CHAPTER 64

I do not own skip Beat! Yoshiki Nakamura does.

Quest of the Living: Part 3

Jen Kagio. A daring woman and a fighter. Extreme and passionate to the point of making think people she was suicidal. Sometimes gloomy, sometimes quirky.

This was Jen Kagio, her new role. A woman who happened to work as a bartender and the inside bouncer of a club in the centre of Tokyo.

Kyoko breathed deeply as she slowly immersed her thoughts with her character's personality but her focus was interrupted as the director approached her.

"You ready?" he inquired in confirmation.

She nodded.

"Your make-up is done, so you will go dress up soon and the stylist will take care of your hair, though I planned for a not too elaborated look to fit your character so it will be a long braid mostly, and that's it," He informed me before changing the subject.

"You told me you learned how to fight," he opened up with a frown, "Are you absolutely sure we do not need to rehearse the simple-move fight scenes? You know already there will be choreographed ones we will have to repeat first, but are you really certain it won't be an issue?" Shingai-san pressed.

She nodded again.

"Yes director, I'm certain," She affirmed, those were really simple scenes. "The scenes are short and I'm mostly the one leading them or reacting to them. There are few actions as it's supposed to end quickly. In those scenes, I'm mostly making a move – to be even more exact – it's not really a fight, just me overpowering or neutralizing a few people. It will be easy."

The director kept his frown on.

"And you will be able to do that? And quickly on top of it?" He questioned.

She nodded with a sure smile. In those scenes she will be mostly interacting with extras. Only three of the short scenes were with real side characters, and for those, she will ask the actors concerned to repeat fairly if she had no other scenes with them before. And of course, longer fights and scenes would be rehearsed and prepared more.

But in this precise case, she was sure she wouldn't have a problem and would be able to make act the other people accordingly once the scene initiated.

He looked troubled – couldn't risk to hurt one of the main actors because of a lack of preparation – so she reassured him and quickly listed him a few of the defence and fight disciplines she learned over the course of these last years; making his eyes popped out at each word she said.

"All that? Okay, I guess you are right, there shouldn't have any problem with such experiences under your belt," the director admitted with a new grin growing out, and looking to be unwinding his stress expression for each second passing.

"But," he said with a pointed finger at her, "don't expect to escape training fight sessions and rehearsals for major scenes, like the ones with Ren. And I won't let you go until those scenes are perfectly executed," He warned her.

She smiled. She still liked how attentive to details he was. She knew perfectly well that huge fight scenes needed preparation to look good. And training and understanding of your partners. It wasn't something you could avoid, just because you had some experience in martial arts.

"Of course director. It wasn't ever my plan to try to avoid them," She said with new amusement, knowing very well he had only been joking.

"Good, good," he said as a new gleam entered his eyes, "But tell me, you really didn't do things by half while you were in the US. You came back with such a large panel of skills, I wished more actors were like that."

She grimaced. He was pushing it. Sure, she learned to defend herself but she still needed to work harder and learn a lot more. There were so many things she still needed to master and experiment.

"You are over-exaggerating director," She protested. She was still far to reach Ren's level of experience. And she knew it was a pipe's dream. As an older person, it would always have more experience than life so she would never be able to catch up in the literal sense.

And objectively speaking she knew she had acquired a lot of acting experience and was much closer to his level than before. But she wished for more, for so much more.

The director seemed to have been about to say something else but one of the cameramen called out to him to tell him they were ready and he instructed her to her dressing room.

They applied make-up to her face, and curled her hairs into lazy big waves to shorten the strands. Then they tied them with a big old classic hair clip, falsely making it seemed like a quick brought up while in fact the elaborate hair styling took at least thirty minutes. Part of it was the curls to make. And another one was due to her very long hair, giving more work to the hairdressers, despite the profusion of compliments she got about it.

She knew hairs that long – hers were mostly at waist length – weren't a trend in Japan at the moment but it was not really that surprising, right? Plenty of women liked having long hair. Yes, effectively, it was a more frequent occurrence in the US, but she didn't think it was worth all the fuss her stylish made.

She shrugged internally, she took good care of it – she had to – , hairs were really important for a woman, especially as someone part of the entertainment industry. Everyone had its own fetishes after-all, and as a stylist, she guessed you had to like fashion, hairdressing and make-up all the more to make it your job.

A few wavy locks came back to the front, tickling her nose and face as she passed on the outfit for her scene. They had put too much powder on her face to her taste.

Not that they could help it, the director didn't want too much on her face but they would be in a nightclub, so if they wanted her face to pop out a bit, there wasn't much choice but to still apply more. But they couldn't apply to much either or it would clash with the portraying of the character. Thus, she didn't have any lipstick but heavily smoky shadowed eyes and a good amount of foundation.

To portray it like there wasn't of it through the dim lighting of the fake club.

But it still displeased her. It itched. She guessed she wasn't used enough to it.

She didn't consider herself as some popping beauty like some of those incredibly curvy and flamboyant women but she took good care of her skin. She didn't have any blemish on the face, giving her the advantage in most shootings, to not be required to apply countless layers of make-up. Hell, in some cases, the directors had judged her clean skin – and some mascara – enough without anything else.

She sighed. She didn't understand herself sometimes. She still liked make-up. For the possibility of becoming a complete other person. With the good costume, a wig and her acting; she could become anything. On others, they could shape themselves into dolls, princesses, or even better, fairies-like.

But she still came to dislike layers and layers on her face.

She contained her urge to scratch her face.

Maybe it was the brand of the make-up, finally. Sure, she didn't like to have a full mask of paint glued to her face if she could help it, and her light daily routine was definitively partly to blame for that too. But it was neither the first, nor the last time she still had to do it for her job. And usually, it went better. But she was also accustomed to organic brands.

She herself used only that, and more and more, professionals in the US turned themselves to more natural products.

She frowned and shook down the feeling. She was a professional. And it wasn't an itchy face that was going to prevent her to act. Especially in front of Ren.

She proceeded to remove the clothes she came in, and once only remained her knickers, she unhooked the hanger with her woman bartender outfit.

She was happy the outfit didn't require to slip the head into it because they had started with the make-up so it would have been troublesome.

She exposed the clothes, pleasantly surprised. It did fit Jen Keigo. It was daring and sexy, but in a more leisure masculine way, completely matching her fighter personality. She removed the black vest from its support. There wasn't any shirt, of course. It was just the short vest to put right on the skin, and she totally understood the choice. Kyoko brushed her thumb on the smooth texture, wondering in which material it was, before unfastening the buttons. She slid her shoulders into the two apertures made for the arms and adjusted the shoulders. Then she looked down. The waistcoat racerback tuxedo suit had only three buttons and a knot tie for the top attach. Up, the vest cut was of a deep V and was in reverse symmetric with the bottom part. A cut in a sharper triangle revealing her belly button and rising toward the fasteners.

She didn't have the bit-bottom black jeans on she already knew there would be another issue to fix. She slipped into the moulding stretchy pants nonetheless. Next, she slipped her feet into the velvety black platform sandals, all too happy for her future stability that they had chosen block heels rather than stiletto.

She came out of behind the screen once she was done and knowing they needed to start soon, called Kira-san – her stylist for the movie who was in the middle of setting the make-up used on Kyoko away – , who had stayed in her dressing room while she was changing.

"Kira-san, there is something I didn't envision being an issue before putting on the costume but what I think I need to know if I need to hide this?" She inquired as she pointed to the woman her right hip where was located her fairy tattoo.

Kira-san eyes grew in size.

"I didn't know you had a tattoo, Kyoko-san."

"I have several in fact," Kyoko said pointing at the tiny fairy at her back and at the inside of her ankle where a tiny cat with flowers could be partially seen behind the wraparound ankle tie, "But this one is nearly hidden so I don't think it would really be an issue."

"You're right," said Kira-san.

"But it would also theoretically fit my character so I'd like to have the director view on this," Added the actress as an afterthought.

The stylist agreed.

"Give me a second, I'm going to ask to know if we need to hide them or not," She told Kyoko before leaving in an excited hurry.

Kira-san returned in a minute and to her surprise, Shingai-san at her heels.

"You are full of surprises," he told her before inspecting her tattoos with extreme meticulousness, looking far too overjoyed.

"Why fairies," he inquired after a while, and Kyoko shifted her gaze as her cheeks reddened a tint.

"I like all kinds of fairies," She replied succinctly.

"Hmm…", he said, contemplative.

"Well, they are small and though they would be a bit too cute for Jen personality, it could also be a way of forecast her inner softness," the director said. "Keep the fairies at her front and back on display," he finally decided, "but I'd like to hide the one at your ankle, that one is too much."

Both Kyoko and Kira-san nodded and the director left after telling her to meet him at the bottom room prepped for the club scene. Kira-san quickly took care of applying some make-up on the inside of her ankle, and Kyoko made her way to the room.

She crossed some staff men that showed her the way, she still had not seen where the shooting would take place – and there were many rooms inside – , and they told her the director wanted to start the scene with her and checked a few things but that Ren was still getting ready.

She found the stairs going down thanks to the tech guys and was once again thankful for the heels chosen as she headed down to a much darker subdued light gigantic room that had been styled as a nightclub. Only some areas were highlighted more and near the cameras already set up. You could see the neon lights all around the bar, the couches and above the dance floor.

The set was divided in four areas.

The surrounding area of the stage where she just stepped on, then two equally sized and levelled parts where had been installed a bar and booths, and then the dance floor – six stairs lower than the other areas – buzzing with extras clothed as they were at a club, and waiting on the sides of it for now.

Once you stepped on stage, the whole place and walls had been covered in black textiles and had been filled with darkened furniture. The grounds were only alighted by narrow blue or green neon-light tubes following and fixed to the artificially made halls. Outside of the stage, you had a full view on whole three parts of the club but she could already envision it would not be the case once on it. You would really only see the close surroundings to your area. They really had gone all-out on this. If it had not been for the out-of-club area with all the technicians and cameras, she could really have believed she was in a nightclub.

She met the director and he asked her if she knew what she remembered how it started and if she knew the basic moves of a bartender. Once she had confirmed, he gave her some precision.

"For the first part of the scene, follow the script but for the altercation and the dialogue in the second part, let your character express herself. I didn't write it precisely on purpose. You told me you had her figured out. Do you think you can improvise and imagine what she would do?" he demanded.

"Yes, I think I can."

"Good. It's the first time I see you act in real in years," Shingai-san told her, "I saw some of your work and that's why I wanted you but I need to see how you would act the character I imagined and how much you need guidance after all those years to be sure of what could be wrong or not in the following scene so don't hold back on how you think your character would act, OK?"

She nodded again.

"It would be more cumbersome to correct it later when we will be in the middle of scenes with Ren, you see," the director explained, "just after this titbit, we will shoot the meeting scene of both of your characters and the brief interaction you will have before jumping into an all too different-kind-of-fire, and I will have to be perceptive about the feelings your interactions give off and your chemistry so that I can change or correct things early if there is any issue on that particular point. And as for the first few scenes we decided to go with it chronologically, it's even more important."

She nodded again, understanding perfectly where he was coming from. A problem between two actors was much more troublesome if detected after too many scenes were already filmed. He would have to focus all of his attention on their first interactions between Ren and her character to be sure all was good. She tried to not feel nervous of what she knew was to come.

The meeting was one thing but she knew what would follow. She could not be nervous. Not now.

"I know I can ask you this because you would really know what I mean and you have experience, so you would be able to do it," he continued.

"I'm sure I can do it, director."

"Cursing allowed?" She suddenly asked.

He nodded with a smile.

"Then, we good?"

She made sign of her agreement once more and he left with a satisfied expression.

She remembered how Kayla used to do when she prepared cocktails, even when Kyoko kept telling her she would not take alcohol, making Kayla being the one to drink her own cocktails or other friends of them in the end.

She reminded herself of whom was Jen.

"When you are good to-go," shouted the first cameraman and she stepped on stage and to the bar.

Iris club, first scene: rascals:

Grabbing the shaker, she poured the syrupy mixture of mango-cranberry juice in the cocktail glass, added a drizzle of liquor, a slice of orange and ice cubes and finished another drink. A white wine, a gin and a martini followed suit in a flash of experted hands and one of her waiters fetched the drinks on a tray to deliver them to consumers. No useless moves were spared. It was fast, efficient and graceful. Like some practised show entertainers have known by heart.

Her hands continued to palpitate to the vibrant thump of the basses, however, much lower it was around the sitting area as she brought new glasses to fill on the counter. She bobbed her head from right to left as she let the pulse of the club filled her, as usual. She made the new drinks with an eye out to watch her waiters and was in the middle of making a whisky when she spotted what she had been afraid of finding.

"Bastard!" She cursed with raging eyes.

The old-fashioned glass she was busy with welcomed a few ice rocks, and got poured an extra inch of the strong beverage in the hast of the bar-woman. The glass slid on the smooth immaculate surface as it was sent directly to the man's hand who had ordered it a minute ago.

"Th-thanks," the man seated at the bar, stumbled out, startled and dazed.

She ignored him, her eyes locked on something the man didn't bother turning to look at but that made her blood boiled as the situation turned even direr.

Setting both hands on the hard-glazing counter and supporting her upper body, she propelled her long legs high above the bar, leaping to the other side, and receiving herself on her block heels with ease before striding away. Tonight, she would commit murder, she decided, as her steps clacked on the tiles to the speed of her fast purposeful gait. It was not stripped of grace in her fury but her movements had only one intention, reach its target.

Finally, she reached one of the little shits who was still gleefully molesting the poor bum of her most famous waiter, and grabbed the hand at fault.

"Asshole trashes, didn't I already tell you to not touch my staff or is there too much shit in your brains to understand common words?!" She shouted as she jerked the fucker away of the young man. Setting herself in front of her waiter and shifting into a fighting stance, she twisted the dude's arm and pushed the man to the ground her knee, while she faced his other garbage friends with scorn.

"CUT", called the director, before leaning on the closest cameraman to see if they got it right. Kyoko let go of the man wrist, apologizing quickly for any pain she might have caused and for the future ones that might happen during the choreographed scene that would follow if this one was good. The men playing the jackasses of this scene assured they were all alright and that it wouldn't be a problem.

A heavy stunned silence was hovering in the room while she chatted with her co-actors, unnoticed by her.

"All good", shouted the director as he stood back to a more upright position and someone whistled as Shingai-san made sign to Kyoko she could step down from the set stage. Not commenting, he made her watch the scene they had just filmed asking her if she thought something could be refined in her mind. She told him she thought she could have walked even faster to Taka-san, the actor playing one of her waiters in the story.

The director shook his head with a smile.

"Would you have been able to do it?"

"I think so, but then again, it might have looked rushed if I did and Jen is supposed to be in control of herself here," She amended after some thinking.

The director nodded thoughtfully, while the cameraman near them gaped at her.

"Kyoko-san, you told me you thought you could do it but you didn't tell me you had been barman while in America," pointed the director at the obvious skilled displayed.

"Sorry but no director, you are mistaken. It's just I have a friend who was temporarily one and I got the chance to observe her a few times," She rectified quickly.

Shingai-san lips quirked up.

"Okay then, we can be glad you are so attentive to others."

She perked up at this, feeling it was a huge compliment on her observation skills.

"Someone once told me, I should always pay attention to what is around me and how a person act and feel, of the world around me. That it would help to build future characters," She recalled.

"And who might be this person who gave you such a precious acting advice?" Shingai-san inquired, wondering if he could guess.

"Ah…" She started lifting her hand reflectively to thread her hand in her hair-feeling embarrassed – , before halting the movement at the last second unless she would mess the stylist work on her hair. "It was Ren," She explained, not aware of said person had just stepped down into the room not so far behind her.

The director grin grew.

"I should have known."

She saw him waved at someone behind and thought she was dismissed, reading to go back on stage but the director interrupted her retreat.

"One second, I have another thing I'd like to know…" He told her. "You just propelled yourself above the bar in that scene, it must have necessitated a good amount of strength and – "

"I'm sorry director, the script didn't precisely say how Jen was supposed to go so I improvised and interpreted a certain way," She admitted. "Was it an overkill?"

He waved it away.

"No, no, it was perfect and made the scene even better I had envisioned," he told her. "But I just didn't expect you to be able to do that so I'd like to have some precision on your strength."

"My strength?"

"Yes," and he asked a strike of questions, without giving her anytime to process them, "Was it just a fluke? Something you can do once it awhile? Or something you could repeat time-to-time? How would you evaluate your physical strength? Are you just used to train harder? You do seem a bit more muscled than the classical Japanese girl… Do you think depending on the situation, we could use this in some of the fight scenes or action scenes to push the scenes further?"

She thought it was pretty common for actresses to train their body and try to stay in shape. Just for the sake of keeping a good body as an entertainer. And even more if you wanted to do your own action scenes and not relay on stunt doubles all the time. This scene hadn't been that demanding, she was pretty sure any actress keeping a tiny bit of attention in having a healthy lifestyle would have been able to do it without thinking twice, she didn't understand the director reaction. Not really. But she did was a bit stronger than the typical girl, even if she had been American. So she guessed she could at least share that.

"I don't know what type of scenes you have in mind, director but I do train a minimum," She replied. "So any scene of this level, I could do them without an issue and with no limit to them. More challenging ones might need training and, of course, stage combat, as you already point-out, will obviously still need former training with either the actors and choreographers or with the stuntmen. Even if I'm able to fight and have experience in several martial arts, it won't be ever the same as a choreographed stage combat, neither what you want in particular. And it's without counting the symbiosis needed between actors or stuntmen."

Shingai-san chuckled, clearly amused at the confusion she was showing.

"I didn't mean there would not be training before shooting the scenes, Kyoko-san, neither that you weren't training," he mended. "But it's a rarer occurrence for Japanese actresses to need to train or simply to do action scenes. It's not that there is none but it's less often."

"And, generally speaking, Japanese women, no, even Japanese men are a bit less strong or need more work to reach a level where they are comfortable doing this sort of thing as it was nothing."

She frowned at this. She had seen Japanese actors doing their own stunts. Sure, there were less but they did exist.

Shingai-san snorted at her.

"Yes, of course, there are some but did you never noticed they tired a bit easier after a stunt. I'm sure you have had the possibility to see a lot of stunts in the US so you should have material to compare?"

She thought hard and had to admit he was right.

She nodded, though if she was honest she found it she kind of thought it was lazy to not try to do it as much, just because it was harder. But again, she shouldn't judge. What had been easy for her might not be for other people.

"But again, I shouldn't be surprised you to think that way," He added, crossing his arms. "You learned with top-notch actors and perfectionists like Ren, Ogata director. Koga Hiromune, Kuresaki producer and other veterans in acting before jumping straight into the big ocean that is the US. It shaped you."

She felt sheepish and didn't see if he was reprimanding her or complimenting her so she just nodded.

Nonplussed, the director fixed her with his intense gaze before breaking into a new smirk.

"I was praising you, you know, and it's all the better for me," he said, already pondering something else, "It will make this movie even better."

But then, what all this discussion of the stunts she could do was about? She internally sighed, wondering if she should try to clarify things later or if they had enough time right now. She knew they would have to start the new scene soon. But before she could decide, the director was back to the subject on its own.

"Anyway, it wasn't what I meant," he corrected, "I literally would like to have a rough estimation of your strength. It's one thing to know you can do your own stunts and action scenes. But I'd like to know how far I can push you."

It was all pretty and all said like that but she had never measured her physical strength quite literally, or like athletes need to. She knew her limits in some situations but that was about it.

She mulled over the best way she could give him a more-or-less accurate answer. Maybe there were a few examples that could help the director picturing it enough.

"For example," Shingai-san added after a moment, trying to help her make it clearer for her, "in front of Ren, it would greatly help to know your limits, especially since he has a tendency to hold back even more in front of women in action scenes. And it's even worse if it's a fight scene."

She grinned at that. She couldn't help but agree. It was really his style to do that.

"He knows I would never tolerate for him to go easy on me," she still said.

"Yes, but it does not mean he won't refrain himself unconsciously; or any man for that matter. Unless I have some substantial proof you would be alright."

Again, he was right.

"Well, I can give rough number of times of what I think are my limits in running, biking and the sort of stunts I did in the past, how long it took to shoot them and how long they lasted but for my actual strength – …" She commented and he noted the new information she gave him on a side of the script quickly, pushing to continue.

"I can tell you I've always been considered rather strong, even when I was younger," She added after a while, still cogitating, trying to think of situation people had told her that or where she had done things or lifted things considerate heavy.

"I figured as much," Shingai-san said before taking note of the huge smile suddenly stretching on his actress's lips with a curious gleam in the eye.

She couldn't take that example, could she now?

But then again, it was a good illustration to give some idea of her strength to Shingai-san.

"Director, I might have an example that could help," she said with a tiny smile.

"I'm listening."

"A short while before leaving for America, an event I will not precisely describe occurred and I used-

He barked a loud laugh once she was done.

Holding his sides, he asked for precision between trembles.

"Seriously?! How old were you?"

She nodded, though she couldn't help her lips to rise at the memory.

"I was seventeen."

He laughed harder.

"How? How much time? And compared to now, what would be the difference?" he fired up to her.

"Twenty or twenty-five minutes. I used the fireman carry," She explained.

Still shaking, he stared at her for more explanations.

"And now? How much time could you last?" he demanded.

"In that hold? Easily an hour," She estimated without a doubt.

His eyes twinkled.

"In what other holds could you do it now then?" He asked, guessing right what she hadn't said.

"On the shoulder? Half an hour," She didn't think she could handle much more.

"Half by shoulder or while alternating."

She huffed.

"By shoulder."

He cackled.

"Other ones?" He asked again.

She pondered for a second before replying.

"I could do a classic front carry for at least 10 minutes or a little more without a problem," she evaluated.

In front of his inquisitor eyes, she estimated.

"I had to throw a heavier man than him in a scene a few years ago and I held a good ten to twelve minutes," she explained, "so maybe at least a quarter. Twenty minutes at the upmost, of that I'm sure."

She nodded with finality. Yes, she was certain she wouldn't hold more. He was still not a light-weight.

Composing himself and stifling the persistent smile, he stood back correctly.

"I'm sorry but this is too good," he started, "would you agree for a little demonstration? Not that I don't believe you but he too took a few centimetres and must be a tint heavier than in the past and – "

"Sure," She agreed. "Well, if Ren doesn't mind," she added with a small smile.

"Perfect," the director said before shouting.

"Ren, come here! I need you!"

PS: Hello everyone. Hope you are well and happy Summer is here. I wish you well. This is the new chapter. New fun coming as you can see. Hope you will like it. Lot of kisses.

Mimagfan.

AUTHOR OUT.