“What about our prizes?” said Mara. “I’m not going anywhere without money.”

“Didn’t the contract say we’d get paid when we complete the challenge? Maybe that really means getting out. They just phrased it so we’d assume it meant, like, staying in the same place for a month and a half.” Now Kyle was on a roll. “Plus, think of the name even. Civilization. What if we’re not the civilization in question? What if it’s about finding our way back to civilization? It’s genius. I can’t believe no one’s done this before. So we just have to, I don’t know, smoke a lot of fish, so we have food for the journey. And then pick a direction and walk our way out.”

“There isn’t,” said Ashley.

It was the first time she’d spoken, and they all turned to her. She sat stiffly; there was something odd in the way she held her shoulders. “There’s no way out,” she said. “I climbed that mountain, remember? We could see in every direction. Every horizon. There were no lights, no roads. Nothing at all. Just trees and lakes as far as you could see.”

“The helicopter ride,” said Kyle. “It was what, forty minutes? That puts us a hundred miles from a road.”

“Sure,” said Bullfrog. “If we flew in a straight line. And if we pick the right direction. A hundred miles from a road, somewhere in the northwoods. Really narrows it down.”

Kyle turned back to Ashley. “You must have missed something on the mountain. Maybe that’s why Lenny wanted you up there in the first place. So one of us would have an idea about where to go.”

“I was looking,” she said. “I know.”

For the first time, Mara felt worried. She saw Ashley’s discomfort and wanted to shield her from it, to take that emotion away and replace it with whatever it was they’d been swimming in for days. She felt angry at the crew for messing things up, when everything had been going great. She put her arm around Ashley’s shoulders.

“So then rescue,” said Kyle. “The challenge isn’t about getting out. It’s about signaling someone to come here.”

“We’ve had a fire going for weeks,” said Mara. Short of a few commercial airliners, specks in the sky, no one had passed their way.

“That means we need something bigger. Something huge. A bonfire. Or an SOS sign. Morse code.” Kyle was practically vibrating, like he’d been waiting for this moment his whole life. “That’s the thing about this experience,” he said. “It’s not as good as real survival, but it’s something, you know? Most people don’t do anything this big in their whole lives. And you know everyone will watch it.” Still talking, he stood up, steadied himself in the doorway of the shelter, and set off for some purpose only he knew.

Bullfrog watched Kyle go. “Let’s see what the kid comes up with,” he said. Then he left, too.

Mara turned to Ashley, whose face was pressed to her knees. “It’s gonna be fine. This is just the game. And hey, we’re together, right?”