Sophie 2: Sophie can’t resist her curiosity with Jumption Juncer, then jumps into action!

Sophie did some word vomit thinking out loud, “We saw Sting Operation earlier, but this is the plus version. I’m not gonna be the one to test out what ‘plus’ means! Maybe it’s easier cause it’s a plus but I bet it’s gonna make it harder,” Faith furrowed her brow and looked suspiciously at Sophie, who continued, “I don’t know though that’s just based on other games, I swear!” Faith let it slide and Sophie moved along, ”Reassembly Required is interesting. I’m great at puzzles so I bet I could do that…” She paused for dramatic effect, then threw game logic out the window and went where surely everyone’s curiosity was calling. “But Jump shun Junce err?? It’s a mystery box. How could I not pick it?”

The rest of them weren’t nearly as curious about it, and just nodded along as she took the reins. Sophie pulled her card. The other two options SCHWOOPed back into the board.

Sophie held the card up to her face, and her vision became a little out of focus. She blinked a bit and her eyes crossed before refocusing. It all happened in less than a second, and then she read the card aloud, “Junction Jumper. Wait, what?” Sophie blinked a couple more times, and her eyes weren’t deceiving her, the title had twisted around and formed itself into actual words.

Sophie was a bit embarrassed that such a simple four letter swap tricked her into thinking the card was made up of non-english jumbled up non-words, but she nonetheless showed the changed title to everyone else.

An “Oooooooo…” escaped everyone as they were surprised by the effect as if it were a magic trick or something. The game may be confirmed magic, but small harmless magical effects like this were still impressive from a player standpoint, as long as the effects weren’t anywhere near the scariness of the girl’s punishments.

Sophie went back to reading, “There’s something at the bottom, but I’ll get to that. Here we go. Junction Jumper. Challenge. Do fifty jumping jacks in the middle of a street intersection. Be careful of traffic! …Hmm, nice of them to be concerned for our safety. Then there’s a big spikey speech bubble thing that says: Twist! After each jumping jack, spin around 360 degrees.”

“The twist must’ve been the thing that changed the title,” Lucy and Sophie both said, stumbling over their words a bit at first to not interrupt each other, but ending in a smile as they spoke in unison.

Faith taunted them, “Wow, we need to contact Ripley’s Believe It or Not or something. Two whole nerds that share one brain cell! Incredible.”

Mia took the card to read it over herself.

Sophie bantered back, “We may each have half a brain cell, but that’s four times as much as you!”

Lucy added, “Yeah, that means you’ve only got one eighth!” Lucy and both other banterers all collectively cringed a little at Lucy’s awkward line, but they didn’t get to answer back or linger on it too long as Mia spoke up.

“So, are you gonna take the punishment or what?” asked Mia.

“Why would I…” started Sophie.

“You’re not exactly in prime condition for jumping now are you?” asked Mia, looking across Sophie’s lower body as she laid sprawled over the ottoman.

“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean?!” Lucy said, getting flustered and coming to Sophie’s defense immediately.

Sophie looked a little hurt that Mia would imply she couldn’t do 50 jumping jacks.

“No, no, nothing like that,” said Mia. She was picking up that the two nerds were twisting her meaning. She continued, “Faith is right, you guys might be ultra gamers but you only have one brain cell each. I just meant your pants are gonna fall off!”

Both Lucy and Sophie felt ashamed for so quickly jumping to that conclusion and for not seeing the forest for the trees themselves.

Sophie sat up and thought about it. She paced around the room, hands holding up her waistband. Everyone chattered a bit, chipping in their two cents on what Sophie should do, but she wasn’t listening. She was thinking about one thing. The future of the game.

Sophie started thinking out loud. She was quickly mumbling to herself as if she were talking herself into it. “Taking the early punishment is never the answer. There’s about seventy-ish spaces left, so ten plus turns, assuming events and punishments don’t slow us down or speed us up. Beating these early challenges is key because the punishments will compound the difficulty of future challenges. It’s a slippery slope. Get a few bad punishments at the start, and you’ll fail every challenge for the rest of the game. OkayI’mgonnadoit!”

“Really?” asked Mia and Faith simultaneously, surprised that Sophie would go for something that would surely leave her repeatedly pantsless in broad daylight.

Sophie said, “One brain cell, ‘ey?” She pointed a finger, alternating it between Mia and Faith. “Alright, let’s go before I change my mind!”

Sophie snatched something up off the floor and slipped her sandals on by the door. Lucy slipped on her own converse shoes, Mia switched her bunny slippers out for some sneakers, and Faith tiptoed around with her boots already on.

Sophie held onto her waistband and headed out the door, looking both ways for the closest intersection.

The ladies stumbled after her with their shoes half on, and Faith took up the rear while she carefully teetered down the sidewalk on her toes.