Chapter 2

Chapter 2:

The crowd’s roaring yelps sounds like a hundred tornadoes whipping across the stage. Rin looks in terror as there are people who fill every corner of the venue. The lights emitted from their EV-Specs look like a thousand tiny fireflies performing a wistful dance. Rin shakes as the overwhelming number of eyes (or in this case glasses) are by far the largest amount to ever look at her in her entire life. The judge sitting on the left has long luxurious hair and bunny ears reminiscent of the beast-men in the comics she read. The figure could be mistaken as a woman but the voice that left their body was that of a male no older than their early 20’s. The man with the bunny ears speaks softly and playfully:

“Hey there, it seems as though you are an alternate as we do not have any mention of Rin in our notes.” Rin shook her head in agreeance as to signal that she wasn’t supposed to be there. The man with the bunny ears smiles. “Well— I guess you must be really good if you were chosen as an alternate. Let us see what you’re made of; play the track”. Nodding to the cameramen; signaling them to give the OK to play the backtrack.

As the music gently starts to play a somber acoustic guitar track over the speakers; Rin starts to panic. She looks all over for an exit the lights on the stage darken and she is unable to see anything other than the blinking lights on the EV-Specs of the audience. Like a flash of lightning, the stage starts to light up. Streams of light flow from the stage and into the crowd but Rin is still unable to make out where the exit is found. She starts to panic closes her eyes and breathes a heavy sigh. In this moment of silence, she starts to remember this memory of her sitting in someone’s lap as a toddler.

The older lady says to Rin “Hey, Rin! Look at up the sky! You see the stars shining up there?” Rin looks up and sees a sky full of stars. “Rin whenever you are lonely; remember to look up at the sky and remember me.”

As soon as Rin opens her eyes, she opens her mouth delivering her first note of the song. Humming a simple “Hhhmm MmmmHmmm” causes the stage to turn from a dark void to lights bridging outward from the center stage marked off with the glowing light that Rin was told to stand on. The green and blue light flowed like bands of ribbon over parts of the audience. She then goes in for the first lyric of the song. “You seemed like the type to let things go but no we always end up back in the same space.” The bands of light flow further out from the stage. She sings another line “Making all the issues worse instead of making them erase.” The bands of light start to emulate actual ribbons flowing from the crowd and moving with the timbre of the acoustic guitar. She wistfully sings “A time that feel most like myself is when you are not beside me and that’s why I think it’s time we part”.

She slowly opens her eyes and sees the people looking up with their EV Specs like they are watching an airspace show in the sky. In this fleeting moment, she feels weightless like everyone in the room has taken up all the air and has left her body numb.

Rin starts mouthing lyrics and the bands of light dance along the aisles of the venues. Mimicking a blanket blown by a tropical breeze dancing around the audience and their EV-Specs picking up the hologram.

In the bar, Shishijima and the woman with the tanned copper skin are still conversing about the meeting when suddenly they hear a light airy voice emit from the holographic screen across the bar. They both look in amusement as though somebody called their name when they happen to see a girl on the hologram with auburn hair looking around and singing. Shishijima looks on and his expression changes from a gloomy wince to his eyes slowly opening and his dropping in amazement. The woman chuckles “Wow, what an interesting tone that girl has”. Shishijima looks at the stage and notices it is in downtown Nova Raton at the Parkova Plex Theatre about 15 minutes away. He starts to look at his smart watch and glances at the woman saying “Can you take care of the bill? I’ve got to go!.” He grabs his jacket and rushes out the door leaving the woman by herself smiling and she says “Oh Shishijima! What are you up to now?” He runs out of the bar and slips on his jacket to catch a commuter tram to downtown Nova Raton. However, the tram is filled with tourists who are in hopes of catching the Dol’ Fest concert at 6:30 pm. So, the tram cars are packed and Shishijima has to stick his upper body outside of the window to stop from being suffocated.

Just as the performance for Rin is getting ready to end the number of eyes and people whispering in the audience start to compound in her head. She can feel their glances and hear every whisper of her performance. She feels a tremendous weight on her but she tries to push through. Until her voice starts to crack just as she is about to sing the next line. At a moment's notice, she sees the judge glance down at her and she feels even more pressure and begins to sign off key as well. Her head is starting to fill with thoughts of uncertainty and aggravation because she started well but is slowly ruining the song. She glances over to see an exit on the left-hand side of the venue. She suddenly stops singing and throws the microphonic headset onto the ground. She runs in between the aisles like she is being chased by a massive alligator. Panting and coughing as though her breath was stuck in her chest by a fast-pitched baseball. She makes her way through the exit door and down the steps towards the other exit door. Now she finds herself in a dark alley surrounded by tin boxes and a sign that is a motion script that says, “Become a muse for an EV-Idol!” the text fades and another line of text reads “August 15, 2073, and says that the auditions will be televised.” She thinks to herself “Isn’t today August 15, 2073?”.

Her eyes begin to widen, and her expressions begin to read as shocked as she begins to realize that not only was performing in front of a live audience she was performing in front of viewers as well. She sits in silently before slowly begins to yelp like a wounded puppy “WHY DID I HAVE TO FOOL THE SECURITY GUARD; I SHOULD’VE JUST WAITED IN LINE AND WETTED MY PANTS!!!” She begins to calm down from her mania to realize “I FORGOT ABOUT MARI!”

Mari is still at the arcade but has since moved to the other side of the table and is listening in with the guy from earlier whose EV-Specs; Rin turned off before she left. They both are laughing as he and Mari are both chatting about Konami Kollou. The guy belts “I love Kollou’s second album Piece be with You Shame; I just love the Soft Rock influence he had in that one” Mari replied “HTG I love PBWS too; I can’t believe with have such similar tastes” she mentions “Would you believe me if I told you he was the reason me and my friend even came today?” The guy responds “Wow! It takes a lot of dedication to stan just one idol let alone a human one! Hey, whatever happened to your friend?” Mari Badgers; “Don’t worry about it! I am sure she will be fine the lines for the bathrooms are irregularly long for these kinds of things. I’m sure she is fine”

Rin runs through the crowd; slipping past person after person trying to get back to that very arcade, she was so desperate to leave.

She thinks to herself “I need to find Mari and he the hell out of here and I know she’s worried about me.”

(Mari can be seen uttering the lyrics of a Konan Kollou song with the guy from earlier)

Shishijima has since left the tram and has made it to downtown Nova Raton he is frantically running toward the theatre in hopes of finding the girl he saw on the hologram. He notices some women with voluptuous bodies sitting at a table. He goes up to ask them if have they seen a girl with auburn hair to start up a conversation, but he eventually gets chased off by their boyfriend approaching the table with drinks in their hands.

He runs not paying attention to anything in front of him as he tries to see if the guys are still chasing him. Rin is weaving in and out of the crowd looking for a way to get back to the arcade. Rin finally sees an opening in the crowd, and she runs past two kids they say “Hey! No need to push; you old hag.” She then turns around to confront them when suddenly a figure runs into her and knocks onto the ground.

As she comes to her vision is blurry, but she sees a figure on the ground in front of her saying “Sorry, didn’t see you there” Then suddenly her vision becomes clear, and she sees a tall man with a faded cut with shaggy blonde hair. Rubbing the back of his head trying to chuckle off the embarrassment of knocking a young girl down. He then focuses on her face and realizes it’s the very girl he wants to meet.

He gets up off the ground and dusts off his suit, walking over to the girl gingerly. He offers his hand, but Rin is hesitant at first but eventually grabs him. He pulls her up from the ground cheerily and says:

“Sorry about that, I usually don’t intend on knocking over girls before I have a conversation with ‘em’.”

Rin looks in confusion “What? You want to talk with me! What about?” They both look at each other for a minute in silence.

Shishijeima reaches into his pocket and pulls out a motion script holographic card.

Then so casually blurts out “Well; I want to manage ya!”

Rin looks in horror and confusion as she is seemingly being poached by this seemingly weird gentleman