Future Traded Yestoday

12

Every time we think we know what's going to happen, this school and whoever is running it always throws us for a loop. After over two years we thought we'd be safe, especially since we've made it through the initial scare of us being separated.

I wish I could blame the two new members of our group- two Chinese guys that came within a month of each other- but I know they're not at fault. We should've convinced the instructors that we could handle training them on our own in our very limited and controlled free time. We should've done better to protect our current standing instead of being thrown back down.

Instead, we were put back at square one.

We didn't need to be back at square one. One of the Chinese guys had already come from a ridiculously top-notch dance school and the other one- the older of the two- already had a ton of singing experience.

Sure, restarting the language lessons would have been helpful, but restarting everything just feels like a waste. This is exactly what we had been afraid of when the kid my age joined, but now we had so much more that we lost.

So much has been thrown into our schedule that I don't think they expect us to be human anymore. Our actual class time had to be extended to accommodate for the two new guys, but they also upped our workout hours in the morning. I heard someone mentioning that they're trying to sculpt us into perfect models without us outright knowing.

I don't know how they thought we'd miss that.

Our vocal and rap lessons were extended along with our dance lessons. Especially our dance lessons. They've stopped separating us like they had been now that those two dance videos were released, but that also means our honorary group member from the other class hasn't been allowed to join us as often.

Or maybe his own group has been too busy. I wouldn't know because I don't have the time for rumor hunting anymore.

On top of this sleep and eating reducing schedule, they keep having us practice promotional skits for some sort of rookie show along with mock photoshoots. I'm starting to think that the photoshoots aren't as pretend as we think they are considering they keep getting more high quality each time, but I wouldn't know how to tell the difference.

So we're all miserable and exhausted and holding onto each other to keep going. We've become hypocrites in the way that we scold each other for not eating enough but then barely eat anything ourselves so we can fit in a few extra minutes of sleep.

And yet we can't find it in ourselves to blame the new guys because it's not their fault this program sucks. Besides, we're all equally suffering and fighting among ourselves would only make it worse.

Except for the playful bickering that ensues between quite a few of us. That could never fail to be entertaining.

Then out of nowhere, just as we were about to break and stage a revolt against the adults, it all stopped. Silence is the most terrifying thing to experience when you've had the volume on max for a month and a half.

Our school work was completely dropped and rather than have dance instructors, choreographers were brought in. A whole team of people were constructed just for our images and to keep us on track for schedules.

The Thai guy, our unspoken leader, the Canadian, the guy that had been to America but wasn't American, and the twin of the Japanese guy were then immediately separated from the rest of us, preparing for something new. The oldest of us, the guy who wasn't American and the guy that hung around me and now claims he's my dad were also pulled occasionally, along with the older, new Chinese guy.

So once again, the younger portion of the group was forgotten. At one point we were even pulled from a group showcase they were preparing for-- some sort of grand reveal to take place after a whole bunch of videos were filmed.

At this point it didn't even feel like we were even going to be needed for the group. They only let us participate in promotional videos for the rookie show and the occasional performance for the children's tv show. To top it off, they took five of the group members to Bangkok to film a whole show, and then flew the rest of us in later to join them for the rookie show there.

Though, at least we got to participate in the rookie show. The two new Chinese guys were forced to stay back. The dancer because they wanted him to film and work on something, and the older one because... I  actually don't know why they made him stay back because he's really good at singing.

And then as soon as the rookie show was over, the older members were pulled to work on some other showcase the people running this school had put together. We were deemed as "too young" and were put on the sideline. But we didn't have anything better to do, so we stayed in the practice room and watched them.

By "we" I mean me, of course, the two guys the same age as me and the youngest of us. Even though he was our best dancer. For some reason the Canadian wasn't told he was too young even though there was just a year between us and him.

We watched as they eventually received masks for the showcase and cool outfits that had lights in them synchronized to the performance for the beginning. We watched in the empty audience as they rehearsed the walk in with other random people not part of the group who we assumed were students from another class in the school.

We kept watching them from the side because there wasn't anything else for us to do. And then we watched as their group name was announced for the first time: Neo Culture Technology.