*The Merge Cabin*
Again the weather outside seemed to have gotten quite rainy, this combined with the fact it's nighttime only made the walk back to the cabin much worse to trench through. However the contestants who were unaffected by this rain seemed to be Sunny, Hannah, and Alex who all stayed completely silent with one another after the events of what happened only minutes ago. Each of them were even behind the rest of the group who were practically celebrating over the fact they all remained unified in their decision to vote off Miriam Hakimi. Kyle and Lia didn't seem to be over-the-moon happy like the rest of their teammates were, but that couldn't get much focus thanks to Leon, Evan, and Chloe all literally singing Kumbaya in unison. All the contestants reach their destinations and enter the building completely wet and soaking from all the water that had gotten all over them.
"Thank goodness there's one person less to stop me from getting the dragon which I deserve!" Chloe specifically seemed ecstatic primarily because apparently she really wanted Phoenix to become her pet. "Thankfully it also means there's no one to literally burn me anymore, that damn psycho."
"You weren't exactly helping out by further triggering Miriam, but I'm glad there's no need for me to be fighting with her anymore now that she's out of the game. Even before I've worked with you all, me and her didn't exactly get along flawlessly." Evan seemed pleased by the turn of events tonight had taken, a smile forms on his face which had relief in it.
"We've all taken our next steps to the goals in our minds and all we need to do is hold our lead, take out everyone opposing us, and then we can all start seeing who's truly the most worthy of the money here!" Leon exclaims while quite obviously looking towards further down the line. It seemed that in contrast to the other two contestants, he just saw tonight as one of many steps which he'll have to take in order to achieve the goal he's set for himself.
"Personally I'll maybe n-never take joy in voting others out so that probably explains why I'm lacking the... spirit the rest of you seem to h-have." Lia lacked the amount of relief and celebrative mood which the other people in her alliance seemed to have.
"Some people just love bathing in the feeling of victory, especially when it's against the people they find themselves wanting to see suffer for the rest of their life, and afterwards." Kyle explains the enthusiasm to his fellow member with an analytical tone being heard in his voice. Neither of them seemed to reach euphoria like how the people in front of them seemed to have felt but his head does turn to look at the green-eyed girl in order to speak with her further. "Although it seems like someone's there for you-"
"Come on Lia! Let's get working on your next video!" Leon's heard encouraging his newly-made friend right on time, however Kyle walks in front of her in order to finish his sentence.
"Perhaps there's someone still present in the game who you'd like to see gone." Kyle gives her some advice before walking out of her way with these final words.
'That could actually explain things, but now that I'm thinking about it... is it really okay to tear apart that friend-stealing little sh-when it won't change anything? Getting her out of the game would satisfy my needs and make my entire body fill with so much joy and pleasure but it wouldn't change the fact Jared thinks I'm too violent, the internet's already turned its back on me, and Leon's the only person I've got left. She might be responsible for sending me down this path but maybe things could work out if I either try being the bigger person or I could rely on my instincts and just give that girl the beating she deserves.' Lia starts internalizing what's been said to her with her Red-Eyes switching off and on, however they seem to remain by the end of her thinking and she looks over at Hannah. Just the feeling of her eyes caused the heartthrob to turn her head and see that the former YouTuber had been staring at her.
"Lia! We mustn't concern ourselves with them right now, let's just have fun tonight!" Leon's voice cheered on from all the way at the back of the room, the two girls continued to lock eyes with each other soon after. Red-Eyed Lia is continuing to internally decide which option would be the better one and the yelling of her current friend seems to cause her to have a harder time making this decision for the time being. Hannah, on the other hand, had so many emotions running through her body and although there's a defeated look on her face she swears she could feel the fear inside of her start exponentially growing.
"Alright then, let's let loose for tonight!" Lia's eyes turn back normal and she turns around before running over to the rest of her group.
"..." Hannah, Sunny, and Alex remained silent during all this and an exchange of looks between them tells one another all the things they need to know. Without needing to say a single word to each other, all three of them opened the door and walked out into the dark and rainy night to make sure their conversation wasn't going to be interrupted by anyone else. Luckily they had some shelter from the rain thanks to the porch which all of them were on, for what felt like forever no one said a single word to spark a conversation... until-
"Who here made the move to flip on our own alliance?" Sunny finally comes out to question the other two people standing with him while looking over at them.
"Like I've said, the person who did it won't admit it, after all we've all seen what happens when you get pissed." Alex responds immediately with a sigh exiting his mouth and his eyes focused on the raindrops in front of them.
"Looks I get it, I'm not exactly worth trusting right now but right now the two of you are my minions! Hurting you guys isn't something I've exactly got planned for the time being but I'll do it if you get in the way of my plans." Sunny takes his turn to threaten the person who's gained the 'Purple' nickname.
"Actually who pushed Leon to becoming who he is right now? Who abused everyone around him physically and mentally to the point they've practically created their own problem?!" Alex starts actually getting aggressive in response to the threat, at this point he's starting to get fed up with the situation that's been thrusted upon him to try and work through.
"I'm aware that the cause of Leo turning into this monster is because of me. Why do you think I'm forced to work with you guys in order to-?!" Sunny takes full responsibility for The Monsterheart Brawler.
"My point still stands that your abusive and cruel nature caused all this to happen! And yet you're threatening us with that exact same thing? Well, I'll gladly pull a Leon and become strong enough to get my revenge on you." Alex continues to verbally battle with the person in front of him.
"The past is in the past, right now I'm trying to get payback on that damn Spanish teen on steroids by ANY means necessary... just because I'm with you guys doesn't mean my moral compass will line up with your lines of thinking, especially not with Hannah Montana's one over there!" Sunny abruptly shifts the topic into being about the only girl currently present in this conversation who gulps once she'd heard her name get brought up.
"Wh-What ever do you-?" Hannah tries asking in order to feign innocence.
"Everyone here knows you've flipped on other people before, everyone saw what you'd done with Fergy before all of you had swapped teams." Sunny doesn't waste any time pointing out that the actor's betrayed others during votes also.
"K-Keep his name out of your mouth! I'm not proud of what happened then but I've learned from Fergy that sometimes voting the people you betray can do more harm than good!" Hannah attempts to downplay the case starting to be made against her.
"You're oddly defensive of him, in fact when you exited the building once you'd kissed Jared you said something, if my ears were correct they were: Fergy, I'm sorry but you weren't on my mind at all... correct?" Alex seems to actually raise up something else against the heartthrob which makes her entire body tense up. Hannah seemed to remain in complete silence and shock at the fact her words which she'd spoken yesterday.
"Wait a second, does that mean you're either cheating on Fergy or at least trying to two-time a guy who likes you and a guy you seem to like? Damn that's cold even by my standards~" Sunny seemed to have been actually impressed at what the implications of the girl's actions seemed to be.
"I'm not a b-bad p-person, I sw-swear! I'm just trying my best to win this game, that's what Sunny's always trying to do by treating everyone as if they're nothing but ants who are meant to follow their leader, isn't it?! In fact you're trying to w-win this too, aren't you Alex?!" Hannah continues the trend of changing what they're all talking about into speaking about the other person here.
"Actually that's not a bad point, he does seem to be quite smart so how do we know you're not going to eventually flip on us if you haven't done so already?! Out of us here you do seem to have your hands the cleanest, but sooner or later you'll need to dirty your hands because if you don't then someone else will do your job for you... In fact I'm sure you exactly know this." Sunny seems to completely focus on staring and dissecting the glasses-wearing contestant in front of him.
"O-Of c-course, I'm aware that I'll have to ruin my pacifistic ways in order for me to actually have a good chance of winning the game, but for the time being I'd prefer finding ways around that very issue in order to prevent that for as long as possible." Alex answers with his head slowly looking down.
"Or maybe you're just saying all that to hide the fact you've already gotten yourself down that hole and you're just trying your best to crawl out of it because you'd rather not show off to the entire viewing world that you're no better than us!" Sunny walks into his direction and the glasses-wearing teen backs away before eventually reaching the railway of the porch.
"W-Wait! How can we trust Hannah though? She could possibly be using her acting abilities in order to trick us into believing that really she's not the culprit and I'm sorry to say, but a part of me believes you're used to avoiding conflict by using the strategy which you've had your entire life." Alex comes up with something in order to deter himself from likely seeming as if he's the person who betrayed their entire alliance earlier. Luckily for him this point seemed valid enough for Sunny to stop going towards him and instead the delinquent turns around in order to face the heartthrob.
"E-Eeep! I've got n-nothing to do with what happened tonight, I pr-promised! In fact how about we all discuss the possibility of maybe you b-being the fl-flipper?" Hannah continues to panic and in her haste, she throws another name into contention.
"WHAT?! You do realize how stupid it'd be for me to work with the alliance that has the guy I've sworn to annihilate in order to vote off a potential number of mines?!" Sunny takes no time in trying to rebuke the fingers which are not started to get pointed at him.
"The reasoning seems to be unclear for the time being, but I'm pretty sure you and Jared never got along either so maybe you've pulled off this entire ruse in order to fool us and take revenge on the guy who's outperformed you multiple times this season?" Alex takes a shot at trying to figure out what in the world would possibly compel the delinquent into voting against the people he's claimed to be working with.
"Look, I'm petty... I'm not that petty, though. I'm only trying to send Leo back to the darkest parts of his mind is because he absolutely destroyed me when we battled and considering how Jared wasn't able to even put up a fight against him during a school game, it's clear that trying to mess him up completely won't be all too satisfying when I've got the ability to throw him off a dragon. So if either of you even dare to question if me out of all people would give the other side an upper hand ever again, then I'll make sure the one who does so will be left out here to rot." Sunny glares daggers at Alex and Hannah who both looked back at the most dangerous member of their alliance.
"Actually now that I think about it, how about we all try comparing ourselves to the people we've decided to declare war against?" Alex gets another idea which makes both his non-official teammates tilt their heads.
"What exactly are we going to compare between our faction and theirs?" Hannah seems to get confused at this suggestion.
"Simple, we'll compare our actions to theirs because there's just something I've noticed regarding us and them. Sunny had mentally messed with and physically beaten up his fellow team members to the point even his sister got afraid of him and all of that led to Leon becoming this Monsterheart Brawler that's now leading the side against us, and it looks like he's taken a few notes from his abuser because he's manipulating a friend of mines into working for him and doing what he wants which means really there's no difference between both of their actions." Alex explains, his head now looking at the rain pouring down in front of all of them.
"First off, are you seriously talking about me as if I'm not standing right here? Secondly, yeah, I've done as much bad stuff as Leo, you could argue I've done even more so I'll own up to that fact, the difference is that I'm not under the delusion that I'm some kind of Hero of Justice or whatever the hell he says." Sunny responds with annoyance starting to build in his voice.
"So you're going to continue treating others poorly and being a bad person just because you're aware it's not the right thing and yet you're not willing to simply try changing your attitude?" Hannah asks once she'd picked up on what exactly is being said.
"Before this whole incident, I'd been willing to try and improve myself and become more willing to fit into society... however until that Spanish prick gets the revenge I'm so desperately craving, then I'll have to combat it with doing messed up crap because there's no way any of us can truly beat him in a noble way, there's no moral high ground for us to stand on when it comes to what we'll have to do to defeat him. Once he's completely dealt with though... I'll try figuring out where to go from there." Sunny responds before staring at his hands.
"Now let's compare two girls who seem to definitely be on the worst terms humanly possible. Lia's an absolutely loose cannon who has her red-eyes set out on targeting Hannah and has been trying to or successfully aggressively attacking her multiple times to the point that Jared's needed to get involved in order to figure out what new way to break her soul in order to prevent her from hurting Hannah much more, now admittingly Hannah has yet to really fight back against her but I'd say that your actions are messed up on a more mental level... you've kissed her ex-best-friend multiple times even though it's clear you and Fergy got something going on, just yesterday you actually convinced Jared to not help out Lia even though he obviously wanted to help her out because she was an emotional mess, and although this last part is a hunch, you seemed to have been aware of Leon's darker side when he'd thrown your current boyfriend through the wall." Alex slowly starts speaking towards the girl by staring at her with a blank expression on his face.
"Look, I'm aware I've m-messed up and did some bad things b-but it's not like I'm proud of them! At this point all I can do is just try acting innocent and lie to myself that my actions aren't that bad, but it h-has to be done for me to get what I want... isn't that what this whole game is about? Doing anything to achieve your most selfish desires? Why does it matter if we're exposed for doing things which people would consider morally questionable when it really just shows that we'd like to get what we want that desperately?!" Hannah seems to start breaking down, tears start to build in her eyes and her entire body seems to start shaking as she snaps back at all the points getting hurled at her.
"Because there's a difference between choosing the lesser of all evils and just doing what seems like the easiest option, the reason for me wanting to keep my hands clean is because I'm aware that people will constantly tell themselves that in a game of lies and deceit they need to do those exact things and compromise the characters they've been building up their entire lives, but getting your hands dirty isn't something that's always necessary at every turn and besides, What's the selfish desire you want to fulfill that compels you into stealing away someone's friend away from them?!" Alex slowly feels the anger start mounting inside him, which is evident by his fists getting clenched.
"I-I'm not going to tell you! You've been doing nothing but reminding me of my own wrongdoings and r-reminding me of how sh-shitty of a person I can be! You've done n-nothing but bring up my worst moments and now you expect me to give you p-personal details about someone like m-me?!" Hannah falls onto her knees and she continues yelling at Alex with her tears rolling down her eyes and the rain pouring down even harder.
"...Dammit, I really did go too far there." Alex recognizes how his words seem to have backfired on him.
"Keep on going with the comparisons, I'm sure they'll make the situation even better." Sunny sarcastically remarks before slow-clapping with his hands, it's quite clear from this he's not the slightest bit amused by all this.
"Sh-Shut up! You're not exactly helping out either so until you actually help out I'd suggest you keep your mouth shut, because right now I'm getting tired of your crap and if it weren't for Jared then we wouldn't even be in the same alliance so just be glad at least he's there to offset you!" Alex quickly gets his anger back and he starts directing it towards the delinquent.
"How hurtful, I'm sure that comment will-"
SLAP!
Before his sentence could finish, Sunny felt an open hand harshly go across his face which catches him completely by surprise due to the timing of when this happens along with the fact he actually felt it hurt his face a bit. Although his body didn't move, his face is now turning away from the person he's speaking with and there seems to have been a red hand-mark that's been planted on his left cheek which he rubs a little. Slowly he turns his head to look at the culprit who'd just slapped him across the face in the middle of his sarcastic remark.
"Fine then, I'll give you permission to come and beat me up... let's see if doing that will work out for you this time~" Alex slowly starts smiling and he spreads out his arms so he could basically offer in a free hit for the contestant in front of him. Instead of getting more upset with Sunny, he just chooses to taunt him because deep down inside he knows that he's no longer the person upset in this situation, it's the person who he's just slapped that's getting filled with anger. All he wanted to do is to expose the teenager in front of him and make him realize that although he's beaten up many people in the game and ticked him off just moments ago, he's absolutely nothing more than some punk and that no matter how bad his actions will get he's still just a pathetic teenager.
"Okay... you asked for it." Sunny accepts the offer almost immediately before he pulls his right hand back and springs it forward, this causes his fist to land a punch right on Alex's chest. The impact of the punch sends him down the small set of stairs on the porch and he falls onto one of the puddles on the ground all the while even more rain starts getting all over him. Once he lands on the ground, he begins coughing violently while he tightly grips onto his chest and it would appear that he's blind right now due to his glasses not being on him now.
"D-Dammit..." Alex quietly says to himself once the coughing fits had started to calm down, but once this does happen his eyes close and falls unconscious in a big puddle that's only getting bigger by the moment. Sunny shakes off his right hand before noticing that Hannah's grabbing onto her hair and sobbing, which means she's too busy breaking down on the porch to have noticed what just happened. Seeing this, the delinquent growls before storming into the cabin and he slams the door on his way in.
.
.
.
Squelch. Squelch. Squelch.
"..." Footsteps were heard going towards the direction of the cabin, however they eventually stopped once the person who was the cause of these noises had noticed the sight seen in front of them. Slowly the camera pans up to reveal that Jared is the person who seems to have arrived near the place and he stands there, taking in the aftermath of the conversation which he'd just missed out on. Rather than saying a single word he just stands there and observes the state of his alliance before turning around and oddly enough, chooses to walk into the forest with only one thought entering his mind.
'Time to execute my plan.'
Shiena Nishizawa-The Asterisk War [From Gakusen Toshi Asterisk]
"[Soft Opening]"
Kennedy, Li, Brooke, Rae, Ciara, and Jun were each shown standing in front of different colors on the screen on top of a stage (Kennedy's background color is shown to be purple and she puts on a devious smile as she appears to be creating something in her hands. Li is the next one up with his color being rainbows and he gives a regular smile towards the camera. Brooke's color was gold and there's a confident smile on her face. Rae's was completely black and showed no emotions on her face. Ciara stood in front of pink and she winked at the camera while giving a seductive smile. Jun's color is shown to be white and he had an emotionless look on his face).
"[Instruments Kick In]"
Jackie, Vince, Fergy, Rainy, and Ingrid are all sitting in front of a black background which has a sort of red string going across it before they all intently stare at the television screen on the stage once they noticed the light from it turning on (Jackie got on her knees and had been smiling...only for her leg to fall off and she faceplants on the ground. Vince put on some sunglasses and he stood up in order to watch what's going on. Fergy blushed and he started crawling over to the television screen, however Ingrid wrapped herself around his arms which stopped him and she closed her eyes before looking away from the TV. Rainy is lastly seen gulping and sweat began immediately rolling down her face).
"Senjou no taiyou wa takaku yurete, Kanjou ni sumitsuku kage wo otosu, [The sun above this battlefield sways on high, casting away the shadows settled upon our emotions,]"
The camera zooms into the screen before revealing Chloe, Kyle, and Miriam standing all across from each other to form a triangle shape between them in the middle of the woods.
"Shiranai mama itami ni kawaru koto satoru you ni. [As if it's aware they'll someday turn to pain unknowingly.]"
Suddenly the screen glitches up and Hannah, Jared, and Red-Eyed Lia all replaced the previous trio and were standing inside of the building which they'd all partied at.
"Kanashimi kara umareta yume mo...Sekai to kimi ga yurushite kureru [Even the dreams born from sadness...Will be forgiven by the world, and you,]"
Once again the screen glitched out but this time Sunny, Evan, and Leon formed the triangle but each of them took a step back and looked like they were ready to leap towards one another.
"So mabuta no ura de kurikaesu, Kono sora ga yobu koe ni. [So take note as it reoccurs behind your eyelids, responding to the voice of this summoning sky.]"
Alex appears from out of thin air and he holds a book in his hand before some kind of magic circle appears below him and he levitates off the ground, once he does this he flies towards the camera.
*Song Skip*
"Hibiite, [Ringing out,]"
Evan pulls out a giant bow before jumping right into the air.
"Kono te no naka de kakushin ni naru shoudou, [That impulse took certain form within my hands,]"
A bunch of projectiles are seen getting fired off at Alex which he dodges, Evan and Alex are now seen battling in the sky while it's nighttime and the sharpshooting loner fires off a bunch of projectiles at once which the-guy-with-no-stereotype blocks using another magic circle.
"Namida norikoete, My star will shine forever! [Overcoming my tears, My star will shine forever!]"
Hannah and Chloe are both on a stage and glaring at one another all the while a large audience surrounds the two of them and were all clamoring while the spotlight were on both competitors.
"Unmei ga dashita kotae o, Tsuyoku kowashite yuke, Yume no tame ni ima! [I'll go forth powerfully, breaking the answer fate has given - right now, for the sake of my dreams!]"
Jared's entire body is shaking while Red-Eyed Lia stares intently at him and the two of them seemed to be in some kind of courtroom, there were sixteen stands which formed a circle however they both stood right across from each other.
"Yomigaeru, Jikan kono basho de, Bokura zettai yuzurenai negai o! [At the past revives, in this very place, I have a wish from which I'll never back down!]"
Miriam's seen jumping into a giant red dragon-looking mech-suit that lunges forward while Kyle is seen already inside of a green humanoid mech-suit with wings which is seen trying to block a strong blast of fire from Miriam's suit's mouth which is pushing him back. This battle seemed to be taking place in a desert.
"Tada hitotsu kono koe de tsuyoku kizande yuke-!: [I'll etch it powerfully with my one and only voice-!:]"
Sunny charges at Leon with a twisted smile on his face but The Lionheart Brawler chuckles before he runs towards The Delinquent and a red fire-like aura surrounded the two of them before their fists clashed with each other, however where they were seemed to be too dark to identify.
"This is The Asterisk War!"
Everyone remaining in the competition all walked into The Final Reckoning before all of them faced the screen before it glitched out once more, this time it goes along with the song right before showing the title card.
Total Drama: Move Along
Episode 16: Enemy
Even though it seemed to be morning time, Evan Herbert seems to be one of the first people to wake up and after sitting up on his bed he looks at the ground in order to ponder what's been happening throughout his entire game. Initially he came onto the show trying to learn how to really speak with other people due to how often people distanced themselves from him back at home, and that led to him meeting a really sweet yet fragile one-legged girl named Jackie. In fact he even pulls out a prosthetic leg that she'd lost out from under his bed and he makes sure to get some wipes in order to keep the robotic leg clean in case it was ever needed again. When she got eliminated he sorta wandered around The K-Shida's in terms of relationships due to three of the members always being with each other, however he did remember that around this time he actually got along decently with Miriam. That didn't last long though since he'd gotten swapped into the minority alongside someone else, in fact thinking of the other person makes his eyes widen a little once he'd remembered them.
'Alex...' Evan thinks to himself before he quickly looks around the room and notices that there seemed to have been three people who weren't exactly laying down on any of the beds meant for everyone there. The missing people were Jared, Hannah, and the person who he's just remembered and so he gently placed Jackie's former leg onto the bed before running towards the door without much regard for the loud noises his running is causing. Swinging open the door, he looks around and immediately spots his former friend laying on the muddy dirt, luckily the weather didn't seem to be raining anymore but he rushes over to him.
"Alex! Are you good?!" Evan asks before he'd noticed that the glasses which Alex normally wore were missing and he starts searching around the place, luckily it didn't take him long to find the missing piece of clothing which was very necessary for the non-stereotyped player. Once he picks up the glasses he stares at it and begins further reflecting on how his time in this game has been doing, and especially how everything has led to this. The two of them were able to actually tie things up between the other former team they'd gotten swapped into, and along the way he and Alex had promised to try and help Leon escape the control of Sunny who he's learned to hate with a burning passion on the inside.
"E-Evan?" Behind him he heard a voice whisper out and it's automatically identified as the voice of his former friend, this much is able to get his mind off of how much of Sunny's overall character were the culmination of everything he despises in this world, after all he wasn't here so there was no reason to think of him. He walks back over to the other contestant that's trying to reach around so he could at least try finding the object that'll help him actually look around the place. Luckily his glasses are placed on for him and his vision kicks back immediately once he sees Evan in front of him.
"Looks like your night of rest must've been rough." Evan remarks to him before lifting Alex out of the mud, although it seems that he's soaked all over his clothing and face, and the amount of mud all over his body made him look like he'd been trying to camouflage into the ground.
"Well, y-you're not wrong about that..." Alex starts off his response with a slight smile on his face, the two of them were speaking to each other just like they'd done before the whole merge fiasco essentially blew up any chances of the two of them even agreeing on making game moves. Unfortunately this takes his smile away and he slowly felt the moment of happiness get snapped away once another question entered his mind. "Wh-Why'd you help me out?"
"Because you're not exactly my enemy, sure you're on the opposing side but my hatred only really extends to Sunny on your guys' side and Miriam, who's now eliminated, so really I don't have any reason to treat you like you're some kind of criminal." Evan explains quite simply, although they're on different sides he clearly didn't believe that reason alone should prevent the two of them from getting along.
"God you're such a mixed b-bag of morality." Alex comments with him shaking his head very slightly before some other talking point enters his mind, "Also you don't have to call me Alex anymore."
"Why do you want me to call you 'Purple Alex'? I'm still unsure of what exactly makes you purple in the first place." Evan questions before narrowing his eyes in order to inspect the contestant in front of him.
"Actually the term comes from another show where people who are normally under-edited or are barely shown in the show to the point you forget they exist are called 'purple players' who suffered the infamous purple-edit. The first person to fall victim to this and get acknowledged for how little they were acknowledged is a player who went by Purple Kelly who got the edit she did due to her quitting the season of the show she was on, which probably explains why Chris was so insistent with giving the nickname to me." Alex gives the entire backstory to the name that's been given to him. During this explanation he turns around and begins stumbling his way towards the cabin while Evan follows behind him.
"So your nickname essentially means you're a quitter to some extent. Who's a side-character that's barely been given any screen time? Sounds harsh to give to someone trying to play the game." Evan gives his opinion on the matter.
"That's a fair assessment..." Alex suddenly goes completely quiet and before he goes onto the stairs which lead onto the porch he looks down and begins thinking to himself. Evan stops in his tracks and tilts his head at this abrupt stop, "Why'd you align yourself with Leon?"
"Because we promised to help him out, so I'm trying everything I can to achieve something we'd been promising him since the post-swap now." Evan answers the question as if it's obvious because to him the reason was quite simple because in reality, helping other people is something he always wants to do. In the midst of his response, the door he'd left open earlier for the cabin finally shuts itself.
"I'll admit that I've failed to help him out in time and it's definitely on me for not trying harder to prevent him from becoming the person he is right now. However, I feel like there's more to your answer than what you're telling me." Alex slowly turns around to face the other contestant with analytical eyes.
"Well we sorta both can help out each other, if I help him out then he's going to continue showing me how to protect other people!" Evan feels his voice getting more cheery during this response and he feels himself get more excited at the prospect alone.
"...So your logic is that by protecting him he's also helping you prepare to protect more people in the future because he's technically an example or template for future people?" Alex tries summarizing his friend's logic.
"You could say that, anyways, would you mind explaining to me why you're working with Sunny? From what I'd been barely able to hear last night, it sounds like your alliance didn't take last night all that well." Evan takes his turn to question his friend with a serious look on his face.
"...Good question..." Alex seems to get completely stumped by this question and even though he initially opens his mouth to answer the question, he slowly closes them in order to think about his answer more. All the words which were said last night start filling his mind and especially the violent actions done to him by the delinquent couldn't help but make him feel more confused than ever about why he's doing the things he's doing.
"You two having an existential crisis too?" Another voice randomly jumps in on their conversation, Alex and Evan slowly turn their heads and they notice the person who came out of nowhere with the question was Kyle who had opened the door to the cabin. Both of them remain silent and the three of them stare at one another, primarily due to two of the people present being unsure how to exactly respond to this. After this, the camera cuts away to Leon who sits up from his bed and looks around the cabin.
"Today definitely feels like quite a lovely-!" Leon initially starts off his sentence sounding quite cheery and prepared for the day which lies ahead, unfortunately he'd noticed someone else who seemed to be awake. This person was Sunny who's currently leaning on the door, it seemed that he's currently trying to listen to the conversation happening on the other side the best he can. Something in him suddenly causes him to blink and he pushes himself off the door before turning around to see that one of his main enemies in the game is staring at him.
"F*** you." Sunny simply says before opening the door and he automatically exits the cabin with these words being his parting words to the other contestant. Once the door had been slammed, the brawler sighs in relief because this meant he didn't have to at least deal with the delinquent this morning. Leon grows a smile before standing up from his bed and he stretches out his arms and legs to start his day off... unfortunately for him someone walks into the cabin right as he does this.
"Well this is quite the inconvenience." Jared comments due to the first thing he'd noticed when he entered the place, is one of the people who hates him the most seeing him standing right there. However it seemed that he decided to walk over to the area which he was meant to sleep in last night, during this walk his hands are seen shaking very slightly. What made things more awkward was that his bed is set right in front of Leon's bed which means that now he's sitting down, the two of them are face-to-face.
"Well if it isn't the heartbreaker, How'd your night of painful rest go?~" Leon goes down the passive aggressive route while he sits back down in order to start up this conversation. He had a few words for the contestant in front of him, obviously these words are most likely to be harsh.
"Painful, just like I'm pretty sure you intended it to feel for me when you threw me off a dragon." Jared responds with his head turned away from the person he's speaking with.
"It doesn't take someone with a high intelligence to figure that out, although you did break our non-verbal agreement to start that Tug of War at the same time." Leon points out and his eyes were seen looking up at the roof in order to remind himself of the events that took place yesterday.
"Yeeeah, in retrospect that probably just added more fuel to the fiery desire you had to absolutely destroy me." Jared admits before shivering at the mere mention of yesterday.
"Glad you recognized that, although something inside of me felt really angered that you would break an agreement with me just like that considering how much some of your alliance members look up at you as if you're the only good-guy left in this competition even though in my eyes, heroes always keep their words and don't compromise their characters no matter what challenge is hurled at them." Leon explains before he began intertwining his fingers with each other which allowed his hands to grab onto each other.
"In my defense, what you did afterwards to me was definitely an overreaction and I'm pretty sure that makes it two people you've injured who you're currently holding grudges against." Jared attempts to make a case against what's been brought up against him.
"Well my actions were less because of you breaking our agreement and more because of how you've been treating Lia ever since you've finally seen her 'Red-Eyes' phase that's been going on for a while now." Leon clarifies his actions with his eyes narrowing right after.
"Your opinions on how I've been handling that situation have been quite obvious by now thanks to how vocal you are about it, although I can't say that I can blame you for not exactly liking my actions or rather lack of actions in trying to help Lia get through these rather hard times for her." Jared looks at the ground while saying his thoughts on his handling of his ex-friend's situation.
"Glad you're at least aware that you should've done more to help her out instead of villainize her and constantly show your loyalty to Hannah over her, this situation might've started over some silly love drama but what makes you the bad guy in this situation is how you did nothing to help her out which means I'm the one who has to pick her back up and help her through these times."
"...Don't act like your approach is that much better, you're making her believe she's doing nothing wrong and that's just not true because hurting other people isn't something she'd ever accept and is wrong when it's not required of you to do it!" Jared slowly starts looking up and he begins glaring at the contestant he's speaking with.
"So you admit my approach is better? My approach of not ostracizing her is better and me actually being there is far better than you being possibly the worst friend to her when she needed someone? If you've got an issue with how I'm handling things with her then too bad because you failed to even try helping her out and you're waaay too late to try and play the hero with her! I'm her friend now. I'm the hero in her eyes. I'm the guy who's going to have my side prevail and will be the reason for you getting sent home." Leon stands up in order to get his point across and he presses his finger against the perfectionist's chest who remains sitting down and angrily staring at the contestant standing tall.
"...What if I've got a Hidden Invincibility Statue?~" Suddenly the voice of Jared suddenly deviates from how it normally sounds with this single line of whispering. Hearing these words lead to Leon slowly taking his finger off him and this leads to the contestant in front of him to slowly stand up from his bed in order to pull something from out his pocket. Indeed he seemed to have pulled out a mini statue of Chris McLean's face which seemed to have a golden color on it and there seemed to be no line on the chin.
"When'd you find that?" Leon feels the anger inside of him growing at this revelation and some kind of dark aura bursts into existence around him, this statue is one of the biggest wild-cards in the midst of this warfare between the two sides. Seeing that the object which could make the difference and help the other side even things out with them in the hands of the teenager he's admitted to despising made him absolutely livid.
"Last night I'd been completely healed up from the injuries you gave me, so I spent a good amount of the night searching around the place and eventually this miracle maker had fallen into my hands." Jared didn't seem to get too intimidated of the angered brawler glaring daggers into his soul.
"How do I know you've not just created another fake one?" Leon begins feeling denial that the opposing side has now one of the biggest game-changing advantages left in the game. However if Miriam could create a fake statue then someone like Jared doing the same thing isn't something that's completely implausible and if he's just bluffing him out then it'll relieve him of the situation.
"If I don't win the challenge today then try taking a shot at me, then you'll see if it's fake~" Jared is now taunting the leading member of the opposing alliance before he slowly puts the statue back inside his pocket. Afterwards he turns away and begins making his way out of the cabin because to him, the conversation has ended since there was nothing else for him to say. However, the rage inside of Leon starts fading away once an idea seems to have entered his mind and so once his adversary grabs onto the door knob he decides to give him some parting words.
"Are you really sure about your alliance? Let's just say you might want to ask them about what happened last night~" These words cause Jared to freeze up completely upon hearing them, but he doesn't try responding to it for the time being. Instead he opens the door and walks out of the cabin, however even without saying a single word this made it clear to the person who'd spoken these words that his enemy had taken internal notes of what was said. Now that the conversation had concluded he lays back down onto his bed and begins thinking about the confirmations he'd been given.
Not much longer later, Hannah is caught on camera walking around outside, currently she's taking her turn reflecting on the events of last night and the words which were all said to her. She turns her head and looks directly at the camera which she just continues staring at for a few minutes, for once she's just doing nothing and yet the attention seems to continue into being on her. Slowly an idea enters her mind and she opens her mouth to speak to it.
"Sorry Fergy... I'm just the worst, aren't I?" Hannah puts herself down with the least convincing fake smile she's had yet and it was almost like she didn't even try acting remotely happy this time around. Once she got these words off her chest she turns around and walks back towards the direction of the cabin where she'd noticed that Leon had just exited the building before leading Evan and Kyle into the back of it to most likely talk strategy with each other. Her head looks around further, this allows her to see that Alex, Sunny, and Jared were all chatting nearby and she begins walking over to them.
'Looks like Jared's been healed up, that's great!' It seemed that the heartthrob got quite excited to see the person she's closest with in the game is doing well again. Knowing him, he's probably asking about what exactly happened last night and so Hannah wants to be there to join in on the conversation and to greet him.
"NO ONE TALKS STRATEGY WITHOUT ME!" Chloe proudly declares once she'd kick open the door to the cabin, this causes everyone to stop what they're doing and instead they give her strange looks which leads to her smiling proudly. With everyone staring at her she waves at all of them and jumps down the stairs of the porch in order to spin after she lands on the ground. To end this short display of showboating she raises both her arms into the air. Everyone goes back to what they're doing, except for Hannah who stands there and looks at Chloe who seems to have noticed her. "Nice seeing you again, friend!~"
"Hello Chloe, it's been a while hasn't it?" Hannah comments now that she's speaking with someone who she's had quite the decent history with all things considered. Both of them walked up to one another with smiles on each of their faces at getting the chance to just talk with one another.
"Not really, but it definitely feels like it considering the hell that's raised over this place." Chloe answers, her head looking around the place to see everyone discussing game-related things. It seemed that all these talks regarding strategy, what today's challenge could be, and the events which have transpired so far all seemed to have slightly annoyed her.
"Calling it 'hell' isn't all that far off, speaking of which, would you mind telling me why you're actually on Leon's side of the numbers?" Hannah fires away with another question.
"It just seems like the safer option, if I'm going to have to steal the spotlight back away from him then I'll need to set myself up well for when the time comes. Basically I've joined to make sure I'll prevent myself from getting injured from Leon and to allow me to get more opportunities in order to make sure all eyes stay on me." Chloe states and during her sentence she looks over at the person which she's seeming to plot against.
"This seems to be quite the conversation taking place." Another familiar voice enters the conversation followed by a notably strong gust of wind which causes both girls to look behind the drummer. Of course the person there seemed to be Red-Eyed Lia who sounds like she's just heard the plan which had been just explained right in front of her.
"...Oh look! Here's the girl who stole your boyfriend!" Chloe grabs onto Hannah and pulls her in front of her in order to direct the attention of the girl in front of her towards something else.
"H-Hey! I'd rather not feel like I'm dying again, so take it e-easy!" Hannah tries convincing the girl in front of her, waving her hands and trying to walk backwards but the girl behind her only keeps on holding her in place. While watching the events unfold in front of her, Red-Eyed Lia stares at the person being used as a shield who is obviously freaking out at the prospect of needing to deal with her. Much to the other girl's surprises the red-eyes go away and Lia giggles once her eyes have once again turned green.
"Sorry for scaring the two of you, my mind's just been scattered recently~" Lia speaks with an oddly sweet-tone behind her voice which takes a while for either of the contestants in front of her to respond to.
"...Somehow that just made me feel even more scared." Chloe remarks, her grip on the person she'd just been trying to throw under the bus being released since her attention's been caught by these words. It seemed that Hannah felt the same way because she wiped the sweat off her face and her eyes focused on the face of the girl in front of them, it was like she was trying to analyze her. These reactions cause the formerly-upbeat girl to sigh in disappointment.
"Now, I know that the two of you are skeptical of me, and actually I'm unsure how long I'll be able to refrain myself from attacking either of you due to circumstances but for now I've decided to take the route of trying to make sure that things won't spiral into violence and brutality. Doing this is tough to do with all the pain and suffering one of you has caused me but maybe having all of us get along (like you'd both like) can make sure we're all going to get along and avoid unnecessary censored bloodshed!" Lia happily explains herself to the skeptics in front of her.
"That's nice and all, but shouldn't people who try making things better understand what caused things to be-?"
"Quiet down, boyfriend-stealer." Chloe cuts off Hannah to try and silence the girl before leaning into her ear right after.
"Don't you want to avoid being alone at all costs?~" Just barely, the camera could catch the words which Chloe is using to sway the actor-in-training before leaning away and turning her attention to Lia.
"Aren't we in the same alliance, actually? Why would you want to ever get violent with me?" Chloe seems to only now process the complete sentence which had been said not-so-long-ago.
"Well you do get aggressive very easily and my trust of you is so low that I've got a feeling my red-filled side doesn't expect us to always be on the best of terms when you've got so little care for other people and so even though we're on the same side, I'll have to try my best in holding myself back from trying to take things too far. Of course, Hannah here already knows how hard it's going to be for me to prevent myself from running wild but hurting you has already caused me some pain and so not doing that will hopefully improve things between us, of course that's as long as you don't make me go further but I'm sure you're aware enough of how much you can get away with!~" Lia goes through many mood swings which involved her red-eyes temporarily showing up again, but it seems she's keeping it under control much more right now.
'Wait, is she blaming me for her constantly beating me up?' Hannah seems to notice something that makes her eyes narrow at the girl attempting to 'improve things' between the two of them. She opens her mouth in order to comment on what she's just noticed, but rather than saying anything, no words come out of her mouth for a while. Just when it looks like she's going to speak after this long pause, she's interrupted once again.
"Sounds like a good plan! Anyways, let's all go to our own sides and discuss strategy before anyone gets suspicious we're making an all-girls alliance." Chloe wraps an arm around Lia as she looks over at both groups around the girls who weren't talking with each other.
"Why would the guys assume we'd work together when we're outnumbered, making alliances based on trust instead of superficial terms like gender, and it's been made clear to everyone that we all don't like each other?" Lia wastes no time in pointing out the flaws with this train of thought.
"I dunno, doesn't that always happen in shows like these?" Chloe shrugs since it seemed not even she could figure out her logic behind her excuse. Even despite this she drags Lia away with her and the two of them join up with the rest of their group. Meanwhile, Hannah watches this happen before sighing and walking over to her group of people in order to discuss how things are going between everyone.
"I'm not apologizing for beating you up, I'll continue to stick with this group because although it's clear not much of you really like me, it's the best chance I've got to take out Leo and even if there's one speck trying to sabotage my plans, I'll make sure to find a way around it." Sunny states to the rest of his team while leaning against the cabin.
"You're the worst person I've ever had to work with, I didn't flip last night but right now you're just making me want to work with Leon who's the biggest threat left in the game who I'll probably lose against, all because you're an absolutely abysmal teammate. Right now my loyalty is only with Jared in this alliance because he's the person I trust the most that hasn't turned insane or lost his mind or has been known to deceive others!" Alex doesn't hold back while yelling at his 'teammate' by pointing directly at him and pressing his finger against his chest.
"..." Hannah just remains quiet at all this commotion, instead she just wraps her arms around Jared who slightly shook his head at everything that's happened.
"Looks like we're all vaguely connected people just barely keeping this dysfunctional alliance together, and I'm the one who firmly established lines yesterday so this is all on me." Jared narrates the situation being presented right to him, indeed things looked like they were miserable for the people he'd been planning to work with. During this chaos he remembers that yesterday he'd been the one to cut-off Lia from their side which sorta compelled everyone to draw lines against each other, knowing this made him look at the ground. He turns his attention towards the other team and chooses to instead focus on them since last night apparently showed they were the more unified between both alliances... or so it seemed.
"Alright team, let's make sure to do anything in order to defeat that scummy other side and that at least one of us is going to dominate the challenge like what happened yesterday!" Leon seems to be trying his best in order to motivate his other teammates using his powerful voice.
"I'm actually hoping for things not to go down like they'd done yesterday, sure I'm going to try my best to help you out but only if it's completely necessary because yesterday's events didn't feel all that good to me and so I'd rather have the two of us figure out other ways in order to get through this competition instead of just violence." Evan seems to actually somewhat oppose the sentiment to a certain extent.
"That's great to hear! I've been thinking the same thing so hopefully we can all try avoiding fights with the other side actually, I'd LOVE to inflict some pain onto those brats and show them that- NO! NOW'S NOT TH-THE TIME!" Lia seems to actually stumble around once her red-eyes had flashed during her response. She falls onto the ground right after and Leon runs over in order to comfort the girl.
"Don't force yourself to do things you don't want to, just do what you feel is right and maybe that'll help you truly stop fighting with yourself if you just trust your own instincts." Leon tries giving her some advice while staring into her green eyes.
"Actually, I completely agree with that because the other team has SUNNY with them and I'm pretty sure he's used plenty of dirty tactics in order to give himself upper-hands against other people and so maybe we're going to have to battle with some of them in order to come out on top." Chloe backs up the leader of the alliance.
"Only if he'll attack first, okay? The more we attack the other team the more we'll be lowering ourselves to the level which Sunny has solidified himself at and so we're going to only attack the others if they try it first. My focus is on helping and protecting the people here, not beating down other people." Evan continues to try coming up with a middle-ground regarding this whole situation.
"..." Kyle stays silent in this group, deciding to instead observes everything that's going on around him and is probably getting lost in his mind about the most random or fitting topics for what's going on. He turns his head and looks over at the other team before noticing that the perfectionist had been doing the same thing which causes a small smile to show up on the baseball-player's face. But everyone stopped talking once a loud air horn had been sounded off, of course everyone knew this could only mean one thing.
*Challenge Time*
Unlike normal, Chris McLean is seen inside a room filled with a bunch of technological things along with three people behind him working on all of the things present in the room. One of the easiest things to distinguish was some kind of set-up which had tons of monitors that's present in the room. It seemed that the contestants were seen on it. Unlike everyone else present he's seen just sitting down on a wheel-chair having the biggest smile on his face and a mic right next to him.
"Now this setup might be confusing for you viewers, so the basic gist is that I've already explained the challenge to these competitors and they're ready to actually compete today. The title of this challenge is Shining Like A Diamond where the contestants will need to make sure that they'll stand out the most, by the end of the series of attempts from each person to outshine everyone else, the audience at this concert will all vote for the person who stood out the most and the person with the most votes gain invincibility from tonight's elimination. Each contestant can either work together, perform alone, or even try outperforming the other person in order to get the most votes by the end of this, however we've given them little time to prepare and have banned any violence from being used so this doesn't devolve into an unintended fighting challenge." Chris gives a long explanation regarding what this challenge is about.
"That explanation could've been a lot shorter, ya know." One of the people working around him comments as they seem to be getting out a blowtorch.
"You know, You're right. And you know, I don't care. My magnificent voice aside, now that you know what today's challenge is about, I'll now announce the challenge has started, and if you're wondering why I've chosen to explain things here... well, it's for this cool transition shot." Chris remarks before spinning his chair around and stopping himself in front of the connected mic placed in front of him. To go along with his words the camera zooms into the monitors and it slowly transitions into what's the main focus of today's challenge.
*Shining Like A Diamond*
All remaining nine contestants were already seen standing on top of a stage with microphones in each of their hands, with varying reactions from the cast themselves. Chloe absolutely loved it all and she decides to step out of the line everyone organized themselves in to a standing ovation from the audience around her, these noises got even louder when someone threw her some drumsticks which she easily catches with her free hand before smirking at all the people showering her with recognition. Seeing this caused her to gently place the drumsticks onto the ground before speaking into the mic.
"Now THIS is the recognition I love seeing from you all, my girls may not be here but I'm glad you all remember the one and only drummer of Eternal Death Flame because you're all getting an amazing performance from yours truly!" Chloe announces to the crowd with the most amount of joy and genuine feelings she's shown this entire season. Compared to the other contestants she was in her zone and held out the mic for the large number of people that were present in order for their voices to be heard loud and clear.
"BLINDING FIRE! BLINDING FIRE! BLINDING FIRE!" Hearing the people there all chant her name in unison made the grin on the drummer's face get even wider, however she does place it closer to her right after.
"I hope everyone watching here knows: Sometimes your family CAN SUCK IT!" Chloe yells out one more which causes the audience to continue cheering for her.
"I agree with that!" Sunny agrees with Chloe's declaration which causes Jared, Hannah, Alex, and Kyle to all think to themselves while Evan shakes his head. The drummer went back into the line with all the other contestants and closed her eyes in order to soak it all in.
'THIS is what I want. This is what winning the show can get me. This is why I'm doing anything to win this season and to be the center of attention, because all these people actually bother to acknowledge me and praise me rather than just... Eh, What does that matter?! I'm on top of the world and winning this season will help keep things that way!' Chloe internally responds to all of this and opens her eyes with the wide smile remaining on her face.
Now the camera chose to focus on the reactions for the rest of the cast being on-stage in front of a large portion of people now that they've quieted down, Alex had been slightly smiling at everyone present but his ever-so-slight wave to all the people were all signs that he's quite obviously not used to all this and is unsure of what to do. Evan blinks a few times and seems to be dead-silent now that there's so much eyes on him, it seemed that he too showed signs of nervousness with his mouth gulping and he brings his hoodie over his head in order to cover it completely by pulling the strings. Jared had his eyes closed and began breathing in and out so he could remain at least somewhat calm considering that it's going to definitely be needed in order to win the challenge. Kyle seemed relaxed like always, unlike his fellow contestants he flips his microphone into the air and is able to successfully catch it which causes members of the audience to clap for him. Lia smiles a bit and tries taking a step out in order to introduce herself, however a mixture of cheers and boos erupt from the audience which causes her to step back almost immediately, her eyes widening at these response before she slowly looks at the ground. Sunny analyzes the wave of people all around the contestants and seemed to smile before stepping out to initially no reaction.
"Doesn't sound like a lot of you know me due to my lack of social media presence, but I'll assure all of you that I'm going to show you all just what exactly I'm made of and how my future is already looking brighter than my name!" Sunny sounds surprisingly excited to speak with the sea of people surrounding him.
"OOOooo~" Enough members of the audience were heard responding with interest to the delinquent who seemed to have charmed portions of them already.
"Boo!" A random kid in the audience seemed to have thought otherwise, however.
"Children in the audience, make sure to shut your mouths and enjoy the show because it'll be a fun one!" Sunny immediately responds to this random reaction without any need to even think about what to say. These words seemed to have silenced the random child and he rolled his eyes before turning around to see that most of the cast looked at him with a smug face. Walking back to them, he decides to cover his mic before speaking with them, "Nothing happened!"
"Well, something's going to happen tonight because the Hero of Spain is HEEERE!" Leon introduces himself very proudly, members in the audience were seen raising up the Spain flag and waving it around in response to this. Although the pop he'd received wasn't loud like the punk drummer, he still got a considerable pop thanks to the fact he seems to be decently well-known and because of his infectiously energetic tone. Instead of speaking much more he turns around and walks back to the rest of the cast, deciding to prepare himself for tonight's performance rather than continue hyping everyone else up. Hannah decides to take her turn right after and she steps out in order to greet the audience with a proud smile.
"HAAANNAH! HAAANNAH! HAAANNAH!" Before she could even speak, Hannah feels the crowd roar with cheers and chants for her before a single word could even exit her mouth. The reaction she'd received seemed to have been on the same level, if not more than Chloe's one because although some people seemed confused at the reaction, the people who knew her didn't hold back at all with how loud they were being. A giggle exits her mouth at how absurdly popular she seemed to have been to the point that just her stepping out to introduce herself caused people to erupt with praise and love for the heartthrob.
"Ahhh~ I wish I could drink-" Hannah starts playfully speaking with some amusement heard in her voice.
"I GOT YOU YOUR LATTE!" Someone in the crowd somehow had already gotten out a cup of latte and was holding it out for the blonde girl to grab. In response to this, the popular girl walks over and picks up the cup before looking at the person who'd given it to her.
"Thank you, Daniel~" Hannah thanks the boy for having done this kind action and she drinks from the latte which leads to her closing her eyes before eventually a smile shows on her face.
"GOOD JOB DANIEL! (GOOD JOB DANIEL!) GOOD JOB DANIEL! (GOOD JOB DANIEL!)" Now the members of the audience who knew the girl, were praising this random guy in the audience for having achieved his unspoken job. Hannah does finish the latte eventually and she gently places it right in front of the person who'd given it to her and she turns around as the wild members of the audience keep doing their thing. Now that she's taken a step forward but stops for a moment, some swallowing was heard from her and she's seen making sure she doesn't puke due to the latte before walking over to everyone else.
'Looks like I've got some competition, annoyingly enough.' Chloe groans now that she's noticed that although her fame seemed to be unmatched, her 'friend' seems to have enough people in the crowd that are passionate about her. All of the lights were seen shining on each contestant and slowly but surely, the audience began to quiet down since the main show hadn't really started yet. Kyle seems to have noticed there were some speakers next to them on the stage with guitars, drums, and pianos also being present on the stage, probably so some of the people here can show off their talents.
"OKAY EVERYONE, BEGIN THE CHALLENGE!" Chris' voice is heard all over the place from another speaker that seemed to have not been on the stage, but it cuts out right after so no one has even the chance to question this. Leon doesn't waste much time in doing his thing and he went over to pick up his guitar, meanwhile Chloe goes over to the drums with her sticks and she sits down in order to prepare herself to play. Kyle flips his microphone into the air once again and catches it before looking over at the two contestants ready to face off against each other.
"Ey." Kyle's voice suddenly gets deeper, the spotlights shining on the six other contestants shut off. Leon immediately starts playing the guitar once he'd heard this, this seems to have caught him off guard but somehow he knew what to do.
"You know my ex, so that makes it all feel complicated, Ye-Yeah."
Thanks to support from his fellow alliance member, Kyle had music and was singing quite casually to the audience surrounding them.
"(It all seems complicated)."
An extra light faintly shines on one of the six contestants who weren't seen before it goes away.
"I read those texts that you sent to yours, But I'll never say it, Ye-Yeah."
Before he could look back in order to see who did this, the light shut back off and the baseball-player just continued singing with a smile growing on his face.
"(I'll never say-)"
Once again the light turns on in order to reveal it was Alex who'd done this.
"You walked in my life at 2 A.M."
Throwing a drumstick at him, Chloe aims them towards the teenager-with-cracked-glasses but she misses and it lands in front of him.
"'Cause my boy's new girl is your best friend,"
But she plays the drums using a single drumstick while an innocent smile remains on her face.
"Act like you don't see me, we'll play pretend,"
No one seemed to have noticed this except for Alex who steps on the stick and kicks it away.
"Your eyes already told me what you never said."
Kyle turns around and looks into the eyes of the other person who seems like they're singing with him.
"Now we're in the back seat of the black car going home,"
Immediately after, Alex walks up beside him and begins singing along with the baseball-player.
"When she asked me, "Is it wrong if I come up with you?","
The two of them continue performing with one another which caused mixed reactions from the people on stage with them.
"We're both drunk on the elevator,"
Chloe, Leon, and Sunny all seemed to be shaking their heads for drastically different reasons from each other.
"When I kissed you for the first time in New York City (Uh)."
Lia, Hannah, and Evan all gave notable reactions by either pulling out their phones or pretending to take pictures of the duo.
Machine Gun Kelly ft. blackbear-my ex's best friend
"I swear to God, I never fall in love,"
Kyle takes center stage once he reaches the chorus of the song which he begins spinning around during.
"Then you showed up, and I can't get enough of it."
His spinning does stop eventually and Kyle smirks before leaning backwards and he falls off the stage without a single care in the world.
"I swear to God, I never fall in love,"
Watching this caught the non-stereotyped contestant by surprise and he steps forward only to be grabbed by his t-shirt and pulled back.
"I never fall in love, but I can't get enough of it."
To his surprise, it seemed that the chill-contestant was somehow on stage again and he threw the mic over to his fellow performer.
"First off, I'm not sorry,"
Barely being able to catch the mic, Alex immediately starts off his verse of the song now.
"I won't apologize to nobody."
He makes sure to turn off his other microphone and to instead use the one which had been given to him.
"You play like I'm invisible,"
In his performance he makes sure to look away from the audience in order to just focus on his rapping.
"Girl, don't act like you ain't saw me."
Only thing which is going through his mind right now is the words which he should say and keep at a good pace without running out of breath.
"Last year was a mess, and how I acted was beyond me,"
Quickly he seemed to slow down the speed for the moment since he seems to be taking smaller and faster breathing during this part.
"But the past still revolves me,"
Something enters his mind and he turns around to see if Kyle had remained standing in the same spot.
"You text me, I ain't responding."
Of course he wasn't, so once he felt something touch his shoulder he jumped up out of surprise.
"But now shit's done chaaaaanged,"
His voice cracks as he tries to continue the song before he turns around.
"Go our separate waaaaays."
Of course it was Kyle who casually waved at him, there seemed to have been a look of amusement coming from him when watching his fellow performer's reactions and freakouts.
"But look at this damage you did to me, I still want nothing to do between you and me,"
Almost immediately, Alex tries playing this off by increasing the speed of his rapping and singing more passionately into the microphone.
"Please, don't say nothing it all sounds so true to me,"
He closed his eyes and sweat is seen dripping down his face.
"We don't have nothing to say, Heeeey!"
Now that he's reached the end of his verse he opens his eyes and sloppily hands the microphone back over to the person who'd given it to him in the first place.
"I swear to God, I never fall in love,"
Without any problem, he sings the chorus once again and looks at the audience in order to make this performance even better.
"Then you showed up, and I can't get enough of it."
Behind him was the non-stereotyped contestant who fell onto all fours in order to catch his breath now that he's not the main focus of the singing.
"I swear to God, I never fall in love,"
Noticing this leads to the current singer to pick up another microphone which seems to have been dropped.
"I never fall in love, but I can't get enough of it."
Alex slowly gets back to his feet but right when this happens he's tossed the microphone once again, luckily he seems to catch it better than he'd done earlier.
"I swear to God, I never fall in love,"
Joining along, this led to the two boys to sing with each other and the two of them were proud to do this.
"Then you showed up, and I can't get enough of it."
They point at one another before running at each other.
"I swear to God, I never fall in love,"
Kyle and Alex high fives each other and stares into each other's eyes after they do their thing.
"I never fall in love, but I can't get enough of it."
During this the two of them slowly began leaning towards each other and closed their eyes...
*Cuts Off*
"Sorry girls, I'm not interested in him." Almost immediately once they abruptly end the song, they look towards the camera and confirm this fact before playfully pushing themselves off of the other person. Lia slowly frowns at this revelation and puts her phone back in her pocket now that she's realized she can't really make a video about what just happened. Both of them laugh a little since members of the audience were heard boo-ing the duo for teasing most of them.
"On this show, love isn't really my priority, also I'm not interested in guys." Alex tries explaining why he's not attracted to the person he'd just performed with.
"Actually that second part's debatable, in fact is there someone here who knows him?" Kyle looks around the audience so he could try and search for someone that's had experience with the non-stereotyped boy.
"Maybe we shouldn't go that f-far, ac-"
"Yes actually! It's nice to see him getting camera's all up in his face all the time for once." Interrupting Alex sounded like a female voice, his head searching around the place since it seemed he recognized the person very quickly.
"L-Lily?!" Alex loudly asks out of surprise, however the crack in his glasses make it hard for him to look around the place and despite him squinting he's unable to properly find the girl. There seemed to be a blush on his face during this search which caused the person beside him to chuckle.
"I'm not going to tell you where I am, just to avoid any camera's getting close to me like you always do!" Lily is only heard continuing to shout and even the cameraman were trying to search for the girl, they have no idea what the person looks like and so they're lost. Now that this had been confirmed, Alex sighs in defeat at being unable to find the person who seems to have had quite an interesting connection with him.
"That's quite interesting, I'll change topics back to what it originally was since I'd rather not out you on national television." Kyle responds to the situation and turns to face the camera.
"I-I'M ST-STRAIGHT!"
"My reason for actually returning the feelings is that you're not exactly my type, but I'll wish you the best of luck with finding the right person since I'm sure we're both going to be fine romantically." Kyle ignores what'd been said and once he'd finished speaking he drops the mic onto the ground in order to turn around and walk back over to the line of contestants. Alex sighs and he looks around the stage, another drumstick is thrown at him and it bonks his head but doesn't really do anything to the point he just ignores it. Chloe runs over to pick up the object, this means now she's got two sticks in order to play her instrument and so she ran back over to it.
'Time to put on a show!' Chloe declares in her mind and she opens her mouth in order to prepare to sing while playing her instrument.
"I wake up to the sound, to the silence that allows,"
Much to her annoyance, someone else had already begun singing and it was revealed to be Evan who somehow had orchestral instruments playing during his singing.
"For my mind to run around, with my ear up to the ground."
Oddly enough he seems to have gotten calmer and seems to even be smiling in spite of getting very nervous earlier.
"I'm searchin' to be whole, the stories that I told,"
Behind her, the punk drummer noticed the brawler walking behind her.
"When my back is to the world, that was smiling when I turned."
Leon gently places his guitar onto the ground and smiles while watching his friend perform.
"Tell you you're the greateeest,"
Currently, Evan's entire body seemed to be shaking and his eyes were closed. Whatever he's imagining or projecting himself into didn't seem to be something that was pleasant.
"BUT ONCE YOU TURN they haaate uuus!"
Although he continues singing in front of everyone there, once he's finished screaming he drops the microphone and turns away from the audience before Leon takes his turn at the front of the stage.
Imagine Dragons-Enemy [From the Opening of Arcane]
"Oh, the misery,"
He sings on top of the stage very proudly and filled with energy.
"Everybody wants to be my Enemy."
Chloe plays the drums during this and actually seemed to be liking the song.
"Spare the sympathy,"
Leon continues to sing the song with a serious look starting to appear on his face.
"Everybody wants to be, my Enemy."
A familiar sadistic smile started forming on his face while someone else was seen running behind him.
"Pray it away, I swear,"
Sunny jumps out from behind the brawler and interjects with his part of the song.
"I'll never be a saint, no way."
Quickly he turns around and quickly flips off the person he's interrupted who chuckles at this taunting.
"(My Enemy)"
Leon sings before turning his head to instead turn his attention over to Jared who remained standing there.
"Pray it away, I swear,"
To get his attention, Sunny pushes the self-proclaimed Spanish Hero.
"I'll never be a saint-"
This works and Leon and Sunny are now glaring into each other's eyes.
"(Look out for yourself!)"
Getting in the last word of the song, Leon knees drops the microphone before grabbing onto his enemy's arm.
*Song Ends*
Sunny moves out the way without any hesitation and chuckles once he'd seen his opponent miss the grab. That wasn't all which the brawler had in mind since he spins his body around in an attempt to possibly catch the delinquent with the back of either of his elbows. These didn't work either due to his adversary actually catching his left arm which causes an impact that causes the floor below them to actually have cracks down in it.
"Hey Kyle, look! Here's my future-prediction-skills coming into pl-!" Sunny looks over in order to taunt the other person he's made it clear he'll be opposing. Initially, Leon tries taking advantage of this by pulling in the blonde fighter but Sunny chooses to let go in order to prevent himself from getting pulled into another attack. His eyes widened once it seemed that something had entered his mind and before he could do anything else, a kick was delivered to his stomach which launched him off of the stage with how strong it was.
"First off, always keep your eyes on your opponent. Second off, you can know everything that's going to happen, but knowledge like that can be useless if you can't do anything about it~" Leon explains with so much satisfaction over what just happened being heard in his voice.
"SUNNY AND LEON! YOU'RE BOTH OUT THIS COMPETITION BECAUSE YOU BOTH SEEM TO BE DEADSET ON MAKING THIS SHOW UNWATCHABLE WITH YOUR PLANS TO GET EVERYONE TOO INJURED TO PUT ON A DAMN SHOW!" Chris sounds absolutely livid over the speakers and this noise caused everyone except for the people he'd been speaking too, to cover their ears.
"S-Sorry I couldn't try br-breaking that up..." Evan apologizes to Leon with his body still shaking, then his friend walks over to him and chuckles.
"It's okay, just remember that only achieving your goal should ever matter and so you need to continue getting used to visualizing yourself simply doing the right thing in protecting other people in any situation possible, even if it results in some death." Leon responds to what's been said which causes the officer-in-training to shake his head.
"S-Sorry, I just can't imagine myself killing others, I'd like to save lives, s-so what's the point of taking lives away?" Evan asks the person who's currently giving advice to him.
"Because people will take advantage of that pacifism, and if you don't try doing what you believe is right at all costs then moments like these happen where you're unable to truly help out the people you want. So no matter how scary the prospects may be, just remember that you'll have to know that actions like those need to be taken for you to become the person your parents are." Leon answers with sincerity in his voice before turning away and walking away soon after.
"..." Alex seems to have watched the entire conversation and he opens his mouth in an attempt to perhaps try debunking or finding flaws in the argument that's been presented to his friend. Instead of doing what he's intended, the fact that Evan's planning to become an officer makes him completely silent because the response had been true, people will stoop to any level in trying to get what they want to happen. Rather than come up with a counter to that, he tries thinking about the overall statement which the brawler had made.
'Good, now it should be my time to shine!' Chloe internally confirms in her mind now that Leon had gotten off the stage. Once again she prepares to play her drums and sing in order to give everyone there the performance she assumes they're expecting from her.
Instruments were then heard playing from the speaker which causes the drummer to groan since this could only mean some other song is going to be played. Just like she figured out, someone does step out from the line in order to stare at their performance. The contestant who takes their turn trying to gain the votes of all the people watching them is Hannah.
Dua Lipa-Break My Heart
"I've always been the one to say the first goodbye,
Had to love and lose a hundred million times,
Had to get it wrong to know just what I like,
Now I'm falling..."
Hannah sings out to the silence of pretty much everyone with some people present paying complete attention to her. Hearing the lyrics of the song caused Jared to raise an eyebrow and all the other spotlights turned off except for the one on him.
"You say my name like I have never heard before,
I'm indecisive but this time I know for sure,
I hope I'm not the only one that feels it all,
Are you falling?..."
Currently the girl had her eyes closed and sang to the audience for the most part, considering that she's facing towards no one in particular she appears to be focusing on her singing only. To add some legitimacy to her performance she puts her hand on her chest in order to emphasize the 'feelings' which she's currently singing about.
"Center of attention,
You know you can get whatever you want from me.
Whenever you want it, baby!
It's you in my reflection,
Now I'm afraid of all the things it could do to me.
If I would've known it, baby-"
To the perfectionist's surprise some of the members of the audience climbed onto the stage and this caused him to back away from what's going on. No surprise came from the heartthrob and instead she seems to play off the people around her who are holding dresses, bottle waters, and even Shans were being waved at her. All of them threw the objects away and instead let the girl walk towards the edge of the stage to continue her song.
"I would've stayed, at, home,
'Cause I was doin' better alone.
But when you, said, "He-llo,"
I knew that was the end of it all.
I should've stayed, at, home,
'Cause now there ain't no letting you go.
Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?
Oh no, I was doin' better alone.
But when you, said, "He-llo,"
I know that was the end of it all.
I should've stayed, at, home,
'Cause now there ain't no letting you go.
Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?"
Her hand forms finger guns and once she fired her shots, the people she'd directed this imaginary gun at fell onto the ground in sync with the music. This led to pretty much every girl and guy around her to have fallen onto the ground before looking at the ground out of sadness at all the people she'd shot down. Finally she turns around and looks over at the pessimist who seemed to have been frightened by the level of control she seemed to have over the people that knew her.
"I wonder when you go, if I stay on your mind.
Two can play that game, but you win me every time.
Everyone before you was a waste of time,
Yeah, you got meee."
Although he starts things off seeming wary of the girl in front of her, the singing of her music begins causing his body to lessen the tension it's feeling and he begins paying complete attention to her. However, another light turns on which both contestants turn over to look at.
"Center of attention,
You know you can get whatever you want from me.
Whenever you want it, baby!
It's you in my reflection,
Now I'm afraid of all the things it could do to me.
If I would've known it, baby-"
Fergy Ferguson's seen stumbling past the spotlight and falls out of view from it, but he's heard getting back up and he slides into the light after this momentary slip-up. Hannah seems to grow a wide smile on her face but this goes away once she looks back and forth between the two people who were literally right in front of her.
"I would've stayed, at, home,
'Cause I was doin' better alone.
But when you, said, "He-llo,"
I know that was the end of it all.
I should've stayed, at, home,
'Cause now there ain't no letting you go.
Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?
Oh no, I was doin' better alone,
But when you, said, "He-llo,"
I know that was the end of it all.
I should've stayed, at, home,
'Cause now there ain't no letting you go.
Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?"
Now she's stumbling backwards and nearly falls onto the ground, luckily for her a group of the people who'd fallen stand up in time to catch her and push the girl back up to her feet. Right after doing this, the group of people performing with the contestant all glare at the two guys which they all assumed this song must've been directed towards. Thanks to this both Fergy and Jared started sweating now that all the bad attention was placed on them.
"Ooh, Break My Heart."
Luckily for the victims of this mess, Hannah starts singing softly yet sincerely.
"Ooh, Break My Heart."
Currently her eyes are closed and once again she grabs onto her chest.
"Ooh."
Slowly she began looking over at the two guys which she's found herself caring for a great deal.
"Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?"
For a split second, one more light turns on to show Lia who intensely watched this situation. No one seemed to notice this though since the female actor runs towards both guys while the song transitions into the chorus once more.
"I would've stayed, at, home,
'Cause I was doin' better alone.
But when you, said, "He-llo,"
I know that was the end of it all.
I should've stayed, at, home,
'Cause now there ain't no letting you go.
Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?
Oh no, I was doin' better alone,
But when you, said, "He-llo,"
I know that was the end of it all."
She stands in between her dilemma before firstly walking around Fergy who followed her with his eyes the entire time, however he seemed to have been conflicted in his mind. Then she takes her turn in circling around Jared, he doesn't try looking around in order to keep track of the girl and instead he just slightly looks at the girl once she has gotten in front of him. In the midst of all this confusion and love triangles/pentagons which seems to be presenting itself, the people who all got onto the stage surrounded everyone who were currently involved before they all fell onto the ground once more.
"I should've stayed, at, home, 'Cause now there ain't no letting you go."
Hannah goes over to Fergy and wraps a necklace around him before turning around.
"Am I falling in love with the one that could Break My Heart?"
Hannah goes over to Jared and even though he had his back turned to her, she wraps her arms around him and closes her eyes.
*Song Ends*
"I'm sorry for having brought you two into this, I-I just..." Hannah tries apologizing for the situation she's caused which has now been made public information to everyone currently present. Fergy grabs onto his necklace and although he does slightly blush at first, he looks at the girl who he's simped for before which causes his face to slowly frown and he looks down in order to think about what all this means. Jared's looking at the ground to the point his eyes can't be seen and currently it's quite difficult to get any sort of read on whether or not this apology is effective.
"You've got so much people in your life already, and yet here you are getting more, and more, and more... while leaving me in the dust without anyone there for me."
"B-But you've got Rival, r-right?! You can't be alone when you're with him and the other girls he likes!"
"I've only ever needed Rival because people like you and our parents never bothered to make me or my former friends feel like we weren't always getting left alone. Also don't you dare say his name, unlike you he's someone who doesn't conform to what others want him to be and disguises their true-selves around everyone. You might be my sister, but you've never treated me like one so I hope you enjoy your status as 'Queen Bee' all you want..."
"..." Hannah remembers a conversation which she had with her sister that caused her arms to wrap around the perfectionist even tighter.
"Hannah-" Fergy tries speaking up in this situation, a smile seemed to be on his face and it seemed that he'd intended to probably try and find some kind of way to cheer up the situation. The Chain of Shame pops out from behind the stage and it drags him out of the building which causes Hannah's eyes to widen and she looks off into the direction which he'd been dragged into.
"FERGY!" Hannah reaches out for the eliminated contestant who'd gotten dragged away before the two of them could properly speak with each other regarding the situation at hand. Another spotlight turns on as all the extras sprinted off the stage, Lia watched everything happen in front of her and she stares emptily at the sight that had just been in front of her.
Jared sings it one more time and Lia kept supporting him by doing the backup vocals, his voice then cracks as he repeats the title of the song, Lia then laughs after this happens. Jared then chuckles at her, it looks like he purposely let his voice crack and he was completely enjoying himself. Jared then looks at the audience and Lia wraps her arms around Jared from behind while she kept on smiling (Episode 4).
All the memories of simpler times in the pre-merge flood back and she slowly feels nothing but sadness and regret fill up her body, unlike normal her eyes weren't turning red like what's been expected by now. Instead she falls onto her knees and looks around the place for Leon, before realizing he's not there anymore and that the only people who could be seen in all this darkness are Hannah and Jared. She realizes that her microphone had fallen out of her hands and she does scramble for it, her hands grab onto the only object she could hold onto. Only now does the girl hugging her ex-friend notice the former YouTuber standing there with a microphone and the light shined brightly onto her, seeing this made the blonde actor's arms slowly unwrap themselves from around the pessimist. Lia holds the object close to her before the perfectionist walks over to the piano and decides to be the one to musically support the girl who's going to perform even if his emotions for the time being are unclear.
Olivia Rodrigo-drivers license
"I got my drivers license last week, just like we always talked about."
Quietly she starts things off her performance with her head turned over to the person playing the piano.
"Because you were so excited for me, to finally drive up to your house."
She takes some steps forward and begins reaching out her hand for the contestant with his back literally turned to her.
"But today I drove through the suburbs, crying because you weren't around."
Her hands stop reaching out and she stops completely in her tracks before making it even near him.
"And you're probably with that blonde girl, Who always made me doubt."
The attention of hers slowly gets directed towards someone else and Hannah just stood there, motionlessly.
"She's so much older than me, She's everything I'm insecure about."
Temporarily her eyes did turn red but she backs away and is able to keep herself normal, evident by her green eyes.
"Yeah, today I drove through the suburbs, because how could I ever love someone else?"
In an attempt to at least try to bury her rage, she shifts herself to be looking over back at the person she'd once fallen for.
"And I know we weren't perfect, but I never felt this waaay for no one."
"I will remember that, speaking of which, weren't you planning to show me some of your videos?" Jared questions, Lia's eyes immediately sparkled and she had a bigger smile than she already had (Episode 3).
"And I just can't imagine how you could be okaaay now that I'm gone!"
"And if anyone ticks me off, then I will not hesitate to do what I did to Jared, to you!" Sunny's voice was heard talking to everyone else, Lia then growls after hearing this before glaring over at Sunny (Episode 5, Part 1).
"'Cause you didn't mean what you wrote in that song about me."
The flashbacks end for now and now present-day Lia is currently pouring all of her teenager heart and soul into this performance, her eyes starting to build up some visible water within them.
"'Cause you said forever, now I drove alone past your street..."
Now that the first part of the song ends one drop of water went down her face and it fell onto the ground, one moment it'd been seen falling and the moment it landed on the ground it's gone.
"And all my friends are tired, of hearing how much I miss you but-"
One forced smile suddenly forms on her face and clearly the memories of how things were, how she had everything, all went into her head.
"I kinda feel sorry for them, 'cause they'll never know you the way that I do, yeah."
Right now she's trying to find some way, anyway, to keep herself from lashing out again and ruining her social status with her ex-crush and the audience who already showed a dislike towards her.
"Today I drove through the suburbs, and pictured I was driving home to you."
Just like what's been seen earlier, her eyes began flashing constantly between red and green to the point she just closed her eyes.
"And I know we weren't perfect, but I never felt this waaay for no one."
All she could do is continue to pour all her efforts into the song in an attempt to release enough of her emotions to prevent herself from going all the way and breaking the deal that's been agreed upon.
"Oh! And I just can't imagine how you could be okaaay now that I'm gone!"
Over the course of this attempt her face seems to start forming a smile and she seems to remain calm as her singing carries on.
"'Cause you didn't mean what you wrote in that song about me."
Hannah starts taking steps away from her once she'd seen the former YouTuber rise up to her feet with her eyes remaining closed until...
"'Cause you said forever and now I drove alone past your street..."
They open to reveal themselves to be red which causes the heartthrob to blink before the microphone is seen slowly falling onto the ground.
*Cuts Off*
'Is all of this... really worth it?' Hannah's voice echoes her thoughts and really, thinking is all she could do for the time being because in the very next moment she's getting slapped across the face. Her entire body falls onto the ground due to this slap and once her body does land on it, she doesn't move at all and instead the blonde girl lays down without any noises being heard from it. Red-Eyed Lia then grabs onto her hair and all the other contestants on top of the stage back away from the girl, she seems to be having a hard time even standing up.
"She didn't deserve that kind of abuse! I'm not meant to do this, I'm meant to help people out, not get my revenge on the girl who's caused me to become who I am!" Lia screams as the world around her feels like it's all falling apart and that nothing makes sense, no thoughts of hers could remain consistent, no senses of hers could even be utilized, everything's nothing but a mess. Is she even a person anymore? Does she even have control over her life anymore? Who are all these people surrounding her to her?
"Hells yeah! Keep on going on your rampage! Don't hesitate in taking down anyone in your path, especially that attention-seeking, boyfriend-stealing, and overrated actor! Keep on making room for me to shine!" Chloe was completely into this and is encouraging the more dangerous side of her alliance member.
"No! We need to all be here to help her out, together!" Evan tries suggesting some kind of solution in opposition to the drummer.
"RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-!" Lia yells louder than ever with her voice switching between rage, frustration, and sadism to sadness, fear, and worry. In order to finally put a stop to this moment, Jared ran over from his piano and although his eyes were still unable to be seen, he obviously knew where his destination was. For a split second, Lia's eyes were green again and everything around her went completely white with only the contestant running towards her being the thing he sees... she's the thing she can comprehend and understand.
"I loved you, Lia Clemins."
BAM!
Jared's fist went straight into her face and his body remained in-place once his attack had landed. Lia's body collapses onto the ground and she lays down without moving an inch. Faintly, streams of tears were seen rolling down his cheeks and Jared fell onto his knees once he'd knocked out the person he's admitted to having a crush on at one point.
"Th-Thank y-you." Just barely he could hear another voice speak up during his sobbing, these words seemed to come from Hannah who slowly opened her eyes now that things seemed to have been settled. He turns his attention away from her and instead holds onto the hands of the girl he's knocked out, his black eyes were finally able to be seen and they were filled with tears and regret. On the ground, Hannah couldn't help but study the moment before sitting herself up and rubbing her left cheek which now had a red hand mark on it.
"Clearly the two of you care for each other very deeply, in fact I'd say you're both needed in order to keep each other in good graces, so I'm sorry for getting involved with you two." Hannah comments before turning away since her legs still seemed to be too shaky to allow her to stand up.
"N-No, it's my fault for not realizing that my lack of actions is the reason for her being like this, after all the most logical decision isn't always the right one to make." Jared completely puts himself at fault for everything that's just happened.
"How about all of us agree on a different truce? That if there's a double elimination then we eliminate these two, because I'd hate to keep these two separated." Evan comes up with a suggestion for everyone else that wasn't near the trio of Jared, Lia, and Hannah.
'So this is why she told me to trust Jared, because at least he's someone who you can trust all the way even if he did seem to have been the cause for what just happened.' Kyle thinks to himself before chuckling to himself.
"Fiiine, because they're-"
"You don't get to talk at all, Chloe." Evan doesn't waste time in cutting off the drummer.
"The challenge is officially over! Rules are rules and so that means both Jared and Lia are disqualified from being voted for alongside Leon and Sunny, so that means your choices are: Purple Alex, Evan, Hannah, and Kyle." Chris announces now that everything seems to have wrapped up.
"HEY! I DIDN'T GET TO PERFORM!" Chloe gets upset once she realizes one very important thing to her.
"The results of the votes will be revealed tonight, mainly because I've got a few words for what happened today." Chris confirms over the speakers. Alex, Evan, and Kyle all nod in agreement before fist bumping each other and walking off the stage soon afterwards.
"I'm still gonna try taking out the biggest threat left in the game." Alex playfully points out how essentially this doesn't change the fact that alliances do still exist in this game.
"Well then, I'll make sure to land my shot against a certain delinquent you're working with." Evan remarks with an equally playful tone, neither of the two seemed like they were going to budge but that didn't mean they couldn't get along.
"Wow, all of you are such weird creatures." Kyle joins in with the playful banter, the other two people laughing in agreement before eventually the three of them had made it completely off the stage. Chloe growls before angrily storming off the stage due to everything that's happened today and she picks up a knife which had been placed behind the curtains and she slashes the walls on her way out in order to let off some steam. Hannah gulps when she'd watched this happen but she turns her head to look over at Jared who still seems to be crying over Lia's unconscious body.
"Th-This i-isn't a happy th-thing, Why's everyone th-thinking otherwise?" Jared mumbles loud enough for the blonde actor nearby to hear.
"Because we've found the solution to your problem, and this time you didn't even need to strategize to literally stop your girlfriend from breaking down even more... all you did was trust yourself to land a good punch." Hannah points out which seems to have slowed down the sobbing of the contestant in front of her. In fact he even wipes off some of his tears before he looked behind him once he'd heard these words.
"H-Huh? You think me punching her is going to fix the problem?" Jared questions the logistics of this claim.
"Look at her right now, observe how she truly feels now that you're truly here for her." Hannah instructs him, the perfectionist looks over at Lia who still had her eyes closed. Now that he looks closer at her, he notices the smallest smile on her face which causes his eyes to completely widen.
"But, my plan of knocking her out had so many flaws behind it and required no thinking, so why-?"
"Because you don't need to think logically or account for every detail, sometimes you just need to trust yourself and do what feels right rather than what is right. After all, you're the Pessimistic Perfectionist!~" Hannah points out before winking at the camera once this happens. Afterwards she's finally able to get herself back up to her feet as Jared looks down at his own hands in order to reflect on what advice has been given to him.
"I'm surprised you're not trying to take her away from me." Jared remarks once he's completely processed the words said to him.
"I'd rather not make Lia feel alone again, and besides, as long as you'll be there for me then the status of our relationship doesn't matter to me." Hannah casually answers before she starts making her way towards the exit of the stage.
"Alright then, 'The Heartthrob', I'll try my best in making you never feel truly alone." Jared reassures the girl with a thumbs up, the blonde turns around to see this and she couldn't help but to giggle.
"You and Fergy are too good for someone like me." Hannah whispers too quietly for her friend to hear, but she turns around and walks away with one hell of a satisfied smile on her face. For the last guy remaining on the stage he sighs in relief and raises his fist into the air out of celebration.
"God, your punches are so w-weak." Jared hears another whispering voice, but he completely understands the words which are being spoken to him. His head slowly turns to look down and he sees the girl laying in his arms with her eyes open enough to reveal that at least now for the time being, her eyes were green. The two of them smiled at one another and the audience all stood up and clapped now that all the drama had concluded in front of them but eventually the sounds of applause and cheers slowly went away while the camera slowly turned black.
*Elimination Ceremony*
All the remaining nine contestants walked out of the woods to mixed emotions coming from everyone after the events of today's literally crowd-pleasuring performances by everyone. Jared had been walking in front of everyone else and it seemed that Lia's pulling out her phone once again in order to record some kind of video with the two of them, seeing this caused the perfectionist to chuckle. Leon, Evan, Chloe, Kyle, Hannah, Alex, and Sunny all entered right after with their eyes focused more on elimination and they were each seen looking at one another.
"Sup Chris." Of course, Kyle didn't seem to be feeling the same way and everyone looked over at the chill contestant before they've all reached their seating spots. Leon, Evan, Chloe, and Kyle were seen sitting to the left side of the host whilst Hannah, Alex, and Sunny all reluctantly sat down with one another on the right side of the seats, oddly enough it seemed that Jared and Lia were sitting in between both alliances. Everyone present including the perfectionist all sighed once they all saw Chris shaking his head at them.
"Did I miss something last time?" Jared notices that the contestants here seem to already know what's going to happen.
"Oh right, you don't know how many people have tried to ruin the show and my love for drama, and knowing that makes me livid!" Chris answers the question quite swiftly with nothing but anger starting to build in his voice.
"Well hey, at least I didn't 'quit' another challenge." Alex tries coming up with something positive in order to lighten up the mood.
"Sunny and Leon, I'm aware both of you have something against each other, other people, and me, but would the two of you please stop trying to see who can get the most amount of potential jail-time?! If this island didn't have no laws against violence then the two of you would probably get kicked off the show right now because it's clear to me all you two care about is this stick-measuring contestant you two got going on." Chris doesn't waste much time in ignoring the words of positivity, instead he goes straight for one of the duo's who got disqualified from the challenge today.
"Not really, he angered me and so I'd made him pay for toying with his victim once he'd looked away, after all he wasn't even my target, it was Jared over here who said some words to me earlier and although he's helped out a friend of mines there's definitely a sense of villainy I've got from him when he told me about the Invincibility Statue he'd found." Leon reveals what's been confirmed for him earlier.
"Wait! You got the statue?!" Alex and Sunny yelled out of confusion, looking like they weren't informed about this fact.
"I'd hoped you wouldn't give away my secret weapon." Jared responds once the cat's been let out of the bag.
"People who threaten me don't deserve my respect, and besides it won't matter because whenever you do play that statue you'll have to make sure you can play it for the right person~" Leon starts gaining some cockiness in his voice which was backed up by a smirk beginning to form.
"There's something else to consider actually, What if he flips one of your members onto our side?~" Sunny jumps into the conversation with a suggestion in which he looks over at Lia.
"Or maybe one of us could flip on ourselves again." Alex points out another possibility before looking at the two other people who he'd voted with yesterday.
"Actually, I'm willing to flip." Kyle casually says with his right hand raised in the air.
"...Is he serious?" Evan asks, his head turning to look over at Chloe.
"I dunno, it's hard to tell with him." Chloe gives a non-answer before she closely inspects the body expression of Kahlin.
"He's probably just joking around, however I'm certainly hoping you don't betray us either." Leon attempts to bring the conversation towards the person who seemed the closest with the leader of the opposing alliance. Lia suddenly had all eyes on her and slowly she puts her camera onto the ground at all the pressure which seems to be getting placed on her. She frequently moves her head back and forth, sweat starting forming on her face which she tries wiping off but it's made clear that there's pressure and uncertainty starting to over power any other emotions.
"Both of us may be close to each other, but remember that we're both our own people and so whatever decisions both of us will make, will be the ones we individually think is the better one." Jared tries his best to try calming down the situation.
"Speaking of who, Lia please for the love of god keep your red-eyes locked for the rest of your time in this game because it's caused quite the amount of trouble and so I'm praying you've learned how to control it." Chris comments with more annoyance in his voice rather than anger.
"I-I'll try my best!" Lia exclaims with some uncertainty, but she does nod and it looks like she does at least want to prevent herself from mentally destroying herself any further.
"And Jared, looks like you've caused quite the love-related mess today which looks like it's been resolved but in all honesty, I'm just curious in seeing what kind of plans you'll come up with so I'll let you off the hook this time... but don't think I'm going to hold back in my anger the next time you try hurting other people." Chris doesn't seem to really snap at the perfectionist which seems to cause Hannah to blink.
"Just to let everyone know the plan tonight, we're voting for you, Chloe!" Hannah blurts out and she stands up from her stump in order to point over at the girl she's publicly targeting. Alex, Evan, and Kyle seem to lock eyes with each other now that they've heard the announcement, it was as if the three of them were trying to gauge how the other person felt about the prospect. Leon and Lia both widened their eyes with this sudden announcement before beginning to think to themselves over different things regarding what just happened. Sunny raises an eyebrow but once he'd looked over at the punk drummer he smiles and seems to be glad that the plan's going to be to vote for her, again. Jared seems laser-focused on Chloe who stood up right after with fire actually looking like they're appearing in her eyes.
"What the hell?! Am I seriously going to be targeted again by you guys?! Well then, just like Miriam I'll declare you my target, 'friend'!" Chloe returns the favor by pointing right back at the heartthrob when she stands up from her seat. Confusion had been present in her mind however, even by the actor's standards this seemed to have been random and right now she's trying to figure out what's to gain from doing this.
"Okay then, looks like we'll see who comes out on top right now!" Hannah suddenly gains tons of anger in her tone and the two girls glared at one another. In spite of being at one another's throats, they both come to a silent agreement and they sit back down since now there was only one way for the two of them to settle this conflict.
"Actually, Hannah won the challenge today so she can't be voted for." Chris explains with a smirk now that he casually reveals who won the challenge today.
"Next best option, then!" Chloe announces before leaning over to the people she's in an alliance with and all of them begin whispering to each other on the exact person they should all vote for. Kyle and Evan seem to shake their heads at what's being suggested, but Leon leans in so he could try and convince the officer-in-training to go along with what plan they're setting up. Meanwhile, Chloe holds Kyle's hands and seems to take a more emotional approach in trying to get him to go along with their plan which ends with both him and the officer trainee nodding before they all looked back over at the host.
"I'm hoping moments like these continue happening where non-show-ruining drama and chaos continue taking place, anyways I hope everyone here has made up their mind. Why? Because of course, it's now VOTING TIME!" Chris yells out loud for everyone to hear loudly and clearly after he chuckled at the discussion that just happened. Compared to yesterday, aside from his beginning rant he seems to have been less upset at the contestants overall to the point he'd simply skipped the nicknamed player rather than berate them. Hannah stands up now that it's time for everyone to cast their votes to decide which of the contestants will be eliminated, so she enters the Confessional Room in order to give her vote.
*After the Votes*
Jared walks out of the room last with his eyes noticing that another burnt torch is present in the fire, of course the name on it was of the person last eliminated from the competition: Miriam. His eyes then search around and he notices that everyone who was sitting down were all present for the events of last night where someone had turned on the alliance which he'd accidentally created. Leon kept a close eye on him, it seems he's trying to analyze his movements and expressions in order to see if what the perfectionist had done was something good or bad.
"..." Jared seems to be unreadable for the time being and the brawler grabs onto the stump out of frustration which causes it to send splinters flying across but luckily they didn't hit anyone. Sunny smirks at this and it seems he's taking pleasure in watching the person who'd beaten him up suffer, in fact he seemed sadistic in this very moment. Chloe just looks at a burnt stump which she pats and Jared walks past her last before taking his seat back down besides Lia. Without much hesitation, the host walks to the room which everyone has just used in order to cast their votes for the night and he picks up the box which contains all those votes. He carries the box with him and walks over to his podium where he places down the box and grabs the cover in order to ready himself to read the votes.
"Alright... both of the remaining vote-canceling items have been found, if you'd like to play it for yourself or anyone else then now would be the time to do this..." Chris states to the rest of the cast which causes people to start looking around.
"..." Leon is the focus of the searching around this time around and initially he absolutely focuses on Jared who'd already revealed himself to have one of the voting-preventing objects but decides to search around more. This situation had one important thing to keep in mind, there's two objects which could now ruin anyone's plans and the possibilities of who else could have one could be dangerously wide since they could either be useful for him, screw him over, or nothing could happen and everything comes down to just the votes and if anyone had flipped. So much consideration made looking around harder to do because of the amount of things which anyone could do, so he eventually stops searching and just waits in silence along with everyone else for what's going to happen next...
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"Well, because everyone's already aware of its existence, I might as well play it." Jared finally stands up and he pulls out the object which has already been revealed. Chris nods and he grabs the object which has been handed to him from the perfectionist's pockets.
"..." Footsteps were heard going towards the direction of the cabin, however they eventually stopped once the person who was the cause of these noises had noticed the sight seen in front of them. Slowly the camera pans up to reveal that Jared is the person who seems to have arrived near the place and he stands there, taking in the aftermath of the conversation which he'd just missed out on. Rather than saying a single word he just stands there and observes the state of his alliance before turning around and oddly enough, chooses to walk into the forest (Earlier).
"Well, as you all know by now this is The Hidden Invincibility Statue." Chris doesn't waste much time in confirming its authenticity.
"Sh*t!" Leon whispers out of frustration, either he's putting his acting skills to the test or the plan involves the perfectionist.
"I've grown a newfound hatred for immunity-bullcrap!" Chloe gets angered over once again getting a player-saving item being used against her.
'Well that's actually not all that upsetting.' Kyle and Evan confirm in their minds, unlike their fellow members they seemed to not mind this reveal.
"I'll play it for myself." Jared clarifies before walking back over to his stump which leads to the girl sitting next to him to let out a sigh of relief now that she knows the teenager she loves is safe from elimination. In fact, Lia leans onto him and giggles out of joy now that any attempt to vote him out seems to have been foiled completely. The host places the object which is essentially his face but golden down on the podium.
"Any votes that any of you have made for Jared, will not count." Chris explains to everyone there before he does take off the cover to the box which makes him raise an eyebrow. It would seem that whatever votes have been casted have interested him and confused him both at the same time. Quickly he recovers and puts on a poker face before looking at everyone else, "Alright, time to re-"
"Hey Chris..." Someone speaks up, interrupting the host in the middle of his sentence and everyone turns their heads to look over at the person who seemed to have an important announcement. This person seemed to pull something out of their pocket and it appeared to be a necklace which had a silver chain on it with a wooden circle acting as the pendant. Everyone looked on with confusion and surprise on all of their faces at the person who seemed to have pulled out the item.
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"How about I execute my plan?" Slowly the camera reveals the person to be Jared as the person who'd pulled out the item with an emotionless expression present on his face. Once he'd reached the host again, Chris accepts it and takes a close look at the object in order to determine whether it's the real one or another fake. During this the perfectionist looks over at everyone and continues to show no emotions on his face to not give anything away.
"WAIT!" Chris seems to have noticed something and Jared turns around to look over at him.
"Oh, so you've noticed it too?" Jared immediately recognizes what the host had noticed about the object.
Jared slowly wakes up inside a familiar looking room that had some lights on, once he sits himself up he starts analyzing the place before noticing one very important thing about it. There seemed to be some zeroes and ones on the ground which made him realize something about this place that this weird glitch seems to have given away. He gets up from his bed fairly quickly and taps on the mirror which shatters quite easily and all the glass on it flies off.
"Gaming technology seems like they've finally achieved that realism they've been going for over the years. Although it's nice to see there's still some bugs and logic-defying features with things like these." Jared jumps through the place where there once had been a window. Luckily for him he lands ahead of the shards on the ground before getting back to his feet and dusting himself off, however the discovery he's made seems to confirm the timing of this flashback to be during Episode 13's challenge. He begins searching around the house in order to check around, but he steps over a tripwire which causes the Chain of Shame to fly out of the forest and it locks onto his left ankle.
"How'd this get-!?" Before he could finish his sentence, he's dragged into the woods quite violently with his arms and legs getting tons of scratches and burn marks from this happening to him. Eventually the chain lets go and he rolls around due to the speed he'd been getting dragged at, but he does eventually slow down and stops tumbling. Initially he lays on the ground and doesn't move at all, but he grabs onto the virtual grass below him and he slowly recovers from the brutal trap he'd been sent through before looking around the place.
"I-I've gotta get b-back to th-the ca-" Jared starts walking ahead even though the pain, however he seems to have noticed himself stepping on something.
"H-Huh?..." He looks down before noticing something on the ground...
"Yeah, we couldn't track your movements during the virtual challenge because we just followed Jun's perspective, which means that the observer we placed there must've given you the real Immunity Idol because of you finding it in the challenge." Chris explains how exactly Jared had obtained the object.
"You already knew that though, didn't you? So that means the explanation must've been for the audience and the other people here." Jared correctly figures out why the host explained something he already knew.
"Of course you'd know the answer to that, well thank you observer for doing what we'd paid for you to do. Anyways, Why exactly are you bringing this out now?" Chris starts becoming baffled now that he tries figuring out the reason for this item to be brought out.
"I'm going to play it for someone else here."
"O-Oh, that's nice to know?" Lia tries remaining positive about this reveal, but she seems to be more confused than anything else.
"Guess you can never be too sure about votes." Alex attempts to come up with a good reason for this action being taken.
"Of course you found TWO of them, aren't you just the luckiest?" Sunny just comes off as jealous at the amount of power during votes which the perfectionist had been hiding from them.
"..." Hannah stays completely silent instead of commenting like the rest of the people there had, instead she just watched what was going to happen next.
"Aaalright? Who will you be playing this Immunity Idol for?" Chris asks with so much confusion in his voice, right now he felt completely clueless on what exactly is going to happen. When this question is asked the contestant in front of him slowly turns around in order to look at all the people who he could also protect for the night. Oddly enough he takes off his glasses and closes his eyes before directing his head towards the ground.
"...I'm playing it for Chloe."
"...WHAAAAAAAAAT?!" All the contestants couldn't help but get practically shocked to the core.
"U-Uhhh, O-Okay? I guess any votes for Chloe won't count?" Chris confirms quite hesitantly, it seemed that this was one of the few times in which he seemed unsure on whether or not he should continue. However, due to the fact the show must go on, he nods and places the Immunity Idol that really wasn't an idol right on the podium. Jared walks back over to everyone else who were still puzzled and baffled at what just happened, "A-Alright, time to read the votes..."
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"First vote, Jared, which doesn't count." Chris says once he'd turned around to reveal that what he's said is true.
'Dammit, I took my shot and missed!' Leon angrily states in his mind and he grinds his teeth out of rage.
"Second vote, Chloe... of course, it doesn't count." Chris seems to forget for a moment that votes for the drummer didn't count.
'He canceled my vote and made me safe from getting voted off! I'm not how to feel anymore!' Chloe had both anger and confusion coursing through her.
"Third vote, Jared, doesn't count."
'So both his side and ours don't have votes that matter? Why wouldn't you want to vote off your enemy, though?' Evan could only just ask questions to himself over what's going on.
"Fourth vote, Chloe, doesn't count."
'I'm sure he's got a plan in mind, but is it really worth negating everyone's votes?' Lia appears to be just as confused over what exactly the plans seem to be.
"Fifth vote, Jared, doesn't count."
Jared stares emptily at the votes and he sees how he'd gotten three votes so far.
"Sixth vote, Chloe, doesn't count."
'Looks like everything is going the way it should be.' Jared thinks in his mind with his eyes remaining closed.
"Seventh vote, Jared, doesn't count."
'Or at least, that's if this next vote continues the trend...' Jared starts considering the possibility that someone could have not voted for either contestant.
"Eighth vote..."
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"Chloe, which doesn't count... and so that means this last vote will make this a no-vote ceremony or the deciding factor on who goes home." Chris seems to finally regain his professional composure and he puts down the second to last vote. Leon starts lowering his head as if he had an idea that only one thing could possibly happen. Sunny narrows his eyes before they completely widen since it seemed he already knew what was going to happen next.
'What in the world do you have in your mind, Jared?' Alex seems to have the hardest time trying to figure things out.
"Ninth and final vote..." Chris pulls out the last vote and takes a while staring at it, his eyes blinking a few times before he looks over at the contestants. Each of them were anticipating what could possibly happen next, most of the cast were all waiting in silence and the only person who wasn't focused on the votes was the other who knew the results already. Sunny had his eyes completely locked on the leader of his alliance, it looks like he's trying to take in the knowledge he's got. The host slowly begins turning the picture around in order to reveal what the results of tonight's Elimination Ceremony would be.
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"Plan, executed." Jared whispers and his voice plays over the slow reveal of the final picture which slowly becomes clearer during its turn.
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"Lia." Chris says with a red cross being made over a picture over the girl who'd gotten sent home with this single vote, instead of any loud reactions all the contestants stayed silent. Alex, Evan, and even Chloe reacted with dropped jaws and nothing but shock came from the looks of their faces. Leon and Kyle slowly looked over at the perfectionist with the baseball-player staring at him while the brawler glared daggers into his back. Sunny finally gets over his shock and instead a smile slowly grew on his face once he'd realized what exactly the longest-running leader in the competition had done, and it both amused and impressed him what's just been pulled off.
"...H-Huh?" Lia simply says before nothing but the wind blowing were heard.
"Lia Clemins, you're the thirteenth contestant eliminated from Total Drama: Move Along... and right now, you got eliminated by the sole vote which came from him." Chris restates what's just happened tonight and he looks over at Jared who looks up at him.
"Goodbye." Jared comments before he grabs onto the YouTuber's hand and he pulls her near the woods before placing her right in front of him. Before anyone could say or do anything else, he leans in to whisper some words into her mouth now that he's voted her off. These were the last words she'd hear before her elimination is made official by the Chain of Shame which comes out and snaps itself around her neck.
"...H-Huh?" Lia repeats what she said earlier before getting pulled into the darkness of the night. No other noises had been heard from her and not even the camera had enough time to exactly hear out what the final words were, making it unclear what exactly had been said to the now eliminated contestant. However, now that she's gone, Jared turns around to see the seven other remaining contestants who continue to give varied reactions.
"Let's just get this over with." He practically ignores everyone else and their reactions to instead pick up the torch of the girl he's just eliminated and he throws it into the campfire. This caused the fire to burn so bright that they were reflected in his eyes which watched the heat burn up and break down the wooden torch with one name carved into it. Rather than give any other reactions he casually walks past the host who laughed a bit before the perfectionist had completely walked away from everyone else who just witnessed what just happened.
"Now that's what I call good television, I've got nothing else for you so get some rest and figure out what will you all do next." Chris instructs all the contestants who just stayed completely silent during all this. Leon sprinted off into the woods almost immediately with Evan and Alex trying their best to tail him, Chloe and Sunny both had grins on each of their faces once the events that have occurred finally processed and they happily followed the other contestants. Kyle stands up and stays still before following everyone else with his head looking at the ground as if he still tried figuring out why everything just happened.
ReoNa-Seimeisen [From Tsukihime -A piece of blue glass moon-]
"Toki ni wa itsuuuki wo, [This moon at all times,]"
Hannah seems to be the last person at the ceremony and she remains sitting down.
"Tsuki ni wa aaai wo, [There is love on the moon,]"
She turns her head to look at where everyone else ran towards.
"Ai na tsuuumi wo, [There is love in sin,]"
She stands up soon after with no emotions still being present on her face.
"Tsumi ni wa batsu wo, [There is punishment in sin,]"
Her eyes close before she makes her way towards the woods.
"Batsu ni wa hiiito wo, [There is punishment for people,]"
Right before entering the place to exit, she stops.
"Hito ni wa yuuume wo, [There are dreams in people,]"
She turns her head and opens her eyes for the camera.
"Yume ni wa anaaata wo, [And you are my dream,]"
For a moment, she winks at the camera with a smile temporarily seen on her face.
"Anata ni wa chikai wo. [For you I made an oath.]"
The screen glitches out and the next thing you know, she's gone.
"Zokurito myaku wooo utsu inochi nooo sen, [The life line pulses and creaks,]"
Red-Eyed Lia's currently running around with her nails now looking like claws.
"Naifu ni nazoootte nobashite shimaetara. [And it spreads traced with a knife.]"
She seems to be in a church where she uses her claws to slash away at black figures that had red cracks all over them.
"Nee dareka oshiiiete tsuki ga mieru nara. [Hey, can someone tell me if I can see the moon.]"
With each slash blue substance spews out of the figures she slashes down, however this causes her to lose her balance and stumbles through blue fire.
"Kesanaaaide, Mada Kesanaide [Don't erase it, Don't erase it yet]."
Once she goes through the fire her entire location changes to a park where it was raining all over the place.
"Kienaaaide, [Don't fade away,]"
Currently she's sobbing on her knees until she sees a hand in front of her.
"Mada Kienaide. [Don't fade away yet.]"
Lia looks up with her green eyes to see Jared standing above her with an umbrella and a smile on his face. She reaches out her hand which no longer has claws and he helps her get off the ground before the girl wraps her arms around him and sobs into him. The boy smiled and used one hand to comfort her and the other to make sure the umbrella didn't allow for anymore rain to get onto her...
Total Drama: Move Along
Remaining Contestants:
The Final Eight: Alex Jones, Chloe Broderick, Evan Herbert, Hannah Jordan, Jared Monuel, Kahlin Mora, Leon Salvatore, and Sunny Persnisky.
Eliminated Contestants:
Kennedy (1st), Li (2nd), Vince (3rd), Jackie (4th), Brooke (5th), Rae (6th), Fergy (7th), Rainy (8th), Ciara (9th), Ingrid (10th), Jun (11th), Miriam (12th), and Lia (13th).
Elimination Preventing Objects:
The Hidden Safety Necklace: Played by Fergy
The Hidden Invincibility Statue: Played by Jared (Fake Played by Jun)
The Hidden Immunity Idol: Played by Jared
I'm sorry Gucci Mane LaFlare for eliminating your second OC you've submitted into the story, Lia Clemins. I'll also deeply apologize if I'd botched her character, I might've definitely leaned in too much into her Red-Eyes and since this was her last episode in the competition, wrapping up the storyline was my focus while making this character the one you had in mind because misrepresenting characters is something I'm never proud to do so hopefully her overall portrayal hasn't been poor. Unfortunately it was always in my plans to have her be sent home before Jared due to him having more potential in my eyes, and honestly I also think the storyline with her Red-Eyes started to last too long and... honestly I couldn't really find much more for her character to explore, but that one's definitely on me. Of course I can't give the in-story reason for her elimination so the next episode will definitely somewhat explain it so... stay tuned for that!
My last chapter from the looks of the feedback wasn't my best one, so this episode I really did take the complaints about the situation seeming more black and white than I'd intended it too, of course it was tough since it's also not meant to flow naturally with the previous chapter but I'm hoping that things like the "good" side not getting called out, a good amount of the characters being drastically different from how they were sent to me, and that things were starting to get too dark.
Basically, I'm always open to constructive criticism or criticism that can help out my story so if there's any flaws you find in this story then I'll take them into account as long as they're unhelpful. Just like usual, here's the link to the Discord server to discuss this story, get previews on the next chapter, and to discuss with the small community we got here:discord . gg / MJ8qF9v (Just take away the spaces).
Now here's the Questions of the Chapter:
(For those with OCs): What keeps you reading this story?
(For those without OCs): Do you think this story holds up for those without OCs in this?
Time to continue my new tradition of shouting out the users who left reviews on the last chapter by the time of this episode!: Artamis9 and Nobody245!
Fun Fact: This chapter's coming out 9 days after my last one... yeah, clearly I've been slacking on the previous chapters. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy your Happy New Years (since this chapter actually comes out on December 31st/January 1st) and-
PEACE OUT!
