One of the many hobos shifts his eyes around the other contestants. Seeing a mark, he moves over to the middle aged woman and attempts to pick her pockets while she's distracted.
The middle aged woman is clueless as the hobo shifts over to her and surreptitiously reaches into her pockets, fishing out three of her gold tokens. Nobody else seems to notice or say anything, as the masked judges stand around observing the contestants.
"This is outrageous! You can't keep us here!" the mustached man contends, but not without a clear tone of nervousness. "I don't care about the hundred grand! Just let me outta here!"
"That is unfortunately not possible," comes the dispassionate response of the masked representative.
"The only way out of here, for any of you, is to win the game by collecting 25 gold tokens. These are the rules, and they won't change, regardless of any personal dispositions you may have.""W-what happens if we lose?" the middle aged woman asks nervously, not having checked her pockets yet.
"In such a case, should you remain in reasonably healthy condition, you will be transported to another facility to be auctioned off to potential buyers.""Like, human trafficking? This is so fucked up! You're all gonna pay for this!" yells the young red-haired woman, raising a fist with teeth clenched.
There's an apathetic pause in the masked man's demeanor.
"I would suggest focusing on matters of greater import to you, contestant #7. Your life depends on it."The mention of 'contestant #7' brings notice to a feature on the contestants' otherwise blank white shirts - a number printed on the back, ranging from 1 to 10.
Papa Joe: 8
BULK MUSCLES: 5
Jittery Joe: 1
Kalusis: 3
Tony Fieraru: 9
Mustached Man: 10
Middle-aged Woman: 2
Man with slick hair: 6
Young red-haired woman: 7
Older bald man: 4
"There is one other rule I should explain, which has to do with player elimination. After each of the games, you will either be awarded or penalized a certain number of tokens. Should you ever find yourself in a situation where you cannot pay the amount of tokens owed, you will be disqualified."There is a pause as the contestants digest the information.
"W-wait, sir! I seem to only have two tokens in my pocket..." the middled aged woman suddenly informs, having discovered the missing state of her items.
The masked man pauses for a moment.
"Unfortunately, that is not our concern. We have made certain that each player was provided their accurate starting share of tokens. Therefore the only conclusion to be drawn is that they've been taken from you while you were not paying attention."There is a look of shock in the woman's eyes. "A-are you saying... someone
stole them from me?" She looks around at the others in disbelief.
No response from the masked man.
Calculating internally, Tony plants himself near the four sympathetic-looking people in the second part of the group, particularly the middle-aged woman, and starts crying. "I-I want to go home, please give me some tokens? 
"
At the child's cries of sadness, the woman can't help but sympathize, as she looks down at the two tokens in her hand.
"Here you go, my dear," she hands one of her remaining tokens to him, offering an encouraging smile and gentle pat on the head. "If any of us deserve to go free, it should be you."
"This is insane! This kid is like 10 years old! Don't you people have even a shred of decency!?" the auburn-haired girl protested, to the silence of the masked spectators.
Kalusis whispers and chuckles to himself in the background
No one seems to pay much mind to the strange individual in the back, seemingly conversing with himself. The old man gives him an odd glance, looking mildly confused if not curious as anyone would be.
"There is one final rule, which is that no physical violence must be used by any contestants at any time. Violations of this rule will result in penalties for all parties involved.""Now, if there are no other questions, shall we proceed to the first game?" the masked representative addresses the contestants a final time, as his cohorts close in, preparing to begin escorting them to another location in the facility.
Name: Papa Joe
Gender: Male
Age: 45
Description: A hobo with long greying beard and ratty hair. Occasional scars across most of his body with unclear origin.
Gold tokens: 8
Name: BULK MUSCLES
Gender: Male
Age: 30
Description: A muscle bound man of tremendous height, 8 feet tall with glassy vacant looking eyes that are crossed.
Gold tokens: 5
Name: Jittery Joe
Gender: Male
Age: 36
Description: A disheveled man who looks exactly like what you'd expect a drug addict to look like.
Misc info: Something
Gold tokens: 5
Name: Kalusis
Gender: M
Age: 347
Description: Blond. Quite short.
Gold tokens: 5
Name: Tony Fieraru
Gender: Male
Age: 12
Description: Who let a kid in here?! Very slight and emotionally temperamental, he'll probably die in a day or somehow inexplicably survive to the end.
Misc info: Eastern European.
Gold tokens: 6
Author
Topic: Crisis Game [IC] (Read 562 times)