And I'm the last of the Irish Rover

After kicking her shoes off, Dani took a deep breath and grabbed the hammer, holding it over her head. This was a pretty raunchy game, there was no denying that. But she was confident in her strength, and knew that she could handle it.

“Uraaah!” With a roar, Dani swung down the hammer with everything she had. Nick thought for a moment that the ground actually cracked when she struck.

The hand shot up towards the naked ass like a rocket being launched into space. It slammed into the cheeks and caused them to wobble like a thunderclap. No bell rang off, though- the only thing that echoed through the courtyard was a loud, raunchy moan.

Dani turned red and dropped the hammer in embarrassment.

Classy game, this was.

“Whatever,” she muttered, shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter anyway. There, I did it, I won!” She wanted to be more proud of that victory, but the disturbing nature of the game made that a little difficult to do.

“I knew you could do it,” Kim said, approaching her. “Now, Dani, what would you like for your prize? We’ve got all sorts of figures to choose from.”

Dani wasn’t quite sure, honestly. She’d approached the game because it was fun; she didn’t really care about winning any figures. She thought about it as she slipped her shoes on.

“How about… oh! I know!” She turned to Carly, who shared her gaze for a moment. Neither girl said anything, they just stared at each other.

“Carly, um…” Dani was the first one to avert her eyes. “You, uh… you said you wanted a figure of yourself, right? So… well…”

“Oh!” Carly’s face brightened. “You… you’d do that? Really? You’d get one for me?”

“I mean…” Dani glanced at the Spank Tester. “…I kind of just did,” she pointed out, smiling coyly at the other girl.

Carly giggled back.

“Okay then,” Kim nodded, reaching below the counter and picking up the Carly figure. “One Carly, coming right up!” It was even wearing the costume that Carly currently had on. “Did you know, you can customize the clothing however you want? You can even order extra sets for free! This is definitely the best bang for your buck!”

“From what I hear, so is Carly,” Rose whispered to Holly, who started snickering.

Carly rolled her eyes, but smiled at the offer from Dani nevertheless.

“Thanks,” she said, taking the figure of herself. “It’s kind of cool, you know? Having my own anime figurine? It’s even cosplaying!”

“Yeah, I know,” Dani laughed. “I was thinking about getting one of myself, but I don’t know, seeing me like that… it’s well-made, don’t get me wrong, but that’s a little creepy.”

“Well, why not?” Carly shrugged. “You can do it! I think the Dani figure is cute! Why not give it a try, anyway?”

She looked at the machine, then back to Dani. “I mean, it’s not like you’ve really got a shot at losing, right? You’re already pretty strong. You could get the whole collection if you wanted!”

“I think that’d be a great idea,” Kim nodded. Her eyes were shining. “Play some games, win some prizes, all in good fun.”

Dani squinted at her. “What, are you on commission or something?” She asked.

Kim shrugged. “Just trying to be a good employee and get people interested in playing the games, that’s all!”

“Well… I guess I might as well try one more time,” Dani sighed in resignation.

She kicked off her shoes and reached for the hammer.

“Ahem.”

Kim cleared her throat and pointed at a sign hanging over the courtyard that had definitely not been there a second ago.

NO SHOES, NO SERVICE

Dani glowered at Kim, who gave her an apologetic look.

“Don’t take it out on me!” She pleaded with her buddy, holding up her hands. “Dakota must not have liked that little runaround you did before, when you bet a more… modest piece of clothing to win, I’m sorry.”

“No, no, I get it,” Dani sighed, rolling her eyes. Then she smirked, reached down, and unrolled her socks. “This should be fine!”

She tossed them to Kim, hitting her in the face with one of them on accident (or maybe on purpose). Kim picked the clothing articles up as Dani slid her shoes back on, and walked over to the Spank Tester machine.

“Well… it’s certainly a loophole,” Nick said, unable to resist smiling in amusement.

“I can’t believe Dani of all people figured something out before me,” Dawn said, shaking her head in disbelief. It felt like she was being called stupider than Dani.

That was not a fun place to be.

“Ah, it’s all in good fun,” Rose chortled, patting the other girl on the back. “Dani’s the kind of girl who sees a simple solution and goes for it! You just have a tendency to overthink things, that’s all! Nothing to be ashamed of!”

Dawn knew that Rose was right, but she also knew that the only reason she had taken off her shirt in the first place was because that’s what Rose had done for HER bet. And while Rose wasn’t to blame for Dawn overthinking things and not giving it more consideration, it didn’t exactly put Dawn in a pleasant mood in regards to the other girl, either.

She didn’t say anything, though, and just stood back to let Dani take a crack at the machine.

“OH YEAH!” Dani shouted, swinging the hammer with all her might a second time. The hand soared up again and clapped those cheeks, filling the air with another pleasurable moan.

“Makes me kinda wonder what Dani spanking me would be like,” Gina grinned, licking her lips. “I bet she’s got a lot of pent-up feelings, and with all that power… woo, boy!”

“You offering?” Dani smirked, strolling back to Gina with an amused gleam in her eye. She knew the punk girl was just playing around and that she shouldn’t take Gina’s offer seriously, but at the same time, she had grown more comfortable with some light flirting between friends.

Maybe that meant she and Gina could actually be considered friends. It was kind of hard to say.

“Well, congratulations on your win,” Kim said, coming up to Dani. “Which of our prizes would you like next?”

Dani glanced at Carly for a moment, and then blushed.

“Um… one of… one of me, please,” she stammered. “You know, if that’s okay.”

“Right! Not a problem!” Kim grinned, handing Dani a figurine of herself. Sadly, it wasn’t the way she used to be. It was an exact replica of her current self, curves and all, only with her bright blue dress instead of the casual clothes she was wearing right now.

“What next, Dani, you going to give everyone a figure of themselves now?” Nick wondered.

“That could be a problem.” Holly pointed at the sign, which had changed once again.

NO SHOES, NO SOCKS, NO SERVICE

“Is Dakota just allergic to playing fair or something?” Dani groaned. “Come on!”

“Well, in her defense, this isn’t exactly a fair game,” Sylvia pointed out. “It’s the kind of game where when you can win, there’s no point in not playing it over and over and over again to keep winning prizes, since you aren’t actually spending money.”

“In real carnivals, games like this one tend to have a ‘one win per month’ policy, to keep people from cleaning them out of prizes,” Dawn pointed out. She didn’t like that Dakota kept changing the rules on them, but she could understand why the other woman was doing it.

“Well, forget it then,” Dani snorted, rolling her eyes. “I’m not going to strip down to my bra. Besides, I don’t really care that much about the figures, anyway.”

She turned to Carly and handed her the copy of herself. “The only reason I wanted to get this one in the first place, is because Carly asked me for it,” she said, blushing. “So… here.”

“Thanks,” Carly smiled back. “Um… but I’m not exactly comfortable walking around with these, they seem kind of fragile. Is there a place where I can put them?”

“There’s a locker, yeah,” Nick nodded. “That’s where we’ve been storing our prizes.”

The group decided to stick together and head for the lockers.

“After this, we definitely need to try some of the wilder rides, Nick,” Gina urged him. “That’s the agreement, right? You stick with Morgana and the kiddy stuff for the morning, and then in the afternoon you’ll come hang out with us on the REAL rides!”

“Hey!” Morgana frowned. “I-I can do the real rides!”

“Are you sure?” Dawn asked. “You’re not going to throw up?”

“I feel much better,” Morgana insisted.

“Well, in that case, we can all stick together as a big group then!” Mary said. “That should be a lot of fun!”

“We have an odd number now, though,” Marley pointed out as her sister put her prizes away in the locker. “That’s going to make riding on things like roller coasters a little awkward.”

“No need to worry about that!”

Everyone turned to see Kim standing in front of them. For once, she wasn’t standing behind a kiosk or a counter.

Even more surprising, she was actually wearing a shirt again. Her carnie outfit had disappeared, and in its place she was wearing her good old schoolgirl uniform again.

“Kim!” Mary brightened, looking like she hadn’t seen her friend in days, even though it had been less than five minutes since they left her at the carnival games.

“You finally off work? Nice!” Dani grinned. She socked her friend playfully in the shoulder. “I guess that means no more rip-offs, huh?”

“Yeah, sorry about all that,” Kim said, shaking her head and smiling sheepishly. “I kinda had to tow the company line a bit. You know, get people encouraged to play the games and go on the rides and stuff. But… there was an upside to it. I got some BP out of the deal.”

Her eyes twinkled.

“1000 BP, to be specific!” She stated. “That’s a lot more than I would ever earn in a day at the boutique, that’s for sure.”

Kim: 3600 BP + 1000 BP = 4600 BP

“Still, I wonder who’s going to be running the rides now,” Sylvia mused. “I haven’t seen any of the faeries around.”

“That’s who was running them when we went on our date,” Kim remembered. “I suppose that they would come back, now that I’m not working?”

“Yeah,” Sylvia nodded. “That makes sense. Sounds like what Dakota would do, anyway.”

“Well, we can think about that later!” Gina interrupted their thoughts. “Come on, there’s a ride I want to go on that I’ve been waiting for the whole time! It’s called the Body Pillow!”

Nick didn’t like the sound of that one.

“Uh… maybe not that ride…”

“Come on, Daddy, it’s no big deal,” Sylvia said, grabbing his arm. “It’s actually a lot of fun! Come on, let’s go!”

Nick glanced at Mary, wondering if she would get him out of this. But she had a determined look on her face that suggested just the opposite.

“I think it’s going to be a lot of fun!” Mary declared, trying to fit in with the cool crowd.

Sighing in resignation, Nick knew there was nothing he could do to discourage her when she was like this, so he agreed.

The Body Pillow was not the kind of ride Nick was expecting. At first, he wasn’t even sure if it was a ride at all. Gina had led them to a building that looked like a really big bed. A round bed, like the kind you might find in some foreign luxury hotel. And when Nick said big, he meant MASSIVE. The bed was large enough that Nick reasonably expected that the entire harem could sleep comfortably on it.

It sure didn’t look like a ride, though.

“Gina,” he said, turning to the punk, “are you sure that this ride is the right one? You followed the map properly, right?”

“I’m sure!” Gina assured him with a grin. “Don’t worry! We’ve got it covered! This is going to be a blast! I know just what kind of ride it is, I went on these all the time back in the day! Get ready to barf!”

Well, Nick certainly didn’t like the sound of THAT.

They approached the building, only to see that someone was standing at the counter where Kim would normally be standing.

There were two things that stood out immediately to everyone there. One, the woman was normal-sized, not a faerie. The other was that they were certainly not wearing a carnie outfit- their clothes were a bright emerald green.

“Ah! Hello again! It’s so good to see you all! Is it good to see me? I bet it’s good to see me. You must be so happy! I know I’m happy. We finally meet again! I was wondering if it would happen, but I never thought it would happen this way!”

The motormouth manning the station was someone that Nick remembered from the corner of his mind, but of everyone here only one person really knew her.

“Nola!?” Sylvia’s jaw dropped in shock. “What are you doing here?! Why are you working a ride at the Amusement Park on my- err, Dakota’s season?!”

“Sylvia! I’m so glad to see you!” Nola turned her flashing green eyes towards the blonde, and curled up her lips in a grin. The little leprechaun practically leapt over the counter to give Sylvia a hug. “I was thinking that I would just never see you again, you know? But then here you are! You managed to become a contestant in your own season? That’s so much fun! I wish I could have that much fun! Or that I could have a season. Well, I did have a season, but then I kind of didn’t? But I still do! But I don’t. It’s complicated. Well, not really. See, my producer decided that my season was getting boring, so he put us on pause. Or cancelled us. But not the fun kind of canceled where people on twitter get really really mad. Oh wait, it’s not twitter anymore. I think it’s called X? That’s dumb. I should just called it ‘Xitter’ because it’s ‘shitter’ than the old twitter. Ha! That rhymed! I love rhymes. Do you like rhymes? Maybe that’s why my season didn’t really last, not enough rhymes. But I could only put in so many! I feel like I’m not really getting through, Sylvia, are you following me with this? Good! I’m glad. So anyway-”

“Nola, stop, please, just stop,” Sylvia said, clamping her hand over the fast-talking girl. “What the heck’s going on?! Your season got canceled?! Why?!”

“I said, didn’t I? It got put on hiatus because my producer wanted to focus on something else. And he wanted to focus on something else instead of me because-”

“Nola, one-sentence answers, please, I’m begging you,” Sylvia sighed, already feeling a headache coming on. Nola was annoying enough when she was a host; as a contestant, she was being subjected to actual human migraines, and that…

…Was not a pleasant experience.

Sylvia could see the wheels in the girl’s pink-haired head turning as she tried to fit as many words into one sentence as she could. So before she could give Nola the opportunity to break into another diatribe, Sylvia decided to try speaking to her directly.

“Okay, nod if I get this right, okay?” Sylvia asked. “Don’t speak.”

Nola nodded, but she never dropped her crooked, kind of disjointed smile. It was very eerie to Nick to see, like she wasn’t all there.

“So, to be clear, your producer suspended your season, is that right?” Sylvia asked.

Nola, still keeping her mouth shut, nodded.

“And he did that, because he wanted to work on another season instead?”

Nola nodded again.

“But he didn’t bring you on to be the host of this new season.”

A shake of the head this time.

“Because you’re annoying.”

“Hey!” Nola’s smile faded and turned into a pout. “I’m not annoying! How could you think I’m annoying?! That’s mean, Sylvia! I thought we were friends! Aren’t we friends? Do you tell all your friends they’re annoying? You shouldn’t, that’s a bad way to keep friends. Even if they are annoying. Which I’m not. Do people think I’m annoying? Why? Is it because I’m too taciturn and withdrawn? I can be more outgoing and friendly! You might not know this but I don’t talk all that much because I’m shy. But I’m working on it! I’m taking speech-therapy classes online, and they’re a great motivator! I still don’t talk as much as I want to, but I’m really bettering myself! That’s good, right? Tell me that’s good! Tell me-”

“Nola!” Sylvia cut her off before she could say any more. She had a good idea why Nola was here, and who had brought her on. “Let’s go back to the nodding. Dakota’s the one who hired you, isn’t that right?”

Nola nodded.

“…Figures. I suppose a leprechaun is basically a faerie, anyway,” Sylvia sighed.

“No basically about it, they’re definitely faeries,” Holly confirmed.

Nola turned to her, her green eyes sparkling.

“You totally get it! Yes, yes, yes! Leprechauns are definitely faeries! Do you like faeries? You should! You look like a faerie, anyway!” Nola skipped over from behind the counter and pulled Holly into a hug, cuddling her tightly. “I like you. Do you want to be best friends? I don’t have many friends. I mean, I did. But they weren’t really friends. More like contestants. Because they were contestants. On my show. Did you know that I had my own season of Harem Hotel? I did. It was a lot of fun! Not good for making friends, though. But I really tried! So do you want to be friends? My name’s Nola. Do you have a name? I feel like you told me before. We have met, right? Or maybe I just think that because I watch your season all the time. Oh, wait, that’s right! That’s how I know your name! It’s Holly, right? Nice to meet you, Holly! I’m Nola! Want to be friends?!”

Holly didn’t really know how to respond to the overeager ball of energy hugging her. She looked desperately to Nick and Sylvia for help, but they both knew better than to get involved.

“Nola,” Sylvia sighed, shaking her head. “Dakota brought Nola here. What an absolute mess.”