Camping. Bugs. Fires. Bears. But first, a break day! Thanks for reviewing, OmniIBIBUltraInstinctGodzilla, Gucci Mane LaFlare and lordgemini.

I found it a little odd that we had another break day. We'd mostly been able to chill during the talent show, apart from a bit of rehearsing once we knew we were in it. I made sure to spend a bit of time with all of the people I counted as friends. I went for a swim in the lake with Bridgette, giggled about crush history with Katie, talked family life with DJ (he turned out to be very devoted to his mom) and even chatted random facts with Harold. And since he'd told me a major secret about himself, I took a chance and mentioned off-hand that I wasn't interested in guys romantically. "I figured since you told me something unusual about yourself, it was time I returned the favour," I said ."But please, don't tell anyone else. I don't want homophobic people voting me off."

Harold shrugged. "Wow. Cool. So…have you had a lot of girlfriends?"

I gave a sigh. "No. No girlfriends yet. Closest thing were celeb crushes. If you really want to know, I've had a bit of a crush on Queen Latifah for a while."

Harold grinned. "So big, loud women are your type? She is kind of hot for an older woman, I gotta say."

I was starting to wish I hadn't said anything. "Can we quit talking about me now?"

Harold made eye contact with me deliberately for a moment, and then quickly said 'Sorry! I didn't realize it was such a big deal for you to tell me. And I swear I won't tell. I'm just interested – I've never met any lesbians before."

I gave a sigh. "You're not one of those guys who thinks girl-on-girl is hot and wants me to show off, are you?"

"Well…" Harold blushed. "Look, I'm a guy! I'm not going to make you kiss someone, but obviously I think it's kind of cute! I mean, you told me – what am I supposed to say? GOSH!"

I sighed. "Don't get in a state. I told you because I trust you and because you told me sensitive info. I was just returning the favour. How about this – I won't talk about it again, you won't ask me any more questions about it."

Harold calmed down. "Okay. I won't ask, and obviously I won't tell. But you can't blame me for being curious."

"Try finding a book on it next time," I advised him, summoning up a smile before I jumped to my feet and went off to find one of my other friends.

I still didn't really talk to the Gophers. I didn't really know any of them well enough. I still sometimes watched Leshawna from a distance, but there wasn't really much to see. She mostly hung out with Gwen, and I was too nervous to try and join them. I knew Bridgette had said Gwen was nice, and I wasn't really afraid of going near her anymore, but I was just not ready to talk to Leshawna. Especially not when she wasn't alone.

Our challenge the next day was simple. "All you have to do is spend one night in the woods." Chris explained. Basically, we just had to go to our campsite, put on a map, along with a compass, and then put up our camp and stay there overnight. The first team back won.

"And don't think you can just hang out at the edge of camp," Chris warned us. "We will watch the footage back to check you actually spent the night at your campsite. You all need to wait to come back until it's properly light, or you're disqualified. Oh," he added, "And watch out for bears. Lost a couple of interns in pre-production."

As it was, I knew bears would usually be too scared to go after a bunch of teens if we didn't invade their space. Leshawna seemed a little afraid, though.

"I had a little encounter with a bear once," Owen boasted. "Let's just say his head looks real nice up on my mantel."

"Oh, this one time, I saw a bear eating our garbage!" Izzy recounted. "He had old spaghetti noodles hanging from his big huge teeth, and it looked like blood and guts, so gross! And we thought he was eating the neighbour's cat Simba but it turned out he was just lost for a week! Uh…" she looked at Lindsay, who was almost green. "You didn't eat spaghetti, did you?" Lindsay shook her head. "Good, let's go!"

Mostly, we found our campground without incident. At one point, Katie stopped me and said "Peyton, look, blueberries!"

"I think one part of this challenge was to find our own food." I said thoughtfully, and called out to the others, "Hey, guys, stop! We need to gather food for tonight and Katie just found a blueberry bush. Let's grab some – we don't know how close we'll be to food sources tonight."

That was good – just about everyone managed to carry a good amount of blueberries that we could share out later that night. A good thing, too, because we didn't find any food near our campground. Katie counted out the blueberries while I tried to start a fire. DJ went to look for extra food and everyone else pitched the tent.

Geoff smiled at Bridgette. "Wow," he said, "You pitch a tent like a guy!"

I stifled a giggle, while Bridgette raised an eyebrow.

"I mean," Geoff amended, "You're not all girly about getting dirty and stuff."

"Gee, thanks," Bridgette muttered.

Duncan, on the other hand, looked at Courtney. "Apart from those two, what's for dinner, woman? I'm starving!"

Courtney scowled. "I hope you don't expect me to dignify that with a response."

DJ came back with a rabbit that he did not intend to cook. "This is my new pet! I'm calling him Bunny."

We had to make do with the blueberries, but at least there was enough for everyone. We all sat around the campfire I'd finally managed.

"This reminds me of this really scary story I heard once." Duncan commented.

"Awesome!" Geoff exclaimed. "Tell it, man!"

"Are you sure? Because the story I'm thinking about is pretty hardcore."

"Ooh, we're so scared." Courtney snarked.

"All right," Duncan shrugged, "But don't say I didn't warn you. One night, a lot like this one…"

Duncan was really good at storytelling. He literally sent shivers down my spine as he told this story about a hook-handed killer. Katie, who was sitting beside me, at one point grabbed my hand in a death grip and wouldn't let go. I could feel her trembling.

"They say that this killer is still alive," Duncan wound up, "Wandering these very woods. He could be just about anywhere, really. Maybe even right here!" And suddenly he had a hook hand. I don't know where he was hiding that, but most of the guys gasped, and all of the girls screamed. Including me.

Duncan burst out laughing.

Courtney was the first to speak up, "Duncan," she snapped, "That was so not funny!"

"Yes, it was!" Duncan argued. "I just wish it was all on camera – oh wait, it is!"

"You are so vile!" Courtney snapped. "Do your parents even like you?"
"I don't know, Jumpy McChicken, I haven't asked them lately."

At that moment, we heard a howl. Courtney gasped and clung to the nearest person. Yeah, it happened to be Duncan. I think everyone except her saw him looking over at Geoff, who gave him a thumbs up.

No way. I couldn't believe it. Could the former delinquent really have a thing for the uptight rule-follower of our team? Or was there some other reason Courtney clinging to him was a good thing?

We didn't have a good night, by the way. Bridgette was really jumpy all night – she said something about being in the forest freaked her out. Then when she left the tent for bathroom reasons, a bat knocked into her and she ended up accidentally kicking a hot coal onto our tent, and it burned down in seconds. We weren't hurt, we just lost our shelter, and then it started raining, too.

I'm not sure when I fell asleep. I think it was still raining, though. Either way, I was the first to wake up when it was light, and the sky was cloudy but dry. That way, I had a perfect view of Bridgette with her head on Geoff's lap while she slept, and of Courtney curled up beside Duncan. Katie wasn't sleeping on anyone's shoulder or lap, but she was curled in on herself. Harold, Tyler and DJ were all lying spread out.

As it was, I think I was the only one that noticed Geoff and Bridgette, considering I think everyone else woke up after Duncan and Courtney and got distracted by them. Duncan opened his eyes first. "Morning, sunshine," he greeted the brunette.

Courtney opened her eyes and jumped up in seconds. "Omigosh, ew! You were cuddling me!"

"I was calmly lying on my back and trying to catch a few Zs," Duncan said coolly. "You were snuggling up to me."

Courtney didn't deny it. She just scowled and said "You are such an ogre!"

"I've been called worse." Duncan lay back down. Courtney made a sound of frustration.

It was light, so after a few minutes, we woke everyone else up and ran back to camp.

Less than a minute after we arrived, before Chris had even said anything to us, the Gophers ran up behind us. "Oh no, they beat us here!" Heather exclaimed. Then she suddenly turned to Owen and snapped "This is all your fault!"

For the third time in a row, we'd won the challenge. And from what I heard later, the Gophers had a harder time. A bear had actually shown up at their camp and they'd spent the night in a tree. Probably something to do with the fish Owen had caught from what I heard – the smell probably attracted it, so I guess it sort of was his fault. At least we'd been able to spent the night without worrying about falling onto a predator.

So we had a numbers advantage. Okay, but I still wondered, so what?

As for us, we actually got a reward. We could go to the campground's "Tuck Shoppe" and get as many free things as we wanted. It was more like a dairy, but I stashed away some cup noodles for another time and grabbed my favourite ketchup-flavoured Lays and a couple of Wunderbars for a serious pig-out in the cabins. We had a fun, peaceful afternoon, but I decided to stay inside, not wanting to see the Gophers looking miserable. We did watch them trudging off to the campfire ceremony later that night, though.

To be fair, I was kind of pleased when I found out later that the Gophers had sent Izzy home. Not that she was as bad as Heather, but she did make me a bit uneasy, with her insane laughing and what I heard happened before the bear showed up – she somehow smuggled a bear suit onto the island and scared the team beforehand because she thought it was funny. Who knew what she'd do next?

Yep, after four by-the-numbers eliminations (I know Sadie wasn't, but still, same loss), we finally have the Bass win a challenge they lost in canon! I did originally have Katie getting lost on her own and losing as in canon, but as Peyton and Katie got closer, I decided to keep her on a bit longer. Whether Izzy will return and whoever else will get eliminated in her original exit episode remains to be seen – because if you remember, Izzy was important in the Bass' win that episode, but also made the fire on the beach bigger for the Gophers. As for Peyton's food choices…I looked up Canadian chocolate bars and chips. Wunderbars have peanut butter and rice crispies, coated in caramel and milk chocolate. I don't like caramel myself, but peanut butter and chocolate is one of my favourite combinations. Wish we had Butterfingers in this country….