I was finally able to leave the infirmary. Since the challenge had seemed to have already started I decided I'd take my time before heading over.

Singing in the shower was something I hadn't realized I missed doing until I couldn't do it in front of the others because of my—get this, stage fright. It was one thing when it was cheering, I was good at that but singing? I was horrid and I didn't need anyone else knowing just how bad I was.

Finishing up getting ready, I decided I'd taken long enough and was finally making my way over to where the challenge was being held for today. As I was walking in I noticed the rest of the Killer Bass gloomily sitting on the wooden bleachers.

Just as I was about to announce my arrival Courtney decided to speak, "Okay this is really bad, one more game and we lose the whole challenge... again!" I stopped at the end of the bleachers while also noticing Duncan lazily sleeping on a section. "We can't let that happen, people, we need someone strong, someone mean, someone who will crush those lame-o Gophers into the dirt!"

I snorted as I watched their gazes shift towards a knocked out punk. "So Duncan?" They'd finally noticed me and Bridget was the first to greet me while the others followed behind.

"I'm fine, fully refreshed." I waved some of them off as I wanted to get to the matter at hand. "So wake him up."

"Nuh-uh, if we wake him up, he'll kill us!" I laughed at DJ scared reaction to the idea of waking Duncan up, but then again Duncan was a very intimidating person.

"Doubtful." I looked at the others and noticed they were either scared or nervous at what he might do to them.

"She's right guys, he won't kill us he wants to win too." At least Courtney understood. If anything Duncan would be pissed and eventually have to get over it.

"They're right. We need Duncan's fierceness to win this!"

"That's the spirit Harold—now go wake him up." Snorting, I shook my head at their unnecessary fear. He wasn't going to do anything—at least not to me that is, but I'm sure they'd be safe too.

I sighed as I watched my team. "This is so stupid—he'll surely kill you all now."

"Shut it, Riley!" I had no idea where it was they'd found the long stick to even be doing this but they were going to attempt to poke Duncan awake with it. I restrained myself from laughing when they'd missed the first time and tried again.

As they touched his nose, his reflexes must have been great because he immediately grasped the stick and pulled it out of their gasp to snap it in half. "You better have a really good reason for sticking this up to my nose."

"Look. We are down two, nothing. I can appreciate that you need a little nap time, but we need your help." Yeah, we did. We sucked, majorly.

"Oh, and why should I help you, darling?" I smirked, he was such an ass and yet I liked that about him—not like that, but like... whatever, it doesn't matter.

Courtney decided to get up into his face, "Because I can personally guarantee you that if we lose this game you'll be the one going home, darling."

Rolling my eyes I failed to notice Duncan looking at me until Bridgette poked my side, making me squeal. "What?" She nodded her head to Duncan's general direction.

I looked over and we stared at each other for what felt like forever but must have been just a couple seconds. He raises his left eyebrow, "What? Guessing by their mood when I got here we suck, so yeah totally need help."

Sighing, he finally agreed. "Fine, I'll play. On one condition, you do what I say when I say it." They all agreed immediately. "Okay, here's a strategy I picked up during my first visit to juvie. It's called Rush the New Guy."

I decided to sit this one out. Watching as Courtney, Geoff, DJ, Katie, and Duncan made their way onto the field, I secretly hoped I sat the rest of this entire thing out.

Bridgette and I chatted for a bit and before we knew it we'd won the round. Getting up with the others to celebrate for the win of this round, I made my way to Duncan's side.

"Not bad, huh?" He looked down towards me and I resisted the urge to smile up at him. Instead, I settled for my classic eye roll and constantly heard snort.

Waving him off, I thought I'd mess with him a little. "Could be better."

"Oh, yeah?" He roughly placed his arm around my shoulder bring me closer to his chest while giving me a playfully soft noogie. I laughed along with him while trying to pull myself away.

"Duncan!" He finally stopped when he'd noticed he'd ruined my hair. It now resembled a really bad case of bed-hair. I ignored him grinning at me while I tried to fix my now messy hair.

"Alright, let's continue!" Chris announced. I pushed myself away from Duncan and made my way to the bleacher with Harold, Courtney, and Sadie. Just as quickly as I sat down and got comfortable we'd won again.

The moment Courtney caught sight of Tyler she began to hound him for answers and Tyler didn't really seem to be giving her answers she wanted to hear. "Where were you?"

"Nowhere." He simply waved her off.

Courtney scoffed before she continued with her interrogation, "You were with that blonde gopher girl, weren't you!?"

I didn't mean to, but I somewhat butted in just to say something simple. "Her name's Lindsay by the way."

Tyler glanced at me and smile before turn his attention back to the she-devil. "No—maybe... so?"

"So, she could have been getting you to spill all of our weaknesses to her!" Oh please, Courtney was totally overreacting. I glanced over at said person and saw that she was playing puppetry with her hands.

"I doubt she's capable of that Courtney." I butted in again and this time she didn't like it because she glared at me causing me to roll my eyes at her and turn my attention to the game.

We'd won again and we're now going to play a final round that would break that tie we were able to create so quickly.

I watched as the others created a huddled circle to try and discuss who was going in for this round. Looking up from playing with the hair-tie around my wrist I noticed Harold making his way back to the bleachers. "Didn't let you play?"

"No..." I sighed, feeling slightly bad for the guy. I wasn't around to see how they'd played in the beginning, but I'm guessing if they wouldn't even let him switch in he must have been bad.

"Gophers, Bass. Let's send this sample to the lab and see what you're made of!" I cringed hearing Chef Hatchet blow his whistle and watched as the others got into position.

The game had been going on for a while now and Courtney managed to finally get Cody out, but Owen was able to knockout Bridgette in return. I'd never been so bored just watching people get hit with balls over and over again.

Just when I thought I would die, Courtney yelled at me to get onto the court. I didn't want to hear her yell any longer than she already was so I didn't bother arguing. Making my way onto the court I was passed a ball by DJ.

"Knock him out, throw him out!" I felt my eye twitch and before I knew it I'd already thrown it towards Noah. How dare he disrespect cheer and be useless to his team.

"Riley!" Groaning I looked over to Courtney, "Throw it at someone on the court!"

"Technically he is on the court..." I could hear the Screaming Gophers chuckle in amusement as well as my own team for my loss control in temper.

"You know what I mean!" I waved her off and gave the court my undivided attention.

Just as Sadie was waving around coming onto the court to play she was hit causing Duncan to facepalm and me to laugh. She shouldn't have been distracted.

Dodging a ball Gwen had thrown I'd turned just in time to see it smack into Courtney. I laughed and in turn, was hit with a dodgeball from behind. "Oh, come on!"

I snorted as Geoff was hit and went down, but fully lost it when Duncan was hit by three dodgeballs from all sides. As he picked himself up and walked off the court he playfully glared at me. I smirked before turning to the court. It was just Harold against Owen.

"Goodnight Harold." I lightly punch Duncan's shoulder before watching Harold and Owen.

He'd dodged so well that it gave the others faith that we could possibly win this. Who knew figure-skating could come in handy on something like this. "You've got this Harold!" I stood up on the bleachers and raised both of my arms.

Hearing a cough I looked down to see Duncan smirking at me—feeling a blush rush towards my cheeks I coughed and sat down before mumbling out a "sorry" for getting a little too excited.

I'd never been so happy—we'd finally won a challenge and it felt so good! I jumped onto Duncan and he spun us around, while the others cheered for our win. Just as Chris announced us as the winners, Duncan and I pulled apart and ran towards Harold with the others.

"Riley!" I paused in my tracked and looked over my shoulder to see—surprise, surprise... Duncan walking up to me.

I felt something flutter inside me and I was confused. Maybe I was still feeling something from the previous challenge. "What's up?"

"You know you didn't have to apologize for showing your cheer side." Cheer side? Oh. He means when I stood up and cheered for Harold.

"I wouldn't call that my cheer side, but it's close." I almost let myself have a full on cheer for Harold. I figured it help boost his confidence in catching the ball, but in the end, I got nervous at the idea of the others seeing. "But that's not why I apologized... I figured it must have caught you guys off guard since I'm always so—"

"Indifferent about everything?" I shoved him as he laughed at my jaw dropping reaction.

I shook my head and lazily ran my fingers through my hair before laughing out, "That's one way to put it you jerk."

"So what took you so long?" I glanced at him and smiled before telling him that I slept for as long as I could before leaving and taking my time getting ready afterward. We walked slowly side-by-side towards our cabin.