"Well, well, well, dreamers! Nice to see you comin' back to visit your main man on a night like tonight. The wind chill's just right for a party on a rooftop…got the breeze to keep you wide awake if the music wasn't already doing that!" C.K. stood up from his usual chair, walking over to his neon fireplace while swirling a glass of some beverage in his hand. He took a sip of it and set the glass down on a nearby end table. "But I think our partygoers are gonna be keeping themselves inside tonight. Insider information is lettin' me know that much. But you wanna get into the show, right? I'll stop delaying my recap, then. L-l-layust time on Total Drama: Neon City– poor Amanda had a rough start to her night with someone calling her up to holler at her like a ferocious beast. That ain't how you're supposed to talk to the ladies, or the gentlemen, for that matter! Manners are an asset that everyone should strive to keep, after all. Meanwhile, Bailey was havin' herself a lil' checkup with Gwenny Gwen! Or maybe it was more of a check-you-out, cause that ice cube was definitely feeling the type of sickness that only a doctor's company could heal! Then we caught up with Garfield, who-" In the middle of C.K.'s sentence, the camera view of him started to glitch out. After a while, the full view of the room was gone, and the screen was full of nothing but static. The static lasted for a few moments before the screen lit up again, only now, it was showing the view of an alleyway, where a lone man was standing in the shroud of the shadows. He took a step towards the camera, but the view was soon replaced with the regular view of C.K.'s room. "-And as far as races go, that one had to be one of the craziest that I ever laid my eyes upon! Imagine losing a street race to a madman in a yacht! Not hard to imagine for most of our partygoers, since Gerald was one of the first to finish the race! Though nothing could outpace Atlas, who was so stuck in the fact that he wasn't doin' so hot as a leader, that he sped faster than a speeding bullet all the way to the end of the track! End of the day, Morgan happened to miss one of the goals on her way to the finish line, and Team A-Side lost the challenge…but the only member they lost was Eli, who was switched onto B-Side as the reward for them winning the challenge! I wonder how the rest of B-Side will react to their new compadre? If I had to guess, I'd say that I think we're gonna get some…explosive reactions, one way or another! Y'all just sit back, tune in, and we'll watch the madness unfold together!"
The neon moon started scratching itself like a record, eventually spinning wildly out of control while the sound meter around it went wild. A beam of neon light shot down into the ground below, bringing the view past a rooftop that had Chris and Chef standing atop it, as well as the cloaked figure of C.K.. The trio were laughing to themselves as the beam passed them by, and they soon disappeared from sight.
"B-b-break it down, dear mom and dad, I'm doing fine," a car burst from where the beam of light had landed, revealing Atlas driving while Bec was in the passenger seat with him. The duo grinned the same grin at the camera as they passed it by, with another car following behind in their wake.
"The highlife's been on my mind," the second car was veering off the road wildly, being that of Jhin, who was too busy eating a tree branch that she had found to be focused on the road she was driving on. She ended up crashing through the wall of a building, revealing a nightclub full of people.
"You asked me where I wanted to be, and now I'm right here, can't you see?" Leo stood near the now open hole in the wall, his jaw practically dropped to the floor, but he was soon shoved aside to safety as Jhin drove right back through it. He looked to see that Gwendolyn had saved him, and looked about ready to tear him a new one.
"I wanna be famous!" Over at the bar, Cherry was downing a shot of liquor and proudly heading off to the dance floor while Amanda just stared at her own shot glass, turning her nose up at the very scent of it.
"I wanna live away from the sun," the camera panned up from the nightclub to the next floor, which was much more of a lounge that had a couple contestants sitting on couches. Eli had himself posted on one of them, sitting back and covering his ears while Suzie started explaining the entire lore of Among Us to him.
"So pack your bags, 'cause the party's begun!" On one of the other couches, 3V was downing an entire flask of some sort of liquor while Elward watched her in some sort of dumbfounded trance, eventually pulling out his own futuristic looking flask but accidentally pouring his drink all over his one working eye.
"Daylife's no way to live with nothing to gain, it ain't no claim to fame," far back in the corner of the room, Henry and Heath were hiding themselves from everybody else, but Heath's hand slowly raised up with Jean-Paul rattling his wooden jaw, startling the two of them so much so that they got up and ran right into each other, falling to the ground with a joint thud.
"I wanna be famous!" Giselle popped out of a closet from the same corner of the room, wearing a playboy bunny suit and putting on a flashy display, but when she saw that the two boys were unconscious, she fell to her knees and started screaming at the sky.
"Na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na!" The next floor up from the lounge seemed to look like a sort of laser tag arena, where Gerald was frantically running away from Morgan, who was firing her laser gun at him. Her shots entirely missed, but one must've struck Allan, as Gerald stopped running and started to cry, holding the invisible friend's body in his arms.
"I wanna be, I wanna be, I wanna be famous!" Marshmallow ecstatically ran right through where the two of them were, flailing her arms and screaming in delight while a confused Edward followed after her, shrugging his shoulders when he looked at the camera.
"I wanna be, I wanna be, I wanna be famous!" At the upper ground of the laser tag arena, Bailey and Eliza were firing at each other, but the lasers stopped coming at Bailey after some time, and she looked up to notice that Eliza had completely passed out on the floor. The cold girl looked at the camera helplessly before tossing her laser gun up into the air. As it came sinking back down, it fell into the neon fire on top of the tallest skyscraper, directly in between Garfield and Zayden, who were having a stand-off while the other contestants sat around them and whistled. Chris, Chef, and C.K. stood over at a podium near the hyperspace tube and snapped in unison for a neon sign to flash on the screen with the words "Total Drama: Neon City."
"'They can all think of it as a replacement for one of the teammates that they've lost!'" Gerald sat on the edge of his bed, the words that Chef had spoken in the prior "elimination" ceremony playing over and over again in his head. "...Replacement…replacement…replacement…" The deranged man had to speak the word out loud, sounding each syllable out like he was trying to say something in a foreign language. The third time he spoke it, a sneer fixed itself on his face. He clutched the edge of the bed tightly with his hands, with the fabric of the blanket overflowing through the gaps in his fingers.
"No! No one could replace him, no one!" Gerald screamed out as he stood from his bed, throwing his blanket across the room. It landed against the wall before falling to the ground in a messy pile. As he stared at the blanket, he breathed heavily, his chest heaving with each breath he took. He started to walk towards the blanket, thinking back on how it happened in the first place. "Atlas…he wanted Eli…he manipulated the votes to get Eli…on our team…the two of them…they knew what they were doing! They were in cahoots together to…replace him!" The man couldn't even grab the blanket, all he could do was grip onto his hair and pull it as he let out another howling scream.
"...Allan…" Gerald's voice sounded choked as the name of his friend escaped his lips. He covered his mouth with his hand, a steady stream of tears starting to descend from his eyes as he imagined all the fun that he and his friend had together in the past. "What…what did the two of them do to you, buddy? W-where did they take you…?" It felt like the world was falling apart around him; he couldn't even really make anything out anymore. It all just turned to darkness– even the blanket that he was standing before he couldn't manage to identify anymore. The images of Eli and Atlas spiraled around him before he screamed out once again.
"See now, dreamers…there are folks that seem scary from the get-go. I definitely wouldn't be caught dead alone in a room with Jhin or Bec for that very reason. The people that you most gotta watch out for, though…the once-thought innocent that have lost the only thing they care about. Even if that thing happens to be just an imaginary friend…" C.K.'s voice slowly faded out as Gerald fell down to his knees. Once he hit the ground, his clothing had changed, and he looked like he was dressed up for a funeral. The solemn keys of a piano were struck as he held up a non-existent person in his arms.
"Here lies the lifeless bride and groom…till death do us part came far too soon. Buildings burn and people die…all of the time…" Gerald slowly stood up, looking off into the darkness to see the silhouettes of two men that couldn't exactly be made out, but looked vaguely like Atlas and Eli. He gritted his teeth when he saw them, and started to approach with his fists clenched. "But I heard that you reap what you sow, so around and around we go…and when you see my face you'll know…" Just as he was about to reach the two of them, it seemed that he reached the edge of where he could stand, and he went plummeting below, landing atop a pile of skeletons.
"You can't save yourself or save your soul, when you meet the man whose life you stole!" The skeletons around the deranged man started to crumble into ash, like they were being burnt by flames that were coming off of him. The pile soon faded to nothing, and he was left alone in the darkness once again. "With withered wings and broken bones, a flight for the fallen, flies the crow! You can't save yourself!" With that note, the lights came back on, and he found that he was in the driver's seat of his yacht in the middle of the streets.
"These vengeful thoughts trapped underneath: rage, scorn, misery! Payback for what you took from me: hope, love, sanity!" Gerald started to accelerate through the streets, giving little care for anyone's safety as he ran several different cars off the road. "I heard that you reap what you sow, so here's to believing in ghosts! And when you see my face you'll know…" The yacht stopped moving abruptly, and Gerald was sent flying through the windshield, his body sailing through the sky until he was left hovering in front of the once neon moon that now looked black and cold.
"You can't save yourself or save your soul, when you meet the man whose life you stole! With withered wings and broken bones, a flight for the fallen, flies the crow!" Gerald screamed as he grabbed onto his hair again, this time pulling so hard on it that he ripped some of it right out of his head, looking at the camera with beady eyes after. "No forgiveness! Just farewell! A match made in heaven that you sent straight to hell! No forgiveness! No escape! May you rest in pieces for your grave mistake!" He came falling down from the sky at immaculate speeds, landing on the highway below and leaving a massive crater where he ended up, only to slowly pull himself back to his feet, wobbling back and forth as he walked closer and closer to the camera.
"For your grave mistake…you can't save yourself, or save your soul…when you meet the man whose life you stole…with withered wings and broken bones, a flight for the fallen, flies the crow! You can't save yourseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelf!" Gerald howled out to the sky in a furious rage, his fingers twitching as he reached them up towards his own face. "You can't save yourself…" The moment he made contact with his face, his vision started to come back to him, and he realized that he was still in his room. "...I…am getting revenge for you…"
Confessional - Gerald
"Atlas…Eli…both of them must've done this because they hate to see me and Allan happy. If that's the case, then I'll make sure they can't be happy, either. I'll destroy them…I'll destroy them!" Gerald panted as he gripped the steering wheel of his yacht as tight as he could, almost cracking the surface of it from how hard he was holding onto it. "YOU WILL PAY FOR WHAT YOU'VE DONE!"
"I believe I did say it before, but it's guys like Gerald here that you really wanna watch out for. You can't have possibly watched that and still thought that he's sweet and innocent!"
"This is just ridiculous…at least I don't have to switch rooms or anything…" Eli grumbled to himself as he locked the door to his hotel room. He was still pretty agitated about the whole team swap thing in the first place. "How am I supposed to make any sort of game plan if Chris is just gonna let stupid stuff like this happen? Guess it at least gets Garfield's target off of my back, though Ed's probably done for, now." He sighed in annoyance, turning around to see that Atlas was standing right behind him with a big grin on his face. His initial reaction was a little scream. "Dude, the hell!?"
"Oh, did I spook you? Guess I did get here pretty quietly…oh well, my bad!" Atlas started to laugh it off, but Eli didn't seem at all interested in whatever he wanted. He just started to walk down the hotel hallway, leaving the football player behind. "Huh? Hey there, slow down!" Atlas ran after Eli, who effectively just got more annoyed by him. The two ended up getting in the same elevator, and while the new teammate tried to press the button for the lobby, the football player blocked the panel with his body.
"...Are we really doing this right now? I've kinda got shit that I wanna do before Chris or Chef start bothering us, so if we could, like, not." Eli tried to move his hand around Atlas, who just kept moving himself around so that the button couldn't be pressed. The couch potato eventually pulled his hand back and slapped it against his own face. "I'm getting the feeling that you're not gonna let me go until I listen to whatever nonsense you've got balled up in your throat spills out, so just get it over with already."
"Haha, balled up in my throat, man, Eli, you're just such a funny guy, anybody ever tell you that?" Atlas chuckled while simultaneously nudging Eli with his elbow, though the latter still didn't seem any more amused than he already was. "Ha…ha…right! I just had a pretty fun idea, that's all! Now that we're on the same team, I figured me and you could, oh, I don't know, visit that skating race track again! You know, skate a little bit, have ourselves a fun time, it'll be a total blast!"
"...Sounds like a pain, not interested." Atlas was a bit shocked by that response, and Eli used his shock to his advantage, finally pressing the button to the lobby and causing the elevator to begin its descent. He leaned back against the wall, looking at his phone while he waited to get down all the way.
"It wouldn't be a pain at all! It would really be a lot more fun than you probably think! You know, just two buds working together to better themselves for challenges to come! I mean, you've got such an effective method with your strategy! I really wasn't expecting you to beat me or anything, but you did, you totally did!" Atlas chuckled as the door to the elevator finally opened. Eli stepped out of it first, but he followed right after him of course. "Haha, come on, we're just gonna do this as buds! We're buds, aren't we?"
"..." Eli blankly stared at Atlas before smirking a little bit, "Yea, I guess we kind of are. So maybe if I have some free time after I'm done with my plans, then we can go to the track." Atlas sighed in relief at that response.
"That's exactly what I'm talking about! It's gonna be such a blast, just me and you shooting the shit, skating around, all that! I'll catch you when you're done with your errands, right?" Eli nodded at Atlas, who grinned back at him and ran off in an opposite direction in the lobby. Once the football player was out of sight, Eli rolled his eyes and headed outside.
Confessional - Atlas
"Man, I was starting to think that Eli didn't like me for a second there! I'm not really used to having people that don't like me! Well, my sister always pretends like she doesn't like me, but that's just a bunch of crazy talk! Oh, and I guess there's Garfield…but who cares about him? Not to be rude or anything, but the guy's just a total dick." Atlas shook his head before rolling up the window to his sports car and speeding off into the distance.
Confessional - Eli
"I would consider Edward my pal, maybe not friend, friend is a bit too endearing of a term to describe someone that I only met a couple weeks ago. Atlas, though? I consider him a pain in my ass…but the type of pain in the ass that I can make some good use of." Eli grinned as he reclined his chair a bit, resting his hands behind his head. "Seems to me like the guy really wants this rematch, so as long as I stall the rematch, I've basically got a person on my team that'll always vouch for me during eliminations. Easy money."
"Getting so much closer than before…now I just need to do another bit of wiring and…" Elward had a singular safety goggle over his good eye, and was watching closely as he brought two separate wires closer and closer together, only for someone to come knocking on his door. The noise startled him, and he ended up touching the wires to himself, sending a jolt of electricity through his body. "Waaaaaaaaaagh!" It took a second for him to pull the wires away, only because the shock was holding him in place, basically. Once he was free from the shock, he took some deep breaths and got up from his seat, running over to his door and opening it to see that Eliza was standing there, holding her hands behind her back.
"O-oh…hello, Elward. I hate to bother you, I do, but I was just wondering if I could discuss a…private matter with you, if that's alright?" Eliza could see that Elward was covered in soot from having electrocuted himself, and she was taken aback by the sight. "Oh, goodness…what happened to you? You smell like someone left a pizza in the oven for way too long."
"Well, I was completely fine until you startled me with your loud knocking! Gah…I don't mean to be rude or anything, but I really was pretty busy just now." Elward grumbled as he took his safety goggle off and wiped his soot-covered arms with a damp rag to get himself cleaned up a bit. "Now you've already got me pulled away from my work, so I might as well see what you want. So get on with it."
"Right, right…I was just thinking to myself, and it occurred to me that you and I don't have much going our way as far as bonds with teammates or anything. I guess I'm a bit worried about the possibility of us getting picked off in elimination by the rest of the team." Eliza pulled her hands out from behind her back and started to rub the back of her neck. "To…subvert that possibility, I was thinking that it could probably be good for the two of us to…you know, work together. Vote together, help each other out, like an alliance."
"An alliance? Yeah, whatever, sure, I really don't care that much either way. I was in the middle of something, as I said before, so if that's all, can I get back to what I was doing?" Eliza nodded her head a little bit at the inventor, who ended up slamming the door in her face right after. He walked back over to his desk, plugging those two wires from before together finally. After he did that, a bright, blue light came emanating from whatever was on top of his desk. "Perfect…she's…perfect!" He grinned from ear to ear, back up a bit so he could take in the full view of what was on his desk. It seemed to be human in shape, thought it was very clearly a robot. Most of it was a silvery white color, with bright blue highlights. It was built to look like a rather attractive woman.
Confessional - Elward
"I've been trying to put together a body for HAILEY for some time now, but I was really having a hard time making something that didn't look like…well…an oversized toaster. HAILEY is a lot more classy than a toaster, so I knew she would want a body that resembled her true form!" Elward cracked his knuckles and leaned forward on his motorcycle. "I just need to figure out how exactly I'm going to get her consciousness into the body…if it were as simple as an upload, I would've gotten it over with by now."
Confessional - Eliza
"Elward is the weakest member of our team, which is…really saying something, considering we've got someone like Bailey on our team. In any case, I was fairly certain that he would say yes to an alliance, but I expected him to be a little more enthusiastic about the offer." Eliza sighed and shook her head, "It doesn't really matter, anyways. I've got him on my side, so my next move is to try and get 3V in on this as well. That'll be three votes together, so not bad."
"Attention contestanitos!" Chris's voice came out through the stereo in Eliza's car, scaring her for a moment before she realized that it was just him. "It's just about time for another challenge at this point, so if you guys could do us a huge favor and come on down to the Gourmet District, that would be awesome! Location's getting uploaded into your car's systems righhhhhhhhht now!" The bright arrow displayed in front of Eliza's windshield, and she glanced at the camera and shrugged her shoulders.
The Gourmet District…the contestants hadn't yet gone there for any challenges. Even the one food related challenge before was in the Chinatown district. But there were a few who had gone out to this part of town to see what it was all about. They could recall streets lined with restaurants to satiate any sort of hunger that you could possibly have. Pizza? They had you covered with about fifty different spots, each one serving a whole different type of pizza than the last. The contestants drove through the savory-smelling main plaza of the district, only for them all to park outside of a massive building with the name "Gourmet Buffet" on it. One by one, everyone got out and off of their vehicles, walking closer to the building to see that Chef was standing outside, dressed like a waiter.
"Chef, I gotta say, I'm really digging the new outfit," Garfield snickered as he led the way into the building, with a vein swelling on Chef's forehead as he passed him by. The inside of the restaurant was absolutely massive, with chandeliers hanging from the ceiling to illuminate the room. The walls were painted mostly in red, but there were golden decals running all throughout the length of them. There were dozens of other people currently eating at smaller tables, but the main attraction was a massive, empty table in the middle of the room. The left side of the table had a card that was for A-Side, while the right side had a card that was for B-Side. "I'm gonna take a guess and say that's where we're sitting."
"Excellent deduction skills, love…showing us all just how sharp that brain of yours is." Cherry brushed past the politician, running her finger along his chest while she walked towards the table. Garfield only rolled his eyes at the action and followed after her, with Morgan walking behind him and tapping away on her phone. Further behind those two, Leo and Zayden were walking together, with the former glancing back at Amanda, who was at the tail end of the group, with even Edward being closer to the rest than her. The floral femboy frowned slightly, as the stock expert wasn't even flipping her coin like usual.
"Something the matter?" Zayden gently nudged Leo with his elbow, getting a blush to sprout up on his face. "You've been staring at Amanda since you got out of your car."
"She's just…so upset right now…I'm really worried about her." Leo sighed and slouched a bit. While slouching, he accidentally ended up brushing his hair against Zayden's arm, which turned his face a bright shade of red that shouldn't have even been humanly possible. "I-I'm sorry! I didn't mean to…uwah!" The seamster squeaked like a frightened mouse and ran on ahead, leaving Zayden to smirk a little bit.
Confessional - Zayden
"It's always fun when people apologize for accidentally touching you when they could just touch you more. …You know, that sounded a lot less creepy in my head." Zayden blushed ever so slightly and looked away from the camera.
"Brap!" 3V belched loudly and kicked her feet up onto the table while setting an empty beer bottle down in front of her. She was at the far end of her team's side, with Eliza and Elward sitting on either side of her. "Ehhhh…so are we, like, gonna eat or something? I was at a sport's bar right before this, so I'm really not that hungry."
"Oh, you were out at one of the bars? You should've let me know, I totally would've gone with you." Eliza smiled at 3V, who just stared at her like she said something in a different language. "...S-something the matter?"
"Miss Ma'am, you and I have talked like…once…twice…some number of times that is really small! From what I know about you, you would be a total buzzkill at a bar…I bet you'd even be passed out after your first drink." 3V chuckled a bit from her own remark, with Eliza crossing her arms in slight annoyance. The drunkard pulled her feet down from the table, only to slam her prosthetic fist down on it instead. "Speaking of drinks, how long is it gonna take for me to get another beer?"
"I am not that much of a lightweight…" Eliza grumbled to herself, with Elward giggling at her annoyance. As they had their little moment, Chris came out from the kitchen all of the sudden. He was dressed eccentrically, more like a restaurant manager than anything else. With a snap of his fingers, a squadron of waiters and waitresses, led by Chef, came out after him, and all of them walked towards the dining table together. The contestants looked between each other before looking back at Chris, who was smirking that devilish smirk of his.
"Alright dudes, you showed up a little earlier than we had expected you to! I was gonna have the kitchen jump right into the entrees, but since you're here so early, we had to make up some appetizers." Chris and Chef both started to snicker evilly, which just confused the contestants more than they already were. "Now, I know we had all of you guys make food for people in Chinatown before...but in the Gourmet District, we thought it would be better if you were the ones that got to do the eating! Better hope that you've saved some room for dessert, because there's gonna be a lot of it!"
"Oh, bollocks…" Edward groaned as he fully realized the situation that was sprouting up around him.
Confessional - Edward
"Mum always told me I was a messy eater…she was right, I really am. Problem is, it's hard to really eat in public when you're worried about other blokes thinking you're some sort of piglet." Edward ran his hand through his hair, sighing in full annoyance. "I'm not entirely sure what the nature of this eating challenge is to be, but I know that it can't be anything all that enjoyable for me. I'm sure by the end of this, I'm gonna be hating all this food…"
"Not such a bad guess, little man! I'm just hoping you get some vegetables in your system! They'll help you grow big and strong when you're older!"
"Here's the dealio! This place, as you probably could have guessed, is a buffet. The all-you-can-eat kind, not the other kind of buffet that's just a pot of deception and lies!" Chris shuddered at the thought of the other kind of buffet, "We're gonna be bringing out non-stop plates for the whole table, and the challenge is fairly simple. Each plate will count as a round, a round is finished once all plates on both sides are cleared off. Everyone will have the opportunity to drop out of the eating contest whenever they would like, but there is a catch! Your team will still get your food…it'll just be evenly distributed between your teammates! You eat less the more teammates you have in! The team that fully drops out will be crowned the losers of the challenge, while the team that sticks to their guts wins! By the way…vomiting is basically the same as throwing in the towel, so try to keep it in your stomach, folks!"
"This challenge…it seems to be pretty easy, no? Atlas and I are always eating big meals after our workouts, so I'm not so worried about the challenge." Bec grinned as he tried to scoot his chair closer to Atlas, only for Gerald to suddenly swerve around him in his own chair so that he was in between the two of them. "Ah…Gerald, friend, I was going to be taking that spot there." The betrayed man turned to look at Bec with complete numbness in his eyes, which only made him grin in response. "You can have it then!"
"Are you guys all ready?" Chris smirked as he looked over the table and saw a few of the contestants looking uncertain about the challenge still. "Doesn't matter to me, because the challenge is going to be starting now anyways! Chef! What lovely dish has been prepared for our contestants' appetizer?"
"For the appetizer, we have…" Chef snapped his fingers, and the waiters and waitresses set down platters before each and every contestant, taking the lids off of them to reveal… "Blooming onions! These onions are made to look like a flower, seasoned up nice and good, and deep fried! You each get a side of spicy sauce with your app, and your plate ain't considered done until the onion and the sauce is all gone! Be grateful, maggots! This is some of the best damn food you're ever gonna get your mangy mouths on!"
With that, the waitresses and waiters took their leave back to the kitchen, leaving Chris and Chef to sit at a smaller table nearby so they could watch the contestants eat. Amanda poked at her appetizer with her fork, grumbling a little in disappointment as she saw a trail of grease dripping down from it. She stabbed the fork into one of the petals, pulling it off of the onion base and dipping it into her sauce. She swirled it around in the sauce for three full spins, and then lifted it to her mouth to taste it. She didn't have any change in expression or anything, she just seemed completely neutral to it. After she finished chewing on that bit, she did the exact same routine with the next petal.
"Geez…" Leo was watching Amanda while she ate. He was going a bit faster with his own eating, and was about an eighth of the way through with his onion at this point.
"If you're so worried about her, maybe you should go talk to her?" Zayden suggested in between bites of his own. He wasn't dipping his onion petals in the sauce like everybody else was though, weirdly.
"Hey, cone-for-brains!" Morgan barked from where she was sitting, with Zayden raising an eyebrow at her in question. "You can't just eat the onion, ya gotta use the sauce, too! If you don't use all the sauce, we ain't gon' get you into the next round!"
"Oh, I was planning to use all of the sauce, I just don't really like dipping in it!" Zayden chuckled before he suddenly grabbed his cup of sauce, lifting it up to his lips and drinking it down like a smoothie. It was like a record scratched in the restaurant, as most of the other contestants at the table were watching him in complete horror, with even the other patrons of the restaurant looking as well. It took him about ten seconds to finish drinking the sauce, and he licked his lips with a satisfied smile after. "Creamy! My compliments to the chef!"
Confessional - Morgan
"That bitch really just…I think I'm gonna be sick…" Morgan gagged, and had to cover her mouth with her hands to prevent her from just barfing right then and there.
Confessional - Jhin
"I thought my eating habits were weird and all, but drinking a cup of sauce by itself? That man belongs in a mental institution for that kind of thing!" Jhin shuddered as the visual of Zayden just drinking the sauce played over and over again in her head.
Confessional - Zayden
"Man, the only downside of this so far is that I'm all out of sauce to drink…it was pretty dang good, if I do say so myself." Zayden patted his stomach with his hand, and ended up belching a bit. "Excusez-moi."
"I don't really know if I'm the one that she'll want to talk to about her issues. I mean, I've been working on making a present for her to try and cheer her up, but I'm still working on it." Leo sighed and took another one of his onion petals in his mouth. He was also a bit disturbed by Zayden's antics with the sauce, but was just trying to look past it at this point. "I think…there's only one person that she'd probably want to talk to, but the last time I tried to convince Cherry to see what was up, it didn't go so well…"
"Oh, Cherry, huh?" Zayden had already finished his whole platter at this point, having enjoyed the appetizer quite a lot more than he had initially anticipated. "Alright, alright. How about I go talk to her then and see how it goes?" Leo blushed faintly as Zayden got up from his chair and started to approach Cherry. The party gal had taken her jacket off so she wouldn't get any grease on it, and was a fair ways into her appetizer. "Hey, Cherry."
"Zayden…I'm sorry, but I don't think I'm gonna be giving you my sauce, if that's what you came over here for." Cherry waved the poorly dressed man off and just continued to eat away at her food.
"Oh, no, not here for that! Though, I definitely wouldn't have turned it down if you were offering, heheh!" Zayden licked his lips as his mouth started to water…the man just really liked that sauce. "No no, I actually came over to see if you wouldn't mind seeing what's up with Amanda. Hasn't really been talkin' with any of us, and since you've got a crush on her, maybe she'll talk to you." Cherry's eyes shot wide open as she heard that question, and the bit of food she had in her mouth suddenly went down the wrong pipe. She choked for a few seconds, and slammed her fist down right on her chest, which made her spit it up. It flew right across the table…and landed smack dab on the middle of Garfield's face.
"Excellent table manners, Cherry," Garfield glared at his teammate and wiped his face with a napkin, using it to grab the spat up food and drop it back onto Cherry's plate. "You still gotta eat that, you know." Chris and Chef both nodded after the politician said that, and Cherry grumbled under her breath before looking at Zayden.
"Love, where'd you get the idea that I would even have the slightest bit of an attraction towards Amanda? Are you drunk?" Cherry was still recovering from choking just a few moments ago, but she looked pretty annoyed by the conversation at hand. "Let me explain something to you about myself…I don't do romance. If you want to hookup, that's one thing, but none of that…lovey dovey shite. It honestly makes me feel quite queasy."
"...Uh…yeah, no, you definitely have a crush on her. You guys were basically on a date the other day, eating pancakes or something." Cherry's face turned slightly red, both from a mix of embarrassment and annoyance. Zayden really didn't seem to get the hint that he was really pissing her off right now. "You spend a lot of time with her in general, too. And the way you look at her ain't the way that you look at a friend."
"You've lost the plot, Zayden. Now you're just being annoying, and quite frankly, it's ruining my appetite. Go back to your seat so I can eat in place, thank you very much." Cherry looked back at her food and, although completely disgusted by it, forced herself to eat the chunk that she was choking on earlier. Zayden sighed and slowly returned to his seat next to Leo, propping his elbows up on the table and holding his head in his hands.
"G-guessing it didn't work?" Leo asked from his own seat. He had just managed to finish his appetizer at that point, and was rubbing his belly with his hands, feeling nearly full already.
"Didn't work at all…" Zayden sighed again, and the two men both glanced at Amanda to see that she was still sadly staring at her food and eating it slowly.
Confessional - Zayden
"Cherry is definitely lying about herself and the whole romance thing, it's just totally obvious that she is. She looks at Amanda the same way that I look at Leo!" Zayden blushed faintly before looking down at his lap and tapping his fingers together. "...Yeah, I really like Leo. I don't just wanna spring that on him, though. I'm kinda worried that he might freak out if I just tell him. And I don't know if he really feels the same way back or not. Honestly, I was pretty sure he had the hots for Garfield."
Confessional - Leo
"The way that Zayden went to talk to Cherry for me was just…" Leo's face was turning its signature beet red coloring again, and he grabbed the bottom of his sweater and pulled it up to cover his face, showing off his smooth stomach and chest without realizing it. "S-so romantic…I really like him, but I…probably shouldn't tell him that. He'll just think I'm weird…or some kind of simp…"
"Really? Lifting your shirt up for free? Hot damn."
"This onion dish is sooooo good…I wish we had this back home…" Bailey was smiling as she ate her dish. She was pretty far into it at this point, although Jhin, who was sitting next to her was almost finished with her own at this point. The madwoman stared at the ice cube for a second before suddenly grabbing her hat and pulling it right off of her head to toss it to the side. "J-J-Jhin? Why'd you just…chuck my hat across the room like that?" With her hat off, her mid-length, blonde hair with its one blue streak was fully visible.
"You look better without that stupid hat on, doofus! Your hair is too pretty to keep covered up like that all the time, GOD!" Jhin started to run her fingers through Bailey's hair, getting a blush out of her. "It's so soft, too! Hiding this from me is basically like hiding a murder from the cops!"
"You didn't wash your fingers after you ate…and now you're playing with my hair with your greasy fingers…" Bailey sighed, but tried to just ignore it and keep eating. "My doctors have told me I shouldn't take my hat off when I'm out in public. Not unless I'm in a room that is hot enough to keep me warm." She seemed particularly annoyed to admit this, and jabbed her fork into the last petal of her onion with a lot of force.
"You actually listen to what the doctors say!? Ha! The only doctor I ever listen to is Gwenny-poo, and that's just cause I really want her sitting on my face! You should be living life to the extreme, who cares about diseases and what not? Fuck 'em!" Jhin grinned from ear to ear, with Bailey chewing down on her last petal. "And you got a bit of sauce on your face, dumbass!" The maniac leaned over from her seat and dragged her tongue all the way up Bailey's cheek to clean up the saucy mess.
"Maybe you're right…for once…" Bailey didn't actually seem freaked out or flustered by the cheek licking this time, she seemed like she was a little too lost in thought. "...Thanks for the advice, babe."
"Babe!? What are you, some sort of gay!?" Jhin gasped before just going back to grinning like before.
Confessional - Bailey
"Jhin really might be onto something…I just get really cold because of my ailment, I've never actually gotten hurt outside of being cold. And quite frankly, I'm pretty tired of people staring at me like I'm some sort of freak because I'm always wearing a jacket in public." Bailey looked down at herself before slowly unzipping her winter jacket. She dropped it off of her body and onto the passenger seat of her car, revealing that she had a dark blue sweater on underneath. "...This feels…kinda liberating."
The appetizers were just being finished up, as Gerald took the final bite of his own. He had been spending so much time focusing on Atlas and Eli, he hardly realized how slow he was eating, but it didn't really matter to him so much. He was simply watching in silence as Atlas licked the rest of the crumbs off of his fingers, and Eli typed away on his phone, both of them blissfully unaware that this man had a vengeance that he was out to seek. Chris stepped forward to the table, looking over all of the contestants with a big grin on his face.
"Looks like that's gonna be it for round one…not too shabby, although some of you took a lot more time than I had expected you to be taking." The host snickered and grabbed two clipboards from behind his back, setting them down on the table in front of Eliza and Garfield, respectively. Both of them looked at the clipboards to see that each one had a checklist with all of their teammates' names on them. "While Chef's proteges are in the kitchen cooking up your first entree, now is the time for you guys to decide whether or not you're going to move on to the next round. Check off your name if you wanna drop out of the eating, don't check it if you're good for the next round. Simple as that!"
"Yeah, as if anyone on our team is gonna be dropping out this early…this is just ridiculous." Garfield shook his head at the clipboard and passed it over to Morgan.
"Bitch, do I look like some one dish wimp to you? A fine wine like me goes with at least three courses!" Morgan flipped her hair with her hand, smacking it right against Leo's face. The femboy winced as the clipboard was passed down to him, and just passed it right on to Zayden, who was still in the midst of scraping out remaining bits of sauce from his cup.
"Huh? Oh, right, yeah, I'm still good for a couple more rounds." Zayden took the clipboard from Leo and, in the process, accidentally touched his hand with his thumb. He didn't notice, although the femboy's face lit up bright red.
Confessional - Leo
"I-is it hot in here? Oh…m-maybe I should turn the AC on…" Leo looked down at the dash of his car, seeing that the AC was already on full blast. His face was still cherry red, regardless of how frigid it was in his car. "W-whaddya know, the cold air is running and I still feel this hot and hea- warm! Warm, I feel warm!"
"Well, it really would be silly to give up so early on this…" While Amanda, Edward, and Cherry were finishing up passing around the clipboard for A-Side, Eliza had only just started with her own team's clipboard. She was initially going to hand it over to 3V, but seeing that the drunken oaf was currently downing another bottle of beer, she just sighed and gave it to Elward instead.
"Alright, HAILEY! Calculate how much room for more food I have without compromising the sanctity of my stomach!" Elward tapped his earpiece with one hand, causing HAILEY's screen to pop up before him. Even just seeing her face made Eliza shudder in fear.
"Yes, master~! You should be okay to consume a grand total of…four hundred more calories before you begin to feel queasy, and another one hundred more after that before you vomit! From the angle you are currently sitting at, you will end up projectile vomiting onto…Bec!" HAILEY beamed, with Bec's eyes widening as he heard what she said.
"That can't be right, I can obviously eat a lot more than that! I'm staying in!" Elward grumbled and passed the list onto Jhin, who lifted her bare foot up from under the table to grab the clipboard between two of her toes with a grin. "JHIN!? Put those away, we're at a classy restaurant!"
"Classy? Please, my ass has more class in it than this dump, isn't that right, freezy pop?" Jhin glanced over at Bailey as she slid the clipboard her way. The ice cube blushed out of embarrassment and grabbed for the clipboard, only to pass it right on over to Eli, who didn't even look at it before he slid it to Atlas.
"Well, there's definitely no way that I'm gonna stop here, I still have a couple more meals to eat before I even make my daily calorie intake!" The football player started to chuckle, and he handed the clipboard over to Gerald. The deranged man looked down at the clipboard and then back at the rest of his team. For the most part, it seemed like they were all off in their own little world, with none of them paying attention to what he was doing. He looked back down at the clipboard and, one by one, he started to check off names. His own and others alike, he checked them all off until the only spots that were left unchecked were Atlas, Eli, and 3V. He passed the clipboard on to the next person, which he had presumed to be 3V, completely forgetting that he had stolen the seat from Bec.
"Well, well…what do we have here, Gerald friend?" Bec murmured while he looked over the clipboard. He didn't seem upset in the slightest to see all the names crossed off…in fact, it just seemed to intrigue him from the way that he was smirking at the list. Gerald still hadn't noticed that Bec saw exactly what he had done, but the clay maker just continued to smirk and gave the clipboard over to 3V.
"Eh? Oh, right…I'm pretty full. I ate before, like I said, so I think I'm good." 3V let out a little belch as she checked off her own name on the list, leaving Eliza to sigh once again. She passed the list back to Chris just as Cherry was passing her team's list back as well.
"Alright! It looks like, for A-Side…everybody is going to be moving on to the second round! While for B-Si-" Chris's eyes practically bulged out of his skull when he saw the clipboard with all the names checked off on it. Atlas looked up at the host with confusion in his own eyes, wondering what could've been so bad about it. "Guys, I know that blooming onions can be filling and all, but I didn't expect this many of you to drop out after round one! Atlas and Eli are the only ones moving on to round two!"
"WHAT!?" The two men shouted in unison, with Eli finally looking up from his phone just out of shock from hearing this news.
"Wait a minute, that d-d-doesn't make any sense, Chris! I didn't check off my name, I know that Jhin, Elward, and Eliza didn't either!" Bailey looked back at the three of her teammates, all of which nodded, each seeming pretty annoyed about this circumstance.
"...Neither did I…" Gerald weakly mumbled, turning his head to discover that Bec was actually next to him this whole time. His eyes filled with fear as he saw the smug look on the clay maker's face. "...Don't say anything…don't ruin this for me…"
"...Yeah, I don't know why the list was like that. No one checked off on it before me…unless I was looking at it the wrong way." Bec shrugged his shoulders, with Gerald breathing a little sigh of relief. At that point, everyone's attention turned to 3V.
"...Why are you guys all looking at me? I got some beer foam on my face again, don't I?" 3V started to lick around her lips, trying to clean up the foam that wasn't even there until Eliza suddenly grabbed her by her hoodie and began to shake her about. "Wahahahahah! What are you dooooooing!?"
"Y-you…checked off all the names on our list, you drunk ape! You can't just make silly mistakes like that!" Eliza let go of the drunkard, whose eye was still spinning in circles from being shook like that. The pizza girl zipped over to Chris, getting down on her knees and clasping her hands together to beg. "Chris, please, she's drunk, you shouldn't take anything she does seriously! J-just let everyone but her move on to the next round, we were all ready for more!"
"Mmmmm…nope! Sorry, but it's just wayyyyyy more fun for me to watch this go down with only two of you guys actually working against the other team! Though I presume that the elimination ceremony is going to be…less than shocking!" The host snickered as he headed back to the kitchen with the clipboards, leaving everyone on Team B-Side to once again glare at 3V.
Confessional - 3V
"Ehhhhh…I don't really remember checking off all of the names. That seems like way too much work to do, anyways. Drunk me is a work smarter, not harder kind of gal." 3V stared at her prosthetic hands, blinking a few times as she did. "...Did I do that? No…no, I definitely didn't do that I don't think, no way."
Confessional - Gerald
"I don't know too much about Eli, but I know a lot about how Atlas acts in situations like this. No matter what, he's gonna keep on eating for the team. Even if it ends up sending him to the hospital where he'll have to get his stomach pumped." Gerald had the faintest, malicious grin on his face as he sat back in his seat. "This is the punishment you get for kidnaping my best friend…I hope it was worth it."
Confessional - Bec
"Yes friends, I could have told the truth about Gerald and his misdeeds…but it is much more humorous to watch things go down like this, now? If he has a vendetta against Atlas, it will be much easier to get rid of him so that I can take his place." Bec was trying on a gray vest in his car, sizing it up to perfection. "That big lug might just hospitalize himself over this challenge…and if not, 3V takes the fall. This Gerald is…quite interesting."
"Alright, maggots! It's time for round two, the first round with entrees! If you thought the first plate was already tough on the calories, then you definitely ain't prepared for what we're throwing at you guys next! Chefs!" Chef snapped his fingers, and the chefs came out of the kitchen, with seven of them each holding a platter of their own while there were two much larger platters that were being held up by two chefs each. They all came to the table, with A-Side getting the normal sized platters while Atlas and Eli got the much larger ones. With another snap from Chef, the lids were raised from the platters to reveal the meal.
"Burgers and fries, but these ain't no baby sliders like all you sissies are probably used to! No, these burgers are each one whole pound of burger meat, with three whole potatoes worth of fries each. Oh, except for Eli and Atlas, who both have four and a half pounds of meat on their burger, and thirteen and a half potatoes worth of fries!" Chef grinned widely as he and the contestants all looked at the massive plates of food that sat in front of the two men. Both of them looked to be pretty nervous just from the sight of it. "And your first round of entrees begins…now!" With that command, the contestants were off to eating.
"Oh boy…" Atlas was busy trying to figure out how he was supposed to hold his burger before he noticed that Eli seemed to be picking his apart. The football player just seemed to be pretty confused by the whole display. "Eli? I don't mean to question how you eat your food or anything like that, but you know you can just pick the burger up and take a bite of it, right?"
"Yeah, if I want to have to spend ages trying to swallow huge bites and I tire myself out before I even finish the thing. Pull it apart into smaller pieces and it goes down a lot easier, that much I can promise you." Eli used his fork to start pulling bits and pieces of the meat off of the burger, and was eating everything in small bites like that. Atlas looked down at his own food in silence, but ended up doing the same thing as his new teammate, trying any way to make it easier on himself. Meanwhile, Cherry was just about finished with her burger already.
"This party food's going to have me feeling all bloated before I even go out dancing tonight…such a shame…" Cherry sighed once she took the last bite of her burger, and started to go at the fries that were to the side. As she nibbled on them, she looked over at the rest of the team, seeing that Amanda was still just sulking and eating slowly as ever. The party gal rolled her eyes at first, trying to ignore her sad attitude, but it eventually just got to be too annoying for her to ignore, and she got up from her seat, walked over to Amanda and grabbed her by the sleeve of her jacket to pull her away from the table.
"C-Cherry!" Amanda immediately whined her name, and was breathing pretty shakily from being grabbed all of the sudden. She weakly tried to pull herself away, but the way that Cherry was pulling her made it hard for her to just escape her clutches. "I…don't like being touched. You know I don't like being touched, you're touching me right now. Stop touching me, please…I don't like it…" Cherry rolled her eyes again, and brought Amanda all the way over to the restrooms and standing outside of them with her before she finally let her go. The stock trader rubbed her wrist while she stared blankly at her.
"You, love…what's got you all doom and gloom in your chair. You're certainly putting a damper on the party with that attitude, that's for sure." Amanda looked away from Cherry, but the party gal grabbed her by the chin and turned her face back so that she was looking at her again. This just caused her to start her shaky breathing once again, but Cherry wasn't letting go of her this time. "What? You haven't gone and taken any strange pills lying about, have you?"
"N-no pills, I don't take pills unless I need ibuprofen. Please let got of my face, it feels weird when you hold me like that." Amanda tried to squirm away again, but it just wasn't happening. Cherry definitely beat her in the strength department, and was holding her good and steady. She wasn't, however, acting as poorly as she normally would to an incident like this. She actually seemed to be somewhat calm.
"Just tell Momma Cherry whatever it is that's wrong with you, and she'll take care of it for you. I can't have my closest ally in the competition so depressed that she can't perform properly." Cherry noticed that Amanda was slowly stopping her fight against her, and she finally let go of her face. The stock trader took a deep breath and held her hands behind her back.
"I got a call from my boss the other day. He was upset with me for telling people on the show company secrets…secrets to the trade that I brought to his attention in the first place. The next day, he called me back to apologize. After he apologized for yelling at me, he started telling me that he needs me and my expertise, it's the only thing that keeps things running smooth for him. Normally praise like this makes someone feel good, but…it doesn't make me feel good. It makes me feel like-"
"Like he's using you, isn't it? Haven't had quite the same issue as you, not quite, but there have been a few blokes that thought they could kick in my sheets with me whenever they 'needed' some action. Drawing lines is important, you know?" Cherry raised her hand back up to Amanda's face, pressing her finger against the top of her cheek and dragging it down to her chin in a line. The stock trader shivered from her touch, and started to adjust her tie.
"...I just don't understand what is so wrong about me telling my methods to other people. I don't like to be cold to everyone like him, I want to be helpful. But he is always so insistent that I wouldn't be anywhere without him, and he's probably right about that." Amanda sighed, and at that moment, her phone started to ring. She looked down at it, only to see that it was a call from her boss once again. She got this miserable look on her face as she looked back at Cherry. "...I have to take this."
"Right, of course…well…chin up, Amanda. We'll put a pin into this conversation and come back to it later, alright?" Amanda nodded her head, and was just about to walk away to answer the phone, when Cherry suddenly leaned up towards her to kiss her right on the cheek, leaving a mark of cherry red lipstick on her face. The stock trader was completely stunned where she stood, and the party gal just walked back to the table with a strut in her step. When she sat back down, she was met by the eyes of both Leo and Zayden staring right at her, both of them looking pretty smug while they stared at her. "...Oh, don't give me those looks, boys. Everyone knows a little sweetness goes a long way in making someone feel better…I'm just helping her mood, is all."
"And I'm the Queen of England," Zayden remarked before lifting his cone off of his head to reveal that he actually had a crown on underneath it. Cherry just rolled her eyes and went back to eating her fries like before.
Confessional - Cherry
"Please, loves, don't think that that little kiss means anything about romance. I want to ensure my safety in this game, and keeping Amanda in tip top shape and spirits helps with that." Cherry shot an annoyed look to the camera while she started to reapply her lipstick, which had been smudged slightly from her kissing Amanda's cheek before. "You wouldn't think she wears any, but that woman has got quite the strong perfume on…albeit it smells of something an elderly woman would wear."
Confessional - Amanda
"...I…need…to ask Cherry out on a date. It seems like she really likes me, and my mom said that if someone likes me and I like them, it's okay to ask them on a date." Amanda was looking at her face in her rearview mirror, just focusing her attention mainly on the lipstick stain on her cheek. She touched her fingers to it and shivered again, though it wasn't necessarily a nervous shiver or anything. "...I don't like being touched. But…I don't mind when Cherry touches me."
"I was really hoping for some more extravagant food if we was gonna be goin' to this big fancy restaurant or whatevah…these greasy foods are just making this bitch feel sick already." Morgan groaned as she set her burger back down on her plate. At that point, she had only finished about half of it, and was clutching her stomach. Garfield looked over from where he was sitting with a big grin on his face while his plate sat empty in front of him. "What? Why you giving me that look, frosted tips?"
"Oh, nothing, I just find it hilarious that you're always so confident, but can be defeated by a simple burger. It really is quite funny, you know." Garfield snickered and lounged back in his seat, with his arms behind his head so he could really relax. Morgan grumbled under her breath and grabbed her burger again, taking a few more bites from it to defy him. "Atta girl. I was going to say, it'd be a damn shame if Edward finished before you, but I'm pretty sure he even finished before me."
"Say what now!?" Morgan looked across the table to see that Edward was just sitting with his empty plate, staring down at his lap in silence to try and avoid attracting too much unwanted attention. The cheerleader took a look under the table, trying to see if there was any food that had been thrown on the ground, but all she ended up seeing was Jhin and Bailey playing footsie, a sight that made her cringe. She came back up from under the table, looking annoyed as ever. "Ain't no way that little shit been finishin' his food faster than anyone else…just look at him!"
"I'm just as shocked as you are…I never expected him to actually have some semblance of use in any of the challenges." Garfield chuckled and nudged Morgan in the side with his elbow. "If I were you, though, I would hurry up and finish with that burger already…rest of the team is all finished and just waiting for you."
"Yeah, yeah, I'm workin' on it!" Morgan snapped back at the politician and just continued to eat. Meanwhile, over with Eli and Atlas, the two of them only had a few fries each left on their plates, both of them looking like they were absolutely sick from all of the food.
"Y-you guys got this, you're almost done!" Bailey tried to cheer the two of them on, clapping her hands for them with a few of the other teammates joining in on the clapping. At the far end of the table, 3V had her arms crossed and was scowling at the ground.
"I definitely didn't check off all the names on that dumb list…someone on this team is obviously trying to frame me! But I don't think I have any enemies here…do I…? Oh, maybe I have a super secret nemesis that I don't even know about and they're gonna make a big movie about this! Siiiiiiiiick!" Her scowl turned to a grin, but then right back to a scowl when she remembered what she was upset about in the first place. Eliza scooted a bit closer to her from her own seat. "What, whaddya want?"
"I just wanna know what you were thinking when you screwed up all of our chances with this challenge…feels like maybe that blunder was a little more than just something that a drunk idiot would do." Eliza yawned slightly and propped her elbow up on the table, holding her head up so that she wouldn't just fall asleep right then and there.
"Yeah, well, it's not just something that a drunk idiot would do because I didn't do it! …Hang on a minute…drunk idiot!? I'll have you know that I'm only sort of tipsy right now, thank you very much!" 3V turned her chin up at Eliza and crossed her arms, with the pizza girl sighing and backing away again. Still, she didn't seem to be too sure of this.
"Something about this definitely seems off to me…3V is usually pretty casual about telling everyone if she did anything dumb in her drunken antics. I've never seen her work so hard to deny something like this before." Eliza scratched at her chin and looked around at the rest of her teammates with a skeptical gaze just as Chris was coming back over to the table with the clipboards.
"Miraculously, Eli and Atlas both managed to survive round two of our little food tournament! How are you two feeling after that, huh? Hungry, I hope!" Chris laughed as he set down the clipboard for B-Side in front of Atlas, with the clipboard for A-Side being set in front of Garfield again.
"Ugh…that was really tough…" Atlas groaned, rubbing his hands on his stomach while he looked down at the clipboard. He saw the pen and the unmarked checkbox next to his name, and even looked like he was contemplating checking it off for a moment. "...N-no! I gotta keep on eating for the team, I'm stayin' in!" A few of the members of B-Side sighed in relief at the football player's declaration, while Gerald just smirked slightly from his seat. Eli then grabbed for the clipboard, and immediately checked his name off from the list, with Atlas looking at him in disbelief right after.
"Sorry, but I really don't feel like eating myself to death because someone made a dumb mistake in a challenge, I'm out." Eli passed the clipboard right back up to Chris, who was grinning from ear to ear while leaning down towards Atlas.
"Looks like you're gonna be going in all alone against the rest of A-Side in this next round, Atlas! For your sake, you should probably hope that some of them end up dropping out for the next round." Chris chuckled as he walked away from the football player, taking the clipboard back from Cherry on the other side. "...Morgan, Leo, and Amanda have all dropped out from A-Side, evening the odds a little bit for our big eater on the other team!"
"What was all of that before about being able to go with at least three courses?" Garfield smirked at Morgan, who just crossed her arms and turned away from him.
"Hey, blondie, keep teasing my sister and you and me are definitely gonna have a problem." Atlas was barely able to talk at a normal volume from where he was sitting, as keeping the contents of his stomach down was proving to be quite the task that talking didn't help.
"Don't be butting into my business, damn!" Morgan groaned and got up from her seat in a bout of annoyance, stomping off from the table and leaving Garfield to turn his smug attitude over to Atlas.
Confessional - Atlas
"Man, I really…ugh…don't like that Garfield guy. He's such a…god…prick!" Atlas was wincing in the middle of his sentences, his stomach rumbling from just how much it was hurting. "Ohhhh…I'd be so mad at 3V right now if I didn't understand that mistakes happen…I can't speak for the rest of my team, though…they definitely don't seem to be the forgiving type like I am."
"Time for meal number three, maggots!" Chef had his chefs coming out with more food once again, only this time, it was platters loaded with spaghetti and meatballs. Of course, Atlas' platter was absolutely massive in comparison to the platters that were given to the remaining members of A-Side. Nonetheless, everybody that was still in it was getting on with their eating quickly. Garfield made sure to keep his eyes fixed on Edward as the two were eating and, in doing so, he noticed that the short lad was eating so much faster than anybody else, but looked like he was trying to cover himself up so that no one could see how fast he was eating.
Atlas had to take a break every few moments in his bites, but with most of his team cheering him on, he was able to keep on eating, regardless of how much it was hurting him to do so. Zayden and Cherry both looked like they were starting to feel sick about halfway through the meal, with Cherry slowing down her bites to try and help her keep it down. Zayden, meanwhile, was not slowing down whatsoever, and with another massive bite, his eyes suddenly bugged out, and he ended up vomiting back all over his platter before face planting in it. This was followed by a choir of "ew"s.
"...L-let's maybe go get you some fresh air…" Leo nervously wrapped his arm around Zayden's, helping him up from his seat. He wiped his face with a napkin, throwing it out into a waste bin that the two of them passed on their way out of the restaurant. Chris strode over to the table while trying to hold back his laughter, though he had a clothespin pinching his nose shut so he wouldn't have to deal with the unbearable smell of the vomit.
"Annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd Zayden is out from blowing chunks all over the meal! I would've thought he'd make it further, but my intuition's not always right!" The host finally burst out into full laughter while Chef came over to collect the messy plate, leaving only three people to keep eating for A-Side.
Confessional - Zayden
"My sister would have loved seeing that happen…she always gets so excited whenever she sees anyone in pain or anything like that. She's sort of weird like that…" Zayden groaned slightly as he sat back in his set, his window rolled down so he could get some fresh air. He did not, however, notice that there was a pair of hands reaching towards him from the back seat, both of them pinching him right on the cheeks all of the sudden. "Ah! Backseat Car Assassins!"
"Wrooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong~!" A mildly annoyed voice sounded out from the seat before the owner of said voice hopped over the seat to get into the passenger seat. She looked vaguely similar to Zayden, at least in her hair color, eye color, and skin tone, though she was clearly older than him, and her hair was pulled into a big, wavy ponytail. "Say, you ever run over any kids in this clown car? This puppy could run over sooooooooooo many kids!"
"H-how did you even get here, Darla?"
"Round four, sloppy joes!" Chef hollered out as three platters were now being brought out to the tables. Zayden had been ejected from the game by force, and Cherry had given up after the last round, so the only ones still competing were Atlas, Garfield, and Edward. Most of the other teammates were just cheering on their own teammates at this point, as scenes of them all eating their food played in somewhat of a montage. Garfield and Atlas both looked to be struggling pretty badly, though Edward didn't seem to be having any issues, as he always ended up finishing his plates before them.
"Round five, enchiladas! Round six, steak and asparagus! Round seven, fried chicken!" Round after round came like clockwork, with the four men still all eating, until finally, when they got to finishing up round seven, Garfield hunched over the table, groaning in clear pain. Chef and Chris both walked over to him and leaned down towards him. "What's the matter with you, maggot? Can't take the food anymore? Gonna give up? It'd be a darn shame if you just gave up right now and left only one teammate…"
"Can't…eat…anymore…" With one more groan of pain, Garfield ended up passing out right there on the table, with the other members of A-Side sighing in defeat as they looked over at Edward, who seemed to be wholly unbothered by this.
"J-just…me and…that little guy, there…?" Atlas took a look at Edward and started to chuckle a little bit, but had to stop as it was definitely hurting him a lot too much to just laugh like that. "Ugh…I'll…beat him just fine…t-this challenge…is in the bag…" The football player raised a thumbs up to his team, getting a chorus of cheers out of them while Chris and Chef looked between each other, each grinning from ear to ear as they headed back to the kitchen.
"You know, Edward, n-no one would blame you if you have to call it quits here…I think you've probably eaten more calories tonight than I have in the past week…" Leo scooted slightly closer to Edward, who just raised an eyebrow at him slightly.
"...Call it quits…? No no, I can't do that…I'm still feeling quite hungry after that last round. Fried chicken…it's quite alright, but it doesn't leave me feeling really satisfied or anything." Edward held his hands in his lap as he waited for the next meal to come his way, with most of his team having their jaws dropped from how shocked they were to hear him say that he was still hungry. Meanwhile, Gerald was starting to look really agitated at this point, seeing that Atlas was still going.
"How come he hasn't died or something yet? This isn't going to be any fun for me if he just gets through this without his stomach combusting!" Gerald clutched at his hair, a headache ringing out throughout his head. As he winced in pain from the headache, Eliza was looking his way with a hint of skepticism. The deranged man continued to clutch at his hair until he felt somebody suddenly tapping him on the shoulder. "W-what do you…want…?" He turned around to see who it was, only to see that he was staring at absolutely nothing. He stared for a moment before his gaze started to soften up, and his frown switched into the biggest smile he could've possibly mustered. His eyes even started to get their normal glow back to them.
"...A…Allan!" The other members of B-Side looked over at Gerald as he wrapped up Allan in his arms and hugged him as tight as he could. Of course, pretty much all of them just looked in disbelief, as to them, it just seemed like he was hugging the air. He kept on squeezing him tightly in his arms, starting to sob from how happy and relieved he was to see him. "Oh, Allan, I was so worried about you! I-I thought Atlas and Eli kidnapped you and tried to replace you! What's that? You just wanted to check out some of the sights? I need to stop being so clingy? S-shucks, Allan, you know I can't help it…you're my best buddy! I love hanging out with you!"
"Hang on a minute, slow your roll…guys, did you all just hear what Gerald said?" Eliza looked at the other members of her team, most of which started to murmur between each other while Gerald just looked at her in confusion. "Gerald…you said you thought Atlas and Eli kidnapped Allan? Kidnapping is a pretty serious thing…most people would try to take justice into their own hands with a kidnapping. You wouldn't do anything like that, would you?"
"Me? Oh…oh I don't think so! Well, I don't know! Whenever Allan goes missing, it's like all the lights turn off and everything goes black! I don't really know what happens in between, but I don't think I would try to do anything bad to them…probably. Huh, Allan?" Gerald looked back at Allan to listen to what he had to say. He nodded his head at him a few times, "Mhm…oh yeah…okay, well, maybe I do get a little bit cranky, at least according to what Allan says!"
"It sounds like you're just dancing around the question, Gerald!" 3V jumped up onto the table, grabbing Gerald by the shoulders to stare at him with her eye as wide open as it could be. The whole situation just made Gerald look really uncomfortable. "Youuuuuu! You're my secret nemesis, aren't you? You were trying to frame me and get me to take the fall for you! Aha! Ahaha! This movie is gonna be totally sick when it comes out!"
"M-movie…?" Atlas groaned from his seat, looking at 3V and Gerald with his stomach grumbling once again. This time, though, it was starting to grumble louder than before…a lot louder than before. Even the look on his face made it pretty clear that he wasn't doing so well at that point.
"Wagh! That boy's gonna blow! Everybody duck and coverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!" Jhin hollered out at the top of her lungs, immediately diving under the table with Bailey. In fear of what was to come, the rest of the contestants all ran to take cover as well, and just as Chris and Chef came back from the kitchen with the next round of entrees, the football player couldn't help but turn back toward them and start unleashing a stream of projectile vomit that was practically a missile with the velocity that it shot out of his mouth at. The two hosts were both coated in vomit, but not only that, they were also knocked right off of their feet and back into the kitchen like they were on a slip n slide. The whole sequence lasted for an uncomfortably long thirty seconds, until Atlas let out another groan and collapsed onto the floor, completely unconscious.
"...A-Side…wins the challenge!" Chris called from the kitchen, although his voice was soon silenced by the sound of him and Chef both vomiting soon after. Edward frowned slightly from hearing that the challenge was over, but he got a pat on the back from both Leo and Cherry, which got a small smile out of him. Meanwhile, the rest of B-Side was coming back over to see Atlas lying there on the ground. They then looked between each other, most of them not even sure what they were supposed to think.
Confessional - Eliza
"It really just doesn't make any sense for it to have been 3V with how stubborn she was being about it earlier…all of the context points towards Gerald having been the culprit that screwed the challenge for us." Eliza tapped her finger against the tip of her nose, frowning slightly to herself. "The problem there is that I could've managed to get Gerald in my alliance as well if he didn't do this…but I think I'm gonna have to vote against him now. Hopefully I can still convince 3V to get on my side after this."
Confessional - Gerald and Allan
"Oh, Allan, I really am just so happy to see you again…everyone was acting really weird when you were gone! Like I said, Atlas and Eli were being so suspicious, I thought for sure that they were in cahoots and kidnapped you or something!" Gerald was still embracing Allan in his arms as tight as he could, just enjoying holding him. "I don't even know who I'm supposed to vote for in this situation…some people seem upset at 3V, maybe she's a good option? You'll vote for her, too? Oh, you're just the best, buddy!"
Confessional - Bec
"Such an interesting turn of events in this boring challenge…Atlas isn't going to be hospitalized, but I've got no doubt that this is definitely going to affect him negatively." Bec whistled as he checked himself out in the mirror. He was using gel to get his hair to look a lot more compact and curly, just like Atlas' would be. "I would vote for him if I wasn't certain that I'll be the only vote against him…which leaves me to vote between Gerald or 3V. Such good choices…"
Team B-Side was up on the rooftops, with all of them sitting down around the neon bonfire while Chef and Chris stood by their usual podium. There was only one drink ticket left in the hands of the hosts, as Eliza, Elward, Bailey, Jhin, Atlas, Eli, and Bec had all gotten their tickets already, leaving 3V and Gerald as the only empty handed members of the team. Chris stepped forward towards the two contestants, waving the ticket in front of their eyes with a big smirk on his face.
"Now, now…3V…Gerald…you two are both in the hot seat tonight for the same reason: your team is suspecting you of sabotaging the challenge by forfeiting most of your team's chances to go ahead in the challenge. Gerald, you were really acting pretty weird during the bulk of the challenge…3V, you were drunk, like you always are, and I'm pretty sure you don't even really remember seeing the clipboard." Chris snickered as 3V shrugged her shoulders, really not seeing what was the big deal about this whole thing. "Now, I could just say who is out, but since the votes are so close…I thought it would be better to just show you them!"
"Come on, stupid holographic screen…" Chef mumbled in annoyance while fiddling with a remote before he was finally able to get a holographic screen to show up above the bonfire. It showed a view of all of the B-Side teammates in their confessionals, respectively.
Confessional - 3V
"Well, I'm not gonna make the mistake of voting for myself again! Wait…have I done that before…? I dunno, I vote Gerald!" 3V nodded before taking a swig from her beer bottle.
Confessional - Jhin
"Behhhhh…beh behhhhh…Gerald is too much of a wimpy wimp to do anything like that! 3V, now that girl is a total crazy pants! She probably did it, so I'm voting her out!" Jhin stuck her tongue out at the camera.
Confessional - Bailey
"Jhin said she was going to hit me with a school bus if I didn't vote for 3V…" Bailey couldn't help but giggle behind her hand, "Her empty threats are always so ridiculous…b-but still, I'll vote 3V."
Confessional - Elward
"This is so stupid! We definitely could have won that challenge all well and fine if I was allowed to go on past the first round! I'm just…aggravated now! Agh, I vote Gerald!" Elward crossed his arms and turned around, with HAILEY's screen popping up behind him, showing a ballot that had the name "Gerald" on it.
Confessional - Eliza
"I just don't think it could have been 3V at all…I'm sorry Gerald, but you have to go." Eliza looked down at her own lap and sighed.
Confessional - Bec
"Oh, this is all so crazy to me…I just don't see why anyone would want to hurt my best buddy by making him over eat! Since no one would logically do that, I have to think that it was just a drunk mistake from 3V, but I'll have to vote her out for it!" Bec couldn't help but smirk as he shrugged his shoulders.
Confessional - Eli
"I'm on the team for one challenge and somebody is already trying to start shit with me…great. Gerald can go, or whatever…I don't really feel like being on the same team as an obvious lunatic." Eli just rolled his eyes before going back to looking at his phone.
Confessional - Atlas
"Ugh…stomach hurts so much…need a bucket…" Atlas was standing outside of his car, and ended up puking all over the ground out there. A message flashed on the screen after that, one that read, "VOTE NOT RECORDED."
Confessional - Gerald
"I mean, it just makes sense to vote for 3V if other people are also voting for 3V!" Gerald just smiled innocently at the camera.
"Atlas couldn't vote so…that makes it a four to four tie on votes. Does that mean there's gonna be a tiebreaker challenge like we did with Morgan and Marshmallow that one time?" Eli looked up at Chris, who was about to answer that before he was suddenly interrupted.
"Wait! You guys are so silly, you forgot to play Allan's confessional! He wanted to record his separately from mine, but his vote will definitely make it so it's not a tie! Watch!" Gerald pointed at the screen as it showed the view of the driver's seat in the yacht, with no one sitting there. Well, Allan was there and all, but no one could really see him.
"Alright, Chris, come on, this is just crazy talk…just bring out the tiebreaker or whatever…" Eliza slapped her palm against her face, groaning in annoyance.
"Wait a minute…what?" Gerald's smile sunk into a frown as he looked at one of the empty seats on the rooftop. "Allan…you…voted for me!? But…you and me…we're best buddies!" Everyone watched in silence as the delusional man stepped closer towards the seat, wondering why this had happened to him. "...I…know that I can act a little crazy when you're gone…but I didn't mean it, I don't wanna get anybody hurt! You just think that it would be best if I took a break from all this competing stuff…? Maybe…maybe you're right…but…are you going to stay here with me gone? …You're gonna come with me!? Really!? Oh, Allan, you're the best pal I could ever ask for!" Gerald wrapped Allan up in his arms once again, overwhelmed by joy as tears started to roll down his cheeks.
"So…like…is there a point to this? Gerald, you really are kind of ruining my elimination ceremony here." Chris crossed his arms and tapped his foot in annoyance.
"Don't worry, Chris! I'll take my elimination in grace! And Allan quitting with me…it kind of makes me feel a bit better about losing!" Gerald turned around to face the rest of his team, blushing from embarrassment. "Guys, I'm really sorry if I've been freaky or weird for the past few days…I really didn't mean it or anything! H-hopefully I can make it up to you later! Allan and I could throw you all a big party!"
"Okay, Chef, get these two clowns out of here already!" Chef nodded back at Chris before leaving the podium to go walk over to Gerald, scooping him and Allan both up in his arms.
"Oof! Oh, Chef, your arms are a lot rougher than I would've thought them to be! You're kinda hurting all of my ribs! But not Allan, though! He's a big tough guy, he'd never ever get hurt by a bear hug like this!" Chef was getting just as annoyed with Gerald as Chris and everyone else at this point, and he brought over to the hyperspace tube to put him and Allan both at the bottom of it. It started to light up, like it was getting to run. "Oh, looks like we're leaving now! Well, hopefully next challenge goes better for you guys! Bye bye, bye byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" The crazy man's voice got softer and softer as he was yoinked off into the distance by the tube, but once he couldn't be heard any more, Chris sighed in relief.
"All of these wackos, man, I can hardly take it!" Chris shook his head and turned to face the camera with a grin, "Well, you've seen it all here, dudes! Gerald is one crazy guy! And I'm still somewhat sure that Allan doesn't even exist and that he's just punking us! I wonder what's going to happen to the rest of B-Side, though…we'll have to find out next time on Total Drama: Neon City!"
C.K. Swing Songs: A Grave Mistake by Ice Nine Kills
Votes: Gerald - 3V, Elward, Eliza, Eli, Allan; 3V - Gerald, Jhin, Bailey, Bec; None - Atlas
22nd: Henry Yates, the Socially Awkward Kid
21st: Gwendolyn Linelife, the Harsh Doctor
20th: Heath Alghieri, the Puppet Master
19th: Giselle Gingersnap, the Wannabe MILF
18th: Suzie Venta, the Reference Queen
17th: Marshmallow Fulloff, the Connoisseur of Sweets
16th: Gerald Piscurr, Mr. Talks to Himself (and Allan Heiver, the Imaginary? Friend)
Team A-Side: Amanda, Cherry, Edward, Garfield, Leo, Morgan, Zayden
Team B-Side: Atlas, Bailey, Bec, Eli, Eliza, Elward, Jhin, 3V
