Can you help me understand how electricity travels?

I know this is super basic, but I’m a little confused. Electricity takes the shortest path to the ground, I understand that.

But my friend told a story about a group of kids forming a line by holding hands, then the one at the end touched an electric fence. Supposedly all the kids got shocked. Can this be true? With my current (heh) understanding, I would think the electricity would go through the first kid into the ground and not to the other kids. Its path would be made longer by travelling through the other kids.

Thoughts?