As it turned out, I only had to wait until later that night to find out the answer. I was in my bedroom, actually doing homework of all things, when my TV suddenly turned on by itself. I checked to see if I had accidently hit the remote and found it sitting on the nightstand beside my bed. I grabbed the remote and was about to switch the TV off when I saw what was on the screen.
It was a hand-held “found footage” style shot looking in through a window at what appeared to be a teenage boy’s bedroom. After a beat, Brett entered the room, holding a bottle of lotion. He locked the door and then tried to turn the knob to ensure that it was actually locked.
Brett had already hooked up the VCR and had a tape ready to go as he moved to the television and undid his pants. Thankfully, the partially turned blinds blocked most of Brett’s lower region from view as he slid his underwear down and hit PLAY.
I couldn’t see his TV screen but the baffled look on Brett’s face was enough to tell me that what he was watching was not vintage porn. Though, it wouldn’t matter for long. In that same moment, Videohead appeared beside Brett and slammed the metal helmet down onto his head.
There was an abrupt cut as the feed suddenly switched to Brett’s point of view. Looking through the helmet’s narrow eyeholes, I could see that Brett was being dragged down a dark stairwell and into what I immediately recognized as Videohead’s lair. Brett’s breathing became louder and more panicked. He glanced at the clay wall to his right and then to the left…
And that’s when we both spotted me. Or, more accurately, a monitor set into the wall displaying a shot of me sitting there on my bed in what appeared to be real time. I held up a hand and, sure enough, my double on the screen immediately mirrored the gesture. To Brett, it must’ve looked like I was waving.
Videohead continued to drag Brett across the room, giving me a quick glimpse at the rest of the wall which I could now see was covered in dozens of monitors identical to the one I was on, each monitor displaying a shot of a different person sitting in a room somewhere and intently staring at the screen. Then Videohead lifted Brett into the chair and turned it to face yet another part of his lair that had, up until now, remained unseen.