M
is for Merger
MERGER Duncan Matthews, legendary media Mogul, and our beloved hero is in a bit of a slump. He is $2.2 bill in the hole. He maintains a brave face, but things are going from bad to worst. A man whose greatest asset is not introspection, may be suffering from a tussle with reality. Some might even say the cuckoo has flown the clocK.
UNSPECIFIED DESERT LOCATION . . .
A soldier with Semitic features lies prone, fires a M249 light machine gun, a gun designed to be easily concealed but kill with the ferocity of larger models. As the bullet is about to strike the target, a dashing photo of Duncan on the cover of Yachting Magazine, taped to an oil drum takes focus. This is what you would call a bad omen for our mogul.
Or maybe not -- the bullet hasN'T struck its targeT. . . yet.
The fluttering black sail displays a gold "M." The rotund Duncan haltered to the pontoon, defying gravity, hovers over the bay, counter balancing (and doing it well) a hundred million dollar super yacht with sails that tower 131 feet. "M" runs neck and neck with "Prophet." Ah . . . boys and their toys.
The catamarans hydroplane out of the water on aluminum foils lowered through their pontoons. A gust lifts Prophet's stern out of the water and the boat flips over as if made of paper. The crew drops into the San Francisco Bay. "M" sails through the finish line. Duncan pumps his hand in victory as his shipmates struggle to lower him down on the boat to safety. Duncan, don't get too cozy with victory. One victory does not a trend make. Pink sky at night, Sailor's delight. . . Pink sky in morning, Sailor's take warning.
Enjoy the moment in the pink setting sun Dun -can.
Roger Miller, Punk Marlboro Man and Duncan's perma -nemesis, and his crew are wrapped in blankets, shivering. This isn't the first, and it won't be the last time one of these two gents instigates the other to shiver in bitter defeat, on or off the playing field. Roger shakes his head miserably, unable to shed the sting of the loss.
He still does manage to be sanguine; "The fat man does know how to throw his weight around."
BACK TO WORK. Duncan's office is a travesty of ostentatiousness, soaring high ceilings, artificially held-up by fake Doric columns. Enormous red leather furniture creates a seating area that seems small given the scale of the room. A marble fountain on one side of the office trickles water serenely. An obscenely large gold plated "M", for Matthews Communications, adorns one wall. Opposite, floor -to -ceiling bookshelves overflow with works of literature, or so the un -breached spines tell us. His 26 year -old, buxom, blonde, secretary, Alicia, powders his face. She has a prosthetic leg that squeaks with every step. Duncan likes 'em broken. The Doctor, nicknamed by Duncan for his surgical acuity in all things financial, is slender framed with hair slicked back in a helmet of hair product, unapologetically grey, impeccably dressed. No one in Duncan's organization knows his real name. The Doctor, at least recently, is in a perpetual state of exasperation. The perverseness of their relationship has no ceiling, soaring or otherwise.
The Doctor does, at least, succeed in convincing Duncan of the urgency of addressing the pesky $2.2 billion over -draft.
TIMES MIRROR NEWSPAPER GROUP HEADQUARTERS
Duncan is underwhelmed by the performance of the head of his newspaper group. Duncan enters the office of Stacey Singer, the editor -in -chief of the Times Mirror Group. And at the moment, he is petrified by his boss' impromptu visit. His right-hand fingers are yellowed from chain smoking. His eye twitches. Duncan gives him a false sense of security peppering him with niceties, before going over to his Mac monitor, lifting it off his desk, jerking it aggressively to pull the plug out, and hurling it out the window. The rest of his belongings follow Mac. Duncan gives Stacey the option of following his computer or vacating the premises the old fashioned way. Even Duncan must admit that punishing Stacey may have been more about the stress relief of destroying a man's life than a genuine dissatisfaction with his performance.
Duncan exits the building and is immediately blasted by gale force winds. A storm brews. He steps over obliterated computer parts and office supplies. A few of Stacey's documents continue to swirl in the wind. The wind is so strong it stops him in his perpetually hurried tracks to regain his balance. A small branch ransacked by the wind breaks free and catches in Duncan's hair like a demented crown. He looks up at the billboards and jumbotrons that overwhelm Picadilly Circus. Their commercial messages have been replaced by an army of personal affronts. They taunt. . .
Duncan still shaken from his hallucinations seeks solace from his ex -wife, Scarlett. She is a natural beauty, allergic to plastic surgery. This is her country home. In contrast to the vulgar, over -the -top gluttony of Duncan's lifestyle, her home is filled with warmth and effortless grace. Despite Duncan's despicable indiscretions during their marriage there is still a lot of love between them. Duncan makes no attempt to hide warts or moral transgressions. Scarlett does her best to talk Duncan down off of the ledge. She was and is the only thing even vaguely resembling Duncan's moral compass. She is the only person Duncan lets his guard down in front of. He does not seek her counsel to have matters candy -coated. And she obliges with zeal.
Scar is the sonogram that shows Duncan has a beating heart.
10 downing street, 2002 . . . Duncan's fortunes not so long ago were oozing with promises of world domination. He had the ear of a battalion of heads of state and titans of industry. Duncan and the PM have an easy rapport. Duncan's utter lack of decorum apparently has its charm. Duncan is svelte, at least by comparison to his present size. He inhales scones and clotted cream from a towering tea sandwich service. His sharp widow's peak and jet -black hair and eyebrows, his family crest. The PM tentatively takes a modest sandwich, clearly afraid of losing a digit. The gilded ceiling and blue themed palate creates a cozy atmosphere. Avi Yassir, director of the Mossad, shaved head and intense /tense grey eyes is escorted in and greeted by the PM and Duncan, a mouthful of scone slopped with clotted cream. Duncan reaches to shake Director's hand before realizing he has a glove of boysenberry jam. A dark mood takes over the room. The Mossad has been humiliatingly exposed spying on their ally, Great Britain and Avi has come to have his knuckles rapped with a ruler. The PM revels in a rare misstep by the Mossad. Duncan skillfully diffuses the hostility. His unorthodox diplomatic skills do not go unnoticed by Avi.
BANK OF OMAHA . . . Duncan, underestimating the stubbornness of a rinky -dink bank in Omaha Nebraska, arrives with puffed out chest to meet Mr. Silverstein, an oily doppelganger for Napoleon. Duncan and the Doctor have come naively to charm this petit fonctionnaire. Duncan looks around the office contemptuously. Silverstein, much to Duncan's shock and horror, doesn't let him get a word in edge wise, as he lowers the guillotine. Duncan, in a daze of exasperation removes the sword from the wall, swooshing it menacingly, narrowly missing a desk lamp.
Two bruising security guards appear in Silverstein's office, guns drawn, hoping Duncan resists.
Violet Matthews, Duncan's daughter, is a socially conscious, left -wing journalist. Violet can be a cold bitch. Her dry wit warms over her icy exterior. Sometimes. She lies with Grayson Summers an erudite charmer and editor of In -Depth magazine. ' They lie naked He's Violet's boss and fiancE. in Violet's bed. They both glow and glisten from perspiration and endorphin release. As would be expected from a doting father, Duncan despises Grayson.
Grayson dreads the precipitous temperature drop from Violet's bed to their dinner with Duncan and his assassin wife.
MR. CHOW'S . . . Angela Wong, Duncan's lethally beautiful wife, Violet, and Grayson sit at a table set for four. Grayson is between the two ladies, who stare at each other icily. The fourth seat, across the table awaits Duncan. Two empty Martini glasses sit in front of Grayson. He sips a third aggressively. Angela sits with her arms crossed checking her watch. Duncan arrives at the table escorted by the MaItre D, sweating and wheezing. He registers he is at the number two table on the power table org chart. Duncan notices a closely cropped, grey haired man, with his back to Duncan. He sits at a table with a perfect view of the room. Opposite him is a homely woman, breasts spilling out on the table. This is table one.
Duncan gives the MaItre D the stink eye. "Fucking Clinton."
Duncan's New York office occupies the whole seventh floor of a garish Manse. The Doctor sits in a chair facing Duncan's Desk. He types away at his Laptop setting up for a meeting with Duncan. Alicia, with two fingers, presses the side of her prosthetic leg. A hidden compartment slides out from the leg like a holster with a robotic sound ala Robocop, revealing a remote control. She removes the remote and presses a button. A projector screen lowers from the ceiling, covering a hideous Old Master still life. Duncan rolls in, inexplicably in a grand mood. Duncan is further buoyed by Alicia's new accessory.
The Doctor begins his Sisyphusian task of getting Duncan to focus on matters at hand.
2002 . . . Avi, blinded by the ease at which Duncan disarmed the PM and a plain ole colossal error in judgment, sees Duncan as the perfect spokesperson for the world's most powerful hacking software, Promis, that the Mossad has just stolen from a hapless software engineer. Opportunity hacks. The software unbeknownst to the client telegraphs every keystroke to Duncan and the Mossad. Miraculously Duncan delivers, spending a decade plus creating an intelligence network for the Mossad second to none.
Duncan, however, is not shy about using this network for his own more personal needs. Duncan Hatches a plan to solve his financial woes by baiting Roger Miller to merge his and DuncaN's companies with Violet as the very scrumptious lure. The Doctor sees a few flaws in Duncan's subterfuge. None thE -less, he deploys Promis to "influence" Roger and Violet's fate. He's a flattened man.
The Roger Miller Foundation for Humanitarianism benefit, Union League Club . . . Roger's event planners have gone to great lengths to make this stodgy Park Avenue morgue a festive affair. It is a standing -room -only fete. City officials, titans of industry, social X -rays abound. Violet enters, alone. She is the only guest in color - - everything else has become black and white. Roger is only metaphorically speechless. He discovers that amongst a number of humiliating faux pas, he has scored one major triumph with Violet, and that is his selection for Humanitarian of the year, Joshua Gerbi (although he had nothing to do with the selection), Violet's political hero, and subject of a profile she has just finished.
Fate? Providence or not, Roger is more than a little titillated by Violet.
Thunderous applause as Joshua Gerbi, scholarly, greying at the temples, oozing charisma, takes the stage. Joshua moves to the microphone to electrify the audience with his crusade to re -introduce Libya's Jewish population.
As with all things Violet, nothing is simple or easy. Roger spends the following morning scouring all the articles he can find written by Violet. He is so taken with Violet's take no -prisoners journalism in war torn countries that he has an epiphany she would make a perfect director for his foundation. His current director Stephania Simone, digests the news.
CHRISTIES AUCTION HOUSE . . . Violet and Duncan are in a private skybox overlooking the packed Impressionist sale. Every muckety muck in the market for unfathomably expensive art are sitting in rows of uncomfortable folding chairs. Grand dames, oligarchs, monarchs, tech -zillionaires, and Middle -Eastern -oil -monopolists fill the room. Pedestrian art critics and wannabees roped off along the sides and back of the packed room suck up the glamour through osmosis. Money wafts down from the air, accumulating on the floor, ignored by the crowd. When a stray bill lands on a shoulder, it is brushed off like dandruff. Duncan has his eye on the prize, Degas' Dancer - -ONce an heirloom of supreme sentimental value that he had to sell in another time of crisis - - is on the block.
And Duncan must have it at any cost (and what the Hell -he is buying it on credit anyway) because Violet loves it.
BAUR AU LAC HOTEL - ZURICH . . . Duncan arrives in Zurich for a more nefarious attempt at staving off financial disaster - - Duncan's specialty. He walks briskly through the Baur au Lac lobby. The manager, clearly waiting for Duncan, runs up to him with a cardboard file box. Duncan ignores him. He can't be bothered with an obvious clerical error involving a year's worth of unpaid bills.
Live large or die. BANK OF ZURICH . . .
Ivan Amman, President of the Bank of Zurich, sporting small circular glasses that balance on a regal nose, is about to volunteer his services to Duncan involuntarily. He is tasked with setting a meet with Libya's most insidious and elusive terrorist.
Roger has cajoled Violet in to meeting him for breakfast to discuss her becoming his new director. Roger has skills guiding the dark art of persuasion. He pulls the most recent issue of IN -DEPTH from his briefcase and sets it on the table. The tiny font of Violet's profile on Gerbi lost in the stripes of the flag. A slight smirk betrays his deadpan delivery.
Violet uses every facial muscle to remain neutral. A pulsing vein in her forehead betrays her. MOSSAD HEADQUARTERS
- TEL AVIV . . .
Duncan arrives in Tel Aviv for a stone to stone with Avi Yassir, now sixty -five with a deeply lined face, but a surprisingly youthful physique. Duncan is not convinced that his years of service as the Mossad's super spy are being equitably compensated. Avi would beg to differ. Duncan's jaw tightens as he stands, his girth intimidating, leans in with his hands on Avi's desk, and explodes.
Avi is a tough one to intimidate.
After Duncan's temper tantrum Avi calls in Agent Makov to organize Duncan's going away party.
L.I.C.E. (LIBYAN ISLAMIC COALITION OF EXTREMISTS) TRAINING CAMP . . .
In the process he has given the Sheik the means to track down Gerbi for assassination. This would not bring father and daughter closer together. Amann has miraculously organized the meeting with the number one most wanted man on the planet. Duncan enters the evil lair of the way -too -dapper -to -be -a -terrorist Sheik Mohamed. Everything is Spartan, except for one corner that has state of the art communication and computer technology. Duncan successfully closes the deal to sell the Sheik Promis, a mightily expensive piece of software, netting him a cool $6 mill.
AL WADDAN HOTEL, TRIPOLI . . . Duncan's suite even by his standards is gargantuan and bizarrely opulent, given that tourism in Libya ain't what it used to be. Duncan lies on his bed in silk pajamas while three naked prostitutes from the United Colors of Benetton coddle and attempt to get the very agitated Duncan to relax. Prostitute 1 of Arab decent drops grapes in his mouth alternately delicately plying him with sips of champagne. Prostitute 2, an anachronism from the 70s, black as night, with a giant afro, sucks his toes noisily while prostitute 3, a buxom blonde Russian rubs his crotch with one hand (to no effect) and violently twists a nipple with the other. Despite their valiant efforts, Duncan stares over Prostitute 1's shoulder at Aljazeera news on a seventy -inch plasma. It is in fact, Violet who stares out at him venomously. His conscience is playing nasty tricks on him.
He hatches a plot that will make him a hero to Violet and sell a few extra newspapers - - not a bad day.
Duncan sits down at the desk. He looks up at the ceiling, composing in his mind what he is about to write. He pokes with two fingers intensely at his laptop.
"Jewssassination: Celebrated Humanitarian Assassinated Outside Tripoli. L.I.C.E. Takes Credit. By Robert Maxwell." He finishes his article and makes a call.
KIT KAT CLUB, BEIRUT . . .
Smythe, a poster child for Tom's of Finland and mercenary that Duncan brings in for the odd job here and there, sits at his dressing room mirror putting the final touches of makeup on a disturbingly convincing Marlene Dietrich impersonation. His cell vibrates. He picks it up and regrets it immediately. The show must go on. Unfortunately, it is the Duncan show and it involves reversing the shit storm Duncan has created by painting a bull's eye on Gerbi's back. Smythe has a matter of hours to recruit a team of mercenaries to extract Gerbi from the Podunk village outside Tripoli he is hiding before Sheik Mohamed incinerates the village. The target will almost certainly be moved to Duncan's back. Lets not forget the Mossad is also seeking Duncan's head on a platter. A perfect desert storm.
Duncan never travels without the means to execute a number of solutions to any number of challenges he might encounter.
'
Three chic handcrafted steamer trunks lie at the foot of the bed. The interlocking "D" and "M" pattern at quick glance could easily be mistaken for "L" "V". One, on wheels, stands upright and is four feet tall. It has a sophisticated digital display with a fingerprint scanner in place of the typical combination lock. He punches in the code. There is a pause, and then a hydraulic sound emanates from inside the trunk, as the trunk automatically opens like a clamshell. Panels open as three monitors rise in to place and a keypad slides out, as does an industrial strength ' joystick. The piEce de rEsistance is a bottle of Dom - - it also slides automatically, silently out of a compartment, the condensation on the bottle indicates that is perfectly chilled. On one of the screens is an image of the earth from five kilometers up. A red dot indicates the drop site.
Smythe and his five ex -special forces mercenaries sit tensely. They are a rag tag bunch. They have lived hard - - A tapestry of military and prison tats camouflage their exposed body parts.
Duncan has wheeled his communication console in to the bathroom and is taking a bath in a Caligula sized tub. He dutifully wears his headset, while he sips a glass of champagne that slips from his soapy hands and disappears into the bubbles.
UNSPECIFIED DESERT LOCATION . . .
The fierce Sirocco winds tears the photo away just before the bullet strikes. It blows along the desert rolling like a tumbleweed, before the wind launches the photo in to the air.
Smythe and the five mercenaries, one after the other, drop from the plane. The faint glow of dawn silhouettes their shadowy figures as they descend, appear to dance tO M . arlene's "Falling in Love" as they gently sway beneath their chutes.
Text - Tim Nye Illustrations - Jon Gomez Layout - Kyle Morrison