#So I decided Fuck It. 4th Dimension entity it is

[kakusu-shipping]

Fuck it, Virtue's Last Reward Self Insert Fic I thought of in the shower. Do whatever you want forever.

"If we are Termites, and our world is a beautifully constructed mound, what does that make you?"

The Anteater in the Lab

There's a man in my father's robotics lab.

He's short, with white hair and really really red eyes. I didn't know eyes could be red. I don't think they're supposed to.

He's been there my whole life. He's never changed.

He doesn't age, his heart doesn't beat, I've never seen him leave to eat or use the bathroom and he's cold to the touch.

At first I thought he was just another robot, one my father built to keep the Gaulem Bay running while he worked on more important matters

"Stay away from that thing!" My father snapped when I'd asked him about it the first time, "Don't trust it, don't go anywhere near it, you understand?"

At the time, I still thought my father had my best interest at heart, so I listened to him.

Mostly.

---------------------------

"Hello again, Kyle, Luna's not with you?"

Kyle, who'd put his babysitter Luna to a wild goose chase so he could make this confrontation alone, made sure the door was fully shut behind him before he dared to speak.

"What are you?"

The thing that looked like a man looked up from it's work on the Gaulem laying on the table, and placed it's tools down slowly. Kyle never hesitated with questions he had, in this lab curiosity was a virtue, and the one thing he'd always been rewarded for was seeking knowledge, so of course the anteater had always known this question would come, it was just a matter of when.

Kyle was only freshly 16, two years before he'd have someone to quell his loneliness, to project his need for a nuclear family onto. He'd long sense learned his father doesn't truly care for him, or long sense made such an assumption, and now that he'd reached such formative years he'd begun to act out, though only in the littlest ways behind his father's back.

This was one of those little ways.

The anteater smiled, "What a deep question. What are you, Kyle?"

"I'm human." Kyle answered, stepping heavily across the room until he was on the other end of the repair table, "Unlike you."

His words would come across as harsh to anyone else, but the thing that looked like a man had been watching over Kyle sense the Nonary Game yet to happen and all the way back to his creation. It knew him in ways no one else in this world ever would. It knew he was just being honest.

"Indeed you are. You're as human as Luna is Gaulem." The anteater hummed and reached for his tools to return to work.

Kyle, one slow to anger usually, slapped his armor covered hands on the table, "Don't avoid my question!"

The thing that looked like a man looked calmly across the table to Kyle, it gave a hum and tilted it's head.

"What do you think I am, Kyle?"

"I don't know-"

A finger placed over the part of Kyle's mask where his mouth would be, "Don't give me that. A good scientist always has a theory. Even if it's wrong, I want to hear your thoughts first."

Kyle's face flushed under his mask ever so slightly as he stepped back. He then placed his hand to his chin and thought, before answering, "When I was little... I thought you were a Gaulem, like Luna, put to work to make other Gaulems..."

The Anteater walked around the table and sat himself on Kyle's side, mimicing Kyle's pose, "A good thought. It'd explain my lack of aging and need for nutrients. But,"

"But," Kyle picked up, shifting his weight, "You're cold, whereas Luna is warm, and has a pulse. Plus, according to my father, he specifically made the Gaulems incapable of self repair, so it'd make sense that they couldn't build new Gaulems as well."

The thing gave a chuckle, ""He" made the Gaulems incapable of self repair, hm?"

Kyle blinked for a moment, then shared in the humor of his own statement. He'd learned a long time ago his father had virtually nothing to do with the creation of the Gaulems. Robotics and Bioengineering were entirely too far removed for one man to do both.

No, the real genius of the Gaulems, the AI that ran the facility, and even Kyle's suit was the Not Man sitting before him. His father just laid claim to these creations.

"What else might I be?" Asked the Not Man, crossing one leg over the other.

Kyle thought, his other Hypothesizes were far from perfect, "Well... We are on the moon. While never scientifically proven, space is near infinite, and I would not be surprised if you were some form of extraterrestrial."

"That would explain my advanced intelligence." The man confirmed, "Though I do look a bit too human, don't you think?"

"I would assume to blend in with other humans," Kyle suggested, tilting his head.

"But the only humans in this facility are your Father and you, and you both figured me out right away. Why would I not shed my disguise at that point? Or simply leave?"

Kyle hummed in thought, he could Maybe and What If this train of thought forever, but based on the resistance he was getting from the topic, he could only assume he was on the wrong track.

"Then... You're like my father, an esper who traveled through time to help him with his work."

The Not Man smiled and leaned back, "You're on the right track, but not quiet. If I was from your father's original time here to help him, wouldn't he be more accepting of me?"

Kyle thought back to the first time he'd asked about the man in the Gaulem Bay, and the sharp way his father had responded. He thought about the times he'd only been passing by and he'd heard his father yelling behind closed doors at this not man for interfering.

"Then you're here to... stop him?"

"Would he let me stay if I was?"

Kyle shook his head, he looked rather lost now.

"Not to mention, espers are still human. Your father may not act like it, but he is just as human as you. He needs to eat, and sleep, his heart beats and aches and flutters same as yours."

"Unlike you..." Kyle trailed off and placed his hand to his chin, thinking again.

When he was young he'd remembered reading about Zombies and Vampires, fictional undead creatures in horror stories that felt cold as the dead and who's hearts never beat. That seemed highly unlikely to be true, but it was about all he had left.

The not man stood up, he reached up and removed Kyle's helmet, as he'd done every time Kyle would visit him, and patted him on the head. His hand was cold. It was comforting. It was all Kyle had.

"What I am is something that cares very deeply for you, Kyle. Why I came here, why I help your father, it's because you are very very important to me." The cold hand moved to Kyle's cheek, "Is that enough of an answer?"

Kyle leaned into the touch of the one thing that cared about him most in the world, even if it wasn't human, it loved him. And he loved it.

"For now..."

[girltomboy]

Horror movie marathon with my coworker

Two weeks ago my coworker and I decided to have a horror movie marathon at her apartment, since we both love horror movies. We'd been planning it for quite some time, and since her collection of watched horrors is more vast than mine, she ended up in charge of picking the movies. We settled on Evil Dead 1 & 2, The Strays, and The Nun, all of which she had seen before but I hadn't, which surprised her, so she decided we'd watch these in one day.

Evil Dead 1 was a bit of a miss in terms of acting, but the story made up for it. I enjoyed the parallel between addiction and a malevolent entity. Some parts were off and questionable, but overall it was a decent horror. I liked it more than Evil Dead Rise, I felt like in the second one the possession part started way too soon and too abruptly. There was less build up and some of its parts were straight up ridiculous, but I enjoyed the symmetry of it.

The Strays was the movie I liked the most out of all the ones we watched. It was unpredictable and leaned more into the psychological dimension of the characters. The acting was really good and the ending was just my favorite kind; the one where you're so astounded you can only laugh.

The Nun was pretty mediocre, save for some alright parts it was the kind of predictable that's not even satisfying to watch, just very cliche. My coworker told me I look like Taissa Farmiga which at first made me laugh but then I realized she's kinda right and it was all I could focus on for the rest of the movie lol. Overall it was just entertaining, and by this point we were both tired enough to stop paying full attention to the movie and just use it to make jokes or poke fun at it.

I had a nice time even though the movie choices were not 100% my kind of horror, I realized my coworker is more into gore horror, slashers or possessions, but I prefer psychological horrors or movies where the source of the terror lacks a physical manifestation (poltergeist movies for example; I went hard as fuck for the Paranormal Activity series up to the 4th movie - which was a miss and caused me to lose interest in the whole concept). On top of that, I forgot my glasses at home and only realized that when I was already at her apartment, which amplified the exhaustion that came with watching 4 whole consecutive movies in a day.

We're planning a second horror marathon next week, and I'm more excited about this one because it includes some movies I'd been wanting to watch forever but never got around to, like Shutter and the more recent Insidious movies. And I'm gonna make sure to remember my glasses this time.

[goldbergjonblog]

The Karma Bitch

Karma is a bitch. It's the more realistic, unforgiving twin sister of Mother Nature. It shows no mercy. Karma doesn't live on our same timeline. She will wait you out and get you at any point. In fact I think Karma waited twenty years to get me and, unfortunately, some others had to suffer for my actions as well.

I am somewhat superstitious, teetering on OCD behavior. When I was in my teens I had this internal obsession with the number three. I needed to count in threes, step in threes, make choices based on threes. It got a bit out of control but not to the point where anyone but me knew about it, hence my parents are saying right now as they are reading this for the first time, "I didn't know that about Jon, did you know that about Jon?". My superstitions revolved mostly around sports. Nothing out of the ordinary for any sports nut. Thinking that what I ate, wore, sat in, where I watched and who I watched with had an impact on the outcome of games. My most powerful sports superstition was shared with my Dad and it had to be shared because it took two people to activate the winning formula. We called it "The Noozh" (sounds like you are saying noodge but towards the end of it you start saying the beginning of Jacques Cousteau's first name). My Dad has a very proud and prominent proboscis and when we really need it he'll lean into me and say "noozh" and I will, no questions asked, give it a rub like I'm summoning a genie out of a lamp. Whether it was an Islanders game in overtime, a big possession for the Knicks or the last out for Mariano Rivera, that Noozh has come through countless times. We weren't frivolous or reckless with it, we knew it could not be taken lightly or disrespected. For it to work we both had to agree that this was a moment that needed it and if it were overused it would lose its powers (see Yankees-Red Sox 2004).

Am I a master of the "dark arts"? Debatable. I have a healthy respect for whatever is going on in that world and I generally don't like to mess with it. But where do practical jokes fall into this 4th dimension? I mean there are the innocuous ones like going on someone's email when they aren't at their desk and begin sending a message to the head of the company that just says "fuck you" on it. I would then put the cursor right on the send button. The person would return, sit down, look at the screen, get confused, reach for the mouse and then just freeze. They couldn't move for five seconds for fear of detonating the bomb. Someone would eventually have to help that person move the cursor with the mouse as if it weighed a thousand pounds, essentially cutting the green wire. That is fairly safe but sometimes you get into the mean spirited kind of practical jokes. The ones that got out of control. The ones you still feel bad about. The ones that generally happen when someone named Nathan is involved.

Three things you need to know before I tell you this. I was thirteen, at camp and Nathan was an asshole from Westchester. Just a prick. Okay I was a prick too and I enjoyed pissing him off. He and I had an escalating practical joke war. It started small - food fights, water balloons - kids stuff. But then I upped the ante and decided, with some accomplices, to put his entire bed on the roof of our bunk, which took him an entire day to find and get down. His revenge went too far and broke the rules of impersonal, ephemeral pranking. What I'm saying is he asked for it. While I was off, probably shooting 100 free throws or some insane obsessive activity, he erased about ten of my cassettes. That's right, cassettes. Things you can’t get back when deleted. Paul McCartney & Wings, James Taylor, Eagles and AC/DC (I'm sure plenty of people are thinking good riddance). Not cool. I was pissed. He took this to a new level where it was going to end in tears, either from laughter or pain, hopefully both.

It took me a day or two of scheming like a Bond villain. I wanted something nuclear. I was going to end it once and for all. To basically let Nathan know that you don't want to screw with me. I felt that my pranks were well thought out, sophisticated. Like the bank robber who takes six months to plan the heist, traveling around the world to put together the perfect team; the tech guy, the comms guy, explosives expert, the guy on the inside and the fence who puts up the money. I liked the details of a prank. The bed on top of the roof was not a one man job and neither was what we'll call "spreading the jam". Nathan's prank was thought out like a caveman. "Me erase Jon Genesis tape. Duh." I just don't respect that. There is an art to pranking. Oh and we are talking early Genesis: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, although I did have a dalliance with Abacab.

Warning: what you are about to read is disgusting, cruel and comes directly from the mind of a thirteen year-old boy who was furious about not having Hotel California on cassette anymore. So beware, skip ahead, go to the next story, hide the kids, but don't judge me, judge the thirteen year-old me.

I put my Goldfinger thinking cap on because Nathan was going to pay. As Nathan was off working on his mediocre tennis game, so he could get back to Scarsdale in the fall and take his junior high school by storm, I looked at his stuff like a serial killer on a scout. Scouring through his bathroom kit, his shoes and his clothes. My good friends/minions, Jon and Patrick were making suggestions that weren't worthy of my ire.

Jon - “Put Tiger Balm in his underwear?”

Me - “Too much of a chance he'll smell them before he puts them on…worse.”

Jon - “Foot powder in his toothpaste?”

Me - “Not bad but I want to haunt him…worse.”

Patrick - “Put dog shit in his shoes?”

Me - “Maybe but...(dramatic pause, maybe the lights even flickered) the dog....what if…?”

And the wheels went in motion. When a dog is in heat, they have certain....secretions and I think the only recognizable one would be blood, but it is a gooey sticky mess when they get excited. We looked over at Birdy, our counselor’s currently in heat golden retriever, as she was curled up in the corner. She was not allowed on anyone's bed due to "her state". I went into psycho mode and walked over to Nathan's bed. I sat on it and started to pat the pillow with enthusiasm. "Birdy, come on girl." My accomplices got exactly where I was going. It was the unspoken language of 13 year-old boys...cruelty. They both joined in, encouraging Birdy. Birdy perked up and scampered over to me. She jumped up on the pillow and settled in for a petting. Then I looked at the horror on Jon and Pat's faces, as they backed away a few steps, which just confirmed to me that this was the right thing to do. All I did was start rubbing Birdy's back, which started the ignition, her leg started moving, she rolled over on to her back. I started rubbing her belly and then things... started... to...happen....on Nathan's pillow, as I placed it on the dog's belly. After about forty seconds, I gave Jon the signal to call Birdy. When she hopped off the three of us looked down on the pillow and, like a dramatic scene from ET or The Goonies where the kids see something spectacular, the camera looking up as their eyes widen and finally resting above their heads, peering down at the alien/creature/body/treasure, we were entranced. This was definitely an alien, because smeared all over Nathan's pillow was something akin to raspberry jam mixed with vaseline (I warned you). We looked at each other and, as adolescent boys do, we celebrated our genius. I calmly turned the pillow over and we left the bunk and went about our business.

That night, at light's out, the twelve campers settled into their beds, the three of us giddy and buzzing with expectation - quick glances at each other with our flashlights to acknowledge the moment. It didn't take long for all hell to break loose. It started with Nathan loudly asking a question to the entire bunk. "What's that smell? Does anyone smell that?" I'm sure someone probably said "your momma”, but that was ruining the moment for us. Then Nathan's flashlight went on and the sheer horror on his face when he turned his pillow over was unimaginable. Think of Mia Farrow when she saw what Rosemary's Baby looked like or the Hollywood producer in The Godfather when he discovered his beloved horse's decapitated head. Nathan jumped up out of his bed and tossed his pillow. The lights came on as our counselor went to investigate. Nathan's eyes immediately went to me. I was calmly sitting up in my bed giving him a "that's what happens when you fuck with me" look. He realized he couldn't play up to my level, he had lost. Eventually the bunk quieted down and everyone fell asleep to Nathan's sniffles and my chuckles. Game over Nathan.

Now that was a bad practical joke in every way possible. But the results and ramifications were minimal. I just had an enemy and a reputation for six weeks at camp. But that was not the worst practical joke, because no one really had to pay. Although I don't really know how Nathan turned out. I have some assumptions - a wealthy upper east side lawyer - okay a very specific assumption.

But did the Nathan practical joke wake up some karmic spirit, who kept an eye on me and basically said "no more”? Did the entity decide to wait twenty years to put me in my place and turn a prank into an international incident? Well, yes. Yes it did.

Twenty years later

I was working on my dream "advertising" job (quotations to be used as a qualifier). I was about to shoot some very cool tv commercials for hockey on ESPN. I was a huge fan and the spots were written from an insiders perspective, so I could get all poetic and shit. In fact, Susan Sarandon agreed to do the voiceover for the spots because she loved hockey and, as she told me, the writing reminded her of Carlos Castaneda. So after beaming from the compliment I immediately looked up Carlos Castaneda.

The shoot had us traveling around the northeast and midwest to work with some of the best players in the game. It was one of those "I can't believe we get paid for this" moments, which in advertising could mean a lot depending on how you deliver the word "this". But this was a positive "this". One of the stops for the shoot was Detroit, as the Red Wings were a dynasty at the time and we were going to shoot during practice and an exhibition game. My partner/accomplice was the nicest, sweetest British woman. Kate was a fantastic art director with impeccable taste and absolutely no knowledge of hockey, which was perfect. I kept it realistic and she made it look nice. Our producer/target, Brian, was perfectly set up for a prank. He was in full business mode, trying to put this big production together. There was very little precedent set for practical jokes during the job, which probably worked in our favor. Detroit, as you may know, borders on Canada and across the river is lovely Windsor, Ontario. Basically an extension of Detroit with less blight and less Kid Rock. Unbeknownst to us, not that it would ever be knownst because we used a travel agent, when booking our travel it became apparent that there were no hotel rooms available in Detroit, which begged the question - are there hotels in Detroit? But there were plenty of room across the river in Windsor, in another country. Passports necessary (foreshadow #1...dun,dun,dun).

In the days leading up to the shoot we had to shuttle back and forth through the Windsor tunnel to and from Detroit. The first couple of times no one paid attention to Kate, who on the initial crossing said, "funny, my passport's expired. I just hope they don't notice" (insert echo effect - notice, otice, ce - foreshadow #2). She actually said this but since this was 1999, we weren't as vigilant or attentive to these facts. Because each time you crossed over you had to show a passport. Sometimes the border guard looked and sometimes they didn't. But each time Kate got a little more nervous. After the third time she mentioned to Brian, "I just wish we had stayed in Detroit. What would they do to me if they noticed the passport was expired?"

"Throw you in jail. Exportation. Firing squad.”

Hahaha. Isn't that funny? (and there's our foreshadowing hat trick).

On the morning of our first shoot day Kate and I had to work at the hotel and drive in later to meet up with Brian and the crew. On our way in to Detroit, after another safe but nervous encounter with the border patrol, we decided to play a joke on Brian. When we got to the arena we called him from the parking lot.

Me (deadly serious) - “Hey Brian, so we have a bit of a situation. It's kind of fucked up”.

Brian - “Umm, okay. Sergei Federov is running late so we're good on time…what?”

Me - “No no no. Kate didn't make it through. They caught her passport, saw it was expired. So...they have her.”

Brian - “.....what? Shut up.”

Me - “What can I tell you? She got caught. They detained her.”

Probably the first time I ever used the word detained. It felt so dire and perfect for the prank. I think Kate even nodded at the word choice. There was a slight pause from Brian but he wasn't biting completely.

Brian - “Bullshit.”

Me - “Look. I'm on my way in, we can talk about it there but they took her passport and they're going to deport her. She's back at the hotel trying to get help from the agency.”

Brian - “Oh fuck. Fucking Windsor.”

And we got him. I am covering the phone and cracking up, nodding back to Kate.

Brian - “So...you're coming in? Can I call anyone? Oh fuck.”

Me - “I know. We couldn't find one hotel room in Detroit?”

Brian - “It's my fault...why didn't she tell me when we booked the rooms? She didn't tell me.”

Me - “Don't beat yourself up. She screwed up. Maybe you could have pushed a bit harder but how could you know. Let's just get through the shoot and try to keep her from getting deported.”

Brian - “Is she okay?”

Me - “Uhh...she's a little freaked out. Look I'll be there shortly and we'll figure it out.”

Brian - “Okay...umm...see you.”

This must be when the Karma Bitch was awoken. A giant alarm clock blaring, her not wanting to wake up but knowing that she can't ignore it because someone was laughing at her, tempting her and they had to pay. So she groggily slams her hand down on the fate tempting alarm. She puts her feet down on the floor, stretches, let's out a morning fart and pulls up her daily log. She sees right at the top that some ad geeks are giving her the middle finger. And then she notices one of those geeks has a record. The Nathan stunt. She stands up and gets ready to go to work.

I hung up completely satisfied that Brian was shell shocked. Kate and I walked towards the arena just imagining the frenzy going through Brian's head. As we approached the ice where the crew was setting up, Kate hid in the entryway. Brian turned and saw me, just milking and cementing the joke a bit. After a few shuffles on the ice he saw Kate step out from the runway and onto the ice. His face went through shock, anger and relief in about two seconds.

Brian - “You fucker.”

The whole crew, aware of the situation, witnessed and appreciated the punking. We made up and went on with our shoot. From this point on you will question this and say "come on, it must have been a different shoot, at least a different day, not the next day. It couldn't have happened". Oh it happened and it freaks me out, and it makes me have huge, universal thoughts. It was as if we went through dress rehearsal the day before. But the next day is when the Karma Bitch looked at the transcript and just said, "Fuck 'em, it's showtime, we'll do it exactly like they said, perfect. Don't change a thing."

We set out for the shoot the next morning, again Kate and I driving in on our own. As we approached the toll/checkpoint, we actually joked about the joke, "wouldn't it be funny if", "what if we...", "Brian would kill us." We did our usual maneuver where I showed my passport and while the guard focused on mine, we slipped Kate's over to him. The theory being they would study mine intently and assume she was with me. We were 9 for 9 up to then. But something must have happened or maybe it's the 9 out of 10 thing, this was the dentist that wasn't choosing Crest. Kate maybe showed some doubt because this particular guard looked a little too close and we saw his eyebrows ruffle and he caught it.

Guard - “You know you're passport's expired?”

Kate - “Yeah, I'm in the process -.”

Guard - “Miss I can't let you through with an expired passport.”

We looked at each other like, no fucking way this is happening. Did Brian do this?

Guard - “You'll have to pull into the station lot and they'll help you out in the office.”

He pointed with Kate's passport to a square brick building across the three lanes. Okay I thought, so they'll help us out. That doesn't sound too bad. We were overdramatizing our prank. How could helping be bad? But honestly all we were really thinking was that we were so totally fucked.

We pulled into the parking area just off to the side of the toll plaza. We were speechless as this was going from ironic to concerning very fast. Cut to the Karma Bitch doing her payback dance/chant - "that's right, who's got the last laugh, who? Who? I can't hear you. Not so fucking funny now motherfuckers". I guess I've cast either Melissa McCarthy or a nemesis from a Pam Grier blaxploitation film as the Karma Bitch.

We walked into the station which looked like a DMV. Just a room with a bunch of people in cubicles behind a long bar. It was fairly empty but there was an air of gravitas to the place. It was silent and sterile. Kate approached and showed her passport. She started to explain herself when the woman stopped her with a look up and a hand giving a stop signal.

Woman (this is where the gravitas comes from) - “You're passport is expired.”

Kate - “I know, we just…"

Kate was losing it as she looked towards me. I took that as an invitation and I stepped over the yellow line.

Me - “I can help out, you see we were -.” 

Woman - “Sir step behind the line and don't speak or you will be held as an accomplice.”

And that's what I did (that's the potentially getting shot post 9/11 moment). Accomplice? To what? I wasn't driving a getaway car. But we knew it was serious. The woman told Kate what she had to do. She could not cross the border without a passport, if she tried again she would go to jail. She had 24 hours to arrange her deportation. I'm sorry...her what?. She had to stay in her hotel room until her "arrangements" were made. She had to go back to England and could not return to the US or Canada until she had a valid passport. Fuck Canada. We had spots to shoot and edit in the US. Kate asked a couple of questions but was accepting her fate. We slowly moved back to the car. They escorted us across the lanes so we could turn around and head back to the hotel, the tunnel and the U.S. in our rearview mirror. The line of cars going into the tunnel looked like a tongue sticking out at us in a flash mob like raspberry.

On the ride back to the hotel the conversation was mostly about why she had waited so long and why the hell did we have to stay in Windsor. The blame going back and forth between Kate and the travel agent. But what we didn't talk about was the Deja Vu we had created and that there was an entire crew waiting for us. No blame was thrown my way for awakening the Karma Bitch.

When we got to the hotel we knew we had to call Brian. Since Kate was off calling our office, trying to get help in staying in the states, I had to call him. Now how the hell was I going to do this? This was impossible. You think it's hard to pull of a realistic prank. Try pulling off a realistic scenario based off of a prank the very next day. I called from my room.

Brian - “Hello.”

Me - “Umm…You’re not gonna believe this. They got Kate.” 

Brian - “Shut the hell up. We're ready to roll.”

Me - “No. I'm serious this time. They really caught her today. We had to go into the border office -.”

Brian - “And they deported her?”

Me - “I know, I know. But yes, that's exactly right. Well not yet. She has to stay in the hotel and has twenty four hours to get on a plane to London. No bullshit.” 

Brian - “Seriously dude. Get to the shoot.”

Me - “I don't know what else to tell you and it's really fucked up but it happened exactly the way we said. She's gotta go. I'm coming to the shoot but she won't be there.”

Brian - “Wait, what? You're not bullshitting.” 

Me - “No bullshit. I wouldn't pull the same prank two days in a row. I'm better than that.”

I heard him cup the phone as he spoke muffled, “Prhumpf ssport Kate ghhmskut, ported”. And then there was laughter. Brian was telling our client and our account person what happened, they started to laugh but apparently his face said it all as they abruptly stopped. I could feel the moment over the phone. Brian got back to me. 

Brian - “Get down here. Yzerman is ready. This is fucked.”

Me - “As soon as I calm Kate down.”

I might have hung up on him as he was mentioning thousands of dollars and hockey stars and impatient clients and crew but I had to. I went to Kate's cell/hotel room, and had a few un-encouraging words for her. There was a lot of uncomfortable silence. She spoke to the office and the travel agent. The story was that she was booked on a flight the next morning from Windsor to Toronto with a connecting flight to London. She would have the deportation stamp on her as the accompanying paperwork would explain. Then she would have at least three weeks of "dealing with her situation" to try and get back. She'd still be there if this were two years later.

I gave her a hug and headed off to the shoot. As I approached the toll, I had flashes of recreating the scene. I should have distracted the guard more, told some jokes, talked hockey, mentioned that we were about to meer Sergei Federov and Steve Yzerman. It was Canada for crying out loud. Hockey talk is like the go fetch ball to Canadians right? I also thought like a criminal. I could have put her in the trunk, gotten her across and those Canadian bastards could eat our dust. I could've done more. I could've done more. But I had to pay, pay for Nathan.

As I stepped onto the ice and started my long shuffle to where the crew was set up, the silence was palpable. Remember, I am walking across ninety feet of ice in the middle of a completely empty twenty thousand seat Joe Louis Arena, except for a a film crew on the other end of the ice. All thirty people on the crew were staring at me, including all-star and team captain Steve Yzerman, as the story had now found it's way throughout the arena. They were giving me the "here's the asshole" look. And as the Ad guy you're already an asshole from the start, because you're telling them what to do different or can we try this or that. It was truly a walk of shame. It was like the end of a buddy cop movie, where one of the buddies doesn't make it, yet it lacked the heroics. Their eyes were angry, like why is this guy wasting my time angry. Or there were those who liked Kate better and I was the one who lost her. Some looked past me, waiting for Kate to appear behind me, but it didn't happen. There was some elbow nudging, as if there were bets made. If this were a movie, Brian would meet me half way with a smile and then a solid punch to the nose. I would fall hard to the ice and then the blood from the back of my head would pool across the white surface. A truly beautiful shot, maybe from above, as the crew applauded. But that didn't happen. I had to face them all and as I got close enough I just said, "I don't want to talk about it. Let's just start shooting." I guess everyone was relieved that something was said, so that's what happened. It was like I pushed a button. The crew set in motion and we were shooting within ten minutes.

During the shoot the lineup of problem solvers started. Random crew members had some thoughts like -

Sound guy - “I can drive over and get her in my trunk, there's plenty of room.” 

Assistant Camera Guy - “I have a friend that works in the immigration office.”

Director (whispering) - “So I was talking to some of the crew and there's a guy who has a boat.”

Now that's a sentence that can never come from a place of legality. If the line was "my buddy has a boat," that's different but "there's a guy who has a boat" can never end in a fishing trip or a nice sail around Lake Michigan. There's trouble written all over it.

Director - “They do it all the time. Wait until around 10pm, hardly anyone's on the water. It takes 15 minutes to get across. We're working on it now. Where to pick her up and all of that.”

I felt like I was in an episode of Hogan's Heroes. Then the client came up to me.  

Client - “I may be able to resolve Kate's situation. I...I kinda know Al Gore.”

After the shoot we all gathered at the hotel for dinner with Kate the immigrant. The client was working the Al Gore angle, making some calls, and Kate called off any maritime border crossing or trunk stuffing. Even with the Vice President potentially getting involved, there was a sense of dread. That Kate had fucked up and she had to deal with it. She was handling that end of it. Calling the travel agent and booking her flight home. Ultimately, Gore could not help. Surprising that the Veep, who was about to lose a gut wrenching Presidential campaign couldn't get involved in helping out a British art director with an expired passport. Now if she was caught driving an electric car across the border maybe we had an angle, but this was of no interest to his people. Having run out of options, and time, we said goodnight, some said goodbye to Kate as we were going to drive her to the airport first thing in the morning.

On the long, rainy drive to the airport there was nothing to say. Brian, Kate and I tried to talk about the job, things she wanted us to get on the rest of the shoot, but it really was of no use. For the last half hour of the ride we were silent. We pulled up to the curb and Kate started to laugh/cry as she hugged us. She walked through the doors and we waved as she disappeared into the river of travelers/deportees. As soon as we got in the car, Brian let me have it and I just listened, taking it, because I knew he was right.

Brian - “So you lost our art director? What the fuck were you thinking? Do you have any sense of karma? You don't fuck with karma. Karma is a bitch. Karma will wait you out and win, always.”

We finished the shoot, edited the spots and we waited on word of when Kate would return. Eventually she sorted things out and was ready to come back six weeks later. We ended up loading her desk, actually decorating it, with Canadian items - flags, bacon, postcards, pictures of moose, toys, t-shirts. When she showed up, she cried again. It was traumatic for me so I can't imagine how she felt.

So what did we learn? Don't mess with Karma, because she’s real and she’s a bitch. Don't let anyone convince you to stay in Windsor. Hold out for that room in Detroit. But just in case you do get in trouble at the border, I know a guy, who knows a guy, with a boat.