Day Four

“Ready to go, guys?” Theatergirl asked her roommates, her glasses glinting in the blue light. The window of Dive Five was covered by a translucent blue covering with tiny silver fish painted on it. Theatergirl found that it gave her the feeling of being calm and in control.

“Mmm- what?” Leo asked, sitting up in her bunk bed. “Oh, sure. Just let me get dressed.” Theatergirl sighed; didn’t anyone realize she’d been up for half an hour and was hungry for breakfast?

“I- I don’t believe I’ll come,” Sea Glass murmured. “I’ll join you later.” Xe sighed and flopped back on xyr pillows.

“What about you, Breeze?” Theatergirl asked, hoping against hope that her other roommate would come. There was no response. “Breeze?” Still nothing.

“She’s probably still asleep,” pointed out Leo, emerging from the bathroom in a t-shirt and shorts. “But I’ll come. Let’s go!”

Relieved that she’d made some progress with her roommates, Theatergirl skipped down the halls and stairs to the dining room, where she found very few other people. Evidently, everyone else was still asleep. Moonlight was there, though, and so were Logan and Puck. Theatergirl got a bowl of oatmeal and sat down beside Moonlight.

As she ate, she kept a careful eye on the door to the dining room, painfully aware that two of her roommates were still missing. Finally, around twenty minutes before breakfast was scheduled to end, Sea Glass emerged into the hall. Xe grabbed a plate of toast and seated xyrself next to Theatergirl.

“Where’s Breeze?” she asked, eyes wide. Sea Glass shrugged.

“I don’t know,” xe said. Then xe stopped and stared at Theatergirl. “Wait. Do you think she was-”

“Murdered?” Theatergirl finished. “I think it’s a distinct possibility.”

“Oh, come on,” Leo said. “We’re already two days into this vacation, and no one’s even come close to being killed!”

“Someone got killed??” asked a very worried voice. The three turned to see Breeze, her frizzy hair forming a cloud around her anxious face. They looked at each other. Then they started to laugh.

Reassured that everything was fine, Breeze began laughing too, but the laughter was cut off by the directors entering the room and speaking into a microphone.

“Welcome to the fourth day of this vacation!” Director 2 said. Theatergirl heard someone mutter something about day three, but Director 2 fixedly ignored this comment.

“Today we will be taking a group trip to the on-site theme park,” Director 1 added, speaking into the microphone. This announcement was met with cheers and applause.

An hour later, Theatergirl sat on a bench, eating a stick of cotton candy and feeling thoroughly happy. Just as she finished the treat, she was approached by the whole group of CBers and AEs, looking as if they had something up their collective sleeves.

“Hey Theatergirl,” Nymph addressed her. “We’re all going on that roller coaster over there, the Falcon Flight. You should come with us.”

Theatergirl looked behind her at the roller coaster, and her heart fell into her stomach. The coaster was unimaginably tall, filled with steep drops and loop-de-loops. Yet something compelled her to say yes to the offer.

“I must be crazy, but sure!” she responded, giggling. Nymph offered her a small half smile and motioned for her to join the group, which ambled away. Theatergirl was surprised to find herself walking next to Breeze.

“Hey, I thought you weren’t the roller coaster type,” she said, puzzled. Breeze nodded emphatically.

“I’m not,” she answered. “In fact, I don’t know why I said yes. Heights scare me. So do sudden drops. So do the headrests of the seats; what if they have lice on them? Plus, what if I get murdered on the coaster?”

“Take it easy,” Theatergirl said to reassure her. “We haven’t had any deaths the whole trip. I’m pretty sure the force field has been fixed by now. So that means no lice and no murders.” Breeze let out a sigh of relief.

As the roller coaster climbed the first hill, Theatergirl felt the anticipation mounting in her stomach. The car swooshed down the hill and rounded a sharp turn, and she smiled with wild joy. The loops sent a thrill down her spine and made her shriek. When she finally got off the ride, she smiled so hard her face hurt.

“That wasn’t so bad, right Breeze?” she asked. No response. “Breeze?” She turned around to see the seat completely empty, the seat belt slashed with some kind of sharp tool. Theatergirl ran around to the other side of the track. Pressing her face to the fence, she could see a small form lying on the ground, twisted at an awkward angle.

Breeze.

“I was wrong,” Theatergirl breathed, staring at the girl. Without hesitating, she ran to tell the directors what she had seen.

1 Name: Ella Starburst

2 Answers: What is your gender and what are your pronouns? Female, Female pronouns

4 Things You’re Bringing: Phone, Chromebook, good book, Cricket magazine. 

5 Words to Describe Your Personality: Extra, Intelligent, Teasing, Extrovert, Hugger.

6 Words to Describe your Appearance: Typical Schoolgirl, Brown hair, Pale, Round Face

Is 7 your favorite number? If not, what is? I prefer 100 and 9!

On a scale of 1-10, what’s your favorite color of the alphabet? I'd have to say ****** 

Thank you admins for dealing with this! 

Day Five, Part One

Logan sat in a chair in the middle of Moo Two, quickly sketching the cat that sat in the corner of the room. The cat was still at the moment, but at any time it might jump up and leave, ruining her sketch. Her lips pursed, Logan sketched in the last detail, picked up a colored pencil, and began to color in the drawing. If she moved quickly, she thought, she might even be able to finish the entire thing before the cat moved! 

Suddenly, the cat jumped up and ran away. Logan spun around angrily to see a figure in the doorway, evidently the person who’d startled away her drawing subject. “What do you want?” she asked shortly.

“I’m Maggie, one of the Directors’ lab assistants,” said the woman. “I’m truly sorry to disturb you, but I’ve been asked to gather all the vacationers for a game of Capture the Flag.”

Logan sighed, put down her pencil, and moved to follow Maggie. They headed down the spiral staircase, around a corner, out a door, through a garden, and finally to a large grassy field. Logan joined the crowd of CBers and AEs in the center of the field, while Maggie moved to confer with another stranger, presumably one of the Directors’ other lab assistants. A few moments later, the lab assistants clapped their hands loudly and called for attention.

“Hi! I’m Maggie, and this is Joe, and we’re going to be running a game of Capture the Flag for you today,” said Maggie.

“Okay, does everyone know how to play Capture the Flag?” asked Joe. Everyone nodded. “Right, then I’ll just clarify one thing for you. The boundaries are ten feet into the forest on all sides. There is a clear line drawn in red spray paint. Do not cross that line. If you cross that line, you are out of the game PERMANENTLY. Clear?” Everyone nodded again.

Maggie unfolded a piece of paper and began to read the teams. “The first team is Moonlight, Fleet, Puck, Logan, Nymph, and Viola?. The second team is Barnswallow, Gale, Joan B. of Arc, Kitten, Breeze, Leo, Sea Glass, TheaterGirl. Any questions?”

Logan’s hand shot into the air. “Why does our team have two fewer people than the other?”

“Because you have a shapeshifter. Any other questions?” Maggie said. There were none, so the teams split up and began to strategize.

“Okay,” Viola? began, “they’re going to expect us to put the flag in the forest, so obviously we shouldn’t do that.”

“Why obviously?” asked Nymph. “I think the forest is a perfectly logical place to put it. It’s hard to get to, it can’t be seen, and it’s at the very back of our area, so they’d have to cross half the field to get there.”

“What if we put a decoy flag in the forest at the back, then put our actual flag in the corner, which is equally hard to get to but wouldn’t be what they expected?” suggested Logan.

“Yeah, and then I could shapeshift into a bird and guard the actual flag,” Nymph added.

Viola? sighed and nodded acquiescence. She then (with a bit of help from her teammates) began to plan who would guard where. It was determined that the defense would be Logan, Puck, and Moonlight, leaving Nymph to fly around as needed and Viola? and Fleet to be offense.

Logan situated herself at the front of the forest just to the right of the decoy flag, where she could vaguely see the other side as well as the actual flag. Well, not the flag itself, which was hidden in a hollow, but the location of the flag. She figured that was close enough.

Nothing much happened around her for the beginning of the game. She saw Joan and Barnswallow attempt a direct raid, which lasted a bit of time since Joan was fighting off defenders with her sword, but which eventually ended in Puck managing to trap them both in a loop of rope and tag them. After this, the team seemed to regroup and plan again, this time sending Leo and TheaterGirl somewhere through the trees-- and then Leo appeared to Logan’s left, causing her to chase the other through the forest until Leo was finally trapped in a corner and Logan could send her to jail. She then returned to her vantage point and watched as TheaterGirl managed to rescue her teammates.

Logan didn’t really like this game, where she couldn’t do much of anything and the other team seemed like they were definitely going to win. Plus, she’d woken up at 5:00 this morning to the cat pouncing on her, so she wasn’t in the best of moods. Also she was tired, and she was leaning against a tree, and she could just close her eyes and relax. It would only be a minute, she told herself. Just one.

She woke, startled, to hear a voice above her. “Hi, Logan,” said the voice. 

“Oh! What are you doing here?” Logan said, trying and failing to pretend like she hadn’t been asleep.

“I just wanted to let you know that I have something really cool to show you. Meet me in the library after this game, okay?”

“Okay,” Logan responded, stepping back to look up at the person. She was hanging upside down from a tree, just out of Logan’s reach. She shook her head and stepped back to lean against her tree, watching the other person scramble like a squirrel along the treetops until she reached where she’d come from.

--

@Ella- thank you for submitting your sheet! We're putting you in the next day we're writing, which will probably be posted in a few days. 

@Marisol- we aren't actually taking new submissions anymore. Ella was an exception because she did try to join earlier but was unable due to an error of some sort. We're very sorry, but you can't join right now. 

I love this!

Day Five, Part Two

Logan watched through the canopy of greenery as the game of Capture the Flag dragged on. A bird, presumably Nymph, wheeled over the field, far out of reach of any of the defenders. Just as it seemed she was about to dive in and grab the opposing team’s flag, a shriek sounded from the middle of the field.

“No! Stop! I hereby end the game!” Maggie yelled, running to what appeared to be an injured deer.

“I’m so sorry,” Joan said sincerely. “I really didn’t mean to hit it with my sword. What can I do to help?”

“Run and get the nurse,” Maggie said. “Wait- no- it’s dead!” A tear slipped down her face.

Barnswallow approached from the side of the field. “Are you okay? Do you have, like, a thing about deer?”

“No, I just-” she wiped her face- “love all animals. It’s okay. Can you guys go inside while I bury her?”

They hastened to do so, many casting glares at Joan. Logan didn’t participate. She was busy thinking ahead to meeting someone in the library. What could she have to show her? Would it be interesting? She hoped it would be interesting. Her head full of all these questions, it seemed like no time at all before she was outside the door of the library, hand poised to knock. Just then, the person came from the other end of the hallway.

“Oh, hey!” she said. “I see you beat me here. Well, it doesn’t matter - the thing I have to show you isn’t in the library anyway. Follow me.” The person turned and walked back the way she’d come from. Mystified, Logan followed, running until she’d caught up. They headed up the spiral stairs to the nook where the bedrooms were. Logan tilted her head - if this was where they were going, why couldn’t they have met here? But no, since the person continued up the stairs.

“I haven’t been up here before,” Logan said, attempting to make conversation. “What’s at the top of the stairs?”

The leader looked back briefly. “I’ll tell you when we get there. Now shush.”

Shaking her head, Logan continued to follow the other girl up one flight of stairs… up two flights of stairs… up three flights of stairs… until they finally reached the top of the turret. Logan began to ask what whether the interesting thing was here, but the other person held up a finger. 

“Just wait,” she said, slightly exasperated. “I promise you, you’ll know it when you see it.”

“Is it going to be really, truly awesome?” Logan asked.

“YES! Now shut up and follow me!”

Now getting a bit suspicious, Logan continued to follow the other person through piles of old boxes and moth-ridden dresses. What could be so exciting that they had to go all the way up here? It must be something really cool, she thought. Maybe there was a real live unicorn! Or maybe there was nothing at all, and this was all an elaborate hoax. No. She resolutely banished that thought from her head. Whatever was happening, she had to look on the positive side. 

“Okay,” said the leader. “We’re almost there. We just need to go up this way to the roof. Here, you go ahead.”

Why would there be a unicorn on the roof? Logan wondered as she clambered onto the sloping roof. Perhaps this was a phoenix instead. Yeah, a phoenix would be almost as awesome as a unicorn.

The other person was speaking again. “The cool thing I wanted to show you is that way. You might have to lean a bit to get the right angle.”

Logan approached the edge of the roof and bent over doubtfully. “I don’t see anything. Are you sure-” Just then, the person planted a firm hand in the middle of her back and pushed her over the edge of the roof. She screamed loudly, but to no avail. Maybe, she thought, she’d land on a unicorn, and it could catch her!

Sadly, there was no unicorn at the bottom of the fall.

Day Six

Fleet was eating waffles at breakfast, wondering what the group would be doing that day, when she heard someone sit down next to her. She turned to look and saw Ella Starburst. Her cheeks were flushed, and she was panting.

“What’s going on?” Fleet asked somewhat warily. Ella ran her fingers through her brown hair before responding.

“My butterfly got caught in a tropical cyclone,” she gasped. “I nearly didn’t make it. As it was, I got here a week late. I’m glad I arrived, though. I heard something about a force field that will protect us…?”

“The force field’s off,” Fleet replied shortly. Ella raised her eyebrows in surprise, and Fleet added, “At least, it seems that way. Two people have already died, but the directors never tell us anything.”

Ella sighed glumly and stared at her lap, while Fleet went back to eating waffles.

Director 1 entered the dining room at a brisk pace, picked up a microphone, and did her call-and-response thing that everyone had gotten the hang of by now.

“Today we will be spending time at the pool, playing many traditional pool games,” Director 1 said. “After that, we’ll have some downtime in our rooms. You may also read in the library, or go to the movie theater, or the arcade. Basically, do whatever you want. Any questions?” Joan raised her hand and asked where Director 2 was.

“Never you mind,” Director 1 said sharply. “Anything else?” There was nothing, so she swept out of the room, leaving the CBers and AEs to trail behind her.

Once they arrived at the pool, only a weak sun poked through the clouds, but the pool was heated, so everyone jumped in with great enthusiasm. There, they played Marco Polo, water polo, and strangely enough, actual pool, since there was a pool table by the pool’s edge. There were rubber balls and diving toys and an ice cream cart, so everyone had a great time.

Kitten, however, was too preoccupied to swim. Every time she approached the water, she couldn’t help but think of Breeze, who was always too afraid to even enter the water. She sighed sadly, and tears pooled in her eyes. Turning away, she walked back to her chair to continue her book.

Finally, after they’d eaten their lunch (grilled cheese sandwiches) the CBers and AEs made their way back to their rooms. When Fleet got back to Fun One, she popped open a can of soda and tilted her chair back, breathing in the sunlight.

An hour and a half later, Fleet was roused from her nap by a scream that cut through the air like a knife. Startled, she raced down the hall toward the noise, which seemed to be coming from the arcade. She turned a corner and saw Joan, standing frozen in the doorway, with tears streaming down her cheeks. Across the room, slumped over one of the games, was Puck.

An arrow was sticking out of her back.

Other CBers were crowded around, trying to comfort Joan. Finally, Director 1 pushed her way through the crowd, closely followed by Director 2. Director 2 did her call-and-response, and the voices were reduced to mutterings.

“Everyone should go back to their rooms until dinner,” she admonished, looking over her glasses at them. As the crowd turned around to follow her instructions, Fleet heard her mutter, “This has got to stop.”

--

“I don’t see why we had to go to all this trouble,” Director 1 muttered, ducking under a hanging vine. Though she’d only been hiking in the forest for a quarter of an hour, her lab coat was already smeared with dirt.

“We both know why,” Director 2 said, staring at her colleague disapprovingly. “While you may be somewhat lacking in morals, you must understand that we can’t let all our guests die. This has gone far enough. And anyway, with the force field down, nothing’s stopping that girl from killing us,” she added with a significant look.

“But- but she could reveal our secret! Any time -- she knows everything!” Director 1 spluttered.

“Yes, but come what may, the lives of our guests -- and our lives -- are at stake, and no secret is worth dying for.”

“This one is,” Director 1 said defiantly. But she continued to trudge through the dense undergrowth behind Director 2.

Several minutes later, they entered a clearing, with the night sky fully visible above them. In the center of the clearing was a small, ramshackle hut. The two walked quickly toward it and entered what was, by all accounts, a complete mess. Undeterred by the clutter, Director 1 began urgently typing commands into a computer, while Director 2 fiddled with the knobs and dials on a box that buzzed with electricity.

Finally, some hours later, the box sparked, then began quietly humming. The partners looked at each other in relief, and probably would have high-fived if they hadn’t been so exhausted.

The force field was officially on.

Awesome!

Time for LOGIC MOONLIGHT!!

Day Seven

When Sea Glass woke up, xe felt strangely positive. Xe wasn’t quite sure why, and the more xe thought about it, the less xe could point to a reason. Perhaps xe had had a great dream that xe couldn’t remember. Perhaps it was just that xe had finally had a good night’s sleep. Xe shrugged, rolled out of bed, and pulled on some clothes.

“Want to go to breakfast with me?” Sea Glass asked xyr roommates. To xyr surprise, all of them agreed.

Upon entering the dining hall, the Dive Five folk saw that they were not the only ones to show odd enthusiasm and energy this morning. Almost all of the attendees were gathered, all of them talking happily. The lab assistants were there too, bustling around to see what people wanted. Already there were people with giant stacks of waffles, pancakes, omelets, even one person eating cupcakes! 

Sea Glass seated xyrself in the corner where xe didn’t have to talk to anyone. Pretty soon, Joe walked over to xyr and asked what xe wanted.

“Um… I’m not sure. Maybe oatmeal? With sliced almonds, if you have them?”

Joe nodded and slipped into the kitchen to report back. Across the room, the murderer got up and followed him in. When no one was looking, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a canister of cyanide, which she began to pour into Sea Glass’s oatmeal. At least, she tried to pour it in. No matter how hard she tilted or how much she banged on the back, no powder would come out. She was about to cut the canister open with a kitchen knife when another person approached.

“What are you doing in here?” Maggie asked somewhat suspiciously.

“Oh, er, I just wanted to help.” The other person surreptitiously slid the canister back into her pocket. “I was going to take Sea Glass xyr oatmeal.”

“I suppose you can do that,” said Maggie. “But stay out of the kitchen in the future, okay?”

The murderer nodded, grabbed the bowl, and headed back into the dining hall. As she set it down on Sea Glass’s table, she mulled over what had just happened. Why wouldn’t the cyanide pour out? It was almost as if there was a force keeping it in… a force… the force field…

She gasped, dropping the tray she was now holding, and rushed back into the kitchen. 

“What, you again? What are you doing here?” Maggie asked.

“I really need you to come with me. It’s urgent, I promise.”

Maggie sighed. “Oh, fine.”

The murderer led her outside to a grassy clearing in the woods, where she then turned around to face the lab assistant defiantly.

“Do you know where the force field workshop is?”

Maggie visibly twitched. “Um, no, and, uh, if I did know, I wouldn’t tell you!” She tried to deliver the line with power, but she was so nervous that it came out like she was a first grader trying to act.

“I don’t believe you.”

“Too bad,” Maggie said, gaining a little more confidence now that nothing bad had happened, “'cause I’m telling the truth.”

“I still don’t believe you,” said the murderer. She held up a finger and walked off into the woods a bit. When she came back, an adorable baby rabbit was squeezed between her hands, and a large knife had appeared against its skin. “If you don’t tell me where the workshop is right now, I am going to peel the skin off this bunny.”

The murderer knew very well that the force field would keep her from doing any harm to the creature. What she hoped was that Maggie wasn’t aware of this.

“I- I’m not going to tell you.”

The girl squeezed the bunny so it made a pitiful mewling sound. At this, Maggie finally gave in.
“The workshop is about a twenty minute walk that way,” she said tiredly. “And you’ll need the door code - it’s 1245.”

The murderer nodded, released the rabbit, and headed off in the indicated direction. When she reached the hut, she swung her knife again and again, cutting wires, smashing computers, and ruining everything she could. Eventually, she stopped, rubbed her hands together, and smiled. Nothing could stop her now.

--

Many thanks to everyone for your kind words and strategizing!