Continued from
here.
MID-CHAPTER UPDATE
"Ambidexterity"
Horatio was found by Umeko, Aaron, and Adrian soon enough. His face looked a bit red due to the heat of the gymnasium. "Have you been fighting the good fight?" he asked. He waited for the inevitable report, but the arrival of someone on the stage pulled his attention away.
The students had become eager to learn who would be this year's Prom King and Queen. Lena Watson, a member of the student council, was the one on stage to announce the results. The music died down as she began to speak. "Thank you all so much for having such a great time!" the girl exclaimed. "The council would like to extend our thanks to each and every one of you for making tonight the best that it could be! Midwich is awesome! Go Cuckoos! Hehe!" Deanna practically puffed up like a peacock, having already expected to win. She strut out into the centre of the gym, spinning slightly to show off her dress yet again.
"I know you're all excited to hear who this year's Prom King and Queen are! Wooo!" There was a spattering of excitement coming from the students, indicating Lena to get on with it. "All right, this year's Prom Queen is..." Lena paused to read off the card and the audience practically held in their breath. Kyle manoeuvred about the gym to make sure he had a good shot of Lena with his video camera. "... Umeko Moe?" Lena obviously sounded confused-- she had no idea who Umeko even was. Two television screens on either side of the gym turned on to show a close-up of Umeko. The cameras in the gym were focused entirely on her. "W-Well, congratulations! Before you come on up, let's announce the King!" Before the girl could continue, she found that Deanna was furious. She screamed at Lena to stop it with the practical joke. Her boyfriend, Damien, didn't look much too pleased either. "I'm sorry!" Lena bleated, sounding like a defeated goat. "I'm sure Umeko won fairly!"
"I better be the King!" Damien demanded. "And Deanna must be the Queen!"
Lena only stood with her mouth open. "U-Umm... okay! The King is..." Lena pulled out the card, but her face noticeably paled at what she read. When someone yelled at her to spit it out, Lena nervously uttered, "James Lancaster!"
One of the television screens changed to show James, his identity obvious now despite the mask. The crowd of students booed, of all things. Horatio became alert, crying, "James is here?! That menace to society must be stopped!" Jake moved in to calm down the mess with the other faculty, but found himself pushed away by Kristoff, who was demanding a recount on behalf of his friends. Jake pulled back, standing near Viviette and Brian.
"Stay behind me," he quietly said to them. Over the din of yelling came a sudden scream, though no one was quite sure where it was coming from. Jake looked off to the side to see a bunch of students running from the sides of the gym.
"It's coming from the vents!" screamed one girl. Everyone's attention turned now to find a sort of mist seeping into the gymnasium. The entire student body broke out into the chaos at this as they rushed to the doors of the gymnasium.
"Everyone calm yourselves at once!" demanded Brennan, but his command fell on deaf ears.
Kristoff smashed into one of the doors, but found it didn't budge. He continued to bang on the door, but found it wouldn't open no matter how much weight he threw against it. In fact, none of the doors would open, and the students who were breathing in the mist were dropping to the floor. The screaming and panic inevitably died down as the students were put to sleep one by one. Horatio, somehow one of the last to succumb to the gas, crawled across the floor in order to get to one of the doors. Grunting, soon he too was passed out on the ground.
***
"Everyone," cried Horatio. "Please wake up!" Having been the first to awake, the boy began awaking others, who were mostly groggy from the sleep. Eventually, one girl started screaming, which quickly awoke the rest of the group.
Everyone was still in the gym. Someone moved to the gym doors and found that they still wouldn't budge. It seemed nothing had changed.
... Except,
26 people within the gymnasium now wore bracelets on their arms. The 26th person with a bracelet was none other than
Jake Cline, your school nurse.
Try as hard as you might, these bracelets weren't coming off.
"The televisions!" cried Kristoff, pointing to one of the screens, which were both now displaying static.
The static gave way for for a vague silhouette of a person, though it's hard to tell their identity, or even their gender. On the intercoms was a sudden bout of static, followed by, "Finally, you are awake." The voice sounds obviously digitally altered to be anonymous.. "I am the overseer, and what you are all now a part of is something bigger than yourselves."
The gym was deathly silent, waiting for the voice to continue. "... While you are all now participants in a game, only 26 of you are the actual players. For the sake of clarity, I will refer to those with bracelets as
players, and those without bracelets as
non-players."
"What the shit!" Deanna cried. "A game? Is this some kind of joke?"
"Is the principal behind this?" Damien asked.
"The commander would never do such a thing!" cried Horatio.
Brennan practically growled. "Everyone shut up!" he yelled.
The voice continued. "Phase one of the game is simple, and it is the first step to escaping the school. Among the 26 players are three agents-- players who essentially represent myself in this game. While all players will work together to complete the game, if any of my agents make it to the end,
only they will survive."
There was a sudden bout of verbal dissent at that notion, but more demands of keeping quiet kept everyone's mouths shut. "Right now, we will hold a vote between the players to determine who they think are one of my agents. It's a tough decision, so I shall give the players a clue... Look for those among you acting different than usual. My agents are masters of trickery, and will likely try to trick the other players and cloud their minds. Once the vote is complete, we will move on to the next phase of the game. You have thirty minutes to make your votes. Just use the right button on your bracelets to cycle through the names on the interface, then press the left button to vote."
As the television screen began to fade to black, the intercom said one last thing. "In honor of your Prom King and Queen, you may not place a vote for either of them during this initial round of voting. Those of you who don't vote will face dire consequences."
Silence for a few precious seconds, and then-- "This is sick!" Deanna was practically wailing as she held up her cellphone. "I can't get a signal! This is disgusting!" She turned on the nearest person with a bracelet, Tom, and screamed at him. "Hurry and vote so we can get out of here!"
Continued
here.
