The Kill Factor, page 10
“I asked you and Mr. Sanderson a simple question, and you lied to me, therefore you suffered a punishment: a twenty-four-hour suspension of followers, a suspension that will end in seven minutes and eight seconds. And, as an additional punishment, I chose not to air the footage of you saving Mr. Sanderson. As for why I didn’t punish Mr. Finch, his actions did not lead to Mr. Sanderson falling overboard, and he was the one who alerted the ship when you foolishly dove in after Teller when he slipped. If it weren’t for Mr. Finch, I would have lost two contestants that night and the show would have been postponed. Any further questions?”
Emerson wanted to ask more. She knew there were a thousand things she did not yet understand about this dangerous game, but all she could do was shake her head. She glanced at the leaderboard again and saw that there was indeed a countdown beside her and Teller’s names that was at six minutes and twenty-three seconds and falling. Emerson looked over to where Kodi stood, watching the Producer with hatred in his eyes. He had alerted the ship that passengers had gone overboard, even though he had said that Teller was not his responsibility, even though he had walked away.
“Good,” the Producer continued. “Let me tell you what happens next: All follower bans will be temporarily lifted, and you will record your daily video diaries from your bedrooms.” The Producer gestured toward the thirty-four frames. “Your video diaries are very important; they are your way of connecting directly to your existing followers and your route to earning new followers. Remember, the contestant who finishes at the bottom of the leaderboard each day will face the public vote against the loser of the game. Be entertaining, be happy, show them the person you wish you were, and they will follow you. At exactly midnight, the person who has the least followers will face the public vote against the loser of the game. If the public chooses to vote you off, you will be escorted to your cell in the prison. After that, the rest of you are free to do as you wish, but tomorrow, the second game begins. You will find your clothing in the drawers and wardrobes of your bedrooms. Your camera drone will become active in ten minutes, at which time you may begin recording your diary. Mr. Dobler, I know that you are already condemned to face the vote, but if I were you, I’d treat this diary as a way to gain support early—boost your followers and you’ll increase your chance of survival should you make it through the vote. Good luck, contestants. Use your time wisely.”
And with that, he turned on his heel and walked away. To where? Emerson did not know, but he followed the curvature of the perfectly round beach and was gone within a minute.
“All right,” Kodi said, raising his eyes and looking at the row of bedrooms, and without another word, he walked toward the wooden frames.
The remaining thirty-three looked at each other, and then followed.
As Emerson got closer to the bedroom frames, she saw that numbers were carved into the center of the top beam, right above where the door would have been if these were real rooms. The bedrooms were laid out in a seemingly random order, and Emerson walked toward hers.
Follower ban, she thought as she glanced once again at the big screen and saw her name at the bottom. She hadn’t dived into the ocean to gain followers. It had been instinct, but the fact the Producer had not shown the footage annoyed her. She was here to provide a better life for Kester, and the Producer was taking opportunities away from her. Diving into the ocean to save someone was a heroic act, and people would have responded to that. Now it’s just wasted, she told herself, and then, quickly, No, don’t think like that. You did what you did because it’s who you are, not because you wanted people to follow you. Despite this, it seemed the only way to make up for lost ground was to perform in these stupid video diaries, but she already knew that she couldn’t do that.
Emerson made it to her bedroom and opened the wardrobe; the door on the right swung away from its hinge, just like the real wardrobe in her room back in the Burrows. All the outfits she had chosen on board the ship were there, hanging neatly. She opened the top drawer of the cabinet and saw myriad different bottles, products, makeup, shampoos, toothpaste. The second drawer contained row after row of underwear; the third had electrical items like hair dryers, toothbrushes, electric razors, straighteners, and more. Emerson closed this drawer, certain she wouldn’t use anything other than the toothbrush.
She sat down on the bed. It even sagged in the middle, and creaked, just like her own. She looked to her left, where contestant number 15, Cobalt Skiba, the boy with the blocked nose, was opening his wardrobe and choosing which outfit he would wear for the diary. She looked to her right and saw contestant number 42, Alasdair George William Tremblay-Birchall, who was sitting on the edge of his bed, his eyebrows furrowed.
“You okay?” Emerson asked.
“Are you asking me because you want to look good in front of the cameras, or are you genuinely concerned?” the boy replied, staring at the waves far away.
“I guess I’m concerned,” Emerson said.
The dark-haired boy turned toward Emerson. “I lost my glasses in my … in my grave,” he said. “I can’t see so well without them.”
“Oh, that sucks,” Emerson replied, unsure of what else to say.
“I think I’m going to ask the viewers to unfollow me,” Alasdair said.
“Why would you do that?” Emerson asked.
“Because if I end up at the bottom of the leaderboard, I’ll be against Zach in the vote. I could go to jail. At least that way I get to live. If I stay in the games and they’re anything like that first one, I’ll likely die.”
Emerson nodded. It made perfect sense. Life in prison was at least life. Staying in the games meant almost certain death. “I can’t do that,” Emerson replied. “I’m here to boost my brand currency so my brother can—”
“Yeah,” Alasdair interrupted. “We’re all here to help our families, but none of us knew that they were going to start killing kids.”
Kodi knew, Emerson thought, but nodded in agreement. “Well, good luck, Alasdair George William Tremblay-Birchall,” she said.
“You too …” Alasdair looked at Emerson’s wrist, then at the scoreboard, before turning back to face her. “Emerson Ness.”
All around them the kids of Retribution Island—The Kill Factor—were pulling off their wet, sandy clothes and running into the trees to change into clean clothes for their video diaries. Emerson didn’t move from her bed. She sat and thought about what she was going to say, what she was going to do. She glanced over to Teller, who was four rooms to her left as she sat facing the ocean. He was wearing the too-small white tank top he had chosen in the Infinity Suite; it showed off the muscles in his shoulders, chest, and arms. He was playing the game.
Emerson looked toward room 47, where Never was applying makeup and looking at her reflection in the mirror that hung on wires, then to room 11, where Tiger was wearing her gold sequined dress and dancing around her bed. Her room was nice—clean and bright, so much space.
Emerson felt her eyes going back to the scoreboard once again. She stared at the picture in the top spot, Imelda Fleet, and she wondered just how much her stunt of throwing the girl’s belongings into the water had both helped Imelda and hindered her own progress in gaining followers.
You’re impulsive, aren’t you, Ms. Ness? You don’t think before you speak, and you don’t think before you act.
The words of Agent Dern ran through her mind. They were now so familiar to her that she barely even heard them.
“She was pretty famous before this whole thing began,” Alasdair said, and Emerson looked around to see that he had followed her gaze to the top of the leaderboard. “She had like two million followers, but the regulators found out that almost half of them were bots. She was arrested for defrauding advertisers and falsely inflating the value of her brand credits; it was a big story. Looks like she has enough loyal followers to get her to the top, though.”
“I threw her clothes overboard,” Emerson said.
Alasdair smiled for the first time since Emerson had met him. “That’ll be why you’re dead last, then. Maybe I should set fire to her shoes or something. Maybe then I’ll get voted out.”
The scoreboard suddenly changed from a list of names and photographs to a countdown that started at sixty seconds.
“Oh lordy. This is it,” Cobalt Skiba said, wiping his nose on the back of his hand and straightening his blue, spotted bow tie. “Good luck, Llanzo!” he shouted over to 14, who offered a double thumbs-up in response.
Emerson watched the numbers count down, wondering what she was going to do or say when the time came.
Finally, the number zero appeared on the screen, and thirty-four camera drones dipped down from the hive above them, one for each contestant, red recording lights glaring.
Imelda was the first to snap into action.
“Oh my God, you guys, this has been the wildest experience. I can’t believe the show has finally begun. I cannot wait to get started and try my best for all my wonderful followers.”
Emerson watched her and couldn’t believe this was the same girl who had marched up to the Producer and told him that he was responsible for the people who had died on the beach.
One by one, all the remaining contestants shook off the shock at what they had just been through on the beach and began performing for the cameras.
Beside her, Alasdair was begging his followers to unfollow him. Tiger was dancing and singing. Teller was doing push-ups and smiling at the camera. Kodi was lying on his back, talking calmly to the drone that hovered above his face. Never was laughing at seemingly nothing. And another contestant (Emerson thought it was Andrew Matthews) had taken his clothes off and was running into the sea.
Emerson looked in wonder at the circus that had erupted all around her. She clenched her jaw and looked into the lens of the drone that was hovering in front of her face.
“Kids have died,” she said. “Less than an hour ago, kids died on the beach. You all saw it. How can you stand for that? How can you watch this? You have to stop it. You have to get us out of here. There is a man who calls himself the Producer. We’re on a man-made beach in the middle of … an ocean somewhere! There is a warm, tropical climate. You have to find us and get us out of here.”
Emerson turned away from her drone, trying to ignore the other contestants who were promising new followers that they would be entered into a competition to win five brand credits if they went on to win the game show.
“Take two,” a voice said, and Emerson turned to see that the drone was still hovering in front of her. The voice had been human, but it had come from the drone.
“Excuse me?”
“Take two,” the drone said again.
“What do you mean take two?” Emerson asked.
“From the top. We’re not using that footage. Please do not talk about the Producer, or give information about the potential location of the games.”
Emerson turned slowly back to face the drone. “Who are you? Whoever you are, you work for this company. People died on that beach, real people! Can’t you help us? Can’t you do something?”
“Please do not mention the Producer or give any information about the potential location of the games. Any mention of the Producer or the location of the games will be cut out of the footage that goes to air. From the top.”
Emerson stared at the drone, waves of rage washing over her. “Fine,” she said. “I was exploited. I was tricked into signing a contract to join a show I do not want to be a part of! I demand to speak to a lawyer. I demand to be let off this island.”
The drone was silent for a while, and then said, “Take three.”
“I’ve said what I have to say!” Emerson yelled.
“Take three,” the drone repeated. “This is your last chance. Please record a usable video diary.”
Emerson looked around in disbelief. The scenes all about her baffled her: Contestant number 4 was talking earnestly into the camera about conspiracy theories involving a world government and plots to control the minds of regular people; a girl wearing a very short skirt was doing yoga and purposely falling over to show her underwear; Teller had taken his tank top off and was doing pull-ups on the frame of his bedroom; Zach Dobler, the red-haired boy who had been last to escape his grave, had found a large jellyfish in the shallow water and was screaming as he rubbed it on his arms.
“Take three,” the drone repeated. “The best way to gain followers is to have a consistent message, be provocative, be upbeat, ask your viewers to subscribe, create effective branding …”
“I’m not going to record anything else,” Emerson said. She knew, deep down, that she was condemning herself to last place on the leaderboard and blowing up her plan to increase her brand-credit value.
“Very well,” the drone’s voice said. “You will be issued with a twenty-four-hour follower ban. This ban will be added to any existing penalties. Good day.”
The record light went out, and the camera drone disappeared back up into the cloud of drones overhead.
Emerson swallowed. She sat on her bed as the hysterical spectacle continued all around her.
What have you done? she asked herself.
By the time the last contestant had finished their video diary, Zach Dobler was lying on the sand in a pool of his own vomit, moaning in pain, his arm a red and swollen mess where the jellyfish stings had gone in.
Everyone else sat around, or stood in small groups, exhausted. The sudden changes in emotion from fighting for their lives, to grieving for the dead, to portraying upbeat social media personalities, had left them drained.
“I can’t believe it,” Alasdair said, shaking his head.
“What is it?” Emerson asked, trying to ignore her jittering nerves, knowing that she was at the bottom of the leaderboard and would have to compete for her place on the island.
“Look at the board,” Alasdair replied.
Emerson looked at it, and saw that Alasdair George William Tremblay-Birchall had gone from sixteenth place to fifth. His begging people to unfollow him had backfired completely, and the seemingly cruel viewers had done the opposite of what he requested and followed him by the thousands.
“Why would they do that? I don’t want to die, Emerson, I just want out of this stupid game show.”
“I don’t know,” Emerson admitted. “I don’t know how they’re even watching this. Surely there isn’t a TV station in the world that would broadcast this?”
“Did you see?” Tiger said, running over to Emerson’s room. She looked happy but exhausted.
“I did,” Emerson said, smiling back at the young girl, who had climbed from seventh place to fourth. “Whatever you did really worked!”
“I’ve got twenty-two thousand followers!” she exclaimed. “I’m famous, baby!”
Emerson laughed. “Yeah, you are.”
Tiger’s face dropped as she remembered who she was talking to. “Hey, I’m sure as soon as they lift the ban you’ll get loads of followers too.”
“I doubt I’ll make it through the audience vote.”
“I don’t know,” Tiger replied. “I don’t think Zach is doing so well.”
“Yeah, I know,” Emerson said, her eyes darting over to the motionless contestant. She didn’t want to compete against a boy who had almost killed himself with jellyfish stings, but she didn’t want to leave the game without gaining more followers either.
“Lion’s mane,” Alasdair muttered.
“Sorry?” Emerson asked, turning away from Zach.
“That is a lion’s mane jellyfish. Their sting is painful, but it doesn’t often result in death … I guess if you purposefully sting yourself over and over again, though …”
“Hey, superstar,” Never said, strolling over with a big smile on her face. “You’re going to smash the viewer vote, I know it.”
“I don’t know,” Emerson said. “It seems like it’s hard to predict what the viewers are going to do.”
“Amen!” Alasdair said morosely.
“You’re doing well, though,” Emerson said, looking at Never’s name just underneath Alasdair’s, in sixth place.
“Yeah, not bad, huh? I don’t think anyone’s going to catch Imelda, though. She’s like eighty thousand followers clear already. It’s not fair, they shouldn’t let influencers on this show! It’s such an advantage.”
Emerson felt a laugh of utter disbelief building up inside her. How had this all become so normal so fast? Before the laugh could escape her throat, the Producer appeared before them, standing grandly on the beach. He had changed. He no longer looked like a kind, caring man. Those sympathetic eyes had become full of dark humor and contempt, and he looked somehow taller and slimmer.
“Contestants!” he bellowed. “You have made it through your first task, and completed your video diaries. The footage is being aired as we speak, and in exactly one minute we will take a shapshot of your follower count and see which contestant will be facing Mr. Dobler in the viewer vote. I want to personally thank you for the efforts you have put in to make the first few episodes of The Kill Factor so special. We have an enormous viewer count that will only grow as word of mouth spreads and social media begins talking about us, and they will talk about us.”
Amazingly, people began clapping at this announcement. Emerson looked around, shocked that ten or twelve of the contestants looked delighted at this news. Most of them were near the top of the leaderboard.
“Thank you, thank you,” the Producer said, smiling at the contestants. “We need to keep the energy up as the games continue. Energy, effort, and enthusiasm, the three Es, that is what will win you followers. Now, one last thing before we announce last place. There is an additional perk for finishing at the top of the leaderboard each day: You win a prize. Today’s prize is a lighting drone. So all of your footage will look even more professional as it goes out.”
There was a murmur of anticipation throughout the crowd at this announcement.
“And now,” the Producer said dramatically, “we count down to today’s winners and losers. Ten, nine, eight, seven …”
