Slide 3: 1 + 1 = 3
“Oh my god, someone please help!” I beg the heavens for support.
“Ahhhh! It hurts so much!”
“Why won’t anyone help her?!” I blame the hell of a world we are stranded in with salty tears streaming down my face.
Desperate screams echo across the water park. Two people hunched over on the floor, one holding on to their belly. Concerned visitors are watching them perplexed.
“Woah, what’s going on, what happened??” A young man walks over and asks in genuine concern.
“It’s… it’s my wife.” I say while clutching the hand of the woman that is writhing in pain. I look up to the confused crowd.
“Your wife…? How old are-“
“She is in labor!!” I yell with desperation.
“L-labor? For real?” Two middle-aged men are getting flustered.
Time out.
Alright, so you are probably asking yourself ‘What is going on?’ Is this some kind of cheesy soap opera? Maybe a rescue TV channel? Of course not. We are still hanging with the Sliders, whose most important mission is to reach the end of the line towards the greatest water slide of all time: The Devil’s Spiral. For the sake of that dream we are willing to go to any length, even childbirth.
“What month is she in?” Suddenly we are approached by a woman.
I begin to sweat profusely. I did not expect an expert to arrive.
“Er… m-month?” I stall for time while looking for support from my wife.
Ramirez, face hidden under a long wig, shakes his head and holds his stomach even more tightly.
“Did she already break water?” Another woman approaches as well. She doesn’t look like she gave birth before, but as far as I know all women naturally know about such things.
Water? What does she mean by water? And how does one break a fluid? Her skeptical eyes might even penetrate my perfect disguise. I have to be careful.
“You are standing right in it.” I point at all the puddles around us. There is water if she likes it so much!
“Eeeek!” A few younger women and even men start to jump back from the puddles.
“All of this?! How long has she been in labor already?” A teenage girl looks at Ramirez in a mix of disgust and sympathy.
“Uh… that is to say… probably a few hours?” I reply without any recourse. Now that they have started the questioning I need to improvise.
“WHAT? Why did you drag this poor lady to a pool in such a condition?” A really angry lady slaps me!
“Bwagh! I-I’m sorry! This was what she wanted. She wanted to go to- Y-yes she wanted to go to the water slide to relax her pregnant body! The doctor said it was good for the baby! And like.. a good breathing exercise?” I still remember my pregnant aunt talking about having to learn to breathe right for relaxation.
“I can’t believe that quack! How could he be so carefree? We need to get your wife to a hospital right away.” A crowd of ladies is now surrounding me and Ramirez.
“Here, I will lend you my shoulder. Come on sir, you must help your wife as well. As a three times father I know how it is.” A really cool guy with a stubble winks and offers us his shoulder.
“Ramirez, this does not look good.” I whisper to my friend.
“I’m sorry Mark; I don’t know how to be pregnant.” Ramirez apologizes to me. A golden heart beats in his large man-chest.
“Time for plan S.”
“Plan S-?” Before he can finish his inquiry I ram my elbow into his side. “AIIIIAAAAHHH!”
‘S’, naturally, stands for ‘Scream’. Or eScalation. Whichever you prefer.
“OH NO. She cannot move! We need the doctor to come - to us!” I continue my impeccable act.
“That sounds really bad.” The crowd buys our act.
“Does anyone have their cellphone with them?”
“Cellphones aren’t allowed in the pool area.”
“Shit! Curse you overreliance on technology!”
“There must be a phone at the reception.” I shout into the panicking mass.
“R-right! We will look after your wife, you just get a doctor.”
“Oh, no, but I-“ They are pulling me up and pushing me towards the exit!
That is when my ankle is suddenly grabbed tightly. The iron grip resembling that of an experienced weight-lifter surprises even me.
“Darling… stay… here…” Ramirez hams up his performs to infinity and sheds real tears of fear. Even the Oscar jury would believe that he has abandonment issues!
“It’s going to be alright dear. Even though you clearly need my attention, the warmth of my stalwart hand and the love of a true man to keep you going through these trying times… I will fulfill the duty society imposes on me and run for that phone. You better believe I will dash away from your dying bedside so our child may live. Even if you will die during childbirth because I was not there.” I take a knee and hug Ramirez one last time before rising to leave.
“Stay dammit!” Several men with moist eyes pull me back and push me towards my ‘wife’.
“We’re gonna get you that doctor!”
“Hold on Miss! We are with you.” Two girls are patting Ramirez on the back and accidentally unhook his badly adjusted bikini top. With superhuman speed I hook it back together to protect my wife’s shameful parts. Wait.
“Have you heard?” The loud and clear voice of a passerby suddenly catches everyone’s attention. In between all our yelling she’s the first real calm voice and thus gets more attention. She is addressing a blond boy who seems utterly disinterested.
“…”
“I said, have you heard?” She unsubtly rams her elbow into his side. A familiar move.
“Grr… heard what?” He asks disgruntled.
“Apparently there was a problem with the phone lines and they’ve been unable to make calls in the entire water park.” The tomboyish girl says while shrugging as if it doesn’t matter to her.
“What a pain. The water park is miles from the city. Would be really annoying to get to a working phone line.” The apathetic boy replies as if he was reading from a teleprompter. Luckily he is only reading from a sheet of paper. That is less conspicuous.
“No way!”
“This can’t beee!”
“What are we gonna do?!”
Now the crowd is really going crazy. I give a really subtle thumbs up to Carla and Ken. The duo promptly ignores me. Aha, keeping to their roles, good thinking.
“HONEY? Is that a hand? I think I can see a hand come out!” I shout and give them a fake freak out.
“WOOOOAAH!” The guys are absolutely terrified, while the women look more determined than ever.
“We just need to get our cellphones from the cars. Call a doctor as fast as possible.”
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“Yeah!”
“I will get a few towels and hot water!”
“I think my grandma was a midwife!”
The entire group is getting extremely fired up and runs off in all directions. I watch them leave with a hand over my mouth. Such wonderful people. I’m proud to be a part of humanity.
I help Ramirez up and take off his long black wig. He looks pretty exhausted from the act. I tear off my fake mustache. Everyone knows that a good disguise includes at least one fake mustache.
Carla and Ken join us.
“How many do you think were that?” I ask professionally.
“Dunno. 20?” Carla replies while counting on her fingers.
“Too slow.” I bite my thumb nail. “At this rate we will never substantially shorten the line.”
We naturally advance the 20 spaces that just freed up in front of us. That’s when Ben returns from his reconnaissance.
“Any exploitable traits ahead?”
“I have not calculated that yet. There is something else that you should know.” Ben adjusts his taped round glasses ominously. Then he looks at Ramirez who is busy wiping his lipstick on a napkin. “Your strategy worked? I estimated a chance of success below 2%...”
“Hah! Beanstalk, you know we can’t be stopped by mere probability! Ramirez has been doing a great job as a woman in labor.” I slap Ramirez back and he blushes from the praise.
“We didn’t need much of a costume for him at least. Would have been tough to get a fake preggars belly around here.” Carla mumbles behind me.
“Where did you get the bikini top and lipstick anyway?” I ask with a raised brow.
“W-who cares?” She gets defensive right away and crosses her arms! Strange. Maybe she got it from a friend. We all know Carla only wears one-piece swimsuits.
“Get to the point.” Ken interrupts with his overbearing presence and pushes between us.
“Hm, right.” Ben glances back at the line. “There is someone we know among the enemy.”
“Don’t tell me!” I jump back in a defensive martial arts stance.
“No, not the police.”
“I-I wasn’t thinking of the dirty cops!” I hastily back paddle. Those meddlesome meddlers would arrest us on the spot if they knew our record. It’s natural to expect them at every turn of a slide.
“It can’t be anything bad. It’s not like we will run into our math teacher around this place.” Carla said with a sarcastic smirk.
“Actually it’s Mr. Hudson.” Ben points at our math teacher, in his grey on grey swim trunks. For no apparent reason he is still wearing his deathly ugly tie though.
“Uwaaah!” Carla immediately hides behind my back with a pale face, fear of the end times edged into her features.
“Why are you so scared? It’s just our teacher.” I shake her hands off my shoulders and walk up to the grey on grey skinned fossil. “Hi Mr. Hudson!” I call out to him cheerfully.
“Oh.” He raises his sharp nose with a mix of disgust and acceptance of his lot in life. “It is you.” I have never once in my life heard the word ‘you’ used as an insult. Until now.
“Sir, I didn’t think you were the type to… well.” Ben walks up to our teacher with respect. He is his star pupil after all. Can’t ruin the image.
“To enjoy life? To spend time with meaningless activities that benefit only the excessive hedonists that created these uncultured distractions for the mindless masses?” Every word coming from his mouth was more pronounced than the last. Is overpronunciation a thing?
“Yeah that.” I reply truthfully.
“Tsk. As expected of you Mr. Masters. No delicacy or tact can be found in your miserable hippocampus.”
I’m pretty sure he insulted me just now, but I don’t know how.
“Camping hippos? That sounds fun!” Ramirez looks happy for some reason. He probably thinks it’s a new pool attraction.
“Hmmm. Mr. Reskovik, why are you wearing a woman’s swimming garments?” Mr. Hudson raises a curled brow at Ramirez outfit. “Do I need to inform your parents?”
“Hey now, we aren’t in school.” I try to calm him down with a placatory hand motion. Why did Ramirez not take that off yet actually? “So you want to ride the Devil’s Spiral too, sir?”
“There is no such thing as ‘want’ in this reality. I have no regard for the popular pacifiers of the common man’s critical thinking capacity.” He’s tapping his half-bald head like he knows something we don’t.
“But it’s a really cool slide.” I reply with a smile.
“Indeed. I am investigating this satanic object of admiration in the name of my community. It is my solemn duty to protect my fellow Christians from any such bad influence. I am not a sheep that is interested in Beelzebub’s traps.”
“Okay then. If you don’t care about it that much, could you let us pass?” I ask filled with hope.
“No.”
“Awww, c’mon.”
“No.”
“Dammit.” I am all out of options. “We are your favorite students, so can’t you make an exception this once??”
“Best. Students.” His nose is creating noises resembling a dying tractor motor. “Mr. Pavil notwithstanding, you are the lowest ranking in the last exam.” He might as well have rammed stakes in all of our hearts at once! Carla sinks to her knees.
As expected Ben is the only one exempt from harsh reality.
I knew that my grades are nothing to write home about, school’s just not important to me. Carla seems to take it pretty badly though. I think her parents actually care? She must have met them very recently to have such a devastated expression. It could even have been in the last six months!
“I tried really hard, but I always get distracted by pie.”
“Pi.” Mr. Hudson corrects Ramirez.
“Pie.” He repeats.
“P.I.”
“I’m not sure what a detective has to do with it. Should I hire them to do my homework?”
“You are not as stupid as you make yourself out to be.” Mr. Hudson squints.
“I get all of us, but why you Ken?” Carla is putting on a brave face and accepts sitting in the corner of shame with us.
“Hmph.” Ken turns away with crossed arms.
“Let me translate.” I raise my hand. “Ken’s simply too cool for school.”
“Ah makes sense.”
“Yeah should have seen that coming.”
“Mr. Kim that is not viable excuse in front of your teacher.”
“He is pretty cool.”
Despite his attitude Mr. Hudson cares about our education for some reason. We should probably not try to question him too much. Still, he is in our way.
“Sir, if you have the results of the exams could you tell me my score?” Ben asks in a casual manner, which is pretty stiff by normal human standards.
“100%. As expected of my star pupil.”
“Hey. That’s my line.” I complain quietly.
“Who’s the worst?” Carla asks while staring at me.
“Mark obviously.” Ken throws in.
“Thanks friends! So glad to know you have my back! With a knife.”
“Correct. Mr. Masters has managed to surpass his previous failures by only getting one question right.” Mr. Hudson blows more air through his sharp nose.
“Seriously? He got one right?” Carla is genuinely surprised. But so am I. Not really interested in worldly matters as I am, such things elude me. The divinity of water slides keeps me afloat through school.
“I think I know how.” Ben adjusts his glasses. “Which was the correct one?”
“Question 23.”
“Now it makes sense.” Ben turns to us. “Question 23 was a question where we had to calculate the approximate vectors of the water streams inside a curved pipe.”
“Oh it’s that really out of place hardcore question.” Carla holds her face in pain.
Mr. Hudson is notorious for his one horrific killer question per exam that only exists to ruin perfect scores. He takes material from several levels above the current curriculum and puts it smack dab into our unprepared hands. The board of education does not dare oppose him though, because he threatens to declare them apostates. Long story.
“It wasn’t that hard.” Ben says with a tilted head.
“You don’t count.” Carla replies coldly.
“It is beyond my comprehension how Mr. Masters of all students managed to answer my golden question correctly. I have investigated your locker for witch charms and neural boosters. It seems neither the occult nor science could explain this mystery.” He admits his unhappy defeat.
“Hmph. Isn’t it obvious? The question was perfect for him.” Ken says, obviously having seen through everything already.
“I don’t get it.” Ramirez shakes his head as he gnaws on a chicken wing. Where did he…?
“Wait. What was that? Water streams in a pipe?” Carla suddenly realizes something.
“Exactly.” Ben nods. “It’s like a water slide.”
“Oh that makes sense.” I nod.
“What?” Mr. Hudson raises his curled brow beyond the limits of his forehead.
“Mark’s single-mindedness is really impressive, sir. As long as you somehow put it into the context of water slides he can basically do anything.” Ben explains calmly. “Mark, what is the square root of 2345?”
“I have no clue. Sorry.” That one is tough for anybody I think…
“If you had to create a water slide with the a diameter that is made from the square root of 2345cm2-“
“48.4252000512 cm.“ I shoot back without even thinking.
“Impossible.” Mr. Hudson’s dead fish eyes widen.
“No, he is definitely correct.” Ben holds up the calculator he always carries with him.
“Not what I meant… Does this mean you are simply not trying?” That was the worst insult to a teacher’s ego. When their pupils didn’t try.
“…yes actually.” Carla suddenly chimes in with a devilish expression.
“Huh?” I look at her with a salty sweat drop of anxiousness running down my cheek.
“Heh. Mark always says that he hates your lessons.” Ken smirks.
“Err… Mark isn’t bad! He just doesn’t like trying very much.” Ramirez tries to back me up and instead stabs me in the foot.
“It’s not so much laziness and more a total lack of interest in anything that you represent, sir.” Ben adds with a guilty look. He avoids my pleading eyes.
“Ohhh, I see how it is. You believe me to be incompetent? BORING. Not jiggy with the hip kidz?!”
“I… what?”
“Such humiliation! A genius that shackles itself for the sake of defiance. Smiling me in the face in his sin! I will have a word with your parents Mr. Masters. There will be no doubt that this will upset the community. May the lord forgive me for what is about to transpire!”
“Please, can’t we talk about this? It’s not you, it’s me.” I say with my hands crossed pleadingly.
“Exactly! It is you! You are the sinner!”
“I feel like that’s gross overreaction for some boring school lessons.”
“Whoops. You said the ‘B’-word.” Carla shrugs her shoulders gleefully.
“P-P-P-P-Preposteroooooous! An outrage! Where are you parents right now young man?! I will have a parental guidance meeting on the spot.”
“His parents are on a business trip in Europe.” Ken is being rather helpful all of a sudden.
“Europe? Very well! You cannot escape!” Mr. Hudson storms off with a tinge of red on his grey on grey face.
“This was all part of your guys' plan, huh?” I ask while watching our math teacher go on a terrifying crusade.
“Sure, sure.” Carla shrugs again. She walks forward one spot in the line.
“Aren’t you glad? One more step in our journey to your dream.” Ken brushes past me as well.
“Hopefully not every step will cost me that much. If Mr. Hudson makes it to Europe I’m pretty sure I will be grounded for life.” I sigh and follow them.
It is true, a man has to give everything for his dream, be it possessions, mind or body. This time the prize was high, for little gain, but how could it possibly get worse, right?
Ramirez coughs after almost choking on some food. I slap his back for support, but somehow the bikini top's strings loosen. It falls off and into the breeze of a ceiling fan, forever lost to the distant pool.
“Eeeeek! Pervert!” Ramirez slaps me across the left cheek and hides his chest.
“My top!!” Carla watches it float away in anguish and then backhands my right face half with her hand as well.
This double team effort leaves me collapsed on the ground. There is always another level of hell below.
----------------------------------------
Today’s MVP: The Education System
Line advanced: 23 people.
Next level: Super Medium Difficulty.