Living in the Fray

Chapter Eight

'Come on Mikey it's about to start!' Tony shouted for the young man to get in to the rec room.

'Coming! I've got snacks for everyone.'

The group all "ooh'd" and "ahh'd" together as Michael wheeled through a trolley from the ships galley in to the rec room where everybody else was sat waiting for the Convict Chase to begin. He had filled the trolley with various snacks he had bought and made; homemade dips and finger food mainly such as a huge bowl of guacamole, freshly made salsa as well as sandwiches and loads of assorted nibbles. He even stacked the lower shelf of the trolley with several cans of beer.

Michael parked himself on the large corner sofa in between Justin and Zach so he had a decent view of the massive rec room holoscreen.

'It's starting now.' Zeke announced to the crew as he automatically turned the holoscreen on to the correct channel and turned the volume up. The picture popped up with the three hosts all in different locations, cut in with footage from around the main island on New Edo from all the CCTV cameras and drones that the shows production team used to capture anything and everything.

'Good Morning and welcome to everyone across the galaxy to New Edo for this years Convict Chase here on Galaxy Network Extreme Sports! I'm your host Paul Adams and with me are Terry St. Vincent and Naoko Harada Walker!'

Two purpose built structures had been set up in downtown New Edo; one at the north end and the other at the south, both surrounded by barriers which kept the huge crowds away from the main stage. There were hundreds of people surrounding the structures, all cheering and shouting; holding up signs in support of their favourite hunter and wearing their merchandise. The crew could see that Krieger had quite a large following, most of them women, a few drag queens and some particularly good looking men dotted in and around the crowds.

'As always, we've already let our cons out with their super special custom made explosive trackers embedded in their necks to ensure the safety of the general public in case they go out of the boundaries or attempt to hurt anyone that isn't a Hunter. We've also given them the standard half hour head start without anybody knowing where we let them loose. This means that our Hunters and their Handlers don't get an easy start. What would a Chase be without any chasing am I right folks?'

The crowd all cheered in agreement and quietened down again with Naoko started to talk in to her microphone.

'So Paul and Terry are at the starting points in downtown New Edo, where two Hunters will be released from each. I'm here at Chase HQ with the handlers, make some noise guys!'

Naoko turned to let the camera film behind her where all of the handlers were sat at large desks filled with more than a few individual holoscreens and other equipment, separated from each other so they couldn't spy on each other's footage. Most of the handlers cheered and waved at the camera while Ronson sat there, glaring with a can of Sapporo in his hand.

'He never changes.' Tony announced to the crew who were now digging in to the plethora of food that Michael had brought them and laid out on a low coffee table in front of the sofa. He grabbed a handful of tortilla chips and delved in to Mikey's homemade guacamole.

'I'll be here with the handlers getting you all the important details and gossip. Plus this year, it's my turn to push the time button!' Naoko had walked over in front of quite possibly one of the biggest holoscreen panels on New Edo. The camera panned out to show the whole screen with had a huge counter set to zero across the top along with individual live feeds of each Hunter. Naoko had made her way over to a gargantuan comedic sized red button which would set the time and start the Chase. Every year the time was randomly selected and shown on the screen and the Hunters would have that amount of time to kill all of the convicts.