Round 1: Fight!

[Gundham]

(Juanita Reid: Pregame Start)

A couple of quarters jingled in Juanita's sweater pocket as she made her way through the arcade. "'Scuse me," she mumbled as she slipped past a couple of older guys lounging near a racing simulator. She was careful to leave some distance between herself and them, a holdover instinct from the pandemic. The days of masks and hand sanitizer were in the past, but some things still lingered. Juanita looked at the rows of machines, wondering how long it'd be before she stopped thinking about how many grubby hands had been on the joysticks and buttons before hers.

Juanita only came to the arcade occasionally. Money was tight in the Reid household these days, and blowing through ten or twenty bucks at the arcade wasn't always an option. Most of the time she just watched other people play and took advantage of the nearby Pokestops and gym battles, giving her an afternoon's worth of entertainment on the cheap. On days like today when she had a bit of change, every quarter had to count. Some machines took two, some took four, others took a whopping eight, which seemed rather excessive for a few minutes of fun. She liked to spread out the experience and play a few different things, in order to get the most for her money.

These days, she liked to think that video games were more than just an escape from everyday life; they were a way to stay sharp. Shooting and driving games were useful for testing reflexes, fighting games were good for analyzing patterns and plotting reactions, and Mrs. Pac-Man was a handy reminder that girls could kick as much butt as boys, if not more. But Juanita wasn't heading for any of those. She was making her way to the classics: a bank of gaudy red-and-yellow Skee-Ball machines. Ever since she was a kid, Skee-Ball had been her mainstay. It was the first game she'd ever beaten her older brothers at, and eventually she'd gotten good enough that they didn't want to play against her anymore. She'd always considered that a significant victory. Skee-Ball was the first machine she visited on any trip to the arcade, and she usually saved a few coins to hit it up again on her way out. She'd never gotten a perfect score, but with enough practice? Maybe someday.

The machine was currently unoccupied, so Juanita took her usual lane at the far left. She thumbed a few coins into the slot, and released the balls. It was time to play.

[Ryuki]

(Chester Folk: Pregame Start)

Chester was looking forward to going to the arcade again. Ever since the pandemic, he’d been stuck at home going stir crazy. Maybe the lockdown could have ended sooner had people wore the stupid masks, but at least it was over now. Still had to deal with those who’d rather risk infecting themselves and others by not getting vaccinated though. That’s why Chester thought it was handy to keep his mask on when he went out.

As Chester made his way through the arcade, he wondered what games he could try. He could blast the undead in The House of the Dead. Or, he could race cartoon characters in Nicktoons Racing. Or, he could beat up martial artists in Tekken 3. He needed to be careful with his choices, because he only brought a $10 roll of quarters, and these games can eat them up like Pac-Man eats pellets.

Perhaps he’ll start with a pallet cleanser. He spotted a row of skee-ball machines along the wall. They only took a couple quarters, so it could serve as a decent warm up. Someone was already at the machine on the far left, so he situated himself at the machine a couple lanes down, to maintain social distancing. He popped a couple quarters in and about 10 balls were released to his disposal. Let the game begin.

[Pippi]

((Poppy Fontaine continued from open the door, close the door, got to get through the other side of the door, open the door.))

Today’s T-Shirt: White, with black text that says ‘Which mash do you prefer? (Choose one).’ Two tick boxes underneath are labelled ‘Potato’ and ‘Monster’.




Y’know, it was really nice to see that the arcade here had managed to survive the pandemic. Like, sure, Poppy knew it had to be one of the most popular locations in Salem for both tourists and locals - the place was full to the gills today, every cabinet and table occupied, and even some of the empty machines sporting a half-full drinks cup as a makeshift ‘Be Right Back’ sign - but it was still the sorta place that lived and died based on how many people actually visited. She had been pretty worried that - so long as everybody actually behaved themselves and stayed the fuck at home during lockdown - she’d roll up to this place and find it totally gutted and deserted.

And it wasn’t a fear born out of customer loyalty or anything, in fact it was the total opposite. Cause, to tell the total truth, Poppy had never actually been to this arcade since moving to Salem; she’d only actually been to one before in her entire life, this little place in St. Ives where she’d sat in one of the racing game cabinets, pretended to drive the Demo car, and watched her dad fail miserably at House of the Dead. It had been a kinda forbidden fruit for her, in a way; there was always a little arcade room at every service station in Britain, and she’d never ever had time to go inside whenever her family stopped off for a coffee or toilet break. She’d kinda made the unconscious decision, as soon as places had fully opened up again, to head on down to The Willows and take a look around the place.

And, well, here she was, big ol’ cup of root beer in hand, wandering through an ocean of vibrant, flashing lights, the hubbub and chattering of the crowd proving more than a match for the sounds of Tekken and Street Fighter. She wasn’t… entirely sure what she was looking for, to be honest! And to be double honest, she was a smidge intimidated by the whole deal; the paralysis of choice in combination with the fact that most of the games were two-player deals was making this much more of a stressful ordeal than she’d expected.

She strolled past a DDR cabinet with a big ‘Out Of Order’ sign plastered to it, just about managing to avoid stepping in a big sticky patch of what she hoped was just spilled drink, and now found herself in the realm of air hockey tables, and other non-electronic games. She scanned the general area, standing out of the way of the main thoroughfare and taking a sip from her root beer, and her gaze stopped on two people she was pretty sure she recognised from school.

Well. To be more accurate, the back of two peoples’ heads she recognised. She watched them play for a little while longer, making sure that her brain was absolutely positively convinced that she knew these people, which was then bulletproof reinforced when she caught a glimpse of both of their faces at the same time. Chester and Juanita, if she wasn’t horribly mistaken. Yeah, those were good folks, good people to talk to. She felt the little rush of anxiety in her brain dissipate, as she stepped up a few feet away from them both.

“Hey guys,” Poppy said chirpily, taking a quick sip from her drink before continuing. “How’s the, uh…”

Oh. Shit. She had managed to, inexplicably, already run into a problem here. Because although she knew what the game Chester and Juanita were playing was, and how to play it, and how to score points, and all that shit, there was one very, very vital piece of information about it that had evaded her knowledge til now.

“... The, uh, ball… throwing game… going…?”

She didn’t have a goddamn clue what it was actually called.

[VoltTurtle]

The arcade at the Willows wasn't exactly a bastion for radical politics.

Natasha didn't play video games. She wasn't interested in toying around with false realities. Instead, she focused on the real world and trying to fix its various faults. Rather than games, what this place offered to her was a nice place to socialize and recruit. She had first encountered Abhishek here at the arcade, and now he was one of the most loyal members of her Vanguard. Today she may well repeat the same stunt.

If not, she could always play some skee-ball. Not to win tickets to get a prize, but for the fun of the game. She had no interest in collecting useless baubles and commodities. Such material would not bring her satisfaction, only create clutter in her household. She wanted to live in the moment, and enjoy the world as it came to her.

Spending her time playing a game like this could be seen as a waste. There were other, better activities she could be doing instead. She could get on her soapbox and try to change the hearts and minds of the public. She could continue to work on that video essay about Lenin's State & Revolution. She could prepare for her election campaign for class president.

Except there was nothing wrong with taking a moment for some leisure. It wasn't like the material conditions for revolution were here yet. Her time would come in the next decade, when the roar of the coming climate crisis was knocking down their door. In the aftermath, the mask of humanity would fall from capital. Then the proletariat would finally understand that she had been right all along.

Natasha's boots clunked against the ground as she approached the skee-ball machines. Her eyes scanned her surroundings, watching for anyone else that would be amenable to her. She had a notable reputation around town for being loud and abrasive. It wasn't something she had tried to cultivate. She was honest about who she was, and had never cared for earning social capital. When you speak truth to power, you tend to earn the ire of those higher in the social hierarchy.

Approaching the machines, it wasn't long before she spotted a few familiar faces from JEM. She didn't know Juanita, Chester, or Poppy well, and she wasn't sure how amenable they would be to her. Today would be a good day for her to experiment and learn.

"It's skee-ball, Poppy," Natasha chimed in from behind. Her voice was calm and measured, but clearly audible over the chaos of the arcade. "It looks like they both just got started."

Natasha slid past Poppy and stopped in front of the machine between Chester and Juanita. One hand slid into her pocket, and emerged with a handful of quarters.

"Want to take a shot at it yourself? My treat," she said with a smirk. "Or maybe I could show you how it's done, instead."

[Gundham]

Juanita gave a friendly smile to the two girls who'd just arrived, feeling just a tad sheepish. Truth be told, she hadn't actually recognized Chester on sight - she didn't know him terribly well, and with most of his face obscured by the mask on she hadn't made the connection until the other two had arrived. She mentally kicked herself for not catching it earlier. She'd have given the guy a greeting or a little wave or something, if she'd known. Ah, geez... I hope he doesn't think I was snubbing him or something.

Well, there was nothing for it now except to be nice and hope that Chester absorbed some of the goodwill via osmosis.

She cradled the ball in her hands, and turned to Natasha and Poppy. "The ball-throwing game is going all right," she said to the latter. "You're welcome to join in! I've only bowled a couple, so there's plenty of time to catch up if you guys wanna." She'd only taken two shots thus far - but the glaring red neon display already showed that today was not going to be the day she bowled the Perfect Game. She'd drained the first one into the 100-point ring, but the second took a bad hop coming off the ramp and spanged off the rim. She'd been lucky enough to pick up a lowly ten points for the effort. The game was a wash, but with a few more people it could still turn out to be pretty fun.

Well... maybe. Juanita didn't know Natasha except by reputation; word in the locker rooms had it that the girl was a bit of a firebrand on the volleyball team. But it'd been a long time since Juanita had played Skee-Ball against somebody with an actual competitive streak, and what felt like an eternity since she'd gone toe-to-toe with another athlete in anything remotely physical. She'd happily welcome the chance to bring someone like that into her game. Uh, our game, she mentally corrected, remembering Chester. "Hey," she said aloud, "maybe we can make it a four-player thing? Winner gets a championship ring from the prize booth."

The rings in question were gaudy, off-brand Ring Pops selling for a princely sum of five tickets. Not enough to break the bank for any of them, but still something that could be worn with a modicum of pride.

[Ryuki]

Just then a couple more girls came along. One of them, Poppy, asked how the skee-ball game was going.

“Well, I just started, so…,” Chester said, a bit awkwardly, then shrugged. He hadn’t thrown a single ball when the two arrived.

Juanita, the girl who was playing skee-ball when Chester got there, invited them to join in on a four player match. The winner gets a ring from the prize booth. Chester didn’t mind being roped in, he liked a bit of competition.

“That sounds fun,” Chester said, “I’m down.”

He quickly glanced over at one of the girls, Natasha, someone he heard could get pretty competitive.

“Win or lose, no hard feelings, yeah?”, he said.

[Pippi]

Poppy let out a squawk of surprise (and that was a generous way of describing it) as Natasha spoke up from behind her, and she just about managed to keep a hold onto her root beer, avoiding what certainly would not have been her first soda-carpet-mishap rodeo. There was a faint blush in her cheeks, and not just because she’d audibly admitted that she didn’t know what skee-ball was called. It wasn’t as though Natasha had spoken particularly loudly or menacingly, after all, and more fool her for not having heard those big heavy boots clomp clomping along; although that did give her the fun mental image of the girl appearing out of thin air, arriving in a suspiciously hammer-and-sickle-shaped puff of smoke.

Poppy was just kinda naturally skittish when it came to sudden sounds and Things appearing out of nowhere, she supposed! That, in conjunction with her lingering nerves from wandering around an unfamiliar place for the first time, was what had contributed to her sounding eerily similar to a startled cat just now. She hoped Natasha wouldn’t think it was, like, a reaction to her or anything. Poppy really didn’t have any problems at all with her, and, in all honesty, agreed with the baseline of all of her politics; she just happened to be really hardcore and really intense about all of them, which could be a little… off-putting.

Yeah, ‘off-putting’, that was a good, diplomatic way of describing it.

Natasha had offered to give her a little lesson on the ancient arcane art of skee-ball, but it seemed as though Juanita had another idea in mind, and honestly, Poppy was totally here for it. Her eyes lit up, growing all round and starry, and she started bouncing on her heels in excitement.

“Oooh, yeah, I’m down for this!” Poppy said, grinning at the others as she made her way to the machine on Chester’s right. “You should probs hold onto your money if we’re doing this, Natasha, cheers for the offer though!”

She stared down the skee-ball machine in front of her.eying it up. The machine stared back, unblinking, emotionless and uncaring to her status as a newbie. It seemed easy enough, at least. Roll the ball down the ramp, hope it ended up in one of the high scoring holes, try and get the highest score outta the four of them. Yeah, simple. Piece of cake. In theory, obviously; in reality, she was probably gonna end up with nothing but 10s, but hey, maybe she’d strike it lucky today! Only one way to find out!

“Yeah, all in good fun and stuff, right?” She said, tagging on from Chester’s statement. “But, uh… go easy on me anyway, yeah?”

She looked down the aisle, beaming at the other three to show she wasn’t being totally serious, slightly adjusting her glasses with her free hand.

“This is my first time, after all!”

[VoltTurtle]

A competition?

Not everything had to be a competition. Natasha herself was much more keen on mutual cooperation. At least there was nothing wrong with a test of skill and prowess between comrades. She still enjoyed playing volleyball at JEM, after all. Though, she never cared to get a prize at the end. It was the journey and experiences that mattered in life, not the material objects.

As a bonus, participating might help take off her hard edge. Despite her reputation, she was not as difficult to get along with as was often assumed. While she could say that all she wanted, actions spoke louder than words. It was better to demonstrate that fact than dwell on it.

"Sure, I'm down," she replied, slipping all but a few of her quarters into her pocket. "Poppy can have the prize when I win, though."

She gave the other girl a smile, and a wink.

"Shall we get started? Are we taking turns, or going all at once?"

[Gundham]

Juanita considered Natasha's question.

On the one hand, she'd already bowled twice, and it'd probably be easier to just finish the game individually and let the glowing red readouts tell the story at the end of it all. But on the other had, taking turns would certainly draw out the event and make it feel more like a proper competition. It was one thing to take a shot when everybody else was occupied and you could just focus on your own performance, but bowling with three other sets of eyes on you, with all of them privately hoping that you'd whiff it... that sounded a lot more fun.

Juanita opened her mouth to suggest that they go with that, when it rather abruptly occurred to her that the others might not feel the same way. She pursed her lips and thought it over. She personally found it invigorating to play with high stakes, and with the pressure amped up, but she got the sense that the others just wanted to play a game and have a good time...Geez, how long had it been since she'd played something like this without thinking about what muscle groups it'd work, or how it'd help her hand-eye coordination, or how to get the high score? Did she even know how to just enjoy Skee-ball?

It was an unexpectedly deep thought, but one she didn't have time to ruminate on. She'd now been standing there for a good two or three seconds, processing. She snapped out of it, and looked over at the other lanes. "Uh... hmm. I've already taken a couple shots, so it might be easier to just go free-for-all? What do you guys think?"

[Ryuki]

“Sure, okay,” Chester said in response to Juanita’s free-for-all suggestion.

This wasn’t a bowling alley, this was skew ball. Why would you need to take turns? Let the scores determine who reigns supreme. He grabbed a ball from the slot and raised it to his face. He focused on which pocket he wanted to target. He set his sights on the 50 point pocket in the middle.

“Here goes.”

With a gentle sway of his arm, Chester let go of the ball, and it rolled up the towards his intended target. The ball launched up towards the pockets, but instead of the 50 points Chester wanted, it landed on the 10 point pocket at the bottom of the board. Chester sucked his teeth in disappointment. He grabbed another ball.

[Pippi]

… Goddamnit, dude. Was she seriously gonna blush up and turn beet red the instant a cute and/or buff girl paid her a compliment or gave her a smile or a wink? History and experience both suggested ‘Absolutely’, but like, come ooooon, she’d barely even talked to Natasha before today! And now she was legitimately getting the doki dokis just cause she’d been winked at in a ‘I’m gonna totally kick your ass at skee ball’ kinda way.

She was nothing if not consistent, at least, as her mum liked to say. Someone cute was nice to her or helped her with something, she immediately developed a huge crush on them, she didn’t do anything about it, and within a week and a bit, it disappeared entirely. Rinse and repeat, ad nauseum. Ah well. It was totally harmless, aside from the week’s worth of heartache, and why change the habits of a lifetime? … Which was also a mum-ism.

At least she had this skee-ball contest to distract her and expedite that ‘forget about the crush entirely’ part. So long as she stopped gawping at Natasha like she’d never seen another girl before, dummy.

Poppy shook her head a little, clearing away the Big Gay Cobwebs, before puttingher root beer on top of the coin slot, and replacing it in her hand with her wallet. She rooted through the coin pocket for a batch of quarters (man, she still had a couple of pound coins in there, she really needed to just toss them in her desk drawer or something), before feeding them into the slot, watching Chester take his turn as her machine dispensed the balls. Ten points was uh. Not a great start! Didn’t need to be a skee-ball master to figure that one out.

“All right, first throw, let’s go! Get your airhorns and confetti ready, this is gonna be mega!”

She very very briefly considered kissing the ball for emphasis, really play up to the crowd of three, but putting your lips on anything in a public arcade was just asking for trouble, and a whole host of brand new and exciting diseases on top. Instead, with an underarm swing that she knew was way too soft as soon as she released, she rolled the ball down her lane. With a majestic Free Willy leap, it launched itself at the board, landing right in the 10 points ring, not even close to anything higher.

“Practice shot,” Poppy said, unable to stop herself from grinning. “Gotta warm up my, uh, skee-ball muscles.”

[VoltTurtle]

Natasha couldn't help but belt out a laugh, leaning on the machine for support. Not only because she was clearly going to win this, but because Poppy's way of saving face was genuinely that funny. The other girl would make for a good member of the Vanguard, helping to keep everyone's spirits up. Though, that would have to wait for later. There was a time for recruitment, and a time for skee-ball.

"Good one, Poppy," Natasha said, as she regained her composure and stretched her arms in preparation. "Now, let me show you how it's done."

With a smile on her face and a few quick flicks of her wrist, Natasha inserted the quarters into the machine. Hardly a loss to get waste a few coins on a game. Especially when they bore the visage of a slave owner.

She took hold of one of the balls right as the machine dispensed them, eyeing the board ahead. She could feel her blood beginning to boil. The pins and needles feeling of that familiar competitive spirit rushed through her. She didn't need to just win, she needed to crush the rest of them. So that made her decision making easy. She'd sink every ball in the 100 point chutes.

Natasha squeezed the ball in her hand tight. She reared back, all the muscles in her back and arms tensing up. Then with one fluid motion, she threw it forward. The ball skidded across the mat, sailing up into the air, and then cleanly missed the highest score hole. Frustration began to build as she watched it sink to the bottom, her score staying at zero.

They can't all be winners.

She didn't say anything after watching the miss, her smile disappearing. She scowled, grabbing another ball without waiting for anyone else to take another shot. For some people, going for the highest possible score and missing would discourage them, and make them attempt something easier to save face.

Natasha was not one of those people.

Once more, she reared back, all the muscles in her back and arms tensing up. She held her breath for a moment, and exhaled as she threw it forward. The ball shot across the mat, up into the air. This time, she didn't miss. Her score climbed one hundred points.

She let out a sigh, her smile returning.

"There we go. Can't make them all, but you miss every shot you don't take."

[Gundham]

Nice. Juanita gave an impressed nod as Natasha's ball thunked into the hundred-point hole, then cracked a smile at the quote she used. Juanita had heard the phrase a few times, but wasn't sure that she agreed with it, since experience had taught her that you also missed a significant percentage of the shots you took in haste. But it wasn't for philosophical reasons that she'd been hanging back, cradling her third ball but not actually taking the shot yet. She wanted to scope out the competition, just a bit.

Chester and Poppy were off to a bit of a slow start, but with the right shots they could definitely pick it up. Natasha, on the other hand, seemed likely to give her a run for her money. It didn't take a practiced eye to note the way that the other girl's posture had changed on the second shot, the way her muscles flexed when she gripped of the ball. There were a hundred little tells that indicated that an athlete was getting serious, and Natasha was evincing several of them.

But she wasn't the only one. Juanita's knuckles whitened around the skee-ball as her grip shifted, and she squared her shoulders as she stared down the lane. Her eyes flicked to the score display between the two lanes, where twin 110s were illuminated. She visualized it ringing in 210-110, then 310-110, then 410, 510... Her heart thrummed just thinking about it. Gah, she just wanted to win. She hadn't won at anything that mattered in longer than she could remember. She wanted to go guns-a-blazing for the 100 point hole, blast out a score that left everybody else in the dust. She pictured them shaking their heads in amazement, their scores nowhere close. They'd be so impressed! ...Wouldn't they?

They wouldn't, she realized soberly. They'd just shrug, congratulate her a little, and then leave. Maybe they'd steer clear of Skee-ball every time they came to the arcade, remembering the time that that weird overly competitive girl hustled them for a ring pop. Somehow, that outcome seemed even worse. She added a mental addendum to Natasha's quote: You miss one hundred percent of the shots you don't take, but you also lose one hundred percent of the games nobody wants to play with you anymore.

Fine. She'd dial it back. Just a little. This wasn't a charity. She fired off two rapid shots, the first one a quick lay-up into the 50-point ring, the second a weak attempt at a forty, which took a bad bounce and became a twenty instead. "Crap!" she groaned, genuinely disappointed in that result. She'd been exclusively aiming for the 100 for so long that she was out of practice for the other rings. It was gonna be an interesting game, all right...

[Ryuki]

Hmph, show off.

Chester raised an eyebrow at Natasha’s 100-point gain. It was impressive, but annoying. Some people had all the luck. Poppy was fairing about as well as he was. Juanita, meanwhile, was fairing better. He needed to step his game up.

“Let’s do this,” he muttered under his breath, as he narrowed his eyes and gripped his ball.

Chester swayed his arm back, then forward, letting go of the ball. It rolled up the towards the board, and bounced up towards the pockets. He had aimed for the 50 point pocket again, but landed in the 40 point ring instead. That’s better than 10 points, but Chester knew she could do better.

Chester grabbed his next ball, and eyed the 50 point pocket again. With the sway of his arm, he rolled the ball towards the pockets. It danced a bit on the rim of his intended target, but it landed right where he wanted.

“Yes,” Chester said, clenching his fist. He grabbed another ball. Current points: 100.

[Pippi]

Ohhh, right. Now she remembered. Natasha was that kind of competitive, wasn’t she?

Her words totally belied her true nature. She might have been quoting Michael Scott quoting Wayne Gretzky, but that little scowl on her face and the complete absence of a reply after totally whiffing the entire board said one thing and one thing only; “If you ain’t first, you’re last.” Apparently that rule applied regardless of whether the ball game you were playing was volley or skee.

And Poppy got it, honest! Cause like, winning was fun, and losing was much less fun, and she herself had gotten way too intense over casual games of League and Smite in the past, so she couldn’t say she’d never had a case of the silent pouty face before. But on the other hand, like, to quote a totally different ice hockey legend; ‘It’s only game. Why you heff to be mad?’ Cause in the end, they were just playing a dumb fun carnival game, with the grand prize being a tiny little cheap plastic ring. Everybody would cheer for the winner, and then they’d all go off and buy a slice of eye-wateringly overpriced pizza. Really not the sorta thing to blow a gasket over losing.

She was reminded a little bit of a friend she’d once had back in Stratford, who came over pretty much every weekend to play Smash Bros., except he would only ever play King Dedede and would throw a huge tantrum if he didn’t win at least one game out of every five. Maybe she needed to try the same strategy here with Natasha and throw the game some just to placate her?

Poppy considered it, then shook her head. Nah. This wasn’t some shitty little twelve year old boy she was playing against, after all. She was sure that everyone here would take whatever the results were gracefully because, again, they were fighting for the coveted trophy of a loop of neon coloured plastic. They were here to relax and have fun! The pandemic had been totally turbo shitty, so she was certain that everybody was as happy as she was to get out of the house and socialise and have a good time again!

Also she’d just thrown another 10-pointer, and you kinda needed to actually be doing good in the first place before you could throw the game.

Poppy put her hands on her hips and pouted, frowning down the lane, trying to use her telekinetic powers to lift the ball up into the 100 point ring. Once again, her powers lay dormant - some day she’d totally activate them, she was sure of it - and she remained dead last in the first round of the Inaugural John Endecott Memorial Academy Skeeball Tournament. This whole ‘aiming’ lark had never been her forte when it came to sports; her usual tactic when she’d played football had always been the ol’ ‘Hoof It and Hope’ strat. Which, admittedly, had worked out surprisingly well for the Under-11s team, but this game required a tiny bit more finesse than launching it as hard as she could. Well, either that, or…

“Hey, gimme some motivation for this next throw, yeah?”

Poppy’s request was aimed at all of the other three, as she stood holding her ball, her grin still firmly planted on her face.

“Gimme some incentive not to cock this next one up, something like, uh, ‘Go on Poppy if you don’t get 100 points then you have to buy us all pizza’ or something like that?”

Soooo, what had all that been about this just being a game? Just a bit of a laugh with the mates? And now she was bringing prizes of actual monetary value into the mix. Ah well. It wasn’t like she was forcing the others to do the same. The only loser here would be her poor wallet.

And hey, maybe she would still make that 100 point shot and she wouldn't have to buy anyone anything! Ha ha. Fantastic joke as always, Poppy.