|-WARNING-|
Fiddle and Aleki Young have disappeared.
|------------|
Victor Pasto used to be a bad worker. He didn't know anything. His supervisor would strain her back to arch over Victor's chair and jab an untapered finger at different icons until the LED screen blushed. "We're supposed to go here to back up what we've done," she hummed, tapping on the monitor. Whatever she referred to would be left battered and bruised. And unrecognizable. Victor narrows his eyes and waits for the effect to end. "Don't worry about it. You'll be past that point in a week anyway. Takes too much time and if the bigs are ever looking at your back-ups, a missing entry is probably the best you can hope for. Just click 'Complete' and it will take you back to the scanner page."
He learned, and he practiced until all he was doing was practicing. He would receive commendations reciting his productivity statistics back to him. It felt good, being told things he already knew.
He used to not know anything. He left that in the past, but time is a funny thing, and a time came along where he used to be a good worker as well.
It was time, and it was a funny thing, what brought this all about. It was after enough gushing had taken public place that the man who held fifth place in the Scanner leaderboards decided Victor was someone who didn't mind being beneath him. Fifth Place looked furtively around before pulling out the face of an ichor watch. It resembled a thumbprint encased in a coin of glass. That's because it was eleven o'clock. Inside a sample of ichor would expand across a map of concentric lines which corresponded to the twelve hours. At noon and midnight it would expand into a reservoir along the edge and complete an ichor circuit, damping the sample and returning it to its original state. "Use this under your finger when your scanning. It has a charge, and something about the nano-movements or whatever blows your production through the roof. Lets you look like you're working all the time if you wanted that. Burns through ichor like a pickup truck, but, you might have noticed," he spread out his arms in show, unfolding from his hunched persona, "there's a lot to be had in these parts. Just don't be obvious about it."
The tip came with only two stipulations: don't get caught, and don't get higher than Fifth Place on the boards.
Victor produced even higher statistics, and earned his bosses even more money, all the while doing less and less—almost nothing at all.
Now Victor Pasto is dead.
|-TASK THREE-|
This task will be focusing in on the characterization of your main character. Specifically, the task requirement for this round is that we get a look at their backstory. This could be done through exposition, a flashback, or maybe you want to set the whole entry in the past. As always, the possibilities are endless. I'll be looking for character traits that your citizens are currently showing to be given deeper meaning as we take a look at the events which shaped them. What makes them unique, and why is your story about them?
|-WORD LIMIT-|
4000 words.
|-STAKES-|
The 2 lowest scores for this task will be up for votes. Of those, 1 will be eliminated.
|-DEADLINE-|
Sunday July 14th 11:00 PM EST
Remember to email your submission to me at crocorocker@gmail.com before the deadline. EVERYONE must submit like this. If you would like additional feedback, you can ALSO share a Google Doc with the same email before the deadline. Good luck!
|-THE_HACKER-|
The Hacker: Marigold Estes
The Victim: SilverBowAndArrow
The Crime: "This was your third mistake: you thought you could outsmart me."
SilverBowAndArrow: 2 (+2)
Delilah: 2 (+0)
Marigold Estes: 3 (+2)
Jordan Baxter: 2 (+0)
Fiddle: 1 (+0)
Wish Bone Lean: 2 (+1)
Aleki Young: 2 (+0)