In the weeks to follow, Daisy prioritized debate over theater, as she did all season long, multiplying the cards, readings and practice rounds against players she knew were qualified at Nats, or playing at Last Chance. However, it seems like the Congressional debaters did more to help other theater actors academically.

Fast-forward to the opening day of Last Chance. After the theater rehearsal, which still ends an hour before Last Chance opens, Paige tells her about the role her dad is about to play in Last Chance for VA:

"All we kept hearing lately is the big math game this week, so this ought to take some pressure off you" Paige tries to reassure Daisy. "My dad is judging at Last Chance and is taking overtime to do so. The parish let him do this because he has a history of driving the debate team from and to tournaments, as well as judging in these"

"I won't let my daddy down, nor yours. I will just play my best for the next three days" Daisy then returns home.

She then storms off the campus to return home, so she can prepare for the first prelim round of the day. And, of course, eats a hasty snack prior to the first game, so that she could have enough energy to play the two scheduled games of the opening day.

When the pairing is released, as well as the judge for the game, she quickly combs her bank of opening statements to see which ones are more appropriate, on the aff and the neg.

Calm down, perhaps I can use my flight under the town's radar to my advantage. Some of my opponents are tired of flying under the radar and might be vulnerable to taking risks to secure their time under the spotlight, Daisy ruminates after the release of the first pairing.

Shortly before the game begins, the judge makes a coin toss to determine who plays on which side. The judge then announces who argues which side:

"This is round one in Lincoln-Douglas at the 2027 NSDA Last Chance Qualifier. On the affirmative, we have, from Venomous Agendas in Louisiana, Daisy Pammant, on the negative, we have, from Cupertino in California, Arjun Tendulkar. Best of luck to both debaters" the judge announces the coin toss result like a quiz bowl moderator would start a game.

I can do this, Daisy sighs while her first six-minute speech begins by setting the framework, that is, the values and the criteria. But the juicier part of the game arrives six minutes later, that is, during cross-examination.

"How would carbon pricing ensure that it would reduce carbon emissions?" Arjun asks her menacingly.

"It's a long-term process, since it would spur development and subsequent adoption of less carbon-intensive technologies, which is not instant. Also, it would raise prices of more carbon-intensive items and reduce their production along with their use!"

"But in the meantime, consumption would be reduced because carbon pricing of fuel would increase freight costs. However, inflation would increase if carbon pricing failed to curb consumption, which is more likely for essential goods and services" Arjun retorts.

"To the extent that an ethical approach to carbon pricing requires differentiating between essential and non-essential goods and services..." Daisy then gets more aggressive about the meaning of what makes a good or service essential, and about how an imperative to reduce carbon emissions would avoid mass extinction and/or societal collapse, or at least lessen their impact.

That game becomes a game about how the ages-old moral issue of prioritizing economy vs. environment, as well as the meaning of sustainable development.

But it is in the second cross-ex section of the game that she starts to show the inconsistency of Arjun's argumentation. About just how inconsistent with his values and criteria he was.

Speaking of inconsistent argumentation, Paige's father finds himself out of luck, because the matchup he finds himself in for the first round features two debaters who feel like novices. Hopefully the second round of the day will prove better than the first one... just not with Daisy because I won't be made to judge rounds with Louisiana debaters.

His notes on the inconsistencies serve him well when comes the time to decide. However, that game soured him on players he feels have no business competing at Nats, and both players' speaker points took a hit.

As the clock is ticking in on him to write his judgment, or RFD, he is reminded that he must stick to the essential aspects of what made the players' argumentation incoherent. And both players' inconsistencies at that.

"And the winner is..." Paige's father tells himself while passing judgment for that game.

Back at her home, Daisy is a little concerned about the implications of this game, as she feels like she may as well be rolling the dice. Or at least for the second game. Fingers crossed that I win this game, but winning the game will only make things harder for me later. Especially since tournaments of this size often tend to have power-matching.

And then the result comes in. A narrower win than she expected, but a win nonetheless.

"Woohoo! Let's roll!" an exuberant Daisy exclaims before the second game starts.

Speaking of which, she shakes in her seat, hoping for the best, knowing that power-matching doesn't have much of an impact this early in the tournament. Stay focused: this time around, I will need to argue how unethical the "polluter-payer" principle is.

But she knows by now that allotting sides, matchups and judges at random at the start of a tournament makes the luck factor front-loaded when power matching is in effect. She then reviews the paradigm for clues in how to approach this game.

"This is round two in Lincoln-Douglas at the 2027 NSDA Last Chance Qualifier. On the aff we have, from Walt Whitman in Maryland, Elaine Woo, on the neg, from Venomous Agendas in Louisiana, Daisy Pammant. Best of luck to both debaters" the judge assigned to work the game announces to start the game.

Venomous Agendas. My ex-boyfriend told me about us losing a game against the VAs at the HSNCT last year; now the school is called Venomous Agendas, too? I didn't think I would face them on the debate floor, too! Elaine can't help but think of Douglas, who broke up with her in the wake of the HSNCT. But Elaine quickly snaps out of it, and begins the aff's opening statement in earnest.

Is the opponent too used to play progressive LD? This sounds like an accumulation of contentions! Daisy ruminates on how Elaine's arguments seemed to lack coherence with her own values and criteria.

Six minutes later, the VA debater finally has an opportunity to call Elaine out:

"You argued that carbon pricing was ethical to implement, and at the same time, it was compatible with free enterprise... I'm sorry, but how can you implement carbon pricing without adding significant administrative hurdles that might make free enterprise illusory?" Daisy asks a question that seems to trip up Elaine.

And then Elaine is left wondering about how Daisy argued among other things, that high levels of red tape hinder innovation and entrepreneurship, and hence unethical since it affects the welfare of humanity at large.

So then Daisy calls for prep time, using two and a half minutes of it so she can prepare her refutation and then make her own case, all within seven minutes.

Her mom overhears her and a girl with a Chinese accent squabbling about the ethics of carbon pricing at the end of these 7 minutes. I really hope that we'll have better games on Saturday morning than that... My daughter's current opponent has no business playing at Last Chance! Many people in town had limited opportunities for civil discourse, so perhaps showing Last Chance games live could provide one, if a little heavy on the jargon, with someone they could feel close to, by virtue of Daisy being a girl of the town.

But both Elaine and Daisy are lucky that the judge still judges in good faith. The same couldn't be said of the judge working Arjun's second game, who gave him the win because his opponent, a girl, was bitchy and argumentative, even though he displayed both traits in that game in equal measure.

"Woohoo! I'm up two-nothing!" Daisy exclaims as the judge posts the judgment for that game.

"Don't go around thinking that every game will play out like this at Last Chance! For what I know, you could have been lucky" her mom warns her before she eats dinner.

"Of course not. I'm well aware of the luck factors that go into a debate tournament, and certainly one as hard as this one" Daisy then eats dinner.

Meanwhile, somewhere in Bethesda, Elaine curses her misfortunes on the debate floor after finishing the night 1-1. She starts crying on her lonesome though. Why is it that we can never beat these God-forsaken Venomous Agendas? They beat us in mathletics, quiz bowl and now LD? Is this some cruel joke? What did we do, or fail to do, to become the VAs' punching ball? Did I let the Vikings down?

The following day, everyone and their dogs at VA, and in Jennings, only talk about last night's big math game. The grand final of the spring Math Madness pitting VA against their mathletic archrivals, won against TJHSST in what feels like a nail-biter of a tiebreaker.

Which makes Daisy feel a little isolated despite being up 2-0 after the first night. Paige comes up to her before the first period begins:

"Daisy, I wish you the best of luck at Last Chance" Paige wishes her luck.

"I know, Paige, I'm going to need it. You know how it is when you win early in debate tournaments: games get harder later"

"That's true! My dad told me about how you're up two-nothing after two games..."

There's no denying that Daisy might have what it takes to get a Nats berth. However, I wonder where the luck factors come from, other than matchups of course, Paige muses as Daisy starts feeling like Last Chance consumes her.

"I still have two more games to win from here to Saturday afternoon to advance"

"And then I will do all the homework I can tonight so I can be there tomorrow morning to watch you play"

"And the principal will be there, too"

"I guess the principal never actually saw a LD round..." Daisy sighs upon learning the principal will do more on Saturday than just open and close the premises. "And there's also the issue of installing and configuring NSDA Campus in the game room before then"

Paige has always been my source of comfort when things get stressful for me. She might not be the smartest girl around, but she has that little something that makes me closer to her than I would have the Congressional players, or even Anna, Daisy reflects on how she feels around Paige before the bell rings.

That night, though, the third game ends up being far tougher than the first two games. After that game ends, she feels like this game could go either way. When the judgment arrives and she loses by half a speaker point:

"Is that it? Has my luck run out?" Daisy laments about this loss.

"I get it, you can't win all the time, but can you win two more games?" Daisy's mom asks her daughter.

"All I have left to do is cross my fingers for a more favorable judge-opponent combo..." she then sighs.

"Better lose a game now than to lose a game into the playoffs, I guess..."

The matchup for the next game arrives and she wonders whether she is gambling her future away. Focus, Daisy. There's only one way to make this gamble worthwhile. Play my best traditional LD today and tomorrow! My coach made me play at Last Chance for a reason!

"This is round four in Lincoln-Douglas at the 2027 NSDA Last Chance Qualifier. On the aff we have..."

But even against another player who goes into the round 2-1, that game gives her a taste of what games at Nats are going to be like. Which is eerily similar to the game she lost that led her to play at Last Chance. A tight game that neither debater dominates. At least until the second cross-ex, where the opponent sees fit to ask a risky question that could turn the tide of the game. Albeit in different ways, depending on who you root for.

"Not implementing carbon pricing would lead to mass extinction. Are you willing to have the future of life on Earth on your conscience?" the opposition asks Daisy in a menacing tone.

"Just because carbon pricing has the potential to prevent mass extinction, doesn't mean it actually will. Implementation of carbon pricing carries a moral imperative to help the population turn to less polluting tech, which, if not met, may render it ineffective in reducing carbon emissions! So while carbon pricing might be ethical on ecology grounds, relying solely on it, however, makes the poor poorer since the cost of necessities go up, and you argue that carbon pricing will help everyone when it won't!" Daisy answers the opponent's question with conviction.

Cross-ex time is over, which makes the opponent ask for prep time. Especially since the opponent only has 4 minutes to respond to the previous 7 minutes.

At the end of the game, the judgment points to the opponent's poor cross-ex question quality. Yay! I'm up 3-1, and I'll make the most out of that day under the town's spotlight! In theater I'm a secondary actress, and so are the Congressional players...