by P. D. Martin
Harris nods. “I want you two to stay here.” He looks at Darren and Stone. “I’ll assign these names to someone else.” He moves toward the door.
“Do you want me to wait?” I call after him, hoping he’ll say no. I don’t think it’s a good idea to keep Jonathan waiting for too much longer. He’s calmer now, but leave him by himself for more than five minutes and that will probably change.
“No. Go ahead.”
“Thanks.”
I enter the room. “Sorry, about that, Jonathan. I needed to get someone on those names, to start contacting the relatives.”
“Families. You won’t find much.”
“Really?” I sit down again and Jonathan follows suit.
He nods. “That’s one of the things that first made me suspicious. We were all from nonexistent or dysfunctional families. I started thinking maybe it was no coincidence. Plus we were missing the real high achievers. No lawyers, no scientists. It didn’t sit right with me.”
I nod. Jonathan sure as hell is smart. Lucky for the others, and for us. If Jonathan hadn’t been suspicious, hadn’t escaped, it’s quite possible we’d never track down the killers. Most of our leads have turned into dead ends—just what the perps want. But Jonathan is no dead end.
“Let’s pick it up from the helipad. What did the pilot look like?”
“The pilot was Chester.”
I wonder how many registered helicopter pilots there are in the U.S. “So he left the limo there?”
“Yeah, he parked it in a garage and then blindfolded us. He said the bunker location was secret, and it seemed plausible at the time.”
“What was the area like? I presume it wasn’t an airport.”
“No. It looked like a factory or warehouse. I didn’t see anyone else around.”
“How long was the flight?”
“About two hours.”
“The Mojave Desert.” I know this is where they must have been held, where some of them are still being held, but I still verbalize it.
Jonathan shrugs. “It was definitely desert, but I don’t know if it was the Mojave Desert or not.”
“So what happened after you landed?”
“Chester took our blindfolds off and pointed us in the direction of the bunker entrance, a trapdoor in the sand. It needed a code to open it—5413. He must have taken off after we went down.”
“And what did you find inside?”
“We climbed down a series of ladders until we got to the bottom and a long tunnel.”
I’m immediately reminded of my vision of tunnels.
Jonathan continues. “At the end of the corridor was another door, but before that was an electronic gate and a conveyor belt. Like you see at the airport.”
“Sounds expensive.”
“The place would have cost a fortune to set up. The technology and construction were both intense.”
I nod.
Jonathan moves on. “When we went through the last door and into the bunker the others were waiting for us.”
“All of them?”
“Yes. Susie and I were the last to arrive. Once we were in, the door shut and locked behind us. We were trapped down there.”
I control a shudder. Trapped underground and being picked off by serial killers one by one—not a nice way to go. I’m not sure if it was better or worse that they had no idea of their predicament.
“What was it like in the bunker?”
“There were six rooms—a large central room containing the living and kitchen areas, two bedrooms, a bathroom, a separate toilet and a soundproof room they called the blue room. The walls were earth with some concrete and the ceiling had steel girders across it. The cameras and a few lights were mounted on the steel girders. Later we found some hidden cameras—spycams.
“It was real basic. Milk crates for seats, a trunk as a table, camping gear in the kitchen. The kitchen also had a large ceramic sink and a pump hooked up for running water.”
I keep taking notes, and check that the Dictaphone is still rolling as Jonathan continues.
“The two bedrooms were small, each with four army cots. The bathroom had another sink with a pump and water outlet, and a small makeshift shower cubicle. The toilet was simply a camping-style pit toilet.”
I nod and keep scribbling summary notes. Once my hand catches up, I ask him the next question. “How did they communicate with you?”
“There was a speaker in the bunker that a voice came over, but most of the communication was through Chester.”
“So he came back?”
“Oh, yeah. He was responsible for the challenges.”
“Challenges?”
“Like on other reality shows—the winner got immunity and was safe from the vote. Safe inside the bunker.” He shakes his head. “Talk about a double meaning. That voice, that creepy voice over the speaker, I knew there was something about the way he said safe. There was more to it, you know? Like he was in on some joke.”
“Was it Chester’s voice?”
Jonathan is silent for a moment, thinking. “It’s hard to tell. The voice was run through some sort of computer distortion program, so it sounded computerized. It was deep though.”
“Chester’s voice is deep?”
“Yeah, you could say that.”
I look at him questioningly, waiting for him to expand.
“His voice is real deep and gravelly, like he’s just had ten shots of whisky and chain-smoked a pack of cigarettes…on two hours’ sleep.”
I can’t help but let out a little snort at Jonathan’s description. “I get the picture.” I smile. “What does he look like?”
“He’s African-American, about six feet five, and built like a brick house. But to tell you the truth, before I realized what was going on, I thought he was kinda nice.” Jonathan shakes his head. “Guess it was all part of the act.”
“Probably. Although it’s possible he was following orders. Who knows what’s going on behind the scenes.”
“True. Anyway, his head was shaved smooth and shiny and he wore a gold earring in his left ear.”
“We’ll get you together with a sketch artist later today. Hopefully we’ll get a match.”
“You’re thinking Chester has a criminal record?”
“He could do. We might get an ID from the sketch, but at the very least we can circulate it to the LAPD and a few other areas for them to keep an eye out for him.”
“Okay.”
“So, then what happened?”
“Not much. We sat on our asses and waited for the challenges. It was pretty boring. In between we’d read, talk to each other, and sometimes we looked for cameras. That’s when we found the spy-cams.”
“Tell me about the challenges.”
“They always held them on Wednesdays. It was our only way of knowing what day it was, especially with no light down there, no way of knowing when it was nighttime.”
“What about watches?”
He shakes his head. “They weren’t allowed.” He pauses. “Whoever won the challenge had immunity. Then we all went to the blue room and told the viewers—” he makes air quotes “—who we thought should go that week, and why. Then they announced who was voted out and that person had to leave the bunker immediately.”
The bodies were found Fridays. Fits with the first three victims perfectly.
“How did you know challenges were on Wednesdays?”
“The voice told us at the start. But you’re right, I guess it could have been a lie.”
“Wednesdays would correspond with the evidence.” I scribble down Wednesdays and then look up at Jonathan. “What were the challenges like?”
For the first time, Jonathan freezes up. Finally he speaks. “Some bad shit happened down there.”
“The challenges?”
He shudders. “The first one seemed pretty standard—a paintball challenge. But I thought the second one was cruel, personal. It was individual recordings we had to listen to over and over again, but they
were nasty.”
“Is that when you became suspicious?”
“Partly. I guess it was a gradual thing. The challenges got progressively worse and that didn’t sit right, but I still didn’t know what was going on. We still could have been on TV, but maybe it was like The Truman Show and the joke was on me. Susie is an actress, and I wouldn’t have put it past her to be a conspirator, as a career move.” He puts his hand protectively on the laptop. “And then came the food challenge. It was for reward this time, and the reward was a pizza and a six-pack of beer. Both very tempting.”
“I can imagine,” I say, remembering the way Jonathan devoured the doughnut.
“Danny won and he actually shared some of his winnings with us, which surprised the shit out of us, because he was pretty much an ass. But then we all got sick. Food poisoning. Danny was real bad.”
“You think it was intentional?”
“At the time it crossed my mind. But I dismissed it. Thought I was being paranoid.”
“But now?”
“Now I’m sure those bastards did it on purpose.”
I’m inclined to agree with Jonathan. The killers have been playing with the contestants all along, and food poisoning would fit. Another form of torture.
“Then, I think maybe they knew I was suspicious or something, because the next challenge was an isolation chamber, only I got different treatment than the others. They wanted me out of the bunker. All of us were light-deprived, but when I was inside my chamber, I had blasts of bright white lights.”
“It’s a form of torture.”
“Yup, I know. But when I came out, everyone else thought I’d been hallucinating, and I started to believe them.” He lets out a small snort. “Susie calls me the great conspiracy theorist. And, I have to admit, I do get carried away sometimes.”
“Enough to doubt your feelings this time?”
He nods. “Enough to think that my instincts were just paranoia.” He grabs my hand, switching from reflection to desperation in an instant. “You’ve got to find them. We’ve got to find that bunker. If it wasn’t for those fucking blindfolds!” He stands up and his chair is thrown backward and over by the force.
I’m not alarmed. Having been through it myself, I know exactly what Jonathan’s experiencing. I don’t expect him to be calm and rational, certainly not all the time. And mood changes are natural as his mind cycles through the multitude of emotions—from disbelief and shock, to anger. At least he’s experiencing them all. It’s a helluva lot better than shutting down.
He looks at me. “Fuck, I wish I knew where that damn bunker was.”
We all wish he knew where the bunker was, but I don’t say that. “Tell me what happened after you got voted out.”
Jonathan tenses. “I said my goodbyes and left Susie and Clair in the bunker.”
I nod.
He takes a seat. “Waiting on the surface was a woman and the chopper. She said she was with the show, but there was something about her that was off.”
“Off how?” I ask, but already I’m assuming Jonathan met Malcolm’s killer, the femme fatale. I can imagine her predator eyes feasting on Jonathan’s innocence.
“She was very—” He stops and is silent.
I complete the picture for him. “She was hitting on you.”
“Yes.” He seems relieved that he didn’t have to say it himself.
“What does she look like?”
“She’s got black hair, about shoulder length, with a wave and bits falling onto her face. She’s about Susie’s height, so that makes her five-seven, and she’s in good shape. Attractive and very sexy. I’d place her in her thirties.”
I nod. It matches the vague descriptions we’ve got on her from the VICAP files, and my impression of the woman, too. “What was she wearing?”
“Black leather pants and a tight T-shirt with a Super Girl emblem on it.”
The sexualized clothes—part of her look, and part of the profile. “Did you respond to her advances?”
“Not really. I was confused. And to be honest, her actions made me even more suspicious.”
I look at Jonathan. “Why?”
He smiles. “Well, maybe I don’t hang out in the right circles, but in my experience, beautiful female strangers don’t tend to hit on me. Let’s face it, I’m not exactly model material.”
“Okay.” I scribble on my notepad. “So what happened?”
“We got into the chopper.”
“Was Chester the pilot?”
“I’m not sure. I couldn’t see the pilot this time. The chopper was facing away from us when I crawled out of the bunker, and there was a divider between the cabin and the pilot area.”
It strikes me that if Chester was the pilot, he was hiding his identity not from Jonathan but from the female killer.
“Both the woman and I had to put blindfolds on.”
“So chances are she doesn’t know where the bunker is either.”
“I thought it odd at the time, but she said only a couple of people on the show knew the actual location.” He laughs, a cynical chuckle. “That they didn’t want a leak and the press or fans descending on the location.”
“How long was the chopper ride back?”
He shrugs. “After weeks in the bunker, my sense of time is shot. I don’t have a clue.”
“Take a guess. Do you think it was more like fifteen minutes or three hours?”
“Two hours, maybe.” He fidgets and his voice is uncertain. They really did a number on him.
“What did you and the woman talk about during the flight?”
“Not much. For most of it we didn’t talk, but when we did, we talked about the bunker. The other contestants, the challenges, you know. She told me how much she hated Danny and how we were all saints for putting up with him for so long.”
“Did she say anything that sounded strange? That made you suspicious again?”
“No. In fact, it felt very natural. She’d stopped with the aggressive come-on, and we were just chatting.”
“And you landed…?”
He’s already told the cops this part of the story, but I want to hear it again, and in his words.
“Some fancy house. Big house, helipad, fountain at the entrance. The chopper took off and we went inside.”
A fountain? A blurry memory of my dream about Cindy surfaces. I saw her run past a fountain. I focus on Jonathan again. “And then?”
“She said we’d chill at the house for a day or two, before a camera crew and the show’s psychologist arrived to debrief me. Then they’d take me to a live TV appearance on Letterman.”
“You believed her?”
“I didn’t know what to think at that point.”
I nod. “Go on.”
“We sat down and she brought out a six-pack of beers. Man, I wanted that beer.”
Back to her MO. Get the victim drunk, vulnerable. And given Jonathan hadn’t had anything to drink for a few weeks and hardly anything to eat, it wouldn’t have taken much.
He continues. “We chatted while we drank and she got flirty again, but not so aggressive. I guess I liked the attention.” He hangs his head in shame, but I don’t know why. Not many men, particularly single men, would resist the attention of a beautiful woman.
“So then what happened?”
“We kissed some but I was still uneasy, something felt wrong. So I quizzed her about the show, but she didn’t like it one little bit. Eventually she got real pissed at me. She started muttering something about none of the others having this problem. I knew something was off, but I truly didn’t believe my life was in danger. Didn’t know the others were…dead.” He gulps and his large Adam’s apple bobs up and down. “I mean, there are conspiracy theories and then there’s this.” He shakes his head. “It’s…evil. I never believed in that word until now.”
I nod, I’ve believed in evil for years. “What happened next?”
“She pulled out a gun.” He takes a deep breath. “And I could tell she
got off on the shocked expression on my face. She held the gun on me and had the gall to tell me that it would have been better if she’d been fucking me. That’s when she told me how it all went down. That she was part of a group called the Murderers’ Club and that the president had recruited them from chat rooms and set this whole thing up.” His hands clench into fists. “She told me that after each immunity challenge, the members of the club voted someone off, and then that person—” he gulps again “—that person was auctioned off to the highest bidder in the Murderers’ Club.” He pauses. “I still can’t believe it.”
“That’s a natural reaction, Jonathan. Most victims of crimes find it hard to accept that it’s happened to them. And this one is so…so bizarre that it does seem surreal. Too evil to be possible.” I use his choice of word: “evil.”
“Well, with a gun pointed at me, I didn’t feel like I had many options. Part of me was still waiting for someone to pop out and tell me I’d been Punk’d, but I guess part of me knew. My survival instinct took over. I still can’t believe I did it.” He puts his head in his hands, disturbed by his own actions as much as by those of the members of the club. “I mean, I’m not a killer. I don’t believe in war, or guns, or any of that stuff.”
He’s silent for a little while, and I let him sit with his thoughts before prompting him again. “What happened?”
He sighs again. “First I tried to talk my way out. I told her that if I was going to die, I’d rather fuck a beautiful woman first. She hesitated and came real close to me. Like she was going to start kissing me again.” He stood up. “I was standing near the wall, and she was only about a foot away from me. I thought she was falling for it, but then she declined the offer. Once she did that, I knew I had to act fast. I thought I probably only had seconds left to live. I didn’t think much of Danny Jensen, but I’ve got him to thank for my life.”
“How so?”
