Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Welcome to the second part of The Championship, a new seasonal event in your home video game: Writer’s Block. You will be placed in one of ten teams, and be given a choice of which type of team display you would like. Each comes with the team’s distinguishing features, a bracelet with a few charms to get access to your specific team areas and to just get around, and a little space man to carry around! Your fellow teammates who were in round 1 are waiting for you…”

Red Rabbit.

Orange Ocelot.

Yellow Yak.

Lime Llama.

Green Guardian.

Cyan Creeper.

Aqua Axolotl.

Blue Bat.

Purple Panda.

Pink Parrot.

The message repeated and repeated. Each new participant listened to it until they understood. Some tried to fight the message box, others spoke to it like it was a friend. After the message had been said five times, it dissolved. Taking its place, a holographic model switching quickly between clothes, and a button generated. It slowly calmed down, displaying small arrows in three different areas for tops, belt and legs.

Each participant selected their desired combination, and pressed the button. They noticed their form change with the new selection of clothes. The automated voice came back as the hologram disintegrated.

“Welcome to the Championship.”

-

Nora felt himself slowly return to a less empty space than whatever that box place was. He felt light surround him, and he shielded his eyes. In the back of his mind, he felt the presence of others, but he didn’t poke the idea. With a sigh – and a curse muttered under his breath – he opened his eyes. There were people near him. Some where next to him, others he could hear getting closer. He turned to face the figures next to him.

“It’s not as bright as you think when you get used to it.” He giggled, looking around him. The walls were lime with terribly spray painted llamas and a few classic male anatomy illustrations... Nora chuckled under his breath.

“Thank god. I don’t know if I could live with that much light.” Another voice spoke. Nora turned to face the figure and smiled. They had tiny llama ears on their head, in a lime colour. ‘ Oh! Lime Llamas! I must have them too.’ Nora thought.

He was about to say something, but the loudest sound of a door slamming open interrupted him.

“Welcome, new sacrifices!” A few joyful voices giggled. Nora’s heart lit up at it. He always liked being included in conversations, especially if people looked this excited to talk. He had no idea why, but it reassured him when his brain told him he was trying too hard to talk to people.

Nora smiled, walking towards one of the bodies that a joyful voice belonged to. “I’m Nora.” He waved.

“Haunt.” Haunt replied. “Glad to have you here, sacrifice.”

Nora’s smile widened. He was so excited too. So so excited. His hands were doing tiny flaps at his side as he started to get to know everyone else. He was so excited to be on the team Lime Llamas for Championship. He went around, saying he was happy to be there, meeting a few new people, but stayed to talking to another fellow new person named Sock, the same person he was going to talk to before Haunt came in.

“C’mon guys. Let’s show you all around The Dome!” One of the Shields, Lyre, who was also in the Lime Llamas waved them towards the exit doors, skipping happily. They all followed Lyre out of the room and up the stairs, before being blasted with light and bursts of colour. “This is The Dome!”

The Dome had three main areas. There was the communal area, a joined floor of The Dome where participants could mingle and talk. There were eleven sets of doors surrounding the communal area, ten with a different coloured frame. Each of those ten sets were called Categories, and was an entry to a team’s room. Only Shields and members of that team could enter. Every team had their own door, with electronic keys shaped in the team’s animal attached to each participant’s belt and bracelet. 

Behind each Category door was a staircase leading down to two sections called Channels. One was where Shields posted information specific to that team, and the other was where the teammates gathered to chat and strategise. Each was shielded off from the other sections for other teams, with soundproof walls past human capability.

The eleventh door, the largest one, was where announcements and score updates for the competition were sent. The doors were always open to teams for viewing, but the Shields were in charge of that section.

And the final main area of The Dome was the huge tower like machine in the middle. It operated like an elevator. Participants use their electronic key to open their very own submission chamber, a pathway below The Dome secluded to that participant. These were called Tickets. When the participant was done with their submission, the room detaches from the machine to make room for more Tickets. Shields can then moderate and approve the submissions, sending points to that team.

There was another room outside of The Dome, called SPRINTO, which stands for Simulated Practice Rounds Including Noted Time Operation. Quite a confusing acronym, and no one else refers to Sprinto as such. Long story short, the Sprinto channel is used for practice, and although a lot of Championship participants use this channel well, others not in the Championship also have access to it.

For a participant to get to Sprinto from The Dome, they can click the coin charm on their bracelet to teleport them outside of The Dome. Outside of The Dome, they cannot see any other player or participant unless in the Sprinto channel, which is nearby where they teleport to. To get back to The Dome, they just click the coin again.

Lyre had explained some things to each of the new teammates as they were going around The Dome, the petty rivalry between the teams where they pretend to hate each other. All the teams were very friendly, it was just fun to pretend to have enemies sometimes.

“Apart from Pink Parrots and Blue Bats. They have some weird romance going on that no one chooses to address.” Someone named Celest chimed in. Haunt laughed, nodding at her comment.

“And Cyan and Orange.” Lyre added. Haunt and Celest nodded, sharing an affirming warning look. 

Nora looked around for participants of other teams. It wasn’t hard to find other teams, they all had different colours and accessories for their team. Nora saw a pair of two different coloured wings holding hands and walking the same direction the llamas group was. One had pink, bird like wings, and the other had blue bat wings. Nora smiled, Pink and Blue.

Nora began putting the different participants to colours and animals. He noticed a group of people with cyan capes with a creeper on them talking to others who had orange cat tails. They seemed to be laughing about jeans shorts? That’s what Nora could hear. He also saw a few sets of pink wings sitting on the floor and staring at little space men. Nora made a note to go look at that later.

There was someone with aquatic fern things on either side of their head. Their bright aqua colour rung a bell in Nora’s head, as well as that there were three on either side. That person was a member of the Aqua Axolotls. They had a shield on their right shoulder, symbolising that they were part of the Shields, as all of the Shields had one. Nora smiled. They were talking to someone with yellow horns, and someone with purple teddy bear like ears. 

Nora continued to walk, trying to complete his rainbow animal hunt. He caught a glimpse of an unfamiliar colour and feature, but a red flash whipped past him. He twirled his head instinctively at the passing blur, which turned out to be a Red Rabbit member, bunny ears flopping as they hopped along. Nora turned back to what he was looking at before.

That person’s distinguishing team feature, was a halo of green spikes. It looked like a great DIY bike helmet. Nora tried to count how many spikes there were, but the Green Guardian moved, beginning to walk in the same direction the Lime Llamas group was.

It seemed that most of the people in the communal area were moving in the same direction, towards the largest set of doors of The Dome. Other groups of teams, introducing their newest team members to Championship, were leading their clump of colour over, others just mingling with participants who weren’t focused on the doors.

As the lime group entered through the announcement doors, Sock grabbed his arm. “This is so exciting!” He bounced around and smiled, his hands flapping and shaking. Nora joined in.

“I know!”

There was a large panel below a stage, where participants had no access. That was where the Shields posted the announcements. There were buttons scattered around the panel, some with the logo for each team, others animated, one where people can input with their own.

Surrounding the walls were posters of other things that the Shields had put up. Nora glanced at them. They were sectioned into score updates and not so score updates. He went towards the most recent score update, finding where his team was currently. Lime Llamas were going strong in 10th place! Not bad.

Satisfied, he went back to his team, and waited for the chaos to ensue.

The new game dropped at five pm. The participants gathered at four and waited for the opening. They were friendly with each other, thankfully. There was no pushing and shoving, because it dropped at the exact same time, no one would get any gain from rushing. A wide range of colours spread across the dome, a few of the Shields interacting as well. It was clear that some participants were more popular than others, but they all got along well.

Time ticked slowly. Many of the participants had noticed Shields beginning to prepare for the drop. They giggled to each other, readying themselves for what was going to happen. This moment, at five pm, would mark the beginning of an extraordinary competition which would be told as bed time stories for generations to come.

Five pm hit, and round two of Championship begun. Briar, the poor Shield initiating the chaos, put up the announcement, sending a ping to all the participant’s bracelet. People rushed forward, slamming down the button corresponding to their team. Nora noticed how the buttons displayed under the announcement, and he smiled, making his way up to the Lime Llama button and slapping it.

“Woo!” Nora cheered, before actually going to read the announcement.

Hi @Championship ! Welcome to Battle Box! For this game, your team has been given a set of prompts from each other team. Outside of The Dome (in Writer’s Block) is where you’ll be able to document and collect for those prompts! Get creative!

Documenting one prompt from each team will get 200 bonus points!

Documenting for nine prompts from each team will get you 300 bonus points!

Along with these bonus points, every twenty four hours, there will be a poll for which team’s prompts will get 5 extra points! The first poll will take place three days from now. For example, if the winner is Orange Ocelots, their prompts will grant 5 extra points to the submissions for the next 24 hours! No this does not mean that Orange gets an extra five points, calm down, kitties.

Nora chuckled.

Scores for this game will be updated - hopefully - regularly. This game will run for two weeks . Happy Championship!

Nora was so excited. Being involved in this event was going to be so fun, and he couldn’t wait to get started. He was thinking about what he might do, plan wise, when a tap on his shoulder grabbed his attention.

“We’re going back to our Category to strategise. Meet you there?” Celest smiled and Nora nodded. He was pretty much done here, so he followed her back down to the Lime Llamas Category.

–

Nora was so excited in fact, that he ended up documenting for a prompt for Yellow Yaks in the next three hours since 5pm. He visited the Sprinto channel for one of those hours, making a few new friends.

“I’m addicted to sprinting.” One of them, Heroic, said after one of the sprints. Nora giggled. 

“How long have you been here?” He put his pen down, flicking his hair and shaking it.

Heroic paused. “Oh Nora, my friend, you don’t even want to know.”

Nora just smiled, nodding and pretending his friend was sane.

–

The first week of Battle Box ran smoothly. Friendships were being made, presidential elections from the polls were ensuing, and people were still talking about jeans shorts. It was the best week that Nora had had in a long time. 

Nora only liked visiting the Sprinto channel if he knew others were there. Sometimes he would look for a certain person, and more often than not they would be there. Today, and for several days before today, they had not. Nora was only a little bit concerned. It had been about a week since he had seen Heroic.

Earlier that day, he had gone into Sprinto and done some training, thinking about where on Earth Heroic could be. It was unnatural for them to go this long without the Sprinto channel. He could only hope they were doing okay.

Nora skipped towards Sprinto, just for a peek in. He had at least one sprint of energy, so paying a visit to the channel wouldn’t do him any harm. However, when he stepped in, his energy went from one to seven.

“Hero!” He exclaimed, rushing forward and enveloping them in a hug, whilst they were training. Heroic giggled. “I thought you were dead! Where have you been?”

“I’ve been at war.” They simply replied, turning back to their training. Nora smirked, chuckling.

“How was war?”

“It was war.”

“Okay-?”

Nora sat down on the bench, pulling out his documents and just passing time until the sprint ended. Hero got distracted, turning and talking about their training to Nora, which Nora would shoo them off and remind them they’re mid-sprint in the most light-hearted way possible.

The two of them sprinted for a while, others joining. They would share parts of what they were training for, getting feedback and comments from the other sprinters. Sprinto was always a fun channel to be in.

–

Nora had finally got the gist of Tickets. Every submission, he would make his way back to the Lime Llamas channel and announce his achievements, before either going to bed, or logging off. When no one else was in the channel, Nora would head back to the communal area, and tell the large lime llama statue of his achievements. The statue was Mama Llama, and had been an addition to The Dome at some point during the week. Let’s just say, Nora loved it.

Nora exited the lime doors, and saw the usual presidential elections. This was one of the last polls as the second week was coming to a close, so every participant’s vote counted. Some of the running parties were chasing people, others were pleading, some just staring at people.

Nora decided to cast his vote to the one which had already been voted for the most, knowing it wouldn’t really matter if he voted for any of the other two. 

Nora had documented at least once each day, and was starting to feel their energy drain out from so much literal bad bitch power, sponsored by Lime Llamas.

–

As the second week of Battle Box came to a close, Nora checked the Championship scores so far.

And the Lime Llamas were not in last.

(Sorry Purple Pandas.)