Survivor - Mexico (Brain vs Brawn vs Beauty)
Chapter 42 - Day 39
Alright, here we are. We are officially on day thirty-nine of this show as our third season is nearly completed. But with one more day to go, it's clearly not over when we have our most important tribal of all. Funky Kong, Plague Knight, and Isabelle's placements are all set to be determined as soon as Master Hand reads the votes on which of the three of them will earn a million dollars. I am so sorry for anyone who's fans of King Knight, Bandanna Dee, Jimmy, Jet, Rosalina, Tifa, Katt, Espio, Ryu, Golden, Specter Knight, Daisy, Incineroar, Panther, and Chica. But those very eliminations all led to the final three we have you, so let's get this show on the road.
Today, we are going to see the finalists reflect on their jury to the final day in the game before we head off to Final Tribal Council where they all make their introduction speeches on why they're deserving to win this game. No, I'm not going to have the entire Final Tribal Council in one chapter, since at that point, it'd be about 20,000 words or something I guess, and I'm not going to make you all go through that lol. So the second part will be the jury speeches and the official winner being confirmed.
~KF
FINALE - PART III
Back in Los Angeles, the crowd was going wild once more as the season finale was just about to resume.
A few members of the audience were some recognizable faces, which included the following: Cloud from Survivor - Emperors vs Knights, Falco, Wolf, and Donkey Kong from Survivor - Kodai Island, and all of the castaways loved ones.
"Welcome back to Survivor - Mexico (Brain vs Brawn vs Beauty). Just a few minutes ago we watched as Isabelle defeated Chica in our first ever fire making challenge in this series. And with Chica going home after making it all the way to the final four, we are now down to our final three contestants that made it the whole way: Funky Kong, Isabelle, and Plague Knight, which is literally half of the Brain tribe. All three of them started on the same tribe together all the way back on day one and they all made it through to the end. Now one of them is set to earn a million dollars. The season finale continues at this moment, so don't go anywhere!"
Fuerza
Night 38
Plague Knight, Isabelle, Funky Kong
-/-
From that tribal on, nobody ever had to worry about eliminating anyone for the rest of the game, the final three all being completely elated that none of them had ever been voted off. That being said, it took a major weight off of their chest.
However, as soon as they laid their torches against the tree while returning to their camp, Funky Kong had a couple questions he wanted to ask.
"Were you set to write down Isabelle all this time?" He asked the alchemist of the group.
"Well,... I guess there's no reason to lie about it now." Plague Knight shrugged his shoulders. "I was trying to help Chica practice making fire when you two weren't around."
"I was wondering where that flint went..." Isabelle spoke up. "I usually checked the tools every time before we get ready to go to tribal to make sure everything is there when we get back to camp."
"...Why did you decide to do that...?" Kong asked of curiosity. "I mean, we thought that since you voted off Panther one tribal before, we figured you had no reason going against us at that point since the line was already drawn..."
"I mean, I have a mind of my own, here..." He said in self-defense. "You already won the individual immunity challenge so that Isabelle as the bigger threat for both myself and Chica, so we just had to force a tie and give Chica a chance to earn her spot in the final three. But, as usual, things didn't turn out the way I wanted to."
Isabelle Cosgrove sighed and shook her head. "Good thing I volunteered to make fire a few times... That was probably my best performance, yet... But I guess we're all here now and should probably get ready to go to sleep. I'm not mad."
"Good, because after everything I had to go through, I'm done. We'll look for the breakfast by the tree mail tomorrow."
As soon as he left to find his place in the shelter to lie down, it left Funky Kong and Isabelle staring in his direction before they decided to face each other.
"I didn't expect that..." Cosgrove was still in disbelief.
"Me neither..." Funky Kong agreed. "I thought that if a person decided to side with us at the other Tribal Council based off what we told him, he'd have no reason to go right back and flip to the other side and force something like that to happen. But I guess since we were dealing with Plague Knight of all people, we shoulda known better."
She sighed at that. "Well,... it's over. Let's just start this fire and go to bed."
"Allow me." Kong went right to the tool kit and searched for the flint and machete. "You've done enough work today..."
"Apparently, Plague Knight all this time had a plan to work with Chica to force a tie at Tribal Council so that Chica had the chance of staying in the game, which I admittedly should have expected." Isabelle took part of the blame even though she was the literal victim in the first place. "I mean, I've been with Plague Knight for a while now, so I should know how he operates at this point. This is just like the time at final six where he tried to go after Funky Kong... Maybe he's just one of those people that does not forgive and forget, which I don't blame him. If that was his revenge for him being on the outside, then I hope he's satisfied... Well, I kinda doubt it now since I'm still here. But still, guess I was not completely safe after all. He almost sent me home!"
Funky Kong just simply sat still staring at the fire, shaking his head at what happened. Oh well. At least he was the first one confirmed to be heading for the finals.
Fuerza
Day 39
The three castaways were all awake as soon as the sun rose, much to their grand excitement.
"Oh yeah, baby!" Funky Kong was the first to speak, leaping out of the shelter almost instantly. "Day thirty-nine, here we are!"
"Ugh..." Plague Knight mumbled and pulled his cloak over his nearly exposed eyes. "It's too early in the morning for that..."
"It's like Christmas morning." Kong beamed. "This is every man's dream right here. Day, freakin' thirty-nine. I signed up for the show hoping that I at least make it past the first Tribal Council, now I'm one of the final three left. What are the odds of that, man?"
"C'mon, you two. We gotta get up." He began to shake his fellow competitors to get them out of the shelter. "Breakfast can't wait forever. I know neither want to just sleep your final day away here."
"The breakfast is not going anywhere..." Plague Knight told him, slowly beginning to stretch himself. "But I'll get up if you're gonna keep doing that..."
Isabelle yawned. "I am hungry, though. We already finished the rice yesterday."
By the time they made it to the tree mail, there was of course a big breakfast waiting. Bacon, bread, eggs, syrup, sausages, mostly stuff that was waiting to be cook in the group's frying pan.
"Woah..." Funky Kong spoke in amazement.
"I'm so hungry, now." Plague Knight said.
"I'm gonna make some french toast!" Isabelle grinned. "You guys want some?"
Plague Knight was the one that actually retrieved the mail.
"Congratulations for avoiding elimination, you are finally free, you survived seventeen Tribal Councils, now this reward is meant only for you three." He slowly turned to face Isabelle and Funky. "...Is this real? ...Have we actually done it?"
"Let's just stop talking and get the food." The bandanna wearing ape just could not have waited any longer. "My stomach is growling by the minute."
"My cousin was the first of the Kong family to sign up for the show. He played and competed, but this time it was my turn to have a go at it. I knew something like this was going to be a lot of fun, and it was. I made some good friends, used my jungle experience to my advantage, stayed true to myself, and even won a few immunities... Oh, and I found an idol, too. ...Yeah, I pretty much got everything I wanted from this. And sure I may not have been a hundred percent safe all the time, but throughout all the crazy strategizing and alliances that went on, I am now in a position where I just don't have to worry about it anymore. For once I can just explore this camp one last time and just take it all in. Now all I gotta do is... convince eight people on why I should be the sole survivor. I mean, this adventure means everything to me. I'm sure my family will be proud that I made it all the way, including Donkey, so Survivor,... I'll never forget you."
The three finalists were acting as if it was the biggest breakfast they ever received in their lives. No more rice and coconut for them. And in a rare event, they were actually going to be full pretty soon.
Plague Knight mostly stuck to himself at this time, as well as for the rest of the day. Funky Kong and Isabelle were the main ones talking throughout the entire time, the former being the most vocal.
"I seriously can not wait to go back and tell my boys at home." He talked between bites. "I could go on for pretty much a whole day of everything that went on out here. But, you know what would be funny? Say if I have kids some day, I'll tell them all about it, they can tell their kids, and pass the legend on you know?"
She actually burst out laughing. "Well, that would be pretty neat. I think word would always go around based on how many people you know. I bet everyone's gonna be talking about my experience the moment I return to the town. Maybe I could bring you along someday after the reunion."
"How'd you think they'd react if they see a guy like me?"
"...Hmm..." She thought as she continued to eat. "Actually, they wouldn't look at you strange. There are all sorts of animals in the town. You're just much bigger, that's all."
"Ah, cool. You wouldn't really have a hard time fitting in my world, either." He figured. "We should do it, Iz."
"I went from almost being the first boot of my tribe for being the weakest to making it to day thirty-nine and outlasting everyone. I think overall I did pretty good out here. I was put on the Brains because of me always working hard to create new ideas and perform tasks to keep my town alive, and I think out here I worked pretty hard to get to this point. Any finalist can tell you that getting to day thirty-nine is not an easy task. Ever since the swapped I decided, 'You know what? Let me just try to keep my old tribe together.' Those were the people I started with, so I naturally trusted them more. Now we have an all Brain final three over here."
Later on after breakfast, Isabelle and Funky Kong were now talking in the boat, with Funky deciding to fish for one last time. Now just for the sake of doing the chore, but purely just for fun. In his world, every single minute out in the wild had to count for him at that point.
While he was simply waiting for bait to come by, Isabelle struck up another conversation. "You know, I think the best part about this is that I met you, Golden, and Espio."
"That's almost exactly what I was thinking. I just would have included Incineroar." Funky responded. "But the four of us still would have made it further together, but... the game happened."
"I think that's a good answer. Blindsides are basically your average Thursday. It's just a matter of when are you supposed to expect it, and us survivors most of the time fail at predicting when it's gonna happen. And even when we do predict correctly, things just don't go according to plan."
A quote that all future survivors should have used to take mental notes.
"The fact that I have a one in three shot at actually winning this game is beyond me." Isabelle was still feeling as if she just found out that she was going to the Final Tribal Council. "If someone from home ever told me that I was going to make it to this point and have a chance of winning, it would have been hard for me to believe. I mean, I'm against seventeen other people. Some people don't even make the merge... And I somehow made it all the way? I am literally screaming on the inside right now. ...But now that I'm here, I might as well take this time to finish preparing my Final Tribal Council speech, or else it would be all for nothing. But I speak in public with the Villager all the time back at home, so I guess that's an advantage..."
"...You wanna know something, Funky?"
"What is it?"
"...I'm just now thinking about this. Realistically, I think most of the jurors are gonna choose between me and you." She realized. "I mean, think about it. I don't know how many people are gonna vote for Plague..."
Judging by his silence, it was something that DK's cousin never thought of until that moment. "...Oh, yeah... You're right. It's probably gonna be between me and you... But, you know what? That just makes this more fun and interesting. I mean, we never had to vote each other off. Me, Golden, and Espio all saved you from being voted off and then you saved me. Now we get to be facing the jury together."
She heaved a long sigh and stared at the water. "Yeah... I get where you're coming from."
"Now, I'll be honest." Funky Kong had a confession to make. "Isabelle was never exactly my number one ally in the game, since I had both Golden and Incineroar at different points out here, but after the both of them left, she did became the only person that I was counting on, and I'm pretty sure she feels the same way. She's probably closer to Golden, but we still protected each other and now here is where it all ends. But now that we're two of the final three and that there are no more eliminations, I suppose we're finally taking the time to get to know each other a little bit. And... all I gotta say is that she's real nice. I can't really say anything bad about her. So I'm glad at how it all ended up. We may go at each other's throat tonight, but no matter what anyone says, at the end of the day, even though there are great stakes here,... it's really just a game. It's certainly possible to separate friendly, real relationships from Survivor gameplay. So we'll both be friends with Espio and Golden after all this is over."
Later on, it was nearly time to head to tribal. And Plague Knight was busy lying back in the shelter with his arms behind his head. Funky Kong and Isabelle happened to be sitting close to the fire pit in the meantime exchanging words and laughs all the while.
"Oh, I just love proving people wrong and making them look stupid." Plague giggled in his confessional. "It was one heck of a ride for me to get to the end. There were multiple instances where I easily could have been eliminated, especially at the final eleven, and I was set to get the boot. But the minute I approached Specter, everything changed, and now I'm part of the biggest blindside in Survivor history. If that doesn't make the jury even think about me, I don't know what will. Everyone tried to get me out, but guess what. I'm still alive and I ended up voting all of them off myself. You see? When you have everybody against you like that, you give them heck. I don't back down to nobody. You stay in it until the job is done."
"Alright, I guess it's time to go..."
Isabelle finished gathering her belongings, Funky Kong carrying a big torch ready to be thrown right into the shelter.
"I still can't believe this is over..." Plague Knight blinked.
"Me neither. But now this will look great on TV to honor the memory of this camp... You two ready for me to throw it?"
"Go ahead."
"Do it."
With given permission, Funky Kong tossed the flaming torch right in. And slowly, but surely, the whole shelter went ablaze. There was definitely no turning back now.
"This is why I like to take charge of my own fate. Sure, you might need other people to help you out at times," Plague Knight continued, having the very last confessional of the season. "but the reality is, you're really doing everything you can just to fight for yourself. I only have me, myself, and I, and every decision that I've made in this game has brought to this point. Now, karma is going to be sitting across from them at Final Tribal Council staring in their faces, and I'll be like 'Oh, well you all tried to get me out or at least weaken me, but look who's sitting here, though.' People could think whatever they want about me, but you can't change facts. When you see somebody fighting and going through heck just to make it, I believe that should be worthy of a million dollars. So,... I'm gonna make sure people know that..."
And as they shelter burned, the final three were officially on their way to the tribal ceremony.
Final Tribal Council
Night 39
It was time for the grand finale. Plague Knight, Isabelle, and Funky Kong knew very well that it was going to be an experience that none of them would have ever forgotten. Although, like how most, if not all finalists felt, facing ones that the final three voted off was rather intimidating, as they were either directly or indirectly responsible for all of them losing a million dollars. Yet no matter how frightening that was, when ones applied for Survivor, final tribal was always something the castaways should have all prepared for. Sure, not everyone could have gotten to the finals, but everyone knew that whoever made it to the end had to fight to get those jury votes.
For any new fans in the audience watching back in Los Angeles was just about to see what a Final Tribal Council is like, the three members of the old Brain tribe sitting down right beside each other, with Funky Kong sitting right between Isabelle and Plague Knight.
They all came face to face with the master hand.
"We'll now bring in your jury..."
And there came the people they had to face one last time. "Espio, Ryu, Golden, Specter Knight, Daisy, Incineroar, Panther, and Chica voted out at the last Tribal Council."
No words escaped from Chica Candance as she took her place on the jury bench sitting diagonally from Panther.
"Alright..." Master Hand was ready to get things going. "So here we are. For this show, our motto is 'Outwit, Outplay, Outlast.' That is something we are all aware of. So for this season, we applied it here. Outwit is where you use your social skills to get yourself through all these Tribal Councils until you've reached the finish, outplay is when you make strategic moves against your opponents just to advance yourself to the end, and outplay is when you simply outlast all the rest, whether it'd be based off challenges or simply making sure other people go home and not you. Thus, this season was born: Brain vs Brawn vs Beauty. And now, look at what we have here... We have an all Brain final three. Congratulations to the three of you."
They all were beaming, each individual feeling proud of his or herself of what he or she just accomplished.
"You all have gone as far as you could, doing what fifteen other people couldn't do, which includes the jury. You have made it through all thirty-nine days. And during that time, there were moments that occurred during this season that I'm pretty sure will be talk about for a long time. For starters, at the merge tribal, there was the most amount of votes cast for a single person at one tribal (nine), all for Katt Monroe who went home in twelfth place. One round later, the Tribal Council where Espio went home after what was without a doubt, the biggest blindside in the history of the show thus far. Most idols played at a Tribal Council (two), most votes negated at a tribal (nine), and for the very first time in the history of Survivor, a contestant idol'd themselves out of the competition."
"Also," There was more. "aside from a fake idol being played by Ryu at the next tribal, we've seen the introduction of the Idol Nullifier played by Panther at the final six, where he played it on Incineroar. But in the end, the three of you represent a big part of everything that went on in this season. But for tonight, the power shifts to the jury as your fate is now in their hands. Their job is to get the information they need in order to make a million dollar decision."
The three all faced them individually as they all eyed back.
"Here's how it's going to work." It was a four step process. "You each will give your opening statement. Your job is to explain to each of these people of why you deserve to be the Sole Survivor of this season. Afterwards, one by one, each juror in the order they have been eliminated will have their opportunity to address you of the type of game you played. You will then each make your final statement, as it will represent as your last chance to persuade the jury to vote in your favor. ...Then we vote for a winner. Big stakes... Plague Knight, we'll start with you."
"Alright..." He cleared his throat before he began to speak. "Hello to all. I'm here on day thirty-nine. Before I begin, I just want to get one thing out of the way. I am absolutely sure that some of you may have thought that I might have been too... vocal about things not going the way I planned based on the position I was throughout most of the game. That being said, if I have ever actually offended any of you, I do apologize, but from my perspective, I was simply trying to survive one tribal to the next. Back on day nine at my first Tribal Council, I was the only one left out of the majority vote. And as a result, nobody from my old tribe was willing to work with me at the merge because they knew that I was going to turn on them. They spared me at the first merge tribal, but the tribal after, I caught word that seven people wanted me out and they all wrote my name down. So I guess my biggest move was approaching Specter for help, because there was no way I was just going to let myself get voted off like that."
"Why did I approach him for help? Because even though when it comes to doing anything, I typically like to do it solo, but with a numbers game like this, of course there was no other way for me to save myself if I don't approach anybody. So by the time tribal happened, good thing I did approach Specter Knight, because I didn't even know he had an idol."
Specter Knight just watched speak.
"So with our combined effort, we made the Brain alliance flush their idol and Espio ended up going home. I know that most of you, including the two people sitting right next to me right now regret deeply that they were unable to get rid of me a long time ago. And because of them blowing that one chance they had of getting rid of me," He paused for a moment. "...now all of a sudden I'm sitting right here. Most of you wanted to vote me out, but I managed to escaped unscathed. So in terms of me living up to my name, I feel like I definitely outplayed some of you that caused me to get to this point."
With a look at Master Hand, the authority knew it was a signal for him to move onto the next person. "Funky Kong."
"Okay..." Adjusting himself in his seat, he began. "'Sup, guys? How are you all doin'? Glad that I've made it all the way. You all know how excited I was when I with immunity. This game means the universe and more, so to know that this is not a dream is just downright awesome."
A couple of the jurors actually started to grin and even chuckle a bit, including Isabelle.
"Um, I think I would describe my game as... basically the adventurer of this season. But,... I'm strategically aware. That's the way I would put it. Survivor without a doubt is an adventure for everybody no matter what the reason is for a certain person coming out here. However, even though people know that I actually don't like to strategize that much, it doesn't mean that I'm one of those people that only came specifically for the adventure. I mean, if you come out here, you may as well as least try to win. But for me, I did more than try. I went ahead and won a few immunities, and after being saved by Isabelle here, I played my idol on her at the final five to ensure she was not going home since I knew she was being a target, and at the time, I did not know for sure if Plague was going to write her name down at that point or not. So I was not going to be fool and just let Isabelle go home making me look stupid. So it was basically a matter of my friends needing me and me needing them. And since this is also a social game, you know you got make some friends that will have your back, anyway."
"With all that out of the way, I may not have been the most openly strategic guy out there, but I think I still had a hand in being in control of the game with my alliance. And I feel like I fully embraced Survivor, with me already having a bit of camp life experience to take care of myself as well as having to strength to compete in the challenges. So I guess if you want to vote for somebody that is basically a little bit of everything, I suppose you can look no further."
Incineroar gave him a big nod with the biggest smile.
"Isabelle."
"Well, hello everyone. Excited to be here just like these two are." Cosgrove smiled. "I guess how I got here is based on what I needed to do to protect myself. I'd say if we were the one that headed to Tribal Council first instead of old Quetzal, I probably would have been the first boot of the season. But I didn't go to tribal for the first time until day nine were relationships were already developing. I think that played a factor in my team choosing to get rid of Jimmy over me, and from there, I found myself in an alliance with Funky Kong, Espio, and Golden. But of course since I was targeted, naturally I wanted to get over the perception that I was too weak of a player to keep around. So, what did I do? I figured that since I owed my alliance something, considering that they didn't have to keep me around at all, I thought that it was best for me to protect them in situations like the swap for example. Funky Kong was in trouble and I was in a position to where I could have voted him out. And may I also bring up that me and Funky weren't even that close at the time, so I could have easily sided with Tifa and Rosalina, but I chose to stick by Funky's side in an effort to keep the Brains together."
"So fast forward to the merge, same strategy. I know it's not as exciting to work with the same people throughout the whole game, but people want tribes to stick together for a reason. And it's because if you're on the team with other people where you have to work together, naturally you build more trust with them than other people from the other tribes that I didn't even know, especially since the relationships that I had with my alliance were one hundred percent real."
Espio and Golden were in agreement.
"And from there, we made it a plan to keep the four of us together for as long as possible, targeting Plague Knight because we felt like he was going to be the downfall of all four of us. So to that I say that we were simply defending ourselves. And even after we realized we couldn't get rid of him, I decided to make an effort to help Plague Knight as well. I approached him multiple times to join my side. And even though strategically we were on opposite sides at different points, we still both started on the same tribe, and now we're both here with Funky Kong. I did what I said I would do and I stuck to my plan to sum it all up. No matter what alliance we were all in, teamwork did in fact prevail in the end."
With her opening statement being finished, it was time to transition to the second step of the final tribal.
"Alright." Master Hand spoke again. "Jury, you have all heard these finalists' opening statements. I'm gonna give you all a minute to gather all in so that you would have time to prepare your questions where you could address either one, or all three of them. Think about what you wanna say."
Final Confessional Count:
43: Funky Kong (+8)
40: Panther (+2)
36: Plague Knight (+4)
32: Specter Knight, Golden, Ryu
31: Incineroar, Daisy
30: Isabelle (+8), Chica (+4)
17: Espio
14: Rosalina
13: Katt
11: Tifa
7: Jet, Jimmy
4: Bandanna Dee
3: King Knight
Typed the entire chapter in one day! Haven't done it in a while, but look at the time between the chapters when they were released. Two months, one month, now only three days. Like I said in the previous chapter, the first part of the Final Tribal Council is easy to be written. All you do is have the finalists reflect on their experience, basically.
But look at the final three we have. Even though they're all from the same tribe, they all have different personalities and different perspectives on the game in general. Who knows. Maybe it could be a matter of who thinks of the game in a similar matter as those three. I don't know how long it'll take me to type up the next chapter, but it has to be released soon, since it's the most important chapter of the entire story. We are in fact, one chapter away from the winner being confirmed.
Oh, and I miscounted. The story is ending with 44 chapters. So this is literally all most done! With these three finalists good luck, and I encourage everyone to review! (Also, Golden's Ponderosa chapter will be posted this week and hopefully Specter Knight's.)
One more quick thing to say here,... um... Plague Knight? I don't know exactly how to put this, but... at the final six you kinda screwed yourself... I believe you made a million dollar mistake. Anyone who manages to figure this out gets a free cookie or something lol. I'll explain in the next chapter's author's note.
(Anyone who wishes to view the confessional chart can PM me.)
