Summer Shenanigans, Wednesday [all day]

[sith_happened]

Today's games were not being held in the park, which should have been a red flag. Fortunately, Anakin has provided a red flag!

Twenty feet up.

At the end of a very gross-looking wooden pole danging over Serenity Cove.

"Today you're all out of for yourselves," Anakin yelled from the top of recycled scaffolding, which had a 40-foot long greased up telephone pole balanced between it about 20 feet up. "Many thanks to our local bars and restaurants for providing the lard, grease, fish guts, Crisco and bacon fat to really lube this thing up."

Beaker, covered in said grossness, looked decidedly less grateful.

"The rules are simple," Anakin said. "Whoever gets across the pole and reaches the flag wins all you can eat at Mooby Burger for a week!" Whether Mooby Burger was a good prize or not was entirely up to the winners. "You may walk, run, or slide your way across, but you may not use supernatural powers."

"And thank you in advance for volunteering!"

Which was news to those volunteers.

"Pick up your t-shirts--" Anakin did not realize that his shirts were a Philadelphia sports reference, "--and listen for your names!"

Oh boy.

"Vi, Eleanor, Beaker, Summer, Isabella, Steve R, Guillermo, Jon, Beta, Stark, TJ, Eddie, Jane, Graham, Belle, Steph, Steve M, Libby, and Alara! Come on over!"

Comments

Arrive and Mingle

[sith_happened]

The location was different, the bleachers were the same. It helped to be able to lift huge, heavy things with your brain.

Re: Arrive and Mingle

[hashtag_chocobro]

Even though Summer had alerted him to the fact that his duties as Shenanigan Spy were, at the moment, no longer required, Prompto had really enjoyed getting Noctra out in the fresh air to sort of boggle at how dumb the world outside her little insulated cocoon of her home really was. And he was pretty excited for the change of scenery, too, to make it a little more exciting for her.

Until they got to the change of scenery, because this? Was pretty much the opposite of fresh air.

"Ugh," he said, wrinkling his nose and then trying to quiet Noctra down as she pretty much said the same thing, but with a lot more crying and wailing and squirming in a way that made him feel pretty glad that she couldn't actually talk yet so her mother never needed to know what he was subjecting her to with all that copious grease in the sun.

Until Prompto himself told her, of course, but, yeah, might not be sticking around for too long with this one...

...until it got started, and then it became almost too fascinating to watch to turn away.

Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[sith_happened]

We know at least a few of you are just going to go shirtless for this. McGarrett.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[somethingwithturquoise]

Summer had pretty much been holding her breath the entire way over to the shenanigans (and continued to hold her breath well after she realized what was going on), because, even though Anakin had seemed genuinely sympathetic to her plight about the pools and she'd gotten recorded evidence of his promise that there would be none, she had trust issues, dammit.

But, needless to say, when she arrived and saw the pole, she was actually not surprised, and was just honestly glad Anakin hadn't said anything that might suggest she was to blame for this being today's activity, as she grabbed a shirt and pulled it on.

"Heh. Pole."

What?

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[heroic_jawline]

Steve turned to the Tony!Pony and sighed heavily. "Do not wander off," he said to his husband, who was far too busy trying to find something on the ground to eat to be listening. "I'll be right back and hopefully you won't remember any of this."

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[grenadesandohana]

McGarrett was not wearing a shirt at all, thank you. Because it was strategic. And also really nice outside.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[pun_king]

T-Shirt pulled unceremoniously over his tunic and cloak, Graham grinned eagerly as he rubbed his hands together in anticipation. He remembered this one from last summer! Or something similar! And he thought he remembered doing okay because he was being very careful not to fall because he couldn't even swim last time! But this time? He'd be ready for anything!

And he always felt, weirdly, like crossing a long pole over some staggering height was a skill that would be very useful to him in the future!

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[no_missing_piece]

You know what, Beta couldn't even pretend she hadn't come down here on purpose out of some morbid sense of curiosity this time.

Also doing things outside of her comfort zone was... not bad, actually?

She might be having a lot of doubts about this choice today, though. The smell was a lot.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[what_big_teeth]

Eleanor was sort of eying the pole with an almost regretfully wistful look, just sort of wondering if this would be easier if she could just transform into a wolf to help her get across. But she couldn't, she was just going to have to stick with how she was at the moment, and the prospects of this working out for her did not feel...great.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[intheeyeofthebeholding]

Jon looked at the pole in dismay. "How do I always manage to choose this week to do things?"

Fortunately, the only one he was asking was the Eye. Unfortunately, it delighted in not warning him.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[stykera]

Stark was not going shirtless. He was changing into his new pole shirt and sighing very heavily.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[outofthequiver]

Libby was going to take a moment to make sure her very long hair was very well tied back before taking a deep breath and trying not to think of all the various ways this could go horribly for her, but at least she probably wasn't going to be the only one, and at least she didn't have to feel bad about not being good at crossing greased poles, because how often was that likely to even come up in a person's life?

Yes, she had pretty much resigned herself to losing before even getting up there. But it was important to set reasonable expectations! And she'd still try her best, too. Maybe she might surprise herself!

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[good_for_six]

Of course Isabela was going nigh on shirtless. Why would anyone think otherwise for even a moment?

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[giveittoyoursister]

Vi took one whiff of the pole and pulled the offered shirt on. She was not going risk clothing she actually liked.

Re: Voluntolds, Come on Down!

[drumsticksandd20s]

"How," Steph asked out loud as she pulled the shirt on, "is this somehow even worse and grosser than last year's grease-fest nightmare?"

Run Across the Pole!

[sith_happened]

Or crawl or scooch or whatever. The RNG says that only four of you: Isabella, Eddie, Steve M, and Summer, make it across to grab the flag, but feel free to mod how far you got (or didn't!)

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[stykera]

Stark tried to crawl. Stark was successful for about half of the pole!

Then Stark was very slimy and greasy and smelly and gross and wet.

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[good_for_six]

Isabela casually strolled across the pole, picked up the flag and did a perfect swan dive off the end.

Pirate!

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[drumsticksandd20s]

Yeah, nope, Steph was just going to... go about three steps without worrying too much about trying to balance and then oh, damn, she slipped and fell in. Oh no, no more getting greasy stuff she didn't want to think about all over herself. What a loss.

This was going into an upcoming game session as a skill challenge, though, and she was already working out the mechanics of that as she made it back to shore.

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[somethingwithturquoise]

Summer took a moment, at the starting end of the pole, to take a deep breath and breath out and center herself and resolve to touch that pole as little as humanly possibly, which meant very daintily stepping onto it, feeling how already her feet were sliding, even in sneakers, and then she let out her breath and just fucking booked it to the other side, with her eyes focused and determined on the end goal like her life practically depended on it.

Or her reputation.

Which was way more valuable than her life, anyway.

And with that motivation at her heels, she realized she'd made it all the way across, snorted, snatched the flag and held it up as she called out, "That's right! I'm back, bitches! They don't call them Summer Shenanigans for nothing! Suck it!"

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[giveittoyoursister]

Vi made a go of it, for pride's sake, but she also didn't try very hard to correct to stay up when her footing started to slip.

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[no_missing_piece]

The most efficient and optimal strategy, Beta decided, was to just fall immediately into the water; no scenario she could anticipate had a different end result than that anyway.

It must be noted that she yelped the whole way down.

Re: Run Across the Pole!

[noonedecidesmyfate]

Belle took one cautious step, wobbled, took another cautious step and wobbled less...and then took one less cautious step and lost her balance. She hung on to the pole for just long enough to get thoroughly disgusting before losing her grip and splashing down into the water.

Talk to Anakin!

[sith_happened]

Who sure as hell isn't going across that pole. It's smelly and gross.

Re: Talk to Anakin!

[stykera]

Know what else was smelly and gross, Anakin?

The hug you were going to get from Stark.

OOC

[sith_happened]

Tada.