Hollywood: The Studio Gambit

Los Angeles, California.

UCLA Medical Center was one of the top hospitals in the country, the kind of place where money, reputation, and world-class medicine all overlapped.

In a private room, a young man stirred.

At first, he saw double. Blurred lights, white ceiling, the sterile smell of disinfectant. Then his vision focused, and the room snapped into place.

He frowned and looked around.

Hospital.

Bed.

IV stand.

A woman asleep in the chair beside him.

It was late. Well past midnight, judging by the darkness beyond the window. The woman must have been keeping watch, but exhaustion had finally dragged her under.

"Ow."

Before he could make sense of anything, a spike of pain tore through the back of his skull.

Memories flooded in.

Not a handful. Countless fragments slammed into him all at once, rushing through his mind like floodwater breaching a dam. Faces. Names. Classes. A house. A balcony. A fall. A hospital. A life that was not his, yet now somehow was.

When the pain finally loosened its grip, he reached up and touched the bandages wrapped around his head.

"Holy shit," he muttered. "I'm in someone else's body."

In his old timeline, he had been an assistant director grinding his way through film and television crews. His uncle had been directing the project they were working on, and once it wrapped, the next production was supposed to be his directorial debut.

That had been the plan, anyway.

After work, he had gone drinking with a few crew buddies. Too much food, too much booze, too much noise. Before he could even begin his life as a director, he had collapsed at the table like an idiot.

Then he woke up here.

Inside the body of the unlucky bastard in this hospital bed.

His new name was Ethan Hawthorne.

He was twenty-two, tall, white, and handsome. Before the accident, he had been on track to graduate from UCLA in June. By any normal standard, the guy looked impressive on paper.

USC had more Hollywood mythology, sure, but UCLA still carried plenty of weight in Los Angeles. It wasn't a degree anyone with sense would laugh at.

He had the looks, the education, and, as it turned out, a family background that opened doors.

He wasn't some untouchable old-money heir, but his father had done well enough.

Charles Hawthorne worked at MGM.

Yes, that MGM. The roaring lion. One of the most famous names in Hollywood history.

And Charles Hawthorne wasn't some middle manager buried in the building.

He was MGM's current CEO.

Ethan's mother, Emily Hawthorne, was more traditional. She had stayed home, run the household, raised two sons, and spoiled Ethan rotten as the baby of the family.

He lay there, sorting through the new memories, and his mood shifted despite the throbbing in his skull.

As second lives went, he could have done a hell of a lot worse.

He wasn't starting over as some broke nobody with no contacts, no money, and no way into the industry. His father was the CEO of MGM. In his old timeline, MGM would later file for bankruptcy and eventually be acquired by Amazon, but right now it was still MGM.

A real studio.

A major name.

His father could help him get a few small projects off the ground.

He didn't even need much. Low budget was fine. Horror was fine. Give him a camera, a crew, and a director's chair. That chair was what he had wanted for years.

As he took stock of his situation, the woman in the chair stirred awake.

The moment she realized he was awake, she gasped, and tears spilled down her face.

"Oh my God, Ethan. You're awake."

He looked at the exhausted middle-aged woman in front of him. For a second, the strangeness of it all pressed down on him. Then the new memories settled into place, and he let himself accept it.

If this really was a second life, then the past was over.

This was his life now.

He raised a hand and patted her back. His throat was dry from days spent unconscious, and his voice came out rough.

"Mom," he rasped, "I think I need water."

Emily wiped her tears with one hand, hit the nurse call button with the other, then hurried to pour him a glass.

As a man in his twenties, Ethan objected on principle to being fed water by his mother.

"Mom, I can do it myself. My head's a little dizzy, but I'm fine."

Emily ignored him completely and held the cup to his lips anyway.

He was helpless. Apparently, patients didn't get voting rights.

He drank.

As the water soothed his sandpaper-dry throat, more memories surfaced. The injury itself was embarrassingly simple. He had fallen from the second-floor balcony at home. Headfirst.

The fact that his neck had not snapped and he had not ended up paralyzed meant the original Ethan Hawthorne had been lucky, tough, or both.

The doctors and nurses arrived quickly. This was a respected Los Angeles hospital, and he was in a private room, so everyone moved fast.

After the usual series of checks, Dr. Carter, the attending physician, stared at the results with an expression that suggested the numbers had personally offended him.

"Mr. Hawthorne," he said, "you're weak, but that's expected after a long period of unconsciousness. Your vitals are stable, and your neurological exam is far better than I expected."

He hesitated, clearly unwilling to sound unprofessional.

"To be honest, I don't fully understand it. Most patients who wake after more than two weeks show some neurological impairment. You don't. I can't explain that yet. I'm not trying to alarm you, of course. It's simply... unusual."

'My soul got swapped out. Good luck diagnosing that.'

Out loud, he said, "Maybe I'm lucky, Dr. Carter. Does that mean I can go home?"

Dr. Carter's expression tightened.

"Not tonight. If the rest of your tests stay clean, we can revisit discharge in a few days. My recommendation is a full week."

Ethan rolled his eyes.

"If everything keeps coming back normal, then I don't need another week. I need fresh air, not another seven days staring at these walls."

The tests took more than two hours.

When Ethan finally stepped out of the examination room, Emily was waiting for him. A middle-aged man stood beside her in a suit and dress shoes, tie still knotted at his throat.

He had probably come straight from the office.

Apparently, running MGM didn't come with regular hours.

"Ethan." Charles Hawthorne strode forward and pulled him into a hug. "Thank God. I can't tell you how glad I am to see you awake."

"Careful, Charles," Emily snapped at once. "You'll hurt him."

He gave a small shrug.

"Mom, I'm not that fragile."

Charles let go at once.

"Sorry. I got carried away. I don't even know what to say." His voice shook despite the smile on his face. "I've never been more grateful to God in my life."

Then came the negotiation.

Ethan wanted to go home. Dr. Carter wanted him under observation. Emily and Charles were torn between taking their son home and trusting the doctor.

In the end, they compromised.

One week was impossible.

Three days was the limit.

Ethan accepted it with the look of a man who had lost a small but irritating battle.

Then, as they passed the nurses' station, his gaze landed on the calendar sitting on the counter.

May 20, 2002.

For one sharp second, his mind went blank.

Then the pieces clicked into place.

2002.

MGM.

John Woo.

Windtalkers.

"Oh, fuck."

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