1. February 8th

FEbrUARY 8TH

Kai

Kai removedher Ray-Bans as she followed Cherry into the empty conference room.

Who names their child "Cherry"? Hope it's a nickname. Must be with that red hair.

"Please, have a seat, Ms. Serrano. Can I get you something to drink? Coffee? Water? Something else?"

Kai sat in the chair closest to the head of the table and removed her Dodgers cap, placing it atop her overloaded backpack on the chair next to her. "No, thank you."

The red-haired woman smiled. "If you change your mind, just let Waters know." She laid an accordion file at the seat across from Kai and pulled the starfish-shaped speaker from the center of the table down to between Kai and the opposite seat. "Sorry to keep you waiting. It should only be a moment."

As Cherry reassured her, Kai heard the door open and close, and a figure appeared in her peripheral vision. She looked up, and her breath stopped for just a second. Scalp-cropped, dark blond hair, muscles that filled a tight navy blue Henley with sleeves pushed just above his wrists, and tan cargo pants with more pockets than any man could ever need.

Holy hell, horseshoes, and hand grenades! G.I. Joe in the flesh.

Realizing she was probably looking like a deer caught in the headlights, she exhaled. Standing up to greet him, she extended her hand across the conference table, trying to smile like a normal human being.

Hazel eyes! A corona of green around the pupil, the flames spread out into blue irises. Eyes so laser-focused, they appeared to pierce her in place. She froze again when their hands connected across the table as Cherry made introductions. "Ms. Serrano, this is Waters. He will be your liaison today."

Silence. It wasn't so much a handshake as a melding of energy. Neither of them dropped the other's hand.

A gentle throat clearing from Cherry seemed to wake them both from the trance. Their hands dropped to their sides.

He found his voice first. "Ma'am." His expression was blank, but he gave her a nod. The only show of emotion was that his irises appeared to flare.

She mentally shook herself and cleared her throat. "Mr. Waters."

"Just Waters, ma'am."

"The men use nicknames here," Cherry explained. There was a pregnant pause. "Well, I'll leave you to it. I'll patch God in shortly." The last part was directed to Waters, and she looked as if she was trying to hold back a grin. She exited.

They remained standing for another moment, just staring over the table. Kai shifted her weight from one foot to the other. Waters seemed to reset himself and gestured for her to sit. He had barely pulled himself up to the table when Cherry's voice came through the starfish. "God online."

"Ms. Serrano." A strong, raspy voice came over the speaker. He might as well have been in the room, the quality was so crystalline.

"God? Seriously?" she whispered to Waters. He just looked back at her stone-faced. "Well, I must admit I do feel a bit as if I'm talking to a nonphysical entity. But this room's a bit large for a confessional."

The voice over the speaker gave a "hmph," and she heard the crinkle of what sounded like a candy wrapper being ripped open. "Let's get to business, shall we?" he began.

Okay, no nonsense. Got it.

"Certainly. Do you want paper copies of my proposal or digital ones?" she asked.

"Both," God answered. "We'll do digital now, and you can leave the paper with us to discuss."

Anticipating her, Waters reached into one of his cargo pockets and handed her what looked like a small USB stick.

Kai raised an eyebrow.

"It will connect you to our Wi-Fi. All it does is project your material on the screen, like if you were presenting through a Zoom call," he reassured her.

Riiiiiiiight. Apparently, I have the word "naive" stamped across my forehead.

She gave a muffled, unladylike snort. "I so believe that to be true."

Kai hauled her backpack up onto the conference table with a loud thunk, pulled her laptop out of the bag, opened it, plugged in the stick, and proceeded to pull up her files.

As she was rustling through her backpack for the proposal document, she looked up to see Waters staring at her bag. Handing him the flexi-binder with the treatment, she glanced at it again, trying to view it as he probably did. "Yeah. I call it the ‘Backpack of Death.' If it doesn't break my back, it will take out someone or something else." Shrugging with a lack of concern, she focused back on her screen, clicked on the folder labeled Stormfront, and proceeded to open several files so that she could flip from tab to tab as needed.

Waters used a remote to pull up her desktop on the large telescreen behind the head of the table.

"Stormfront. Is that the name of the film?" God asked. His speech lost a little of its clarity as he worked around something in his mouth.

"It's a working title. We never save files on computers or refer to films by the actual title to protect it from paparazzi."

"In other words, the film has its own alias," God surmised.

Kai shrugged, then remembered he couldn't see her.

At least, I don't think he can. Perhaps there are cameras?

She surveyed the room, and when he spoke, she swore she could hear a smirk in his voice. "Yes, I can see you, Ms. Serrano."

"Okay, that's not at all creepy," she muttered under her breath.

"So, tell me what my company can do for you," God pushed.

She glanced up at Waters, but his face was blank as he intently watched her.

If he's this gorgeous while on automaton mode, a smile would probably be licensed to kill.

She turned her face back to her computer screen. "I'm looking for a Navy SEAL consultant for a film I'm directing. I had someone lined up, Kent ‘Ka-Bar' Leech, but apparently, he will unexpectedly be in the field longer than planned. He suggested Tribe as a place to find a suitable replacement."

There was silence from the man over the speaker and G.I. Joe across from her. She noticed the latter was staring at a point just over her shoulder, but as soon as he caught her glance, he refocused on her.

God prompted, "And you know I have SEALs working for me because…"

"Kent wouldn't waste my time suggesting I contact you if you couldn't help me. Is there a problem here?" she asked.

"We don't do movie consults," Waters replied.

"So I gathered from Kent, but he said it was worth trying since I'm now in a bind time-wise."

She heard crunching over the speaker as God pulverized whatever he had in his mouth.

"Why do you need a consultant?" he asked. The last word sounded like it was in air quotes.

Gathering herself, Kai put back on her director persona. "Stormfront is an action film depicting a team of Navy SEALs who are sent on a mission into Central America to rescue an ambassador and his daughter from a hostage situation in El Salvador. Cliché, I know, but that's why I need assistance. I need someone with actual SEAL training skills and knowledge so that I can turn this testosterone-heavy, error-filled writing into award-winning entertainment."

"You have issues with testosterone?" God barked.

"If I were filming some sort of black leather, homoerotic, motorcycle mafia feature, no," she snarked back.

"SEAL missions are highly classified," Waters injected. "As are the means by which they do their jobs."

She nodded. "Being a SEAL himself, Kent was going to help me with what we could and could not have, while still making the story ring true by helping us work around something the Navy wouldn't want shown to the world. I won"t settle for ‘mostly true.'" She interlaced her fingers in front of her and leaned on the tabletop with her forearms. "Now I'm forced to find an alternative since he's on assignment."

"Trying to avoid the critics" scathing reviews on accuracy?" She could hear the sneer in God's voice.

Motherfucker is baiting me! Okay. I'll play, asshat.

Narrowing her eyes and scrunching her nose, she glared at the starfish. "What I care about, Mr. I-Named-Myself-After-A-Deity, is actual SEALs and other Navy servicewomen and men complaining about yet another Hollywood director trying to make a fuck-ton of money by using romanticized, inaccurate portrayals of who they are and what they do. What I don't give a flying fuck about is what the critics say."

Silence on the other end of the speaker stretched for several moments. She tried to focus on the starfish rather than looking up at Waters, but despite her better judgment, she felt drawn to whatever his reaction would be to her little tirade. She risked a look up at the man. He still had no expression on his face as he stared her down.

Fuck a duck! Hope I'm not drooling. So intense!

The disembodied voice interrupted her thoughts. "Exactly what are your expectations of this consultant if we agree to take on this task? And it's a big ‘if.'"

This is starting to feel like an interrogation.

Her naughty brain poked at her with an evil laugh.

Let G.I. Joe interrogate me. Slap the cuffs on. I'll tell him anything he wants to know.

But then the naughty brain was given a bitch-slap by her nice brain.

It's such a funsucker sometimes.

"Why did you agree to see me if you wouldn't consider taking the job? I didn't make my intentions a secret when I called for the appointment."

"You are here, Ms. Serrano, because Kent Leech called in a favor from one of my men." The disembodied voice, which had been cold with her before, was now at frostbite level. "He used that favor to ask me to listen to your request, and that's all I guaranteed I would do. So, I ask you again, Ms. Hollywood-Princess-Think-I'm-Stanley-Kubrick-Director, what do you expect of us if we agree to take on this task?"

Her eyebrow arched at the fact that she'd managed to provoke him.

Hollywood Princess? What a fucktool!

Calmly, she replied, "First, I want training for the actors. Obviously, it would be impossible to put the actors through actual SEAL training. I'm into realism, but I'm also practical and know that type of training is overkill. But as much as possible, I require my actors to film on location and do their own stunts. This is far more expensive, but again, it means more realism. I prefer to spend my budget on hiring someone to train the actors to do the actual work rather than stressing out about CG-ing a bunch of ones and zeros into submission. Not only is computer work a pain in the ass, but it also slows down the editing process.

"Second, I want a consultant on-site overseeing the execution of training, adjusting, or retraining as needed.

"Third, I want that consultant to shape my actors into a synchronized team, or at least as close as possible."

She flipped her screen to a series of location shots depicting sets that were rendered and scouted for the film. "As part of this plan, the entire film is being shot on Roatán, one of the Bay Islands of Honduras. Inside Coxen Hole, its largest city, we've secured living space for the various crews and rented several warehouses for storage and the building of interior sets. However, the actors will be living in a house we've rented about ten miles outside the city limits. I want the actors to actually live together in that house, eat together, and bond just like a SEAL team would, without external interference from crew or locals, and all outside contact is restricted as well until filming is complete, just like it would be on a mission."

Again, there was silence, and it was even longer than before. Kai focused on the starfish; expression unflinching as she waited for God to respond. However, it was Waters" low voice that broke the silence. "What you're asking for is a rather tall order, Ms. Serrano, and to be honest, impractical. SEAL teams train for over a year, and even some of the very best end up ringing the bell. Besides that, the type of bonding and cohesiveness you're looking to create in a simulated environment takes a very long time to develop in reality."

Kai focused on the quiet soldier now, unable to avoid it since he'd finally chosen to speak.

Ohmygod. He needs to talk more often. Every time he speaks, his voice reminds me of hot fudge sliding down vanilla ice cream.

She tried telling her libido to shut up, but she didn't think it would listen.

Keep your tongue in your mouth and your butt in the chair. Otherwise, next thing you know, you'll be crawling over this table and licking him like he's the spoon with the last dregs of a sundae on it.

Rather than argue with his attempt to convince her that what she wanted was unreasonable, Kai clicked open six dossiers evenly spread across the screen that showed pictures of the five men and the actress who would play the leading roles, along with a brief synopsis of each character's configuration within the film. She then yanked six different colored folders out of her backpack and tossed them across the table to Waters.

Another long stretch of silence ensued as Waters picked up the folders and leafed through each of them for a minute or two apiece. After finishing the brief overview, he placed the folders in a neat, completely symmetrical pile on the table, then turned to look at the telescreen. One elbow rested on the table, his hand propping up the side of his face as he assessed, again with no expression on his face. She briefly wondered what it would be like to be under that scrutiny in private.

Baby Jesus on a skateboard, this guy is way too intense.

Kai refocused on her computer screen, afraid that if she watched him think in silence any longer, she'd cave and beg him to speak to her. Hell, he could read the serial numbers from computer equipment for all she cared. And to add to that nonsense, she was feeling herself salivate as she stared at his muscles underneath the shirt sleeve on the arm propping up his head.

What the hell is wrong with me? Men do not affect me like this.

Minutes later, Waters swung his body back around and opened the flexi-binder she'd given him, scanning several of the pages. Finally, he closed the folder and raised his blank face to Kai. "There are issues here without even reading the script, starting with its calling for an incorrect number of elements. Platoons are sixteen in number, or two squads of eight, or four elements of four."

"One of those men plays the villain, but his character is a former teammate, so he also needs the training."

"There are no female SEALs."

"Well, that is technically incorrect. One has qualified, and three more are currently training. So while there might not be one on a team at this time, it would not be inaccurate to portray a woman as a SEAL. However, that's a moot point because the female isn't a SEAL. She's a CIA operative. Is there going to be an actual question in here somewhere?"

He continued on, expressionless, as if he hadn't heard her responses to his concerns. "You also have some duties mislabeled and divided out."

Seriously? Oh, it's on like Donkey Kong now.

She stared at him. "Look, G.I. Joe." He blinked slowly, raising his eyebrows and lowering his chin. "I'm very aware of what my strengths and my faults are. I'm not stupid. I didn't write the script. If I had, I would have been talking to someone months ago, and all the proper research would have been done right the first time around. Instead, I was smart enough to realize that there was fabulous potential but a shit-ton of errors, and some pretty huge ones at that. It would be irresponsible of me to assume I know it all because I've done some basic internet searches. And while I know I'm damn good at what I do, I'm also aware enough to understand that allowing my ego to drive me would be a mistake. I refuse to be a detriment to the project, or worse, endanger my actors and crew. I need it done right, or I'm not doing it at all. So… here I am, searching for a consultant. An expert to fix the bullshit before we start filming."