00 – Prologue
Hands tight around her throat. Mouth opening and closing, but no air filters through. Rage held steady, meeting her gaze.
The window is open. Her desk is moved out of the way. Dozens of uniforms, all the same as her own, gather about. No one intervenes. No one calls for help. They all just watch.
Can't breathe. Can't breathe. Her legs are lifted from the floor, the hands moving from her throat to her uniform collar. She stumbles along with the forceful grip, coughing and spluttering and sobbing. No more, she begs, but her assailant doesn't listen.
She trips on a desk, and the voices around her rise in volume.
"Is Horibe-senpai going to throw her out the window?"
"Nah, she's just gonna scare her."
"Sh-Should I get a teacher?"
She squeezes her eyes shut and screams. The hands pull her up to her feet again, and she throws her arms out to ward her assailant off. The hands tear at her collar, exposing her undergarments. The hands move farther and farther away.
The crowd screams. She opens her eyes. Staring back at her is no longer rage, but fear. The same fear she herself felt with all her being mere seconds ago. Chestnut curls cascade around Horibe's face, swallowing her head whole by the second. In Horibe's hands is her uniform, torn and tattered, and she can just see one of Horibe's shoes slipping off her foot as they lose their balance.
Horibe is frozen in midair, begging her for help. She wants to reach out, wants to stop the tragedy.
Horibe falls.
And falls.
And—
"Suzuki-san?"
She stands up with a jolt. The classroom is gone, morning sun of Fukuoka replacing it. Horibe isn't in front of her—no, it's a middle-aged man in a bus uniform, his arms crossed in front of him as he stares down at her. The bus has been parked in front of them, and for a second she feels embarrassed to have brought him to a complete stop over her.
But, of course, she remembers why the bus is here in the first place.
"Yes," she replies, stifling a yawn.
"I'm with the Home. Do you have your paperwork with you?"
She digs through her bag and hands him the papers. He lets out a low whistle as he reads over her details.
"They're gonna eat you alive, kid," he half-jokes. "Then again, you could probably just push 'em out the windows. You seem to be good at that."
Her breakfast starts to turn over in her stomach. "She was—"
"Don't care what pretty little excuse you have," he says loudly. She flinches, backing off without so much as a fight. "When push comes to shove, you're still the one who killed your classmate."
God, she wishes he'd used a better phrase than that. He probably did it intentionally, though part of her worries what a rehabilitation camp for trouble youths would be doing keeping someone like that around. The bus driver grabs her bags and tosses them right to the back of the luggage compartment. It's a good thing she got her valuables out beforehand and hid them in her sweatshirt.
The bus driver stretches and jabs his thumb at the door. "A'ight, hop on. Fukuoka is the first stop in this thirty-nine hour trip."
She climbs aboard and takes one of the seats at the back, right by the window to keep some distance between her and the bus driver. Her paperwork is tucked into a folder under his seat, where the others will probably join it. She can't bring herself to wonder who she'll be attending the Home with. If manslaughter is cause enough to be "eaten alive" by the other campers, then she doesn't want to know what would be considered big for them.
The bus lurches forward, and the first day of travel begins. She closes her eyes, pulls her glasses off and sets them on her lap. If she thinks hard enough, she can remember what the front page—the first section—of her forms looks like.
Full name: Suzuki Nui
Transgression: Voluntary manslaughter
Will they be worse than Horibe, she wonders? Or will Nui be spared another living hell that was her high school career?
The next day and a half would have the answers, she supposes.
Shortass prologue is short. But hey, welcome to the Scout SYOC - the form is on my profile, but before you send it in there's a few details to give about the camp the characters will be sent to and the kinds of campers it accepts.
The camp itself
1. The camp runs from the start of summer vacation and finishes after the first month of conventional schooling. This means three whole months are spent in this camp.
2. The camp caters to kids who are deemed "troubled" or "antisocial" in society. They accept kids from all around the world, having a large campus to work with, and functions on the singular goal of rehabilitating kids so they can adjust better to society and building teamwork and character.
The camp has four squads - North, South, East and West - that are divided evenly in gender ratio, and these squads typically have a volunteer student/teenager acting as their "guide"
3. The squads are all placed into two cabins (with S and N being in one, and W and E in another). The cabins are technically coed, but there's a section of room for bathrooms and councillor offices that separate where the boys sleep and where the girls sleep.
4. The camp leaders/supervisors come in only two varieties: Super lax and uncaring, or super intense and intimidating. Neither type of supervisor has interest in rehabilitating the kids, and focus more on actually making sure the camp is funded. This is where the volunteer teens come in.
5. There are no classes in the camp, as some teens have been sent there due to the education system itself. Instead, they're given activities that build trust and allow them to have some fun, while also teaching them valuable lessons about teamwork and society. (They're really outdated and terrible lessons, and not many people like them.)
6. The camp has its own kitchen that squads are often put on duty to work in. They cook and clean throughout the day that they're assigned kitchen duty, and typically eat during their break while everyone else eats in the cafeteria. The utensils are all really weak, easily breakable plastic, so as to prevent injuries that may prove fatal; the plating is all either the same plastic or just paper plates and bowls; and the food and drink is limited to:
Breakfast - Healthy cereals, eggs, bacon, sausages, toast (with whatever), French toast, pancakes, milk, various kinds of juice, and water.
Lunch - Hot dogs, rice, omelettes, sandwiches, salad, milk, various kinds of juice, soda and water.
Dinner - A "surprise" meal that typically consists of some form of meat, soup, and two side vegetables. All drinks are available.
7. The area surrounding the camp (which is rather vast and provides lots of ground for recreational exploring) is separated from the outside world by a long, high fence that reminds one of a prison setting. The only way in and out of the camp is through the front gate, which is electronically locked and opened from the main office.
8. To keep the location a proper secret so as to prevent the disturbance of rehabilitation, the camp is only accessible by one of its buses - which stops by in certain areas around the country to pick up kids and take them in one trip to the camp. The bus can fit around fifty kids on it, and the only indication that it's run by the camp is the logo on the driver's shirt. This bus is how our characters will arrive at the camp.
9. Common pickup sites for the camp are major cities all over Japan, with Tokyo being the city overseas campers are picked up from. Tokonosu is part of these cities where campers are picked up.
10. The camp prides itself on its radio silence, which means there are no televisions or newspapers or radios that can connect them to the outside world. There's virtually no mobile reception, to boot.
11. The camp's activities include rock climbing (plastic wall), arts and crafts, zipline (one group gets access every second day), campfire games (spooky stories, bonding sessions), hiking/orienteering, treasure hunts, squad contests (like dodgeball or soccer games), environmental care (planting trees and flowers, tending to existing/growing plants, weeding small areas)
12. The camp has a timeout zone, where kids who cause trouble (and are caught) get put into a form of solitary confinement. The timeout zone itself is just a small cabin/shed that can be locked from the outside by a padlock and is generally kept shut for a good three or so hours to let campers cool off. It's stocked up with old blankets and canned food, as well as the secondhand clothing that is given to campers from juvenile detention.
13. There is a small lake a small way away from the campus that the group sometimes goes to for kayaking and swimming. On particularly hot days, all activities are suspended so the kids can go swimming and stay cool in the lake.
The kids
1. While the kids that are sent to the camp are typically troubled, there is a good deal of restrictions on the types of kids who can attend. For example, children who have recently been put into police custody or have served time will only be allowed in the camp as a "test" parole after they've done the required time given to them, and their performances and recoveries are assessed by the volunteers. The crime the teen may have committed is overlooked, just as long as they have enough good behavior when doing their time that can ensure they won't act out again on camp grounds.
Other types of kids that are sent to the camp: Kids who have drug problems (smoking, painkiller addiction, etc.); kids who harassed other students in their school; kids who start fights; kids who need a break from school (due to stress, mental health issues, etc.); kids whose parents feel they can "improve" themselves by going to the camp.
2. There are teenagers who volunteer to guide the camp goers, and they're referred to as "Squad Leaders" by the camp staff, though they prefer the term "Guide". They're typically in the camp for either extra marks in school, good Samaritan work, or because they were former camp goers who want to help others get to where they are.
3. The kids are typically aged between fifteen and nineteen - 8th/9th graders to 12th graders
4. Some of the kids come to the camp more than once, and they're generally either kids who didn't quite impress the people assessing them for parole, kids who still struggle with their issues or kids who enjoyed being there and want to come back to better themselves further.
5. The kids are often awarded stickers that represent their achievements. At the beginning of the bus trip, they're given a stapled together booklet with accomplishments and goals inside, and small boxes to put stickers in. Volunteers and leaders can award these stickers, and they're recorded and assessed at the end of the summer to see how much the teen has "improved". Each sticker resembles your traditional scouts or guides badges, and there's a small synopsis on the stickers' meanings underneath each box
6. The kids who come in from juvenile detention centres are required to wear tracking bracelets/anklets for the duration of their stay, which sound out an alarm if they ever try to leave the premises without permission (as in, the moment they walk out the gate is the moment an annoying high pitched sound starts coming from their wrist/ankle). This is mostly implemented in order to make sure that the kids who agreed to come at the suggestion of their prisons don't use this as an opportunity to escape the remainder of their sentence, especially since there's not a lot of kids who wind up being granted release after their first trip to the Home
7. Kids coming from prisons also don't really need to wear their uniforms - they're allowed to wear casual clothing for the duration of their stay, mostly due to the fact that the harsh weather combined with their uniforms don't make for a good combination. Their clothing is second-hand from the Home, though.
Ugh, feels this half of this is just info. You can find the rules on my profile, just above the form and below the character list.
