✎ news:squirrels_vs_lizzards:7 [Work In Progress]

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====== SQUIRRELS VS. LIZZARDS ======

On New-Year's Day, the new arena just outside of Spindle lights up, attracting attention. Spotlights dance around the sky above it, and the noise can be heard from a great distance. Tiny orange and grey shapes weave around the beams of light, floating elegantly.

If you follow the commotion to the arena's entrance, you find that the Squirrels vs. Lizzards fight is on today. The entertainments offered on the posters promise to be interesting. The arena is even more impressive close up, with grand arches and bas-relief carvings lining the outer wall. In the entrance-way, there is a squirrel collecting entrance fees: 1 Trope for a nice seat with a good view, or 0.5 Tropes for a worse one, with change given in the form of Halftropes and Squirrels Banking Corporation notes (which can be redeemed for the appropriate value by contacting Mister Sir).

If you don't pay the fee, you probably heard what happened from someone else later. If you do, you are shown into the arena, which even without performances would be an impressive work of architecture. The more expensive seats near the central pit are spacious and comfortable, with individual distinct carvings mostly themed around squirrels and lizards, and a pair of opera glasses at each seat for a better view. The cheaper seats near the back are plain but servicable, and still have a view of most of the pit.

Guests enter the stadium, looking eager with anticipation or merely curious. Quite a large group look rather childlike, with bright-coloured clothes in simple designs. The stadium is far from full, even as the start of the main event approaches and the flow of arrivals slows. Peculiar-looking squirrels walk up and down the aisles carrying trays of complimentary refreshments. There's water and something labelled "squirrel tea", which not many are brave enough to try.

Mister Sir, highly recognisable by the cloud that surrounds him (unless anyone else has acquired a personal cloud since you last heard), stands on a raised podium near the centre of the stadium, making announcements, building hype for the event, and advertising the commemorative socks (only 0.2 Tropes!).

For the first event, a large group of various sorts of squirrels and miniature tornadoes enter the central pit. Mister Sir announces that the first performance is the squirrel anthem, and a hush falls over the crowd. There is a noise from the assembled squirrels that could generously be described as not actually music. It finishes (much to everyone's relief), and it is announced that the next act will be aerobatics, with two competing teams and a vote by the crowd afterwards on which was best.

First up is the red flying squirrel team. They swoosh around above the arena, moving rapidly as though intent on proving their flying ability. At one point, two of them nearly crash and the short red streaks trailing behind them like mini contrails somehow get tangled up and both of them fall to the ground, squeaking furiously and scratching at each other. That act is quickly ended, and the grey flying squirrel team performs. They are more sedate, moving in elegant patterns but with less of an athletic performance. The grey flying squirrels just look like little swirling clouds, not actually recognisable squirrel shapes, so they must have been the clouds involved in the squirrel anthem.

The next act is announced to be a musical performance by the lizards. Five of them take the stage, after quite some delay, and start singing. It's mostly one of them singing actually, with the others doing intermittent backing vocals. It's not what you'd expect of a professional music performance, but it's much more of a recognisable tune than the squirrel anthem. After this finishes, the squirrels are invited back on stage for a rap battle with the lizards. The lead lizard singer, being most confident, starts. The squirrels' reply, as before, is only slightly coherent and doesn't contain any actual words. With no content to reply to, the lizard criticises their singing ability, and easy shot at this point, and boasts about its expectations for the upcoming fights. The lizard seems much more competent with the more lyric-focused performance style than the earlier more convential singing. The squirrels again squeak for a while, and the battle is announced reluctantly as a win for the lizards.

Next up is wrestling. Three squirrels enter wearing singlets, looking rather strong for squirrels but still fundamentally squirrel-sized. Three lizards enter from the other end and pair up confidently. The smallest of the lizards is 3 times the squirrels' height. Rings appear in the floor for the matches to use. The rules are explained then the wrestling matches run one by one. Despite the squirrels' impressive musculature, the lizards' much greater size would seem to be a decisive advantage. The squirrels are still small enough to be easy to pick up, but they take advantage of their greater nimbleness to evade the lizards' grips. The first match drags on quite a while as the squirrel mostly tries to stay out of the lizard's way, occasionally jumping at it to elicit a reaction. The lizard bats it out of the way, but it twists around in the air to land on its feet. It still lands outside the ring though, so it loses the match. The second squirrel changes tactics and remains on the ground and tries to disrupt the lizard's legs, which it manages to do reasonably well. The lizard takes advantage of the fact that it's allowed to use its tail for support to keep its balance, until the squirrel runs under its tail right after tripping it, causing it to flinch and fall over. The third match is rather anticlimactic, as the lizard feints and causes the squirrel to dodge straight into its other hand, then slams it to the floor.

The crowd is more excited now, and cheers when they hear that the main event, the battle between all the lizards and hundreds of squirrels, is about to happen. Squirrels of all sorts, as well as several goblins, pour out into the pit to join the wrestlers, and lizards face them from the other side. At the sound of the starting whistle, both groups charge at each other. The squirrels' tactics are chaotic, with some charging straight at the lizard line, some holding back and shooting with arrows, and some flying up to attack from above.

The lizards remain more regimented, with 3 main groups which appear to be focusing on defending the central lizards. It soon becomes clear why, as powerful attacks from the middle of each cluster cut through the surrounding squirrels. The ray-gun blasts are too fast for the squirrels to dodge. The lizard defences are less effective against the airborne squirrels, as the lizards themselves have no ability to fly. They focus their ranged weaponry on the cloud-squirrels, who shoot back at the raygun wielders that the lizards are trying to protect. Two of them go down before the lizards are able to shoot down the majority of the flyers.

That only causes a short delay before another lizard is able to pick up the gun and start using it again. The squirrels attack again, this time using tornado blasts from magic wands to disrupt the lizard defences. The lizards make a valiant effort to stay in formation, but they're getting blown all over the place and before long, one of the squirrel mages blows the ray-gun out of the lizard's hands and all the way into the waiting squirrel army. Once the squirrels are able to use the lizards' own weapons against them, the remaining lizards don't hold out much longer and are soon all either surrendered or incapacitated.

With the battle over, there's a brief intermission for both sides to collect their wounded while the grey flying squirrels, voted favourite for their earlier performance, dance overhead again to keep the crowds entertained.

There are a few more performances by the squirrels, dances and acrobatics (by non-flying squirrels this time, but you would hardly have guessed it by the way they jump), but nothing as spectacular as the main battle. The event winds to a close, and you are once again invited to purchase commemorative socks on your way out. If you bought one of the cheaper tickets, that //would// be something to do with the 0.5 Trope note you now have, but maybe you could just find someone else who has another and redeem them.

//OC: if you think you would have bought a ticket for this event and attended, you can sort that out with Mister Sir at the start of next session.//
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