The First Three "Pages"

[lar_laughs]

Front Cover Page: Solid blue with white writing. A watermark of the Ashgrave logo is impressed in lighter blue on the page. Use a slightly curvy font that will be known as Eliza’s font.

My name is Eliza Jane Carter. Yep, that’s my real name. I bet you were expecting a Psuedo but I don ‘t have one. My beginnings here at Ashgrave weren’t exactly normal so there are a lot of things about me that aren’t the same as the rest of the population here.

In case you aren’t familiar with what “here” means exactly, I’ll go slower. Here is Ashgrave Prepatory Academy, established 1953. At least, that’s what the plaque hanging in the Main Hall says. The building was here in 1953 but the school itself didn’t officially begin until 1994 which means that next year is the 50th anniversary of the institution. Word is that the Trustees are planning a major celebration.

If we’re lucky, the school will be around for us to celebrate something. I have my doubts…


Page 1
These coming panels are all dark with very little detail to the surroundings. It is clearly a well-appointed office with bookshelves along the walls, large windows, and thick carpet. The desk is heavy wood, a piece of furniture typical of a businessman trying to impress clients.

Zo is a medium-build teenage girl with very little that is distinctive about her. Her hair is light brown and she wears is long, clipped back from her face with bobby pins. Her blue eyes are darkest along the very edge and have light brown/gold highlights near the pupil. She doesn’t wear any makeup and has pale lips and a smattering of freckles along the bridge of her cheeks. Normally her face is peaceful but when she gets worked up, she’s likely to be smirking.

Gre is a tall teenage boy with multiple piercings along the curve of both ears. His skin is a deep tan and his longish, dark black hair is straight and sticks up at odd angles around his head as if he doesn’t care about how it looks (even though it takes quite a bit of work to get it to look like that). There is a distinctive, reddish birthmark on his neck that is shaped like a five-pointed star with rounded points. It is about the size of his hand and he often puts his hand on his neck in an unconscious attempt to cover it. He has light brown eyes that appear golden in certain light.

Both kids are wearing jeans and dark sweatshirts with the Ashgrave logo/crest on the back.


Box 1: A dark panel showing nothing behind Zo’s head. Our perspective is tilted slightly, only show her eyes (wide and scared) and part of her mouth (open in astonishment).

Zo: What are you going, Gre? We’ve got to get out of here.


Box 2: This panel is still dark but there are more office-like gray shapes in the black behind Gre. He is sitting in a nice leather desk chair, his hands behind his head. His mouth is quirked up into a mischievious grin but he looks completely calm. It’s a tight shot but we see the upper part of his chest.

Gre: I’m relaxing, Zo. You might try it. You’ve been nothing but a bundle of nerves all night long.


Box 3: Pull back and have both of them in the shot. We’re looking at Gre so only see the back of Zo, giving us a good shot of the logo on the back of her sweatshirt. There are vague gray office shapes around them but the shot is relatively dark with the only light coming from a desk lamp. Gre is still relaxing in the chair. Zo is expressing outrage with her body language, arms flung out in the air.

Zo: We broke into a Trustee’s office. I think that entitles me to some nerves. Now get up so we can get out of here.

Gre: Settle down. No one is going to catch us.

Zo: How would you know? Last time I checked, you weren’t a people reader. (bubble continues over to the next panel)


Box 4: A longer shot of Zo, with more of her body. Her hands are now on her hips and it’s clear she’s angry.

Zo: You’re a machine reader. Someone could be coming our way right now and you wouldn’t know. I’m not prepared to loose my future because you want to relax.


Box 5: A wide shot of the two of them again, from the side. Zo is leaning on the desk, staring intently at Gre with narrowed eyes. Gre has taken one hand from behind his head and is gesturing at Zo. He looks nonplussed by her anger.

Gre: There’s nothing to worry about.

Zo: I disagree. There’s a lot to worry about. We shouldn’t be in this room right now and I shouldn’t have just looked through those files.

Gre: And you probably shouldn’t have put any of them in your pack.

 
Page 2
(the first three boxes stretch across the top of the page)


Box 1: Another tilted shot of Zo’s face. This time we get to see more of her face. Her eyes are wide and her mouth is scrunched up (as if she’s saying OOPS) because she didn’t think he’d seen her.

Zo: Needless to say, we need to leave. I just want to level the playing field. I don’t want to be kicked off the field altogether!

Gre: Who said you’d be kicked out? Besides…


Box 2: Same sort of shot of Zo but her head is in the act of turning to look over her shoulder.

Gre: …We can’t leave yet. Things just got interesting.


Box 3: There’s just enough of Zo’s face to see that she’s still looking over her shoulder to give us some perspective. The rest of the box is in shades of grays and black. The vague shapes of a group of people is just possible – 4 people. Three standing together and one behind them. The person on the left is taller than the other three.

(coming from the shadows): We’ve come to tell you about a new playing field, Zo. One you might like better than this one. You won’t need those files anymore. Gre? Would you put them away for Miss Zoanne? Now, let’s get comfortable because we aren’t leaving this room until we straighten some things out.


Box 4: Same dark blue background with light blue Ashgrave logo engraved in the background with white curvy lettering

Most kids come to Ashgrave Prepatory around the age of 12. Some might come when they’re older but very few come earlier than that. The reason? The Public School System only hires teachers for 1st through 5th grades and only the largest cities even have 5th grade classes. Anyone who gets a higher education than that is very rich, very connected… or a potential Ashgrave Prepatory student.

What does it take to get into Ashgrave? I know you’re asking yourself that by this point. How can I get out of going to a 10-7 job like the rest of the 13 year olds out there? And what is the cost to my family?

The cost is nothing. In fact, they pay your family for the opportunity to educate you. For six years, Ashgrave will educate and train you. After that time, they’ll find you a job and a place to live in a nice town with very little crime and a few trees scattered around as if the place were a park.

Think you still want in? Think you have what it takes? You might… if you’re 15 percent of the population. This is a school that caters to people with abilities. By abilities I mean anyone who can do things that defy the laws of nature. There’s a student here right now who can bend metal objects. Another one has been known to blink small objects out of existance. Still another can run for hours at a time. Those are the ones you’d expect to see here, learning to acccept who they are and learn how to use these extraordinary talents.
But there are others who may bend the laws of space and time but aren’t extraordinary. It would seem, with all the time and energy that the Ashgrave Trustees put into each student, they wouldn’t want these less than stellar examples. Each and every child that proves to have any abilities is accepted into Ashgrave Prepatory Academy. In fact, they are welcomed with open arms.

So open, in fact, that they may never get free of the embrace…

~~~~~ more to come!!! ~~~~~

To those of you who know the "comic book" world a bit better (or understand the process of creating the script for one), I would love your input. This is only my second year doing this and I still haven't been able to track down an actual script for a working book (so that I can see BOTH sides of the process) or a decent book/website that might tell me more about how to write this. I get a lot of "Whatever works for you" from the Script Frenzy site. They did mention a book that I'm going to look into getting.

Any other suggestions (both on the formatting of the script and the overall vibe so far) are greatly appreciated.