Remo glanced over at the man. He found that he was staring into the vacant eyes of Jann Revolta. The actor had been a star in the 1970s only to become a has-been in the 1980s. If Quintly Tortilli hadn't resurrected him from box-office death by casting him in Penny Dreadful, the actor would have been relegated to B-movie sequels featuring talking babies for the rest of his inauspicious career. Thanks to Tortilli's retro mentality, Revolta was now in virtually every movie Hollywood produced.
"What are you doing?" Revolta asked, curious. Half standing, Remo was craning his neck, trying to see if there were any vacant seats. Unfortunately, the cabin was full. Exhaling annoyance, he sat back down.
"I'm trying to read," Remo muttered.
"Oh." Revolta nodded. "I don't do much of that. I'm too busy making movies to read even half the scripts I do. Hey, is that a script?" he asked excitedly, leaning toward Remo's tray. His ample paunch made it a struggle. "Gimme twenty million and I'm in." As soon as he saw the main character's name, the actor's face grew deeply disappointed. "Ohhh, I can't be in that movie," he groaned. "It's a Lance Wallace vehicle."
Remo had heard of the actor. But he couldn't be in Chiun's movie. Remo hadn't seen Wallace during any of his time on the Taurus lot. Revolta supplied the answer to a question Remo didn't have time to ask.
"Lance is back as the hotshot cop, but I heard he finished his work a month ago," the actor said. "Of course, Quintly wanted me to star at first. Back then, it was this weird little story about assassins working for the government or something, but then the studio changed the focus and moved it the franchise route. Did I mention I have an airplane?" Remo had quickly lost interest in anything the actor had to say. He was focused back on the script. Hoping to shut Revolta up without having to deal with the questions a paralyzed voice box might bring, he went the Machiavellian route. "Horshack carried you," Remo said blandly. He didn't even glance at the actor.
Revolta frowned. "I'm sensing coldness here," he said.
"Think how much colder it'll be when I stick you out on the wing at thirty thousand feet."
"Is this a test? If it is, you can't upset me with your hostility," Revolta insisted. "I'm a 40.0."
"If that's your IQ, it's about twice what I expected."
"Just what I'd expect from a 1.1," Revolta said firmly. "I'm talking about the Timbre Scale. It plots the descending spiral of life from full vitality all the way down to death. You're a 1.1. Someone who exhibits covert hostility."
Remo was a little disappointed in himself. He thought he was being as overt in his hostility as possible.
"I am a 40.0," the actor continued proudly. "Someone who experiences complete serenity." He fumbled in his carry-on bag, producing a thick paperback book. "If you want to change your life for the better..."
With a lunatic's grin, he offered the book to Remo. On the cover, an ominous black tornado ravaged a desolate plain. The word Diarrhetics was printed at the top. "By Rubin Dolomo" was printed in smaller type at the bottom.
Remo remembered hearing about this on TV. Revolta was one of the many celebrity members of the Poweressence cult. A few years before, he had even gotten the president to chastise Germany for its treatment of cult members in that country. In exchange, Revolta agreed to dull the sharper edges of his performance as the President in a film based on the Chief Executive's 1992 campaign.
Remo accepted the Poweressence bible from the actor.
"Here's a little trick the First Lady taught me," he said, smiling.
His hands became chopping blurs. By the time he was finished four seconds later, Revolta's book had been transformed into a heap of confetti on the actor's lap. Revolta's eyes were wide as he stared, slack jawed at the mound of shredded paper. "Thanks," Remo said. "I feel better already." He returned to Chiun's script.
Snapping his fingers, Revolta summoned a stewardess to remove the remnants of his bible. "You're mean," he proclaimed once the woman was gone. "I wouldn't be in your movie for all the twenty million dollars in the world." He tipped his head, considering. "Unless the back-end deal was sweet enough. Twenty million plus enough points to cover your meanness and maybe buy me a new airplane. Of course, I'm playing Poopsy-Woopsy in the TeeVee-Fatties movie that's coming up. Time is tight, but I could do your movie after that. I've got about a week. Okay, it's a deal," he exclaimed grandly. When he found that Remo was still engrossed in Chiun's script, he bit his lip. "Are they still calling that thing Assassin's Loves? I can't believe they didn't come up with a better working title after they rewrote it into Die Down IV."
Remo had been doing his best to ignore Revolta. But at the mention of the movie title, a twinge of concern knotted small in his stomach.
"What do you mean, Die Down IV?" he asked.
"That's the latest Die Down movie," the actor said, pointing at Remo's script. "They do that with movies sometimes-retitle them during production. Especially franchise ones like this. Throws people off the scent. I don't know how good it works, though. Everybody in the industry knows Taurus got the rights to the series and that Tortilli is directing it."
Remo looked down at the script with disturbed eyes. His thoughts turned to Reginald Hardwin and the White House siege. If what Revolta was saying was true...
"But I know the guy who wrote this," Remo said. "I don't think he's ever even seen one of those movies."
"I told you. Things change in development. Like when I was making I'm Talking to You, Too. Originally, there was only supposed to be one craft-services truck. But my leading lady had gotten so fat by the sequel they were bringing pizzas in by the..."
Remo was no longer listening. Hands flashing, he skipped rapidly ahead in the script.
He found what he was looking for on page forty-two. In a detailed action scene, a group of armed terrorists invaded the White House and took the First Family hostage. Skipping back, he located another long section where the same terrorists blew up a floor in a Manhattan office building.
"Damn," he muttered.
"...the Jaws of Life to get her out the door," Revolta finished. Glancing over, he noted the look on Remo's face. "Oh," he said, looking down at the script. "Does it still end with the big gun battle at LAX? When Quintly mentioned that to me, I told him it reminded me too much of Die Down II."
Remo hadn't even thought to see how the screenplay ended. He was still trying to digest the fact that for much of the day he had been holding a virtual blueprint of the White House siege in his back pocket.
Remo had been ready to blame Bindle and Marmelstein. But now he realized Quintly Tortilli was a better actor than he'd thought. The director had been faking it back in Seattle. And in Hollywood, he'd neglected to mention that the movie that would benefit most from the recent news events Die Down IV-was his.
In an instant, it was all clear. Tortilli was the mastermind.
Remo skipped to the end of the script. He could see nothing of a battle at Los Angeles International Airport.
"It looks like it's on a boat," he said aloud.
"Must have rewritten it again." Revolta nodded.
"Definitely a boat," Remo said, talking more to himself than to the actor. He was riffling through the script. "Terrorists steal a mothballed battleship from Long Beach."
"Isn't that closed?" Revolta said. "Anyway, I don't like it. Too much like Under Siege. Although that was a Die Down I rip-off." He glanced around, annoyed. "Are they going to feed us or what? I haven't eaten since the airport."
Only now were they taxiing for takeoff.
Remo wasn't paying attention to the actor. He was thinking about how Chiun's screenplay ended. It seemed anticlimactic after invading the White House. The theft of a retired battleship was mild compared with what had already gone on. But here it was in Remo's hands.