Popcorn
Page 22
In the siege room the shot still resonated.
“You bastard! When will this end!” Bruce had rushed over and was holding Velvet, who sobbed hysterically, still handcuffed to the lampstand beside her dead mother.
“You saw the ratings, man. They went up. Blame the couch potatoes.”
“You hypocritical swine!” Bruce shouted. “You killed her — no one else did! What is it you’re saying? That the media, the public, is responsible for the fact that you’re a murdering lunatic?”
“I’m just saying I wouldn’ta shot her if people hadn’t switched to The Simpsons.”
“You are responsible!”
“Yes. I’m responsible for me, but you are responsible for you and they are responsible for them. I don’t see anyone doing much about that. I’ve got an excuse, I’m a psycho. What’s your get-out?”
Kirsten received a message from the producer. She turned to Bill. “Get down! There’s a SWAT team coming in!”
“No!” Wayne shouted into the camera.
Above them they could hear the sound of the roof being breached. Wayne grabbed Scout by the hand, and addressed the camera. “Wait! Hold it. I’ll give myself up, Scout too, I swear. Stop the attack. Keep the cameras rolling. We’ll give up.”
Outside, Chief Cornell signalled that his forces should pause. Was it possible that they could get out of this nightmare without further bloodshed?
Wayne continued to shout at the camera. “But we give ourselves up to the people. The people are responsible. They decide our fate, the fate of everybody in this room.” He had hold of the ratings computer now. “It’s up to you, the people out there…the lives of us all are in your hands. Here’s how it is. When I’ve finished talking, if everybody watching switches off their TV, I swear me and Scout will walk out of here with our hands up…But if you keep on watching, I will kill every last mutha in this room, including myself and Scout. Not a bad show, huh? Exciting, right? And to see it, all you have to do is stay tuned for another few seconds. Well, you’re responsible. Are you gonna turn off your TV?”
THIRTY-NINE
INTERIOR. THE LOUNGE. DAY.
Wide shot. The room eerily still. Wayne stands with Scout before the television camera. In one hand he carries his weapon, in the other the ratings computer.
Close-up on Wayne from the TV camera’s point of view. Grainy, video-style quality to the picture.
WAYNE: (Snarling into camera)
I said, are you gonna turn off your TVs?
Whip pan down from Wayne’s distorted face to the ratings computer. Picture turns to sudden hard focus. We see what is clearly some kind of graph climbing. Wide shot of room. Wayne hurls the computer to the ground.
WAYNE: (Shouting)
No you ain’t!
Cut to…
INTERIOR. THE TV CONTROL TRUCK. DAY.
Chief Cornell and the others are watching Wayne on the screens. Fast jagged, staccato zoom on to Wayne’s image on one of the screens. Mid two shot of Cornell and the SWAT commander.
CHIEF CORNELL
Take him.
EXTERIOR. THE ROOF OF THE MANSION. DAY.
SWAT officers blast their way through.
Jump cut to…
EXTERIOR. A WINDOW OF THE MANSION. DAY.
SWAT officers swing through windows on abseiling ropes, smashing glass.
Jump cut to…
INTERIOR. OUTSIDE THE LOUNGE DOOR AT THE TOP OF THE STAIRWAY INSIDE THE MANSION. DAY.
SWAT officers smash door down.
Jump cut to…
INTERIOR. THE LOUNGE. DAY
Extreme wide shot. Wayne and Scout at centre.
Mute sound. Slow motion.
SWAT officers burst through the windows and doors. Wayne and Scout open fire.
A little later the room was filled with strange green figures. Green jump suits, green rubber boots and gloves, green face masks. The green figures were tracing the outlines of the dead. One of them tried to draw a line around Wayne. The chalk made little impression on the sticky swamp of congealing blood in which his body lay. The green man tried using some white tape but nothing much sticks to blood soaked shag pile.
The whole room was alive with flashing light, the effect was almost stroboscopic. Hundreds and hundreds of photographs were being taken for further analysis. The contorted features of the corpses flickered in brief moments of glorious illumination. Their grotesquely twisted limbs seemed almost to twitch in the jaggedly pulsating light.
Hundreds of bullets and cartridge cases were being tweezered from the floor, more prized from the walls. Hairs were plucked from clothing, bloodied thumb prints carefully preserved. The green men and women missed nothing. A pair of pink Doc Martens, freckled with a few spots of blood, were photographed where they lay then placed in a plastic bag marked LAPD. Lab. Likewise a can of hair mousse, a pair of panty hose, a tiny glass, miraculously still upright and containing a splash of crème de menthe.
There was little point in this forensic zeal. Everyone knew who’d killed whom, who had died and who had survived. The whole thing had been captured on television and would shortly be available on video in all good stores.
There is however a process and the green figures had a job to do. A full inquiry into the events of that terrible Oscar night had already been promised. The authorities were anxious to show that, despite everything, they remained in control.
Outside Bruce’s house the survivors were carried away in screaming ambulances. Other ambulances waited for the dead.
EPILOGUE
Bruce survived Wayne and Scout’s bloody confrontation with the officers of the law but his career never recovered from the terrible events for which many felt he was partly responsible. He now makes tired, cynical movies in France. He has written a book about the night Wayne and Scout entered his life, called Who Is Responsible?. In it he divides the blame equally between Wayne and Scout, the media, the police and the millions of people who did not turn off their TVs.
Brooke died of her wounds. Her parents subsequently claimed that by pursuing a selfish debate, rather than making the simple statement Wayne had asked him to make, Bruce denied Brooke proper medical care for the vital period in which she could have been saved. They hold him responsible and are in the process of suing him.
Bill and Kirsten both died in the police assault. Their families now claim that as they were both employees of the television companies there was a duty of care and that the companies are therefore responsible for their deaths. Both families are currently suing the networks. They are also suing the police, whom they hold responsible for not intervening earlier. In a separate claim they are again suing the police, whom they also hold responsible for intervening when they did.
Velvet was also killed in the crossfire. During a memorial service at her school, her principal reminded the congregation that society had a responsibility to protect young people like Velvet and had failed to do so. Her grandparents are investigating the possibility of suing the estates of Wayne and Scout. In the largest single claim in history, they are also suing the millions of people who did not turn off their TVs, who they feel are also responsible.
Many of the people who did not turn off their TVs have formed themselves into action groups, claiming that they have experienced anxiety, stress and mental torment as a result of the terrible moral dilemma that the TV companies allowed them to be put in. They hold the TV companies responsible and are pursuing claims for damages.
The TV companies are currently lobbying for more specific guidelines on how to act under similar circumstances. They claim that, in the final analysis, only government can be responsible for how public amenities operate. They have announced that they will attempt to offset losses resulting from claims made against them by taking action against Congress and Capitol Hill.
Police Chief Cornell and News and Current Affairs Chief Murray both lost their jobs as a result of the débâcle and hold each other responsible. Murray claims that Cornell should have taken
charge of the situation and ended the siege sooner. Cornell claims that Murray should have denied the killers the oxygen of publicity which precipitated the final drama. In private lawsuits they are suing each other for loss of earnings.
Wayne Hudson’s family are currently pursuing the Department of Welfare. They claim that it was early neglect of Wayne’s problems by social workers that was responsible for turning him bad. They assert that it was clear that they were bringing Wayne up inadequately, and feel he should have been taken into care. They are suing.
Scout’s family are also suing the Department of Welfare. They claim that constant intervention by social workers when Scout was younger left her insecure and easily influenced. They claim she should not have been taken into care and are suing.
On Capitol Hill, in the aftermath of the bloodbath, the Republicans claimed that the liberal values perpetrated by the Democrats were responsible.
The Democrats blamed Republican opposition to gun control.
Scout survived the gunfight and was eventually sent to a secure mental hospital, where she has discovered religion. She feels that the Almighty does all things for a purpose, and that in the long run God is responsible.
So far no one has claimed responsibility.
THE END
Table of Contents
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
THIRTY
THIRTY-ONE
THIRTY-TWO
THIRTY-THREE
THIRTY-FOUR
THIRTY-FIVE
THIRTY-SIX
THIRTY-SEVEN
THIRTY-EIGHT
THIRTY-NINE
EPILOGUE