I muttered sure, or thought I did, and scratched my hair, which felt grubby and tangled. I’d never felt so sweaty, dirty, and gross in my whole life. And we had to do the whole hike over again today.
Birds were chirping and flitting all over the place. There must have been hundreds of them, which was disconcerting, because I couldn’t see them; they were hidden in the foliage. Like everything else on this planet, waiting to turn around and bite me.
The coffee wasn’t bad. Tasted pretty good, actually, and convinced me that I really was awake. By the time the smell of it spread through the shelter, the others were awake, scrubbing hands over faces. There was a latrine nearby—a wooden shed with a chemical composting toilet, which sort of ruined the effect of being in wilderness. Breakfast was energy bars and dried fruit, and even those tasted good after the cold night.
“What do you know,” Tenzig said during the short meal. “We survived the night.”
“There really weren’t too many horrible things that could happen to us in just one night,” Charles said. “Not this close to civilization.”
“You call this civilization?” Ladhi said, scratching her head, picking out tangles in her hair, which was longer than mine. I could brush mine with my fingers. She might have to chop hers off after this. “I think there’s something living in my hair.”
My head starting itching even more after that. I didn’t want to think about it.
Somehow, we’d survived our night in the wilderness with nothing worse to show for it than a few blisters, bug bites, sunburns, and muscle strain, which seemed like more than enough damage for one trip. I didn’t know if I had any more confidence than when I’d started, but I did have the satisfaction of knowing I could play Stanton’s stupid little games.
Packing to go back was a pain. Nothing seemed to fold down as small as it had been when we started, none of it fit back in the packs as neatly as it had yesterday. We kept stuffing the packs, restuffing, and still gear poked out at awkward angles. We had to let the stove cool off, which meant we finally got everything put in some kind of reasonable order, and there it was, sitting all by itself in the middle of the clearing. So we had to start over again.
But we managed, got our packs on and were ready to go. Tenzig consulted the map and GPS—more to feel like he was doing something official than because we really needed directions when the trail was right in front of us. Really, how hard could it be? And didn’t we all feel better about ourselves now? Doing this on Mars, that would have been a challenge.
Mom could have started a fancy school on Mars instead of making us come here.
The air was getting warm again, and the sun had climbed. Though it seemed to be burning my skin, the heat didn’t get any deeper. My bones were still cold and my muscles still hurt.
“We’d better step it up, people,” Tenzig said over his shoulder. “They’re expecting us back in an hour.”
We were walking single file down the trail, and we all glared at him.
“They’ll wait,” I said.
“They’ll think we can’t hack it,” he shot back.
I grumbled, “The way I look at it, they stick a bunch of offworlders in the middle of a jungle—”
“Forest,” Charles said.
“Whatever—told them to go all survivalist with equipment they’ve never used before and minimal instructions. I figure if we show up at all without calling for help, we proved we can hack it.”
“He wants to get back before the other groups do,” Charles said. “This is a race for him.”
Ladhi looked back and forth between them. “Is it? Is it supposed to be a race?”
“No,” I said. “We’ll get back when we get back and it doesn’t matter.”
We walked for another half hour, feet dragging, scuffing in the dirt. The sun wasn’t quite as hot when we were under the trees, but during an open stretch, it beat down. No one had thought to put hats in our collection of gear.
Somebody’s laughter rang through the trees.
I looked around, couldn’t see anything. It might have been birdsong. Then it came again, along with the sound of voices, an easygoing chatter.
“What’s that?” Ladhi stopped and stared, fearful, as if wild animals would announce themselves with loud voices.
The noises came closer, until Charles said, “It’s the competition.”
We stopped and waited. Sure enough, a group of students came around the curve in the trail behind us. George, Elzabeth, Angelyn, Bently, and Tamra. All Earth kids. Not anyone I particularly wanted to see at the moment.
“Wow, look at this,” George said to the rest of his group. “Where’d you people come from?”
“We’ve been here the whole time,” I said. “Where’d you come from?”