Alice in Borderland: New York

Rising Tensions (2): Three of Clubs (2)

Part 1 Chapter 5
Three of Clubs (2)

"No."

"No, no, no, no, NO!"

This couldn't be happening! A game about music? Even though it was the Three of Clubs...  a music game? Was the whole world really against her? Would the Borderland's cruelty ever end? With a Herculean effort, June tuned out her panicked thoughts to listen to the rules:

"Rules:
-Every 5 minutes, the players are each given a code to memorize.
-The players must play the instruments that are associated with the colors they must repeat.
-Players are free to wander the venue in the 5 minute downtime between rounds.
-Players must discover the code to exit the building by the end of the game.
-It is GAME CLEAR for all players once the code has been inputted.
-It is GAME OVER for players that do not successfully memorize their number, or escape the building in time."

"Memorization? This seems...more like diamonds." Teineji remarked. "Interesting..." Asher said. "M...memorizing a code? With music? No, we have to find the code and escape." June stammered. "Round 1." The speakers said suddenly. "Codes have been distributed. Each player, please walk up to the stage one by one." The stage lit up, displaying an array of different instruments, each with a different colored tag. June looked at her phone, and saw a line of six squares: 2 orange followed by a blue, and the same thing again."I'll...I'll go first." June offered. "Alright." Asher said, letting her go up.

June, shaking, slowly walked up to the stage. Her trembling hands grabbed the trumpet, which had an orange tag, and, after a few failed attempts at playing, blew two notes on it before setting it down. She then walked over to the trombone and slowly blew one loud note that rang across the concert hall. After June repeated this, the speakers spoke. "Player June has cleared her first round." Almost immediately, June dashed off the stage and ran to a different part of the concert hall as quickly as she could. Away from the music. Away from the pain.

She arrived in a gift shop area, panting heavily. Surrounded by the music sheets of famous long dead composers, she broke down in tears and started to cry. Why... why was she here? How could she escape? June didn't know how long she stayed there, sobbing as she remembered everything. All of the pain, all of the trauma, that music had caused her. It must have been only a few minutes, but it felt like hours.

Eventually, June stood back up and began wandering the gift shop. Most of the books were just about music sheets of composers, but one book caught her attention: a book about the history of secret codes. "At least it's not a book about music." June said to herself, opening the book and flipping through it. It was mostly about the origins of  famous codes and ciphers, such as the Caesar Cipher and Morse code. As June flipped through the book, time seemed to fly by, as before she knew it, a siren was blaring.

"Round 2 will commence shortly. All players, please return to the main stage."

June sighed and checked her phone as she walked back to the stage. Red, red, orange, yellow, yellow, orange... the same pattern as  first round, just with different instruments. "I'll go first again. Just to get it out of the way." She said. No one objected. Shaking, June stood up to the stage again. She shakily played 2 notes of guitar and a note of trumpet, before playing 2 notes of violin and another note of trumpet. Throwing the instruments down as soon as she was done, June sat down again, still shaking.

One by one, the others walked up to the stage and played their instruments in the correct order. "Round 2 cleared. All players played correctly. If the code has not been discovered by the end of round 3, it's GAME OVER to all players."

"June, follow me!" Teineji called to her. June did so reluctantly, following Teineji to the main entrance of the building. The building had a large wheel with 5 different letters. "So...it's a letter code..." June said. "Maybe it's based on the...the notation? Like A, B, C, D, that sort of thing." "Maybe..." Teineji said, clearly getting agitated. Then, the speakers rang out.

"2 minutes until Round 3 begins."

"Shit!" Teineji cursed, his eyes becoming wild. Desperately, he looked at the wheel and seemed to have a flash of inspiration. He ran up to the wheel and started to enter something. "No, wait! You'll die Teine- Trey!" June yelled. Teineji fiddled with the lock, before pulling it, and...

It unlocked.

"Wha- huh?!" Teineji said, stepping backwards in shock. "Congratulations. The correct code was inputted. To all surviving players, it's GAME CLEAR." The speakers confirmed right after. "Wow..." Lucas said. "How did you figure that out?" June exhaled. "Thank god Teineji was there. I could never have figured that out on my own." Meanwhile, Teineji was speaking awkwardly. "Oh...you know, just...read between the lines..." he stammered, while internally screaming. "How did I get that? I just guessed..." Teineji thought to himself, grabbing his Visa and the playing card. "Oh well. At least we're alive."

June walked out of the center, a light breeze blowing on her hair. She walked with Teineji, back to their home. Back to the Tech Center.
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Author's note: This actually did happen in the roleplay XD

If you're curious about the actual/intended solution, each player's code corresponded to a letter in Morse Code, which they had to put together to get the word clubs (this is the reason player limit was exactly 5)
But Teineji's player guessed clubs and found the word anyways so 🤷 lol

The next 2 fragments won't focus on a game, instead they'll talk about some faction drama 👀