As Sierra took a tentative step forward, a familiar, albeit unwelcome, blue screen flickered into existence directly in front of her face, momentarily obscuring the unfolding airport drama.
[Sierra Ming as Darren Jiang.
Act 1]
The text shimmered, then dissolved into a scroll of dialogue and stage directions. Sierra's eyes scanned the first few lines, and a wave of nausea washed over her.
This script... it's so bad, I'd genuinely prefer a head-on collision with a runaway baggage cart right now.
Steeling herself, she plastered on a mask of grim determination, channeling her genuine disgust into what she hoped looked like righteous fury.
"WHAT ARE YOU ALL DOING?!"
Darren's voice, surprisingly deep and resonant, boomed through the terminal, momentarily silencing the general airport din. Heads swiveled, and a hundred curious eyes landed on the strikingly handsome man whose face was a thundercloud of serious anger. Sierra wasn't acting anymore; her fury at the sheer inanity of the plot was entirely genuine, but she was a professional (or at least, she was trying to be), and the show, apparently, must go on.
Her gaze swept across the assembled crowd, a desperate plea for recognition silently broadcast.
Which one of you poor souls is stuck in this mess with me? Give me a sign! A secret handshake! A knowing wink! Anything!
But, of course, it was a futile exercise. They were all in different bodies, and her acquaintance with her fellow 'bus crash survivors' had been tragically brief and under considerably less glamorous circumstances.
Finally, her eyes landed on Hannah, a picture of pale, tear-streaked misery huddled on the floor. Sierra moved towards her, the script's instructions echoing in her mind. She extended a hand, aiming for a comforting, if slightly stiff, gesture.
"Hannah? You—"
Before Sierra could even deliver her carefully rehearsed line, Lily, who moments ago had been radiating pure, unadulterated venom, suddenly dissolved into a cascade of theatrical tears. She launched herself at Darren, clinging to him like a particularly desperate barnacle.
"Darren! You finally came!" Lily sobbed, her voice perfectly pitched to carry across the terminal. "I... I just wanted to pick up Hannah, because I felt so terrible that no one had picked her up after two whole years... in the mental hospital!"
The last two words were delivered with a pointed, almost gleeful emphasis, designed to ensure maximum public humiliation for Hannah.
Sure enough, Lily's perfectly projected sob story hit its mark. A ripple of murmurs spread through the gawking bystanders.
"Mental hospital patient?"
"Poor thing, and so young too!"
The whispers, laced with pity and morbid curiosity, were a symphony of success for Lily.
Sierra's hand twitched, a primal urge to introduce Lily's face to the nearest hard surface bubbling to the forefront.
This sneaky, manipulative homewrecker! Darren, you absolute dolt! How could you be so blind?! This woman practically has 'villain' tattooed on her forehead in neon lights!
She cursed the CEO for his spectacularly poor judgment, for the umpteenth time.
Hannah's trembling body was a silent plea, igniting a protective spark in Sierra. She wanted nothing more than to sweep the poor woman away from this public spectacle. But, alas, the script was a cruel mistress. Before Sierra could even consider a heroic intervention, one of Lily's cronies—a woman Sierra recognized from the script as a particularly venomous 'friend'—stepped forward, her eyes narrowed in a theatrical glare at Hannah.
"Darren! Thank goodness you arrived! Lily, in her boundless generosity, invited us all to pick up Hannah because she felt so sorry for her! But then Hannah had the audacity to push Lily away and, can you believe it, insult her as a shameless mistress!"
"Huh? Isn't that right?"
Sierra blurted out, her internal monologue escaping her lips before she could censor it. The words hung in the air, a record scratch in the dramatic tableau.
Silence.
Lily, still clinging to Darren, stiffened, her theatrical sobs abruptly cut off. Every single 'friend' in their little entourage froze, their expressions a mixture of shock and confusion. The airport announcement, a disembodied voice droning about boarding times, mercifully broke the spell, jolting Sierra back to the horrifying reality of her misstep. Her eyes widened in horror.
Oh, you idiot! You absolute, utter idiot!
A frantic internal scramble ensued, Duoduo's urgent prompts echoing in her mind.
[Quickly! Damage control! Recite the lines! Fix this mess!]
Sierra's eyes darted to the blue screen, frantically scanning for the next line.
"What did you say?!" Sierra roared, forcing a fresh wave of indignation into her voice. "Ha... Hannah, how dare you insult Lily! Lily and I are innocent! She's dying, with only a few months left to live! Why is your mind so dirty even after two years have passed? I... I'm deeply disappointed in you!"
Her words, a desperate attempt to salvage the scene, rang out, laced with a theatrical betrayal that she hoped would convince everyone she hadn't just accidentally agreed with the 'shameless mistress' accusation.
Sierra's impassioned declaration, meant to convey righteous fury, instead came out sounding like a frustrated teenager trying to explain why their homework was late. The sheer panic in her voice, a stark contrast to the script's demand for unadulterated rage, only served to amplify the already palpable awkwardness.
Lily, her theatrical tears momentarily forgotten, slowly loosening her embrace, pulled back from Darren. Her eyes, wide with a manufactured heartbreak, fixed on his face. Even lines that definitely weren't in the script began to materialize from Lily's trembling lips.
"Darren... do you... do you consider me a... a shameless mistress...?"
Oh, for the love of all that is holy, YES!
Sierra screamed internally, battling the urge to blurt out the truth. But no, she quickly reminded herself, she's Darren; the poster child for male idiocy, a man so utterly clueless he'd believe a snake oil salesman selling sand in the desert.
With a Herculean effort, she attempted to mold Darren's handsome features into an expression of tender reassurance, but the result was less 'comforting lover' and more 'man desperately trying to suppress an explosive bout of food poisoning.'
"Of course not, my dear Lily... I was just... too angry, and I misspoke..."
No sooner had these unscripted words tumbled from her lips than a new player entered the dramatic arena. A man, sleek and smarmy, stepped forward, his gaze fixed on Darren.
"Darren! We tried our best to get Hannah to admit her mistake, but she absolutely refused! That's why I told her to kneel right there until you arrived! But she wouldn't do it, and instead... like a wild animal, she clawed and hit everyone!"
Sierra's eyes, now sharpened by a growing sense of injustice, quickly assessed the scene. Hannah's hair was indeed a tangled mess, and faint scratches and bruises marred her neck, hands, and even a glimpse of her ankle. Meanwhile, the 'victims' of Hannah's alleged rampage, though their clothes were a bit rumpled, appeared remarkably unscathed.
No blood, no visible injuries, just a few artfully disheveled outfits.
The man, oblivious to Sierra's silent appraisal, continued his monologue, a strange, unreadable glint in his eyes.
"She seemed determined to run away, so we had no choice but to restrain her until... you arrived."
A peculiar sensation prickled at Sierra's spine as the man spoke. According to the script, this was Jason Su, Darren's supposed best friend, a character explicitly designed to be one of those morally bankrupt types who found glee in Hannah's suffering.
Yet, his delivery was all wrong. His words were textbook villainy, but his tone? Flat. Utterly devoid of the gleeful malice one would expect from a trashy sidekick. He sounded less like a co-conspirator and more like a bored customer service representative reading from a pre-written apology.
And then it hit her. The emphasis.
"She seemed determined to run away, so we had no choice but to restrain her until... you arrived."
He'd stressed those last two words, almost imperceptibly, but enough to trigger a frantic scramble in Sierra's brain.
Jason! He's one of us! One of the bus passengers! My group member!
The realization hit her like a rogue luggage cart. Her earlier, unscripted blurt about the "shameless mistress" must have been the secret handshake, the covert signal that convinced Jason that the 'Darren' before him was, in fact, a fellow member.
His improvised lines, especially that pointed addition about restraining Hannah until Darren's arrival, weren't just random dialogue. They were a breadcrumb trail, a coded message from one trapped soul to another. A hint that only a fellow 'group member' would understand, especially given Darren's rather significant two-and-a-half-hour delay.
Still, caution was her watchword. She needed to be absolutely certain. If her unscripted outburst about the mistress had triggered an improvisation from Lily, what else could deviate from the pre-written narrative?
Sierra had a hunch that any deviation from the script, any unscripted word or action, would be met with an equally unscripted response from the genuine inhabitants of this world. It was a dangerous game, but one she had to play.
So, for the sake of a crucial test, Sierra decided to stick to the script, at least for now. She strode over to Hannah, knelt down with a practiced ease, and, with a firm but not unkind grip, tilted Hannah's chin upwards.
"Hannah... not only did you hurt Lily, you also hurt my friends?"
Hannah's gaze, when it met Darren's, was a raw testament to betrayal and despair, a look that spoke volumes of a husband's unwavering distrust. Her face, a canvas of profound sadness, was so utterly convincing it tugged at something deep within Sierra.
Lily's calculated manipulation and Hannah's heart-wrenching hopelessness were simply too perfect, too nuanced to be anything but genuine. Sierra momentarily convinced that neither of them could possibly be fellow group members. Unless, of course, her group was comprised entirely of Oscar-winning method actors.
Hannah shook her head slowly, tears tracing paths through the grime on her cheeks.
"Darren, please... believe me... I didn't do it at all..."
"Hannah... how can I trust you when you're always hurting Lily?" Darren's voice, laced with a carefully constructed disappointment, cut through the air. "Has two years in a mental hospital truly not changed you at all?"
The words, though scripted, were delivered with a genuine frustration that resonated deep within Sierra. Not at Hannah, of course, but at the sheer, unadulterated idiocy of the character she was forced to inhabit. She released Hannah's chin, her gaze shifting to Jason. This time, the words that tumbled from her lips were entirely her own, a dangerous deviation from the script.
"Jason, since my wife apparently assaulted you earlier, I see no reason why you shouldn't return the favor. Consider it a... disciplinary measure."