by Jay Martel
Today, Perry was on his way to a $10,000-a-plate dinner for one of Del’s pet causes, the Little Greenies Foundation, an organisation devoted to educating children about the perils of global warming. Perry was using this function as a pretence to get close enough to the billionaire to ask for his help in saving the Earth. In so doing, he was about to give the famous media mogul his biggest audience of all time.
An hour earlier, while Perry shaved in a bathroom next to the underground dressing room, Marty Firth had explained to him that Edenites were fascinated by super-wealthy Earthles. They couldn’t get enough of men who spent their lives acquiring vast, unspendable sums of money at the expense of other earthly pleasures and relationships, only to die and have that money mean nothing to them. Marty told Perry that he planned to use this fascination with pointless wealth to increase the audience of Bunt to the Rescue.
‘You know that money is the only thing that makes a difference to most Earthles,’ Marty had told him. ‘And, after the debacle at St Jude’s, you realise that inspiring the masses to become better people isn’t enough without a real organisation behind you. Del Waddle can give you that organisation.’
Perry frowned. ‘But he’s already giving his money away. And I’m just going to sound crazy. Why should he give away more of it because a crazy man shows up at one of his benefits and tells him to?’
‘Remember: you’re on a mission,’ Marty said. ‘You’re desperate. You’ll do whatever it takes.’ When Perry continued to stare at him blankly, Marty waved his hand. ‘You’re the star – you’ll figure it out.’
Perry shook his head. ‘I’ve known rich people. They really like hanging onto their money. That’s why they’re rich.’
Marty smiled the crinkly, eye-twinkling smile that Perry had quickly come to loathe. ‘No one ever said saving Earth was going to be easy.’ He then excused himself to consult with other producers about ‘setting up shots’. Perry took the opportunity to slip back into Amanda’s dressing room. He needed to talk to someone about his misgivings. ‘The upcoming episode’, as Marty referred to it, seemed like a Sisyphean task at best. If Earth’s survival depended on Perry making an effort to redeem the planet in the eyes of its viewers, there were certainly better ways to do it.
He found Amanda attempting to fasten a string of pearls around her neck and offered his help, which she gratefully accepted. Her initial enthusiasm for dressing up like an Earthle had subsided. ‘I don’t know why anyone would do this,’ she said. ‘Such a waste of time.’ With the necklace in place, she turned and looked at Perry. ‘So, what do you think?’
Perry had fallen in love with Amanda when she’d worn her blue Galaxy Entertainment jacket and no make-up. Now, seeing her in the evening gown, radiating the same effortless beauty on a much larger scale, he thought he’d pass out from blood rushing to places it didn’t normally go, and certainly not in such volume.
‘Not bad,’ he managed to say, and was about to discuss his problems with the new mission when Marty entered.
‘Your limo’s ready,’ he chirped. ‘Come on, superstar. Let’s go save the planet.’
* * *
Perry finally had his second cufflink in place when the limousine, which seemed nearly a block long, turned into a mansion-lined street and pulled up to an imposing wrought-iron gate. In the distance, he heard his driver talk into an intercom. After a few moments, the great gate opened soundlessly and the limo drove through.
Perry reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and removed an engraved invitation on thick creamy card stock that probably cost more to print than Perry spent annually on clothes. When Marty gave him the invitation, Perry had wondered how viewers were going to believe that a poor screenwriting teacher would be able to afford ten thousand dollars for a dinner when he’d just given all his money away.
‘You had a retirement account with the Writers’ Guild,’ Marty said. ‘We took it out of there.’
When Perry had protested, Marty cheerfully reminded him that retirement funds were now wishful thinking at best to the lead character in Bunt to the Rescue.
The limo continued driving through a landscape of trees and lush meadows with no house in sight. Just when Perry was convinced that they had somehow become lost in a wilderness area in the middle of Beverly Hills, a white mansion fronted with ionic columns and topped with gleaming solar panels came into view. The limo nosed its way into a bevy of other stretch limos that fanned out like shiny sticks of liquorice before the mansion’s entrance. Perry thought that it was a good thing the partygoers were financing a foundation to educate children on global warming, since they clearly weren’t up to it.
The driver opened Perry’s door and he cautiously emerged, half expecting his flung-together outfit to fall apart when confronted by gravity. Miraculously, it stayed intact. Attempting to exude the air of someone who actually belonged at such an exclusive address, Perry nodded to his driver and walked from the limo.
‘Tuck your shirt in.’ Amanda’s voice rang in his ear. He noticed her standing with a group of other beautiful people by the mansion’s entrance. She appeared strangely at home in the plush surroundings. He watched as she turned away from the group and opened her Louis Vuitton purse, releasing a small swarm of flies into the air. ‘Don’t look at me,’ she said in his ear. ‘Remember, you don’t know me until we’re back underground.’
Amanda and Marty had repeated this so many times that Perry thought he would scream: Amanda is your field producer, but you don’t know Amanda. She’s there to guide you through the episode but can’t help you in any other way.
Perry tucked in his shirt while walking towards the front door. ‘I’d be looking at you even if I didn’t know you,’ he muttered softly.
‘And don’t talk to me,’ the voice in his ear said. ‘What are the viewers supposed to think?’
‘That I talk to myself,’ Perry said. From the other side of the driveway, Amanda scowled at him. Perry smiled back at her and she turned away.
‘Stop messing around and get in there,’ she said. Perry showed his invitation to a woman with a clipboard standing at the door and walked between two huge bronze doors depicting scenes from the Old Testament. Perry recognised them as reproductions of ‘The Gates of Paradise’, the famous baptistery doors in Florence, and he wondered what Del Waddle did when he had a fight with his wife – there was definitely no way to slam these without heavy machinery.
Perry crossed the marble floor of a gaping entryway, pausing to navigate a busy ant trail of white-suited caterers dashing back and forth with shiny silver trays. He finally came to another set of double doors that opened onto a lawn so rich and lushly green in the dying afternoon light that Perry wanted to drop to the ground and hump it. A tastefully designed sign informed him that ‘The grounds of the Waddle Estate are maintained with reclaimed water’. All around the green expanse were clusters of beautiful and immaculately dressed partygoers.
Perry perused the perfectly tanned and tucked faces of the saviours of Earth. Everywhere he turned his head he saw movie stars, studio heads, and A-list directors. If a bomb went off, Perry thought, Americans would have no choice but to start reading again. No writers, however. Even the most sought-after screenwriters weren’t sought after for an event like this. At such a happy, carefree occasion, no one want to be reminded that they were all dependent on some greasy little computer jockey’s imagination.
Seeing all these outstanding individuals in one place, Perry felt even more fraudulent than usual. To seemingly underscore this feeling, a few of the partygoers glanced over at Perry and quickly looked away. No one was faster than the Hollywood elite at telling who did and didn’t belong.
Between the conversing partygoers frolicked laughing children of all ethnicities garbed in the official uniform of the Little Greenies: green cap, green neckerchief, and a T-shirt reading ‘Save the Planet’. At one end of the perfect lawn, a group of pale and serious young men played acoustic music on a stage. Perry recognised them as a
popular rock band that had just released its sixth consecutive platinum album. He couldn’t fathom what it would cost to have them play at a party, let alone play softly.
He took a sparkling flute of champagne off a passing tray and sipped it. The vaporous elixir playfully tickled the back of his tongue and made him instantly happy. He realised that he’d probably never tasted real champagne before. As the soaring strains of another international hit emerged from the original artists and the Southern California light became even more golden, he surveyed the glowing glade before him, the bubbling fountains, the amazingly attractive, charming people, none of whom – women or men – Perry would throw out of bed, especially after his second sip of champagne.
And he realised that he was in deep, deep shit.
Who, standing in this beautiful preserve of the rich, would believe that the Earth was in real and immediate danger?
Perry snapped out of his reverie when a large bald caterer yanked the champagne flute out of his hand, scowled at him and strode off. He was about to protest when Amanda’s voice purred in his ear. ‘I told him to do that.’ Perry turned and saw her in the distance walking towards the stage, her back to him. ‘I told him you’re a recovering alcoholic.’ Perry started to speak. ‘Again, no response is necessary. You’re desperate and you’re here on a mission, don’t forget that. The group just to your right: there’s your man.’
Perry turned to a nearby conversation cluster and saw, among several men in expensive suits and women in designer gowns, Del Waddle. Unlike the rest of his guests, Del wore jeans – the ultimate power statement at a gathering like this – a baseball cap from one of the teams he owned and a ‘Save the Planet’ T-shirt. He was tastefully unshaven and, in one arm, held an adorable young girl wearing a Greenies cap and neckerchief. Perry steeled himself and walked towards the group.
‘Watch it, mister!’ Perry looked down to see that he’d nearly stepped on one of the Greenie children, a boy playing in the grass with a ball painted to resemble the Earth.
‘Sorry,’ Perry said.
‘Go fuck yourself,’ the child said.
Perry realised that, peering up from under the green hat brim, was none other than Nick Pythagorus.
CHANNEL 20
THE PHILANTHROPIST
Inside a control room within the Galaxy Entertainment building on Ventura Boulevard, all hell was breaking loose. The Nakeeth director, his many eyes swivelling wildly, faced thirty-six monitors, many of which showed Nick Pythagorus confronting Perry Bunt. He yelled at the assistant director and oozed several pints of dark green liquid onto the control board. The assistant director, in turn, yelled at his technicians, who then yelled at each other.
In the middle of this chaos, the calm in the middle of the storm, sat Executive Executive Executive Producer Marty Firth, munching on a sliver of goat’s-cheese quiche, which both he and Vermy were enjoying immensely. This was what live television was all about, Marty mused. These were the moments that made him feel truly worthwhile.
‘Didn’t we know this guy was loose?’ the director shouted in a guttural voice, fixing Marty in the gaze of a dozen eyes. ‘How is it that we didn’t pick him up earlier? We only have 500 cameras pointed at this crapstand!’
Marty shrugged. Everyone in the company knew Nick had been fired, had shed his fly tattoo and jumped the grid. But this sort of thing happened all the time – you didn’t shut down productions because some nine-year-old former executive was out there somewhere, nursing a vendetta.
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Marty said. ‘He’ll be gone by the time we come back from the commercial break. Amanda, can you take him out?’
At the Beverly Hills estate, Amanda was already trotting across the lawn towards Perry and Nick. She nodded discreetly. ‘Good girl,’ Marty said and returned with gusto to his quiche.
The latest episode of Bunt to the Rescue had been moving along fine until moments earlier, when a production scanner had picked up a ‘casting irregularity’ on the set. It took several seconds to identify the irregularity as a DFE – Disgruntled Former Employee.
With surprising frequency, DFEs ‘went native’, often divulging information to Earthles that caused shows to be cancelled or rescheduled. Sometimes their bitterness would lead them to establish communication with Leslie Satan and join The Movement, working to destroy the productions they once nurtured. Nick Pythagorus was now one of these.
Nick’s fall had been precipitous, even by the standards of the intergalactic entertainment business. Before satellite cameras trained their lenses on Perry Bunt in St Jude’s Shelter for the Displaced, Nick had been the wunderkind who would shepherd Earth to its ratings-grabbing ruination. But on hearing that his finale was being postponed for a second time, young Nick had lost it. While youth definitely had its advantages, self-control was not one of them. He had pitched a full-out tantrum on Marty Firth’s desk, giving Marty no recourse but to fire him and send him back to the moon with a security escort. Nick, however, had quickly slipped the guards, removed all his tracking devices and used his knowledge of Channel Blue to elude detection.
Now standing at the party next to a surprised Perry Bunt, the fired executive knew he didn’t have much time to do what he’d come for, but he loathed Perry so much that it was hard to resist a little abuse. ‘You stupid Earthle sap. You have no idea what you’re part of, do you? No idea.’
Perry stared down at the boy, unsure of how to react. Was this part of the show?
‘This is not part of the show,’ Amanda said into his ear. Perry could see her trotting quickly towards Nick’s back, out of the boy’s view. ‘He’s not supposed to be here. Walk around him and get to Del.’ Perry tried to do as he was told, but Nick blocked his path.
‘Your girlfriend’s not being honest with you,’ he said. ‘We can wreck you if we want to because we made you.’
Perry frowned. ‘What?’
Nick exhaled, exasperated. ‘You writers are so damn stupid. I’m going to lay it out for you, OK? You and this whole planet are nothing more than—’
Amanda’s left hand clamped down on his shoulder. ‘Nicholas, you’re being a very bad boy. You know it’s nap time.’ She pulled him away from Perry, but Nick dropped down, slipping from her grasp, and ran towards the house. Amanda followed him at a brisk trot. Perry watched her go, unsure of what to do.
‘Go to Del,’ her voice rang in his ear.
Perry remained where he was, watching Nick and Amanda disappear behind well-dressed guests. What was Nick trying to warn him about? What had he said? That Amanda was lying to him, that ‘we made you’. What did it mean? Again, Amanda seemed to anticipate his thoughts. ‘He’s still upset because we ruined his plans for the finale. Now he’s trying to ruin our show. Don’t let him. Go to Del now.’
Perry took a deep breath, turned and walked towards the circle of partygoers that included Del Waddle. He found a gap between the casually dressed billionaire and a bearded man in a dinner jacket and gingerly wedged himself into it.
‘It’s really too much,’ the bearded man was saying. ‘I mean, he apparently really believes that aliens are going to destroy the Earth.’ Perry froze. What the hell was going on? Did they already know who he was and why he was here? No one was looking at him, but maybe that was part of the show – to see how he’d react.
‘What do they call it again?’ asked a mean-faced older man.
‘Buddyism,’ said the bearded man. ‘Apparently, their prophet is a homeless guy named Buddy who was taken away by the police and hasn’t been seen since.’
The older man raised his champagne glass. ‘God bless the LAPD for making more prophets than we know what to do with.’
The group laughed except for Perry. He warily took a slow step backwards when Amanda’s voice came into his ear. ‘Stay there,’ she said. ‘They’re just talking about the religion you started. It’s been in the local news. They have no idea you’re Buddy.’
‘I’m not Buddy,’ Perry muttered under his breath. �
�There is no Buddy.’
‘Quiet. They’re starting to look at you.’
Sure enough, the partygoers were casting sidelong glances in his direction. Perry smiled. ‘Buddy, huh?’ he said awkwardly. ‘That’s a good one. People sure are crazy.’ The group stared at him, nonplussed.
Del shrugged. ‘Well, if it gets people to do good, who cares what motivates them, right?’
‘Oh come on, Del,’ said an older woman with dozens of gold bracelets on one forearm that shimmered and clanged as she spoke. ‘They’re deluded! It’s just another case of religion turning people into total idiots.’
‘Opiate of the masses,’ snorted the bearded man.
‘More like the children’s cough syrup of the masses,’ the older woman said, and everyone laughed, including Perry, who probably laughed a little too hard in his effort to seem like one of the gang.
Del peered over at Perry and extended a hand. ‘Del Waddle,’ he said. ‘I don’t believe we’ve met.’
‘We haven’t,’ Perry said, shaking his hand. ‘Perry Bunt.’
‘Welcome, Perry,’ Del said.
Perry smiled nervously, his mind whirling through different approaches to becoming ‘the crazy guest’ at the party.
‘This is your opening,’ Amanda said in his ear. If there had been an earpiece or anything tangible in there, Perry would’ve torn it out and flung it to the ground. Unfortunately, he’d taken a pill back in the dressing room and had been stuck with Amanda’s voice in his head ever since.
‘Thanks for supporting Little Greenies.’ Del gestured to the small girl in his arms. ‘This is my daughter, Wynd.’ ‘Wynd’ was pronounced ‘Wind’, and although Perry couldn’t hear the ‘y’ in the girl’s name, he knew enough about Hollywood to assume it was there.
‘Hello, Wynd,’ Perry said. ‘Mr Waddle—’
‘Del,’ Del said. ‘Please.’