Total Drama Stormbound Chapter 2: Ice to Meet You, a total drama series fanfic

We're back for the first official challenge of Total Drama Stormbound! Thank you so much to all have favorited, followed, and reviewed, I appreciate your support so far! And as a side note, I did go back and tweak a few small things from the previous chapter, including some stereotype changes, but nothing was critical to the actual plot of the episode. Also I have a season logo now!

I also want to give a big shoutout to IAmChefProject for beta reading this chapter! I'm very proud of how it turned out so I hope you enjoy it too.

"Previously on Stormbound!" Nimbus' voice sounded over a shot of a bird's-eye view of the island. "We met our thirteen campers on the boat ride to Camp Ventallan, and we gave them some sweet merch!" The scene switched to a clip of Iggy showing off his golden flame umbrella to Martin. "But there may have been some hidden surprises." As he spoke, clips of Maggie being chased by a swarm of bees and Lio getting electrocuted played. "But the biggest surprise of all was the storm! The waves were crazy, dude." The next clip showed Nimbus, Javi, and the contestants (minus Naila) being washed ashore on the dinghies. "But we made it to camp… mostly in one piece." Another clip played, showing Naila flying off of the sinking ship with her fireworks and wrecking Javi's trailer. "There was some property damage involved, leaving Naila not only disqualified from the competition, but in some serious debt to us, so she's working it off as an intern. But something tells me she and Javi have more than a little bit of patching up to do!" A final clip showed Javi handing Naila a roll of duct tape. "Twelve campers remain, and they are about to face their first challenge in their new teams." The logos of the Deluge Dragons and the Gale Gryphons flashed onscreen. "I'm Nimbus Cloudbreak, and this is… Total! Drama! Stormbound!" An animated flash of lightning covered the team logos, transitioning into the theme song.

Theme Song: "Stormbound" by Nimbus Cloudbreak

"No. Freaking. Way." Celia touched her hand to the window in wonder. She was in the girls' cabin, gaping at the sight in front of her that was being illuminated by the rising sun.

Selene sat up on her top bunk and bumped her head on the ceiling, but she barely flinched. "What are you- wow!" she exclaimed, louder than intended, as she jumped down from the bed and came up behind Celia.

Her voice woke up Kit, who made a noise of distress and thrashed around in their bed. They managed to tangle themself up completely in their sheets, but they wriggled free just as quickly and rolled out of bed to see what the others were looking at. When they looked out the window, their jaw fell open and their eyes widened. "How did that even happen?" they murmured, in awe of the scene in front of them.

From the window, they could see the campfire pit, the stage, the mess hall, the field and the picnic tables… the entire campground was covered in a layer of snow.

As the girls (and Kit) watched the snow from inside, the door to the boys' cabin was suddenly thrown open. "It's showtime!" Ollie cheered and ran through the snow. He jumped in the air and tried to do a cartwheel, but his hands sank into the snow and he fell on his back, still laughing.

Confessional: Ollie

He had some snow in his hair but he was grinning like a maniac. "I've traveled all over the world with my friends at the Cirque D'émerveillement!" he explained. "Oh, that's my circus troupe, I perform on the trapeze!" he added as an afterthought, saying this as if it was a completely normal thing to do. "So I see snow all the time," he continued. "But this is different! This is Camp Ventallan and there are new activities and new friends, so it's, like, brand new snow!" His eyes sparkled with a childlike wonder as he clasped his hands together.

As Ollie continued to frolic and do some stunts in the snow, he suddenly ran straight into Martin, who was carefully picking his way through the snow. The fencer stumbled but was able to gracefully catch himself. "Watch where you're going," he snapped, and turned to walk away.

"Wait!" Ollie ran after him. "You're Martin, right?" He gave him a friendly smile.

"I'm sure you understand that you're on the other team. I promise it's nothing personal, but my teammates rely on me and I expect the same of them."

"It's just a game, and we're not in a challenge right now," Ollie protested, frowning slightly.

Just then, the door to the Dragons cabin opened again, and out came Iggy in his snow gear. "Ollie! We're having a team meeting!" Iggy shouted, as Lio came out behind him.

"I will leave you here, Oliver. It seems wise for me to coordinate with my teammates as well."

Ollie watched Martin leave as his teammates came out to greet him.

"Ollie!" Iggy called out again.

"Alright, alright, I'm coming! The show can't start without me!" Ollie ran over to Iggy, but his smile seemed a little bit more strained than before.

"What's all this noise about?" Maggie whined as she opened the door to the girls' cabin and glared in the direction of the boys. She was about to complain to Ollie when she noticed Drake, who was sitting on the cabin porch with a sketchbook in his lap, and she went right up to him. "Drake? What are you doing out here?" She noticed that Drake had a blanket wrapped around himself and there was snow starting to pile around his feet. "Wait, have you been here all night?"

Drake nodded. "Couldn't sleep," he murmured and grimaced. "I was thinking of all the things that could hide in the snow. I can have nightmares about the monsters under the bed any day. This seemed more interesting." He gave a dismissive shrug when he saw how concerned Maggie looked. "It's nice and peaceful out here, yeah," he added and tried for a small smile.

"Whatcha drawing?" Maggie looked over Drake's shoulder, and before he could close the sketchbook, she saw a highly detailed sketch of a gruesome creature: a rotting, undead, wooly mammoth. She stumbled backwards and screamed. "Ew, ew, gross! Why would you ever draw something like that?"

Drake shrugged. "It just came into my mind, I guess." He saw Maggie start to back away slowly, and he turned to the camera in confusion.

Meanwhile, Tanja and Paradise were already investigating the snowfall. Or rather, Tanja was shoveling a path through the snow to the mess hall, as Paradise just watched her from the porch.

Confessional: Tanja

She shook her head disbelievingly. "Climate change isn't real, they say."

"Somebody could slip and get seriously hurt," Tanja grumbled. "Are we really going to have a challenge in this weather?"

"I hope not, it's freezing out here!" Paradise responded. She let Tanja walk in front of her, before following in the path she had made, earning her an exasperated expression from the activist and a roll of her eyes.

Confessional: Paradise

"Yeah, I'm nervous. This is going to be, like, a lot harder than I thought it would be. Do we really have to?"

After the excitement of the newly fallen snow had faded, all of the campers had congregated at the mess hall. "Good morning everyone!" Sophie chirped. There was a warm smile on her face, though she looked a little bit frazzled and there were bags under her eyes. She was ladling some sort of porridge into bowls. It was a simple and humble dish, likely limited by ingredients because of the cargo ship sinking, but it looked appetizing enough.

Earl poked at his bowl of porridge when he got it and watched it jiggle. "Wow! What a unique viscous quality!" he exclaimed.

Sophie blinked in confusion. "Thanks, dearie… I think?" She then handed a bowl to Paradise.

"This is it?" Paradise asked, looking at her bowl dubiously.

Sophie lightly rapped her hand with the handle of her spoon. "Honey, we're all working with what we have here," she said sternly.

Paradise was fuming, but before she could say anything, Tanja grabbed her arm and dragged her away. "We are very grateful, Mrs. Cole. We will be enjoying our breakfast now."

"Let go of me, you brute!" Paradise snapped at Tanja.

"You can insult me all you want, but do not disrespect the people that serve you," Tanja snapped.

Meanwhile, the Dragons had all huddled around one table. "Alright." Iggy pounded his fist into his palm. "The only way to stay in this game for sure is to keep winning, and I think I have a plan."

"Who says you get to be leader?" Celia retorted, leaning back in her chair and putting her feet up on the table.

"I do. It was my first action as leader," Iggy said smugly, and Celia facepalmed.

"Maybe we don't need a leader at all?" Ollie suggested. "Can't we just all work together?"

"That sounds like an easy way to get our asses kicked," Iggy scoffed.

"I don't know, blindly following someone just cuz they were the first to ask seems like just as bad of a decision," Celia snapped.

"You guys, stop!" Selene suddenly shouted and slammed her fist on the table. The entire mess hall went silent, while Kit was startled and face-planted into their bowl of porridge.

Selene then realized that everyone (save for Kit) was looking at her, and she blushed and laughed nervously. "S-sorry," she mumbled.

"No, my sister is right," Lio said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "I think fighting is the last thing we should be doing right now, we wouldn't want there to be any hard feelings during the first challenge, would we?"

Confessional: Lio

"I'm clearly the most capable leader here, and I just can't stand it when people argue. I can already tell that this team is going to be… difficult to control, but I've dealt with worse before," he said confidently.

Confessional: Ollie

"Is it just me, or are people taking things way too seriously? I know, I'm a performer and this is a show, but I'm happy just to be here! On TV! Meeting new people! It's all for fun, right?" He dramatically threw his arms out wide… and hit his hand on the confessional wall. He cringed and cradled his hand before he just laughed and continued. "Of course, my troupe could use the prize money, you wouldn't believe how many unicycles we go through."

Confessional: Kit

Their face was covered in porridge, so only their eyes were visible. They cocked their head and blinked at the camera.

The Gryphons were also sitting together, and despite being calmer people overall, they were less organized than the Dragons. Earl was frantically scribbling notes on his clipboard. Next to him, he had a cup of tea… or rather, a beaker of tea. An Erlenmeyer flask, to be specific. Wonder where that name came from.

"What are you doing?" Maggie looked over Earl's shoulder.

"I can't believe this weather!" Earl responded, looking frazzled as he continued to take notes. "There are so many tests that I need to run!"

Confessional: Earl

"Of course winning the competition would help my family—both of my families—but if I am able to publish my findings on these strange weather patterns, I'll blow up more than alkali metals in water! I just need to stay in the game long enough to collect my data."

As the campers continued to eat their breakfast, all of a sudden, Naila appeared out of nowhere, jumped onto an empty table, and sounded an air horn. Selene whipped around and yelled in shock, and Celia had to duck to avoid taking her elbow to the face, while Kit fell into their porridge again.

"Ay, mija, give that back!" Javi hollered, hopping onto the table after her and running after her, only for Naila to blast the air horn in his face and run off. Javi chased Naila into the kitchen, and the sounds of clattering pots and pans could be heard in the background.

At about that time, Nimbus opened the door of the mess hall and casually strode in, whistling the Stormbound theme to himself. He simply gave a shrug, before running a hand through his hair and stepping forward to address the campers. All of them were looking, albeit confused, at him. Naila and Javi had at least served to get their attention. "Welcome to your first full day of camp! I hope you're excited for the activities that we have planned for you today."

"Hey, are you gonna talk about the snow or what?" Celia called out before Nimbus could continue.

"Ah, of course, I knew I was forgetting something!" Nimbus snapped his fingers. "And honestly, we're as surprised as you are! We've heard reports of unusual weather in this area, but this is way cooler than we were expecting, hah! I think it will make today's challenge even crazier!"

Earl rubbed his chin. "A coincidence, how intriguing." He nudged Martin. "That doesn't sound quite right."

The fencer shook his head. "I don't buy it at all," he whispered back.

"We're starting things off with… some fun get-to-know-you activities!" Nimbus revealed. "Some icebreakers, if you will."

A couple of campers snickered at this, including Celia, Kit, and surprisingly, Martin, but most of them just groaned.

"Aw, don't be like that! Javi and I have made sure that today's challenge will be totally extreme!" As Nimbus spoke, a loud crash came from the kitchen, followed by Naila's cackle and a groan of pain from Javi. "You guys might not even come out alive." He smirked.

Maggie gasped. "That's not funny!"

"Hmph, bring it on." Iggy cracked his knuckles.

"You guys are going to be competing in three different icebreaker games out in the snow today," Nimbus explained. "Best two out of three wins!"

"Are you going to tell us all of the challenges now?" Martin asked as he adjusted his glasses.

"Nope!" Nimbus declared cheerfully. "Surprises are more fun!" He flashed a grin at the camera.

Confessional: Martin

"It is far from ideal to have a deficiency of time to devise the optimal strategy. But if there's anything I have learned from my studies of fencing, it has been that thinking on my feet can be just as critical of a skill. Literally, ha."

Nimbus headed for the door and the campers started to follow him, but they were interrupted by Sophie's stern voice coming from the back of the mess hall. "Out of the kitchen, both of you!" she scolded, before Javi and Naila were both forcibly thrown out the kitchen door and into the main mess hall. They flew all the way over the counter and went the length of several tables before landing in a heap by Nimbus' feet. They both groaned in pain as the rock star stared at the camera with a deadpan expression.

The camera cut to Nimbus, Javi, and all of the contestants gathered near a hill a little ways from the cabins, having made the trek out of camp in the snow. "Your first challenge is called Trust Toboggan," Nimbus explained, standing in front of the hill. "One member of each team is going to sled down this hill and off the ramp." He pointed at a pair of ski jump ramps installed at the base of the hill. "And the rest of your team will be using these mattresses to catch them!" He gestured to a pair of old mattresses lying in the snow.

A couple of contestants looked worried, but Celia grinned confidently. "I've seen worse. Is that all you've got?" she asked.

Nimbus then smirked and held up two blindfolds, which caused Celia to gulp. "You don't need to see if you trust your teammates to catch you. Now, Dragons, Gryphons, pick someone to sled."

"Well, a lighter person would have less momentum and be easier to catch," Martin mused as he glanced around at the other Gryphons.

"Maggie?" Tanja asked.

Maggie shook her head quickly. "Oh, no, I can't. I'll get motion sick."

Confessional: Maggie

"The only time I went on a roller coaster was when I was third wheeling this couple. He was totally cheating, and I needed some good evidence, but I ended up barfing all over both of them during the ride." She shuddered. "I didn't even know it was possible to be allergic to your own vomit. Never again."

Tanja quirked an eyebrow at this. "We're all going to be doing things we don't want to do here, but I… trust that you know your own limits?" she said, not looking all too enthusiastic about it.

"That's quite alright," Earl cut in. "If nobody else would like to be the test subject, I would not mind an opportunity to collect some samples of the snow at higher altitudes on the island."

"Hey, what about him?" Paradise, who had been silently watching the others the whole time, finally spoke up and pointed at Drake. He was sleeping on the ground and had started to sink into the snow. "I bet he won't care."

"Huh, me?" Drake suddenly sat up and his eyes traveled up the steep, perilous looking slide down the hill. "Oh, yeah, sure, I've seen scarier. Way scarier."

Tanja had looked frustrated, but when Drake spoke up, she smiled at him. "Then you should go for it. Team Gale Gryphons?"

"Yes, go Gryphons!" Earl and Maggie cheered.

Martin nodded. "Now, I have an idea for the optimal formation for carrying the mattress…"

Meanwhile, the Dragons seemed to be putting less thought into their strategy for the challenge. "I wanna sled! Can I sled?" Ollie jumped up and down.

"Yeah, sure, you can do it." Celia shrugged nonchalantly.

Ollie looked confused for a moment, before he grinned again. "This is our opening act, and I'll be sure to put on a memorable show!" He clapped his hands together.

Confessional: Celia

"Yeah, I know I got pumped up earlier, and I've gotta admit that jump looks sick. But do I trust these guys to catch me, while I can't even see them? Ha, as if!"

"Alright, Dragons, we've gotta catch this guy. Let's talk strategy!" Iggy called out.

Celia rolled her eyes. "What's your brilliant plan?" she asked him.

"Win." Iggy smirked. "In any way we can."

"Seriously?"

"It's gotten me this far."

Lio got in between them, putting a hand on each of their shoulders. "Let's not get distracted. We're going to all need to work together, and I believe that each one of us has something they can contribute." His eyes fell on Kit, who was a little ways from the team huddle, fidgeting with some metal bits. "Do you have any ideas, Kit?"

"Uhhh, give me one second!" Kit dumped a ton of stuff out of their pockets, including the remains of their umbrella and a wide assortment of tools, including a hand saw and an entire cordless drill, creating a comically large pile on the ground.

Lio's eyes widened when he saw the pile. "Oh my, aren't you prepared?"

Confessional: Kit

"Hehe, maybe I go overboard when collecting tools." They were turning around a small screwdriver in their hands. "I do most of my work with my hands anyways."

Kit giggled and held up a pair of pliers. "Well, you see, this here doohickey is for-"

"That's very interesting," Lio interrupted, realizing that Kit had a huge pile of other tools to talk about. "I'm sure your tools will be valuable in upcoming challenges."

"You really think so?" Kit squealed and grinned widely, and Lio smiled back at them.

"Sure, but maybe not now. It's good thinking of you to get rid of the extra weight."

"Lio!" Selene called out. She was easily carrying the mattress above her head with the rest of her team gawking at her. "What's the plan?"

Lio's eyes widened. "Selene, put that down!"

"Okay!" Selene chirped, nodding vigorously, and set the mattress down… right on top of Iggy.

Lio just gasped in horror. "Selene!"

"Oh my gosh I killed him!" Selene yelled and hid her face in her hands.

Just then, Iggy's hand poked out from the side of the mattress… and formed a middle finger. He crawled out from under the mattress and made a big show of brushing the snow off of his jacket and flipping his ponytail. "How about you stay out of this one." He glared at Selene and Lio.

"Stop, it was an accident!" Selene protested.

As the Dragons continued to yell at each other, Ollie quickly slipped away and went to stand near Nimbus. Paradise saw this and shoved Drake in the direction of the host to join him.

"Alright, so Drake will be sledding for the Gryphons, and Ollie for the Dragons!" Nimbus declared.

Suddenly, the revving of an engine sounded and Javi drove over to the group riding a snowmobile.

"Why do you have a snowmobile if you weren't anticipating this sort of weather?" Martin asked.

Javi's eyes darted around. "Uhhh… get over here kids, we've gotta go!" he hollered.

Ollie whooped and Drake yawned as they got onto the back of Javi's snowmobile.

Martin narrowed his eyes and exchanged suspicious glances with Earl as he saw them leave.

"The rest of you, get ready with your mattresses!" Nimbus said.

"Let's get going!" Iggy ran over to one of the mattresses and the other remaining Dragons helped him lift it, minus Selene who was reluctantly just running beside them. Meanwhile, the Gryphons were taking their time as Martin directed them into formation. He and Tanja were bearing most of the weight, with Martin in front guiding the mattress and Tanja lifting it from behind.

"Ugh, this mattress is gross!" Maggie whined. "There better not be any bed bugs on it."

"You're allergic to them?" Martin guessed dryly.

"No, they just freak me out!" she shot back. She and Earl were doing their best to help out, but meanwhile, Paradise was standing off to the side, examining her manicured nails as if she was bored.

"What the hell are you doing?" Tanja yelled at Paradise.

"Well, you guys are pretty strong," Paradise responded smoothly. "I know I would just get in the way."

"There's no worries, do what you think is best," Earl piped up, but he was quickly stopped when Tanja glared at him. "... my apologies."

Confessional: Paradise

"Why would I ever do work when somebody else could do it for me? I'll let the gross sweaty people do the dumb work, but I'm not worried. I'll, like, make sure they know I'm useful."

Confessional: Tanja

"Urgh, we are a team. It's only fair if everyone makes the effort to do their part," she said, frustrated.

Meanwhile, the Dragons were a lot less strategic and organized, but they more than made it up with sheer enthusiasm, even with their most energetic teammate gone.

"Go! Go! Go! We can do it, Dragons!" Lio chanted.

"Lio, you're too tall, you can't be in the middle!" Selene shouted at him, but she had to nudge him to get his attention.

Iggy led the way, carrying the front of the mattress, doing his best to sprint through the snow and practically dragging his teammates behind him. Lio was guiding the mattress from the back.

"Slow down, we're going to drop the mattress!" Celia hollered at Iggy as she ran alongside him.

"Not now, we'll lose our lead!" he shot back, stubbornly continuing to try and run through the snow. But they were interrupted by Ollie whooping as he sledded down the hill, neck and neck with Drake, who was silent.

"Haha, I'm flying! This is way better than the trapeze!" Ollie had a wild grin on his face as he went off the jump and flew into the air.

"Ollie, don't!" Lio called out, but it was too late. Ollie spread his arms wide and posed in the air, letting go of the sled in the process.

"There he is!" Paradise pointed as she saw Drake going off the ramp. He was hugging his knees to his chest in a fetal position, but the expression on his face was completely blank as he fell.

Confessional: Drake

"This can't be worse than the time my brother pushed me down the stairs and told me there were zombies coming," he recounted. "Turns out he wanted me out of our room so he could spend time with his girlfriend. But zombies don't scare me anymore, yeah. Nothing really does."

The two teams ran with the mattresses to catch their falling teammates.

"Move!" Tanja yelled, as she and Martin tried to maneuver the mattress towards Drake, and the rest of the Gryphons struggled to keep up.

But in the end, Ollie landed on his feet on the Dragons' mattress and struck a pose, still blindfolded. A trumpet trill inexplicably started playing out of nowhere. "Ta-da!" He bowed deeply, before losing his balance and falling backwards onto the mattress. He sat back up and laughed.

Meanwhile, Drake fell, still in a fetal position on the toboggan, and landed in a snowbank just ten feet away from the Gryphons, creating a deep hole and fully sinking into the snow.

Tanja instantly dropped the mattress, causing Martin and the others to stagger, and rushed to dig Drake out of the snow.

"And the winners of the first icebreaker are… the Deluge Dragons!" Nimbus declared.

"Too easy. Has the ice broken yet?" Iggy snarked.

"You guys were great, we're going to be such a great team!" Ollie clapped his hands together.

"Now that you guys have learned to work together and trust each other in a life threatening challenge…" Nimbus started.

"This could have gone very poorly for him," Tanja interrupted, glaring at the rock star. She was still carrying Drake.

Drake suddenly cracked one eye open. "Anything is life-threatening if you think about it the right way, yeah?"

Maggie raised an eyebrow, but she looked more curious than remorseful. "Are you okay?"

"Now, both teams, come to the frozen lake for your next game."

Javi drove up to Nimbus on his snowmobile. "Need a ride?"

Nimbus grinned. "Let's rock!"

"Hey!" Tanja called out as they drove away. "You can't just leave us like that, it's highly irresponsible!"

The two of them didn't even look back.

"After them, we can't lose sight of them!" Iggy started to run after the two hosts.

"Or we can just follow the snowmobile tracks," Paradise pointed out.

Iggy skidded to a stop and looked down at his feet, to see the very clear trail that the treads of the snowmobile had left. "…that too."

The campers followed Nimbus and Javi further inland through the woods, and soon, they made it to a small lake that was partially frozen over on the edges.

"Oi, took you long enough." Javi smirked, leaning against the snowmobile, and Iggy just scoffed at him.

"Welcome, campers, to Lake…" Nimbus stopped and looked at Javi. "Does the lake have a name?"

The mechanic shrugged. "Why would it? This island isn't even on any maps."

"Lake Naila!" Naila suddenly jumped out of a nearby snowdrift, startling both Nimbus and Javi.

Nimbus and Javi exchanged glances, before Nimbus nodded. "Sure. Welcome to Lake Naila."

Confessional: Naila

"Today the lake, tomorrow the island ahahaha!" She threw a handful of confetti in the air.

Confessional: Javi

He was using a broom and dustpan to sweep up the confetti. "Ay, mija, not again!"

"Now, for this next challenge, you're going to be getting cozy with each other while balancing on these ice floes!" Just as Nimbus was speaking, Javi kicked the ice, causing two floating chunks of ice to break off from the frozen edge. "You win when the other team falls in."

The ice floes looked like they would be just barely large and buoyant enough to hold six teenagers.

"Ooh, so do we get to push them off?" Celia asked, cracking her knuckles.

"That would be really funny, but I'm afraid not," Javi responded.

"What do you mean, what we're doing is even better!" Nimbus interrupted, giving Javi an annoyed look before he turned back towards the campers. "We will be doing a classic get-to-know-you activity, two truths and a lie!" he explained. "You will be given three facts about your teammates, which we have done you the favor of gathering, and you will have to guess which one of them is a lie. Without any help from the person who the facts are about, so I hope you've gotten friendly with each other!"

"And don't try any signaling or funny business," Javi added. "You can't answer your own questions, but something tells me you won't want to…"

Maggie giggled. "Ohhh, this is going to be so exciting." She rubbed her hands together, and Paradise looked at her with concern.

"And here's the best part!" Javi put in. "Every time you guess incorrectly, you will get a crack in your ice floe! Oh, Naila!"

Naila was now holding a giant sledgehammer that was as tall as she was. She hopped into a rowboat at the dock and started (very inefficiently) paddling around using her sledgehammer like an oar. "Ahahaha let's see who falls in first!" She cackled as she waved around the hammer.

"Dude, where can I get one of those?" Celia grinned.

"This one's mine, you can't have it!" Naila hugged the hammer to her chest and blew a raspberry at Celia.

"I wonder what could be lurking in the water?" Drake mumbled as he squinted at the murky water. "We could be swallowed up at any moment, so does it matter if we win or lose?"

"Dude, are you okay?" Nimbus asked him, but he didn't wait for a response. "... eh, I don't care enough to stop the show. Alright teams, out onto the ice! And don't fall in, or you will have to sit out for the rest of the challenge. And I don't think you want to have Naila fish you out…"

Martin was the first one onto the ice for the Gryphons. He moved carefully and kept his footing, taking a strong stance in the middle of the floe… until Maggie skidded into him. He windmilled his arms and barely managed to keep them both from falling in. The scuffle caused the entire floe to rock.

"Be careful, we don't have much surface area to work with and ice has a very low coefficient of friction!" Earl called out.

Meanwhile, on the Dragons, Iggy was about to jump right onto the ice, but Lio held him back. "We have to be careful. We don't want to break the ice before the challenge even starts." He carefully stepped onto the floe, holding his arms out to keep his balance, before extending a hand to Iggy.

Confessional: Iggy

"What I wouldn't give for longer legs," he grumbled.

Iggy looked at Lio's hand for a moment, before he huffed and jumped onto the floe on his own, causing Lio to frown.

Lio looked exasperated. "We're a team. We need to communicate and help each other out!"

"I think that's just code for 'we need to do everything you say.'" Celia rolled her eyes and hopped onto the ice floe after Iggy.

Ollie jumped onto the ice next, and the floe barely rocked as he landed lightly and kept his balance easily. "Woohoo! … huh, what were you saying?"

Lio facepalmed.

Eventually, both the Dragons and the Gryphons were able to get their entire team balanced without anyone falling in or breaking the ice. Drake was asleep leaning against Tanja, and Celia looked pretty annoyed being squished between Selene and Iggy.

"Let the icebreaking begin!" Naila cackled and sounded her air horn.

"Alright, first up on the Gale Gryphons, Paradise!" Nimbus pointed at the heiress. She just glared at him. "As you may have gathered, your friend here is really freakin' stacked. Which of these does her family not have: a rose garden, an Olympic pool, and a personal gourmet chef. Man, I want to be friends with her parents," the rock star joked.

Paradise's eyes widened and she suddenly gasped. "No, you don't!" She shook her head vigorously. "I mean… that would be, like, really creepy, shame on you for even thinking something like that," she said haughtily.

"Yeah, like, how could you!" Maggie added, egging both of them on.

"Okay, alright, fair enough." Nimbus put his hands up, seeming a little bit confused.

"I recall that your umbrella had flowers on it?" Earl offered. "So having a garden seems probable."

"That is correct!" Nimbus declared. "Naila, the Dragons could use an icebreaker."

"Ahahaha prepare to meet the inevitable watery depths of dooooom!" Naila was enjoying herself entirely too much. She swung her sledgehammer at the base of the Dragons' floe, causing an audible crack to be heard as they all screamed and were jostled around.

"Ow! Who just elbowed my face!" Celia yelled.

"Ha, it's not Selene's fault you're all the way down there," Iggy jeered as the follower mumbled a strained apology.

"Shut the fuck up, don't pretend you're tall either!" Celia shot back.

But while the team was still recovering, Nimbus pointed at the Dragons' ice floe."You guys are still next up!"

Selene was biting her nails and shaking with nerves. "Selene, stay calm, you're going to break something!" Lio scolded her.

"I am calm!" she shouted, causing Kit to jump slightly in surprise.

"Your teammate Ollie has a number of unique talents," Nimbus said, pointing at him. "And they include juggling, contortion, and riding a unicycle."

"Dude, what are you, a clown?" Iggy raised an eyebrow at him.

"Well, not exactly, but I was taught by the best clowns! And Uncle Rufus the strongman… and Auntie Elena the lion tamer… and all my other friends. They basically raised me!"

"What about your-" Iggy started to ask.

At this, Ollie's smile left his face, probably for the first time that day, but he quickly perked up again. "Oh, but it doesn't matter, all I care about is that now I'm with the circus doing what I love!"

"I'm not hearing an answer from you, Dragons!" Nimbus called out.

Kit looked at Ollie and cocked their head, but he only shrugged and gave them a look that said 'I got nothing.'

Nimbus looked unamused. "This is getting boring. Naila, if you would?"

"Wait, no nonono don't!" Kit yelped, realizing their team wasn't going to make a decision any time soon. "Is it the second one?"

"Huh… oh, yes, actually," Nimbus responded.

"Aw man." Naila pouted and lowered her hammer, then started to turn her rowboat around.

"Hehe, yeah, I'm pretty flexible but I panicked the last time I tried to fit into that tiny box," Ollie explained.

Naila swung her hammer at the Gryphons' floe, chipping off a small piece. Drake's foot slipped, but Tanja grabbed him by the back of his jacket before he could fall.

"Ooh, I think I'm getting seasick," Maggie groaned.

"Don't you dare throw up on me!" Paradise snapped.

"Oh, don't worry, I wouldn't dream of missing any of this." Maggie shook her head and giggled to herself.

"Whoa, that was a good hit!" Nimbus cheered, and Naila dramatically bowed in the background. "Your turn, Gryphons! Two truths and a lie, about Drake. He's the youngest of four siblings, he's memorized the entire script of the Sasquatchanakwa Blood Moon franchise, and he's never left his hometown before this."

"Huh?" Drake blinked sleepily.

"You talked about your siblings." Maggie snapped her fingers.

"And he does seem to know a lot of facts, so I think it might be the third one" Paradise mused. Tanja looked at her in surprise.

"What? It's a simple observation," the heiress protested.

Confessional: Paradise

"I get bored easily, there's not much to do around home, so I'm always trying to watch people and see what they're like. They're not worth actually talking to, of course, but it is pretty interesting."

Tanja turned away from Paradise with a grumble. "The second one it is."

Martin nodded. "The second is far too specific, it doesn't fit with the others."

Nimbus shook his head. "Actually, it was the third one."

"Hah, you think we actually care about consistency and organization, that's cute," Javi jeered. He was sitting reclining on the snowmobile seat and watching the challenge.

Confessional: Drake

"The sasquatch, of course, lurks in waiting anyways, because sasquatches don't care about what humans think is impossible… Blood. Guts. Blood. Guts. Ooh, guts and blood, let's shake it up a little," he recited in a monotone. "I have a photographic memory," he explained. "But honestly? I kind of wish I didn't."

"I mean, the third one isn't, like, that crazy," Paradise said with a shrug. "I've traveled maybe twice before coming here."

"Not all of us are happy to stay where we are." Tanja responded, before shooting a concerned glance at Drake.

"Not all of us have a choice!" Paradise shot back, clenching her fists. "But you would never understand!"

"Prepare yourselves," Martin interrupted as Naila paddled over to the Gryphons' floe.

"The end is near ahahaha!" The prankster cackled and swung her sledgehammer at the ice floe, causing it to rock.

Meanwhile, the Dragons' bickering had faded into a tense silence, with Iggy and Celia doing their best to cross their arms and look away from each other, which was pretty hard given how the team was packed together on their small ice floe.

"Dragons, two truths and a lie! In the months before coming to camp, Iggy-"

As soon as he heard Nimbus, Iggy's head snapped towards the rock star, his ponytail hitting Kit in the face.

"He broke up with his girlfriend, got into a fight with his parents, and tripped during an important race. Ouch."

Iggy glared at Nimbus, and he seemed about to speak up to defend himself when Lio put a hand on his shoulder. This caused Iggy to turn the same nasty glare onto Lio… hitting Kit with his ponytail again in the process.

"Seems kind of mean whatever we guess," Ollie mused.

"Does it matter at this point?" Kit remarked.

"I think it's the first one," Celia spoke up. "Iggy? Have a girlfriend? Please."

"I mean…" Ollie started sheepishly as he looked over at the track star.

"That's fair, people can be pretty superficial." Lio nodded.

"Yeah, I know I look good… hey!" Iggy protested, before he quickly glanced at Nimbus and shut his mouth.

"Could he have lost a race?" Ollie wondered, probably because it seemed like the least offensive of the three, but Iggy was still fuming.

"Or, is he more likely to disappoint his family or his partner?" Lio mused.

"I'll let you know I have a great relationship with my family!" Iggy yelled finally, not caring about the rules.

Nimbus shook his head. "You're not allowed to answer. Point to the Gryphons." Naila rowed over to the Dragons.

Celia smirked. "Seems like you're not the medalist you say you are."

"I could've been. And I should've." Iggy made a fist.

"Hey, at least you're here now? That's the whole point of this, right, moving on from the past?" Surprisingly, it was Ollie that was able to reason with him.

Iggy gave a grim nod, and his usual rude demeanor faded for just a moment as he looked away. "It's more than that. It's redemption."

Ollie seemed about to say something else, before Lio butt into their conversation. "That's the spirit, we still have a chance to win… whoa!" The diplomat suddenly lost his balance as Naila hammered their floe. Selene grabbed the back of his shirt right before he fell into the water.

"And it seems like the Dragons are close to breaking a lot more than just the ice," Nimbus remarked. "Gryphons! Two truths and a lie! Martin, you're up."

The fencer looked as expressionless as ever as the rest of his team watched him warily, while on the Dragons' floe, Iggy and Celia were yelling at each other in the background, and Selene just seemed to be yelling along.

"Seems like your perfect fencing prodigy actually has some things to 'fess up to," Nimbus continued. "He once tried to ask out his best friend but chickened out and ran away, he cheated on a test to maintain his perfect GPA, and he's stolen money from his mother's purse."

A couple of his teammates looked at him more warily, but Maggie just laughed. "Oh, how intriguing, I would love to hear that story… any of those stories!"

"You seem pretty preppy… but I'll say the last one is the most unreasonable," Tanja spoke up, and Earl and Paradise both nodded in agreement.

Nimbus snapped his fingers. "That's right! This round goes to the Gryphons!"

"How does this cause you so much glee?" Tanja wondered aloud as Paradise and Maggie cheered at their victory. She looked at Martin, concerned.

The fencer suddenly gave a harsh laugh. "I apologize, it's just that… the fact is quite nonsensical, considering that it has been many years since I have seen my mother." His expression somehow turned even more cold.

Tanja could barely reach the fencer's shoulder, but she put a hand on his arm.

Martin shook his head. "But it has been many years. So has Cyrus, for that matter."

Tanja quirked an eyebrow. "Cyrus, eh? Is that your friend who you…"

The fencer looked at her with a blank expression, before he nodded slowly.

"Ooh, I'll remember that!" Maggie said as she eagerly squeezed past Earl to be a part of the conversation. In the process, she bumped Drake, who was barely awake enough to pay attention. The artist toppled over and fell into the water with a splash.

"Ew, you got gross cold lake water on my dress!" Paradise shrieked.

"Drake!" Tanja gasped.

Drake resurfaced and spit up water. "I knew it would happen," he said.

"How glorious, you've accepted your doom in the depths of Lake Naila!" Naila cackled, before effortlessly lifting up Drake by his jacket and throwing him towards the bank, where Javi helped him out. "Wow, he weighs… less than my conscience ahahaha! Now, time to slay the dragons!" She held up her sledgehammer and used it to row towards the Dragons' floe… but since it was a sledgehammer, the process was comically slow.

Kit examined the cracks beneath their feet. "We should cover that spot," they said quietly.

Celia and Iggy were still feuding and didn't pay them any heed, but Lio turned to them. "What was that?"

"Cover that spot," Kit said more frantically, as they pointed at a spot between two fractures. "Don't let Naila hit there, there will be a crack!"

Confessional: Kit

"I'm good at breaking things," they said with a shrug as they chipped at a small piece of ice with their screwdriver. "I can tell when they're about to fall apart."

Just as Naila swung at the ice with her sledgehammer, Lio hollered "Hey Naila!" and the prankster turned her head. This caused her hammer to just barely miss the weak spot, and another crack formed on the ice, but the floe stayed intact.

Celia stumbled and fell into Iggy. "Hey, are you trying to push me in?" He glared at her.

"I wouldn't have fallen if she hadn't been rocking it," Celia jerked a thumb at Selene, who was shaking with nerves.

Kit exchanged glances with Lio and gave him a shaky thumbs up, but he only sighed and rubbed his temples.

"Dragons, two truths and a lie! And this is a two-for-one with our resident twins, Lio and Selene." At Nimbus' words, the Dragons finally paused their arguing for just a moment. "They've had a joint birthday party every single year. Helios and Selene aren't their birth names. And they're actually identical twins."

Iggy looked between Lio and Selene, who both seemed shocked at the facts being revealed. "Ha, the last one's gotta be the lie, that makes no sense!" the runner called out confidently.

"Well, actually…" Kit started, but the other Dragons were nodding in agreement. Selene was silently seething in rage and Lio just said nothing.

Nimbus shook his head and put up a finger. "Oh, that's actually incorrect! Naila, would you do the honors?"

"Wait, what? Lio's a guy and Selene is- …oh." Thankfully, Iggy trailed off when Celia elbowed him. But before Naila could swing at the Dragons' ice floe, Selene stepped forward and shook her fist at Nimbus. "How could you do this?" she yelled, and stomped her foot.

"Selene…" Lio started, but it was too late, and cracks started spreading under her feet. The whole ice floe crumbled apart, no sledgehammer needed, and the Dragons all screamed and fell into the freezing water. In the background, Naila jumped up and down gleefully, which caused her boat to capsize, and she screamed and fell in with the Dragons.

"And the winners of the second icebreaker are… the Gale Gryphons! Now get out of there before you fall in too!"

No sooner than Nimbus had spoken, cracks began to form under the Gryphons' feet. "Go!" Tanja yelled, and ushered the others off to jump ashore. They quickly obliged and scrambled to get back onto solid ground, but in their rush, the cracks began to spread faster. Paradise slipped on the ice, but Tanja caught her and threw her safely onto the bank, before the ice finally cracked and she fell in.

"I told you not to touch me!" Paradise yelled at her as she landed facedown on the ground.

Tanja crawled out of the water and back onto the bank, shivering. "D-duly n-n-noted. Next time I will leave you to take a swim."

Earl produced a towel out of nowhere and handed it to Tanja, who looked at him in amazement.

"Oh, don't worry, it's completely sterile," he said with a smile and a wave of his gloved hand. "All of my equipment is."

"It's not that… Why do you have a towel?"

"In the lab, there are risks of things spilling that are far more hazardous than cold water," Earl explained.

Tanja looked impressed, and she took the towel from Earl and dried herself off with it. "Seems someone on this team has some sense," she remarked, grinning at Earl, before she glared at Paradise.

Earl just shrugged humbly. "I value safety very highly, even more than the Euclidean constraints of storage space."

"That's, like, definitely not how that works," Paradise put in.

"Why are you more concerned with judging people than participating in the actual challenge?" Tanja snapped at her.

Earl noticed this and frowned. "Please, let's just continue with the challenge. We're not ready to celebrate just yet." He looked to the rest of his team for support. "Martin?"

The fencer was pacing back and forth in the snow, deep in thought, and barely even noticed Earl. Meanwhile, Maggie was writing some things down on a notepad, presumably all of the secrets that had just been revealed, and giggling to herself.

"Maybe if I can learn more about this snow," Earl murmured to himself, as he bent down and scooped some snow into a new beaker.

Meanwhile, the Dragons had made it to shore. Iggy was wringing out his ponytail, annoyed, and Celia rubbed her hands together to keep warm.

Lio and Selene were a little ways from the rest of the team, and Lio had his hands on Selene's shoulders. The shorter but stronger twin was taking some deep breaths and trying to calm down, while her brother also looked pretty distressed.

"Hey…" Ollie started as he approached them, only for Selene to whirl around and raise a fist. She had a wild look in her eyes, almost like a cornered animal. Lio grimaced and shook his head at Ollie and the acrobat laughed nervously and backed away.

"Dragons. Gryphons." Nimbus looked from team to team. The Gryphons looked determined, while most of the Dragons just looked wet and cold. "The score is tied, one to one. This final icebreaker will determine which team will be voting someone out tonight."

Confessional: Martin

"It has become clear that the Dragons have quite the advantage in physical challenges. Ignatius, Selene, and even Oliver are all quite formidable. However, we have them beaten when it comes to mental challenges, or, well, anything where they have to collaborate. So our performance depends a lot on what type of challenge this will be… it feels quite frustrating and stressful, having our success depend on a factor outside of our control. So it is even more important that I remain focused."

"For our tiebreaker challenge," Nimbus started, and paused dramatically. "We will be having a foot race back to camp!" he announced.

"Yes, let's go!" Iggy pumped his fist in the air and squealed like a little girl.

Celia stared at him and raised an eyebrow, and he blushed and cleared his throat.

Confessional: Iggy

"H-hey," he protested. "This is my biggest chance to show everyone what I've got, of course I'm excited."

Confessional: Celia

"Geez, a foot race, are they running out of ideas already or what?"

"That doesn't seem quite like a traditional team-building activity," Martin remarked, causing Nimbus to frown.

"That's cuz it isn't," Javi cut in. "But we have something else to spice it up, and so you can get all buddy-buddy and all that sappy stuff."

"That's right, everybody pick a partner!" Nimbus declared. "This is a three-legged race!"

Confessional: Celia

"Forget I said anything," she grumbled.

"The first team to get all three pairs back to camp wins the challenge," Nimbus explained.

"Everybody needs to get there? What kind of race is that?" Iggy scoffed.

"One that requires strategy in addition to speed?" Martin responded. Iggy glared at Martin, but the fencer's expression stayed completely neutral.

"Y'know, if you want to, like, help each other and stuff like that," Javi explained. "Or… no roughhousing, but if you can think of ways to keep the other team from crossing…" He snickered to himself.

"That's allowed?" Maggie gasped.

"I'm not sayin' it's not allowed." He gave a casual shrug.

"Just don't seriously hurt each other," Nimbus interrupted. "Or else Sophie will kill me," he added under his breath.

"You have ten minutes to strategize!" Javi announced. "And be sure to come up with somethin' entertaining!"

"Alright, Dragons, huddle up!" Lio called out. "Selene and I will pair up, obviously. We're the closest, so we'll be able to work together."

Selene nodded and pounded her fist in her palm. "We need this win."

"If there are no objections, of course," Lio added hastily.

Confessional: Lio

"I just want everything to run smoothly. No fighting and no distractions. Especially after the… recent setback." He frowned deeply.

"Well, I'm sure none of you weaklings will be able to keep up with me," Iggy huffed. "So, you!" he pointed at Celia. "You're the smallest. I'll carry you."

She immediately shook her head. "I'm never doing that!"

Lio frowned, but then he began to think. "That's… actually not a bad idea, if you think you'll be strong enough to-"

"I know I'm strong enough," Iggy cut in, puffing out his chest and glaring at Lio, but the diplomat seemed unfazed.

"As I was saying, if you guys are able to run ahead, we should have an advantage, since you can be there to stop the other team from crossing, or at least stall them," Lio explained.

"Well, I have an idea of my own…" Celia looked around at all the snow and a smirk grew on her face. "If you're carrying me, then I'll have a hand free…"

Kit cocked their head. "I think I know what you're thinking. And I can help hehe." They stuck their hand impossibly deep into their pocket, tongue sticking out as they dug around for a bit, before they held out… what looked like a giant ice cream scoop?

But when Celia saw it, she pumped her fist in the air. "Let's do this!"

Meanwhile, with the Gryphons, Earl turned to the rest of his teammates. "Alright, who here seems to have the best chemistry?" He produced his tea beaker out of nowhere and held it up for emphasis. The tea inside was bubbling for some reason.

"I'm going with Drake," Maggie declared and grabbed his arm.

Drake blinked sleepily and looked at Maggie. "Hmm, what? Oh, yeah, sure."

Martin shook his head at Earl. "Chemistry aside, this challenge is as simple as finding a partner with a matching gait. Those two are the closest in height, so I know they will perform the best. The same goes for us."

"So it's decided, we'll be partners." Earl nodded. "We wouldn't want steric bulk interfering with us forming a strong bond."

"Oh, there's no way I'm going with her," Paradise interjected, glaring at Tanja.

"Are you really going to throw a temper tantrum during a challenge?" Tanja shot back.

Earl stepped between them. "Lady Paradise can partner with me. I insist."

"But the plan…" Martin protested. "That will be suboptimal. Is your inability to collaborate going to become this much of a hindrance?"

"We'll manage," Tanja assured him.

Confessional: Earl

"Maybe Paradise is like the noble gasses." He tapped his chin. "When you have everything you could ever need, like a full shell of valence electrons, you become stable and inert. But even the neutral atoms can be induced to react with a catalyst, like Tanja seems to be doing."

Back with the Dragons, Ollie grinned at Kit, who was busy shoveling tools back into their coat pocket after helping Celia with her plan. "Are you ready, Kit?" he asked them.

They nodded vigorously and rocked back and forth on the balls of their feet. "Oh yes. This is good. The others are kind of scary."

"Ten minutes are up!" Nimbus yelled. "Everybody to the starting line!"

"What starting line?" Javi asked.

"Uhh, this one!" Nimbus ran to draw a line in the snow with his shoe, and beckoned for the duos to come over.

"Naila, give back Javi's air horn and do your job," Nimbus added.

Naila grumbled to herself and threw the air horn at Javi, hitting him in the back of the head. She began to link each of the pairs' ankles together, cackling to herself. "Just make sure you don't step on any cracks… except for you!" She pointed at Martin, causing his eye to twitch.

The partners all prepared to run. Iggy grabbed Celia, who looked unamused, but cooperated as the track star lifted her up.

"Go!" Javi shouted and sounded the air horn, causing Martin to cover his ears. The campers took off, with varying degrees of success.

Iggy took the lead, carrying Celia, while Martin and Tanja followed them.

"This is just like when I was first learning to walk the tightrope. One step at a time, right?" Ollie said to Kit. They tried to take a step forward together, but Ollie slipped and fell on his butt and they both laughed.

"Okay, the four of us should stick together," Lio called out to Kit and Ollie. "Selene-"

Selene suddenly slipped in the snow and toppled over.

"I told you to follow my lead!" Lio scolded.

After adjusting to the ankle cuffs, Ollie and Kit were setting up a faster pace. Meanwhile, Lio and Selene were still struggling.

"Wait for us!" Lio called out. "We should- whoa!" He fell over again and Selene fell on top of him.

Ollie and Kit exchanged glances. "Sorry guys! We'll meet you there!" Ollie finally said, and the two of them ran off.

Elsewhere in the woods, Earl and Paradise were doing their best to run, but Paradise seemed pretty distant, and it was making it hard for Earl to synchronize with her.

"What's the matter?" Earl asked.

Paradise shook her head. "Huh, nothing's wrong."

"Is it about your secret?"

"No," Paradise snapped. "Besides, I doubt someone like you would understand."

Earl didn't seem offended. "Well, let's finish this challenge quickly, right? I don't know about you, but I'm not quite fond of having my ankle shackled as tightly as a molecule in an ionic salt lattice."

"Ugh, yeah, I just want to be out of the cold," Paradise agreed reluctantly.

While Earl and Paradise tried their best to pick up the pace, Maggie and Drake seemed committed to walking the whole thing, but they had managed not to fall and they were racing steadily, but Drake seemed a lot less enthusiastic about the partnership than Maggie seemed to be.

"Soooo… you have to tell me about your monsters! Or your brothers and sisters!" Maggie said as they walked.

"Same thing," Drake said, before going silent again.

"You really don't have any tea to share?" Maggie tried again.

"You should ask Earl for that, yeah," was all the insomniac said in response.

Maggie gasped, as if offended by this. "Why are you being so difficult!"

Drake just looked at her, confused. He yawned and blinked sleepily.

However, another pair of Gryphons was a lot more spirited. "Alright, inside! Outside! Inside! Outside!" Tanja called out as she and Martin ran together. Despite Martin having longer legs, they were coordinating well.

Iggy ran past the two, kicking up snow. "Eat our powder, I'm winning this!" he shouted. He was somehow running while carrying Celia, despite their ankles being tied together. The rebel looked very unamused and she had her hands in her pockets, as if she was just trying to slow Iggy down.

Martin and Tanja ran faster to try to keep up with them, but Celia suddenly whipped out some snowballs and began throwing them at the two Gryphons. Tanja lost her balance and fell in the snow, taking Martin with her.

"Ice to meet you, suckers!" Celia crowed triumphantly.

Confessional: Tanja

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, Dad."

Confessional: Martin

"I should be angry. That was a scenario that I should have accounted for in my tactics, but…" He suddenly burst out into a fit of laughter. "Ha, 'ice to meet you,' that was pretty good." He then cleared his throat and adjusted his glasses, composing himself again.

Tanja tried to get back up, but she slipped on the ice. "Stop them!" she yelled, as Iggy ran off with Celia still clinging to him. She and Martin began to throw snowballs at Iggy and Celia. One of them hit Iggy in the butt, but it just bounced off harmlessly.

Nimbus and Javi were standing at the entrance of camp, having arrived via snowmobile. As soon as Iggy saw them, he hoisted Celia up.

"Ow! Watch it!" Celia yelled at him as she was dragged along, but she was ignored as Iggy ran into camp.

"First… place!" Iggy shouted and set Celia down. He was clearly very out of breath, but trying his best not to show it.

"And it's a picture perfect finish from a picture perfect couple!" Nimbus commented wryly.

Iggy and Celia both glared at Nimbus. "I'm gay," they snapped simultaneously, before turning to look at each other in shock. "Wait, what?"

"So am I, dudes, sorry for assuming." Nimbus put his hands up and gave a sheepish grin.

Confessional: Nimbus

"Maybe the stories about navigation going all wacky in the Bermuda Triangle were true after all. Even my gaydar is off!"

"Don't you, like, have a girlfriend?" Celia asked.

But as soon as she said those words, Iggy's smug expression instantly hardened into a glare. "Didn't you get the memo? I had a girlfriend." He crossed his arms. "But I won this challenge, and that's all that matters." He tried to storm away, causing Celia to stumble as her leg was pulled along with him.

"I'm still tied to you, dumbass." Celia tugged her leg back and Iggy fell face down into the snow.

Just then, Martin and Tanja ran into camp. Tanja was struggling to keep up with Martin's longer stride, but they had stayed together. As soon as they made it to camp, she put her hands on her knees, huffing and puffing. Meanwhile, Martin was already looking in the distance to keep track of the others.

"Oi, it's one to one now," Javi called out.

Iggy and Celia shared worried looks. "You're distracting me from keeping the other teams away from camp," Iggy snapped. "Let's just go." He tried to pick Celia up again, but she swatted his hand away.

"What's your deal?" Celia yelled. "Would you really rather you win yourself and make the whole team lose? Is that why you lost your girl, huh?"

Iggy said nothing, and tried to pull Celia by the ankle back towards the entrance to camp. Celia dug in her heels, but Iggy's legs were stronger.

"Hey, we're done with the challenge!" Iggy called out to Javi. "Can I get rid of her now?"

Javi chuckled at them and shook his head. "I mean, we could let you do that… but this is funnier."

Back in the woods, Lio and Selene looked very bruised and battered.

"I don't understand, we should be perfectly in sync." Lio groaned. "A little snow shouldn't make any difference, we've been the champion of every three-legged race since we were, like babies!"

"We're not babies anymore," Selene grumbled.

"What was that?" Lio raised an eyebrow.

Selene flinched. "Uhhh, nothing."

Confessional: Selene

"Lio can be… very controlling sometimes," she said with a weary shake of her head. "But he knows what he's doing, way more than I do, so… I will support him!" she yelled fiercely, causing the whole confessional to shake slightly.

Meanwhile, Ollie and Kit were wandering through the woods. "Do you know which way to go?" Kit spoke up suddenly.

Ollie looked at them, and then shrugged. "I thought you did." He suddenly gasped as he had an idea. "We could… climb a tree to look for camp!"

Kit stared at Ollie, and then their gaze slowly traveled down to their shackled ankles.

"Oh. Right." He giggled and rubbed the back of his head.

The two of them began to search around the woods for any identifying features, but the snow made everything look the same.

"Well, one step at a time, right?" Ollie said optimistically.

Meanwhile Drake and Maggie were walking slowly and carefully. "Oh, I can't fall," Maggie said as she picked her way through the snow. "There's this very specific kind of dirt that I'm allergic to."

"Yeah, and if we make too much noise, we could alert the meowl," Drake added.

"Is that another one of your gross monsters?" Maggie rolled her eyes, starting to get annoyed.

"It's like an owl crossed with a cat," Drake explained, perking up as he talked about his creation.

"Huh, I'm allergic to both owls and cats, but that actually sounds… kind of cute," Maggie said, surprised.

"After digesting its prey, it coughs up hairballs full of bones," Drake added.

Maggie pulled a face. "Ugh, there it is."

Right outside the border of camp, Paradise pulled Earl behind a tree. The two of them were slowly sneaking up to camp. "Throw a snowball that way," she commanded Earl.

"Why can't you-" he started to ask.

"It's cold, you're the one with the gloves," she hissed back.

Earl just gave a shrug and obliged, tossing a snowball towards the opposite end of camp. Just as soon as it fell, the two heard Celia and Iggy yelling battle cries and throwing snowballs towards the noise at a very rapid pace. One of them hit a bird, causing it to chirp in agony and crash to the ground.

Paradise and Earl looked at each other and gulped.

"Their rate of fire… how do they do it?" Earl wondered.

The scene quickly cut to right outside camp, where Celia was using Kit's ice cream scoop to make a large pile of snowballs.

"We need to get around that," Paradise whispered to Earl. "Can't you, like, science your way out of this?"

"Maybe we could use sodium chloride to melt the snow… no, the velocity is too high, it wouldn't matter." Earl shook his head, in a panic. "I only collect data! I can't do this!"

Paradise just rolled her eyes, but she seemed to be making no effort to help. "Seriously?"

"Perhaps we should wait for Drake and Maggie?" Earl suggested. "Then, we can work together to make it past the defenses?"

Paradise looked exasperated. "Those two? We just need to worry about ourselves, and if they can't make it then we should vote one of them off."

Earl seemed a little upset at this, but he thought about it for a moment. "We have no way to locate them anyways. We will have to find our own way to camp."

Meanwhile, Martin was pacing around camp with Tanja, watching for the other teams. He shot a wary glance in the direction of Celia and Iggy, when he saw they were… throwing snowballs at nothing?

"Who's there?" Tanja called out. She squinted as she thought she saw something move behind a tree.

But suddenly, Martin was hit in the face with a snowball, knocking his glasses off his face.

"Nice shot!" Ollie cheered as he and Kit ran by. The engineer pulled another snowball out of their pocket and threw it at Tanja.

She blocked it with her arm as Martin fumbled for his glasses. "That was a dirty move," the activist grumbled.

"Sorry guys!" Ollie called out to Tanja and Martin as an afterthought as he and Kit ran into camp. He high-fived Javi.

All the while, Earl and Paradise were still hiding behind the tree outside camp.

"Ugh, we should have gone earlier, now there are four of them," Paradise groaned. "Do you have anything that could help?"

Earl reached into his pockets. "I already gave Tanja my towel. I could… analyze the wind speed with my anemometer? Then we can position ourselves downwind so they can't smell us coming… no, no, that makes no sense."

"Well, the other team all behaves like wild animals, so if they hunt us by smell I wouldn't be surprised," Paradise scoffed, recalling how much the Dragons had been fighting during the lake challenge. "Not that I smell like anything, of course, I can't stand being dirty."

Earl nodded in agreement. "Nothing ruins an experiment faster than sources of contamination."

Confessional: Earl

"I thought my data would be a great asset in this competition, but maybe it's just a distraction. I can't let my family—both of them—down."

All of a sudden, Paradise's eyes widened. "Wait, that's it! Your wind thing!"

"The anemometer? You really think that minimizing their olfactory advantage would be enough to get us past them?"

"No, the umbrellas! You still have yours, right?"

Earl nodded and pulled his umbrella out from his pocket. It still had an anemometer attached to it. "Of course! We can use the umbrella as a shield! Are you carrying yours as well? We should maximize the surface area of our cover."

"I, uh, I left mine in my room," Paradise responded. "I didn't think we would need it."

"Hmm, that's quite alright, I'm sure if we find the right angle, there should be enough coverage."

Confessional: Paradise

"Okay, I left my umbrella behind because I didn't want it to get ruined in the challenge. It looked nice, and pretty things don't deserve to get dirty, right? Besides, I'm not the one that carries around an entire chemistry lab wherever they go!"

Meanwhile, Celia and Iggy were still patrolling outside of camp when they saw Earl and Paradise approaching them, hiding behind Earl's umbrella.

The two Dragons continued to throw snowballs, but Earl blocked them all with his umbrella. "Your procedure is working!" he said.

Soon, the Dragons ran out of snowballs. "You wasted all our ammo, dumbass," Celia snapped and reached for the snowball scoop, but Iggy snatched it first.

"I'm making more snowballs, I'm faster."

"Hah, are you trying to compensate for the balls you don't have?"

As the two started to play tug-of-war with the scoop, Earl and Paradise were steadily getting closer and closer to camp, practically unopposed. But they failed to realize that they had lost track of the other duo on the Dragons.

"Ooh, how does the spinny doohickey work?" said a voice from behind Earl. Kit made grabby hands and ran right up to the umbrella he was holding out.

"Get away from us!" Paradise shrieked as Kit began to disassemble Earl's umbrella and anemometer with their bare hands, muttering things to themself all the while. Ollie was next to them, watching them work with amazement.

When Kit was done, the entire umbrella fell apart in Earl's hands and the parts clattered into the snow. Ollie scrambled to grab as many of the pieces as he could.

Earl and Paradise looked at each other, stunned. "Run for it!" Paradise shouted and they ran towards camp, with Earl still holding the handle of his umbrella.

Iggy and Celia both simultaneously dropped the scoop when they saw the two Gryphons approaching, now without their shield.

"Aw, mierda," Celia swore, and Naila jumped out from behind a tree and censored it with Javi's airhorn. Iggy fumbled to make a snowball to throw at the two, but it was too late, and Earl and Paradise made it past Nimbus and into camp.

"Looks like the teams are tied again, with just one pair yet to arrive for both the Dragons and Gryphons," Nimbus remarked.

As the pairs all gathered outside of camp, Iggy and Martin locked eyes, both holding snowballs.

"You might as well give up now," Iggy boasted.

"Yeah, no need to let the Dragon victory drag on," Celia added.

"Not this again," Tanja groaned wearily. "Hey, why are you laughing?" She turned to Martin.

Martin adjusted his glasses and cleared his throat, the smile quickly fading from his face. "I'm not laughing," he protested.

The two pairs continued to stare each other down, until finally, another team emerged from the trees. It was Lio and Selene. They both looked a lot worse for wear, especially Selene, but they seemed to have gotten the hang of things, and they were running together with their arms over each other's shoulders.

"Get your asses over here!" Celia hollered.

"You can do this!" Ollie cheered at the same time.

Just then, Selene tripped again and they both fell.

"Are you kidding me!" Iggy yelled.

Further back in the woods, Drake shuffled along with Maggie, following Lio and Selene's tracks, but neither of them seemed willing to go much faster than a walk. But suddenly, the artist had an idea. "You know, I once had a nightmare about giant bees," he spoke up.

Maggie stopped in her tracks, causing Drake to stumble. Her eyes grew wider and wider, her face turned red, and she took a deep breath and… "Bees? Where?!" The gossiper suddenly shrieked and started running in a panic, causing the snow to melt with how fast she was running. Drake nearly fell over as he tried his best to keep up.

Confessional: Drake

"I haven't run that fast since before I accepted that the monsters would catch me no matter what, yeah."

The Dragons were scrambling as they saw Maggie and Drake come out of the trees, rapidly catching up to Lio and Selene. Iggy and Celia threw snowballs at Maggie, but they evaporated as soon as they hit her.

"We need more power. Pass me the spinny thing?" Kit asked Ollie.

"Sure… whoa!" Ollie handed Kit Earl's anemometer, but then his eyes widened as he saw that Kit was trying to connect it to some kind of large motor apparatus that they had built.

"What is that noise?" Martin was taking aim at Lio when he heard Kit's machine humming.

The cups on the anemometer started to spin, and Kit held the machine to the ground, causing it to start scooping up snow and throwing it. But the motor was too strong and the device started bucking around in Kit's hands. Ollie quickly rushed to help them try and aim it at Maggie.

"Is that even allowed? It looks dangerous!" Tanja said, wide-eyed, but when she glanced over at Javi, she saw that he was just laughing his head off.

Confessional: Javi

He wiped a single tear from his eye. "It's so beautiful. I'll have to keep an eye on that chique for sure, but for now? I'll just watch 'em all chuck snow at each other."

Paradise thought for a moment, before she turned to Earl. "You were saying something about sodium chloride?"

He glanced at Kit and Ollie, before slowly nodding at her.

"You ruined my experiment! Metabolize sodium chloride, you… uncontrolled variable!" Earl shouted, and he ran over to the two Dragons, with Paradise in tow, and flung a beaker full of salt on Kit and their contraption. All of the snow around them started to melt. "I promise I'll help you clean up after!" he added quickly, causing Paradise to roll her eyes.

While the rest of their team was distracted, Lio and Selene were continuing to run. "Um, Lio?" Selene looked back at the rapidly approaching Maggie, but this caused her to stumble. Lio caught her and just continued to run.

"They were gonna take me to their hive," Drake mumbled, causing Maggie to panic even more as she ran.

While watching, Tanja looked impressed. "I didn't think she had it in her."

"I must admit that I did not consider this possibility," Martin admitted. He carefully took aim and threw a snowball at Selene, but she managed to block it with her arm. The fencer looked tense as he watched: Maggie had almost caught up with the twins, and they were neck and neck in the final sprint into camp.

"We might just make it," Drake murmured, but he didn't sound enthusiastic.

"I'm doing the backup plan!" Selene shouted at Lio.

"Selene, don't-" Lio started, but it was too late.

Selene suddenly grabbed Lio and made an impressive flying leap, and the two of them hurtled into a snowdrift just past Nimbus.

"I'm… allergic… to…" Maggie gasped, before she promptly fell over and passed out, just a few steps from the finish line.

"Is it over?" Drake asked, lying facedown in the snow.

Confessional: Maggie

She was in the fetal position rocking back and forth. "Please. Not the bees. Anything but the bees. And the cockroaches. And mosquitoes. And the peanuts, tree nuts, soy, dairy, gluten, shellfish…"

Confessional: Selene

"I… I did it?"

Confessional: Maggie

"…latex, kumquats, crayfish…"

Confessional: Lio

"The team needs me and Selene! I will lead them to victory and make sure that no hard feelings remain, and no secret will get in the way of that!"

Confessional: Maggie

"…pencil shavings, mineral water, and dying."

Suddenly, a spider came down from the confessional ceiling and hung in front of her, causing her to let out an unholy shriek that caused cracks to form on the camera lens. "And spiders! I forgot about spiders!"

"I guess it's pretty obvious that it's GGs for the Gale Gryphons!" Nimbus announced, before he nudged Javi. "…that's what the kids say, isn't it?"

Javi gave Nimbus a shrug. "Sure, you can say that. Congrats, Dragons, or whatever."

Drake raised his hand. "Can I please have my leg back now?" he asked. Maggie was still lying on the ground next to him.

Naila popped out of a snowdrift, causing Maggie to regain consciousness and scream, while Drake just blinked. The intern unlocked Maggie and Drake's ankle cuffs, and Drake immediately rolled away from Maggie, spread-eagled on the ground, and closed his eyes.

"Who's next!" Naila yelled, brandishing her key at the other campers. Soon, all of them had their cuffs removed.

"We did it! That was such an incredible performance!" Ollie cheered and hugged Kit, causing them to let out a disgruntled squawk, but he quickly let go. "Ow, did you… just poke me with something?"

"Oops, screwy boi in my pocket, hehe." They pulled their screwdriver out, along with several other tools.

"We… definitely have a long way to go as a team," Lio started. "If you had just listened to me…"

"Oh, don't worry about that! We won! Something must be working!" Selene yelled excitedly, causing Lio to cover his ears.

Lio glared at Selene and she hung her head. "Sorry."

"Dude, you were awesome!" Celia offered a fist bump to Selene and she returned it, making an effort to be gentle. "Ohh, did you see those guys' faces when we pegged them!" She pantomimed throwing a snowball.

Meanwhile, the Gryphons were gathered together somberly. Maggie looked nervous, Tanja glared at Paradise, and Drake yawned.

Confessional: Maggie

She was sweating. "There's nothing I can expose him about, he just… doesn't seem to care about anything."

"It was all his fault!" Maggie yelled at Drake. "I would've made it if he hadn't distracted me. Plus, he fell into the water during the other challenge sooooo…"

"We were going slower than a flesh-eating snail, yeah. And they move slower while they're crawling on your feet so they can dissolve your toenails with their acid pores." Drake looked down at his shoes, as if checking for said snails.

"You're horrifying," Paradise gasped.

Tanja looked a little unsettled herself, but she was more upset by Paradise. "I wouldn't call yourself safe either. What have you done to help us today?"

Paradise just sputtered and glared.

"I found her to be quite companionable and clever," Earl spoke up, though he seemed a little intimidated by Tanja. "I think that unfounded hypotheses will not get us anywhere, but there are no hurt feelings in science, right? This challenge was an experiment, and we need to analyze our data to see which way to vote."

Martin gave a small shake of his head. "We?" he echoed.

"Like that one gaming console, yeah," Drake randomly interjected. "My brother never would give me a turn."

Martin ignored him, or maybe he just didn't hear considering the insomniac's tendency to mumble. "It's your data, you are welcome to come to your own conclusion."

Earl frowned at this, but Tanja gave a grim nod.

"Alright Gryphons, come with me to the campfire!" Nimbus called out. "It's time for Stormbound's first ever elimination ceremony!" he cheered.

Confessional: Tanja

"Paradise is infuriating, but maybe Drake isn't in the best place here. Who am I able to help more?"

Confessional: Martin

Martin looked at the ballot in his lap as he expertly twirled his pen around in his fingers. "Besides Tanja and perhaps Earl, all of our players seem like a hindrance at first glance, but they seem to have unique skills to contribute as well. It's only a matter of weighing them."

Suddenly, Javi started pounding on the confessional door from the outside, interrupting Martin's monologue. "Hurry up and vote already! Estás cagando in there or what?"

"There's no need for vulgarity," Martin called out to him. He hesitated one moment longer, before he wrote down a name on his ballot in perfect cursive.

The Gryphons all gathered around the campfire, which had been lit. Drake was surprisingly wide awake, and he appeared to be sketching something in his notebook, a monstrous bird creature with a blue feather crest that looked suspiciously like Nimbus' hair.

The rock star was holding a lightning bolt-patterned tray with five marshmallows on it. "You know, I'm a pretty nice guy, and I think that after a tough challenge, you guys deserve a sweet treat. But here, marshmallows represent immunity, and if you don't get one, it's game over!"

"Somewhat juvenile, but thematically appropriate and logistically simple, I like it." Martin gave a small nod of approval. "As opposed to some of the other baffling decisions you and Javier have been making on this show."

Nimbus rolled his eyes. "Ugh, just take the first immunity marshmallow of the season." He threw the marshmallow at Martin, and the fencer expertly caught it in his mouth, but was expressionless as he chewed. The light from the campfire reflected off of his glasses and obscured his eyes.

"Also safe is… Tanja."

Tanja caught her marshmallow and looked relieved, but grimaced as she looked around at the rest of her team, worried about the others.

"And Earl."

Earl produced a new, clean beaker out of nowhere and caught the marshmallow in it.

"Paradise, you barely helped in the first challenge. And Maggie and Drake, you two lost the last challenge for your team. But safe today is… Maggie."

Maggie ducked when Nimbus threw the marshmallow at her, and it flew past her and was caught by Tanja, who muttered something about food waste.

Confessional: Martin

"I don't know what Drake did to make Magnolia run like that… but knowing she is capable of that, I believe I could get her to do it again."

"Oh, I can't eat that, I'll get hives," Maggie said. However, she smirked to herself.

"Paradise. Drake. Who is it going to be?"

Drake jolted awake when his name was called. "Huh?"

Paradise risked a glance at her team, only to see Tanja looking at her with contempt.

"The last marshmallow goes to…" Nimbus dramatically held up the plate of marshmallows.

Paradise looked nervous, while Drake rubbed his eyes.

…

"Paradise."

Paradise grabbed her marshmallow and stared at it in her hands. "I… I knew you guys needed me," she said finally, but she didn't sound all too confident.

"And that means, Drake, you have been eliminated from Total Drama Stormbound," Nimbus said.

"That's about what I thought, yeah." Drake shrugged. "My brother told me I would never make it far."

Tanja put a hand on the insomniac's shoulder, looking a little remorseful. "Don't let them get to you. You were here, and that's more than any sibling of yours is able to say, no?"

"Oooorrrr, you could try scaring them for a change!" Maggie added. Tanja gave her a disapproving look, but Drake cocked his head… before a more sinister smile grew on his face.

"They taught me everything about monsters and nightmares. Maybe I need to show them, yeah."

Nimbus seemed to be getting bored of the sentiments. "Gee, look, it's already… uh…" He looked at his wrist, only to realize he wasn't wearing a watch. "Time to rock around the clock! Alright, the rest of you, head back to your cabins," he commanded, shooing the campers off. "Drake, you're going with Javi."

"C'mon, chico, I managed to get you a ride by cashing in a lil favor with a friend of mine," Javi explained, gesturing for Drake to follow him to the dock.

The snow had started to melt, so the walk wasn't too arduous. When they arrived, a boat was waiting for them. It was heavily patched up and fortified with different kinds of scavenged wood and metal, including what looked like the wing of an airplane, and it was flying a tattered black skull and crossbones flag. However, on closer examination, the boat looked suspiciously similar to the cargo ship that had previously sunken.

"Welcome aboard the Loser Cruiser!" a voice called out. A young Hispanic woman with olive skin and wavy brown hair in a bob waved to Drake and Javi. She stood at 5'7" and had a slim build, but her dark tan and calloused hands indicated she was used to hard work. She was wearing a navy blue coat over a ruffled white blouse, with brown trousers and black boots.

"Captain Ada Magellan, at your service," the woman said from her position at the bow of the ship. She tipped her black and gold tricorn hat, which had a green feather plume on it, and beamed proudly at the two on the dock.

"Always one for the theatrics," Javi scoffed. "You're just a damn ferry for some teenagers, Magellan. Don't get distracted from holdin' up your end of the bargain."

Ada frowned slightly at Javi, and she was about to say something, when a green parrot wearing a skull bandana on his head suddenly swooped down in front of Javi and squawked in his face. His feathers were a suspiciously similar shade to the plume in the sailor's hat. "Awk! First Mate Kiwi the Destroyer says ye landlubbers should scrub the deck!" He then landed on Ada's shoulder and clacked his orange beak obnoxiously, yellow eyes glaring at Javi.

"Stop that, Kiwi, this is a newcomer." Ada tried to swat the parrot off of her shoulder and he took off to dodge her hand and stuck his tongue out at her. "Your tongue isn't even supposed to work like that!"

"Awk! First Mate Kiwi the Destroyer wishes to continue our conquest of the Camp of Ventallan!" Kiwi shrieked in response.

Ada didn't miss a beat. "Why don't you help our guest 'conquer' his new quarters, then," she retorted.

Kiwi just rolled his eyes. "What's in it for me, captain?"

Ada sighed. "I'll give you a cracker."

"Well, why didn't you say so earlier? Awk, come on landlubber!" Kiwi waved a wing at Drake, who barely flinched. "…Are you alright?" the parrot asked.

The insomniac had just been quietly watching the entire exchange, and he gave a shrug. "Tired," was all he said.

Kiwi landed on Drake's head and nestled himself in his already rumpled hair. "Just do as the first mate says, awk!"

Drake stepped onto the boat and headed below decks with Kiwi calling out unhelpful directions. "Watch your step, landlubber!" But eventually, the two of them came to a room with the door slightly ajar. "Awk! Make yourself comfortable!" Kiwi squawked.

It was little more than a closet with a sleeping hammock. But in his point of view, lullaby-like music was playing and he saw a rosy-tinted room with a massive four poster bed with white sheets and soft downy pillows, and he smiled to himself. "Better than sharing a room with my brother, yeah. Maybe… maybe there are no bed-bugbears here."

Drake shuffled towards the hammock… and then he fell down on his face and fell asleep on the floor.

Kiwi glanced around to make sure no one was watching, before he landed in the hammock and reclined on his back with his wings behind his head.

Back on the island, the campers were back in the mess hall warming up with hot chocolate that Sophie had made. The chef offered Earl a mug, but he shook his head. The scientist was mixing tea with his immunity marshmallow in a beaker and stirring it with a glass stir bar.

"Dearie, is that black tea and marshmallows?" Sophie asked. "I never would have thought of that."

"They aren't things you would think would go together, you know, but I'm always willing to give them a chance. I introduced all my friends to putting hoisin sauce on their fish and chips," Earl explained proudly.

As a chef, Sophie felt mildly horrified, but as a mother, she nodded in understanding. "I used to cook for my family. Everyone has their own preferences and it makes me happy to fulfill them."

Meanwhile, Martin was staring out the window, deep in thought as he stirred his hot chocolate. Tanja sat down next to him. "We work well together," the activist said.

"But it wasn't enough," Martin responded. He still seemed upset about their loss. "I should have known better than to pair up the two most frail members of our team."

"You can't rely on anticipating everything," Tanja remarked. "Nothing about this game is as predictable as you want."

"Nor is it as fair as you would like," Martin pointed out.

"True. But we were clearly the strongest players. We're safe if our team has any sense."

"And you believe that we can ensure our continued safety by collaborating?" Martin predicted.

Tanja raised a brow in surprise. "What I was thinking exactly."

"And I'm in," Martin said simply and extended his hand.

Confessional: Tanja

"I know I am not a strategist, and it would be quite easy for me to get outmaneuvered. But it is my responsibility to watch everyone's back, and I am used to it. Our partnership will at least help our team succeed. We cannot afford to lose anyone else…" She thought for a moment. "Except Paradise… no, no, I should not be saying that." She shook her head.

Tanja shook Martin's hand. "We will be formidable, I can feel it."

Meanwhile, Lio and Selene were sitting together. While the rest of the Dragons were celebrating their victory, Lio seemed a little more pensive.

"Are you thinking about the lake challenge?" Selene asked.

Lio just nodded slowly.

"I can't believe they did that to you!" Selene yelled. Nearby, Kit yelped in surprise and spilled their hot chocolate, and Lio quickly shushed his sister. "Sorry," she mumbled.

"I would prefer they didn't know, I'm, well, not…" Lio looked down at his hands folded on the table.

"You are a guy!" Selene raised her voice again and pounded her fist on the table.

"Some of them probably didn't understand… aaand now they'll never forget." He shook his head in annoyance.

"It's just… I want to tell them to listen to you, but-"

"This doesn't change anything," Lio said firmly, as if he was trying to convince himself of the fact. "I will help repair all the bonds that may have been broken, and as long as we work together, I'm sure I can lead us to victory. We are indispensable members of our team and we can put this behind us." He looked around the mess hall determinedly… only to see Celia and Iggy were arguing again.

Outside, Naila was cackling to herself as she sprinkled a beaker of salt around, which she had most likely stolen from Earl. She was creating a pattern of melted snow on the ground that looked suspiciously like a demonic summoning circle. "Ahahaha I curse this land!" she declared.

"Ay, mija, no demons!" Javi shouted, trying to grab the salt from her. "We can't risk those angry phone calls."

While Javi chased Naila around camp in the background, Nimbus turned to the camera. "We were off to a chilly start, but it looks like everyone is finally getting warmed up to each other! Will Lio be able to keep his team under control? Will Tanja and Martin's new alliance last? And is there anything that Maggie isn't allergic to? We'll see next time, on Total! Drama! Stormbound!"

Votes:

Drake- Earl, Maggie, Martin, Paradise [4]

Maggie- Drake [1]

Paradise- Tanja [1]

Remaining Contestants:

Dragons: Celia, Iggy, Kit, Lio, Ollie, Selene (6)

Gryphons: Earl, Maggie, Martin, Paradise, Tanja (5)

Elimination Order:

13. Naila (no team, disqualified/intern)

12. Drake (Gryphons)

Drake is… a weird character. He's definitely an "easy" early boot due to his constant state of exhaustion and unsettling all of his teammates with his monsters, but I was still sad to let him go. I hope he was entertaining during his time competing, he and Maggie are just such a cursed duo. I had fun with coming up with all sorts of awful critters and honestly I learned a lot about his character from writing him.

On another note, I have a Discord server for this story, as well as my other projects and art. If you would like to discuss the story, read previews, and see my art of the cast, feel free to join, the invite code is tT3nBaG5WM

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed! I'm still very new to this but I think I'm getting into the groove so the next update should be a little quicker. As usual, concrit is appreciated and I would love to know what you think!

Feline's Forecast: The fog is rolling in, and searching for anything in this weather will be like finding a needle in a haystack.