A week into the camp, and Annie Bennet had managed to become acquainted with all five other roomies in her hut, and had even befriended two of them (the two that had shut up about her accent the quickest). Isabella Santos from Placedo, TX, and Michelle Daniels from Ellisville, IN, seemed to hang onto every word she said about life in London and the UK. Whilst she did often ask about their home states, the conversation more often than not turned to British entertainment, UK schools, and the history of Britain, and Annie was only too happy to satisfy her friends' appetite to hear about these things (she could after all talk about medieval Britain all day – it was one of her favourite topics in history lessons).
Charlie Darcy had had similar success with befriending the inhabitants of hut 60; the attraction for the others of having a rich friend had been offset by the snobby and stand off-ish first impression people often made about the young San Franciscan. She had always been told by aunt Gigi that she was incredibly like her father in temperament (and heart), and her aunt would go quiet for a good minute or so whenever she mentioned this, and how it can affect first impressions. Charlie had on numerous occasions asked what was wrong, but Gigi had always brushed it off and bounced away. Charlie too had managed to become adequately acquainted with all her hut, and become close with two of them; Hannah Sparks from Enterprise, AL, and Jessy Powell from Portland, OR. They were two very friendly girls. Two very friendly girls who were, whilst perfectly sincere in their admiration for their new buddy, were also certainly willing to be indulged in hearing about the latest tech news, and having the latest apps shared with them (illegally - probably).
It was in the middle of one morning after the first week had passed, that hut 60 went down to the edge of the forest (after sharing another app) to try their hand at paintballing.
"Okay, okay. Hut 59, it looks like you've got yourselves some opponents." Ms Kulp (Junior) bellowed to Annie and her roomates, who were already kitted up. She turned to address the approaching girls. "Am I right, ladies?"
"Indeed you are." Hannah replied.
"Well that's great. All six of you? Fantastic. Equal numbers then. Now, we're going to have a game of catch the flag. Do you guys know how this works?" She was met with a few shakes of heads, though two emphatic nods from Annie and Charlie. "Let me explain then. The playing arena, which is in the forest here, is split into two territories. One for each team. Each team has a flag which is placed at the back of their territory. Your team's job is to collect the other team's flag and take it back to your territory before the other team does the same to your flag. If however, you're not careful, you can be tagged in the other team's territory. If that happens, you have to be freed by a teammate touching you. You can get tagged by being shot. Is that clear?"
By now, the shaking heads had turned into nodding, and Annie and Charlie, who were now both kitted out, were wearing confident smiles behind their face masks.
"That's fantastic, girls. Now, Annie Bennet from hut 59 has generously donated a red bowtie to be her team's flag. Hut 60, I need flag from you. Can't be too big, or too camouflaged in colour. Something quite bright and light to carry."
The girls rummaged round their bags that they'd brought with them. Nothing seemed to spring out to them as fitting that description very well, until Charlie let out a large sigh and reached much further into her rucksack.
"Would this do, Ms Kulp?" She groaned, pulling out a navy blue and white plaid shirt.
"Perfect." The young woman murmured, pondering on how both of these girls had pulled out two such strange items of clothing from their bags, and what they were doing there.
She proceeded to walk round the edge of the forest before ducking in to place the plaid shirt in its position at the back of hut 60's territory. "Now, hut 59 you'll start in line with this tree here," she pointed to a tree on the edge of the forest near to them with a yellow line marked on it, "and hut 60, you need to walk all the way down there and start in line with the tree on the edge of the forest with the red line on it. The edge of the territories is marked in the forest with a long white line sprayed onto the ground. If there's an emergency in the game, then repeatedly blow your whistle. Anyone found to be blowing their whistle unnecessarily will automatically lose the game for their team. Otherwise, I and a number of other camp staff will be standing at the halfway point. I will blow this airhorn in five minutes exactly to start the game, so go on hut 60. Get moving!" With that, she ushered off the girls.
"Right, I think we should split up into pairs." Annie began. "Two pairs go into the enemy territory to get the plaid shirt, and the remaining two people patrol our territory and tag them if they come over." She saw the others nod along. That was enough support to enable her to continue. "We go in pairs across the line so that there's someone to unstick anyone who gets shot, and to shoot anyone in defense if someone's shooting them."
"But we can't tag people if they're in their own territory." Isabella declared.
"No, but we can stop them trying to tag us if we just shoot them right back, yes?" They nodded along again. "Now, I think I'll go over the line with Michelle. Isabella you can go over with Jade, and Tori and Ashley can patrol our territory. Does that sound ok?" The nods were more emphatic this time, as they paired up and stood in line ready to start.
The airhorn went, and Annie charged forward with Michelle; both trying to navigate through the trees, bushes, and undergrowth whilst keeping a scanning eye out for any opponents or the half way mark that would signal that they were in enemy territory. Eventually they found the white line across the ground and spotted a member of camp staff patrolling the line. As they entered into hut 60's territory, their paced dropped down to a slow and hesitant walk; careful to hide behind trees and make as little noise as possible when there was even the slightest rustle from nearby.
"What's that over there?" Annie whispered to Michelle as she pointed to something that looked white and blue.
"It looks like it's staying still, so it's probably not them."
"You're right." Annie began to creep forward a bit faster. "We've got to be quick. Smooth and quiet, but quick."
Michelle started to scan around for enemies a lot quicker now, as they got close enough to be able to confirm that this was the plaid shirt they'd spotted. As they got even closer, it became clear that it would require someone with a bit more height than Michelle to retrieve this shirt, as it was hanging from a tall branch. Luckily, Annie was remarkably tall for her age, as she often pointed out to other people. It took a couple of jumps for her to grab it, and as soon as she had it firmly within her grasp, she sped off back the way they came, without much thought for her partner, who was slower.
"Michelle, there's the line, only a few hundred feet away. We've almost made it!" She muttered to her friend. When she heard no reply, she looked round, finding nothing but the usual trees and wildlife. "Michelle?" She spoke again as something hard collided with her left shoulder. She looked down at the dollop of paint. Yep, she was hit.
"Tag. You're it!" Charlie emerged from behind a bush; a red line on her mask to signify her team, and a cheesy nametag. "Oh, but where's your partner you've been buddying with?"
"You tagged her, didn't you?" Annie replied bitterly.
"Yeah, I did." She admitted. "If you run back now you may be able to find her and untag her oh! But you can't can you? Because you're tagged now.
"How the hell did you find us?
"Well you were pretty easy to find." She snatched the plaid shirt from the other girl's hand.
"No we weren't! We weren't going very fast or carelessly."
"No, but you were easy to find with Illuminate Me." Charlie pulled down her left cuff to reveal a smartwatch.
"Illuminate Me…so is that some kind of app then?" Annie could feel her face turning red. It was a good thing the mask wasn't giving anything away.
"Yeah. My dad's company developed it. It lets you geotag videos, photos, music, messages and general vibration alerts, and of course I've shared it with my roomies' phones."
"So you've been sending information about my team's location to each other, and you get some kind of alert whenever they get near to a sighting?"
"Yeah, you're pretty good at this!"
"My mum works in digital media too." Anger started to rise in Annie's voice. "That's cheating!"
"She said nothing about using technology in the rules."
At that moment, cheers began to erupt from behind them, before the airhorn blew again and a voice in a megaphone cried out,
"Hut 60 crosses the line with the bowtie and wins! Everybody back to the edge of the forest."
As Charlie began to walk off with a swagger in her step (which might have been partly down to the bulky protective clothing), Annie stood there watching in silence. There was nothing more irritating and anger-inducing to her than cocky, rich Americans using their privilege to get ahead. On top of that, this American had gone and wounded her pride. She couldn't simply laugh it off now. No way. This was going to get serious.
Eventually Annie made it out of the forest and back to the rest of the group. They began to take off the protective gear, as Ms Kulp Jr encouraged them all to shake hands with one another. This happened without too much of a problem, until an unmasked Charlie came to shake hands with Annie, who had her back turned to her and still had her mask on.
"Annie, shake hands with Charlie. C'mon." Ms Kulp demanded.
With a huge humph, Annie removed her mask and turned round to see Charlie's face; only to be greeted with what she swore for the first eleven years of her life was her face. Her face alone.