Don't Be Afraid To Ask

*39* Perth Nakhun

— Don't involve me in this! —  Zee raised his voice, trying to keep his expression as contemptuous as possible, eyeing New briefly, then me, just as he had written it in the script.  — I don't care about childish quarrels!

— But they're your subordinates! — I protested, bringing as much timidity and fear of my boss to my character as possible.  According to the story, Kevin was fearless, the only person he was afraid of was Pat, Zee's young head of the Shadowhunters' Formula 1 division.

— How dare you lecture me?!

— N-no, no, Mr. Pat, I wasn't going to lecture you... —  I stammered.  It has to look real.  We've been rehearsing the same scene for a good hour now, and we both still had some reservations.  In the series, I played a ranger who always accompanies Pat on missions.  Pat's character is actually Pierre Gasly, only our writers changed everyone's names.

— And yet you interfere with how I supervise my employees!

— N-no... —  I started with a trembling voice and stopped mid-sentence when Ohm suddenly appeared out of nowhere in front of us.  From his expression, you can see that something bad has happened.

— Listen, have any of you seen Fluke? —  Ohm's anxious question interrupted our study of the scenes we were supposed to shoot the next day.  I looked around.  Annie was sitting next to me, her back against mine, Zee and New, along with Max and Nate, took their seats on the bed, and Kaownah was lounging on his back on the floor holding the script sheets above his head.  Each of us was already dressed in pajamas in case we collapsed while cramming and practicing the next lines.  Snack wrappers, soda and drink bottles, colored highlighters and telephones lay everywhere, Annie herself had two.  There were also plenty of stuffed animals that we got from fans.  Ohm was the only one not wearing pajamas, perhaps because he was the last one to arrive at the hotel.  Almost simultaneously, I got up off the floor with Annie.

— No, and he's not in your room? — Zee answered Ohm's question with a question.

— What's happening?  — Nat didn't understand.  He jumped off the bed and stood closer to me to get a good view of our unexpected visitor.  As he moved, the quilt slipped off and landed on the carpet.

— Fluke is missing? —  Max asked.  — Are you sure you haven't seen him?

— I'm sure I haven't seen him since morning.  We split up because I was supposed to shoot a few takes today and he was supposed to go back to the hotel tomorrow, he was supposed to do some shopping and wait for me in the room, but he's not here.  He never disappeared without notice!

— Calm down, everyone, calm down.  Let's think... — I asked.  Mark taught me how to behave in such a situation, first of all, do not panic, because then it will be harder to come up with something sensible, and it is easy to miss some important detail.  — You say he was supposed to go shopping, right?  So maybe it's normal that it's not there yet?

— You don't understand anything! — Ohm exclaimed, grabbing me by the shirt and lifting me up almost effortlessly.  — I feel something bad happened! I feel it!  We must find him!

— Don't panic, Ohm, I think Perth is right: we need to think about it.  Maybe some of us will go look for him?

— I'll call Tutor — New suggested in turn, grabbing one of the phones from the nightstand.

— What?  Why to call Tutor? — Kaownah became interested.

— I guess it's time to let him know —  Nat said, and Zee nodded at him.  — Tutor and Yim are our bodyguards.  They work as actors on a daily basis, it's their cover.  They are also private detectives.  If anyone can help us, it's them.  We call them every time, unless the case is more serious, then we notify Mark, our friend and their boss.