"I'm not sayin' it man" someone muttered from inside the tent.

"Yes you are" that was Fro. Ivy knew because she opened the tent flap as he said it. Everyone was staring at her. She raised her eyebrows belligerently at them and, plopping down on her bed, began to inspect her nails.

"Go" Sparky hissed. Ace muttered something that was surprisingly descriptive at him and then turned around and lay on his bed, with his back to Ivy.

"C'mon Ace" Fin murmured.

"Fine!" he grunted and turned around. "Rocky I'm... Oh c'mon man, this is bullshit".

"Just do it" Eight said.

"No" there was a definite tone of finality in his voice. Ivy looked up from her nails, and raised an eyebrow questioningly . He shook his head, and then frowned at Ace, who was by then lying back down on his bed with his hands behind his head. No one said anything.

"So..." Ivy said in a sarcastic voice, "how's everyone's day going"?

"Is there anything to do in here?" Snake muttered, looking round the room. His eyes rested excitedly on a pack of cards sitting on the floor. "How 'bout we play a game"?

"Man, you scare me when you say stuff like that" Fro said, although he looked quite interested in playing.

"C'mon. It's just a friendly game of poker" Snake implored and Ivy grinned.

"I'm in" she smirked, sitting down to next to Snake who had taken up a seat on the floor and was shuffling the cards.

"Me too" Fro grinned, joining them on the floor. One by one the other boys joined in until everyone in the tent was sitting or in Ace's case lying on the floor. Fin looked pretty uncertain about all of this, and Ivy wondered if he had ever played poker before. Somehow she doubted it.

They played the first few rounds quite quickly and it became quickly apparent that some of the people in the tent had had more practice than others. Fin barely even knew what the hand he was trying to get, let alone how to get them, and Fro had the worst poker face Ivy had ever seen. As was expected Ace and Jack were both unbelievably good and although it shocked the boys, Ivy wasn't too bad either.

"How bout we make this more interesting?" Snake asked with a smirk, after about five rounds.

"And how do you suggest we do that?" Fro looked too interested. This wasn't going to be good.

"You guys heard of this game called..." He paused and looked at Ivy with a smirk and she realised what he was about to say, "Strip poker"?

"Hell yeah" Spark said with a look in Ivy's direction, "I'm so in".

"Me too" Jack grinned, but he had enough manners to not look at Ivy when he said it.

"You boys have fun with that, I'm out" she said and Snake grinned at her.

"C'mon chick, where's your sense of adventure?" He smirked.

"Unless..." Fro said with a sly smile, "You're worried you're gonna lose".

"What? Of course I'm not worried about that, I could beat any of you" she scoffed.

"Then what's the problem?" Snake asked and Ivy glared.

"Fine, I'll play your stupid game" she retorted, rolling her eyes. Eight decided to play quite quickly after that.

"I think I'm out" Fin muttered, standing up and walking away from the group on the floor.

"Aw, Fin, if I can do it, you can do it" Ivy pleaded but he shook his head and sat down on his bed to watch.

"I'll play" Ace said with a frown, "But only 'cause I ain't got nothing better to do".

"Good. It's sorted then. When you don't wanna take anything else off, you quit, but if you play a round you have to follow through" Snake said looking pointedly at Ivy, shuffling the cards quickly and dealing them. Ace won the first hand, and got to keep both of his shoes, unlike everyone else, who was down to one. Ivy frowned. She knew this was a bad idea. After a few rounds of people betting their shoes and socks, the game began to get more interesting.

Snake chucked his shirt into the middle, as did Fro and Eight, until Ivy added a sock to the pile.

"I don't think so chick" Snake grinned, "A shirt's worth at least two socks".

"What? If you put in one shirt, then I'm putting in one sock" she exclaimed.

"No way" Fro disagreed, "Think about like this; how many socks could you make with one shirt? At least two".

"Fine" she retorted adding another. Jack followed suit with a wistful look at his now bare feet. Then it was Ace's turn. Ace had tunred out to be even better than everyone thought he was to begin with, having lost one shoe and nothing else.

"You know..." he said with a small smirk, "If I'm goin' by your rule, then I ain't gotta put anything in; you can't make any shoes with a shirt after all. But since I'm a giving person..." he trailed off and added his other shoe. Everyone showed their hands and Snake gave a triumphant smirk when he won.

The betting in the next round consisted of Jack shirt, Ace's socks, Snake and Ivy's hats, and Fro's bandana. Eight grinned and took off his glasses. Apparently clothes were more important than being able to see. Luckily for him, he won that round.

Ivy was starting to get worried. Although she still had more clothes than Fro and Eight, who were both down to their jumpsuits and boxers, she had a shirt, a jumpsuit and a pair of shorts left before she was wearing less than she would want to be in front of a bunch of sex deprived teenage boys.

Fro bet his jumpsuit the next round, and unfortunately for him, he didn't win. Apparently, just taking off his jumpsuit wasn't enough, because he decided to do a rather interesting attempt at a striptease. This resulted in most of the boys throwing various discarded items of clothing, including a few shoes, at him.

"Alright, alright" he yelled, from behind his arms that he had held up to shield himself, "I'll stop, but I'm out". Everyone breathed a sigh of relief as he took a seat next to a rather uncomfortable looking Fin.

'Round's not over yet" Snake smirked, looking at Eight who was down to his jumpsuit and his glasses, which he had now been told, weren't counted as clothes. He was looking rather worried. "Show us what you got boy" Snake raised his eyebrows at him. Eight looked round shiftily. Then he muttered something under his breath.

"I fold" he groaned, standing up and chucking his jumpsuit on the ground. There were loud catcalls and whistles from around the circle as he glared at everyone and then went to his bed.

"And then there were four" said Jack with a small smile, looking pointedly at Ivy.

"Not for long" Snake muttered slyly, raising his eyebrows at Ace who smirked back.

Ace won the next round, meaning that both Snake and Jack were out of the game. Ace raised his eyebrows at Ivy, who was now wearing a singlet and shorts. He smirked and looked her up and down obviously but he didn't say anything. Ivy gave him a sardonic smile and raised her eyebrows right back at his topless state.

"You better bloody win this boy" Snake muttered bitterly, "I didn't just get naked for no reason". Ace ignored the comment.

"You're not too bad are you" he acknowledged and Ivy smirked.

"Can't say the same for you" she retorted and she picked up her cards, keeping her face neutral when she saw that she had absolutely nothing.

"We'll see about that" he murmured, looking at his cards with a calm expression on his face.

He won. Of course he would win. That was just her luck. She scowled at him as she pulled off her shirt so she was left sitting in a pair of shorts and a bra despite her numerous attempts to keep her shirt on. Surprisingly none of the boys made any comments, but that wasn't really the point. She knew what they were thinking and it was bad enough. She knew she shouldn't have played this stupid game. Now she was surrounded by more than half naked boys all staring at her.

The only thing that made her stay in another round was sheer determination to beat Ace, which she was sure she could do.

"Let's make it interesting" Fro called from his spot on Fin's bed, "All or nothing. Loser takes everything off".

"I don't think so" Ivy glared at him.

"Scared?" Ace smirked

"No" she snapped

"Right..." he muttered, biting his lip in a disbelieving way.

"Fine, let's do this then". How could she have ever thought that she loved this boy; he was the most annoying, confusing, cryptic, all round insane person she had ever met. She wanted to slap him. Ivy could do this. She would win.

She lost. Again. She wasn't surprised. She knew this was going to happen. This was what she got for being too competitive. She wasn't going to do it. They didn't actually expect her to did they?

"I'm not doing it" Ivy said, hoping they would accept her decision. They didn't.

"What? Yes you are" Snake cried.

"You're not getting out of this that easily" added Fro.

"If we can do it, then you can do it" Eight said encouragingly.

"Deal's a deal babe" Jack laughed. Ace didn't say anything. He just sat there watching her with a smirk on his face. He knew, Ivy realised, from the start that this was going to happen. Bloody annoying cocky prick. She was pissed off now.

"This is illegal you know" Ivy said, "I have the right to use my body however I want. And right now I want to keep my clothes on".

"Too bad" Sparky grinned. "You said you were going to so now you have to. And besides, you just made that law up". Ivy opened her mouth to put the rather colourful language she had learnt over the past few months to good use when she was interrupted by the tent flap opening. Federovski stood just inside the flap. He was staring with a bewildered look on his face at the various states of undress around the room. Ivy realised she was only wearing bra and gave a small shriek as she grabbed her shirt off the floor.

"Hey shrink, what's up?' Ace asked sitting cross legged on the floor.

"Hello Joel" Federovski said, pretending not to notice how everyone was dressed, "I came to tell you all that the storm is dying down. And Ivy dear, you have a letter" he added, holding out an envelope to her. Ivy stared at him opened mouthed and then snatched the letter from his hands eagerly. Did Mac finally write back? Had he forgiven her? This was wonderful. She ran over to her bed and huddled up against the wall, ripping the letter open. But there was something wrong. The writing was different, but maybe that had changed over the year she was gone. But the small hearts that dotted the i's were definitely not his. Whoever this was from, it wasn't her brother. She began to read with a strong felling of foreboding.

Ivy

I want to start this letter off by saying that no one, but especially not me, forgives you for what you did. We still detest you and it's only due to extreme pity that I'm writing this letter. No one else thought that it was a good idea to tell you what happened, especially not while you're in the middle of God knows where, but we were at one very distant point in time best friends. And despite everything that you've done to me and your family, you have a right to know this. And before I tell you, I want you to know that despite myself, I am truly, truly sorry for how much pain this will cause you. I know how much you cared for him, even after what you did, and he still cared about you, more than you would believe. That's why it's hard to write this.

Ivy, Mac was killed. They found his body floating up the river, completely mutilated. They had to call you parents in to make sure it was really him, so some of us had hope, but it was him. Ivy I'm so sorry. If there was a better way of telling you, even if I and to drive up there myself, I would do it, because even you don't deserve this. Don't go doing anything stupid. If you need to talk to someone, I suppose you can write to me. For now, I suppose I can forgive you slightly. Chanel says, that she sort of forgives you as well and so does Tiffany. So all of us are here for a little while if you need us. We're all still at the same addresses, although Tiff's father added another house onto their estate and we got a new storey as well.

I hope this finds you alright, even if you did completely screw us all over. And I hope you don't have any strange disease like rabies or something, from living in the desert. I'm so sorry Ivy, one last time.

Kennedy

Xoxo

Ivy dropped the letter on her bed. All the boys were looking at her. They looked slightly alarmed. Ivy wondered if she had made a noise while she was reading the letter that she didn't know about. She didn't say anything as she crawled down into her bed and hugged the covers close around her.

This was a joke. A horrible, stupid, evil practical joke. It was probably Tiffany's idea; she never could handle the fact that Ivy was better than her. Who would do something like that? Lie about their brother being dead. Ivy felt tears well up in her eyes. But if it wasn't true, then why was she crying? Why did everything in her body hurt like she had just been hit by a freight truck? Why was she shaking?

It was because it wasn't a joke. Her little brother, the most important person in her entire existence was dead.

...

Her friend sounds like a bitch lol.

I know what happens next, but it might take a while to get it up, because I have a gi-gantic assignment which is due tomorrow and I havent started. Some thing about slavery. Anyone know any good movies about slavery in America? LOL

And sorry abut the strip poker bit being really confusing, cos I know you don't put your clothes in the middle and all that, but it was too confusing to change it and it really isn't actually important anyway.

Thanks for the reviews everyone but...

It's dead even right now, so I need more! And just to clarify, by run away I meant, leave the camp, not run away like how Stanley and Zero did. So, should she run away or get kicked out.

Also no I'm not Amrican lol, I'm from New Zealand. Which is little and next to Australia in case some of you don't know where that is. And I'm going to italy, and England and Paris. I'm so excited! hehe, I know, I'm pretty pathetic.

So, please more reviews, otherwise Im too confused to keep writing the story.

And lastly, would people be hugely averse to the warden having a niece who came to the camp?

if you are just mention it, otherwise I'll bring her in. Not for long, just a few chapters.

cheers

xx

Bee