Club Calypso: Survivor

Marianna Trench sat miserably in the debris that used to be her nightclub. The only thing that remained whole was the disco ball-- because her stupid sister had ventured out in the middle of a hurricane to save it! Only Daniela could survive in a storm named after her. Weird karma, that.

Mari didn't know what to do. The building, while still having four walls and a floor, had no roof, and had been condemned by Layla:)n officials. Fixing it would run her a couple million-- a couple million she couldn't afford.

"Whoa. Bummer," came a voice Mari didn't particularly care to hear just then.

"Come to enjoy my failure?"

"It's a natural disaster," Inda Nett shrugged. "Doesn't your insurance cover it?"

"They said since the storm was named after my sister, that makes it 'unnatural' and therefore they owe me nothing." Mari buried her head in her hands. "Once again," she said, voice muffled, "Dani ruins my life."

"Chin up. You've been selected for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Your world will be turned upside-down--"

"What are you blathering on about? My world has been destroyed. Turning it upside-down can only stir up the debris and possibly get some in my eyes, blinding me, and making my life even worse than it already is."

"I'm giving you the chance to win twenty million dollars to do with as you please."

"Oh, I feel so blessed." Mari tossed a piece of roofing tile at Inda. "What's the catch?"

"I'll be sticking you on an island for eight weeks with seven other contestants," Inda grinned. Mari couldn't decide if it was genuine or evil.

"Well. I guess, since I've got nothing better to do now that the club is gone..."

"Great! Meet me at the docks tomorrow at dawn!"

"Dawn?! That's barbaric!" Mari whined, but Inda was already speeding down the street in his Mustang. "Damn him, I didn't even get to ask who else is competing."

* * *

"Teff! Coli! We must pack for a survival contest! Where's the blender?" Daniela tore through her pristine, never-been-used kitchen in search of the one thing that had been used. "I cannot live without my morning protein shake!"

"Um, Daniela, I think Inda said you can't bring a lot of stuff. He's putting you on one of the Sphere Archipelago islands that doesn't have electricity," Princess Teff said, hiding behind the cooktop island. Oddly enough, Dani didn't throw anything at her.

"Batteries? Can I run the blender on batteries?"

* * *

"Hi, Dream?"

"Hi, Uly. What's up?" Dream Sylvia Driad put the finishing touches on the tree-blanket she'd been making, cradling the phone on her shoulder. If she was going to be away for eight weeks, her tree, Shirley, was going to need it.

"Going on that Survivor trip Inda Nett is hosting. How about you?"

"Yep." Dream fluffed the fringe.

"You seem distracted."

"Just working on a tree-blanket."

"Oh. I guess that's important. So I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Okay."

"Bye." Across town, Ulysses P. Chuck, aka UPChuck to his friends (well, to Mari, mostly), hung up his phone and smiled contentedly. Eight weeks on a deserted island with Dream! It didn't occur to him that one of them could be voted off in the first week, nor that there would be six other people on the island with them.

Nope, UPChuck was just a very happy guy.

* * *

"Guess what, darling? I've gotten us an all-expenses-paid vacation on a tropical island!" Frogman said grandly, breezing into his girlfriend's apartment full of screaming, trouble-making tads.

"Oh, thank God!" Doreen cried, pulling one of the tads off of the window ledge and dumping him on the floor. "Tell me it's without the kids!"

"No children allowed!" Frogman shouted over the crying of a couple of the youngest tads.

"I love you!" Doreen leapt across the room to embrace her amphibious lover.

Frogman smiled into her hair. With his brains and his complete control over Doreen, not only would the contest be a shoo-in, but he'd also have a pretty nice vacation, too!

* * *

Early Sunday morning...

"Inda, I'm missing church for this," Dream fretted.

"Yeah," Daniela echoed. "I mean, all that money would be nice, but what about church?"

"Go to confession when you get back," Inda shrugged.

"Let's get on with it, okay," Marianna said impatiently. She was sprawled on the dock, eyes closed, and until she spoke, everyone had thought she was napping.

Dava Guru Jini was at the opposite end of the dock from Mari. They hadn't spoken since high school, and this was almost guaranteed to be awkward... especially if neither one of them got voted off early in the game.

UPChuck was thinking much the same about Frogman. It was no secret that they hated each other-- UPChuck was the quintessential "nice guy", and Frogman was the embodiment of Evil for the tri-county area. It was just one of those things. But it could definitely ruin the romantic mood if Frogman made a move on Dream-- or if he somehow got the idea that UPChuck was after Doreen.

Pez DeSpencer was also nervous, but only because he had recently been named Daniela's boyfriend and he still wasn't sure what that might entail. Especially on a trip like this.

"Okay," Inda said, rubbing his hands together briskly and looking around at the exhausted faces of his contestants. He was so glad he'd gone through the old CBS affiliate's tapes and found this game show thingy. "Rules are: you can only take what you can carry off the boat while rafting to shore. No personal items, just the survival gear I put on the boat. Only exceptions are the clothes on your back and your toothbrush."

"Good thing I wore layers," Mari muttered. Dani, in sarong and bandeau, started to look panicked.

"You have to participate in weekly challenges. Every Saturday night you vote one person off the island-- whoever won that week's challenge is immune from being booted. When there are two people left, I'll bring the others back to decide who wins. And no killing people allowed." Inda looked around. There was more than one disappointed face because of that last rule.

"What about suicide?" Mari asked.

Inda glared at her. "You'll all be on TV, by the way, and live Webcast."

Daniela panicked. "Without hair products?! Without makeup?! What next, are you going to make us eat rats?"

"You don't have to eat them. We'll give you plenty of rice and fresh water to survive each day. You can fish, or catch bugs--" Frogman licked his lips-- "or you might find some bananas or coconuts or something."

"Cool. Let's get on that boat," Mari said, jumping up and heading for the little motorboat.

Daniela shivered.



* * *

Inda's Narration, Week One: Not surprisingly, Marianna has managed to get everyone to work together to build a shelter, using a combination of flattery (Daniela and Frogman), threats (UPChuck and Pez) and asking nicely (Dream and Doreen). She's also somehow managed to avoid talking to Dava, even though the two of them did the most actual work.

Pez has proven himself valuable by catching fish, and Dream's ability to talk to trees has found a good supply of bananas, coconuts and berries. Frogman can catch bugs quite easily, but for now that's only valuable for entertainment. Nobody else wants to eat bugs just yet.

The surprising thing is that Daniela continues to look great despite the hardships the island imposes. I just don't know how she does it.

* * *

Challenge, Week One: Egg-on-a-spoon race.

"This is a challenge?" Mari asked incredulously, holding her spoon between two fingers and swinging it around.

"Yes," Inda replied, handing out eggs. "By the way, if your egg doesn't break, you're allowed to eat it afterward. And the winner gets immunity in the first vote plus a bottle of whatever alcoholic beverage he or she chooses."

The contestants lined up at the start line, eggs balanced precariously on spoons. "Stay in your own lanes," Inda warned. "Ready? Set... Go!" He fired a gun into the air.

Pez jumped, dropping his egg. It rolled safely into a hollow in the sand. Resigned, he went to retrieve it.

Mari walked cautiously forward, keeping up a good pace without rushing. This was stupid, but she was going to keep the egg in one piece even if it meant losing the booze.

Daniela clomped forward in her platform sandals, but distracted by thoughts of scrambled eggs, she didn't see a rise in the sand and tripped. Her egg rolled unharmed into Frogman's lane. Dani breathed a sigh of relief and reached for the egg...

And Frogman's webbed foot stepped on her hand, crushing the egg. "NOOOooooo!" Daniela howled. "You stupid frog!" She tripped Frogman, sending him flying into UPChuck and causing both their eggs to topple and break.

"No fair!" Frogman yelled. "She left her lane! Do-over!"

"Yeah, do-over!" UPChuck shouted. "Fly-breath left his lane too!"

Frogman sputtered over the insult, then jumped at UPChuck, starting an all-out brawl. Inda watched, amused. Ratings were going to skyrocket!

Doreen inched along, oblivious to the noise. Frogman had told her to go slow-- he would win the alcohol, and she would make sure they had a second egg to eat. Other than that, she needn't worry about anything.

Dava, Dream, and Marianna were moving at about the same pace, moving cautiously but rather quickly. Then Dream noticed a snail in her path and stopped to make sure it got across the remaining three lanes safely. As she bent down, her egg dropped off her spoon. "Oh, no!" she frowned, picking up the egg. She also picked up the snail, then left the course to return the snail to the wild and wait for the results of the race.

Marianna stopped for a moment to look around. Dava wasn't far behind her, and Doreen had hardly left the start line. Everyone else was on the sidelines, looking bummed. Frogman and UPChuck also looked bruised. And now Dava had caught up. Mari picked up the pace.

Then, for no apparent reason, Dava jumped, dropping his egg and breaking it. Mari slowed down. No sense in breaking her egg now and having to wait three hours for Doreen to get to the finish line.

Five steps... four... three... two... one more step... "Rum," Mari said as she crossed the finish line.

* * *

That night, as Dream shared her egg with UPChuck, Doreen gave hers to Frogman, and Pez gave his to Daniela, everyone looked on jealously as Marianna mushed bananas into a coconut shell and slowly, carefully added Bacardi rum. She'd hoped to find a pineapple, but that, apparently, wasn't going to happen on this stupid island.

She tasted the mixture. Needed more coconut milk. Ice would have helped, too. She took a sharpened stick and rock and cracked open another coconut from the pile. As she worked, she hummed an old song about a surfer girl.

When the drink was satisfactory, she pocketed the rest of the rum and moved on to a handful of uncooked rice. With all eyes still on her, Mari ground up the rice by pounding it with a rock as it sat in an empty coconut shell. Then she added her egg, which had been waiting safely nearby, and some of her daily ration of water.

"What are you doing?" Daniela finally asked. Inda, watching from his nice, warm, food-filled boat, on the Webcam, was glad. He'd been wondering, too.

"Rice pasta," Mari answered simply.

Everyone who'd had hardboiled egg and rice for dinner groaned. Why hadn't they thought of that? That would have been such a good way of extending the food supply.

"Don't freak. If this doesn't work, all I've got to eat tonight is my banana colada sans ice." Mari started kneading the Sno-Ball-sized clump of dough with her fingertips.

"With rum," a handful of people sighed.

Mari thought idly if it would be possible to fry the dough in... hm, what was oily here? Besides Frogman. Sunscreen? Ugh, no. No, she'd just boil the pasta in water. Now for something to boil it in... Hadn't she grabbed a pot along with the rope and Swiss Army knife when they were on the boat?

"Anybody seen the pot?"

"There's drugs on this island?" Daniela asked, frowning.

"No! The cooking pot!" Mari said, exasperated.

"Oh. I was using the bottom of it as a mirror," Daniela said, reaching into the shelter and handing it over. "Don't burn it."

Marianna snatched the pot out of her sister's hand and poured some of the drinking water into it. Twenty minutes later (the fire wasn't very hot), she had a coconut shell filled with mostly-cooked doughy globs and realized there wasn't any butter. Shrugging, she sprinkled a little of her rum over the pasta. It wasn't that bad. She'd have to add it to the menu at the club. Then a pang hit her stomach, and it had nothing to do with the mediocre food. There was no more club.

Mari was quieter than usual the rest of the night.

* * *

Voting, Week One:

"Good morning!" Inda cried, bounding into the Survivor camp.

Coconut shells came flying at his head from various spots on the ground.

"Damned if I know what's so good about it," Mari groused. She sat up and attempted to brush the mess of hair out of her face. Her hair had other ideas. "Where's my scrunchy?"

"Oh, sorry, had to borrow it," Daniela said, tossing said hair accessory into her sister's lap as she emerged from the jungle.

"Where were you? And why did you borrow my scrunchy?"

"The jungle, and because I needed something to hold my hair back while I worked on my face."

Mari regarded Dani's face. No trace of makeup, but the brat did have a very clean look about her. No pimples, while she and Doreen had both broken out (Dream was an elf-dryad hybrid and didn't get pimples). And Dani's hair, after she'd taken it out of the scrunchy, was just as straight and unmussed as it usually was for a night on the town. Suspicious, but if Inda was sure Daniela wasn't breaking any rules, Mari didn't really care.

"Okay, today is the voting, so we have to have a hike up the volcanic mountain--"

"Inda, there is NOT a volcanic mountain on this island," Mari interrupted.

"There is now."

Mari looked at Inda like "Oh, yeah? Show me, buddy."

Inda pointed north. Sure enough, there was a volcanic mountain, smoking quietly, where there had been none the night before.

"Okay, I don't even want to know how you pulled that one off. No, seriously, I don't want to know. Somehow, I think the truth would just make me more paranoid." Mari started picking through the tangle that was her hair. "But if you can get a mountain moved in overnight, never mind one that smokes and potentially spews lava, why do we have to hike up the damn thing? Don't you have, like, a Star Trek transporter or something?"

"Um, no," Inda said, starting to look scared. "Just the mountain. Sorry." He looked around at everyone else. Frogman had started catching his morning supply of bugs. UPChuck was surreptitiously glancing at Dream while she ran through her morning calisthenics. Doreen was fingercombing her short hair (Mari, for once, envied her the practical haircut). Dava was either still asleep or ignoring everyone. Pez was fetching coconut milk for Daniela, who was on her bedroll again, looking up at Inda with an imperial air, waiting for him to say that of course the Dancing Queen of Calypso Beach would not have to walk up a silly mountain, that there wasn't a Star Trek transporter but there was the next best thing, a helicopter. A yellow helicopter, preferably. Daniela liked yellow.

"Okay, let's get a move on."

Daniela sat, shocked. No helicopter? Not even a Jeep? Oh, dear. Well, it was a good thing she'd been in Girl Sprouts when she was a kid. They'd done a lot of hiking in that. Maybe she'd remember how to do it.

Everyone else started getting up, Mari still wrestling her hair into a messy braid. Then, silently, still half-asleep, the group headed north.

* * *

"We're about halfway there now," Inda announced over his shoulder. He, Marianna, and Dava were leading the way, talking quietly about various "adult" things. They had always been the most mature of their generation in Layla:). The current topic was politics in the Calypso Beach district.

"My feeling is, if they're not going to clean up the public beaches, what's the point of having a paid Beach Commissioner at all? He's just putting the tax dollars into his pocket and going on vacations to clean beaches in other countries." Mari slammed the walking stick she'd found into the ground to emphasize her point.

"It's not that easy to get rid of a public office, Mari," Dava pointed out.

"I don't want to get rid of the office, I want to get rid of the slacker that's in there."

"But it's an appointed office," Inda mused. "So it's not like we can oust him at the next election."

"He's been in that office for twenty years, too," Mari said. "Apparently our long line of Town Managers hasn't noticed the lack of work being done by the Beach Department."

"Do we even know what party affiliation Commissioner Leerey has?" Dava asked.

"Damned if I know," Mari shrugged. "I think he acts like a City-dweller."

"I'm pretty sure he's not a Tree-hugger." Inda stopped to look up the mountain. "I swear this thing keeps getting bigger."

"How did you put it here, Inda? Maybe that's got something to do with it," Mari said, looking up at the mountain herself.

"Uhh... promise not to tell?"

"Who would we tell?" Dava asked pointedly. "Does anyone else care?"

"Right-oh. I had some people drill into the ground till they hit the fault line that runs under the archipelago, and that made it erupt and form."

"And you controlled it?" Mari said, eyes opening very, very wide. "You made a natural volcano overnight, and kept it under control, and we didn't even notice? What the hell did you do to the tectonic plates around here? We're all gonna die!"

The entire group looked up at this last, hysteric statement. Inda glared at Mari.

"Sorry, guys, I was just overreacting to something Inda said about my club," she said hastily. That seemed to reassure them all.

"My scientists said everything would be okay," Inda said quietly. "Don't worry about it."

"So what about all the flora and fauna up here?" Dava asked, gesturing at the lush greenery and occasional mosquito on the slope.

"Landscaping," Inda grinned. "And the animals moved in from the rest of the island on their own."

"Peachy," Marianna muttered. She slapped at a mosquito. "Remind me to thank them."

* * *

"Alphabetical order. Write the name on the paper, hold it up to the camera, and talk for a few seconds about why you chose that person to be booted," Inda explained. "Then stick it in the bucket. Daniela first."

"You bet your sweet patootie," Daniela said, bounding up to the voting area. She scribbled something on a piece of bulky, multiply-recycled paper with a grease pencil. "Well, camera, I chose Frogman, because he creeps me out. I like Dava and Doreen, and Mari's my sister, and besides she's immune this time, and I need Pez around to do stuff for me. I don't care either way about UPChuck and Dream. But Frog-face is just gross, I mean, eating flies?" She dropped her paper in the bucket.

"Dava?" Inda called.

Dava shuffled up to the table. "Daniela's mostly useless, but Frogman is even more useless. I don't like the way he makes Doreen do stuff for him all the time. The poor girl needs a break. So in hopes of giving her a bit of a vacation, I'm voting for Frogman." He scrawled the name, then carefully folded and placed the paper in the bucket.

"Doreen."

"Well... Frogman told me to vote for UPChuck, but I think he's nice and he helped with the shelter without complaining... Pez is the only one I'm not friends with, so I guess I'll vote for him."

"Dream."

"I have no idea who to vote for. I don't think Frogman's been doing his share, though. Neither has Daniela, but frankly, I'm scared of what she'll do to my tree if I vote for her and she has to leave the island... and I'll still be stuck here, defenseless. There you go, Frogman."

"Frogman."

"I'd love to get rid of Marianna first off, since it would break her heart to lose the money, but she's immune. So, my second choice. UPChuck makes me nauseous. Helping, and carrying things, and making sure the girls are okay... how spineless. See ya later, Chuckie."

"Marianna."

"As much as having Dava here makes me nervous, since I know he can read my mind, I'm still going to have to get rid of Frogman. Ew. Did he just eat another fly? I mean, we could probably use the pest control out here, but frankly, Doreen needs a break from him. Buh-bye, Froggie."

"Pez."

"Gosh, I don't know who to vote for. Daniela didn't give me any direction. Well... eenie-meenie-miney-moe, that's the one that has to go... Frogman."

"Ulysses."

UPChuck leapt from his place in the council to the voting table in one bound, blatantly impatient to cast his vote. "I hate having to go last. I hate having to wait to get rid of... guess who... Frogman! He's done nothing but abuse Doreen, not to mention he's just disgusting. I'll bet Marianna said something about pest control; that's why she lets him hang out in the Club. Anyway, that's my vote."

As UPChuck regained his seat, Inda walked over to the vote bucket and started tallying up the votes. "Wow."

"Aren't you supposed to show those one by one to the whole group?" Mari called.

"Oh, yeah," Inda grinned sheepishly. "Here we go. Frogman... Frogman... Frogman... Pez... Frogman... UPChuck... Frogman... Frogman."

Frogman was staring in disbelief.

"The council has spoken, Frogman. You'll be heading to the boat with me for a luxury cruise back to the home port."

Frogman started to count on his fingers, then realized he had flippers. "Doreen, let me count on your fingers." She held up her hand obediently while he thought it out.

Marianna had already figured it out. Either Doreen had voted for Pez, or she'd voted for Frogman... because obviously Frogman would have voted for UPChuck. "Inda..." she said loudly. "Get over here right now!"

"What is it?"

"Frogman's gonna flip out when he does the math and figures out Doreen didn't vote the way he wanted her to. Get him out of here. I'll get the others back to camp."

"Oh no. We're going," Inda said, running up to Frogman and grabbing his wrist. "Volcano's gonna blow! Hosts and losers get to leave first!"

Frogman's survival instincts blew right past his math skills, and he ended up dragging Inda halfway down the mountain.

* * *

Later that night, Marianna and Dream comforted Doreen by the fire.

"I know you didn't want to vote for Uly," Dream said, holding Doreen's hand. "And don't worry, by the time the next seven weeks are up, Frogman will have forgotten about the whole thing."

"If he ever figures it out in the first place," Mari snorted. "Look, hon, now you've got a real vacation. We'll make sure you don't have to do so much. You really deserve a break, taking care of all those kids all the time."

Doreen just nodded absently as she gazed into the flames. They didn't know what she was really so upset about... she missed him.