BATW Interview: "Harlequin" (Marie Blackwood)

BATW Interview: Marie "Harlequin" Blackwood (Darkened_Star)

Convict Interview
Subject: Marie Blackwood
Female, 27
Treason.

Date: 19 April 2028
Upcoming BATW: 12-14 May 2028


Twenty-six years, and the Guantanamo Bay Detention Center was not only still open but experiencing a revival of sorts. The Center had become the destination not just of foreign detainees but of American Citizens charged of Federal crimes as well.

It had taken Marcus almost a year to get clearance to recruit a "Breakfast at the Whitney" contestant from among the Center's population. But it had all been worth it, for just weeks before his paperwork had been approved, a very special tenant joined Gitmo's numbers.

As he stood at a closed linked fence gate, Marcus opened a manilla folder and looked again at the picture paper clipped to the first page. Beautiful, he thought, yet again. Marie Blackwood should have been posing for fashion magazine covers, not mug shots in a Federal Prison Facility.

A loud horn caused Marcus to flinch. Two more short sounds broke across the flat plain of the Center, then the gate before Marcus unlocked and slid open. He proceeded forward -- as he had with the six gates behind him -- until the Guard flanking him on the left gestured him inside a door.

Sitting on the far side of a metal table -- shackled to it, much as Elizabeth Nunez had been two days earlier and 5,000 miles away -- was a woman who didn't look anything like the one in the picture Marcus had carried with him all the way from Detroit. She wore a very unflattering, pale yellow jump suit that did absolutely nothing for the figure that a second photo in her file proved her to have. Her previously beautiful head of blond was showing a couple of inches of dark roots, just one of the prison's many attempts at denigrating the beauty. As Marcus got closer to her, he found her face devoid of any makeup, but was pleasantly surprised to find that Marie had a true natural beauty that made the deprivation of face paints almost irrelevant.

He stopped before the table, opened the folder again, removed the portrait, and -- leaning forward, his eyes set firmly upon hers -- slid it across before her, asking, "Marie ... how would you like to be this woman once again?"

She stared at him with dead eyes. But not quite, she'd gone through hell and back. American's were still very protective of their President's, and to even be implicated in such an event would lead to a certain treatment. A certain very special treatment. The head of the Secret Service, humiliated, had ensured that. She'd been consigned to Guantanamo bay only a few weeks ago, not that the time made any difference.

The guards had recieved special instructions when she'd been delivered into their 'care' and after three weaks of beatings, rape and the torture for which Guantanamo was so famed, she was barely even human any more. Not that they'd ever regarded or treated her as such. But even so a single, solitary spark of defiance burned in her eyes, it flared at the sight of her own image on the table in front of her. Her past image, maybe even, her future image.

They had reluctant about allowing Marcus access to her, her survival and freedom and the Secret Service and the civil authorities would be utterly humiliated. Then considering the shows track record, they reluctantly agreed, the show's income was enormous, it's contribution to the economy huge. That and Marcus' talent for eliciting whatever reaction he wanted from his audience merely sweetened the deal. The deal being that almost no one came out of the show alive. Marie was as good as dead.

She looked up at him with those dead, empty eyes, "I'll do it."

Marcus's smile widened as he thought, Well, that was just too damn easy.

He retrieved the photo and returned it to the folder, then turned and gestured to the Guard standing a dozen yards back. When the woman stepped up to him, Marcus pulled a folded piece of paper from his suit jacket's inside pocket and handed it to her. "This is a transfer form. It is already approved of and signed by the President--"

He looked to Marie with a smirk, then turning back to the Guard added, --the current President. I want Miss Blackwood released from her shackles and taken to my plane at the airport ... immediately."

The Guard's eyes, which had been widening slowly as Marcus spoke, dropped to the paper that bore the Seal of the President of the United States of America. She stumbled, "I ... I'm not sure... I'll, um, need to check with ... with--"

"Go check with whomever you wish," Marcus said, turning back to Marie and waiting. Once the Guard had backed a couple of steps, then turned and hurried away for confirmation, Marcus smiled slightly to Marie. "You will be returned to a holding facility in the United States by this time tomorrow. There, you will be given anything you need to ... regain your health ... your strength--" His gaze shifted, to her bi-colored hair and the bruises and abrasions that were showing despite her captors' best attempts to minimize them. He added, --your dignity. Then, the first week of May, you will be transferred to a training facility in an undisclosed location. There, you will receive training in hand-to-hand combat, weapons use, battlefield first aid, and ... other stuff that could come in handy to you and your team members."

He glanced about himself, to the tall chain link fences and seas of razor wire and towers with machine gun armed Guards, then looked back to Marie. "I will ensure that you have everything you need to be ready for ... for what's ahead. But, Miss Blackwood ... I feel that I should inform you..." He leaned over the table, settling his weight upon the palms of his hands on the metal table. "... that once we leave here today ... it would not in your best interest to change you mind about being part of my ... program. I can only imagine what has happened to you since your arrival here at Gitmo, but I can assure you--" His lips spread in a knowing smile as he added, "--it is nothing compared to what my people will put you through should you threaten my ratings with your withdrawal. Am I understood?"

Her lips pulled back from chapped skin. A smile forcing it's way onto her hollow, dog-tired face. She spat, using what little moisture there was in her mouth to express her disgust. "You bastard, I'll do it, I'll do whatever you want, as long as you promise me my freedom. I won't do anything to harm your ratings don't worry. Oh yeah, I understand alright."

Her body was bruised, battered and her will was near broken, but not quite, she still had a spark of defiance, a spark of life and she intended to hold onto it for as long as possible. If this damn show was the way to do it, then she was in. Not that she had much choice, it was this or years of rape and torture, then death. She would be completely out of her mind if she didn't take this chance, or did taking it just prove that she was?

3 May 2028 -- Wednesday:

Harper Friend -- who, in regards to his surname, regularly told the people he was training I'm not yours! -- tossed the staff through the air to Marie, commanding, "Quick! Don't hesitate!"

No sooner did she get a grip upon the seven foot long weapon than she charged three steps, spun as she flailed the inch and a half thick staff around in a maneuver designed to confused the attackee, and surged forth, bringing the weapon around the man's weak side, right directly toward his head.

Harper -- armed only with his wits and experience -- deftly ducked the swing, spun the opposite direction Marie had, caught her across the back of her neck with one hand and across her middle with the other and--

She slammed onto her back on the mats so hard she that the air rushed out of her chest with a loud oof!

Harper dropped quickly to a knee beside her, bringing his balled fist down with unbelievable speed in what could have been a crushing blow -- or a plunging knife -- to her chest but wasn't; he hand came to a stop upon her sternum, his fore arm resting upon one of her young firm breasts as he spat out, "You're dead...! Again..."

He stood and stared down at her for a long moment, waiting for her to regain the breath that the slam to the Training Center's deck had taken from her. "Marie ... you're very good with your hands. In fact, I rarely see a woman who can deliver a punch with the speed and agility and power that you can. Your knife skills--" He made a so-so gesture with a wobbling hand. "Good enough to keep you alive in a street fight, but here ... you'll need to get better. But...!"

He leaned over and picked up the staff laying beside her and held it out before her. "This ... you have to improve with. The first rounds of combat are all about hand-to-hand and hand-held weaponry. You don't learn to use this--!"

He threw the weapon straight down at her. Marie managed to snag it in one hand, but the force and angle caused one end of it to strike her in the knee with a thunk.

"This you have to have down pat," he said backing away and gesturing for her to stand, "If you have any plans for reaching Day Two. Now ... get up ... and kick ... my ... ass!"