I can do this! I will not bring shame to the cheese. My ancestors would undoubtedly haunt me if I did.
Nearly... there... Almost....
You strain your jaw muscles, trying to let the last few pieces of cheese sliver down. You're at the end, though your mouth feels like the testing grounds for an extremely viscous and coagulated nuke, minutes after zero hour, gooey and runny tastes climbing over the insides of your cheeks, worming round your jaw and scattering sparks in front of your crossed eyes...
The. Last. Piece. Of. Cheese.
It seems to take an age to get there, but the hunk of Utah-11b Anoxic Cheddar finally passes your lips... rests on your tongue, enzymes seemingly dissolving the sharp, numbing taste before you can chew... the solid, rubbery, crushed texture beneath your teeth... finally... you've done it... you've eaten... the... cheese.
"Now wasn't that nice?" The assistant grins at you.
"Up for another?" she asks, sweeping the checkered napkin off the trolley to reveal another, identical tray below. Oh, n.....
Moan.
"somebody? helllllp.... "
An orderly walks in, checks that you won't die of immediate heart failure before her shift ends or anything, and walks out again.
"Agh... you shapeshifting monster... will never win..."
PM
P. M.
The players whizz past one another's positions, this time ending with Jan's rocket 100 degrees
clockwise from Zack's.
Or at least, that's what they plan to do.
As they pass, Zack aims his shackle at Jan and fires a spray of clear fluid at his opponent, completely drenching her with a full-on, high-velocity blast, throwing her off course as she swerves against a wall, scorching and crackeing, but not destroying her rocket, and grinding to a halt a mere
45 degrees clockwise from her attacker. Nearly set aflame by a huge burst of heat, her temperature stands at 90 degrees, and she has only 340 units of fuel left, as she waits, shaken but alive.
Zack meanwhile has 370 units of fuel, and his temperature reads 81 degrees centigrade.
"Ten seconds till the last moment you can enter numbers in, folks! And the challenge doesn't stop till the rockets do!"The host smiles like a child gently, patiently teaching a young animal to do something that will hurt somebody, evidently proud of this new rule change.