A Pinstriped Finger's My Only Friend (23 page)

"Let the speed round
commence
!" The announcer sounds more frantic than ever. "Make every second
count
! Game on!" He starts singing a fast-paced tune like an action movie theme, scatting the instrumental parts and adding his own sound effects. "Dow ba-da dow! Chicka pow pow boodoo scoot! Sheeow!"

Judd gets up off the floor and runs back to his spot just in time. As soon as his feet touch the big white X, a nun on a unicycle rides past and drops a cheese sandwich in a clear plastic bag in front of him. Other nuns do the same for the rest of the competitors.

Across the floor, Wayne grabs the bag, yanks out the sandwich, and wolfs it down so ravenously, hunks fly everywhere. At one end of the gym, Kaela dumps out her sandwich, blows up the bag, and pops it between her hands. At the opposite end, Eva drop-kicks the whole package, sending it flying into the stands.

As for Judd, he walks in a circle around his sandwich, scoping it out. Then, he grabs a rose from the floor, bites down on the stem, and does a Spanish flamenco dance on the sandwich, stomping all over it with one hand...

(...his right hand, including me...)

...raised over his head. A glob of white and yellow mush is all that's left in the bag by the time he's done.

Suddenly, a buzzard sounds...

(...that's right, a
buzzard
, not a
buzzer
!)

...it cries out "SKREE-AWK!" and the players all stop what they're doing. The crowd roars, shrieks, whoops, etc. The floor suddenly changes from wood to a glossy black surface, and digital scores in giant red numbers flash to life in front of each competitor. Judd's changes from 38,115 to 42,500, the highest by far of the four.

"New game!" shouts the announcer.

The floor changes back to wood, and a four-foot square section in front of each player drops away. When each section rises back up into its space, it's covered with a huge heap of what looks like spaghetti and doll parts.

(What the fudge??)

(Good thing the dude's in his own crazy zone! I wouldn't even know where to tell him to
start
with
this
one!)

Around the gym, the other players make their moves. Eva scoops double-handfuls out of her pile and smears them on the floor in a kind of art project. Wayne leaps into his own heap and rolls around like a dog on a poop-pile. Kaela screams and curses at her heap, reprimanding it for smoking and coming home past curfew.

And Judd? Singing the alphabet song...

("A, B, C, D, E, F, G...H, I, J, K, LMNOP...")

...he digs out fistfuls of noodles and doll parts and moves his entire pile one foot to the left. When he's done, he starts moving it back again, singing the alphabet song in reverse.

But he doesn't get time to finish before the buzzard sounds. "SKREE-AWK!"

The floor becomes a digital scoreboard again, and Judd's made another big jump. His score now is 62,712, which is 22,000 higher than his closest competitor, Eva.

"New game!" says the announcer.

The floor shifts back to wood, and crimson ray beams shoot down and vaporize the spaghetti and doll parts. In their place, the world's weirdest clowns...

(...heads like opening and closing umbrellas, bodies like accordions, legs like springs...)

...lead out pink and purple tarantulas the size of luxury cars.

(OMG! What now??)

The clowns lead the tarantulas to each of the players and hand over the reins, then
wheeze galumph wheeze galumph
away. As the crowd cheers wildly, Judd and the others stand and stare at the giant spiders, considering their next moves.

Eva's the first to take action. Holding on tight to the reins, she clambers up onto her tarantula's hairy back. Straddling the creature as if she's riding a horse, she kicks its sides and cries out "Yaaah!" The spider responds by skittering across the floor, heading straight for Kaela.

Kaela's slower on the uptake this time around. Scratching her head, she walks around her tarantula, sizing it up...then catches sight of Eva galloping toward her. She starts to climb up on her own spider, then grimaces and backs away. Dropping the reins, she leaves the beast behind and charges toward Eva on foot.

Wayne just runs in circles around his tarantula, singing the Spiderman theme song and pretending to shoot webs at it.

As for Judd, he grabs hold of the tail hairs of his spider, gives it a kick to get it moving, and lets it pull him around the floor as if he's water-skiing. When the spider speeds up, Judd does tricks, kicking one leg up and then the other, even turning around without letting go, then turning back around. By the time the buzzard sounds...

("SKREE-AWK!")

...the audience is clapping and cheering like crazy, just for him and his giant tarantula. The other players are forgotten: Eva and her spider just chase Kaela without ever catching her; Wayne keeps singing and running in circles. Judd is the true showman here, by far.

The floor becomes a scoreboard again, and Judd's numbers light up. His score has leaped to 89,127, while the other players' scores have barely budged. It looks to me like the writing's on the wall.

But the round isn't quite over. As the freaky clowns scurry in to clear out the giant tarantulas, the announcer hums a different tune over the P.A. system--a blazing fast version of "Flight of the Bumblebee."

Then he speaks. "Now it's time for the grand finale! What's faster than the Speed Round? The
Super
-Speed Round!"

The crowd roars. The people in the stands are shape-shifting faster than ever, constantly changing forms. The tournament players might be staying the same, but no one else in the gym holds steady for more than a minute or two.

"This one's for all the marbles!" says the announcer. "Winner walks away with the one and only
Living Cup
! So let's rock and roll!"

The floor stays black, in scoreboard formation. The marching band plays a number that sounds like an orchestra tuning up at a high rate of speed. The crowd noise intensifies.

Then things start happening. Three circles of light the size of hubcaps appear on the floor in front of each player--one white, one yellow, one red. A giant word in red holographic block letters appears in midair over the middle of the gym: "
Choose
."

As the other players each pick a light disk and stand on it, Judd lies down on the floor so he's stretched out over all three lights at once.

His score jumps by 5,000 points, while the others get nothing.

"
Boom
!" yells the announcer, and the game changes.

The lights vanish, and huge tubes drop down from the ceiling, two for each player. They stop a few feet above the players and hang there, swaying slightly. A black cord with a handgrip shoots down beside each tube, within the players' reach.

Again, the giant word appears in midair: "
Choose
."

All three of the other players grab both cords and pull them--probably because Judd scored big by choosing all the selections in the previous game. But nothing comes out of either tube.

As for Judd, he steps away from his pair of tubes and pretends there's a
third
tube alongside them. Reaching up, he pulls the imaginary cord.

When he does so, the two
real
tubes rumble, then drop down loads of balloons and confetti.

Judd's score soars by 8,000 points. Again, the others get nothing.

"Boom boom boom!" shouts the announcer.

Suddenly, all hell breaks loose. Things and creatures begin appearing around Judd, materializing from thin air. Something new pops up every fifteen seconds...

(...I'm counting!)

...and Judd has to deal with it, obeying the command hovering and flashing in midair: "
Do
."

(Whatever
that
means.)

Judd totally immerses himself in the challenge. He's so focused, he loses all awareness of the other players.

(So do I!)

It's all he can do to react to the wild-and-woolly barrage that's been set loose upon him.

Things move fast, but I'll describe them as best I can. It goes like this:

A living basketball bursts toward him with dozens of tiny eyes blinking and tentacles writhing.

(A
living basketball
?)

Judd catches it, gives it three licks, and throws it to the crowd just as...

The floating word flashes: "
Do
!"

(...fifteen seconds later...)

...a fire extinguisher pops up in front of him and blasts him with a long stream of white foam. Judd lets it cover him, soaping his hair and singing like he's in the shower.

(...fifteen seconds later...)

...a goat with red high heels on its horns stumbles out of nowhere and coughs up a red bra. Judd flips the goat on its back and hogties its feet with the bra, then pumps his fists in the air like he just wrangled a top steer.

(...fifteen seconds later...)

"
Do
!"

Fast food restaurant ketchup packets shower down from above, as foot-long scorpions with the heads of babies clatter toward Judd. He drives back the creatures by stomping on the packets, spraying them with bright red goo.

(...ten seconds later...)

"
Do
!"

(Did I say
ten
?? The game's speeding up!)

Bedsheets flop down around Judd. What's he going to do? Use one as a cape? Pretend he's a ghost? Wrap himself up like a mummy?

Wrong on all three guesses. The dude sits down Indian-style and tears off strips, smears them with ketchup, and...

(...ten seconds later...)

"
Do
!"

Abandoning the bedsheets, Judd gets to his feet as a black-and-white-striped octopus the size of a car tire flops toward him. The octopus shoots a jet of black ink that splatters Jud's pants, which he then proceeds to...

(...eight seconds later...)

(That's right,
eight
!)

"
Do
!"

A shower of tiny snails rains down around Judd, just as a flame-thrower belches out...

(...five seconds later...)

"
Do
!"

Three waist-high silver robots work their way toward Judd, making progress by quickly taking each other apart and putting themselves back together further along...

(...four seconds later...)

"
Do
!"

Judd's stuffing snails down his jumpsuit when stuffed toys start pelting him and a swarm of bees the size of tangerines swoop toward him. He swats the bees with the animals, but...

(...three seconds later...)

Water balloons drop from above, and they're full of vanilla pudding that splatters everywhere when they...

(...two seconds later...)

Ping pong balls fall by the thousands, just as marbles roll out to cover the floor, and...

(...one second later...)

...a barrage of wigs...

"
Done
!" That's what the floating word says as the buzzard sounds.

As the bombardment ends, Judd stands among the remnants with head thrown back and laughs with high hilarity. His pants are scorched and soaked with octopus ink, his shoes are coated with ketchup. His jumpsuit's plastered with fire extinguisher foam and overflowing with ping pong balls, snails, and marbles. Giant bees cruise in a buzzing halo around his head, which is topped by a big pink bouffant wig with a gold bow in the front. His hands are full of pudding-filled water balloons.

As the audience roars louder than ever, Judd rises five feet off the ground. The three robots have built a platform to give him a dramatic boost. When the platform stops rising, he holds the balloons high, then smashes them together in front of his face, spraying it with creamy yellow pudding.

(And that, my friends, is how you put on a show!)

The platform rotates, letting everyone in the gym get a good look at Judd licking pudding off his fingers.

(Okay, so
not
my favorite move, but at least he cleans me up in time to get a good view of my own.)

As we turn, I see that the other three players haven't fared nearly so well. None of them are raised up on elevated platforms, soaking up applause. Kaela's slumped in a pile of bedsheets, oozing with pudding and foam. Wayne's running for the exit, trying to escape the tangerine-sized bees. What about Eva, who had so much energy going into this round and seemed so determined to win? She's flat on her back with an octopus on her belly and a goat gnawing on her blonde hair.

The floor flickers as the scores update...and the winner is plain to see. No one else even comes close. No one else has even half the number of points that the winner does. The winning score: 537,953.

And that score belongs to...

"Judd Ramsey!" says the announcer. "Congratulations! You are the undisputed
winner
of this year's
Permanent Tournament
!"

Everyone in the stands...

(...still evolving in all their wild variety...)

...leaps to their feet...

(...hooves, claws, fins, paws, pods, whatever...)

...and lets loose an explosion of cheering that literally rocks the house. The marching band plays something that sounds more like a fight song than a tune-up...

(...a
little
more...)

...and colorful streamers and balloons...

(...non-pudding-filled...)

...cascade from above. The other players are forgotten. All eyes are on Judd. Everyone and everything is focused on him, as if he's the center of the universe.

(Whichever universe this
is
.)

It's just like the old days, back home...the pep rallies in honor of the basketball team, especially team captain Judd. So many glory days, so many moments in the sun for him--roaring applause, leaping cheerleaders, booming band. His name spoken over the PA system, echoing through the gym. So much adoration all around.

He hasn't had much of that lately, not since we left our home reality. I know he's felt lost and off-balance; I've tried to fill the void, but there's only so much I can do. One little pinky, even a
Killdigit
, can't take the place of a gym full of screaming fans.

So I let him enjoy his moment. I don't interrupt. I let him wave and grin and soak up all the love. Even with the pudding, snails, ping pong balls, robots, and all the rest, it must give him a taste of home. It must make him feel appreciated and confident, even with all the weird, changing creatures doing the cheering instead of normal teenagers. Who knows when he'll come close to feeling this way again; who knows if the Living Cup will be the key to our escape from the insanity.