Editing You Are My Sunshine (section)

==Summary==
The mid-1970s are a period of break-neck change for citizens of the Novella Islands. Building back from the ashes of the Great War, the subsequent and haunting echo of the world's entry into the nuclear age, and a change in flag (and government, if only in principle), 'only yesterday' feels like a year ago. Swept up in the tide is Dr. Courtney Moon, a former chemical engineer who - in an attempt to clear her conscience from her actions during the war - entered academia as a lecturer. Unproficient and unable to find the absolution she so desperately seeks, she settles into the monotonous and dull routine of teaching high school science. A disinterested instructor begetting disengaged students, Moon's situation hardly improves, though the task is menial enough for her to perform to a degree of acceptable adequacy. It is at a school excursion to the commissioning ceremony of a nearby nuclear power plant - to which Moon is begrudgingly appointed to chaperone the students - that a seed of madness takes root within her mind. The booming nuclear industry, its lax safeguards, and a broader societal upheaval have created the perfect storm; a missing vial here, a misplaced box there, nobody will ever be the wiser.

Relentlessly curious, and determined to see her teacher smile at least once before she graduates, Alice is the perfect foil for the dreary cloud of depression that hangs over Moon. More importantly, she is the perfect patsy, with light fingers to boot. Over the next few weeks, under the guise of preparation for a science fair project, numerous repeat visits to the facility ensue; all the while, Moon's collection of illicitly obtained material grows. Reaching a critical mass (in more than one sense), she locks herself away in her apartment, and takes the plunge off of the deep end and into mania. After an extensively technical montage, her magnum opus is finally complete: a home-made, basketball-sized atomic bomb. Finding her having drunk herself to the point of passing out, Alice - worried due to Moon's extensive absence from her teaching duties - enters her apartment in its state of utter chaos. Tidying up the most egregious of mess, and ensuring Moon is safe and comfortable, Alice takes her leave... unknowingly contaminating herself with highly radioactive residues. Moon's descent into psychosis accelerates, now that she has her ultima ratio. A series of bizarre ransom demands appear at the Federal Parliament building over the next few days: a nativity play to be transmitted on the national broadcaster (in late August), the First Minister to deliver his address to parliament in bathers and a traffic cone atop his head, and for Opthelia's ambassador to be publicly pilloried in Federation Square. At first, the letters are ignored, but the same radioactive residue from Moon's apartment is found contaminating the papers. As the First Minister dons an orange cone with a red face, Inspector Christopher Woodrow is tasked with finding and arresting the culprit, before the demands reach the point of international incident.

Alice's health deteriorates rapidly over the span of just a few days, from radiation poisoning she incurred at Moon's apartment-turned-laboratory. Upon hearing of this, Moon visits the dying girl, and as Alice finally succumbs to her ailment in the arms of her teacher (who grants the girl a pitying smile in her final moments), the last remnants of her sanity evaporate. Placing the bomb back into the duffle bag she brought it in, Moon leaves the Gadsby household, sending an incoherent confessional email to the authorities as she enters a metro station. Arriving at Burgess International Airport, Inspector Woodrow has apparently beaten her to the punch, confronting her as she arrives at the top of the escalators. The film concludes with the camera zooming in on the horror etched on Woodrow's face, as he realises what the audience will shortly see in the reflection of his glasses: Moon no longer has her bag with her.