NEW YORK – The fiery female alliance on CBS' "Survivor: Vanuatu — Islands of Fire" (search) flickered Thursday, sending research assistant Leann Slaby (search) off the island.
"I got blindsided," Slaby told The Associated Press of her surprising dismissal. "My brain was kind of frozen at the moment. It took me awhile to get the wheels running."
Sparked by Twila Tanner, lone male player Chris Daugherty created a voting bloc with unpopular player Eliza Orlins, Scout Cloud Lee and Tanner to vote Slaby, a critical member of the all-female alliance, out of the game and into the jury.
"I trusted Twila from day one," Slaby said Friday. "Twila and I stuck together even when the tribes split and when we got back together. But Twila mixed it up. I'm not sure what her motivation was unless she just lost trust in us. Twila always played the game very paranoid, which maybe is a good thing."
Early in the gender-divided game, Slaby also aligned herself with Ami Cusack, a player whom many "Survivor" castoffs have called the mastermind behind the all-female alliance, which sent four men out of the game.
"The fact of the matter was this game was split by sex from the very beginning," Slaby said.
Cusack, who won immunity, was unable to be voted off by the new alliance.
"Ami and I thought we had it all wrapped," Slaby told the AP. "I guess I was too confident."
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