Roland wiped another area on his arm. Underneath the dirt, he saw the red welts, but this time they were oozing a black tar-like liquid.
Skylar glanced at Roland’s video feed. “That’s ok, Roland. The black stuff is the dead necrum cells.”
Coach let out a sigh. “Roland, if you wouldn’t have turned away so quickly, you would have been blinded. Necrum reacts the quickest to optic cells. Can you get up?”
Roland got to his feet. “I feel better.” He walked over to the edge and looked down. About thirty feet below was the ledge that Duke must have landed on. This side of the mountain was a much gentler climb down. There was no sheer rock face. It was about a forty-five degree angle downwards with large boulders. He could see Duke a ways down. He was hopping from one large boulder to another, instead of climbing down between them. “Looks like Duke is taking the mountain goat’s trail down. I’m going to take the same way.”
Coach crossed his arms. “This stretch is only a little over two miles. Then you will hit the next checkpoint. At the bottom is a little mountain pond. You need to jump in and get this stuff washed off you.”
Roland climbed down to the ledge and took his first leap onto one of the rocks. “Sky, set me up something like Grip that I can use to move faster across these rocks.” One of the hover cams flew by and then came back for a second pass.
Skylar pulled up the Grip plugin and began making modifications. “I’m on it.”
Coach watched Pinnacle’s feed from the hover cam. “Roland, you look like a war refugee with all that dirt and blood.”
Roland nodded and watched the hover cam fly away towards the plateau. He made another quarter mile, jumping between the rocks.
Skylar finished her mods and then hit the upload button. “Roland, I uploaded the new plugin now. It’s called Leapfrog. It uses some elements from the Grip plugin and the Fast Twitch plugin.”
Roland nodded and turned off his High Altitude plugin and then gave the thought command Leapfrog. He saw the words light up in his HUD. He could feel extra tension in his legs. He jumped towards the next rock. He went several feet higher than he expected and came down on the ground past the rock. After regaining his balance, he jumped towards his next rock. He gave a thumbs up to Sky as he landed it. “Nice work.” Roland got into a rhythm, jumping between rocks. The Leapfrog plugin made it almost effortless. He was able to make the jumps with only one leg at a time, making it seem like he was taking great, bounding strides between the rocks.
Skylar watched his vitals as he went. “You are making good progress, but this plugin is highly inefficient with its energy usage. You are burning calories at an extremely fast rate. You will want to disable it as soon as you get past these rocks.”
Roland nodded. He had already gone a mile and a half with the plugin. He could see the mountain pond ahead and just beyond that, the checkpoint. The red light in his arm had begun to flash again. He kept up his pace and made it out of the rocks. He disabled Leapfrog as he jumped into the pond. The water was crystal clear and icy cold. When he came up, he washed off the last of the dirt and blood. The red welts remained, but the black ooze had stopped. Then he took off jogging towards the checkpoint.
Skylar scanned Roland’s vitals once more. “All clear from the necrum.”
Roland reached checkpoint two. It was a banner spread between two poles like the last one, and it said, “Welcome to Checkpoint 2: River and Swamp.” As he passed under it, the light in his arm turned from red to green and then went out. This checkpoint had a long series of tables after it, each filled with water, sports drinks and nutrition bars. Roland downed four waters and three red sports drinks as went past and then grabbed two handfuls of the nutrition bars, three in each hand. He ripped into the first one and gobbled it down.
Skylar looked at the wrapper as Roland opened it. “Each one of those has about five hundred calories, so that’s about three thousand calories total. That one says Fudge Brownie on it. What’s it taste like?”
Roland kept up his pace. “Tastes like chocolate covered sawdust.”
Coach looked over the map. “Eat up. You are in position 495 and still have a lot of ground to cover. For the next ten miles you are going to be slogging through one of the worst swamp areas outside of the Louisiana bayou.”
CHAPTER EIGHT:
LEECHES
ROLAND JOGGED AWAY from the checkpoint towards the tall grasses and cattails ahead. He couldn’t see anything beyond them. Then the scent of the marsh hit him like a brick wall. The stench was a combination of fetid mud, rotting plants and stagnant swamp water. He coughed after his first breath of the foul odor. “Ugh, it reeks.” It was an unwelcome change after the pure, crisp mountain air.
He got up to the cattails and stopped to part them and look through. All he could see was more cattails and dark water. Some movement in the water caught his eye. He looked closer. It was mosquito larva - millions of them.
He heard a rustling sound to his left. He looked ten feet away to see a large hybrid racer go crashing right through the cattails. Roland headed left to where the cattails were parted after the hybrid had gone through. He could at least see into the swamp. The big hybrid was making a pathway, slogging through the muck.
Skylar had the three dimensional, holographic map pulled up and was going over the route. “Roland, follow him for now. His heading is pretty close. We are working on finding a better route for you now.”
Coach zoomed in on the area ahead of Roland and rotated the map a few times. “You’ve got about three miles of this type of swampy terrain, then it looks like you will hit a river. The river is kind of an S shape.”
Roland nodded as he stepped into the murky water. He sank down just past his knees. He began making his way forward, but it was slow going. He couldn’t even jog. It was more like big steps that plowed through the swamp grasses. “Ow!” He swatted at his left shoulder. “Horsefly or something.” Then he slapped his right forearm. He killed three mosquitos that were trying for a quick meal. “Sky, find me a better way. I’m spinning my wheels here.”
Skylar was already typing as fast as she could. “I’m working on it, Roland.”
Roland watched the hybrid in front of him, slogging forward. He could hear him yelling at the cattails and the bugs. “Looks like his progress is about the same.”
Coach sighed. “Yep. Next three miles is going to be like this. I think it will clear up once you get to the river.”
Roland found a small bit of ground where the water only covered his shoes. He paused for a moment and looked down. It looked like there were black leaves stuck to his legs. He bent down to brush them off. As soon as Roland’s hand touched the first one, it began to move. “And I was just thinking, this terrain couldn’t get any worse.”
Skylar stopped typing and put her hand over her mouth. “What is that?”
Coach zoomed in on Roland’s feed. “Leeches. Looks like you’ve got at least a dozen of them.”
Roland reached down and gripped one of the slimy leeches. It was at least two inches long. He tugged on it. The stubborn creature didn’t let go. It just stretched out.
Coach held out his hand. “Don’t pull on it, Roland. It will upset the leech, and it can make him regurgitate back into the wound. Then you’ll get an infection.”
Roland straightened back up. “Sure wouldn’t want to upset it.”
Coach glanced over at Skylar. “Skylar is going to work on using the nanotech to get rid of them. I’m working on your route. You just keep going.”
Roland nodded and stepped back into the murky water and kept going. He had made about a mile so far. He looked over on his left and saw two other digitals that were also pushing through the swamp. Then he saw a splash in front of them, and one of the contestants went down into the water. The other was yelling for him and trying to help him up. Roland saw a huge, green tail splashing in the water in front of them.
Skylar paused her typing to watch the commotion. “Was that an alligator tail?�
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Coach nodded. “Yes. Judging from the size of the tail and splashing, it has to be at least ten or twelve feet long.”
Roland sped up as much as he could. The racer that was trying to help was hitting the alligator in the head as hard as he could. His teammate was screaming whenever he got his head above the water. The splashing water now had a red hue to it. Then the splashing stopped, and the racer’s body bobbed to the surface. His teammate flipped him over and yelled his name while checking for vital signs. Roland looked back to see medics on hovers coming in to help the man. He had been horribly mauled. They loaded his tattered body onto a stretcher and flew back to the medical station.
Skylar checked the contestant data. “That guy’s vital signs just went offline. I don’t think he made it.”
Roland tried to put the grisly scene out of his head. He focused on finding areas that looked shallower and easier to move through. His odometer in his HUD showed that he had traveled about a mile and half through the swamp.
Skylar finished her typing and hit the upload button. “Roland, I just uploaded a new plugin for you called Sonar Viz. It sends out a sonar pulse around you and maps the water and how deep it is, but it will give away our position to any of the hackers out there.”
Roland gave the thought command Sonar Viz. “Anything has to be better than this. Not worried about hackers right now.” His vision changed to a rainbow of colors as he looked at the water. “Whoa! What’s with all the colors?”
Skylar watched Roland’s video feed. “It’s based on the same technology used to map the ocean floor. It’s basically an elevation map. The deeper the water, the closer it is to blue and the shallower it is, the closer it will be to red. So, avoid blue and go for red.”
Roland nodded. “Avoid blue. Got it.” He looked around, most of the areas were bluish green, but there was a small area that was red. He stepped on it. It was only about two inches of water. At one time, it must have been a levy to separate out parts of the swamp. Roland started moving forward. The levy was only six inches wide and otherwise completely hidden in the swamp. Roland started jogging. It was the first time was able to actually make some decent time in the swamp. He focused on his red pathway. He went into a run. He passed the big hybrid who was still yelling at the swamp.
Coach let out a sigh. “Nice work, Skylar. That was a big help. Roland, you are almost to the river.”
Roland kept on his red course. It was hard to keep up the speed on such a narrow pathway. He slipped and fell a few times, but was able to recover quickly and get back on track. Then the cattails disappeared, and he stepped onto a sandy bank. He could see the river ahead.
Skylar looked at Roland’s position on the map. “Three miles through the swamp down. Seven more to go.”
CHAPTER NINE:
WATERFALL
ROLAND SWATTED AT four mosquitos on his arm and then at another horsefly on his neck. “Sky, do something about these bugs!” He slapped his other arm.
Skylar sighed. “Sorry, Roland. I’m still working on it.” She found what she was looking for and started typing intently.
Coach pulled up Roland’s vitals. He had been watching Roland’s energy levels. Even with adding all the calories from the nutrition bars, Roland was still burning calories at an alarming rate. He still had plenty for now, but Coach was concerned about his burn rate.
Skylar finished working on the new plugin. She hit the upload button on her holographic terminal. “Roland, I just sent you a new plugin in called Ultra Sonic. It will emit an ultrasonic frequency that should repel the insects.”
Roland gave the thought command Ultra Sonic. Then the most ear shattering sound he had ever heard blasted through his ear drums. He tripped and went down before he could clear his head enough to disable it. Roland got up, brushed the sand off and started jogging again. “Sky, you almost blew my hearing out!”
Coach looked over at Skylar. “I think you stunned him.”
Skylar looked apologetic. “Sorry, Roland. I think I put a decimal in the wrong place. I’m fixing it now.” She went back to typing. “Ok, I fixed it. Try it again.”
Roland slowed to a walk. “You sure?”
Skylar stared at Roland’s video feed. “Yeah, it’s fixed. You can use it. I promise.”
Roland closed his eyes and gave the thought command for Ultra Sonic again. This time there was no deafening sound blast. He opened his eyes and started jogging again. “Much better.” He could still hear a slight high pitched whine, but it wasn’t that noticeable. He looked down at the big leech. It was gone. He looked behind him. He saw it in the sand where it had fallen off when he had enabled the plugin the first time. “Leech is gone.”
Coach nodded and sipped his coffee again. “Good, looks like it’s working now. Get running and make up some time.”
Roland went into a run. He got into a good paced rhythm, even with the sand. The bugs completely stopped bothering him. Nothing even buzzed near him. “No mosquitos. Nice work, Sky.” Roland held a steady speed through the next four miles. Then he heard a rumbling noise in the distance. He rounded a bend in the river just as he passed the seven mile mark. The turbid river changed from a steady flow to raging rapids. The faster flow of water took the swamp stench with it. Roland took a deep breath of the fresh air. The air was cooler. The riverbank also changed from a thick brown sand to small gravel that crunched as he ran on it.
At least thirty other racers were gathered ahead of him trying to make their way through the rapids. The shoreline disappeared as the river swelled to the edges. At the edges were mangrove trees and thick vegetation. Rocks stuck out in various places in the river rapids. All of them were either razor sharp or completely rounded with no hand holds. The contestants were gathered here, because they hadn’t been able to find a way downstream through the rapids. The current was too rough and strong to swim against. The rocks were too far apart to jump between them. Roland slowed as he came up on the group of racers. About half were standing and watching the other half who were attempting to make it through the rapids.
Roland watched a couple of racers who were about to try their luck. They both swam out of the calm water into the rapids. They switched their positions around so that they could float with their feet pointed downstream. Roland saw the Jamaican woman in front of him. He tapped her on the shoulder. “Hey, how did you make it around the mountain and get in front of me?”
She winked at him. “We Jamaicans are fast, mon. Call me Bianca. Now, watch these two. They are about to go through the meat grinder.”
Roland raised an eyebrow. “I’m Roland. Meat grinder?” He watched the two as they tried to steer against the current. It was an exercise in futility. They had been lined up straight, but the currents pulled hard to the left and the right making it nearly impossible to go downstream. He watched as each of them got pulled off to the side where the current turned into whirlpools. The whirlpools were extremely strong and filled with sharp rocks.
Bianca pointed at the racer on the right. “Yeah, mon. The whirlpool is the meat grinder. He’ll be lucky to make it out now.”
Roland winced as he watched the man flail uselessly against the current and then careen off of each rock like the steel ball in a pinball machine. The current finally spit him out about even with where he had started. When he finally stood, blood flowed from long gashes on his forehead, arms and legs. “Whoa.”
Then Bianca pointed between two of the larger rocks in the center. “A few minutes ago a woman in a red racing suit managed to go right between both of those rocks. Then the current shot her forward to the waterfall. Next, I saw Ugly go right through the center too. Since then, no one else has been able to make it through.”
Roland nodded. “I see. Thanks.” He walked away from her and lined himself up directly with the two big rocks. He gave the thought command Sonar Viz. “Sky, I need your help here. Sounds like Spectra and Duke both made it through. We need to figure out what they did.”
Skylar was looki
ng intently at Roland’s feed with the Sonar Viz plugin turned on. She stood up and swiped her hand through the air to move Roland’s feed over to her terminal. “I’m analyzing it now.” With her software, she could pull out details that Roland couldn’t see by just standing there.
Coach pulled up the Pinnacle hover cams and began going back through the footage. “Roland, I’m going over the race footage to see what Spectra did.” He swiped his hand through the air to move the video feed backwards. He found Spectra in the river. He watched for a minute. “Roland, she goes under the water. Pretty deep from what I can tell. Then she pops up right after the two big rocks. The currents shoot her to a big rock in the center of the waterfall.”
Roland went out to his waist and looked down into the water. The Sonar Viz plugin showed that there was indeed a narrow trough that runs between the two big rocks. He judged it to be at least ten or fifteen feet below the waterline. It showed up as dark blue with the Sonar Viz. The rest of the areas varied from green to orange as they got shallower. “Look at the blue area, Coach. The currents must not run as strong in that area. That’s how she was able to get through.”
Skylar finished enhancing the feed in her holographic terminal. “That’s right, Roland. I ran an analysis on the direction and strength of the current. The fast current only goes about six feet deep. Below that is much calmer water.”
Coach shook his head as he watched the rest of Spectra’s footage. “Roland, this waterfall is no joke. It has to be at least a hundred and fifty foot drop. Directly below the waterfall there are sharp, broken rocks.”
Roland kept looking at the underwater channel. “How did she get past them?”
Coach paused the footage. “Same way she got off the top of the plateau. She climbed up on that rock in the middle, did another swan dive and then changed over to her glide mode. Looks to me like you would have to jump at least ten feet away from the waterfall to clear the rocks.”
Nano Contestant - Episode 2: Ultimate Endurance (An Urban Futuristic Fantasy Sci-Fi Action Adventure Genetic Cyberpunk Techno Thriller) (Nano Contestant ... Fantasy Action Adventure TechnoThrillers)) Page 4