Ben Bova - The Starcrossed

“No.”

“No money for staff or technicians or art directors or…”

“No money for nothing!” Finger bellowed. “Not another penny. Just what’s on the budget now. Nothing more. You’ve got enough to do thirteen shows. That’s it. If the series isn’t a hit after the first couple weeks, it’s over.”

“I can’t work like that,” Westerly said. “I’ve got to have decent material, competent staff…”

“You work with what you’ve got. That’s it, baby!”

“No sir. Not me.”

“That’s all there is,” Finger insisted.

“I can’t work that way.”

“Yes you can.”

“I won’t!”

“You’ve got to!”

Westerly got to his feet. For an instant he was tempted to walk over and grab Finger by the throat and make him understand. Then he realized that the man was a safe five thousand kilometers away.

“I won’t do it,” he said quietly. “I quit.”

“You can’t quit.”

“Says who?”

“Says me.” Finger’s voice went low and ugly. “You try quitting and I’ll send you some visitors. Guys you owe money to.”

“Who? The IRS? My ex-wife’s lawyers? They can’t touch me in Canada.”

“Not them. The guys you bought your goodies from, just before you took off for the far hills. They can touch you… oh, brother, can they touch you.”

Westerly felt a river of flame run through his guts. “You told me you had squared thatl” he shouted.

“I told them that I’d square it… after you’d done the first thirteen shows. They’re waiting. Patiently.”

“You lying sonofabitch…”

“And you’re a cathead, an acid freak. So what? You do your job and you’ll be okay. You just make do with what you’ve got there. And no complaints.”

With his eyes closed, Westerly echoed, “No complaints.”

“Good,” Finger said. “Maybe we can all get out of this in one piece. Even if the show flops, the Pineapples are winning pretty good”

“Wonderful.”

“Damned right it’s wonderful. Now you take good care of yourself and have fun. I’m already contacting the right people about the Emmies. They’ll be watching you. Them… and others.”

“You’re entirely welcome. Good night.”

Finger and his office abruptly disappeared, replaced by the rest of the sitting room and the ugly three-dee console.

Westerly stood without moving for several minutes. Then he stirred himself and headed for the bedroom. The flightbag was on the bed. And inside the zipper compartment, he knew, were enough pills to make him forget about this phone conversation.

At least, for a little while.

Gregory Earnest sat in the control booth, high above the rebuilt starship bridge set.

Directly in front of him were the engineers and technicians who ran the complex three-dee holographic equipment. They sat along a row of desk consoles, earphones clamped to their heads, eyes fixed on the green, glowing dials and viewscreens that were the only illumination in the darkened control booth.

Beyond the soundproof window in front of them, the set was alive with crewmen and actors. Electricians were trailing cables across the floor; cameramen were jockeying their self-propelled units and nodding their laser snouts up and down, right and left, like trainers taking high-spirited horses for a morning trot. Mitch Westerly was deep in conversation with Dulaq, one arm around the burly hockey star’s shoulders. Rita Yearling lounged languidly on her special liquafoam couch, glowing with the metallic sheen of her skintight costume. Ron Gabriel paced nervously around the set, orbiting closer and closer to Rita.

Earnest’s nose throbbed whenever he saw Gabriel. And a special vein in his forehead, reserved exclusively for passions of hatred and revenge, pulsed visibly.

“The first take of the first scene,” a voice whispered from behind Earnest.

He turned to scowl, but saw that the speaker was Les Montpelier, from Titanic. He let his scowl vanish. Montpelier was B.F. s special representative; here to lend an air of official enthusiasm to the first day’s shooting. He was higher in the pecking order than the Executive Producer, entitled to scowl but not to be scowled at.

For a moment neither man said anything. They simply sat there looking at each other, Montpelier’s trim little red beard nearly touching the Canadian’s shaggier black one.

Then, over the loudspeaker, they heard Westerly’s voice crackle: “Okay, let’s get started.”

A technician held out the clapboard and shouted, “Starcrossed. Episode One. Scene One. Take One.”

“We’re on our way!” Montpelier said with almost genuine enthusiasm, as the clapboard cracked and fell apart. The embarrassed technician picked up the pieces and scuttled out of camera range, shaking his head at the broken clapboard in his hands.

An omen? Earnest wondered.

Brenda Impanema stayed well back in the shadows, away from the bustling men and women on the blazingly lighted set.

“Would you like a chair?”

Startled, she looked around to see Bill Oxnard smiling at her. He was carrying a pair of folding chairs, one in each hand.

“I won’t be able to see if I sit down,” she whispered. “‘Then stand on it,” he said as he flicked the chairs open and set them down on the cement floor.

With a grin of thanks, Brenda clambered up on a chair. Oxnard climbed up beside her.

“I thought you were back at Malibu,” she said, without taking her eyes from the two minor actors who were going through their lines under the lights.

“Couldn’t stay there,” he replied. “Kept fidgeting. Guess I wanted to see how the equipment works the first day. And I’ve got some new ideas to discuss with you, when you have some free time.”

“Business ideas?”

He looked at her and Brenda saw a mixture of surprise, hurt and anticipation in his face.

With a slow nod, he replied, “Uh, yes… business ideas.”

“Fine,” said Brenda.

The actors were clomping across the bridge set, pronouncing their lines and fiddling with the props that were supposed to be the starship’s controls. Out of the corner of her eye, Brenda could see Oxnard shaking his head and muttering to himself.

“What’s the matter?” she whispered.

“The lights. I told them we don’t need so much wattage with this holographic system. They’re going to wash out everything… the tape will be overexposed.”

“Can’t they take care of that electronically, up in the control booth?”

“Up to a point. I just wish they’d listen to what I tell them. Once, at least.”

His teeth were clenched and he looked very unhappy.

“It’ll be all right,” she said soothingly.

Oxnard grimaced and jabbed a finger toward the actors. “You don’t use an astrolabe for navigating a starship! I told Earnest and the rest of them… why don’t they listen?”

Mitch Westerly wasn’t worried about the astrolabe or any other technical details. His head was still buzzing from last night’s high. Faced with the first day’s shooting, he hadn’t been able to get to sleep without help. Which came in the form of pills that floated him up among the stars and then dumped him on the cement floor of the studio with a bad case of shakes.

Liven it up, you guys! he ordered the actors, mentally. We don’t have time or money for retakes. Put some life into it.

“We haven’t seen any signs of the Capulet starship since we left Rigel Six,” said the first bit player, pronouncing “Wriggle” instead of “Rye-gel.”

“Maybe they never got away from the planet,” spoke the second, as if he were being forced to repeat the words at gunpoint. “They were having trouble with their engines, weren’t they?”