Survivor - Heroes vs Villains

Chapter 31 - Day 28 Part 1

Alright, so here we are with the official top ten. My apologies, but I forgot to mention in the ending author's note last time that Donkey Kong is the second casataway to outpeak himself. He placed eleventh in Kodai Island, and he is still in the running for this season.

So we are dead in the middle of this season. Who do you honestly think is going to win at this point? Your guess is as good as the next person's, because we still have a ways to go.

~KF

EPISODE TEN: Deja Vu

Darleem

Night 27

Donkey Kong, Yoshi, Bowser, Zelda, Wolf, Ryu, Shovel Knight, Plague Knight, Golden, Springtrap

-/-

With the night waves crashing down on the beach, literally half of the remaining cast returned to their home.

"Well, that was the first time I have been blindsided this season." Shovel Knight spoke out loud. "Well done, fellas."

"I really wasn't expecting that." Yoshi hung his head in shame. "I knew Vector was being a target for quite a bit now, but I didn't know he was gonna get blindsided now."

"I agree with both of them." Zelda commented. "Vector was a big threat, but... I am definitely out of the loop on this one. ...So Wolf, based on your reaction at tribal, I take it you weren't expecting your name down to be written?"

"Nah. Not one bit. I think that the strong guys were all on the bottom, our alliance was in the majority, but there were clearly divisions." He said in front of everyone. "We both approached the Strong Guys Alliance for some votes without telling each other anything, and we both blindsided each other at tribal."

"Yeah, that's what happened. Only thing is you all got your way and we didn't." Yoshi replied. "I'm not blaming you, though... So what made you guys decide Vector over Wolf? ...You all just wanted him out for the longest time?"

"Honstly, I feel like he should have been gone home." Bowser answered. "Ridley was right. He was gonna go all the way to final tribal by playing the exact same game twice. If Ridley did that, he would have been out the door before the merge. He probably got irritated that he was still here and Vector beat him twice, maybe this does him some justice."

"You all love Ridley, don't you?" Plague Knight laughed, still amazed that they had not let him go, yet.

Zelda sighed slowly shaking her head. "This was unexpected. Now, don't get me wrong. I do realize that of the four of us, Vector was seen as the biggest therat in the alliance for some time. But for my game, I needed Vector to stay in until it was the right time for me to let him go. So I felt like I needed to break up Wolf and Springtrap before they tried to do something to us, but it appears it was one round too late for us to make a move. ...Now I'm afraid that I am possibly on the outs, and my game is on the line."

She paused for a bit curling up her lips, thinking of all the possible consequeneces with the recent tragedy on her end. "I am trying to play the best game I possibly could. Being more strategic and sociable just to get some jury votes at the end, while making sure you're not too big of a threat to be voted out is such a difficult thing to accomplish. Most of the other castawys have been voted out before, and for some of them, getting to the end is a new achivement for them. Yet I have never been voted out before. The only objective on my list is to win, but with this setback, my fate in this season has grown more unpredictable. Hopefully I can somehow pull myself out of this. I really needed Vector to still be here and now I'm in hot water."

"Sorry we had to do you three like this." Donkey Kong apologized. "I know you all tried to bury the hatchet with me and Golden, and I believe we have. But, we're all gamers, which is something all twenty of us should be familiar with."

"It's fine, DK." Zelda held a hand out, but she still exhaled at the situation. "You did what you had to do for yourself because you're trying to earn that title just as the rest of us. I can not ever bash someone for trying to do their job."

"And I really do like you, Zel." Golden folded his arms. "It's really a shame we had to do this."

"But as she said," Shovel Knight placed a hand on his shoulder. "it's all part of the game. And speaking of, I think I speak for everyone standing here right now that we all are simply glad we're here for another day. There were twenty of us All Stars when this season first began, we all want to get to the top, though half of us were not able to make it to this point. We all are and we're fortunate enough to have come this far."

"Well said." Ryu nodded at that. "I'm still shocked to see myself still in this game myself, knowing my history based how I performed in my last season. ...Pretty sure every last one of us are thinking the exact same thing."

"Exactly." Shovel raised his finger. "The fact that we all have made it four weeks out here enough is something we all deserve a pat on the back for. Whether I'm voted out tomorrow or right before final tribal, this is all worth it regardless. Without each and every one of those players that got voted out before us, we would not be standing here right now. We all shall play on and go from here. Good luck to all of you."

"And I wasn't just saying all of that just to get peoples' jury votes if I make it to the final three." The shovel wielder immediately denied anything the players might have been thinking. "My ally in Vector being blindsided really has me thinking. ...It's deja vu for me all over again. The Hero Four was basically Chatan Four all over again, and now we're weakened. It's the very first time thorughout the entire season I had any sort of setback besides the Heroes' losing streak. Yet,... this really makes me realize how difficult this game really is. We tried to make a move, but the Villain Three managed to make a flashy move against us first. I do not know what is going to happen to me at this point, so I figured to might as well say my thanks now and tell every last one of those players of how I really appreciate them. It's an honor to play with nineteen cutthroat players and be an All Star. Not everybody gets a second chance, so even if I placed twentieth, it's been a pleasure... But I still have some fight in me, so I'm not going to roll over and die."

Not too long after everybody finally began to separate, Zelda found Yoshi sitting alone on the beach, Shovel Knight being seen walking away from his location and towards the princess.

"...Is he okay?"

Turning his head side to side, he glanced back in his direction. "I believe it is the fact that himself and Vector have managed to align together again for twenty-seven days and have probably gotten even closer and now he's out of the game."

"So he's simply upset that his friend is not here anymore?"

"Well I believe he understands that not all of his friends can make it far. I believe he's grasped that aspect of the competition." Because that was the number one lesson Yoshi had to learn. Not everybody earned first place, and voting people off was... part of the game, even when it came to people he cared about. "Maybe it's because of Vector being taken out like that and Yoshi not even knowing. Vector knew he was going home eventually in Caribbean, but he was blindsided this time."

"Hmm..." She also eyed Yoshi's way.

"I think he'll be fine. You can talk to him, but I feel like he just needs a moment to process this."

And so, she came over to him to make sure he was doing alright in spite of the circumstances. Though wrapping her arm around his shoulder, he jumped in slight surprise.

"Oh! I didn't hear you at all... Where did you come from?"

"Hehe, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you."

"No no, you're fine. ...I think we're all imagining what could have been if Vector was not voted out tonight. We were really doing so well, Zelda! All those challenges we lost in the pre-merge and we were still doing well out here together!"

"I know." She rubbed his back. "I guess things just can not go the way we want them to all the time. We have to remember we are not the only ones playing. We don't even make up half the tribe even if Vec was still here. Inside my mind I may have a moment or two because of this, but given time, we could be back on our feet... somehow, someway. But if you feel like you need to take your time processing this, Shovel and I will be at the shelter and we'll all talk in the morning."

"I bet Zelda and Shovel Knight were thinking that I was just sad that Vector left and I have to now play the game without him, and I am. Things just... aren't the same without him around. He's funny, knows how to make people laugh, and now he's gone again and I'm outlasting him for a second. But I know he's cheering me on from the other side. But I am more upset about the fact that I could have actually saved him this time. I'm gonna beat myself a million times over this." He went on as Zelda was seen heading back to the shelter. "I had a freaking immunity idol and I blew it. Whether it was mistake for him to know or not, this was the time where I had to play it on him, but none of us expected this! Imagine what it would have been like to have me having an idol and playing it on him shocking everyone... And I already know how sneaky Springtrap, Wolf, and Plague Knight are, but not this sneaky! They're good! But for me,... what am I gonna do now?"

Darleem

Day 28

It appeared to be about seven in the morning and all ten of the players were in the shelter. Even for the couple of castaways that were awake of the time, they were all cooped up inside lying down thinking to themselves in peace.

Honestly though, it looked kind of funny and even a little 'cute' to some of the fans seeing the Darleem family all cuddled up next to each other.

Zelda was one of the members of the tribe that actually had her eyes open. In spite of remaining in place for nearly the entire night, she was still unable to get enough sleep. Not as if they actually had a good night's sleep as it was, but in her mind, she was too upset to sleep. She had a lot going on up there.

"Thinking about what to do next in the game is rather hard, whether you're on the top of the tribe, in the middle, or at the bottom of the totem pole. I can not let Vector being blindsided bring me down, because the game moves on regardless. And yet,... it is rather frightening with your fate now being in the hands of other people. That one moment when my ally goes home could have been the very thing that ruins my entire game, worst case scenario. We all were there when Shovel Knight had his moment to simply thank everyone around him for the experience, while at the same time acknowledging how brutal the competition can get. Before we all went to bed, he told me that the best thing we all can do is to simply not give up. I don't plan to, but... sometimes it's hard finding the light at the end of the tunnel."

Not too long later on, she felt that she needed to interact with Shovel Knight as soon as she could have.

"I was thinking about you a last night."

"Oh." He grinned from beneath his helmet. "Guess I've made an impact on you, then. You alright?"

"Your words can be truly inspiring." She spoke chuckling. "Somtimes perhaps even I need to be reminded to keep going. It is never over until it is over."

"Hmm..." That had Shovel thinking a bit. "This is strange. Aren't you supposed to be teaching me the ways of the game? I very well realize that there is always the chance of a setback. Competition is always tight no matter what direction you go in."

"That I am aware of." Zelda acknowledged. "I'm not giving up at all, but for the moment I'm thinking... 'What now?'"

"Well, I suppose it's all about how you handle things. It's just the two of us and Yoshi in our alliance now. But at the end of the day, all three of us have made it far in the game previously, so there's a way to squeeze ourselves out of this. Besides, I don't really know the chances of us being rid of over other folks such as Donkey Kong, Wolf, Springtrap, or Ryu at the moment."

"You're... probably right about that. Hopefully. But I'll be thinking of you all the while. We both need each other more than ever now, and we're not going to feel any better until we get ourselves on the right track."

"Hey, I'm with you." Shovel rubbed his hand on her back in support. "You've done a lot for me. I suppose you can lean on me for... moral support."

"I appreciate it." She actually did just that, in spite of her being taller than the knight. ...A bit awkward, but neither were complaining so supposedly it was working. "I believe it was your positive energy that explains why you were so well liked in our season in the first place."

That actually did make sense. The cut-throat, competive season that was Emperors vs Knights with all sorts of things happening, while Shovel Knight was busy being kind to everyone. He never even did anything to anyone on the jury, showing why he was a bit of threat in the late stages in the game. ...Obviously, however, he would have lost to players such as Sheik and Foxy in a final three situation.

Although, Luigi and Knuckles would have lost in a landslide against him. Had Shovel knew a little more about the strategic game at the time, he would have fought a little harder to keep Knuckles in that final seven round over Foxy.

"Just do me a favor and keep being yourself." Zelda told him. "People love you for it."

Day 28

"You guys ready to get to today's reward challenge? For today's challenge, we will be dividing into two teams of five. Three people from each team will head over to a series of obstacles. Each time, that same person will be in a chair, to which your teammates will have to pull up to retrieve all thirty bags in numerical order, with one person from collecting five bags at a time. Once you have all thirty bags, you will untie each one to reveal a lettered tile that will help you solve a Survivor phrase. First team to finish wins reward. Wanna know what you're playing for?"

The rewards were actually pretty good so far this season. What was next?

"The winning five will be taken to a private island where they will enjoy a Survivor-styled coffee shop."

"Oh my God."

"What!?"

"Yes!"

"Holy smokes!"

Things just kept getting better and better.

"You will enjoy cookies, brownies, crossiants, pastries, muffins, doughnuts." Ooookay, Master Hand. The fans were pretty sure his point was made. "And hopefully the coffee you drink will be enough to keep you energized for a little while. This has gotta be worth playing for."

"Let's get to it, baby!" Springtrap clapped his hands loudly. "I'm already ready!"

"'Let's get to it' is kind of my line, Springtrap. But I'll give you a break on this one." Damn... This was like, the third time the master roasted Springtrap at a challenge and the teams were not even picked yet. "We've done this challenge in Kodai Island and Emperors vs Knights. Wolf, Bowser, Donkey Kong, all three of you were on the winning team in your season. Zelda, your Emperors tribe won this challenge in your season. Shovel Knight, not only your team didn't win, you were the very first person ever in this series to be sent to Exile Island."

"Hahaha!" He laughed recalling the very moment he was told to separate from his tribe. "I remember that all too well. Felt lonely on an island all by myself like that, but at least I avoided Tribal Council."

"Alright. I'm gonna divide you all up and we'll get started."

-/-

"Alright, we have our two teams. Wolf was picked as a captain for the blue team. He chose Donkey Kong, Ryu, Yoshi, and Plague Knight. Springtrap was picked as captain for the red team. He chose Bowser, Golden, Shovel Knight, and Zelda. Playing for reward. Survivors ready?"

For their first runners, both Wolf and Springtrap on their respective teams got themselves mentally and physically prepared at the start of the obstacle course in front of them.

"...GO!"

Music: Bramble Blast (SSBU/Donkey Kong Country 2)

And they were ready to takeoff.

"Move it, Wolf! Move it!"

"Attack this course, Springy!"

Most of them were Smashers, right? Maybe it was time for them to participate in a training exercise. ...Climb up!

"First you gotta head up and over the inclined net!"

It sounded simple enough, with bothe men attacking it with no issue at all, both of them leaping over.

"Nicely done, Wolf!"

"Go, Spring! It's all you!"

The lupine held onto the net as he completely threw himself over while the rabbit simply hopped down, dashing immediately onto the next obstacle. Come on. Leap over the bars! There was no time for laziness!

Was it good practice for platforming? Maybe there was the chance that they all needed to do some platform if there was going to be another 'Subspace Emissary'. Although it was an icnonic adventure mode for brawl, certain characters not being meant for platforming was a known issue. So for that day, it was best to get their leg work in.

"Neck and neck off the bat! Both guys racing to get their coffee break!"

"Coffee doesn't pour and drink itself, Springboy!"

Oh, Bowser...

There were only three bars to leap over, which both guys successfully completed. Now it was time for some more leg work. Step up! GO!

"They're not at the high step obstacle. Use your legs like you've never used them before. Move it!"

See? Even the Master Hand knew his players needed some more training. What if Galeem and Dharkon came back? More worlds would have been at stake with FNAF, Shovel Knight, Undertale, and even Bully of all franchises being sucked in it... Remember? Jimmy Hopkins participated in Survivor - Mexico, but he unfortunately flopped being the one being voted out first of the Brains tribe on day nine over eventual game winner, Isabelle Cosgrove.

It was still nearly neck and neck, with both men dashing right for the chair. Yet even for a Survivor castaway, a little safety was not going to hurt anybody. Pulling the lap bar over themselves, their teammates began to do their part by pulling them up with the ropes.

"You gotta find numbers one through ten! Dig in!"

"Let's go!" Donkey Kong barked, him pulling with Ryu, Yoshi, and Plague Knight.

"Up, up, up!" Springtrap commanded Bowser, Golden, Shovel Knight, and Zelda.

"UGH!" groaned Bowser, Kevin grabbing the first tile for red.

"Both guys have one tile each!"

"To the left! To the left!" That was right, Wolf. To the left. To the left. ...Obviously those were lyrics to one of a certain singer's biggest hits.

"Over! Over!"

"Down! Down!"

"Up! Go up!"

Jeez, Louise! If there were all on the road together, the players not being involved in a major car accident would have been a miracle indeed.

"Springtrap and Wolf are barking order to their team, but it's working. Both of them have their first five letters."

"Pull up! That's it!"

"Go, go, go!"

"Wolf with number six! Springtrap with number six!"

"It's gonna be down to your left!"

"Oh, my hands..." Plague Knight spoke quietly, already struggling. The poor man was pulling as hard as he could have, yet unless everyone was blind, they all already knew he weighed lighter than everybody else.

"Springtrap and Wolf are getting number eight! Both teams are doing a great job!"

"One more! One more!" One more to go for red, the other team right there with him.

"Hurry, hurry!"

"Alright, go! Go!"

"Blue has all ten! Red has all ten!"

With the chairs quickly lowering to the ground again, the two cool kids released the lap bar and carried their ten tiles to the puzzle area to drop them off.

"Go, blue!" Master Hand commanded. "Go, red!"

Ryu Hoshi and Golden Fredbear began to dash their way to the beginning of the course, being the next pair to tackle it. And Golden was not a Smasher, so he clearly needed a training. Ryu on the other hand already had a major advantage with that. The martial artist pretty much trained for things his entire life.

"Right on, boy!"

"That's what I'm talking about!"

"Ryu immediately over the first obstacle! Showing a lot of energy on day twenty-eight!"

Landing on his feet, he dashed over the bars, throwing himself over as his life depended on it.

Even Golden was amazed knowing he was literally competing against him as he spoke. "Damn... This guy's good."

Well, he should have known better knowing he was one of the few people that played with him before.

And then by the time he got to the high step, he nearly ran across it as if he was practicing from the time the first episode of Kodai Island aired on television. And that was the season that introduced the challenge in the first place.

"Great job, Ryu!" Yoshi clapped his hands.

"We gotta get ready." Zelda was already preparing himself to pull him up.

"Golden doing a nice job, but it's clear he is no match against Ryu in this!"

Racing to the chair, he nearly slammed the safety bar over him.

"Let's do this, guys! Eleven! Eleven!"

Meanwhile the bar had just began the high step himself.

"Don't panic, Golden." Shovel Knight told him not to worry. "This puzzle is going to most likely take a minute to figure out."

"Ryu working on number thirteen!"

"Coming, coming..." Now Golden was finished. "Come on!"

"Down, down, down!"

"Could red somehow catch the other team right here? Competition could always get tight at any moment in Survivor challenges."

Fredbear was trying to collect number twelve while his compettior was working on number fifteen, halfway done with his set of numbers.

"Lower me, lower me... I got it! Back up!"

"Higher! Higher!"

"Ryu's nearly finished! Golden's hands moving as fast as they can!"

"We have to pull harder..." Donkey Kong grunted, using all of his might to pull up his friend.

Plauge Knight was seen grunting, feeling like his arms were going to fall off. "I don't really have big, giant muscles like you, DK..."

"Okay, one more. One more. Maybe I can reach..." Ryu leaned a little over to right in attempt to grab number twenty, ignoring Golden shouting at his team to pull in all sorts of directions. "Got it! Drop!"

"Blue has their next set of numbers! Golden working on number eighteeen!"

"Just keep pulling. We're doing fine."

"Go, blue!"

"Run, Plague!" Wolf yelled out... Wait,... Plague was going? Oh God!

"Plague's going up next for the blue team. They probably figured he's not going be difficult at all to pull up!"

Oh... That actually made sense. As previously stated, he was lighter than all the other castaway. So if anything, why would he not have been up for it? The obvious downside was that he was no Ryu on the obstacle course, with no big strong muscles at all like him or Donkey Kong.

"Golden is done. He is gonna gather up all his bags!"

"No pressure, Plague!" Yoshi called out. "You can do it!"

"Here goes nothing." Plague's small looking himself crawled up that net like the itsy, bitsy, spider.

"Golden's finished. Red is gonna send out Shovel Knight!"

He was small, but stronger. Plague needed to hurry up.

Though he made it to the second obstacle with no trouble at all. Yet due to his height, he had to try just a little harder to make it over the bars, nearly jumping to get over them.

"Plague Knight's gonna take a little more time getting over the bars. Could only do so much."

But he was really giving it his all, a lot of effort being written on his face underneath.

"UGH!"

Alright, that was two. One more.

"Shovel Knight getting started on the course now! ...Plague Knight getting ready to take on the high step!"

Honestly, this was the funniest part of all. There was only so much room for the legs. Knowing Plague's size, this mean that he had to work a little harder. Not that he was bad at all, since he kept a consistent speed. But due to his slight disadvantage made things appear to be a bit awkward for him.

"Lift those legs up!" Ryu told him from afar, to which he was doing so. But it looked as if it pained him every time he raised his needs. And Plague had to be quick, too. Unsurprisingly that earned a couple laughs from the audience.

Shovel Knight all the while had just a bit more muscle than Plague when it came to leaping over those bars, even though they were similar in height. He was actually slowly gaining on him as a result.

"Shovel through the second obstacle! He's starting to close the gap!"

"Okay, I'm done. I'm done..." Running his way over, he had one more job to do before the puzzle: grab the numbers and that was it.

"Blue's starting to work on their final ten numbers. Shovel coming up!"

"...Alright, I'm ready!" Just three seconds behind Plague Knight. The red team was still in it. "Woah...!"

"Pulling up Plague Knight is gonna be like pulling up a feather!"

What a way to be shady, master.

"I'm here!" Shovel Knight was now at the chair.

"Up!" Donkey Kong barked out orders to his team. "Left!"

"Plague Knight grabbing number twenty-two!"

"Move! Move! Move!" Bowser and the other red team members found little difficulty moving Shovel Knight himself, grabbing his first numbered tile.

"Red team only one tile behind. They have caught up!"

"Further, further... I got it! Twenty-four!"

Though paying attention to Survivor history, both times the challenge was done both in this series and in real life Survivor, the puzzle was known for taking a rather long time to solve. Basically, the winning team was completely up in the air. Sure, one may have argued they all basically could have taken their time throughout the entire physical portion of the challenge. Yet there was the 'what-if' scenario of the puzzle being solved rather quickly? Best to not be an ass out of oneself to assume, right?

"Plague Knight working on twenty-seven! Shovel picking up twenty-six!"

"Hurry up, hurry up, guys!" The masked knight circled his arm around rapidly. "We can't lose this!"

"Plague picking up twenty-nine..."

"Right there with them. Almost there!" said Shovel Knight.

"...Alright. GO!"

"...We're done!"

"Both teams are done! Gotta get on the table!"

"UGH!" With heavy lifting, and Plague taking a couple trips (allowing Shovel Knight to really tie it up at that moment), it was time to let the brainstorming begin.

There was a minor twist to this one. This time, the entire team was on the puzzle. Five on five.

"Thirty tiles in total, but yoiu may have a few pieces that are blank..." Master Hand told them, everyone throwing the number bags holding the tiles in off to the side. "This is the part where we usually do the time skip since it usually takes a long time for the Survivor phrase to be figured out."

"We need to put all our heads together on this one..." Zelda suggested to her team. "It's a six word phrase here. Think of anything that comes to mind."

"The biggest word is seven letters." Springtrap immediately began scratching his head. "What word do we commonly use in Survivor that is seven letters?"

Umm,... 'torches' and 'snuffed' were both seven letters. 'Council' was also a seven- wait a minute, that was eight letters right there. Nevermind.

"Come on, guys. We really gotta think big if we really want this reward." said Yoshi, putting both of his hands on top of his head. "I am usually not known for doing puzzles like this."

"Well, now we can all do it. Together." Ryu wanted optimistic vibes only.

"Just unscrambling some words." Donkey Kong commented. "Ain't nothin' to it."

Both teams were shown from a top point of view placing down letters on the table for possible word combinations. Maybe the fans that were watching from home wanted to try and figure out for themselves.

'_-_-_-_' '_-_-_-_-_-_-_' '_-_-_-_' '_-_-_-_-_' '_-_-_-_' '_-_'

O-H-R-N-H-E-P-U-S-D-E-I-I-F-O-W-K-Y-M-A-E-G-W-A-P-T-E-O

...

Yeah, not as easy as it looked. Though it was giving the viewers of taste of what it was like to actually be playing on the show. Survivor is no joke. One was a fool to believe otherwise. It could have literally been anything... Survivor related at that. And then to be starving on day twenty-eight with one's mind being all over the place due to all the chaos happening all the time?

It was not for everybody.

"Uh..." Bowser had a clog finger on his noggin. "'Moving' seven letters?"

"No." Zelda shook.

"Tartar sauce..."

This was not Spongebob, Koopa...

"Would 'knowing' work?" Wolf suddenly asked with his team.

"...Ooh!" Plague Knight snapped his fingers. "That actually does work! Let's try that!"

"Blue team could possibly already have something."

Springtrap was glancing over. "They'd better not already have it."

"I've done this before." Zelda reminded him. "There were a few times were one of the teams figured they had something going only for them to run into a dead end."

'K-N-O-W-I-...'

"..." Wolf slammed his fist down dropping an f-bomb. "_, man. There's only one 'N', so it doesn't work."

Sorry, O'Donnell. 'Knowing when to pull the trigger' was the phrase from the first season. Production was hell of a lot smarter than to have the exact same phrase be the answer twice.

Plague Knight covered his face with his hands. "We're wasting time..."

"Relax." DK replied. "At worst, this could take about an hour to finish."

Elapsed Time: 25 Minutes

Well, that was nearly half an hour so far...

"Twenty minutes have passed. One minute a team thinks they have something, next minute they're back to square one... Imagine what it would be like if this entire episode was based off this challenge alone."

That... would have been a discussion on its own.

Golden suddenly had another thought in his mind. "'Proving' is seven letters, isn't it?"

'P-R-O-..."

"Nope." Springtrap exhaled. "There's no 'V'."

"Man... That would have been something right there."

"We have to keep thinking." Shovel Knight did not want anyone giving up here. "We are against another team here."

"...'Playing'?" Now that was something Ryu assumed. Since all people knew what folks said about assuming, right? 'It makes an ass out of you and me.' In this case scenario, it was the perfect time to find out if Ryu was an asshole. Was he?

"...Nope." Donkey Kong shook in reply. "There are no 'L's here."

Alright. So Ryu was an asshole and he took a big fat L just for that. Thanks a lot, Ryu. No help at all... asshole.

"'Showing'..." Plague had a thumb beneath his chin. "We might need to try that."

'S-H-O-W-I-N-G'

"...Okay, that actually worked." Wolf smirked out of hope. "Good going, Plague."

"Blue seems to be making a little progress." Master Hand noted, causing some looks from the other team.

"Umm, okay." Springtrap blinked. "Now I'm really starting to get concerned."

"Oh, Goddesses..." Zelda shook her head at the whole situation. "What could it be?"

"One word down, five to go." Ryu folded his arms. "What's next?"

"If we have to show somebody something out here, what do we have to show?"

Well first of all, one did not need to 'show' or 'prove' to anybody anything. Just for one's self. But if people needed to show themselves something, what in Survivor did they needed to show?

"Guess we can tackle the four letter word down, now. Let's see..." Wolf went to brainstorming. "Peek?"

"Keep." Donkey Kong snapped his finger.

'K-E-E-P' 'S-H-O-W-I-N-G'

"...That's good! That's good!" Plague Knight began to grow excited. "Okay, come on. We have another four letter word over here."

"Oh, Star Spirits." Bowser began to grow a bad feeling inside. "We need to hurry up."

"Shhh!" Zelda sounded. "See if one of you can listen in on what they're saying..."

Springtrap being the closest to the other team began to lean his body to his right in an attempt to grab any information.

"Now we do have a 'W' here." Yoshi held the letter in his hand. "I'm going to put it here. 'Keep showing... what'."

"Wow. That's obvious." Wolf snickered.

'K-E-E-P' 'S-H-O-W-I-N-G' 'W-H-A-T'

Plague all of a sudden began snapping his fingers repeatedly before jumping up and down. "Oh my gosh. Guys, I think I know what it is."

Unfortunately, the producers decided to not have any words shown at the bottom of the television screen of what he was telling his teammates. And so, all the fans heard were mumbles.

"Blue is moving rapidly now! Are they gonna be right?"

"That's it." Springtrap shook his head in disappointment. "We're not getting coffee today."

"We got it! We got it! We got it!"

"Plague Knight, say it!"

"KEEP SHOWING WHAT YOU'RE MADE OF!"

"BLUE WINS REWARD!"

"Yes!"

"Finally!"

"We did it!"

Wolf clapped his hands out of extreme relief. "Good job, boys. We're getting outta here."

"..." Golden snapped. "Showing... That was the one. We could have easily had that."

"Alright..." Time for everyone to say their farwells for the time being. "Ryu, Donkey Kong, Yoshi, Wolf, Plague Knight, you guys can head on out. You all will be taken to a private island to enjoy a nice break from camp. Enjoy."

"Ooh, this is gonna be fun." Yoshi was anticipating on the experience. "They're gonna have all kinds of sweets there."

"One question, though." Ryu wanted to compare and contrast. "Starbeans or Dumpin' Doughnuts?"

Poor Springtrap did not even want to look at the winners. And of course, Bowser had to look the most pissed out of everybody.

"Alright. Bowser, Shovel Knight, Zelda, Springtrap, Golden, got nothing for ya. Head on back to camp."

"Times are really getting rough out here. I got blindsided last night and just when I finished gathering my thoughts together and cheered Zelda up, I ended up losing a good reward." Shovel Knight shook in disbelief. "I've done that challenge twice and my team never won, so I'm afraid I'm in a rough patch at the moment. I try to always think that when you're at your lowest, things can only get better. But the thing is, how bad can things really get for a man out here? What other setback is going to come my way next? ...If I get medically evacuated? I hope and pray hard something like that does not happen to me or anyone out here, even though they're all my opponents. But what I can say is that I'm human. Even I can grow frustrated. And it's okay to be frustrated. You just can not lie in it forever. So,... guess I'll just take my time processing all of this. And when I'm ready, I'll be able to move on and see what other opportunities awaits me..."

Okay, sure all of the confessionals this chapter went straight to whatever remains of the Hero Four at this point. But everybody else will get their chance soon.

But hey, I think of all three times I've written this challenge out, this has gotta be my best take on it yet. So in the next chapter, we'll see how the social interactions go with the coffee shop reward.