Chapter 1.5: Team Meeting

Fern sat in the back of a small room, her head held in her hands as she listened eagerly. Ten other girls were sitting at desks when she arrived. To her surprise, they all looked so plain. The teenager had heard numerous accounts of trainees looking larger than life, their faces screaming that they'd be a star someday. But all the girls here looked like normal, average teenagers, much like herself. Realizing this made her anxiety go away and become replaced with the joy she had felt when signing her contract. One girl, a straight-haired brunette, waved at her to sit at the desk on her right. Once she sat down, the woman who led her in left, and the man at the front of the room, took over.

In his hand was a long pointer you would have seen back in elementary school. He moved with a beer belly and an annoyed look on his face. The man sneered as he spoke, almost like that was just his natural facial expression since birth. "This moment forward, you ladies will be put through a series of trials. These trials will test not only your talent but your potential."

The pointer was pressed against a large calender. Today's date was marked with a red sticker. "Anyone can sing. Anyone can dance. Anyone can rap. Those skills can be taught to you. But not everyone can answer questions without stumbling in an interview with the press at your debut showcase. Not everyone can maintain composure when dancing at a show and the audience is refusing to cheer for you. A nobody."

"We are not asking you to be decent but also aren't asking for you to be aces." The pointer was gestured aggressively at each of the girls, making some blush and others twitch with discomfort. "We are asking you to show us that you can withstand these trials to experience the real thing. Don't expect to debut if you can't complete a practice costume change or finish a recording on time."

The man started to walk down the aisle of desks, looking at every face with a level of sternness that stung. Fern bit her lip as she mulled over what had just been said. From what she could see, everyone else was taking their time to digest it. You could tell who had trained before and who was the fresh meat. The girl the blonde was sitting next to looked calm. She had been nodding along the entire time with a look in her eyes that had to be acceptance. While on the other hand, Fern could see a girl in the front who looked nauseous. This was a lot for them. Especially since, from what Fern could tell, she had to be the oldest girl in the room. Some of these girls looked twelve if not thirteen‌.

Seeing this made Fern feel two things. One was fear that these girls would be a higher priority than her. It was no secret that a trainee, debuting older than nineteen, was getting rarer and rarer as time went on. Most companies wanted girls who were younger than eighteen. Hell, some wanted girls younger than fifteen. Fern stuck out like a sore thumb even if she looked a year or two younger. All of this led to her second emotion. Anger. She felt kind of angry that they had thrown these girls to the wolves at such a young age. She was a legal adult who could handle herself sometimes. These were kids who needed some guidance, they needed someone to think of their best interests.

"Because there are so many of you, we will have to form smaller groups.

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Both girls looked at each other with interest. It was clear to the blonde that the brunette knew, or at least suspected, what came next.

The man grunted and looked at them. "Alright. You three will write your names down on the whiteboard over here and put your ages next to them. After this week, we will assign two of you as group leaders. That means you are responsible for keeping track of who attends practice, who breaks rules, and reporting it all to instructors daily." This amount of responsibility was shocking to Fern. They all had just gotten here and now all of this was being thrown on the two of them.

This was the real deal.

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"Ladies, you all will be attending the same lessons and practices for the first week. After team leaders are assigned, we will hand you all a schedule that will stay the same for the next two months. Then we'll experience the first cut." The man was sitting down now, as he had been talking for an hour at this point. Droning on and on about every little thing they would have to go through to make it.

He had explained that the male trainees all stayed in the Kyoto camp. This was due to restructuring the company had done and the buyout of a smaller label for Japanese indie artists. This allowed them some fresh blood to put into the system and they sent everyone to train together for now. The remains of the debut lineup were in Korea doing Pre-Debut activities. He scowled and said that the company had burned through trainees like water with restructuring. But that they were the last lineup and anyone who managed to be added from the LA camp would be sent to Korea as soon as possible. Which meant they would be learning Korean along with their regular training daily.

"There's no way of knowing how many of you will be cut in two months. It could be none or all of you. There's really no telling, so you all need to be on your best behavior, working yourselves to the limit to survive. The longer you stay, the higher your chances are."

This all made sense to Fern, even if the man's delivery was harsh. The blonde was determined more than ever to stay. She needed to survive the first cut and hone her skills. While the label was obviously not the best off compared to other agencies, they still had resources. And these resources would form her into not just a girl group fan, but a talented one who could become an idol. Idols looked perfect on a television screen and had just to wink to get new fans to buy their albums. If Fern wanted that power, she was going to have to train her ass off. The other girls appeared to be thinking the same thing. While they still looked anxious, there was a fire burning in their eyes that made the blonde feel some type of unity.

The man clapped his hands. "Great. Now, everyone, please raise your hand if you have ever heard of the 'Idol Star System' or anything similar to it." This was something that seemed to be crucial as the man’s voice became much more enthusiastic. Which made it even odder that Fern had never heard of it before.

The brunette from earlier raised her hand and was called upon. Her voice was confident as she spoke, drawing everyone’s attention to her relaxed expression. She looked like this was the norm for her and hadn’t sweated at all during the intense lecture. “The ‘Idol Star System’ is a database used to train potential idols in every area there is to become a performer. In my old company, we used an early beta version of it.”

"Good answer," With a smirk, the man continued on as the brunette smiled and sat back in her seat. She was satisfied with the praise. "You all will be using a finished version of the database to become the best idols you can be. The Idol Star System will only share your information with us, the staff. So your fellow trainees will be in the dark, whether you are above or below them, in progress."

The teenager stared in confusion as the man gestured for them to open their desks. She wondered how some technology could help them improve as idols. And more so, how these rankings would even work as they weren’t being judged just on their skills but their presence. She wasn’t too sure some database could keep track of who had the best when it changed, depending on the concept and song. It was all so confusing. When she reached down into her desk and lifted the top off, like everyone else, she was met with a tablet. The tablet with decently sized, similar to that of a pearbook she had as a child. It had to have cost at least a couple hundred. Fern turned it on and saw that there was no lock screen but it was waiting for her to put in her information.

She clicked on it.