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Chapter Seven – Questions Are Raised
Tribes
Cakobau
Annabelle-Marie
Andrea
Hayden
Jarod
Mike
Peter
Rachael
Tiffany
Naulivou
Bob
Candy
Chris
Louise
Meredith
Michael
Richard
Sarah
“So what does happen in a tie?” asked Miss Parker the next day when the group was sitting in Sydney’s office. Broots was in front of the computer, printing out all of the articles he could find that people had written about Jarod since his previous search three days earlier.
“It depends,” replied the technician, turning his chair to face her. “One time, there was the purple rock of death – everyone pulled a rock out of a bag and the person who got the purple one was eliminated.”
“Purple rock of death sounds rather unfair,” remarked Sydney, looking up from a blog that described Jarod as a ‘mystery man’ and expressed the author’s desire to perform a number of intimate acts on him. It was a document Miss Parker had thrown away in disgust.
“I guess it was,” Broots agreed. “But nobody would change their vote, so it was the only way they could do it. Oh, yeah, and another time, they counted back all the votes that the two people had received at previous tribal councils and the one with the most votes was eliminated.” He scratched his head. “Then, in Palau, one of the tribes only got down to two people, so they had a sort of mini-challenge against each other and the winner of that got to stay in the game.”
“I see,” Sydney murmured, returning to the document he was perusing.
Material about the Survivor contestants was piling up and the focus of the pursuit had almost completely shifted to this new angle. Occasionally offices would find mentions of Jarod in newspaper articles that were unrelated to Survivor, but on such days, a sweeper team was dispatched and, sometimes, returned with boxes from Jarod’s lairs. Clearly Jarod had been busy following his return from Carthis, setting out the pursuit that would cover his absence while on Fiji, among other things. Interestingly, there were no leads for the time since his return from the Fijian islands.
Jarod himself appeared in a number of Survivor-related articles, and details about his past were starting to emerge. The first questions about his occupation were being raised and mentions of a pursuit had begun to surface. The Triumvirate was suffering from a bad case of what Sydney had, with a twinkle in his eye, officially diagnosed as ‘nerves’, and this was working its way down the hierarchy. Neither Lyle nor Raines had reappeared after their T-Boards. The remaining members of the pursuit team were the only people in the Centre not on edge.
“Hey!” Broots exclaimed suddenly. “Look! They’re talking about us!”
Miss Parker and Sydney exchanged worried glances. They had always known that this would occur, but this was sooner than any of them had suspected.
“Pictures?” Miss Parker demanded sharply.
“Just a description,” Broots replied. “But if this is already here, it won’t be long before there are photos around the place. Remember, we must have been caught on a million security cameras.”
Miss Parker jumped to her feet and began to pace the office.
“Damn it, Jarod,” she muttered under her breath. “Didn’t you realize this would happen?”
“Why would he do this?” wondered Broots, unknowingly echoing his boss’s thoughts. “Didn’t he realize what it would mean – to us, too?”
“I suspect he did,” replied Sydney calmly.
Miss Parker spun on her heel and glared at him. “And what do you mean by that?” she spat.
“Only that Jarod always thinks through his pretends, Miss Parker, and I imagine this one more than most. I have no doubt that his research into the program and the interest generated on the Internet would have shown him that we would be exposed. But remember,” Sydney added, “that this protects us in the same way it does Jarod’s own family, in the sense that the Triumvirate cannot afford to have any of us disappear.”
The woman pursed her lips briefly as she considered this before slowly nodding. “All the same, he can’t control everything,” she reminded the psychiatrist. “He’s slipped up before.”
“Not for a few years,” Sydney argued. “I presume you are referring to that situation in the Dover Town Bank, and when you were stuck in Florida together.”
“Not only that.” She glared at the older man. “Carthis didn’t exactly go according to his genius plan.”
Both Broots and Sydney looked at her curiously. It had been months since the group – minus Mr. Parker and, of course, Jarod – had returned from that island, and in that time she had said nothing about what had taken place. The two men had discussed it between themselves, but decided that it was better not to bring up the subject. All the same, now that it had been mentioned, both men wondered if they could push it further. A glance at Miss Parker’s face, however, showed that the subject was already closed. She sat down and pulled another file towards her, becoming, to all outward appearances, engrossed in it.
Broots had handed his laptop to Sydney and now turned to one of the other computers in his small office. A moment later, however, he turned with an exclamation and furtive glances to the left and right. “We’re being watched,” he said in hushed tones.
For once, Miss Parker laughed. “Of course we are, you idiot,” she told the technician. “This is the Centre.”
“No, Miss Parker,” replied Broots. “I mean right now!”
With one accord, the three people in the office turned to the camera in the corner that was trained down on the desk. The small red light that showed it was working flicked on and off, as if, Sydney thought, someone had winked at them.
“I take it that this person is not within the Centre,” the psychiatrist guessed.
Broots nodded vigorously. “I don’t know where exactly. I can try to triangulate it, but it could take time.”
Miss Parker opened her mouth, but then closed it and stared blankly at the floor.
“What is it, Parker?” Sydney asked softly. Then, after a moment during which she failed to respond, “What are you going to do?”
Instinct had prompted Parker to order Broots to locate the call, but something more personal made her stop. Sydney’s words showed her that Jarod had acted to protect not only his own family, but them, too. They were safer than they had ever been in all the previous years of the pursuit, and it was all due to Jarod putting his privacy on the line. So she stopped and thought for a moment, uncertain for one of only a few times in her life.
“Parker?” Sydney’s voice broke in, a quiet reminder that she was not alone and at liberty to follow her train of thought through to its logical conclusion. “What do you want Broots to do?”
She glanced around quickly and found her answer in the clock. She faced the other two with a slow smile and then turned her eyes to the security camera, ensuring that she spoke clearly so that her words could be understood.
“Go to lunch,” she ordered and left the office.
☼ ☼ ☼
Everything at the Centre had changed, and it was so sudden that the former members of the pursuit team still found it difficult to believe. Broots was the only one of the three still coming to the Centre on a regular basis, and that was because his technical skills were too valuable for the Triumvirate to ignore, but even he had a regular work schedule, arriving after Debbie left for school and picking his daughter up from Miss Parker’s house every afternoon at 5.30pm. They even had weekends together. It made Broots shake his head in disbelief when he thought about it.
All four people, including Sam, now lived from one Thursday night to the next, more enthusiastic about the program every week. Even Miss Parker dropped the charade of indifference and openly supported Jarod. Sydney wondered quietly to himself during the evenings he now had the leisure to spend at home whether it was just the sudden change at the Centre that had caused this in her, or if it had begun some time earlier – perhaps when Mr. Parker disappeared? What really had taken place between her and Jarod on Carthis?
The third episode began with Naulivou returning from Tribal Council. Peter helped Jarod pull the outrigger canoe up onto the beach and strolled back to camp alongside the Pretender.
“Hey, I, er, I guess that was a pretty stupid move,” he said slowly.
“I guess it was,” Jarod agreed, before joining in the conversation between Hayden and Annabelle-Marie.
“Even more stupid was talking to me like that,” said Jarod in a confessional, his eyes glowing in the night-vision shot. “What did he expect me to do – magnanimously forgive him and welcome him back into the fold? And he admitted that he was one of the people who voted against me. For all he knew, I had no idea he’d turned against me. But his guilty conscience is nice for the moment. He can stew a bit and we’ll see if we have to get rid of someone any time soon.”
“Catty,” remarked Miss Parker as she dipped a corn chip into salsa.
“It will be interesting to see if Jarod makes the best use of the information,” remarked Sam, after swallowing his mouthful of nachos. Some players do, but others don’t seem to get how important it is.”
“I would hope Jarod would be one of the former,” Sydney offered. “But we shall see, I suppose.”
“Another morning here in beautiful Fiji,” Louise remarked sarcastically from under the Cakobau shelter as the rain poured down. Thanks to their Fijian helper, their shelter was almost completely watertight, but, as they did not have a shelter over their fire, as Jarod’s tribe did, anyone tending the fire ended up drenched. As a result, tempers were frayed.
“So who’s cooking?” Bob demanded, looking from one to another of the women. Michael, who had already commented to camera on Bob’s old-fashioned beliefs in the previous episode, looked wary, but said nothing.
“What about you doing it?” Candy proposed, once it was clear that no one else was going to say anything.
Bob looked shocked at the mere suggestion, and Sarah narrowed her eyes slightly at his obvious hesitation.
“Oh, I… I’m sure you’d do a better job, Candy,” Bob stuttered, suddenly realizing his monumental gaffe.
“You’re too kind,” drawled Louise in would-be casual tones, but the tension in the camp was clear to the Centre employees watching. In the end, the group split up into pairs, leaving Bob on his own and with no doubt as to the degree of his failure.
“I’m almost tempted to suggest we throw the next immunity challenge, just to get rid of him,” hissed Candy to Louise as they gathered firewood. In an attempt to calm the situation, Richard and Chris were cooking while Sarah and Michael fished. However, this pair was seemed to have another reason for tension and this, Michael explained in a private confessional, stemmed from Sarah’s difficulty fitting in with the other members of the tribe.
“She just isn’t one of us,” he explained. “She was always first on the list to go, but now Bob’s stupid comments have made him a bigger target. I don’t want him to go, because he’s got strength, but he’s breaking up the tribe, so…” he trailed off and shrugged.
“Oh, not again,” Broots groaned as the advertisements began.
Sydney had to smile at the technician’s woeful tones. “What is the matter, Broots?”
“I’m just so tired of the tribes being dumb enough to think throwing a challenge in order to get rid of a member who’s causing problems is a good thing,” the younger man told him. “It’s always been the start of a whole string of losses. I just don’t get why they haven’t learned that it’s stupid yet!”
“Maybe because they’re stupid,” Miss Parker offered drily.
“That’s not impossible,” remarked Sam, a smile tweaking the corners of his mouth.
Tribes
Cakobau
Annabelle-Marie
Hayden
Jarod
Mike
Peter
Rachael
Naulivou
Bob
Candy
Chris
Louise
Michael
Richard
Sarah
“So what does happen in a tie?” asked Miss Parker the next day when the group was sitting in Sydney’s office. Broots was in front of the computer, printing out all of the articles he could find that people had written about Jarod since his previous search three days earlier.
“It depends,” replied the technician, turning his chair to face her. “One time, there was the purple rock of death – everyone pulled a rock out of a bag and the person who got the purple one was eliminated.”
“Purple rock of death sounds rather unfair,” remarked Sydney, looking up from a blog that described Jarod as a ‘mystery man’ and expressed the author’s desire to perform a number of intimate acts on him. It was a document Miss Parker had thrown away in disgust.
“I guess it was,” Broots agreed. “But nobody would change their vote, so it was the only way they could do it. Oh, yeah, and another time, they counted back all the votes that the two people had received at previous tribal councils and the one with the most votes was eliminated.” He scratched his head. “Then, in Palau, one of the tribes only got down to two people, so they had a sort of mini-challenge against each other and the winner of that got to stay in the game.”
“I see,” Sydney murmured, returning to the document he was perusing.
Material about the Survivor contestants was piling up and the focus of the pursuit had almost completely shifted to this new angle. Occasionally offices would find mentions of Jarod in newspaper articles that were unrelated to Survivor, but on such days, a sweeper team was dispatched and, sometimes, returned with boxes from Jarod’s lairs. Clearly Jarod had been busy following his return from Carthis, setting out the pursuit that would cover his absence while on Fiji, among other things. Interestingly, there were no leads for the time since his return from the Fijian islands.
Jarod himself appeared in a number of Survivor-related articles, and details about his past were starting to emerge. The first questions about his occupation were being raised and mentions of a pursuit had begun to surface. The Triumvirate was suffering from a bad case of what Sydney had, with a twinkle in his eye, officially diagnosed as ‘nerves’, and this was working its way down the hierarchy. Neither Lyle nor Raines had reappeared after their T-Boards. The remaining members of the pursuit team were the only people in the Centre not on edge.
“Hey!” Broots exclaimed suddenly. “Look! They’re talking about us!”
Miss Parker and Sydney exchanged worried glances. They had always known that this would occur, but this was sooner than any of them had suspected.
“Pictures?” Miss Parker demanded sharply.
“Just a description,” Broots replied. “But if this is already here, it won’t be long before there are photos around the place. Remember, we must have been caught on a million security cameras.”
Miss Parker jumped to her feet and began to pace the office.
“Damn it, Jarod,” she muttered under her breath. “Didn’t you realize this would happen?”
“Why would he do this?” wondered Broots, unknowingly echoing his boss’s thoughts. “Didn’t he realize what it would mean – to us, too?”
“I suspect he did,” replied Sydney calmly.
Miss Parker spun on her heel and glared at him. “And what do you mean by that?” she spat.
“Only that Jarod always thinks through his pretends, Miss Parker, and I imagine this one more than most. I have no doubt that his research into the program and the interest generated on the Internet would have shown him that we would be exposed. But remember,” Sydney added, “that this protects us in the same way it does Jarod’s own family, in the sense that the Triumvirate cannot afford to have any of us disappear.”
The woman pursed her lips briefly as she considered this before slowly nodding. “All the same, he can’t control everything,” she reminded the psychiatrist. “He’s slipped up before.”
“Not for a few years,” Sydney argued. “I presume you are referring to that situation in the Dover Town Bank, and when you were stuck in Florida together.”
“Not only that.” She glared at the older man. “Carthis didn’t exactly go according to his genius plan.”
Both Broots and Sydney looked at her curiously. It had been months since the group – minus Mr. Parker and, of course, Jarod – had returned from that island, and in that time she had said nothing about what had taken place. The two men had discussed it between themselves, but decided that it was better not to bring up the subject. All the same, now that it had been mentioned, both men wondered if they could push it further. A glance at Miss Parker’s face, however, showed that the subject was already closed. She sat down and pulled another file towards her, becoming, to all outward appearances, engrossed in it.
Broots had handed his laptop to Sydney and now turned to one of the other computers in his small office. A moment later, however, he turned with an exclamation and furtive glances to the left and right. “We’re being watched,” he said in hushed tones.
For once, Miss Parker laughed. “Of course we are, you idiot,” she told the technician. “This is the Centre.”
“No, Miss Parker,” replied Broots. “I mean right now!”
With one accord, the three people in the office turned to the camera in the corner that was trained down on the desk. The small red light that showed it was working flicked on and off, as if, Sydney thought, someone had winked at them.
“I take it that this person is not within the Centre,” the psychiatrist guessed.
Broots nodded vigorously. “I don’t know where exactly. I can try to triangulate it, but it could take time.”
Miss Parker opened her mouth, but then closed it and stared blankly at the floor.
“What is it, Parker?” Sydney asked softly. Then, after a moment during which she failed to respond, “What are you going to do?”
Instinct had prompted Parker to order Broots to locate the call, but something more personal made her stop. Sydney’s words showed her that Jarod had acted to protect not only his own family, but them, too. They were safer than they had ever been in all the previous years of the pursuit, and it was all due to Jarod putting his privacy on the line. So she stopped and thought for a moment, uncertain for one of only a few times in her life.
“Parker?” Sydney’s voice broke in, a quiet reminder that she was not alone and at liberty to follow her train of thought through to its logical conclusion. “What do you want Broots to do?”
She glanced around quickly and found her answer in the clock. She faced the other two with a slow smile and then turned her eyes to the security camera, ensuring that she spoke clearly so that her words could be understood.
“Go to lunch,” she ordered and left the office.
☼ ☼ ☼
Everything at the Centre had changed, and it was so sudden that the former members of the pursuit team still found it difficult to believe. Broots was the only one of the three still coming to the Centre on a regular basis, and that was because his technical skills were too valuable for the Triumvirate to ignore, but even he had a regular work schedule, arriving after Debbie left for school and picking his daughter up from Miss Parker’s house every afternoon at 5.30pm. They even had weekends together. It made Broots shake his head in disbelief when he thought about it.
All four people, including Sam, now lived from one Thursday night to the next, more enthusiastic about the program every week. Even Miss Parker dropped the charade of indifference and openly supported Jarod. Sydney wondered quietly to himself during the evenings he now had the leisure to spend at home whether it was just the sudden change at the Centre that had caused this in her, or if it had begun some time earlier – perhaps when Mr. Parker disappeared? What really had taken place between her and Jarod on Carthis?
The third episode began with Naulivou returning from Tribal Council. Peter helped Jarod pull the outrigger canoe up onto the beach and strolled back to camp alongside the Pretender.
“Hey, I, er, I guess that was a pretty stupid move,” he said slowly.
“I guess it was,” Jarod agreed, before joining in the conversation between Hayden and Annabelle-Marie.
“Even more stupid was talking to me like that,” said Jarod in a confessional, his eyes glowing in the night-vision shot. “What did he expect me to do – magnanimously forgive him and welcome him back into the fold? And he admitted that he was one of the people who voted against me. For all he knew, I had no idea he’d turned against me. But his guilty conscience is nice for the moment. He can stew a bit and we’ll see if we have to get rid of someone any time soon.”
“Catty,” remarked Miss Parker as she dipped a corn chip into salsa.
“It will be interesting to see if Jarod makes the best use of the information,” remarked Sam, after swallowing his mouthful of nachos. Some players do, but others don’t seem to get how important it is.”
“I would hope Jarod would be one of the former,” Sydney offered. “But we shall see, I suppose.”
“Another morning here in beautiful Fiji,” Louise remarked sarcastically from under the Cakobau shelter as the rain poured down. Thanks to their Fijian helper, their shelter was almost completely watertight, but, as they did not have a shelter over their fire, as Jarod’s tribe did, anyone tending the fire ended up drenched. As a result, tempers were frayed.
“So who’s cooking?” Bob demanded, looking from one to another of the women. Michael, who had already commented to camera on Bob’s old-fashioned beliefs in the previous episode, looked wary, but said nothing.
“What about you doing it?” Candy proposed, once it was clear that no one else was going to say anything.
Bob looked shocked at the mere suggestion, and Sarah narrowed her eyes slightly at his obvious hesitation.
“Oh, I… I’m sure you’d do a better job, Candy,” Bob stuttered, suddenly realizing his monumental gaffe.
“You’re too kind,” drawled Louise in would-be casual tones, but the tension in the camp was clear to the Centre employees watching. In the end, the group split up into pairs, leaving Bob on his own and with no doubt as to the degree of his failure.
“I’m almost tempted to suggest we throw the next immunity challenge, just to get rid of him,” hissed Candy to Louise as they gathered firewood. In an attempt to calm the situation, Richard and Chris were cooking while Sarah and Michael fished. However, this pair was seemed to have another reason for tension and this, Michael explained in a private confessional, stemmed from Sarah’s difficulty fitting in with the other members of the tribe.
“She just isn’t one of us,” he explained. “She was always first on the list to go, but now Bob’s stupid comments have made him a bigger target. I don’t want him to go, because he’s got strength, but he’s breaking up the tribe, so…” he trailed off and shrugged.
“Oh, not again,” Broots groaned as the advertisements began.
Sydney had to smile at the technician’s woeful tones. “What is the matter, Broots?”
“I’m just so tired of the tribes being dumb enough to think throwing a challenge in order to get rid of a member who’s causing problems is a good thing,” the younger man told him. “It’s always been the start of a whole string of losses. I just don’t get why they haven’t learned that it’s stupid yet!”
“Maybe because they’re stupid,” Miss Parker offered drily.
“That’s not impossible,” remarked Sam, a smile tweaking the corners of his mouth.
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