Come on, put your Sherlock hat on and call your best friend Watson! Thanks for reviewing, Nicky Haugh, GIANTPANDAMAN (as Chris always says, it's a family show, plus I don't think Stephanie wants her younger siblings AND her dad to tease her about that when she gets home) and SuperKitty4789.

We had another break the next day, but the show was getting so stressful that I didn't really enjoy it. The island had been a lot easier, but ten weeks of competition with this one and another afterwards looming made things really tense.

The next day, our reward challenge began when Harold found a USB in his breakfast taco. Courtney let us plug it into her PDA (okay, only when Duncan took it off her and reminded her that it was part of the challenge), and the six of us left crowded around to see what it said.

The USB had a video clip of Chris. "I hope you all had a filling breakfast." he said. "It was so delish. I was practically on Cloud Nine! I could've had a dozen of them. But enough about breakfast, it's time to six this combination, I mean, conversation."

"So weird." frowned Beth. "I think maybe Chris needs a vacation."

I frowned too. "I'm not sure. I think he's trying to tell us something, maybe give us a combination. Nine...twelve...six..."

The image of Chris continued. "Right now, I'm gonna relax in a safe and secure place, and get ready for today's challenge. You're probably wondering what the challenge is. It will remain a mystery until you find me. Hopefully, you'll clue in and track me down, but in the meantime, I'm gonna crack open a soda and relax. See ya."

Duncan and Harold didn't want to find him, but Lindsay did. She agreed that Chris was giving us hints. "He said he was on Cloud Nine, which is like Heaven, which means he's not alive any more! And what do you do with dead people? You bury them! So maybe he's buried underground."
I rolled my eyes. "Lindsay, you've got it all wrong. He was giving us a combination for something – nine, twelve, six." Everyone except Courtney looked blank. "He's locked up somewhere secure and was telling us how to get him out. But I'm not sure where."

Courtney smiled in a superior way "Stephanie's right about the combination. But as for where he is...it's so obvious. Chris said he was feeling 'safe and secure'. Get it? Safe?"

The rest of the competitors looked blankly at her.

"Chris said that he was going to crack open a soda. You crack a safe. Now you get it?"

"Nope. Still nothing." Lindsay informed her.

"He's clearly in the bank vault set from the bank heist challenge!" Courtney finally said. "Duh."

I smiled. "Okay, now I get it. I wish I'd known that combination two weeks ago. I wouldn't have had half as much trouble freeing Leshawna!"

Courtney led the way to the bank vault as Lindsay protested. "Hey, I was the one who said Chris was giving us clues!"

"You did, sweetie." Beth said soothingly. Lindsay seethed.

I tried to beat Courtney to the bank vault, but she was already keying in the 9 by the time I reached it.

"Yeah, thanks for stealing the ideas I confessed, genius." I snapped.

"I knew them anyway." Courtney said, still in her superior tone. "That was the most obvious part of the message."

When she got the door open, she went straight to Chris and demanded "What's my prize?"

"Hm, I hardly recall having mentioned any sort of prize." Chris said in a British accent. Then he returned to his normal voice. "But thanks for releasing me. It was getting stuffy in there."

After a bit of banter, Chris explained that today's genre was mysteries, and we'd meet him at the train station that night. But before we did anything, we needed to get someone's handprint and DNA to board the train.

I went to the confessional. "Okay, so I have to make sure no one does anything to get my DNA and handprint, as well as getting someone's. This won't be easy."

So naturally, I sneaked some tomato sauce from the craft tent and then hung out with Duncan. Before he knew what was going on, I'd squirted the sauce on his hand, printed the prints on paper, and pulled out a few of his green hairs. They both went into a bag.

"Sorry, dude," I said, "But a girl's gotta get the prints!"

Besides, I wasn't as bad as Courtney. She pretended to treat Lindsay to a spa session to get her prints. And Harold was caught in his own trap when Duncan sidestepped it, then pinned the geek to the ground to get his prints and stubble hair.

Lindsay actually set up a pretty good way of getting Courtney's prints, but Courtney pretended not to notice the blue paint or paper she stepped on after showering, but then stepped on the paper and wrung some of the water out of her hair so the prints didn't show up.

Beth managed to trick Lindsay into covering her hands in tomato sauce instead of just squirting it on her.

As if Courtney wasn't mean enough, she also got Duncan's prints. Then she offered to hang out with me for a while, but I shook my head. "No way, Court. Not after getting Duncan and Lindsay's prints. How do I know you're not trying to get mine, too?"

Harold got Beth's prints while she was in the confessional, so by the end of the day, we all had a set, except for Lindsay.

Courtney demanded her prize again, but Chris told her it wasn't prize time.

"Make it prize time!"

"I'm trying to do my job here!" Chris protested.

"Maybe I should get my lawyers to do their job." Courtney threatened.

"Moving on..."

"I want a prize. I want a prize! I WANT A PRIZE!"

Chris gave her some chips to shut her up, and we boarded the train. Chris actually had to get mine and Courtney's prints to ride the train, since no one had managed to get our prints previously. And we even got food.

Then suddenly, everything went black.

"Who shut off the lights?" I heard Harold say.

Then Chris' voice. "Hey, you can't kill the host!" There were scuffles, and then the lights came back on.

Beth spoke. "Look! Chris is dead!"

Chris was lying on the floor, looking pretty much dead. It was true...but somehow I didn't believe it. Chris dying in the middle of a mystery challenge? That was too much of a coincidence.

Although, one thing we got out of it was Courtney's reaction. "No! That's not possible! I never got a decent prize! Harold, give him CPR!"

But Chris seemed to be way past that point. Still, Courtney remained convinced that this was a setup after we found out we couldn't reach anyone. She was sure Chris was faking and that our train was fake, but after she made Duncan go on the top of the train to check, he confirmed that it was real. Oh, and after the lights went out a second time, Chris' corpse disappeared, leaving behind only a red outline that Lindsay had drawn with her lipstick.

"If this is real," Harold said, "And if we are really stuck in this car, then somebody here must be..." He took out a magnifying glass. "The murderer." He said the last word in a weird accent.

"Oh, can't you be serious?" Courtney scoffed.

"I am! What could be more serious than...a murder?"

When we saw Chris had gone, Courtney again said that it was a setup. "Duncan, go check to see if he's in one of the other cars."

Duncan obeyed, while Harold looked for clues to the 'murder'. "I don't wanna get murdered in my sleep."

"I don't wanna get murdered either!" added Lindsay, copying Harold's way of saying the word.

I gave a sigh. "This is a challenge, okay? Courtney is right that Chris isn't really dead, but Harold has the right idea. Beth, Lindsay, let's help. We need to find evidence of whodunnit!"

But it was Harold who found the real evidence. "It's one of Duncan's green hairs!"

A weird chord played.

"Where's that annoying music coming from?" Courtney looked around. I looked over at Harold, who hid his keyboard behind his back. When he saw me looking, he gave me a pleading look.

I mouthed I won't tell at him, and he shot me a grateful look.

When Duncan got back, everyone except Courtney accused him of killing Chris. They said that Chris not giving Courtney a prize was his motive, because she was his love interest. Beth even found handcuffs to restrain him to one side of the car.

"I think we should keep looking for evidence, just in case Duncan didn't do it." I said.

"Yeah." Courtney said slowly. "I second that."

"Even though you think this is all fake?" I smirked at her.

"Well..." Courtney stammered, not sure what to say. "...I agree with you, Steph! It's a challenge! We need to check our facts before we do anything else."

Lindsay agreed. "We still need to figure out how Chris died." And I should add here that it was Lindsay who figured things out. She was the one who found the napkin with orange powder on it, held as if it had been used to suffocate Chris.

And as Lindsay said, the powder looked as if it had come from chips. Courtney's chips. "Which she refused to share. Therefore, Courtney was the only one to have orange cheesy fingers!"

And when Lindsay brought out a set of Courtney's prints, that was it. Courtney was the murderer.

"Oh, I really had you guys! I look good in rubber, don't you think?" Chris was suddenly walking in, very much alive, dragging the dead version of him by the hand. It had been rubber all along! "Crackerjack special effects, dude!"

Lindsay had won the reward challenge, or as Chris called her, Detective Lindsay.

"I prefer Detective Lindsay, Her Hotness." the blonde corrected.

"No! This isn't fair!" Courtney protested. "I've won two portions already! I was the one who knew you weren't dead! She couldn't even tell the difference between a human being and a rubber dummy! I didn't do it! I'm innocent!"

But Chris didn't waver. Lindsay could spend a night at the movies with anyone at all. And...

She took Duncan. Not because they were friends, but because she knew it would annoy Courtney. And I had to hand it to her – Lindsay had a good brain when she actually tried to use it. How come she'd never used her brain on the island?

Good question, huh? Lindsay was my pick to win in TDA. She was by far the best, with Beth second. Even after I knew the finalists, I watched "Rock N Rule" over, hoping that this time, Duncan would be eliminated.