They seemed to drive for several hours, leaving behind any sign of civilization and heading out into the countryside. Mikey was starting to get agitated.
"mooom, I need the bathroom" he whined.
"It's not long now honey, see, we're almost there." His mother replied, as she pointed out the window to a large grey shape over the next hill.
'What is that?' Jon wondered to himself.
As they drew closer the shape grew bigger and bigger until they could see it was a giant metal dome, not unlike the one from The Truman Show. They pulled into a large car park and walked the rest of the way until they came to a large building on the side of the dome. A curved metal sign over the entrance read
"Welcome to West Lake Valley"
The family entered the building, finding it to be just a large room empty room with several doorways along each wall. There were many other people inside, standing around talking to each, many of them Jon recognised as people from his town.
"Jon, you're here as well then" Karyn's voice shouted across to him over the crowd. Jon sighed with relief, at least he wouldn't be facing whatever was coming alone.
"Yeah, have you seen anyone else we know?" He asked as she reached his side.
"Plenty" Karyn replied, "Biff and Sarah are with their families over there, and a few teachers from school are around somewhere"
Jon was about to ask something else when a man's voice sounded out through an unseen speaker.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, Welcome to West Lake Valley. If I could have your attention for a few moments, there are some things I need to explain before we can begin with the groupings." Jon and Karyn looked at each other nervously, were they going to be separated after all?
"First of all there is no need to worry about clothing, food, or any of life's other necessities, they will all be taken care of as anything and everything within West Lake is within our control, and we mean everything, but you'll discover that for yourselves once things are under way." At this point Jon and Karyn exchanged nervous looks.
"secondly" the man continued "there can be no exchanging of roles. Our database has worked out the ideal solution for each of to provide a complete break from the norm. Now If you could be patient while your groupings are assigned, we'll get under way" and with that he was gone.
"Assigned roles? Jon, did a certain stone have anything to do with this?" Karyn hissed. Again Jon was about to reply when a female voice rang out over the tannoy.
"ladies and gentlemen, if you could please form orderly lines across the hall, we can begin preparation"
This was followed by ten minutes of shuffling bodies as the assembled horde of people arranged themselves into several long lines. Next, a few of the doors lining the hall opened allowing several official looking men and women in blue boiler suits with large boxes into the room. They began working their way along the lines, asking each person their name, and handing them a small object from their box.
"Name?" a young woman barked at Jon
"Umm, Jon Gibson" He sheepishly replied. The woman pulled out what looked like a chunky wrist watch with a small keypad and entered his name onto the screen.
"Put it on your right wrist, and don't take it off until you're told to" She snapped before moving on and repeating the process with Karyn.
After another twenty minutes everyone had been issued with a watch, and the woman came back on the tannoy.
"If you could turn your attention to the watch displays, you will see your assigned group number, so please head to the corresponding door in an orderly fashion and you will be taken to your lodgings"
Jon looked at the screen of his watch, and saw the number 38 flashing on the display.
"Snap" Karyn smiled, "c'mon then Jon-boy let's go find out who else is with us" she added as she grabbed his arm and they headed towards door number 38.
