Oh, hello Kelly!
Having a nice dinner, are you?
And a nice nap?
And are you, in general, having a good time doing things which you ought not be able to do?
"I'm having a blast, thanks!"
Okay, just checking.
Are you about to "wash the dishes," Dona?
Of course you are. Sigh. How are you not dead of food poisoning yet?
I'm surprised to report that my contestants appear to have numbed themselves to the horrors of constant murder. Executions normally send them into week-long redness from which they emerge only hours before the next; based on this, I had expected them to be trapped in a spiral of hopeless depression forever. This week, however, their despair did not even last for a whole day! By ten the next morning everyone's mood bars were bathed in cheery green.
You know what this means, Darren.
Fix everything.
"Look, I unclogged the toilet and repaired the sink, but I am not staying in here long enough to take care of the shower! Do you know what an outhouse with no ventilation smells like on a tropical island?!"
"I know that the sink is very dirty, dear, but don't you think we ought to wash all the dishes before you clean it out?"
"I most certainly do not. Go away! :D"
"Fine. The dishes won't get washed at all, then."
"Hey, I don't need a sink to wash them!"
Please don't, Dona. Please don't.
She did anyway, of course, and then she apparently got rot-breath because she decided to brush her teeth.
Over and over again.
For hours.
Nelson kept rolling wants to harvest some wild produce and go fishing, and food supplies were getting a bit low, so I sent him out to replenish them.
The trip just wouldn't have been complete without at least one out-of-place taxi sighting, would it? Who's in this one?
Um, ew. (And lawl at Sim-Me floating on an invisible couch in the background.)
Darren managed to fix the shower at long last, and Esmeralda wandered in to congratulate him with a hug. He waved her off angrily while thinking bad thoughts about nachos.
Then he left the outhouse and talked at Meece for a while.
"There are at least a hundred reasons why you shouldn't vote me off this week, and I can tell you all of them! Number one: I am going to be the president someday, so allowing me to get killed would be an act of treason! Number two: I have a love interest and therefore my death would be inherently more tragic than yours or Nelson's or Dona's. Number three..."
"Would you shut up already?!"
I think that his little speech may have had an effect opposite to the one he was aiming for.
Wednesday rolled around, and Wednesday is now the designated immunity challenge day because I say it is. All right, everybody into the out-of-place taxi and to the delightful surprise that awaits!
Welcome to the site of your first real challenge, ladies and gentlemen. The last one was hastily thrown together just so you would all have something new to do. That is not the case here.
As you can see, you stand before a great maze that is brimming with many fine objects.
There is, for example, a top-of-the-line and ridiculously expensive computer...
A chess set carved from marble...
An enormous plasma television with accompanying video game system and antique sofa...
The best shower currently on the market...
And, to go with it, the best toilet currently on the market. Like the chess set, it, too, is carved of marble--even if it does not come with much privacy...
Finally, there is the kitchen island. It is equipped with two well-stocked refrigerators, a grill and stove, an espresso machine and ample counter space. A large pool separates it from the rest of the maze, and the oversized fountains that spray overhead announce in no uncertain terms that this place is Special.
It is the goal of the immunity challenge, you see. The first sim who autonomously swims to the kitchen island and makes use of the appliances shall be declared the winner.
To give everyone an equal chance, their hunger bars were magically filled and allowed to run down over time. At first, as a result, they were reluctant to enter the maze; they found that they enjoyed each other's company more than they wanted to enjoy the fun activities I'd offered.
Within twenty minutes, however, they all went in.
Did I mention that I was going to lock them in for the duration of the challenge? No?
Now I have.
Meece, having been internet-deprived for too long, immediately went to go catch up on her web browsing.
Everyone else flocked to the television, but for some reason they decided to sit BEHIND the sofa and not ON it. I don't understand you people.
After an hour or two of television, Darren thought that a shower sounded like a great idea. There was just one problem: despite the maze's size and the number of fences walling him off from the other contestants, the game's engine read them as being in the same room. And Darren had no wish to shower with an audience.
He attempted to shoo everyone away, but since they couldn't leave the maze he only wound up bringing them over to his location.
At last they tried to squeeze into the toilet stall, but there was only room for Meece and Darren remained unsatisfied and unable to shower. Esmeralda was the only one to ignore his pleas for solitude; she had better things to do, like wander the maze and...
Stand by the pool?
Esmeralda, are you going where I think you're going?
You are! But will you do what I think you're going to do?
You will!
Esmeralda has won the immunity challenge and cannot be voted off this week. And, with that, everyone is free to go!
Instead of exercising their freedom by returning home, Dona and Meece chose to fight over the computer while Darren complained about his shower.
Nelson was the first to leave.
Darren thought about it, but ultimately stayed put in the maze.
This is the toilet after one day of use by five contestants. Eesh. In retrospect, it's no wonder that Kelly found wetting herself preferable to using the outhouse.
Darren's incessant whining about the shower interrupted their epic battle over the computer, so Dona and Meece tried using their x-ray vision to play video games through the couch instead. This lasted for about ten minutes before Darren yelled at them to get out of the room and they were forced back into the toilet stall that was obviously not designed to accommodate three people.
As everyone stood there, probably wishing that Darren would just go home to clean himself off and let them enjoy the television for a while, Dona began to look around shiftily.
I...I see. You stole the toilet.
Let me clarify this: there is a big-screen television, an expensive computer, a chess set, comfortable furniture, and a couple of very nice refrigerators all for the taking, and you stole the dirty toilet.
"Yes!"
Okay, then. Whatever.
Esmeralda was the first to pass out from exhaustion.
Around three in the morning, Darren finally got over his inhibitions and took a bath.
Then he swam to the island for a cup of coffee, as he was tired.
That was probably not the best idea. The combination of missing toilet and diuretic was too much for his bladder, and seconds later his hygiene bar had been drained again.
I'm sure you can see where this is going.
The endless cycle resumed.
My thoughts exactly.
By dawn, Meece was in the bath instead of Darren. Where was Darren, you ask? Had he finally gone back to camp?
Nah. He'd been exiled to the toiletless stall along with Dona, and, as you can see by the lines of stink trailing from his body, had never managed to get himself cleaned up a second time.
Esmeralda wandered off at some point, leaving the other three behind, and at some point they all wound up on the kitchen island to drink coffee and eat lunch. Then, almost simultaneously, they decided it was time to leave.
There was just one little flaw in their plan.
Leaving the maze required that they swim off the island first...
And they were all too tired to swim.
The rest of the day was spent eating...
Drinking more coffee...
Freaking out...
Having bladder accidents...
And making the occasional half-hearted escape attempt, which always ended in miserable failure.
Eventually, after ingesting enough caffeine, Dona made it across!
Inspired by her victory, Darren attempted to replicate it.
He couldn't.
Meece succeeded, however, and heaped well-deserved scorn upon him.
"You can't even swim across a pool and you think you're going to be the president? You're stupid! Oh, and you look like Rick Santorum."
Enraged by the comparison of his beautiful face to Santorum, Darren found the strength to get across the pool and out of the water.
Evening wore on and the others returned to camp, but Dona returned to the pool.
She jumped in.
She thought about how tired she was.
She went back to the island.
"Why?!" you ask. "Why would she do something so monumentally stupid?!"
Well, you see, there was a dirty dish over on the island, and she just couldn't resist the urge to lick it clean.
The plate dealt with, she attempted to leave.
She couldn't.
"But...but I wanted to leave!"
Maybe you should have thought of that BEFORE you jumped back into the pool, Dona!
She spent the night passed out under the fountains' spray, and finally, as the sun came up, got into her bathing suit and tried again.
Hm. It still won't work.
Maybe if you pass out again?
Or drink more coffee?
Success! Now you can go home!
Or you could nap on the couch that you're too good to sit on. That's fine too.
After she woke up, Dona had a nice, leisurely shower. Perhaps she's getting ready to go home?
Apparently not.
Um.
Why, Dona? Why?
Once again, she found herself trapped on the island.
Now she really wanted to go home, but, unable to do so, she spent the entire day wandering in circles and passing out instead.
She jumped into the pool every so often, but never made it more than a foot before she had to turn around.
As dusk fell she took a break from her new routine and began to steal appliances. Where is she keeping all of them?
The sun rose again. She stared longingly at the distant ocean and thought about beds.
Another sunset came, and Dona was still trying--and failing--to get of the island.
Meanwhile, at base camp, the others had managed to break their shower for the hundredth time.
On the other hand, they had been quite attentive to the garden over the past four days.
The past four days?
Yep. It is Saturday evening, the elimination round has just started, and Dona is still trapped in the maze.
Sim-Me is pissed.
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