The Spawn of Lilith

by Dana Fredsti

  “Portia,” Herman said, “I’d like you to meet Lee, your new stunt double.”

  Swallowing, I said, “Looking forward to working with you.” I smiled politely, not wanting to seem over-enthusiastic.

  She looked me up and down dismissively. “You’re working for me, not with me. Don’t forget it.”

  Okay, then. A number of replies sprung to mind. Instead I kept it simple. “Nice to meet you, too.”

  The frown lines deepened.

  Herman stepped forward.

  “Portia, may I have a word with you?”

  She rolled her eyes. “I suppose so. You are the producer.”

  “Why yes, yes I am, nice of you to remember.” Except Herman didn’t say that. Instead he smiled graciously.

  “Thank you. Let’s go to my office.” He turned. “Kyra, if you can get Lee into makeup, we can start lighting the first scene.”

  Portia pushed herself out of the makeup chair and sauntered out of the room without a second glance at either me or Kyra. Herman flashed us an apologetic smile and followed her.

  We waited a few beats, listening to their footsteps move down the hall and through the door that led to the front offices. Then we looked at each other and started laughing.

  “Okay, then,” I finally said.

  “Have a seat.” Kyra gestured expansively toward the row of chairs. I sat down in one well away from the chair previously occupied by Portia. Heaven forfend I be in her seat when she came back.

  Kyra did a quick and efficient job on me, while telling me about her stint as a contestant on Face-Off, a popular reality show featuring makeup artists.

  “I totally should have won,” she said, “but I swear there’s a gender bias with some of the judges.” A moment’s silence while she carefully applied eyeshadow to my lids with feather-soft strokes. She stood back, took a critical look at her work and nodded. I took advantage of the pause to ask a question.

  “So, aside from Portia, how’s the rest of the cast to work with?”

  Kyra shrugged. “I’ve only met them briefly,” she said. “So far everyone seems nice.” She smiled. “Ben Farrell is great. A real sweetheart.”

  Good to know.

  “What about the crew?”

  “Well, I can’t say enough good things about Herman. But then you’ve probably figured that out on your own.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, he seems almost too good to be true, especially in this business. Really invested in giving people a shot.”

  “He saw me on Face-Off.” Kyra smiled wistfully. “Luckily he was more interested in working with me than the guy who took first place.”

  “Is this Jaden’s first gig, too?”

  Kyra frowned. “I think so, but I’m not sure. He’s a real pain in the ass.”

  “Herman and I ran into him just a few minutes ago. He seems kind of twitchy.”

  Kyra rolled her eyes. “That’s one word for it. You’d think special effects is the only important thing on this film, the way he goes on about it.”

  Everyone always thinks their department is the most important. It’s the nature of the beast. I kept the thought to myself, though, and said, “Really? That’s a shame. He seemed nice enough.”

  “Oh, he can be charming, don’t get me wrong.” A bitter tone crept into her voice that seemed strangely out of place. “But honestly, he’s a snake. You can’t trust him. He’s already tried to tell Herman and Jack that I’m not good enough. He’s got ideas that don’t match mine, and he doesn’t understand that FX and makeup should work together. Jaden’s not interested in collaboration, though. He just wants to tell me how to do my job.”

  I stayed quiet as she applied a neutral-colored lipstick and then spun the chair around so I faced the mirror.

  “There. What do you think?”

  I looked at my reflection. “Wow. Can I take you home with me?” Kyra had managed to make me look attractive and awake without making me look particularly made up. When men said, “Oh honey, you look great without makeup!” this was totally what they were talking about.

  She did my hair in a quick sloppy French braid. Her fingers brushed the scar on the back of my neck. I winced reflexively.

  “I’m sorry, did I hurt you?”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “Just an old injury that’s still a little sensitive.”

  She nodded sympathetically, and even better, didn’t ask any questions. “I’ll be more careful next time.”

  We heard distant footsteps, coming from the front hallway.

  “We finished?”

  Kyra nodded. “Wardrobe’s next door. Joan’s in charge. You’ll love her.”

  I was up and out of the room just as the doorway to the front offices started to open. I knocked on the door of the costume department, then ducked inside without waiting for an answer.

  The room, relatively small, was divided up into sections by the clothing racks, with men and women’s clothes further sectioned off by character name. There was no sign of the wardrobe supervisor.

  The back of the room was partitioned off by a tall painted silk screen, all done in designs of Chinese-style dragons with vivid golds, deep reds, and black lacquer. I heard a rustling noise back there.

  “Hello?” I called out. “Anyone here?”

  No answer.

  I poked around further back, checking out the rack that had Jeanette’s wardrobe on it since that was what I’d be wearing. Nothing fancy or sexy. Just khakis and tank tops, along with a couple of olive-green jumpsuits that looked like they’d escaped from the first Alien movie. Stuff I could move in. Fight in.

  Best of all? No leather corsets.

  “Hey there,” a deep voice said from behind me. I jumped like a startled cat, turning to see a very tall, broad-shouldered man in his late fifties grinning down at me. I instantly recognized him as Ben Farrell. He matched Drift and Tater for height. Wide shoulders, too. A mix of Asian and African-American, he reminded me of an older version of the singer from Fine Young Cannibals. Ben was in great shape, especially for someone creeping up on sixty.

  It just wasn’t fair. Guys could play romantic leads until they died, but unless you were, say, Helen Mirren, a woman over forty just wasn’t considered sexy—at least not by the majority of those who did the casting. It sucked.

  “I didn’t think anyone was in here,” I said weakly. “Sorry if I startled you.”

  “Now, you kind of look like Portia,” he said, “but there’s no way in hell she’d ever say sorry for anything, and you’re at least ten years younger than she is. So I’m thinking maybe you’re her stand-in.”

  “Actually, her stunt double,” I corrected him, “although they talked me into doing some stand-in work today, for lighting purposes. Evidently Portia canned her actual stand-in yesterday.”

  He laughed, a deep rich chuckle, and then shook his head.

  “On a movie with this budget, she should be standing in for her own damn self, like the rest of us are doing.”

  “Have you worked with Portia before?”

  “I have not.” He shook his head. “This is the first and the last time I hope to have the privilege of working with Miss Lambert. I’m Ben, by the way.”

  I shook the hand he held out. My fingers vanished in his grip.

  “I know. I’ve seen Dead Maze more than once. I’m Lee Striga.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Your name sounds familiar.”

  I didn’t bother suggesting a reason why. “I’ve done a lot of stunt work,” I said and then neatly changed the subject. “Is anyone from Wardrobe here? I’m supposed to get in costume ASAP, so they can light the first scene.”

  “Joanie was here a minute ago. I think she just went to, uh, powder her nose.”

  I grinned at his euphemism. “I’ll wait for her.”

  “Well, I guess I’ll see you on set.” He gave a little salute and turned to leave. “I’m standing in for myself, don’t you know.”

  Working with Ben Farrell just might make up for working with
Portia.

  * * *

  I spent an hour and a half acting as Portia’s stand-in so Connor and his gaffer could get the lights set for the first scene—Jeanette’s cabin, one of the early ones in the script. She wakes up to find out there’s a satellite nearby that needs repair, and the Bootes is about to enter an asteroid field.

  Meanwhile Jake, her shipmate, has turned the ship around to face Mecca. This segues directly into a scene where Jeanette stalks down the corridor to the bridge, yelling at Jake via an audio link.

  Connor and Paul—the gaffer—spent a lot of time muttering about key and fill lights, blue tones versus red, and a bunch of other technical terms that meant nothing to me as they tried different placements to see what worked best.

  I kept a cup of coffee close by and did my best to pretend that I was a posable Barbie doll instead of a person, because that’s pretty much how Connor seemed to view me. Nevertheless, I did my best to cooperate and follow instructions, including hitting my mark.

  I was good at that. No false modesty. When your life sometimes depends on your ability to stop your body—or a car, motorcycle, or weapon—within a matter of precise inches, you learn to be really good at finding and hitting that mark.

  Connor actually seemed a little impressed. He gave what might have been a nod of approval when I jumped off the bunk bed and landed exactly where he wanted me for the fifth time in a row.

  He and Paul then nattered in a corner for a few minutes, more things about 1Ks versus 2Ks and “I need a bloody 5K, dammit!” C-stands, fill spots, and other stuff. They seemed to be trying to figure out if they had enough lights to set up for the next scene.

  As much as I hated to say anything nice about him, I admired Connor’s proactivity. Setting a scene’s lighting could be one of the most tedious time-sucks in the industry, depending on the DP and his crew.

  Jack stuck his head around the corner of the cabin.

  “How’s it going? We gonna be on schedule?”

  “Of course,” Connor said, as if surprised he would even ask. “I think we may even have time to light the corridor for the next scene, although we really could use a 5K. Do you know if Herman’s ordered it yet?”

  “Uh, not sure,” Jack replied. “I’ll check with him.”

  “Good. We’re pretty much done here.” Connor glanced at his wristwatch. “We can get started lighting the corridor. We have, what, half an hour before we start shooting?”

  Jack clapped his hands together. “That would be great!”

  I sighed. I couldn’t help it. It would be nice if someone asked me if I minded. Darius and I were supposed to start working on the choreography for the knife fight. We were going to block out the basics in a small clearing of trees at the edge of the parking lot fence and then move inside later when the soundstage was available.

  Jack must have felt my irritation, because he looked at me anxiously and said, “Lee, that’s okay with you, right?”

  “Sure.”

  I mean, what else was I going to say?

  At least he’d asked.

  “That’s great!”

  Oh well, at least there were no hygiene-challenged Priaptic demons on set.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Connor and Paul finished up with most of the corridor lighting about the time Portia deigned to show for her first scene of the day. She brushed past without a word, looking totally put out. Not a clue as to how many people would kill for the chance to be where she was now.

  Or did she just not care?

  If I ever make it big, I told myself, and become that much of a jerk, I hope someone just shoots me and puts me out of everyone’s misery.

  I hightailed it out of there before Connor decided he needed me for anything else. I hunted down Darius, who was happily camped out at the craft service table, doing his best to drain the coffee urn. He nodded when he saw me approach.

  “You are ready?”

  “You have no idea.”

  He smiled at that. Just enough to show me that he had a sense of humor lurking behind his dour Eastern European façade. First we headed over to the props department to get weapons and meet Michael, the department head. A lot of films have actual weapons handlers, but Pale Dreamer didn’t have enough weapons or a big enough budget to warrant it.

  Props was located at the back of the soundstage, behind the Morganti spacecraft. It was housed in one of the larger rooms, next to the Lighting Department, Set Design, and FX. I tried to ignore the skin-crawling sensation I got walking past the Morganti set, that sense that something was off. I’d have to film at least one scene there, when Jeanette was chased by the ambulatory corpses of the Morganti’s previous victims. So I had to get used to the creepy-crawly sensation.

  The props room was dimly lit and looked like a well-organized junkshop. Heavy metal shelves lined the walls and held pieces of unidentifiable machinery, bits I recognized from radios and video machines, auto parts, and tools. One shelf held weird objects d’art, ancient-looking weaponry, the kind of stuff I’d seen as set dressing on the Morganti ship.

  Sitting in an incongruously comfy upholstered rocking chair, behind a small table and among all of the organized clutter, was Michael, an attractive older man somewhere in his fifties. Short, impeccably styled brown hair shot through with silver. Designer “skinny” jeans and a tight Lacoste polo shirt in a deep wine shade. He gave me a nice professional smile when I walked in.

  The smile increased in wattage and switched from professional to personal when Darius came in behind me. Michael looked me over with more interest, giving me a quick up and down.

  “You must be Portia’s new stunt double.”

  “Guilty,” I said.

  “Oh, no, hon, she’s the guilty one.”

  Does anyone on this film like Portia?

  “We need the knives,” Darius said.

  “Rubber or steel?”

  “Rubber to take with, steel to show.”

  Michael stood up from his chair and reached into a plastic organizer with multiple drawers, each neatly labeled as to the contents. He rustled around for a moment, then pulled out two sets of identical knives, slapping them down on the table.

  One pair consisted of basic combat knives, with seven-inch blades and black woven nylon sheaths. The other pair looked suitably alien, the blades jagged and painted with the same sickly iridescence as the Morganti craft. One blade from each pair did indeed prove to be rubber.

  “Wow,” I said, impressed. “These are amazing.”

  “Yeah, Jaden did a good job with the replicas,” Michael said. “Not my area of expertise.”

  “Not your usual type of job?”

  He gave an aggrieved sigh. “I’m used to picking out the perfect tea cup for River Byers on shows like Model Women. Now?” He shook his head. “Knives, swords, skulls, auto parts…”

  “How did you happen to take this job?” I asked curiously.

  An embarrassed expression flashed over his face. “I had a couple of slow years after a family illness. My partner Duane…” He paused, smiling sadly. “Well, Duane was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer. I stayed home to take care of him. By the time I was ready to go back to work, it seemed like it had pretty much dried up. Hollywood has a short memory and not a lot of gratitude.”

  Amen to that.

  “Well, a friend of a friend introduced me to Herman. He was willing to give me a chance to prove I could do something different.”

  Of course, I thought, wondering briefly how Herman had managed to make it in Hollywood, given his propensity for hiring lame ducks and has-beens.

  Do I qualify as a lame duck?

  I decided not to pursue that line of thought.

  Darius and I went outside and got to work on the choreography. It was exactly what I needed after dealing with Portia’s attitude and the tedium of stand-in work. We worked up a good sweat and even better choreography. The knife fight was so gonna kick ass.

  That satisfaction almost made up for my irritati
on I felt when Jack approached me during lunch, at one of the picnic tables set up outside the elephant doors. He had an unctuous smile on his face.

  “Lee, I know you’re busy working on fights with Darius,” he said, “but we could really use you again tomorrow morning, just for an hour or so—maybe get here early again? We have a couple of shots in the corridor where you could really help.” He wasn’t quite smart enough to sound apologetic.

  “Tomorrow morning?” I looked at him over my plate. “I thought that was on the call sheet for today.”

  He scratched his head, looking a little sheepish. “I was hoping to get to it today, but the first scene’s taking a little longer than planned. It’s okay, though,” he added brightly. “We budgeted in a few extra days, just in case.”

  Just in case Portia acted up, I surmised.

  “The corridor scene’s already lit though, right?”

  He nodded vigorously. “Yup, all finished. There still just might be some places where we need your help.” He seemed reluctant to get any more specific than that.

  Oh well, I thought. I’ll just beat the early-morning traffic again.

  * * *

  “Okay, then,” Jack said, rubbing his hands together. “Portia, Jeanette is really pissed off at Jake because he’s turned the ship around to face Mecca. So let’s really see the irritation in your body language as you walk down the corridor.”

  “Are you shooting this from the front or the back?” Portia folded her arms across her chest, giving Jack a preview of her ability to show irritation.

  “Well,” Jack replied less enthusiastically, “we’re going to do one take from the front, getting all the dialogue, and then another take from the back with the same dialogue. We’re lit for both, right Connor?”

  Connor nodded from behind his camera, which was set up at the far end of the corridor. Effie, the boom operator, lay on her stomach on a sturdy metal railing overhead so she could follow Portia’s movements with the microphone while staying out of the shot.

  “You get to film me doing my lines from the front,” Portia said coldly. “Beyond that, my stunt double can have her ass shot.”

  Great. Now I’m a butt double.