A/N Alright Japan! This episode is pretty good in the original show. I really enjoyed it.
The flight from Egypt was enjoyable. The chairs were comfortable and the food was delicious. Despite our luxurious surroundings I'd had enough of the massage chair within an hour, and decided to read instead. While Noah seemed to be enjoying the rest, he too decided to read after several hours of indulgence.
I found myself looking over the top of my book. Desperately trying to observe him without coming off as creepy. I didn't want to be a Sierra, but Noah was very reclusive. He tended to avoid giving out personal information.
It seemed Noah liked hardback books without the dust cover. Perhaps this was due to the fact that some books didn't have much information without the dust cover. I really wanted to ask Noah what he was reading, but I didn't want to bother him. A bibliophile does not like to be interrupted when reading.
I must not have been as subtle as I thought, he drolly remarked. "You know if you want to avoid being seen as a stalker, maybe don't stare at people."
I blushed. "S-sorry. I-I just wanted to k-know what books you liked…"
"The kind you can read." He replied, aloof as ever.
I sighed and glanced around. "Where's Alejandro?"
" He left a while ago with some sweets. Probably trying to lower the other team's guard." He shrugged.
Shortly afterwards Chris called us all to the common area. We were nearly to our next destination so he was going to tell us our challenge.
"Is it a reward challenge or an elimination challenge?" Harold interrupted.
"Good question Harold, aaaand like I'm gonna tell ya." The host said.
"No one got booted last time so this has elimination all over it." Tyler told Lindsay.
"Are you sure? I could use a reward. Like candy, or a whole bunch of shoes." Lindsay commented.
"And I hope you all brought your giant radioactive monster repellant," Chris continued, "because we are about to land in... JAPAN!" With that Chef burst through the nearby set of doors wearing an orange gi and gripping a katana between his teeth.
"Gosh you guys that's totally a Chinese uniform." Harold remarked.
"H-harold's right." I muttered, unable to help myself. I knew it was a bad idea, Chris didn't take getting interrupted well, but I had a tendency to correct people. I didn't really mean to, it just kind of happened.
"Thank you Harold, Quill. Now as a reminder, anyone who doesn't sing-" Chris tried to remind them.
"It's just you really think you'd work harder to get it right." the ginger continued. I shook my head, trying to get him to drop it. He didn't take the hint.
"Harold, anyone who doesn't sing," he repeated forcefully, "is immediately disqualified."
"You're cultural insensitivity is just gosh, I mean gosh!" As Harold continued to rant Chris gave Chef a look and the hulking man sliced the door open. We were all sucked out of the plane, without parachutes. Then a familiar bell rang.
"Seriously?! I mean seriously?!" Noah yelled, from beside me.
"Sing, and I might just save your musical buttocks! Maybe you'll try harder this time, 'kay?" The host yelled through a megaphone. I sighed, that was Chris for you, you work your butt off trying to please him and he still thinks you're not trying.
We sang a song about what we'd like to do before we die. I was close enough to hear Noah but not much else besides the parts where we all sang. I sang during all of those.
In addition, when everyone was singing about the goals they wished to accomplish I added. "Bestselling book!" I wanted to write something as good as 'roll of thunder, hear my cry.' or an Agatha Christie novel.
Later I joined in with Noah's "But first we must cease dropping, our goal here would be stopping." Finally when we were listing off things to fall on I called out. "Stunt Mattress!"
We all landed in a large bowl of rice. I wasn't sure how we'd avoided being injured, but somehow we had. I surfaced to see Lashawna chewing out Harold, rightfully so in my opinion.
"What you know just sent us free falling out of a plane!"
"But I went to sensei Steve's feudal Japanese summer camp." Harold protested.
"Oh yeah? I speak Japanese too, Lashawna hana no yomi desu." Alejandro complimented her. I felt another surge of jealousy, which I didn't quite understand. I knew Alejandro was flirty, so why was I possessive? It's not like he'd given her too big of a compliment.
"How's that?" the sista asked.
"I said you are as beautiful as a flower." He translated. Harold didn't look pleased with his flirting. Regardless it was time for the challenge to begin.
First off Chris introduced us to a game of human pinball. Apparently Tyler also knew of the show as he and Harold geeked out over it. Chris told us one member of each team would be participating. That person would be sharing a ball with a panda bear. Made sure to whisper my nitpick under my breath, still having the events prior fresh in my mind.
Team Victory had to choose first and Lashawna chose DJ. He immediately complained, scared of hurting the panda. Apparently whilst inside the pyramid DJ had touched a mummified dog, and he was now convinced he had been cursed. Though I knew I should be more empathic I found myself rolling my eyes. I blushed as I realized Noah was doing the same thing.
Chris gave DJ the panda anyway, and began hurting him immediately. Then it was our turn. Noah made a comment about being allergic to panda feces, something that may or may not have been true, which Tyler quickly dittoed.
" "I'll do it for my team." Alejandro declared.
"Wicked. Incoming!" The host said as he threw the panda at Alejandro.
The moment the panda was in his arms it calmed. "Well hello handsome creature. May I scratch your ears or get you a tasty cookie?" The panda smiled and cuddled to the Spaniard. Many of the girls awwed. I was merely blushing as I had found myself picturing what it would be like to be in the panda's place.
Next team warriors had to choose. Heather and Courtney argued until Cody offered to do it. Chris gave him Sierra as his animal. I became concerned about his well being. Anyway we won with team Victory coming in second. Alejandro's panda worked in tandem with him leading to our exceptional score. Team Victory's came at a cost as the panda had been knocked out by DJ and the gentle giant was not doing well. As for team Warriors, well let's just say I was starting to feel protective of Cody. Harassment isn't okay.
After the pinball game with an ad for the Japanese version of Total Drama Action. It was in English with Japanese subtitles but everyone's voice was dubbed over, save Chris', it was surreal.
Courtney, ever the astute one, asked why this was.
"Turns out the locals just don't like the sounds of y'all," Chris said with a shrug. "Sorry!"
"No you're not!" The type A retorted.
"True...," Chris acquiesced. He then told us the next challenge would be to create a commercial for Chef new candy, called 'Total Drama Yum Yum Happy Go Time Candy Fishtails' which was quite a mouthful. We could pick anything in the cargo hold, and we'd pick in order of points from the last challenge. As such we got first pick.
We went in and Alejandro immediately decided we should do a parody of a monster movie, with Owen in a pink spider costume and an alien head. He asked each of us in turn what we thought of the idea and everyone agreed, or at the very least they were okay with it.
"And what of you Quill?" He asked me.
I frowned. "I-!t's good but it could be a bit more wacky. So I think everyone should be as over the top as possible. I-!zzy you like Owen, and you dated that animatronic monster, so maybe you should say something about that and pretend to swoon? "
"Izzy likes that idea!" The ginger agreed.
"Thank you for your critique." He smiled. As we headed out of the hold Alejandro bowed toward Harold. " Good luck, honorable opponent."
"I don't need your luck." Harold scoffed, clearly sore about Alejandro flirting with Lashawna.
"Of course you don't. You have superior leadership skills and vision. Your team is lucky to have you." With that we headed to make our commercial.
As we were setting up the city, Owen started to stomp around, knocking buildings over. Noah gently told him to wait until we were finished. Say what you will about his apathetic nature, he clearly had a soft spot for the big guy.
We all returned to the place where we'd viewed the promo. Our commercial was first. We had made a parody of a monster movie. It seemed pretty good to me. Owen stomped around destroying buildings, he even said 'monster noises' at one point.
"Oh no! The large out of shape monster!" Alejandro cried.
"We must run!" Tyler said stiltedly
"Think of the children." Noah deadpanned.
"He's so hot! I can't take it!" Izzy exclaimed, pretending to faint into my arms.
"We will stop him with this!" Alejandro exclaimed. He threw the fishtail into Owen's mouth and then we all sang a jingle.
Team Victory's was next. It was okay. It reminded me of an art film, unfortunately art films are quite niche, aside from both Fantasias, so it wasn't exactly a good way to sell things, particularly to a Japanese audience. In addition, DJ completely forgot his lines, Harold overacted and Gwen sounded more annoyed than pleading. Still I liked it better than most.
Then Team Warriors showed their 'masterpiece.' The commercial started with a close up of a candy fishtail on a bright background. This was followed by four masks having fishtails thrown into their 'mouths' Followed by a fishtail jumping out of the fish tank and playing basketball, but just before it was about to make a slam dunk, it exploded in a bunch of flashing lights and donuts. It was weird, which to be fair was pretty accurate to an actual Japanese commercial.
Afterwards it was revealed that Team Warriors won because of exploding doughnuts. An odd reason to win, but it was Chef's product. If he wanted to be associated with exploding doughnuts that was his choice.
Of course Chris had to ask about the loser." I also have to know: who bit the biggest?"
"Those guys," He replied, pointing to team Victory. "With that sad donkey thing. You lose! You're sending someone home! Tonight!"
We were all a bit downtrodden about sleeping in economy class but at least we didn't lose. So I sat next to Noah in economy feeling nervous. I kept glancing towards him, eventually looking over his shoulder just long enough to see what he was reading.
"Seriously? I'd think you of all people would understand how annoying that is." He told me with a raised brow.
I blushed. "S-sorry it's just… I-I really want to get to know you…"
"What's there to know? I'm just a guy who likes books and has a knack for sarcasm." He shrugged.
I sat in silence a moment. "N-noah?"
"Yes?" he sighed.
"I like Tolkien too."
A/N: Not much changed this chapter because not much needed to be changed. Like I said, Quill isn't supposed to be fix all. Harold is one of the eliminations that has very little done by Alejandro. It's really Harold's hubris and subsequent guilt that got him out.