by Spencer,Alan
"Let him think on it for awhile," Luke said to Bliss. "We have our meal to finish in the meantime."
David was helped up out of his chair and carried out of the theatre. He could hear another reel begin to play. He didn't get to see what was playing.
He was taken to a private cell where he waited for the next update from his captors.
He slept hard in what resembled a jail cell. He had a wooden bench for a bed. There weren't windows. The door was made of steel. He was trapped in a tiled box.
When he woke that next morning, or evening, or however many hours later, his thoughts snapped right back to Charlie.
Would they leave her alone?
Had they already captured her and set her up to die like they did to poor Noelle?
He thought about ifs.
If he hadn't argued with Charlie that morning. If he had found the right floor of that building for his job interview. If he had escaped the mansion when he was loose. If he had been a better father, Noelle wouldn't be a drug user, and vulnerable to such an attack. If he had fought back harder at the interview. If he had escaped those goons and called the police.
If.
If.
If.
David could torment himself over these things, but that wouldn't do service to Noelle's memory. It wouldn't protect Charlie, or anyone else that mattered in his life.
The one thing he chose to do was use reason against the situation. This wasn't a police matter. They couldn't keep him safe. The Blooms, and whoever else was in on the game, would stop at nothing to keep their activities a secret. They had the means and the ability to kill and get away with it.
Even if he escaped them, he would always be in danger. His loved ones would always be in harm's way. There was only one true solution to the problem.
The Blooms, and anybody associated with The Event, had to die.
There wasn't a fact more clear cut.
The steel door came open. Luke stood among his goons.
"Stay where you are, Mr. Smith. It's time for a talk. Stay seated. This won't take long. We haven't got much time before The Event.
"I wanted to let you know I've done some research on you. You've got an interesting background. It makes me even more confident about the choice I made by sticking with you.
"Your mother suffered from agoraphobia. She couldn't step outside her apartment without panicking. She gave birth to you, and then she started fearing public places. I understand she had trouble giving birth to you, and there were complications, and the whole event was dragged out. I guess it messed her up inside, huh?
"Then your father takes the reigns of parenting. He did his best to make sure her anxiety didn't rub off on you. The change in your mother was toxic to the marriage. I've read several police reports about it. You were the only witness to it, Mr. Smith.
"You were seven years old, and your father was trying to force your mother onto the sixth story balcony of your apartment. Friends of your father said he was researching immersion therapy. He wanted your mother to get over her fear of public places. He thought forcing her to overcome her fears would help her.
"Somehow, both of them end up fighting and pushing, and they both fall off the balcony ledge. They died on impact. I wish I was there to see it. I bet the sound of bones breaking," Luke closed his eyes and shuttered once, "was something of true beauty."
Luke lit a cigarette.
"You were the only witness to the event. Neighbors heard wild screaming and arguing. It was deemed an accident. Some wonder if it wasn't murder. That your father tried to throw your mother off the balcony because he couldn't stand her phobia any longer. I'm curious. What do you remember, Mr. Smith? Was it an accident, or was it murder?"
He thought about what to tell Luke.
What would appease him?
The longer he stayed quiet, Luke visibly couldn't stand it.
"Your dad had lost his job at the steel factory, and your mother hadn't worked since she gave birth to you. He was taking to drinking. So was your mother. She downed the meds like candy, and the scotch like water. So very cliché."
David couldn't stand it any longer. He had to shut Lucas up. The man's voice was nails on chalkboards.
"Fine, you want to dissect me? Go ahead. I mean, look at your situation. You're rich beyond belief. You've got a fancy mansion and every privilege in the world, and the best you can do with your life is dig up people like me to play in a game you created. You could be changing the world in a positive manner, or you could be sitting at a desk smoking cigars and lighting them with burning hundred dollar bills, and that would be more sane than eating people, and torturing people, and murdering people, and raping people. Judge me if you want. But try looking at yourself. Fucking seriously. You're the one with life issues. Not me."
Luke had that goofy grin on his face.
He was entertained.
"Oh, I love it when people's backs are against the wall, and they finally lash out. I understand why you're the way you are. Isn't that what everybody's after? People are always trying to figure out everybody else' shit out. I'm only asking you these questions so I know about you specifically, Mr. Smith. I have to know if there's a killer inside you. So please, if you grant me the favor, I would love to know what you remember being that seven year old on that night your parents died."
David sucked in a few tokes of the cigarette.
"If you must know, my mother was trying to overcome her fear by herself. She would step out onto that balcony, face the city, and then she'd collapse and crawl back into the house. Little by little, she could stand on that balcony for longer and longer stretches.
"The night they both died, she must've leaned on the edge. I remember her letting out a cheer, and then she tipped forward. She clutched onto the railing, and my father ran out to help her, and they both ended up falling. It wasn't murder. It was an accident.
"Nobody believed that version. I moved in with my aunt and uncle who cursed my father, and said he was a killer, and that he couldn't hold a steady job, and he couldn't keep my mom under control. They called him a killer, and he wasn't. I'm the only one who knows the real truth.
"And you, Mr. Bloom, you revel in murder and killing like a pig rolling in shit. You make me sick. I may not be the best father and husband or be all that successful in life, but one thing I know I'm not, and that's a psycho.
"One other thing, you asshole. You hurt anyone else in my life, or touch Charlie, you've got a world of pain coming to you."
The goons weren't expecting it.
David lunged, cocked back his fist, and channeled the horror of every moment since the job interview gone wrong. He made impact. That connection crushed Luke's nose. The man was thrown against the wall. His head was knocked back into the wall. He lay limp on the ground, still in shock from the punch. Blood was oozing down his face and draining onto his fancy suit.
One set of goons gathered Luke up, and the other threw him to the other side of the cell. Before anything else could happen, the goons and Luke were gone.
This was another first in David's life. He was served breakfast at gunpoint.
Luke's goons surrounded him in the cell. One goon had a 9mm trained to his head as he ate a tray of bacon, eggs, toast, and orange juice.
He refused to eat it at first.
The goons had other ideas.
"Eat it all, Mr. Bloom says. This is not optional. You'll need your strength, so eat up, or Mr. 9mm starts talking. You want to eat bullets instead of bacon?"
"What? You going to shoot me?" David laughed. "You did all of this crazy shit in order for me to play in some stupid game. And you'd shoot me for not eating? After all the effort you've put into this, and--"
He was pistol whipped.
"Eat the food. Shut the fuck up. No more talking."
He blinked blood out of his right eye. He used the cloth napkin to dab at his eye.
Once he finished eating, the goons guided him into a hallway. They were back inside the Bloom mansion. Luke w
asn't anywhere to be seen, nor were any of the other Blooms. They moved through several areas, twisting and turning among various sections of the mansion, until they descended down a stairwell that led to an open room of showers.
"Strip down. Then use the soap and shampoo provided hanging from the showerhead. You've got ten minutes. Make them count. We're on a strict schedule."
David did as he was told.
That was another first in his life. Shower by gunpoint.
The showers came on their own, and they stopped on their own after exactly ten minutes.
A towel was thrown at him. He dried off. The goons offered him a new set of clothing.
"Change into these. You got five minutes. Make it snappy."
The clothing had a military feel. Black steel toed boots. Green army fatigue bottoms. White shirt. Backpack. He didn't know what was inside the backpack. He wasn't given the chance to peek inside of it. Once he changed, the group of goons charged in at him. A hood was forced over his head. One of them kicked David on the ass to hurry him along.
"Get going, asshole. I'll be happy to see you gone. You've caused enough problems for us. Never in my life has this been so difficult."
They were out of the mansion and in the open air. He heard a helicopter's wings chopping overhead. He was shoved inside the transport. Plastic twine was wrapped around his wrists.
"Stay seated," a goon advised with grated teeth. "You try anything, I'll throw your ass out. It'll be a hard landing. You'll pop like water balloon."
David did his best to remain calm.
He had a long ride ahead of him.
They were escorting him to hell, he believed, as it got hotter and hotter wearing the hood. Even outside the hood, his body was covered in dripping sweat. Hours they'd spent airborne. Maybe half a day.
Where could they be taking him? There wasn't any conversation over the loud thupping of the chopper's blades. His nerves had been pumping for most of the trip. He stayed on the edge of his seat and remained guarded and ready for anything.
More hours passed.
He could only imagine what The Event actually entailed. A game where rich people got their rocks off. Blood, guts, and sacrifices. Death and dismemberment. Rape and terror.
These people had to die. He knew it for sure. This wasn't a call to the police. The Blooms, and everybody else who had a hand in these proceedings, had to be taken out. A bullet through the back of the head would be too kind.
The Event needed to be cancelled forever.
I'm going to end this massacre myself. I'll never be safe otherwise. No one will ever be safe until they're sleeping under six feet of earth.
The helicopter landed.
The engine was shut off.
A goon instructed, "Follow us, and shut your mouth. The sooner you get to where you're going, the sooner you get to take off that hood."
David was hoisted out of his seat. He stepped onto what felt like a helipad. Then he was stamping through sand. The air was desert-hot. Could this be Arizona or Mexico?
No time to think.
The ground dipped. Gates opened. He was walking on solid concrete. There was shelter over his head. Gates closed behind him. A hermetic door gave a sharp hiss. He crossed the barrier. He was walking down a steep and very long set of stairs. He was deep underground. He was blasted by a wall of air conditioning. The buildup of sweat on his skin quickly turned into a cold gel.
"Keep moving. Pick it up. Make it a fast jog. In a straight line. Keep your chin up. Don't be a pussy. You're here. You're not going anywhere. You are theirs now. Get over it, buddy. If you don't, you'll be one of the first to die."
His feet banged against metal grates. He heard the slow build up of clapping and cheering. There was a throng of people up ahead. When he arrived in the same room as the voices, the crowd roared. This was a stadium where the home team had just taken the lead.
An announcer spoke into a sound system with the gusto and cheesiness of pay-per-view wrestling. "Brought to you by Luke Bloom, HERE IS DAVID SMITH!"
He was jogging forward blindly.
The announcer moved on to the next in line. "Brought to you by Marlow Bloom, HERE IS KAYLA CARSON!"
The roar was just as loud for Kayla as it was for him. Others names were being announced. Deron Fisher. Gabriel Hennings. Jane Patrick. Bruce Spiller. Gloria Pounder. More and more people came and went, and the crowd was loving it.
He was still jogging. Two goons were right behind him. David could move his legs, but without the full use of his arms, and the hood over his head, he was helpless. He had no idea if there were people nearby with guns ready to mow him down if he tried to escape.
The crowd's noise was gradually muffled by distance and barriers.
"Stop jogging. Walk. Keep it slow. You're not going anywhere, Mr. Smith. I got eyes on you everywhere. You're almost there. Then you can take that hood off and breathe easy. Then it'll be time to play."
His feet clopped against stone. A gate rattled ahead of him. Rusty hinges squealed.
"In you go, Mr. Smith."
The plastic twine over his wrists was cut. The hood was removed. He was shoved through a threshold. The gate behind him slammed closed.
"Walk straight down that corridor. The door will open automatically. When you enter, notice there are machine guns pointed at you. You do anything else except follow my simple ass instructions, you'll be executed. Notice the blood stains on your way. We mean it. We will kill you for disobedience. Just go straight and enter the doors until you meet up with the rest of the group. Now get your feet moving!"
David did as he was told. He observed the wild spatters of blood on the cinder block wall and concrete floor. There was even shreds of pulped guts. He could pictures dozens of bullets cutting up someone.
He continued down long straight hallway after long straight hallway until he met a glass wall. It opened like a grocery store's automatic door. He entered and kept moving. One more glass door later, and he could see them standing in place. Hundreds of people were crowded together. And David Smith would be one more to add to the numbers.
He entered the expansive room crammed tight with persons dressed in the same garb as him. The air was warm and humid without any ventilation. The final glass door behind him was covered in beads of condensation. The urge to turn around, seek an exit, and bust out of the place was overpowering.
The group were standing rigidly in place. They were afraid to move, speak, or act on any impulse. Nobody said a word to each other. They were prisoners. Even the men and women nearest him avoided him. They were that scared.
There were long nozzles sticking out of the walls. They looked like the barrels of machine guns. The head of the room appeared to be a giant garage door. At the left and right sides of the room were giant TV screens shielded by fencing. The screens were black.
He wanted to speak to the group. He had a thousand questions to ask.
Hands grabbed him from behind and startled him.
"Hey, what the hell?"
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you. Please, don't hurt me. My name is Kayla Carson. We need to talk. I heard them call your name ahead of me. They said you're from the Bloom family. So am I. We need to help each other. I haven't talked to anybody sane in at least two weeks. Please."
Kayla's face was slick with sweat. She had blonde hair put back in ponytail. The sides of her head were buzz cut. She had a toned and tight physique. Kayla appeared to be in her early thirties. Both her eyes were wild in the sockets. They were begging him for compassion.
"Yes, of course. We should help each other. I'm David Smith. Sorry to meet you under these circumstances."
"Yeah, apologies all around. I don't think we have much time before it all begins. Do you know what's in the backpack they gave us?"
David forgot all about the backpack. He slung it forward and opened the side zipper. There wasn't much inside. Two twenty ounce bottles of water. He drank from one of the bottles immediately. His mouth was a
dry oasis. He drank half the first bottle and decided to save the rest for later.
He searched the contents and found three energy bars, a first aid kit loaded with gauze, band aids, rubbing alcohol, a needle and thread, and one mag flashlight. He imagined bashing it against somebody's skull.
With the water in his system and the flashlight/weapon, he started to feel slightly better about the situation. If feeling better was possible.
Kayla sorted the contents of her pack.
The contents were identical.
"Well, what now?"
He shrugged. "I don't know. These other people make me nervous. They're not talking. We better keep our voices down. I'm afraid they're going to turn against us, or I don't know what."
Kayla's eyes scanned the room. She didn't like what she was seeing either.
"They've been through the same hell we've been through. I'm sure they saw their loved ones get killed. They got everything over us. What I see in their eyes is what I feel."
"And how do you feel?"
"Like I'm about to be executed."
She pointed at the side walls. "What's with the TV screens?"
"No idea. It's all a part of the fun, I guess."
"Their fun. Not ours."
A new man entered the room after the glass door opened and closed automatically. He was a terrified butter ball with gray hair. He was panting out of breath. His face was bright red and oozing sweat. The man would prove helpful to their situation.
"Who are you?" David asked. "You know something about all of this, you better spill it, and make it quick."
The persons in the room suddenly turned their attention to the single man.
The man wasn't bothered by the attention.
"You won't be happy with what I have to say. You people will hate me. Hear me out. Please. I can help you. I'm the only one who can."
"Why's that?" Kayla snapped. "I think you're nervous for a different reason than the rest of us. Speak up."
"Listen to me." He raised his hands up in defense. "I mean no harm. I'm in the exact same shit you are. My name is Niles Backwater. I used to be on the other side of things. I put my money down like the rest of them to enjoy this show. I forced innocent people like you into the game. They kicked me out of their club, you see. Things are progressing too fast. These people, they're in over their heads. They'll expose themselves. They're making horrible decisions. The Event is getting too big for its own good. I couldn't stand by quietly and let it happen.
