He shifted forward, our knees touching, and then shifted back as the van took a turn.
I checked my phone.
Eamon:Saw the arrival footage. You good?
Eamon:Call when you can.
Griffin:Fine. Contained. Will call after load-in.
The van pulled off the freeway. We were close now, fifteen minutes to the venue. The Forum rose ahead, white and imposing against the LA skyline.
The crew was already moving equipment. Trucks backed up to the loading bays.
Soo-jin still hadn't appeared. Staffers would have notified him immediately, and he would have seen the footage.
He'd chosen absence… as a strategy.
He didn't appear during moments of disorder because his presence wasn't useful then. He appeared afterwards, with everyone rattled, uncertain, and looking for a steady hand. When the script ofthis is why we need structurewould land hardest.
The van turned into the venue's loading area. Doors opened. Taemin and Minjae climbed out. Soyeon on their heels.
Rune paused at the threshold. Glanced back at me.
I saw the question in his eyes:What happens next?
I didn't have an answer that wouldn't terrify him.
***
I normally would have gone to the production office with the rest of the detail. Kang headed in that direction, trailed by the local contractors.
Something pulled me toward the stage instead. Perhaps it was a familiar need to see the space for myself and understand sight lines and fall zones before trusting someone else's assessment.
The Forum was massive. Nearly eighteen thousand seats, circular, with sightlines that wrapped the stage in complicated arcs.
The loading dock was all motion and metal. Forklifts reversing, crew calling measurements in English and Korean, and the industrial scrape of truss sections being assembled. Radio chatter bled across multiple frequencies, production and security comms layering into white noise.
I stayed out of the way. Observed.
The crew was positioning a lighting truss stage left. They worked the chain motors with practiced efficiency, but the truss wasn’t where the plans said it should be. I'd studied them in Portland the way I studied everything, looking for variables that could turn into problems.
There was a mismatch. One rigger was on a headset, listening to someone, then relaying information to his crew. He pointed up. They adjusted the motor speed, brought the truss down two feet lower than the plan specified.
I moved closer. A stagehand walked past carrying a tablet. I recognized him from Portland.
"The truss position. Is that a permanent change?" I asked.
He glanced up. "Yeah, we're rerouting. The sound designer wanted to adjust the speaker array, so the lighting had to compensate. Rigging approved it."
"When was it approved?"
"This morning. Verbally. We won't file the updated plan until after load-in." He shrugged. "Happens all the time. You adapt."
It probably was standard. Tours adjusted constantly. Still, the weight distribution was wrong.
The change brought the truss lower and shifted it six feet stage left from the original position. I'd memorized the LA choreography after watching the rehearsal footage. Formation positions were consistent.
Rune's mark was stage left center. Three feet back from the edge. That's where the truss now hung.
