Chapter 6: The Finish Line?
It was yet another game of Majide and Anita simply wanted to get it over with. This was despite the fact she had such a big lead that basically she had already won - but since the show loved to humiliate the contestants as much as humanly possible, it continued on regardless. Called "Don't Lose Your Marbles", the object of the game was to place contestants on top of a pillar with marbles underneath their feet. Initially this pillar would start low - about 5 feet high - but eventually it will be raised to as high as 12 feet.
During the contestant's time atop the pillar, the area below was covered with white foam to cushion any falls. There was also a small shower near the area so that the contestant could wash off the foam... but a simple fall from a pillar into some sticky foam simply wasn't enough for the game show. All of the contestants, prior to their ‘marble' ordeal, were required to go into the ‘testing round'; a centrifuge machine called ‘The Spin Cycle.' Used in training NASA astronauts and Air Force pilots, the machine was capable of spinning up to 9Gs - enough force to make someone pass out. The contestant would have to stand this force in the machine for 8 seconds, which was more than enough time to let this happen. If the contestant passed out anytime during the spin, than he/she was eliminated.
After Hamada explained the rules, the four contestants one-by-one climbed into the Spin Cycle. Only the middle-aged man passed out, which immediately eliminated him. Thus it was only the three remaining contestants who climbed up each of the pillars to delicately balance atop the marbles. As the pillars slowly rose, each contestant tried to stand as still as a statue. Anita and the other female contestant managed this just fine; however the male contestant was barely staying balanced, wobbling and gyrating like his dear life was on the line. As the pillars reach to their full heights, this man finally succumbed to gravity and fell off, landing on the foam. No more than three seconds later, this man screamed something incoherent and sprinted to the shower. Anita and the other contestant started to get more nervous; it was clear that there was something special in the foam.
The two remaining contestants stood on the platform for more than three minutes, motionless. Anita was quietly amazed that the other woman could stand so still, but what she didn't know was that this particular contestant was also a Yoga teacher, using all the amazing balance of her art. Eventually however, inevitably, the other contestant's legs started to get weaker, and she too fell. Once again, as this unlucky woman touched the soft foam she promptly began screaming in pain, and she too wasted no time in rushing towards the shower. Anita was the winner once again.
Standing on top of a small crane, Hamada congratulated Anita heartily. "Well! Once again - congratulations! You are really starting to impress me..."
"Thank you." Anita weakly mustered, trying not to talk too much in fear of landing on the hazardous foam. Hamada continued,
"Also, since you've won all of the games here, you also qualify for the final game, the obstacle course! How does that feel?"
"Great," she muttered, "Now can I get down?"
"Sure..." said the cheery presenter with a devilish grin. Quick as a wink, he pulled out a rather big marble from his pocket and threw it right at her feet.
"Owwww! Why you...AAAHHH!"
Staggering, her balance lost completely, Anita toppled straight into the foam. As she landed on the mysterious foamy substance, her body started to feel like it was burning. The foam had Menthol and Methyl Salicylate in it! (The same stuff they use in heat rubs like Bengay, Deep Heat, and Tiger Balm.) Yelling, Anita immediately leapt out of it and made a bee-line to the makeshift shower, hitting the spray button and roundly cursing both the host and the show, "That repulsive, diabolical jerk...! Just wait 'til the show is over!"
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A few hours after the traumatic incident, the restaurant was closed, and Leroy, Sachiko, and Tyrone were busy cleaning up. Michelle came downstairs with her normal clothes on, less shaken than before, but still traumatized. After a few seconds, she was noticed, and Leroy and Sachiko looked at each other. Not a word was spoken. Apparently reading his mind, Sachiko nodded once and left the room, giving them that remained some needed privacy to talk.
Leroy spoke up first. "Look - I just wanna apologize to ya fo' what happened earlier today. If I hadda known it woulda turned out like this, I woulda neva' allowed it."
"I understand. I'm at fault as well, because... well, I did agree to it. I was just as naive as you were about this. We're both responsible."
"Yeah... that's true... but I'm more responsible for talking you into this! I can't fix what happened to the past, but I won't allow this teh happen again. Maybe this won't make It up, but I got sumthin' that will take care of yo' otha' problem."
"What's that?"
"I got some food leftover from today that I can give ya for yo' friend's birthday. Matta' o' fact, I like to bring it ova' ma'self."
Michelle cheered slightly. "That's great! The more the merrier I say - if you can, bring your wife and your son along as well. It's a surprise party so we have to arrive... nonchalantly. She's not supposed to know."
"Well somebody gotta watch Rei, so I'll just leave Sachiko here. Me n' ma son will come."
"That will be fine."
"Good. Now since I'mma man of ma' word, I'mma pay you as well."
Michelle glowed. "Great! So we must have made some money today?"
"Hell yeah girl, we made some mad bank today! About over 200,000 yen!" (That's over $1,700 US dollars in 2007.)
Tyrone and Sachiko overheard them and they came to the cash register. "Are you serious?" they said in unison.
"As serious as death and taxes! This takes care of the loan we borrowed. If we keep on getting sales like this, we'll take care of the rent in no time!"
"That's great! Now I can finally get that Sony Playstation 3!" Tyrone exclaimed.
"Now don't jump the gun son, we still needa pay off a few bills."
"Still, this calls for a celebration!" Sachiko elated.
"Well me and Tyrone are going to Michelle-san's place tonight for the birthday party. You can't come because somebody's gotta watch Rei."
"Actually, Rei's still up. She can't fall asleep."
"Well that's even betta'!" But he wasn't done yet. "So tell me sumthin' folks, are we the greatest?"
"Sho' Nuff!" Sachiko and Tyrone said in unison. Michelle didn't understand what was going on.
"Are we the funkiest?"
"Sho' Nuff!"
"Are we the tastiest?"
"Sho' Nuff!"
"Are we the baddest mo-fo, low-down, around this town?"
"Sho' Nuff!" (This time Michelle joined in.)
"Well who are we?"
"Sho' Nuff!"
"Who are we?" he emphasized.
"Sho' Nuff!"
"I Can't Hear You!"
"Sho' Nuff!"
"That's right! Sho' Nuff's Chicken and Waffles! The best chicken and waffles in all of Tokyo!" Leeroy, naturally failed to mention that it was the ONLY chicken and waffles restaurant in Tokyo. "Now let's git some of our food and bring some of our coupons. Who knows, we might get some returning customers."
Tyrone was getting excited about going to the party, "A'ight pop. I need to put on something nice!"
"A'ight boy, but hurry up! We don't want to be late and I don't want to food to be too cold!"
Shortly afterwards, the excited group were striding down the street, offerings of food steaming in their hands.
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"Welcome back to Majide! And now... it's time for our final game; the obstacle course! As usual, our obstacle course consists of four difficult challenges. Our contestant must finish all the challenges in four minutes or less. The first challenge is called ‘What's Buggin' Ya?' and requires our contestant to put three giant Hissing cockroaches in her mouth. With those bugs still there, she then has to ride a tricycle on top of a smelly, slimy surface to the finish line!" Anita felt like she wanted to throw up. "The contestant will then spit out the bugs into a cup! Those bugs must be living or else the game is over."
"After that comes the second challenge - 'The Black Box'! As you can see, it's a giant box 10 feet long and 7 feet high, totally dark inside! Viewers can see inside with our night vision camera. All's our contestant's need to do is run through the box.... but I must warn you! It's not as easy as it sounds..." he ended with his wicked smile. That sure didn't make Anita feel any better. Hamada smirked, "My suggestion to you is to run as fast as you can. Stopping will only make it worse."
"When you get out the box, you will encounter the third obstacle. It's none other than our infamous 'Run for Your Life!' You will run through a small maze with two pitbulls chasing after you. When you are out of the maze when you see a small gate with a door - close this behind you and the dogs won't be able to bite!"
Anita's face paled. "T-two pitbulls?" She said nervously.
"Yep, two pitbulls!" Hamada lowered his voice conspiratorially. "We used to use a young tiger way back, but unfortunately things went a touch wrong... anyhow, back to the game! If you finish the third obstacle, then we finally come to the last challenge; 'The Death Pool'. It's a 10-feet pool filled with Piranhas and Stonefish. You must quickly - and I really do mean quickly! - swim through the pool to reach the finish line. If you do all of this within 4 minutes, then you win one million yen!"
Anita's eyes bulged wide open when she heard about ‘The Death Pool'. She couldn't believe that even the producers of this gameshow would go that far. "Are you ready?"
She nervously ducked her head in ‘yes'.
"Okay... then ready!" Hamada raised his arm. Anita tensed. "Set!" The gameshow host grinned evilly and slashed his arm down. "GO!"
Anita was at the first obstacle in a flash, quickly grabbing the cockroaches from a cup. She had to seriously block out of her mind how disgusting it all was. Closing her eyes, she put the cockroaches in her mouth, and then she leapt onto the tricycle. The floor was green, smelly, and slimy, which made riding said tricycle far more difficult that it sounded at the time - she couldn't ride too fast or else she'd slip and fall, and she couldn't ride too slow or else her time would run out. She tried peddling faster, but the wheels simply spun out on the slick surface, providing no traction. After tipping onto the nasty substance once, Anita gave up on the peddles and just used her feet, which worked much better. She was able to get through the course in less than a minute and spit out those ghastly cockroaches. The nasty taste out of her mouth lasted longer!
Still spluttering a little, Anita raced towards the second game - the mysterious ‘Black Box'. Taking Hamada's suggestion as gospel, she increased her speed to a flat out sprint... only to find out that it really wasn't a very good suggestion. About a second after she entered the blackness there was a snapping noise, then a sharp pain in her left toe. The next instant that snapping noise was everywhere, and pain multiplied all over her body. On her shins, her arms, and even on her fingers. She was literally screaming in pain with the heartless audience laughing in the background at her. Stumbling into the light, she saw the culprits - rat traps. The floor in the Black Box was literally covered with rat traps! Yanking them off took time, and she was still in serious pain. Even that didn't stop the audience from laughing at her. By then she was totally pissed with the audience, the show, and with Hamada.
Blocking out all the pain in her body, she threw herself at the third challenge. Running the maze was hardly any problem - it was easy to outrun and outsmart the dogs. For once, she went through a challenge without any problems.
And finally, she reached it. The final challenge. The Pool of Death. At first Anita was terrified, but suddenly a strange feeling of detachment came over her. Setting her pain aide, she took a few steps back and ran as fast as she could. At the pool edge, with a mighty leap, she jumped, sailing clear across the water and landing neatly across the finish line marked on the other side. A rippling silence fell over the audience - an awestruck hush. Even Hamada was amazed! Hisame, by contrast, jumped out of her seat and shouted for joy.
Hamada cleared his throat and looked slightly disbelieving. "Eeer,,, Congratulations! Yes, Congratulations! You won one million yen!"
Totally amazed at what she had done, the news she had cleared all of the obstacles shoved the pain from the rat-traps to the back of her mind. Anita started jumping for joy. This was a tactical error. Unfortunately, while she was jumping, she landed on a puddle and slipped sideways, falling into the pool. The piranhas wasted no time. Ferocious teeth latched on. Luckily, her fall had avoided the Stonefish's dorsal fins, otherwise she would have been poisoned.
Hisame started to scream. "Oh my God, somebody save her!"
Hamada too began to panic, "Somebody help her, quickly!"
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It was evening, and Maggie was glum and tired. She'd saved somebody's life, but all she got out of it was a crummy cupcake. After all her efforts she had finally appeared at the party, frustrated and miserable (not to mention worried), and all for nothing. Today was supposed to be the surprise party but the surprise had ended up being on her! She had nothing for Nenene.
She was so miserable that she didn't want to read; instead she turned on the TV. The machine sparked to life, by luck or providence, on the E! TV Japan channel. Little did Maggie know that this twist of fate was going to give her an even bigger surprise.
"...and the biggest news today in the Book world is the unintentional outing of Sumerigawa Nenene. During one of her book signings today, she confirmed long-time rumors of her lesbian relationship with noted crimefighter Mui Maggie."
Maggie blinked, stunned. Nenene. They were out. Her mind raced wildly. How could the author have done that? She'd trusted her. It wasn't much of a secret to those who knew Maggie, of course, but it was quite another thing to be outed in public without her consent. Maggie was still stunned. Nenene had betrayed her trust.
"Why Nenene, why?"
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