Chapter Text
The Cameraman
A Turning Red Story
Prologue: The Interview
In front of the CBC HQ in Toronto, Canada, an early 2000’s orange sedan slid into an empty parking space near the front doors on Front Street. An average looking 37 year old man stepped out of the car wearing a light blue and white flannel and carrying a medium sized cardboard box with both arms. After struggling to lock his car while still carrying the box, he started to make his way to the entrance to the building.
After maneuvering through the double doors that led into the main welcome center for the building, he made his way to the receptionist’s desk. No one really paid attention to him while he was walking towards the desk, seeing as he looked like almost every other person already in the building, with his pale skin tone and dark brown hair, along with his outfit of a flannel on top a Nirvana t-shirt with navy blue jeans held up with an old, decaying belt, and a pair of old, worn out black Vans sneakers and white socks. He even had a small stubble of hair around his mouth and chin.
After weaving through the early morning crowd of employees, locals, and the occasional tourist, he finally made it to the receptionist’s desk and heaved the box up onto it to relax his arm muscles. The receptionist gave the box, which was labeled “CmCrdr Rec’s ‘02,” a wary look before looking up at the man currently catching his breath slightly.
“How may I help you sir?” She asked, looking at him curiously.
“Hi, I’m here for my 9:00 o’clock meeting with uhhh,” he took a slip of paper out of his right chest pocket, “Sandra Picard. Can you point me to her office please?”
The receptionist nodded and typed a few words into her computer and clicked her mouse a few times before she looked back towards him.
“You are Nicholas Kristoffersen, correct?” She asked.
“Yes, I am.” Nicholas responded. She nodded and typed a couple more words before looking back towards him again.
“You're right on time, she’s been expecting you. Just take the elevators over there,” she pointed towards the elevators, “to the 4th floor and head left. Her office is right at the end of the hall, room 406.”
“Thanks.” Nicholas said, before picking up the box with a grunt and walking over to the elevators. He pushed the up button and waited a few seconds until the doors opened to an empty elevator. He went inside and pressed the button for the 4th floor. After the doors closed and he started moving upwards, he started to hum the lyrics to Nobody Like U quietly to himself, but quickly stopped when someone else got onto the elevator on the 2nd floor.
When the elevator stopped on the 4th floor, Nicholas stepped out of it and turned left, silently counting the room numbers as he passed them.
“403, 404, 405, ah, here we go. 406.” He stopped in front of it and temporarily moved the box to the crook of his left arm to knock on the door. He waited a couple seconds in moderate discomfort at the feeling of a 20 pound box digging into his arm before a faint “Come in.” was heard from inside the office. He opened the door and stepped inside, grabbed the box with both hands again (much to the relief of his upper arm), and kicked the door closed.
A middle aged Indian woman wearing a grey suit looked up from whatever she was doing on her computer to Nicholas and smiled at him welcomingly.
“Ah, Mr. Kristoffersen, you're here. And I see that you’ve brought the footage, excellent. You can just put those right there and have a seat, I have something to ask you.” Nicholas nodded and placed the box on the little corner table that Sandra indicated and took a seat in one of the black leather chairs in front of her desk.
“So, Nicholas, is it okay if I call you Nicholas?” Sandra asked
“Yeah.”
“Alright, thank you. Always, Nicholas, I’m sure you’re wondering why I need your tapes of Pandapocolypse 2002, and I’m assuring you it’s all for a good reason.”
“Ok, but just to be clear, I’m getting them back once you guys are done with them, right? Because they’re very important to me.” Nicholas asked.
“Yes, of course, you can get them back right after we’re done with everything. But anyways, the reason we need them right now is because… we’re making a documentary.” She said,
“A documentary?”
“Yes, a documentary.” A beat of silence passed between the two of them, before Nicholas broke it.
“Fucking finally! It’s been 20 years! I was starting to think no one would ever make one, but you are! Thank you! I’ve been waiting for this for decades!” Nicholas said, in a euphoric tone.
“Oh good, you like it.” Sandra said, in a slightly relieved tone.
“Like it? Of course I like it. I’ve been holding onto these tapes for 2 decades just waiting to show them to the world and not be dismissed as an attention seeking clout chaser on Youtube or Reddit. Thank God.” Nicholas finished his rant, and looked towards Sandra, who now had a very pleased expression on her face.
“Well I’m glad that you liked it, and that in fact brings me to my next point in this conversation: Would you like to be part of an interview for this documentary?”
“An interview? Me? Why?” Nicholas asked in a confused tone.
“Well, since you have provided most of the footage taken from the ground during the… incident, and from what you have already told me over the phone that clearly suggested that you had an extremely first person view of the main event and the ones leading up to it, it would be an idiotic decision from a director’s point of view to not get an interview with you.” Sandra explained.
“Huh. That’s a good point. Sure, I guess I’ll do it. What kinda questions will I be answering?”
“Oh, not much, I’ll just be asking you to recount your experiences to the best of your memory from start to finish.”
“Hm. Sounds easy. When can I do it?”
“Now, if you’re available. I have most of the day off.” Nicholas looked at his old Casio watch, which showed it was just 13 minutes past 9, and went through his mental list of things he had to do today, which was surprisingly empty.
“I… also seem to be free all day. Let’s do it.”
“Good, follow me please.” Sandra said, before getting up from behind her desk and walking out the door, with Nicholas following close behind, picking up the box on the way out.
As they walked through the hallways, they were joined by a few different people that Sandra called to her side. Apparently, she was relatively high ranked in the company. Nicholas noted a cameraman with a modified go-pro on a tripod, a sound guy with a laptop and a boom mic, and a few more people that he didn’t recognize.
After a few minutes of walking through the hallways of the building, they eventually reached a meeting room with floor to ceiling windows that showed views of the CN Tower and the top of Rodger's Stadium across the train tracks. After they entered the room, the crew members that Sandra brought immediately got to work prepping the room for an interview, disassembling the table and carrying it through the door, taking the chairs out, and setting up the camera.
“You can put the box down Nicholas, someone will take it to the editing team and they’ll figure out what to do with the tapes.”
“No, the box doesn’t just have the tapes you want, they also have some very private recordings that I would like to keep hidden from everyone else. I’ll just give you the ones that you need. Does anyone have scissors?” Nicholas asked to the room, and was then immediately handed a pair of scissors by a passing employee. He set the box down on a small corner table and opened it, and rooted around all the cassette tapes stashed haphazardly in it before he found a small plastic container labeled “Pandapocolypse ‘02 Recordings” and took it out. He handed it to Sandra, who then gave it to another employee who quickly left the room to take them to wherever the editing team was.
It was around then that the room was ready for the interview, with 2 contemporary modern chairs placed opposite each other in the middle of the room, angled slightly to the left, and a small wooden table with a potted plant on top of it between the chairs. Sandra took a notepad out of her pocket and took a seat in the chair facing the windows, and motioned for Nicholas to take a seat in the other chair, which he promptly did, but not before taking the box and stashing it under the chair.
Once Nicholas was seated, Sandra motioned for the camera man to start recording, and the interview started.
“Before this interview starts properly, I would like to thank you once again for providing most of the footage used in this documentary. None of this would really be possible without it.” Sandra started, for the benefit of future viewers.
“Oh, it’s no problem. I’ve just been holding onto them for 20 years waiting for a chance like this to come along, and here it is. I’m glad that they’re finally seeing the light of day after decades of sitting in a basement all alone.” Nicholas said.
“Good, good. Anyways, let's go to the beginning. Nicholas, how did Pandapocolypse start for you?”
“For me? Uhhh, I guess it all started sometime in late April, 2002 for me. I think it was the 28th or 29th….”