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Shae Gui and Shawn Gu were waiting in one of the Star Carnival’s extra tents, waiting for Shy Guy’s Perplex Express to be chosen as a board. Unfortunately, someone just started the battle for the Star Rod over at Star Battle Arena, so they had a while to wait.
“Shae, I’m bored,” Shawn complained. He was lying on the tent floor, spinning his conductor’s hat on his gloved hands.
“Shawn, get up, you’ll get your robe dirty,” Shae grumbled. “And we’ll be working soon enough.”
“You know that’s not true. The battle for the Star Rod takes forever . They really should’ve hired more MCs so that multiple boards can run at the same time.”
“We don’t have the budget for that, and you know it.”
“Because we spend it all on candy ! Fucking candy !”
“Watch your language! We aim for an E rating here.”
“Fuck candy.”
“Shawn.”
“ Fucking candy .”
“ Shawn. ”
“No! Fuck the candy! We’re surrounded by boxes of it! You think the players can eat all of this? No!” He got up off the floor, and walked over to one of the candy boxes with its lid already opened.
“Shawn, we’re going to get fired!”
“They won’t know.” He pulled out a candy in a yellow wrapper, with a ball symbol on the front. “Let them eat candy!”
Shawn put the candy in his mouth, wrapper and all.
Oh boy, transformation time , Shae thought.
Shawn was propelled into the air by an unknown force, and was held there for only a second before being torn into tiny molecular pieces. Then, he was put back together in the shape of a ball with a Shy Guy mask on it.
“Shawn, you dumbass!” Shae sighed. “That was Bowlo candy!”
He jumped.
“Yes, I know I said dumbass, shut up.”
He jumped again.
“I don’t know how you change back! I sell the candy, I don’t eat it.”
Shawn jumped one last time before he decided to try a new method of movement: rolling. He raced around the perimeter of the tent a few times before rocketing towards Shae. She was easily bowled over. Shae picked herself up and saw Shawn had transformed back into a regular Shy Guy, a stack of ten coins in his palm.
“Woah, what a cool candy,” Shawn whistled, pocketing the ten coins. “Thanks for the change, Shae!”
She just realized her pockets felt lighter.
“Of course you did that,” she sighed.
“Damn, I didn’t realize how good these candies were before. Let’s see what else is in there…” Shawn raced back over to the box before Shae could stop him, pulling out a different yellow candy with a tornado on it.
Oh god, not a Bloway .
Shae distanced herself from Shawn as much as she could before he completed the transformation, but not even an entire tent’s worth of distance could help her escape the wrath of Tornado-Shawn.
She fell down back at the entrance of the tent just as Shawn was returning to normal.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “You flew pretty high.”
“It’s nothing I can’t handle,” she sighed, getting up. “Now, you’ve eaten candy. Don’t take any more from that box.”
“Fine, fine.”
“Thank you.”
Shae sat back against the box she was leaning against earlier. She suddenly felt very tired, and closed her eyes to take a nap...until she heard Shawn prying open a candy box.
“ Shawn ,” Shae sighed, not opening her eyes.
“What?” he shrugged. “You should get to eat some candies, too. Here.” He threw her one with three dice printed on the red wrapper. It bounced off her mask and landed in her lap.
“A Thrice Candy ? Really?” Shae stared at the candy in disbelief. “If I’m going to break the rules, at least make it a candy worth rule-breaking for .”
“Just eat it,” he sighed. “I’ll try and find something better.”
She supposed she couldn’t be too mad at him. He was stationed at Payday Waystation, and not at Chew Chew concessions like she was.
Once she ate the candy, rainbow light surrounded her for only a second before disappearing, leaving her with three standard dice in her hand.
“That was pretty cool,” Shawn commented.
“The effect isn’t as spectacular,” Shae held out her hand, showing him the dice.
“Oh. Well, I found something better. Here.”
He tossed her another candy. This one had a green wrapper with a Swoop printed on the front.
Vampire Candy , she thought. Now we’re getting somewhere .
Shae popped it in her mouth, and soon, she felt heavy wings on her back.
“Oh, woah, you’re a vampire now,” Shawn said. “These are some weird-ass candies. Alright, the effect’s pretty cool, but you’re kinda starting to scare me. Would you mind de-transforming?”
“Not until I take back what’s mine,” Shae said in her scariest voice before rocketing towards Shawn. He held up his hands to protect himself, but it wasn’t his blood she was after.
Slamming into Shawn, Shae reached into his pocket and took ten coins. Then, she de-transformed.
“That was terrifying !” Shawn yelled at her, cowering against the box
“Payback,” she shrugged. “Anymore you wanna open?”
“I thought you said we should stop.”
“I did say that, but I still need one more good candy. Thrice candy doesn’t count.”
“Fine. Why don’t you open one this time?”
“Gladly.”
Shae opened the box right next to them. It was filled with all manner of candies wrapped in blue, but one in particular caught her eye.
A Duelo , she thought. Perfect
As soon as she swallowed the candy, Shae was filled with a desire to battle.
“You ready to fight?” she asked, feeling the flames engulf her.
“Anytime,” he answered, and the two raced over to the minigame tent.