Chapter 13 - Blinded by Your Gracie

The luxury hotel was like walking through the grounds of a great palace and my first speculation was that it would most likely be fit for a king or queen. The moment I came face to face with it, I stared in wonder. Holy moly, I thought, This is where they're staying? I felt as if I had a sort of deep connection with this building because it reminded me of all the ancient buildings I laid my eyes on back in Romania. I remembered getting all excited whenever I saw luxurious looking buildings like that and I used to squeal and beg my mum to let me explore and absorb each and every sight. As I thought of this and where I was going to be in about an hour's time, a mischievous thought came to my head.

"You lucky gits." I said, smiling at Larry and Iggy jokingly. "You guys get to live in the lap of luxury with an en-suite bathroom with an extra bedroom and I get to sleep outside in a wooden bed that'll most likely give way in my sleep and I won't even have the resources for proper hygiene!"

Iggy shrugged and smiled back. "Well…sorry man, but you didn't sign up to stay in a hotel for three weeks did you?" He suddenly looked as if another thought had come to him and he whispered, "But just because you want to stay where we are, don't try and be the first out."

I shook my head. "I won't. I don't want to be judged as any normal lazy teen who doesn't care about anyone but themselves. I want to be seen as unique."

Larry chuckled uncomfortably. "Yeah, you're unique in many ways."

I didn't know if it was just me or whether Iggy had noticed as well, but ever since last night, Larry had been acting really quiet and I had no idea why that was. I felt that now was the perfect time to inquire about his unsociability, but before I could, he said, "Well, we're here now." He turned to face me, his expression looking somewhat concerned. "Are you sure you're fine being driven to the jungle on your own? Or do you want us to come with you?"

I shook my head. "Uh…I don't think that's allowed, I'm afraid. They said that you have to be there by yourself without any justification. I have no clue why, but I'm sorry you can't come with me."

Larry took a sharp breath, then gulped audibly. "Oh…uh…right." He blinked a few times and I noticed that his voice had cracked when he had spoken just then. Was…was Larry okay? "Well, are you ready to most likely starve and…and make lots of new friends?" Larry forced a smile to try and support me, but instead, I could see tears growing in his blue eyes.

I rubbed him on the shoulder and moved closer to him. "Hey, hey, what's the matter?" However, I thought that that was a foolish thing to say because by now, Larry looked so out of breath from his emotional state that he couldn't even reply. As soon as I realised how upset and worried he actually was, I pulled him into a hug. "It's all right." I said slowly. "Just go on and cry, I don't care if I get tears on my shirt." and Larry went on and cried.

After a while, a minute to be exact, he finally lifted his head and took deep breaths. "I-It never got to me as much before…" he sniffed. "But it's just the fact that it's all happening now…it's really getting to me."

"I know…" I said, gently stroking his shoulder. "But it'll be fine though, I won't forget about you if that's what you're worried about."

"Actually, that's partly what I was worried about. I don't know why I didn't tell you before."

"Well don't be." I used my sleeve to wipe a tear from Larry's face. "Even though I'll be making lots of new friends in the jungle, I'll still be thinking of you. I promise."

Larry nodded and dabbed at his eyes. "Yeah, and I'll be thinking of you as well. I'll watch you every day and I won't miss a thing." He pulled me into a tight hug. "I love you, man. I'll…see you soon…"

I smiled broadly and for a moment, I felt as if I was going to shed a tear myself because I loved it when Larry used his words like that, but I didn't dwell on that thought since I knew I had somewhere to be, so I broke away from the hug and turned to walk away. No sooner had I got around the short corner when I heard quiet sobs coming from behind me. I stopped, peeked around the corner and saw that Larry had broken down again.

"Come here, you." Iggy said to him, wrapping his arms around him before they both turned round to walk inside the hotel.

Oh… Now I felt awful for not sticking around longer, but unfortunately, I didn't have time to wallow because I had taken notice of the time and I had to rapidly find a reliable mode of transport otherwise I would most likely be late.

…

Dust. Yellow. Cracks in the ground. That was all I could see and it was all that was there. Just desolate, dusty prairies of plains that stretched out to the sky in all directions. Hopefully, my eyes wouldn't hurt for much longer upon observing the most boring and undetailed environment that ever existed. As much as I loved Larry and Iggy as friends, I still wanted to get to Camp as soon as possible because it would be a thrilling time to meet all of my new friends and receive my new clothes that I wouldn't change out of for three weeks.

Despite the fact that I was sitting in the back of a safari jeep, I really had the desire to get up and sit down in something much more comfortable than a car seat that had barely any padding. And that wasn't all. The weather here was absolutely stifling. I had to open every window in the back compartment since I had gotten so hot and bothered and I was pretty foolish to forget that it may have been on the edge of winter in the UK, but in Australia, it was their summertime.

I was currently wearing a T-shirt and jeans and regardless of the people I were to be in the presence of in future, I just wanted to take all my clothes off and jump into a cold swimming pool. Therefore I would let all the cold liquid particles sink into my skin, unclench my muscles and cool down my entire body. The current air around me was suffocating and frowsty and I felt that if I wasn't exposed to the highest quality oxygen in a few seconds, I was going to pass out. Just then, the jeep stopped and at once, the worst case scenario came to mind. Had we broken down? Well, seriously not because I didn't hear any noises like faults with the engine. I soon found out what was wrong when the driver said to me, "All right, mate, this is your stop."

I peeked out at the desolate atmosphere and took yet another raspy breath of the humid, dry air. "What, in the middle of the plain?" I croaked.

"Yeah, sorry about this, but the show's director said we have to drop you off here." He walked round to my side and opened the door for me. "Don't worry, you will be fine."

"Well, what's going to happen from here?" I asked, stepping out onto the hard terrain below.

"We know what'll happen, but we're not allowed to tell the contestants." The driver walked back round and got back into the jeep. "Have a great time." Then he started up the engine and drove off into the distance. It took at least thirty seconds for the vehicle to drift out of sight.

What just happened? One minute I was in a car, and the other minute, I was left here. Stranded. Where would I go? What would I do? Even though the driver had said I would be absolutely fine, I still couldn't help but panic a little. When was I going to get to the jungle? Was I even going to get there in time? Oh no no no. What was I going to do now? I genuinely didn't know what to think at this moment in time. Seriously I couldn't have been dropped off here for a negative reason. Okay…okay… That was all I had to think about then. I just had to keep calm and hope that everything was going to run smoothly.

Eventually, it did. It was when I was staring off into the distance when I heard something that sounded a bit like a buzzing bee. I turned around and I saw that it was another safari jeep, one that looked the exact same as the one I had been sitting in. Perhaps it was going to pick me up and take me to the jungle. As it gradually slowed down towards me, I moved closer and stopped at the back door, but before I could reach for the handle, the door opened and a girl stepped out of the vehicle, causing her and me to jump. We had actually come face to face with each other. However, before I had time to apologise, the girl took the words out of my mouth.

"Oh! Sorry!" she exclaimed upon seeing me. "Did I hit you with the door?"

"No, no, y-you didn't, I'm fine." I replied, forcing an uncomfortable smile. If I was being honest, I was partly paying attention to the girl's words and partly paying attention to her appearance. It was something that…I thought I had seen before… Hold on. This girl had turquoise eyes, teal coloured hair with little violet streaks in it, tied up in half up, half down pigtails and she was wearing light jeans, a purple blouse with pink spots, a vest top underneath and a black metal necklace was wrapped around her neck. Yes. It was definitely that same girl who looked at me on the plane!

"Oh, that's perfectly fine then." the girl said. "I really don't want to upset my first campmate when we're not even in the jungle yet."

"Well, don't worry." I smiled fully now, trying to help this girl feel better because… I didn't know, but even though I had been in her presence for about two minutes, she had a kind of… sad aura about her that I couldn't put my finger on. "I'm okay, you didn't hurt me." I looked down at the floor awkwardly for a moment, then held out my hand politely. "I'm Ludwig, by the way."

The girl looked down at my hand as if it were a burning flame that would set her on fire if she came into contact with it, but after a few seconds, she took my hand and shook it, smiling. "I'm Gracie." she said. "So uh, are you excited for I'm A Koopa?"

"A little bit." I replied. "At first, I was terrified about the fact that I would be meeting new people. See, I'm a little shy."

"Oh, so am I sometimes." Gracie said. "I was actually worried about meeting new people and them turning out to be very mean, but…it seems to be going well at the moment. I mean, you seem really nice."

Instantly, my ego rose right above the exosphere. "Oh, well, that's not normally what people say about me having only met them two minutes ago."

"Why?" Gracie asked.

I chuckled. "It's not that they think opposingly, they just don't say anything. Or sometimes they do say something, but they just give me the impression that they seriously want nothing to do with me, which is…kind of what I'm worried about now." By now, I was biting my lip in concern, since another thing had sprung to mind.

"Oh. Are you thinking that some of the other campmates will be like that? I really hope not."

"There may or may or may not be, but if there are, then I'd say the best thing is to not worry about it and ignore them if they're going to be knobheads."

Gracie giggled, which was something I didn't expect to happen, and it was probably because I had just said a 'naughty' word. "I guess so." She walked around the hard, dusty road and sighed heavily. "Gosh, how long are we going to be here for?"

"I don't know." I said. "Apparently, someone is going to come and pick us up soon, but I actually do wonder how long we'll be stranded here…"