Emmett Sparks' POV:

"Ely?" I gingerly knock at her door.

Ever since Friday night's fiasco, I'm being as gentle as I can. I speak as less as I can, and with more neutral words, so as to not trigger her again.

"Ely? We've got to leave in five minutes," I say.

No response.

I try opening the door and it's open. I peek in to find a empty room. I look around, in the closets and in the bathroom. None of them turn up trumps.

A small fear starts in my heart as someone yells, "Emmett!"

That sounds like Ely!

"Ely! Where are you?" I shout back.

"Downstairs!" she yells back.

Relieved, I run down the stairs nearly tripping over the last one when Ely catches me.

"Careful! Aren't we supposed to be leaving soon?" asks Ely.

"Yeah, I was searching for you..." I say as we walk out and soon reach the venue, not the auditorium we auditioned in, but a big villa.

When we walk in, we're greeted by a highly enthusiastic Rina. She seems to be very pleased with the contestants...

After about 15 minutes, we're asked to assemble in front of the small podium in the hall.

Silvan starts talking, "Welcome, everybody! Today, the 40 contestants, 10 from each group, who have been selected are here. You will be battling it out over the next couple of weeks for the title of the winner of the 4th season of 'The Mic'."

"Only half of you are going to move on to the next round" says Nicola.

A sort of terror strikes my heart and I tense.

Ely squeezes my hand and pats my shoulder.

"You can make it!" she whispers in my ear.

"I hope..." I mouth.

"But, don't be scared. As of today, none of you are out of the game..." says Rina.

"So you guys will have to perform in groups with a minimum of four and a maximum of six. Each group has to perform two songs. Once you form your group, you have to get your names written at that desk there. You will be provided with a list of songs which you can select from. By lights out today, you also have to get the songs written next to the group. Tomorrow evening, you will be performing. You have the rest of today and tomorrow morning and afternoon to practice. Good luck! Get started!" says Charlotte.

Silvan, Nicola, Rina and Charlotte walk out of the hall. There's chaos now. People are walking around trying to form groups.

"Do you think we should stay in the same group?" asks Ely.

"Sure, yeah!" I reply.

I start to say something else, only to find out that Ely's distracted. She's trying to find somebody to team up with, so I do the same.

A guy and a girl show up and the girl starts talking, "Hey! So, are you part of any group?"

"No, both of us aren't." I reply.

"You're two different acts? I thought you were a duo, like us. We're J Square. I'm Jade and this is Jake. We're twins and are 17..." she replies.

"Really? We're twins as well! Only, we came in as different contestants. Oh, sorry! I'm Emmett and this is Elyssa." I say.

"Shall we team up?" asks Jade, looking at Ely.

When she doesn't reply, I nudge her, to which she turns to me and gives me a questioning look.

"If you don't want to team up, it's okay; we can find others..." says Jade.

"No, no, she'll agree! I think she zoned out..." I blurt out.

Jake finally speaks, and his voice is very rich, "Hey, Elyssa; we're Jade and Jake Mitchell from J Square. Will you and your brother team up with us?"

"I'm sorry if you guys felt bad; Em's right, I kinda zoned out. I'd love to team up with you guys, that is, if you guys want me to." Ely says.

She always seems to know how to smooth down ruffled feathers!

Jade is clearly mollified and Jake breaks out in a big smile; Jade follows suit.

"Sure!" she replies.

We shake hands and begin to search around as we need at least one more act.

"What about them?" Jade points out three people standing in the corner of the room.

"Let's try!" I add, enthusiastically.

We walk up to the three.

One of them is this really tall guy who basically looks like Scott Hoying from Elyssa's favorite band, Pentatonix, only with brown hair, green eyes and clean-shaven. He's also dressed unlike Hoying.

The other two are two girls, one a little taller than the other. The shorter one seems to have a lot of makeup on that seems to set her bluish green eyes off. The taller one has nearly no makeup on. She looks really young, maybe even younger than us.

"Hey, are you guys a group?" asks Jade, to which the guy nods.

"Well, we've formed a team, so maybe you can join us. These are two soloists, Emmett and Elyssa and we're a duo, J Square." adds Jake.

"Care to join?" adds Elyssa with a wink.

My tongue seems to be tied into a knot. I cannot stop looking at the taller girl. Her eyes are so strangely enchanting.

"Sure!" adds the shorter girl.

They then introduce themselves. The guy's Cole, the shorter girl Kristen and the taller one Zöe.

Zöe smiles and adds, "We're Kristen, Cole and Zöe! That's the name of our group!"

We shake hands and wonder whether to add somebody else or not when Kristen asks if we can also include an older woman standing next to the wall looking dazed.

We agree and walk up to the woman, whose name is Lillian Philips and is in the fourth category, who soon agrees to join us.

We go to the desk and get our names written. We are handed the list of songs and are hit right in the face with a huge dilemma: which song to choose?

There are so many songs from varied genres! I really hope this doesn't lead to any fights!

I'm most scared for Ely, if something happens to trigger her at this stage, it's unthinkable!

Ely seems to notice my dilemma and my fears and squeezes my hand reassuringly.

"We're going to make it through this! Don't you worry!" she tells me.

I really hope she's right!

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