October 24, 2026 · daily scene
The Expiration Date
Given circumstances
- Character
- Colonist
- Setting
- Colony commissary, shelves half-empty, ration packet in your hand.
- The moment before
- You picked up your weekly ration. The date stamped on it is from three years ago. Before the colony was built. Before the first ship even launched.
- Scene partner
- The supply coordinator, standing behind the distribution desk with a tablet
Direction
You're not angry yet. You're confused, then suspicious, then insistent. The change happens when they try to dismiss you and you don't let them.
Script
This date can't be right.
COORDINATORIt's fine. The packaging is airtight.
It's dated three years ago. We've only been here eighteen months. So unless we packed food for a colony that didn't exist yet—
COORDINATORIt's a printing error.
Then explain why the lot numbers on every single packet are sequential. Same batch, same date, fifty packets. No printing error does that.
I checked the inventory logs this morning. Earth supply sent these before the first shuttle launched. So either someone's been lying about when this mission started, or you've been feeding us food that's older than this colony.
Written for Act It Up. Free to rehearse and perform for practice, classes and self-tapes.
Record this scene with a teleprompter and a scene partner who reads the other lines.
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