The silence in the backstage hallway was strange.
They were all confused.
A staff member stared at the script evaluation board, then stared back at Zeno’s retreating figure.
“Did none of us tick anything off?” they whispered, looking around for someone to explain.
“Not even one wrong verb?” another muttered, rifling through their clipboard with panic.
“Not a single preposition?” someone else asked, horrified.
Gene PD sat frozen, jaw tight as he stared at the untouched error chart.
“Did… someone leak it?” Gene asked no one in particular.
“I made sure no one else had it,” he whispered to himself. Not even the judges, except for Bacon PD, knew of the concept of the show right before this day. He wanted to keep it down as much as possible to increase the suspense.
“Then how?” Gene muttered, watching Zeno with suspicious eyes as he settled back in his seat.
In the viewing room, Hero was just beginning to regret every decision he’d ever made in life.
“I swear he got every word!” Hero shouted, fending off the entire cast. “Even the pauses were accurate! He did this one thing where he stopped right before ’spotlight’—it made it so much sadder. I couldn’t move.”
“Are you sure?” Ian narrowed his eyes.
“Yes, I promise! I wanted to tell you guys earlier, but I was too into it!”
Everyone stared at the screen again in silence.
They didn’t want to believe it. They couldn’t believe it. The scores wouldn’t be released until the end—but what even was the point now?
“Maybe he’s a robot,” someone whispered. “An android. A very sad android.”
Meanwhile, back in the auditorium, the rest of the contestants had tried to rehearse during Zeno’s turn, but ended up doing nothing but watching in disbelief.
Shelly stood frozen near the curtain, her fingers trembling on her sides. Her mouth was dry. She couldn’t even remember the first line anymore.
Jiwoon was up next, and again, he was in the same predicament. He found himself stumbling over and over again, forgoing the emotion just so he wouldn’t have to forget the words.
Zeno sat on the seat in front of Shelly and sighed. She snapped out of her daze and turned to him with wide eyes.
“Don’t let the swap go to waste,” he said casually.
Shelly pursed her lips, guilt rising again. “I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s alright,” he cut her off before she could spiral. “Like I said, I wanted to go first anyway. Now I can rest.”
She looked down, fidgeting with her sleeve. “But it threw off your prep time. And you still did… all that.”
Zeno smirked. “I didn’t need prep time.”
Shelly gave a weak chuckle. “I wish I could do that too.”
“Confidence,” he mentioned, his gaze focused on the stage. “Don’t lose the confidence you tried hard to build. I know you’ve come a long way.”
She looked up at him then and saw no sarcasm in his face.
“You can do it,” he said. “So do it.”
Shelly bit her lip and nodded to herself, suddenly feeling a hundred times more capable.
She focused on her turn and tuned out Daniel’s and Youngmi’s performance. Daniel cursed in the middle of his performance because he blacked out while Youngmi was on the verge of tears, not because of the emotion of the piece, but because she couldn’t recall the words properly.
When it was Shelly’s turn, she had done… okay. She wasn’t amazing, but she didn’t blank out either. A few lines were messy, but she remembered most of it. And more importantly—she didn’t throw up.
She figured her score wouldn’t break any records, but it wouldn’t kill her chances either.
Beside her, Daniel was chewing on his bottom lip. He couldn’t even keep still, shifting his weight from foot to foot like the floor was lava.
He had gone third. Unfortunately, Zeno’s decision to ascend to some kind of godlike level during his turn did not help Daniel’s nerves.
“I messed up,” he muttered under his breath.
They all turned their heads toward the monitor, where the screen began to reveal the score graphics. A glowing “ZENO” appeared first, his photo sliding in from the corner. The music intensified. A digital timer counted down from 3.
2.
1.
SCORE: 99
Daniel choked on his spit.
“Only one wrong?” Ian said from the viewing room, eyes bulging.
Hero just sat back with his arms crossed. “I told you. I don’t even know the single word he got wrong.”
Onstage, Zeno nodded once before letting out a slow breath. That had been deliberate. He used the preposition “the” instead of “a,” because he didn’t want a perfect score. Even the staff couldn’t tick it off during the first run and only pointed it out when they replayed it.
“That score’s impossible,” Gene whispered.
“No,” Bacon said with an amused smile. “’ It’s not. Just improbable.”
“You were the only one who had the script.”
“And I still am. So, I can assure you there weren’t any leaks.”
They both turned their heads toward Zeno, who had stepped back in line, hands behind his back. Then, did that mean that Zeno just had a really good memory?
Before they could ponder more about it, the second reveal came.
SHELLY.
SCORE: 75
She breathed a soft sigh of relief. She ended up in second place! That much of a gap between her and Zeno, though?
Daniel felt his lungs physically collapse. It was between him, Jiwoon, and Youngmi now. Two would have to leave, and he didn’t want it to be him.
He hadn’t felt religious in years, but here he was, internally bargaining with every divine being he could name. “Please,” he whispered, “just let me stay. I’ll be nicer to people. I’ll recycle more. I’ll actually call my mom.”
The screen lit up.
Daniel’s face popped up.
SCORE: 66
That number again. He really must have something to do with the devil.
Daniel let out a sharp breath, feeling relieved.
Jiwoon and Youngmi’s names were shown next, but the word ’ELIMINATED’ appeared in harsh red letters beside their profiles.