Dead Space

by Lee Goldberg

  "How's it going?" Charlie asked. Gharlane sat on a stool in the center of his unit, directly under the single bulb that hung from the ceiling. The unit was crammed full of boxes bulging with decades' worth of men's magazines.

  "I'm getting closer to discovering the truth," Gharlane dragged his loupe slowly over the centerfold, his body curled over the magazine so far, the bumps of his vertebrae poked through his Grateful Dead T-shirt.

  "The truth?" Charlie asked.

  Gharlane raised his head. "Last night I saw a movie with Julia Roberts that had a love scene. They showed her breasts, but not her face. Well, those were definitely not her breasts. Wrong shape entirely. They belonged to a body double, and I'm tracking those breasts down."

  "Why?"

  Gharlane stared at him and scratched his bony knee, which stuck out through the hole in his faded jeans. "I thought you were a police officer once."

  "I was."

  "Then you should be outraged. The producers perpetrated a fraud on the American public," Gharlane said. "A lot of people paid seven bucks to see Julia Roberts, not a body double. I think the public has a right to know just whose breasts they were looking at."

  "I never thought of it that way," Charlie said, an idea occurring to him. He'd have to talk to Lou about it. "You gonna be around the next couple days? I may need a favor."

  Gharlane nodded. "Sure."

  Charlie had to get to the studio, but first he had to finish his security check. He steered the cart down the row of storage units, checking to make sure all the corrugated, sliding doors were secured with padlocks and that nothing was amiss.

  * * * * * *

  Alison Sweeney sat in her jelly bean blue Miata outside Canoga Stor-All, a map book open on her lap, checking it against the address she'd written on a slip of paper. No mistake about it. This was the place.

  Maybe she wrote the address down wrong. There was an easy way to check. She got out, walked up to the front office, and went inside. There was no one behind the counter.

  "Hello?" she said.

  No one replied. Just a few feet away, and to one side, was a half-open door. She leaned over the counter to peer inside, but all she saw was part of a TV set, the edge of a recliner, and the leg of a coffee table. She might have seen more, but that's when a snarling dog hidden on the other side of the counter leaped up, snapping at her pony tail.

  She screamed, staggering back into a man's arms. Reflexively, she jammed her elbow into his stomach and stomped on his foot. He yelped and released her, freeing her to spin around and poke her fingers into his eyes, just like she was taught in her self-defense class.

  He lost his footing and slammed against the wall, sliding down in a heap on the floor, one hand over his watering eyes, the other on his sore belly.

  "Wow," she said.

  Alison was proud of herself. It was the first time she'd ever put her self-defense skills into practice, and she'd easily felled a man. But pride quickly turned to panic, because now she recognized her attacker.

  "Charlie?"

  He nodded and struggled to his feet, still gripping his stomach. "Hell of an elbow you've got there, Alison."

  "I'm sorry," she said, helping him to his feet. "I didn't mean to do that."

  Charlie grimaced and staggered to the counter, mainly so he could lean on it without being too obvious.

  "I really did do that, didn't I?" she asked. "You didn't fake all that just to make me feel good."

  Charlie wiped the tears out of his stinging eyes and tried to bring her into focus. "I'm not that eager to please and I'm certainly no match for a woman of your physical prowess."

  A few years ago, back when he was a Beverly Hills cop, he was shot in the gut by the crazed old, TV star Esther Radcliffe, who was late for a sale at Neiman Marcus. The bullet they dug out of him made a nice paperweight. The wound hadn't bothered him in months, but then again, nobody had elbowed him in the stomach lately. Now the pain was back, along with a few painful memories.

  "I took a couple self-defense classes at Pepperdine," Alison rolled up her sleeves another notch or two. "Now I've got the killer instinct."

  Charlie looked down at McGarrett, his tail thumping proudly on the floor. Apparently, he had the killer instinct too. Everyone was pretty happy with themselves around here, except for him.

  "So, are we still working together?" she asked.

  "Is that why you came down here?"

  "After you walked out yesterday, I wasn't sure you were coming back."

  Truth was, neither was Charlie.

  Someone once told him the key to the movie industry was getting the audience to suspend their disbelief long enough to get sucked into the story. But Charlie learned it was also the key to working in the industry. He was able to suspend his disbelief, to fool himself into believing that the people he was working for deserved his help. Until now. Until Eddie Planet.

  After Esther Radcliffe shot him, Pinnacle bought Charlie's silence by making him the star of My Gun Has Bullets. The show was pitted against Eddie Planet's Frankencop, which was financed entirely by the mob, who tried to make it a success by actually killing the competition. Charlie survived, but was never able to pin anything on Eddie.

  "Eddie Planet is a liar, a conman and a coward," Charlie said. "He'll do anything to get a show on the air and keep it there. Anything."

  "So will most of the producers on the Pinnacle lot."

  Charlie smiled at her. "Except none of them nearly got me killed."

  "Give them time," she smiled back.

  He had been giving the situation a lot of thought during his patrol of the storage unit. Could he protect Eddie Planet? What made Eddie different from everyone else he was asked to look out for? Was Eddie any worse than Nick?

  The only difference between them was that Eddie was a threat Charlie already knew, just as Nick would now be. If Charlie continued as a studio trouble shooter, there would be a lot more Eddies and Nicks in his future. Shortly before Alison elbowed him in the gut, Charlie had made up his mind.

  "Regardless of what I think of Eddie Planet, the fact is someone is killing people involved with Beyond the Beyond," he said. "I can't walk away from that."

  She sighed, relieved. "You're going to stay."

  "I never left," Charlie said.

  "So, what's the plan now?"

  "Put the new cast and crew under constant guard, but it's a short-term strategy. I have to find out who is behind this," Charlie said. "What I haven't figured out is how."

  Alison gave it some thought, pursing her lips and wrinkling her brow. She looked so adorable, he had the sudden urge to kiss her, but he held it back.

  "It's a shame there isn't some way to make them come to you," she said, "besides waiting for them to try and kill another actor."

  Charlie looked at her. She just showed him the way.

  "What?" she looking back at him.

  The solution was so obvious, it was invisible.

  Before he knew it, he was giving her the kiss he was resisting only seconds before. The instant their lips parted, she melded against him, returning the kiss, her hands sliding up his back and drawing him to her.

  The screen door banged, startling them both. They pulled back from one another, and Charlie saw Lou LeDoux standing at the door. Lou was showing up for his shift.

  "Should I come back later?" Lou asked.

  Charlie and Alison let go of each other, both feeling a bit awkward.

  "No," Charlie said. "I'm glad you're here. I need you to do me a favor, but give me a second."

  "Only a second?" Lou said. "No wonder your wife ran off with the gardener."

  Lou disappeared into the apartment. Charlie looked at Alison, who's face was flushed. He wasn't sure whether it was embarrassment or passion, but finding out which would have to wait.

  "Can you find Eddie Planet for me?" he asked. "It's urgent that I see him right away."

  "You know how to find them, don't you?"

  "No," he replied. "I kno
w how they'll find me."

  * * * * * *

  Before tourists entered the Pinnacle Studios tour, they were funneled down a money-sucking gauntlet of neon storefronts known collectively as Pinnacle City, "the Capitol of the State of Hollywood."

  Pinnacle City was downtown, urban America as envisioned by the Brady Bunch, where The Happy Homeless danced with rap-singing members of the Goodtime Gang, and the Smile Police gave out chocolate tickets to all the nice girls and boys. The kids usually had the tasty tickets jammed in their mouths before their parents realized they cost $10 a pop.

  Shopping and dining in Pinnacle City was a multi-media entertainment experience designed to drive children into a state of frenzy and bludgeon their parents senseless, willing to spend anything to shut their kids up and have some peace.

  All their senses assaulted, most people cracked, gladly forking over $3.50 for a water-downed coke, $50 for Pinnacle t-shirt or $75 for a stuffed Muck Thing toy.

  By the time the shell-shocked tourists staggered, ears ringing and eyes watering, to the front gates to pay $30-a-head for the studio tour, they'd already been soaked for twice that much on the walk from the parking lot.

  Of course, the Los Angeles Planning Commission saw this as a model of urban planning, and were adopting it into their long-term strategy for reinvigorating the city.

  This was one of Thrack's favorite places.

  He could come here, in full Confederation uniform, and not feel out of place. Tourists even asked to have their pictures taken with him.

  But mostly he liked it because of the Celebrity Galaxy, the scifi restaurant. Each booth was a space capsule and the food was served on flying saucers. It was the fancy restaurant he took lucky space gals for special occasions.

  Thrack sat outside with Melvah behind the restaurant on a bench shaped like a rocket, watching the two, space-suited Astrovalets parking cars for people who came to Celebrity Galaxy for lunch. There were quite a few, even though the food was lousy.

  Celebrity Galaxy was another vanity tax shelter for over-paid Hollywood movie stars, this one jointly owned by actors who made it big in scifi. Kurt Russell, Sigourney Weaver, James Cameron and Alf all had money in the restaurant.

  People didn't come for the food, they came too see the underwear Sigourney wore in Alien, Kurt's eye-patch from Escape from NY, and other framed, jarred and stuffed props from movies.

  Melvah impaled an empty, Styrofoam cup on Thrack's hard-on so people would think he had a drink in his lap. No sense drawing any unwanted attention. Thrack noted with pride that it was a Big Gulp cup.

  A few hours earlier, Zita called Melvah at the office and let her know Odett was taking a meeting with Eddie Planet, and that it would be a good opportunity to nab the super-agent.

  Melvah agreed. She also thought it would be a good idea to kill Eddie Planet as soon as possible, but Zita argued against it, saying it would be easier to sign him.

  Melvah tried to talk to her about taking over the show herself, but Zita had a meeting with Tom Arnold that couldn't wait. Melvah would bring it up again tonight, she wanted to see the issue resolved before BeyondCon this weekend.

  Thrack nudged Melvah with his elbow and motioned to his cup. "Want a drink?"

  He snortled hysterically. Melvah couldn't help but smile, even though she was watching the two Astrovalets closely. One of them drove off in a Mercedes, leaving the other behind.

  Melvah saw Clive Odett's Hummer turn into the parking lot. The eager Astrovalet stepped forward to greet him. She jammed a taser in his back, jolting him with a couple hundred volts, and dragged him back to the bench. Thrack got up to greet Odett instead.

  Unfortunately, Thrack forgot to take the cup off his crotch before he stood up. That would have been a serious problem if not for the fact that Clive Odett was completely oblivious to anyone who wasn't someone. Odett was too busy talking on his cell phone to notice the cup, or even Thrack.

  Thrack opened the driver's side door and was awed by what he saw. The Hummer was the greatest piece of machinery Thrack had ever seen. In dash TVs. Fax machine. Phone. Leather seats. There was even a satellite dish on the roof. Thrack didn't just want to have it, he wanted to live in it.

  Clive Odett started to climb out of the Hummer, flipping the phone shut with one hand and holding out the keys with the other.

  In Los Angeles, rich people lived in private neighborhoods, safe behind gates, burly guards, security cameras, and laser-light sensors, but gladly handed over their cars to anyone standing outside a restaurant. It was, in Thrack's mind, one of the things that made this city great.

  "Don't try to park it in a compact spot," Odett smiled, "I hate picking Toyotas out of the tire treads."

  Thrack touched him with the taser. There was a loud snap, the shock kicking Odett right into the passenger seat, leaving him wide-eyed and twitching, his hair standing on end. Thrack jumped into the drivers seat, slammed the door shut, and stomped on the gas pedal.

  Thrack was half-way across the parking lot, trying to tune The SciFi Channel on the dash-board TV, when he saw the reflection of a Ford Crown Victoria chasing after him in the rear-view mirror.

  Charlie Willis wasn't prepared for this. He came here hoping to intercept Eddie before his lunch, instead he arrived to see Clive Odett carjacked by a guy in a silver space suit with a Styrofoam cup stuck on his crotch. Before Charlie knew it, he was chasing the Hummer.

  Did he really intend to rescue Clive Odett? It didn't matter. A carjacking was a carjacking, his instincts were taking over.

  The Hummer picked up speed. The carjacker didn't bother to weave around the parked cars, he simply slammed through them, creating an obstacle course for his pursuer.

  Charlie was reaching for the cell phone to call the police when the Hummer side-swiped a station wagon, sending it spinning across his path. He wrenched the wheel with both hands, narrowly avoiding the wagon, but forcing him to charge through the open, compact parking space between two mini-vans.

  Sparks flew on both sides of the sedan as Charlie sped between the mini-vans, sheering their paint off to the metal.

  Thrack caught the sparks out of the corner of his eye, reminding him to jolt Odett one more time for good measure. Snap! Odett bounced off the dashboard and crumpled on the floor. Thrack saw a tour bus turning into the parking lot, blocking the exit to the street and the on-ramp down to the Hollywood Freeway.

  No problem. It was the long way anyhow.

  Thrack turned sharply, smashing into a light-post, and headed straight for the cyclone fence separating the lot from the steep, freeway embankment.

  The light-post broke, flew over the Hummer, and landed right in front of Charlie, who swerved to avoid it, sending him head-on towards the tour bus. Charlie swerved again, fish-tailing, the bus clipping the back of his car, tearing off the bumper.

  The Hummer flattened the fence and headed straight down the embankment, which sloped down to the five lanes of northbound traffic at a sharp, 60% grade. Charlie didn't know how steep the embankment was when he, without even thinking, followed the Hummer.

  Unlike the Hummer, Charlie's Ford Crown Victoria wasn't a 190 horsepower V8, with 4-wheel drive and a 130-inch wheel base. While the Hummer hugged the embankment down to the freeway and barged into traffic, the Crown Victoria rolled end-over-end down the slope, landing in the slow lane like a discarded soda can.

  Charlie was upside down and strapped into his seat, covered with broken glass, the inflated, steering-wheel airbag all but obscuring his view of the Hummer disappearing onto the westbound Ventura Freeway. That's when the first car crashed into him.

  Thrack was oblivious to the wreckage behind him. Just as he was getting on the Ventura Freeway, The Powers of Matthew Starr came in on the SciFi Channel.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Eddie Planet never made it to lunch, some accident at Pinnacle City shut the whole place down. He hoped Clive Odett was sitting there, waiting for him. That way, word would get around that Eddie Planet was
so hot, he stood up Clive Odett.

  Just to make sure the word got around, as soon as he got back to his office he told Brougham to tell every secretary on the lot what he'd done,.

  Missing lunch gave him a few extra minutes to punch up his casting suggestions for Beyond the Beyond before heading to Kim Woodrell's office with Jackson Burley.

  Kim was, as usual, dressed in black, wearing a loose blouse, trim jacket, and a short skirt that made every meeting a gynecological exam.

  Eddie was sure she did it to disarm men, to make them feel uneasy, but staring at a woman's crotch was something he felt comfortable doing.

  Burley, on the other hand, didn't know what to do with his eyes, and kept them glued to the wall behind her while she perused the list of casting suggestions.

  She set the paper down and looked at Burley. "What do you think of this?"

  Burley cleared his throat. "I think the addition of the interstellar bounty hunter character is a compelling, dynamic step in the modernization of the franchise."

  "That's because it's the character Eddie threw in for you," she said. "And I'm throwing it out."

  Burley's face reddened as if he'd been slapped.

  She looked at Eddie and leaned forward, so Eddie could stare at her breasts through the open collar of her shirt. "You really think Ricky Schroder is the actor to replace Chad Shaw?"

  "It's Rick Schroder now," Eddie corrected. "And he has a very commanding presence. I think he's the next David Hasselhoff."

  "I don't want the next David Hasselhoff," Kim crumpled up the paper into a ball and threw it on the floor. "I want the next Johnny Depp. The next Woody Harrelson. This show is supposed to be hip."

  "I see what you're getting at, and I have just the man," Eddie said, pausing a moment for dramatic effect. "Jaleel White."

  "Urkel?" Kim asked incredulously.

  "We'll show a side of him no one has ever seen before," Eddie said. "The man. The leader. The rugged action hero of the 90s."