The Ruins Trivia Quiz

Answer: Cancun

Four friends, Eric, Stacy, Jeff, and Amy, decided to take one last fling before moving on to their prospective jobs and schooling and flew to Mexico for a vacation. Staying in Cancun, the gang spent most of their time on the beach, in turn meeting some fun tourists.

While scuba diving, they met Mathias, a German traveler visiting with his brother. One night, they also met three Greek tourists, each naming themselves with fake Spanish names (Pablo, Juan, and Don Quixote). Although the Greeks knew very little English, they all had a blast anyway. On one day, Mathias was visibly upset, and he told Jeff and Amy that his brother had gone with a girl on an archaeological dig at some ruins out of town, but he hadn't yet come back, and following an argument with him, he was quite worried. Amy and Jeff agree to help him find his brother, though Amy is extremely hesitant. Regardless, Amy and Jeff, and Eric and Stacy help Mathias, pack their things, and head out the next morning with one of the Greeks, 'Pablo', who leaves a copy of the map behind for his two companions. Arriving in Coba, the group hitches a ride with a middle-aged Spanish man in his yellow pick-up truck and make their way to where the map describes.

When they arrive, the man pulls Amy aside, specifically urging her not to go down the path, and offering to drive them back. They refuse the offer, saying that they need to find Mathias' brother, and they trudge onwards down the jungle path. Following this map, they realize that the path will be on their left, and if they hit a small Mayan village, they've gone too far. They inadvertently hit the village shortly after.

Answer: Amy

When the group arrives at the Mayan village, they find that everyone is hard at work tending to crops, and no one speaks English to them. They soon remember that the path they need to take is before the village and they make a retreat. Amy notes that it may have been near a set of fields that they passed on the way to the village, and sure enough, they find the path amongst the treeline, although it is blocked by a large, obstructive plant, clearly placed there by someone.

They proceed, but are soon stopped by one of the villagers who rides in on his horse, telling them not to go up the nearby hill.

They continue to argue, saying that they need to follow Mathias' brother, and the man pulls a gun and shoots it into the air to warn them away.

While trying to take a picture, Amy accidentally backs up onto the nearby hill, which is covered with green vines and red flowers, and the man realizes the loss and lets them proceed onwards. The six of them climb up and over the steep hill, which seems smothered by these green vines, and they find a fair bunch of mounds along the side. Mathias digs into one of these mounds, finding the sap of the plants burns the skin, and he discovers the bones of his brother. Taken aback by this, the group realizes that the Mayans probably killed the man and buried him in the vines to hide the body.

They nearly accept defeat until they hear the ringing of a cell phone. They find that the noise leads them to the top of the hill to a large hole in the ground next to a weathered windlass and length of rope. Pablo volunteers to head into the hole and is slowly lowered into it, but the group realizes that the vine has wound itself around the windlass, and as it is pulled through the pulley, it is tearing and releasing its sap down the line. The rope frays itself too fast, and Pablo drops into the abyss.

Answer: Eric

With Pablo hitting the bottom of the hole, Eric nominates himself to go inside to help him. The group uses a large canvas tent, left behind from previous venturers, to make a new, braided rope so that Eric can go inside. As it turns out, the rope is too short, and Eric drops the rest of the way, accidentally landing on Pablo and cutting his leg with the lantern that Pablo brought earlier. Eric realizes that Pablo's legs are broken and they quickly make a backboard with the materials left behind.

While Amy takes the next descent into the cavern (since she's the lightest), Eric notices vines all throughout the cave as well, and temperature variations; one minute it's freezing, and the next it's boiling. Amy makes her way into the hole and they awkwardly lift Pablo onto the stretcher, accidentally breaking his legs even more.

As he's lifted back to the surface, Amy and Eric once again hear the cell phone, and try to search through the vines for it. As they tear away at the tendrils, they find that regardless, the sap is too acidic for them to keep trying for it, and they make their way out of the hole.

Answer: Birds

Using the materials that remain undestroyed by the vine growth and weather, the group builds a temporary shelter for themselves during the night and for Pablo so that he doesn't get affected by the heat in his state. Jeff organizes the group to do this and decides to descend the side of the ruins to look for a way out of the situation, and to watch for the Greeks, who they remember that Pablo left a map for.

As he goes down the side, Jeff's position is alerted to the Mayans by the sounds of birds, and because of this, Jeff is unable to get through their barricade, which is now surrounding the location. Along with this, Jeff notices that the vines are difficult to traverse going down the side of the ruins, but as he ascends them back to camp, they seemingly part to make a path that he never noticed earlier.

The group decides to take turns patrolling the base of the ruins near the the entry path for the Greeks while the others sleep in the tent. During their sleep, Eric feels a tangled web of tendrils on his leg and tears it free while Amy takes a sip of their rationed water, and feels bad for doing it.

Answer: A metal pan

The following morning, the group wakes up to find a few odd occurrences beginning with the vines that have made their way up Eric's leg and around his thighs. Jeff also finds that his pants are coated in a fine fuzzy fungus that stings to brush off. As each member continues to keep watch at the edge of the ruins, they each find more mounds circling the area covered in vines, and Jeff finds a pan on the ground, partially hidden by the vines, which has 'Danger' written on it in Spanish.

The group soon returns to the tent to find Pablo with the vines covering the lower half of his body, and upon pulling away the acidic tendrils, they find that the vines have eaten away at his legs, leaving the bones.

As they toss them aside, they watch as the leaves of the vines open and close to make use of any liquids left for them, and they are shocked to believe this.

They soon realize what they've gotten into. Although the rope and windlass reaching into the cavernous ruins was covered in vines, it still remained for them as a trap, forcing at least one person to fall into the ruins. Amy decides to go on lookout while Eric complains that the vine is moving inside of him as well.

Answer: Amy and Jeff

To stop Pablo's exposed insides from furthering his death, Jeff and Mathias end up cutting off Pablo's legs and sealing them shut with a heated frying pan. Although the group knows it's too late to save him, they continue to try, even as they watch the vines take the remaining bones from the work station. Amy and Jeff decide that they need to go into the ruins to search for the cell phone, which may be their only means of escape, and they are both lowered into the depths to find it. Amy races ahead when the chiming ringtone is heard, but Jeff stops her, realizing the truth behind the vines' ploy.

The vines that they are walking on may be getting denser and denser, but there is no cell phone; the flowers on the vines are making the noise, and the vines that they are walking on are bridging a gap overtop a larger fissure. Amy and Jeff quickly rush back to the entrance, and Jeff tosses a molotov cocktail at the vines before they ascend in on the platform.

When they reach the top, the vine emits laughter through its flowers, somewhat mocking their efforts. Eric, frustrated with the feeling of the vine within him, cuts into his leg to try to grab it and pull it out, but the group stops him. Mathias decides to take the next watch at the base of the ruins and leaves the group at the top.

Answer: True

Jeff soon makes the connection with the untouched rope and the birdcalls he heard down the side of the ruins (used to alert the Mayans of his whereabouts) and he takes the next shift at the base of the hill. When Stacy returns to camp, she Eric, and Amy drink the afternoon away to get by.

They talk about who should live it were a movie, and about their different talents, but soon, Eric begins to cut himself again to stop the vines. They continue to drink and eat the rations until they have an argument amongst themselves, but this soon ends when the vines begin to mimic their voices, manipulating their sentences to say things that never really happened. Mathias, meanwhile, takes Jeff's place on lookout and Jeff returns to hear this. Realizing that everyone else has been into the liquor, he criticizes them for being so foolish, and furiously walks off on his own amongst the mimicry of the vine.

Answer: Amy

The rain comes after this, and the group takes the chance to gather water and clean up. During this, however, Amy blames Jeff for the ordeal, saying that he was so adamant on coming to the ruins but she just wanted to stay in Cancun. Although she does this, however, Jeff makes no attempt to back down, and Amy moves across the camp to pout. Stacy and Eric take a nap inside the tent while Amy begins vomiting, presumably from the alcohol. Jeff thinks he hears her calling for him, but he steadfastly sticks to his guns and continues on with his work.

The group later returns to find her laying down where she had vomited, only to find that the vine had inserted itself into her throat, choking her while nobody had watched. Jeff tries to avoid tearing the vine to stop the acid from spilling, but he finds that it's no use, she's already long passed.

They place her in a sleeping bag and leave her near the camp. Eric, meanwhile, spends his time with the knife in the tent, and Jeff decides to help him cut the vine out to stop his complaining, then sew him up after with the supplies.

When they do this, Stacy and Jeff find that he was telling the truth, and they remove a tendril and sew him back up. Eric insists that it isn't every piece, but they fear he may lose too much blood. The vines, at this point, unleash yet another power. Now, along with their voice adaptability and their movements, they can produce smells.

Answer: Jeff

The group decides to bury Amy to save her body while Stacy makes her way to the base of the hill for her shift. By the time she and Mathias switch once again, they look to the sleeping back to find Amy's sleeping bag moving and shaking. When they open it up, they find that only her skeleton remains, and that the vine has somehow penetrated the edge of the sleeping bag to salvage her body. Jeff takes the next shift at the base of the hill as it begins to rain, and while he does this, Eric, Stacy, and Mathias argue about the things that the vine has said while it laughs at them mockingly.

When they realize that Jeff hasn't returned from his shift, Mathias goes to the base to look for him. During this time, Stacy and Eric make love, but leave the tent to discover that they accidentally forgot to keep watch on Pablo, and because of this, the vine was able to cover the rest of his body, strangling and wearing him down to his skeleton. Mathias returns to say that Jeff is missing, but they all know what happened; Jeff's hat is on Pablo's skeleton. While the remaining members of the group performed their duties, Jeff attempted to escape the ruins through an opening in the Mayan blockade, but he was shot by their arrows and dragged back into the ruins by the vines, only to become another of the plentiful mounds of bones.

Answer: No

Mathias and Stacy once again decide to open Eric to take more vines from him and they find that more have grown within his chest cavity. They do pull a fair bit out and sew him back up to stop the bleeding, but Eric protests that it isn't enough once again. They decide to leave Eric to rest while they patrol the borders and they find that Jeff's bones are near the edge of the Mayan patrol. While they are gone, however, Eric grabs the knife and proceeds to cut himself, fishing the vines out of his skin with his fingers. He continues to cut himself as Mathias and Stacy run to help him, but Eric accidentally stabs Mathias during this, killing him. The vines quickly take this body while Stacy takes Eric's knife away. Eric pleads with her as he slowly dies of the blood loss and acid to kill him and she decides to do it to ease the pain. She leaves the body with the vines as well and they pull him into another mound.
Stacy, now the sole group member, decides to finish the rations and water on her own, packs up her small keepsakes and heads down the side of the ruins. When she reaches the edge of the patrol, she decides to leave herself there as a warning to those who may come after her, and she cuts herself to begin the process. She soon realizes that the sign that Jeff found was placed in the same area, though, and that although she may place herself at the base of the ruins, the vine had total control. She lets herself be carried away and covered by the vine's tendrils.
Three days later, the Greeks arrive with three new friends. As they call Pablo's name and race up the vine-covered hill, they don't notice the Mayans arriving behind them.