Day 4: Gymnastics/P.E. with Alice and Keefer
“I don’t even know what to say anymore. Just try not to kill anyone and make sure you listen to Alice and Keefer.” Akira juggled an icepack and screwdriver in one hand and a manual in the other. She had said before the class had started, that she had to take care of the people who had been injured: Griffin with a horrific headache and Dante who was recovering from Riley’s drowning incident. Still, there were quite a big crowd attending the mandatory classes.
“Will you be coming back?” Karin pulled at the too-tight shirt displaying ‘MCC’ in big block letters. It was P.E. today and like in swimming, everyone was in similar uniforms: Black shorts and black shirts with MCC written on it.
“We all know someone is going to—oh my God, Kateri blink please. You’re really creeping me out.” Akira made a face and shuddered. Day 4 and Kateri still couldn’t close her eyes.
“Sorry, can’t help it.” Kateri said flatly and turned to face the wall. They were back in the gym, minus the desks.
“You need to get that checked out ASAP, but for now just stay here. Anyways, I’ll be back once I check on the other two.” Akira trotted out and Alice stepped up to take her place.
“Well, for all of you who are partially out of shape due to Colette’s flash-mob tea parties, then listen up. We’ll be doing some basic exercises and then participating in some healthy competition.” Alice pulled a double handspring and stood perfectly still on the recently installed parallel bars.
“I don’t think I can do that.” Thomas, the ever present creeper, muttered. He stood at the back of the group with his arms folded. Nothing seemed to faze him, even when Belinda set fire to curtains. Luckily Kateri was there and threw her lemonade on everything but the flames, thus stopping the spread.
“Well, maybe you weren’t included.” Ela dropped every word like it was coal. He obvious dislike of her brother wasn’t exactly subtle. Then again, nothing about her was subtle.
“Ahem—anyways, let’s just start with a short jog!” Alice beamed at everyone.
Nobody moved.
“I said,” Her tone took a demonic nose dive. “Everybody. Run. Before. I. Eat. You. ‘Kay?” She giggled in her normal voice.
Karin immediately bolted, setting Sebastian after her and Acacia who just wanted this nightmare to be over.
5 minutes and 14 collapsed people later, Alice blew her whistle.
“Everyone huddle up! Keefer is going to announce the fun activity.” She gave way to her partner and grabbed a blood-box.
“So yeah, we’re going to hold a mini Olympics trial and whoever wins… uh. Gets immunity from the next class?”
“Pssst, Keef, I don’t think we have clearance for that—“ Violett began hissing.
Suddenly the door crashed open and Akira shouldered her way through.
“Actually I’m totally okay with that. It’ll force everyone to put in 110% for once.”
“Oki doki! That’s good enough for me,” Alice gave a thumbs up and tossed her drink backwards. “Looks like we’ll be starting with javelin throwing—“
“No.”
“Fencing—“
“No.”
“Discus…”
“No.”
“Pole launching.”
“No.”
“Okay. I’ve got it. A---“
“No.”
“But I didn’t even say anything!”
“Sorry, knee-jerk reaction. Continue.”
“How about an obstacle course? It’ll be like a walk in the park,” Alice waved her hand comically in the air. “First across the monkey bars, through the 50 yard tunnel maze, three turns on the seesaw, and finally you slide down the slide of death. Got it?”
“Wow, it really is like a park…” Travis tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Yeah, I’m game. I don’t want to go to class tomorrow anyways.”
“Me either.” Was the response from most of the others. Those who wanted to participate lined up next to Akira. The others: Karin, Colette, Aerith, Nodin, Ace, and Melina , settled a safe distance away from the disaster waiting to happen.
“On your marks… get set--- Keefer what are you doing in there?” Alice received angry sighs from those who had tensed up to run. “Sorry, my bad. Okay, for reals this time. On your mark… get set… GO!”
And they were off.
Sebastian reached the monkey bars first and swung four at a time, not bothering to notice the bean bag that swung from the rafters. It managed to knock him into Kaki who trailed closely behind. With them gone, Alice and Travis took the lead. Not to be outdone, Violett ran above them on the bars. She hopped down seconds before the others and scampered off into the tunnel maze.
“Like heck I’m getting in there.” Amor pulled up short of the entrance to the multi-colored tunnels. “It looks like Chuck E. Cheese in there.”
“Yeah, there’s no way I’m getting stuck in that thing.” Ela skittered in next to Amor and they both watched as Kateri, Solana, Locke, and Riley dove head first into the hole.
“Oops, I forgot to tell them that one of these tunnels leads nowhere… I knew there was something I forgot.” Alice slammed her fist against the side of a tunnel and made and hand-sized dent in the pliable plastic. “Well, I better find out who went where. BRB!” She hopped through an opening and scrabbled furiously after those in the lead.
There were still 12 accounted for in the race: Akira, Alice, Keefer, Solana, Bridgette, Riley, Violett, Locke, Kateri, Travis, Acacia, Vevila, Rano, and Tono.
“What the…” Griffin wandered into the gym, his head throbbing. Dante dragged himself after the wyvern and rubbed his eyes. “This is why we cannot have nice things.”
They watched as the participants reached the seesaw. Rano and Tono, a terrifying duo, brought their weight down on the seesaw Acacia was sitting on and sent her flying. Dante lurched forward and caught her as she sailed close to where Sebastian was.
“Akira! What is the meaning of this? This looks like that Hunger Games movie we watched yesterday!” Griffin’s voice barely carried over the din. He saw as there were less and less members able to stand at the last leg of the race. It was down to Akira and Keefer.
"Oh great. I'll get the stretcher if you grab the ice packs," Ace and Aerith disappeared in the direction of the make-shift stretcher while the smaller members retrieved several trays of ice.
"So, in theory, if you pass the finish line before me, you won't have to go to class.... even though you never go anyways...?" Keefer looked at Akira through slitted eyes. His heart was barely pumping and his breath was pretty regular, but next to Akira, she wasn't even breaking a sweat.
"You guys made the rules, not me." She shrugged her shoulders and grinned. "Stop wasting time, I have a race to win."
Akira threw herself down the plastic slide and narrowly dodged a potato peeler--- a potato peeler?!
"Okay, okay, I know what you're thinking, but we ran out of funds for making this slide dangerous. Plus, I'm sure you would have killed us if we had actually made this dangerous." Alice was keeping pace with Akira from the ground level. She had managed to pull Locke from the maze and was now acting as the danger behind the name of the slide of death.
"Hey, that was my job!" Keefer was bounding down the 45 ft slide at an alarming rate.
"Heh. It would be a real shame if you were to slip, wouldn't it?" Alice snickered and threw another peeler up.
"Nice try, but I won't fall for--- oh shoot." Keefer tripped over his shoelace and proceeded to wipe the slide with his face as he tumbled past Akira.
"Well I can't say that wasn't expected." Akira dug her heels in and brought herself to a stop. "Y'know, I think we can safely say I won and that someone is going to need a facelift."
"Yup. I second that.... but just to be safe, if the police ask what happened... it wasn't anything to do with a potato peeler. 'Kay?" Alice flipped the peace sign and dashed off.
This was going to be one interesting summer...
