Chapter 7

I woke up with a start still screaming. I shot up and fell out of my cot. The second I heard that bell ring, the guys laughed, as I lay there on the ground, grumbling and unmoving. That was one weird dream.

"What the fuck? I've never woken up at this god damn time. What time is it, four?" I yawned, sat up and stretched to the air. I grabbed my hairbrush from inside my box and tried to gently brush through the knots. I pulled and tugged. I gave up and decided to just leave it. I honestly couldn’t be bothered. My crazy hair up in its high bun, I stripped off my pajamas, standing in my underwear and bra. I was too tired to care and put on a white tank top. That crappy orange suit was next. As I pushed up the sleeves I looked at the guys. They all stared at me weirdly. “What?” They all looked away and mumbled different things.

"Well, you better get used to getting up this early… you'll be doing this for the next eight months." Said X-Ray blinking. I think he was confused about what he just saw. I rolled my eyes and trudged out the tent. I was outside in less than five minutes, which was my new record, though my eyes were still shut. I opened them and it was still dark. I heard the boys come out behind me. A gunshot sounded which opened my eyes, only to see Mr. Sir shooting a… lizard? It looked like the one from my weird dream that bit Katherine. Mr. Sir crab walked away from the showers. His eyes were wild and darting around, his hair was mangled. The boys were staring at him too. He looked at us and carried on walking. He disappeared behind the Mess Hall. Another gunshot rung through the heavy air.

"Uh, Squid, why was Mr. Cowboy shooting a, well, lizard?" I turned to Squid who was walking away with the rest of the boys to a line of others. I caught up and stood behind him.

 "You know those things are dangerous, don't you? If you get bit by them, well you’d be gone after a slow painful death.” He said.

“You can tell it’s a Yellow Spotted lizard ‘cus of the eleven spots it has down its back…” said Zigzag as we moved farther up in the long line.

“Yeh but if you get close enough to count them, you’re probably going to end up dead.”  Zero said quietly from behind me.

“Really?”  He nodded as a reply. I shuddered thinking how much pain poor Katherine must have been. Squid tossed a shovel at me and I followed him to another line. The breakfast queue. My breakfast was… interesting. It was a moist tortilla, which was dipped in honey. It dripped the gooey honey to the sand as I took one. Well, at least I think it was honey.

I walked behind the boys trying to eat the tortilla without it getting all over me, when Mr. Sir *cough* Creepy Cowboy *cough* beckoned to me. I walked over to him. Mr. Creepy Cowboy spat on the sand.

“This is where you’re gonna dig your hole. Five foot wide and five foot deep, you can use your shovel to measure.” He walked away and pulled out a handful of sunflower seeds from his pocket. He started popping them into his mouth. I looked at the ground, and sunk my shovel into it. After around two feet the sun was high in the sky and I could feel the full blast of it on my shoulders. I took a swig of my canteen, getting the last mouthful and stared up and shoved my shovel deeper. At least I was getting a good tan. I didn't bother asking someone how long it would exactly take, because, by the time I reached three feet, it was lunchtime, canteen-filling time, and annoy the crap out of Mr. Mean Shrink time! On the back of a blue truck a huge tank filled with water had a nozzle to fill up our empty canteens. I skipped over to the line and stood behind Zero.

“Hey, Kat, come stand behind me.” Said Zigzag as he pushed Zero back and tugged my arm.

“She can go in front of me, if she wants to?” asked Squid but before I could refuse he took my hand and pulled me in front of him, behind Armpit. What was this, the status quo?

“You know what guys, I think I’m fine standing last. I mean we’re no better than each other…except Stanley of course, he’s worse.” Stanley glared at me as I made my way back behind Zero. As Mr. Pendanski filled up my canteen I decided to have some fun with him. "Hey Mr. P! How is your day going? Good, oh that's absolutely wonderful! And I got acquainted to the boys last night very fine. Thank you so much for filling this up! See you around Mr. P!"

“Oh, um yes your welcome. See you around too?” He looked at me amazed. I smiled my best cute girly smile and turned around just in time to be graced with Mr. P's look of "What the hell was that?” which I found quite rewarding indeed.

"What was that?" Zigzag said, with a hint of amusement in his voice.

"That is how you confuse the hell out of a crazy psychologist. Entertaining, wasn't it?" I walked away with a smirk and the eyes of my fellow camp-mates following me to my hole. I began to dig, without eating lunch, and by the time I finished; it was only around three fifty in the afternoon. There were only three people still digging, Caveman, Zigzag, and Armpit. "See ya around boys." I spat in my hole, which X-Ray had informed me that this was a tradition the boys did when they finished their holes.

         As I walked back into camp, happily eating lunch as I went, I noticed a lovely clean house with two trees out in the front. I looked around. There were no other trees. A hammock was strung between them. The trees were providing shade. Shade. No one was around. I cautiously tip toed slowly to the hammock. I was greeted with a cool feeling surrounding my body. I felt the fabric of the hammock, it was a soft white sheet but much thicker than the ones on our beds. I checked if anyone was around again, and then lifted one leg onto the hammock. Then I leaned over and fell in. I rolled over so I was now looking up through the trees leaves. They were quite dry and not very green, but who cares? They gave me shade! I flicked my lighter on, the flame danced as a soft breeze started up.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” said a panicked voice. It was X-Ray with Squid and Magnet. He made me jump. My lighter flew from my hands and landed on the ground right next to a pile of dead leaves. Smoke rose. The boys backed away.

“Holy shit!” I screamed as I jumped out of the hammock and tried to grab my lighter. Flames already sprang up. I threw my hand in and grabbed it swiftly. The metal was hot and it burnt the inside of my hand. I dropped the silver to the ground again and examined the tingling red rectangle on my palm.

“Um, Kat you wouldn’t mind helping us! We kinda have a problem!” exclaimed Squid. I looked up at him. The tree nearest to the pile of leaves was on fire. The fire was eating its way up the dry bark, pulling chunks down to the ground where piles of embers were glowing. I shoved my lighter into my pocket, unhooked my canteen from my jumpsuit and put out the highest part of the fire. Magnet copied and so did X-Ray and Squid. But it wasn’t enough. The fire hissed and black smoke started to rise. The branches of the trees looked like they were reaching for the sky so it could pull it out of the mass of deadly orange.

“This isn’t going to stop it!” shouted Magnet.

I ran over to the opposite tree and untied the hammock. It fell loosely to the ground. I picked it up and threw it against the burning part of the tree. I started to pat it down, smothering the flames. Seeing what I was doing the boys took of their tops and did the same as me. The flames started to disappear. A thick black line ran down the side of the tree. We finally put it out. The glowing embers turned to coal. We were all panting hard. X-Ray’s lenses had turned black and he started to rub them clean. All of our faces were covered in soot and our orange jumpsuits had ash smudges all over. I looked at Squid and we burst out laughing. Soon all four of us were in hysterics.

“What do you think you are doing?” said a voice. We looked up all at once, none of us laughed.

“Well…um…we there was a fire an-” Magnet tried to explain.

“Excuse me?” she said. I didn’t understand why the boys had all had looks of fear across their faces. The woman was tall, wearing a brown cowboy hat with a neat ponytail tied back underneath. A pair of sunglasses hid her eyes. She had on a white vest and a nice pair of skinny jeans. To me, she wasn’t sinister at all. “You four are coming with me.” She signaled to the house.

“We’re in deep shit now…” muttered Magnet with a sullen look on his face.

“What do you mean? Who is she?” I whispered to him.

“That…that is The Warden.” X-Ray hissed. I was still confused.

“The number one rule of Camp Green Lake; don’t upset The Warden. Now we’ve gone ahead and done it!” Squid cleared my confused thoughts. She was the boss of the whole place! I get it! I frowned. Great, I’m in trouble with the boss and pulled my friends into it as well. When we got to the porch she pointed at the carved wooden bench sitting beside the front door.

“Sit. You’ll come inside one at a time to each tell me what exactly happened. You must not tell any lies only the truth, I have four stories to hear and if one of them is different…” she pulled of her sunglasses and looked us each in the eyes, “well lets just say there will be severe consequences…for all of you.” I gulped. “Now then, let’s start with ladies first.” My head shot up. She stared down at me. I looked back at the boys. They all looked in different directions. I got up and followed The Warden inside her cabin.