Park

Sam, Leia, Karl, Floyd

You arrive at the park and find a huge crowd of students and their families milling about a section that's been cordoned off. Sachi is manning a booth near the entrance, sorting people into three groups. A small girl - his sister, presumably, judging from their near-identical hair - is sitting at the booth with him.

"OK, everyone! To repeat, if you're not participating and you're just here to support people, go ahead and grab a seat in the back! Participants are split up in two groups!" Sachi is announcing to the line.

"Two groups!" the little kid echoes.

"If you're here to cook, head over to the cooking stations on the right! There's plenty of ingredients to go around. Once everyone's in, we'll start the competition! Anyone that pre-made their chili, head over to the station on the left! Once the others are cooking, we'll judge your group. And after judging the pre-made division, we'll move over to judging the fresh division. And after that, we'll have our awards, and that'll be it!"

The little girl throws her arms up. "Chili!"

You all look around to see where everyone is.

Over to the right, you see Raine and Freya, side by side, standing ready to run for the ingredients as soon as they get the signal, and... glaring at each other? Grant is trying to shoo away a raccoon that seems to be following him around. And Avel is twirling a knife in one hand and a ladle in the other, doing an imaginary drum solo and banging his head to whatever's playing through his headphones.

Laura is sitting in the pre-made section, a confident grin on her face as she holds a huge, metal pot. Tom has a much more reasonably sized pot beside him as he kicks back in his seat. Lance and Zack both have sealed plastic containers with chili. They're sitting at the same table staring each other down.

Mattea is loitering around the area for non-participants, chatting with people and occasionally glancing over at Sachi with a smile. Kiran and Tia are sitting together, holding a small, hand-made flag with what might be Somnis' face drawn on it? And, as usual, Jimmy is darting around with his camera snapping pictures for the yearbook.

Floyd panics a little not sure of where to set his pot until his arms threaten to give out and he hurries to put it down near Laura giving a quick hello to his fellow freshmen as he passes.

Sam

Sam will grab a seat next to Tia and Kiran.

"Hey Kiran and Tia,". "Long time no see,". "How have you guys been?" Sam asks Kiran and Tia.

Sam will obviously be rooting for Raine as loud as possible.

Dewey looks around for anyone he knows, his eyes settling on Tia, Sam and Kiran.
“Do you guys have room for one more over here?”

Leia will stay concentrated on all her tools, recipes and ingredient, trying to do everything in her power to not compare herself to the other contestants.

She's here to have fun, not to win.

She'll try using all of the ingredients she has her in possession (all types, not necessarily empty all the quantities she has).

Leia is proficient in art though, so she'll try to make it so her chili has the shape of a smiley face on top before you start eating it, detailed as much as she can detail it.

"Don't worry about it. Raccoons are allies, I think they're the natural predators to ferrets. If I just bend more to his demands, I'm sure he'll go away..."

Karl throws another tart at the raccoon.

Sam

Sam notices that Dewey looks totally drained about something.

"I don't know your body language seems to tell a different story,". "Were you up all night studying?". "Or did it have to do with that secret thing that we can't talk about?" Sam asks Dewey.