"Peter, Mr. Phoenix Talon," he nodded, seating himself. "How are you? Where did you get that new receptionist?" he added.
    "Paige? She's a temp."
    "She didn't say a word to me when I came in, is that weird?"
    Peter shrugged.
    "I'm sorry I'm late," Jenkins had several folders with him. "I don't know how much Peter's already gone over with you, but we're very exited to be going forward on this project, assuming we can go forward on it. I understand that some members of your team have reservations."
    "I'm sure they're reservations they can get over," Peter put in. "I mean, this is just such an exiting—"
    "Peter." Jenkins gave him a mild look.
    "I'll have to talk to 'em," Phoenix Talon temporized.
    "Do you know exactly what the core of their reservations are?" Jenkins pursued earnestly.
    "Have you ever met Lucky or Needle?" he asked after a pause.
    "No, I can't say as I've had the pleasure, they do have a certain..." Whatever he was about to say, he decided to rephrase it. "Lucky in particular has a certain public presence that we were actually hoping would play off rather favorably in some aspects of what we have in mind."
    "What did you have in mind?" Whatever it was, he could just imagine what she'd have to say about it.
    "AMC six months ago made an acquisition of a mid-sized company that among other things produces the Stupendous Comics line."
    "Right." Mid-level independent publisher, or at least they had been.
    "AMC is very interested in a high degree of integration. We were hoping to be able to, if this works—and we want to stress that we've been over this with the government and they're perfectly willing to go along with it—and you would need additional funding for your team, as well as extra profits going to charity. We'd be taking a cut, obviously, since we're putting it together, but the proceeds that are your part of the contract will be divided evenly among the state budget for funding you as well as various different charitable organizations. But anyway, we were hoping to be able to do a comic book, there's the basics of a movie treatment, as of course AMC owns the studio. We're also heavily invested into the small, local broadcasting experiments, one of the members of your team already has a show with them."
    "Yeah. Albert." He managed not to call him "Frog."
    "So as you can see, we're going with a very broad base of things. Having a representation of Lucky would very clearly define certain aspects of the team for the comic book, and Peter's been doing a lot of research into this, I don't know how familiar you are with that particular media?"
    "I read. Go on."
    "You have certain fundamental breakdowns...."
    "See the way it generally operates," Peter broke in enthusiastically, "and I'm sure you're familiar with this since you read the medium and everything, is that each character's fulfilling certain archetyping, and having Lucky involved would definitely nail down a somewhat gruff, loner-vigilante character that's growing in popularity, while at the same time carrying a serious redemption bit that could also be carried through in the television show. Her public appeal is also growing slightly at this point, the work she's doing with children and everything else, all very positive—"
    "Of which proceeds from this could easily be funnelled into the shelters that she works with," Jenkins took over again. "I really think this would be positive all the way along."
    "Retail sales we expect to be fairly high within this area, plus the national exposure that you would be getting," Jenkins added, looking for the right combination of bait.
    "So what do you want me to do this morning?" Phoenix Talon asked, still unconvinced.
    "Well, we're hoping to feel out exactly what it is that you're looking for," Jenkins said, still in that earnest voice. "We have plans that we can show you, but unless we actually get an agreement contract from your team, we can't move forward with any of your images. Now, to be perfectly honest, our direct bosses see this as a serious opportunity that they do not want to let pass by. And there is the possibility that overruling our judgement—cause this is not what we want at all," he added quickly, "that if we do not have the rights to use your images and the concept of your team, we still have acceptance from the state, for use of the concept of a Bosto-based super-hero team with the name Revolution."
    "But not with any of us. Just with people you'd make up," Phoenix said.
    "Yes. Now, a certain degree of money has already gone into this, we've tried to impress upon them that we don't feel this would be particularly viable, perhaps in the action figure field, maybe as a comic book, but as for the larger things, the advertising segments of it... we'd much rather go with the genuine article. There's a certain degree of concern that you might go through another popularity dip," he admitted. "It could become rather difficult, it might be better for them to simply make people up, but I really feel that would be—"
    "Wrong," Peter interjected firmly; it sounded as if the idea was personally offensive to him. "That would be wrong. I mean, you people are the genuine article, and we can certainly use that energy."
    "Exactly," Jenkins confirmed. "I don't want you to consider this as a threat hanging over your head, I just wanted you to be aware of the fact that if your team does not go along with this, there might still be a Revolution comic book and TV show, with characters that look kind of like you, but aren't. We have a lot of lawyers who would be able to tell the art department how to get as close as possible without infringing your personal.... persona."
    "Yeah, yeah."
    "I feel that this would be heavy-handed, clumsy, and very ill-considered."
    "Well, thanks for laying it out for me," Phoenix Talon told him. It was certainly a lot to think about.
    "What are you interested in?" Jenkins wanted to know.
    "I ain't got a lot of time this morning," he stalled, "and I definitely need to talk to my teammates. So if we could just take these pictures...."
    "Okay, that's fine. We have a studio right through here, I see that you're already prepared."
    Peter punched the comm. "Okay, Paige? We're set in here, if you want to tell the photographer to come in? All right, thanks. Right through there," he pointed. "We just need a few action shots, various different angles, get the proper feel for it, have you seen any of the...." He pulled open the portfolio and showed Phoenix the spreads. Some of of the layouts were all right, and some of the ideas actually looked pretty good, although that Starr Krunchies spot with Lucky was just wrong.
    "She ain't gonna go for this," he told Peter. "Just so you know."
    He made a note. "Do you know whether or not Mr. Silver would be interested in this? As I said, we're expecting a certain degree of resistance from some members of your team, but...."
    "Scott's real laid back, I don't see why he wouldn't."
    "And Mr. Smith?"

| Top |