Dragon Country, part 1
Written for 
dragonbigbang 2014. With big thanks to my betas, brandywine28 and
chalcopyrite
If you would like to read the story in one piece, it is up on my website here.
Please note: this story contains a scene of rape and violence.
"Going dragon-hunting this weekend, Bass?"
Lance leaned back in his chair. "Hello, Chris."
"Because," his friend said, "I've saved you the trouble." With a grand flourish, he produced a small, shiny object and set it in the middle of Lance's desk.
Lance picked it up. It was surprisingly heavy, for something perhaps an inch across-though he suspected the weight was due to a leaden core rather than actual gold content. Still. The tiny dragon spiraled in on itself like a snail, with a fronded head arching upwards at the top, and a tail curled for balance at the back.
"But it doesn't have wings. Not a real dragon if it can't fly," Lance said, mournfully.
"Who says it can't fly? A wingless dragon can totally fly if it wants to." Chris tapped the little ornament. "And you don't have a gold one.
"You shouldn't keep bringing me these love-tokens, Chris. People will talk."
Chris grinned, and sat carelessly in the chair on the other side of the desk. "If any of these people are gorgeous brunettes, send them my way. If they're not, fuck 'em."
"I think you have that backward," Lance murmured, and than sat forward to stare. "What in all creation have you done with your beard?"
Chris preened. "Like them?" He stroked the twin protruding spikes of his beard in what Lance dimly discerned as an attempt to look statesmanlike. Which was bizarre, coming from Chris, so he was not at all surprised it didn't last long. Chris was like that-head like a beehive, buzzing with a thousand different ideas all the time, but there was never any conflict between what he said and what he thought, unlike most of the rest of the world. Chris was essentially honest, and even if his honesty was relentless and at times quite hard work to deal with, it was still more restful than normal human behaviour, which put up a front about everything whether it was necessary or not. Chris probably couldn't put up enough fronts to keep pace with the frantic speed of his thoughts. If Lance wasn't careful he tended to get headaches after Chris's whirlwind visits.
"It's a… style choice," Lance said with care.
Chris laughed, with an echo of completely expected glee. "Anyway, I gotta run. I just came in to say, I got you a new customer."
"Oh?"
"Yeah, new guy in town, came to get some maintenance on his motorcycle. Beautiful machine, too, great lines, going to be a pleasure working on it. At least, it'll be a pleasure if my asshole boss gets off my back. I guess punching him in the face would be a firing offence, huh? Anyway, the guy said he was looking for a place to stay and then a job, so I gave him one of your cards. He's got something, definitely. You'll like him. Mind you, he's a bit naive. Told me right off that he didn't know anything about mechanics and he wanted someone to make sure the machine was running right as it should. If I'd been a metal-hack I could have fleeced him and he'd never have known the difference."
Lance privately thought that nobody with an ounce of discernment would think Chris was untrustworthy, but he didn't bother to say so. Depending on his mood, Chris might decide he liked the image of himself as a fearsome criminal, and would be insulted to be called honest. "Does he have a name?"
"Huh. Now I think about it, I don't remember his name. Alan… Adam… Algernon?"
"Now you're just messing with me."
Chris grinned. "Gonna remember the bike, so it doesn't exactly matter. But he's got something, you'll see."
"Yeah, 'cause my week isn't busy enough already."
"You can work Saturday," Chris said, briskly, and stood up. "You don't have to go dragon-hunting this weekend, remember?"
There were perfunctory goodbyes, and the sound of a cheerful exchange between Chris and Lisa as Chris made his way out. Lance picked up the little gold dragon, and smiled. Cute. He set it next to the inkwell, and turned his attention to his schedule for the day. Telephone calls to a couple of his least favourite clients, three interviews with people looking for work, an hour before lunch to review some possible matches, and then-
"You have a therapy session this afternoon," Lisa said, uncannily echoing his own thoughts. "Good thing I brought cookies." She grinned at him, not without sympathy, and dropped three application forms on his desk. "Your interviews for this morning. First one's in at ten." Lisa was probably wasted here, working for his one-man employment bureau, but she was easily the best assistant he'd ever found. Not as decorative as-as some of the others, she was plump and cheerful rather than coolly elegant, but her friendliness was an asset and, more importantly, she was smart and efficient. And she had a habit of humming to herself while she worked which Lance found very restful.
His 'therapy session' this afternoon would be anything but restful. He wasn't surprised to find Britney's name in the day-planner again. Every six weeks-less, sometimes-she came back to him because the person he'd recruited to be her minder stroke nanny stroke secretary stroke companion… hadn't worked out. He wasn't sure the right person for the job actually existed. He was fairly sure Britney needed half a dozen people around her to get her life properly in order, but she was always insistent that she couldn't bear having that many people telling her what to do-and pointing out that she was supposed to tell them what to do didn't help.
But they'd talk, and she'd tell Lance her troubles and what she wanted, and he'd try to figure out what she really wanted and, more to the point, what she needed, and see if he could send somebody along, and for a week he'd get calls telling him what a treasure he'd found for her, and then things would go quiet, and then it would be back on the old merry-go-round again. This time would be no different, no matter how much he wanted to help. What Britney really wanted, he suspected, was a mother, and you couldn't hire those. Any more than you could hire the perfect husband.
Oh, well. A problem for this afternoon. Meanwhile, he had calls to make, and three hopefuls to interview. One of them even wanted to be a personal assistant. Maybe she'd be good enough for Britney.
The calls were no fun. Both clients were sharks. Talked a good talk, but he remembered meeting them originally and he wasn't fooled. The barely-veneered determination to get the most work for the least pay was normal but depressing. He'd fill the posts, because everybody wanted to work in the movies even if it was only in the accounting department or as a secretary, but nobody good would stay with them for long.
Interviewing possible job candidates was better, usually, but Lance knew before he shook hands and said goodbye that he wasn't going to find the miracle that would transform these three lives. As the last one closed the office door, Lance sat back and sighed. Some days it was hardly worth coming in to work.
Happily, Lisa seemed to have a talent for knowing when he needed coffee, and as soon as the third interviewee was gone she brought two mugs through-hers bore a cartoon mermaid, his a Welsh dragon-and sat down in the chair opposite. "Any good?"
"Sometimes, I wish this were an ordinary agency, just trying to fill vacancies in regular places like offices and restaurants. That way we'd get people who actually want to do the jobs they're applying for. Carpenters who actually want to build stuff, accountants who want to do the books, that sort of thing. Not the folks who're too distracted by working in a real, live theatre to notice that they have to buckle down and do the job they were hired for."
"Ah, the glamour of show business," Lisa said, wisely. "All wannabes?"
"All three of them had the right answers to every question I asked, and all three of them secretly believed that all they had to do was get next to a theatre producer, or a film director, or a casting agent, and it'd just be a matter of time until their shining talent was discovered. Sometimes I think nobody wants to work for it any more."
Wisely, Lisa didn't argue, although they both knew it wasn't true. There were plenty of people on their books who would work until they dropped. It was way more heartbreaking to watch the workers strive and strive and never get that lucky break than to watch the wannabes sail happily on into disappointment.
Lance, in a mood to rant, went on: "I mean, we can find them something, because everybody needs regular jobs done, and if it makes them happier to be pen-pushers in showbiz, instead of earning a decent wage somewhere else, then so be it. I mean, it won't make them happier in the long run, it'd be better if they just gave up their stupid dreams and found something sensible to aim for, but it's not up to me to tell them that nobody's been discovered like that since Mabel Normand."
"And look what happened to her," Lisa said. "Did any of this morning's lot have talent, do you think?"
He shrugged. "Doubt it. The talented ones have something to show for it at their age." It wasn't that talent was a necessity-he'd met plenty of singers who couldn't sing, actors who couldn't act, dancers with no sense of rhythm and magicians with no flim-flam. Some of them had made it anyway, on account of having more ambition than any six normal people, and a willingness to do whatever it might take. Overall, though, talent was preferable. There was a lot of competition out there. "Well, this won't get the bills paid. Who's on the list?"
Lisa opened her notebook, and they got down to business. By one o'clock Lisa had a selection of possibles to contact, and Lance went off to Fatone's to fortify himself for Britney's visit with lasagna and insalata verde, and to flirt with their head waiter. It was easy flirting with Joey, because Joey flirted with everybody and didn't take any of it seriously, which was just what Lance needed.
*
"I guess, I don't really know why it's not working out. She's good with the kids, not great, I mean, she keeps them organised and they go to bed regular, but I don't think they have fun, you know? And I get the feeling she don't really respect me, and I'm paying her wages so I think she ought to be respectful, don't you?"
Lance wondered what it was that had precipitated this latest sacking. He'd probably never find out. Britney had a way of refusing to think about things that upset her, and he had to be very careful to sort the specifics of behaviour from lingering emotions when debriefing the failed candidates. Better for all concerned to leave it at 'personal differences' and 'incompatible', even though it was frustrating never to have the full picture. What was clear, though, was that she was feeling more than usually insecure today.
"Is there something particular that we need to avoid? Or look for next time?"
"Oh!" She beamed at him. "You have a new dragon!" She picked up the little gold snail-dragon. "That's so cute. Where'd you get him?"
"A friend-my friend Chris-brought him over this morning."
"Ooh, and would this Chris be a boyfriend?"
"No! No, not a boyfriend."
"Don't be so sure."
"Trust me, I'm certain."
"Maybe you should look closer. The guy brings you random presents-this isn't the only one, am I right?"
"Well," Lance admitted, "he did bring me that green one on the shelf, but that was-"
"See! Guys don't do that unless they want you. They just don't."
"Chris is not trying to woo me, seriously. He brought Lisa a bunny pin one time because she'd been talking about how she had a baby rabbit when she was a kid."
Britney shook her head knowingly. "You wait. Is he cute? I bet he's cute."
"Er." It hadn't ever occurred to Lance to evaluate Chris's cuteness quotient, and he floundered. "I guess… I mean, he's not a hideous troll or anything, he just-we're just friends." Britney was not going to be convinced, but Lance was certain of his ground. Time to get the conversation back on track. "You know, I think we're getting closer to finding the right person for you. Is there something particular we should look for?" he prompted, gently. "Has your situation changed?"
"I-I. I'm trying to… get back to painting."
"That's great!"
"I guess. I sorta need someone around who'll be, like, supportive of me." She faltered, and the shade in her pretty brown eyes spoke of fear rather than eagerness, and suddenly the dam broke and the whole mass of insecurities spilled out-could she still do it? was what she did really art? was it only clever because she was a kid? were her paintings just childish and stupid and only valuable because Mother had persuaded that critic they were, was it not real at all? Would people laugh at her if she tried again? "I have ideas, there's things I want to do, only I'm not sure, it's difficult, and, and I really need an assistant who understands."
Lance was going to have to debrief the previous assistant-Melanie Hill-very carefully indeed. Mentally he was already flipping through the index to see if anyone had mentioned an interest in the visual arts, but nobody leapt to mind. "I think it's great that you're working again," he said, infusing his voice with reassurance and confidence. "I always loved seeing what you came up with before."
She smiled at him, doubt still swirling. "It's, you know, it's hard to get back into it. I guess sacking my assistant doesn't help, 'cause I'm going to have to run after the boys myself until you come up with the perfect person." It would give her an excuse not to face the empty canvasses. Lance sympathised.
"I will do my best."
"I know, sweetie," she said. "You've always been great. I know I'm kinda difficult, but there has to be someone out there who's the perfect person, you know?"
Lance did know. Unfortunately, when the client didn't really know what constituted perfection, it was hard to keep her happy. He would try, mostly because he really wanted Britney to be happy. She'd had a lot to deal with, and she tried so hard, if he could help her get her life in order he would do everything he could.
"Um, Lance, there's actually-can I ask you a favour?"
"Sure."
"See, there's this concert. I kinda want to go, because it's a guy I used to know, when we were teenagers, and everybody's talking about him now. And Kevin has the boys until the weekend, only, my friend who I thought was going to go with me," she paused, and Lance was very nearly sure there was no such friend, but he kept his face in neutral and let her finish, "she had something come up, so I wondered if you'd go with me?"
"I-ah. Let me check my schedule."
"Only, it's tonight… Please come! I hate going out on my own, and it'll be fun, I promise!"
"I really-" I don't go to concerts, Lance wanted to say, but faced with Britney's bright hopefulness he couldn't quite bring himself to say no. "I guess... I could."
"Oh, that's brilliant! Thanks, Lance!" She flung her arms around his neck and hugged him.
"I might have to go sit outside for part of it," he warned her. "I have, sometimes I have issues with crowds."
"It'll be fine," she assured him, blithely. "I'll send a driver for you. Oh, we'll have such a great time."
Against all his expectations, Lance was having a good time.
There were good reasons he didn't go to concerts. Leaving aside the issue of being in an overexcited crowd, too often it gave him a headache to see someone up on the stage whom he knew, for sure, was not pretty, not talented, not graceful, and to get the impression that they were all those things. To get a mixed message from brain and ears, one saying 'wonderful' and the other wincing at bum notes. People called it stage presence, or the magic of theatre, when a singer was beautiful in performance and yet could walk barely recognised through the crowded streets the next day, or when an actor held an entire theatre mesmerised and somehow completely lacked charisma on the screen.
Lance knew better.
He'd learned to recognise a glamour when he felt that dissonance. He knew that some of the glamour-enhanced performances he'd seen had been astonishing, magical, memorable, and that regular people had emerged in a daze from those events. It was almost a shame it didn't work on him, but it didn't. Maybe it was-at least in part-because he had to fix his shields firmly in place to block the waves of love, adulation, sexual fervour and so on that flowed around him from the audience. Shielding against all that was self-defence. He'd figured that out long before he even realised he was a receiver.
Whatever it was, the glamours didn't work on Lance, and the discrepancy between physical fact and perception gave him a headache. Not that every performer had a glamour, and most of them were just small enhancements, but they were surprisingly common. The effect almost always seemed to be unconscious, a projection from that secret part of the brain that most people didn't even know was there, and Lance had never been able to figure out whether glamours manifested from the insecurities of people who were afraid they weren't good enough or from the certainties of people who believed they were better than they were. He had, once, dealt with an applicant who projected her glamour deliberately, a very strange experience indeed. She was an actress who'd been referred to him by a cousin, so he'd taken her out to lunch, and on the way he'd caught her deciding to switch on her glamour-and the immediate reaction from the men they passed on the street had testified to its effectiveness. She was doing very well, these days. But she was, in Lance's experience, unique.
It was an asset to his professional life that Lance could discern when a performer used a glamour, and guide this actor towards the stage and that singer away from the recording studio… once he'd even met someone with the opposite affect, he called it a lackluster, a singer who made phenomenal recordings and yet failed to keep the attention of a live audience. No charisma at all.
This singer certainly kept his audience's attention. Justin Timberlake was not short of either talent or that indefinable something, and he accepted the crowd's adulation as his due. There didn't seem to be anything to give Lance a headache, nothing slathered over mediocrity to make it shine, and yet.... It took Lance a while to figure it out, but he did, eventually. Justin Timberlake was wearing a glamour that looked exactly like his own face. Now that, Lance thought, was the stuff of dreams for the psychoanalysts, a perfect mixture of ego and insecurity.
There was something else going on, too, and once Lance had stopped puzzling over the glamour question, he caught it: a faint telepathic imperative calling Love me! Love me! Definitely not deliberate, especially not with that very occasional I need you going on underneath. That confident, commanding performer wouldn't be sending out such a message on purpose! But it was there, and it was oddly appealing. Lance decided he was prepared to go along with it, provisionally.
He adjusted his shields, grinned at Britney, and enjoyed the show.
*
Even the next morning, Lance was still energised from the concert. He'd let himself absorb just a little of the crowd's excitement, and it was a most amazing feeling. He'd slept soundly for exactly six hours, bounced out of bed, and was at his desk long before Lisa arrived.
"Oh, my-what are you doing here at this hour?" she exclaimed. "I thought you'd be late, today. How was last night?"
He grinned at her. "Great! Way better than I expected."
"And did Britney, uh, Ms Spears have a good time?"
"She loved it. I think it's been way too long since she had any fun. And she-" He was interrupted by the telephone. Lisa mouthed "later" at him and hurried to answer it. Lance got back to his papers. There were a couple of likely ladies in the file who might be able to cope with Britney, but he didn't know whether either of them was at all interested in art. It wasn't something he'd ever thought to put on his miraculous index. Oh well. Better call them in for another chat and see how they felt.
Lisa came in with fresh coffee (Lance never made coffee in the office, for the cranky filter machine hated him and responded only to Lisa's touch) and a new possibility for Britney's assistant, a Mrs Kasdorf, who had proved her efficiency by calling on the dot of eight-thirty and who sounded suitably maternal. She would be in at ten for her preliminary interview.
"I have a good feeling about today," Lance said. It was probably the leftover buzz from the concert, but he might as well enjoy it. "Maybe this Mrs Kasdorf will the the one we want. I suppose you didn't happen to ask her about art?"
"Uh, no. Sorry, I didn't know that was a thing now."
"Not a problem, no way you could have known. Can you call these two and get them in as soon as possible? Don't tell them it's a specific job, just say it's a refresher." Lance didn't like to get people's hopes up. Job seekers who'd been on his books for a few weeks got offered the chance to come in for coffee and cookies every so often, and sometimes he was assessing them for a particular job, and sometimes he was just reminding himself who they were. It was an idiosyncratic system, as far as he knew, but it worked for him and for his applicants.
"I guess you don't have time to tell me all about the concert," Lisa said, sounding resigned.
"Not right now. Um. You're going early tonight, aren't you? How about we get together at lunch. We can talk about Mrs Kasdorf and the other Britney prospects, and I'll tell you everything I can remember about last night."
"You're a good boss," she said, and trotted back to her desk in the outside office. After a few minutes the rhythmic clack of the typewriter started up.
"Eh, maybe it isn't my lucky day after all," Lance said as he helped himself to a slice of pizza. "Mrs Kasdorf is close to perfect, but she looked awful blank when I asked her did she like art. And the way Britney's feeling right now, that's going to have to be a priority. Although," he paused for a bite, "I'm not seeing how her personal assistant is supposed to be her… her art teacher, or her, hmm, cheerleader, as well as everything else. Maybe I should persuade her into going to art school." Even as he said the words, he knew that wasn't going to work. Britney was-or had been-a famous artist. She wouldn't go back to school alongside a bunch of kids. She couldn't. He couldn't, either, if he were in her place. "Yeah, I don't know."
"Don't worry about Mrs Kasdorf," Lisa said. "You have Ms Hedderson and Ms Peters to see before you make any kind of decision. Tell me about the concert!"
So Lance talked about the show, the atmosphere, and the singer. And he told her how afterwards, Britney had squeaked with surprise and wriggled away from him through the crowd towards an older woman who was exuding maternal pride, who after a moment's astonishment had flung her arms around Britney. By the time Lance reached them, Britney was handing over a card. "Tell him to give me a call, if he wants to get together. We can talk about old times, it'll be fun!" she said.
"Didn't she want to go backstage? If she knew Justin Timberlake's mother," Lisa said, confused.
"I think she was nervous." More like terrified, but he wasn't going to spill Britney's secrets, however much he trusted Lisa. "And it probably wasn't a great time and place to get back with a friend you knew when you were, like, ten years old." And had a crush on. "I hope he calls, though."
"Pity he isn't one of ours, you could have found out."
"We have to leave a few for the other agents," Lance said. "I think I might buy his record, though. He was-" There was a loud knock at the door. It opened.
The most amazing man walked in.
He was tall, blue-eyed, dressed in black from head to foot, and he blazed with charisma. Lance could have sworn he felt the heat of it ripple through the air.
"Can I help you?" Lisa said. Incredibly, she sounded impressed, but not intimidated. How did she do that?
"A guy called Chris Kirkpatrick told me you could. Hi. I'm Adam Lambert. Oh, I'm so sorry-you're at lunch. I'll come back-"
"No, no," Lisa leapt up. "You're fine. It's a working lunch, really. Come on in. Are you looking for work? Let me get you one of our forms. Would you like some pizza?"
"I'm good, thanks."
Lance watched Lisa bustle about, and tried not to let Adam Lambert see him staring. There was something incredibly unsettling about this man who was sitting there being charming to his assistant. He was ridiculously attractive and had the most appealing smile Lance had seen in years, and something about him set Lance's teeth on edge. What was it? The ripple of heat around him that Lisa apparently didn't perceive at all-now that Lance looked more carefully it could not be charisma. It was something else, something he didn't recognise. And there was-was it a glamour? Not exactly, not the way Lance understood glamours, but there was something deceptive about him. Something untrustworthy.
"I'll just go wash my hands," Lance said.
He cleaned the pizza grease from his fingers, tidied himself up, and tried to puzzle it out. Lisa was obviously entranced, but Lisa's gift seemed to be restricted to providing refreshments at the perfect moment-which was a very handy gift for an assistant to have, but it barely qualified as telepathy, and nobody but himself seemed to have noticed Lisa had it. She obviously didn't perceive that aura boiling around Adam Lambert.
Who opened Lance's door at that moment, and said: "Shall I come in?"
"Sure," Lance said, shortly. "Take a seat." He reached for Lambert's application form.
"I see you're into dragons," said Lambert, after a moment of silence.
With a little gold one next to his inkwell, a hand-size green model on the lower bookshelf, two smaller ones on the upper shelf, and a leather dragon-etched bookmark on his desk, Lance could hardly deny it, though he didn't think it was worth making conversation about. After scanning the form twice-because he didn't take in any information the first time through-he looked up.
"You've just got into town?" he said, trying not to sound too suspicious.
"Just a few days ago." There was nothing, no reverberation of satisfaction or uncertainty or anything else. Lance loosened his everyday shields a bit. Nothing. No emotion to be read except from Lambert's face, which was calm and apparently friendly. Lance coughed, and pushed a bit.
Adam Lambert had a diamond-hard shield in place. Nothing was getting through it. Lance slammed his own shield back up. He'd never met anyone so utterly opaque.
"And Chris sent you here," he said.
"He said you have great contacts in showbiz, and that's where I want to be."
"A singer."
"That's right."
"Do you have tapes? I like to hear what people can do before I send them out for jobs," Lance said. He hoped it didn't sound too sarcastic. He wasn't supposed to be rude to applicants, even applicants who were lying through their impeccable white teeth.
"I don't have anything like that. I thought I could just, you know, sing?"
"Okay, then. Go ahead."
Lance forced himself to look as Lambert stood up. Took in the leather jacket, strong, shapely hands, long black jeans, boots which-"Those boots are dragon-hide!" he said, accusingly. "Dragons are a protected species!" Everyone knew that. Dragons were extinct, most likely, you never heard of sightings nowadays even if stuff like dragonhide boots did manage to show up now and again. No dragons left in the world was the last thing Lance wanted to believe, and certainly the idea that this man was wearing something made from the stolen skin of a dead dragon made him want to rip them off Lambert's feet and send him into the street in his socks.
"I didn't kill it, you know," Lambert said, smiling. Lance clenched his teeth on the response that wanted to fly out. Who the hell was this man?
"Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?" Lambert sang, "Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality."
As he sang, Lance sat back in his chair and stared. He'd never heard the song before, and the lyrics were rather strange, but that voice, the range, the power and control... And there wasn't a performance glamour, he was sure of it now, there was definitely something giving Lambert this huge presence, but it wasn't that. This talent, this singing, was real.
He vaguely noticed the door open, and Lisa standing listening.
The singing ended, and for a moment Lance had nothing to say. He wanted to applaud. Lisa did applaud, then disappeared back to her own desk.
"So, uh, do you think you can find something for me?"
"I-let me make a call. No, you can stay, it's fine." Lance picked up the receiver, and dialled. "Simon Cowell, please. It's Lance Bass." He was relieved to be put through at once. Simon could be a real bastard if he wasn't in the mood to play nice, and Lance did not want to have to leave humiliating messages, not in front of Adam Lambert. So stupid-he should have made Adam go to the outer office and sit with Lisa. "Simon, I have someone I think you should meet. Singer. Yes, I think so. As to that, you'd have to decide for yourself, but I think you'll be interested. All right, that sounds good. Thanks. Oh, don't thank me, usual terms and conditions apply! All right, I will." He put the receiver down. "Tomorrow afternoon, here's the address." He scrawled it on the back of a business card. "Take some sheet music with you."
"Who is Simon Cowell?"
Lance stared. "He's the biggest music promoter on this side of the ocean."
"Oh! So, that's great! Thanks." He really did have a potent smile. Lance thought of the dragon-hide boots, and did not reciprocate.
*
Lance was not particularly surprised to receive a phone call from Simon Cowell the following afternoon. It would have astonished him if Cowell had not wanted to sign Adam Lambert. Once his own commission came through, he would do his very best to forget him.
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dragonbigbang 2014. With big thanks to my betas, brandywine28 and
chalcopyrite
If you would like to read the story in one piece, it is up on my website here.
Please note: this story contains a scene of rape and violence.
"Going dragon-hunting this weekend, Bass?"
Lance leaned back in his chair. "Hello, Chris."
"Because," his friend said, "I've saved you the trouble." With a grand flourish, he produced a small, shiny object and set it in the middle of Lance's desk.
Lance picked it up. It was surprisingly heavy, for something perhaps an inch across-though he suspected the weight was due to a leaden core rather than actual gold content. Still. The tiny dragon spiraled in on itself like a snail, with a fronded head arching upwards at the top, and a tail curled for balance at the back.
"But it doesn't have wings. Not a real dragon if it can't fly," Lance said, mournfully.
"Who says it can't fly? A wingless dragon can totally fly if it wants to." Chris tapped the little ornament. "And you don't have a gold one.
"You shouldn't keep bringing me these love-tokens, Chris. People will talk."
Chris grinned, and sat carelessly in the chair on the other side of the desk. "If any of these people are gorgeous brunettes, send them my way. If they're not, fuck 'em."
"I think you have that backward," Lance murmured, and than sat forward to stare. "What in all creation have you done with your beard?"
Chris preened. "Like them?" He stroked the twin protruding spikes of his beard in what Lance dimly discerned as an attempt to look statesmanlike. Which was bizarre, coming from Chris, so he was not at all surprised it didn't last long. Chris was like that-head like a beehive, buzzing with a thousand different ideas all the time, but there was never any conflict between what he said and what he thought, unlike most of the rest of the world. Chris was essentially honest, and even if his honesty was relentless and at times quite hard work to deal with, it was still more restful than normal human behaviour, which put up a front about everything whether it was necessary or not. Chris probably couldn't put up enough fronts to keep pace with the frantic speed of his thoughts. If Lance wasn't careful he tended to get headaches after Chris's whirlwind visits.
"It's a… style choice," Lance said with care.
Chris laughed, with an echo of completely expected glee. "Anyway, I gotta run. I just came in to say, I got you a new customer."
"Oh?"
"Yeah, new guy in town, came to get some maintenance on his motorcycle. Beautiful machine, too, great lines, going to be a pleasure working on it. At least, it'll be a pleasure if my asshole boss gets off my back. I guess punching him in the face would be a firing offence, huh? Anyway, the guy said he was looking for a place to stay and then a job, so I gave him one of your cards. He's got something, definitely. You'll like him. Mind you, he's a bit naive. Told me right off that he didn't know anything about mechanics and he wanted someone to make sure the machine was running right as it should. If I'd been a metal-hack I could have fleeced him and he'd never have known the difference."
Lance privately thought that nobody with an ounce of discernment would think Chris was untrustworthy, but he didn't bother to say so. Depending on his mood, Chris might decide he liked the image of himself as a fearsome criminal, and would be insulted to be called honest. "Does he have a name?"
"Huh. Now I think about it, I don't remember his name. Alan… Adam… Algernon?"
"Now you're just messing with me."
Chris grinned. "Gonna remember the bike, so it doesn't exactly matter. But he's got something, you'll see."
"Yeah, 'cause my week isn't busy enough already."
"You can work Saturday," Chris said, briskly, and stood up. "You don't have to go dragon-hunting this weekend, remember?"
There were perfunctory goodbyes, and the sound of a cheerful exchange between Chris and Lisa as Chris made his way out. Lance picked up the little gold dragon, and smiled. Cute. He set it next to the inkwell, and turned his attention to his schedule for the day. Telephone calls to a couple of his least favourite clients, three interviews with people looking for work, an hour before lunch to review some possible matches, and then-
"You have a therapy session this afternoon," Lisa said, uncannily echoing his own thoughts. "Good thing I brought cookies." She grinned at him, not without sympathy, and dropped three application forms on his desk. "Your interviews for this morning. First one's in at ten." Lisa was probably wasted here, working for his one-man employment bureau, but she was easily the best assistant he'd ever found. Not as decorative as-as some of the others, she was plump and cheerful rather than coolly elegant, but her friendliness was an asset and, more importantly, she was smart and efficient. And she had a habit of humming to herself while she worked which Lance found very restful.
His 'therapy session' this afternoon would be anything but restful. He wasn't surprised to find Britney's name in the day-planner again. Every six weeks-less, sometimes-she came back to him because the person he'd recruited to be her minder stroke nanny stroke secretary stroke companion… hadn't worked out. He wasn't sure the right person for the job actually existed. He was fairly sure Britney needed half a dozen people around her to get her life properly in order, but she was always insistent that she couldn't bear having that many people telling her what to do-and pointing out that she was supposed to tell them what to do didn't help.
But they'd talk, and she'd tell Lance her troubles and what she wanted, and he'd try to figure out what she really wanted and, more to the point, what she needed, and see if he could send somebody along, and for a week he'd get calls telling him what a treasure he'd found for her, and then things would go quiet, and then it would be back on the old merry-go-round again. This time would be no different, no matter how much he wanted to help. What Britney really wanted, he suspected, was a mother, and you couldn't hire those. Any more than you could hire the perfect husband.
Oh, well. A problem for this afternoon. Meanwhile, he had calls to make, and three hopefuls to interview. One of them even wanted to be a personal assistant. Maybe she'd be good enough for Britney.
The calls were no fun. Both clients were sharks. Talked a good talk, but he remembered meeting them originally and he wasn't fooled. The barely-veneered determination to get the most work for the least pay was normal but depressing. He'd fill the posts, because everybody wanted to work in the movies even if it was only in the accounting department or as a secretary, but nobody good would stay with them for long.
Interviewing possible job candidates was better, usually, but Lance knew before he shook hands and said goodbye that he wasn't going to find the miracle that would transform these three lives. As the last one closed the office door, Lance sat back and sighed. Some days it was hardly worth coming in to work.
Happily, Lisa seemed to have a talent for knowing when he needed coffee, and as soon as the third interviewee was gone she brought two mugs through-hers bore a cartoon mermaid, his a Welsh dragon-and sat down in the chair opposite. "Any good?"
"Sometimes, I wish this were an ordinary agency, just trying to fill vacancies in regular places like offices and restaurants. That way we'd get people who actually want to do the jobs they're applying for. Carpenters who actually want to build stuff, accountants who want to do the books, that sort of thing. Not the folks who're too distracted by working in a real, live theatre to notice that they have to buckle down and do the job they were hired for."
"Ah, the glamour of show business," Lisa said, wisely. "All wannabes?"
"All three of them had the right answers to every question I asked, and all three of them secretly believed that all they had to do was get next to a theatre producer, or a film director, or a casting agent, and it'd just be a matter of time until their shining talent was discovered. Sometimes I think nobody wants to work for it any more."
Wisely, Lisa didn't argue, although they both knew it wasn't true. There were plenty of people on their books who would work until they dropped. It was way more heartbreaking to watch the workers strive and strive and never get that lucky break than to watch the wannabes sail happily on into disappointment.
Lance, in a mood to rant, went on: "I mean, we can find them something, because everybody needs regular jobs done, and if it makes them happier to be pen-pushers in showbiz, instead of earning a decent wage somewhere else, then so be it. I mean, it won't make them happier in the long run, it'd be better if they just gave up their stupid dreams and found something sensible to aim for, but it's not up to me to tell them that nobody's been discovered like that since Mabel Normand."
"And look what happened to her," Lisa said. "Did any of this morning's lot have talent, do you think?"
He shrugged. "Doubt it. The talented ones have something to show for it at their age." It wasn't that talent was a necessity-he'd met plenty of singers who couldn't sing, actors who couldn't act, dancers with no sense of rhythm and magicians with no flim-flam. Some of them had made it anyway, on account of having more ambition than any six normal people, and a willingness to do whatever it might take. Overall, though, talent was preferable. There was a lot of competition out there. "Well, this won't get the bills paid. Who's on the list?"
Lisa opened her notebook, and they got down to business. By one o'clock Lisa had a selection of possibles to contact, and Lance went off to Fatone's to fortify himself for Britney's visit with lasagna and insalata verde, and to flirt with their head waiter. It was easy flirting with Joey, because Joey flirted with everybody and didn't take any of it seriously, which was just what Lance needed.
*
"I guess, I don't really know why it's not working out. She's good with the kids, not great, I mean, she keeps them organised and they go to bed regular, but I don't think they have fun, you know? And I get the feeling she don't really respect me, and I'm paying her wages so I think she ought to be respectful, don't you?"
Lance wondered what it was that had precipitated this latest sacking. He'd probably never find out. Britney had a way of refusing to think about things that upset her, and he had to be very careful to sort the specifics of behaviour from lingering emotions when debriefing the failed candidates. Better for all concerned to leave it at 'personal differences' and 'incompatible', even though it was frustrating never to have the full picture. What was clear, though, was that she was feeling more than usually insecure today.
"Is there something particular that we need to avoid? Or look for next time?"
"Oh!" She beamed at him. "You have a new dragon!" She picked up the little gold snail-dragon. "That's so cute. Where'd you get him?"
"A friend-my friend Chris-brought him over this morning."
"Ooh, and would this Chris be a boyfriend?"
"No! No, not a boyfriend."
"Don't be so sure."
"Trust me, I'm certain."
"Maybe you should look closer. The guy brings you random presents-this isn't the only one, am I right?"
"Well," Lance admitted, "he did bring me that green one on the shelf, but that was-"
"See! Guys don't do that unless they want you. They just don't."
"Chris is not trying to woo me, seriously. He brought Lisa a bunny pin one time because she'd been talking about how she had a baby rabbit when she was a kid."
Britney shook her head knowingly. "You wait. Is he cute? I bet he's cute."
"Er." It hadn't ever occurred to Lance to evaluate Chris's cuteness quotient, and he floundered. "I guess… I mean, he's not a hideous troll or anything, he just-we're just friends." Britney was not going to be convinced, but Lance was certain of his ground. Time to get the conversation back on track. "You know, I think we're getting closer to finding the right person for you. Is there something particular we should look for?" he prompted, gently. "Has your situation changed?"
"I-I. I'm trying to… get back to painting."
"That's great!"
"I guess. I sorta need someone around who'll be, like, supportive of me." She faltered, and the shade in her pretty brown eyes spoke of fear rather than eagerness, and suddenly the dam broke and the whole mass of insecurities spilled out-could she still do it? was what she did really art? was it only clever because she was a kid? were her paintings just childish and stupid and only valuable because Mother had persuaded that critic they were, was it not real at all? Would people laugh at her if she tried again? "I have ideas, there's things I want to do, only I'm not sure, it's difficult, and, and I really need an assistant who understands."
Lance was going to have to debrief the previous assistant-Melanie Hill-very carefully indeed. Mentally he was already flipping through the index to see if anyone had mentioned an interest in the visual arts, but nobody leapt to mind. "I think it's great that you're working again," he said, infusing his voice with reassurance and confidence. "I always loved seeing what you came up with before."
She smiled at him, doubt still swirling. "It's, you know, it's hard to get back into it. I guess sacking my assistant doesn't help, 'cause I'm going to have to run after the boys myself until you come up with the perfect person." It would give her an excuse not to face the empty canvasses. Lance sympathised.
"I will do my best."
"I know, sweetie," she said. "You've always been great. I know I'm kinda difficult, but there has to be someone out there who's the perfect person, you know?"
Lance did know. Unfortunately, when the client didn't really know what constituted perfection, it was hard to keep her happy. He would try, mostly because he really wanted Britney to be happy. She'd had a lot to deal with, and she tried so hard, if he could help her get her life in order he would do everything he could.
"Um, Lance, there's actually-can I ask you a favour?"
"Sure."
"See, there's this concert. I kinda want to go, because it's a guy I used to know, when we were teenagers, and everybody's talking about him now. And Kevin has the boys until the weekend, only, my friend who I thought was going to go with me," she paused, and Lance was very nearly sure there was no such friend, but he kept his face in neutral and let her finish, "she had something come up, so I wondered if you'd go with me?"
"I-ah. Let me check my schedule."
"Only, it's tonight… Please come! I hate going out on my own, and it'll be fun, I promise!"
"I really-" I don't go to concerts, Lance wanted to say, but faced with Britney's bright hopefulness he couldn't quite bring himself to say no. "I guess... I could."
"Oh, that's brilliant! Thanks, Lance!" She flung her arms around his neck and hugged him.
"I might have to go sit outside for part of it," he warned her. "I have, sometimes I have issues with crowds."
"It'll be fine," she assured him, blithely. "I'll send a driver for you. Oh, we'll have such a great time."
Against all his expectations, Lance was having a good time.
There were good reasons he didn't go to concerts. Leaving aside the issue of being in an overexcited crowd, too often it gave him a headache to see someone up on the stage whom he knew, for sure, was not pretty, not talented, not graceful, and to get the impression that they were all those things. To get a mixed message from brain and ears, one saying 'wonderful' and the other wincing at bum notes. People called it stage presence, or the magic of theatre, when a singer was beautiful in performance and yet could walk barely recognised through the crowded streets the next day, or when an actor held an entire theatre mesmerised and somehow completely lacked charisma on the screen.
Lance knew better.
He'd learned to recognise a glamour when he felt that dissonance. He knew that some of the glamour-enhanced performances he'd seen had been astonishing, magical, memorable, and that regular people had emerged in a daze from those events. It was almost a shame it didn't work on him, but it didn't. Maybe it was-at least in part-because he had to fix his shields firmly in place to block the waves of love, adulation, sexual fervour and so on that flowed around him from the audience. Shielding against all that was self-defence. He'd figured that out long before he even realised he was a receiver.
Whatever it was, the glamours didn't work on Lance, and the discrepancy between physical fact and perception gave him a headache. Not that every performer had a glamour, and most of them were just small enhancements, but they were surprisingly common. The effect almost always seemed to be unconscious, a projection from that secret part of the brain that most people didn't even know was there, and Lance had never been able to figure out whether glamours manifested from the insecurities of people who were afraid they weren't good enough or from the certainties of people who believed they were better than they were. He had, once, dealt with an applicant who projected her glamour deliberately, a very strange experience indeed. She was an actress who'd been referred to him by a cousin, so he'd taken her out to lunch, and on the way he'd caught her deciding to switch on her glamour-and the immediate reaction from the men they passed on the street had testified to its effectiveness. She was doing very well, these days. But she was, in Lance's experience, unique.
It was an asset to his professional life that Lance could discern when a performer used a glamour, and guide this actor towards the stage and that singer away from the recording studio… once he'd even met someone with the opposite affect, he called it a lackluster, a singer who made phenomenal recordings and yet failed to keep the attention of a live audience. No charisma at all.
This singer certainly kept his audience's attention. Justin Timberlake was not short of either talent or that indefinable something, and he accepted the crowd's adulation as his due. There didn't seem to be anything to give Lance a headache, nothing slathered over mediocrity to make it shine, and yet.... It took Lance a while to figure it out, but he did, eventually. Justin Timberlake was wearing a glamour that looked exactly like his own face. Now that, Lance thought, was the stuff of dreams for the psychoanalysts, a perfect mixture of ego and insecurity.
There was something else going on, too, and once Lance had stopped puzzling over the glamour question, he caught it: a faint telepathic imperative calling Love me! Love me! Definitely not deliberate, especially not with that very occasional I need you going on underneath. That confident, commanding performer wouldn't be sending out such a message on purpose! But it was there, and it was oddly appealing. Lance decided he was prepared to go along with it, provisionally.
He adjusted his shields, grinned at Britney, and enjoyed the show.
*
Even the next morning, Lance was still energised from the concert. He'd let himself absorb just a little of the crowd's excitement, and it was a most amazing feeling. He'd slept soundly for exactly six hours, bounced out of bed, and was at his desk long before Lisa arrived.
"Oh, my-what are you doing here at this hour?" she exclaimed. "I thought you'd be late, today. How was last night?"
He grinned at her. "Great! Way better than I expected."
"And did Britney, uh, Ms Spears have a good time?"
"She loved it. I think it's been way too long since she had any fun. And she-" He was interrupted by the telephone. Lisa mouthed "later" at him and hurried to answer it. Lance got back to his papers. There were a couple of likely ladies in the file who might be able to cope with Britney, but he didn't know whether either of them was at all interested in art. It wasn't something he'd ever thought to put on his miraculous index. Oh well. Better call them in for another chat and see how they felt.
Lisa came in with fresh coffee (Lance never made coffee in the office, for the cranky filter machine hated him and responded only to Lisa's touch) and a new possibility for Britney's assistant, a Mrs Kasdorf, who had proved her efficiency by calling on the dot of eight-thirty and who sounded suitably maternal. She would be in at ten for her preliminary interview.
"I have a good feeling about today," Lance said. It was probably the leftover buzz from the concert, but he might as well enjoy it. "Maybe this Mrs Kasdorf will the the one we want. I suppose you didn't happen to ask her about art?"
"Uh, no. Sorry, I didn't know that was a thing now."
"Not a problem, no way you could have known. Can you call these two and get them in as soon as possible? Don't tell them it's a specific job, just say it's a refresher." Lance didn't like to get people's hopes up. Job seekers who'd been on his books for a few weeks got offered the chance to come in for coffee and cookies every so often, and sometimes he was assessing them for a particular job, and sometimes he was just reminding himself who they were. It was an idiosyncratic system, as far as he knew, but it worked for him and for his applicants.
"I guess you don't have time to tell me all about the concert," Lisa said, sounding resigned.
"Not right now. Um. You're going early tonight, aren't you? How about we get together at lunch. We can talk about Mrs Kasdorf and the other Britney prospects, and I'll tell you everything I can remember about last night."
"You're a good boss," she said, and trotted back to her desk in the outside office. After a few minutes the rhythmic clack of the typewriter started up.
"Eh, maybe it isn't my lucky day after all," Lance said as he helped himself to a slice of pizza. "Mrs Kasdorf is close to perfect, but she looked awful blank when I asked her did she like art. And the way Britney's feeling right now, that's going to have to be a priority. Although," he paused for a bite, "I'm not seeing how her personal assistant is supposed to be her… her art teacher, or her, hmm, cheerleader, as well as everything else. Maybe I should persuade her into going to art school." Even as he said the words, he knew that wasn't going to work. Britney was-or had been-a famous artist. She wouldn't go back to school alongside a bunch of kids. She couldn't. He couldn't, either, if he were in her place. "Yeah, I don't know."
"Don't worry about Mrs Kasdorf," Lisa said. "You have Ms Hedderson and Ms Peters to see before you make any kind of decision. Tell me about the concert!"
So Lance talked about the show, the atmosphere, and the singer. And he told her how afterwards, Britney had squeaked with surprise and wriggled away from him through the crowd towards an older woman who was exuding maternal pride, who after a moment's astonishment had flung her arms around Britney. By the time Lance reached them, Britney was handing over a card. "Tell him to give me a call, if he wants to get together. We can talk about old times, it'll be fun!" she said.
"Didn't she want to go backstage? If she knew Justin Timberlake's mother," Lisa said, confused.
"I think she was nervous." More like terrified, but he wasn't going to spill Britney's secrets, however much he trusted Lisa. "And it probably wasn't a great time and place to get back with a friend you knew when you were, like, ten years old." And had a crush on. "I hope he calls, though."
"Pity he isn't one of ours, you could have found out."
"We have to leave a few for the other agents," Lance said. "I think I might buy his record, though. He was-" There was a loud knock at the door. It opened.
The most amazing man walked in.
He was tall, blue-eyed, dressed in black from head to foot, and he blazed with charisma. Lance could have sworn he felt the heat of it ripple through the air.
"Can I help you?" Lisa said. Incredibly, she sounded impressed, but not intimidated. How did she do that?
"A guy called Chris Kirkpatrick told me you could. Hi. I'm Adam Lambert. Oh, I'm so sorry-you're at lunch. I'll come back-"
"No, no," Lisa leapt up. "You're fine. It's a working lunch, really. Come on in. Are you looking for work? Let me get you one of our forms. Would you like some pizza?"
"I'm good, thanks."
Lance watched Lisa bustle about, and tried not to let Adam Lambert see him staring. There was something incredibly unsettling about this man who was sitting there being charming to his assistant. He was ridiculously attractive and had the most appealing smile Lance had seen in years, and something about him set Lance's teeth on edge. What was it? The ripple of heat around him that Lisa apparently didn't perceive at all-now that Lance looked more carefully it could not be charisma. It was something else, something he didn't recognise. And there was-was it a glamour? Not exactly, not the way Lance understood glamours, but there was something deceptive about him. Something untrustworthy.
"I'll just go wash my hands," Lance said.
He cleaned the pizza grease from his fingers, tidied himself up, and tried to puzzle it out. Lisa was obviously entranced, but Lisa's gift seemed to be restricted to providing refreshments at the perfect moment-which was a very handy gift for an assistant to have, but it barely qualified as telepathy, and nobody but himself seemed to have noticed Lisa had it. She obviously didn't perceive that aura boiling around Adam Lambert.
Who opened Lance's door at that moment, and said: "Shall I come in?"
"Sure," Lance said, shortly. "Take a seat." He reached for Lambert's application form.
"I see you're into dragons," said Lambert, after a moment of silence.
With a little gold one next to his inkwell, a hand-size green model on the lower bookshelf, two smaller ones on the upper shelf, and a leather dragon-etched bookmark on his desk, Lance could hardly deny it, though he didn't think it was worth making conversation about. After scanning the form twice-because he didn't take in any information the first time through-he looked up.
"You've just got into town?" he said, trying not to sound too suspicious.
"Just a few days ago." There was nothing, no reverberation of satisfaction or uncertainty or anything else. Lance loosened his everyday shields a bit. Nothing. No emotion to be read except from Lambert's face, which was calm and apparently friendly. Lance coughed, and pushed a bit.
Adam Lambert had a diamond-hard shield in place. Nothing was getting through it. Lance slammed his own shield back up. He'd never met anyone so utterly opaque.
"And Chris sent you here," he said.
"He said you have great contacts in showbiz, and that's where I want to be."
"A singer."
"That's right."
"Do you have tapes? I like to hear what people can do before I send them out for jobs," Lance said. He hoped it didn't sound too sarcastic. He wasn't supposed to be rude to applicants, even applicants who were lying through their impeccable white teeth.
"I don't have anything like that. I thought I could just, you know, sing?"
"Okay, then. Go ahead."
Lance forced himself to look as Lambert stood up. Took in the leather jacket, strong, shapely hands, long black jeans, boots which-"Those boots are dragon-hide!" he said, accusingly. "Dragons are a protected species!" Everyone knew that. Dragons were extinct, most likely, you never heard of sightings nowadays even if stuff like dragonhide boots did manage to show up now and again. No dragons left in the world was the last thing Lance wanted to believe, and certainly the idea that this man was wearing something made from the stolen skin of a dead dragon made him want to rip them off Lambert's feet and send him into the street in his socks.
"I didn't kill it, you know," Lambert said, smiling. Lance clenched his teeth on the response that wanted to fly out. Who the hell was this man?
"Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?" Lambert sang, "Caught in a landslide, no escape from reality."
As he sang, Lance sat back in his chair and stared. He'd never heard the song before, and the lyrics were rather strange, but that voice, the range, the power and control... And there wasn't a performance glamour, he was sure of it now, there was definitely something giving Lambert this huge presence, but it wasn't that. This talent, this singing, was real.
He vaguely noticed the door open, and Lisa standing listening.
The singing ended, and for a moment Lance had nothing to say. He wanted to applaud. Lisa did applaud, then disappeared back to her own desk.
"So, uh, do you think you can find something for me?"
"I-let me make a call. No, you can stay, it's fine." Lance picked up the receiver, and dialled. "Simon Cowell, please. It's Lance Bass." He was relieved to be put through at once. Simon could be a real bastard if he wasn't in the mood to play nice, and Lance did not want to have to leave humiliating messages, not in front of Adam Lambert. So stupid-he should have made Adam go to the outer office and sit with Lisa. "Simon, I have someone I think you should meet. Singer. Yes, I think so. As to that, you'd have to decide for yourself, but I think you'll be interested. All right, that sounds good. Thanks. Oh, don't thank me, usual terms and conditions apply! All right, I will." He put the receiver down. "Tomorrow afternoon, here's the address." He scrawled it on the back of a business card. "Take some sheet music with you."
"Who is Simon Cowell?"
Lance stared. "He's the biggest music promoter on this side of the ocean."
"Oh! So, that's great! Thanks." He really did have a potent smile. Lance thought of the dragon-hide boots, and did not reciprocate.
*
Lance was not particularly surprised to receive a phone call from Simon Cowell the following afternoon. It would have astonished him if Cowell had not wanted to sign Adam Lambert. Once his own commission came through, he would do his very best to forget him.
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