to his craft under
	the Ross shelf. While there, a frustrated Gotha plans on doing things
	his own way. With a potentially devastating thermal charge set, Mac
	pleads one more time to let him get the tissue sample or risk being
	consumed by the massive explosive powers of the thermal charge.
	Reluctant, Gotha accepts after fighting with Mac on the issue.

	Near the dome, two figures stagger their way toward the front gate.
	Mac and Gotha, a seemingly drunken pair, approach the guardhouse to
	give themselves in. With the guards in a state of comfort with their
	appearance, Mac and Gotha let lose on the guards and take them out
	quickly. They run around the dome planting small charges that will
	cave the dome in, each in their own direction until they meet on the
	other side. With the charges set and their plan in action, they are
	foiled once again by Dorn. With no way out and soldiers bearing down
	on them, they have no choice but to give in. However, Dorn knows
	nothing of the charges.

	Mac and Gotha lie strapped to tables in the lab. Unable to get out,
	they watch helplessly as Dorn's men prepare for another injection.
	Dorn, Agent Darrel and Dorn's sidekick, Chase, watch from behind a
	protective Lexan wall as Dr. Ryan uses a set of robotic arms to bring
	the syringe down on Mac. Ryan empties the contents of the syringe with
	one squeeze as Mac bites his lip. Nothing happens. Mac curses at Dorn
	while fighting off the temptation to laugh. Suddenly...

	BOOM! The first charge goes off and shakes the dome. At the same time,
	Darrel begins convulsing in the lab. He falls backward, squirming and
	writhing on the floor. Everyone panicks. Dorn quells any attempt to
	kill it by forcing his soldiers to stand fast. BOOM! The next charge
	goes off. The body of Darrel begins splitting into two. One part of
	the mutation takes on the likeness of Childs and the other remains
	that of Darrel. BOOM! Yet another charge shakes the dome, followed by
	a continual series of explosions over the next few minutes. The Darrel
	half rushes Dorn and his men and takes him out first. The Childs half
	crawls its way to Mac, groping, fighting to stay alive.

	Mac, not knowing what to think, can only lay there and watch. Childs
	reaches Mac and begins loosening the restraints. Childs manages to
	pass on one message to Mac, "Fight it inside, Mac. Fight it like I
	did," he cries before falling to the floor. Released, Mac sees Darrel,
	obviously The Thing, rush out of the lab. Mac quickly unties Gotha and
	tells him to meet him at a rendezvous point. Gotha takes a sample of
	tissue and moves on.

	Mac grabs one of the guards weapons and heads out in pursuit of The
	Thing -- his one last battle with the creature that took the life of
	his team at the outpost and the creature which brought all of this
	upon him. But the battle will be far from over. Before settling his
	score with the Thing, Mac is confronted with the force that Dorn has
	unknowingly unleashed. Will Mac survive the onslaught of infected
	agent workers and bring a final demise to The Thing? Will he be
	reunited with Gotha and watch as the Dome is brought to it's knees? Is
	a portion of the UFO functional and escape-ready for The Thing?
	Perhaps. Mac's success will have to depends on how well he can fend
	off the imminent intruder that now grows within his own body.