Author's Note: I'll put the votes for each couple to the right of their
-Izzy and Owen-2
-Heather and Justin-20
X-Lindsay and Tyler-0
-LeShawna and Harold-4
-Beth and Cody-4
X-Eva and Ezekiel-0
-Bridgette and Geoff-11
-Gwen and Trent-55
-Courtney and Duncan-77
X-Sadie and DJ-2
-Katie and Noah-7
Courtney's eyes flicker open. She shivers. Even though she and Duncan were curled up in a corner, she was still cold. Courtney lifts her head and looks out the exit. There were still stars out. Courtney smiles and slowly lowers her head back onto Duncan's chest. It's so pretty out, Courtney thinks groggily, watching tiny crystals of snow fall.
But then Courtney's ears picked up the sound of a distant roar.
She picks up her head again. The roar grows louder. Courtney nudges Duncan.
"Pst. Duncan," she whispers. His eyes slowly open.
"Yes, Princess?" he asks groggily.
"There's a noise coming from outside," Courtney whispers. Duncan chuckles.
"What is it? A squirrel?" Duncan jokes. But then he hears it. "What is that?" Duncan slides out from under Courtney and stands up.
He pauses to listen, and then he puts his hands on the packed-snow ceiling. His eyes show terror. "Aw, fuck, Courtney," he says.
"What? What is it?" she shrieks.
"I know that sound. It's an avalanche!" Duncan exclaims, right before chunks of snow shoot past the exit. The chunks soon turn to pure snow, and you can no longer see the horizon. "Courtney, help me hold up the ceiling!"
She stretches out her arms, but they don't touch the ceiling. "I can't reach!" Courtney exclaims. She sees Duncan's arms start to shake with effort, and then he jumps at her.
She flinches, but it turns out he was just scooping her up in his arms.
"Courtney, the ceiling's gonna cave in soon. And I just want you to know that whatever happens, I-I love you," Duncan says quickly.
Courtney takes Duncan's face in her hands. "I love y--" she says, but just then, the ceiling falls down.
"Geoff, Holy crap!" Bridgette shouts. He jumps awake.
"What?" he asks. Bridgette can't point since she was zipped up in Geoff's coat with him, so she just nods her head towards the pile of white snow blocking the overhang exit. "Oh my gosh."
"Yeah. I know," Bridgette says. Geoff unzips his coat and Bridgette climbs out. He stands up, brushes off Bridgette's coat, and holds it open for her to stick her arms through. She zips her coat up.
"How're we gonna get out?" Geoff asks. He goes over to the wall and starts feeling the heavy snow.
"I'm… not sure," Bridgette admits. She gets on her knees next to Geoff.
"Well, we better start digging," Geoff says.
"Okay, this cold weather is doing no favors for my dry skin," Heather complains, digging a bottle of lotion out of her jacket pocket. She rubs it in on her legs.
Justin points at the ground. He and Heather had slept in a lone evergreen tree, hoping that the branches would block the wind. Heather looks down.
"Holy cow, did we fall down a couple branches during the night?" she asks Justin. The snowy ground was closer to their branch now than it was last night. Justin shakes his head.
"Hmm. Well, let's see," Heather says, climbing down and jumping onto the mound of snow. "Oh. My. Gosh." Justin drops down next to her. He puts his hands on his hips.
"You got that right. It was an avalanche." Justin messes with his coat zipper.
"Avalanches can knock down trees? Well then I guess we were lucky. Anyway, we better get out from under this tree so Chris can see us from his helicopter," Heather proposes, now taking a nail file from her coat pocket and replacing the lotion.
"Gwen!" Trent exclaims.
"Mm?" she says, waking up.
"Look!" he says. So Gwen rubs her eyes, and opens them up.
"Oh my goodness!" she exclaims, seeing the huge pile of snow in the middle of the ice cavern.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Trent asks. Gwen nods.
"Oh yeah. Can we climb out of here using that snow pile?" she replies.
"I'm thinking we can," Trent answers, leading them over to the huge mound of snow. He and Gwen climb to the top, and look up.
"Uh…" Gwen says, seeing the rim of the ice cave. The icy rim seems to be about a whole meter away.
"I think I can jump and reach it," Trent says. Gwen's eyes widen.
"Trent, the edge looks slick with ice. What if you fall?" Gwen asks. She didn't mean to, but her voice wavered on the last sentence.
"Gwen, how else are we going to be able to get out of here?" he asks, placing his hands on her waist. She shrugs and looks down. Trent kisses Gwen's cheek and he gets ready to jump.
He vaults into the air, and his hands grab the rim. One hand slips, and Gwen shrieks. But Trent rights himself and pulls himself over the edge. His head reappears over the rim.
"Okay, Gwen, you're going to have to jump. Just grab my hands, okay?" Trent asks. Gwen nods shakily and gets ready to jump. Trent hangs his hands over the edge.
Gwen jumps, and screams. She only got hold of one of Trent's hands, and now she's dangling over the hard, icy floor of the cave, about 20 feet above the ground. Trent grabs her other hand and grunts as he pulls Gwen onto the surface.
"Congrats!" Chris calls from a megaphone in his helicopter. Chef drops down a rope ladder.
Izzy and Owen, Heather and Justin, Beth and Cody, and LeShawna and Harold were already sipping hot chocolate when Gwen and Trent climbed into the helicopter.
"…So, enough about zucchini and back to my other story. My Uncle Ted sooo helped prepare me for this challenge when we got lost in Antarctica while ice fishing. His baiting boat was no match for the thick ice and since there are no trees in Antarctica, duh, we had to eat the fish raw. That's because my uncle's boat had just sunk right before that. It sunk because of a huge whale that was breaching right next to us and when it's tail whacked against the water, it flooded the boat. Then when we were swimming to shore, Uncle Ted's dog, Henry, got hypothermia so we killed him and ate the raw flesh. It was all about said and done when…" Izzy rambles.
