Please accept my apologies for the amount of time this chapter has taken me to finish. I intended to finish it during the summer, but experienced a lot of emotional stress to the point where I was unable to write most days.
Here's hoping the rest of the chapters won't take quite so long to write.
Screaming Gophers: Dawn, Alejandro, Noah, Cody, Trent, Zoey, Jo
Killer Bass: Duncan, LeShawna, Geoff, Gwen, Heather, DJ
Thrashing Bears: Sadie, Cameron, Courtney, Scott, Lightning, Izzy, Bridgette, Mike
"Last time on Total Drama Island, things started to heat up in the kitchen: Courtney, Bridgette, Zoey and Gwen tried to figure out the identity of the mystery poet. Scott got a little squirmy when Sadie and Mike teamed up together, and the chemistry got explosive when Izzy kissed Cameron, which was no doubt a terrifying experience. The tension between the teams was running high, culminating in a food fight of epic proportions with more friendly fire when Beth got inspired to turn on their queen of mean Head Chef, Heather. Man, I love these kids. In the end it was bye-bye Beth, after her teammates found out she took a cursed idol from Boney Island. Will Beth's elimination mark the end of the Bass' losing streak, or does the curse still linger? Find out today on Total Drama Island!"
Cue theme song.
"Today's breakfast is French-Hawaiian-Italian fusion casserole!" Chef announced to the teens, dropping a scoop of slop onto a plate. And then with a satisfied chuckle, he added. "With a little extra something."
"So, like, leftovers from the cooking challenge?" Sadie asked as she took the offered plate of food.
"Yeah! You got a problem with that?" Chef demanded, raising his voice.
"S-sir, no, sir!" Sadie responded, saluting the ex-soldier with an almost trembling hand.
Moving to the table where her teammates were seated, Sadie's foot caught on a loose floorboard and Gophers member Noah ended up wearing the vast majority of what had been on her plate.
"Oh goody. Just what I needed." The bookworm muttered.
"Oh my gosh! I'm, like, so sorry!" Sadie said, clapping her hands over her mouth.
"Now I'll have to go all the way to the cabins to change." He said, sighing. "As if I didn't already have enough physically exerting things that I don't want to do."
"Is there anything that isn't too much effort for you?" Jo retorted, rolling her eyes.
"Yes," He didn't miss a beat. "Reading."
"Deadweight."
"Cutthroat."
"You say that like it's a bad thing."
"My mistake, I thought it was." He couldn't fight a yawn.
"What? Just thinking about walking exhausts you?" Jo snorted. "Pathetic."
So when Jo yawned immediately after, Noah smirked. "So what's your excuse?"
Glancing around with increasingly heavy eyelids, Noah realized that at least half of the other campers in the room were slumped over in their seats, unconscious, and the other half looked like they were almost there. Lowering his increasingly heavy head against the table to save energy, he opened his mouth to warn those of his teammates that were still awake.
But then he was out too.
"Good morning campers." Chris's voice was hardly the first thing she wanted to hear in the morning. Especially when he sounded so damn pleased with himself.
"Ugh." The queen bee said, sitting up groggily and rubbing her eyes. Regarding her surroundings, she clenched her fists. "What the hell! Chris!"
"We thought you might enjoy this challenge, Duncan. Remind you of your home away from home, ya know?" Chris's sadistic voice crackled over a nearby loudspeaker.
"Aww, man." Duncan said, leaning on part of the cage to test the stability and strength. It didn't budge. "This bites."
"Remind you of mistakes you wish you hadn't made?" Courtney asked softly, offering a reassuring smile.
"Mistakes? Yeah, mistakes like getting caught." he said, smirking as her smile evaporated.
"Couldda guessed that'd be the only regret you have." LeShawna said.
"Who said I don't have more regrets?" he cast an annoyed look at the girl in the second enclosure. "I mean, I regret the fact that you're still here."
"You feeling all macho and brave now that you've got six feet and two cages separating us, tough guy?"
"I call this challenge 'the jailbreak'. Your objective is to escape these cages and be the first team back to camp. So yeah, go forth and conquer or whatever." The loudspeaker crackled, and then went silent.
Cameron knelt down and scraped up a handful of sand, letting it run through his fingers. "We could probably dig our way – Izzy, what are you doing?"
"Escaping." She replied. Or at least, that's what he thought she said. It was hard to decipher her words, since she was gnawing on the bars of their enclosure and hadn't even paused to speak.
"Oh no, no, no, no, no." Bridgette said, pulling at the bars of her cage desperately with trembling hands. Taking a deep breath, she called out as loudly as she could. "Hello! Anybody! Is there anybody out there?"
There was no response.
She was alone. Alone in the woods. In a cage. Alone in a cage in the middle of the woods.
Could this day possibly get any worse?
"Just when I thought this day couldn't get any better," Noah said, regarding the now-dried food stuck to his shirt as he sat against the bars of the enclosure.
"It is a pretty sweet day out today." Geoff agreed before throwing his weight against the bars of the enclosure, but not making any progress in terms of escape.
"That was sarcasm."
"Oh." Geoff said, pausing for a moment to regard the other boy. "Bummer."
"Well this sucks." Gwen said monotonously, laying on her back and staring up at the top of the enclosure.
"You could help, Goth Ball." Jo snapped, winding up and aiming a well-placed kick at the bamboo bars, but finding it was still fairly solid.
"I'll get right on that." Gwen said, rolling her eyes.
"And here I thought the laziest person in this game was on my team." Jo retorted. "Who are you – Noah?"
"You sure know how to motivate people, don't you?" Gwen quipped, glaring at the jock-ette.
"Between the three of us, we should be able to figure a way out pretty easily." DJ said quickly, interrupting in an attempt to diffuse the tension between the two women.
Gwen sat up with a sigh and shrugged. "I guess."
"Ugh. Stupid jerk." Heather said, wrapping her arms around herself as she shivered. She was both assuming and hoping that her blanket was still in the mess hall.
"Echinacea?" Dawn asked, holding her hand out to the queen bee.
"You think you're so funny," she snapped. "You're not."
"The juice of the Echinacea flower is said to help cure colds."
"So, what? You want me to eat some random leaves you found in the woods?" Heather made no attempt to hide her disgust nor to bridle her contempt. "No thank you."
"Sha-OW!" He exclaimed as he slammed against the bamboo bars for a third time in under two minutes.
"I don't think this is going to work." Zoey told the jock. "We've got to think and figure out another way to get out of here."
"Lightning's not so good at thinking." The jock said, backing up so he could get a bit of a run at it before he slammed against the bars again.
"I'm sure you could be, if you tried." Zoey said optimistically, but the jock just sprinted the few feet and slammed into the enclosure wall once again.
It looked like she was going to have to figure a way out on her own.
"I wish Eva or Katie or B were here." Sadie said with a dejected sigh. "They'd be able to figure out how to get us out in, like, no time."
"If Dakota were here, she'd be able to call for help." Cody responded, sighing too.
"Dakota is, like, super skinny. If she were here, she'd probably be able to fit through the bars and save us from the outside."
They'd already inspected every part of the enclosure, looking for possible weaknesses and come up with nothing. The cage was made entirely of thick bamboo poles and metal bindings, giving them squares of open space that were just under a foot in diameter – big, but not big enough for anyone but a young child to squeeze through.
They were going to have to think of another way to escape.
He really was not in shape. His biceps were already aching and the hole he'd been digging in the sand with two pieces of flat rock he'd found was only about a foot deep. The rock had only been one piece when he'd found it, but had split in half the moment he tried hacking away at the bamboo bars, so he'd taken to digging instead.
"Caahh, hi he hhkknnn." Izzy said, still attempting to chew her way out.
"Pardon?" Cameron asked, staring at the redhead with a bewildered expression behind his bottle-bottom glasses.
She pulled back from the bars for a moment and spat out a mouthful of bamboo chips.
"I don't know how pandas eat this stuff." She said. "You know, pandas didn't used to eat bamboo. When they roamed wild in Canada and the United States, they were ferocious carnivores. But after their prey, the American Bison almost went extinct in the 1980's, they all migrated to China and started eating bamboo."
"Uh, Izzy, pandas have livedon bamboo diets for millions of years."
"Haha, you would think, right?"
"This is probably the worst challenge we've done so far." Noah said. "And that's only partially because I'm still wearing breakfast."
"At least you've got lunch, brah." Geoff said, grinning. "I don't even know how long we've been out here, man. I'm starved."
Regarding the stuck-on food, he frowned. "Trust me, it's not all its cracked up to be."
"Hey Gwen, what if I give you a boost?" DJ asked, pointing up. "The bars at the top look further apart. Maybe you could climb through?"
The goth looked up. "I don't know, they look pretty close."
"I bet you're thin enough that you'd fit through."
"Hmm, maybe." Gwen said, shrugging before she got to her feet. Brushing the grass off her skirt, she looked up at the bars above them.
"What's to stop Goth-ball from getting out and ditching us?"
"Gwen and I are on the same team." DJ answered. "I trust that she wouldn't bail on a teammate."
"I don't."
"Well you're welcome to figure your own way out if you want." Gwen snapped, rolling her eyes.
Confessional
"Chris only said you have to be the first team back to camp." Jo said. "He didn't say whether it's the first people who get there or the first team with all its members to get back to camp, and I don't trust Goth-ball to not cut and run. Not that I need anyone's help to get out of that cage."
Sighing in frustration, the redhead winced as Lightning slammed into the enclosure wall again. He'd been at it for hours.
"Sha-OW!"
"You know, if it's painful, maybe you should st-"
"Sha-OW!"
"Stop!" Zoey exclaimed in frustration. "Stop! This isn't working! We need to figure out another way to do this!"
Lightning paused. "Girl, are you trying to sha-lose?"
"No, but-"
"Then be quiet! The Lightning is working!"
"You're not getting us any closer to being free! You're just hurting yourself! You can't win if you injure yourself!"
"No pain, no game!" Lightning retorted, before striking a pose that emphasized his biceps. "And the Lightning's got game!"
"Actually, I think the saying is 'no pain, no gain', not 'no game'."
"Either way, Lightning's got it!" The jock said, rubbing his sore shoulder for a moment. "My Pops always says 'if you don't win, you're not my son'! And Lightning wants to see his Pops again!"
"That – that's awful!" Zoey said, horrified.
Lightning turned to her, eyes narrowed. "Did you just insult my Pops? Oh no you sha-didn't!"
"No – I just – to each their own!" Zoey said quickly. "If – if that's okay with you."
Lightning glared at her for a moment, before turning back to his previous task. "Now leave the Lightning to his pain and his game!"
"Argh!" Zoey cried out, running her fingers through her hair in frustration as Lightning began to slam against the bamboo bars yet again. But then she froze, her dark eyes wide, and she pulled a thin piece of metal out of her hair.
A bobby pin.
She could pick the lock.
Pausing to spit out another mouthful of bamboo chips and splinters, Izzy turned to the bubble boy.
"One time, I had to chew my way out of prison."
"How do you even-"
Izzy cut him off. "Halfway through, the tunnel caved in and I was stuck for three days before this army of ants showed up and told me that I was their lost queen."
Cameron paused from his task to regard the girl with a sceptical expression.
And then, out of nowhere, "We need to break up. You've been crowding me all day, and I just need you to give me some space."
"Break up? But we were never even dating." Cameron said in confusion, but by the time he was done the sentence, Izzy had vanished, and he realized that the redhead had actually managed to chew her way to freedom.
Confessional
"How can you break up with someone you're not even dating?!" Cameron asked, eyes wide with bewilderment. "I mean, both people have to agree to be 'dating' in the first place!" He frowned. "Right?"
Carefully trying to navigate across the top of the enclosure after DJ had boosted her to the top, a glint in the grass caught her eye. Climbing down the side, she leaned down to inspect the shiny object.
"Hey guys, look what I found." Gwen said, straightening with a shiny key in her grasp.
"Nice work Gwen!" DJ said, nodding in approval.
Trying the key, Gwen heard a click and then the door swung open. Giving DJ a high five as he made his way out of the enclosure, the goth and the teddy bear took off in the direction of camp. The jock-ette took off in the same direction, but as the two rival team members disappeared in the undergrowth, the jock-ette slowed.
Sprinting back to the cage, she pocketed the key before sprinting on her way as well.
Confessional
"I could beat them at a footrace in my sleep." Jo said with a shrug. "Besides, you never know when a key might come in handy in this game."
"Almost got it." Zoey whispered to herself, bracing herself for the jerk of the bamboo cage as Lightning slammed into it.
Click.
And then the slam came, and the door flew open. The lock rolled off into the grass and Lightning somersaulted across the clearing.
He slid to a halt only a few feet from the edge of the cliff, then got up and gave a fist pump of victory. "Sha-yeah! See? Lightning told you he would win!"
She didn't even bother to point out that the only reason they were free was from the bobby pin that she'd twisted well beyond repair to pick the lock.
"I'm coming Pops!" Lightning cried out, screaming at the top of his lungs as he began to sprint down the hill. Zoey began to sprint after him, but it was immediately apparent that she would never catch him.
Glancing back over her shoulder, she slid to a stop and began to sprint in the opposite direction – back up the steep slope and to the edge.
Taking a deep breath, she put her hands together, pressed flat in a praying motion.
"Please please please don't let me die."
And then she dove.
Frowning at the state of their situation, Alejandro glanced over when he heard his companion gasp.
"Did you think of something?" he asked.
"When I was your age, I asked my elders for advice; not to solve my problems for me." Mike muttered in an abnormally wheezy version of his own voice. "Lazy, good for nothing teenyboppers."
"Excuse me?" Alejandro asked, frowning.
"You heard me, eh sonny? Well good! Your whole generation needs a kick in the pants!"
Confessional
"Mike is not the first person I would choose to be trapped in a cage with for a challenge, but he's also not the last person I'd choose." Alejandro said, a devious half-grin on his face. "Mike's – or Chester's, as he's now asked me to call him – behaviour is really quite fascinating."
"Well, at least we're not trapped out here all alone, bro." Geoff said, remaining optimistic despite the fact that he was giving up on trying to break free for the moment.
"That makes me feel so much better." Noah said, rolling his eyes. How Geoff could maintain such a sunny disposition at all times, he'd never know. Even though he was giving up hope of escape, he was still so damn cheerful. All the time.
As Geoff turned around, away from the gate of their little enclosure, he stopped dead in his tracks, mouth hanging open.
"Uhh, dude?"
"What?" Noah asked sharply.
"I don't want to alarm you or anything but there's a bear behind you."
Noah rolled his eyes, but didn't turn around, which bewildered Geoff, who had backed up all the way to the other side of the cage.
"You-you're not even going to look at it? Aren't you scared?"
"So you can shout 'gotcha' or something? No thanks." Noah said, refusing to be fooled by the party boy's painfully obvious attempt at a practical joke.
But when a cold, wet nose bumped against his arm, and made a soft whuffing sound, Noah ran to the other side of the cage, screaming like a little girl.
The fall is the hard part. Sometimes, your life flashes before your eyes and you see every one of your best and worst moments, replayed in mere seconds. You think about relationships in your life that are way more complicated than they need to be, and the relationships that make it all worth it in the long run. The places where you have been, where you are now, and where you want to go in the future.
It's a moment of complete clarity, when you know exactly what you need to do.
Other times, you feel like you're experiencing the moment in slow motion. Your brain freezes up and you know you need to act, to react, but you can't even remember how to scream or even breathe.
And as Zoey plunged into the depths of the lake, she felt relief flood her entire body as she regained control.
The cold of the lake water pulling her out of her trance immediately, she began to swim for the surface, her lungs crying out for air. And as her cherry-topped head broke the surface and she began to swim towards the shore, she saw Lightning still sprinting down the hill.
She could still win.
"You're going to get us in trouble."
"Relax, princess," Duncan shrugged off the brunette's concerns as he waved his lighter under one of the bamboo bars, trying to set it on fire with minimal results.
"You're probably breaking like a hundred different rules right now."
"If I was, McLean would have said something about it by now." he shrugged.
"But-"
"Oooh, fire." Another female voice piped up, and their attention was drawn to the girl standing outside their enclosure, staring at the flame from Duncan's lighter with wide green eyes. Sprinting through the woods on all fours, she looked like an animal as she crept towards the flame with a look of intense fascination.
"Izzy!" Courtney said, unsure whether to be relieved that a teammate had arrived that could help her or nervous about which teammate it was that was seemingly coming to the rescue.
"Courtney?" Izzy's eyes darted towards the brunette, and she cocked her head to the side. "Oh! I know! I'll help you!"
And with that, Izzy got to her feet and began to pat her pockets in search of something, her mouth puckered in a look of intense concentration.
"Is there a key anywhere. . ." Courtney trailed off as Izzy found what she'd been searching for and a grin spread across her face like the Cheshire Cat. "No, Izzy – is that?"
Izzy didn't give a response, and instead stepped up to the bar that Duncan was still trying to set on fire, and tossed the ball from her pocket right by the flame.
"This is not going to end well." LeShawna said, frowning.
"Oh no, not again!" Courtney said, a look of terror etched across her freckled face. "Duck and cover!"
The smirk melted off of Duncan's face as the ball became engulfed by the flame.
Her hands trembled as she pulled at the lock, trying in vain to pick the lock with a twig she'd found on the ground. She hated the woods. She could deal with the woods if she had company, but alone was a big no no. She could not handle being alone in the woods.
Maybe this stick would work. Maybe she'd be able to get free and then she could find her way back to camp.
And maybe Chris would stop making her go out into the woods alone.
BOOM.
As a column of dark grey smoke pierced the mottled blue and white of the cloudy sky, Bridgette flinched. And as a large number of dark birds took to the skies by the smoke cloud, cawing and shrieking in fear, her chest began to tighten.
The sky overhead turning dark with the wings of hundreds of terrified birds, and wildlife fleeing past her cage, Bridgette began to panic.
Animals were fleeing.
Something was horribly wrong.
Rubbing smoke from her eyes, Courtney found Duncan crouched in front of her, his arm around her protectively. Looking surprised, she shrugged him off and stood up, arms crossed over her chest.
"You're welcome." He said, his voice full of snark as he got to his feet too.
"I didn't need your help." Courtney retorted, before her features softened and she uncrossed her arms. She opened her mouth and put her hand on his arm gently, looking almost like she was about to thank him, when Izzy spoke and killed the moment entirely.
"That was awesome!" And with that, the redhead burst out laughing.
"You could have killed all of us!" Courtney said, storming over to the girl with narrowed her eyes.
"Haha, I didn't though." Izzy said. "And I got you out!"
Courtney opened her mouth to argue further, but Duncan cut her off, slipping past her. His smirk had returned as he spoke. "Thanks Crazy."
And with that, he took off running in the woods, headed back to camp.
LeShawna followed, casting an apologetic look back at Courtney. "Sorry girl, I feel for ya, but I'm in it to win it."
And with that, she took off running towards camp. Turning back to face her teammate, Courtney found that Izzy had gone too, so the Latina groaned with frustration before beginning her sprint back to camp as well.
"This challenge is so stupid." Heather said, looking positively miserable as she shivered in the corner of their enclosure. "This whole show is stupid."
"Things aren't always as dire as they seem." Dawn said, scratching behind the ear of a squirrel that had climbed into her lap.
"I didn't ask for your opinion." Heather snapped, rolling her eyes.
"Oh, what have you found, little one?" Dawn asked as a bunny joined the squirrel on her lap. "Is this what I think it is?"
"Could you do me a favour and shut it?"
"But-"
"That's not shutting it."
"As you wish." And with that, Dawn got to her feet and unlocked the cage door with the key that the rabbit had brought her.
"What part of quiet don't you understand?" Heather snapped at the sound of the lock clicking, before glancing over to see her companion leaving. "Hey! Where are you going?!"
"I wish this were the first time since I've been on this show that I may end up getting mauled by a bear." Noah said, unamused, as the bear sniffed at the bars of the enclosure.
"That's harsh, bro." Geoff said sympathetically. "I feel for you, man."
"Thanks. Your sympathy makes me feel so much better about the situation."
"That's rad." Geoff said, grinning. "Glad I could, like, help you out."
"That was sarcasm." Noah said, rolling his eyes.
"Oh. You should get a sign for that or something." Geoff said, glancing over at the bear for a moment and then looking quite sad. "You know, this is probably how animals at the zoo feel."
"That's funny, I thought you were an animal from the zoo."
"They must be so scared and helpless all the time, ya know? That sucks, man."
Confessional
"Okay, so if I win this show, I wanna throw a really rad party for like a few hundred of my closest friends." Geoff said, before tipping his hat. "But now, I think I'm gonna donate some of that money to like some wildlife protection foundation or something. Being caged really sucks."
"Dude, are you gonna help at all?" Trent asked, casting a frustrated glance over his shoulder at his cell-mate.
"Nope." Scott said, pausing from his whittling for a moment to sniff his armpit.
"Don't you want your team to win?"
"It's more of wanting to ensure that your team loses."
"If my team loses because of me, yours will lose because of you and it will be a tie for last place."
"Think of it as me taking one for the team then."
"You can take one for your team. We'll take two for ours." A female voice greeted the duo, and Trent turned to the cage entrance with a look of relief.
"Jo, thanks for the rescue." Trent said.
"Don't thank me yet, Boy Band." Jo said, standing by the door with the key, but not making any actions with it. "I need a favour."
Trent raised an eyebrow. "What kind of favour?"
Confessional
"Alejand-joke sees me as a threat, for obvious reasons. He has good looks on his side, so obviously that's why people vote with him." Jo explained. "I'm not going home because morons are willing to send home the competent people just because a pretty boy says so."
"I'll scratch your back and you'll scratch mine?" Trent said, frowning. "Alright, fine."
"Alright then." Jo said, putting the key in the lock and turning it, unlocking the door before sprinting away with the key in hand.
Confessional
"Being in an alliance doesn't mean I'm going to stay behind and hold hands." Jo said. "I need his vote, that's it."
"Dude, I think he's following you." Geoff said as Noah moved to the other side of the cage and the bear followed him from the outside of the cage.
"I've always wanted to be the limping antelope." Noah said in annoyance. "Darwinism at its very finest."
"Maybe he's hungry too."
Noah cast his most annoyed expression at his cell-mate. "Thank you Sherlock."
Confessional
"Evidently, intelligence has nothing to do with the whole survival of the fittest thing." Noah said drily. "Because if intelligence were a factor, that would make Geoff's mere existence an anomaly."
"I mean, the smell of the food on your shirt is making me pretty hungry too." Geoff said.
Noah had never face-palmed so hard in his entire life. "The bear wants my shirt."
"Oh, bummer."
Noah tore off his food-covered sweater-vest and tossed it to the other side of the cage, where the bear was sniffing at the bars. But Noah's lack of physical fitness didn't help matters and the sweatervest landed in a heap on the ground – inside the cage.
Smelling the scent of food stronger now that Noah's shirt was closer, the bear reached into the cage to swipe the shirt, but it was just beyond its reach.
"Aww, man, he can't get it. Poor dude."
Noah only rolled his eyes.
The bear swiped for the shirt a second time, reaching further.
Okay, so the last time she'd been in the woods, she was pretty sure that she hadn't seen this much wildlife. There were birds and rodents everywhere, and she'd even seen three deer leaping through the woods.
But she was too busy praying that she was ahead of Lightning to notice that all the animals she kept seeing were all running in the same direction. They were fleeing.
But she wasn't about to stop and start birdwatching – that is, she wasn't until she sidestepped around a large bush and almost ran headlong into a cage in the middle of the woods. Her hands out in front of her to brace for impact, her body crashed into the cage, prompting the cage's inhabitant to shriek with terror.
"Bridgette?" Zoey asked, taking a deep breath.
Bridgette was on her knees in the cage, her body trembling with each breath and her hands gripping the bars of her cage so fiercely her knuckles had turned white.
"Please help me!" Bridgette asked desperately between gasps for breath.
"Bridgette – are you okay?"
"Please help me." Was Bridgette's only reply – again between gasps for breath.
Moving around to the side of the cage where Bridgette was, Zoey crouched down in front of the girl. "Bridgette? Can you do something for me?"
Bridgette nodded.
"Take a deep breath." As Bridgette complied, Zoey made a fist and pointed her index finger up. Holding it front of the blonde surfer girl, Zoey offered a reassuring smile. "Now blow out the candle."
Once more, Bridgette complied.
Confessional
"Okay, I know we're on different teams, but she was having a panic attack when I found her." Zoey told the confessional. "I couldn't just leave her there!"
"Come on." Zoey said, gesturing in the direction of camp as she pushed open the door to Bridgette's cage, after unlocking it with a key that had been hanging from a tree branch nearby.
"Thank you for helping me." Bridgette said, smiling at the redhead.
"Don't mention it." Zoey said, returning the blonde's smile before gesturing once more towards camp. "Let's go."
The bear had been swiping through the bars at Noah's sweater for nearly ten full minutes. And with each swipe, the bear got more annoyed. And with each swipe, the bear put more weight against the side of the cage. And with each swipe, the cage groaned more under the pressure.
And then, suddenly, the groaning stopped.
The cage lay in pieces around the two of them, and all that lay between the two of them and the bear was a sweater-vest covered in that morning's breakfast.
So they did the only logical thing to do if one finds him or herself in that situation.
They exchanged a terrified glance before running for their lives into the forest, screaming very much like little girls.
Confessional
"Well what did you expect us to do?" Noah snarked. "Stick around to find out just how hungry that bear actually was?"
Jo burst through the forest first and began her sprint for the finish line. It was a few moments before Scott and Trent followed suit, sprinting as fast as they could in a futile attempt to catch up to Jo.
The Gopher and Bears players who had already arrived at the finish line began cheering for their teammates to arrive, louder and louder as each person got closer until the two teams were shouting their support.
Jo skidded to a stop as she reached her fellow Gophers, turning back to yell 'encouragement' at Trent, along with her teammates' more supportive cheers.
As Trent and Scott sprinted towards the finish line, they were neck-and-neck. That is, they were until Scott seemed to stumble and slammed into Trent, sending the musician sprawling on the ground.
"Oh, sorry!" Scott called back, entirely insincerely.
Confessional
"That was a dirty move." Trent said, holding an icepack to the shoulder that had hit the ground first. "I'd wager my guitar on the fact that he did that on purpose."
Still screaming, Noah and Geoff burst out of the woods, the party guy easily having pulled ahead of the bookworm. Trent had picked himself off the ground and was limping towards the finish line as quickly as he could, where all their teammates were assembled and waiting.
Geoff and Noah were covering ground quickly. Geoff arrived first, followed by Trent and then Noah.
"Congratulations Bass – looks like you finally broke that losing streak!" Chris said, still grinning.
"We made it dude!" Geoff said, letting out a cheerful whoop in celebration, offering Noah a high five.
The bookworm, who was bent over, gasping for breath and clutching the stitch in his side, gave an annoyed look at the blonde Bass member.
"C'mon bro! We both survived! Don't leave me hanging!"
And with a roll of his eyes, Noah returned the high five, if only to shut Geoff up.
"We're down to the wire now! Who will end up at the campfire tonight – the Gophers or the Bears?" Chris asked, looking directly into the camera to address the audience.
"Look, there they are!" Cody called out, pointing across the campsite to the edge of the woods, where Bridgette and Zoey were walking side by side.
The Bears and the Gophers began to cheer for their respective teammates.
"RUN, DAMNIT! RUN!" Jo yelled, getting the attention of the two girls.
The blonde and the redhead exchanged an alarmed look and then began to sprint for the finish line. It was Bridgette, then Zoey, then Bridgette again.
They were neck-and-neck, one taking the lead for a few seconds, and then losing it to the other girl. And they kept switching leaders every few seconds for the entire sprint.
And in the very end, it was Zoey.
"Gophers take second!" Chris said before turning to the Bears. "I'll be seeing you losers at the campfire tonight."
"Nice work Zoey." Trent said, putting his good hand on his teammate's shoulder.
"What happened to you?" Zoey asked, regarding her friend with a concerned expression.
"Took a tumble. Don't worry, I'm fine."
"Campers, I have seven marshmallows on this plate." Chris said, the firelight illuminating his face as though he was about to tell them all a horror story. "If you do not receive a marshmallow tonight, you are eliminated from the competition. And you can't come back. Ever."
Courtney rolled her eyes in annoyance at the spiel that never failed to accompany her team losing.
"Mike. Izzy." Chris said, tossing a marshmallow to the blue-shirt brunette, then the green-shirted redhead.
"Cameron. Sadie. Lightning." And each of the team members caught a marshmallow.
"Courtney." The Latina just rolled her eyes again and went to join her teammates at the campfire.
"Bridgette, Scott, you are our bottom two tonight." Chris said, looking from one to the other as the news sank in. "You were the last two members of your team to arrive at the finish line. And it looks like your teammates are quite prepared to blame the loss on the two of you. But who will be going home tonight?"
. . .
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. . .
Lights suddenly lit up the entire campfire area from above and the sound of helicopters cut through the night.
"Izzy, we know you're down there!" A voice over a megaphone called. "You are under arrest!"
"Wait – all that stuff you said was true?" Courtney asked in disbelief.
"No, just the RCMP part." Izzy said, grinning at her teammate one last time before jumping to her feet. "YOU'LL NEVER GET ME ALIVE! HAHAHA!"
And with that, she sprinted into the woods, pursued by three helicopters with spotlights.
"Well, that was unexpected." Chris said after a moment of stunned silence from the team. Then he shrugged. "But I guess that wraps everything up here."
"So, nobody else is getting eliminated tonight?" Courtney asked.
"Well, I mean, I can boot one of them if you want me to-"
"No! That's okay!" Courtney said, putting her hands up as if in surrender. "We're down enough players as it is."
"Alright then." Chris said, shrugging and making his way back to his trailer and leaving the Bears to breath a unified sigh of relief.
The Votes:
"Bridgette came in last place." Lightning said. "Lightning carries his team anyway but losers have got to sha-go."
Static.
"I still don't trust Scott." Courtney said. "But Izzy could have killed me today. Quite frankly, she's a danger to society."
Static.
"Sorry 'sweetie'," Scott said. "But I've said it before - you're expendable."
Static.
"Courtney really needs to lighten up." Izzy said. "She lectured me for like three hours before supper. It's was all 'blah blah blah explosions are dangerous blah blah people could have died blah blah starting forest fires is illegal'."
Static.
"Scott said we were voting for Cam tonight." Bridgette said with a shrug. "He's a nice guy though, it'll be a shame to see him go."
Static.
"Okay, so Scott told me to vote for Bridgette, but I totally thought Scott and Bridgette were supposed to be tight!" Sadie said. "That's, like, major betrayal! I think Scott should go!"
Static.
"Bridgette told Scott about my 'quirks'. I don't want someone on my team that I really don't trust." Mike said.
Static.
"I guess I choose Scott – he and Bridgette were both last place for our team, but at least Bridgette did it fairly." Cameron said, adjusting his glasses.
Eliminated so far:
37th: Katie
36th: Staci
35th: Sierra
34th: Sam
33rd: Eva
32nd: Owen
31st: B
30th/29th: Lindsay & Ezekiel
28th: Justin
27th: Brick
26th: Dakota
25th: Anne Maria
24th: Harold
23rd: Tyler
22nd: Beth
21st: Izzy
Still in the Game:
Screaming Gophers: Dawn, Alejandro, Noah, Cody, Trent, Zoey, Jo
Killer Bass: Duncan, LeShawna, Geoff, Gwen, Heather, DJ
Thrashing Bears: Sadie, Cameron, Courtney, Scott, Lightning, Bridgette, Mike
This is by far my most-reviewed story, and we're almost at 200 reviews. I just want to thank everyone who's ever read this story, whether you reviewed or not, for sticking with the story for as long as you all have. Updates have been sparse these past two years, but we're getting closer to the home stretch, and it's all because of you guys. (Let's be honest, if you guys weren't reading, I definitely would not be more than 120,000 words into this beast).
And a special shout out to Explorer of the Unknown and The Prime Writer for all their help with this story and some of my others as well. I can assure you 100% that this chapter would still not be finished if it weren't for their contributions.
So question of the chapter – what is your favourite relationship to read so far in TDIR? Romantic, platonic, frenemies, enemies, they all apply.