9.5 – Horse of a different color

Nikolas’ POV

Camp HanzenHall

Founded centuries ago by a middle aged man who didn’t want to move away from Ridgevalley to give his children a summer camp experience. Originally having spent the entirety of his life studying to become a doctor, like most every other member of his family, he surprised everyone by giving it all up and dedicating himself to create a summer camp.

It was small and uncared for at first, only receiving around five children per summer. But eventually its warm reception, its great views, and its many amusements started to bring more people over. What really tipped the scales, however, was when the founder came up with a riddle.

It was a riddle he officially gave out for only one summer, telling the children that it led to a magnificent and rare treasure. It didn’t seem particularly difficult, barely even 5 lines, but there was never a report of it ever being solved.

 

For a whole decade the camp became famously known for its unsolvable riddle, reaching easily up to hundreds of children coming at once each summer. The founder never gave away hints, and eventually he passed away, his riddle still unsolved.

To this day, Camp HanzenHall still stands, though it’s undergone some modern improvements. The principal focus is still the same the founder always wanted it to be: Teamwork.

And the riddle – and the treasure it lead to – continues to be unknown and forgotten.

But not for long.

“Thank you again for the ride!” Salandra chirped at my parents who smiled back.

“Have fun you two.” Papa said.

“No doubt about it with this.” I smirked, waving the paper with the marvelous word treasure written on it.

“Don’t forget to actually participate in the activities.” Papa said.

“Just you wait and see, I’ll bring back the treasure.” I declared and papa chuckled before giving a final goodbye.

We started making our way up the small hill. I stuffed the paper in my back pocket, unable to get the smirk off my face.

I mean really, treasure. Sounds like a much better ending than what I found in my basement.

“Is that a rock climbing wall?” Salandra asked, skipping a bit.

“Hey there!” A counselor called up at us once we’d reached the top. “The rest are in the cabin, come on.”

“Oh wow…” Salandra muttered. “This place looks great.”

I wonder where he hid it? Under a tree? Near the cabin? Where would you hide a treasure?

The cabin was already packed with five other kids already chatting away like they all knew each other.

“-BOOM and he just walks away while the other guy’s still holding the remote with the same dumbfounded face like he-” The brunette was enthusiastically sharing with the group when the male counselor cut in.

“Sorry to interrupt this fascinating story, but two of our new arrivals are here.”

“Everybody here are regulars,” The female counselor began. “But don’t be shy, this group doesn’t bite.”

“That’s Tom,”

“Hey.”

“Dawn,”

“I kind of bite a little.” She said with a wink.

“Kaan,”

“Looks like I’m finally not the only real supernatural here.” Oh yeah, now that I look at him he’s got tiny black wings on his back and I can kind of sense his magical presence. A fairy? Didn’t think I’d ever see one.

“Kenya,”

A roll of eyes.

“And Tatiana.”

A slight tilt of the head, not even looking at us.

“And you two are…”

“Riddle-solver extraordinaire, Nikolas Whitelight.” I said, adding some theatrics. The counselors raised their eyebrows slightly.

“Salandra Grace, but you can just call me Sal, I don’t mind.”

“You two can grab yourselves some chairs. The last one should be arriving soon and then we can start dividing the teams.”

“Teams? For what?” Sal asked.

“Well it’s a little tradition we have here.” The male counselor started.

I sighed inwardly. I was kind of hoping my subtle insert of the word riddle would get the conversation going, but apparently not. I want to get started on this treasure thing soon, but that’s going to be a little hard if I don’t even have the riddle to start with.

The fairy with tiny wings leaned back to talk to me as the counselors started explaining something about a competition and the whole camp divided into two teams.

“Whitelight huh?”

“It’s what my birth certificate says. What? Have you heard of my family?”

“In a manner of speaking. More like I am your family.” He smirked.

The brunette beside him – Kenya – jabbed him in the side. “You’re distracting him, he’s supposed to be listening.”

“No it’s fine I can do both.” I insisted, willing Kaan to elaborate.

“Ah well, more on that later.” He said with a shrug.

Before I could protest or the counselor could ask me not to interrupt, the door opened.

“Ah! There’s our last newbie.”

“People usually call me Zac.”

Zac!?

“Newbie?” Dawn said, perking up in her chair. “Wasn’t he here last year?”

“Yeah, but he chickened out after the first day.” Kaan replied.

“I didn’t chicken out. I had better things to do.” Zac said.

I can’t believe it. Well damn am I happy. I have an insanely long list of questions I need to ask this guy. So many that I actually wrote most down after that incident when I had to babysit Jesse.

“Good timing Zac, we were just talking about the competition.” The female counselor said, motioning for Zac to take a seat.

I watched him intensely, trying to subtly let him know him and I needed to talk.

He acknowledged my presence with a small nod and a weird look, then went and ignored me as if he hadn’t seen me since the bank robbery. As if he hadn’t appeared in that weird vision and given me pretty specific instructions on how to bring everything back to normal. Actually he’d looked a little different then?

Something was up and there were too many unknowns with this guy.

He sat on the small table beside the purple-haired girl. He gave her a wink, but she gave him the cold shoulder as the counselors started listing on the rules again. And my attention was back on the counselors as I heard the word prize.

Our stay here was going to be characterized by a competition that would include a total of 7 challenges.

Each team would get the opportunity to practice the different challenges and to choose their champion to compete against the other team.

The winner at the end of the summer would receive a unique prize. A trophy with all of the team member’s names on it to be showcased for the years to come.

Summer camp wouldn’t only be about the competition however, there were a lot of other activities we were going to do, and time to ourselves to train or practice in advance. The first challenge was going to be in the next few days, giving us the time to separate into teams and start practicing.

Oh and one extremely important rule: No cheating using any kind of supernatural advantage.

Not that I knew enough spells to cheat anyways. Not that I was going to put that much effort in the competition anyways with a prize like that.

***

“We’re going to need two captains.” The male counselor began.

Both the fairy – Kaan and the dark skinned girl – Dawn stepped up. I gladly stayed back, hands in my pockets.

“You again Kaan? It’s not fair,” The brunette – Kenya, said. “Mr. Little wings is always captain.”

“And thanks to that my team won last year. And you were on it! Why are you complaining?” Kaan exclaimed.

“Mr.Little wings,” I snorted, unable to help myself. I didn’t think anyone was paying enough attention to hear my comment, but when I looked up several of them were looking between me and Kaan, who had his eyes narrowed at me.

“It would be a great idea to have one of the new arrivals be a captain.” The male counselor said.

“You should do it Niko!” Salandra said, giving me a slight push.

“No I don’t want to.”

“You scared your team is going to lose Mr. Wannabe Hip hop?” Kaan asked, and I had to look at Salandra in confusion before she gestured at my bandana.

“Hell no, I’d beat your ass baby wings!” I replied. Judging by his face he did not enjoy being reminded of his tiny wings.

Sal jumped in between the both of us. “Perfect! Two captains, two teams right?”

“If everyone is okay with the captains, we’ll pick the teams now.” The female counselor said. She glanced at Dawn for approval. Dawn shrugged.

Wait, I’m a captain?

“Can I pick first?” Kaan asked and I shrugged in response. “I’ll take the blue girl.”

“Salandra.” She rectified.

“I’ll take Salandra.”

I chuckled to myself. He must think because she’s my friend she’s a valuable asset.

“Zac.” I said, motioning him over. He actually seemed disappointed.

“Ana.” Kaan gestured at the purple haired girl.

“Take Dawn, she’s hot.” Zac said, elbowing me. Is this guy serious?

“Kenya.” I said instead.

“We don’t have the same tastes.” Zac muttered.

“That’s not why I chose her.” I shot back annoyed. It was mostly to go against what he ordered me to do because it was for such a stupid reason.

“Tom get over here man.” Kaan said, choosing his last member.

“Well guess we get Dawn anyways.” Zac grinned.

“Suits me, with Kenya and I on the same team you’re going to LOSE Kaan!” Dawn said, sticking her tongue at him.

“Yeah we’ll see about that.”

***

I sighed loudly, but everyone was too busy training to hear or even care.

When they were talking about competitions and challenges and stuff, I kind of expected more you know? A lot more! Something else to entertain me while I try to find that treasure – and the riddle that goes with it.

Our teams got separated because we couldn’t both train for the same challenge. Guess what we got?

FISHING.

Most boring thing ever. I don’t even know why that’s included as a challenge! I didn’t even realize there were fish to fish in that half lake.

It probably wouldn’t be as bad if the other team wasn’t doing something that looked infinitely better.

“Hey captain,” Dawn called out. “You’re supposed to participate.”

“No thanks fishing isn’t my thing.”

“If you don’t at least try we can’t decide who’s going to be the champion.” Kenya said.

“Just ignore him girls.” Zac said. “Whether he participates or not, it probably won’t make much of a difference. We’ll win either way.”

Dawn chuckled, but Kenya didn’t seem convinced.

“Don’t be a party-pooper.” Kenya snapped. “If you ruin summer camp because of your newbie attitude I’ll make you regret it.” Somehow, I didn’t think that was an empty threat.

With some exaggerated movements, I got up and went to join them.

“Fine then, I’ll do my job as a captain. Who here’s even caught a fish yet?”

Dawn beamed. “I did! A small one.”

“Would’ve been mine, but she stole it.” Zac joked.

“Well then there we go. Dawn is our champion in fishing.” I declared. Kenya gave me an unhappy glare, but left it at that.

I glanced over on the other side of the lake where the counselors were talking.

I hadn’t been able to find the riddle anywhere and I’d hoped the counselors would just willingly give it to me but…

They hadn’t picked up on my hints and when I’d gone to ask them about it, they’d told me my team was setting up their tents or they were beginning training and that I should go join them.

But with a little bit of patience, they ought to give it up right?

***

“Riddle? Nikolas, you aren’t here to solve a riddle.”

“Haha, that’s old stuff. I doubt that treasure is still there.”

“Don’t worry about something like that. Just have fun!”

So for some reason they’re really keen on not giving me access to that riddle.

Footsteps caused me to get up from my I-give-up-it’s-time-for-drastic-measures position on the fence.

“Niko! I can’t believe we’re not on the same team.” Salandra exclaimed with a genuinely saddened expression.

“Hey it’s not that bad!” I’m actually pretty happy about it. My team would’ve probably lost if you were on it… “See it as you infiltrating enemy territory?”

“Are you telling me I should sabotage my team?” Salandra asked with disapproval.

“Er no?” I said. Her expression didn’t change. “Look I don’t have time for that right now. I gotta find a way to get my hands on that riddle!”

“Oh! For that treasure you were talking about?”

“Yeah! The counselors won’t give it to me and I don’t know how else I can get it.” I muttered. “But I was starting to think that it was probably somewhere in the cabin, I’d just need to snoop around a bit.”

“You’ll never guess who my team chose as their archery champion.” Sal said, rocking on her heels with a proud grin.

“It’s starting to feel like I’m cursed with these mysteries.” I groaned, throwing my hands up in the air. “Speaking of cursed…I was thinking about that basement at the bank lately…well really about everything that happened there-”

“Someone say curse?” Kaan cut in the conversation. “I’m probably the most knowledgeable person about those around these parts.”

“Wait are you serious?” I asked.

“Scratch that, I definitely am. I told you didn’t I? I’m a Whitelight. A real one.”

“What does that mean?” I asked, sensing the insult.

“The Whitelight Witch family. They were the best and strongest witches you know. They invented curses. And well probably wrote every spell book out there.”

“But you’re a fairy.”

“I did say centuries. Fairy blood eventually got mixed in my family.” Kaan said condescendingly.

“So you’re both like distant cousins!” Salandra exclaimed.

“VERY distant cousins probably.” I snorted.

“You’ve both probably heard of my ancestor. He was one of the most famous fairy police officers. The best of the best. Every criminal feared him. Nathan Whitelight.”

“Nope doesn’t ring a bell.” I said.

“No, sorry.” Sal said in a small voice.

“You guys are missing some serious culture.” Kaan said, shaking his head in disappointment. “Anyway, come on Sal. The team’s about to cook supper.”

“Wait a second. You said you knew all there was to about curses.” I interjected. Kaan smirked.

“Kenya complained to me about you so…I’ll tell you what I know if your team can beat me. Which probably won’t happen.” Kaan said before him and Salandra made their way off the deck.

Heh

Nathan Whitelight. Some old forgotten fairy officer.

Dude’s obviously never met my side of the family.

 

  

 

Hey guys, I would love to hear your thoughts and theories on what happens in the story, especially for this generation. I’m focusing a lot on mystery solving (as you can see) and everything has its time and place. It would be a great help if you guys shared your opinions that way I could gauge whether I’m releasing too much or not enough information.

Thanks for reading!

 

P.S. The answer is YES, you can indeed find Kaan on the Whitelight family tree.

Fun fact = I left Tyzel and Nikita to their own devices and Tyzel started snobbing her.

 

Credit

Summer camp

Tatiana

Now I can’t find the original post with the sim because I’m pretty sure the creator took the site down, but basically Simsered made these fantastic sims and said it was okay if I used some of them. I changed Tatiana up a bit, but the basic sim is the same 🙂

And let’s just end this abnormaly long author’s note of mine with a pretty accurate doodle if i do say so myself