Afraid of the Dark

Č̸h̴ąp̷ť̸ęr̷ T̴é̶n̴

The crowd could barely contain their excitement. Each time one of the YouTuber's introduced themselves on stage, there would be another roaring scream of joy. It took a while to actually get through the introduction of the event. However, the hosts of the Insomnia Stage show - Matt and Chris - did eventually manage to guide Ethan, Bob, Wade, Tyler, Mark and Seán through the first part so that they could finally get onto the main sections. The stage had been set up so that there were two long sofas set up in a 'V' shape, with a shallow coffee table between them. To the side of that, there were also three tables, each containing objects which had been covered up by a cloth.

"So, boys! What do you think you are going to be doing today?" Matt called out to the group.

"How are we supposed to know?" Seán laughed. "All you told us in the briefing is 'be careful', so that could mean anything."

"Do you think it's going to be dangerous?" Chris asked.

"Knowing this show, it could be literally anything, so possibly," Seán replied.

"I bet that's reassured all of your friends who have just come over from America to this show for the first time," Matt smiled. The five American members of the group laughed, along with a lot of the crowd.

"If I told you that we were doing something creative, what activity would first come to mind?" Matt asked the group.

"Pictionary?" Ethan suggested.

"Drawing contests?" Mark asked.

"Both good answers, but not the correct ones," Chris stated.

"I am worried how the word 'dangerous' and the word 'creative' are going to fit together," Bob stated.

"Well, what we plan on doing today doesn't involve any pencils or pens..." Chris continued.

"Well, it does have pens, Chris," Matt cut in, holding up a packet of sharpies.

"Okay, fine, so we have pens. But what you won't have is paper. Because paper canvases are overrated, it's about time we try out something new on this show."

Matt nodded enthusiastically. "There is always an issue with Insomnia festivals, and that is that they don't always fall on very good times in the year. We rarely get a October festival for example, meaning we never really get to do anything with Halloween."

"Does anyone in the crowd have any idea of what we are doing?" Chris called out. There were some mixed responses.

"If you are thinking of pumpkin carving, then you are bang on the money!" Matt said. He walked over to one of the tables, and pulled of its cloth with a "Ta-da!" to reveal an array of knives, pumpkin carving tools, fake LED candles, and of course a pumpkin. "It might be a little unseasonal, but we never really get to do this, so let's give it our best shot and hope we don't cut any fingers off!"

"We are going to split you guys into pairs, which is going to form three different teams! Each team will have five minutes to plan and clean out their pumpkin - because yes, you are going to have to get your hands dirty and clean all that gunk from the middle out..."

"We can maybe send you all home with a bag of it, and you can make yourself some soup!" Matt chimed in. Chris laughed.

"We could do that, or we could ask you guys to kindly dispose of that gunk in the bin bags under your tables. Anyway, after those five minutes are up, you will then have ten minutes to carve whatever you want onto it - but keep it PG, folks."

"Then, we are going to judge your creations on three categories! Style, which is how it looks, difficulty, which is how hard and ambitious it was to make, and finally - a bit of a 'wildcard' topic - durability! We'll be giving you all some little baby pumpkins and it will be up to you to prove to us that your carved creations are durable enough to withstand a pelting," Matt explained.