Chris stared at himself in the mirror, taking a few deep breaths to try and relax himself. The bags under his eyes made it clear that he was still having a hard time sleeping after the sudden appearance of the ghosts the other day, but he seemed to be in a bit better spirits than before. He glanced over his shoulder to see Chef standing behind him, dressed up entirely in his military garb, war paint on his cheeks. "You really…yeah, you really like these types of challenges, don't you?"
"Hey man, whatever lets me yell at the contestants like the maggots they are." Chef grabbed onto his dog tags, which were wrapped around his neck by a chain. "Besides, I ain't had a chance to be in charge since that disco challenge. It's about time the world gets more Chef Hatchet."
"I guess you got me there…the episodes where you're thrashing the kids about always get pretty good ratings. Heh, besides, in a challenge like this, just about anybody could get eliminated. Plus, it'd be pretty funny to see Jianne get tossed aside by, oh, I don't know, Luna or something." The two hosts giggled to themselves, Chris soon clapping his hands quickly, causing one of the walls to open up and reveal a bunch of Atlantean weapons. Bubble cannons, tridents made of seashells and coral, a whole assortment. "Yessir, this is gonna be a good one! But, before we get into the challenge or anything like that, there's one thing we've gotta get to. Chef, would you care to do the honors?"
"Heh, my pleasure, man. Last time, on Total Drama: Lost City," Chef turned to face the camera, taking Chris's place in doing the intro. "With Chris being all gunked up by that little haunting from before, we had to call in some special help to torment these maggots. Poseidon's crazy assistant brought in Evander, former competitor of the show, to mock each and every 'nerd' and 'dweeb' in all of Atlantis. The challenge was all about being cool, looking cool, and acting cool, something pretty much none of these kids could do. With people like Natt scribbling on his arms in permanent marker, and others like March missing the complete point of the challenge, it looked like the challenge was gonna fall in favor of Jianne, though a miracle happened! Shrimpy little Nicolás was determined to win the prize from the challenge, which was a free pair of glasses from Lens Maker Louie or whatever his name was. He used that determination to fight like never before, out cooling the rest of the contestants with ease. Heh, Jianne was not happy about that, not one bit! With every winner, there also must be a loser, and the maggot that was the least cool by a mile was March. She took a nice long ride back to the Aftermath gang, but not before being the second person to blame Alexis for their loss. Girl's turning out to be a real crazy twist villain…entirely by accident. In any case, we got more wild shenanigans on there way right now, on Total Drama: Lost City!"
The camera hovered over an ocean, quickly descending beneath the water and happening upon Atlantis, zooming in on the wreck of the Chris space station, where the host himself was on his knees, sad that there was an asteroid in his face, while Poseidon patted him on the shoulder and Amphitrite sighed in annoyance.
"Dear mom and dad, I'm doing fine," the camera quickly shifted over to the carnival zone in Atlantis, showing Natt and Anne on a large Ferris wheel, enjoying their time together until it suddenly fell out of place and rolled away.
"You guys are on my mind," down at the controls, Zachary and Amelia were revealed to be messing with them, laughing maniacally until Vicente came over and bonked both of them on the head with plastic baseball bats.
"You asked me what I wanted to be and I think the answer's plain to see," in one of the carnival tents, March and Luna watched Benjamin in awe as he rode a unicycle while bouncing on a trampoline, juggling bowling pins, and holding a torch with his teeth.
"I wanna be famous!" Tony tossed a frisbee at the wheel, causing Benjamin to fall on top of an unsuspecting Bonnie, and the torch to set his shirt on fire before the bowling pins landed on his head, which caused Liz to give him a thumbs up with an evil grin on her face.
"I wanna live close to the sun," out in the ocean, Alex was in his diving suit, trying to catch a sea monkey, but failing utterly, just like he had when it was a space monkey, while Dusty shook her head in disappointment, lassoing the creature back to them, but catching Jett instead.
"So pack your bags, cause I've already won," on the seafloor, Archie studied a squid closely until it shot ink all over his helmet's glass shield, which made Jianne giggle a little bit before wiping it off.
"Everything to prove, nothing in my way, I'll get there one day," not too far from where the two were, Damien and Gretchen ran away from a massive shark, which knocked them off to the side, showing that it was swimming away from Flint, who was throwing rocks at it while Alexis chased after him.
"I wanna be famous!" the camera switched gears to show a submarine, with arcade-esque machines in it that Taylor and Crustacean were fighting over.
"Na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na," zooming into a "pod" of sorts near the arcade games, a virtual world that was full of immaculate fantasy aspects and monsters was shown.
"I wanna be, I wanna be, I wanna be famous!" Nicolás, dressed as a knight, was running in fear as blasts of dark energy were tossed at the ground behind him, each blast destroying part of the ground.
"I wanna be, I wanna be, I wanna be famous!" the camera revealed Thomas, in dark mage garb, as the source of the blasts, floating in the sky and laughing maniacally until Maggie, dressed as a witch, flew over to him on her broom and tackled him to the ground, making out with him before he blasted the camera with one of the energy balls.
Afterwards, the whole group was seen on a nautically themed aftermath stage, which Sebastian and Haley were at the center of, glaring at each other while all of the contestants, accompanied by Maggie, who was hugging Thomas tightly, whistled.
Nicolás sat on his bed, unwrapping a box that had just made its way to him from the Lens Master himself. He still couldn't quite see things straight, but he knew well what this box had in it. He popped it open, revealing a pair of glasses with a silver frame to them. Without any time to spare, he grabbed them and placed them on his face, smiling cheerfully as the room came into perfect vision for him. "Finally…I can see again!"
"Woah! You got more super power things for your eyes! Are these ones going to break, just like those other ones?" Benjamin attempted to grab the glasses from the nerdy boy's face, though he slapped his hands away and climbed further back onto his bunk. "Yeesh…sharing is caring, you know?"
"Last time I shared with you, you made me regret it in record speeds. If you must know, that's exactly point zero zero one seconds." Nicolás looked back at the imbecile, who had a blank expression that showed just how little he understood of what he was trying to say. "You know…one one thousandth of a second." Still, not much feedback from Benjamin. It was like the hamster that was running on the wheel in his head stopped for a water break. "...A very small number."
"Man, you should've just said that from the first place! I swear, you guys are always going on about your weird metaphors and linguistic masteries that don't fit into average conversation." Benjamin shook his head at Nicolás before whistling and walking out of the room. The nerdy boy sighed to himself, shrugging his shoulders soon after. He got up from his bed, looking over to see that Natt was sitting at a desk in the corner, studying something rather closely.
"Hey, Natt…whatcha doing?" The nerd scratched the stubble on his chin, looking down at the table and noticing the Father Time card.
"Oh…just studying this business card I found a couple days ago. You know, it was really weird, considering that I found it on that shipwreck…but there is just no way that this was printed back when Captain Jack McLean was alive and kicking." Natt let out a sigh, sliding the card over to Nicolás so that he could take a gander at it. "I've been trying to make sense of what it is for the past few days, but every search online comes up blank. I know I've heard the name before too, so it's only making me that much more annoyed."
"Father Time…well, I know that would be Chronos." Nicolás pointed out the name, which made Natt raise an eyebrow, as he hadn't quite thought of that yet. "Considering the fact that we've got Poseidon and Amphitrite down here…oh! Maybe it's Poseidon's dad! Chronos is the father of all the main gods in that pantheon, so it wouldn't surprise me."
"I guess you've got a point there…so, you think he's just another one of these media types that's overseeing the show? Maybe they had him scope the ship out for the challenge and he left his card there on accident?"
"Yeah, that could probably be it. If you want, I could try doing a couple deep web searches…my area of expertise has often brought me pretty good results." Nicolás proudly grinned, pointing to his chest with one hand while loosely shrugging with his other arm. "I've used articles that were buried under mountains of firewalls for some of my school essays. Always did end up scoring pretty high when it came to those." The goofy nerd then realized how cocky he sounded at the moment, soon blushing and twiddling his thumbs. "Sorry…I sounded like a total Jianne for a moment there. I-in any case, I can definitely take a look into it, if you'd like."
"Yeah, sounds good to me." Natt shrugged, grabbing the card from the table and handing it to his former teammate. "Even if it turns out to be something dumb, let me know about it, will ya? I'm invested at this point…gotta know what it ends up being."
"Yep, you got it!" Nicolás softly grinned, closing his eyes and failing to notice that Natt was holding his fist out towards him. He peeked his eyes open, a bit confused at first, but he lightly fist bumped the boy, immediately feeling pretty thrilled after.
Confessional
"You know, ever since that last challenge, I feel like I've had a lot more confidence…and I have to say, I love it! I mean, I was never like this before…people kinda just walked all over me." Nicolás thought back to his time on the space station, in which he had gotten eliminated fairly quickly. "...I just hope I don't start acting like Luna or Tony. Urk…that would be the worst."
"If Nicolás manages to find something from that, then more power to him. I guess, while he's looking into the card, I could ask Poseidon if he knows about Father Time at all." Natt shrugged his shoulders, that dry expression of his still present, as always.
Confessional End
While the two boys went to their own devices, trying to pry more into the mysterious card that they had in their possession, Amelia found herself being the subject of a conversation with Alexis while the two were both in the midst of brushing their hair in the bathroom. "So, not that I have anything against him or anything, but ever since the merge of the last season, Flint has been treating me super weird, you know?"
"...What do you mean?" Amelia raised an eyebrow, though she was only loosely paying attention to what the other girl was saying, more invested in getting her hair done up the right way.
"Well, for starters, he's always calling me his queen…like, at least three times in each conversation we have. Like, yeesh, I get that you've got a crush on me or whatever it is that you have, but the way he goes about it is pretty creepy. Not to mention that he doesn't like seeing other guys trying to talk to me." Alexis kept blabbering on, leaning towards the mirror ever so slightly to see if she currently had any hairs standing up out of place.
"Wow…that really sounds like it's just the worst. I can't imagine having anything like that happening to me, I'd probably cry myself to sleep at night." Amelia rolled her eyes ever so slightly, though Alexis didn't seem to notice this. At the same time, she thought to herself, "Is this girl ever going to shut up? She's been going on and on all morning…my ears are starting to get numb."
"Yeah, it can be pretty bad. I mean, he's nice and all, but it's just unbearable at times. I'm sure you've probably had someone like that at one point or another, right?" Alexis turned to face Amelia with an inquisitive smile.
"...Well…" Amelia tapped her chin for a moment, looking up in thought while a thought bubble appeared over her head with Luna's face in it. She shook her head before looking back over at Alexis. "I'm not sure. Listen, I would love to hear you go on and on about things that mean literally nothing to me for another, I don't know, four hours or so, but I've got plans to actually enjoy myself today, so I'll be taking my leave now."
The actress brought her hairbrush with her as she passed by Alexis, who was stunned by her bluntness. After she had left, the mistress of all things accidental glared at the doorway. "Hmph…if she didn't wanna talk, she could've just said so."
"What the hell is up, Lexi!?" Jianne burst through the doorway, grabbing Alexis and pulling her in for a huge hug, squeezing the life out of her. "I feel like we haven't had enough time to hang since the merge, you feel me?"
"My bones…" Alexis was barely able to grunt those two words out, her face near purple in color until Jianne finally set her back down on the ground. She took in a big breath, the color soon returning to her. "Jesus, Jianne…you're hugging me like you're trying to kill me."
"Well, I gotta show you just how great of a hugger I am, after all. I'm a great kisser, great hugger, and pretty much amazing at everything in between. Anyway, I saw Amelia stomping out of here all annoyed. You're making a whole army's worth of enemies, aren't you?" Jianne booped Alexis on the nose, causing the girl to slap her finger away. "Heh! Feisty, feisty!"
"I don't see what you mean by that…the enemies part. Amelia was just being a little rude to me, that's all." Alexis set her hairbrush down on the sink and sighed lightly. "I try to open up and be friends with more people, and that's how they act towards me."
"I dunno about that, chief! Remember March and Gretchen? Both of them were pretty peeved at you…blaming you for their eliminations and all that." Jianne patted Alexis on the back rather roughly, bumping her forward a little bit. "I mean, kudos to you. I don't think even I could make that many enemies that quickly! You aren't trying to make it a challenge, are you?"
"W-what!? No! No, no! I don't wanna have all these enemies at all, and I really don't know what it was that those two got in their heads, but I didn't do anything to them." The girl shook her head and crossed her arms, still annoyed over the Amelia interaction previously. "And I don't think you should be so eager to make enemies, either."
"Why not? I mean, it doesn't really matter, right? Can't get voted out anymore, so I'm not worried about how many people don't like me or whatever." Jianne laughed proudly, blissfully unaware that she would be a prime target for a sabotage with a mindset like that.
"...Nevermind. I'm not going out of my way to make the others hate me. You can do whatever you would like, because I know that you're gonna be you no matter what I say."
"You're damn right!" Jianne patted Alexis on the back again, this time with enough force to
knock her off of her feet and to the ground.
Confessional
"I can't seriously have that many people who hate me, right? I mean…I knew Gretchen and March were a bit upset with me, but they can't seriously think that I caused their eliminations, right?" Alexis had a worried look on her face as she stared at the camera. "...R-right?"
Confessional End
As the final eleven contestants wandered around in their dwellings, the speakers around the cabins suddenly piped up with a loud noise of feedback. "Aaaaaaaaaaaattention! Each and every one of you maggots better get your sorry butts out here before I send in my newest private in to drag you out of your beds!"
"Heheh…private…" Bonnie could be heard in the background of Chef's announcement, giggling like the adorable little pervert that she was, at least up until something could be heard bonking on her head. "Ow, daddy, why?" Another bonk noise echoed after she said that bit. "Fine, I'll stop, geez…" While the little gremlin rubbed her aching forehead, the contestants started coming out of their buildings, each of them having their eyes widen as they saw that Chef was in his military gear. The only one who didn't seem to be worried or intimidated in the slightest was Jianne, who was grinning her cocky grin.
"J-Jianne, I don't know if I would do your usual boastful routine while Chef is in charge." Damien tried to warn the girl, though she brushed him off.
"Meh, if Cheffy has got an issue with me, he can talk to me about it like a man!" Jianne grinned at the co-host, who rushed over to her and stared her down menacingly. "Yo yo, how do it be, princess?"
"You drop and give me twenty right now, maggot!" Chef pointed down to the grass angrily, only getting a scoff back from Jianne. "Oh? Would you rather me make it forty instead?"
"One hundred, take it or leave it." Jianne immediately dropped down to the grass, starting to do her push ups quickly, and impressively. It wasn't long before she was done with all one hundred of the push ups, and she got back up to her feet with that grin still on her face. "There! Do you need me to do anymore, or are you already embarrassed enough that your scare tactics just plain don't work on me?"
Chef rolled his eyes at the girl, starting to pace back and forth in front of the rest of the line. Each contestant stood completely still, remembering just how evil he could be from the capture the flag challenge in the prior season. "You maggots have been in need of a good thrashing from me for a while now, and that time has finally come. Chris won't be leading this challenge, and by the time it's over, you're gonna wish that he did! Private Bonnie! Show them the weapons!"
"Daddy, yes, daddy!" Bonnie saluted Chef, getting an intense glare from him due to the choice of words she used. She snickered to herself before stumbling over to a rather large crate, opening it up to show everybody the weaponry that was in Chris's wall earlier. "Badda boom! We got enough weapons to make a JROTC kid wanna sleep with you for a chance to touch 'em!"
"Would you quit it with all the gross innuendos and comments!? Dammit girl, how are we supposed to be intimidated if you keep trying to rouse rabble like that!?" Chef stormed over to her, bonking her on the head with a megaphone.
"Ow!" Bonnie used her hands to rub her cranium, which surely had a good sized bruise on it at this point. "I'm definitely trying to rouse something, but I'm not sure if rabble is the word that you'd use for it." Another bonk came down upon her head, knocking her to the grass so that she was laying face down. "Alright, alright…no more bonking…I don't wanna get sent to horny jail…"
"For the love of- nevermind all of that!" Chef snapped back to face the contestants again, glaring as his eyes scanned the lot of them. "This challenge is gonna be tough on the mind! You've got yourselves a real battle in the trenches! Trench warfare ain't no joke, and if you aren't watching your six at every given moment, you'll be taken out! You there, cowgirl!" Chef pointed right at Dusty, causing her to salute him. "You don't want your brain to splatter all over your boyfriend's nice vest, do you?"
"Sir, no, sir!" Dusty tried to be compliant, so as to keep the co-host off of her back.
"That's right! You don't! That's just one example of what could happen if you don't take a trench battle seriously! Back when I was in the war, we used to call the trenches the one true hell on Earth!" Chef reached into the crate, grabbing a bubble rifle and a trident for each contestant and tossing them over to them. "Your goal is to keep yourself in the trenches at all times! Your enemy's goal is to get you out of the trenches, no matter what it takes! The loser is gonna be whichever one of you unruly maggots gets yourself knocked out of those trenches! The winner, the soldier that takes the maggot out, is getting a buffet fit for a warrior! You can choose one of the other soldiers to bring along with you, of course. Do I make myself clear, maggots!?" The burly co-host glanced around the contestants, seeing all of them nodding back to him, except for Jianne, who shrugged her shoulders. He didn't care to pay attention to her and her antics, though. "Good! Now get yourselves suited up so we can get out into the ocean and to the trenches! Challenge starts at o-nine-hundred!"
Confessional
"Yuck…trenches. I get that it's a challenge and everything, but I gotta say, I would really rather not get mud all over myself, regardless if I'm wearing a diving suit or not." Luna pointed toward the camera while a vein bulged in her forehead. "You hear me, Chef? I will make you pay if any of that nasty mud touches me!"
"Hm…I feel like this is honestly a great chance to prep myself for any of those military roles that I'll be casted for later on." Zachary tapped his chin in thought for a moment before smirking excitedly. "Haha! Free practice, I'm always down for that!"
Confessional End
It didn't take long for the eleven contestants to get in their diving suits and on the submarine, each armed with their tridents and bubble rifles. They looked around at the scene, noticing that the number that they had started with dropped immensely…entirely by half, to be exact. The tensions were high, as each member of the cast knew well that they could be the next member added to the list of losers. Yes, one of them wasn't making it to the final ten…but who would it be? The question raced through everyone's heads, except for maybe Benjamin's, whose inner machinations were more like static on a TV.
Chef and Bonnie drove the submarine closer and closer to the trenches that the co-host had mentioned before, only to find that they were…for one, massive. But, on a much more important note, very dark. The submarine eventually descended to the entrance of the trench, one singular ladder that led down into the dark depths. The door to the submarine opened up, allowing the contestants to pour out of it, one by one. Chef stayed back on board while Bonnie followed the group out. "Maggots! Private Bonnie is gonna be swimming around overhead to see who gets knocked out of trenches first! Once she sees it happening, she'll report her findings, and I'll call the challenge! You've got ten minutes, that's right, ten minutes to scatter once you get in the trenches. Get to it!"
Hearing the co-host shouting in the manner that he did was enough for the remaining eleven members of the cast to hurry into the trenches, each and every one of them heading down different paths. "Chef thinks he can just boss me around and scare me out of my wits, eh? Can't say I blame him for trying, but it won't work! After all, I'm the expert when it comes to reality TV…I've gotta prove that one way or another." Vicente had his trident strapped to his back while his bubble rifle was clutched in his hands. "But if I run into Dusty…nah, I definitely won't find her. Even if I did, we would probably turn the other way."
While the reality TV pro chuckled to himself, Damien had taken an entirely different path, and was nervously humming to himself as he traversed the dark, eerie paths. The theater kid preferred the feel of the trident, and as such, had it at the ready while his bubble rifle was hanging on his hip. "Okay, don't freak out…it's just a little dark, and you don't know where any of the others are. Right…I guess that in itself is worth freaking out about…I'll just have to stay in one place if I'm gonna survive this challenge. Let's see here…aha!"
Damien noticed a cave dead ahead, and immediately rushed to get inside. It was still dark, though the light from his suit did put him at ease. The cave seemed to be pretty boring, and empty for that matter, but it had a decent sized rock for him to rest himself on. "Phew…I'll just stay put and wait for them to call the challenge. That should be fine…" He took a seat on the rock, slightly sinking into it with a confused look on his face. "Huh? I don't remember rocks being squishy…"
The theater kid got up from his seat, soon looking down at where he just was to see a rather large eyeball staring back at him. He blinked twice, his eyes soon widening before he let out a howling shriek that echoed throughout all of the trenches. "That's right, sissies! These trenches are a damn scary place! You've got five more minutes to get yourself hidden, and that's it!" Chef's voice hollered out at the group from the submarine shortly after Damien had let out that horrifying shriek.
"What in tarnation is all that screamin' about?" Dusty narrowed her eyes in the direction that the scream came from, soon shrugging her shoulders and continuing down the trench path that she was taking. She had her bubble rifle held in her right hand, while her left hand was gripping the trident. She certainly looked as if she knew what she was doing with the tools. "Man…is it just me, or is it getting really hot over here?"
The cowgirl had beads of sweat forming on her forehead, though she was unable to wipe them away, considering that her helmet was in the way. She seemed to have come upon some sort of clearing, one that was pretty massive. The only details she noticed about it were several dozens of small craters in the ground, but she didn't think much of it. As she kept pressing onward into the clearing, she started to feel a rumbling beneath her. She looked down to see that she was standing in one of the craters…then realizing that it was more than just a crater. "Crap!" The girl took a dive out of the crater, a high pressured stream of water soon bursting from it like an erupting volcano.
"Well, would you look at that." Amelia snickered to herself as she noticed the geyser's eruption overhead, though she was in a different area of the trenches entirely. "Looks like someone's going to have a lot of fun dealing with all of that nonsense over there…if everyone just stuck to the main paths, like me, there would be nothing to worry about!" The actress laughed a snide laugh, continuing on through her chosen path, only to suddenly fall in a hole that she didn't notice in front of her. She could be heard screaming as she fell, eventually landing in a wide pit. The pit itself had several cavernous paths extending from it all over the walls. "W-well! No matter for me…I'll find my way back up there, no doubt!"
"What's that? Methinks some horrible actress has just taken some horrible plunge somewhere out there!" Zachary chortled to himself while he had stopped moving through his trench path. He had a pretty good intuition when it came to his enemies getting punished, and this time was no exception. "And look at that…I'm lucky enough to have ended up in a bunker! Smooth sailing for me from here on out, I tell ya!" The actor took a seat in the wrench bunker, the seat he chose being a cruddy metallic one that might be in a kindergarten graduation ceremony. He snickered to himself, aiming his bubble rifle right at the exit of the bunker so that no one could break into it.
"Hmmmmm…something about this doesn't seem quite right to me." Benjamin tapped at his helmet in question while he thought about where he had ended up. He was in a cave, much like Damien and Amelia, although in a much different situation than either of them were. He was hanging from the ceiling by his feet, a sticky substance keepin him up there without any issues. "...Oh! If I'm sticking to the ceiling…that must mean…I really am The Fly! Haha! I knew it!" Benjamin did a happy little upside down dance, soon noticing a crazy amount of ravenous leeches surrounding him. "Oh! Hello, friends!"
Natt was trudging through his own path, bubble rifle at the ready, though he noticed that it was painstakingly difficult for him to actually move. Each step felt as if it was draining him to take, and he couldn't quite put his finger on why that was. "Come on…it's almost like I'm…" The dull boy looked down at his feet, noticing that he was knees deep in a mud puddle that stretched along a great length of trench. Either way he looked, he was surrounded by that mud, and it grabbed onto his legs tightly. "...Ah, rats…"
"Oh gosh, oh gosh, oh gosh!" Nicolás huffed and puffed as he ran as fast as he could through the trenches. He glanced over his shoulder for a brief moment, only to see that there was an army of small fish swimming quickly after him. "Ah! Go away, crazy fish!" the boy kept on running down his path, blindly firing some of the shots from his bubble rifle behind him. "Go away, go away, go away!"
"You think you got it bad!? You haven't seen anything bad, yet!" Jianne called over to the boy from her trench path, which was nearby his own. He could just barely see her through some gaps through the wall between them, but he did notice that she was also firing shots behind her. "You're getting chased by guppies compared to me!"
"Well, what are you getting chased by, then?" Nicolás inquired the girl while he kept running and firing his rifle.
"Uh…" Jianne looked behind her for a brief moment to see a vicious looking barracuda on her tail. She shrugged, firing another bubble blast at it before looking back through the wall at the boy. "A big chump of a fish, that's what!"
While the two contestants ran for dear life from their attackers, Alexis was moseying on through a rather calm path. Most of the others had to deal with some sort of nonsense wherever they had ended up going, but she seemed to be the exception of this. "Huh…guess I got pretty lucky with the trench paths. All the screaming from before…the others must really be going through it right now." The girl giggled to herself for a brief moment, her peace soon being interrupted by a booming announcement from Chef.
"Maggots, you better be all ready, because the challenge is officially starting…now! Remember! Stay in the trench if you want to stay in the game! That's an order!" The co-host's voice cut out, the peace returning to Alexis in her little trench path.
"Well…I guess I can just keep walking around, for now. I'll probably bump into somebody at some point, but until-" Alexis was interrupted once again, this time by a pebble that was skipping across the ground, right towards her. She raised an eyebrow as it came to rest against her boot. "...Wonder where that came fr-" Suddenly, another diver leapt out from the darkness, stabbing their trident into the ground in front of Alexis. The accidental mastermind fell back onto the ground, quickly reaching to grab her bubble rifle, but as she did, the attacker thrust their trident right through it, cracking it in two. As she got a better look at the attacker, she came to realize who it was. "L-Luna!?"
While Alexis was under attack from Luna out of nowhere, Damien found himself running circles around the cave that he was stuck in. "G-get away from me, you sucky squeezy monster!" A large octopus swam up to him, knocking him to the ground as it struck him in the back of the helmet. He was quick to spin around, pointing his trident up from the ground, but the second he did, the creature swam away, making sure to keep out of striking distance. "Oh, sure! Swim away the second I have a fair chance to hit you back!"
The theater kid got up to his feet, holding his trident tightly as he backed away from the octopus, trident still aimed towards it. "Come down here and fight me like a man, you cephalopod!" The octopus took those words to one of its three hearts, soon reaching over with one of its tentacles and ripping the trident out of Damien's hands and snapping it into two pieces. The boy watched as the pieces sunk to the ground. "U-uh…I see. Well, I say we call this fight a draw and leave it at that, does that sound good?" The octopus narrowed its massive eyes at the boy.
Confessional
"You know, I think that Mr. Octopus isn't so bad. Surely I was in the wrong for coming into his home uninvited. Do you think you could let me go now?" Damien looked towards the octopus with pleading eyes, revealing that it was still squeezing him tightly with its tentacles. It narrowed its eyes at him again, soon slamming him against the door and breaking it down.
Confessional End
A small blaze somehow burned within one of the caves that was shown before. It was a miracle that it was actively burning underwater, but considering the person that was sitting next to it, it was better not to question it. Benjamin sighed as he dusted his hands off, looking ahead at a bunch of leeches that he had wrapped up together like a giant bouncy ball of sorts. "Friends, I don't know why you thought it was a good idea to bite me…haven't you heard of me? I'm The Fly! The Fly doesn't let anybody bite him!"
The ditzy boy stood from his seat, walking over to grab the ball of leeches and lift it up with one arm while toting around his trident with the other hand. "Well, guess I can bring you with me while I go look for more friends! Chef wants me to throw someone out of the trench, so you guys can help me with that!" Benjamin giddily jumped and clicked his boots together before heading on out of the cave, the fire soon dying out afterwards.
Meanwhile, someone was having a much more difficult time in her own cave…that being Amelia, who came running out of one of the side branching paths and back into the pit itself. "Dammit! I've been in here several times already! Okay…so…if that path didn't work…" The actress looked around at all the pathways that were available to her, the number seemingly endless, She smacked her hands against the sides of her helmet, panicking at this point. "This is impossible! There are so many of them, how will I ever make it out of here!?"
"Maybe I can help you out?" Amelia gasped as she heard the voice of a man coming from the cave. She turned to face the direction of the voice, seeing a man in a diving suit. He seemed to be hunched over greatly, and from the look at his face through the glass of his helmet, she could tell that he was old. Wrinkly skin, a beard as white as snow, and bushy eyebrows to match. She could barely see the deep blue pupils of his eyes from how lightly they were opened. "I'm a professional diver, so I've been around this area quite a bit…I can help get you out."
"Oh, I don't know about that. Putting my trust in some random old coot that I found in the middle of the ocean doesn't exactly seem like the most sane idea to me." Amelia kept her distance from the man, curious as to how he even got there in the first place.
"Of course…I see your concern. That's all well and fine, you can do as you please. It was a mere offer that I laid out for you…I won't force you to take my assistance." The old geezer leaned against the wall of the cave, his expression not changing a bit from plain and calm. Amelia had to think to herself for a moment before eventually deciding on what to do. It was weird, just seeing him down here out of nowhere, but she was lost…and the endless looping of the caves pathways was only making her more uncertain with every second.
"Fine, fine, I'll go with you. Just don't try to touch me or anything. I've learned a good deal of martial arts from ani-...from classes. Just martial arts classes." The old man leaned back up, chuckling a bit as the girl fumbled over her words.
"Alright, I can promise you that much. Come along, dear…we'll get you out of these dreary caverns." Amelia slowly walked over to the man, keeping a few feet between her and him while he turned to face one of the cave's paths. He started to walk down it, and she followed in suit.
Confessional
"Taking help from this random guy isn't my best moment, but I assessed the situation and it seemed like the best plan of action! I don't do things that I regret, so this was no exception!" Amelia had her arms crossed as she talked down to the camera in her snooty tone.
Confessional End
Nicolás and Jianne kept on running from their respective attackers, each of them practically out of breath at this point. "I can't keep going on like this…I'm gonna fall over and that's gonna be that!" The nerdy boy cried out to Jianne, who rolled her eyes back at him.
"Well, I can keep running for days! Months, even!" The egoist boasted her own achievements, and the paths that they were taking soon merged into one, with the fish army and the barracuda crashing into each other and chasing each other out of the trenches entirely. The two contestants stopped running for a moment to take a few deep breaths, exhausted from all the activity. They noticed that they were finally in the clear, each chuckling nervously before going dead silent. They stared right at each other, neither of them moving a muscle or making a sound.
Both divers jumped back from each other, aiming their bubble rifles at the other. "Hoho! Looks like the pencil-necked math wiz is pretty quick on the draw! You gonna shoot me, huh? Better hit me hard if you're gonna pull that trigger!"
"You and your…your…down talking everybody else! Always like you have such a big game, but I bet it's because you're hiding how you really feel about everyone! Maybe if I beat you here, it'll help you realize that you're insane!" Nicolás was talking with some spirit, but it was clear that he was nervous, considering he was shaking as he aimed the rifle at her. Jianne gritted her teeth, annoyed with his words. They both tugged on their triggers, intending to blast the other with bubbles, only for both rifles to click. They realized that, in the chase with the fish, they had used up all their ammunition. "...It seems my calculations were wrong…I thought I had one or two more shots left."
"Calculations, schmalculations! We can settle this, trident to trident!" Jianne tossed her rifle to the side, soon grabbing her trident from her back. Nicolás followed in suit, still gulping nervously with the realization that he was now going in close range against the most competitive person still in the game. They started to charge at each other, only for a bubble to whir between them before they got right near each other.
"Ah ah ah! I wouldn't move another muscle if I were you guys!" The two glanced in the direction that the bubble came from, seeing steam coming from the barrel of Zachary's bubble rifle. "Trust me…there's not gonna be any more warning shots after that one. Now, if I were you guys, I'd put the tridents down…you're clearly at a disadvantage here." Jianne and Nicolás just stood there, blankly staring back at Zach. "...Well? Ain't ya gonna drop 'em?"
"...I'm calling this guy's bluff! No way he's got more shots left in that thing!" Jianne started charging towards Zachary, only for the actor to fire another bubble at her, this one knocking her all the way back into one of the trench's walls. "Urk…looks like he wasn't bluffing…but surely there isn't anymore, now!" She got right back up, starting to run towards the boy again, only for him to fire another bubble at her. This one sent her right back into the trench wall, and she had a little more difficulty getting up. "Okay…but after those two…you're definitely out of ammo…" She started to stumble back towards the actor, with Nicolás nervously looking back at her.
"Jianne, for the love of god, don't keep doing this!" Jianne ignored the nerd's warning and kept pressing on ahead, only for Zachary to fire another shot, which knocked her flat on the ground. Nicolás sighed, hunching down dejectedly before hearing a clicking noise coming from Zach's rifle.
"Eh? Guess I'm finally out! Oh well…hey, Nick! Wanna watch me win the challenge?" The actor stepped out of his bunker, trident now in hand while he started walking towards Jianne. The nerd looked over at her, seeing that she was practically incapacitated on the ground. "Gonna be super easy, with her already down like that!"
"But she's…you already…she can't fight back like that…" Nicolás continued to watch while Zachary kept moving towards Jianne.
"Yeah, that's kind of the point. She can't move, so I don't have to waste as much effort knocking her out of the trenches." The actor smirked as he leaned down to pick her up off of the ground, only for a trident to swing against his side and knock him back a few feet. He narrowed his eyes, turning to face his attacker, which was none other than Nicolás…though his trident wasn't shaking in his hands anymore. "What's the big idea? You're not really gonna make me try, are you? I already use so much energy being awesome everyday…"
"...You're not gonna win by knocking her out of the trenches. If you're gonna win, it's gonna be me that you're throwing out." The nerd had an incredibly angry look on his face, though Zachary was just amused by it.
"I don't know why you care so much about her…you know she probably hates you, right?" Zachary laughed for a moment, but he stopped when he noticed that Nicolás was incredibly silent. "Meh, alright. Have it your way." The actor shrugged his shoulders for a brief second before swinging his trident and slamming it against Nicolás side, knocking him down almost immediately.
Confessional
"Soooooo annoying, I swear." Zachary shook his head at the camera before letting out a soft sigh. "I mean, why can't they let me just do what I want? It's only fair that an actor of my caliber gets what he deserves!"
Confessional End
Dusty gasped for air as she danced around the crazy amounts of geysers in her clearing, avoiding each blast of water as it came bursting through the ground. "For Pete's sake, where is the way out of this dang ol' mess!" The cowgirl frantically looked around, eventually picking apart a gap in one of the walls. "Aha! That's the ticket out of this mess!" She continued to zip past each eruption, doing her best to avoid certain doom. As she got closer to the gap, she discovered that there were a lot more geysers right before it. They were all bunched up, making it far too difficult to cross it without any issues.
"Come on, Dusty…ya made it this far, ya can make it even further!" With a deep breath, Dusty started gunning it for that gap in the wall. As she ran, geysers began erupting furiously, but she wouldn't let that stop her from making it to the other side. She kept on running, the final geyser ripping her weapons out of her hands, though she still made it through on the other side. She raised her fists in the air, taking a few deep breaths before shouting out excitedly. "Woohoo! I done made it to the other side! Take that, geysers!"
"Yeah, nice job there." Natt spoke to the girl, clapping his hands for her slowly. She looked in front of her to see him in the mud, down to his waist. "Don't mind me…I've been here for a while, actually."
"Huh? But what is-" Dusty looked down to see that she herself was sinking down in the mud as well. She tried her best to break free, but it was to no avail, as she was soon down to her waist, just like Natt. "Aw, consarnit!"
Confessional
"Stupid mud pit ruining the sweet victory I just nabbed from geyser valley over there!" Dusty furrowed her brow and crossed her arms. "How come ya didn't warn me about that?"
"Oh, I'm sorry…I was under the impression that we were in the middle of a challenge where we needed to beat each other." Natt rolled his eyes at the cowgirl, who bumped him in the side with her elbow.
Confessional End
Alexis was running away from Luna for dear life at this point, the model flailing her trident around like a ferocious warlord that was determined to slaughter their enemies. "L-Luna why are you going so crazy right now!? It's just a challenge, you don't have to kill me to win!"
"You took something from me!" Luna grabbed her bubble rifle from her hip, firing a bubble at a rock near Alexis and causing it to bust into many pieces, which the latter tripped over almost immediately. She clutched at her ankle, hissing in pain from the trip before Luna stepped on her chest with her boot, holding her down to the ground tightly. "You really do love to ruin things for other people, don't you? Is that your kink?"
"What are you talking about? I didn't- ack!" Alexis grunted as Luna stepped down harder. She tried her best to pry the boot off of her, but it was to no avail. Whatever was fueling Luna's rage was intense enough to give her this unfounded sense of strength. "L-Luna, please!"
"Oh, don't you 'Luna, please' me! You know damn well that getting rid of March was supposed to be my fun to have! Mine!" Luna dropped down to sit on top of Alexis, digging her finger into her chest intensely. "You figured that eliminating Gretchen was fun enough, why not continue the fun by eliminating March, too! That's what you thought, isn't it?"
"No I didn't! I didn't even eliminate March, she got herself eliminated because she didn't understand the challenge! How is that my fault?" Alexis kept trying to break free from Luna's grasp, but it just wasn't working in her favor. She was stuck good, and there was nothing around to help her.
"Keep telling yourself that, but I know that you're behind it. Word around the girls' room is that you've got it out for Amelia now…you can't possibly think I'll let you get away with that, right?" Luna leaned even closer to Alexis, pressing the glass of her own helmet against hers. "It would really piss me off if you went and eliminated the person that's my ticket to the finale." Alexis stopped squirming at that moment, going completely silent while Luna giggled innocently. "Please…you don't seriously think I didn't know about her 'using' me, right? 'B-but what about Liz?' What? You mean the free pass to the merge I was given? If I'm anything, I'm a crafty little bitch."
"I'll just tell Amelia, then…about all of this." Alexis glared back at Luna through the glass, though the model hardly seemed affected by this in the slightest.
"Oh, go right on ahead! I'm sure she'll believe you…you know, considering that you did just cause two eliminations through your little sabotages!" Luna got up from the ground, taking a few steps back from Alexis, who backed up against the wall of the trenches. "I could get rid of you now…but I think it'll be fun to watch you make a fool of yourself first. Until then, Alexis!" The model walked away from her enemy, cackling maniacally all the while.
Confessional
"She's…damn, she's good. I got no Flint, no March, no Gretchen…I have Jianne, but as far as people who are good at working with others, she's not there." Alexis stared down at her feet in thought for a moment. "The only thing I can do…is nothing. If I say anything, it'll be misconceived, I know that much."
Confessional End
"And it's just a turn here, and…" The old man was still walking with Amelia through the caverns, though they eventually came to the exit. "Here we are!" The actress stepped forward, exiting the cave to see that she was back near where she started. She let out a sigh of relief before turning to thank the man.
"Well, I suppose that I owe you-" As she looked around, she noticed that the man had effectively fled from the area. He was nowhere to be seen, and this just left her all alone. "...Geez, the one time I actually try to give anyone my thanks and they just up and skedaddle away. Hmph. Guess I know to keep that sort of thing to myself in the future." Amelia started heading back to the beginning of the trenches, annoyed as could be. On the ground, right at the exit of the cave, there was a business card…one that had the words "Father Time" on it.
Back where Zachary and the two others were, he was still beating up on Nicolás, who was on the ground, huddling up to cover as much of his soft spots as he could. "You're really not making this any fun, you know that? I wanna have funnnnnn!" Zach kept whapping the boy with his trident, though he wasn't budging at this point. "Finnnnnnne. I'll go back to beating up on Jianne, then. I don't wanna get you out anyways…you're too pathetic to waste an opportunity like this on. Gots to get an actual threat out while I can!"
The actor swung his trident at Jianne, though Nicolás dove on top of her so that it hit him instead. He groaned as the trident whacked him something fierce on his hip, feeling a ringing sensation through his bone. "Come on, man! You're totally the worst! I'm not gonna get you out now, I'm gonna get her out, and that's final! So, move it, buster!"
"N-no…" The nerdy boy was barely able to respond to Zachary, who only bonked him on the back of the head with the trident again.
"Fine. But if that's gonna be the case, I'm gonna keep bonking you until I don't feel like bonking anymore. Trust me, it takes a long time for me to lose interes- hey, look! A deep sea frog!" The actor immediately shifted his gaze to the small creature that was quite a ways away from the two on the ground. Nicolás winced in pain as he slid off of Jianne, noticing that she was starting to shuffle a bit, like she was coming back to.
"Eh…?" Jianne glanced over at the nerd as she finally woke up, seeing that he looked really tired. "Nicolás? Weren't we fighting? What the heck happened? Why do I feel like I've been out of it for a while?"
"...Well, Zachary…he…" Nicolás paused to think for a moment before continuing his sentence. "He was trying to beat me while I was down…and you jumped in the way. Knocked you out cold…"
"Eh!? That prick! I was supposed to beat you!" She tried to pull herself up off of the ground, but she still felt a bit too woozy to do it. "Urk…I'd teach him a lesson if I didn't feel like crap right now! That son of a bitch! Oh…I guess, are you okay at least? If I used the energy to protect you, you'd better be."
Nicolás paused for a moment, a small smile forming on his face despite the damage that was done to him. "Yeah…yeah, I'm fine."
"Well, that's good then. I still wanna beat you…but I guess we're gonna be stuck here for a bit." Jianne sighed as she lay back down in the dirt.
Confessional
Nicolás lifted his shirt up, revealing a series of bruises along his side from where Zachary was hitting him. "Man, my parents would be pretty upset if they saw me like this. I don't know, though…for some reason, I feel pretty good right now."
Confessional End
Vicente whistled to himself as he wandered through his trench path, having not seen any of the others for a good amount of time. After a little while, he heard a strange noise from behind him. He looked over his shoulder just before a ball of leeches struck him down to the ground, each leech untying and covering him like a thick blanket. Benjamin could be heard laughing boastfully further down the path, and he had his trident in hand while he walked towards the reality TV pro.
"Woop woop! I win, I win, I win!" Benjamin did a little strut to move towards Vicente, grinning like an innocent baby all the while. "First to beat somebody else wins a banquet! That means that I win!"
"Actually, my large friend…" Vicente reached up from his leechy blanket, grabbing Benjamin by the arm with both of his hands. "I believe it was first to get another player out of the trenches wins. So, in that case…" Using the force of rising up, and the immense water pressure, Vicente flung Benjamin over his shoulder, sending him soaring right out of the trenches and into the open sea. "...I win!"
Bonnie watched from overhead while Benjamin went flying out of the trenches, soon clapping her hands against the side of her face fearfully and turning her microphone on. "No! Benji the mega hottie has been flung out of the trenches by Vicente! T-that means…Vicente wins!"
"Oh…I think I did the math wrong on that." Benjamin started swimming back towards the submarine, the army of leeches following him as if he was their mother or something odd like that.
Confessional
"Heheh…Chef is letting me be the one to send Benjamin home tonight!" Bonnie snickered to herself, licking her lips maniacally. "Oh yeah, but the thing is…he won't go! He has that ticket, so he's getting off scot free! That means more time for me to…mmmm, yeah…"
"Hm…I get to use my little ticket to not get sent away again, but who to use it on? If only I could read this thing…" Benjamin had the note from Tony in his hands, his eyes soon going wide. "I…can't believe it! It was…gasp!"
Confessional End
The contestants met back at the fish bowl, where Benjamin was standing next to Bonnie at the podium. She was running her hands along his chest, drooling as she felt him up while he glared at the rest of the contestants. "R-right…Benjamin, hottie, you get to pick any one of the other contestants to get rid of…except for Vicente, since he won the challenge, fair and square. Which one of them did you want to send home?"
Benjamin grabbed the note from his pocket, holding it up to show the group, immediately causing Amelia to gasp in fear. "Tony asked me to do him a favor and do my best to eliminate the person that got him eliminated, and now, I can do just that! I'm shocked to finally understand who it was, considering all we've been through…that's right! I'm eliminating the person on this note! And that person is…"
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"...Damien!" Benjamin uttered the name, with almost everybody gasping out of complete shock right away. Even Bonnie was startled to hear that Benjamin was choosing to eliminate his best friend instead of the name that was actually on the note. "That's right! I may not be able to read some letters, but I know enough to find out tha and I all in the same place could only be one person! Damien!"
"B-Benjamin!? That's not my name on that note, that's Amelia's!" Damien rushed over to the boy trying to show him how it wasn't his name, though Amelia was snickering all the while. "S-see? It says Amelia, not Damien!"
"Yeah, nice try Damien…there isn't a single Q on this note, so it can't possibly be her. To think, I thought you were a cool guy! Turns out you're just like the others, trying to get rid of people for your own gain! Buh bye!" Benjamin shoved the theater kid back, knocking him into the Water Slide of Shame. He screamed all the way down to the Submarine of Losers, with Jianne soon rushing over to look down the slide with her jaw dropped. "Well, that was sad to do, but it had to be done."
Bonnie backed a few steps a way from Benjamin, a funny look on her face. She wasn't sure what she was feeling at the moment, but whatever it was, it made one thing very clear to her…she wanted to be as far away from Benjamin as possible. "...Elimination ceremony is over. Everybody go back to your rooms." She pointed to the exit of the fish bowl, that look still on her face. One by one, the contestants left the fish bowl, eventually leaving Bonnie as the only person in there. She looked down the water slide, staring blankly at it for a moment. "...I'm sorry, Damien…"
Author's Notes:
*And we lost our innocent lover boy, oh no! It really is a shame that Benjamin is as goofy as he is, cause Damien has been eliminated by his mistakes twice now. We'll have to see if the theater kid is harboring any hard feelings for his friend when we pull around to the next aftermath, which is only two episodes away! Better start thinking up some questions for our losers, because there are a whole lot of them that are gonna be there!
*Placements: 22nd - Crustacean; 21st - Thomas; 20th - Archie; 19th - Anne; 18th - Alex; 17th - Taylor; 16th/15th - Liz/Tony; 14th - Flint; 13th - Gretchen; 12th - March; 11th - Damien