[It’s a wrap!]

After eight long months of back-to-back work on set, Ian and the crew were finally ready to end the exhausting shooting process.

After the shooting, the troublesome things included editing, mixing of audio, and sound adjusting—in short, post-production was about to be done.

Ian and Raelynn walked together and entered the set.

The day was already feeling gloomy as they both entered the set.

“How is everything looking?” Ian asked loudly as he saw people getting prepared for the shot.

One thing no one knew was that the shooting process was about to wrap. But according to their schedules, the shooting was about to be ongoing for several more weeks. Yet, of how dedicated they were, Ian somehow was able to finish the project sooner than they had expected.

“Good!”

“Good morning, Ian!”

“Oh, guys! Sir Renner is here!”

“How is it going?!”

As Ian walked inside the set, everyone started calling his name out as usual. During the time they had been working together, just like any other team who works together, they had gotten comfortable and became friends.

Nevertheless, the work environment remained the same. It was intense, serious, and an environment where the actors felt comfortable enough for how professional Ian was being.

With Ian’s attitude towards the work, all the actors were sure about what they were working on.

Ian’s confidence in his job and how he works made not only the actors but also almost everyone else aware of the movie that they took part in.

As Inception was a complicated movie with a theme that would take the brain cells of an entire human to understand, the one thing that the actors would and could rely upon was the knowledge of Ian.

Thus, from Ian’s side, he was extremely successful in providing all the information they needed to them. Whenever they had questions, he answered them. Whenever they wanted clarifications, they’d provide them.

Nevertheless, he knew that the shooting process shouldn’t take much time, because the more things get dragged, the more things would be uneasy to end.

“Alright, I have got a special announcement to make if we get this one shot perfectly! All I want is good emotions, the play of words, and perfect character management! If the dialogues are going to be well-rehearsed, that’d be a plus! We’ll begin in thirty minutes! Where’s Leo?”

Ian asked as he said to all the actors who were already prepared.

Some actors had make-up artists and other people hovering around them, helping to get ready. But other actors were chatting in bunches, here and there.

Ian asked the latter while looking around seeing there was no sight of Leonardo DiCaprio on set.

"He’s in the dressing room. He was having trouble with the makeup, saying how the artists changed.”

Ian nodded and walked inside the dressing room.

As soon as he entered the dressing room, he saw the man sitting in front of the mirror. Leo’s back was visible to him.

“May I come in?” Ian asked politely.

During the times of shooting, Ian had gotten used to visiting actors and actresses while dressing or makeup just to explain what the shot was of. And during such situations, it became a norm that the actors and actresses began questioning the story and several other things that made those little conversations longer and more meaningful as he went on explaining every bit he knew and created for Inception.

There were numerous occasions when shootings got delayed because of such incidents.

But not even once Ian thought it was a bad idea to explain to the actors what they were a part of.

“Yeah, Ian, come!” Leo replied.

His voice wasn’t happy, yet Ian thought that it could be simply due to what Niko had said before.

As Ian walked closer, he suddenly saw Leo’s face and gasped.

It. Was. Horrible.

Soon enough, Ian was laughing and Leo joined him.

“What the fuck happened to your face?” Ian couldn’t help but ask in between laughter.

Leo rolled his eyes after taking a huge breath inside.

“I was angry because of this…entire…. Look. Ah! And I have no idea what the fuck this is!” he replied.

With how they were talking to each other, it should be obvious that both Ian and Leonardo had gotten so much closer than before, that they were almost friends.

Leonardo’s face was a mess. The foundation was extreme, and his eyebrows had gotten darker than they should. Surprisingly, he had lipstick on, and simply, he looked like a clown.

Ian chuckled again.

“I’ll let the dressing team know.” He laughed again.

There was something that Ian personally wanted to talk to Leonardo about. But with how Leo was looking, Ian couldn’t help but smile and forget for a moment what he was about to say.

He walked outside immediately with one thing in his head. Someone is looking for a job.

-

[Four hours later]

The shot went on for four hours. Ian planned to finish quicker, but Leo somehow messed up his lines although he had no idea what was yet to come.

“....CUT!” He yelled. “Give me a second, y’all! Take a break!”

Ian said and tried to check the footage that they took.

He sat in his chair and sighed. He clicked ‘play’ and started to watch the footage over and over.

‘This is perfect'.

He waited for a moment to say anything. He looked around to notice the set. To his right, there were makeup artists adding touches to the actors and actresses. Niko and several other men were trying to adjust the camera and lighting.

“Oh my god! No way! I thought I messed up!”

“Nah, I think it’s a good shot! Hey, did you hear about the promotion with VanityFair?”

The conversations between the actors flooded his ears.

People around him were so happy that he felt the team that worked with him for Inception had started to grow in him. The way they were laughing, and how it all came together by the end of the day—-was amazing.

Ian stayed silently and waited until everyone settled down.

Normally, during times like this, he’d be calling out… ‘Get ready for the next shot!’ but today, he was about to say something different.

“Alright guys!” he said through the speaker. Necks turned, and eyes were focused on him. “It’s a wrap!”

“What?”

“Are we done for today?”

“Hey, is that it? I thought we were doing another scene!”

“Are we done?!”

The voices overlapped one another.

“It’s a wrap for Inception! We’re done with the shooting!” He said loudly, making almost everyone gasp.

“OH, MY GOD! WHAT?!!”

“IS IT TRUE?!”

“DOES THAT MEAN WE ARE DONE?!”

“WOW... THIS QUICKLY?!”

“What the fuck- It hasn’t even been ten months?! I thought this would take at least… Two years!”

The actors and almost everyone there were shocked.

Ian smiled.

“It’s a wrap, y’all! That’s a short time to film such a great movie, but you’d be stunned when you see the outcome, and I’d bet my life on it. So, until then, y’all off the hook!”

Ian said and everyone cheered.

“That was so unexpected!”

“Who thought this would be this fast!”

Among all those dialogues, Leonardo walked towards Ian.

His eyes were unreadable. Ian frowned in question. “What’s up?” he asked.

“Ian, are you being serious right now? The shooting is over?” he asked, as surprised as everyone else.

It wasn’t an easy thing to admit. That a movie that could be as great as the next masterpiece of the industry is done with its shooting in less than nine months—was it true? Leo questioned himself, and now Ian.

Ian chuckled. He was about to explain before Leonardo continued again.

“So, that is fucking true.”

Ian frowned.

“Shooting is done? Yes, it’s true. You can read the script again to see if we’ve missed any more scenes, but as I know, you’ve already read it twelve times, and I’m sure your brain wouldn’t like the fact that it needs to read the script again.”

“Nah, the fact that Ian completes movies quickly. Like, the shooting process always takes less than a year—which I thought was complete bullshit by the way. Like, even third-grade movies take more time than that to shoot, but this…. Ah! It is true!” Leo chuckled to himself.

Niko yelled, distracting the two men who were talking to each other.

“PARTY AT BLUE WHALES! EVERYONE! WE’VE SEVEN HOURS TO GET WASTED!”

All the actors including Leonardo cheered at it.

“Have a great night,” Ian said and gave a slight hit to his shoulder.

Leo smiled back, “You too,”

-

[At Sarah’s House]

It was 5.43 pm. The day was getting late yet Ian had come to visit Sarah and Lilian right after the shooting ended quickly.

Sarah and Ian sat across from each other.

“....Thank you so much for coming, Ian. It means a lot…”

‘For Lilian to know that someone is there to look after if something happens to me,’ her thoughts said and eyes expressed.

In the corner of her eyes, she saw how Raelynn had Lilian in her arms with a loving look on her face.

“How are you holding up?” Ian asked.