the gauntlet discussion

Why would she ever think that running the obstacle course was a good idea? Oh yeah, she wanted to see how well she did. On the bright side, Karaline managed to get through most of the course without feeling like she was going to die. On the shitty side, she was sore. That's why she was currently floating in the Wave Pool, with the waves on low. Being in water has always relaxed her, and it gave her time to think. Kara wasn't the worst person here in terms of training, but that wasn't saying much. A lot of these people were good, like really good. She's been trying to get training in so she won't get her ass handed to her in the exercises. She has pretty good endurance, due to all those early mornings running she did at home but she definitely needed to train some more in hand to hand combat and using a weapon.

She sighed,, lazily doing a backstroke in the water. In the very least, she felt very at home with her element. Maybe more than the majority of the others, not that she would know. Her family wasn't interested in talking about her affinity because she wasn't born a male and there hasn't been enough time at Ainsley to see how everyone interacted with their own element. What she did know was that she felt right at home in the water. When she was a child ,her brothers used to tease her that she would have an affinity towards fire because of her hair, but there was always a sense of familiarity when she was close to water. It always seemed to call to her, perhaps she was a fish born out of water.

After going back to his dorm room to change into a new shirt, Pierce decided to do some exploring before he retired to his dorm for the night. He was mostly looking for a place to outlet his anger and make him self so exhausted he didn't have the energy to be mad, so he figured the training center would be the place to be. But of course, the first place he went was that nasty little redhead. All he could see was her bright ass hair through the water, and for about two seconds he had the very strong urge to jump in the pool and drown her. But instead he quickened his pace to walk out of the room instead, moving towards the nearest door.

But before Pierce could make his way completely out of the room, a panel with a few bright buttons caught his eyes. There was a control panel for the wave pool? He could literally drown the redhead without having to even get his clothes wet, or have to take them off? Tempting. Pierce walked over to the electronic panel, reading the different setting. He was pulled out of his thoughts though, when he heard the water break and the girl pop her head from its surface. Oh. That wasn't the same redhead, like at all, she was at least 6 feet taller than the first one, and about 2 times hotter. He could probably still drown her though, if he wanted.

As comfortable as she was in water, Karaline figured she could do some laps in the water. The waves were pretty peaceful at the moment. She had always been able to tell the mood of the ocean, when the waves were going to turn harsh or calm themselves. Briefly, she wondered if she would be able to do the same with the Wave Pool. The ocean was natural, but this pool was mechanically made, maybe it made a difference and maybe it doesn't. Either way, the water feel nice against her skin and she wasn't skilled enough that she could afford to waste all her time just floating around, no matter how much she wanted too.

Kara flipped off her back and onto her stomach, swimming towards the shallow end of the pool. She steadied herself against the wall for a second before kicking off and started to pump her arms legs, the rush of the water against her face was always a welcomed sensation. She wondered if the Gauntlet featured any swimming, probably. Or at the least, it would make sense for there to be some sort of aspect for every element in the race. Eventually she submerged herself completely underwater, the chlorine stinging her eyes but she managed. It was more irritating than swimming underwater in natural water, but not unbearable. She had just gotten to the middle of the pool, when she broke over the surface, pushing her hair out of the way. Before she could get back under, a figure caught her eye by the control panel. Kara stared for a second at the boy, he was pretty cute. He looked like the type she would be able to charm back home, but the irritation in his eyes made him less handsome than he was. Probably another rich boy that thought she had no place here because of her breasts and might be trying to scare her but from that scowl she wasn't sure if he was only trying or if he really wanted to mess with her. Typical.

She lifted one eyebrow at him, his move.

If Pierce hadn't been completely sure what he had wanted to do about being able to fuck with the control panel before, this girl's snarky ass expression tipped him over the edge. Of course he wanted to drown her, she was snotty, and she was pretty clearly asking for it. But you know what was even more important to him than his own desires? His training. His parents had told him not to make himself a target, and even though he knew little Miss Attitude in the pool wasn't going to be able to hurt him, who knew what kind of friends she had. Pierce had seen some pretty real competition out there during orientation, and with his luck, one of them would be this little girl's pimp and hit him with a butter sock in his sleep or something.

So even though his finger had twitched towards the button, Pierce eventually dropped the scowl off of his features along with his hand. Stupid brat. He wasn't going to drown her, but he could at least shut off the lights on his way out. So that's what he did -- good luck finding your towel in the dark, redhead.

Nora probably should've been using this pool for training. Generating waves and swimming against them to strengthen her muscles and her endurance, or whatever, but instead she was just sitting at the edge, soaking her calves and tilting her head back in the sun. Hmmmm, she was tired after all those runs with Daniel. Really she had obviously been pulled into some kind of evil plot- she had tried repeatedly to get Cassie to wake up and give it a go with Daniel but no. Cassie was always saying how she had to sleep or she was going to get food or making up some excuse and dammit cassie the sooner you got with Dan then the sooner Nora could stop with all this crazy running stuff.

Although it was probably going to help her in the next competition and in the Gauntlet over all.

Curses.

But she'd been sunbathing for a little while now, relaxing when she noticed Bonnie walking up to the pool. "Hey! Bonnie, right?" because they'd been through punishment together and how gross it had been. Plus....Nora was pretty sure that Cassie had mentioned talking to Bonnie.

Bonnie was in desperate need of a way to wash off the aftersmell of early morning punishment... in the horse stables. Eeeew. Except, the bathrooms were super uncomfortable, and she was not about to take one with what was going on in there. Why couldn't they just designated certain times of the day to boys and girls? Or, hmmmm, give the girls a different bathroom? Ugh, this academy was sick. Still shivering gross irritation, Bonnie scrubbed at her arms.

She hadn't talked to a whole lot of people, so her name being called was unexpected. Especially by somebody that she didn't really know. At least, she was pretty sure she didn't ... oh wait! Bonnie waved happily at the other girl, coming over to join her at the water's edge. "That's me," she confirmed, tucking her hands between her knees. "You're Nora, right?" After Cassie and her had talked, Bonnie had taken a trip to the gallery to scope out the other students. If she couldn't make fast friends, at least she could know who her options were.

"What're you doing at the wave pool?" Bonnie wondered, tipping her head with the same curiosity. She doubted that Nora was hanging around for the same reason she was -- coed shower fear -- so she figured she'd ask.

Oh. Okay wow. So obviously someone hadn't hit up the showers since punishments yet. No worries. That would be fine, poor girl. Maybe she was one of the ones who wasn't comfortable with the whole co-ed showers thing. There were quite a few girls at the school who weren't comfortable. And a couple boys too. Although Nora doubted that no one wasn't at least a little unnerved by it. After all, no one was as comfortable with their body as they all liked to pretend they were. "Yup, Nora. Cassie's best friend. You met, Cass," Might as well make connections right?

She patted at the spot next to her on the ground with a smile so that Bonnie could take a seat. Even if she smelled like the wrong end of a horse. if someone came along and pushed the girl into the pool right now it would probably do Bonnie a favor. "Just relaxing. Taking in the sun. Avoiding everyone else," Most people were at the obstacle course or dealing with drama from the competition. She'd seen a couple guys get into a fight in the hallway of the dorms yesterday over how one guy hadn't woken the other up when the alarms went off....whatever.

Petty drama. "What brings you here?"

"Oh! Yeah, I did. She wanted to know if I knew anything about punishments," Bonnie wrinkled her nose, looking down at her bruised hands -- shoveling piles of crap all morning was both vomit-inducing, and very, very hard work. "I really wish I could say that I still have no idea what they are." Wasn't that the truth? She'd do just about anything to get out of them next time around. Two weeks, two weeks. She only had to suffer through it for two weeks. And then she would just suffer through all the awfulness her body would have to go through in order to up her rankings ... No problem. Uuuugh big problem.

Bonnie gave Nora a look. "I stink." she said plainly, knowing full well that Nora already knew. "And the showers are ... well I don't know what's going on there, but I wasn't going to get in the middle of it." she shivered, making a grossed out sound.

"Actually," she said a little hesitantly. "If you don't mind, I'm going to hop in. Try to wash off some of this smell? I think it will do both of us a favor. I won't do any splish-splashing, though, so don't worry." Bonnie chuckled. She was already pulling off her shoes. She figured she'd just slide in and hang by the edge, dip her hair in the water and not gross Nora out with stinky horse smell.

Nora wasn't sure which one she'd rather deal with. "Honestly, I think I might prefer shoveling the horse crap. You wouldn't believe how gross the bathrooms are. I'm pretty sure that before this year they've never been cleaned. And do yourself a favor and never look under the toilet seats because I had to clean one and there was vomit and who knows how long that's been there," Of course that was to be expected....either someone at school was bulimic or there were people who were more nervous about this competition than they were letting on. Seriously though, it had been gross.

When Bonnie slid into the water Nora felt a slight twinge of guilt. Did she make it obvious she was grossed out by the scent? Hmmm now she felt a little bad. She hadn't been trying to be rude. But maybe she unconsciously had. "At least it's only two weeks of punishment right." And if Bonnie was shoveling shit that meant she hadn't made it out. "I'm sure that we'll do better next time." Although she wondered what had kept the girl. It had been nearly impossible to try and sleep through those alarms. Maybe Bonnie slept naked and had taken too long to get ready?

Or maybe she slept like the dead.

Bonnie almost offered to switch places, but after hearing about the vomit she was assured that everybody had it pretty rough. Punishment was punishment it seemed. She dunked her head under the water, raking her hands through her hair. When she broke the surface, Bonnie gave Nora a sympathetic scrunch of the nose, "I guess that's true. Just two weeks. Besides, if the next competition involves any heavy lifting, we'll have lots of scrubbing and shoveling experience to back us up. We might even win." Bonnie laughed, light enthusiasm in her tone. She bobbed in the water, having always been a pretty good swimmer, and tilted her head back thoughtfully. It's weird how it could be such a nice day here; seeing some of the injuries brought on by daily activities always made things feel damp and dreary. But no. It was warm today, so warm that Nora had been soaking it up when Bonnie'd showed up. "Actually, to be honest, I'm kind of dreading the next challenge." Bonnie realigned herself, worrying her inner cheek. "Is that just me?"

Bonnie was nice, Nora could see why Cassie liked her; especially compared to the many boys of the academy who seemed like they were all filled with this innate desire to prove who could be the biggest asshole. Seriously. What was wrong with all of these boys? Were they that upset about the fact that a girl could win the gauntlet just as well as they could? "Win. Wouldn't that be the dream." Although it was far more likely that these stupid punishments would leave them all too tired to be able to win, half of them would probably be too sore to even compete. Unless the next challenge involved having a super strong gag reflex there was no way this punishment thing was helping her out at all. "I doubt you're the only one dreading the next challenge. Especially with all the heat going around the Academy now- the fights. The rivalries. It's all going to make the next challenge that much worse. All we little people can hope for is that the people up top are so busy sabotaging each other that we can slide right past them into victory." And wouldn't that really be the cherry on top of the pie?

Bonnie scrunched up her nose, "I don't see the point." She admitted. "I mean... I do... but I don't." She worked out the words in her head, calculating for a minute before speaking. "I mean, more than one person wins the Gauntlet in any one race. So shouldn't the ones on the top ally themselves with each other, and then work together to sabotage the little guys?" Bonnie tilted her head in thought. To her this made utter sense. Friends meant more to her in a place like this an enemies did. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I want to live -- a lot -- but that's what I would do if I were them." Bonnie knew that she came off pretty empty headed, but if she was big and strong like the top ten, or basically anybody who was fast enough not to have to undergo punishment, than she knew that she would be a lot nastier than she was naturally. People came back from this academy totally scarred, and if you had the tools to be part of the ones that didn't then... well, she figured you should use them.

Nora smirked, oh Bonnie....she didn't have much experience with competition or boys did she? "Sure, you'd think that's how it works. That's the smart thing to do, right? But....take the Raemer twins. They're like four numbers apart and I heard that one of them stole the clothes of the other. I'm sure it's only going to heat up from there....." Yeah it would've been smart if the top ten banded together and formed some kind of super group, but she doubted it would happen. All those kids had been raised with winning in mind, not just winning either but being number one....and that was. Well that was a hard thing to do. "So don't count all us little folk out yet, we could still come in from behind and make quite the impression." She smiled easily at Bonnie, because hadn't Bonnie been like disqualified for not even getting out of her room? For all they knew she could be top ten material.

A little sound of disbelief drizzled across her lips. "He stole his brothers clothes? Like, when he was showering?" Bonnie's bottom lip hung low, trying to imagine what getting out of the shower would've been like-- you grab for your panties and nope, totally gone. Shirt? Pants? Towel? Gone gone gone, like the wind. She shivered just thinking about it. "Might as well start showering with my clothes on. Boys are so gross." She bit her lip. "But ... I should go take a shower. The pool doesn't exactly wash away the smell." She scrubbed her hands through her hair anyway, ducking her head back into the water. When she straightened again, Bonnie lifted herself out of the pool, shivering. "Brr. That was both a really great idea and a really bad one," but she didn't sit down. "I'm gonna hit the showers, but I'll talk to you later, okay?"

Nora was sure there was a lot more gossip she could have chatted about with Bonnie, in fact she fully intended to later. But for now she would let the girl go shower and clean up....maybe then she wouldn't smell like horse butt afterwards. Or she'd be unlucky and smell like horse crap for the entirety of the punishments like most people seemed to. She just smiled and waved, deciding to hang out by the pool awhile longer and then maybe she would go train or something.