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A recurring theme this week has been history repeating itself. Things that have happened in the past are surfacing again, and things that are new may be only be new to us, not them. It seems The Order is playing the long game and their actions are becoming more clear over time.
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For those of us around during the Tension era, you’ll no doubt remember the time @electrichippo was brought to see Gatekeeper Four have her neck slashed by Sabrina, then known as Addison/soon to claim the title of Gatekeeper 2, and soon to be called Overseer.
So then last night, we learned that Lia was put in a similar situation. Brought into a small room to see Noah slit the throat of Horace from ear to ear. We’ve pieced together that this was a way for him to ascend to Horace’s position.
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This has also led me to wonder about other more violent beats of the Tension-era story, specifically @buz ‘s “killing” of Gatekeeper III. At that time, it caused a large disturbance in the community with regards to safety – seeing a participant lay hands on an actor edged us into unknown and risky territory. Granted, that was all quickly cleared up.
However.. with the idea in mind of old stunts and gags being used as a cover for new crimes, I wonder if it’s too far out there to start wondering when that’ll resurface. Would they ask one of us to do their dirty work, under the cover of “it’s for the show, just a walk-on role like in The Walking Dead” or “it’s just a stunt, we have medics on site” or “they’re just blanks, don’t worry”?
Or even worse, what if they kill a participant, with the same cover? “they were in on it, it was just a stunt..” the whole final scene of Ascension comes to mind here, pretending to chloroform someone before brutally murdering them in front of a live audience.
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There was also the question presented by @a – “Why put on a show?”
We’ve landed on that being a cover for their actual less than kosher doings. They can show us anything, do anything to us, whatever, and it’s all covered by “oh that was just part of the show, nothing to see here.” And that’s extrapolated by the fact that it’s been done before.
Imagine – Lia goes to the cops, says she saw someone get their throat slit. They start to poke around, and the defense is just “oh the ol’ throat slitting gag? yeah it’s whatever, we did that last year too, it’s just a show.” Not airtight, but it’s also not as big of a deal.
In fact, there’s the same sorta thing as when the ~four fandom was addressed and we were told that she had no idea she had such a cult (pun sorry) following, and we were told she’s just some soccer mom or something and we really shouldn’t look into her. “Horace? Yeah, he’s just an actor, and older gentleman, he only had appeared in a small part a couple times, don’t know where that guy went after the show wrapped.”
That’s all speculation, but I don’t think I’m too far off.
However, I think by placing these things within the framework of a show, and asking us to suspend disbelief while in a show, that also allows us to allow them to do whatever they want. We’ll let them kill our friend, because while they’re doing it, we’ll be saying “oh it’s just part of the show, I really don’t want to make a fuss and interrupt the scene.” We’ll let them strap us to a chair and put a rag to our face, because last time they did it, they said it’s not real, we’re just pretending to be chloroformed. We signed a waiver, but they wouldn’t ACTUALLY hurt anyone on purpose.
Because they’re calling it a show, and there’s an established etiquette in place for immersive theater, they effectively own us.
But does this knowledge have any positive effects on our safety? Probably not. We’ve been told countless times to just walk away, probably due to exactly this.. and instead we just run twice as fast directly towards them. Vying after a scoop or a unique scene or to get a little bit of the spotlight. Hell, I know I’m not alone in thinking I’d still jump in a van if a mysterious voice calling from a blocked number tells me to.
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@kasch brought up an interesting tidbit on Slack about conversations he had with others where he heard stories similar to Lia’s Real Actual Snake Being story, including the jolt of electricity and other aspects. That’s his story to tell, so I’ll let him tell it. -
Also very recommended reading on thematic repetition within Anointment vs Tension from @mkarrett is here!!
It’s really interesting to look back at this with the things we (think we) know in mind.
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