Screenwriting : .026 Secs by Seth Madison

026 Secs

Logline:

When a struggling party magician accidentally makes the moon vanish for 0.026 seconds, a ripple in space-time causes a space shuttle crew to vanish into different dimensions—fracturing reality, rewriting fate, and triggering a series of unintended awakenings across time.

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Genre:

Alt-history / Sci-fi drama with light surrealism

(Think: Donnie Darko meets The Leftovers meets Primer, but someone’s uncle is still trying to book kids’ parties.)

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Summary:

On January 26th, 1986, in a tragic combination of desperation, ego, and a clearance-rack spell-book from a worn down magic shop, children’s birthday party magician Ricky the Remarkable pulls off his most “incredible” trick:

He makes the moon disappear.

Not for long…Just 0.026 seconds.

But it’s long enough to matter.

Long enough for a ripple in the gravitational field to tear through orbit, disrupt the fragile shielding of the Messenger Space Shuttle, a mid-80’s shuttle that meets an unfortunate end similar to that of the Challenger Shuttle, but instead of exploding… the shuttle implodes inward—not destroyed, but scattered and the crew flung across timelines, dimensions, and realities.

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Main Threads:

Ricky The Remarkable-

Magician Extraordinaire-

Now blacklisted, haunted, and slinging balloon swords at vape expos, Rick is the unwitting cause of the greatest metaphysical incident of the 20th century. He spends his life trying to understand how he did it… and if he can do it again.

Winston Marks-

Messenger payload specialist –

In our timeline, but no longer of our dimension, he’s a museum night security guard with no memory of his past. But in his dreams? He speaks every language known to man, fluently, because he’s now subconsciously linked to every version of himself across all timelines. He sleepwalks through ancient dialects and dead scripts—unaware that he’s the cosmic glue keeping timelines from collapsing.

Commander Evelyn Hurst- 

presumed dead –

She returns to Earth in the year 2086—a hundred years too late—only to find her mission erased, her identity lost to history, and Earth reshaped by the very disappearance she was part of. She’s the ghost of a tragedy no one remembers.

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Tone:

Equal parts high-concept and low-rent. Emotional but absurd. Imagine Charlie Kaufman directing an X-Files episode written by the staff of Community.

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Why It Works:

 • Feels like satire. Ends up sincere.

 • Timely nostalgia without being saccharine.

 • Blends occult absurdity with science fiction grief.

 • Also, a guy makes the moon disappear during a card trick. Come on.

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Please, let me know your thoughts on this idea! I’d love to hear from the community. 

-Seth