Games and Players (For snappleR)

"Hahahah, God, Amy," laughs Blaise as she cranks the difficulty of an already hyperactive song. "We're gonna look so freakin' spastic..."

But he squares his stance as the song gears up, as if in a match. And true to form, he begins bobbing on the balls of his feet, warming up those calf muscles.

And then: madness commences.

Blaise's familiarity with DDR is passing. Amy was right in her assessment of him - he's a dancer. And the closest DDR comes to dancing, in his mind, is tap. Blaise is not a tap-dancer. He has the good fortune of having a deep wellspring of energy and endurance, both of which highly important in the world of DDR, as well as excellent coordination to back it up. And as a dancer, his rhythm is solid.

The only problem is, this is not dancing. This is, at best, a fussy raindance. So while his feet patter-patter-patter-thump around the panels, including some rotations and turns, there's a good chance Amy will win out simply for experience with the game.

Yet, despite his inexperience and the concern that he's going to lose again, Blaise is all smiles. The only reason he isn't chatty is due to the intense, relentless need to pay attention and constant, jolty motion. In short: it would screw him up and make him sound like an idiot.

Amy was untalkative, too, but she was hardly silent. As soon as the game started, it became clear that neither of them were going to come close to passing the song, and Amy broke out laughing at their mutual attempts to talk the bigger game. The song ended before it even reached the halfway point, and the audience quickly dispersed, disappointed and dismissive, but Amy had to lean on the balance bar to catch her breath. "Hahahaha oh god, that was great. You actually had me going there for a second."

Amy straightened up, abs aching from her crack up, and was pleased to see the happy look on Blaise's own face. "So, what now? This feels like a tie. Want to take a break, grab a coffee, keep going after?"

The game laments their ensemble suckage, and Blaise simply falls back against the safety bar behind him with a panting laugh. A look towards Amy confirms that he's not lost any face - or if he had, not by much. Her idea isn't a bad one, except that it includes coffee.

"Me with coffee. Hah. Bad idea. But!" He leans off the rail and hops down from the platform. "They have a juice bar over there." Blaise points back the way they came, but more to a side. Juice bar, because arcades tend to attract minors. Well, minors and professional wrestlers, apparently. "We can grab a drink, then I'm going through with my plans."

When Blaise looks to her again, it's with a sly smile. Oh no, DDR had nothing to do with those aforementioned plans.

"Unless you just can't wait. Which I'd totally understand. The anticipation's gotta be killing you!"

Amy wasn't a coffee drinker, either. She was going to get a juice anyway, and maybe a baked good with some chocolate in or on it. Part of her wanted to get her business out of the way before getting back to gaming.

But Amy was curious, there was no denying it. "Oh, you actually gonna make a decision this time, instead of forcing the girl to do it? Fine. It's all on the line now. Last game determines Champion of the Universe, and the Champion of the Universe does not pay for her own juice today." Amy paused. "Best two of three."

Blaise's eyes light up when she issues her challenge. That might be the next hint that he actually does have something in mind; something he's actually good at. As it turns out, Blaise does not have a good poker face.

What's more, his confirmation is a cheerfully chirped, "'Kay!"

He begins making his way deeper into the arcade with every expectation that she's going to follow. "I saw this earlier on the other end of the arcade. I was thinking about messing with it..." The teen pivots to shoot Amy a playful grin. "...but that technology scared me!," he dramatizes, hands clasping under his chin. "But after you explained how we use our bodies to play games these days, I think I'm ready to give it a try!"

The build-up comes to a head when they get past a wall of shooters. There it is, nestled against the opposite wall from DDR: an XBox modified for arcade use, connected to a massive screen and featuring none other than Just Dance 2014.

"Dibs."

Amy's excitement was on a slow crescendo. Blaise didn't seem like he was bluffing this time, and his mock modesty suggested that he actually did have a game that he was confident about in mind. When they arrived at their destination, Amy's grin had reached maximum wideness. Just Dance. It was the perfect choice.

She turned to Blaise and stepped in close, looking straight into his eyes from inches from his chest. "Alright, you're on. You think your power moves are gonna save you? I've changed my mind- let's make this a one match game. Go big, or go home." She took one of his hands and dropped a few coins into it. "Get us started, Blaise."

Many of the arcade-goers ignored the pair, perhaps familiar with their earlier bluff near the DDR machines. But traffic was high, and more than a few freshly interested patrons were gathering. Amy was going to have to make a round, keeping them back far enough so that the two breakers could do their thing. But before she started, she couldn't resist adding one more stipulation over her shoulder. "Loser buys drinks, and has to address the winner as "Champion of the Universe" for the rest of the day."

Amy stands close to Blaise, and the young man doesn't give her an inch. His gaze rests on hers, half-lidded, with a coolly confident smile on his face. The audience didn't matter to him right now. The only thing in his mind was meeting her challenge, exceeding it, and impressing her.

"Try not to let your jaw drop too hard, 'kay?," is his only retort to her big talk.

While she's moving around the perimeter, Blaise slips a couple coins into the slot. A coin-fed XBox game - so weird. But it's like he'd observed in the beginning: Japan takes its gaming seriously. It appears that they're going to do their performances one-on-one, as Blaise does not select a duet.

'She said to go big. I got this.'

He intends to pull out all the stops. It's for all the marbles. But he needs a little preparation to make it perfect. He steps back to the center of the clearing, his form registering on the camera. He runs his hands along the central zipper of his jacket and flares it out to ensure it's hanging loose on his frame. The growing crowd is scanned, and his eyes land on a boy wearing a cap. Blaise offers a bright, friendly smile and points at the hat. The boy is confused for a moment and touches the accessory in question, which elicits a nod from Blaise. He steps forward and offers the hat up, which Blaise takes with a quick word of appreciation. After adjusting the cap's size to fit properly, he sets it over his head; worn properly, bill forward. Wardrobe is a go.

Naturally, this level of preparation gets a few intrigued murmurs from those gathered. Some enthusiasts have caught on by now, though, and snickering rises here and there.

The selection becomes clear: Fine China by Chris Brown - Extreme Mode.

A throbbing electronic baseline kicks on, and Blaise is in position, nodding in beat with a fingersnap on snare. And that's as modest as the routine will ever be. It almost immediately reveals itself to be a Michael Jackson tribute, consisting of silky smooth spins, transitions, pops, and locks. And that's just the introduction.

When the song really gets going, Blaise's feet move in a shuffle that seems entirely too carefree to be so precise. His body flows with fluidic grace, peppered with playing with the lapels of his open jacket and adjusting the tilt of the hat just so. His slender body angles to create perfect silhouettes during the song's bridge, the broader movements of the dance slow and dramatic. The build-up explodes into sharp, swift, precise movements in the chorus, only to lead seamlessly into the next verse.

Everything about Blaise's performance suggests he's done this many, many times in the past. He carries himself with a playful smugness that matches the tone of the dance. His movements are exact and confident, but never forced. There is no tension in his frame; his body language is natural and relaxed. He's a natural performer, not shying away from any aspect of the routine - neither the pantomimed violin nor jazzhands shake him.

As the song winds down, it calls for a hat-toss. Blaise carries through with the motion and breaks choreography just enough to flick the hat back to the boy he'd borrowed it from - more to the side than dead ahead. And then he's right back into things, running a hand through his hair before turning to shuffle-step away, fingers snapping in beat. If Amy happens to be at the end of his short road, she'll be treated to a little chintap in the end.

The Dance:

Amy grooved along with Blaise’s song. She knew that she was beaten.

Amy hadn’t played the game too often before, but she had planned for the possibility that Blaise was a Just Dance vet; her contingency plan had been to select the easiest song, with the most lenient grading curve, then coast to victory. But with an excited crowd at their backs, she couldn’t just wuss out now and pick anything less than extreme mode, like he had. They were expecting a show, and she wasn’t going to disappoint.

Being a pro wrestler had changed her some, it seemed.

If Blaise’s intention had been to impress Amy, he achieved it. Blaise was smooth and he was confident. Every step was deliberate and planned, right down to the borrowed accessory at the beginning, but relaxed, like he was actually dancing. His movements matched the ones on the screen perfectly, but he hardly glanced at the screen, making the whole performance seem more like choreography than input for a video game. He made Chris Brown, a flaming douchebag in any other context, sound good.

When the song ended, and Blaise’s swagger brought a finger up under Amy’s chin, he would find her engaged in a confident mock golf clap, still keeping up appearances for his- and the audience's- sake.

“I ask you to come at me with everything, and you go full Michael. Not bad, Blaise, not bad at all. But two can play at that game.”

She had her selection picked, too; she had seen it while he was scrolling down to his song.

Amy picked "Blame it on the Boogie"- classic Jacksons. The dance, as she found out, wasn’t particularly difficult, and it was in styles that she was already comfortable with, so any stiffness she may have had at first quickly melted away. Soon she was just as fluid as the woman on the screen. Once she had found her rhythm, she began to stray from the prescribed dance, finding the repetition a little boring, and believing that she’d already lost, anyway. So she threw in some of New Jack Swing’s bouncier moves during the chorus, a bit of locking during the bridge, difficult moves that she felt matched the song a little better. She was a performer, too, and knew what it took to please a crowd.

But, at the end of the day, they were looking to a machine to evaluate human expression. As good a dancer as Amy was, she still needed to see the moves before she could mimic them, and that learning curve, however brief, lost her a great deal of points. And even if her personal flourishes had earned approval from the crowd, the XBox couldn’t find it in itself to award her points for creative license.

Blaise won. The scores were closer than you’d expect between a beginner and a season veteran, but they were far enough to show that Amy would need many hours of practice before she could challenge Blaise for Just Dance supremacy.

Amy stared at the score screen, trying to think of something to say, a taunt that expressed her congratulations and appreciation of his dancing, while simultaneously making fun of his relatively weak combat skills. Anything clever that she could think of, though, immediately deflated when she had to affix, “Champion of the Universe,” to it. Stupid mouth.

Blaise moves back into the audience and folds his arms over his slightly-heaving chest. High energy songs, regardless of who you are, take their toll on the ol' respiratory system. But that's what makes it a good workout. Hell, that's how Zumba gets away with it.

That and it looks kind of like striptease dancing.

Someone had made some congratulatory remark to Blaise, stealing his attention briefly and causing him ot miss the selection. But the moment he saw a female silhouette of Coolio on the screen, he sorted it out real quick. "Ohh, good choice..." This will be entertaining. Lots of fast-paced scissor-steps to be had.

To his surprise, Amy's actually good! He'd thought she wouldn't be! He actually expected her to be blowing steam with her bravado before and prove herself to be a complete newbie. But as it appears, these two have some very similar tastes in gaming. When the song reaches its bridge, he gives a wholly supportive, "Wooo!" And when she breaks into freestyle, he starts laughing - though not in a mocking way. It's a great show!

When the song has ended, she's getting applause. She seems to be transfixed on the screen, though. So Blaise creeps in behind her and throws an arm around her shoulders and collar, tugging her back for a friendly snug. "Nice moves," he offers. And should she give him a look, she'll be met with a bright, unrestrained smile. He saw the scoreboard - he knows he won. He knows she knows. But he's not rubbing it in. There's no gloating or ego to be found behind those eyes. "That was awesome. But I can't knock something off my bucket list until we do a killer duet, and I have just the song."

Should his arm still be in place around her, he'll step back to relinquish her personal space. "But first, juice?"

Amy was startled out of her reverie by the sudden arm around her shoulders, but relaxed instantly. The compliment was genuine, and his look was warm. Blaise was an easy guy to get along with.

She hadn’t been upset about the results, since they were about what she’d been expecting, so it wasn't any trouble for her to smile back. “Okay, I’m in. Let’s go get you that juice, Ch... Champion of the Universe.” She wondered if she could shorten that to just "champ" without Blaise complaining too much.