6 Days Out

You slipped on the ice and broke your leg, and the group pitched the tent where you fell. Every evening Nick, the dispatcher at the rescue station, promises a helicopter over the radio: any minute now. Every morning you send Mark and Lena out for supplies and order them back by nightfall. At night someone calls at the entrance in their voice, and under the flap it looks exactly like them. You decide who gets in.

Key Features:

• Six nights, one tent: You can't walk. The whole map is the tent: the entrance, two slopes, a red lamp, the radio and your sleeping bag.

• Who's at the entrance: The thing outside speaks in your friends' voices and looks exactly like them. Ask for the password. Listen for words repeated exactly as before. Opening up is your call.

• Hold the tent: If it pulls the zipper, hold the slider. If it presses on the fabric, push back with your hands. Sweep the snow off the slopes, or the radio loses the station.

• Bring them in: Watch Mark and Lena on the GPS as they walk back in the dark, and keep in touch over the radio. Turn on the red lamp so they can find the tent in the blizzard.

• The leg and the battery: The leg hurts and your vision swims. Bandages and pills help for a while. The radio battery runs down, and new supplies come only with those who made it back.

• Any minute now: Every evening Nick says the helicopter is on its way. Every morning you give the same order. On the last night your friends have no strength left to walk, and you choose who to let go.