Chapter 10 - In Which Hazel Creates a Distraction

Sunday, November 10th, 2013

(1:14 P.M.)

"'Bout ready to start?" Ben asked, sliding into his seat at the interview desk. "You still look sort of angry."

Hazel rolled her eyes. "Maybe it has something to do with being detained for the past thirty hours whilst you collect all these testimonies."

"Yeah, sure," Ben smirked. "We all know you're just upset that you lost Musical Chairs."

"Jack tripped me!" she retorted. "He should have been disqualified."

Ben chuckled. "Alright, name please?"

"Hazel Hayes."

"Colony?"

"Swindon Town."

"Occupation?"

"Island Event Coordinator."

"Registered superpower?"

"Ecokinesis," she answered.

"Meaning?" prompted Ben. It wasn't strictly necessary to understand the supposed ability, but he was curious.

"Manipulating nature. Growing plants and that sort," Hazel explained.

"So your superpower was that you were meant to have a green thumb? Bit rubbish that, isn't it?"

"No," Hazel said, a bit indignantly. "Ecokinesis means that you're able to control plants and make them grow instantaneously. Need a ladder? Grow some vines. No one respects your personal space? Maybe they will if you're carrying a fucking cactus. Interrogator being an arse? Two words." She leaned in closer and whispered, "Poison. Ivy."

"Right! Let's move on!" Ben said quickly, glancing over to Ciaran and then glancing back to Hazel. "Superhero name?"

"Flourish," she responded, smoothing down the front of her dress and brushing back her hair.

"Ah, that's quite nice," Ben said cheerily before glancing down over his notes. "So, it seems that you were somewhat of a leader for the Hopefuls. You were one of the instigators of the battle, in fact."

"It was never supposed to be a battle!" Hazel insisted, getting riled all over again. "I just got a few people together to try to distract some of the hordes of fans around Alex so that Carrie could get through and try to talk some sense into him."

"Alright," said Ben calmly, trying to placate her. "Why don't you tell me how you got involved with Carrie and the Hopefuls then."

"Okay," she said, taking a deep breath, "I wasn't going to get involved with this. I told myself I wasn't going to get involved with this, but then WOTO went and pulled that horrible stunt…"

"You mean with their talk show?" asked Ben.

Hazel nodded excitedly. "Did you see that show? It was terrible! The way they just started in on Phil and Carrie… I can't believe Brad and Liam would take advantage of the situation like that. They just made me so angry!" she exclaimed, raising her hands in a manner that perhaps indicated a desire to throttle one or both of the WOTOs.

"I love them dearly," Hazel continued, "but sometimes they just don't know when to take things seriously. Alex's music was really hurting people, and they were just having a laugh and making out like Carrie was completely mental. That's when I knew I had to do something…"

xxxxx

Wednesday, November 6th, 2013

(10:00 A.M.)

Once I'd left the boys a voicemail telling them exactly what I thought of their behaviour on the show, I headed over to Carrie's house to check in on her.

I was shocked when she answered the door. Her hair was snarled, one of the straps on her dress was torn and there was something that looked suspiciously like a boot print at the hem. It looked like she'd had a pretty tough time getting out of the chaos at the television studio, and it was clear she had been crying.

"Aw sweetie, how are you?" I asked.

Carrie opened her mouth to explain, but a choked sob came out instead. As I folded her into a hug, she started rambling about how she was just trying to help, and how ridiculous it was that everybody thought she was causing trouble out of jealousy.

"I just want my best friend back," she murmured as she started to pull herself back together. "I'm sorry, Hazel," she whimpered, noticing the little wet patch where she'd cried into my shoulder. "I've got your dress all wet now!"

"Shh, it's okay, it's fine. I needed to wash it anyway," I consoled, brushing her messy hair back from her face.

Carrie found a tissue in her pocket and wiped her eyes. "This morning was such a disaster," she sniffed.

"I know, I saw the show," I told her. "That's why I'm here. Are you alright? Can I do anything to help?"

"No, Hazel, don't get involved in this," she objected. "It's such a mess… I don't want to get anyone else hurt."

I shook my head firmly. "Do you really think I'm about to sit back and watch people spread lies about you for trying to help?"

"I wouldn't blame you," Carrie muttered. We moved into the sitting room and she gave me a weak smile. "But it is nice to know that at least someone believes me."

"Speaking of that," I said, glancing around, "where's Phil?"

"Jack and Dean took him back home to get cleaned up." Carrie sighed. "One of the audience members…" She gestured vaguely around her nose with her hand, indicating that Phil had been hit during the riot.

"Oooh," I winced. "Is he alright?"

"Phil says he doesn't think it's broken," she sniffed. "And Jack says it'll look better once they wash off the"—her voice cracked on the last word—"blood." Tears welled up in Carrie's eyes again. "S-See why I don't want anyone else getting involved in this?"

"Oh, it's too late for that," I said firmly. The concern in my voice was quickly becoming replaced by determination. "I'm definitely involved now. No one hurts my friends—not on my watch."

The two of us talked things over for a while, and Carrie explained her theory to me in greater detail. She figured that Alex had to be using mind control somehow to manipulate everybody into buying his music. Carrie was hesitant to blame Alex, though. She kept saying things like, "maybe he doesn't know he's doing it", and "if he would only let me talk to him maybe I could get him to see what he's doing".

"I just don't know what to do," she groaned finally. "The album is going to be released Saturday at midnight! That's only like two days away! If there are people selling their own organs for pre-order copies, I can only imagine what they'll do for the album itself!"

"And the authorities won't listen?" I clarified.

"We tried! No one is taking this seriously!"

"That can't be true. What about Phil?" I prompted. "He went on the show with you."

"Alright, there's Phil and me, and Jack and Dean… and maybe like two others." She sighed in frustration. "But the entire rest of the island thinks I'm making this up!"

I pictured the hordes of desperate fans that I knew were already camping out in Alex's yard, waiting for the release. Slowly, an idea began to form in my mind.

"So, what you need to do is get through to Alex, right?" I asked.

"But I can't!" Carrie protested. "He won't let me in and there are so many people determined to make this release happen. There's no way anyone is just going to let me waltz on through to talk to him!"

"I understand… but is that what you need to do?"

"Yes, but—"

"Okay," I cut her off, "if that's what you need to do, then that's exactly what we're going to do."

xxxxx

"So, eventually we came up with a plan," Hazel told Ben. "Phil, Jack and Dean would stick with Carrie as sort of a guard, while Tom Milsom and I would sneak into the encampment and cut the power to the main speakers, which were playing Alex's songs 24/7. Since the music seemed to be the only thing most people cared about anymore, we figured it might cause enough confusion to disrupt the crowd a bit and let the others through."

"Alright," Ben nodded, "so you and Tom were making a distraction, and the others were trying to get Carrie in contact with Alex. That seems simple enough… so what went wrong?"

"Well, Tom and I were able to crawl in through some shrubbery and cut the main power line without any incident, but that's when things started to get even more strange," Hazel said, shaking her head as if she still couldn't quite believe what had happened next.

xxxxx

Friday, November 8th, 2013

(9:09 P.M.)

Once the blare of "Funnel Cake" sputtered into silence, Tom and I exchanged grins and high-fives of victory. The momentary glee of having accomplished our goal died away as we waited to see what the reaction would be, realising that we had no idea if it would actually work.

At first, people were mostly just confused. Some froze, waiting to see if the music would turn back on again. Others took a more proactive approach, with shouts of, "Oi! Who cut the music?" and the like. People definitely took notice, but I wasn't sure if it would be enough of a distraction to let Carrie sneak through to Alex.

After a few moments of music-less relative quiet, we saw people shaking their heads and looking around, dazed. It was almost like everybody was in some kind of a trance. Or maybe just coming out of one.

Along the perimeter, I could see four figures moving through the confused crowd, and then one split off to go around back.

"I think it's going to work," I whispered excitedly to Tom. "No one's noticed them yet!"

"I guess Carrie was right," he said. "That music is definitely affecting these people somehow. I just can't believe Alex would do that… " Tom murmured.

As Alex's fans seemed to snap out of it, the volume level gradually began to rise again and the atmosphere turned decidedly tenser. The Woodstock-like vibe of blissed out music lovers shattered as people all around us started bickering and breaking off into cliques, dark looks and insults flying between the different groups.

"Can you see what's happening?" Tom asked anxiously. "Did they see her?"

But that didn't seem to be it. The Nermie Army was turning on itself whilst Carrie slipped through unnoticed. It wasn't long before we realised that there was a lot more drama going on than Carrie and Alex could account for.

xxxxx

"And that's how the battle began, but you have to understand that was never our intention," Hazel insisted. "We just wanted to make a distraction. There was no way we could know that cutting the music would turn everybody mental!"

"But you say that's when everyone turned on each other?" clarified Ben.

Hazel nodded.

"Interesting," he drawled noncommittally. "So if what you're saying is true, it stands to reason that it was the music itself that was affecting people's behavior. I suppose that could somehow be part of Alex's supposed mind-control power. Or, something else entirely…" he trailed off, thinking aloud now.

"I don't know what was going on or what made everybody act like that, but his fans started fighting against one another. Stopping the music might have started it, but the battle didn't have anything to do with us," Hazel declared.

Being a good investigator and reserving judgment, Ben neither confirmed nor denied that statement, but he did call an end to the interview.

"Thank you, Hazel. I think I've gotten everything I need from you for now. You're free to go. And you can send along the next person on your way out!"

A/N: This chapter was co-written with Chelsea (tumblr: fatedfortunes)