Selina Skies
November 13, 2022 12:34 AM
Challenge Results and Party by Selina Skies
The third and final challenge had involved an impressive array of projects, and the scoring had been a real challenge. Selina could see that all the teams had put a fantastic effort in. They were all creative, all featured contributions from the whole team, but at the end of the day, some were more creative, or better executed, or had a more balanced effort from everyone involved. There were a lot of different factors that could contribute to a successful team, as shown by the very differing captains that had headed them. Although the one thing she felt they might have in common was that no one would have pegged them as natural leaders…A notice had gone up asking all the students to meet in MARS for the results and a celebration. The room had snacks arranged around the outside. In the middle were currently rows of chairs, though these would largely vanish to be replaced by more informal seating arrangements once the announcements had been read out. There would be beanbags and some arm chairs around the edge, but most of the space would be open for mingling, or even dancing if the teams wanted to. A large banner hung across the back of the room reading ’Congratulations All Teams’ and below it were a gold, a silver and a bronze flag with the words ‘First place’ ‘Second place’ and ‘Third place’ The spaces under those numbers were currently blank, but would be filled in soon enough.
“Hello, and welcome,” Selina smiled, once all the students were assembled. “I’m happy to see you all here, and I want to congratulate each and every one of you. Regardless of where your team finished, you all showed a huge range of skills—magical, musical, creative, as well as things like leadership, co-operation and kindness, which are no less important than fancy spells in making something like this work.
“After the results, you will have time to mingle and celebrate. You don’t have to stick with your own team. The party will go on until six. You’re not required to stay for the full time, but I’m glad everyone is here to show a sporting attitude by celebrating our winners, and to take pride in your own achievements during this challenge.
“First, we will begin with the results of the last challenge. Once again, I was impressed by the range of skills on display, and this was a very close run thing.” She waved her wand, and a glittering list appeared in the air beside her, filling in from the last placed team to the first.
=8. Team 2 - 13 points
=8. Team 3 - 13 points
=6. Team 7 - 14 points
=6. Team 1 - 14 points
=4. Team 5. - 15 points
=4. Team 4 - 15 points
3. Team 9 - 18 points
2. Team 8 - 21 points
1. Team 6 - 24 points
She allowed some applause, and a tiny bit of quiet murmuring, but she didn’t want to allow too much time for mental maths, and the spoiling of the final reveal.
“We will now announce the overall winner. As we announce the top three, I would like all members of the team to come up and receive your awards. You will be able to keep the large trophy for the length of the party, after which it will be returned to the school to be displayed in our awards cabinet. Each team member will receive one these miniature replicas to take home.
“When the results of the final challenge are added to your existing scores, this is how our table looks…” she said, waving her wand, to bring up the leaderboard. Again, each team appeared one by one in glittering green writing in the air beside her, filling in a little more slowly than the challenge three results had, and stopping before the crucial top three, which would fill in as she announced them, in bronze, silver, and gold glitter respectively.
9. Team 1 - 35 points
8. Team 7 - 41 points
=6. Team 2 - 42 points
=6. Team 3 - 42 points
5. Team 5 - 43 points
4. Team 4 - 46 points
“In third place, with a total of forty-eight points is…. Team nine, led by Theo Spurn.” She beckoned them onto stage, announcing the rest of the team members as they made their way up, and offering Theo a handshake as she presented him with the bronze trophy.
“In second place, with sixty points is… Team eight, led by Mab Pierce-Beales.
“And finally, last but very much not least, and probably not coming as much of a surprise given how they have dominated in every single challenge, our first place winners are TEAM SIX lead by Sadie Chalmers!” Although she had remained unbiased throughout, Selina couldn’t help but be a little pleased that it was one of her own house who had captained the first place team. She gave Sadie a warm smile as she shook her hand and presented her with both the large gold trophy and her own miniature copy.
“Congratulations to our winners, and to all of you regardless of where you placed. Please enjoy the celebration.”
Subthreads: It's over and that's the real reason to celebrate by Olaf Brockert with Nausicaa Scapetello
Good...um...thing...all (tag Jasper) by Xavier Lundstrom with Jasper Brockert, Oz Spellman
Well, that's done now by Lenny Pierce with Piper Wilson
I...what? by Sadie-Lake Chalmers with Lyla Holland
Hurra! [tag: Liesl] by Hansel Hexenmeister with Liesl Brockert
I guess it's over. by Esme Brockert
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Selina Skies
Challenge Results and Party
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Lenny Pierce
November 14, 2022 5:56 PM
Well, that's done now by Lenny Pierce
Dressed in a pink skirt and his favorite glittery unicorn shirt, Lenny gathered with the rest of the school, and mostly around his own team to hear the results of the three part challenges that had dominated the talk of the year. Coming out of challenge two, they'd been tied for fifth, and he thought their arcade had been pretty awesome, though from what he'd seen of the other groups, the other attractions being created were also pretty awesome. The Haunted House had been terrifyingly creepy and tea room had been sophisticated looking and the water park just looked so amazing he kind of wished it was a real place, and Lenny really didn't know how the teachers were going to grade this.As it turned out, it was by putting the arcade tied for last. For just one second, he thought they'd come in first, with their team listed at the very top, and he'd drawn in breath to cheer, but no, it was in descending order, and he let the breath out in a huff of disappointment. As he looked over the range of scores he saw it was another close call for everyone but the top three. He hoped that meant they wouldn't fall too far from fifth, though they would probably fall a few places after coming in last. He held his breath as the overall results went up from ninth place to fourth, and yup, there they were Team 2, tied for sixth, so they'd only dropped one place after their worst performance, which was good.
It was a poor note to end on, though, with each challenge getting worse and worse for them. He checked the line up again, looking for Cole's team, and there he was in fourth, so go him. Lenny made a note to offer congratulations later to his twin and roommate. He'd done the best of the four Teppenpaws in their year, with Levi and Piper both behind even Lenny. (Leviosa's team seven only being one point behind, and Piper's team had been cursed from the start.)
The top three teams were called up. He didn't know anyone on team nine very well. Lazarus and Samara were both in beginners with him this year, but he wasn't close to either. "GO LAZARUS!" he shouted and cheered anyway, figuring the other second year deserved some kind of acknowledgement from him just for being in the same year group as Lenny.
In second place was team eight, and for that one, Fortune and Alexander had the same distinction as Lazerus for being second years, and Liesl was in his house and only one year up, so Lenny cheered loudly again, and yelled, "GO LIESL, FORTUNE, and ALEXANDER!" with a pumping arm gesture. "WHOO!"
In first place was, of course, team six, because obviously it was team six after they placed first in every single challenge. "ALL RIGHT, GWENDOLYN!" Lenny shouted to the second year in that group. "YOU ROCK!" She was a pureblood, so he had no idea if she even knew what 'you rock' means, but he felt it was pretty obviously a compliment given the "WHOOO!" he added after it.
Satisfied that he had cheered the winners sufficiently that he could not possibly be mistaken for a sore loser, he shrugged at his teammates, and offered, "Well, good working with you folks. We did all right, I think." Not fantastic. They would have gotten trophies if they'd been fantastic, but he felt all right was a safe claim to make. "I'm hungry!" he announced suddenly, and darted away to get some food. Hopefully there was something vegan up there.
Apparently other people had the same idea, and he had to wait in a line to get to the table of snacks. "Hi," he said cheerfully to the person who lined up behind him, figuring he may as well chat with someone while they waited. "The challenges were pretty cool, right?"
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Lenny Pierce
Well, that's done now
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Piper Wilson
November 15, 2022 12:01 AM
Yup. On to the next thing? by Piper Wilson
The Challenges had now come to an end and Piper, who was usually a person who was brimming with optimism, was not even remotely optimistic about their chances of even getting second to last place. They had been at the bottom throughout and she just did not think, short of some miracle, that things would improve. Regardless of how cool their waterpark had been, all of the other attractions were amazing too.She knew that someone had to be last. That was the way competitions worked. Piper wished that it hadn’t been them, but she had to accept that it likely would be.
Honestly, it bothered her more that she hadn’t gotten as close to her teammates as she liked. She had honestly really hoped that she would make new friends. And while she had liked her teammates, the Teppenpaw didn’t really think they would be interested in hanging out with her much, aside from hopefully Wally since he was her cousin.
Still, she had her friends, the other Teppenpaws in her year, and now that the Challenges were over, Piper could get back to spending time with them more often. She hadn’t gotten to do so nearly enough this year. The Challenges had taken up a fair amount of time, and obviously since she had to study and go to classes and stuff, they had affected the amount of time that Piper would have spent with them.
And maybe they would hang out together at the party for the Challenge results. That would be fun. She was glad they were Teppenpaws too, so they wouldn’t give her a hard time about being in last place. It was one thing to lose, it was quite another to be mocked for it. Good friends, real friends did not do that. And Piper was pretty sure that Levi, Lenny and Cole were real friends. That was what mattered most of all. That was far more important than winning any competition.
Which was good since she and her teammates so obviously had not done so. The second year did hope that she had done her best to use the skills that Professor Skies had mentioned. She didn’t have much for musical skills and leadership was meant for their Team Leader to display, but Piper had tried her best magically-she was good at magic, but she was still just a second year, so there wasn’t much that she had learned yet-and creatively and she was sure she’d been cooperative and kind. Professor Skies had just said those were important things, so she could at least feel good about that, and about trying. More importantly, she had really had a good time regardless of how they had done in terms of scores.
That was what mattered most of all, having fun, doing her best and having good friends even though that last one had nothing to do with the Challenges. It was still nice to have them though.
And someone had to lose, that was just how it worked. She accepted that it was going to be her and her team. She did worry about Wally though and how he would feel about losing to his brother, even though she didn’t expect Stanley's team to rank all that highly either.
However, when the results of Challenge Three appeared, Piper’s face lit up. They had not gotten last place in it! Their waterpark was tied for sixth with Levi’s team. They had done it! They had actually beaten someone! Unfortunately the two teams that had done worse were her brother’s and Lavender, Stanley, and Lenny’s but still. This was the only time they hadn’t flat out been last. Piper would take it.
Then it was time for the overall rankings-and yup, her team was last. But that was what she had expected after all. Then Levi and her team got second to last and Lenny and her cousins’ and their team tied for sixth. Cole had done the best out of all her friends and close relatives taking fourth. Piper applauded for them all, as well as Gwendolyn, Liesl and Samara who had finished in the top three.
She looked around for one of her friends, spotting Lenny first and joining him in the food line, she was hungry anyway. “Yes, they were!” Piper agreed. “Did you see that my team’s waterpark didn’t get last place? I mean, I’m sorry you did, I’m not trying to make you feel bad about it, it was just that, we finally didn’t get last in something” She honestly did not know what the strategy was to a successful Challenges. Even Ryan, who had led his team to second place, had felt like he blundered into it.
Nor did Piper know what they could have done differently. She thought they had worked all right together although there was a bit of tension with Oz and Iris, with the latter seeming…unimpressed with the former.
“Your arcade was really cool though.” She added. It was, all the projects had really been pretty amazing. “It was too bad that everyone couldn’t win, but I guess that wouldn’t be much of a competition then.” Piper looked at the other Teppenpaw. “Still, even though we didn’t do well, I mean, it was really fun and I’m a little sorry to see it end. At least we’ll get to spend more time together now though, you, me, Levi and Cole. With the Challenges we didn’t get to do that as much.”
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Piper Wilson
Yup. On to the next thing?
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Lenny Pierce
November 16, 2022 6:28 PM
Great, what's that? by Lenny Pierce
Lenny grinned at Piper, glad she'd at least had fun even if her team had bombed in the rankings. "I did see you did better!" he exclaimed when she brought up their water park, which she had every right to be proud of. He shrugged off her concern about his own team's low score in the last challenge. "Don't worry about it. The only thing I'm mad about is that your water park doesn't exist in the real world because I wanted to go on that slide!"He grinned again, to show he wasn't really mad about even that (though he definitely did want to go to their water park and it was a real shame that it didn't exist). "Seriously though, I'm glad you did well the last challenge, and that we all had fun even if our teams didn't do so good. And, yes! Everybody's attractions looked awesome! I don't think I could have judged that and picked just one winner. I think it must have come down to the logs and figuring out who had the most ridiculous ideas that didn't make the cut or something, because every single one was great from what I saw."
"Yeah, it'll be good to have the Tepps together again, though it was pretty cool teaming up with new people we wouldn't normally get to work with though. I got to meet Cole's friend Yarielis, so it was good to interact more with someone he talks about so much. She seems pretty shy though. She didn't say a lot. Did you make any new friends on your team?"
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Lenny Pierce
Great, what's that?
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Piper Wilson
November 18, 2022 6:30 AM
Uh, the Concert? by Piper Wilson
Piper laughed. “I know. Pretty much all of them would have been fun. It’s too bad it’s not the Fair this year instead of the concert. Maybe we’d be making them as exhibits. And I’m glad you liked the slide. I, um, I came up with it.” She said shyly, blushing and looking down at the ground. The second year did not want to come across as the least bit full of herself, but the compliment made her feel good. Not that Lenny had known that it was her idea.Still, Piper worried that her saying that she’d come up with the idea that her friend liked and wanted to ride would come across as bragging. Even though, to be honest, she really had come up with a lot of the ideas for the waterpark. Oz and Iris had seemed sort of over it all. Not that the Teppenpaw had really blamed them for feeling that way. Being last the entire time was probably fairly discouraging.
She nodded. “Yeah, I agree. I have no idea what I would have picked either. If you put all the ideas together, it would have made a really fun amusement park.” Honestly, Piper had no idea how things were really judged. “It’s possible that some of the winners used more complex charms and advanced spell work.
The second year actually did have another theory about why they had finished so poorly overall, but she didn’t really like to think about it because it was not very nice. The thing was, two of her teammates, Oz and Iris, were not only so over the whole thing by the time they reached the final Challenge, but did not seem to like each other or work well together. And that…might honestly have been why they had not done very well. Piper hated to blame them, and really, she wasn’t mad or anything and she actually did like them both-she did like most people, unless they were really horrible like Aunt Jillian or Aunt Pearl or Piper’s cousin, Aunt Pearl’s daughter Carrie, the latter two being people that Piper did not recall ever meeting-but the Challenges were supposed to be a thing that was at least partially about teamwork and if people could not work well together, how could they succeed?
It wasn’t as if they were bad people or either was the one that was particularly at fault. Some people just weren’t meant to be friends. They just didn’t mix well or have any common ground. Piper was glad that she had not really met anyone that she felt that way about. She was glad to have her Teppenpaw friends.
The second year shrugged. “Probably not. I mean, Wally is my cousin, like, my first cousin once removed” Brockert relations needed to be specified as such. Gwendolyn was her cousin too, but they had only recently met and spent time together during the last few years whereas Wally was someone who Piper had known while she was growing up.“ So hopefully we’ll spend more time but like, mostly they’re older than me. It’s not as if I would mind spending time with them, but like Morgan is going to graduate,though she’s friends with my brother, so maybe I’ll see her again if they stay in touch, but Oz is going to be a sixth year and Iris will be a fifth year, so they probably won’t want to hang out with me.”
She looked at Lenny. “But that’s cool about Yarielis. She seems really nice. Just because she’s shy doesn’t mean she’s not a person that would be pleasant and fun to spend time with.” Piper didn’t really know how much she would have in common with the other second year, who seemed fairly sporty and tomboyish. So it was interesting that Yarielis was described as shy and was pretty quiet since Piper sort of thought of those types as being loud and boisterous. She guessed she had learned a valuable lesson about stereotyping people but those traits were just fused together in her brain, and while she could remind herself that she shouldn’t do that, it would take time to unfuse them in her head.
Piper grinned. “But it will definitely be cool hanging out with the four of us again, even though it was pretty cool meeting other people. Honestly, I wish I had gotten closer to my teammates.” Even the ones closer to her age, she just hadn’t bonded with like she wanted. But at least they hadn’t…not gotten along like Oz and Iris. “But at least I have the three of you.”
“So, “ The Teppenpaw girl asked. “Are you looking forward to our Performing Arts act at the concert? I have to admit, I’m sort of glad I don’t have to play a junk instrument, I’d much rather do the act with puppets.” While Piper and Levi had the roommate thing, she and Lenny had the Performing Arts club that was theirs.
She really needed to find a thing that was her and Cole’s.
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Piper Wilson
Uh, the Concert?
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Lenny Pierce
November 21, 2022 6:33 PM
Oh, right. That. by Lenny Pierce
"Really?" Lenny asked, impressed, when Piper claimed that she'd been the one to come up with the idea for her group's demo slide. "That's great! You were brilliant! And that would have been amazing if we could have done these for the fair." It was a shame the yearly rotations hadn't worked out that way this time. Musical performances clearly hadn't be a strength for either of their teams, or honestly, pretty much any of the teams. Rosalynn's group hadn't been terrible, but he wasn't sure even they had qualified as good after only having two days to make their own instruments and arrange original music, never mind practice. Lenny and his immediate family were not musically inclined, but he had enough musicians in his family branch to know that music acts didn't work like that.Lenny nodded along as Piper talked about her teammates. He was pretty sure he'd known she and Wally were cousins before, but he probably wouldn't have been able to swear to it had anyone asked him. He also wouldn't be able to swear to it if anyone ever asked him which of the other students Wally even was. He was one of the older kids, so Lenny hadn't crossed his path much.
Other than Yarielis, though, he understood her doubts about the other -older- students on their teams wanting to hang out with them in the future. The next youngest on his team had been Amethyst in Fourth, and while they'd share intermediates next year as third and fifth years, it was still a pretty big age gap and the only time they'd ever be in the same class group. "Well, maybe if there's classwork next year where the third years have to work with a fifth year, you could team up with Iris and I can team up with Amethyst, because we already know each other because of this, and that'll be easier than if we never got teamed up like this." Though maybe Yarielis would prefer teaming with Amethyst, since she was quieter than Lenny and the two girls were from the same House. Well, if it came up, they could work it out then.
"Cole says she's definitely pleasant and fun to be around," Lenny confirmed. "I didn't say being shy was a bad thing," he added a little defensively, because he knew he was kind of from the opposite end of the spectrum and it might seem implied even if he didn't mean that at all. "I just meant the group format made it hard for her to speak up and for us to get to know her very well.
I'll try to catch up with her one-on-one sometime. That might make her feel more comfortable."
"Yeah!" Lenny agreed, holding out his hand for a high five when Piper cheered the freeing up of Challenge time to hang out as Tepps again.
He nodded emphatically with a big grin when she brought up the concert. "Absolutely! The puppet act is going to be epic! And, to be entirely honest, I'm kind of glad we don't have to do the junk instruments either. I didn't sing so I don't think I'm the reason why we placed in the low tiers, but music was never something I was any good at. I'm much better at juggling and acting with puppets, and that's way more fun, too."
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Lenny Pierce
Oh, right. That.
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Piper Wilson
November 22, 2022 12:14 PM
Yes. That. by Piper Wilson
Piper’s cheeks turned pink.”Thank you.” Actually, she had been kind of proud of her idea for the slide. “And yeah, that would have been really cool. Although I’m not sure how we would have made full sized versions of them for the fair, I mean, we would have had to get the materials and that doesn’t work as well when we have to make them actually big enough to use since we couldn’t just..make them out of materials that we have around the school. There would probably be all sorts of safety issues.”She paused. “Of course, we do allow students to play a game where they’re flying around while people try to lob metal balls at them, but still. It would still be kind of difficult to make things like that ourselves for the fair.” Another thing occurred to Piper though. “But there’s the water room. We could imagine my team’s waterpark there and go down the slide there!.” That would be really cool. “We could even reimagine it as one of those slides where multiple people go down at a time, so the four of us could go down it together.”
Piper nodded. “Perhaps” That would make sense rather than teaming up with someone random, but it wasn’t as if they would get to spend a lot of time with their older teammates. Which was unfortunate, since she had really hoped to bond with her team. Making a new friend would have made it all worth it after losing but at least she had some great friends already.
She heard the defensive note in the other Teppenpaw’s voice. “I’m sorry.” Piper apologized. “I didn’t really mean that you were saying that. It’s just that some people think that being shy means someone is boring and it’s kind of an instinctual, automatic response for me to defend them in that way. “ Of course, Lenny would never look down on anyone like that. Piper felt bad that she had made her friend think that she thought that he had. She would never want to insult anyone, let alone one of her closest friends.
The second year continued “And you’re right, a group format is absolutely more difficult for some people. Approaching her one on one is the best way and I’m glad you’d want to reach out to her” After all, as far as Piper was concerned, when someone was shy, they needed others to do just that. Everyone needed at least one friend and it wasn’t fair to expect someone who was shy to make the first move. “Maybe next year, she can share a tent with Levi and me for the Bonfire, since we can’t have just two people or share with you and Cole.”
Piper returned her friend’s high five before responding to what he said about the Concert. “I know. I never learned how to play an instrument.” Contrary to what some believed and expected, not all purebloods of her social status had to learn how to do so. Certainly they had that opportunity if they wished and she was sure that in some families everyone had to-Amity and Chaslyn had, of course,been required to learn several by their mother=but it wasn’t like a thing that was the case with the Wilsons or the Brockerts or her parents. Her parents would actually never force her and Gabriel to do anything extra that they didn’t want to do.
Although,it was far from the worst assumption people made about people like Piper. Some people thought they were snobby or mean or downright evil. She would much rather assume that they thought she played an instrument, even though she actually didn't. "And I totally agree. I at least know more about what I'm doing there. And I enjoy acting." Piper paused, thinking.. "I don't think anyone actually wants to play junk instruments. The Challenge itself was kind of a cool idea, it's just that part of it that wasn't...great."
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Piper Wilson
Yes. That.
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