Playing School

As firm as Ellie's decision to leave after taking her skirt off was, this situation was sufficiently unexpected to shock her determination. She risked nothing, this was truly a chance to show how knowledgable she is on the subject with no strings attached. Of course she would remain in her underwear, but then everyone already saw her like this. There is no option to be unseen now and the recordings are out of her control too, they always were. And in any case, what is the big deal with it... She has shown more on public beaches and she was not paid for that.

"Let's do the quiz", Ellie says, sounding firmer than she herself expected to. "Very well", the host nods. "Please say A or B". Twenty circles appear on the screen with a press of a button on the remote. "B", Ellie says, her shrug making it clear how pointless she finds the choice when all outcomes are as of yet concealed; with her earlier "show" or "tell" challenge she could at least have hazarded a guess. A half of the circles disappears. "You will have fifteen seconds per question to say verbally which letter indicates the correct answer", the host instructs Ellie. "Starting... now".

One of the bubbles bursts to reveal a few lines of text with four options from A to D underneath; the image of a clock at 11:59:45 next to it takes almost as much space as the question itself. The time limit is obviously ridiculously restrictive, on the first question especially a third of it has passed by the time Ellie realised the challenge has already began. She has barely finished reading the options when 3 and then 2 flash with loud beeps as the time runs out and she shouts out the option she thinks most fitting at the very last second. The sentence under (B) that she selected flashes without an indication whether the answer was right or wrong and the next question appears a moment later.

Ellie is caught in the whirlpool of questions which she barely has time to process. She can tell some of them are tricks... But she is too well aware of the fact all of them might be. If she was not on a stage in her underwear she might have felt better about her responses; certainly many in the audience have figured out most answers under the same time constraints. Still, Ellie is quite certain she had at least some right by the time the frantic two and a half minutes are over. She finds herself somewhat out of breath with the mental effort... but nonetheless manages to make herself look at the host defiantly rather than with hopeful expectation that she actually feels.