TOGETHER STRONG | JUMANJI • ALEX VREEKE | ON HOLD

Nine

"IT'S THE NEXT LEVEL. The first time, my hot air balloon wouldn't even take off. And then there was the whole plane thing I mentioned, and once I got down to my last life, I realized I was screwed." Alex showed his wrist, showing he only had one black line left. "And half the stuff that came at me, I had zero way to deal this. I mean, you can't kill a black mamba with a margarita."

"You sure can't. You need a zoologist for that." Fridge said and pointed at himself.

"Alex, we can help each other. You've been here a long time, you know the game, and between us, we have a lot of strengths." Spencer started.

"Yeah, we're actually pretty good together." Martha looked up at Spencer, nodding her head along.

"I don' know, Bro, okay, I mess up one more time, I'm toast. Totally freaks me out even thinking about going back to the transportation shed." Alex explained. "I don't wanna die in Jumanji."

"We just gotta stick together. If we do that, we can win. I know we can." Spencer encouraged him.

"Oh my god. You're the missing piece. You were the thing we needed to find." Rae jumped up.

"So the clue was to, what...go to the bazaar to find the missing piece?" Martha asked. "It wasn't the elephant."

"It was me." Alex smiled. looking at the group in front of him.

"Yeah." Bethany smiled.

"Dudes, let's do this." Alex stood up from his sitting position.

Hey, Spencer, you gonna drink that margarita?" Fridge asked, kind of intoxicated.

"I, you're done." Spencer laughed.

"THERE IT IS. The transportation shed. There's all sorts of vehicles inside. We gotta get one, and get across the canyon, and get to the Jaguar statue." Alex explained after everyone crouched behind a couple of rocks.

"Okay, I see the transportation shed, I see the canyon, but I still can't see the statue which is weird, 'cause it's like the most important thing in Jumanji and it's huge," Bethany explained, looking down at the map.

"That's what she said." Fridge snickered under his breath.

"Are you drunk, Fridge?" Spencer called him out.

"What are you talking about? I ain't drunk." Fridge denied.

"He is drunk," Martha said.

"I had three little margaritas." Fridge explained.

"Well, you are about half of your usual size." Rae teased from beside him.

"Whatever." Fridge grumbled.

"Okay, Alex. What do we do here? How do we get past these guards?" Spencer changed the subject.

"Last time, I waited until they left."

"How long did that take?" Rae asked, keeping her eyes on the two guards.

"About three weeks?" Alex estimated.

"Oh, we gonna die." Fridge cried.

"Okay, Plan B," Spencer said.

"Maybe there's another door somewhere. But we gotta distract those guys first." Alex spoke.

"I've got it. Distracting guys is like, the main thing I do. Fridge plays football, Spencer plays video games, Rae skates like it's still 2013. I distract guys." Bethany stood up.

"Bethany, I hate to break it to you right now, but you don't exactly have the...the tool kit." Fridge pointed to her.

"Not me," Bethany smirked, pointing towards Martha.

"What?"

"You have to go down there and flirt with those guys. Hold their attention while we sneak in." Bethany explained.

"No. No! I can't just go over there and flirt with some weird soldiers I don't even know." Martha spoke.

"I know girl, but right now we don't have a better idea," Bethany said.

"You don't understand. I actually can't do it. Why don't we send Rae down there?" Martha pointed towards Rae, who was taking her jacket off, revealing both of her arms covered in tattoos.

"They could get intimidated by the tattoos on her. You have to do it." Bethany explained.

"I can't talk to guys. I'm terrible at it." Martha worried.

"I can give you some pointers," Bethany spoke.

"No, I'm sorry, we, we have to come up with another plan. I'm not. No. Not doing that." Martha shook her head.

Martha, you just have to distract them long enough for us to get into the shed." Spencer talked to her.

"I really don't think I can Spencer, I'm not... Like, I'm not actually some badass girl." Martha sighed.

'What are you talking about? You're a total badass. You could do anything." Spencer hyped her up.

"Wow, that's really beautiful, Spencer. How about we set up a nice candlelight dinner for the two of you." Rae spat, trying to get the two to stop flirting.

"All right. Show me how it's done." Martha said, and the two walked away.

"Hey, what did you mean by the candle-light dinner thing?" Spencer grabbed Rae's arm.

"What?"

"You said it. Me and Martha, candlelight dinner. What did you mean by that?" Spencer asked.

"The girl is into you, Spencer," Fridge spoke, and let go of Rae's arm so she could walk with Alex to find another door.

"SO, IN REAL LIFE, YOU SKATE," Alex spoke, getting rid of the silence.

"Yeah. Tony Hawk is a real inspiration for me." She explained.

"Before I got stuck in the game, a few of my friends and I would hang out at a skate park, and watch everyone skate. There was this one girl, who showed everyone who's boss. But I never learned her name." Alex said.

"She sounds kinda badass." Rae watched as the smile lit up on Alex's face as he talked about the girl.

"She was. She was always at the park. So much that I learned the days she would be there, and went jus to watch her." Alex said.

"Hey, there's another door. We should go get the others." Rae pointed out. The two walked back to where Spencer and Fridge were standing.

"Hey, we found a side door," Alex said and started leading the way back to the door.

"Guess what I found." Fridge laughed.

"No, no, no, don't tell them." Spencer pleaded.

"There's the door," Rae said, as they crouched by more rocks.

"I just need something to cut through the fence. Fridge, you got anything like that in the backpack?" Spencer asked, making Fridge take the bag off of his back to search it.

"Yeah, I should." Fridge said. "Here you go, I got some Uhm, some bolt cutters. That see like a good tool for the situation?"

"Perfect, actually," Rae said before Bethany wandered over.

"It's called backpack power, baby," Fridge spoke to Alex.

"You guys, I think this is gonna work," Bethany said kneeling next to everyone.