The Dawning: Bloodlust 2

Excerpt

Pearl Harbor, Present Day

Valerie leaned on the railing, looking out over the calm waters of the harbor. Like most actual working harbors she'd seen, this one was far from the pristine blue of the tourist traps. The big ships kept the sand and mud from the bottom churning, and no matter how hard the crews tried, small amounts of oil and fuel always leaked into the water. The result was a brownish froth that looked a lot like the small lakes and ponds from her childhood back in Kansas. But the water here, near her white perch atop the massive ship below, held more oil. It glittered in the sunlight, casting rainbows from the surface of the gentle waves.

She sighed. The scene would have been beautiful if not for the very reason for the memorial's existence. Even the polluting oil still seeping from the wreck of the battleship USS Arizona lying as a silent tomb below her feet painted a pretty picture as it rippled and rolled on the water. The memorial itself, when she ignored the meaning, was a beautiful addition to the seascape.

Her gaze moved from the water near her feet and came to rest on the top of some part of the superstructure of the once mighty ship rusting on the bottom of Pearl Harbor. She didn't know anything about ships, especially warships, but it looked like maybe a gun turret. In her mind's eye, she could see the sailors, in a panic and with little command, fighting to save their ship from the attacking Japanese aircraft.

In her mind, the Arizona lived again, as it had more than seventy-five years ago. Bristling with guns, big guns, and other weapons she didn't recognize, it shown a dull gray in the morning sunlight. But something was terribly wrong with the picture. Aircraft looking like tiny flies compared to the enormous ship swarmed in the skies overhead. The whistling of bombs, like those she'd heard in old war movies, filled her ears, and torpedoes left bubbling white wakes in the water of the harbor as they moved with blinding speed towards their targets. Explosions rocked the air and many ships around Arizona belched huge clouds of black smoke, and her mind could see flames pouring from many.

The sailors fought valiantly, manning the antiaircraft guns and other weapons on the deck. She saw some men with rifles, down on one knee, firing at the aircraft as they came in fast and low to deliver their deadly payloads. But the men fought in vain. From her perspective of future time, she knew the outcome, if not the details, of the battle that raged in her mind.

"This tends to put the entire war in perspective, does it not?"

Valerie jumped when the man spoke. She turned to face Stanley Markinson where he leaned casually on the rail beside her. She hadn't even seen him walk up next to her. He did that a lot, moving like a phantasm through the night, silent and unnoticed.

"Yes, it sure does." She hesitated. She really didn't like Markinson that much, which always struck her as strange. He was always nice and polite and, in some ways, reminded her of her grandfather. Roland always said that Markinson was like the old-world aristocracycultured, refined, and unfailingly polite, but always just a little uppity, with an attitude that he always spoke to someone he saw as inferior.

"I did not mean to startle you." He nodded toward a bubble of oil that surfaced from the rotting hulk below. "Amazing that there is any oil left to leak out, is it not?"

Maybe his avoidance of using contractions bothered her. She really didn't understand why she never warmed to the manshe only knew that he made her a little nervous. "It is that. I wonder why no one has ever tried to clean it up."

He laughed softly. "There have been many such plans, but all involved disturbing the tomb below us. Perhaps, today, it could be done." Markinson waved his hand around at the memorial. "Too many people have forgotten what this place means. We have lost the perspective of an open window on the past."

Roland walked toward them with a small entourage around him. He shook his head at Jack Ortega, one of the two screenplay writers for the Bloodlust series.

"No, no. We can't do that, Jack."

Ralph Kramer, the other writer, stepped up alongside Roland. "We're going to need special effects, and good ones, for this film, Roland."

Roland rolled his eyes. "I agree, but what you're talking about is two hundred million dollars' worth of ILM work. We simply can't afford that kind of outlay just to get a fifteen minute scene." He looked around for his director. "Jim, come over here."

Jim Alba was the senior director since Roland stepped down from directing nearly every film Midnight Interludes Studios produced. Valerie suppressed a smile at Jim's pained expression. He hated dealing with the writers and preferred to have one of his nasty cigars in his mouth when forced to. "Yeah?"

"These two are making me crazy with the FX stuff. Here's the deal." Roland took a deep breath. "If you, as director, say there's no way to make this movie without spending all this money on the special effects, then we'll spend the money, even if I have to sell pencils on Hollywood Boulevard."

Jim shrugged, and Valerie saw him pat his jacket pocket, as if checking to make sure he had a cigar in there. "Right now, my feeling is that all the FX would take us in a direction we don't want to go."

"How's that?" Jack stood very close to Ralph, as if circling the wagons for the coming attack.

"Well, this is a romance, not an action film. I think a huge battle scene is going to swamp the romance." Jim looked at Markinson. "What does the author of the novel have to say?"

Markinson smiled. "The attack on Pearl Harbor is central to the story, and several chapters are devoted to it in the book. But for a film, I am not sure we need to play it up into a major scene."

Roland glanced at her and winked before he turned to Jack and Ralph. "That's my feeling exactly. Stanley is just better at putting it into words than me."

Jim made sucking motions with his lips as if he had one of the cigars that smelled like a cat box overdue for changing shoved in his mouth. "I think we can do it just as well with newsreel and other historical footage. We could even get permission to colorize the stuff if we need that for continuity."

Roland turned to her. "What do you think, baby?"

Valerie blinked a few times. "Who, me? I'm just the casting director and acting coach."

"Exactly. Will the performers have an easier time getting into character one way or the other?"

"I doubt it makes any difference. Old footage or new FX, it's not live action they can interact with." She thought for a moment about the images still echoing in her mind of the battle for Arizona. "Actually, it does make a difference. The special effects are fake, someone's idea of what happened. The footage Jim is talking about is real, what did happen. I'd vote for the historical footage."

Roland laughed as he slipped his arm around her waist. "After being married to me for more than two years, I'd think you would know this isn't a democracy." He kissed her cheek softly, and pleasant tremors rolled through her body, along with a wave of warmth. "OK, people, let's talk some more."

Roland and the entourage walked off to look at some other aspect of Battleship Row, leaving her alone with Markinson again.

"That is very wise, Valerie. The real events of the past always have a larger impact than simple stories."

"I think that's right." She chuckled. "But what do I know about history?"

Markinson looked around at the tourists who wandered around the memorial and at the small group of cast, crew, and executives from Midnight Interludes clustered at the far end of the platform. A smile, one Valerie thought looked a bit wistful, slowly spread over Stanley's face.

"You might be very surprised."

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