The California sun felt nice coming through the big windows of the VA hospital.
It made everything look kind of yellow and hopeful, which was weird because the place smelled like cleaning stuff and medicine.
Connor "Duke" Hauser was trapped. His right leg was a sculpture of plaster and steel, suspended by a pulley system.
The white-hot pain of his initial injury had faded into a deep ache, a companion reminding him of the helicopter crashing he'd honestly rather forget.
On the bedside table lay a cheap, spiral-bound notebook, a gift from a well meaning girl volunteer that he tried to flirt while in bed.
It was open to the first page, the handwriting a little wobbly, thnaks to the painkillers swimming in his system.
'Woke up in California,1966, leg is hurt. Mind is full. A little too full.'
A few lines down, a more recent entry:
'January 18. Physical training today. The therapist says I'm making progress. It doesn't feel like it. The world is out there going past meanwhile i'm trapped in here.'
On the radio in the nurse's station, The Beatles' "We Can Work It Out" battled with the Mamas & the Papas "California Dreamin" for airtime.
Batman was a primetime sensation, and everyone was talking about the Gemini 8 mission, set to launch in a few months.
Inside the hospital, time was measured in pill cycles and the wait to the physical therapist. Of course, Duke had some comics beside him.
The chaos in his mind after getting the memories of two lives had finally settled after 3 days.
The memories of a man from 2026 were no longer a mess at least.
A familiar tap-tap and the squeak of soles on linoleum announced Joe, the orderly.
A veteran of the Korean war, Joe had kind eyes in a face etched with stress lines.
"How's the leg today, Hauser?" Joe asked.
"Still attached," Connor replied, a faint form of a smile taking shape on his mouth. "Doctor told me that's the important part."
"That it is," Joe chuckled softly. He held out two envelopes. "Mail call. Looks like one from home."
The first was from a hometown friend.
He wrote of the Texas farm Connor used to work in, of his neighbor, Lyle, fixing the tractor, of his little brother Michael's ribbon.
The letter was a blanket of support, but he could feel the worried lines beneath the words.
The other envelope, was official, from the U.S. Marine Corps. More discharge paperwork.
He read his friend's letter twice.
In his past life, he was a 24 year old Petroleum Engineer, in a meeting when he suddenly woke up in this place, in the past.
Same name, Connor Hauser, completely different situations.
Connor Hauser, born in 1947, and victim of an ambush while he was a Door Gunner in the Vietnam War, had gotten a injury on his right leg when his plane got shot down.
Upon noticing his injury, they took him to Japan and from there he got send here, medically discharged.
And well, he was here now.
The boredom that stayed on him was heavy, he even stared out the window, watching a palm tree sway as entertainment.
He missed his phone, League of Legends, Tablet, working legs, etc.
He had even bought a pirated PSP with a lot of PSP games and PS1 games just before he got send here.
It was January 18, 1966 and he was still getting used to things.
It was just the third day since he woke up in this body in 1966.
His own reflection stared back from the window a nineteen-year-old, black hair, blue eyes, and a surprisingly sharp face.
"Hauser, you in there?" Joe's rough voice cut through his thoughts.
"I'm good, Joe. Just… thinking."
"Right," Joe said, leaning a hip against the bedside table and fingering a pack of Lucky Strikes in his pocket. "Stuff's rough, man. But you gotta keep moving forward, can't let it anchor you. Stress is a killer. Ruins your chakras."
Connor just nodded. 'Even in this life man, California has its... characters', he thought.
"Thanks, Joe appreciate it and… thanks for everything." Since waking up in this new-old skin, Joe had been his guide through the maze of paperwork and pain.
"You just gotta take care of yourself for a while. I know a guy, sells some things to take the edge off, ever heard of Mary Jane?" Joe offered with a knowing look.
Another nod, he was doing a lot of nods lately but weed didnt feel like something he wanted to touch right now.
Joe gave his shoulder a firm pat and moved on, leaving the young soldier alone with his thoughts again.
Some cosmic joke of a god had dumped him in 1966.
He remembered Hollywood for a moment at this time, a smaller industry.
No Hollywood New Wave. A world where neither blockbusters nor superhero stories had become a thing yet.
In his past life, he had worked on the theater scene, trying to break into the industry in some way, later after consuming all his savings, he finished his CS degree and did his Masters in Oil.
But now, he could try again.
He looked at his reflection wondering whether he could become an actor with his looks. He stared at his leg realizing he would not be able to dance nor walk normally.
What actor cant even walk?
In his past life, his drama teacher once told him, "If you can't imagine yourself teaching in a small town to people interested in learning how to act, then this career path isn't for you."
If he didn't do something with this second chance, he really deserved to rot in this sterile place.
The night came and desperate to escape the hospital's grip, he used a small stash of his Army pay to hail a cab to Westwood in a wheelchair.
He needed to see something that wasn't beige walls and somber faces.
Movies had a way of lighting up the world. Duke remembered how sad he was watching movies in 2026, every movie had some kind of preachy message.
He didn't mind a movie being political as long as it was entertainment, sadly movies in 2026 were mostly not.
The marquee of the Theater was a blaze of light. It had been playing for months, but the line still stretched down the block.
The film was The Sound of Music.
The sheer, unapologetic joy of it, was the opposite of everything he was feeling which drew him in.
He bought a ticket and found a seat in the packed theater.
The lights dimmed. The screen filled with those breathtaking aerial shots of the Austrian Alps. The music swelled.
And as Julie Andrews spun on that hilltop, something clicked into place in his mind.
It wasn't just a memory of having seen the film. The entire movie in his mind perfect and pristine.
Every sweeping shot, every chord of music, every line of dialogue from the Captain and Maria, right down to the mischievousness of Gretl.
It was all there, in his mind.
His heart hammered against his ribs. He closed his eyes, testing it. He reached for another film from his future, Jaws.
Same results.
The opening swim, the ominous score, Quint's monologue about the USS Indianapolis it all played out in flawless high definition.
He tried to recall a film he'd only heard of but never seen, nothing. But the ones he had… they were all there. A perfect, private cinema in his skull.
'This is it. This is my tool. I can remember movies.'
A jolt of excitement surged through him, burning away the ache he still feel in his leg.
His fist came down on the worn velvet of the armrest, the sharp pain in his hand a grounding sensation.
"Hell yeah," he breathed, a wide smile breaking across his face as the Von Trapp children sang in harmony on screen.
A woman in the next seat shot him a disapproving look. He didn't care. 'fcking Karens even appear in the past.'
He sat through the rest of the film in a daze.
When the credits rolled, he took a cab back to the hospital.
His mind a roaring engine, concepts of plans forming in this life.
He had been given a cheat code by some insane or well a rather generous god.
In his past life, the industry was fighting AI on film, Wokeness, changes to scripts cause of meaningless algorithms to appeal to a demographic that normally would never watch certain type of films, private equity, bs bosses.
But it was different now.
This time, if he failed, he would have no one to blame but himself.
...
I had already rewritten the first five chapters since a month ago.
As you know, this fanfic will strecht from 1966 to 2020s(if i'm able to)
The protagonist will become a tycoon mostly focused on movies, videogames, and themeparks(without buying Disney)
If you got any recommendations you can say it here.