Shadows Over Camp Darkness

Up is Down

Three thousand and six hundred seconds later, give or take an eye blink or two, and Gideon was staring at six upside down and irritated teenagers. How they had managed to all get caught by one trap was beyond her, and it both amused and annoyed her. To be fair, they weren’t all her kids, so at least it wasn’t a case of epic failure on their part, but to be honest that really didn’t matter. Two kids from her Intake, the Half Elf and the Siren; two kids from Xavier’s group, a Dirt Witch and a Zephyr; two kids from Lisa’s batch, a troll and a vampire; and all of them were covered in dirt to boot.

“You know what, I’m not even mad. A little concerned, vaguely confused, a bit hungry, but not mad.” Gideon called out to them. Then to make their day even more miserable, she turned around and walked away with Dilhil right beside her.

“Ah… aren’t you going to get them down?” the vampire asked, looking over his shoulder but not offering to do it himself.

“Nah, between the six of them I’m sure they’ll figure it out. Besides, they wanted to try and cheat, they can handle the consequences. So where were we?” The Fury shrugged, leading the vampire back to her usual sitting area.

The Maelstrom last year had destroyed a lot of property, but the forest had come out mostly intact and the log that Gideon liked to park the kids on was still in perfect condition. It was smoothed by many butts over the years and had achieved a semi comfortable chair status. After laying the traps with Lisa and Xavier, they had given the combined three Intakes the challenge of tripping the traps without getting caught in them. It was a standard tactic that they liked to use, giving each of the House Leaders a chance to pull people out and talk to them one on one, while another Councilor watched over the flock of them. Lisa had already had her go while Gideon watched the kids attempt to locate as many of the traps as possible, with Hantu immediately proving that once again it was a bad idea to underestimate his capabilities simply because he was grossly obese. As a Goblin, he had a natural affinity to connect with the nature around him, though not on the same scope a Dryad would, and it helped steer him in the right direction. Even better was the fact that Omen and Mardrom stuck with him, trusting that talent that he’d already revealed. Gideon had spied the Elf and Siren trekking off with some of the boys from the other Intakes and it occurred to her that she would have to be on alert for some illicit fraternization, but as long as the Siren kept her Song under control there would be no need to step in. It seems that a little hanky panky wasn’t the actual concern, as they had grouped in with two others as well and then set off to try and ‘reset’ traps that had already been triggered, just to trigger them again and claim the point.

“We were discussing why exactly I ah….do what it is I do.” Dilhil sounded so uncomfortable Gideon was surprised he wasn’t squirming in pain.

“You try to escape reality by drinking Fae blood, to the point where it overdoses and you almost die.” Gideon said it plainly for him, not letting him hide from his actions. It wasn’t just the addiction she had to address, but instead the fact that there was something driving him to behave that way. Helping solve the one would help him resolve the other.

“I don’t want to die.” The vampire spat in denial, but shut down again almost immediately after his outburst. “I just…. I want to be someone else. I don’t want to die, but I don’t want to live as me anymore either. Haven’t you ever just…wanted to not exist for a while?” he still wasn’t looking at her, fingers fidgeting against the leaves that had already fallen this Autumn.