Hudson, Vince, and Cor rushed forward through the ropes course – scrambling up and down cargo nets, swinging across black pits on ropes, and navigating other obstacles. There was no sign of any other participants, either in front of them or behind them. If they completed the course within the ten minute time limit, they would each receive at least 1 trial merit, and based on their current positioning, at least one of them would receive 5 merits for finishing in the top 10.

After completing the ropes section, the obstacle course took a sharp right turn. Cor was in the front as they rounded the corner at a low run. There was a thin red line on the floor at the edge of the turn, similar to the starting line, but a different color. As soon as Cor crossed that line, his feet lost touch with the ground and flew upwards towards the ceiling.

Hudson, following directly behind Cor, tried to stop but couldn’t in time, and he also was thrown upwards after crossing the line. He landed on top of Cor, who was lying on the ceiling in a disoriented sprawl.

“Guys, what’s going on?” Vince asked. He had managed to stop ahead of the red line, and was looking up at Hudson and Cor, who were untangling themselves from each other and standing up – on the ceiling, thirty feet above.

“Uh, it seems like the floor and ceiling switch places, after crossing that line?” Hudson said. “It’s a bit of a jump, er, fall, so be careful crossing.”

Vince lay down on his back, lifted himself up on his hands and then spider-walked across the line. As soon as the majority of his body was across the line, he fell forward toward the ceiling, arms and legs flailing. He managed to land somewhat on his hands and feet.

“This is some crazy science-fiction stuff,” Vince said as he shook himself off. “It’s like gravity is the opposite now.”

The change in perspective was disorienting. Hudson felt slightly nauseous at the change in gravity, and struggled slightly to reorient himself in the obstacle course.

Ahead of them, around another sharp turn in the course, the floor and ceiling (originally the floor) were both covered wall to wall in the deep black of portal rifts. Small platforms, some with red stripes on the edges, others without, were spread out across the floor and ceiling as well.

“I think we have to jump from platform to platform in order to cross,” Hudson said.

“How?” Vince interjected. “There must be gaps of at least twenty feet across in between some of these.”

Hudson looked around, and then up at the former floor and new ceiling. “Look up, er, down? At the floor? Or whatever. I bet wherever there are redlines, the gravity switches. See how where there are big gaps on the floor, there are platforms on the ceiling? And vice versa?”

“I think you got it,” Cor said. “No sense sitting back and working our jaws any further.”

Cor jumped across to the first platform, looked up, tensed slightly, and jumped across the red line on the edge, leaning back and tucking his legs up as he did so.

At first Hudson thought Cor was doing a cannonball dive into the dark portal hole, but at the peak of his arc, instead of falling back down, he zoomed up towards the ceiling. He managed to land on his hands and knees on the next platform, right next to the edge.

“Be careful judging your jumps,” Cor called down to Hudson and Vince. “There is some extra distance between the platforms you have to cover.”

Hudson and Vince followed after Cor, trying to mimic his movements. Cor eventually figured out how to land on his feet most of the time, and Hudson was also getting the trick of it. Vince, on the other hand, had bruises from landing on pretty much every part of his body except for his feet.

Some of the jumps were also quite tricky, and at one point, they had to backtrack and take a different set of platforms after running into a dead end. But the three managed to hustle through the changes in gravity at a decent pace, not forgetting that they were on a timer.

When they finally made it out of that section, Cor, Hudson, and Vince rounded the corner and saw the end of the obstacle course in sight. Directly in front of them, stretching for about twenty feet, were black portal holes on the floor, walls, and ceiling. The only way across were narrow bridges, each about ten inches wide. Two were on the “floor”, and two more were on the “ceiling.” Halfway across each was a familiar red line, indicating a flip in the gravity.

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Hudson could see three of the cheater group waiting on the ceiling (from his perspective) on the other side of the bridges. Behind them another five feet or so was a thick yellow line, which Hudson assumed was the finish line, because there were five people behind it. One of them included the scar-faced leader of the cheater group, George Adams, who was sitting down and appeared to be meditating.

There were three more cheaters who were not behind the finish line, and who waited to block them instead of completing the course.

Clara was nowhere to be seen; Hudson assumed she had been knocked into one of the portal pits, similarly to how they had thrown Kenji in earlier.

“Well, lookee there. Our favorite bumps on a log… Can’t say I’m surprised,” Cor said.

“One minute remaining in the Challenge,” Director Ix’s robotic voice interrupted.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” Hudson said. “Listen close, I have an idea.” Cor and Vince leaned in closely as Hudson quickly whispered his plan.

“That’s crazy!” Vince said.

“Suck it up buttercup,” Cor said to Vince. Turning to Hudson, he asked simply, “Can you do it?”

Hudson nodded.

“30 seconds remaining in the Challenge,” intoned the director.

Hudson and Vince ran to the bridge on the right, while Cor walked over to the bridge on the left. Vince carefully walked out onto the bridge, until he was directly in front of the red line indicating a change in the gravity. Cor stood in front of the red line on his bridge.

On the ceiling, the three cheaters had split up, with one of them standing at the end of the bridge where Cor would land, and two standing at the end of the bridge where Hudson and Vince would land. Horizontally, they were only about ten feet away, and Hudson could see the arrogant smirks on their faces.

Looking across at Cor, Hudson nodded, took a deep breath and activated his breathing technique. With a surge of strength, he grabbed Vince’s clothes at the waist and neck, picked him up over his head and threw him as hard as he could.

While the three cheaters gawked at Vince shooting forward over their heads, Cor dropped down and cupped his hands underneath the bridge. Pushing forward across the red line, his feet were pulled upward towards the change in gravity, and Cor started to climb forward, holding onto the bridge above him.

Hudson stepped back a few steps, took off at a sprint and leapt across the red line on his bridge.

Vince, arms and legs akimbo, had landed just short of the thick, yellow finish line in a sprawling heap. One of the cheaters ran back and grabbed him by his leg before he could cross the finish line.

Hudson landed on his feet in between the finish line and the bridge, and in between the two cheaters; the one pulling Vince by the leg backwards, and the other rushing towards him, a punch ready to swing.

He paused slightly; his plan to throw Vince across the finish line entirely had not quite succeeded. So close… but now, all he had to do to cross the finish line was dodge the attacker behind him and dart forward. It would be easy… but he’d be leaving Vince behind.

Making a quick decision, he dashed forward towards the man hauling Vince backwards. He had his back turned to Hudson, so it was easy for Hudson to grab the man in the same manner as he’d just done with Vince, pick him up over his shoulder, turn, and throw him into his fellow cheater behind him.

Vince, freed from the grip of the cheater, scrambled forward across the finish line.

Meanwhile, Cor had reached the end of his bridge, feet dangling down towards the cheater still waiting for him. He switched his arms over very cautiously, so that his back was turned to the finish line, and then raised his feet up to the end of the bridge slowly. As he placed his legs on the end of the bridge, his fingers started to slip and lose their grip because of the steep angle. Before he could lose his grip completely, he pushed hard with his legs off of the end of the bridge and launched into the air.

The woman waiting to knock him back into the portal had moved backwards, away from the portal. As Cor fell down, she backed up slightly and prepared to launch a crescent kick with her back foot at Cor as soon as he landed.

Just before she could launch her kick, she was tackled from behind by Hudson. The two sprawled in a heap that Cor neatly sidestepped to dash across the finish line.

Hudson tried to extricate himself from the woman he’d tackled, but unfortunately she had not lost her wits completely and was clearly more experienced in grappling. She quickly had Hudson in a headlock, and he was starting to see stars when the director announced the Challenge was over.