Page 2 of My Big Alien Bodyguard

The phraseprocessed throughseems a little harsh, but Simon Scowl’s just being real. My time in the limelight is scheduled for the next three years. I have to make as much money in that time as possible because after that I will be entirely irrelevant. Sure, I can keep on touring and put out records and continue to be aquoteartistunquote, but I’ll never have this kind of investment backing me again. I’ll never have over a thousand shows lined up for me in a row. I am about to embark on the most exciting, profitable, grueling tour of my life, and I cannot fucking wait.

“Why don’t you two get to know each other,” Simon Scowl says. “You’re going to be spending a lot of time together over the next few months and years. May as well be friends. But nothing more than that. We don’t screw the crew. Got it?”

“I’ll try to contain myself,” I say dryly.

“Alright. Well, I’ll leave you two to get along.”

Simon Scowl leaves the suite. I notice that the taciturn Zayne makes no effort to stop him. I go to follow after him, but having moved out of the way to let my manager pass, Zayne puts out a big alien hand, scruffs me by the back of my dressing gown, and pulls me back like I’m a toddler trying to run into the path of oncoming traffic.

I hate it when dudes I don’t know grab me. The absolute audacity is too much. I do not like being treated like a thing.

“Don’t put your hands on me,” I snarl, slapping at his arm, or trying to. He grabbed me from the back, so I’m kind of left swatting and growling like a snapping turtle. “I will have you fired so fast your head will spin, buddy.”

I don’t actually know if I can have him fired or not. I’ve never threatened to have anybody fired before. I didn’t much like the way it felt coming out of my mouth, but it’s out there now so I guess I’m going to have to double down.

Zayne has yet to say a word to me. Or anyone. Is he mute?

“What? Not going to talk to me? Is that small courtesy too much to ask?”

I do not like being ignored or treated like a lesser creature just because I am human. I notice this happens a lot. Simon Scowl talks to me like people, but from time to time I get the sense he wants to eat me. That could be my leonine-related prejudice showing, though. I have to give every life form a chance. A lot of my fans are alien, and by all accounts a lot of them are better people than most humans.

This particular alien is giving me a stern, glowering stare.

“What? Do I have something on my face?”

“You’ve got an attitude,” he says. His voice is like the distant roar of furious beasts just barely contained in a humanoid form. It is a voice of authority and gravitas. It makes me physically quiver, even though I very much want to be immune to it. It’s the sort of voice that warns by merit of tone alone that this is someone not to be fucked with. Unfortunately, he fucked with me first and left me no choice.

“Yeah. Well. I’ve earned it.”

I sound spoiled, but I’m not. Nobody on this Earth, or off it, has ever spoiled me. I’ve worked my ass off for everything I’ve ever gotten, right up until the lucky break that plucked me from obscurity and landed here. I do not intend to miss one second of it thanks to so-called safety concerns.

Zayne

She’s a brat.

She’s pretty, though, which always helps. But not in a traditional way. Most of these starlets are waif-like, delicate things with large eyes and sweet features. Simon told me this was going to be a darker season. I didn’t like his tone when he said those words. Usually the starlets are ballad singers, but this one comes from the punk rock pop genre. I know these things even though they are not of interest to me, simply because these are the waters I have been swimming in for a very long time.

Starlet Lyric has stronger features than most. Her eyes are a piercing and irritated blue. She has dark hair cut shorter on oneside than the other, an asymmetrical cut that demonstrates the line of her jaw and the sharp set of her features. Her energy tells me that she’s going to be a handful.

I have studied her, though I am a stranger to her. Simon had her picked out for some time. He says she’s perfect, though I am not sure for what. She is older than most of the starlets that come through Simon Scowl. He usually likes them just barely old enough to enter into a legal contract. This woman is twenty-nine years old. She has had a harder life, and her gains have been harder won. But she thinks she knows everything already, because she thinks everything that can happen to her already has happened. She’s wrong.

“I need to go out,” she says.

“No. You don’t.”

Her face screws up in irritation. “I do. I really, really do. My fans are out there, and they want to see me, and you know what, I want to see them. It’s not your job to stand in my way, is it? You can come with me if you like.”

“You’re staying in the room. It’s not safe down there. Get used to being careful. You’re a product now.”

“I’m a product?”

“Sure. Like a precious, easily hurt, delicate little glass flower. Think of yourself as something very breakable.”

I see her blush when I call her delicate and breakable. She likes that, but she definitely does not want to like it. As soon as the moment of brief vulnerability establishes itself, it is gone.

“Stay out of my way,” she says. “I didn’t work this hard to be told I can’t interact with my audience. They’re the only reason I gothere, and they’re the only people who will stay with me after this is over.”

I have no interest in arguing with her. I am here to do a job, and I intend to do that job whether she likes it or not. I’ve dealt with some starlets who would chew my ear off all day long, and I’ve adapted to ignore female wheedling.

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