SOL Day 11 - You tried to do the right thing

You figure you better just get to bed. You don’t want to lie there and think about Riley until you can fall asleep, but you don’t know what else to do. If the weather was nicer, you would go for a long run outside to take your mind off things, but it’s gross out there. You could swim or something.

Or you could probably chat up any one of these girls in this place and not spend the night alone. What about Claire? She seems nice. But you also get a weird vibe from her. She’s not like the girls that you can effortlessly seduce. And even if you did get her into bed, you wouldn’t be able to look at her without seeing Riley and thinking about her. Claire is great. She doesn’t deserve that kind of… thing.

Before you can make up your mind, you get a text. You check it and see that Riley is gathering the team up in her room. Puzzled, you join the others, who are dutifully responding to the summons.

There’s not nearly enough room in a Lodge bedroom for all of you, but you pack in with everyone else. It’s not all bad; you’re behind this girl named Elena. You don’t usually go for muscle girls, but she’s a goddess. If you have to be pressed up against someone, you could do worse.

Riley’s there. With Lara.

“OK, I’m bad at speeches,” Riley says, blushing. “Good job, everybody. Winning the game and stuff. Um, so I just found out about a thing. I guess I don’t want to out the person that I learned it from, but they um, very bravely I think, shared it with me. There may be a rule change. FUTA might be doing more crazy shit to make us more ridiculous. Because that’s what they like to do,” Riley says.

“Oh God. What is it?” Sam asks.

“A point system for individuals, I guess. Basically, they’re going to track everything we do and assign an MVP after the week’s game. Then that MVP becomes the team captain.”

The reaction is pretty serious, and the room gets loud.

“Oi,” Lara says, gesturing for everyone to calm down. “Not so loud. Sensitive information.”

“So I wanted everyone to know,” Riley presses on, still blushing. “So that everyone is on an equal playing field.”

“Yeah, but what do we do?” Max asks.

“Do?” Riley looks at her blankly.

“What do we do about this?” Max looks around at everyone else. “Right?”

“Right,” Rebecca says hesitantly. It looks like everyone else was about to do exactly what you were tempted to do: make a play for the throne. But Max just kind of… publicly shamed them.

Riley stands there, obviously overheating. She doesn’t have an answer. She’s an honest person, and she wanted to share this information rather than hide it. But she obviously didn’t think about what to do next.

You push your way to the front.

“I know what to do,” you say confidently.

“You—you do?” Riley asks, looking relieved and grateful.

“Yes.” You turn to face them. “We ignore it.”

“Excuse me?” Lara says.

“Ignore it,” you repeat. “Think about it. You can try to be captain and have a week of fame until the team loses because everyone is focused on themselves and not the match. Or you can have a season of fame by being on the team that stuck together, capitalized on the greed of the other players, and won every single game. The other teams will tear themselves apart. All we have to do is pretend this rule doesn’t exist. It doesn’t matter who the captain is. We stay focused on winning, and we all get famous,” you say.

The room is quiet.

“I like it,” Sun says finally. The others are nodding. Riley looks like she will melt.

“Right. Use it against them. Strike first,” Sheva says approvingly.

“Strike hard,” Max agrees.

“No condom,” Lara adds. Everyone looks at her. “Is that not it?” A pillow bounces off her face. Rebecca threw it. Lara snatches it up and lunges at her. Elena grabs her. Suddenly, there’s chaos. Sheva grabs a pillow and you pull Riley out of the way, shielding her.

They’re all acting like idiots, but they heard you. They get the message.

You look down at Riley, in your arms. To your surprise, she’s looking up at you.

“Thank you,” she says.

You open your mouth to reply, but Lara smashes you with a pillow.