"We thought it'd be fun. We thought we'd be safe, but, we didn't realize the... horror waiting for us on the island. Claws... teeth... screaming... so much screaming."
"How much screaming?" Ben asked as his hands were around my arm, holding onto me for dear life.
"Uh, shh! He's getting to the good part." The Doof shushed Ben who was sitting on the opposite side of him.
Darius continued, "The T-Rex stalked closer... her jaws opened wide." he made arm motions. And as he was about to speak again, a camera flashed.
"What?"
"Huh?"
Some muttered in confusion and Darius takes off his hood.
"For the vlog." Pinky says after a moment of silence. "Keep telling your little story."
Darius puts up his hood again and tried to regain the eerie mood.
"Oh, here we go." Sir Idiot says quite loudly and I look over to him to quiet himself, but he doesn't notice me as he was too invested in Darius' story.
He starts again,"The T-Rex sta-" "Dang!" Pinky interrupted loudly. The scary mood was definitely ruined.
Mr. Blue shirt groans and puts his head in his hands. What a crybaby.
"Out of space. Wait, I'm sorry, hold on. I just don't wanna delete my selfie on Everest, you know?" She shows Sammy the photo and she ooo's.
"No, I don't know." I mutter looking over at her with a small hint of annoyance and she gives me the same look back.
'She climbed Everest? Damn, she really can do it all.' I thought to myself in astonishment... and a hint of jealousy. Man, I wish I could stand on Everest, looking down at everyone... then raining all hell fire on the world below with bombs and guns going BOOM, POW-
"Maybe I should start over." I was interrupted from my thoughts by Darius.
"No! In fact, you can just stop." Ben shouts, still clinging to me like a monkey.
"It's alright Benny, just a story." I say to him, patting his shoulder with my free hand. "It's not real, and never will be."
"Dude, chill. He's not even telling the story right now." Master Elf Ears sighs.
"You chill, dude." I mock him and he sticks his tongue out at me, which I do back.
I then purposely whisper loudly to Ben, "Don't touch him, he probably has rabies with that attitude." I look up to the man with no lips and he's staring holes into my head, completely annoyed with me. I smirk and look the other way, pretending I had said nothing.
Darius looks between us weirdly but then flips his hood back up trying to finish his story.
"So the T-Rex stalked-" "Shouldn't we call Yasmina over? I bet she'd love this story." Darius gets interrupted again.
He flops down onto the bench, utterly defeated.
'Poor guy.'
"Maybe she wants to be by herself."
"Yeah, just give her some space." I agreed with Pinky, trying to wrangle myself out of Ben's death grip. I sure wish I can feel my arm right now.
"I don't understand." Sammy says blankly, oblivious to the term 'by themself'.
"You know how sometimes people just wanna be alone?" I try to reason with Sammy, but looking toward Ben, implying my statement. He obviously doesn't get it.
Then she starts cracking up, hitting her knee a few times. "Oh, Y/n, you're hilarious!"
"Yeah, hysterical I am." I reply bluntly.
"I think she's just shy and doesn't know how to make camp friends." Sammy states, before a clash of thunder erupts, followed by the downpour of rain.
"Maybe we should go inside."
Ben suddenly releases himself from me and starts to run up the slick stairs, "Way ahead of you!" He shouts before turning a corner. Hey, at least I can feel my blood circulating now!
"Hurry, hurry, hurry!"
"Aw man!"
"Oh, it's coming down fast."
"Well, that was a waste of time." They start to say in sync, trying their best to stay dry.
I'm left behind with Darius and watch as he lays there a bit, before scoffing, "Thanks, Brooklynn." he mutters.
I notice his down attitude and start to head towards him. I stick my hands in my pockets and shift awkwardly.
"Hey, dude. If you don't mind, I'd like to listen to the rest of your Dino story. It seemed pretty sick before, y'know, those guys interrupted the mood." I smile at him and he looks up at me before lifting himself from from the bench.
His frown makes a complete 180 as he grins at me. "Alright!" he says and flips his hood up, walking up the stairs as thunder booms behind him.
I follow him and pat his shoulder before looking back. Yasmina is still standing by the railing, trying to get, what seemed to be a notebook, out of the rain.
"Shouldn't you come inside? Don't want you getting sick out here when you're supposed to be on vacation!" I shout to her.
She looks up at me, startled I'm still nearby, and clutches her notebook to her chest.
"Oh, um, thanks." She looks around awkwardly and walks past me into the building. I shrug and follow her in, glad to be out of the rain.
Walking in, all I can hear is Ben complaining about Darius' story and stating that he wasn't scared.
'Lie'.
And Sir 5-head was complaining how uncool it was.
'Another lie'.
These boys need to get it together.
I walk over to the food station, looking over the options of cereals, listing them in my head.
'Raisin Brand? Seriously? Is someone's grandma around or...?' I think to myself.
I suddenly hear a loud, "You need a friend!" with a yelp following after. I spin around and see Sammy talking with Yasmina. Or, Sammy talking to Yasmina, while she is trying to understand if an actual language is being spoken.
Yaz spins around, looking for some type of help. Her eyes land on me and she motions to Sammy who was rambling beside her. I gave Yasmina a shrug, followed by a weary thumbs up. I really didn't know any other way of helping her in the moment.
She just has to figure it out by herself. Tough luck.
She spins back around, staring at Sammy as she's talking.
I look towards the others and can't really hear their conversation. I roll my eyes and watch as That One Guy and Darius are arguing about something while Pinky was trying to dry off her phone. Ben was just kind of watching, putting on hand sanitizer.
I start to head back to the bunks, exhausted from the day. Everyone here is crazy, I'm telling you!
———————
"Yes!" Darius pumps his fist into the air, staring at this dinosaur in front of us.
"We get to drive gyrospheres? Cool!"
"Saddle up, dudes and dudettes. We're going on a cattle drive, but with dinosaurs! It's a Dino-drive!" Dave announces, throwing himself around. This guy is fun.
I look around at these so called, 'gyrospheres'. I notice one has 3 seats instead of 2 like the others. I bet it's because we're un-even.
"And just to be clear, all these dinosaurs are herbivores, right?" Ben asks, a little shaken up being so close to one.
"Well, they only chewed on the last kid a little, so we're, like, 99 percent sure they're cool."
I can hear Ben's gulp as he shrivels back a little. I sling my arm over his shoulders, "Don't worry, little bro. They're just messin' with ya'. These guys won't touch us." I pat his shoulder while saying this and he just nods silently.
"Park personnel are moving a group of dinosaurs to fresh grazing lands across the island, and we get to ride alone behind the herd."
"See? It'll be a nice little joy ride." I try to smooth my words to Ben.
"Are you kidding me? Dinosaur migration patterns are my jam!" Darius yells and I chuckle.
Then Mr. Long Face put his hand on his shoulder, trying to act all tough and cool. "You may wanna consider a new jam, bro." He says to him.
I scowl at him, 'Why does he need to ruin everyone's mood all the time? What's his problem? Such a pain in the ass.' I groan to myself internally, picking a fight with him in my mind.
I look over to Darius sweetly, "Dont worry, D. It's a cool jam." I wink at him and he turns to me with an eye-closed smile , rubbing the back of his neck.
"So, uh, you sure you there things are waterproof? Looking pretty grim out here and hair this awesome does not come easy." Mr. NOTshot says.
"Look, Elvis wanna be, your precious, perfect hair will be just fine, m'kay?" I groan at him, making my tone into a high-pitched baby voice.
He snarls at me, quickly becoming embarrassed. I grinned, happy with myself.
"Yes, Y/n. Kenji, you're hair is going to be fine." Dave agrees. "Storm has already moved up coast, away from us."
"Cool! Time to show these fools what a gyrosphere master can do."
'Master my ass' I chuckle to myself.
"No way! You are riding with Ben, as a passenger."
"But-seriously? But he's so, uh..." He looks over to Ben, who gets startled by moving the gyrosphere.
"Hey, jerk face! My brother is not 'so, uh..'" I mock his attitude and facial expressions, "I bet he doesn't want to go with you either! I sure wouldn't." I grumble the last part. I really didn't want to get stuck with him.
But I was 'bout ready to punch him. No one talks bad about my brother, no matter what they say.
And Roxie points to me, "And, you! You're in the 3-seater with Darius and Brooklynn. It's a new design, so take it slow, not everything has been totally cleared yet. But I'm sure you'll be fine."
Wow. She's just going to stick us in a unprepared vehicle? What if it explodes, huh? What would you say then? That we're 'fine'? Y'know what, who cares. If we explode, we explode, right?
I sit in the far, middle seat, waiting for Pinky and Darius to hop in whenever.
I watch as Darius talks to Dave about "driving solo". What? Are Pinky and I not enough for him?
Dave and Roxie start to talk to him and I watch as Darius groans. I stick my head out, "Hey, tough guy, get in here! You're with us-" I look to Pinky who's on her phone, "-me! Hop in, bro!"
He jumps in the gyrosphere and MISERABLY try's to make a conversation.
"Hey, Brooklynn, Y/n! Are you as stoked as I am for our gyrosphere adventure?" He asked, glancing at both of us.
"Sure, whatevs." Pinky answers blankly and looks at her phone again. I perk up from my seat.
Darius sighs but I lightly punch his shoulder, "Hell yeah, dude! This is a once in a life time experience! Right, Pinky?" Darius smiles at me, while Pinky gives us a look before turning away again.
I frown and shrug at Darius, who shrugs back as I fall back into my seat.
"You can at least show some emotion." I mumbled and buckle my seatbelt.
Suddenly I hear static ring through my ear as Dave starts to speak a little too loud through a walkie-talkie. "Allllllllll righty, campers."
"The headsets are for emergencies. You can always reach us on channel six."
"Let the herding begin!" they say.
Suddenly Darius drives us past them and near the heard.
I sure hope Ben is okay.
I lean over my seat. "Hey, guys, pass me the walkie-talkie real quick. I need to ask Roxie and Dave something for a sec'." I ask them as nicely as possibly and Darius hands me the radio device.
Since the cord doesn't go very long I have to lean over the controls to talk to them.
"Hello? Dave, Roxie? I have a question for you guys, over."
Dave answers me, "Yeah, what's up, kid? Over."
"Okay, so, what are your guy's favorite color? Over." I ask them as sweetly as I can.
There was a pause from the other side and Pinky and Darius both gave me a confused look, I only grinned at them.
"What?" I can hear Roxie faintly ask from the other side.
I bring the microphone area closer to my face and shout slightly, "What are your guy's favorite colors? Over."
"Did you just ask us our favorite colors?"
"Yes, over."
"Uh, okay. Mine is yellow. Over. Roxie?"
"Red, I guess? Is that all you need Y/n?"
"Yes, thank you. Goodbye, over."
I put the walkie-talkie back where it belongs and lean into my seat. Darius and Pinky both glance at me and I grin, "Hey, man. Someone has to be the favorite. What's a better way of doing that than annoying them with stupid questions? Am I right?"
They look away and give each other a look before going back to what they were doing. These guys need to learn how to have some fun, jeez.
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