"What the hell is on your face?" Director Cooper Braggs asked incredulously.
He was a decently tall man with sandy brown hair, a scruffy, full beard, and icy blue eyes. Rather than call him handso, it was more accurate to say that he had a distinct, morable face.
He was wearing a wrinkled navy-colored shirt, light-wash jeans, with a cigarette tucked behind his ear, and as he stared at Ari, he looked as if he were watching a strange alien creature.
"Makeup," Ari responded calmly, finding his reaction mild after the nonsense he had previously dealt with Larry Jackson.
He hoped that the director would lose interest, considering the fact that he had probably fild weirder things, but instead the man began circling him as if he were on display on a podium.
"Humiliation ritual? Lost a bet? Gay icon?"
"No. No. No. It was a....stylistic choice."
[Wasn’t it because you had to cover your ugly face?]
Wasn’t it because you took my stats that my face beca ugly in the first place?
Ari did his best to ignore NOVA’s snarky comnt while staring at the director.
"Well, you have terrible style. Go back to makeup and have them take it off." The director ordered, pointing back toward the makeup area.
"Sorry. I can’t do that. I prefer to record like this." Ari replied calmly.
Although his visual stat was finally within the C rank, Ari wanted to get it to at least a B- before he began showing his face without it.
Even if it was a bit risky, he thought that he had done well enough not to get eliminated because of his signal song performance, and as long as his team did solidly, he should be able to scrape by the next round without being eliminated.
However, since contestants now needed audience votes in combination with points gained from performance rounds to determine their ranking, he would have no choice but to expose his face during the next filming round.
But he wanted to delay it as much as possible to make sure he could stuff as many stat points toward the visual stat as he could.
"You do realize that I am the boss here." Director Cooper Braggs glared at him, but Ari refused to back down, ignoring Jamie’s subtle jab on his arm.
"I know."
"And you’re still refusing to take it off?"
"Yes. I’ve kept in on so far and want to continue doing so."
The director looked him over for a mont before beginning to cackle to himself while bending backward.
Kekekekekekekekekeke-
Ari: ಠ_ಠ
Ari: "...?"
Was this demonic possession?
Or was the cigarette laced with sothing else?
Ari silently took a couple of steps backward and waited for the director to finish his laughing fit.
After 2 minutes of insane laughter while his spine made a lowercase n, the director stopped as if a switch had been turned off and stood up straight.
"Heh. If you insist, I don’t have ti to coddle you. My vision awaits! Everybody, get into your positions! Filming starts in five minutes!"
As the director yelled, the staff mbers and all 100 contestants, dressed in a gray school uniform with light makeup, were arranging themselves on the most intricate stage that Ari had ever seen.
It was a large, pearl white, triangular stage with smaller triangular sections within it, featuring LED lights embedded in the floor and nurous lights overhead and at all angles.
The innermost triangle section of the stage would contain 15 contestants, 7 of whom would be mbers of Jamie and Benjamin’s old team, and as they perford, the stage would rise, creating a three-tiered pyramid type situation that would have dancing and singing contestants on each level and eventually reconfigure itself to beco so unique shape at the end.
The director had positioned the rest of the contestants in different sections and on various sides to fit his envisioned plan, but inford them that they would be moved depending on how they did.
As he got into his position near the very back, Ari had no idea how any of it worked or what the final result was supposed to look like.
When they first arrived and the director gave them a brief tour, he listened with curiosity.
However, as the director explained every single detail for over 45 minutes, his eyes glazed over until they were released to hair and makeup.
Because there were so many contestants and only five makeup artists, the line was quite long and everybody was rushing, but since Ari had already painted his face and wouldn’t be applying makeup, a stylist had quickly applied so weird-slling product to his hair and brushed the curls out into a strange frizzy fluff, which made him look like a poodle, and sent him to go stand in a corner an wait for everyone else to be done.
When he was finally done, Jamie had taken one look at him and laughed until he fell over, then laughed so more.
Feeling irritated, Ari pointed out the fact that not only had his blonde hair been curled, making him look like Goldilocks, but his cowboy hat had been confiscated, he had a lip color applied with foundation on his face, and his half-up, half-down hair bun had a ribbon tied into a bow.
Jamie pointed out Ari’s lipstick and eyeliner, Ari pointed out his blush, and before he knew it, the two of them began wrestling, which was separated by Carlos, who looked extraordinarily handso with his slicked-back hair, a loosened shirt without a tie, and his well-fitting pants.
Even though he was laughing while pulling them apart, the Spanish boy’s brown eyes had a hint of lancholy in them, but regardless of how many tis Ari asked, he always said that he was fine and nothing was wrong.
Ari had repeatedly been checking his stats, and unfortunately, there had been no improvent, so he made a ntal note to ask Benjamin how things were going on their team.
For now, it was ti to focus on the performance.
Stretching his neck and arms to prep his body while adjusting the wireless headset on his head, Ari glanced at the people around him, noting that they were mainly his D-grade dance mates, and quite a few faces were too familiar.
He briefly t the gazes of Michael and Sachi before looking away and facing forward, where the director was examining the different monitors and adjusting each cara until he was happy.
As the bright lights of the studio bead down, Ari began to get hot and a bit antsy from just standing there without saying anything.
After several minutes, it seed the director was finally done adjusting the caras because a male staff mber holding a black and white clapperboard stood at the very front facing the contestants.
"Pick Signal Song - Take 1 - Mark!"
"Mark!"
After yelling the words and getting a response from the director, he snapped the clapperboard shut with all of his strength.
Click!
As the loud click reverberated through the studio, the director pointed his finger directly at the contestants staring at him while the signal song began playing.
"Action!"
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