Justin tried to clear his head, but he couldn't shake a constant feeling of being dazed and completely out of it. As the stage hand guided him to his spot, checked him over from head to toe one last time, and then ran off the set, Justin realized that he might have a hard time ahead of him, as he looked up to something that looked like a man-made cliffside that stretched at least forty feet above his head. He started to ask what the hell was going on when a spotlight flicked on overhead, startling him, and the audience started to cheer wildly.
"Ooouuur first event," the host said, dragging out the words in a way that Justin found particularly annoying, "will be the Race to the Top! Justin and Mark, you both find yourselves at the bottom of identically-designed rock walls." Justin glanced to his left to see that Mark was, indeed, also standing beneath a forty-foot high cliffside. "Your goal is to climb up the wall and grab the flag sticking out of the top. But bewaaare! As each of you ascend the wall, there will be certain... obstructions... that come your way, some of which may knock you down, perhaps even all the way to the bottom! Are you rrrrready??!"
"Uhh," Justin stuttered, "not really. Shouldn't we have some sort of safety harness or someth--"
"Get Set! And GO!"
Frustrated, Justin nevertheless whirled around and started climbing up the wall. "This should be a piece of cake," he thought to himself. "After all, how good a climber can that scrawny little--"
He stopped himself as, out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Mark zipping up his side of the wall, as natural and as nimble as a monkey climbing a tree. He already had shot out ahead of Justin, and the audience was cheering him on. "Maa-aark! Maa-aark!"
"Stupid kid," Justin muttered, as he kicked it into high gear. He started pulling himself up higher, putting in an extra effort, and within thirty seconds, the two were dead even at the halfway point.
"Ittt's anybody's race at this point, folks," O'Malley called out. "But let's see if the boys can handle what they're about to encounter!"
As Justin looked down to make sure he had the proper footing, he heard a loud rumbling coming from up above. He looked up and his eyes widened as he saw several large, heavy-looking boulders tumbling down the side of the wall at him. Panicking, he covered his head with one arm while clutching on with his other to the handhold. One of the boulder's hit right where his hand was gripping, the shock knocking him loose, causing the crowd to let out a collective gasp. Justin started falling, but instinctively reached out with one hand to grab something, anything, and stopped his fall, only having lost a few feet.
"Ooooh, that was a close one for Justin," O' Malley egged him on. "Will he be able to catch up to Mark now?"
Justin glanced over and saw that Mark was now three-quarters of the way up the wall. "How the hell did he survive that?" he asked. Shaking off the pain still in his fingers, he tried in vain to catch up, but by the time he was back to where he was before he fell, Mark had already gotten to the top and grabbed the flag. Bells started ringing and lights started to flash, and Mark let out a cheer.
"And we have a winner!" O'Malley yelled out. Dejected, Justin carefully made his way down the wall again, while Mark walked down the stairs that apparently were built into the backside of the wall. When Justin got to the bottom, a stage hand shoved him towards the right, where the host was standing with a beaming Mark.
As the other assistants started moving the rock wall sets away, Justin noticed that, while the boulders on his side had to be pushed away one at a time by several stage hands at once, the assistants clearing Mark's side were lifting them up with practically no effort at all. "Son of a bitch." He muttered. "His must've been made of styrofoam."
"Okay, Mark," O'Malley said, "since you won Round 1, you've won…" He paused for dramatic effect. "Eighteen inches added to your height!"
"All right!" Mark pumped his fists in the air, celebrating, while the crowd's cheers grew even louder.
Justin, meanwhile, wrinkled his nose in confusion. "Eighteen inches? What the--" He stopped as he saw Mark starting to inch higher and higher. At first, Justin thought it was just an optical illusion, but after a few seconds, he saw that the boy's clothes were growing tighter and tighter, revealing more skin than they ought to. For his part, Mark looked like he was immensely enjoying the growth, maybe even a little too much, Justin thought. By the time it was over, the ten-year-old was now the same height as Justin.
"All right, Mark, we'll have to get you some new clothes before the next round starts!" The audience laughed in unison as O'Malley grinned, and Justin shook his head in disgust. Whatever was happening around him needed to stop, and now before it got even crazier. He just had no idea what was going to happen next.
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