The road less travelled...

*Note to self: must not get ideas during Pilates class - very distracting!!*

Chapter Eight – A Few Surprises


Tribes
Cakobau
Annabelle-Marie
Andrea
Hayden
Jarod
Mike
Peter
Rachael
Tiffany

Naulivou
Bob
Candy
Chris
Louise
Meredith
Michael
Richard
Sarah


The reward challenge began after the commercials ended and it was for blankets and pillows for the winning tribe. It was partially based on luck. Two members of each tribe went into a sandy pit and dug up colored clay pots. These were brought back to the other tribe members, who had to solve the puzzle on the lock of each pot. Once these were opened, the jigsaw puzzle pieces inside the pots could be retrieved and then put together. The first tribe to correctly put the puzzle together won reward.

Chris and Richard took on the task of digging for Naulivou, as the pots were large and they were the strongest men on the tribe. Mike and Peter chosen for Cakobau, but they struggled to find the first blue pot. Naulivou were looking for their third pot and were working on the combination locks by the time Mike and Peter struggled up the sand with the large clay object, but the locks presented little trouble to Cakobau, with Jarod taking a subtle hand when the others seemed to be struggling. In the end, although Naulivou found all of their pots first, it was the locks the presented them with problems and Cakobau took the lead.

Despite their best efforts, Naulivou fought impossible to catch up and in the end it was relatively easy for Cakobau to put the pieces of the jigsaw together and claim the prize while their opposition was still only half-finished. They carried off the pillows and blankets in triumph, and, as the commercials began, Broots turned to the others with a look of enquiry on his face.

“So have they already started to lose in order to get rid of Bob or Sarah?”

“Maybe.” Sam shrugged. “It looked like they were really struggling with the puzzles on those jars – but why would they throw a reward challenge?”

“Perhaps so it looks less surprising if they all fail in an immunity challenge?” Sydney suggested.

“Well, we’ll have to wait and see about that,” said Miss Parker. “You know what really surprises me, though? The fact that we haven’t had Jarod rubbing any of this in our faces. I would have expected him at least to call.”

“Maybe he knows that we know,” Broots offered. “After all, it seems like he knows everything else that goes on at the Centre.”

This was so true that it evoked no response from anyone. The rest of the episode was not particularly exciting for the Centre staff as it focused primarily on Naulivou and it was no real surprise when they lost the immunity challenge and were summoned to Tribal Council later that evening.

“Bob or Sarah?” Broots asked, turning to Sam, who looked thoughtful.

“It’s tough to say. They’ve been really careful with their editing so you can’t tell for sure which of them will go. But at a guess – Sarah.”

“See, that’s interesting, ’cos I think it’ll be Bob.”

“But would that not put Naulivou at a disadvantage against Jarod’s tribe?” queried Sydney.

“It might,” agreed Broots. “But they might feel that getting rid of the troublemaker will make it easier for the tribe to work together.”

“Personally, I thought Sarah was causing them more problems,” commented Miss Parker.

Broots checked his laptop, which was open on the table, and grinned. “Betting odds say that the next person voted off will be Bob.”

The group fell silent while Jeff Probst brought the urn containing the votes back to the Naulivou tribe and there was a tense moment while he read the votes.

“Sarah. Bob. Bob. Two votes Bob, one vote Sarah. Bob. And the fourth person voted off Survivor: Thailand: Bob.”

“Good,” Broots declared in satisfied tones, almost before Jeff had finished speaking.

There was a soft chuckle from near the door; everyone except Sydney assumed it had come from him, but the psychiatrist, aware that he had made no sound, cast a sharp glance over his shoulder, towards the darkest corner of the hallway near the front door, and was just in time to see a shape move further back into the darkness.

Realizing that the others had become immersed in the following’s week’s teaser and Bob’s final words, Sydney took advantage of their concentration to get up from his chair and silently leave the room. His eyes adjusted to the dark hallway and he was unsurprised to see that the front door stood fractionally open, a small block of wood – Broots’ makeshift doorstop – keeping it from closing completely.

“Very good,” a familiar voice remarked as Sydney stepped outside and pulled the door almost shut.

“I did not believe you could possibly stay away,” Sydney replied with a soft chuckle as he sat down on the step beside his former protégé. “In fact,” he added, “I was very surprised to hear nothing from you last week, considering how close you came to being voted off.”

Jarod’s teeth shone white in the moonlight as he grinned and leaned back against the porch rail. “Who says I wasn’t paying attention?”

“Is it worth it, Jarod?” Sydney was unable to restrain his curiosity. “Is it worth losing your anonymity?”

“Anything is worth keeping those I care most about safe,” came the ready reply.

Habitual reserve kept Sydney from asking if he and the other Centre employees came under that umbrella and for a moment there was silence. In the moonlight, the older man studied Jarod’s features.

“You still look a little thin,” he remarked critically.

Jarod chuckled. “You try spending as long as I did in the wilds of Fiji and see how you look.”

“How long were you there?” The question came out before Sydney could stop himself, but even as he asked it, he wondered if an answer would be forthcoming.

Jarod’s expression quickly confirmed that Sydney was not going to learn any secrets from this conversation. “Contractual obligations,” he remarked with another broad grin. “I couldn’t tell you even if I wanted to.”

“But you have no intention of telling me,” Sydney added knowingly. “Even if you were at liberty to do so. I know you better than to believe that you would say a word.”

“Syd?”

The female voice from inside the house caused both men to start and the psychiatrist glanced over his shoulder to see Miss Parker come to the doorway, her silhouette standing out sharply against the hall light. She shot him a puzzled glance.

“What are you doing out here?”

The step on which Jarod had been sitting was already empty and the psychiatrist shook his head as he stood up, glancing out across the dark garden, aware that a pair of eyes would be watching him from the shadows. Without answering his colleague’s question, he followed her back into the house.

“I would guess Jarod will make the merge and then he’ll be voted off,” Broots was suggesting as Sydney returned to his seat on the sofa.

“Not if he doesn’t give them a reason to vote him off,” Sam argued. “There are plenty of guys who are more threatening than Jarod, particularly in the other tribe. If I were there, I’d be voting off people like Richard and Michael before I got rid of Jarod.”

“Not that you’re biased, Sam,” suggested Miss Parker.

“Of course not, Miss Parker,” the sweeper replied, with a chuckle, as he stood up and collected his things, leaving the house with the others.

☼ ☼ ☼

Broots stood and watched the three cars drive away before he went back inside. It was a tradition now that he ordered in on Thursday nights, so it was easy to clean away the various plastic and paper plates that had held the Mexican spread from that night and toss the empty soda cans into the recycling. Sitting at his computer, he uploaded the episode from TiVo so that he could write a full report on it the following day – and wasn’t that a task he relished! – and then switched off the television.

Debbie’s footsteps and the familiar rattle of her key told him that she had come home from visiting some of her school friends.

“Dad,” she demanded as soon as she entered the house, “who’s upstairs?”

Broots stared at her in confusion. “Nobody, why?”

“There’s a light on in your room.” She suddenly took a step closer to him. “It’s not a burglar, is it?”

“Well, I-I’ll go find out,” Broots told her, trying to be reassuring, as he picked up the poker and began to go up the stairs.

It took his eyes a few seconds to adjust to the dark landing, but he saw almost at once that Debbie was right and that there was light coming from under his bedroom door.

“Who are you?” he demanded out loud, hoping that his voice didn’t shake too much.

Behind Broots, a shadow slipped silently into Debbie’s bedroom. Unaware of this, Broots sidled towards his own room and then abruptly threw open the door.

The room was empty.

However, it was clear that someone had been there. The bed was draped with a collection of what Broots quickly realized were Survivor buffs in three colors – blue, green and, somewhat unaccountably, red. A torch with Jarod’s name on the tag lay on top of the pillows at the head of the bed and the ceremonial tiki used as the immunity idol stood on the floor.

Broots, instantly reassured, lowered the poker and moved back to the head of the stairs, calling down, “It’s okay, Debbie, you can come up. There’s no one here.”

“Almost no one,” said a deep voice from behind him and Broots leapt several inches into the air.

Jarod chuckled softly and then smiled at Debbie as the girl came up the stairs, staring at him with wide eyes. Then, with Broots still speechless, the Pretender calmly walked down the stairs and out of the front door. Debbie turned her father, but, having recovered from his initial shock, he spoke first.

“Don’t tell anyone, Debbie. Understand? No one can ever know that he was here.”

His daughter eyed him warily. “Do you know him?”

“Yes.” Broots gave her his best ‘Miss Parker’ look and was secretly thrilled to see her wilt visibly, just as he did. “Not one word, Debbie, understand?”

“Yes, Daddy,” she murmured and slunk off to her room.

Going into his own room, Broots shut the door and leaned the poker against the wall before staring at the collection on and around his bed. This was the stuff that a Survivor fan’s dreams were made of. If Sam knew this was here, Broots was aware that he would probably have to fight the sweeper for them. Broots had one brief thought of putting them up on eBay right away, but then common sense made him realize that, the longer Jarod was in the game, the more value they would have.

Besides, he wasn’t really sure he could willingly give them up. After all, the bragging rights were probably worth more than anything, so for the moment he packed them all carefully away, the buffs in his locked box beside his bed, where he kept his other valuables, and the torch at the very back of his closet before heading for a shower and wondering whether there would be a merge to create the Red tribe or if one group would simply decimate the other, as had happened before.