After Duncan left to go back on the plane, the teams were put on different colored mats. Team Victory’s was yellow, Team Amazon’s was pink, and Team Chris’ was blue.
"Ooh look team colors." Izzy said happily.
"Why is our mat yellow, we're no cowards." Harold asked angrily.
"Relax, sugar. The mat's gold 'cause Team Victory's in first place!" Leshawna explained with pride. Starlight couldn’t argue with that one.
As Team Amazon were bantering, Starlight noticed Sierra walk over to Izzy.
“The Duncan and Courtney fans will be so devastated but I think you and Owen have a big shot at becoming fave Total Drama couple on my fan site." Sierra said happily.
"Owen's magic, when he breathes, his nose whistles the Canadian national anthem." Izzy said.
Starlight looked over to see Owen and his nose was doing just that or what she thought it was anyway, she didn’t know much about Canada, being from another dimension and all.
"Super cute, but he's no Cody, did you know he slept with his stuffed emu Jerry until… well okay he still does." Sierra said happily.
"And you know this how?" Noah moved over to Sierra and asked incredulously.
"I called his aunt once, I pretended I was a telemarketer." Sierra explained.
"Ooh, stalkericious." Noah said sarcastically.
Suddenly the cymbals rang, bringing Starlight’s attention to Chris sitting on an intern while another one was fanning him with a giant leaf. Starlight rolled her eyes at the scene, the host was such an egomaniac.
“Don't know about you guys, but I am loving Egypt! Mm. And I'm gonna love it even more watching you enjoy your second challenge. The Amazing Camel Race!" Chris announced.
"Where are the other camels?" Ezekiel asked.
"There are no other camels. It's a camel race. Not a camels race." Chris explained.
"Yes." Heather exclaimed happily.
"We won last time, but they get a camel, they get a goat, and we get a stick?" Leshawna said incredulously.
Starlight raised an eyebrow at that remark, didn’t she say that just earlier?
Each reward has it's advantages, trust me." Chris said.
“Everyone, I need to pitch a team meeting.” Alejandro told his team as Starlight shrugged before she stood in between Noah and Sierra.
“We need no camel. We have each other, we have the strength, the will, and together we will triumph.” Alejandro said in determination.
“Yeah!” Owen clasped his hands together happily.
“Yeah!” Tyler cheered.
“Alright.” Noah rubbed his hands together.
“I’m game.” Starlight smirked before looking to see Sierra with a blank look on her face but before she could dwell on that, Alejandro began speaking again.
“Alright, so we need to get on the goat in a perfect balance. Noah and Tyler, get on the goat together, Sierra and Owen, get on Noah and Tyler’s shoulders respectively.” Alejandro commanded politely.
As soon as the four teammates did just that, Owen gave a smile at the Latin, “Hey this is so cool Alehandout or Alakazam. Ah, I’m just gonna call you Al, woo.”
Alejandro just gave a blank look.
“Yeah, this is gonna work.” Noah scoffed.
“Have faith Noah. Believe in us.” Alejandro encouraged before turning to Starlight, “I’m going to need to carry you if that’s alright?”
“If you insist.” Starlight said in confusion before Alejandro grabbed her by the back and lifted her up, and then leaped on top of Owen and Sierra which perfectly balanced them all on top of the goat.
“Whoa, we’re perfectly balanced.” Tyler said in shock and awe.
“Okay, color me impressed.” Noah rolled his eyes in amusement.
Starlight then looked down to see Team Amazon on their camel and Chris standing on a stool, “A'ight. Nile's that-a-way. Kinda big, blue, and watery. Can't miss it. Or I guess you can, but then you'll die. Probably get killed by the local scarab beetles. It's mating season and they get all... kill-y when they're in heat." The host said happily.
That sounded ominous.
"I am glad there aren't any out here. Those things are nasty!" Leshawna said happily.
"I'll tell them you said so." Chris says before Starlight looks behind her to see Chef pouring a jug of scarab beetles on the ground.
The contestants begin screaming as scarab beetles began swarming the field while Starlight found herself clutching onto Alejandro to avoid falling when suddenly the music bell dinged.
"Ooh! Time for a song! Think of it as a mini-challenge. Music can soothe the savage mate-seeking scarabs, so make up a good song and maybe they won't kill ya. Or don't but you'll get disqualified and become bug food." Chris said happily.
Starlight groaned along with the others but knew the show must go on lest she get eliminated like Duncan.
https://youtu.be/-gLGxlGCdqA?si=xqaVY73pvQOH4JgS
(Song begins)
The song began with Cody, DJ, and Harold snapping their fingers in sync before Alejandro began singing.
“No need to get crazy, it’s loving time at last.”
“You don’t wanna eat us up.” The boys all sang in unison.
“We’re mostly full of gas.” Owen finished before seeing more scarab beetles crawling near him, “No! No!”
“It’s mating time for scarabs.” Starlight sang along with the girls.
“So whatcha waiting on?” Leshawna smirked as she backed away from the scarabs.
“Just ignore us humans.” Izzy sang as Cody whistled.
“And make out till the brink of dawn.” The contestants sang much to Starlight’s bafflement, considering how straightforward that was.
“It’s loving time.” The boys harmonized as the scarab beetles began nuzzling together and away from the contestants.
“Loving time loving time.” Starlight and the girls chorused.
“Scarab mating season.”
“It’s loving time.”
“Loving time, loving time.”
“Scarabs, get busy now.” Alejandro said calmly.
“It’s loving time.” Harold sang.
“Loving time, loving time. Scarab mating season!” They all sang along.
“It’s loving time.” Cody sang as he and the Amazons began silently riding their camel away causing Alejandro to inch forward, letting their goat follow.
“Loving time, loving time. Scarab mating season!” They all sang along.
“Seasonal eh.” Ezekiel spoke before realizing his mistake, “Oh no, WAIT!”
(Song Ends)
It was too late, the scarab beetles had heard Zeke and began snarling before chasing after them once again. The camel and goat immediately began running whilst carrying their respective teams, and all Starlight could do was watch as Team Victory run from the beetles in fear in sympathy.
After a while, Starlight and the rest of Team Chris were far away from the scarab beetles and were quick to catch up with Team Amazon who were more than eager to taunt them about being in the lead.
“We’re gonna win the race now so see ya.” Heather smirked at them before blowing a raspberry.
“Eat sand losers.” Courtney fired with a smirk as well.
Starlight silently furrowed her eyebrows at the girls’ behavior but what surprised her was what Alejandro said next.
“Such witty remarks from such fiercely intelligent women. I am both humbled and intrigued.” Alejandro complimented which was indeed confusing to Starlight. She was all for being peaceful but it was weird how Alejandro was complimenting the two people who just insulted them.
“Nice try, but I’m with Duncan.” Courtney waved him off.
“And what a pity it is that you should give yourself to a quitter, who doesn’t deserve you.” Alejandro smiled back much to Starlight’s shock.
“Wh- that’s not- Duncan is totally… would somebody hurry this camel up!” Courtney stammered before turning to her team angrily.
“That was a bit of a low blow, don’t you think?” Starlight asked cautiously as she turned to Alejandro.
“I’ll admit that it was a bit… unorthodox to bring up her boyfriend but I’m sure we all wanted to take Courtney down a peg just a little.” Alejandro explained nervously.
“Yeah, that makes sense to me. She was a major pain to watch her treat Lindsay so badly last season.” Tyler admitted from below.
“Yeah… Courtney’s really mean.” Owen gulped nervously, as if fearing that Courtney would overhear him.
Starlight had to admit, from what she saw on the show Courtney wasn’t the best person, heck from what she saw, she bargained lives TWICE on this show but Starlight still believed that her relationship with her partner should be shown a bit of respect.
“Okay, I understand what you’re saying.” Starlight sighed, “Just try not to go too far.”
“Of course.” Alejandro smiled reassuringly.
Alejandro’s eyes wandered to the left where he could see the Nile just nearby and his eyes widened in shock before whispering to his team, “Hold on everyone I’m changing our direction.”
Alejandro swayed his hips and soon the goat began running to the left to the Nile and away from Team Amazon. Starlight was tempted to call out for the Amazons but bit her tongue. That did not seem like the best idea if she wanted to stay in the game and if she hoped to at least make a living when being stuck in this place, she’d probably need that million.
So she went with her gut and said nothing.
Starlight finally was set down by Alejandro and was running along with the team to the Nile only to see the finish line was on the other side of it which wouldn’t be a problem if there weren’t crocodiles everywhere.
“There’s the finish line.” Tyler exclaimed.
“Yeah, on the other side.” Noah cried out in annoyance.
“Welcome to your third challenge.” Starlight faintly heard Chris say.
“What?! Speak up!” Owen shouted back but all he could make out was gibberish from the other side.
“Did anybody get that?” Owen asked curiously.
“WELCOME TO THE THIRD AND FINAL EGYPTIAN CHALLENGE, BASKET CASES!" Chris’ voice echoed from the other side from which Starlight soon saw was a megaphone. After that, Owen screamed and jumped to cower on the ground.
"Each team must weave a basket of river reeds. Your basket has to be big enough to hold your whole team, including the reward from last challenge aka goat face over there." Chris explained from across the Nile.
“Hey.” Tyler cried out in offense to that last part.
“I believe he meant the goat.” Alejandro explained to the jock whilst pointing at the goat eating grass behind them.
“Oh… cool, thanks.” Tyler smiled at the Spaniard.
"Then you're gonna use the baskets to get away with those oars to row yourselves across the finish line. First team across flies first class to our next destination!" Chris finished.
“This is perfect." Sierra said happily.
"What? The fact that we're hosed?" Noah asked stoically.
"I'm a fourth generation basket weaver, we're gonna need a lot of reeds." Sierra explained before she grabbed some of the reeds from the field and started making a boat immediately.
“Perhaps we should grab more reeds so Sierra does not strain herself.” Alejandro advised to which they all nodded and began pulling out the weeds from the ground or in Starlight’s case began levitating them out.
Soon, after a while of basket weaving the boat, Sierra finally began a conversation.
“Hey Starlight, there’s some stuff I kinda wanna know.” Sierra began curiously catching her team’s attention.
“Yeah?” Starlight raised an eyebrow.
“Where are you from? I mean, you’re obviously not from Earth given the fact you’re a talking pony, but I wanna hear where you came from.” Sierra explained giddily.
Starlight was a little nervous to answer that question, from what she saw, Sierra wasn’t really good at keeping things to herself and from what she could tell, she was a gossip but it’s not like telling her what dimension she was from would hurt… would it?
“Well if you want to know where I’m from, I’m from a kingdom called Equestria. It probably sounds absurd to you, but it’s a place where ponies like me reside in with other creatures.” Starlight explained awkwardly.
“Oooh! What kinds of creatures?” Owen asked in awe.
“Well, there are Dragons, Changelings, Griffons, and Yaks.” Starlight answered, smiling a bit more at how well the conversation was flowing.
“Whoa…” Tyler’s eyes widened before blinking in confusion, “Uh… I don’t know any of the other creatures except dragons.”
Starlight rolled her eyes fondly, she didn’t blame the jock for not knowing what those creatures were, he had to be there.
“Forgive me for asking, but aren’t Changelings shapeshifting monsters who feed from the love of their victims?” Alejandro asked curiously.
“How do you know what Changelings are?” Owen asked with a raised eyebrow.
“I’ve read Ancient Mythology.” Alejandro said briefly.
“Well not anymore. Apparently Starlight was able to convince the Changelings to share love instead of feeding on it.” Noah explained with a chuckle causing Sierra to gasp in shock.
“How did you do that?” Sierra asked with wide eyes.
Starlight blushed a bit in embarrassment before explaining, “Well… at that point Chrysalis, the Queen of the Changelings had kidnapped the princesses of Equestria including my friends who are known heroes there to feed off everyone’s love. So I had gotten the help of my best friend Trixie, Discord a Draconequus known as the Lord Of Chaos, and one of her former subjects Thorax to infiltrate her hive and get them back to save Equestria. Long story short, I ended up figuring out how sharing love helped the Changelings not starve so I ended up convincing them all to change for the better. It helped that they all did not like being ruled by Chrysalis.”
“Why would they all defect?” Alejandro asked curiously.
Before Starlight could answer that, Noah spoke for her, “Apparently Queen Chrysalis was also Tyrant Chrysalis and pretty much abused her subjects to obey her commands. Apparently she even tried to feed off of the aforementioned Thorax to punish him for wanting to befriend the ponies.” Noah explained.
“Wait… how do you know all this Noah?” Tyler asked with a raised eyebrow.
“He and Starlight both met when she first got here and they’ve been talking a bit ever since.” Owen explained giddily.
“However, there are some things Starlight neglected to mention, like the fact Chris casted her in the new season in the first place.” Noah glared with a teasing frown.
“I was sworn to secrecy. I would’ve told you if I could.” Starlight smiled with a playful roll of her eyes.
“Yeah yeah.” Noah smirked back before speaking again, “I still don’t get why you tried to reform that Chrysalis though. From what you told me, she was horrible.”
“Yeah… she tried to starve her own species. That’s terrifying. Imagine not being able to eat anything?!” Owen shuddered, “Who would have the will to be so awful to their subjects?”
Starlight felt disheartened by that statement, considering her own past and all but she didn’t blame Owen for feeling that way.
“Well I thought if her subjects were able to reform, maybe she could too.” Starlight explained sadly.
“No offense Starlight, I am not sure you can really change somebody like her. Some people or creatures in your case aren’t worth wasting your time on.” Tyler said bitterly.
“Yeah… I guess so.” Starlight sighed miserably as she continued working on weaving the boat. She knew that wasn’t always true but Tyler did make some points, and if Chrysalis wasn’t worth saving, did that mean she was worth saving too…
Those thoughts shook out of Starlight’s mind as soon as they came. With all she’s experienced, she knew she was worth saving but even so, Starlight was unsure if she could ever reveal her past to these guys. She did like them but could she really trust them with the knowledge of her worst deeds?
For now, she wouldn’t say a word about her villainous deeds, but maybe someday.