DISCLAIMER:
Hello again, chapter 14 released,I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it.
I also want to thank you for the reviews, if you have anything you like or dislike, go ahead and write it, I love to answer your reviews.
wacky620: Thanks for the insight, after 4 seasons of competition I always thought that there would be some friendships here and there, especially if we have 2 campers
About why not call Courtney, it's because as you guess, they are not in good terms and Cameron, well, she would call him as his second option if Trent call failed ;D.
Total Drama belongs to Fresh TV and his creators. I don't own anything from the properties used in this fic
Down and Outback
Last time on The Ridonculous Race, our teams were sent to the big house and friends became enemies, enemies became friends, and the Drama Team makes a dramatic discovery when Trent calls to ask about his debut album, only to learn he will not record any album. Wait for it:
(We see the scene where Trent learns the news from his manager, losing the color of his face, and the focus in his eyes.)
There it is, it was really sad, and it still is, which teams gonna get fired this week, find out right here, this is The Ridonculous Race.
Yesterday Chill Zone is today Starting Point, the teams will start in the order they finished yesterday, and Gwen walks to the first position, holding Trent by the hand, he is pale, with his eyes unfocused and a blank expression on his face.
Don greets them, "It looks like we have some serious drama happening with the Drama Team," as he ends his joke, Gwen looks daggers at him, making the host show a fake smile and sweat a little "*cough*, I mean, you can start now."
"Come on, Trent, push the button and get the travel tip," said Gwen. Trent automatically raised his arm and let it fall over the button, getting the travel tip. Then he remained still, staring at the space in front of him, not showing any intention of taking or reading the tip.
"Thanks, let me read it then," Gwen take the travel tip and read aloud "All in: bunny bagging, go to the marked farm and collect 10 bunnies in a sack, and deliver it to the local farmer to get to the next travel tip, there is also an albino bunny in the farm, if you catch it you can skip directly to the next challenge. Hmm capture rabbits, doesn't sound easy, but let's give it a try!" she tells Trent, jumping and raising an arm, showing a fake excitement, trying to get a reaction from him.
"No reaction? We have a tough crowd here," she said, annoyed by the lack of response coming from Trent, again she holds his hand and runs toward the farm, he walks quickly behind her as a robot.
As the travel tip stated, the farm was infested by rabbits, some white, some brown, some gray, some spotted, they were running across the farm eating and digging everywhere.
"All those lovely, fluffy, cotton-like little ones make me wanna throw up, cute overload!" says Gwen, giving a sack to hold the bunnies to her partner "Let's hunt some rabbits," she added and jumped over a group of rabbits trying to catch 1 or 2, but Trent stayed there, looking toward the ground, expressionless, the goth go back to face him.
"Ok, I know you are depressed about what happened with your album, but you cannot let it get to you. Don't think about it, focus on the race, we are already in the best 11, why don't try to win this?" Gwen looks at him frowning worried and making a sad smile.
Trent nodded and mechanically began to walk behind the rabbits. Gwen sigh, she isn't good cheering people, scaring them yes, of course, but cheering definitely no.
Confessional: Quitting the race.
(Gwen is folding her arms and frowning, looking at the camera, while some teams try to catch bunnies in the background, as Trent slowly walks away, dragging the sack.)
"At the beginning, I say that I didn't enter the race for the money, and is true, I enter to win my freedom from contractual obligations, and I already did it," she makes a small smile.
"So why not quit? Well, I will be lying if I say that I don't want the money, half a million dollars would be more than enough to help my family, pay my college and have some good savings," her eyes sparkle as she talks about her family, then saddened as she looks toward Trent
"But more than that, I don't want to leave before I found a way to cheer Trent up, you know all the race he always tried to motivate me and stay positive, and now it breaks my heart seeing him like that, so I will help him. I don't know how, but I'll figure something out," she said smiling, if she put a lot of thinking into it, she will surely find an answer.
"I can't find any way of cheering him, all my ideas are not going anywhere," she thought aloud, after a lot of thinking.
"Relax, dude is just going through the 7 stages," reply to her Spud, the brunette member of the Rockers, that casually hear her.
"7 stages of what?" turn Gwen out of curiosity.
"The 7 stages of sadness, my old band 'Next to vomit,' write the most wicked ballad about that," proudly replied the rocker.
"Weren't those the seven stages of heartbroken?" interrupted Gwen, raising an eyebrow.
"Same thing," answers Spud shrugging.
"Well, what are the seven stages?" Gwen asked, not sure if she wanted to continue the conversation.
Spud smile, "I'll just sing you da song, two, three, four" he closed his eyes and began singing "Heaaaaart break, stage one, tatada da, tadada da tadada" he was humming the rhythm as he was doing some air guitar.
"I am sure it is a 'wicked' song, but can't you just tell me what the stages are?" asked Gwen narrowing her eyes.
"Sorry, I got to do the whole song, or I won't remember it," Spud reply narrowing his eyes as well and then continued humming "tarara ta ta tui tui."
Meanwhile, Trent was walking behind the rabbits, too slow to catch them, he suddenly sits down in the middle of the field, with his head tilted downward and vacant gaze, not noticing that someone else was looking at him.
"Hey, Noah," said Owen, looking at the former musician, "Don't you think there is something wrong with Trent? He is not looking well," he asks in a worried tone.
"Why? Because he looks like something died inside him, or because he is so depressed that the bunnies are trying to comfort him?" replies Noah snarky.
Trent was surrounded by a lot of rabbits with worried expressions and tearing eyes, some of them were cuddling against him or licking his hands, the cool guy remained unresponsive.
"Exactly!" said Owen "He looks so sad, do you believe Gwen dumped him?" he looks at Noah frowning with sadness.
"Do I look like a couple's counselor? Also, I think they weren't back together," said Noah.
Now Trent was buried under a mountain of cuddling and licking rabbits, some of them going into his sack.
"Maybe he tried to get back together, and she rejected him," Owen tells his little buddy, "we need to help him."
"Woman, you can't live with them, but you can't live without Emma," states Noah, making a love-struck face thinking in the older of the Sisters' team. "*cough* what I mean, you can do whatever you want, but only when we have ended the challenge, I don't want to lose because you are a softie," he says with a stern gaze.
Trent stands up slowly, taking the sack now full of rabbits, and began to walk mechanically in the direction he came from, covered in earth and with an empty stare, some bunnies still licking his face from his shoulders, or on the top of his head.
"Don't worry about the challenge Noah, I have a plan to capture the rabbits," said Owen proudly, he the squat over 3 bunnies, and farts over them, the poor critters fainting from the odor.
"Hehehe, see?" presumed Owen to a disgusted Noah who was pressing his nose.
At the same time, Gwen, scowling and with her arms folded, was still hearing Spud's humming.
"When do the lyrics begin? Because this song has lyrics, right?" she asks in a serious tone.
"Lyrics? Oh no, this is the instrumental version, but the seven solos are named after the seven stages of heartbreaking."
"You mean sadness, right?" Gwen was beyond annoyed, "look, this serenade is not getting anywhere, thanks anyway, but I need to capture some rabbits," she said, walking away from him.
"No, wait," Spud tells her, "Trent now is in the first stage 'Nooooo' when he became mister angry pants, he will be on stage 2," Spud smile as he remembered the stages.
"So, making him mad could help, well I don't lose anything trying, thanks," she then goes looking for Trent, leaving Spud there waving at her, the rocker forgetting that he also needs to capture bunnies.
Gwen found Trent covered in dirt and with a bunny over his head, "what happen to you?"
Trent remains silent and gives her the sack, with more than enough bunnies.
"You did it! Let's go and get the next travel tip," Gwen takes the sack with one hand and holds Trent's hand with the other, walking fast toward the local farmer, the rabbit in Trent's head falling to the ground.
The local farmer was a blond Australian man in his 50s, with dark blond hair, sturdy build, and some wrinkles across the face, he uses brown trousers, a white shirt, a brown vest, boots and a black hat with crocodile teeth. Gwen gives him the sack full of rabbits, and he gives them their next travel tip.
Gwen began to read it "All in: Glide asunder from the Great Down Under, great another rhyme, take one of the gliders and fly away from Australia to the Chill Zone at New Zealand's Aspiring Mountain."
The goth sighs, "At least is a new form of near-death experience that we haven't tried." she missed Trent, always saying something positive, now he didn't say a word, staring blankly at the ground.
"Ok, all aboard," Gwen adds, running toward the glider while holding his hand, "You take the passenger seat, and I will pilot," she put him in the back seat, and fasten his seatbelt, then she takes the pilot seat and fastens hers.
When they were in position, the glider was hurtled into the air toward New Zealand.
Most of the travel to New Zeland was in silence, Gwen trying her best to guide the glider, and Trent not showed any emotion, just as before boarding.
"You are aware you are like a better driver than I, right?, I mean I get pretty nervous in these things, not for losing the challenge, it's more the fall from thousands of feet what really scare me," she was controlling the glider but was pretty nervous, and the problem with Trent wasn't helping at all.
The musician didn't answer her, resting in his seat, looking into the blue sky.
Gwen, at last, lost her patience "AWWWWWW! Trent listen, all that happened with your album sucks, but you can let it affect you like this, at least made an effort to aaaaaaaaah!," as she was trying to advice/scold him, Gwen lost control of the glider and began to going down, unfortunately crashing against another glider, both falling into the ground.
"Are you all right?" asks Gwen as she exits the crashed glider, Trent, who was already out of the debris, nods at the goth. Both were dirty but unscathed.
"Fine, let's investigate the glider we hit, maybe the other team needs help," both walk toward the other glider, and are surprised to find that the occupants were Owen and Noah.
"Fancy meeting, thanks for almost killing us, it's always better if it's someone you know," greet them Noah, a little rough-up by the landing.
"I'm also happy to see you and Owen are fine, Noah," Gwen replies nonchalantly. "Let's go to the Chill Zone."
"Trent man, are you okay?" Owen asks walking toward the former musician, Trent has the same blank expression that the big guy saw in Australia.
"Owen, let's go!" Noah hurried the party guy, but Owen seeing that Trent didn't answer, decided to carry him on his shoulder and take him to the Chill Zone, Gwen walked behind them and step into the carpet of completion after them.
"Noah and Owen you are sixth," Don says as they step in the carpet "Trent and Gwen you are seventh, normally I should penalize you because Trent was carried by another team, but seeing the drama you are immersed, I will let it pass," he smiled and laugh at his own joke, Gwen ignore him.
"Thanks, Owen," says Gwen to the big guy as he left Trent on the floor, the former musician also thanked him with a pat on his wide arm and walked away.
"Gwen, did something happen between you and Trent?" asks Owen, with teary eyes "because he seems so gloomy and sad. Did you break with him again?"
"What? No, we are only friends, why did you say that?" replies Gwen with her eyes wide open, "It's something more personal, and I really don't know what to do to cheer him up."
"More personal than breaking with him on international TV? I don't know Gwen, that hurts a lot," Owen told her honestly, he was not talking about the break between Gwen and Trent, but about his own experience, his girlfriend Izzy also broke with him in a reality show.
Gwen felt a stab in her heart, what was Owen problem? Why did he think that this is her fault? And why to bring up when she and Trent broke up, then wasn't her fault either, she didn't do anything wrong.
Noah sigh and went to buy some coffee, Owen's heart was at least as big as his stomach, so he could not leave a friend in need, Noah let the goth and the party guy at least have some time to talk. At the coffee machine he heard the news, the stage was a double elimination round, the Stepbrothers, and the Rockers were out, he didn't know any of those teams, but fewer opponents were good news for him and Owen… and Emma.
Meanwhile, Owen and Gwen were still talking.
"Ok Owen, listen, Trent problem is not my fault!" she tried to relax, feeling her veins pulsing on her temple "with the phone call we won in the last challenge, he called his manager, I don't have all the details of their conversation, but they cancel his debut album and the record deal was terminated."
"That sounds terrible," said Owen biting his lower lip, "we need to cheer him up, did you tried to buy him his favorite food?"
Gwen's anger began to subdue as she began to feel some gratitude toward the party guy, he seemed truly worried about her teammate "Don't worry Owen, is our team problem and I will find a way to help Trent," she then hugs him, something unusual in her "Thanks, you help me a lot."
"Hehehe, you are welcome," lied Owen with a fake smile, feeling guilty for not being of help. The first Total Drama winner and the first runner-up parted each one going their way.
Gwen bought some hamburgers and a soda for Trent, she takes them to his room, but he was already sleeping, so she leaves them in the fridge with a note, and then went to her own room.
Gwen tried to understand him, he just lost his dream, his goal, so she didn't know what to do to cheer him, she doesn't have experience helping others with his emotional problems, after all, she became a loner by own decision, didn't wanting to follow stupid trends imposed by others, but that also means she didn't have experience cheering friends because she has few of them.
But there was something more in her head, something she didn't want to think about until she can help Trent, and it was Owen's words, Gwen didn't understand why she got so angry, probably because he talks about the time she and Trent broke up, and make it look as if it was her fault. Owen was wrong, it was nobody's fault, but for some reason, when he blamed her, it made her blood boil.
The goth couldn't sleep, so she took her sketchbook and tried to draw something, but she had artist block, after scribbling for a while, Gwen rests in her bed thinking about Trent and Owen until finally, she falls asleep.
Unknown to her, she was not the only one worried about the former musician, Owen couldn't come with anything to help Trent, and Noah makes clear that he didn't want to 'meddle in others affairs.' Owen thinks, and thinks, and thinks, suddenly he found an answer, not for Trent problem, but for his own, if Noah doesn't want to help, he only needed to ask someone who wants! And he had the right person for the job.
At last, we depart Australia, but there is so much Drama in the Drama Team, could Gwen find a solution before they are eliminated?
This episode had some parallelism with the original, but Trent and Devin's problems are quite different, and also Gwen and Carrie are entirely different characters. Even then, I like how it went.
Teams eliminated: the Larpers, Tennis rivals, Geniuses, Vegetarians, fashion bloggers, Mother and daughter, Adversity twins, Step Brothers, Rockers.
I hope you enjoyed the chapter.