Ari and Zac

Chapter 26: The Transcript (Segment 7)

HOST: There are those who would say the same about you. There are also those who would call you a raving conspiracy theorist.

PIERCE: Really? And who's saying those things? Where do you think those rumors got started? Think about it.

HOST: Are you accusing Dominick Torrent of character assassination?

PIERCE: That's just the tip of the iceberg, and you know it.

HOST: You believe Torrent has actual blood on his hands?

PIERCE: The man's awfully good at covering his tracks. That's all I'm going to say.

HOST: Why did you agree to come on our program tonight, if that's truly all you have to say?

PIERCE: Like I said, my legal counsel has advised me—

HOST: To stay silent. Yes, I understand. Because you yourself could be sued for slander if you say something that isn't 100% fact. Is that correct?

PIERCE: It's not about fact and fiction. Listen, he's a powerful man, a master manipulator. He's got powerful friends. I'm not going to make any statement that might give him an opening to come after me. I can't. But I will go so far as to ask you a question, if you'll allow it.

HOST: Go ahead. What question is that?

PIERCE: What do you think really happened to Mae Song Yee? You've been investigating this whole mess. You tell me.

HOST: The circumstances of her death were widely reported.

PIERCE: Yes, the official version of the story.

HOST: You find the official version difficult to swallow?

PIERCE: It was awfully convenient. I mean, look at the timeline. That much I can say. It's all public record. First, Mae fell completely off the map. Overnight, she went from international fame to MIA. Completely missing in action. That's odd, wouldn't you say? And then she was oh-so-conveniently reported dead in a major terrorist attack, when people were too distracted by the massive death toll to pay attention to the details surrounding any one victim—

HOST: So you don't believe Mae really died in the attack. You think she died before that?

PIERCE: I never said that. I'm not convinced she ever died at all.

HOST: You think Mae Song Yee is still alive?

PIERCE: Her remains were never found. You said so yourself, earlier on this program.

HOST: OK then. Let's entertain this scenario. Assuming Mae Song Yee didn't die, where do you think she's been all this time? Why has she never been heard from since the date of her alleged death?

PIERCE: Excellent questions. Seems hard to believe that someone would fall off the radar screen like that without a compelling reason.

HOST: So what are you suggesting? That she went into hiding somewhere?

PIERCE: Went into hiding? That's one way to put it. That would suggest she did it of her own free will.

HOST: You think she's being held captive against her will?

PIERCE: That would be one possible interpretation of the known facts.

HOST: Held captive by Dominick Torrent?

PIERCE: Let me be clear. I never said that. Never said any of those words. Again, my lawyers have advised—

HOST: Did your lawyers advise you to cast aspersions on Dominick Torrent's character through thinly veiled theories and innuendoes?

PIERCE: You're the one who keeps bringing up his name. I haven't mentioned him once this whole interview.

HOST: Surely, you have to hear how ludicrous that theory sounds.

PIERCE: Does it? I don't know. Doesn't sound so off the wall to me, when you consider how much money certain people have made in certain business dealings.

HOST: Then why are you the only one who hasn't accepted the official version of the facts surrounding Mae Song Yee's death? Authorities investigated. They ruled her deceased and issued a death certificate. None of her friends or family ever came forward—

PIERCE: She has no friends and family! Do your research! If you dig around for anyone who knew her personally, you won't find them. Mae Song Yee lived one hell of a lonely life. Have you looked into her at all?

HOST: By all means, Mr. Pierce, enlighten us.

PIERCE: Mae Song Yee spent her early childhood as a ward of the Baekje Orphanage in Busan, South Korea. That's a city in the southeast, surrounded by traditional fishing villages.

HOST: An orphan?

PIERCE: Yes. Interesting coincidence, right?

HOST: Go on. You seem to have done some digging. Tell us more.

PIERCE: Trust me, I've been fishing through the birth records for years. Never could find out where Mae came from before the orphanage. There are no records of her biological parents. Her file dates back to when she was about four years old. She was inducted into the Korean Orphan children's choir. I have an old CD cover, if you want to show your viewers.

HOST: Yes, let's put that up.

PIERCE: That's Mae there in the front row. The littlest one on the right. She was the youngest member of the choir and quickly became the featured soloist. That's when she came to the attention of LM Entertainment.

HOST: Her K-Pop record label.

PIERCE: Correct. One of their talent scouts took over as her guardian. He adopted her legally. Mae moved with him to Seoul and he signed her with LM Entertainment by the time she was seven years old. Then he spent the next decade molding her into the highest grossing K-Pop act in history.

HOST: Until she met Dominick Torrent.

PIERCE: Exactly. Mae met him, and then she abruptly retired and followed him to New York. And nobody tried to stop her. Nobody kept an eye on where she went or what she did. Because she had no real family. No friends. No connections whatsoever to tie her to her homeland once she turned 18.

HOST: And then what happened to her in New York?

PIERCE: I don't know exactly. Let me be crystal clear about that. The rest is just a theory. A hypothesis. I'm not claiming it's the truth.

HOST: Go ahead. Tell us your hypothesis.

PIERCE: Just think about it with me for a moment. What if Mae Song Yee didn't go to New York of her own free will? What if she never did anything of her own free will, her whole life? What if someone realized who she was, and what she was, from the moment she first opened her mouth? And she spent her whole life in captivity, like one of those dolphins at Sea World, used for the sole purpose of entertainment, passed from one owner to the next?

Until finally someone got his hooks into her and figured out how to use it. He figured out how to isolate whatever that magic was. How to harvest it, and harness it, and use it for his own devices. And then, once he stole what he wanted away from her, then he didn't need her any longer. So she vanished. Dead, or hidden away somewhere, a shrunken shell of her former self. Forgotten. Silenced. Never to be heard from again.