And we have our first challenge, and, as promised, you get to help decide who gets voted off. I'll give instructions at the end of the chapter, so if you have a character in the story, read them carefully.
The Plunge into the Deep
"Last time on Total Drama Island," Chris began as he always began an episode. "Our twenty-two campers arrived, and two animals. They split into two teams, the Striking Iguanas and the Howling Toucans, and then chose their tent partners. And now, far out in the ocean, we are preparing for our first challenge. Who will win? Who will be the first to leave? Find out today on Total Drama Island: Caribbean Summer."
"Don't you need a license to scuba dive?" Zak asked Chris. Everyone was in a custom wetsuit made for each of them and with his or her team's color and logo.
"Especially this far out from shore?" Brooke asked.
"Not in the waters the show owns," Chris said. "Today's challenge is a three part challenge. First, you will all scuba dive to the bottom and look for these keys." Chris held up a golden key. "Don't worry, they are marked with tags that should be easy to spot. Then, for each key your team collects, one key per person, you will be given supplies for a sailboat. The team that builds the best sailboat wins. So, everyone, grab your masks and air supply."
Everyone geared up, or, almost everyone. Rufus and Russell didn't.
"What about Mr. Muggles?" Russell asked. "I can't leave him without care to go scuba diving."
"Not to worry," Chris said. "Chef will watch him until you return."
Russell reluctantly gave his dog to Chef, then got his gear.
"And what's your excuse?" Bex asked Rufus.
"The mask will leave red marks on my face and I'll get my hair wet," Rufus said. "And that, you see, cannot happen."
"Is that so?" Bex asked.
"Yes."
Bex looked at Todd, Alex, and Madison. They all nodded. "Either you go in yourself, or we're going to push you in."
"And drag you to the bottom without air," Todd added.
Rufus looked at them. "You wouldn't."
They all nodded and ran at him and pushed him over the edge. When he came up for air, he yelled. "You four are dead."
"Now your hair is wet," Alex said. "No reason to not help us."
Rufus used the ladder on the back of the boat to climb back up. He glared at them, then grabbed the last set of scuba gear.
"Okay, you have about an hour's worth of oxygen," Chris said.
"Oh, and let me guess," Walter said. "There are man-eating sharks in these waters?"
"I'm not sure, but there are jelly fish and sting rays," Chris said. "And, you can go, starting… Now!"
Everyone jumped in with a large splash. Chef took Mr. Muggles and put the dog in a crate.
Near the surface, Nessa was slowly swimming down, but kept stopping, shaking her head. When a fish brushed by her, she began freaking out and suddenly, couldn't see straight. She didn't know if she was swimming up or down or to the side. Manny, glanced around and noticed her erratic movements. There was plenty of time to get a key, but Nessa needed help and she needed it right away. He swam up and grabbed her, got kicked in the side, then held her arms at her sides until she opened her eyes. She calmed down slightly seeing Manny. He pointed up, and she understood that he wanted to speak to her at the surface.
"What was that about," Manny asked as they emerged.
Nessa was still shaking. "I can't do this." She turned back to the ship and began swimming back.
"Hey, wait, what's wrong?"
"I'm afraid of deep water," she said.
"That's fine," Manny said. He swam with her until she reached the boat and climbed on board.
"Thanks," Nessa called to him over the edge. "And good luck."
"Back so soon?" Chris asked.
She began to shed the gear. "I couldn't do it. Too afraid."
Cristie was swimming near the bottom, when a fish with sharp teeth went for her hand. She pulled her knife from its sheath and slashed the fish in half. Then, she spotted a key with the blue iguana tag on it. She swam to it and grabbed it. and made her way to the surface. She emerged and climbed up the ladder.
"Tsk, tsk, Iguanas," Chris shook his head. "Two of you are chickening out."
"What?" Christie asked. She held out the key.
"Wow… that was fast," Chris said.
Christie spotted Nessa. "What are you doing up here?"
"I'm too afraid," Nessa said wiping a tear that slid from her eye. "If we lose, it will be my fault. First challenge and I chickened out."
"It's alright," Christie said. "We are not losing. But if we do, you're out."
The campers continued to search the ocean floor for keys, some having more success than others. Eddie had the unfortunate luck of finding himself surrounded by jellyfish for the better part of an hour, rendering him stuck until Alex came to his rescue with a long pole with a net at the end he found next to his key. Rufus had no problem spotting keys, only they were Iguana keys. He took them anyway, ripped off the tags, and tucked them into his wetsuit.
Confession Cam:
(Rufus) "Hey, even if I didn't find a Toucan key, I still prevented at least four of the Iguanas from finding keys. I say that's just as much help."
Jamie and Bex swam near one another. Suddenly, a shark appeared. Instead of fleeing, they got closer, then grabbed its fin, so as it swam faster, they moved faster. They held on, angering the shark, but scaring it more than angering it, until they each spotted a Toucan key. They let go, watched to see that the shark fled, then swam and retrieved the keys.
Autumn kept finding ship wreckage and exploring it in fascination. At one wreckage sight, she actually found a pair of black boots falling apart. She considered swiping them, but when she reached inside, the first, a crab scratched her. She dumped them out, and one of them had a key. She brightened, grabbed her key, and made her way to the surface.
And so they kept exploring, some running into trouble, others finding absolutely nothing. As Madison was swimming, a scared shark swam by her powerfully, knocking her hard against a rock. She didn't break any skin, so the shark kept going. However, she didn't realize that her air supply had been damaged and she was leaking air. She kept swimming, feeling a little light headed after a while, but assumed it was from pressure of the water. Anyway, she spotted a key. She grabbed it, but, just as she grasped it, she realized that she wasn't getting any oxygen. She pushed off the floor, but not nearly hard enough to propel her to the surface and she lost consciousness.
Rufus saw a flash of yellow, finally, and swam to it. He grabbed it and looked up. However, in the distance he saw a body sinking. He checked his air supply, which was still more than half full, so he decided to do the 'right thing.'
Confession Cam:
(Rufus) "I thought, what the heck. It'll only make me more likeable. And, what if it was from my team, which it was, mind you."
Rufus arrived to find Madison. He looked at her oxygen to see it was empty. He pulled her mouthpiece out and replaced it with his for a few seconds as he began to swim up. He kept taking a few breaths and kept it in her mouth most of the time. He struggled, but luckily he worked out a lot and was soon able to break the surface. He looked over at the ship. "Hey," he called out. "I need help out here."
"You can swim back to the boat on your own fine," Christie called out recognizing the voice.
"Yeah, but the cowgirl can't," he yelled. He was struggling to keep her head above water and hold both of their keys. "Her air supply was defective."
Chef jumped overboard with a rescue ring (and of course wearing his air tube) and swam out to where Rufus and Madison were. He grabbed Madison and then tugged on the string, which was then reeled in. Rufus swam behind them. He climbed up and took a few deep breaths as Nessa made sure that Madison was breathing.
"She has a pulse and is breathing on her own," Nessa said. "I don't think she inhaled very much water, if any."
"That's good," Rufus said. He held out the keys.
"Uh, don't you remember, only one key per person," Christie said.
"Madison was holding one when I found her," he said.
They both turned to Chris. "I'll allow it."
Once the time was winding up, the rest of the campers found their way back to the boat. Zak was the last to return, unfortunately without a key. Zak explained why he took so long. "I had to come up in increments so I could adjust to the pressure changes."
"Striking Iguanas, you have seven keys, as Nessa, Walter, Zak, and Russell did not retrieve keys," Chris announced. "And Howling Toucans, you have nine, as only Gail and Eddie failed getting keys. If you look at the water again, you will see four rafts. Two for each team. Your supply crates are in those. You will need to paddle back to the island, which is straight east of us. Manny and Rufus, here are compasses."
"Why does he get the compass?" Todd asked.
"Because he saved a team member from dying, which saves me from being sued," Chris said. "Now, climb into your boats and start paddling."
They each started climbing down the two rope ladders to the rafts. After a few moments and only Rufus had made it into a Toucan raft, Bex rolled her eyes and just jumped over the side of the boat and climbed into a raft. Jamie, Todd, and Ashlynn followed her example, and as soon as they were in, they set their raft off, before the other team could get their first raft out. The Iguanas sent their first boat out when the last of the Toucans was climbing into the second.
The Toucans were off to a better start, but once in their rafts and rowing, the Iguanas worked better as a team and they moved a little faster. Eventually, the Iguanas pulled ahead and they reached shore a whole minute before the Toucans.
Confession Cam:
(Nessa) "Since I was unable to get a key, I paddled like there was now tomorrow. My raft mates kept pace with me, and we pulled ahead of the other raft in no time."
"Okay, everyone, let's get the rafts onto the beach," Manny called out jumping out of his raft so he could pull it onto the beach. Most everyone followed his example, with the exception of Russell.
"Mr. Muggles and I are more sophisticated than that," he said holding his nose high. As soon as the raft was all the way on the shore, he walked off and toward where the grass began and the tents were.
"Get back here," Christie yelled.
"Or what?"
"She's a trained assassin," Phoebe called out. "Plus, you didn't get a key, you didn't paddle, so you are going to help build this boat unless you want to go home right now."
"I'm sure you can win," Russell said.
"We will lose on purpose," Phoebe said, narrowing her eyes and crossing her arms.
Russell made a face, then sighed. "Daddy has to go do some work. Go have fun, but stay in sight." He then walked back to the rest of his team. "Where do we begin?"
"Okay, here's what we need the most," Zak said pulling out a construction blueprint. "Okay, we should have several pieces of wood that are curved. We'll start with that as it'll be the frame."
Everyone opened the boxes and they found the frame pieces. Most of them were working on putting the frame together, but Brooke knew she would be more useful by organizing the equipment into different groups where they would be used and when.
"Okay, everyone, hurry, we're falling behind," Rufus said when they got to shore. Everyone from his boat jumped out and they dragged the raft to shore. Then, each of them grabbed a crate and brought it to their work area.
"We have to find the instructions first," Todd said. He opened one of the crates as the rest of the team opened the others. "Anyone have any blueprints?"
"Nope," Bex replied. "Tools, and sanders, and screws.
"None in here either," Jamie said. "But the sail is cool."
"I've got what looks like will be the mast," Ashlynn said.
"I just have a bunch of wood," Rufus complained. "Where is the other half of our team?" He looked out to see they were still several minutes away from shore. "Hurry up," he yelled. "We're falling behind."
"Calm down, Rufus, we'll work with what we have right now," Todd said.
"Hey, Todd, go flirt with Brooke," Rufus said pointing to the bookworm on the other team standing over the blueprints.
"How's that going to help?" Ashlynn asked.
"Look what she's looking at," Rufus said. "Get a peak in at the instructions, and give us a thumbs up when you see how to build the mast or something. Then we'll yell at you to come back."
Todd frowned. "I'm not going to use Brookworm like that."
"Then I will," Rufus said and began marching forward.
"Hey," Todd caught up to him. "Fine." He took a deep breath and then walked over to Brooke. "Hey Brookworm."
"Hi, Todd," Brooke said looking up and blushing slightly. "Why are you over here?"
"I'm waiting out the argument between Bex and Rufus over who is heading our project," Todd said. He looked down ah the blueprints quickly, then back at her. "You guys seem to be working well together."
"Yeah," she said. "Walter calls himself a tinkerer, so he's always building things, and that really seems to be helping."
Todd got another look at the blueprints and quickly studied the mast piece. He then gave a thumbs up behind his back. "So, Brookworm…"
"What are you doing over there?" Rufus yelled loudly. "How about you try to help your own team."
"I guess they came to some resolution," Todd said apologetically. "Got to go." He then jogged back to his own team. "Okay, here's what we have to do," Todd began and then started explaining.
The mast was finished by the time the rest of the team arrived. "What took you so long?"
"Well, if you didn't notice, you're all stronger than us," Paige said with a deep breath.
"Find the blueprints, we're already falling behind," Todd skipped to the needs of the team.
"How are they so far into their boat?" Gail asked.
"By working as a team," Todd said.
"Found them," Eddie said reaching into a crate almost falling in.
"I can't believe they would be so cruel," Paige said. The boat with Chris and Chef pulled up and Chris jumped onto the dock. Paige marched to him. "Do you know how many trees you had to cut down for this challenge alone? You can make boats with recycled material nowadays."
"Paige," Bex called. "Get back here. We need to all work as hard as we can."
"Um, guys," Brooke said to her team as they were finishing building the boat so that they only needed to sand it down, use the sealant that Chris had provided, and then to the mast. "We have a problem."
"What's that?" Nessa asked.
"We don't have parts for a mast."
"What!"
They checked all their crates, but they were all empty. "Wait, I have an idea," Walter said. "Take the crates apart and fashion a mast with the planks of wood."
"Good idea," Manny said. "Okay, Cristie, Phoebe, Erik, Walter, Russell and I will carefully take apart the crates while the rest of you sand that even."
"Right," everyone said and went to work. Christie pulled out her knife and used it to pull nails out.
"And try not to wreck the nails," Walter said. "We're going to need them."
"Okay, sealant is dry," Zak said after they had painted it on. "Now we need to flip the boat..."
"Got it," the almost silent Vinson said and single-handedly flipped the boat the right way up.
The rest of his team nodded. "Impressive," Christie said. "Ever tried to crush a skull in before?" Vinson shook his head to indicate he hadn't.
The Toucans worked to try to do as well as the Iguanas, only they had trouble making sense of the blueprints, they were all tired or angry, and Jamie had disappeared for a short while and returned reeking of pot and acting a little high.
"We don't have time to sand it. Let's just seal it."
"You can't put sealant on an unsanded surface and expect it to work."
"Let's sand it really quickly."
"Don't sand against the grain."
"I can't believe this, so many dead trees."
"If you don't start to helping, we're going to lose."
"Give me that sander!"
"Hey, get away," Eddie suddenly yelled. Everyone turned to see that Mr. Muggles was scratching, biting, and ripping at their sail.
"Bad doggy," Gail tried to shoo the dog away. It didn't notice she was even there.
"Git here," Madison ran up and picked up the Pomeranian. It started yipping and scratching at her.
"What are you doing to my precious," Russell yelled and ran over. "Give me back my dog."
"Your dog destroyed our sail," Bex said. "Give me that thing, Madison."
"Take it," Madison said handing it over.
"What are you doing?" Russell asked, following. Bex started to run, then threw the dog several feet out into the water.
"Go fetch," she said. "And if it comes to us again, we'll use his skin to patch the rips in our sail."
"Okay, campers," Chris called out walking onto the sand a little while later. "I'm going to make judgment and then it will be time for dinner." He walked over to Iguanas boat. "Very nice, except for the mast. It's very unique."
"We had to make it out of scraps because none of our crates contained a mast," Manny explained.
"Very resourceful," Chris nodded. He then headed over to the other boat. "It looks good…" He tried to pull out the sail so that he could see it extended, except his slight tug caused the mast to fall over and break the boat in half. "Sloppy work."
"Why wasn't the mast nailed to place?" Alex asked.
I told Paige and Jamie to do that," Rufus said.
"We did," Paige said.
"No," Madison said looking at the bottom of the mast, "ya'll nailed them straight into the mast. Ya'lls was supposed to nail at an angle."
"I did nail at an angle," Jamie said. "I swear."
"Yeah, up," Autumn said.
"Well, our winner is obvious," Chris said. "Congratulation Striking Iguanas. Now, we've added a twist. I will pick one person from the winning team, and that person will choose someone from the losing team to give immunity to. This challenge, I choose Brooke. Pick a member of the other team to save tonight at the campfire ceremony."
Brooke looked over the team, then smiled. "I choose Todd."
"Okay, Todd, you're immune tonight," Chris said. "And now onto dinner. The campfire ceremony will take place in two hours, so make sure you cast your votes on who you want to send home, Toucans."
"Great going, guys," Rufus growled. "We just lost the first challenge when we had a clear lead after the first part."
Wow... right? Okay, If you're character is on the Iguanas, you're safe, and you don't get a vote this time. Toucans, however, I want you to put yourself into the mindset of your character (think of their personality, who they get along with, who they don't, etc.) and select one of "your teammates" to vote off. Send me your vote in a PM (don't forget to write down your character's name). If you put your vote in the review, I will not accept that as your vote and I'll choose who your character votes off instead.
Okay, just a recap of what characters did what:
Todd: Immune (so don't try to vote him off)
Rufus: hid 4 keys from Iguanas, got a Toucan key, saved Madison's life, suggested Todd flirt with Brooke to get a look at the blueprints while half the team was still paddling in.
Madison: got key, almost died because of broken air tank, Actually stopped Mr. Muggles from destroying their sail completely, helped push Rufus overboard so that he would participate
Bex: Got key, jumped overboard first (giving others the idea), tried to keep people on task, started the whole 'push Rufus overboard', tossed Mr. Muggles into water and threatened Russell to keep the dog away.
Gail: did not retrieve key, tried to 'shoo' Mr. Muggles away
Eddie: did not get key, found blueprints, noticed Mr. Muggles destroying their sail, was surrounded by jellyfish for a long time
Paige: got key, complained about the death of the trees because of the wood used for the boats, incorrectly nailed down the mast.
Ashlynn: Got key, jumped overboard to get to raft faster
Alex: got key, freed Eddie from jellyfish, helped push Rufus overboard
Autumn: got key,
Jamie: got key, took pot break during the challenge, jumped overboard to get to raft faster, incorrectly nailed mast down
Don't forget, PM me if you are voting someone off. Also, challenges are still needed, but I also want everyone to create a character close to your character (sibling, friend, within 3 years of your characters age) for a future challenge. TheVinceKid, please feel free to PM me the challenges you have.
