It was a few hours after Izzy and her crew had cleaned up the mess left over by Sadie, and the commotion had all died down. The campers had gone back to the cabins, and Chris himself was standing on the beach staring off into space.
"So," a voice behind him said, "can we go?"
Chris spun around, and saw Noah, Josh and Justin standing behind him.
"Oh, it's you guys," Chris sighed, "yeah… yeah, whatever. You can leave. I already have enough footage of you guys from what happened here today."
"Thank god," Noah said, "I was worried we'd be forced to stay here."
"Yeah, I'm not keen on spending more time here than I have to," Josh said, "especially since last time you almost-"
"Don't remind me," Noah hissed.
"Look," Chris said, "you better just say your goodbyes to everyone and then get going. I have planning to do."
"Right," Josh said, "we'll be out of your hair in no time, don't worry."
The three made their way to the cabins, where the rest of the campers were already settled in and getting ready to go to sleep. DJ, who was awake and watching the stars, greeted them.
"Hey guys," he said, "what's happening?"
"Just getting ready to leave," Josh explained, "we wanted to say goodbye first."
DJ smiled, and got to his feet.
"Well, it was nice seeing you guys again," DJ said, shaking their hands, "I hope you do well for yourselves."
"You too DJ," Justin smiled.
DJ led the trio into the boy's cabins, and the veterans began to exchange goodbyes. Cody in particular was saddened by the departure.
"You sure you guys can't stay longer?" he asked.
"Yeah, we really need to be getting back," Justin said, "but we'll hang, alright? Give me a buzz when the season's over and we'll meet or something.""
"Alright," Cody shrugged.
"Good luck," Justin smiled, "try to make it to the finals again, okay? Maybe you can win this time."
"I'll do my best," Cody grinned.
"Well, goodbye everyone," Justin said aloud, "it's been nice seeing you all again."
Everyone murmured their goodbyes, and the trio turned to the door, where Alejandro was standing by. Justin opened his mouth to say something, but Al cut him off.
"Getting ready for a lecture, I suppose?" Alejandro asked, "No need. I have thought about it, and I have mended my ways. No manipulation this season."
Justin thought a moment, then said, "You really mean that?"
Alejandro sighed, then held out his hand.
"You have my word," he promised.
Justin glared at Alejandro.
"C'mon, let's just go," Noah said.
Justin looked as if he were about to leave, then finally turned and grasped Alejandro's hand.
"Look," Justin said, "I'm willing to give you a second chance, but I'm not in this season, so frankly that doesn't count for anything. It's these other guys you have to worry about."
"Actually," Alejandro said, smiling slightly, "it… means more than you may think. Thank you."
~o.0.o~
Roughly half an hour later, Josh, Justin and Noah were on their way home, leaving the competitors behind. It was getting very late, and everyone was in bed- except for Gwen.
Gwen , who had for been trying to sleep for quite sometime, was now getting dressed, and heading out of the cabin.
"Hey," Courtney yawned, "Gwen, are you alright?"
"Yeah, fine," Gwen sighed, "I just…. I don't know, I just can't sleep."
"You sure you're okay?" Courtney asked,
"Yeah, no, I'll be fine," Gwen said, "I just need to go for a walk, tire myself out a bit, that's all."
"Okay," Courtney nodded, "be careful out there."
Gwen nodded, and opened the door…. Only to find herself unable to go outside. She merely stood there, gazing into the darkness- and unable to shake the feeling something was staring back. After a few minutes, Gwen quickly shut the door, and took a few steps back.
"I thought you were going for a walk?" Courtney asked.
"Ch…change of plans," Gwen gulped, "Can't… can't go out there."
"Gwen, you're starting to scare me," Courtney said, "what's wrong?"
"Nothing, nothing!" Gwen stammered, "I just… need to sleep."
Much to Courtney's confusion, Gwen rushed over, and literally leapt into bed. Courtney shrugged it off, and went back to sleeping.
It was hours before Gwen started to drift off. Just when she finally thought she was going to be able to sleep, she had- well, a nightmare would be inaccurate, especially since she wasn't even sleeping. No, she had sort of… mental flashes. Images flew into her head, images she couldn't control. Thoughts of burning buildings, screaming people, a destroyed laboratory, the list went on. Gwen clamped her hands over her eyes, and tried to block everything out.
Gwen would spend the rest of the night wide awake, tormented by those retched images.
~o.0.o~
Three days later, and the contestants were scurrying about, performing various tasks around camp. Some were gathering food, some were starting a fire, some were cooking, and some were just enjoying a little free time.
Vevo was dancing around to music in the boy's cabin when there was a knock at the door. His face flushed a deep scarlet, and he cleared his throat.
"Yeah?" he called out, "Who-"
Ezekiel poked his head through the door.
"Eva says to wait five minutes, then meet us in the woods north of here," he said.
"Right," Vevo nodded, "now get the fuck out!"
Ezekiel muttered something, then slammed the door behind him.
Vevo did, however, wait as he had been instructed. He and Eva both agreed that they should NEVER, under ANY circumstance be seen together publicly. They knew too well that it would raise suspicions, and that was something that they could not afford at this stage of their plans, which had been going well.
It seemed the two worked well together. Eva heard Vevo's proposal of dooming the cast to starvation, then swooping in to save the day… for a price. Eva had one suggestion, however- they needed someone to pin the initial fires on. That way, they had someone to take the initial fall and lower everyone's guard. Then, instead of demanding obedience, they could merely present the food as a trade, and try to act the part as some sort of merchants. Vevo agreed quickly, and they began to formulate who would make a good scapegoat. Luckily for everyone else, they weren't able to think of anyone thus far.
After the five minutes were over, Vevo exited the cabin, then made his way into the wilds. After working his way through the trees for a while, Vevo finally found the two.
"There you are," Vevo scoffed, "so what's so important you had to drag me away from-"
He was interrupted when Eva tossed something large at his chest. Vevo staggered backward, but managed to catch the item in his hands.
"what hell-" Vevo began.
"Shut up and look," Eva demanded.
Vevo shook his head, and looked down at his hands.
"Wait a second," he said, "is this…?"
"Yup," Eva smirked.
Vevo grinned, and held up the object Eva had thrown- one of Chris' treasure chests.
"Eva, you just made my day," Vevo smiled.
"This is AWESOME!" Ezekiel agreed, "What are we gonna do with it, huh?"
"Shut the hell up and let me think," Vevo said, "look, this is a good shield in case anything backfires, but it has plenty of uses before then. We can't be too rash."
"Agreed," Eva nodded, "so give it back to me, and-"
"Woah woah, give it to YOU?" Vevo demanded.
"Yes," Eva snapped, "I'M the one who found it."
"I was the one who found it!" Ezekiel cried.
"Oh, shut up," Eva snapped, "no one cares about you. I'm serious, though, Vevo. You better hand that to me, or-"
"Whatever, fine," Vevo said, tossing it to her, "not like we can keep it in the cabins, anyway. We need a place to hide it. Somewhere we have quick and easy access to, but will be hard to find for anyone else."
"Yeah yeah, I'll figure something out," Eva said, gripping the box tightly, "you don't need to worry about it."
Back at camp, Gwen and Cody were sitting by a fire, talking.
"You sure you're okay?" Cody asked, "You just seem really… weird lately."
"Not much sleep," Gwen murmured, "the… dreams. Haven't you had the dreams?"
"No, what… what dreams?" Cody asked.
"I don't know," Gwen shrugged, "it's… it's like… I'm in this room, and everything is red. Then he shows up, and… everything just… goes away."
"Who's 'he'?" Cody asked.
"I dunno," Gwen shrugged.
"Look, I'm starting to worry about you," Cody said, "I really hate to say this… but maybe you should leave the game."
"What?" Gwen demanded. She was shocked- how could her friend suggest something like this?
"Look, you're going through a rough patch, is all I'm saying," Cody gulped, "I'm just saying- if this keeps up, maybe you should consider going home. I know a lot is riding on this, but it won't be worth it if you-"
"I'l be fine," Gwen snapped, "listen Cody, I-"
"Breakfast is ready!" DJ announced, dropping a plate of fried snails in front of them.
"Sorry," DJ frowned, "might not be your thing, but this is all we could find today. I seasoned 'em up best I could though. Wonder if Johnny would help us out- anyway, enjoy!"
"Thanks, DJ," Cody smiled, "smells great."
"Look," Gwen said, "I don't want to talk about this anymore, okay? I'm staying in the game, and that's FINAL."
"Alright, alright," Cody said, "look, I'm sorry if I offended you, I just don't want you to get hurt doing this."
"Whatever," Gwen muttered, "just leave me alone for a while, alright?"
~o.0.o~
A few hours passed, and it was time for Chris to gather everyone up and explain the day's challenge.
"Alright guys," he said, "here's the deal. For today's challenge, you're going to do a little spelunking. There's a nearby cavern I want you to dive down into. Once you're at the very bottom, you'll need to navigate to the end of the caverns, where you'll find a blue flag. The first team to get that blue flag back to me wins immunity from tonight's elimination."
"Oh, great," Duncan muttered, "you know, I really hate these cave challenges."
"I know you do," Chris smiled, "I know you do. Well, if you follow me, I'll lead you to your safety gear, and you can get started with the challenge."
Chris brought everyone to the mouth of a cave, where he had lots of rock climbing gear waiting around.
"Alright, cool," Miri smiled, "how do we get it set up?"
"Beats the hell outta me," Chris shrugged, "but I'm sure you guys'll figure it out!"
The contestants groaned, and set to work.
After a while, the Legion had finished setting up.
"Okay, I think that should be good," Miri said.
"You think so?" Johnny frowned, "I kinda thought we were all winging it."
"We were," Miri assured him, "but this should be fine. That, or we all die. Interesting experiment, right?"
"Not really," Johnny said.
"Let's just go," Quinn said, "if we're all going to die, we might as well just get it over with."
With that, the Legion began their descent. A descent that was quicker for some than others. After going down a few feet, Veronica's chord snapped, sending her plummeting into the darkness below.
"HELLLLPPPPPP!" she cried.
"Veronica!" Sunny exclaimed, "I'm coming, don't you worry!"
Sunny scrambled to… to do something. She really had no idea what TO do, as she had never BEEN rock climbing before. She managed to loosen her harness just enough, however, to send her sliding down the rope.
"Son of a BITCH!" Lucky exclaimed, "What do we do?"
"We just keep going down," Lance exclaimed, "we try to head after them. But we gotta do it slowly, no sense injuring ourselves."
At that exact moment, (probably to spite Lance), Quinn hurdled into the darkness below at an incredibly high speed.
"Did she just-" Lance asked.
"Yeah," Johnny said, "yeah she did."
"Doesn't matter," Lucky said, beginning to make his way down, "so long as these ropes hold up-"
SNAP!
And then it was Lucky's turn to fall downward.
"Wow," Vevo laughed, "he is NOT good at living up to his name. Why don't you mark that down for your little 'experiment', Miri?"
"Ridiculous," Miri scoffed, "irony not a factor. Of course… going INTO a test with an already expected outcome has the ability to change the result of the test itself. If Lucky's life was a metaphor for a test, and his name an expected outcome-"
"Uh, HELLO?" Lance interrupted, "We've got four possibly injured people! We need to go help them!"
"You're right, sorry," Miri agreed, "let's get going. Maybe we can make up for lost time before the Ronin-"
Almost predictably, the Ronin began to climb down the other side of the cave. Their safety gear was fashioned expertly, and they made their way down at a smooth, steady pace.
"Today is just not out day," Lance sighed.
Meanwhile, at the bottom of the cavern, the four teens were beginning to get their bearings.
"Oww," Sunny groaned, "I think I have ropeburn!"
"Quit complaining," Quinn yawned, "you'll be fine. It'll clear up eventually."
"I… I think I broke my arm," Lucky choked out.
"Let me see," Quinn muttered. She walked over to Lucky, and examined him closely. "No, I think it's just dislocated."
"You sure?" Lucky groaned.
"No," Quinn shrugged, "here, let's try this."
With that, Quinn grabbed Lucky's arm, and a minute later, he let out a yell.
"Yeah, it was dislocated," Quinn smirked, "you should still probably avoid using it for a while, though."
"God DAMN it!" Lucky shouted, "Gee, thanks for the heads up, you FINK!"
"Aww, I'm sorry," Quinn smirked, "want me to kiss it and make it better?"
"Oi!" Sunny snapped, "Aren't we forgetting something? Veronica's still here somewhere, you know!"
"Crap," Lucky groaned, "you've got a flashlight, right?"
"Yeah," Sunny nodded, "at least Chris had the decency to give us that."
Sunny turned on the flashlight, and shined it around the room.
"Where IS she?" Sunny asked.
"Over there!" Quinn said, pointing to a nearby rock.
Sunny shined her light, and saw Veronica was indeed slumped against it. Sunny couldn't be sure, but it looked like she had hit her head on the way down.
"No," Sunny groaned, "Veronica, no!"
"Oh baby," Lucky frowned, "ain't that a kick in the head."
~o.0.o~
A few minutes later, and all of the contestants, Ronin and Legion alike, had reached the bottom of the cave.
Johnny made his way over to his four comrades, a worried look on his face.
"You four all right?" he asked, "Anyone hurt?"
"We're fine," Sunny mumbled, "but Veronica… she's been acting… odd."
Johnny turned to see what Sunny was talking about, and was temporarily taken aback. Veronica was laying on the ground, staring at the ceiling, a wide grin on her face.
"Well that's creepy as hell," Lance muttered.
"She's been like this the whole time," Quinn shrugged, "creepy, but at least she shut the fuck up."
Of course, what they didn't know was WHY Veronica was smiling. It was because she was no longer in a cave- at least, not in her mind- she was in a beautiful meadow with all of her pony friends.
"C'mon, Veronica!" Autumn Twilight, a nearby unicorn said to her, "We need to harness the power of love and friendship to cast down the evil Chris-a-tron!"
"Right!" Veronica nodded, "He can't be allowed to bring his dark shadowy shadows of shadowness to the super happy fun meadow!"
Veronica withdrew her sword from it's holster, and thrust it into the air.
"I HAVE THE MAGICCCC!" She shouted.
Her teammates watched all of this with a confused glance.
"Um," Tyler frowned, "what… what is she doing?"
Sunny shrugged, and watched as Veronica danced around the room, swinging a stick in the air. She then suddenly shouted, "FOR FRIENDSHIP!" And charged off into a nearby cavern.
"Damn it!" Quinn exclaimed, "Somebody get her before she can go any further!"
As the Legion charged after Veronica, the Ronin watched in amusement.
"Well, I do believe this challenge just got easier," Alejandro smiled, "vamos."
"Wait," Cody said, "but even WE don't know where we're going. There are multiple paths here, which one do we take?"
"He's right," DJ groaned, "there ARE a few paths we could take. How are we supposed to decide?"
"That's easy," Eva scoffed, "we just go this way."
"What makes you say that?" DJ asked.
"Well, we have to go SOMEWHERE," Eva scoffed, storming off into one of the caverns, "you gonna follow me or not?"
The Ronin hesitated a moment, then grudgingly followed after her. It took a while, but eventually they began to hear things as they made their way through the tunnel.
"Hey, do you guys hear that?" Courtney asked, "It sounds like rushing water!"
"It IS running water!" Duncan pointed out, "look, just up ahead!"
Duncan pointed to a small stream of water leading away from the competitors.
"Do you think that could take us to the exit?" Harold asked.
"Worth a shot," Duncan shrugged, "come on, guys."
Meanwhile, The Legion was still attempting to catch Veronica.
"Damn it, where'd she go?" Vevo scowled, "And how did she manage to lose all of us?"
"Don't worry about it," Johnny said, "she can't be far from here. We just need to keep going a little further, and-"
"HA!" Veronica shouted, leaping in front of the contestants, "I've got you cornered now!"
"Oh, thank god, we found her," Lance said, "alright everybody, let's get moving-"
Veronica swung a large branch, catching Lance straight in the knee.
"Ow!" he exclaimed, "What the-"
"Your plans end here!" Veronica shouted, "Using the power of-"
"This is getting ridiculous," Quinn scoffed. With that, she waled over, and interrupted Veronica's speech with a hard backhand.
"What the- OW!" Veronica exclaimed, "Quinn, why would you do something like that?"
"You were acting like a freak," Vevo snapped.
"What're you talking about?" Veronica asked, "actually, where ARE we?"
"Someone wanna fill her in?" Lance sighed.
"I will," Sunny sighed.
Sunny turned to Veronica, and explained all of the events that had led them to their current location.
"But that's- I don't remember any of that!" Veronica exclaimed, "Honestly!"
"I know, sweetie," Sunny smiled, "but you might want to lay low for a little while."
"Maybe you're right," Veronica gulped.
"So where do we go now?" Miri asked, "I mean, now that we're all the way down here, it would take too much time to go back…"
"So we go forward," Lance shrugged.
~o.0.o~
About an hour later, and the Ronin emerged outside, greeted by the bright sunlight.
"Finally!" DJ smiled, "About time we got out of there!"
"And look! There's the flag!" Cody cheered.
The geek grabbed the nearby flag, and turned to his teammates.
"C'mon, we better go get this to Chris," Cody said, "let's hurry!"
~o.0.o~
Chris was relaxing on the beach when the Ronin approached him.
"Chris!" Cody panted, "We have the flag!"
"huh?" Chris frowned, "Flag? Oh, right, the flag! Well, um, good work. I declare the Ronin officially immune from tonight's elimination!"
The Ronin cheered, and Chris held up a hand.
"Now, we just have to wait for the Legion to show up," Chris explained.
It took a while, but the Legion eventually did arrive.
"Looks like you guys are back on the chopping block," Chris announced.
"Thanks for that, Veronica," Quinn scowled.
Veronica's face turned red, but she said nothing.
"I'll give you guys a while to think it over," Chris said, "elimination in one hour."
CONFESSIONAL: Lucky
So, is Veronica going home? I doubt it. Sunny made me a sling for my arm, but until it's healed I'm pretty well useless. I don't foresee myself sticking around all that long.
END CONFESSIONAL
It was time for the elimination ceremony, and Chris had everyone gathered around.
"Okay," he said, "if I call your name and throw you a marshmallow, blah blah blah, you know the drill. First marshmallow goes to…
Sunny.
Quinn.
Tyler.
Lance.
Johnny.
Aria.
Vevo, and…
Miri.
Lucky and Veronica, it's down to you two. One of you is going home tonight. One of you basically blew the challenge for your team, and the other is a cripple. So, the final marshmallow goes to…
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All of a sudden, Aria got to her feet, and stared at Chris.
"Final marshmallow goes to… goes to…" he murmured. Chris shook his head, and frowned.
"Huh," he thought, "you know, I get the feeling we need to do a recount."
"What?" Quinn demanded, "Will you hurry it up already?"
"Sorry, I made a mistake," Chris called out groggily, "the real person going home tonight is:
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"ARIA! The boat of losers awaits!"
"Wait a second," Miri pointed out, "that doesn't make sense- how could SHE be the one going home-"
"My time is over," Aria said, "it cannot be stopped. You have no need of me anymore."
"Ummm…. What are you talking about?" Lance asked.
"Tread carefully," Aria warned, "and whatever you do, avoid His call."
With that, Aria turned and walked away from the stage, almost vanishing into the darkness.
"Well, that was unsettling," Johnny frowned.
Chris shook his head, and cleared his throat.
"Anyway," he said, "There you have it folks! Aria, the island's latest reject! Tune in to see who goes home next time on
CAMP TV:
SPECTER ISLANDS!"