number one: Use the words Azure, electric, stone-age, urgent, and urban in a story or essay. (10 min)
The electric motors whined as Sam put the bus in reverse and tried to back out of the ditch. He stopped swearing briefly to turn on the microphone to the passenger compartment.
"Ladies and gentlemen, we're having some difficulty with the terrain. Azure Tours assures you that we will complete the "stone age" tour to your satisfaction, but due to the nature of the time we cannot always guarantee the exact route or sights we will show you."
Sam switched the microphone off, and resumed swearing. The bus shuddered as its six big wheels caught, slipped, caught, and after a few jolts as he played the clutch, accelerator, and winch control, finally lifted itself out of the ditch.
He kicked it into idle and waited for his navigator to unhook the winch from the tree. Thank goodness the urbanites couldn't see the ground directly beside the bus... people were funny about seeing rifles. He turned on the outside mic.
"Hey Grant, how's the winch?"
No reply.
"Grant?" Of course, he couldn't see the ground directly beside the bus either. "Grant? Hey jackass, no games, answer me." He started keying in an urgent call to base, but held off on sending it just yet.
number two: Use the phrase "It's customary...". (10 min)
He started fiddling the external cameras, turning them inward to look at the bus. There was the tree, winch cable still wrapped around it. And... shit. There was Grant's rifle on the ground. The stupid git should know better than to put it down.
Drag marks led away from the rifle, and Sam made the camera follow them, right to a small hunting group of the very people his tour bus was here to see, standing over Grant with their weapons at the ready.
"Shit."
Somebody banged at the door, and Sam got up to answer it, clipping his gun to his belt.
One of the tourists was standing there. "Driver, what is the meaning of this nonsense?"
"What nonsense? It's customary that when you drive into an unexpected ditch you get out, and getting out involves a bit of jerking around."
"Not that, driver." The tourist, plainly wealthy and with arrogance to match, snorted and looked down his nose at Sam. "I was under the impression that first, nobody was to leave the bus, and second, this tour was safe." He waved at the screens showing, in full colour, Grant's body and the stone-age hunters.
number 3: Write about a crime. 10 min
"Well sir, none of the clients are to leave the bus. This time is uncivilized, and there is potential danger from wild animals that have been extinct for centuries or millenia. However, the winch can't wrap itself around a tree, so the navigator had to go outside."
Sam kicked himself for not remembering to shut off the camera feed to the passenger compartment. He glanced at the image again. They were still there, talking among themselves and gesturing at the bus.
He turned away from the passenger and shut the door, then slapped off the camera feed to the passenger compartment. He had to get Grant and the rifle back, and unhook the winch. If he went out, the hunters would probably get him the way they got Grant. His eyes slid to the tranquilizer gun. It was loaded for doping large aggressive animals that posed a danger to the bus, enough to kill a human several times over.
And it was illegal to kill even a stone-age human. But it was illegal to leave anything modern here.
