Alternate Battle for Dream Island

ABFDIA 3c: Contestant's Nightmare 3

For a little while, the contestants of this new season of the Battle for Dream Island just let the gravity of their situation sink in.

A brand new competition. A brand new Battle for Dream Island. It feels like it's only been yesterday when the first one ended, when Pen was declared the winner and they all got to *finally* see and enjoy the island's many wonders. Well, maybe because it *was* just the other day. Still, whether or not it had been a day, or a week, or a month, a year, or 2,763 years, it would've always felt like it was too soon. *Far* too soon. When the BFDI ended, when they were finally given the time to sit back, relax, and enjoy life once more, they realized what it really was: horrible. Awful. Terrible. All-around bad. Most of them didn't win the island. Most of them didn't even get close. Most of them didn't even have fun. They're having fun now, sure; the island was unlike anything they'd ever seen or experienced before, but, like, who cares? Back in the day, back in the grasslands, they just made their own fun, and in their own way too. They couldn't possibly care less about the diktats of their fellow living object, let alone a speaker box that suddenly fell out of the sky and proclaimed that they were now the one running things. Life was simple. Life was great. Life was *fun*. And then they were made to Battle for Dream Island, and it was horrible. And now, now that they've gotten just a *moment* of reprieve, they're gonna be made to do it *again*?

A feeling of very pure, very deep rage was quick to spread across the contestants, but then that emotion would subside just as quickly.

This was just life now, wasn't it? This is the way things are. One day, things were one way, and the very next they were a different way. And they most likely would never get to go back ever again. And was that *really* so bad? If one really thought about it, if one humored Tennis Ball for even just a moment, one would realize that, if you *really* concentrate on it, *nothing* is the same from day to day. The sky may still be blue, the grass may still be green, the wind may continue blowing, and the people may still be annoying. But the fine details, the minutiae, the second-by-second things will be different. No one moment is ever truly the exact same as one in the past. It's not even possible. What made this any different? It was at a larger scale, it took more time to get used to, but it was just... change. People change. The world changes. The universe does whatever it wants, regardless of what anyone thinks or does. If it wants to snap away a living sewing needle out of existence, there's just absolutely not a single thing you can do about it.

That's enough thinking about that. There are teams to form.

"Obviously, we're gonna stick together." Pencil declared. "There's *nothing* that's gonna separate us. Right?" She'd blink. "Right?" "Yeah, right!" Match nodded in agreement. "Like, of *course* we're gonna be on the same team. After that last season, I'm not gonna, like, take any chances again." "Great!" The writing utensil chuckled. "Well, now we need a third; my first choice was gonna be Pen, but... you know, he's kinda... not available." "Well, what about, like, Icy?" The matchstick replied. "She's in our alliance, right? That already makes, like, three of us." "Well, yeah. That would've been my next option. But..." The one with the eraser for a brain (and erasers don't have brains) looked around. "Where *is* Ice Cube? Feels like I haven't seen her in a while. Icy? Where are you?" The other one would nervously look around. "Huh." She'd frown. "Icy? Like, where'd you go?" "She probably left you two!" Leafy suddenly interjected. "You guys probably mistreated her, and so she stormed off in anger! This was *exactly* what I was fearing. I warned you about-" Pencil groaned. "Nobody *asked*." She'd angrily push the leaf away. "Leafy, do your 'nice' thing and, like, go away. That'd *really* make us happy."

Eraser aimlessly wandered around, not really sure on who to choose for his team. Everyone had something or other that perturbed him in *just* the wrong way, something that made him want to go back a few steps and just... *hurl*. It was during that directionless perambulation when Blocky suddenly showed up. "Hey, hey!" He'd wave. "There's my pal! We're not gonna let 'em get the better of us this time; this time, we're gonna *win*-" The parallelogram gave him an ugly glare. "*Really*?" He'd interject. "You're just gonna pretend that everything's fine? That all of this is just... *okay*?" "Uh... Yeah?" The hexahedron shrugged. "We've got a brand new opportunity to do better! We did *terribly* last time, so we *really* gotta-" "This is *Pen's* island!" The manly one continued. "We're seriously just gonna fight over it again, instead of trying to look for him, instead of trying to give it back?" "Oh. It's this again." The red one sighed, muttering a variety of words to himself. "Look, *bud*." He'd seethe. "We're not fighting over... *his* island again. We're defending it. You know, from Golf Ball?" He'd then sigh. "Weren't you listening, like, at all? Don't you have a brain?" "Erasers don't have brains." The one that destroyed clarified. "That explains a lot." The block remarked.