New York, 19/12/2012. 21:15
"How was I Maggie?" Nathaniel asked after the interview was over.
They were back in the lodge and now that he wasn't wearing makeup anymore, he had the impression of living again. He knew that he had to get used to it eventually but that still feels extremely unpleasant so far.
"No worse than usual." She answers with her deadpanned voice.
"That's why I love you Maggie, your support is always heartwarming." He said with a laugh.
"Just shut up! I'm still mad at you for disappearing just after your movie and album were released." She said angrily.
"It was not what I planned to do but I had no choice in the end. Trust me, I would have liked to stay here Maggie. I feel bad for leaving you alone to take care of things while I was away."
"I know. Despite all of your flaws, you are a hard working kid. Moreover, I heard from some of my people that your grandfather kind of disappears and then comes back after you disappear, so I gather that you had something to do with it."
"Kind of yes but I can't tell you anything about this." He answers.
"I wasn't asking because I don't care about gossip and it's not my business but I'm going to ask you to not disappear again until Christmas at least."
"The studio is that mad with me?"
"No but I am. The studio understood that you were sick and thanks to the fact that you did a lot of interviews in local news channels, they didn't even try to ask for their money back. I saw the numbers, the movie did especially well in the city that you visit so kudos to you. It's been two weeks and the movie is still well placed in box office and we just passed the two hundred fifty millions in earnings worldwide." Maggie said with a smile.
"And since I own five percent of the movie and you get ten percent of the deal you negotiate for me… You start looking for an Ivy league university for your daughter or not yet?" Nathaniel laughed.
"We already have everything planned for her future." She smiled wolfishly at him.
"I'm sure you do." He laughed again. "So, what are we going to do now?"
"We need to talk about what you want to do with your life. I got a lot of calls and I mean really a lot of them. For starters, what do you think about sponsorship?" She asked.
"Sponsorship? I'm not really interested, why are you asking?"
"I got offers from various companies, not the least of which are Nike, Apple, Coca Cola who all want to work with you. The money they offer for a few hours of commercials is just insane."
"Well, I'm not interested. I like having my own thing and be as objective as I can. Doing commercials will just make me a sell out and be honest, I don't really need the money so I'm going to say no to that."
"Got it, I'm not really surprised at your answer to be honest. Next, you have been offered new roles for movies but since you are going to start SpiderMan early next year, I denied all these offers in your stead." She explains.
"Thanks, you were right. I won't have any free time for the foreseeable future. I even think I'm going to stay to the SpiderMan role and not look for anything other than that. What do you think?" He asked.
"It's your decision but this is risky. If the movie goes bad, it could end your career as an actor. Moreover, the movie is going to take a couple of months to turn, after that you are going to be bored."
"Bored is something I never knew in my life Maggie, I hope someday I will. I'm a singer first and foremost if my acting career stops, I will not be sad about it." He shook his head.
He had thought about it for some time and he could not do everything as they were only a limited number of hours in a day and all of his were full even when he was sleeping five hours a day like him.
"Noted. Next, I received a call for you to sing at the next Victoria Secret Party. Interested?" She asked with a frown.
Seeing the smile that came to his face, Maggie's face scrunched up in disgust and she spat.
"Men are thrash. "
*******
New York, Lyndon Tower. 19/12/2012. 23:05.
"Scott I need you for something." Nathaniel said.
They were meeting in the bunker under the Lyndon tower, Lina and Hans here too were looking at everything with curiosity and excitement writing on their faces. Press by time, Nathaniel was forced to contract an external company working with the DOD on various secret complexes for the military. Now that they were finished, everything was perfectly clean and futurist looking. Screens were turned on everywhere showing the Lyndon logo, Lina and Hans almost dying to test the whole system.
"Sir?" Scott asked, curious.
"It seems I'm going to be blocked in New York until Christmas so I'm going to ask you to retrieve the last member of the team."
"Of course, it's not a problem. I just need to know where to find him or her." He answers.
"Well, that's where it's going to be a little complicated. She's a trainee in Williamsburg, Virginia, also called The Farm by the CIA."
"Oh I see, well I never liked these assholes so taking one of their recruits is going to be fun, at least for me." He smiled.
"Well me either but you must be careful. I arranged for your rank to be reinstated so that they can't just refuse you at the gate but don't tell them anything about who you are working for and why you need this trainee in particular, do you understand me?" Nathaniel warned him.
"Yes sir." Scott nodded seriously.
"Good, take this, you will have all the necessary information you need in there. I took you a plane ticket for tomorrow, take a good night sleep Scott."
"Thanks sir." Scott answered, taking the files and exiting the bunker.
"Good, Now you two. I see that you are dying to touch the computers and you will have the occasion to do it but not now. I want you two to take everything apart and look for things that do not belong there, spying device, tracker, everything. I want this place totally secure, got it?"
"Yes sir." they answered, starting to get to work excitedly.
"After that, reconfigure everything to your liking. If you need new materials, juste tell me and I will foot the bill. Just keep in mind that I want it secured and efficient."
"Yes sir." They repeated, even more excited now.
Nathaniel just laughed and let them go nuts. He hadn't even left yet that he was already hearing metallic sound on the ground.