The knees of Girl Scout Troop 24601 trembled with fear on the last night of their three day hiking trip in the woods. On that night, only neon purple flashes of lightning lit the sky and thunder shook the earth. The rain poured horizontally because of the incredibly strong gusts of wind. The howling wind made the trees looks as if the were reaching for the girls and trying to grab them and eat them up.

"Well girls," said Prudence, the troop leader, "we'd better set up camp here before the storm gets any worse."

The four girls, Karli, Diane, Paige and Alyse frantically set up their tents. Suddenly, there was a bright flash of lightning and a booming clap of thunder. Alyse's head jerked in the direction from which the lightning and thunder seemed to come. She dropped her tent she had been futilely trying to put up and it flew away in the wind like a kite that had lost its string. Alyse didnt even try to capture her runaway tent. Instead, she stood paralyzed with fear, staring at something in the distance. The other girls stopped what they were doing to see what Alyse was staring at so intensely. Paige let out a deafening shriek. There was a large crack in the ground that was quickly growing into a canyon. The worst part about it was that it was speedily traveling towards them. It was like a large snake slithering on the ground waiting to swallow them whole. The foursome huddled together scared that this would be the last night of their lives. Prudence began to run frantically in the woods yelling, "He's come for me he's come! Oh my gosh he's here after some many years!".The girls thought that would be the last time they would ever see or hear of Prudence again.

As the canyon grew nearer the girls' huddle became closer and tighter. Their nervous sweat dripped onto each others clothes. Suddenly the canyon stopped moving right at their feet. They let out large sighs of relief and quickly let go of each other trying to pretend the had never held each other that closely. Diane and Karli, uselessly trying to pretend nothing had happened, tried to set up their tents again. They were interrupted by another shriek from Paige.

"What now Paige?" Karli asked annoyed

"Its the the..." Paige was trying to say something, but her fear caused her only to stutter and speak only gibberish. Karli went back to where she had been standing before fighting against the wind and rain. She too let out a screech and sent Diane running over to see what all the commotion was.

"Oh dear!" she said, "I read something like this in my near death experience book Ive been reading. Tonight won't be any fun for us. Just when I thought I was finally getting lucky something like this happens to me."

"What's going to happen?" exclaimed Alyse, "Will I ever see my boyfriend, Casey, again?"

"Well, I dont know exactly what will happen, but I think that..." Diane didn't even get to finish her sentence. Out of the canyon a dark fog started emerging. It couldn't even really be called fog, it was more like smog. There was deep hissing like when a pot of water starts boiling over. Out of the fog emerged a handsome man just as a lightning bolt struck the earth. He had a dark black goatee and long sideburns. His hair came to his ears in little curls. He had a black robe on and was carrying a large pitch fork.

"Oh, he's hot." Paige commented to Diane.

"Dude, he's the devil." Diane responded disgusted. The devil looked over them and then a confused look came over his face.

"Were there not five of you in this campsite of yours?" he asked quietly, yet he could still be heard over the howling wind, thunder and pouring rain. "I've come for Prudence, but Im assuming she ran the minute she saw me coming. You four will have to come with me and take her spot as my slaves."

"We're not coming with you!" yelled Karli, "We dont associate with evil such as yourself Mr. Devil!"

"You'll have to tell me where Prudence is then, young ladies," answered the devil.

"Never!" Paige cried defiantly.

The devil's head jolted from Karli's direction to Paige's angry and determined eyes. "Oh, but Paige, dont you see? If you would just tell me where your dear Prudence is, I could give you all the free things from Ulta you want for the rest of you life."

Paige, had to think for moment. She looked up towards the gray cloudy sky and stroked her chin with her manicured fingers. Should she save her troop leader, or save her money? After a few seconds she looked at the devil scornfully and said with a little smirk on her face, "I will never tell you where Prudence is!" The devil's eyes sunk with disappointment, and for some reason he and his canyon looked just a little smaller. The storm even began to clear up just slightly. The devil turned his eyes to Diane. He looked her up and down as if trying to assess her weakness.

"Diane, if you would reveal Prudence's location for me, I can make you the greatest French Horn player there ever was. Just think of it, you could be first chair in the Green Valley High School Varsity Band." he said confidently.

"Nice try, buddy, but I dont think so. I can earn first chair on my own," Diane replied mocking the devils lame effort to tempt her. Again the devil and his crevice seemed to shrink and the storm was a little less rough. Since the devil knew he only had two more tries to find out where Prudence had gone, he knew he had to make these offers really topnotch.

"Alyse," the devil whispered with an evil smile, "Reveal Prudence's location and I will make Casey an even a better boyfriend than he already is."

"Boy, I cant imagine him being better than he already is," she thought herself. For a long time Alyse had to think and each minute that went by the devil got bigger and the storm got stronger. The crevice became wider and seemed to ache to swallow them up. Finally, Alyse answer the devil and told him Casey was already perfect and couldn't be made any better. The devil shrunk down to the size of a toddler. The canyon was merely a tiny hole in the ground and the storm was just a little trickle of rain.

This was it, the devil's last try. He had to make it good. He looked at Karli and studied her for what seemed like hours. Karli began to sweat again. Her shiny red hair was becoming wetter than it already was from her pools of sweat. The devil made her turn around and poked her all over trying to find a weakness in her.

"Ah," said the devil, "I know what you want. You want to never cry again. You want people to stop teasing you about how easily you cry. Well, Karli just tell me what I want to know and I can make that happen for you. Dont forget, I'm all powerful."

"First off, you cant be all powerful because if you were, you could find Prudence on your own. Second, crying is part of my identity, I like it that way too! Adios Mr. Devil!" Karli said as tears streamed down her face.

At those words, the devil and his hole shrank away to nothing and the sky became a beautiful pastel blue. Prudence came running back and thanked them for saving her from the devil through their loyalty to her.

"I told the devil that he could only have my soul if he could find one person who wouldn't be loyal to me in my girl scout troop," Prudence explained, "Thanks for making the right choice girls, and fighting off the devil. You girls really have taught the devil, me, and the world a lesson."