Story: Test
Summary: Seeing how well the BR Act works in Japan, the American government has decided to run a test of their own version of the Battle Royale. Without informing any of the public, government officials summon graduates of 2010 with one guest per person for three schools back to the high school for a "meeting" regarding class events beyond graduation. When the meeting is scheduled to begin, a knock out gas is released into the air and the graduates and their guests are kidnapped to an abandoned island to participate in the American Battle Royale.
Warnings: Violence, language, possible sexual themes
…
A dark red Dodge Intrepid pulled into a parking space in the student parking lot of Bedford North Lawrence High School, and a girl with light red hair stepped out of the driver's side. She had graduated from this high school only three weeks ago, and now her and the rest of her class were being summoned for a meeting. And, for some bizarre reason, they were required to bring a guest.
The girl grabbed her black purse and slammed her door shut. As she was picking some hair off of the shoulder of her white baggy t-shirt – she also wore baggy black cargo shorts and black flip-flops – her guest, a boy who was a junior in the high school stepped out of the passenger's side.
He had short dark brown hair with blonde highlights, and wore a tight light purple shirt and dark blue jean shorts with white Nike's. He sighed. "Well, let's get this over with."
The girl nodded. "Yeah." She locked her car, and they walked up the hill that separated the parking lot from the school, and into the cafeteria.
As they entered the cafeteria, the boy asked, "Who's Cat bringing?"
The girl shrugged. "No idea, but I think she's going to bring Victor."
"Ah."
The two walked up to a check in table, where a man in a military uniform said, "Graduate's name, and guest's name."
"Graduate: Linda Burbanks," (BNL Player Number 12, Graduate), she said.
"Guest: Ray Nicks," (BNL Player Number 12, Guest), he said.
The military man nodded. "Thank you, please take a seat."
"Hey, has a Catherine Black," (BNL Player Number 11, Graduate), "checked in yet?" Linda asked.
He looked and nodded. "Yes, about five minutes ago with a Victor Grey," (BNL Player Number 11, Guest), "as her guest."
"Thank you."
Linda and Ray walked around until they found a girl with long blonde hair, and wearing a black tank top and a red skirt with white flip-flops and black-framed oval glasses. Sitting next to her was a boy who was a senior in this high school with shoulder length brunette hair, and was wearing a blue t-shirt and cargo shorts with black Reebok's.
"Cat, Victor!" Linda ran up to the two sitting down dragging Ray behind her.
The two turned around and smiled. Cat gestured for the two to sit across from them at the table, which they immediately did. "How's your summer been?"
"Okay, I guess," Linda said. "I'm kinda dreading starting college in the fall."
"Yeah, me too."
"You two are lucky," Victor said with a sigh.
The girls exchanged a look before looking back at him with a confused look. "How?"
"You never have to come back here."
Ray laughed. "He's got a point."
"I wish I had a high school schedule," Linda pouted.
"Yeah, our classes are so long next year," Cat sighed.
"Excuse me," a woman up at the microphone at the front of the cafeteria said, "we'll be beginning shortly. Everyone who's still signing in, please hurry and take a seat."
"Hey, losers, move your asses, this is our table," a girl with curly brown hair said. She wore a white tank top and pink mini skirt with black stilettos. This was Carrie Nicholson, (BNL Player Number 5, Graduate), the class of 2010's resident slut.
Cat and Linda both stood up to make a point that they were taller than the slut, and could kick her ass. But before either "loser" could say anything, Carrie's boyfriend, Steven Renaldo, (BNL Player Number 5, Guest), stepped between his girlfriend and the other girls. Despite him looking like a bad ass biker with his spiky black hair, leather jacket over a white t-shirt, and blue jean pants with black leather boots, he was just as short as Carrie. Cat and Linda just laughed, they could easily kick his ass too.
"Come on, you two, let's go somewhere else," the voice of reason in that group, Renee Johnston, (BNL Player Number 4, Graduate), said. She wore a pink tank top and blue jean short shorts with pink flip-flops, and her long white hair with razor-blade straight with perfection. But, regardless of the fact that she was pretty and hung out with Carrie, she got along with everyone.
"Whatever," Carrie turned and followed Renee and her boyfriend, Lewis Smith, (BNL Player Number 4, Guest), to a table across the cafeteria.
Linda and Cat sat back down, commenting on what a bitch Carrie was. Victor and Ray agreed just as the same man who signed them in walked to the mic with a gas mask in his hand.
"Thank you all for coming. I understand that we don't even have a fourth of the graduating class here. That is understandable for people out of state for college, but if you had seen a member of your class around town that is not here right now, it's on you that you will be outnumbered."
Murmurs erupted around the room, confused about the soldier's statement.
"Also, those of you here without guests, shame on you." He slipped the gas mask halfway on. "Class of two-thousand ten and guests, goodnight. I'll see you when you wake up." He slipped his mask the rest of the way on and gave a thumbs up to the woman from earlier, who now had a gas mask on. She flipped what seemed like a light switch and leaned against the wall.
Some people looked to the glass doors of the cafeteria and saw chains and locks wrapped around the handles outside of the doors. When the chains and locks were noticed, people stood up and tried the wooden double doors at the front of the cafeteria, but they were chained too.
Within minutes, the graduates and guests of the class of the 2010 were either leaned over tables or on the floor in front of the wooden doors, asleep.
…
Linda groaned as she opened her eyes. She had a headache from hell, and was uncomfortable lying on the cold concrete floor. She sat up and looked around the semi-dark room as other people were standing up and trying to get a look around.
Someone found the light switch and turned on the dim florescent lights that hung from the ceiling of the large classroom they were in.
Once the lights were on, Linda looked to her right and saw Ray slowly stirring next to where she sat. She began to look around again until she realized there had been something different about how Ray looked. She looked at his neck and saw a small metallic band wrapped around his neck. She reached for her own neck and felt the same thing wrapped around it.
"What the hell?" As Linda looked around, she saw everyone noticing the same thing was around their necks, but no one seemed to know what was going on.
Cat sat up not too far away from Linda and shook her head. She had a slight headache, but nothing that wouldn't be gone in a few minutes. She looked around when she noticed where they were and became confused. She'd thought they were in the cafeteria of BNL.
"Cat, what happened?" Victor asked as he slowly sat up.
She shook her head. "I have no idea."
He looked over at her, and his eyes widened when he saw the band. "What's that around your neck?"
Cat reached for her neck as Linda and Ray walked over to them. "I…I don't know."
"We've got them too," Linda said as calmly as her confused brain would let her.
As everyone in the classroom was trying to come to terms and think of logical explanations as to why they passed out and woke up in a classroom, a flat screen TV monitor mounted to a old wall at the front of the room flipped on. On the screen was the same soldier from the cafeteria.
"Our monitors are saying that everyone is awake and walking around, so we'll go ahead and start," he said calmly. The camera zoomed out from his face to show a blown up map hung onto the wall behind him. "Before I get into the details, I would like to tell everyone that you are not the only graduates and guests participating in this."
Everyone gasped slightly, confused but scared.
"There are three schools, and you are in three different school houses around this island, which is relatively large. The schools participating are: Bloomington North High School, Bloomington South High School, and Bedford North Lawrence High School." He reached off screen and grabbed a conductor's baton.
"Bloomington North and South?" A male voice came from somewhere in the back of the room.
"What's going on here?" A female voice demanded.
"Now, the cameras in the schools are showing many people demanding to know what's going on, so I'll tell you. For years, Japan has been using a program called Battle Royale, or the BR Act to minimize child crime rates. It requires that once a year, a ninth grade class is selected at random to be placed on an evacuated island. Once there, the forty to forty-two students are instructed that their new lesson is to kill each other until there's one left."
Mouths around the room dropped to the floor, some people screamed, others gasped again. They couldn't believe how calm this guy was being about something so horribly brutal.
"The idea intrigued the president, as it ended up doing to the congress. Our government recently passed its own BR Act. Of course, even by law, having ninth graders kill each other was too brutal for our government to stomach. Instead, America's BR Act is designed to keep adult crime rates down. This version has a computer randomly select a state, and then congress selects three high schools within a tri-county area. The graduates of the current year, and a guest of each of the graduates' are then taken to an abandoned island."
"Oh shit," Cat yelled when she realized what he was about to say.
"Test subjects of the BR Act, your instructions are to kill each other until there is only one of you left."
…
BNL Players Remaining: 40
Bloomington N. Players Remaining: 55
Bloomington S. Players Remaining: 37