Stolen: A SciFi Romance

Chapter 1

Taylor

The aqua sea stretches before me, wrinkled but calm. Fat and blurry with haze, the sun struggles to haul itself out of the sea. Green palm fronds wave overhead through the perfect aqua sky. Scattered purple and pink clouds form up rank on the horizon, as if trying to deny warmth and light to the world.

I stare at the flat Pacific and heave a sigh. Nothing but ankle biters. After all the trouble I went through sneaking my quiver onto the set, too. I stare up at the red and yellow pop-out board leaning against the palm’s trunk and shake my head.

I shouldn’t be surprised. After all, if this patch of the big island’s coast were any good for surfing it would have been developed. The water here seems shallower than it should be, and the unmitigated wind blows out any chance of even weak waves.

I rise from under the palm, blocking my vision from the bright morning sun. They’ll want me on set soon. For a show that’s supposed to be ‘real,’ the producers certainly put a lot of effort into making me seem glamorous. I was expected to be on set along with the other female cast, so their hair and makeup might be done for the day’s shoot. 

The director prefers the gentle light of morning and evening. This means the early morning shoots often stretch into late nights of editing and re-recording dialogue for the ADR track. I hate that the worst of all. Who wanted to be faced with themselves being fake and annoying on camera?

I didn’t even want to be on the show. I had no ambitions for stardom, not even of the temporary viral type. What I need is to pay tuition while finishing up my PHD in Geology. I only started the pro surfer thing so I could break even on my expensive hobby.

One thing led to another. I got a local surf shop to sponsor me, and I’ve been trying to leverage my Instagram fame into more sponsorships. Then the Love in Paradise: Hawaii gig landed in my lap. It seemed easy enough; spend two months at a beautiful island catching some rays and getting paid to do it while some camera guys skulk around in the background.

The realty has proven to be somewhat less pleasant. You see, reality shows aren’t real at all; they’re just unscripted. This means I don’t have to memorize lines, but what you see on the screen isn’t real anyway. I’m often told how to behave before my scenes, which are carefully staged to seem natural even though they’re anything but.

I come over a sandy rise covered with short scrubby grass and spy the villa in the distance. With its off-white modernist architecture, the structure seems like an attempt to evoke a Spanish Villa crossed with the bad guy’s mansions in the Fast and Furious movies. Not a good attempt, either. 

Grips rush around with set pieces, like a large oriental rug which must be rolled up and put away between shooting because the sun will dull its color, and we film out of sequence. I already knew ahead of time that I would not be ‘winning’ the competition. My elimination is planned to come up in two weeks when Chad Whitman will present me with a black lea after I profess that I love surfing more than I could ever love anyone.

That will be a brief moment of honesty. When we shoot that scene, I’ll be telling the truth. I’ve dated since I hit the tender age of sixteen, and when it comes to men, I’m… disappointed.

I’ve been told by many people, male and female, that I need to lower my expectations. Men are only human after all. Men just aren’t good at expressing emotion. Men need their space.

I’m okay with people having flaws, but I still have standards. Some guy sitting on a couch in his mother’s basement playing video games and eating pizza just isn’t going to get my digits. 

Most of the guys who do have it together in their life are colossal jerks. They will lie and pretend to be okay, and then unveil their pure dickishness when you least expect it. So dating is something I’ve done less and less of over the years.

I’ve been focused on my education and surfing. There’s just not much time for anything else. Besides, I’m tired of being disappointed, and ever more tired of being told I should just expect to be.

“Tennyson’s back,” shouts one of the grips over his shoulder while carrying his end of the rug. 

“About damn time,” Chester Reilly the self-important assistant producer snorts. He pokes his spray tan disaster face over the edge of a second-floor balcony and glares at me. “Where have you been?”

His mouth falls open. Chester jabs a finger at the pop-out tucked under my arm.

“Is that a—is that a surfboard?” His voice quivers on the cusp of hysteria. 

“I don’t have a surfboard,” I reply with a shrug.

“Yes, you do,” he sputters. “It’s right there under your arm.”

“No, it isn’t,” I say. “I’ll be right up for the wardrobe department to have their way with me. I’ve just got to stash something in my room.”

“The surfboard you’re not supposed to have,” Chester snaps. “You know what the salt water does to your hair. We need your blonde locks waving in the air for the promotional material. Can’t do that if it’s dried out and stiff like straw.”

“It’s a good thing I don’t have a surfboard, then,” I say with a shrug, entering the villa. I step carefully over a line of cable run through the long corridor connecting the bunkhouses with the main building. I hear Chad’s voice from somewhere as he goes over his elimination speech. Like all of us, he knows how this show is going to end; with him ‘selecting’ Makaylee the Tik Tok dancer in extra short shorts. Who also happens to be sleeping with the producer.

Chad’s statements seem to suggest he might not be interested in women at all, but he does have nigh perfect cheekbones and a chiseled physique. I can be impressed with his appearance while acknowledging he’s an arrogant ass at the same time.

I stash the board and walk up the sun-drenched steps to the upper level patio. White canvas tents serve to protect us from sun and wind as the makeup and hair ladies fuss over our appearance.

I normally eschew heavy cosmetics, meaning I’ve felt as if my face has been covered in dirt for this entire shoot. I’m starting to wish I were one of the girls who had been eliminated early on.

When they’re done with my face, they present me with a red bikini on a hanger. I frown at the thong-style back. “How am I supposed to limbo with this dental floss riding up my crack?”

“Hey, that’s good, save that for when the cameras are rolling,” says the director, a pencil necked man with curly dark hair. “We’re trying to skew you toward the apathetic Gen Z crowd. Lots of ennui, lots of a ‘to hell with it all’ attitude. If you were going to win the competition, we could never go this route, you understand.”

“Yeah, I understand, Mitch,” I growl. In the end, I wear the revealing suit. I’m not supposed to ‘win’ the limbo competition, but I have to fall in just the right way so the cameras catch my failure in all its glory.

My butt is sore and I have sand places I really don’t want sand by the time we call a break for lunch. I make up a plate of sushi and head out of the villa to stride along the beach. Still nothing but ankle biters. Damn, what does it take to get a decent swell out of the ocean around here?

They’re probably going to be mad I took this walk. The stiff wind plays havoc with my carefully styled hair. Oh well. Let them be angry. Sooner or later I’ll be done with this nonsense for good. No more modeling, no more pretending I’m an internet celebrity.

I’ll become a soul surfer, not worried about competition or looking pretty for the cameras and sponsors. Hopefully I can get a job teaching at the University, and if my students google bikini photos and gawk at them, well, I suppose it’s a good problem to have.

Nowhere in my plans do I see a husband. I don’t need a man to be fulfilled and happy, and I resent the very notion.

My brow furrows when I see something on the beach ahead. Still glistening with the tide which deposited it on the dark, wet sand, the shape resembles a dolphin or porpoise. When I grow closer, I realize it’s a large squid. A very large squid, and not one I recognize. 

“Where did you come from?” I ask as I come up beside the black and yellow striped creature. Squids are soft-bodied invertebrates, which means he should be collapsing into a squid shaped puddle. This one seems too rigid, and other things stand out as well. Its single eye turns out to be made of thick glass.

“Is this a prop?” I wonder aloud. Maybe another production was filming around here?

Something slithers around my ankle. I yelp and jump back, but the suction cups on the squid’s tentacle cling tight. It feels like the real thing but for the hard core inside the tentacle. I peer through the translucent flesh and see what appears to be circuitry.

“Knock it off,” I growl, more annoyed than afraid. After all, it’s just a stupid prop, not a real giant squid. A second tentacle wraps around my waist, pinning my left arm to my side. Now I panic. Even if it’s just a prop, it can still kill me if it malfunctions.

More tentacles shoot out from the center mass, drawing me inside the creature’s maw. I slide through an oiled aperture and wind up inside a small chamber. The tentacles wrap around my limbs, and I realize I’m staring out the same glass eye I’d remarked upon before.

This thing is a robot, or something. What in the hell? If Mitch was going to ambush me with this kind of crap, the least he could have done was give me a heads up—

I scream as the squid lurches toward the water. I pound my hands upon the squishy interior, hollering for assistance as it slithers into the foaming surf. Water washes over the armature, though I remain dry as a bone on the inside.

We seem to dive deeper, the sun growing more distant. I shudder inside of the phony squid and sincerely hope this is part of the production.

Because if it’s not, then either I’ve lost my mind --or the universe has.