Chapter Text
Mustard Bottle slowly opened her eyes. The others were talking around her in muffled voices; they gradually became clearer as she regained consciousness.
Stocking let out a sigh of relief when she finally woke up,
“ohmygosh, she’s not dead...”
Mustard Bottle didn’t know what was going on. She tried to stand up and ask everyone why they were surrounding her, but a sudden spike of pain in her leg sent her tumbling back down.
“Ow, ow— ow, ow-ow, ow!”
Stocking yelped and held on to her, just in time to break her fall. Mustard Bottle looked down towards her legs—specifically to the right, where the pain was concentrated—and saw how it bent into sharp, unnatural angles. In an instant, the memories came flooding back.
Oh yeah.
She was up for elimination.
Standing beside her, Melony spoke up into the air with a tone of urgent concern,
“Is the cast ready yet?”
Airy responded a second later,
“Yeah, in a minute. I just need to attach the wooden plank.”
“Plank?” Nail asked incredulously, “What kind of cast is this again?”
Airy didn’t answer, but directed his attention onto Mustard Bottle and her broken leg,
“Hold on, before I give you the cast, I need to straighten out your leg first.”
She didn’t know how, but Airy speaking to her made her feel like she was being watched. Of course, that was far less important to her than what Airy said he was going to do.
“W-wait, what?” Mustard Bottle asked, eyes widening.
Mustard Bottle tried talking her way out of it,
“Nononono, i-it’s fine. I can just let it h-heal on its own—” She winced in pain as she continued to plead, but still preferred it over having Airy straighten her leg.
Airy talked over her,
“Hold still, this should only hurt a little.”
“Besides- I s-swear that I’ll be fine and I’m PERFECTLY CAPABLE OF—"
Before Mustard Bottle could say anything more, an invisible force grabbed her leg and forcefully straightened it out, pulling it with a sharp crack.
The others either grimaced or looked at her in worry, with the exception of Tomatoey, who was lying a distance away from everyone else, still with that vacant look in her eyes.
Mustard Bottle bit her lip to restrain herself from crying, but it wasn’t enough to stop a tear from rolling down her face.
A wooden cast that was bound together by vines appeared in the air, and was placed onto Mustard Bottle’s leg. Two wooden crutches also fell besides her, and Airy told her what to do,
“Use these to help you walk.”
Mustard Bottle shakily got up with the help of the crutches and Stocking, and tried to take a step forward, only for her to lose her balance when one of them breaks.
Stocking managed to catch her before she could fall, to which the two girls let out a sigh of relief.
“It’s okay, I’ll help you,” Stocking said.
She carefully took the other crutch off the ground and handed it back to Mustard Bottle, who gave her a small, grateful smile,
“T-thank you.”
“No problem.”
“Are you gonna be okay wearing that cast?” Nail asked, “It looks... really uncomfortable.”
“I think I’ll g-get used to it,” Mustard Bottle replied, voice still a little wobbly, “Besides, I’m just glad that I’m not dead at this point...”
“Yeah,” Stocking agreed, “I can’t imagine dying in a place like this.”
“Can’t say the same for us all, though,” Candy Bar interrupted, glancing at Melony, “How’d you describe it?”
Melony thought for a moment, looking uncertain,
“It was... odd, is all I can say,” he shrugged, “Right, Tomatoey?”
He and the others turned to face Tomatoey, only to find a disturbed patch of grass where she originally was, the only sign that she was ever there.
“Er- where’d she go?”
“Airy,” Candy Bar began, failing to control his tone.
“Yeah?”
“Where did Tomatoey go?”
“Oh, right,” Airy said, “She was eliminated. Between her and Mustard Bottle, she got the most votes, so I sent her back.”
“How many votes even were there?” Nail asked,
“I don’t know, I didn’t count.”
Nail looked exasperated while Candy Bar facepalmed, but Airy continued nonetheless,
“Anyways, moving on from the elimination, it’s time to introduce our newest contestants.”
Once again, everyone complained.
“I’m sorry- newest contestants?”
“Hold on, you can’t just do that!”
“How many, exactly?”
“Are you kidding me!?”
Everyone continued to argue with Airy—even Mustard Bottle, although her voice was heavily drowned out by the others—but a few moments later, a subway seat materialized out of thin air, a couple of feet away from them.
It fell to the ground with a thud, and everyone went silent.
[ONE: JUST TRIPPED]
Staring at the subway seat, there was only one thing on their minds: “Were they a new contestant?”
Cautiously, Nail walked towards the subway seat and examined it. It didn’t have limbs, nor did it show any signs of life. Now that he was up close, he noted that almost looked like one he’d sit on in the subway trains he’d usually ride.
He looked to the sky, confused.
“I don’t get it, this is just a regular subway seat—”
A tub of whipped cream, the same size as the subway seat, suddenly appeared above him. It fell on his head before he could react, landing on the subway seat.
“Ow! What the—?”
Nail backed away to the others right as a double bass appeared and landed next to the subway seat. The contestants watched in shock, and a little bit of fascination, as more items appeared around the pile.
A container of airline food.
A giant contact lens.
A plastic lunch tray.
Everyone waited for something to happen, holding their breath. Stocking protectively stood in front of Mustard Bottle, while Melony tried to hide behind Candy Bar.
After a couple of seconds, it was Stocking who broke their silence and asked,
“Um, are you sure you teleported the right things?”
Airy answered in his usual deadpan,
“Yeah. Just wait.”
They waited, and after a few seconds, the subway seat suddenly gained a face. Everyone stared at it in bewilderment, and the subway seat looked almost as confused as them.
“What in the world...?” He squinted his previously hidden eyes, before growing himself a pair of arms.
Either ignoring or ignorant to the other contestant’s stares, the subway seat pushed the tub of whipped cream off of himself, which caused him to gain consciousness, too.
One by one, each of the inanimate objects—with the exception of the contact lens—all came to, and were met with the horrified expressions of the original contests, who had backed far away from them.
Nail tried to say something,
“Uh—”
“Hello new contestants,” Airy interrupted, “I am your new host, Airy, and welcome to this competition called ONE.”
A familiar, obnoxious trumpet performance began to play, and the Contact Lens finally gained consciousness. Melony brought his hands over his face.
“Oh, brother...”
The subway seat still looked confused,
“Um, could someone please explain what’s going on?”
Airy began,
“You’re on the Plane, here to—”
Candy Bar cut him off,
“Long story short, we’ve all been kidnapped by this invisible host to compete in this game show to win a wish for anything we want.” He said the last part while sarcastically doing jazz hands.
The new contestants all reacted to that prospect with varying degrees of delight, much to the others’ shock.
“Ooh, that sounds fun!” The airline food exclaimed, eyes sparkling.
“Yeah, I could get used to this,” The tub of whipped cream agreed.
“Don’t you guys have lives?” Stocking asked, “Are you not concerned with getting back to them?”
“Pfft,” the tub of whipped cream dismissed, “this beats standing around in a fridge any day.”
The original contestants looked at each other in confusion at his statement, but soon decided that talking to the newbies couldn’t do any harm.
Even though they were weird, they still seemed friendly.
The lunch tray walked over to Candy Bar; she seemed eager to introduce herself to someone.
“Hey, how’s it going? I’m a school lunch tray, it’s nice to meet you.”
Candy Bar was shocked that she was trying to talk to him at first, but he quickly recovered and tried to put his friendliest smile.
“Hi, my names Parker, but uh,” he clicked his tongue in disapproval, “the host is making everyone call me Candy Bar. What’s your name?”
The lunch tray looked confused.
“Hold on, wait, you have a name?”
Candy Bar was equally surprised.
“You... don’t?”
The lunch tray responded casually,
“Nah, that’s a human thing.”
Candy Bar’s surprise morphed into bewilderment,
“I’m sorry- a what?”
Stocking and Mustard Bottle were talking to the double bass nearby, the latter was much more apprehensive than the former.
“So, u-uh...” Mustard Bottle trailed off, only for Stocking to finish her sentence,
“How did you do that thing before?”
“Do what?”
“You know,” Stocking did a ‘poof’ motion to emphasize what she was saying, “the limb thing!”
The double bass looked confused, like the two of them were earnestly asking her whether the sky was blue.
“Oh, you guys don’t know how to do that?”
The other two shook their heads in response.
“I thought that was, uh, common knowledge.”
“I- I don’t t-think it is, uh...”
Mustard Bottle and Stocking watched as the double bass gave them a demonstration.
“It’s pretty easy, actually. All you gotta do is...”
The double bass popped her limbs back into her and sprang into the air, falling back to the ground and lying motionless on the grass.
Stocking and Mustard Bottle’s jaw dropped. They stared at the motionless double bass and then at each other in horror, and stayed that way until the double bass came back out of her ‘shell’.
Near the far end of the poles, Melony and the whipped cream container were talking to each other. The latter of whom seemed only seconds away from bursting into hysterics.
“So, let me get this straight. You,” he pointed to Melony, “a watermelon, have a job?”
Melony nodded and smirked a bit; the mocking tone completely flew over his head,
“Yeah, I run a gym in Yakima. It’s a pretty good place, if I do say so myself, heh.”
“Might I ask how you aren’t getting caught?”
At that, Melony expression turned into one of concentration, and he started to think.
“Well, I mean, I have all the valid permits and licenses to own and manage one, so I don’t really—”
Airy cut him off before he could say anything more,
“Oh yeah, forgot to mention that the new contestants are from a different world than you guys.”
An imaginary lightbulb lit up above Melony.
“Ohhhh. I guess that makes sense.”
The tub of whipped cream looked amazed.
Lastly, the subway seat and Nail were talking at the exact same spot where the new contestants appeared in, as the subway seat didn’t have any legs to walk with.
“So let me get this straight,” Nail started, “you guys come from a world of higher beings who rule everything.”
“Yep.” The subway seat nodded.
“And these higher beings, they’re called... humans, right?” The word still felt unnatural to say.
“Mhm.”
“Okay, and these humans use you like objects on a daily basis?”
“I mean, we are objects.”
“—Yet you’re forced to keep your sentience a complete secret to them?”
“Yeah, it kinda scares them.”
The subway seat looked nonchalant, while Nail was still curious.
“So what were you doing before you got here?”
Two humans were riding on a subway train, one using his phone, and the other one asleep.
Without warning, the subway seat the sleeping human was sitting on disappeared from under him, and he fell to the floor, waking up in shock.
The other human stopped using his phone to look at the man, eyes wide, and they speechlessly stared at each other for the rest of the ride.
A flight attendant was taking a passenger’s order for what they wanted for their in-flight meal. The passenger asked for the fried oysters option and a glass of water.
The flight attendant poured the passenger the glass of water and went to take the fried oysters. She grabbed a container from her meal cart and was about to serve it to passenger, only for it to disappear in her hands.
She and the passenger froze in disbelief, and started to shake uncontrollably.
A stack of lunch trays were sitting on a school cafeteria table. According to the wall clock, there was still an hour or two before the cafeteria was open.
A lunch lady behind the table was preparing food, and because she had her back turned on the trays, she did not notice when one of them vanished from the pile.
On the executive floor of a massive high-rise building, a businessman in a suit was spacing out during an important company meeting. He drank his coffee and tried to pay attention, only for half of his vision to suddenly go blurry.
He rubbed his eye and blinked rapidly, mumbling to himself, before realizing that his co-workers were all looking at him and asked him what was wrong.
Flushing, the businessman said that his contact lens must’ve fallen out and landed on the floor, and hastily excused himself to the bathroom to go apply another one.
In front of the refrigerated row of a supermarket, an employee was mopping up the floor from jug a of milk that a customer had dropped a couple of minutes before.
The employee cleaned up the spill and a customer approached him, asking for assistance. The two of them walked away, over to where the customer’s shopping cart was.
A couple of seconds later, a tub of whipped cream disappeared from the dairy fridge.
The girl was still in her bedroom, and was trying her best to work up the courage to tell her parents that her bass had vanished into thin air.
She grabbed the bow off of the floor and steadied her heartbeat. Repeating a mantra in her head that she wasn’t going insane, she opened the door to her room and left to find her parents.
Hopefully she could find a replacement before the concert came up...
“...Huh,” was all Nail could say.
Airy finally spoke up now that the contestants had time to mingle.
“Now that all of you got to know each other a little better, let’s name the new contestants—”
Said contestants became very excited.
“Wait, we’re getting actual names?”
“Like for real?”
“I’ve always wanted one!”
Candy Bar shook his head and sighed,
“It’s not as exciting as you think.”
Mustard Bottle looked up to the sky uneasily,
“You a-aren’t going to drop another table on us, r-right?”
“No, I ran out of name cards, so I’ll list them all now.”
The original contestants were all relieved.
“Let me just...”
The new contestants were all teleported into a straight line. Each of them—except for the double bass, who simply looked neutral—had an exuberant smile on their faces.
“Alright, there we go” the subway seat was the first one in line, he looked up to the sky with a grin, “Starting with you, you’ll be... Subway Seat.”
Subway Seat’s smile fell.
“Next is, um, Tray.”
And so did Tray’s.
“And after that is Contact Lens.”
And so did Contact Lens’.
“Next up, you’re... Airline Food...?”
“Oh, um, alright,” Arline Food mumbled, “that was pretty disappointing.”
He looked down to the ground and stopped smiling. By this point, nobody was.
“Called it,” Candy Bar whispered to Melony.
Airy continued,
“Yeah, Airline Food. After him is Bassy—”
Bassy’s expression didn’t change.
“Okay.”
“And finally is... u-uh... W-Whippy... Creamy...”
Whippy Creamy facepalmed,
“It was literally so easy: Whipped Cream. How did you screw this up?”
“I don’t know. Didn’t think we had enough ‘y’ names.”
“Whatever,” he rolled his eyes, “just tell us when the competition is starting.”
“Or even what it is,” Tray added.
“Right,” Airy said, “your challenge is to climb up to the top of one of the six poles. The last three to make it up will be up for elimination. 3, 2, 1, Go.”
And with that, the second competition had finally begun.
As soon as Airy’s announcement was finished, Candy Bar immediately ran to one of the poles and starts to climb.
“See you at the top!” he shouted to Melony.
“H-hey, wait up!” Melony whined. He ran up to the same pole Candy Bar was on and climbed up after him, while Nail, Stocking and Mustard Bottle all stayed on the ground.
As for the newbies, Tray and Whippy Creamy glanced at each other before they shrugged and sprinted over to the poles.
“Didn’t expect for it to be like, right now, but okay.” Whippy Creamy murmured as he scaled the pole to right of Candy Bar and Melony’s and to the left of Tray’s.
Airline Food was still trying to process the challenges rules—and sulking over the fact that he didn’t get an actual name—but seeing Tray and Whippy Creamy start to climb snapped him out of it.
“Oh dang, it’s already starting,” he commented. Airline Food jogged up to one of the available poles, the one on Tray’s right, and he looked over to the other contestants who still haven’t started.
“Good luck, you guys!”
He began his ascent.
“Airy really couldn’t think of anything better as a second challenge?” Nail mumbled, close enough for Subway Seat to hear.
“Oh,” he started, getting the other’s attention, “this is the second one? I guess we were late to the party.”
Nail shrugged and gave it to him straight,
“Eh, you didn’t miss much.”
He walked away, but not without wishing him luck on completing the challenge.
Subway Seat waved goodbye, wishing that he could’ve followed him.
Candy Bar was in the lead by a large margin, almost at the top while everyone else was still around the halfway point.
He looked down towards Melony, who noticeably struggling—only a third of the way up their pole.
“For someone who runs a gym, you sure are taking a while...” he mused, mouth curled into a taunting grin.
Huffing, Melony looked up at him, taking another deep, labored breath.
“Well I’d like to see you try being a watermelon and climbing this!” he yelled, letting one of his arms go to shake his fist at Candy Bar.
Melony’s grip was rapidly loosening, and he abruptly started to slip down.
He yelped and held onto the pole harder, blushing once he realized that Candy Bar was laughing at him.
“It’s harder than you think!”
Candy Bar was still cackling, wiping a tear away while he managed to hold on with only his other arm,
“I’ll take your word for it, then,” he snarked, “Have fun down there!”
With that, he climbed up the final stretch and pulled himself to the top, dusting himself off.
“First place, too,” he muttered.
Sure enough, and much to Melony’s chagrin, Airy announced his victory a few moments later,
“Oh. I guess Candy Bar is the first one safe from elimination.”
Candy Bar was teleported back to the ground a second later, right next to an awestruck Subway Seat.
“Woah, that was incredible!” he exclaimed.
Candy Bar smirked, taking on a boastful tone,
“Yeah, it was nothing.”
“You managed to get to the top so quickly!”
Candy Bar brightened at the compliment. He shrugged,
“What can I say? I’m just good at climbing. I used to go spelunking all the time with my...”
His grin faded, slowly replaced with a haunted expression,
“my friends...”
He trailed off after that, and eventually went silent.
Subway Seat had a puzzled look on his face,
“...What’s spelunking?”
Near the leftmost pole, Mustard Bottle quietly asked Nail and Stocking, “Aren’t y-you guys going to d-do the challenge...?” still wincing slightly from the pain in her leg.
Stocking shook her head, offering Mustard Bottle a meaningful look,
“Probably not, I’d rather make sure that you’re okay,” she said. Her voice relaxed Mustard Bottle, even if it was only by a bit.
“Same here. I just want to go home at this point,” Nail said, “Couldn’t Airy just replace us with people who were actually willing?”
“I thought you guys would’ve wanted to compete here,” the host said, making the three of them jolt in surprise. They forgot how he could be watching them at any moment, “Remember the prize?”
Nail was the one who responded to Airy,
“You know we actually have lives, right?” he began, using a voice that was usually reserved for Liam whenever they’d hang out together and argued on what to order for takeout, “I was fine with being here for a single competition, but you’d have to be insane to think that we’d be willing stay here for a week, let alone a month!”
Nail had to pause for a moment to regain his composure. His voice had steadily risen throughout his argument.
“And besides, after what happened to Mustard Bottle, we definitely aren’t sticking around.”
Airy’s voice betrayed no emotion,
“Come on, it isn’t that hard.”
Mustard Bottle abruptly shouted at him out of genuine frustration,
“I literally CAN’T USE ONE OF MY LEGS!”
Nail and Stocking were both surprised at her sudden outburst, while she herself looked horrified for yelling back. Stocking tried to help the other teen to calm down, who was struggling not to cry, spilling out a litany of unintelligible apologies.
As she did, Nail looked up to the sky, and spoke with a sense of finality,
“We’re not doing this challenge, Airy.”
“...Alright,” Airy conceded. For a moment, Nail got his hopes up, genuinely believing that his speech had actually convinced the host to send them back.
The ground around them started to rumble, and after a couple of seconds, the pole beside them lowered closer to the ground.
“I made the challenge easier for you guys. What do you think?”
So much for hope.
“Oh geez, I’ve never even walked before,” Subway Seat said to himself. Candy had already snapped out of his earlier stupor and was now at near the base of one of the poles, encouraging Melony in the only way he knew how: by teasing him.
“Are you seriously that weak? Just climb already!”
“I’m trying—I swear, I’m trying!”
Subway Seat tried to push himself off of the ground, only using his arms, but couldn’t do it without painfully straining them. He dropped back to the ground, exhausted, and could only watch the other contestants get closer to the top with a glum expression.
In hindsight, he should’ve asked Candy Bar to carry him to the poles while he still had the chance.
Whippy Creamy dragged himself up to the top of his pole, pleasantly surprised.
“Wow, that really was easy!”
“Okay. Whippy Creamy is the second one safe.” Airy teleported him back to the ground immediately after.
At the same time, Airline Food had also reached the top.
“Oh. Airline Food is safe, too.”
“Sweet!”
Airline Food also got teleported back to the ground, right next to Whippy Creamy. The two of them jumped and high-fived each other.
Tray and Contact Lens were nearing the top of their poles, but Airy suddenly introduced a new obstacle,
“Alright, this is going too quickly.”
Just then, a strong wind suddenly began to gush around the middle of the poles, significantly slowing everyone down. Especially for lightweights like them.
“This should make it a bit harder.”
Contact Lens tried to hold on, but had to let go and was blown away into the air.
“Wait—AAAAaaahhh...!!” His voice faded away as he flew high into the sky.
Tray almost suffered the same fate as him, barely managing to hold on. At the last second, she suddenly gained an idea, and was able to rotate her position so that the wind wouldn’t blow her away from the pole, but instead towards it.
“Phew...” she sighed in relief, drowned out by the sound of the wind, before slowly continuing her climb.
“Hey, do you need help?” Whippy Creamy asked to Subway Seat, who looked up towards him.
Whippy Creamy had noticed him on his quest to reach the poles, lying down on his back in a futile attempt to push himself across the grass. He had felt a sudden compulsion to help the struggling contestant, although he didn’t know why.
“Please,” Subway Seat gratefully said.
Whippy Creamy smiled and grabbed Subway Seat, holding him in his arms and carrying him towards the poles. Subway Seat was surprised at his strength, but he only managed to go a couple of steps before he had to drop him back on the grass, exhausted.
“Sorry,” he panted, “this is probably gonna take a while...”
The other contestant glanced at him and returned his smile. “You don’t have to apologize, I’m just glad that you’re even trying to help me in the first place.”
To Subway Seat, that was already enough.
Now that Tray had climbed high enough and was no longer in range of the wind, the rest of the challenge was smooth sailing. She reached the top a minute or two later and felt immensely proud of herself.
“I made it! That wasn’t too haaAAA—”
She accidentally lost her balance and was about to fall off, but just as she did, Airy teleported her to the ground, landing on her face.
“Tray also made it to the top so she’s safe.”
Her whooping was muffled by the grass.
Mustard Bottle, Stocking and Nail still hadn’t moved from their spots, either unable or unwilling to climb the pole.
“Will you try if I make it shorter?” Airy asked, lowering the pole by a little.
Nail responded on their behalf, as Stocking was distracted with talking about what she was doing before she got teleported to Mustard Bottle, who had calmed down, tuning out everything else to listen to her. He deadpanned, “No.”
The pole lowered again; it was now at half its original height.
“How about now?”
“No!”
“So... tired...” Melony wheezed. He had climbed enough to get out of the wind’s range, the end was in his sights, but his limbs were so sore from the strain of climbing, he couldn’t do anything except to hold onto the pole and stop himself from slipping back down.
“Come on man, you’re almost there!” Candy Bar shouted at Melony, wondering why his encouragement wasn’t working. “You’re not giving up, are you?” He had half a mind to climb up the pole again and make him go faster.
Melony groaned in response. He was starting to lose his grip, dangerously close to letting go. Tears threatened to fall from the pain of the wood digging into him, yet even when Melony knew that Airy would simply revive him, he could not bring himself to fall. Not when Candy Bar was watching.
He didn’t want to disappoint him.
That still didn’t stop the pain from coursing through him, and soon enough, Melony silently started to cry. Gasping for breath, all while he was holding on for dear life, incapable of even using his hands to wipe his tears away.
Candy Bar, who couldn’t sense how distressed he was, continued his mockery.
“Wow, you really are!” he exclaimed, right before he delivered the finishing blow:
“Guess you weren’t as strong as I thought you were...”
He only noticed that something was wrong when he didn’t receive a response.
“Melony?” Candy Bar asked, tone switched to genuine concern. Why wasn’t he doing anything?
“Are you okay—?”
“Why are you being so... mean to me?” Melony mumbled. Quiet, with a sadness in his eyes that Candy Bar had never seen before.
“I d-don’t- I don’t understand—You want me to climb, but a-all you’re doing is making me feel worse for trying in the first p-place.”
There was no anger in his voice, nor resentment, but only confusion. Stinging, hurt confusion.
“Why?”
Candy Bar froze, mind reeling.
Had he... had he really been too harsh on Melony?
He would always talk to his friends like that, whenever they went spelunking and whenever they were hanging out in general, and so would they to him. Jabs and insults—it was all just light banter to them; nobody really meant what they said to each other.
But looking up at Melony, at how he miserably clung to the pole, how the tears still flowed from his eyes, how they rolled down his body and landed on the grass, it dawned on Candy Bar that they weren’t even friends.
Of course that was why Melony hated his encouragement.
To Melony, it wasn’t even encouragement in the first place.
“Melony, I-I—"
What could he even say to fix this?
“I’m sorry.”
Candy Bar looked at his friend fellow contestant in earnest, but he knew that a simple sorry wasn’t enough.
“I’m sorry for saying all those things to you, I thought that we were friends and I just... thought that I could treat you like how I would with my friends back home,” Candy Bar finally understood what it meant to be a piece of garbage. “It’s... it’s my fault for not noticing how much I was hurting you. I’m sorry.”
They stared at each other for what felt like an eternity. What came out of Melony’s mouth was the last thing Candy Bar was expecting,
“We’re not friends...?” he sniffled.
It was like a gut punch to Candy Bar. “You... want us to?”
Melony nodded from above.
“Melony, we’ve only known each other for a couple of hours. I don’t even know your real name and- and from the way I’ve been acting, I... I don’t think I even deserve to be your friend.”
The air was silent again; Candy Bar couldn’t remember the last time he ever felt this way.
“I... I still want to try,” Melony began, steadying his breath, “being friends with you. But can you promise that you’ll try to be nicer, at least? Please?”
There was a fragile hope in Melony’s eyes, now that he had calmed down. Candy Bar couldn’t believe that Melony was giving him a second chance, but this time, he wasn’t going to screw it up.
“Okay,” he said, with all the sincerity he had, “I promise.”
Melony gave him a grateful look, “Thank you.” And the tears finally stopped flowing.
He closed his eyes, trying his best to concentrate. He could do this.
Using up the last of his strength and overcoming the ache in his limbs, Melony managed to scale up to the top of his pole.
“You did it!” Candy Bar gasped.
Delighted, he backed away from the pole to see his reaction.
Melony’s smile was brighter than the sun itself.
“Phew, we made it!” Whippy Creamy said, exhausted.
Subway Seat beamed at him.
“I know I’ve already said this a million times on the way, but once again, thank you.”
“Really, it was nothing.”
Airy spoke to the contestants a few seconds later once he teleported Melony,
“Just you guys know, there are three safe spots left,” He went back to trying to convince the trio on the far end to climb the pole afterwards.
“How are you going to climb, by the way?” Whippy Creamy asked, “Since you don’t have legs to support yourself and all.”
“...Huh,” Subway Seat paused, looking up towards the towering height of the pole he had to climb. “Now that you mention it, I haven’t actually came up with a plan for that. Didn’t think I’d even make it this far.”
Whippy Creamy may have facepalmed at that, but internally, he thought to himself that it was still worth the effort.
Melony lied down as soon as he was teleported, too tired to keep standing.
Candy Bar was lying besides him, bumping him with his elbow.
“I knew that you could do it.”
“Honestly, I had no way to tell from the way you were ‘encouraging’ me,” Melony joked. He idly wondered what Candy Bar’s friends were like, whether they were also as good at climbing as him.
“Then mark my words,” Candy Bar plainly said, “From now on, Melony, I promise you that I’ll be a nicer friend.”
Melony smiled. “And I promise to you, Parker, that I’ll be a better climber from now on, too.”
“You—!”
Candy Bar lightly punched Melony’s side, laughing, and warmth bloomed in the both of them.
They continued to lay on the grass, a genuine smile on their faces.
“It’s Garrett, by the way.”
“Hm?”
“You said you needed to know my name for us to be friends, right? Now that you know what it is, we can officially start our friendship!” Melony laughed to himself, music to the ears.
“Garrett...” Candy Bar slowly repeated.
He liked that name.
By the time Melony had been declared safe, Airy had lowered the leftmost pole to almost ¼ of its original height.
Even then, Nail and Stocking refused to try.
“If you guys climb this pole, you'll all be safe.”
“Yeah, only for the ones who can actually climb,” Stocking shot back, glancing reassuringly at a nervous Mustard Bottle.
“Do you even want to be—”
“No, Airy!” Nail repeated for the umpteenth time, “We don’t! We’re not doing your competition anymore, so please, take us back.”
Airy’s response to Nail’s argument was to shorten the pole even more; it was now so low, the three of them could basically step on it.
“You might as well—”
“No.”
Now that the pole couldn’t go any lower and they still refused to participate in his challenge, the host had to do something, right? Nail thought that they had finally succeeded in forcing Airy’s hand.
It didn’t last long.
“Ah—no!”
With a cry, Mustard Bottle suddenly tripped and landed on the ground. Once of her hands ended up touching the top of the pole and she sighed in defeat.
While she winced, Airy announced her safety, sounding ever so slightly happier than before.
“It looks like Mustard Bottle is safe from elimination this round. Two spots remain.”
Stocking had tried to run to Mustard Bottle and tried to catch her, but she was too late. The teenager helped her get back on her feet, concerned.
“Mustard Bottle! What happened?”
“It’s f-fine,” Mustard Bottle replied, shakily taking her crutch from Stocking’s hands, “I- I just tripped.”
“But... but you tripped on the pole.”
“Yeah, I know,” she looked ashamed of herself, “D-don’t worry about it, though, I can just wait until next r-round.”
“Are you sure you’ll be all right with staying for another challenge?” Nail asked.
“I m-mean... it’s too late now,” another jolt of pain, “ugh... it won’t be long until a-another challenge comes, at least.”
Nail and Stocking looked at Mustard Bottle, then at each other. They nodded.
“Alright, let’s do this challenge,” Nail sighed.
“Agreed.”
Nail walked up the pole and stepped on it, securing immunity, but before Stocking could do the same, someone else had reached the top of the rightmost pole.
“Oh, I made it.”
Bassy.
“It seems that Nail and Bassy have taken the last spots for immunity, which means that Stocking, Contact Lens and Subway Seat are up for elimination.”
“WHAT?!” Nail, Stocking and Mustard Bottle all exclaimed in unison.
“Aw, crud,” Subway Seat said, dismayed. Whippy Creamy gave him a sympathetic pat on the back.
“Voting will end in a couple of hours, so, uh, see you guys there.”
“Could someone please get me down from here now?” Contact Lens shouted as loud as he could. He was still floating high above the poles, with no way of getting down.
“Oh, right.”
Contact Lens was teleported a few seconds later, flat on his back. He got up with a curious expression on his face, and turned to Tray to ask,
“So, what did I miss?”
“Honestly?” Tray said, motioning her hands for Contact Lens to look around.
“A lot.”
In Greensburg, Tomatoey was teleported back, where she finally came to.
She blinked, breath hitching, before she grabbed onto the kitchen counters and shakily got up.
She looked around, trying to gauge if anything was wrong, but aside from the knife, which was still on the floor, nothing else seemed out of the ordinary. Outside, the sun had even started to rise.
Really, it was like she had never been teleported in the first place.
It was all a dream, she told herself, stamping out any thoughts about ONE, you passed out from exhaustion, and you just had a bad dream.
Tomatoey repeated her mantra again and again until she was satisfied, and once she was done, she slowly plucked her knife off the ground and washed it in the sink, placing it back into the block when she was done.
It was still the weekend, so Charlie could sleep in as much as he wanted, but the food Tomatoey had planned to prepare last night had already gone bad. What should she clean up first?
Her eyes roamed around the kitchen and landed on the ingredients for the fruit salad, lying on the island counter.
Pineapple... Strawberries... Kiwis...
Watermelon...
Screw it, she needed a drink.