by Brett McBean
On stage, under the lights, sweating and with nerves pulling at his gut, Marty Laffin realised then just how serious this situation was. He watched as the others in the group made their way to the entrances. He noticed they all carried similar bags.
Turning his eyes back to the madman on stage, Marty saw him wink.
“Just stay cool, okay?”
He then turned and faced the audience. “Good evening, television watchers. My name is Sam, although you all can call me Uncle Sam. If you all do as I say, you won’t get hurt. My family is currently presiding over all the exits, so if you wish to escape, I’m afraid you can’t. Not only are they locked, but if you do try, you will find yourselves on the wrong end of a bullet.”
All two hundred audience members gasped and turned to make sure he was telling the truth. Most began to cry when they saw the figures by the doors, bags by their feet, guns cradled in their hands.
Marty glanced up at the dark control room. He wondered why the hell the police hadn’t been called yet. And where in the hell were the security guards? He told himself he had to remain calm, do what these psychos wanted, and most of all, to try and save himself from these people.
“Ah…excuse me.” The meek voice came from the floor manager. He stepped away from the darkness. The plump man was wearing a fearful frown.
“Yes?” Sam said, smiling.
“I’ve, ah, got a message from…Shorty.”
“Is he on the headphones?”
The floor manager, Bill, nodded.
“Good. Tell him everything’s going to plan down here.”
Marty watched as Bill relayed the message.
“He said…same up here,” the floor manager said.
The man nodded.
“Hey! What’s going on here?” The call came from a man in the audience.
Marty wanted to shout to that man to shut up. But his mouth was so parched that, even if he did have the courage, he wouldn’t have been able to speak, anyway.
There was a long pause before the man said, “A cleansing.”
What does that mean? Marty wondered. And how did they get into the control room?
“Well, what do you want from us?”
Marty heard some of the audience whispering at him to keep quiet.
“That will all become clear soon,” the man answered. “But for now, let’s get this show back on the road. Shall we?”
He turned around and grinned broadly at Marty. “Shall we?”
Marty nodded slowly; he was having trouble breathing and he felt like he might faint.
“Ray! Slide!” the man called.
Two of the man’s cohorts came running up onto the stage. They looked young, perhaps in their late teens, and both were bald and carrying guns. That their faces looked so young and fresh was all the more frightening, considering the evil yet vacant gaze in their eyes.
The man still had his eyes fixed on Marty. “Do you keep your guests in the greenroom?”
Marty nodded.
“Where is that?”
“Ah, down there, through the back doors. Then go down the stairs and all the way to the end of the corridor. It’s the last door on your right.”
The man grinned a thank you.
Marty felt dismal for telling this man the location of the celebrities. But he figured that if he didn’t, they might very well kill him and find it anyway.
“Go,” the man ordered the two young followers.
They nodded and hurried off.
The man turned and faced the audience. “There’s nothing to fear. You are all in the hands of Uncle Sam now. Everything’s going to be all right.”
The man stopped talking. All became quiet. The theatre remained still until the faint popping of gunfire echoed up; four quick shots.
Shouts and cries spewed from the two hundred audience members. Disbelief hung in the air. That some of the most famous icons on this planet were dead, shot in a split moment, wasn’t fully comprehended by most people in the theatre. Included in those was Marty.
How can this be happening? Marty wondered.
But he told himself he had nothing to fear. He was one of the biggest talk show hosts in the world. His program was beamed to more countries than any other. He was so famous it was practically a protective shield.
I’m going to be all right, he thought.
That was why Marty Laffin wasn’t prepared for the sudden lunge by the man. In an instant, the man stabbed the knife into his jugular. Marty screamed from the intense pain. But the scream soon became gurgled as blood filled his throat.
He heard the screams of the audience and felt the blood pouring down his chest.
“Die you fucking pig. Die!”
Before Marty fell to the stage floor dead, he heard the shouts of the man’s posse. They cried out with joy, and Marty thought, amidst the whirl of suffering, that this was some sort of triumph. As if this was all a game to them.
The last passage Marty heard, as blood flowed from his throat, was the man crying out, “Death to television! Live in purity! Welcome to the game of survival!”
Part 2: The Game
1: (from the house of George and Francis Murly)
It was just an ordinary Friday night for George and Francis Murly. They had cooked up some popcorn, the old fashioned way in a pan with insalubrious amounts of oil, and were sitting on their old, tattered synthetic fiber couch with the tall electric fan blowing much needed air onto their aged faces. The T.V. was locked onto an umpteenth re-run of The Sound of Music.
“I’ll tell ya. This heat’s gonna be the death of me.”
“Oh go on,” Francis laughed. “It’s not that bad. You’re just an old grouch.”
“Am not,” George huffed, stuffing a large mouthful of popcorn into his mouth.
“I’ll tell you what will do you in. Eating too much popcorn all at once. You’ll choke.”
George huffed one more time and snatched up the remote. “I’m sick of this damn movie. Seen it, well, at least fifty times.”
“Oh you have not,” Francis chuckled and scooped a small amount of popcorn into her mouth. “You’ve seen it the same number of times as I have. About four or five.”
“That’s enough. I’m seeing what else is on.”
Francis shrugged and continued munching on the popcorn. She didn’t care, just as long as they had something decent to watch.
George flicked though various programs: movies, sports events, documentaries, before he stopped on channel six.
On screen was a scrawny, unkempt looking man. He was behind a desk and smiling a toothy smile. He nodded to somebody off the screen.
“Who on earth is that?” Francis gasped. “He looks dirty.”
“Be quiet,” George snapped. “I wanna listen.”
The camera panned to the rather haggard looking band leader, Dave Morrison. He cut the band off with a limp wave then leaned into the microphone. “And now. Heeeeeere’s Sammy.”
As the camera panned across the stage, settling on the man behind the desk, there was only the smallest amount of clapping. It was faint and sounded strange, echoing through the theatre. The man behind the desk smiled and joined in on the clapping. “Thank you, Dave.” He pulled the desk microphone closer. “Welcome, viewers, to…‘Who wants to be a Survivor!’” He raised his arms in a flailing manner. The few claps and whistles again filled the air. The camera remained positioned on the man.
“My name is Sam. I’ll be your host for the night. The old host, Marty Laffin, is dead. I punctured his throat with this knife.” He brought up a large, grimy knife. “Like this,” he said. He then mimed the way he stabbed Marty, rolling his eyes and lolling out his tongue as he mimicked the way Marty had looked as he died. Then he placed the knife onto the desk. “Well, I suppose you viewers want to know what this new show is all about. You heathens!” he bellowed.
The microphones around the studio just managed to pick up the response of numerous people, who also shouted the word, heathen.
> “Your religion is television! May you be scorned by our Lord and Saviour!”
Again, the mimicking from around the studio.
The man gestured with his hands for quiet. He gazed directly down the camera and said, “I am your only hope of salvation, people. Let us not be ruled by machine and propaganda, let us be free and live the truth of the way.”
He shook his head. “Before we begin tonight’s events, let me share with you, potential converts, videos of recent sacrifices that needed to be performed in order for us, human and fellow man, to be cleansed of the evil we call television.”
He nodded to somebody off camera.
The studio was replaced with a shaky image of a small house. It was night. Whoever was holding the camera was jogging up to a door. The sounds of laughing and whispering could be heard. Somebody, not the cameraperson, rang the doorbell and then somebody whispered for everybody to be quiet. The door soon opened and a young man answered with a look of utter surprise.
“What’s thi…” he managed to start before a horde of people, some looking no older than twenty, rushed past the camera and pushed their way into the house. There was a lot of hooting and laughing while the cameraperson ran down to join the others. The group had the man on the ground, along with a woman, and was tearing the unfortunate couple’s clothes off, yelling, “Heathens! Worshippers of evil!”
The camera remained focused while the two screaming people were stripped naked and tied with ropes to the legs of a table. In front of the camera were at least ten people and they were now all holding knives and guns. They whooped and shouted at the two bound and terrified people, and with the ever present eye of the camera, they proceeded to slice and stab at them for around five minutes. Finally, the carpet soaked with blood, and the couple gasping every last blood-filled breath, the gang shot the two people – the man in the head and the woman in the chest.
The camera followed as some of the gang dipped their fingers in the blood and wrote, all over the large television set: THIS IS EVIL and DEATH TO MASS MEDIA.
Lingering one last time on the severely butchered bodies, the screen went black.
The screen changed back to the bright lights of the studio and the man sat behind the desk sporting a maniacal frown. “Well, well, well,” Sam said. “How’d ya all like that?”
The sounds of mass crying could be heard in the theatre.
“Bill, ask Shorty if we’re still on the air.”
Bill talked into his earpiece, and then nodded.
“Good,” Sam said, grinning. “Good.”
“This is awful,” Francis huffed. “Turn it off George.”
“That looked so damned real,” George muttered. “Wonder what this show is?”
“It’s sick, that’s what it is. Some people have a sick sense of humor.”
“But that little bald guy is funny. In a peculiar sort of way.”
“Well I’m not watching it,” Francis said and stood up. “I’m going to bed.”
George waved at her to be quiet, and Francis huffed and marched out of the lounge room.
2: (from the house of the McGregor family)
Stewart McGregor knocked on the door of his parent’s room, waited for a few seconds, then stepped inside. His father looked up from his paperback and smiled.
“Hey, Stew. What is it?”
His mother still had her head buried in the folder of her current case.
“Mom, Dad,” he said.
His dad slipped off his reading glasses and frowned. “What’s the matter?”
“I think you both better come and look at this.”
The three of them walked into the lounge room, where the T.V. was still on. Stewart asked his parents to sit down on the couch and he took one of the chairs beside it. On the screen a bald man with a long, unwashed beard was sitting behind a desk.
“That looks like the Marty Laffin set,” Luke McGregor said.
“It is. Well, was,” Stewart corrected.
“What is all this?” Pam McGregor said. “What’s going on?”
“I think you’ll be interested in this,” Stewart told them both. “That man, he killed Marty Laffin. On screen. Right before the camera.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Luke chuckled.
“It’s the truth,” Stewart said solemnly.
Both Luke and Pam gazed at their twenty-year-old son. They saw it in his eyes.
“Oh my God,” Pam muttered. She flicked her eyes toward the screen. “Who is he?”
“A terrorist?” Luke asked.
“I don’t think so. I think he’s some sort of cult leader. Like Charles Manson or David Koresh. Calls himself Uncle Sam. He’s taken over the show.”
“Jesus,” Luke muttered.
“He’s already shown a video of the gang murdering a couple at their home. It was…horrible.”
“Where’s the police?” Pam said.
Stewart shrugged. “He hasn’t said anything about the cops yet. But he must have it all under control because he ordered two of his followers to shoot the guests.”
“He shot celebrities?”
Stewart nodded. “And the show’s live.”
They all turned and faced the television screen.
A very frightened woman was sitting in one of the chairs beside the desk. She was a heavyset woman with a lot of make-up, which was now streaming black and red torrents down her chubby face.
“Here we have Doris. Welcome, Doris, to Who Wants To Be A Survivor!”
The only sounds were the blubbering of the woman and the clapping of the bald man.
“Doris hails from…where did you say?”
She responded with a loud and wet onslaught of crying.
“Let’s say Miami. She looks like she comes from Miami, doesn’t she, Dave?”
The camera panned wildly across to the bandleader. He gave a forlorn glance at the camera, then nodded ever so slightly. The camera just managed to catch some of the other band members. A few were crying. The camera lingered on Dave for a while before returning to the little man at the desk.
“Don’t talk much, do ya Dave?” He chuckled. “How are you doing up there, Shorty?”
The man looked beyond the camera. Somebody muttered. The man nodded then turned back to Doris.
“Shorty, Bobby and Flag are all going fine,” the man said with a grin.
Doris sniffled and wiped her nose and eyes.
“Now, here’s how we play the game. I’m gonna ask you ten questions. If you answer all of them correctly, you live, if you answer even one wrong, I’ll give you a choice on how you want to be killed. Understand?”
The woman, who was bawling uncontrollably, attempted to run away. She was stopped by two bald men who grabbed her and shoved her back into the chair.
One of the men leaned close and whispered something in her ear. She nodded and remained in the chair.
“We all settled down?” the man asked.
“Yes.” The woman spoke softly.
“Okay. First question. How…” He stopped and looked over at Dave. “Hey Dave, how about some music for Doris? Some thinking music.”
He grinned when Dave began playing a soft, moody arpeggio pattern.
“Perfect. Now, Doris. How many balls did Hitler have?”
The woman sniffed and looked at the man with a peculiar frown. “W…what?”
“How many testicles did Adolf Hitler have?”
The woman swallowed and whispered, “One?”
“Very good,” the man laughed. “That was an easy one to begin with. Next question. What’s the capital of Australia?”
With a fearful frown, the large woman looked to the floor and sobbed. She shook her head.
“Hurry up. Only ten seconds left.”
There was a faint shout from the audience. The microphones barely picked it up, but the word, “Canberra”, was heard.
The man rolled his eyes and shook his head.
“Canberra?” the woman said, looking up at the man with a
hopeful stare.
The man looked past the camera and nodded.
A gunshot blasted and everybody in the audience screamed. The man stood up and raised his hands. “Silence! All be quiet or else you will suffer the same fate!”
The music stopped. It took a little while before the audience quieted down. With the sounds of many crying, the man sat down and said to the camera, “Turn around and show it.”
There was a whirl of motion until the camera rested on the dark audience.
“Lights!” shouted the man from behind.
The theatre illuminated to reveal the horrendous sight of a man whose head had been blown apart. Those around him were splattered with the man’s blood, as well as gooey bits of brain and tissue. As one woman vomited, the camera swiveled back to the man at the desk.
He had a large smile.
“We don’t allow cheating on this show, do we, Dave?”
A quick pan to Dave showed him with his head in his hands and crying. The camera went back to the man.
“Dave’s a little distraught at the moment. But we’ll continue. I’ll ask you another question, okay, Doris?” He looked at the audience. “And no more yelling out the answers.” He turned back to a shaking Doris. “Which one of Saturn’s moons resembles the Death Star from the movie Star Wars?”
Doris choked back tears. She looked as though she might throw up.
“Come on, only ten seconds left. Which one looks like the Death Star?”
“I don’t know!” Doris screamed. “The biggest,” she sobbed.
“No!” Stewart McGregor cried at his T.V. set. “It’s Mimas. Stupid woman.”
“Stewart,” his mother gasped. She stared at him, grimacing.
“Sorry,” Stewart said without turning his attention away from the TV.
“I’m afraid that’s incorrect,” the man behind the desk sighed. “The answer I was after was Mimas. Now, how would you like to die?”
It was all too much for the woman. She screamed a high-pitched wail and jumped out of the chair. The two men grabbed her again, this time pushing her back into the chair and pinning her with their gloved hands. She struggled and fought but had no luck in breaking free.
There was a shout from the audience and the cry of, “Nooooo.”