1-8 Infinite Blade Dance

In which Bethany and Jonas share in the pure entertainment spectacular that is the Infinite Blade Dance.  

inc: The Podcast is:  
Allyson Levine as Bethany  
Raimy O. Washington as Jonas  
Leah Cardenas (@leahgabrielle____) as The Announcements  
Ellis MacMillan (linktr.ee/mothscraps) as The Robo-Archivist  

inc: The Podcast is written, produced, and edited, by Monte D. Monteleagre and Alexander Wolfe, and is a production of Wolf Mountain Workshop.  For more information, or to contact them about other projects, they can be found at montedmonteleagre.com, and writingwolfe.com, respectively. 

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Transcript

Episode 8 - Infinite Blade Dance
Intro
Small Intro and/or Content Warning
Theme Song
The Dance of the Blade plays, eventually fading into the drones and beeps of regular work tone which themselves fade into the ticking of a clock.
Scene 1

BETHANY
Jonas? You okay there?

JONAS
Hmm? What?

BETHANY
I asked if you were okay.

JONAS
Oh, yeah, peachy.
(A moment.)
Why?

BETHANY
Because you were asleep Jonas.

JONAS
Or was I?

BETHANY
You were.

JONAS
Or was I?

BETHANY
Really?

JONAS
I was just resting a few of my eyes. Only the ones facing you.

BETHANY
Jonas. I had to set up a mirror on the other side of you because you kept using that 
excuse. They were all closed. Are you feeling well rested now?

JONAS
Yeah, ship shape.

BETHANY
Hopefully better shape than this ship.
(A moment.)
Okay, because it keeps both of us out of trouble you weren’t “sleeping” right there. I 
mean, listen, I know what it’s like to finally get a chair after you’ve been standing for a 
year. Just don’t get too comfortable or we have to take it away.

JONAS
Who’s “we?”

BETHANY
Me, but I’d get in trouble with somebody else if I didn’t. And I don’t want to figure out 
who I’d get in trouble with. Please, just do what the rest of us do and put a couple of 
push-pins into the seat so you can stay awake.

JONAS
Do we have push-pins here?

BETHANY
You’ll have to find your own. The company doesn’t provide them anymore because they 
don’t want to get sued for all the push pins in our seats.

JONAS
I’ll get right on that.

BETHANY
I look forward to the quiet yelping. Jonas, eye contact here, look at me with all those 
eyes, quiet yelping.

A clock ticks again.

BETHANY
Jonas. Jonas. Really? Wake up.

JONAS
I am awake.

BETHANY
You are now. You were not.

JONAS
I was always awake.

BETHANY
Is that-? Jonas. You’re getting that milky, gunky build-up in your gills. You are clearly not 
getting enough sleep in your off-hours. Why not?

JONAS
It’s a new lotion.

BETHANY
Gill lotion?

JONAS
Yes.

BETHANY
Okay, that would be poison, so are you getting scammed into buying poison again or are 
you not getting enough sleep?

JONAS
When you put it like that I don’t want to choose anymore.

BETHANY
Which is it?

JONAS
Well I’m sleeping in my off hours.

BETHANY
Okay. Then you either need to get better sleep or you need to stop buying poisons from 
anybody on the ship. And, since either of those could be true for you, please do both. 
Okay?

JONAS
I wasn’t even asleep today.

BETHANY
I don’t care, Jonas, just clear out your gills. 

JONAS
(Mocking.)
Just clear out your gills, Jonas.

BETHANY
Ignoring that. And if I find that milky gunk on any of my special pens again, I will 
sacrifice all of my push pins to keep your eye permanently open.

JONAS
All of my eyes?

BETHANY
40 push pins. One eye.

A clock ticks.

Snoring.

BETHANY
Okay, Jonas, I’m going to assume that you are having a respiratory infection, and that 
you are not in fact in a deep sleep right now.

The snoring continues.

BETHANY
I’m certainly not going to turn around and check, because if I turn around and check I will 
be liable for your behavior as your direct superior.

The snoring continues.

BETHANY
I will not check because I can tell from the sound that you are making that you are dealing 
with a pretty serious upper respiratory infection. This sudden disease is preventing you 
from giving a verbal response. Not to mention, if you were asleep that would be the third 
time today and the eighth time this week, and I refuse to believe that you would actually 
be this big of a jerk.

It is impossible to ignore that Jonas is snoring right now.

BETHANY
If you were asleep and I woke you up, I would just have to listen to you fall asleep again. 
I know for a fact, Jonas, that you sing lullabies to yourself to fall asleep. And I can’t deal 
with that right now because I ran out of pills last night. Did you know that, Jonas? Also, 
on the topic of sleep, I have not slept since the night before that due to the anxiety I felt 
because I was running out of anxiety repressors. I have blinked 8 times, total, since then. 
My prescription does not refill until two full shifts from now, on the only day this cycle 
that the pharmacy is closed. Did you know that, Jonas?

Just cartoonish snoring.

BETHANY
You did not. However, if you do happen to be asleep, which I doubt, you could get in a 
lot of trouble for that. Pills or not, I don’t want that.

A chair squeaks as Bethany turns around.

BETHANY
Wake up, Jonas.

JONAS
No.

BETHANY
(A moment.)
What?

JONAS
Five more hours.

BETHANY
Right now, Jonas.

JONAS
Why?

BETHANY
Because you’re on the office floor, you’re using a chair as a blanket, and I’m worried 
about you.

A moment.

JONAS
Hmm?

BETHANY
I’m worried about almost everything right now, and in the top twelve is that you are 
misusing both the floor and the chair.

JONAS
You’re worried about me?

BETHANY
Only enough to get you off the ground. After that, you’re on your own.

JONAS
You don’t have to worry about me.

BETHANY
Your gills are so full of milky, nasty gunk that it has petrified and is crumbling off into 
your Black Goo, which you keep leaving unattended because you’re asleep and to 
prevent a fire from happening I have to drink your gunky black goo cause it’s the only 
thing that can stop a gill gunk fire from burning down the entire ship.

JONAS
Are... you okay?

BETHANY
Peachy, Jonas. Why aren’t you sleeping in your off hours?

JONAS
I... am?

BETHANY
Look at me with your eyes that, everyday, sink a little bit deeper into your crusty eye 
tubes and tell me again that you’re sleeping in your off hours.

JONAS
They can’t be that bad.

BETHANY
I will requisition another mirror if I have to, and you know how well that went last time.

JONAS
I’m sleeping a little bit.

BETHANY
It really doesn’t seem like it.

JONAS
I thought I was doing better at hiding it.

BETHANY
Why would you think that?

JONAS
Maybe because I’m tired?

BETHANY
Why are you so tired, Jonas?

JONAS
Because I’m not sleeping as much as I should.

BETHANY
Okay. Okay. We’re getting somewhere now! I love these little therapy sessions I get 
cornered into. Next question, why aren’t you sleeping as much as you should?

JONAS
Honestly, I’ve been kind of getting into sports.

Just the smallest, most incredulous pause.

BETHANY
The intramural sports program on this ship was decommissioned because the injury rate 
wasn’t high enough to keep upper management entertained. They were almost tempted to 
make a decision in their boredom. The athletics wing of the ship has been used to store 
hundreds of thousands of menacing looking barrels that are actually empty. How could 
you possibly be getting into sports?

JONAS
I’ve been reading about them.

BETHANY
You’ve been indirectly forcing me to glug down gill gunk black goo because you’ve been 
reading about sports?

JONAS
Yeah, sort of?

BETHANY
Great! Honestly, great. Thank you for coming clean and telling me everything. Honestly. 
Everything, now that you’ve told me that, is fine. I was really worried about it for a little 
bit there, but we have pulled through to the other side. Jonas. Thank you.

JONAS
Really?

BETHANY
No!

JONAS
Are you still worried about me?

BETHANY
This is stupid.

JONAS
So, we’re done worrying about me?

BETHANY
No. Like I said, I’m worried about everything right now. One of the categories of all these 
worries is you. And in that category, I have so many new worries, all of them less 
pressing, but they add up.

JONAS
I understand, but what if I tell you that they’re good stories?

BETHANY
I don’t really see how that makes a difference.

JONAS
I’ve been getting them from the EBI folder.

BETHANY
No.

JONAS
Yeah.

BETHANY
Have you been sneaking EBI stories out of the office?

JONAS
No. Technically, no.

BETHANY
Technically.

JONAS
Technically no.

BETHANY
How technically?

JONAS
Bethany I just woke up. Can’t this wait just a little bit? I haven’t even had a cup of black 
goo.

BETHANY
That’s okay. Maybe even good. How did you “technically” not sneak stories out of the 
office?

JONAS
Well, technically...

BETHANY
Uh-huh. Now you keep talking, that’s how this works.

JONAS
Technically it’s not “stories.”

BETHANY
Just data, then?

JONAS
Uh, sure?

BETHANY
That’s not convincing.

JONAS
What would be convincing?

BETHANY
The truth.

JONAS
The truth is actually better than what you think it is.

Pause.

BETHANY
Is it? I am so excited to hear this truth.

JONAS
Technically it’s only one story.

A long pause.

BETHANY
One story?

JONAS
Yeah, it’s not like there are dozens missing from the folder.

BETHANY
We’ve been behind. For weeks. Because of one story?

JONAS
It’s a pretty good story.

BETHANY
Go get that story. And bring it back here.

JONAS
Oh I don’t need to do that.

BETHANY
For the sake of your health, your job, and my health, and my job, not to mention the 
general cleanliness of this office at large, go get that story, Jonas.

JONAS
I don’t have to. I have it on me.

BETHANY
Weird, convenient, but weird.

JONAS
I don’t go anywhere without it in case I’ll have a little time to look at it again.

BETHANY
Give it to me.

JONAS
Are you going to destroy it?

BETHANY
Probably not, I’m just really frustrated and there’s a lot going on in my life right now. I’m 
just going to hide it for both of our sakes. To keep us both out of trouble.

JONAS
I’m pretty sure I know all your hiding spots. Here you go!

A paper changes hands.

BETHANY
(A moment.)
Jonas.

JONAS
Please don’t destroy it. It’s... I like this one a lot.

BETHANY
I forgive you.

JONAS
Oh... why?

BETHANY
Because I’ve done this job for way too long and I have never found anything as cool as 
The Infinite Blade Dance.

ANNOUNCEMENT
Attention all ship personnel. Benji, an intern-level member of the Regrown Organics 
Department has been going to other departments to claim that they are responsible for 
the invention of wet powder. They are not. Dorthey, the Resources-General of the 
Regrown Organics Department would like us to remind you that they invented adding 
liquids to powders to create wet powders. If you see Benji, please report their location to 
any individual who is cleared by the Department of Disappearances. Any level of 
clearance will do. Happiness is productivity.

 Scene 2
The Blade Dance Music begins, and we hear a soundscape that will drive Alex absolutely insane trying to create.

Deep planetary whirrs and rumbles pan in an orbit around the listener.

JONAS
A planet, the only one in it’s solar system, orbits a star at the edge of exploding into a 
Supernova.

Deepest of rumbles and chaos.
Cracking rocks.
Screams and hisses of sci-fi cars going past at blinding speed.
Echoing caverns with echoing mechanical hammering.
Big Inception “BWAAAAAA”.
Roasting crackling meats just barely fading over the end of the “bwaaaa”

BETHANY
A city, the only one on its planet, spanning an entire hemisphere. The land has been 
crushed under massive space-scraping buildings and thick concrete mega-roads, which 
sometimes collapse into the strip-mined underground caverns. All water sources are 
hidden beneath a lattice of mega-bridges and hyper-dams. The Lone Star burns brighter 
through the smog layer every day, roasting the planet in it’s own death throes.

JONAS
And on the other side of the planet?

Armored footstep.

BETHANY
One warrior.

Another step.

JONAS
One sword.

Scraping of sword on stone.

BETHANY
One job.

Silence.

JONAS (TOGETHER)
Kill. Everyone.

BETHANY (TOGETHER)
Kill. Everyone.

A low, demonic, howl of a scream, the slashing of a sword, the slicing of meat, and two large pieces of something that used to be alive falling to the ground.

BETHANY
Star Shadow and the Sword that Ate a Billion Lives.

The sword is sheathed and the rest of the chaos is contained with it.

JONAS
It’s so cool.

BETHANY
Honestly, I can’t believe I forgot about this story. This one. The Infinite Blade Dance. 
The coolest story in the folder.

JONAS
I can’t believe you forgot about the Infinite Blade Dance, you’re the one who found it! If 
I found this I would never do anything again for the rest of my life. And I still might not.

BETHANY
It has to be the pills. I finally miss one day of medication and all the sudden I’m 
remembering this.

JONAS
I think I deserve a little credit here.

BETHANY
Yeah, yeah of course. Thank you for finding this one again. Thanks for the trip down 
memory lane, Jonas, I needed it.

JONAS
Okay, no problem, but back to the task at hand: How does Star Shadow get so big when 
everyone else is so small?

BETHANY
Because they eat all the fallen failures that have been broken by the sword.

JONAS
But how does that make them big? Nothing in the file explains how it makes Star Shadow 
big.

BETHANY
I don’t know. Nobody knows. When I first found the story I brought it to one of my 
friends on the Department of Things Larger Than We Expected Science Team and they 
said, “I don’t know, dude, but that sounds so cool.”

JONAS
And then the Sword That Ate a Billion Lives, which Star Shadow forged from the space 
scraper that collapsed, killing their entire extended family and the entire community they 
were a part of? That’s just... I’m sorry it’s so cool.

BETHANY
Don’t be sorry, you’re right, it’s awesome. It’s unbelievable. This nameless nobody in a 
crater decorated with the memories of a neighborhood the rest of the world was already 
working to forget just started hammering at the collapsed building.

Hammering, distant, but growing. 

JONAS
With nothing to eat but the bodies of all of their loved ones and then hundreds of 
thousands, maybe millions, of others. Eventually all were strangers. Some Star Shadow recognized. Most they didn’t.

BETHANY
And with every hammer-fall forging the blade into shape and with every body they 
consumed, Star Shadow grew bigger and bigger.

The hammering stops. 

JONAS
Until finally it was Star Shadow and this nameless sword towering over all these buildings 
in this massive city-planet. 

A massive rumble begins.

JONAS
They raise their patchwork blade high above their head and 
deep into space. They bring it down, pulling asteroids from the darkness of space itself  and displacing the very moon from its orbit. Just like that. A single swing. Half the planet destroyed. 

In the silence, a single sword cut and an echoing slice that builds into a roaring wind-scream before being silenced again.

Millions of lives instantly extinguished. Millions more thrown into space without a 
moment of warning. Even more than that will perish in the days and weeks to come. Half the planet just goes dark. Instantly. That’s how the sword earned its name.

BETHANY
The Sword That Ate A Billion Lives.

JONAS
Can you imagine? Seeing that? Live? I can’t believe I missed it.

BETHANY
We would have missed it no matter what. When Star Shadow brought their sword down, 
that planet went from one we weren’t allowed to incorporate to one we could. Before half 
that planet went dark, we couldn’t even look at it.
(A breath.)
Well, this was great, Jonas, but we’ve been talking about this for too long. We have things 
that are due soon. Come on, we need to get back to work..

JONAS
But what about the army the remaining people sent?

BETHANY
Star Shadow smote all of them like it was nothing.

JONAS
It took a year to raise another one.

BETHANY
Which Star Shadow smote again.

JONAS
And another year and another army. Smaller this time.

BETHANY
Even easier to smite.

JONAS
Another year.

BETHANY
A few battalions.

JONAS
Smote.

BETHANY
Another year and a few squads.

JONAS
Smoted even harder.

BETHANY
Another year.

JONAS
Some volunteers.

BETHANY
A food stand to celebrate the volunteers as they went off to face Star Shadow.

JONAS
Somehow, the few volunteers lasted longer than the armies. Except for the one who 
tripped and smote themself on their sword.

BETHANY
Because it took Star Shadow longer to notice the rest of them.

JONAS
And then every year after that, half the world began to celebrate the handful of volunteers 
sent to face Star Shadow and The Sword That Ate a Billion Lives.

BETHANY
Every year, all the volunteers died.

JONAS
And then there weren’t any more volunteers.

BETHANY
There were professionals.

JONAS
Trained from birth to be the hero that would take down Star Shadow.

BETHANY
Trained to be the one out of ten sent to the scorched lands every year to finally avenge 
the consumed and stop Star Shadow from dragging the sun down to the planet and ending 
all life forever.
(A moment.)
But the real fun is the festivals.

JONAS
The food.

BETHANY
The parades.

JONAS
The dances.

BETHANY
Celebrations of all kinds leading up to The Infinite Blade Dance.

JONAS
And then the Dancers march off to die to a sword so large it pulls meteors from the sky. 
To be killed by a being everyone believes will bring the apocalypse. All in a vain attempt 
to stop the Infinite Sword from Reaching the Final Step in its Dance.

BETHANY
When I first found this story, I talked about it for days straight without stopping. And 
the thing is, people wanted to hear about it, hear every detail. They wanted to know 
everything so I just kept getting to talk about it and talk about it and talk about it.

JONAS
That doesn’t happen a lot for you, does it?

BETHANY
People tell you things that you want to hear. That’s all.
(A moment.)
I wasn’t actually on my prescription yet when I found this story. I used to be able to get 
a lot of work done and still go around... I don’t know... I wasn’t going around having fun. 
I certainly wasn’t doing that. I don’t know.

JONAS
People change.

BETHANY
I just can’t shake the feeling that... I used to play this game where I would try and decide 
who on the ship would volunteer to be a Dancer. I wouldn’t. I don’t volunteer for things. 
But I think it would be a better job than this one. The Dancers all lived full lives. Some of 
them were even happy. At the end, they didn’t even volunteer, they were chosen, trained 
from birth with a singular purpose. And then look at us. Trained from birth to do... this, I 
guess. And we didn’t even get very much of this done today.

JONAS
Don’t worry about that, it’s not like anyone is going to notice.

BETHANY
Maybe they will. Maybe they won’t. It doesn’t matter.

JONAS
Then can we call it a day?

BETHANY
It doesn’t matter because I won’t be able to leave this office until I get everything done, 
otherwise I won’t be able to sleep and I just ooze onto my sheets until I finally just have 
to get up and come back here in my off hours and finish everything so either way I end 
up here. I’d rather save the steps. I wish I could just call it a day, but I don’t want to end 
up with gunk in my gills.

JONAS
This can wait till tomorrow.

BETHANY
It can. I can’t.

JONAS
It’s really not a big deal.

BETHANY
This is just how it is.
(A moment.)
I just can’t help but wonder what it would be like to have a job like the Dancers.

JONAS
Bethany. The Dancers were on the same basic cocktail of extremely experimental chemicals that our company eventually required for membership in the intramural sports league in an attempt to spice things up. 

BETHANY
That’s different. Those are fun chemicals. I have to take boring cocktails to function like I 
was able to function just a few decades ago. They just make up for all my personal 
failings.

JONAS
I don’t think that’s true. I think this job sucks.

BETHANY
(Dropping it.)
Sure. Do you want to hang onto this one?

JONAS
I don’t want to keep it from you. Just put it where it goes in the folder.

BETHANY
You re-found it. You put it back.

JONAS
No, I insist. You can put it back.

BETHANY
Come on Jonas.

JONAS
It’s one of your favorites. You found it first. You should have the honor.

BETHANY
You brought it back into my life. You can put it back.

JONAS
Yes... but....

BETHANY
Plus I have all these forms to make up.

JONAS
Okay, but...

BETHANY
But what?

JONAS
I can’t actually remember where in the folder it’s supposed to go.

BETHANY
What?

JONAS
I pulled it out weeks ago, so...

BETHANY
Well I put it in many, many cycles ago.

JONAS
Please just put it back.

BETHANY
You need to figure out how the organization system works. You put it back.

JONAS
Yeah, “Organization system,” sure.

BETHANY
It’s organized.

JONAS
You don’t remember where it goes either.

BETHANY
I... don’t.

JONAS
Okay, so let’s just put it somewhere.

BETHANY
No, I’ll figure it out. Just put it on the bottom of my pile.

JONAS
(A moment.)
Thank you.
(Another moment.)
And I guess give me the fun ones from the pile so we can both go home.

BETHANY
Overtime is unpaid.

JONAS
That won’t stop me from bothering you.

A moment.

BETHANY
Thanks Jonas.