Animalistic

Britney Spears and Happy Pills

     "I take my pills and I'm happy all the time"

Max quietly sings to himself backstage. His mic isn't on right now, and the house is big enough that no one can hear him anyways with the music playing, so no one should mind. Not anyone that he cares about, at least. It'll be time for his crew to be on soon, so Maxwell is sitting at a table backstage, by himself. Everyone else was still struggling to find their twirlers, except Monty, but he didn't want to be around her in the first place. Max thinks that maybe he should tell Miambu that his stick is still in the dressing room. 

     Soon "If you seek Amy" ends, and Max , along with the rest of his crew, line up to perform onstage. Thankfully everyone found their stuff. "Toxic" starts playing, with everyone running onstage as Monty, a puma, heads to centerstage and starts singing. Max is supposed to join her in the prechorus, but Max doesn't see a reason to not do a backflip in the background while he waits. Afterwards, he rushes over to her while backup dancers cover him. This was their first time trying a mostly-acapella track, but judging by the audience's faces, they seemed to like it. Soon the song ends, with the hot-pink spotlight shining all over the place, signaling for the other teams to go onstage for bows. 

     While Max is up there, he spots a few of his friends near the audience. Not sitting with them, but being escorted outside. Max decides to think about it later, needing to finish the bow routine first before investigating anything. 

     After he's done, he immediately hops down the stairs as fast as he can and asks the security guard what happened to his friends. He technically  wasn't supposed to leave until the show was over and everyone else was gone, but he was sure his manager Lily would understand.  The guard informs Max that all he know is that they went outside. Before Max can get out the door to the parking lot, however, he is interrupted by Cas, a kangaroo on the rival dance team. Max turns around to see who the purple arm blocking the door in his face belongs to, and sighs, figuring out he wasn't the only one in a hurry to leave. 

"Hey." The kangaroo says.

"Hey." Max responds, growing impatient. 

"Do you wanna.... go out for a drink after this?"

"No." Max says blandly, somewhat creeped out. 

     At this, Cas seems agitated and leaves in the other direction, leaving the doorway free for Max to go through. He runs down the hall trying not to make a lot of noise, and finds himself standing in the parking lot, deserted yet full of cars, probably because the finishing speech isn't over yet. Max calls out for his friends, hoping to hear a response. He had no idea they were coming, and he feels bad for not finding them earlier. Now they're probably lost. He notices Nathan's car in the parking lot, and wonders where she possibly could've gone without her car. He walks closer to the car, wanting to make sure she wasn't in there, and notices Nathan's phone still sitting in the driver's seat. Okay, now he's worried.

"C l a n k ."

    Max quickly looks behind him, hearing a metallic-sounding noise coming from a few feet behind him. He spots Cas the rest of her crew of all female dancers approach him from one of the dark spots in the lights, clearly trying to be intimidating. They're all carrying metal pipes, or at least some sort of junkyard weapon, except for Cas who seems ultimately.... Unarmed. 

'Oh, not this again' Max thinks, really not wanting to deal with crazy Cas again. "Can I.... help you?" Max says, trying to seem indifferent in response. 

"You tell me." She says.

"So.... is it true that you've got a thing for Monty?" Cas speaks again, trying to not act offended in response to Max's 'are you really doing this' look. She speaks with a tone like she already knows the answer. 

     Max doesn't say anything in response. It was a popular rumor, that's true, but a baseless rumor nonetheless. 

Cas takes a step forward, blowing a bubble with her gum. "I mean, it's rather pathetic how you're constantly in her shadow, and how you hang out with weirdos, when really, you should be taking my advice."

     Max thought about that for a second. Was he really always in Monty's shadow? He decides, no, everyone hates Monty and wanted her to leave anyway. Sure, she bosses everyone around, and everyone puts up with it for some reason, but that doesn't mean she gets more spotlight than the rest of them, right? Right?

     Now Max was indeed quite angry. He takes a charge at her, antlers-first, but quickly falls on the ground unconscious, likely due to one of the girls in sequined leotards. He wakes up in a dark room, able to hear faint whispering. Max tries to lift his arms, but it feels like he's strapped to a chair. He can't tell for sure, because Christmas lights are wrapped around his antlers, and he can't see past the bright lights.