"We weren't expecting visitors here right now, but welcome! I'm Wénjié, and I'm your host in this presentation on the Operating Superstars project!" Wénjié introduced herself in front of an unexpected audience. She was standing behind a large marble podium on a stage and was wearing a light blue dress with navy blue bows, white gloves and a light yellow blazer. Her right hand was firmly placed on the surface, and she gestured with her arm, outstretched towards a large holographic projection of the Operating Superstars project logo.
"I worked on this presentation with the help of some former rivals to show we can work together. The color symbolism in the logo represents black, amber and green text being nearly universal on early displays, the silver for Chariots of Colors, the teal for Defending Waits for Nobody and the red for the blinkenlights symbolic of the early superstardom movement! She cheerfully explained. She then looked directly towards the audience again. "They'll introduce themselves, then we'll move onto the next slide of the presentation!
Her excitement turned towards annoyance, and her smile into an irritated frown. There was nothing but silence for several seconds, and the slide of the Operating Superstars logo remained unchanged. She firmly put both of her hands on the desk and looked around in front of her, and to the sides to no avail. "I'm going to have to check if they're backstage." She said to the audience, turned turned around and trudged over to the wall behind her.
They were where she suspected, behind that wall.
"What's the hold-up on that screen?! There's an audience! Some people actually showed up!" She dashed over to where her two collaborators were; they were talking with each other and looking at a screen.
Antares looked towards Wénjié. "It's an emergency! Wolfgang got trapped in a software factory!" She sounded worried and exasperated.
"Again." Pleiades sighed, and she also looked towards Wénjié.
"Again?!" Wénjié exclaimed in disbelief.
"You can say that again." Pleiades nonchalantly said.
"Now if the malware that trapped him there the first 3 times still haven't learned their lesson--" Antares added.
"Whoa whoa, whoa-- I'm sorry for interrupting but that just sounds even worse!". Wénjié interrupted with even more disbelief in her voice. "I should be going back to the presentation, but I want to know what's going on? Are they coming back again and trapping him there like the first times, or is he going into dangerous factories on a lark and just got trapped this time?" She asked.
"The emails didn't say, but if this is because of malware trying to get ransom again, against any teammate, ally or civilian, they must be taught a lesson. No matter how many times it takes, and I'll teach them." Antares said, sounding menacing but also with a hint of anticipation.
"It's not clear yet, but Wolfgang didn't send it." Pleiades said.
"Who did?" Wénjié asked, sounding concerned instead of annoyed.
"Marilyn did and-- she's trapped too." Pleiades said and facepalmed. She just received another email from Marilyn which read "(P.S: I got stuck too -_-)"
Pleiades looked back up at the screen when she saw an email sent just a few seconds ago. "I just got another one and it's from Priscilla." She said. Antares and Wénjié also looked at the screen.
"The rest of the band thought it'd be a good place to practice. I disagreed but was outnumbered and now Marilyn got caught too. Please arrive without haste. It's quite troublesome here..." The first part of the email read. It also included instructions to where the factory was; it was one city over from The Defenestrators' headquarters in Grand Blue.
"I'll help!" Wénjié confidently said. "The presentation can wait. We'll do this, and I gladly will for The Defenestrators!" Wénjié shouted with determination.
"For The Defenestrators!" Antares and Pleiades shouted in agreement, though the agreement between this trio would quickly be broken up by them boasting about who could get there first, and Wénjié boasting that she has no obligation to join this rescue mission and just really wanted to do this.
As they ran off, the remaining visual displays that hid the construction site in front of the audience vanished. There it was in its old web, "Under Construction" GIF glory.
"Dangit-- ahh--- why did they have to put me on the spot like this?" A pink-haired woman dressed as a construction worker grumbled. She then nervously looked at the audience ahead and smiled.
"Sorry about that. How rude for them to dash off without any notice and take the illusion with them. Their presentation would've been to distract you from the construction going on in the index page since it hasn't been built yet but since the spotlight's on me now, I'll introduce myself. I'm Kyouko, a member of Defending Waits for Nobody." She introduced herself.
"Okay, so they got to the first screen about the project logo symbolism. DWN and Chariots of Colors have a long history together that's mostly friendly rivalries but when I debuted so long ago now, it got hostile." She said, sounding nervous at the end of the sentence. "It's so good to see a new era of cooperation even as we find ways to keep competing!" Kyouko chuckled.
"Argh... They didn't give me a copy of the notes." She sighed but she then smiled again. "One of the many things I learned in entertainment is sometimes curveballs will be thrown and entertainers need to adapt. That was a key to success back in the day." She chuckled.
"Another thing that I learned is that you can't go wrong with DOOM!" She said, and presented a large screen that was loading the famous game. "You can head back to the Story Chapters site, which although it's under construction too is where you were intended to go, or you could stay a while here."
She then pointed at a link that materialized in front of her. "Click on this to return."
"To anyone who wants to stay, I'll invite you to a DOOM gaming session!" Kyouko offered to the rest of the audience. She messaged her other teammates and invited them over to join her.
