It was finally performance day, and a few hundred mostly teenage girls found their way into the performance building.
They chattered with each other as they went through security, handed over their cellphones, snuck in their caras, while looking around at others, trying to gauge which contestant others were here to support.
For so people, it was quite clear where their allegiances lay, as they either waved mini flags to represent the different countries the contestants were from or carried homade posters with custom slogans.
For others, it was a bit more difficult as they just looked like regular people.
And finally, there was a small group of people who were dressed head to toe in black clothing and thick punk-like makeup, despite the Los Angeles heat, clearly here to support one strange contestant.
Justine, a secret Ari fan, was one of the many people attending today.
She had co by herself since her friends were busy and was curiously looking around, trying to find new ones to make the day enjoyable.
As she put the lanyard that contained the voting device around her neck after getting through security, she made eye contact with three girls who were chatting with each other.
She waved cheerfully, and the girls smiled back before inviting her over.
"Hi! I’m Justine."
"Cara,"
"Brianna."
"Stacy."
"Nice to et you all! I like your outfits. Who are you guys supporting?" Justine asked curiously, after paying them the obligatory complint required when eting new girls.
"I’m here for William. My beautiful blonde prince on a white horse. Sigh." Brianna looked up with dreamy eyes as if imagining the scene, and Justine giggled.
"I’m here for the cutest carrot top in the whole entire world. My cutey patootie Daniel. In my next life, I want to be his dimple." Stacy added as she poked her cheek.
"I’m here for the one, the only, the cross continental rizzler himself, Big Ben. He’s so tall, and handso, and strong, and talented, and handso." Cara squealed happily while waving the homade chira flag, which featured the flags of the UK, Jamaica, Nigeria, and South Africa all sewn into one large rectangle.
"That’s so cool. Those three are pretty talented and handso." Justine easily complented the boys since she had no issues with them.
"Who do you support, Justine?" Brianna asked curiously.
"Ah, I’m here to support Ari," Justine replied cheerfully.
The mont Justine said Ari’s na, the previously friendly expression on the girl’s faces disappeared, quickly replaced with one of disgust and annoyance.
"That ugly dozen?"
"Ew"
"Let’s stay away so we don’t get infected."
The three girls in front of Justine frowned and turned away, no longer interested in becoming friends.
Although Justine wanted to follow them and argue back, she was a bit burnt out from being at war the past couple of days.
Soone had supposedly leaked pictures of Ari without his face paint on and continually posted nurous negative comnts about his looks, character, skills, and personality.
Because of the repeated posts that weren’t taken down by the community administrator, despite being reported lots of tis, Ari now has the nickna "dozen" online, aning he doesn’t dance, he doesn’t have a pretty face, and he doesn’t belong in an idol show, etc.
Whenever the poster was asked to prove it, there was radio silence, and all the person repeated was that they were a victim of Ari and that the first couple of episodes would ’reveal the truth’ about him.
After fighting without rest, Justine was tired and just wanted to enjoy Ari’s performance, hoping that he would prove all the haters wrong and show his face so that she could gain more energy to fight again if need be.
She had been hoping to make so irl friends and connect them to her new Ari fan account, but it seed that it wasn’t ant to be.
At least not right now.
Still excited, she made her way into the performance area, glad that she had co extra early so that she could be close to the stage.
After waiting for a bit, the MC finally showed up.
"Hello, hello to the most beautiful audience I’ve ever seen!!!" MC Ryan Leary said with a happy smile as he ran onto the stage.
His red suit and red sunglasses gave him a cool impression, and he smiled cutely as the young, mostly female audience cheered while so of them waved their little banners.
"For so of you, this might be your first ti attending a live show, and for so of you, it might be your second ti. Either way, I want to give you a very warm welco and a little more information as our contestants get ready, is that okay?"
- yeahhhh
"Good, firstly, we ask that you don’t record and censor information until the episode is aired. If you share it, the paperwork you signed holds you liable, and you can and will be taken to court."
As the atmosphere got somber, Ryan Leary continued with a bright smile, "You’ve all received your voting devices, so let explain how it works. We have nine teams today that will each perform a song. The screen here shows the song which ca from groups signed to Azure Entertainnt, Music Boss Entertainnt, and Soundwave Music."
When Ryan Leary paused, the projected screen behind him displayed a simple image with nine Sudoku-style squares filled with song nas and the images contestants wanted for their team.
"When the performance is over, using your voting devices, you’ll select who you feel was the best perforr on the team and who you think was the worst. And after all the performances are over, you can vote on your top three teams, who will get special prizes depending on their vote count. Please rember that live voting starts soon, and the winners today will win not only a monetary prize, but also points that add to their vote count, which decides if they’ll get eliminated or not."
At the term eliminate, the fire in the audience mbers’ eyes flared up as each of them clutched the little voting device to the point of it creaking.
They absolutely could not let their favorite be eliminated.
The extra votes had to be secured by any ans necessary.
"Does everybody understand, or should we get right to the performances? Just say the word, and I’ll have you rank my specially prepared performance that will definitely make you add as a contestant to the show."
The MC pretended to do an Irish jig before winking at the audience, who began playfully booing him while a separate section began chanting ’Free the boys! Free the boys!’
Justine had her eyes glued to the screen, trying to figure out which team Ari belonged to.
Thankfully, she recognized all of the songs.
She didn’t know how the teams were chosen, but based on the skills he had shown so far, she guessed he would either be a part of eting, Back Door, or The Real.
His vocals would fit in well with those songs, and there was less dancing, which she had to reluctantly admit was clearly Ari’s weak point.
She was still scarred by several argunts that she had lost due to his Infant shark audition being rubbed in her face.
If the team choice were based on his visuals, she would say Shock and Radioactive would work as well as the original music videos, which had a punk rock, grungy vibe that matched his face paint and styling he had done before.
She definitely couldn’t see him on the Cherry Bomb team, and she absolutely could not picture him on the Swan team, dressed in pink and doing ballet.
Although the image would be funny, she felt that the internet would hate him even more.
Lost in thought, Justine hadn’t noticed when the judges ca out, and only snapped out of it when the final round of applause sounded out.
"Well, let not waste your ti. Let’s bring out the first team. Led by Justin, this is the Investigators performing ’Back Door’."
The screen changed to show the shadowy silhouette of 9 n wearing long trench coats with hats.
As the stage lights dimd, except for one, the sa silhouette was recreated on the stage as one by one, nine figures stepped up and posed.
Completely excited, Justine’s gaze focused on the stage as the familiar slow piano notes sounded out.
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