Laura was distraught, blaming herself for what happened although it wasn’t her fault. Her parents came to pick her up and bring her home. Captain Garcia had the unenviable task of bringing Jason’s Explorer back home and telling Bill and Edith Hunter that their son had been kidnapped again. Laura had also called Daniel as Jason had asked her. Daniel and his fellow band members were devastated by the news. They couldn’t rehearse as planned. Instead they vowed to do whatever it would take to find Jason. It was time to put Jason’s Network on the task of saving its creator.
Chapter 21
Cruel Retribution
(Saturday Evening and Sunday)
After Laura had driven off and Jason was knocked out and taken prisoner, Brice and Derrick moved quickly to get him restrained and moved over to the underground cistern. Jason’s wrists were handcuffed behind his back, his ankles bound with a piece of rope, and his mouth was gagged with a piece of duct tape. Brice helped lift Jason up and over Derrick’s shoulder. They had both wrapped their boots in plastic bags to obscure any footprints. Derrick carried Jason out the back door, down to the trail by the culvert, and over to the cement fence.
Earlier that day, they had placed a twelve-foot collapsible ladder over the cement fence. When they arrived there, Brice climbed over to the other side and then helped Derrick bring the still unconscious Jason over the fence. When they were on the other side, the ladder was lifted off and collapsed. After Jason was brought inside the cistern, Derrick went back and retrieved the ladder. He next went back outside to move Brice’s car from where he had left it on San Anselmo Avenue into a neighborhood several blocks away.
Now it was a question of waiting out the inevitable police response and for Jason to regain consciousness so that they could begin Roland Thomason’s plan for revenge. Brice puttered around with the video equipment and lights while Derrick decided to relax on the cot in his tent. He took a few practice shots of Jason to double check that the equipment was working.
When Jason regained consciousness, a few hours later, he found himself lying face up on the floor of the underground tank. He could feel the metal cuffs on his wrists behind his back. His arms were somewhat numb from the weight of his body lying on them. He looked down and saw that his ankles were tied together with a piece of rope. He could feel the adhesive on his mouth from the duct tape gag. As he looked around the cistern, he could see that he had been taken to some sort of underground tank with metal walls and floor. There was dim battery powered lighting. Jason looked around and noticed that the underground tank had been set up with all kinds of portable camping equipment and what appeared to be a tripod with a camera. Over in a distant part of the tank he noticed two men, the ones who had grabbed him after the exchange for Laura.
Jason started to struggle with his restraints. He tried to sit himself up, but was still a little disoriented. The restraints around his wrists and ankles didn’t make things any easier. Eventually his captors noticed Jason’s struggles. They both came over to him. Derrick had a pistol in his hand.
Brice pulled the tape off of Jason’s mouth and said, “I am going to release you now. Don’t even think of trying to resist or escape or Derrick will blow your brains out!” Jason lay there passively as Brice unlocked the cuffs binding his wrists and untied the rope around his ankles. Then he sat up on the floor. Derrick offered him a few sips of water from a plastic bottle.
“Who are you and where have you taken me?” Jason asked. “Why have you kidnapped me? I have never seen either of you before.”
“All of that will be told to you in due time,” Brice responded cryptically. “Soon you will be asked to stand up and deliver. Now I am going to give you a chance to use the porta-potty over there before we begin.”
After Jason relieved himself, he was guided at gunpoint over to the wall of the cistern where Brice had installed hardware fittings. Jason was made to stand face out from the wall. Each of his wrists was manacled to fittings on the wall on either side of where he was standing. Likewise, his ankles were tied to other fittings with pieces of rope. When Jason was secured and helpless, Brice went over to the tripod where he had set up the video camera and pressed record.
Brice came back to where Jason was and looked him over from head to foot. Then without warning, he made a fist and punched Jason in the gut as hard as he could. Jason shouted out in pain from the unexpected blow.
“Jason Hunter, welcome to the rest of your life!” Brice said. “You are about to be taken on a very painful journey to your death! All of this courtesy of Roland Thomason!”
“Roland Thomason!” Jason said in a surprised voice. “I thought he was in prison.”
“He is, thanks to you,” Brice replied, “and now he is getting even for what you did to him.”
“What I did to him,” Jason said shaking his head. “Roland Thomason is in jail because of what he did to the teenagers at Camp Chinquapin, including those two boys he and Walter Gaither were torturing to death in his illegal prison!”
“Shut up!” Brice ordered as he punched Jason again, this time in the face. “I don’t want to hear your excuses.”
“It’s the truth, not an excuse,” Jason answered bravely.
“I don’t want to hear another word out of you!” Brice retorted with a third punch to Jason’s gut. “I’d gag you right now, but we want to hear the sounds of your screams as we beat you senseless!”
“Yeah, you are real brave, beating up someone bound hand and foot who can’t even try to fight back!” Jason said fighting back the pain.
“Just keep it up, punk!” Brice said. “Let’s see how defiant you are in a couple of days when you have to beg me for a drink of water, a bit of food, or the chance to take a pee.” Then Brice and Derrick took turns punching and beating up Jason.
Jason was in agony as his body absorbed blow after blow from Brice and Derrick. Eventually to survive, his mind just tuned the pain out and he closed his eyes in a netherworld state. When Brice realized that Jason was going unconscious on him again, he told Derrick “enough” and stood in front of Jason. He grabbed Jason’s chin and shook his face. Jason opened an eye half way. His other eye was blackened from an earlier punch.
“This was just the first of many beatings you will receive,” Brice said in a low, cruel voice. “Eventually you will beg me to kill you!”
Jason just shook his head in disbelief. How had his life come to this? The only positive thing going through his head was the thought that at least he had saved Laura from these brutal men. He wanted to say something, but decided against it. In a minute it didn’t matter anyway, because Brice taped his mouth shut again with a strip of duct tape.
A couple of hours passed by. It was now past eight o’clock and getting dark outside. Derrick told Brice, “I want to get out of here and get something to eat before the restaurants close. Plus it would be a good idea to move our cars again. I need to get out of this hell hole, even if it is only for a little while.”
Reluctantly Brice agreed. He was unsure about leaving Jason alone, even though he was beaten and secured to the wall. But Brice was getting hungry also, and the thought of a properly cooked meal instead of campground food had appeal. Before they left, he went over to Jason and checked his restraints. Jason was in a semi-conscious state, occasionally making groaning sounds, but not struggling with his restraints, which were still solidly in place.
Brice and Derrick walked up the ramp in the cistern to the entry hatch, opened it, exited, and closed it. They sidled down the edge of the cement fence until they reached a neighborhood street on the other side of the culvert (which was underground in the neighborhoods). The two conspirators decided to take Derrick’s car after they moved Brice’s car again to a different location. They figured that there might be a police bulletin about the black Dodge sedan.
When Brice and Derrick returned to the cistern ninety minutes later, they decided that they had done enough for one day with their prisoner, Jason. Besides Derrick had picked up a twelve-pack of
beer, so they worked on that before retiring for the evening. Brice did go over to Jason with the camera and took some video of him. He figured that Roland would enjoy seeing Jason suffering by himself as their helpless captive, after all the time that his older brother had spent in prison. Then Brice just decided to leave Jason where he was. Bruised and hurting, Jason passed in and out of consciousness all through the night.
The next morning Brice and Derrick got up and had a leisurely breakfast. Brice deliberately cooked some bacon and eggs on the little camp stove, just to torture Jason more with the smell of food.
Then it was time to deal with Jason. Brice went over to him, untied his ankles and then released his wrists from the handcuffs. Upon his release, Jason fell to the floor, partly because he had lost his balance and partly in relief from being strung up for such a long time. Brice reached down and pulled off Jason’s gag.
“It’s time for us to have another conversation,” Brice told Jason. “But first do you have any needs?”
Groggy and disoriented, Jason replied, “Water. Water, please. And a little food. I haven’t eaten since yesterday morning.”
Brice’s response was to slap Jason hard across his face. Jason flinched and cried out in pain. “When you talk to me,” Brice told him in a mean sounding voice, “you will call me ‘Sir’!”
Jason looked back at Brice, still smarting from the slap. “Water please, Sir,” he said in a low, wavering voice.
“That’s better,” Brice replied somewhat smugly. He gave Jason a bottle of water and allowed Jason to take some sips of water. Then he brought over a power bar and gave it to Jason to eat. After allowing Jason to use the porta-potty, Derrick and Brice guided Jason back to the wall and attached his wrists to the handcuffs. Brice turned on the video camera.
Coming back over to Jason, Brice started the so-called conversation by saying, “So what do you have to say for yourself, Jason?”
“I am just a teenager who tries to enjoy life and help others when I can. I still don’t understand why that merits a death sentence in your world….Sir,” Jason added “Sir” at the last minute to avoid being hit again.
“I told you that this is being done for my brother, as revenge for what you did to him,” Brice replied. “Can’t you get that through your thick head!”
Jason then looked over at Derrick. “Why are you doing this? I don’t know you and I never did anything to harm you.”
“Nothing personal,” Derrick replied. “To me you are just another side of beef to be processed. And this job pays really well.”
Jason shook his head at that response. He remembered some of the stories that Cody had told him about his imprisonment at the hands of Roland Thomason and Walter Gaither, and what little regard they had for human life. He realized that it would be futile to argue with them. Any response he gave that contained the truth about events at Camp Chinquapin, his life or beliefs, or the unfairness of what was happening would only be met with contempt on the part of his captors. Clearly their plan was to slowly torture him until he died. Jason knew that his only hope for survival now would be to try and last as long as he could and hope that the outside world could somehow find him before he was killed.
Jason’s sudden silence made Brice angry. This wasn’t playing well on the video. “What do you have to say for yourself, punk?” he asked Jason angrily.
“I really have nothing more to say. Clearly we live in different worlds that don’t relate to each other,” Jason said. He realized that he was going to get hit for what he said and not saying ‘sir’ but he didn’t care any more. Jason was now in total survival mode. He steeled his body for the pain to come.
Brice and Derrick proceeded to give Jason another beating, although this one was a lot shorter because Jason wasn’t giving them the responses that they wanted. He basically tuned them out, absorbed the pain as best as he could, mentally trying to remember all of the things that Tim and Cody had told him about how they survived being the prisoners of Roland Thomason and Walter Gaither.
The next item in Roland’s plan of revenge was to put Jason in a stakeout, spread-eagled on the ground of the cistern, and attached to fittings that Brice had installed on the metal floor. Although stakeouts were normally done outside so that the victim could take the brunt of the hot sun’s rays, he still could do things like water torture with drips of hot or cold water, shine a bright lamp on him, or put crawling insects on him.
Brice taped Jason’s mouth with another piece of duct tape. After applying the gag, Brice released Jason from the manacles. Derrick helped him guide Jason down to the floor where the fittings were, and his arms and legs were bound in a spread-eagle. Although this was uncomfortable for Jason, it was still better than being attached to the wall. He had barely gotten any sleep last night, and soon he managed to doze off.
Brice realized that Jason had seemingly managed to win another round by falling asleep, but he was in the stakeout that Roland had asked for, so he just left Jason there for the time being. He took some pictures to document what happened. Roland was very specific on that. “Document everything that happens, no matter what. It’s part of the learning process of what humans are capable of in the face of adversity.” More of his psychobabble, Brice realized, but Roland was paying the bills and so he had no problem following simple directions like that.
It was just a matter of time before Jason would crack from the strain of his captivity. All Brice had to do was be patient until the breakdown occurred. No normal human could withstand the torture he had planned for Jason. Soon Jason would put on the pathetic begging show of a broken victim willing to humiliate himself for a sip of water, a bit of food, or the false hope that he could somehow save himself by doing every degrading thing he was told to do.
Brice looked forward to finishing his business with Jason. Then he could start having a good time with the money he was earning for torturing and killing one of his older brother’s enemies. That thought made Brice smile for the first time in a while. Jason Hunter could have his moments now, but in the long run, he would just be another dead body.
Brice went over to his tent, next to where Derrick was now relaxing in his tent. He decided to relax for a while more, and then maybe go outside and see how things were, and find out if there was any media coverage of Jason’s disappearance. It was always good to know what your adversaries were doing.
Chapter 22
Jason’s Network Fights Back
(Saturday)
Daniel had just finished getting dressed after a swim at the local YMCA where he had been working out with Eric, their usual Saturday morning activity of exercise and swimming when he checked his cell phone and listened to the message from Jason. Jason’s recorded words were like a punch to his gut.
“Eric!” Daniel yelled over to his friend and bass player in his band. “Laura is in trouble and Jason has gone after her. Listen to this message.” Daniel held his cell phone up to Eric’s ear and replayed Jason’s message.
“We have to help Jason,” Eric said after listening. “We can’t rehearse today. In fact we can’t do anything but help search until we know Laura and Jason are safe!”
“Yeah, you are right,” Daniel replied. “I don’t understand where this came from. We haven’t been working on anything lately other than our Jason’s Network assemblies and getting ready for the band tour.”
“Things were progressing real well,” Eric continued. “I think that we should go over to Tim’s anyway and meet with the other band members. You know they will want to help with the search also.”
“I’m glad that you drove today, Eric. Drive us over there while I get on the phone to the Whatever Foundation. I need to contact Henry Foster so that we can get an immediate message out to the Jason’s Network members in this area.
Eric and Daniel gathered up their things and hurried out to Eric’s van. Once inside, Daniel got on his cell phone and called the Whatever Foundation emergency number. Soon he was in touch with Jill Baines, the foundat
ion’s business manager, to let her know of the danger Jason was in, and Henry Foster, the Webmaster who had set up the Internet websites for Jason’s Network. They both readily agreed to do all they could to spread the word and rally local area network members to be on the alert. Henry said he would monitor the police band and information networks for any updates from their end. Daniel said that he would periodically call back with anything that he was able to find out.
Daniel had just finished talking to Henry when Laura called him, as she had promised Jason. Although Laura was near hysteria and wracked with guilt over what had just happened, Daniel was able to get most of her story before Captain Garcia needed to question her some more.
Daniel tried his best to reassure Laura. “What happened wasn’t your fault, Laura. This was some insidious plot to grab Jason. It’s because his love for you was go great that he would instantly drop whatever he was doing to go after you, and fall into someone’s trap. Please understand that I, the other band members and Jason’s many friends, the people in Jason’s Network, his foundation, and anyone who knows Jason will not stop until he is found. I will pass on the things you told me. Someone out there has to have seen something!”
When Eric and Daniel arrived at Tim’s house, the other band members were already there, listening to some practice recordings from recent rehearsals and their assemblies for Jason’s Network. Tim, Nick, and Jonathan vowed to do everything they could after hearing the shocking and sad news.
“You know we all owe our lives in some way to Jason,” Nick said, starting the conversation. “I thought we were actually in a very safe and pleasant time. You weren’t working on any cases we didn’t know about, were you, Daniel?”
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