The sound of the harpoon gun still echoed in my mind, and it drowned out the sound of the arguing around me.
“There has to be some way off this fucking boat! We can’t just fucking wait around back here for them to kill us!”
“The only door in or out of this room leads to the stage! Do you really want to run TOWARD the people with the fucking harpoon gun?”
“Well it’s better than just waiting around! I don’t know about you but we’ve got a better shot making a run for it than we do standing around here!”
“How do you know that they’ve ONLY got a harpoon gun? How do you know they won’t just kill us all the moment we try and make a break for it?”
“I don’t but at LEAST I’m thinking of ideas, Johnny! What are you doing right now?”
I looked over at Johnny and Harry as they argued. Beside them, Chance sat dead silent, a faraway look in his eyes and Janine had retreated to one of the corners, not daring to speak to anyone. The look on Katrina’s face after the harpoon had struck her was burned into my memory. The shock… followed by the nothingness. The way her body had just given up in her final moments.
I couldn’t unsee it.
Couldn’t get it out of my head.
I knew I never would.
Already I could smell Katrina in the kitchen. The… aroma of her meat… oh God.
It…
It smelled good…
It made me sick to my stomach, knowing what they were doing to her but it smelled good.
I looked down at my phone again. I’d had service before we’d gone out on stage to find out who was being eliminated. Now I had nothing. No bars. No way to contact the outside world. Nothing at all. I still tried sending messages, but none of them got out. I tried my sister, my Mom, my manager, even two of my exes. I’d tried everyone I could think of. Nothing. Nothing was getting out.
“Ten minutes until showtime, folks!” The MC announced from the next room, “And make sure you come hungry!”
My stomach turned again. I wanted to vomit, but I’d already gotten that out of my system about ten seconds after I’d gotten backstage so I didn’t really have anything in my stomach to vomit up.
Katrina… I’d only known her for a short while but she’d seemed like a good person. Even if she hadn’t been… she was somebody’s wife, somebody’s mother, somebody’s daughter and they’d…
They’d just killed her without a second thought.
The crowd had fucking cheered when they’d killed her!
“So what exactly is your plan to get through this, huh?” Harry asked, glaring into Johnny’s eyes. “We just try to win and see if they let us live? Fuck everybody else?”
“I don’t know!” Johnny snapped, “I just… I don’t know, okay?”
The door to the backstage opened and all of us turned to look at it. The same crewmember who’d first led me backstage came through the door, before quietly staring at us. His expression was calm and focused.
Harry pounced on him almost instantly, storming toward him.
“Alright buddy, you’d better give us some goddamn answers and you’d better fucking give them to us right now!”
“Relax,” The crewmember said quietly and I noticed a small pistol in his hand. Harry froze, staring at it, before staring back at the crewmember.
“I’m sure you have questions. I have been sent here to answer them.”
“Oh really, you’re sure we have questions?” Harry spat. “Well I’m all ears, asshole! Let’s have a fucking heart to heart!”
The Crewmember didn’t seem phased by his outburst. His expression remained stony and calm.
“By now you’re aware that there was a slight omission, in your contracts. You will still be paid the agreed upon amount for coming here. That much is legally binding. However - only the last man standing will have the privilege of spending it, along with an additional sum reserved to the winner.”
“And the rest of us?” Johnny asked.
“Our audience revels in bloodsport,” The crewmember replied plainly. “In fact we’ve built our business off of it. We offer our customers the sweetest meat available. A meat reserved only for those with the drive to claim it.”
“Oh God you’re fucking cannibals…” Harry said under his breath as if the truth had just dawned on him, before turning away from the crewmember. “Jesus Christ…”
“Our customers prefer the term gourmands and if you put our reservations aside, you will find that what we have to offer is quite a delicacy. The management has even arranged a sample… if you are so inclined.”
He reached up one hand and snapped his fingers. On his command, two men dressed in black kitchen uniforms entered the room, each carrying a covered dish. Wordlessly they set the dishes down on the far side of the room before removing the covers, and revealing colorful platters with steaming, succulent looking meat on them.
It would have been appetizing if I didn’t know who it had come from.
The kitchen staff left as quickly as they had arrived, and the crewmember waited until they were gone before speaking again.
“Your bodies will become the canvases that our artists shall create their masterpieces upon. That should be a comforting thought to you.”
I looked over at him, wondering if he actually believed the bullshit that was coming out of his mouth. And as far as I could tell… he did.
“You should be grateful that you can spend one final night in glory before transcending into art. Although if that does not suit you… you can cause a scene and try to run, in which case you will only end up in the kitchen all the faster.”
Johnny gave Harry a knowing look that Harry didn’t acknowledge.
“What if we don’t want to be art?” Janine asked, her voice trembling. “For Gods sake none of us want this! Katrina didn’t want this! I just… I just want to go home, please just let me go home!”
“Your contract was signed and must be honored,” The crewmember said calmly. “Perform for our audience well enough and you will be allowed to return home at the end of the night.”
“And you’re really just going to let us go?” I asked. “You’re not worried about us going to the police or something? You’re really just going to let us go home?”
The crewmember smiled knowingly at me.
“What would the police do for you, Miss Wilde?” He asked, “How can you be sure that they’ll believe you? How can you be sure that they don’t work for us?”
The cold certainty in his voice sent a chill through me, and the room fell silent.
“Five minutes until showtime,” He said before turning away. “Best of luck to you.”
With that he was gone again, leaving us watching the clock and waiting to meet our fates.
***
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to ROUND TWO!”
The Announcers jovial voice generated applause and cheers from the crowd, as they gathered around their tables, platters of half eaten meat set before them. I watched them from the wings, my heart sinking as I noticed the buffet table behind them, decorated with a spread of dishes similar to the ones that had been brought to us backstage.
Steaks.
Chops.
Stir fries.
Katrina.
More was coming too. In the open kitchen behind the crowd, I could see one of the kitchen workers removing something from an oven. I watched as they set it down on a platter with a bed of rice, while one of their colleagues decorated it that platter and the rice with all sorts of garnishings, although I wasn’t entirely sure what part of Katrina it was until I saw them setting the top of her skull back in place, removing the mystery and replacing it with horror. Someone neatly combed her hair and flared it out behind her roasted skull, while someone else lay slices of meat in a fanned pattern around her charred skull. Somehow… I knew that it used to be her brain.
I watched as they took the grotesque display out to the buffet table, and a few members of our audience flocked to it. I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. All I could do was watch as they put pieces of Katrina’s brain on their plate, before taking a knife and carving away the meat from her cheeks.
They even…
God they even took her eyes…
“First up, give a warm welcome back to the musical stylings of Chance Park!”
The crowd applauded again and beside me, Chance stood stiff and terrified. His breathing was shaky and uneven. He held his guitar in a white knuckled grip and didn’t seem to want to move.
“Come on down, Chance!” The MC said, and I watched as he squeezed his eyes shut. Tears streamed down his cheeks as he forced himself to take his first step.
He looked out at the crowd, then looked past them at the horrific buffet table they were eating off of. A weak, trembling sob escaped him… and for some sick reason, the audience laughed at that.
“I… I don’t want to be here…” He said, his voice broken and trembling, “P-please I don’t want to be here… I don’t… please don’t make me stay here. Please don’t. I-I won’t tell anybody! Please!”
The guitar fell from his hand, as he completely broke down into open tears.
“Please I… I’ve got my Mom at home! I don’t want to die, please! PLEASE! I don’t wanna die! Please!”
The crowd still laughed.
And they laughed.
And they laughed.
Chance shuffled toward the edge of the stage, sobbing and pleading with them, but they just laughed at him.
“I want to go home!” He cried, “I don’t want to do this anymore! I just want to go! Ple-”
The sound of the harpoon gun made me flinch and Chance’s voice died in his throat. His body hit the ground with a sudden and heavy thud, the metal rod of the harpoon jutting out of his face. His one good eye was fixated on me and his mouth was open in a final, silent scream.
The crowd just cheered.
“What a shame, ladies and gentlemen! Looks like Chance Park has forfeited! Seems like he couldn’t quite follow up that powerhouse performance from round one! Then again, guess he did say that he was a failed musician, right? Who would’ve thought he’d have cut right to the point like that!”
Most of the crowd groaned, as Chance’s body was removed. Just like Katrina before him, I watched as he was taken to the kitchen where his clothes were removed and he was prepped for cooking.
”Well let’s not dwell on failure, ladies and gentlemen! The show must go on, and up next we have Johnny Sawyer! Give him a hand, folks!”
I looked over to see Johnny quietly walking past me to take the stage. I could see the fear in his eyes and I watched him pause as he looked down at the bloodstains that marked where Katrina and Chance had been killed. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath then opened them. I saw a timid but forced smile cross his lips.
“Well…” He finally said, “I’ve played some tough crowds before. But you guys really skewer the competition, don’t you?”
The crowd laughed at that, and I saw Johnny tense up. I could see him staring down at the bloodstains again before he forced himself to continue.
“And I thought my family were my harshest critics. Guess they could take some lessons from you guys. My parents actually hated that I got into comedy, y’know. They didn’t really think that I was gonna go anywhere. They wanted me to get into something else. My Dad wanted me to get into marketing, my Mom wanted me to be a doctor. And to be fair I did try my hand at the doctor thing. I really wasn’t cut out for it, although funnily enough my medical internship actually did help my comedy career a little. I don’t know if you guys have realized this. But doctors have a fucked up sense of humor. Like… holy hell. They say shit that would probably make you guys squirm!
For example: I spent some time in the clinic of one of the hospitals in my hometown, shadowing one of the doctors. And just about every time some old biddy came in complaining of aches and pains, or whatever he’d mark their file with the word: COPS. He did that a lot. And at one point I asked him: ‘What’s cops?’ And he said: ‘Oh it stands for Chronic Old Persons Disease. Y’know. Aches and pains. Shit that happens when you just get old.’ And I was just in shock! I mean, the way he said it, it was like: ‘Yeah this shit happens, whatever.’
So I asked him: ‘Okay but what if those aches and pains or whatever are a symptom of something more serious?’ And he just gave me a look…”
Johnny leaned in toward the audience. “Didn’t say anything else, he just gave me this look.”
He shook his head.
“At that point you might as well just walk into the room and be like: ‘Good morning Mrs. Smithers, go fuck yourself and get the hell out of my office!’ Jesus Christ… I swear, people in the medical industry are some of the most cynical people I’ve ever met. You could be rolled into their office bleeding everywhere and they’d just be like: ‘Yeah it’s a flesh wound, you’re good for another fifteen minutes. I’m on my lunch break.’ Zero fucks given. Just none at all.”
He carried on like that, trying to keep his voice even as he shuffled through his routine… and I admired him for that. I honestly wasn’t sure if I’d be able to follow suit or not. But I guess I was going to find out soon.
”Give it up for Johnny Sawyer, folks!” The MC said, as Johnny finished up. The crowd applauded him and he waved nervously before quickly disappearing backstage. I caught him giving me a quiet but sad look before he vanished.
“Next up, give a hearty hand to welcome back Kimmie Wilde!”
The crowd cheered for me… but that didn’t set me at ease. Every muscle in my body told me not to walk back out onto that stage. But I did it anyways.
Forcing a broken smile I waved to them as my eyes were drawn to the buffet table near the back. Katrina’s pale skull stared back at me with empty eyes and bits of flesh still clinging to her bones. I was vaguely reminded of a pig roast I’d gone to years ago in the worst way possible.
In the kitchen area, what was left of Chance hung upside down from meat hooks as they butchered him. I watched them slicing his legs into steaks, trimming away the fat before throwing them on the grill. I could see his bloody, ruined skull sitting on a counter, his head cut open to salvage whatever was left of his brain. Looking into that kitchen, I had a horrifying vision of my own corpse strung up in there and I wanted to start crying.
Instead, I just made myself look away. I forced myself to laugh, even though I know it sounded fake.
“Hell of an event you guys are hosting here…” I said, my voice cracking a little. I tried to focus on the routine. The jokes I’d already decided to tell.
God, how could I tell fucking jokes at a time like this? How could I stand there and act like I hadn’t just watched the audience in front of me cheer while two people were murdered and butchered? How could I go on like everything was normal when these people were probably going to kill me? For a moment… I briefly considered just throwing the microphone aside and telling them to just get it over with.
I considered it.
And maybe if Harry hadn’t been there, that’s exactly what I would have done.
But Harry was there, and I’d be damned if I was going to die before he did! So I tried not to look at the horrors in front of me. I tried not to think about them. And I performed.
“So is this a date night kind of thing or what? Any couples having their first date here?” I asked, “Hell of a venue for a first date. Very exclusive, I’m guessing… but hopefully it’d be worth it. Y’know. Little a bloodsport to get the blood pumping, right?”
“Damn right!” Someone in the audience yelled.
“Wow, someone’s excited,” I murmured. “Y’know personally my standards aren’t that high. Like. Just take me to McDonalds and I’m happy. Give me a ten pack of McNuggets and I’m all yours. You could put a wedding ring in there and I’d accept it right on the spot. The grease will wash off, it’s alright.”
Jesus Christ, why did I have to pick the routine about food?
“Did you know that just about every country has its own nickname for McDonalds? Did you know this? In Australia they call it Macca’s. Can’t you just imagine the Crocodile Dundee saying that? Macca’s. It just sounds Australian! ‘Oi mate I’m goin’ down to Macca’s to get meself a roo burger!’ So many people in Australia call McDonalds ‘Macca’s’ that they’ve even started putting it on the signs! I’m serious! You can look this up! It’s wild! In Japan, they call it Makku. Yeah that sounds about right. Makku. It just fits! If a random Samurai walked up to you on the street and was like ‘Bring me to Makku’ I’m pretty sure you’d know exactly what he wanted on instinct! And now you’re wondering what a Samurai would order at McDonalds. It’s a trick question. He’s just there to use the bathroom. Canada has its own unique slang for McDonalds! Did you know this? I actually use this one myself, but I didn’t realize that it was so widespread that it’s actually considered the official Canadian nickname for McDonalds! Do you guys know this one? If you don’t then get ready.”
I paused for effect.
“It’s McDicks. Australia gets Macca’s. Japan gets Makku. We get McDicks. I mean… that’s just undignified! And yet somehow it fits!”
I shook my head in fake bewilderment.
“McDicks,” I repeated. “Yeah I just went to McDicks for lunch! Mmm, mmm, mmm. I love McDicks! That just sounds dirty! You ever wonder what it’d sound like if you applied that name to the rest of their menu? Instead of the Big Mac, you get the Big Dick!”
The crowd got a kick out of the joke at least and if I didn’t pay attention to the stuff of nightmares right before my eyes I could almost take a little pride in the fact that they might be less likely to murder me at the end of this round.
“How about the McDicken?” I asked, “Or Dick Nuggets? Fillet o Dick… shit you people would probably actually eat that, wouldn’t you?”
The crowd exploded with laughter and just like that the Fillet O Fish was forever ruined for me. At least they were able to laugh at the fact that they were complete monsters, so there was that, I guess.
If nothing else, they remained fairly enthusiastic through the rest of my fifteen minutes and when I was done, I took a page out of Johnny’s book and got off the stage as fast as I possibly could. Looking back, I saw Janine standing in the wings, waiting anxiously for them to announce her.
“Kimmie Wilde, everybody! And talk about WILD! What a riot! She’s a hard act to follow but don’t discount our next act just yet, please welcome back Janine Caruso!”
The crowd cheered for her as she meekly came on stage, staring at them like a deer in the headlights. For a moment, I wondered if she’d break down just like Johnny had. But she seemed intent on composing herself. She took deep breaths and stared into the crowd before making herself speak.
“Thanks… so… so… so I’m… morbidly fascinated with conspiracy theories…” She began, struggling through the first few words before finding her footing. “Like, you look at some of the people out there and the things that they believe and they’re just bonkers. But as crazy as they are, there is a part of me that kind of wants to understand them, you know? I mean, theoretically the person who believes this is a rational, sane human being. Someone you can reason with… right? So sometimes I’ll go out of my way to reach out to these people. Talk to them. Try and understand them. See if I can’t make sense of their beliefs. Easier said than done. This one guy I talked to believed that the earth doesn’t actually rotate, and that the sky was a hologram designed to hide the existence of God… where do you even begin with that one? Like, what does this guy think, that when you turn off the hologram, God is just going to be there vibing? Really? What happens if some intern spills coffee on the sky hologram machine, do we all just collectively look up and see God on the couch in his underwear watching TV? Seriously?”
The crowd gave her a few quiet chuckles, but not much else. In the front row, I watched as a middle aged man pried apart what had once been one of Chance’s hands, picking out the bones and eating around the tendons to get at the meat the same way one might eat a chicken wing.
“But I wanted to give this guy a fair shake and I decided to let him attempt to explain his theory to me. And he just unloads on me all this technobabble about how this one experiment in 1887 somehow inadvertently proved that the earth wasn’t rotating and how a bunch of other experiments that had been done to measure stuff like the velocity of light somehow proved that the earth didn’t actually move. And the way he described it, it all sounded very scientific and almost made sense. Until I asked him how they hid God before they invented the holograms. And without missing a beat this guy just said: ‘There was a curtain.’”
She shook her head.
“It’s so fascinating. I’ve been digging into this stuff for a few years now and so many of the theories people have are just off the wall insane! But the one thing I’ve noticed is just how many of them are religious. Now I’m not trying to drag religion through the mud or anything! But there’s a weird correlation between people who make up batshit insane conspiracies and people who are super religious. I heard one lady say that the entire sky was actually the eye of God, meaning that he was literally watching everything. And that just raises the question, is God like leaning uncomfortably close to the world at all times? Because that’s a little messed up. Just imagine it, you’re going about your business and God is just leaning in like…”
She leaned toward the edge of the stage.
“And this lady actually believed that…”
The audience was fairly quiet. Janine got a few laughs, but not many. Maybe her routine might have been funnier with better delivery, but her voice sounded smaller than normal. She seemed to stutter over her words a little too often, and at the end, when her fifteen minutes was up, the applause was quieter than normal.
Janine stared out into the crowd, and I could see the quiet resignation on her face. She closed her eyes, before quietly uttering a muted:
“Thank you.” and leaving.
She brushed past me and went backstage without a further word. I considered following her, but wasn’t sure what I could say to her.
“Ladies and Gentlemen of the Illuminati, that was Janine Caruso! Also known as bottom left on the voting board!”
The MC’s joke got a louder laugh than any of Janine’s had.
“Last but certainly not least we have Harry King! Give him a warm welcome folks!”
The crowd cheered for Harry as he took the stage and I briefly considered leaving. But instead, I made myself stay.
I wanted to see how they reacted to him.
“Thanks folks, glad you haven’t killed me yet,” He said. His smile seemed a little more natural than everyone elses had and there was barely even a stammer in his voice. “Funnily enough this isn’t the roughest crowd I’ve ever played and this isn’t even the first time someone’s threatened my life on stage.”
I already knew the joke he was setting up.
It was part of his usual set. God, he really hadn’t changed things up, had he? It wasn’t even his joke! He’d taken it from some other comedian by the name of Jim Bragg who we’d worked with a few times before.
“See about three or four years back, I was doing this gig out in Texas. And I don’t know what this guys problem was, but I guess he wanted to get in on the show. So I’m going through my routine and he starts calling out to me, making his own jokes and shit. It’s annoying, but hey I can deal with a heckler and I’m kinda at the point where I wanna have some fun with this guy, cuz I’m an asshole. I don’t apologize for it. I’m a major fucking asshole! And I wanna see what happens when I start pushing. So I’m in the middle of my set and this guy is just cutting off everything I say like: ‘Hey asshole tell some actual fucking jokes! Hey bring back that other guy he was actually funny! Get off the stage, dickwad!’ And I finally just look at him like: ‘Buddy relax, if you keep catcalling me your girlfriend in the seat next is gonna start getting jealous!’ Oh and that made him mad. This guy starts straight up swearing at me like and by this point I’m in my element. He gets up and he says: ‘Do you wanna fucking go, man? I’m 215 pounds and I work in landscaping, and if you don’t stop running your mouth I’m gonna fucking break you in two!’ Now at this point… I can’t stop myself from laughing. So I look at him and I ask… ‘Are you threatening me or hitting on me?’ And that’s when he tries to get on the stage! I’m sitting there laughing my ass off while security drags him away!”
Harry’s act got more of a reaction out of the crowd than Janine’s did and I quietly left him to finish while I went backstage to find her. Johnny was already at her side when I got there, his hand on her shoulder as she broke down crying. I pulled up a chair to sit with her, and though there was nothing I could say or do… I still just tried to be there for her.
***
“And that’s the end of Round 2! Ladies and gentlemen, you know the drill! Who’s on the chopping block this time? It’s all up to you!”
The same knockoff Jeopardy overture from before sounded as we stood on the stage. Beside me, I could hear Janine struggling to breathe. Her eyes were wet with tears but she still tried to stand tall as if defiance would somehow change anything.
I felt her hand reach out to grasp mine and I gave it a reassuring squeeze. The seconds seemed to stretch on forever… and for a moment I prayed that somehow they’d decide to vote for Harry, even if I knew in my gut that they wouldn’t.
I could feel the tears streaming down my own cheeks as the votes came in and when the MC made his announcement, we all already knew what he was going to say.
“That’s our time! Johnny, Kimmie and Harry you are SAFE!” A broken sob escaped Janine. I could feel her shaking, I could feel her terror as she stared into the audience. A man near the back stood ready with the harpoon and I know that she saw him as he took aim.
“And as for Janine… I’m so sorry, but you’re our unlucky loser! Thanks for playing!”
Janine squeezed her eyes shut in the moment before the harpoon fired. The impact knocked her off of her feet, and she almost pulled me down to the ground with her. Her hand was still squeezing mine so tightly as she collapsed. The harpoon jutted out from the right side of her chest and she gasped for air, screaming in pain as she did. Her legs kicked out beneath her as she writhed in agony.
The cheers of the audience were louder than they’d been during her performance. Janine kept a white knuckled grip on my hand, her eyes met mine, quietly pleading with me to save her. But there was nothing I could do.
The kitchen staff came up to the stage to take her away. I tried to push them aside, tried to keep them away from her, but they were stronger than me. One of them threw me to the ground while his companion picked Janine up bridal style. She sobbed and wheezed, trying desperately to push herself out of the mans grasp before he carried her over to the kitchen.
“No… no… no…” She rasped, like a crying toddler. “No… no… no…”
I could only watch as she was dropped onto the metal table where Katrina and Chance had been set before her. She tried to pull herself off of it, but one of the kitchen staff held her down while another reached for a knife and Janine’s eyes followed it with growing terror.
“No, no, no, no, no, no…”
The man with the knife grabbed her by the hair, pulling her head back and exposing her throat before dragging the knife across her neck. Janine’s final words ended in a pained wet gasp. Her entire body spasmed violently, twitching and shaking as dark blood spilled out of her neck. Her limbs kicked and thrashed as she struggled to save herself. But she was past saving at this point.
We all were.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we now begin our second 30 minute intermission, after which Round 3 will begin! Hope you’ve still got an appetite!” The MC announced.
In the kitchen, we watched as they prepared Janine’s body. She wasn’t even dead yet. But they were already preparing to butcher her.
Harry turned and went backstage without a word, but Johnny and I stood and watched the whole time, silently mourning her… and knowing that at least one of us would soon be joining her.