Work Text:
Los Angeles, 1987
"Pretty, innit?"
Nina turned away from the fading sunset, visible through the bar's spacious windows, to the man who had sat next to her, beer slopping out of his glass. "It is," she said briefly. Though honestly her mind had been on her plans for the rest of her trip, driving the California coast on a long delayed vacation.
The shortness of her reply didn't seem to phase the little Brit. His grin shifted a drooping handlebar mustache and luxuriant goatee that would not have been out of place in the '70s. "That's what I love about this city, the sunsets," he said. "And the ladies," he added, with a smarmier edge. "Wonderful place to meet people, Los Angeles."
Nina put on her best chilly smile. "I'm just passing through," she told Mustache. "Business in San Francisco."
He faked surprise. "You are, now? Well you ought to let some of us old hands show you a good time while you're here." He toyed with his beer, and glanced at her sidelong in a practiced move.
"I really don't have time." With her left hand, she took a careful sip of her wine, a bold California red that was growing on her. Maybe I'll be able to schedule a wine tour, she thought. One of her friends in San Francisco knew someone who knew a vintner who, Maryann claimed, would cheerfully uncork a flight for the right potential buyer.
Or maybe I won't, she thought, as a tingle shot through her right arm. Her black gloves were conspicuous in the dusty summer heat, and the City of Angels' less formal dress codes. But to the casual observer, they maintained the illusion that Nina still had two flesh and blood arms, covering the prosthetic William Bell - and a host of specialists, sworn to secrecy - had made after her arm had been caught in Walter Bishop's trans-universe portal. After hours of practice, the nerveless prosthetic usually responded to her intentions, but the ghost sensations from absent inputs still made her slightly jerky, clumsy in odd ways. If it got too bad, she'd have to cut her trip short for another round of adjustments from the specialists. An unreliable right arm would not mix well with nearly five hundred miles of winding coast coast road and a sheer dropoff to the sparkling blue ocean.
Mustache's attention had been caught by the bar's television, as the bartender flipped from a basketball game to the news, where Howard Stark appeared. Nina muffled a smile in her wine: Howard had been one of her meetings on this trip. SI and Massive Dynamic might be competitors, but when there was a need for high level talks, Nina was the go-between. Howard and William both appreciated the advances of modern science, but held violently divergent opinions on its applications. Old Howard's judgements, Nina sometimes suspected, hadn't changed since his friend Captain America had crashed into the ice four decades ago.
"Amazing," Mustache said, staring at the news clip. "Stark and all them... doohickeys, thingamajigs, his company makes."
"You have an interest in technology development?" Nina asked, surprised.
Mustache guffawed. "Naw! I'm an actor, love. Trevor Slattery - call me Trev."
"Nina," she said coolly. Call me 'love' one more time and I will shut you down, she thought, annoyed. "What projects are you working on, Trevor?"
"Well, I'm sort of between gigs, at the moment," he said, waving one hand. "Filmed a pilot for CBS - Caged Heat - the network didn't pick it up. The muse speaks, but the suits don't always hear, eh?"
"Picking your audience can be an important part of a successful production," Nina offered, diplomatically. It was one reason her star was rising at Massive Dynamic: Nina knew the ins and outs of presenting a respectable face to Massive Dynamic's more conservative investors, while William and Walter pushed the edges of science and technology behind the scenes.
"Ex-actly," he drew out. "Now, a writer, he wants the actors to play out his vision, to be an extension of his ideas. But the actors, we want to be stars. We want room to improvise. Not so much room for that on these telly shows."
Nina considered that. "You're saying that the studio considers actors as parts of a machine. Something that can be swapped out to improve the whole." Like a prosthetic arm.
"I want to leave my name in people's memories!" Trevor said, thumping the bar. "I want beautiful women to say, Oh Trev, he's a great actor. He's served his muse. And handsome men, too," he added as an afterthought. "Wouldn't mind seeing a bit of envy on some of their faces."
I imagine not, Nina thought. Working at Massive Dynamic meant dealing with egos, but usually the egos of men and women who believed the world revolved around their ability to master the forces of science, rather than their skill in hold an audience in their hands. It was something to think about during her trip, and maybe discuss with Sam Weiss when she flew back East, if she hadn't forgotten the evening when next she saw him.
"Well, Trevor, enjoy your evening," she said, draining her glass.
"You're not leaving already?" he asked, with exaggerated dismay. "And we were having such a good time. Sit down, have another."
She straightened her gloves. "I have a long drive tomorrow. Good luck with your acting."
His acting career wouldn't always go well, but years later, Nina would watch news of the leader of Ten Rings with a small frown, trying to recall why a grizzled terrorist's voice would evoke the tang of a California red and a phantom tingle in a nerveless prosthetic limb.