INT. CUPID'S LABORATORY - DAY
As Cupid enters the pitch black room, the lights turn on automatically. It's a laboratory with several tables covered in beakers, test tubes, and preserved, functioning human organs. He hangs his white cloak on a coat rack, revealing his white tights, and puts on a lab coat, goggles, and rubber gloves that were hanging there. He steps down two steps onto the laboratory floor. He sits in a hovering computer chair and floats over to a blank wall.
Cupid snaps and the wall becomes a screen populated with Love Profiles and researches percentages (marriage rate, divorce rate, % of people in relationships, % of people single, number of soulmates found, lost, or in the wait, number of marriages to soulmates vs number of marriages to non-soulmates, etc). He navigates the computer with his hands. He sees that the number of married people is beneath 50% and the divorce rate is above 50%. He sees the falling number of young marriages and the growing number of old divorces. He hits his thighs. Then, he lowers his head rubs his temples. He snaps twice and shuts off the monitor. He sighs.
Cupid floats, on his hover chair, through the room once more, looking at holographic pop-up monitors in front of beakers and tubes labeled dopamine, testosterone, phenylethylamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and norepinephrine and other things filled with liquid chemicals and grounded powders. He stops at one group of beakers and tubes in particular.
He looks over the holograph and checks notes. He looks at the test tubes, hanging up on a rack with a purple fluid in them. He pushes the holograph to the side. He takes a dropper and extracts the chemical from a test tube. He takes the solution and drops it on a petri dish. He then takes a human blood sample and drips the solution on it. He scans the reaction with his phone by waving his phone over the dish.
After reading the results, Cupid takes the dropper and mixes more oxytocin into the next test tube. He grabs a new petri dish and places the solution on it with a larger sample of blood and scans it again. He looks at the information being extracted from the reaction. He smiles. He takes the solution and mixes more oxytocin into it. Then, he takes the test tube and brings it over to a functioning, preserved human brain inside a glass container.
Cupid takes the solution and pours it into the container preserving the brain. He scans the reaction with his phone. He watches the information pour in. He gets excited. He takes the successful tube and covers it with a cork. He leaves the lab with it in-hand.
EXT. EARTH MISSIONS HEADQUARTERS - DAY
Cupid, in his white robe, comes up to Frank. He is giddy. Frank is busy looking over notes with four angels around him. As Cupid comes closer, three of the angels depart.
CUPID
(Giddy)
Frank! Frank!
Frank turns from the other angel.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
Cupid. Ah. We need to talk.
CUPID
I've don't it, Frank. I've finally done it.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
You've done what? Look, we must talk. Last night's performance was only-.
Cupid shows Franks the purple fluid.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA (CONT’D)
(Confused)
What is this?
CUPID
The serum to change everything.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
Cupid... We can't-.
CUPID
Its properties are almost guaranteed to work. A few test trials and we should be able to save love.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
(Disappointed)
Cupid...
CUPID
(Sharply)
Frank, don't look at me talking about numbers. You know I don't care about numbers.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
But you are getting scary close to the breaking point and the Big Man is talking STDs. And you know how STDs effect everyone's paths. I mean relationships will tank heavily.
CUPID
STDs are so-. They're not enough. They have condoms now.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
And that should tell you how severe these will be...
CUPID
(Slumping; depressed)
Frank... Frank... We can't do that. All I need is one trial and we can change everything.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
(Grabs test tube)
What will this do?
CUPID
It will allow the test subject to only see the love of his life. Like, it'll reduce the- how do I put this in Laymen's terms? Basically, we increase the desire for love while negating the impact of lust. Like, they'll desire true love, so much so, that everything that doesn't look like it will be altered in their perception to where it will remind them only of true love.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
(Hands test tube back. Lays hand on Cupid’s shoulder)
Cu, Imma gonna be frank- well, brief, with you here... This sounds dangerous.
CUPID
More dangerous than an STD that can't be prevented by condoms? I mean look what AIDS, Chlamydia, Gonorrhea, Herpes, and all those other STDs did.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
Careful, Cupid.
CUPID
(Sarcastic)
Sorry. Right. He knows all. (Serious) But! If He knows all, He should know it's not dangerous. Who says it's dangerous? It's just reinforcing the good and putting a mirage over the bad. There's no danger. No danger at all.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
It's not red. It's purple.
CUPID
It's just a color.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
I smell the human blood, Cu... I worked in Death Division for fifteen hundred years. We can't go around manipulating people's bloodstreams.
CUPID
It’s not gonna turn their whole bloodstream purple. Frank, please. I am begging you... People are lost in their lust. They are lost in superficial images of love... All I'm asking for is the opportunity to change one life. One life to see if we can save them all... You think I don't see what they are doing to the definition of love? I see it every day and have been seeing it for thousands of years. We’ve given them love stories, STDs, love songs, example after example, and they still commit to fallacies. If another country burns up in flames over this... I don't know. I might transfer. And I've been an angel of love since my birth, maybe being an angel of death will suit me better.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
Cu... you can't-.
CUPID
Don't tell me I can't give up if you're going to keep my hands tied.
Cupid lifts the chemical up in Frank's hands.
CUPID (CONT’D)
He knows what I’ve been working on. It's now or never...
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
(Sighs)
I'll put in the request order.
CUPID
Yes!
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
BUT... if the Big Man says no, I don't want to hear anything else about this. I don't know what you're doing with your free time, but this is dangerous stuff.
Frank stirs the tube.
FRANK SCOVANOSIA (CONT’D)
(To himself)
Really dangerous stuff.
Cupid kisses Frank on the cheek.
CUPID
It's gonna work. Trust me. Trust me!
FRANK SCOVANOSIA
Yeah yeah.
Cupid walks away pumping his fists. He claps a few times and quickly heads inside. Frank looks one more time at the solution. Then, Frank looks up to heaven concerned.