75. The Real Joke and An Early Christmas.

Disclaimer: The story that I have written here takes on the names of real people, but this story is based in an alternate earth with some changes in its timeline.

This story does not intend to represent the celebrities/real people or make any commentary on them whatsoever. This story is entirely fictional, and it should be viewed entirely as such.

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Recap of the Previous Chapter –

After Eva left Mark went back to writing the draft of the beast until an hour later when he was interrupted by Keanu. He had come to Mark with a request from River, that he wanted to read the script for "The Killing Joke". Mark, though hesitant at first, agreed to it and went to meet River and talk with him about the Joker.

After a long chat between the two friends Mark left River to his devices and went back to work. River read the script and was blown away by the dark, eerie tale Mark had written. The theme and hidden messages he found really resonated with him and he was fascinated by the Joker.

Later Keanu found him rehearsing lines from the script and noticed that River was so engrossed in the script that he nearly forgot about his body's pain and condition. He was glad that his friend found a nice distraction and admired his dedication. The chapter came to an end with Mark and Eva talking about Mark's plans for the next year.

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– Quotes of the chapter –

"All we have to decide is what to do with the time given to us."

— A great white haired old man.

"Why do I still live?!

What more do you want from me? I gave everything I had to you, to them. Look what they've made of our dream. This bloated, rotting, carcass of an empire is not driven by reason and hope, but by fear, hate and ignorance. Better that we had all burned in the fires of Horus' ambition than lived to see this."

— Roboute Gulliman.

I AM THE BANE OF FOES

AND THE END OF THE TREACHEROUS

I AM THE END.

— Unnamed Space Marine.

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~ Third Person's POV ~

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Date: Monday, 17th September, 1990.

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Location: In Mark's private residence at the Eidolon HQ.

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Time: 08:52 pm.

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His day finally came to an end, the draft for the beauty and the beast was nearing completion. He just had a healthy meal of Wellness chicken soup and an assortment of grilled vegetables and chicken with Eva.

After a round of exhausting "exercise" with her, he was now relaxing. Mark laid on the bed with one his hands behind his head holding it up as his other slid its fingers through the silky smooth red locks of his lover's hair.

He seemed lost in some thought, Eva snuggled up to him laying her head on his chest as she gazed up at him with a look of pure content and happiness on her face.

Like there was no other place she wanted to be than in the arms of her lover, of her master, of Mark. He seemed to be troubled by something, she wanted to ask him what it was and see if she could help him with it.

"Mark, what's on your mind? You look upset." Eva asked, finally unable to hold it in any longer.

Mark just hummed at first and then put his thoughts together before answering.

"It's nothing big, honey. It's just that I gave River the script for the Killing Joke. But only the first version of it you know." He said explaining his problem.

"Why just the first version?" She asked bewildered.

"Because, I don't think it's the right time to reveal the truth behind the Joker to him." He replied as he sighed and then looked her in the eye as he asked her inturn. "You remember what made me write the second version of the killing joke?"

"I remember it was after you talked about it at length with Peggy, right? She gave you some kind of idea, that's what you told me." Eva replied after trying to recall for a bit.

"Yeah, the idea." Mark said, as he chuckled, "Eva, never forget, Peggy is worth every single dollar and more that we spend to keep her with us."

"Her insightful takes on our scripts are truly a game changer. The killing joke was already pretty damn, I should know, after all I spent years coming up with it. But the second version is just better."

"She said that after watching Knives Out for the first time, she really liked the "unreliable narrator" trope that I used to show events differently in flashbacks."

"The idea that she gave me was that because I already showed the Joker as a mentally ill and delusional person, why don't I use it as a turning point and show two different truths; the first will be the Joker's and the other the actual truth." Mark finally explained the truth behind the second script.

"Wait, so the first version has the Joker's truth, his deluded perspective? and the second version has the actual truth?" She asked as she sat up a bit in surprise.

"Yup, her idea just lit a fire in my mind and I wrote for hours before I stopped and I had a rough second version of the script before me."

"After working with Peggy for a few more days we were able to work out the kinks and perfected the script to a point which I was satisfied with." He explained how the second version came to be.

"Mark, can you tell me the story of the Joker and how you came up with him?" She asked curiously as out of all the stories he had written this one seemed more important to him than most.

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~ 3RD PERSON POV ~

And she was right, maybe it was a woman's intuition or just because she knew Mark so well. The Killing Joke, despite being adapted from the joker and the dark knight, two of Mark's favorite movies, was actually quite original.

He used scenes and dialogues from two different movies, but the task to combine the two together so that it flowed perfectly and made sense was so hard that he might as well have written an original story.

Well he did write a significant bit of an original story arc for the plot to come together and make sense. After all he didn't have a Batman to serve as the protector. So he came up with an original character who would be a detective who is investigating the Joker's case.

He knew it was decades of experience as a writer from past and present life being perfectly complemented by his genius intellect and talent as a writer that allowed him to create the Killing Joke.

It wouldn't be wrong to call it his magnum opus, his best work yet, his masterpiece.

"Well.." Mark said as he began explaining the second version of the script of the killing joke.

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~ Nina Jacobson's POV ~

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Date: Wednesday, 19th September, 1990.

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Location: Heathrow Airport, Terminal 5, Aspire Lounge.

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Time: 07:36 am. (Taking the timezones into account)

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She was sipping on a cocktail as she waited for Mark and his group to arrive. She had chosen this lounge as it had private booths which at least gave their users a good deal of privacy and security.

Occasionally she kept glancing at the file in her lap, her mouth still felt dry after thinking of the things she had accomplished in just the last 2 months.

The level of responsibility that Mark had laid upon her and the authority that went along with it was heady.

Millions of dollars were casually left in her disposal, available to be drawn at the blink of an eye all just to entice any potential seller of their IP or company.

Joining Mark at Eidolon, had actually opened her eyes to the real world and how big wigs of the industry operated and did business.

She couldn't thank Mark enough for the experience, joining Mark and Eidolon instead of staying at Silver Pictures looking for a better offer.

At first she thought the only reason Mark was giving such importance to her was because of the company being a new start up.

But to her pleasant surprise it wasn't so the work culture at Eidolon was very different from what she had seen in any other company or professional work environment she had worked before in.

The managers were much more strictly observed and supervised by the executives. This was done so that they wouldn't lay off their responsibility to their subordinates.

Also Mark made it a rule that overtime was always duly compensated and employees were rewarded with bonuses for their hard work and dedication towards the job.

Like just a few days back she had been given a bonus for the spectacular box office performance of Knives Out. Even though she only worked on a nominal basis on the film she was still compensated well for her contribution to the film.

After finding out about this she even talked with other executives at Eidolon and also the other companies that were under Mark's ownership or control.

She found out that this wasn't an isolated thing as all of them followed the same rules and guidelines that Mark had laid down for corporate conduct and ethics in his companies.

Mark treated cases of sexual harassment and bullying very seriously with the victim being compensated out of the salary of the abuser and even firing the abuser and blacklisting them from all of his companies as well.

Such great practices were things that really attracted good employees to his companies. This was something that Nina found out after investigating a bit more on the companies that Mark owned.

She was really glad that she had such a great boss who knew how to properly take care of his employees and run an organization despite being a young man who was just 20 years old.

She was ruminating about her recent adventures, when she heard a knock at the door.

*Knock*

She looked up to see Mark standing before her with a smile. He was dressed very casually in a t-shirt and some joggers with no mask on his face, she understood that he was going as a nobody.

"Hi, Nina. It's so good to see you." He said as she stood up slightly and they shook hands cordially as Mark took a seat.

"Good to see you as well, Mark." She replied with a smirk ready to blow his mind with her surprise.

The work she had been tasked with was finally done, the amount she had been told to offer them felt unnatural to her. But Mark's deep pockets provided and she in turn would provide him with something he seemed to want to desperately acquire.

It truly was a pain in the butt to go through so many people to buy out the rights but she and her team were finally done and couldn't wait to give the good news to Mark.

"You look really happy. Do you have any good news to share?" Mark asked as he called over the waiter and ordered a dark chocolate banana milkshake for himself.

Nina waited for the waiter to leave as she sipped on her cocktail. After watching him leave, she leaned forward a bit and said with a grin. "The work is completed, boss. A few of them will take longer but the ones on priority list have all been taken care of."

"All?!" Mark asked slightly surprised as he knew the tall task he had entrusted her.

"Yup," she replied with a grin like she was the cat who caught the canary. Mark didn't fault her because if what she said was true she really had outdone herself.

"Looks like I will have to prepare another bonus for you." Mark said with a pleased smile.

"Of course, you would be hard pressed to find a more hardworking person than me." She replied jokingly.

"Here, sir. This is the file. The first one is the transfer of ownership of Games Workshop Group, their best-known products are Warhammer and Warhammer 40K."

"After my offer to purchase their company there were hesitant at first but some elbow grease and a sincere offer of $16 million dollars did the trick." She explained with a sly smirk.

"Sir, with a 66% stake you are now the majority owner of the Games Workshop." She said with a grin.

"Do you have any orders to pass on? I think with the packed promotional tour you might not be able to make the time to see them for yourself." Nina said as she tried to get on his good side by being a team player.

"Thanks, Nina, but after asking around so much you should know. I always personally visit the company that I buy into. Even if it's just a majority stake of ownership and not a complete takeover." Mark replied with the teasing smirk on his face as he leaned forward.

Nina looked a little flustered at being called out about her snooping around but she was put at he is after seeing how lightly Mark treated the thing.

"Sorry, boss." She still apologized just to be on the safe side.

"It's alright, I'm happy that you are being this careful. After all, the future of your career depends on it." Mark replied with a gentle smile.

Nina was about to reply but stopped because of a knock.

*Knock* "sir, your milkshake is here." The waiter announced his arrival.

"Come in." Mark replied as he called him in.

"Thank you," Mark said, receiving the milkshake. He already slept in at the flight and had his first cup of coffee before they landed so he didn't really feel the jet lag much.

As he sipped on the frothy milkshake he glanced at the papers for the ownership transfer for the GWG. With it he finally got the Warhammer 40k IP in his grasp, he still fondly remembered painting the miniature models with his friends.

Even though it was a small IP now worth only a few millions, he knew the heights it would grow to in future.

But now with his help and endorsement, he will do his best so that the Warhammer 40k IP will eventually surpass its previous popularity and become known worldwide as a household name.

He planned the 40k IP to eventually be adapted into comics, video-games, TV shows; animated and Live Action and maybe even movies if there was a public demand for it.

After he was done daydreaming about his future exploits, he moved on to the next one in the folder as he gestured for her to explain the next.

"The next one is for the movie adaptation right for a book from Mr. Winston Groom called – Forrest Gump for a time period of 6 years. It cost us nothing except for a standard reservation fee and a stipulation that 5% of the production budget be paid as commission." She explained with giddy happiness as she knew how great of a deal she had gotten.

"Nice work." Mark replied as he read the file, he had a smile like he was a kid who was celebrating an early Christmas and Santa had left him many presents.

"The one after that is for the universal adaptation right for the toy line named Transformers from Hasbro." She continued explaining as he turned to the next IP.

"I took halo and DOOM's short animated films and the new comic released by Eidolon as you recommended. It really helped me sway their opinions, at first they looked down on me as Eidolon is quite new at the scene."

"But after weeks of back and forth with the release and dominance of Knives Out at the box office. Hasbro finally settled on a one time fee of $10 million dollars. But they want a 12% cut in the profit we bring from the use of the transformers brand."

"I wasn't sure whether you would accept the cut so this deal is currently on ice. The cut was at 22% but after some negotiation, I managed to bring it down to 12%. I don't thi–"

"No, it's fine, Nina, you did a great work negotiating with them. 12% is acceptable to me." Mark replied interjecting while making some calculations in his head.

"But it will be based on the contingent that they are willing to invest equal capital for any adaptation we make." He said putting forward his own terms.

"It is a standard Hollywood rule so it shouldn't raise many eyes. If they are willing to accept this contingent then make it official." Mark finished saying his piece and moved on to the next file.

After a pause as she noted it down and they began again. "The next is quite similar, with Doom and Halo's short films as proof of capability. I was able to get to the film and TV adaptation rights of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for $4 million along with a 3% profit sharing clause for the merchandising rights."

Mark nodded his head as he glanced at the file, TMNT would become a cultural hit in the US with his animated TV show so the merchandising rights were even more important.

As he moved on to the next file she introduced it, "That's one of the special requests you made, sir. I had a talk with the author Andrzej Sapkowski about how you want him to expand on his short stories and make them into a series of novels."

"At first he was doubtful at first but with some sincere requests and a good amount of money he finally agreed. Now you own the yet to be written Witcher novel series, it's quite the gamble you took, boss."

"His short stories are good and quite popular with the locals as well but how it will be accepted by the international crowd is yet to be seen." She said, intrigued by Mark's risky venture.

"Sometimes to win big you have to take big risks as well. How much did it cost us to get the IP?" Mark replied nonchalantly as he asked the literal million dollar question.

"Not much actually. Due to the currency exchange rate working heavily in your favor, boss. We only had to pay him $2.5 million and a 3% royalty as the author of the series." She replied with a smirk.

After paying in the 10 million range for buying IPs, this development was a pleasant surprise for Mark.

It also gave him the idea to buy IPs or adaptation rights from authors of those countries where the exchange rate would favor him like – Japan, China, or some eastern European countries like Poland, Sweden, Bulgaria, etc.

"And now we come to the final IP and your last special request, sir. I will be honest it was the hardest out of them all to acquire. The rights were scattered among three different companies and took some time to get all of them together." She said drawing attention to the final file that was thicker than the rest.

"Oh really?! do tell me about it, it seems like an interesting story." Mark replied jovially as if taking pleasure in her misery.

"Well it all started with Mr. Tolkien selling the exclusive film, merchandising and stage rights for The Lord Of The Rings And The Hobbit to the United Artists for a 100,000 pounds in 1969." She began as if telling a story.

"So except for the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, the rights of every other work that had ever been written by him were still in the hands of Fourth Age Limited."

"A company that his son now oversees that held the adaptation rights of all his other books as well as any TV show adaptation with 8 episodes or more."

"After miserably failing several times to adapt The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, The United Artists eventually gave up and sold most rights to Saul Zaentz who was a producer working alongside them before."

"Mr. Zaentz then created the Middle Earth Enterprises, a company which held the rights of Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. He teamed up with Ralph Bakshi to adapt the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit into TV animated movies."

"They found some success but the reception was lackluster and the quality of the product was even more so."

"Now as I have mentioned beforehand, U.A. only sold most of the rights to LotR and the hobbit. What they held onto was the distribution rights for the two, I had to pay around $3 million to acquire just that." She explained while grumbling.

"Mr. Zaentz was a different case though, he wanted to sell us his company itself – Middle Earth Entertainment with a contingent that we cannot rename the company. After some further negotiations he sold it to us for $8 million."

"Now we come to the Fourth Age Ltd. the company set up by Mr. Tolkien to oversee the rights of the rest of his books. I personally met with Christopher, Mr Tolkien's son who is in-charge of running that company."

"He is also the one responsible for editing and publishing several other books set in Middle Earth based on the extensive notes left behind by his father."

"So the Fourth Age Ltd. held the rights for all of his other works, any TV adaptation that had 8 or more episodes and a 7.5% royalty fee for adaptation for of all Tolkien's works including Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit." She finally finished the story.

"7.5." Mark finally said, he had been patiently listening to the intriguing tale of the adaptation rights of Mr. Tolkien's work but that high of a royalty drew his attention.

"So much did we settle for, with him?" Mark asked wanting to know the number.

"Not as much as you might think, boss but the deal did come with a few interesting clauses though. Christopher agreed on selling us the adaptation rights for the other books but he wants to be a part of the creative process." Sje replied as she replied his requests.

"He is afraid that we might tarnish his father's work like UA or Saul Zaentz. Though he was willing to lower the royalty from 7.5% to 5% if we agree to use the 2.5% he gave up for charitable work."

"He didn't even ask for it to be done in his name, just that it be used for education or orphanages if we could."

"After a brief round of negotiations and with knowledge that you would were the buyer he agreed to give us the universal adaptation rights of Mr. Tolkien's work for $16.5 million." She finally revealed the number they had agreed upon.

Hearing that, Mark let out a sigh of relief as it was a number he could bear. He was even willing to go as high as $25 to $30 million for it, after all it was a potential multi-billion dollar franchise. He wasn't going to be stingy while trying to acquire it.

"So in total, boss. I spent around $61 million and managed to acquire for you —

66% of The «Games Workshop Group»

«The Witcher»

«The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles»

«Transformers»

«Forrest Gump»

«The Middle Earth Entertainment» with it the rights of – «Lord of the Rings» and «The Hobbit» and finally the complete rights of Mr. Tolkien's work from Fourth Age Limited." Nina summarized concisely.

"So how did I do, boss?" She asked with a confident grin.

"You did wonders, Nina. Honestly I was expecting you to go a bit over $70 million. But it looks like Eva won that bet." Mark replied with a pleased smile and why won't he be, he held the "one ring" in his hands now.

"A bet?" She asked, interested in hearing about their bet.

"Well Eva bet you would need to spend close to $60 million whereas my bet was at least $70 million." Seeing that she was interested, he explained the terms of the bet nonchalantly.

"If she won I would give her one of my penthouses in New York and release a book/comic of her chosen genre or style."

"A pent-house?!" She almost choked as her boss revealed the bet. She knew those go for millions of dollars.

"Don't worry, Nina. You did a great job, be proud of it." Mark said with a nod of assurance when he saw her panicked expression.

"Boss, can I ask you something?" She asked hesitantly.

"Sure, go ahead." Mark replied in a happy mood as he kept aside the folder in his backpack and checked her loyalty score.

Nina Jacobson. Loyalty: 68 → 81.

'Nice, giving her this opportunity and properly acknowledging her accomplishments really seems to do the job.' Mark thought to himself with a smirk and then looked her in the eye as she asked her question.

"Why did you buy all these IPs at once, boss? Even the GWG was bought off just for Warhammer 40k, there is no way that we can even adapt these for years to come." Was her question.

"So they won't be bringing us a profit as well, so why spend millions of dollars on something which won't bring in any in the short term?" She asked the question that had been bugging her since the very beginning when Mark had given her this task.

Mark chuckled at her question, "you're very perceptive, Nina." He said as he honestly explained their situation to her after seeing her rising loyalty.

"Eidolon Entertainment's greatest strength right now is me and my IPs that I have created. While it's good and will continue to expand in the future, it simply isn't enough to sustain the giant that I want to create Eidolon into."

"Also I can't deny that there are excellent works out there that want to adapt as well. This is why I want to buy IPs, as for why am I collecting them so quickly?" He said as if he was asking a question to himself.

"It's because we are a new force in Hollywood, but one that is having a meteoric rise. So, very soon all of our actions will come under close scrutiny by our rival studios."

"If you try to acquire adaptation rights then, it will become a bidding war to see who can wrestle away the IP from us. They will stop at nothing to stop me.. stop Eidolon from succeeding." Mark said with a sigh.

He checked the loyalty score again.

Nina Jacobson. Loyalty: 81 → 82.

His honest answer and him being forthcoming with her seems to have paid off. He decided to strike the iron while it's still hot.

"But that's for us to worry about later. I need to head out soon." Mark said as he paid the bill and left a sizable tip.

"Nina, you're doing really well. But I also need you to properly train Sarah as your replacement so I have someone to rely on when I promote you." He said as got up and wore his backpack, in his outfit he didn't look any different from a young student.

"Yes, boss! Thank you for your consideration." Nina exclaimed as she got up and bowed slightly and opened the booth's door for him to leave.

With a final nod, Mark left her. After he was gone, she closed the door and slumped down. Meeting with Mark can be intense sometimes, she was really nervous when Mark called her out on her investigation.

Thankfully he waved it off and even seemed happy at her proactiveness. But what made her have hope for the future was Mark's attitude towards her. He never treated her any different because of her being a woman or thought any less of her.

All he evaluated his employees was on the basis of their performance and their merits. With almost no baisness in his judgement, while this was a basic thing in a normal corporate work environment. This was actually something she found to be very lacking in Hollywood for her observation.

As executives seemed to fill important positions with their friends and families instead of hiring competent people to increase their power and authority. But it eventually only leads to the slow death of such studios.

Silver Pictures, her previous workplace was the same and she didn't hold much hope for Eidolon. But Mark and Eidolon had been a good surprise for her as well, she had already been praising Eidolon as the best place to work at in Hollywood in her friend circle.

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{Author's Note: Man this was a bitch of a chapter to finish, while it seemed like nothing much happened. This was a set-up chapter, where I introduced the idea of the true Killing Joke. One that Mark is hiding from River currently, this will lead to some drama later on.

Not to worry it won't be edgy or emo, just wholesome and heartwarming. At least I will try to keep it that way other than that, this is the list of IPs that Nina acquired for Mark.

1. Warhammer and Warhammer 40K. Everything.

2. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Only TV shows and Film and Merchandising.

3. Transformers. Only Film and TV shows.

4. Forrest Gump. Only Film.

5. The Witcher. Everything.

6. All the books of Mr. Tolkien. Everything.

Now the results of the previous Poll for the 3rd movie to be released next year (1991).

1. Home Alone → 53 votes.

2. Dumb and Dumber → 2 votes (come on show some love to this amazing movie)

3. The Mask → 19 votes.

4. Write-in. Well most of your suggestions have been part of my list and when the polls for future movies are up you can vote for them.

The winner with a huge leg up is Home Alone. Wooo! I personally voted for Home Alone. I am happy to see it win by such a large margin. Thanks for participating guys.

Anywhos, moving on, thanks for reading my work. I am entirely motivated by interaction, suggestions and feedback. So please leave a comment or review and I will probably write faster.

If you like my work please throw a power stone my way so my book can climb the rankings. Slurp some nice ramen and I hope you all have a beautiful day. (⁠｡⁠•̀⁠ᴗ⁠-⁠)⁠✧

Update schedule for this book: 1 chapter every 2 days.}