Chapitre 119: Chp 110 : Release The Fiction
Sorry folks, the game that he released on NE3 was not Dark Souls, but Elder Scrolls, There's a revision. The timeline now is the day after NE3. Enjoy.
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Jessica drove her '82 Ford inside the driveway of one of many luxurious estates inside Beverly Hills' high-end neighborhood.
Of course, it wasn't her house, it would be a dream come true for her if she had this kind of luxurious house. It cost maybe all of her savings to get only the down payment of this house and her annual salary to pay one month's worth of the installment.
She sighed dreamily at this house. Any woman would be thinking that it would be best to marry a rich guy and spend her entire life drowning in wealth. But unfortunately, it wasn't her. She was born into a middle working-class family and work hard is her motto.
She broke out from her musing, got out of her car, and entered the house to find a delicious smell she very much loved when every time she used to visit the orphanage.
She saw Al was cooking some eggs and bacon and an evil smiled appeared on her face.
He noticed there was a presence behind him and immediately turned to see Jessica was approaching him with careful steps, seemed like wanted to surprise him.
Al groaned "Jessie, please behave."
Jessica's face showed him an innocent look. He just sighed at his assistant impishness. If he did not have to deal with her weird shenanigans sometimes, she would be a perfect assistant in the world.
"Do you want some?" He glimpsed at her for a second before turned back his focus to the cooking.
"Sure, I haven't had my breakfast this morning. You have some coffee?" She said.
"They are on the shelf, can you make one for me also?" He said without looking at her.
"One coffee for the Boy Wonder, coming right up!"
Al snorted, another article telling him about his title as the Boy Wonder because of his appearance in the NE3 yesterday.
It could be said that yesterday's event was the biggest gamers event in the United States and some people said that it was the Super Bowl for gamers.
The article also said that he as the writer of cult sci-fi owned that game company and he designed the bestselling video games himself.
Everyone was saying that there's nothing that this boy couldn't do. Fortunately, most of the news was good, while only supermarket tabloids only talking shit about him.
Once he was done with the omelet, maybe because of the habit, he unconsciously cried out, "Laura, the egg is ready!"
Jessica stunned and locked her eyes on his back which turned frozen. Then she braced herself to ask him, "Al, Is Laura here?"
It took time for Al to answer her question. She saw from his gloomed face and she got the answer.
"No..." He whispered.
"Oh, Al..." She said full of sympathy.
He laughed mockingly to himself, "I seemed forgotten I was not there anymore." He said before the silence took over.
"Funny, despite you said that Laura was in the last place of the sister you love, you called her first."
Jessica always knew how to break the awkwardness and Al really appreciated her for that.
Al smiled remembering that airhead girl and said, "She's the only one who was crazed with my cooking you know."
Both of them laughed it off and Al went to put the omelet on the plates and giving them to Jessica. She also did not forget to give the coffee to him.
"Ah, the smell of Java in the morning."
Jessica saw him making a weird easygoing face and started to worry, "You okay, Al?"
His relaxed face turned to gloomed ones, "No, More than ten years living in the orphanage has grown on me. I don't know leaving there was so heavy for me."
"You can just go back there. It's your decision right to leave there? I can help you talk to her again." She offered
"I want to, but James had said that there are more and more paparazzi swarming in that neighborhood and I'm afraid that it would disturb them."
"Just ask someone to live here. I'm sure Toby won't mind living with you. Maybe, ask Laura. She likes to be with you. Or Annie and Melissa, the three of them are inseparable."
"No, they need to stay in the orphanage. They have yet to become an adult. I'm a special case remember?"
She hummed, and a lightbulb shone on her head, "Why don't you bring your little girlfriend here. She also won't mind."
"Jessie, her parents are Christian although they were not a conservative, seeing their daughter living on the same roof with a boy will make them crazy."
"And you've been snogging her until she screamed like a banshee in your room! Where's the Christian in that? I thought they were supposed to have sex in wedlocks." She said sarcastically.
It was then his cheeks turned scarlet red, "Enough about her, we need to go to the book signing."
"Fine, killjoy. But we still need to find a solution for you. Oh wait, are you afraid to live here alone? Don't worry Al, there's no ghost here."
"I'm not afraid of ghosts, Jessie!" He cried out.
"Okay, okay, calm down, geez. Where's John anyway?"
Before he could answer, John came from the backyard.
"There he is, John, you want some coffee too?" Al asked.
"I would love to." He replied.
As they were done breaking a fast, they finally went to the book signing event that was held in one of the bookstores in Venice Beach.
He was still in partnership with The World Publishing Company for the past 5 years.
He heard that this company changed the ownership many times for those years but he didn't care, as long as the contract still brought him a lot of benefits and they didn't offend or pushed him, he will have a long partnership with them.
He was sure that the publishing company wouldn't want to part ways with him. Mostly because his book, Jurassic Park alone that sold 100 million copies around the world.
As for the collection of his short stories, they were sure that this book would become another bestseller.
Los Angeles in winter was a bit warmer than any other place in the United States.
While there is a great increase in rainfall in the winter months, the winter months in Los Angeles are still frequently sunny and pleasant with mild -to-warm temperatures. The average highs range from 17-21 C° with cooler overnight lows in the 8-12 C°.
Winter is the best time to visit the beach here. It was warm enough to relax with a comfy sweatshirt or jacket but never try the water because it was hypothermia inducing.
So it wasn't weird if Venice Beach today was so crowded. But Al felt the crowd was a bit peculiar for him.
There was a long line that even he didn't know where it ends and even there were some Broadcast Vehicle from a few TV Stations and a lot of officers from L.A.P.D were present here.
Then he realized the line was started from the place where the book release and signing were supposed to be held. Once again, he underestimated his popularity as a celebrity.
When he got off of the car, one person from the line screamed for his name and the crowd followed the line of his sight and now every single crowd was screaming and shouting for his name.
Then dozens of security with a body like a football linebacker were holding the crazed crowd.
One of the security held his shoulder and before John Mick rebutted him, the security quickly said, "Mr. Brandt, can you please come with me inside? There will be more chaos if you stay here."
Al nodded and followed him inside the bookstore called Small World Bookstore. Same as the name, it was a small bookstore and Al was confused why they held it in this kind of space.
What Al missed was that it was supposed to be a small event where there would be only children who came into the bookstore and he would read them some stories from the book.
But that was before the world knew he was the author of a cult book such as Jurassic Park, Death Note, Matrix, etc.
Then yesterday, an announcement appeared in the newspaper that Alphonse Brandt was going to release his brand new book and then a lot of people came to this beach since the ungodly hour and waited in front of this closed book store.
When he entered the bookstore, he was separated from Jessica and John because of how tight the security was inside the bookstore. At least he could see 5 bodyguards inside.
Then came a woman with glasses and medium build and greeted him with so much enthusiasm, "Mr. Brandt! I'm from The World Publishing Company. Please let me apologize for all of this... I thought this would be a small event and we tried to be discreet with the invitation and only invite some big-time journalists. But some things happened..." She paused to see his reaction.
His face was stone cold because of dissatisfaction and he tried to hold back his anger, "Yes, I knew of it, Miss?"
"Jane, Jane Friedman. You can call me Jane."
"Yes, of course, Ms. Jane. The problem is I expected there would be only children and their parents in this bookstore but I didn't see any of them inside the book store."
She winced at his words and became uncomfortable. "I'm sorry Mr. Bradnt but the children were also in the line with their parents."
"WHAT!? You let them in that goddamned line?"
Jane stepped back at his outburst. She never saw this boy mad on TV before but seeing his mad face closed was so surprising.
"Now you go there and let the children in with their parents. I was told I'm going to release the book, have a press conference and talk to those kids and the last thing is book signing of my stories book."
"How about the other fans?"
"What do you mean other fans. This will be a book released by Alphonse Brandt, not Edward B. Ephron! In the contract, you are supposed to hide my identity, now that it has become public knowledge, I expect your company would mitigate the effect of your carelessness. As for those book fans, you can kick them out or tell them the truth. I won't sign any of my other books besides the children's stories, Understand?"
"Yes, Mr. Brandt." She immediately went back and coordinate with the other people from the publishing company.
"Wow, I don't know that you can be that mad." Came a woman's voice. He thought it was Jessie but turned out he was wrong. he was greeted by a familiar face he didn't see since Hanukkah Day.
"Elisabeth!? What are you doing here?"
It was Elisabeth Murdoch, one of many daughters of Rupert Murdoch, the Australian media conglomerate.
But knowing her face didn't mean that he knew why she was here.
He turned to see how tight the security was. It was as if he was the President of the United States. "How you bypass all of that?"
"Well, turned out my dad bought The Collins publishing company share and become the major shareholders of that company, which unexpectedly also owned The World Publishing Company, so here I was."
He was surprised at how Murdochs was really serious at expanding their influences outside Australia. His buying spree has become a headline in some newspapers and wasn't lose against the Japanese company buying spree.
"You don't have to come here right? I mean that's your father's company business."
"So, you don't like me to be here? Fine, I can leave as soon as possible."
"No, you are wrong, it's just weird to see you here."
"I always take the time to visit Venice Beach on weekends every time I'm visiting the United States. I heard that they are having an event here, I am also interested to see it. I didn't know it was you who was holding a book signing and release. When I realized that this is one of my father's companies, I made a call to him so I get an exclusive seat in this book release."
"I see... Did you say you visit here every weekend?"
"Yes, I'm waiting for someone here."
"Oh, any American man that caught your attention?"
"Not an American, and certainly not a man. I think they were coming from Eastern Europe. His name is Borat with his little sister, Anastasia. I'm waiting to see him having another little performance here."
Al's eyes were like a deer on the headlight. Elisabeth was still looking for Borat and Anastasia?
Fortunately, Elisabeth didn't pry anymore and immediately changed the topic.
"You are also the writer of that confusing book right? I read it a some and I must say I didn't understand any of it. But I see that your book fans are so eager to see you."
Black lines appeared on his face. "Confusing book, now you hurt my feelings. Besides, it's not the book signing of my other persona, I'm releasing my collection of short stories I created since I was a child in LA Times."
He smiled reminiscing his first story, the Toys Story.
"They make a blunder and now there are a lot of fans of my book under that pen name. There should be a lot of children gather here."
Before he could talk to her further, Jessie called him to tell him that the book signing would start.
As he was sitting inside, he could see the security outside was dividing the book fans into two groups.
Finally, he could see a lot of the children and their parents inside the bookstore while the other fans were out there, being jealous of these kids.
Besides releasing the book and giving some of them free to these kids, he also signed some old children's books he released a few years back.
The book contained 12 different kinds of stories;
-Toy Story
-Léu, The Lion King
-Finding Nemo
-Bug's Life
-Po, The Dragon Warrior
-Monster Inc.
-The Incredibles
-Wall-E
-Up
-Raya And The Last Dragon
-Coco
-Secret Life Of Pets
He was also reading some of his stories to the children and he could saw their enthusiastic faces.
These kids really loved his stories collection and inside the book, there were also some of the illustrations he drew like it was supposed to be in the future.
He was so glad to find that every child really likes his stories very much. The kids have also had a chance to ask him some questions and all of their questions were so damn cute!
"Are you still waiting for E.T. to come?" One of the kids asked.
"Always," He answered.
"Can you see a ghost?"
"Yes I can dear, I saw a ghost of the king of England in London and he was so kind to me. Not all ghost is scary and evil, maybe they need friends."
The kids came giggled after hearing his response then turned to tell him that he also had a friend in his house like he did in the movie and his parents said it was his imaginary friend. That made Al's and his parent face paled.
"Why you kiss your mommy as daddy do?"
This one he answered by 'try ask your parents' then he glared at their parents and warned them to not let this kid watch <Back To The Future>.
There were also a pair of sisters and brothers that left a deep impression on him. They said they really wanted to become an actor like him and they asked a lot of questions about acting, although mostly it was all from the sister.
It was then their father introduced himself as Stephen Gyllenhaal who was also a director. He said he admired Al very much and hoped there would be a chance to work with him in the future.
Then he turned to both of the kids and asked them to introduce themselves to him.
"My name is Margalit Gyllenhaal and this is my brother, Jacob."
When he heard that name, he finally knew who it was. This girl would be the future Rachel Dawes from <The Dark Knight> and this boy would be the future Mysterio from <Far From Home>.
He shook his hand with their father and gave him a business card for Muspelheim Films, then said farewell to both of them after signing their books.
A few hours later, all of the children were cleared of the line. Then he saw the book fans of his other pen name were waiting on the outside and cold.
He recalled that some people were waiting since dawn and he began to sympathize with them.
He started to think that it's time for the adults who brought his book to sign theirs. So he called Jane and told her he would hold the book sign for the book under his other pen name.
Jane's mouth stretched from ear to ear and started to organize it with other people. He didn't know if he should regret it or not but he thought he just sign a death warrant for him.
Somehow he heard a big cheer from the outside. The book signing for them was kinda bit different from the kids.
Where the kids only ask a few things unrelated to the book, his fans were spurting a lot of different theories about Inception.
Asking a deep question about religious issues on Death Note. And few of them insulted him because he made the worst Sci-fi in the world and securities needed to escort him forcefully to the outside.
He found himself surprised when he signing 'Al's Collection Of Short Stories' book where should be only kids buying this book. His eyes widened to find someone he didn't see for a long time.
"Leslie?"
She gasped, "You remember me, Al?"
"Of course, you are Leslie Mann, right? The first fans I ever met." He smiled. "How are you?"
"I'm great! Although I'm living in San Francisco now."
"Really? That's cool. Wait, you come only for this book signing?"
"Yes." She nodded.
"Let me?" He asked for her book. "To my first fans in the world, Leslie Mann. I hope you have a good life and all of your dream come true. Alphonse 'Al' Brandt, here you go."
"Thank you, Al, this is the best thing in my life," Leslie said.
Finally, the book signing was done and he could feel heaviness on his right hand.
"I think I sprained my wrist." He muttered.
"Well, I didn't count it but I think more than a thousand people are coming," Elisabeth said while giving him a water bottle.
"Only 1000 my ass! You should restrict it to 100."
"Don't blame me, I was only a spectator. Blame my father's company." She smiled and Al gave her a stink eye. "Okay, as an apology from the Murdochs, let me I invite you to have a coffee with me? Deal?"
Al shrugged, "Why not, let me tell John and Jessie first."
The sun is set and he went off the book store. He did not forget to use some disguising tools such as a cap and sunglasses.
He didn't know if it could work but if Captain America did it and succeeded, then it must be a good disguise.
They walked as the orange glow colored their body.
"How about here?" Elisabeth pointed at a coffee shop called Starbucks. "I found there were a lot of them in New York and so far I only found one in LA, and it was here."
"Fine by me." He shrugged while giggling on his mind. Elisabeth complained that she could only find Starbucks in New York and only one in here, wait for another 20 years and you would be mind blown.
While he was having a nice coffee, he couldn't help but see her looking at the place where he disguised himself as Borat.
"Still looking for the troupes?" Al asked.
"Hmm? Yes,"
"Why are you so enamored with those two. Don't tell me that you have a crush on this Borat guy." He teased.
Elisabeth's face turned red in embarrassment at what he said and he kind of jumped when he saw that. "You are!?"
"Jeez, don't be so loud okay! It's not a crush... I just like his voice and his sister's. They said they will perform someday in the future. Every weekend when I am coming to the USA, I always come here expecting they would be here but they were not."
"Wow, they must be leaving a very deep impression with you."
"They did, I even asked one of my daddy's men to convert it to audiotapes and I brought it every day. Wanna hear it?"
"Sure."
She let out her walkman and gave one of the earbuds to him. He heard some of the songs he sang and he was hit with a sense of nostalgia. Including Ievan Polkka and Lose, one of their greatest hit songs.
Some of it was Alice's voice and the audio quality is a bit bad and there was a lot of background sound on the audiotape.
"How is it? Amazing right?" She said with her voice dripped with enthusiasm.
"They are good, too bad the audio quality is a bit bad."
"That's why I'm searching for this guy." She whined. "What if they recorded them in studio quality. It will be great right?"
As she turned off the cassette tape, both of them finally be able to hear what's song was played in the café.
"Uh, I love this song," Al said after hearing the unique melody.
"You like this song?" Elisabeth was looking at him weirdly.
"Yeah, I like The Smiths, their songs I mean. And this one is on top of the list."
That earned a laugh from Elisabeth and his face looked as if asking her why.
"No, I mean, seriously. Do you like their songs? You are not embarrassed or anything?"
"Why? I mean, I know their vocalist was an asshole but, you know, they are unique. Look, try to listen to the song."
Elisabeth just nodded at him and tried to listen to the song. The lyric was so weird, the guitar was abrupt, the rhythm was messy but the weird thing was she kind of like it.
"To die by your side, it's such a heavenly way to die..." Al hummed. "Weird but it stuck in your head right?"
Elisabeth nodded weakly, "Y-yes. But, in my home, I heard just becoming their fans was akin to joining an obscure cult."
"You mean like goths and hippies in here?"
"Some kind like that. I had one friend who told me that liking this meant an effete or possibly gay." Her eyes widened, "Are you?"
"No! I'm straight as an arrow, Beth."
"Ugh, my name is Elisabeth, or just call me Lizzie please."
"Nope, I reserved the name Lizzie for someone, for now, you are Beth."
She rolled her eyes and he continued.
"Yeah, this song is a bit obscure and some people who liked it were rather listening to it while they were alone in their room while the door is closed. But I don't doubt their talent, I had a few good songs from them, if you like I can show it to you someday."
"Are you inviting me to another date, Mr. Brandt?"
"If you want to call it a date, go ahead. I prefer it's a gathering for the music enthusiast. Besides, I have a girlfriend and I love her very much."
"She's a lucky girl."
"Nah, I'm the lucky one. If she wasn't the one who makes a move first, I might date in another 10 years." He remembered last Christmas.
After the music was over, another song was played and it wasn't foreign to him. Of course, it was so familiar, he was the one who sang it.
"Is this your song, what is it called?"
"Shallow, first time hearing it?"
"Yes, my friend in Aussie said it was a good song. I only heard the Live Aid. Is this the studio recording version?" Al nodded at her.
She closed her eyes, savored every melody of this sings until she recognized the woman's voice.
"Wait, I know this voice... Is this belong to Anastasia? If I heard correctly, why your voice is sound like Borat... No way!" She cocked her head to him who has his eyes like a deer on a headlight.
To Be Continued...
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