"It has to be my fault."

Those words scared Neil way more than he'd like to admit, but to hear that come from his friend's mouth with so much conviction. He shuddered and clutched onto Nikki. He didn't know when they had moved from both sides of Max to sitting in front of him but here they were, trying to meet is eyes and convince him that is wasn't his fault. Neil frowned, tears threatening to spill from his eyes. How and why did this happen to his friend.

"M-Max, c'mon. Of course it wasn't your fault, they just want you to think that. Please, come back with us and we- we'll talk to David and Gwen and then Child Protective services will help you! Y-yeah, come on Max please?" Nikki whimpered. She began to tug on Max's sleeve, begging him to get up and follow them

Neil didn't know whether to sigh with relief or grow more concerned when Max didn't even put up a fight like he normally would have. S

Stepping over rocks and twigs, the two friends led Max back to Camp. David and Gwen were there waiting in front of the Counselor's cabin, David pacing and Gwen twitching anxiously on the porch. Once they spotted them however, David and Gwen immediately froze before running over to the trio.

"Max! Max? Are you okay? Did something happen to you? Why is he like?" David directed the last question at Nikki and Neil who stood nervously.

"We don't know, we just found him sitting under a tree and when we told them about Child Protection services showing up he just started ranting about how it was his fault. We tried to convince him that it wasn't but he just completely shut down on us!" Nikki was so close to crying, tears threatening to fall as she sniffed. "We don't know what to do."

David looked crestfallen. "It's alright Nikki, c'mon we need to get you guys back inside so they can speak to him."

The campers and counselors all knew who 'they' was and started to walk towards the cabin where 'they' waited.

The door shut behind them and what was talked about in that room was never revealed.

-Next Summer-

"C'mon Neil! Max texted me saying we were already there!"

Neil rolled his eyes as Nikki dragged him towards the bus. They had just gotten out of school and the duo had begged their parents to keep sending them to Camp Campbell. They had agreed, thinking 'why the heck not?' So now there they were, Nikki dragging Neil onto a rackety, old, broken down school bus with the Quarter Master glaring at them as he closed the doors.

"Yeah yeah Nikki, calm down. It's not like we're going to be any faster with you jumping around in the back." Neil stared at his green haired friend as she paced up and down the rows of the bus.

Nikki looked different, although not by much. She still remained the energetic and crazy friend Neil had met over the summer but she had matured. Instead of bright red overalls, they were a darker red with pins attached to them. She had on a white T-shirt that had a pastel pink skull on it. She wore a red and white baseball cap as well. Her ears were pierced with the black skull earrings Neil had gotten her for Christmas, she had been so excited getting those.

Neil himself looked different as well. Instead of the bright piss yellow turtleneck he'd worn last summer, he now had a black short sleeved shirt covered by a white coat he had gotten from Nikki over Christmas. His dad and Nikki said it made him look more like a scientist now, he wore it nearly everyday. He still had on brown jeans but wore a silver watch on his right wrist. He had definitely matured after the summer.

As they sat in the back of the bus, they wondered what the rest of camp would look like now that Campbell had been taken to prison and David bought the place. They hoped it'd be much better, a safer too. The skating camp that was there was falling apart last time they had checked.

It was only 2 hours later when they arrived at Camp. The sign had been renewed so it actually said 'Camp Campbell' instead of 'Camp Camp'. It was neater and the place looked cleaner as well, not as much trash was snagged in the bushes.

They journeyed father into camp, greeting the older campers that were already there. Meaning Spacekid, Nurf, and Harrison.

They got closer to the Counselor's Cabin to see Gwen sitting on a chair on the porch on her tablet. Turns out they had installed wifi for better access. Gwen was a bit different as well. She had bleached part of her hair and had an eyebrow piercing, which she really rocked.

She raised her eyes and spotted Neil and Nikki approaching the cabin and smiled slightly, "David and Max are inside, David's been trying to get him to brush his hair for the third time today."

Nikki smirked. After the whole ordeal last summer, Max's parents were taken away after he eventually confessed to the abuse he had been taking at home. David, Gwen, Neil, and herself had been there for him during all that. A bit later after summer ended, they found out that Gwen and David had actually adopted Max and they had all moved in together.

When they opened the door they were met with a very interesting sight. David stood with a hairbrush trying to get Max down from the top of a bookshelf. Apparently when Neil and Nikki grew, Max had stayed short.

"MAX! Max, come on! The others will be here any moment now!" David jumped up, trying to get Max, "Plus you could get seriously hurt! Please come down!"

Max rolled his eyes but stopped when he saw Nikki and Neil in the doorway. "Hate to point it out to you David but Nikki and Neil are already here."

David whirled around wide eyed stopped jumping. He had changed a bit too, although not a lot. Instead of the yellow camp shirt he had tied around his neck last summer, he a had a proper yellow and orange striped bandana instead. Neil wasn't sure if that was much of an improvement or not. And like Gwen he had also dyed his hair although it wasn't very noticeable first glance. He'd dyed his roots brown that eventually faded back into the fiery red mane.

"Neil! Nikki! Didn't notice you there! Sorry, just, Max is being highly unreasonable!" David faced them a large smile on his face.

Max rolled his eyes and jumped down, "Chill out David, it's not like anyone's going to give a fuck about my hair."

"Heeeey, language."

Nikki snorted at the exchange and instead they settled on studying their friends. He had changed too. Max had a silver earring in his ear as well as an eyebrow piercing like Gwen's. Instead of his normal blue hoodie, he had a darker blue jacket with a smiley face pin with crossed out eyes near the shoulder. He also wore a black T-shirt with a white skull on the front. Like last summer he wore black jeans, but these ones were ripped. He looked better, and healthier too. They hadn't noticed how malnourished he actually was until he took off the hoodie. He looked more filled out now that he'd been living with David and Gwen.

"Hey guys!" Max smiled at them as they ran to hug him, David cooing as he went outside to give them privacy.

"Max! Oh man, you have no clue how good it is to see you! All those other kids at my school are a bunch of wusses! Even the guys!" Nikki ranted, "Oh yeah! Turns out Neil lives close to my house so we've been hanging out after school a lot! How was your year?"

Max smirked, "Been pretty good actually, David's been a pain in the ass though. Always so cheery and sunshiney, it's pretty annoying." Neil rolled his eyes.

Max grabbed them, "Hey, so they finally fixed the ladder to get onto the roof. David doesn't know this but there's a ledge at the back that we can hang out on. C'mon."

He dragged them into the little room with the ladder that led up to the roof and helped them descend down to the ledge he'd been talking about. Already there were three cushions and a cooler up there, filled with sodas.

Neil let out a low whistle, "Nice." Nikki bounced around, "This is so cool! Alright this is our official hangout spot now!"

They sat down and opened some sodas. After a few minutes of silence Max spoke, "Guys." Nikki and Neil turned to look at him, the serious tone he used catching them by surprise, "Just wanted to say thank you. For, you know, everything you did for me last summer." Max turned to face them with most sincere look they had ever seen, "So yeah, thanks. Thanks for everything."

Nikki teared up and pulled Max and Neil closer to her. Neil laughed and ruffled Max's hair.

"We'd do it all over again for you buddy. We'd do it all over again. And to think, that all happened because of some dumb Talent show!"

"Ha! Yeah, a really dumb Talent Show."

Hey guys! Thanks for reading this! This is the last chapter! But it won't be the last story. I'm going to write another fic of what happened inside the cabin and the aftermath. Like how David and Gwen adopted Max, what struggles did they have to go through. What were Neil and Nikki doing that whole school year? So be ready for that! It might be a long time before that fic is actually written but be prepared!

Extra Scene

"So Max? Was it? What would you like to tell us about your parents. Are they treating you okay at home?" The person asked nicely. She folded her hands and looked at the still child, narely older than 10 her files said.

Max refused to look up at her. Neil, Nikki, David, and Gwen stood with him, silently encouraging him to talk, to open up. Max wants to, but he's worried about what would happen. Would they go to his parents to ask questions? Would they believe his parents over him? God, if they believed his parents-

They'd kill him for sure.

". . . Max?"