Banker’s not-yet-striking face is pursed with concern for his partner. “Did that list of plants say what they were good for? If we can find a natural antiseptic—”
“I’m fine,” Black Doctor interrupts. “It barely pierced the dermis.” He shifts his face into kindliness. “Besides, even the best plant isn’t going to be better than what’s in the kit. But thank you.” They resume their climb.
Zoo is still staring after the faux boulder. “We could have gotten hurt,” she says. “Really hurt.” She expected challenges and danger, but not like this. She didn’t think the creators of the show would roll a five-foot-diameter obstacle down a heavily wooded trail straight at her. Her dismay causes her expectations to shift: a small first step toward inconceivable eventual heights.
“We’re okay,” says Tracker. “And the top’s not far.” Zoo turns to follow him. She’s no longer smiling.
A quarter of a mile to their west, Carpenter Chick and Engineer push through the woods. Several small twigs are stuck in Carpenter Chick’s hair, and Engineer’s right sleeve is torn at the cuff and thick with brambles. They pause to consult their map and compasses.
“We’re so close,” says Carpenter Chick. “But all I see are trees.”
“It’ll open up any minute,” Engineer replies. “We have less than a hundred feet of elevation left.” He tucks the map away and leads them forward, then stops and says, “Whoa.”
“What is it?” asks Carpenter Chick. She ducks beneath a branch to stand beside him. Their cameraman hustles to their side to capture their drawn faces, then pans right to a sheer forty-foot cliff.
Lesson of the day: Contour lines can be deceptive when elevation gain occurs in the form of a cliff at the end of a wooded plateau.
“How do we get up that?” asks Carpenter Chick.
“An elaborate system of pulleys?” replies Engineer.
Carpenter Chick is silent for a second, then adds, “And maybe a lever.”
Suddenly they’re both doubled over laughing. Carpenter Chick hiccups and says, “Next time let’s take the trail.”
On the trail, Air Force is grimacing. The incline is agony on his ankle. He is moving by force of will and a drummed-in sense of teamwork—he cannot let his partner down.
“The trail looks different up here,” says Biology.
“You’re right,” Air Force replies. They pause, standing together nine feet before the trigger point. What Biology and Air Force are noticing is subtle: disturbed earth and upturned stones still shaded with the ground’s moisture. In their place, many others would have kept walking, oblivious.
“Look at that,” says Biology. She walks a few steps forward, pointing at the Styrofoam boulder that menaced Zoo and Tracker. It’s lodged between two pine trees just below the trail.
“You think that’s what fell?” asks Air Force. “A rock that size should have made a lot more noise. And caused more damage.”
Biology glances uphill, then approaches the boulder. “I guess,” she says. She’s uneasy, but experience has taught her to breathe through unease and channel fear into motivation. By any measure she’s a remarkable woman, yet other than this moment and a plethora of dehumanizing shots featuring her physique, she won’t get much airtime. Too quiet, the editor will say. She was more outgoing in her interviews, where she didn’t need to breathe through unease or channel fear. But even she knows she wasn’t cast for her personality.
Biology’s foot breaks the plane between a stump and a tree with a fake beehive dangling from an upper branch, and their cameraman sends his signal. Biology peers at the boulder. The painted Styrofoam has been chipped and dented in places, revealing white, pebbly patches. “I don’t think it’s real,” she says, just as the warning rustle comes. When Biology hears this she has no trouble imagining what’s coming. “Hurry!” she says, taking Air Force’s arm. He dashes along as best he can.
The producers don’t intend to actually hit anyone with the fake boulders, no matter the waivers signed. There’s plenty of warning, warning enough for even slow-moving Air Force and Biology to clear the perilous area. They are almost fifty feet ahead when the boulder careens across the trail; they don’t see it, though they hear it. Their cameraman records the boulder’s passing. It makes it farther than the first, past the previous curve of the switchback, before getting stuck against the upended roots of a long-fallen tree.
Well out of earshot, their laughing fit concluded, Carpenter Chick and Engineer work together to solve their forty-foot problem. The answer is simple if arduous: They pull themselves up a steep slope littered with leaves, fallen branches, and downed trees. Engineer slips and slides downslope, kicking up a dark trail in the leaf litter. Carpenter Chick helps him and they clamber slowly uphill. They are nearly to the summit.
But they are not the first to finish the final leg of this Challenge. Tracker and Zoo crest a slope and see the host ahead, waiting on an exposed rock slick, green mountains spread behind him. There are signs of civilization in the background: roads, cars turned by perspective into toys zipping soundlessly along, clusters of buildings. The contestants will see these, but the viewer will not—each shot will be either cut to exclude them or blurred to obscure them.
The host welcomes Tracker and Zoo imperiously. “You are the first to arrive,” he says. “Congratulations.”
“What now?” asks Zoo. She’s looking past the host, admiring the view.
The host’s voice turns conversational. “We wait for the others. You can relax.”
Zoo sits by the host. Tracker gives her a little wave, then disappears into the woods.
“He’s not tired?” asks the host.
“I don’t think he gets tired,” says Zoo.
Twelve minutes later, Black Doctor and Banker emerge from the trees to the west of the trail. They have leaves and prickers stuck in their hair. They accept their overbearing greeting, then sit beside Zoo, who is lying in the sun with her eyes closed. Out of sight, Tracker is being shooed away from the production camp. Air Force and Biology appear moments later to accept third place. It’s another forty-five minutes before Engineer and Carpenter Chick slink into the mountaintop clearing from the east—they’ve been wandering the wooded mountaintop for the last half hour, but they ran into Tracker moments earlier and he pointed them in the right direction.
Below, the trio lurches disconnectedly up the trail.
“How much farther is it?” whines Waitress. She feels sick. Despite the dryness of her mouth, she hasn’t taken a sip of water in more than an hour. Her calorie-deprived body is too tired for her to want to lift the bottle, and she’s shuffling her steps. Instead of leaving footprints on the trail, she leaves scuffs.
Rancher is right behind her, stealing quasi-accidental glances at her rear end. “Can’t be far now. You can do it.”
“I need a break,” she replies, bending over and placing her hands on her knees. Her jacket hem slips up past her waist. Rancher catches himself staring and jerks his gaze out to the trees. Exorcist is ahead, tromping noisily, but staying within sight of his teammates. He notices that they’ve stopped and doubles back.
“You hurt?” he barks.