Morgana's Gift Pt. 07

"Oh you had somebody else before me?" Kev chuckled. "Hopefully I'm not stepping on anyone's toes by coming in and taking over."

"I don't think so," Emily said to him. "We had Hans Zimmer scoring it, but after hearing his first piece of test music for it, the tone was just such a bad fit for the project that we both agreed to part ways. I think he didn't like us saying 'less doom, more neon' over and over again."

"OOOF!" Kev said. "Yeah, I can't imagine your film and his music was a very good culture fit."

"I certainly didn't think so," Emily said, "but one of the concessions I made to the studio in order to help get funding was to let them pick the first composer for the project until I could prove it wasn't a good mesh."

"The execs saw the gunfight scene at the beginning of the second half with Hans' first pass score on it, and they were aghast at how much it simply didn't work with his music. They couldn't wait to get someone else on the soundtrack, but Emily gets the second pitch, so once we have some of your music temped in, I think the execs won't have a problem with it," Alice said.

"Then I'll do my best not to let anyone down."

"Good luck, we're all counting on you," Alice said, doing her best Leslie Nielsen impression from 'Airplane.'

It was early evening in LA, and that meant rush hour traffic no matter how he went about it, so Kev decided to wait it out a bit, and headed over to Caveman Vintage Music, a place where he was certain he could pick up all the gear that he needed.

Trey, the guy behind the counter, was an old friend of Kev's, and the moment he stepped into the store, it was a little like Norm walking into Cheers, where everyone knew his name, everyone was happy to see him and they were already a few steps ahead of showing him some things they thought he might like. Trey looked way more like a Hell's Angel than a musician, with long stringy salt-n-pepper hair that hung down just past his shoulders, and a shaggy beard that went down even further, stocky and swollen, with a voice that sounded like it had smoked five lifetimes of cigarettes in his sixty plus years on the planet. The giant Coke bottle bottom glasses stood out a bit, though.

But Kev knew that Trey was a hell of a guitarist, having been a guitar tech for Jane's Addiction, Nine Inch Nails, Ministry, Megadeath, Korn and a dozen other less famous bands. About six years ago, though, he'd gotten a major leg injury and couldn't move around anywhere near as well as he used to, so he'd taken his part job gig as a counter jockey at Caveman and turned it full time. Every so often, though, Kev had convinced Trey to play a bit, and every time was envious of the large man's ability to rip through a blistering lead line and make it look so incredibly effortless. He was going to have to consider bringing the man up as a session player from time to time.

Shopping for gear on someone else's budget was surreal, and he found himself having to remember that all of this would be expensed to the studio, and that while he was paying for it briefly, he wasn't really paying for it at the end of the day. Even still, he didn't want to go overboard, so he only picked up a handful of particularly key pieces of gear he knew he would need, as well as cable to get them all connected to his existing setup.

"Getting a new band together?" Trey asked him as he was ringing him up.

"Nah, doing some composing work for the Hollwoodland people."

"Oh yeah? Anything I'd have heard of?"

"Nothing I can talk about right now, but I'm sure there'll be announcements in the next few months."

"C'mon, Kev, we're old buds. Who'm I gonna tell?"

"My hands are tied, my friend, but I'm sure Variety'll have it pretty soon," he said, putting down the credit card Elizabeth had given him.

"Okay okay, I'll stop asking then."

"Thanks Trey. I appreciate it. I would if I could, but I can't."

"Yeah yeah yeah, I get it, I get it. Just don't forget your buds when it comes time to the premiere, huh?"

"I'll make sure I've got a ticket with your name on it, Trey, assuming you can wait a year."

"Hey, I've never been to a premiere yet, so it'll still be my first. You want Aneet to help you with the stuff to the car?"

"Yeah, that'd be great."

With the back of his vehicle filled up, he called Natalie first, but she'd already gotten a ride back to the house on the earliest edge of rush hour, so the commute hadn't been brutal. She asked when he'd be back so she could prepare dinner, and he said he was going to check with Ashley, but he'd be home within ninety minutes if he didn't need to pick her up and two hours if he did. Natalie said she'd have dinner ready for two and a half hours from then, just to offer up some flexibility.

After that, he called Ashley, and she happily suggested he come and pick her up, having just finished up her day on campus, eager to head back to the house and glad to not have to take an Uber, so he took the Tesla over toward the UCLA campus. The car's navigation told him it would be far faster to stay on surface streets, so he did so, as rush hour was starting to evaporate, but still wasn't entirely gone yet.

'Why couldn't Morgana have given me the gift of teleportation?' he thought to himself as he pulled up in front of the UCLA library where he saw Ashley and one of her friends waiting for him. The girl was dressed in sporty clothes, track pants and a track jacket, with a bright pink backpack slung over one shoulder. She had dark skin like unsweetened coffee, with black hair in a tightly curled afro that only extended an inch or so from her head. Ashley, on the other hand, was dressed as low key as possible, with jeans and a UCLA t-shirt on, her navy backpack also slung over one shoulder. She moved to hug her friend then half-walked, half-skipped over to the Tesla, hopping into the front seat, leaning over to kiss him hard, both of her hands holding onto his cheeks, before she finally pulled back and slumped into her seat, grabbing her seatbelt to strap herself in. "Thanks for picking me up!" she said to him, cheerily.

"That was quite the warm welcome you gave me," he said, tapping the accelerator to start the vehicle in motion again.

"Duh," she said, rolling her eyes in amusement. "I didn't want Sharice thinking you were my dad or anything, or that she had a shot with you." She grinned a little bit, shifting in her seat to sit as wide legged as possible. "Unless you wanted to have a shot with her. I could probs make that happen if you wanted. She'd totes tucker you out, though."

"Elizabeth is doing the scouting for the house, so I think you'd better talk to her if you're trying to get your little friends into my bed," Kevin said with a laugh.

"Don't be so uptight, Daddy," she giggled. "You don't have to keep everybody you fuck. Sometimes you can just fuck to fuck, y'know? We're sexual creatures, humans, and though we've been denying it, it's best to let our carnal natures come out from time to time. Get down, make love. Besides, she said you were cute, so I wouldn't mind if you just wanted to bang one out with her some time, simply to expand your college sampler platter."

"Are you two old friends?"

"Just met last week," Ashley said. "But she seems nice. We're gonna take Intro to Statistics together once classes start next month. I'm gonna be surrounded by co-ed pussy, Daddy, so you'd better get used to me bringing some home from time to time, although I'm gonna be on campus a lot more, so you better be willing to dick me down when I'm home."

"I'm sure we'll get it worked out at a level that's satisfying both you and me, Ashley."

"Oh, I totes gotta ask... you think you're gonna bang Alice Karteaux? Because she seems dope, and you two seem to get along pretty well."

"We're just co-workers, Ashley," Kevin said. "It'd be extremely unprofessional to do that, and besides, she hasn't shown any interest in me, and I already have the three of you at home, something I can't see Alice being all that into."

"Mmm." The tone the teenager gave seemed to convey she didn't entirely believe him. "Maybs consider asking her out after the movie's been released then. Just to see. You miss one hundred percent of the shots you don't take."

"That's months away, but I'll try to keep it mind," he said to her.

"You heard anything about this bodyguard candidate you're meeting with tomorrow?" she asked him. "I was trying to get Elizabeth to tell me a bit about her, but she's totes still miffed at me for telling you about Natalie before you met her."

"Not a whole lot," Kev admitted. "Only one detail in terms of her qualifications."

"Oh? What's that?"

"She's ex-Mossad."

"What's that mean?"

"The Mossad is the Israeli version of the CIA, I guess."

"Damn. Sound like a bad ass. Did Elizabeth tell you her name?"

"Miriam."

"Dope. Hope she's hot."

"I would think being hot would be a handicap to being a spy," Kevin said with a chuckle.

"You did say she was ex-Mossad. Maybs she was Too Hot To Spy."

"I don't think that's a thing."

"That's totes a thing."

"Saying it's a thing doesn't make a thing."

"It's totes a thing."

"It's not a thing..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"It's totes a thing."

"You're so lucky you're cute," he grumbled.

"And that I give great head! As reminder, tomorrow's wakeup blowjob day, so don't stay up too late." She giggled, licking her lips. "I wanted to put it on your calendar, but Elizabeth wouldn't let me."

"Maybe if you put it code."

"I'll put it code!" she said excitedly. "The Spy Who Blew Me!"