"No, no, no. Try it again."

I tried again.

"No! Shit Wizard, it's not rocket science."

I glared at him. "It's not my fault I'm not a boy."

I flopped down onto my bed and pulled a pillow over my head, trying to drown out the sound of X's voice and Armpit's laughing.

We'd been at the 'lessons' for almost an hour, without fear of interruption, since Squid and Magnet had been coerced into dragging Zigzag off to the wreck room to try and give us free time. I was kind of starting to wish they hadn't.

"Who would have guessed finding out she was a girl would turn her into a whiny little bitch as well," X said, none too quietly.

"Shut up,' I grunted, without taking the pillow off my head.

"Too right," Armpit agreed. "She can dig holes all day in the hottest place on earth, but she can't deal with a little criticism."

"Shut up!"

"Make us," X replied, sounding almost a little angry.

I sighed. Maybe they were right. Armpit definitely had a point. I pulled the pillow off my head and stood up. "Fine. We'll try again."

"Good. Walk."

I walked.

"No, that's not right. Do it again."

I had barely even lifted my foot when X Ray's cries of "No!" filled the tent again.

"Oh for fuck's sake, this is fucking ridiculous." I sat back down and glared at him again. "I didn't even move."

"Look, Wiz, you just need to try it differently," Armpit said, in the most thoughtful voice I had ever seen him use. "It's not about trying to do what we do, it's about... feeling the way we do."

I rolled my eyes. "That makes a lot of sense."

"It does actually," X said. "Good call Pit. I like that. Feel the way we feel."

"You two are crazy."

"Look, do you want us to help you or not?"

"Of course I do, but you don't need to be all mystical and shit to do that."

They sighed knowingly and I looked at each other, shaking their heads.

"You have so much to learn," X told me. I snorted.

"You know what, I think I'm done. To be continued, yeah? I'm gonna take a shower."

I rose to my feet and, picking up my towel and some clean underwear, I headed for the showers. It was when I got to them and saw the crowds of boys still milling around outside that I realised this may not be going to work so well. Namely because it was the middle of the evening and if I started stripping off right here someone was bound to notice something. I didn't know how I had forgotten that.

But I could hardly turn around now, could I? I'd look even stupider than I did now, standing around staring at all the boys. No wonder they thought I was gay.

"Boy!" I jumped when a voice boomed from right behind my ear.

"Holy shit, you didn't have to-" I stopped when I turned around and saw Mr. Sir. "Oh, Sir. Mr. Sir, I mean, my – I – um didn't realise-"

"Stop your blabbering, I got a message to deliver to you."

I shut up quick smart and nodded, as though he would wait for me to be ready before he started talking.

"The warden wants to see you," he told me, cackling evilly. "Wants to have a little chat with you, she does."

I almost laughed, because the way he was talking made me think automatically of Yoda, and then I couldn't stop picturing him with furry green ears. Then what he had said sunk in and suddenly I didn't want to laugh anymore. Especially not after my recent findings. Or rather X Ray, Armpit, Magnet and Squid's recent findings.

"M-me? With me?"

"Yes wi' you!"

"What, I mean why? Why would she want-"

"Get! Now!" He yelled and pointed a finger in the direction of her cabin. I scrambled off, towel still in hand towards the warden's cabin.

She answered almost straight away when I knocked. So quickly it seemed almost as though she had been standing on the other side of the door waiting for me. Not a good sign at all, in my opinion.

Despite that though, she still seemed surprised to see me.

"Oh, it's you. Hello Hayden." She stepped back from the doorway. "Come in, come in."

I stepped inside gingerly and studied the room. It was full of random posters of some girl, and I wondered for a second if maybe The Warden was lesbian, but then I figured she probably wasn't because her and Mr. Sir obviously had something going on and as far as I could tell he was a man.

"Mr. Sir said you wanted to see me," I told her, sitting down on one of the seats she gestured to. I considred for a second that maybe I shouldn't have brought it up since she was most probably about to kick me out because everyone boy in my tent except for ZigZag knew about my little secret. But it was too late to take it back now, and acting all jumpy would only make things worse so I tried to be calm.

"Oh," she took her hat off and looked upwards thoughtfully. "Yes, I suppose I did. I wanted to check how you were mending up?"

"Fine." I shrugged the question off, relieved at how casual her tone was. She didn't sound like a woman about to condemn someone to prison.

"Good. So it's not hurting you to dig?"

"Nope."

"Excellent. That's really excellent. And I trust everything... else is going alright too? The walking, talking, general male behaviour?"

I nodded.

"Wonderful. You're really handling this so well Hayden. Most girls would have cracked under the pressure and told someone, but not you. I have yet to regret my decision to allow you to come here."

"Thanks..." I replied uncertainly, twisting my towel uncomfortably between my hands.

"Were you going to have a shower?" she asked me, her tone suddenly brusque and to the point.

"Yeah, but there's a whole load of boys outside, so I might just have to wait until later."

"Nonsense. Use mine."

I paused and raised my eyebrows. "Really?"

"Really. You have to be up at four am tomorrow, I see no sense in staying up later simply to clean yourself when you'll be dirty again in the next four hours."

"Wow. Well... thank you."

"Yes, it's not a problem but be quick about it. And whatever you do, make sure you don't let anyone see you coming out here looking too clean. We don't want anyone to get suspicious about us."

I frowned. "About us? Don't you mean about me?"

The Warden grimaced. "Trust me Wizard, if people see you coming out of here after having a shower the automatic assumption will not be that you're a girl."

Ew. I got her point, although I kind of wished I hadn't. "Right."

"All right then. In that case, I'm heading over to the office to check up on some files. I'll be back in half an hour. Try and be finished."

"Sure."

With that she turned and strode off out the door and I scurried into the bathroom and tugged all my clothes off, jumping under the warm - that's right warm – spray. It had been too long since I had felt hot water. Way, way too long.

For a long time I just stood still under the stream of water, marvelling in the heavenly feel of the warmth. I completely zoned out and just stared at the wall, blocking out all sounds and things around me. Then when I was done, I scrubbed up quickly and climbed.

I dried myself off and pulled on my underwear. I followed this with my chest wrapping bandage, before realising I had left my jumpsuit out on the chair in the warden's room. I was fairly sure it hadn't been half an hour, so I went out to go and get it.

I had set one foot out the door when I saw the problem with my plan. The massive, glaring problem that was sitting right in front of me. A problem which went by the name of Zigzag, and was seated in the chair next to my jumpsuit.

He caught sight of me just after I saw him, and his shock levels looked to be about the same as mine.

"Mother fucker," I swore under my breath and spun around, scuttling back into the bathroom and trying to cover my face at the same time.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" I yelled, standing in the bathroom with my back pressed up against the wall and my towel clutched around my chest. I couldn't see him and when there was no answer, I wonder if he had run outside in shock.

I waited a few more seconds and then peeped around the corner. Shit, he was still there, sitting staring at like some crazy looking giraffe. This was not good. Actually, this was bad; very bad. Not only did Zigzag have to find out that I'm a girl, he had to do it by seeing me half naked.

"Are you just going to sit there staring at me?" I snapped, when I was safely back around my corner and out of view.

"Sorry." Well that was he fakest apology I had ever heard. God, what a perv. "I didn't realise anyone was in here."

Bullshit, he didn't know. Unless he was deaf. "What, could you not hear running water?"

"No. I mean, yeah, but no, cause, see, I didn't think it would be... a girl, you know?"

I glared at the wall, pretending in my head that it was Zigzag. I tried to think of a witty comeback for a few seconds, but it's kind of hard to be smart when you're in your underwear in front of a reasonably hot guy. Especially when he thought you were a guy and has only just, this very minute found out that actually, you're not.

"Yeah, well you're the only one who didn't think that. Everyone else heard about me a long time ago."

I didn't even need to be in the room to know that Zigzag would have that stupid confused look on his face, like the one he got when Zero had talked in front of him that time. Apparently that's how much of a shock I was; on par with Zero talking. I couldn't be that bad an actress then.

"Oh shit. You're not one of them government spies are you?"

"Huh?"

"Damn it, I knew they'd get you in here some time. Look, I don't know nothing about anything and I ain't done nothing wrong since I started that fire but that was an accident, and you ain't got nothing on me-"

"Woah, slow down there buddy," I peeped back out around the corner and narrowed my eyes at him, trying not to show any more of my face than was necessary to see him. He was still sitting still staring at me, as though he was trying to see round the corner, which was kind of gross except that I wasn't so sure it had anything to do with trying to check me out anymore.

Was it possible that he actually hadn't recognised me? He had only seen me for a few seconds, but he would have... wouldn't he? He wasn't actually that thick? I winced. Yes he was; of course he was. Talk about misplaced benefit of the doubt.

"I'm not a spy."

He snorted. "Like I'm gonna believe that. Do I look stupid to you?"

Yes, extremely. "No, not at all. Really, I'm not a spy, I'm um, just a girl."

"Right okay. A girl who likes to visit detention camps? A seriously deprived girl maybe." He laughed at his own joke.

"Actually, I'm um, a... relative." I don't know where the lie came from but it practically poured itself out of my mouth. Well poured a little haltingly, maybe. It was more like the pour from one of those juice containers when they do the glugging thing. "She's my – aunt. Right. My aunt. I'm her niece. She's my, um, Mom's sister and shit."

Maybe the 'and shit' wasn't the smoothest touch, but much to my surprise, the idiot actually bought it.

"What, seriously? I mean, oh yeah, totally. I heard about you coming here ages ago."

I almost burst out laughing right then, except I didn't want to give myself away. Let me tell you, it took a hell of a lot of restraint. "Did you, now?"

"Phh, yeah," he answered, as though it was obvious. "Of course."

"Good for you. Look it's been nice getting to know you, but I was actually hoping to get changed."

"Oh, right." He stood up.

"What are you doing here anyway?"

"Oh, I um, just problems – very manly problems – that I need to talk to the – your – The Warden about."

"Right." Who knew Zigzag was so funny? Even if it was by accident. "Those manly problems are a serious... problem."

"Mm."

"Right."

"I'll go then."

"Alright."

"Bye."

"Yeah."

When I heard the door close behind him, I sighed and flopped back against the wall in relief. Thank the Lord that Zigzag was so completely crazy and apparently blind too.

This was definitely a story which needed to be told to X, asap.

...

"No, I'm not kidding. I had to tell him I was the warden's niece."

"You what?" The two of them chorused in time with each other then burst out laughing again. I shushed them and glanced at Zero who was sleeping on his bunk over in the corner and stirred slightly at the noise but didn't wake.

"I know, it was insane. And then he acted like he knew I was coming all along."

X Ray laughed a little harder. "Oh God, this is too much, man. Way too much."

"Epic," Armpit agreed. "Who knew the boy had so much style?"

"I'd call it skill," X snorted. "Anyone who can catch Wizette naked is one talented man. Wait, what's that you say? We did that too? Oh that's right, everyone's done that."

"Ha ha," I snapped, grabbing my pillow and burying my face in it to try and muffle my mortification. "You realise it's not funny. Now he's going to think there's some girl strolling around camp who isn't there."

"And who's fault is that?" X asked, not sounding the least bit sympathetic, like I had hoped he would be. "You're the one who lied to him."

"What else could I have done?"

"Um... the truth is always an option. If you're really, really stuck, that is," Armpit told me. I glared at him and flipped him off with my pillow free hand.

"You're an asshole. You're both assholes. Fuck you."

X ray glared at me. "Do you have to be so rude? I mean, I like to consider myself a gentleman-" I snorted and he ignored me.

"-so I'm not going to retaliate, but you seriously get on my damn nerves sometimes."

"Yeah whatever. Like you're so gentlemanly."

"Oh, get fucked."

I chuckled. "See?"

"Will you two shut up? I can't even think with all this shit you're spouting at each other. How's a man meant to meditate on something when all he can hear is you two jibber jabbering." Armpit glared between us.

There was a moments silence, then X looked at me.

"Did he just say Jibber jabbering?"

"I think he did."

"Man..."

I nodded in agreement. "Man..."

We both looked at Armpit. "...Man."

Armpit looked back at both of us and glared. "Shut up.

Any further development to the extremely intelligent conversation we were having was cut off by the arrival of three of the other tent dwellers. Squid came in first, covered in a thick dark layer of dust that made him look a bit like a sand zombie. He was looking back over his shoulder in an attempt to continue his conversation with the two boys that trailed in behind him, arguing loudly. It only took a few snatches of the conversation to work out what they were talking about and when I did, I almost fainted.

"Man, you really are crazy." Magnet shook his head and laughed disbelievingly.

"No I'm not!" Zigzag protested, flopping down on his bed and glaring around at all of us, as though we had something to do with it. "I'm not, I saw her."

"Saw who?" X interrupted, as though he didn't already know. Admittedly it was quite convincing, but I was too shocked that he wasn't killing himself laughing to care that much.

"Tell me you knew the warden had a niece here?" Zig asked him, crossing his arms over his chest like a moody little kid who just got told that Santa didn't exist and was still in the denial stage.

I waited again for X -ray to start laughing at him and tell him that actually he was an idiot because the warden's so called niece was really his roommate in disguise. But once again, X-ray managed to surprise me.

"Yeah, I heard about her." He shrugged noncommittally. "So?"

"So? Are you kidding? There's a girl in the camp who I didn't know about and all you can say is 'so'?" Squid interrupted as though he actually might have had a shot with her in the first place. As though he would have even talked to her, come to think of it. I felt kind of obliged to tell him this.

"Like it matters. She wouldn't look twice at someone like you anyway," I informed him, pulling my cap down lower in case Zigzag chose this moment to grow a brain and recognise me.

"Someone like me?" Squid asked, sounding offended.

I nodded. "Someone ugly."

Magnet cackled gleefully and Zig and Armpit both chuckled, but X just grinned slyly at me.

"Yeah, well from what I hear, this niece isn't all that hot herself."

I glared at him. I wasn't usually one to blow my own whistle, but he was really asking for it. "That's not what I hear. I heard she's pretty beautiful. A bit of a Heidi Klum kind of look about her."

X snorted. "More like Seal."

I resisted the urge to chuck my pillow at him and tried to think of something witty and insulting to say back to him, but came up blank. I was however, saved by the least likely person.

"No way." Zigzag shook his head looking pretty committed to whatever he was about to say. "That girl was hot."

I almost choked on my own spit. In fact, I actually did a little bit, but I managed to clear my airway without drawing too much attention to myself. X-ray and Armpit looked equally as shocked as I was, but managed not to choke themselves. None of this seemed to deter Zigzag at all.

"Yeah she was like all tall and tanned and Italian looking. Not Heidi Klum, but you know... It was a nice view."

On the outside I kept myself completely composed despite my internal gape which was going on. Did Zigzag just call me hot? And tall and tanned and Italian looking? Okay, admittedly that was a bit weird since I managed to inherit about zero percent of my Mom's Italian genes – and I mean that seriously, I'm not just being modest – and the tan was a little overshadowed by the shocking tan lines that I had going on around my shoulder area, but still; it was the thought that counted, wasn't it? Just the fact that he'd been looking was enough to warrant me feeling pretty damn special. Except that he had been looking. Which was kind of gross and inappropriate.

"I'll bet," Squid said dreamily, which managed to squash my flattered feelings immediately and made me feel a bit ill. Unlike Zigzag, Squid definitely didn't have the right to picture me in any form of undress that Zigzag may or may not have been picturing me in at that moment. It was alright when you were a hot, blonde guy. When you were a wannabe gangster with a bad accent and a stupid toothpick pretending to be a cigarette in your mouth, it was most definitely not alright.

"I'll bet not," Armpit muttered, glancing at me and wrinkling up his nose. I subtley raised my middle finger at him from where it was resting on my knee. He grinned. "He's only saying that because he wants us to be jealous."

"I bet you are," Magnet agreed with Pit. "Besides, if she was hot, she wouldn't like you anyway."

I raised my eyebrows thoughtfully. Not necessarily. There was nothing stopping a girl from liking someone like Ziggy. He might be a bit schizophrenic or whatever the hell he was and he might be a bit thick at times but there was something oddly magnetic about him.

"Too true," X agreed. "Isn't that right Wiz? Can you imagine any girl in their right mind going for Zig here?"

"Yeah," I murmured, not fully paying attention to what I was saying then something clicked in my head and I snapped out of it. "What?! I mean no! Pfftt, God, ew, what a stupid question, who would ever go for... Zigzag?... God."

Good save Hayden, I wanted to roll my eyes at myself only I had no mirror. Most of the other boys didn't seem interested. Zigzag was looking offended, the others had already moved onto a new conversation topic and only X seemed the slightest bit interested in my last comment. He was staring at me with his eyebrows raised, looking like he had a whole lot to say on my momentary lapse of concentration, but thankfully he didn't.

"Plus she had great legs," Zigzag looked off into the distance (which in this case was the far wall of the tent) dreamily, backtracking to the earlier topic of conversation.

I almost, almost felt an almost blush creeping onto my cheeks. Not quite, but almost. No one had ever talked about my legs before. Not in that context anyway.

"And great tits."

At that point a pillow smacked Zigzag firmly in the head. It took me a couple of seconds to realise I had thrown it. I bit my lip and grinned sheepishly to cover up the scowl which was threatening to come out now that Zigzag had gone and ruined the whole moment.

"Sorry," I said sarcastically. "It just slipped."

"Asshole," Zigzag muttered, glaring at me, but he didn't seemed truly bothered by it. Instead he flopped down on his mattress and buried his head under his own pillow. Within minutes soft snores filled the tent. A few minutes later louder snores began emanating from the other beds and the boys dropped off to sleep. My eyes were beginning to droop when I heard a voice.

"Watch that Hayden," X-ray said softly from the other side of the room. I blinked.

"Don't know what you're talking about," I muttered sleepily, hoping he dropped it.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about. It won't end well."

"Shut up X," I told him and then my eyelids shut firmly and I fell into an uneasy sleep.

So how was that? It's the first of the promised Zig-Hayden thing to appear for quite awhile. Sorry about that, I just felt like there was some other more important stuff to write about.

By the way thanks for all the reviews fom everyone. I want to go through and answer them all and thank you individually but I'm too worried I'll forget someone and feel horrible for the rest of my life. Okay, small exaggeration but you know. But seriously thanks. I read them and they're all so nice and they inspire me to want to keep writing this. You guys are wonderful.

hope you enjoyed.

Bee