Opalina Outpost

Chapter 15 /Part 2/

"Contestants to the course entry," boomed a woman with a megaphone. "And another reminder, if at any point you fail an obstacle, you cannot bypass it. Go back and complete the obstacle before moving to the next." Hopefully he hadn't missed any other pertinent rules. His competitors darted forward like gazelles, lining up just in front of the curtain where the woman stood. Lio edged to the back of the line.

Outside, a cheery voice boomed over the distant sound of the crowd. "Ladies and gentleman, welcome to this year's Mastali Legend Challenge, sponsored by—"

A damn announcer was the last thing he wanted to hear. Maybe he should pretend to twist his ankle and limp away before anyone saw him. But then he'd have to tell his crew he hadn't even tried. The line moved forward, and Lio trailed with it. To his doom.

"Starting positions," the official said, and the line broke apart as each competitor headed to a starting mat. Lio found himself on the outer edge of the course, close to the grandstand. Close enough to hear someone calling his name. Please, Goddess, no—

"Gooooo Liooooo!" shouted Yorune, dangling halfway over a railing to wave at him. And spread along the rail beside her, flashing salutes and shouting advice he couldn't understand, was the entire Opalina crew. Including Ravi.

"Go away!" he wailed. "I've done nothing to deserve this!"

"Take your marks," the woman with the megaphone said. A cannon boom reverberated into his bones, and they were off.

Sheer adrenaline gave him a burst of speed and melted the sound the crew and the audience and the other competitors into discordant noise. He reached the first obstacle with most of the pack, a rock climbing wall. Half the competitors accelerated up it as if they routinely ran up vertical walls, while Lio clung to one handhold and tentatively stretched for the next. By some miracle he kept his footing up the wall and rolled over the top to see the rest of the course. He tried to run onto the springy net that stretched out from the top of the rock wall, but it bounced him onto his ass. Someone had the gall to jump over him as he staggered around on the devious trampoline surface.

His competitive field bounded past, gaining momentum for a slick, slanted wall with no handholds. Lio got halfway up it before his feet started to slide, and he threw himself onto his stomach, scrabbling frantically for the rim of the wall. He didn't make it. The wall emitted a long, slow, dreadful squeak as he backslid, dripping off the steep slope like a glob of featherweed.

He tossed a miserable glance at the crew. Half of them appeared to be weeping, they were laughing so hard. Ravi leaned on the rail, one hand strategically covering his mouth, but Lio could tell from the crinkles around his dark eyes that he was grinning.

"Let's go, Lio!" Yorune cheered. "Keep trying!"

So he did. He lost count of how many times he squeegeed down the stupid-fucking-bane-of-his-existence wall, but by some miracle, he got a decent lunge up and his sweaty fingers latched over the top edge. His crew applauded so enthusiastically that half the grandstand joined in.

The bean-bag target obstacle was a bit of a respite, mostly thanks to the hours he'd spent in the Amphitheater throwing pebbles at cans with Duhar. When the last of the five targets thudded down, he trundled across another net and faced a ludicrous obstacle that required him to leap from knotted rope to knotted rope above a pool of water. Of course he was soaked on the first attempt.

Scrabbling onto the next platform, he lay facedown for a moment, trying to catch his breath. A jubilant roar went up from the audience. The announcer was congratulating someone for winning. Maybe that meant they would send a medical team to rescue him from the rest of the course.