Pew pew!
Dollface grinned and let out an excited yelp, destroying all competition in the ring from her sniper's nest. From where she stood in the laser arena modeled after a pirate ship, she could see both bases, all the players, and around several small retaining walls to hide around.
Dolli Mae woulda loved this!
Except, Dolli Mae was off at state rifle competitions, winning golds and making the town proud with her bitchin' skills by outdoing all the boys who bragged about their hunts.
Prissy Missy, having seen them enter the laser tag arena, had snatched her sticky kid brother by the arm and dragged him over with some other kid, insisting on them kicking Dollface's skinny ass.
It was easy enough getting the jump on Prissy Missy and her lameass team. All Dollface had to do was set up her usual spot like Grampa had taught her in the fake crow's nest and deploy Izzy and Princess as ground support.
"Hands up."
Dollface squealed and nearly dropped the subconsciously death-gripped toy, surprised to hear Foxx's voice as she threw her hands up in a show of surrender.
She turned to see a red plastic toy gun aimed at her receiver vest.
He laughed. "Gotcha."
Annoyed, she fired at him, only for it to fail, as she was on the same team as him.
She turned the same color as the toy, flustered at the arena attendee she'd literally known since preschool.
Missy squealed in exasperation as Princess fired and hit the queen bee wanna-be's vest.
Princess let out a flat bray of laughter.
"What are ya doin' here?" Dollface whisper-yelled up at him.
He was sooooooo tall!
And wide!
"Got bored." He said with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
"Isn't it yer job t'wait outside and make sure nothin' gets broken?" Dollface teasingly asked, rolling her eyes.
"Eh..." he waved his hand, indecisively, "I'm tired o'sittin' 'round. Wanted a hit'r two, just fer fun. No one'll notice anyway. Besides, she tries t'get me t'put th'vest on her every time. It's gettin' old!"
"Yeah, fair." Dollface muttered, glad it was too dark to see her ever reddening face.
The Merston High football team was really doing him some good...
Ugh, later idiot.
Pew!
Foxx hit Missy, then fired at her stinky brother.
"Nice!" He pumped his fist as the kid began to whine loudly.
"The base!" Dollface panicked a little, being reminded of the game's objective by a robotic voice that played whenever the colored disc of light was shot at.
That sneaky little creep that had been dragged in by Missy had gone by mostly forgotten, was now pew-pewing at the round light disc attached to the plywood 'base'.
The little loser was even saying "pew pew" aloud.
Oof.
"I'll get 'em for ya." Foxx thundered down from the nest and lasered the kid in the receiver while using his size to distract from the task of attacking the base and it's lame automated voice.
The kid promptly backed away, seeing he wasn't even a third of Foxx's size.
Foxx looked up at Dollface's sniper nest, and made a quick salute with a goofy grin, and jogged out of the arena.
Dollface tried to wipe off her grin and blamed her fluttering chest on nerves, then hit Missy, watching Princess and Izzy ambush the two smaller children. Five bucks each well spent, especially after point-count.
Missy had tried to flash that perfect smile, the kind she used on other girl's boyfriends, on Foxx, but it casually went unnoticed.
Which was hysterical to Dollface and crew.
Once out of the arena and on their way to the prize room, the group of girls stopped to stare at two men loitering nearby.
One was fairly short and getting a bit plump around the middle, while the other was taller and had a full on beer belly swelling against his violet polo. He looked like a snake that had gotten into Izzy's little backyard hen house and ate an egg.
In small town America, that was the average middle aged male body type and nothing to get to upset about.
Dollface watched them inspect a wall ornament of a pepper and mushroom with pepperoni pizza and mutter to each other.
The smaller absently picked at his teeth, a bit of black olive stuck between them.
Dollface could feel Michael tensing up upon seeing these two.
"Maybe they're the new owners?" Dollface whispered to her friends. Asking that simple question made her stomach knot up into a little cold ball of sadness and nostalgia. As creepy as the animatronics here were, this was still their home.
She had to stop being childish, animatronics weren't alive!
They weren't real, no matter how much she wished they would be.
Dollface, we gotta leave.
The purple guy sniffed.
He pulled out a hankie, refusing the dirty oil stained shop rag from his companion's pocket with disgust. The man shrugged, and happily blew into the rag while his companion in purple grimaced in clear disdain.
Dollface tried to place their faces, finding them familiar.
"They look kind of gross," muttered Princess, pushing her glasses up her nose.
Michael silently agreed.
"Princess! Be nice!" Hissed Izzy.
Princess shrugged, not seeing the problem. Michael didn't either.
Dollface became very invested in her shoes.
Something felt off about all of this. Maybe they were the new owners checking out the traffic and quality of the venue? If they were, it was like watching scavengers pick at a raccoon on the side of the highway before it was fully dead.
Michael twitched, shine vibrating.
"So how much longer do we have to be here, it's getting painful to watch full grown men try to figure out what a kiddie restaurant is." Princess said, intruding on Dollface's thoughts.
"Oh! Yeah, uhh," Dollface checked her watch, one of her older male cousin's hand-me-downs. She wished she could afford an armful of swatch watches, but everytime she got enough from work, something would come up and there goes her new set of time keepers.
"Maybe we could work here when it's reopened."
"That would be awesome!" Izzy replied, rattling her tokens with a shake of her cup. "We have 'bout an hour or so left, so I say we go to th'arcade games an'maybe see th'ventriloquist one last time an'get a cheap prize 'r two. For old times sake!"
"Yeah, okay!" Princess cheered, "Who wants to play Mortal Combat with me again?"
Dollface groaned and smiled. Princess was the top of the leaderboard on that machine, no one could defeat her.
But right now, they didn't have time to worry about anything in the world.