by Haidji
The Geek set to work.
He quickly designed the system’s basic architecture and sourced the components using his secret network, so nobody could link the components together and attempt any reverse engineering. A micro-laser inside each candidate’s glove would, when commanded, immediately and silently cut the wire, in a nanosecond.
The command would come by wireless signal, sent by a transmitter at the edge of the platform. A wireless cloud-computing network, set up with next generation encryption, would control the system.
Only the Council’s designees would have access. Passcodes would change at least 24 times per day. Multiple redundancies were built in, to make everything fail-safe.
For the Geek, this was all business as usual.
He reserved his signature moment for the wireless network part of the system. This was the challenging part. It would be totally unhackable.
He wrote the software code for it from scratch, every bit of it. Each packet in the streaming data transmission signal would be wrapped in a spinning cocoon of encryption.
Even if a hacker could intercept the signal and, given a miracle, break the encryption code within nanoseconds, the encryption cocoon would already change before the hacker could access the decoded information, let alone try to alter it. Even the Geek, himself, thought this was radically cool.
The system was ready. They decided to test it in the next game day.
‘Would be a stormy and rainy day…let’s make some improvements, and test the new stuff also’, suggested Yellow.
‘We’ll vote about it…now,’ said Black
They voted about it and the council agreed.
The Gravedigger wasn’t a problem anymore.
Purple laughed, thinking about the modern new way.
The wireless way to cut wires.
Chapter 25
Step 2 – Day 4
The sky was falling all over the Stadium. Nobody expected such a tempest. As would the souls of the already dead be crying over the public, rain was falling, crying for the ones that were gone, and for the ones that stayed.
Steven Laurence was a genius. He had thought about rain. So, over the platform, a roof opened by the first sign of water. Transparent like glass. But it wasn’t glass.
Covering the whole area, so the rainwater would not destroy the beautiful red femme fatale dress. The system would protect the Hostess, and the platform. For the crowd, he thought that the more inclement the conditions, the more visceral their experience would be—and after all, they were paying to live an unforgettable experience.
All he saw before was heavy, boring, old looking. He wanted to innovate, to have the right strength, flexibility, and transparency. He knew what he wanted; he wanted to be the new breath in Architecture. For this, it was simple; to be a new breath all he needed was
Air.
He called it ‘Windplate’.
Inspired by a piece of paper he found one day lying on a table at Starbucks, something about a lost study that someone once made, about something called the ‘wind body’. The study was very interesting, and the description clear into details; he discovered that it wasn’t a simple pattern, and he made it.
It was elegant in its simplicity. The Stadium was round, with the platform in the center and the elevator in the center of the platform. This allowed the crowd a good view, regardless of their seat location.
Laurence created an invisible plate of wind, suspended above the platform. Emanating from the top of the elevator shaft, silent forces created a small wind circle about one meter thick, which could be controlled in diameter and strength to achieve the desired measure of protection.
The wind plate spun in circles over the platform.
No rain, dust, birds or bird droppings could ever fall down on the platform. Instead, the Windplate’s centrifugal forces swept them all aside, to fall outside the platform area.
When he realized how truly innovative his ‘Windplate’ really was, he immediately filed a patent for this new wind energy instrument.
The crowd was surprised and wondering, looking between the candidates and the Windplate.
Trying to understand how, with no physical deck, the rain wasn’t falling over the platform; as would the Storm itself cry around the candidates but with its tears falling only outside the platform's edge, where they, the crowd, were standing. Inside all was dry. They called it Magic.
The day’s proceedings started, with the Hare Krishna group selling iPods, CDs and songs in front of the stadium. Nobody, apart from smokers, would buy lighters under the rain.
And the Hostess announced:
‘Thank you for being here, under this terrible weather. Thank you very much for your support and attention, I hope that I, that we all, I mean … almost all…survive this game day…you know what I mean, the counter already started, under the tempest, they are here, ready to jump for their lives.
A big round of applause please, for the candidates, welcome to
SUICIDE GAME!
The new game
The new mania
8000 candidates 1000 candidates today!
Only one will survive
Only one can win!
Live from the Night Stadium
Nothing compares to what you'll see here
Nothing compares to what you'll watch
You have already chosen your candidate,
You have Made your bet
To be part of a
New and unexpected game
Now it’s time to leave it all in the laps of the gods
And when the bell rings…it is time to jump…for your life!
10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1!
JUMP!’
The first group jumped, under the rain.
Around lunchtime, the Hostess announced that there would be an extra jump this day, especially made for those in the crowd who had come, under storm and rain, to watch the Game.
And the good part was that it wouldn’t be just an extra jump. Not only this day’s candidates would jump, but all candidates; all survivors from the second game step, would jump together, at the end of this day. Probably over 1000 candidates, depending on how many would make it in this game day.
‘Over 1000 candidates jumping together under the rain, just for you. This will be something really amazing! ‘
Minivans were already bringing the candidates from the condominium, and the makeup team artists were working with no breaks, to make all the 963 candidates from the other days ready for the last jump of this day.
With 125 winners from this fifth jump, added to the survivors from the other days of this second step, there would be exactly 1088 candidates for the extra jump.
The Gravedigger was also watching this last jump. He was curious about how many would die, because after his damaging of the wires, all candidates whose wires he damaged had died; but the 1088 had survived, so when they jump again, no wires will break…so it can only be a joke, this last jump. Maybe they wanted to make a big celebration with all 1088 candidates? There were probably not so many champagne glasses or models there; all this was strange, but worth to see, thought the Gravedigger.
It was time for the last jump of the day, the ‘Extra Jump!’ The platform was full with candidates and dancers, who were ex-models.
Two, three or sometimes even more candidates were now using the space that one candidate usually used. The platform was more than just full.
Rain was falling outside the platform. Due to the roof system, the Hostess was dry and beautiful.
But the candidates were at the outer edge of the platform, and raindrops were falling over them, sliding over their bodies as would they be washing their souls from all questions and doubts, before their jump into an uncertainty destiny.
Morris, the computer freak sitting at the main computer on the control room, was waiting to test the new wireless system. With all seven Council members, and Louis the Geek, standing directly behind him.
Step by step, even
the Hostess could recognize the candidates. All dressed in the same way, same makeup.
But there was something impossible to change, under all the makeup.
And this something was their individuality.
Still alive inside of them, until their last moment.
Still visible even for the ushers, as they dragged the lifeless bodies through the sand on the ground.
Even then, they still were individuals.
With something unique, impossible to be changed.
The Hostess saw them so close to each other on the platform, and she liked the idea of the extra jump, but was also when the idea to see that they were individuals had started to disturb her. She did not have time to think, the countdown already started.
The voice of the Hostess was loud and beautiful.
‘Now, live from the Night Stadium, especially for you,
For you that came all the way here under this tempest, for you in front of the Stadium trying to see something through the rain curtain, for you at home, or at work, being here with me under this terrible weather all day,
For all of you, the extra jump, to thank you for being here with us today, no matter where you are, thank you for being here with me, welcome to the extra jump, welcome to
SUICIDE GAME!
The new game
The new mania
Now only 1088
Only one will survive at the end.
Only one can win!
Live from the Night Stadium
Nothing compares to what you'll see here
Nothing compares to what you'll watch
You have already chosen your candidate,
You have Made your bet
To be part of a
New and unexpected game
Now it’s time to let all be in the laps of the gods
And when the bell rings…it is time to jump for your life!
She spoke in harmony with the countdown, with all screens showing her, together with the countdown numbers.
10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1!
And the jump bell rang out loudly
JUMP!’
They jumped, all at the same time, still hearing the echo of the bell’s sounding, as the Hare Krishnas and teenagers were singing the new Life in a Wire song, Suicide Freak, outside and inside the Stadium.
And after the 21-meter free fall…Morris touched the computer screen. There was a ‘click’ sound, which no one could hear outside the control room.
The Geek and the seven Council members were standing behind Morris, watching the candidates on the computer screen.
It was, as if something had gone badly wrong.
Like a black mass. Falling out of the game, as a bolt of lightning crossed the sky.
Bumping into the Stadium ground, with a dumb drum thunder sound, where the wet sand embraced their bodies.
The Public stood up trying to see the ground. But they could see…nothing. Sand was in the air. Like a rare tempest in the desert, they felt embraced by the thirsty sand.
The Gravedigger was scared, and he wasn’t easy to scare, he almost jumped after the candidates to see what was really going on, but stopped in the last second and went down with an elevator.
Are they all dead? Are they all dead? Are they all death?
Persons were screaming.
White mist came over everything; the oldest trick, dry ice. To create magic, or just to avoid the cameras showing the bloody ground of the Stadium.
The Ushers couldn’t finish their work removing all the bodies, and didn’t even have time to make the sand look fine again, or to remove all them, as the platform came down with just seven candidates hanging on their wires. The Gravedigger started to help them with the bodies.
The platform came slowly up again, all lights on the Stadium falling over it.
Where each one, with a champagne glass, was celebrating, and the beautiful Hostess was announcing the end of the four days of the Second Step:
‘Here: the Seven Ultimate Candidates.
Yes, life takes unexpected ways sometimes.
From a huge possibility of choices at the beginning of this day, only seven were correct.
The next day will be a day off. But then, I will have a surprise for you in the third Step of the Game, thank you very much for being here with us today, under tempest, under rain, thank you for being here in the last day of this second step from Suicide Game. A big round of applause please, for the Seven Ultimate Candidates.’
While the crowd was clapping and whistling, the platform silently went down to the Stadium’s sandy ground. The minivans were already there; ready to bring the candidates to the condominium.
They were not only the Seven Ultimate Candidates now.
They had turned into Celebrities.
They needed special bodyguards with motorbikes around the minivans, to escape from the paparazzi on their own motorbikes, on the way to the condominium.
Chapter 26
Cassandra stopped after the game at Alessandra’s, to see how she and the baby were doing by the storm, and asked if she might want to come over to visit while they were doing the makeup of the seven last candidates, the next morning. Alessandra would come with Dawn and Wow.
Only one makeup artist team would stay for the Third Step of the game, and this could only be the best one. Cassandra, John and Tim were in this best team; it was an honor. They were the best team. John was more than happy.
The other teams would now work outside the Stadium, because the kids’ parties’ makeup teams couldn’t cover the demand for symbols to be painted on the public’s foreheads. To have the real candidates makeup artists’ teams outside, was a great idea, of course; voted and approved by the Council members, after being suggested by Blue. And, of course the makeup, made by the real Suicide Game makeup artist teams dressed in their real uniforms, would be more expensive.
Cassandra appeared to work in the kitchen, but as a part-time worker she was told to just help to clean the kitchen, then she could go home; with only seven candidates left, they wouldn’t need her for the last game step.
Cassandra came home earlier, this night. And decided to walk with Luca in the park. For the first time since she moved into her apartment, she was in the park and she felt good there, walking hand in hand with Luca.
The other kitchen workers joined the group of workers that separated the losers’ belongings. For the different charity groups and/or sellers.
The Council had directed that the seminars would be made individually, in the next day. So also that nobody could notice if Anthony wouldn’t be there.
Alessandra was looking into Dawn’s bright eyes and thinking. The baby walked after the dog, calling it wow wow, smiling and laughing after him.
Was good to see the baby’s eyes. Most persons she saw before being inside the Stadium with Dawn and Wow, were wearing sunglasses.
Few were the persons whose eyes she could see. Most of them hid themselves behind sunglasses. As would masks not be enough anymore, in a world where a 20 year old was too old to be a model, but they expect persons to retire at almost 70, and die with 100.
What about persons who see work as…something to fulfill their dreams? As something they like to do?
They almost couldn’t see the colors of the world around them, reducing all into a darker world where the sunglasses could only be taken off of their faces when they went to sleep.
In a cult of pessimism, where they believed they have the need to protect themselves from happy colors. From the happiness and joy they both longed and feared.
Such as their fear to love the perfection of their imperfect bodies.
The perfection of their individuality, with bodies made by measure for each one of them, always searching for a common ideal, nonexistent, utopic, where biometric measures put them under knives and diets, without to realize the beauty of their own beings. Hidden under so many layers of esthetic globalization.
Observing the persons, so similar insi
de, so different outside; spiritually identical, physically so different, Alessandra was thinking about things.
Was it so difficult to accept happiness in this world?
So difficult that persons always seem to search for the dark side of life? Why?
Too much brightness hurts their eyes?
Louis, the Geek, was content that his wireless system was perfect. He was content, but not really happy, something else was in his mind.
The Geek had a personal dream he was pursuing for years.
He wanted to find the members or, who knows, maybe even the founder, of probably the most secret society in the world: The White Angels.
The White Angels society was growing day after day; about that, the Geek was sure.
Walking among common persons, even their members usually knew only a few other members.
The Geek knew one of their rules: 2.5% from their profits went out of their bank accounts. Not always to the same account and also not on a regular basis. But when it did, it was mostly around 2.5% and the Geek was good with numbers.
For many years, he was following and searching accounts, trying to find them. He already had a list with possible members and his forensic evidence showed that they were probably growing.
But, who are the White Angels?
There was a rumor that the higher members shall have secret meetings and decide about the World’s destiny. That some of the most important persons in the world belonged to them.
Inspired by the legend that in ancient times angels came to Earth to teach and help human beings, some persons believed that between the higher members, there shall be real angels, incarnated or not in human bodies.
There were lots of rumors about them, but the truth was that nobody seemed to know who they really were.
The Geek had already followed some of the persons in his list, to find out where the meetings were, but nothing came out of that. He couldn’t just stop someone on the street and ask: 'Are you one of the White Angels? I’ve been watching your bank account for months and saw the 2.5% going out. Who are you?’
