“Pencil.”
Pencil grumbled at the mention of her name, thinking someone in her team was just continuously speaking ill of her for the mistake and incident she had caused during the challenge.
She sat alone in the middle of nowhere, mostly around the edge of the competition area, where everyone else barely visited. She was all alone, cursing all of those who had blocked her way out of her previous intention– going back– as well as the various other people who were bad-mouthing the entirety of CloudYAY as a whole. She didn't care about that, but only did when her name was in it.
“Pencil, are you listening?”
The taller one turned towards the source of the voice, the voice that was annoyingly calling for her, in which she had mistaken as another belittling.
Standing behind her, eye-level due to her short height, was Golf Ball. Pencil raised a brow, clearly uninterested. Expression was just sour enough to alert Golf Ball that she didn't wish to talk to anyone at the moment– but Golf Ball never took the hint, huh?
Pencil groaned, rolling her eyes after the ball didn't leave her. She turned back to where she was staring at, a much empty place with no one, because looking at anyone would just boil her head. She didn't need any reminder that she was an outcast, as much as she would never claim to be outloud.
Baffled, Golf Ball gasped exasperatedly. “Stop ignoring me!” She demanded, much to Pencil’s annoyance.
“Ugh, what do you want?! Can't you see I'm busy!” Pencil faced the smaller one, standing up with her hands spread up in the air, emphasizing her frustration in Golf Ball’s presence. Golf Ball stared at Pencil with a perplexed look, clearly not finding what Pencil was so occupied with.
“No.” She bluntly answered. “All I see is that you were sitting here by yourself, completely available… to chat.” She trailed a bit before she added the last line, sounding a little hesitant.
Pencil scoffed. “What? Gonna scold me on the same thing over again? You know I would very much appreciate it if you stop being a bossy bot. An annoying one, even.”
Looking offended, she took a breath and exhaled, bringing her feet to her face as she muttered to herself quietly about “Why am I doing this”, before turning to Pencil once again.
“I want to talk to you. About what had happened.”
“And I don't care, Golf Ball.” Pencil sourly retorted, sitting back down and looking away in an attempt to ignore the smarter one.
“Pencil, I understand your struggle in the competition field with your failed leadership.”
Pencil’s eyes perked up, but she furrowed her eyebrows immediately to not look so… desperate.
“Whatever, GB. You're not lecturing me about your leadership when you're literally a bad one yourself.” Pencil crossed her arms. Golf Ball’s eye twitched, but she had to keep her cool. She sighed once again.
Golf Ball approached Pencil, then sat down beside her. Pencil blinked, simply confused as her eyes widened. “What– What are you doing?”
“I'm.” Golf Ball looked away. Her expression was unreadable to Pencil, as the pause in between her speech made Pencil impatient.
The other coughed, either clearing her throat or was choking on her own breath, as her face was a little flustered even by her own action, very uncharacteristic and unsual of her. “I am providing you comfort by… being there for you.” She closed her eyes, eyebrows furrowed in what seemed like an angry expression and mouth curled downwards, by her face was heating up as she said this.
Pencil opened her mouth, but closed it. She looked a little dumbfounded, feeling her own stomach stir up into an unusual feeling, the butterflies flying around inside. Her eyes were wide open and her mouth fell agape.
After the silence that seemed to be eating her alive, Golf Ball spoke. “I believe it is important for all of my teammates to have a balanced mental stability during the competition to avoid the factors of what usually caused an ineffective challenge accomplishment.” She finally opened her eyes to glance at Pencil. “I hope you will be alright when the next challenge has arrived, as you almost caused a complete destruction over our whole universe.”
Despite the mention of it again, her tone felt genuine and less demanding like how she used to usually talk. It felt… heartwarming, to Pencil’s amusement, and coming from Golf Ball? She must be dreaming. Pencil felt a deep sense of care from the nerd, and she couldn't shake whatever feeling she had going on in her stomach and her chest at the time.
“I–” Pencil, in a state of a completely flushed face, flung her arms towards herself and crossed them on her chest. “Wh-Whatever, Bossy Bot, I'm fine! I'll do fine on the challenge like always.” She spat.
Though, it sure did make her think. No one understood her, or what she had gone through. No one understood the action behind what she had done, why she jumped for that yoylelite, and it still made her deeply sick.
Not Golf Ball, no. She wouldn't get it. She had worse leadership. Pencil thrived with her alliance during BFDIA, having made to the final 8, and Golfball only ever had one follower throughout the seasons. But, Pencil now had none.
Golf Ball fell silent, watching as Pencil’s face slightly shifted to a crestfallen expression, filled with sadness that only showed briefly before it changed to a more frustrated one, glaring back at Golf Ball.
Golf Ball just raised her brow. “I can see through your aggravation, Pencil. Your tirade from earlier proved your words otherwise.”
“What do you even know, we're nothing alike.” Pencil barked, now completely not in the mood.
Golf Ball shot her a glance before her eyes fell towards the ground, then the sky. “As much as I don't want to admit it, we are somewhat similar.”
“How are we even similar?” Pencil’s tone sounded unamused, a sense of her was curious but at the same time she knew she would be hearing absolute nonsense. Golf Ball never made sense to her, stupid nerd.
“Tennis Ball was the last follower I had, the only one that respected me enough so our team can reach its goal more effecient and affectively.” Golf Ball heard a distant voice of Tennis Ball exclaiming something to his teammates as she mentioned his name, she sighed. “If we keep doing this, we will only cause further destruction and have our chances of winning reduced to a hazardous degree.”
Since she felt nice, Pencil decided not to mention her bad leadership once again, instead, giving in. “So,” she raised a brow, “what are you suggesting?”
“We must work together to our advantage and that of our team. I am not fond with Donut’s attempt in leading the team and Pillow’s delirious and psychopathic character, and Yellow Face had gone bankrupt. I barely know Winner at all.” She looked up to the taller one, studying her expression.
To Golf Ball’s surprise, Pencil had seemed less upset and moreso surprised by the offer, but she then looked away, bringing her arm to her chin and she hummed out loud. “Hm.”
“Think about it, Pencil. With my brilliant intelligence and your agility in performing challenges, we will definitely be unstoppable!” Her body turned completely towards the other, face lit up and genuinely enthusiastic about the idea.
After some thinking, and since Golf Ball was literally looking at her with the eyes she couldn't even resist– in which she didn't know Golf Ball was able to do that– she inhaled and sighed really long. “...Fine.”
Golf Ball immediately stood up, in which Pencil was a little caught off guard off, as the ball grinned towards her. “Thank you for the acceptance of my offer. I wish us success in this associafion.” As she turned around, she made her way back to her underground laboratory.
Pencil sat there and watched her go.
“Huh.”