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As Taggerston’s morning televised administrative work is winding down, the cast and crew of Lives of the Innocents accumulate at the studio and commence setting up for the afternoon shoot There’s only one television studio on the island, so they have to share A scene of film set banality ensues – crew setting up, large metallic objects and green screens on stilts moved to and fro, thick cables tripped over, groggy men cursing loudly into walkie-talkies and mobile phones, the bearded fox in the director’s seat making regal gestures next to the iPad-bearing female assistant, the scent of coffee and electricity, the whir of electric fans beneath the thin murmur of voices Lucia always arrives early to pick up the script, a sense of demonstrative duty The actors only have an hour to learn their lines before shooting starts Time to find out where Hornby is going today Krstal Mrdok brushes past her towards the coffeemaker   —Why Lucia, I have to say, that is the loveliest dress I ever saw you wear Did you get that around here? Or did you have someone make it for you?   It’s been around three years now since Krstal Mrdok was written into the show Actually she’s the first non-Sagosian, quasi-elite actress ever to appear on Lives of the Innocents since the show started some twenty-three years ago Her character arrived rather mysteriously, as Lives of the Innocents typically evades referring to real life events on the island, opting instead for a sort of idealized or fantasy version of Sagosian life It’s not even really Sagosia, more a fictionalized version of what used to be called Sagosia, named Port Matthews on the show – though the quasi-native audience can clearly recognize all the local referents, from the typical Sagosian accent to locales (on those occasions when they venture outside the studio to do outdoor shoots – something the producers generally frown upon since it requires extra expenditures, particularly given the unpredictability of the weather in the wet season)   One of those awkward moments – innumerable since Krstal first