That’s where I find myself now. Running away from the Nox, busting through the glass window, and letting the cables take me fifty feet down onto a landing pad. Fifty feet doesn’t sound that high until you’re looking down at where you’re supposed to land. But I must’ve failed to realize that I’m not the Federation Prince, and my bones are not made of titanium, and I will break just as easily as the next guy.
I swallow the bile rising in my throat.
Run, spin, knee, wall, I keep reminding myself, remembering the rehearsal for this shot. Run, elbow, back-step, jump. Run, kiss ass goodbye, jump—
Suddenly, I feel something buzz in my tattered uniform. It’s been made to look singed at the edges and caked in soot, like I’ve just—you now—been through a siege.
I reach into my jacket.
Unknown 3:47 PM
—So, about your question yesterday…
—Where would YOU go?
—Anywhere, any time, in the history of you?
“Hey, hero, you ready to rock and roll?” Ms. Scary Eyes calls to me.
God bless my poor unfortunate soul. “Do I have a choice?”
Down below, Amon, the director, barks a laugh. “We got the paramedics standing by. You’ve got brass balls, Darien! I respect you!”
I follow the stunt coordinator back down the hallway specially built for this fight scene. It’s one continuous camera shot, so no mistakes.
Run, spin, knee, wall. Run, elbow, back-step, jump. Run, kiss ass goodbye, jump.
I’ve practiced this. I can do this.
3:48 PM
—I honestly don’t know.
—I wouldn’t go anywhere alone—it’s a big universe out there.
—I’d need a buddy system.
Unknown 3:48 PM
—LOL scaredy-cat. Then where would WE go?
“Quit texting your girlfriend, hero! Get ready.”
3:49 PM
—The frozen tundra of the Arteysa Galaxy is supposed to be nice.
Unknown 3:49 PM
—Brisk! I like it.
“Loverboy!” the stunt coordinator snaps. “Can someone take the kid’s phone away?”
Kid. I try not to let the word sting as Gail rushes up and snatches the phone out of my hand. “I was just making sure my will was in place. And my insurance,” I add under my breath.
The cameraman moves his hundred-thousand-dollar equipment closer, bracing to follow me down the hallway. Is it too late to opt out? I’m not good at this. I should probably just—
“Get ready,” Ms. Scary Eyes says, and radios down to Amon. “We’re set!”
“Three, two…,” the AD says. I turn around, rocking back and forth on my feet.
Get into the moment. Slip on Carmindor like a Halloween mask that still smells like rubber. Breathe in. Breathe out.
“Start running. Go!” the AD directs, and then shouts “Action!” A horn blares.
I take off down the hall. A Nox comes out of the first doorway. I spin on my heels, ducking his punch. A piece of stucco wall pops over my head—fake gunshot—and three more go off down the hallway. I grab the Nox by the collar and send his face into the fake wall.
“And BOOM!” the AD shouts.
I stumble on command, feet slipping out from under me. Another Nox emerges from the next doorway and slams the tip of his rifle against my forehead. Fires.
I dodge, grabbing the gun, and elbow him in the side. I back-step, aim, fire. The Nox is blown backward on ripcords.
“FINAL CUE!” roars the AD.
Tossing the gun to the side I hurtle the downed Nox, dodging another knight trying to grapple onto me. I can feel the harness digging into me. My heart’s in my throat.
I can almost see the fire, the taste of fake blood in my mouth, the stucco falling from the ceiling, the screams of people trapped in the Federation building as it goes up in flames, the titanium in my bones hurting—because for Carmindor they never stop hurting, never will, his humanity rebelling against the unnatural inside of him—and for a moment, I look at the window and I’m not afraid.
Run, kiss ass goodbye, and—
I launch myself out the window, arms pin-wheeling, air rushing around me faster and faster. The green-screen floor comes so close so fast, between one heartbeat and the next, my life flashes before my eyes. I don’t regret most of it—except one minor, inconsequential thing.
I never asked my mystery friend’s name.
The harness tightens, pressing against my chest, squeezing the breath out of me. I land, feet spread like I’ve been practicing on the green-screen ground. Right where they want me.
Nailed it.
I hold the landing for one second—two—
“And CUT!” Amon yells from the ground. He runs up to me and slaps me on the back. “Amazing! Great job. That was sick.”
“Thanks,” I wheeze, tugging at the harness. I relish my feet planted on sweet, sweet ground. My hands are shaking; I push my thumbs into the harness so the director doesn’t notice.
From the window the stunt coordinator applauds. “Perfect! You could be a stunt man,” she adds. I feel the ropes on my harness begin to tighten again. As if they’re about to hoist me up. “Except next time, try not to scream like a girl.”
“That’s not very PC,” I yell up, my voice shaking, before I realize what she’s said. “Wait—next time?”
Amon claps me on the shoulder. “Word of advice? Don’t grimace like the harness is pinching those pretty brass balls. You don’t wanna have to record sound for this scene in post, right? That’d be embarrassing.” He motions for my stunt coordinator to set me down again, and one of the assistants comes to unharness me. “Okay, five-minute recess!”
Thank the gods of special effects. The moment the assistant unstraps me, I make a break for the restroom in the corner of the building, because all the jostling has not been kind to my bladder. But as I sidle through the crowd of PAs loitering around the snack bar, I get this weird déjà vu, like I’ve passed someone familiar. When I look again there’s no one I recognize—no one besides all the lucky PAs cramming doughnuts in their faces.
I duck into the bathroom and do my business, but my hands are still shaking from the stunt. It’s the adrenaline messing with my eyes, my brain, making me hallucinate that I’m seeing people.
“Shake it off, Darien,” I tell myself. I would splash water on my face but it’ll ruin the special-effects makeup on my forehead: a shard of glass embedded into my hairline, a line of blood curving down my temple. I’m just being paranoid. No one’s here trying to snap pictures of me. I mean, I don’t even have any friends left to sell me out.
The longer I spend in this oasis of conflicting aromas—one of the PAs stationed bowls of mango potpourri everywhere—the longer I prolong going back out there and doing it again. Mark told me that doing my own stunts would be good press—and I did most of my own stunts on Seaside Cove—but this is different.
Just another way I’m not the Federation Prince. He isn’t scared of heights, or firefights, or flying through space with a 0.1 percent possibility of landing his target.
Darien Freeman? He’s scared of it all.
WHEN MY PHONE PULSES WITH THE wake-up alarm at its usual ungodly hour, I reach for it, swiping clumsily for the UNLOCK button to shut the alarm up. But it’s not just the alarm. I have a message.