DISCLAIMER: I do not own Hollywood U. This amazing game belongs to Pixelberry! :)

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01. (19/04/16) Holly: My first review! Thank you so much for reading my fanfic! :)

Chapter Two: Day 02 (Tuesday) – Ice Cream Cart (Level 03)

Breathing in the fresh air of the ocean, Thomas allowed himself a contented smile. After the events of the previous day, he decided to wake up early to go jogging at the Long Beach Marina, an area of the city known for eccentrics who preferred to live on water instead of on land. Because of its reputation for housing bizarre types of people, it was normally a secluded area, which was just how he liked it.

As he looked at the waves that were lapping at the bottoms of the small boats that were docked at the harbor, a startling thought occurred to him. In a way, I'm like one of these boats, he mused moodily. He was tied to the university, not truly free to pursue his own projects because of his teaching responsibilities. While he did find his second love in teaching the film professionals of the next generation, a part of him knew that if it were not for them – a sharp spear of resentment ran through him as he thought of a certain clandestine society – he would have spent the last few years of his life in the metaphorical arms of his first love – directing; bringing extraordinary visions to life. But, for now, he was at the university, where irritating students crept into his thoughts to the extent that he was starting to hear their voices in his head even during his personal time…

"Are you sure that this Holly Chang lives here, Ethan?"

With a start, Thomas turned to his left. That voice wasn't just in his head after all. Walking uncertainly to one of the houseboats was Marie Claire, the student that had been put on academic probation. She was being led by one of the junior agents in his class, whose name he learned was Ethan Blake. He gave a silent groan. I'm surrounded by students even when I'm not teaching…

Focused on their task, his students did not notice him as they continued walking to a houseboat that was docked two spaces away from where Thomas currently stood. He heard Ethan explain to his friend who Holly Chang was – a familiar name to Thomas, as she was the one who wrote the legendary unproduced script Permanent Wound – and heard him flatter Holly after she agreed to speak with them.

"Hello, Holly. I'm Marie Claire," he heard her introduce herself. "I was hoping you could help us by writing a script for Lisa Valentine's new music video…"

She already has plans for her first high-profile project? Despite himself, Thomas was slightly impressed.

"I've heard of you," Holly Chang replied. "My sources tell me that you're a hooligan who gets into fights at clubs. I don't want to work with nut-jobs, sorry," she said in a voice that wasn't sorry at all, and moved to close her houseboat's door on them.

"Wait!" Ethan stopped her before she could close the door completely. "You can't believe everything you hear! She was accused by Bianca Stone, and you know who her father is…"

"But that still means that I shouldn't collaborate with Marie Claire," Holly said, crossing her arms. "Whether you like it or not, reputation's important in this town, and I'd be harming mine if I were to work with her."

True, Thomas thought to himself.

"But…" Holly studied Marie Claire closely. "Okay, I'll give you a chance…"

Really? Thomas thought incredulously.

"Really?" Marie Claire asked happily.

"…if you can answer my next question. If you give me the right answer, I'll work with you," Holly finished.

Marie Claire shifted the position of her feet before looking at Holly intently. "Okay, then. What do you want to know?"

"It's simple," she replied. "Why do you want to work with me?" Holly shushed Ethan when he tried to speak. "I didn't ask you, Ethan." She gestured to Marie Claire. "I asked her."

From his vantage point, he could see that Marie Claire was doing some very quick thinking. Thomas wondered what she knew of Holly Chang, if she knew that Holly Chang had a reputation for wanting things to be perfect. That was the reason why she didn't allow anybody to produce Permanent Wound – she didn't trust others to do her vision justice. Between an imperfect movie and no movie, the choice for her had been easy.

Finally, Marie Claire spoke. "I don't know much about you, to be honest. I only know about the history of your script, Permanent Wound, and how people wanted to change it. And what I learned from that was that you didn't want to create something mediocre or that had mass appeal. You wanted absolute perfection. And," she said, "perfection is exactly what I need if I want to stay at Hollywood U. You're the best screenwriter in the business, and I don't want to work with anybody but the best."

Thomas raised an eyebrow. Her answer sounded like an assessment of Holly's skills and history, and how Holly had passed Marie Claire's standards. Arrogant, even with the tacked-on bit of flattery at the end.

He saw Holly smile in delight. "You understand," she said, her voice warmer than before. "Magic happens when you work with the right people, and I think you're one of those people, Marie Claire. I'll write your script."

"Oh, thank you!" Marie Claire gave Holly a tight hug, and Thomas gave a small laugh at the look of horror on Holly's face. "Do you want to listen to the song? It's a really fun song, and it's all about…"

Shaking his head, Thomas decided that it was time to jog back to his house so that he could prepare for his classes. While he wouldn't say that he was happy for her – she was too troublesome to gain more than a fraction of his sympathy – he was surprised by her initiative in getting her requirements completed.

We'll see if she had the skills to match her spirit, he thought to himself as he jogged away from the harbor, not pausing to stop and listen to a song about a girl who wanted to party.

He entered the lecture auditorium in the afternoon, looking forward to assigning his class the first project of the year. Despite how it seemed to his students, the 24 Hour Film was one of his favorite projects of the year, and he was curious to see how his new batch of freshmen would take to the challenge.

"As you must know," he said to them, "working in Hollywood means subjecting yourself to a high-pressure environment, no matter your specialty. It is a producer's job to wring every last dollar from a movie's sponsor, and it falls to the cast and crew to meet deadlines to the executive staff's satisfaction."

He spotted some worried looks at the mention of deadlines. Wait 'till you find out what's coming your way, Thomas thought evilly.

"A professional's skill is not measured by their performance in times of comfort – it is tested during instances where everything has gone wrong and there is nobody left to clean up the mess. Being able to handle pressure separates the somebodies and the nobodies. And I will test you by telling you to make a short film in 24 hours – entirely from scratch."

The nervous students became even more nervous, but there were others, Thomas observed, whose eyes lit up at the challenge. As he handed out the envelopes containing the teams' mandatory genres and props, some of them took the envelopes hesitantly, while others, like Marie Claire's director student partner, Diderot Donaldson, took their assigned envelope gleefully, saying that true cinema was "fast and loose."

After all the envelopes had been handed out, Thomas returned to the podium. "Your short films will be screened at the Batista Theatre tomorrow evening, and the entry that annoys me that least will be proclaimed the winner. You will regret it if you embarrass the university – and you will deeply regret it if you embarrass me." Seeing them gulp and nod, he said, "Alright, hatchlings – your one full day of filming will begin in three… two… one. You may start."

All at once, the room was filled with voices. Thomas watched as some students took out notebooks to prepare outlines, while others merely glanced at the contents of their envelope before rushing out the door, excited to create.

Thinking to himself that he wanted a cup of coffee from a particular nearby establishment before heading home, Thomas took a shortcut through a park just across the street from the university gates. Throughout the afternoon, he had seen several of his students filming snippets of videos for his film assignment, causing him to wonder why one appeared to be challenging a tree to a duel, and why another was preparing to row a canoe down a flight of stone stairs. He hoped they were in the process of making brilliant work – but the canoe stumped him.

Halfway through the park, he paused to watch the sun set over the horizon, hoping that his students had been more productive than they let on. Straight ahead, he could see a man pushing a grocery cart towards a large ramp that wasn't normally situated in that area of the park. It was a strange place for a ramp to be placed, as one of the ends was surprisingly close to a small lake.

Wondering what was about to happen, Thomas followed the man with the grocery cart until he was standing about forty feet away from the ramp. After that, he stopped as the man approached the ramp and, with the help of his companions who were nearby, positioned the cart on top of the side of the ramp that was further from the lake. He watched silently as a young man with a bright red jacket and a manic grin on his face curled himself up inside the grocery cart.

Wait, Thomas thought, he's not thinking of-

Without warning, the young man inside the cart hurtled down the ramp almost faster than Thomas' eyes could follow before the cart and the man both shot out of the other side and landed in the lake. Upon surfacing, the man whooped and signaled to a camera crew, who gave an affirmative signal in return.

Thomas scoffed at the man's foolhardiness. A stuntman. I should have known. What other kind of person would take the time to set up a ramp in a public place and use it to test the transportation capability of a grocery cart? It's good that I rejected that written request for a stunt program two weeks ago. I can't even imagine one of my students-

Shocked mid-thought, he watched, dumbfounded, as the man managed to convince one of the bystanders – a familiar one to Thomas – to come with him. Why is Marie Claire- did she just point to the-

"Fully-stocked ice cream cart!" he heard his student say eagerly.

"Awesome choice!" exclaimed her risk-taking… friend? "That's the most dangerous one – lots of broken bones for us if we do this wrong!"

He started to pull Marie Claire to the ramp, not noticing her suddenly fearful expression.

"Um… um… really?! Can I switch?" she asked her crazy friend as he led her towards what could be her doom – and she slumped her shoulders when she saw that changing rides wasn't an option.

Thomas could only blink as he wondered what kind of trouble she had gotten herself into now. And it was trouble – there was no other way to describe a situation where a person found themself sharing a ride in an ice cream cart with a lunatic whose excited explanation – "Of course we didn't empty this thing! If this wasn't filled with ice cream, then it would just be a cart, not an ice cream cart!" – could be heard even from a distance.

The ice cream cart started to move – and before Thomas knew it, the class troublemaker and the stunt lunatic were going down the ramp – flying through the air – and landing in the lake. A few seconds later, they both floated to the top of the lake, and he could hear Marie Claire shouting triumphantly, "We're alive! We lived!" before she and her friend swam to the edge of the lake. Their eyes were bright with adrenaline as they walked to Ethan, who Thomas just noticed was in the area as well.

Thinking to himself that he would prefer to get that cup of coffee on a day when there were fewer reckless idiots in the area, Thomas quickly turned and walked back the way he came. Idiocy may not be scientifically contagious, but he still didn't want to risk it.

(End of Chapter Two.) (20/04/16.)

01. Canon compliance:

The HWU quests that took place in this chapter were Ready, Set, Pitch (Level 03) and 24 Hour Film (Day 01 of 02).

02. A tiny request:

Thank you for reading my fanfic! :D If you've read this far, I hope you'll consider taking an extra minute to leave a review for Chapter Two ("Ice Cream Cart")? :D Reviews really mean a lot to me as a fanfiction writer because I get to hear your thoughts on something I worked really hard on ^_^ Even if it's the year 2075 or something, I would love to hear your thoughts on this chapter! :D