Anticat

My leg slipped out from under me tossing me partially down the slide as I held onto the side. A knife bit into my shoulder and my side as my other foot finally found a different knife to support my weight.

"You good?" Noah asked looking at me and offering a hand.

"Yeah fine." I replied pulling myself back up to the top more carefully.

I looked at my shoulder and side. Neither was deep, but if we had to hide from another shark it would be an issue.

"We need to keep moving." I brushed past Noah to look at the next obstacle.

A merry go round type circle with bars and painted horses was in front of us, but, I stared at it, how was this supposed to work exactly?

"This is probably the teamwork part." Noah sighed, "It's not exactly one you can solo climb.

I stared at it for a few more moments and scratched my head, the thing had been turned on its side like a hamster wheel instead of the usual flat spinning disk.

"Aren't most of these like ten feet across? Why is this one so large!" I estimated its height at 50ft.

Noah was right, this one would be a huge pain to solo climb, but even with a team how was everyone supposed to reach the top. If someone held it in place from the top the others could try to climb, but-

I calculated in my head again, no there were bars to hold onto, but some spaces were over ten feet between the bars. Even if it didn't move we couldn't climb it.

The same went for moving it from the top, the large gaps would prevent it, and the metal disk itself was like a knife with spikes so grabbing the edge itself also wasn't an option.

I walked across the little metal platform at the top of the slide to it. I grabbed one of the metal bars and pushed down using my weight. The giant wheel started spinning slowly and I released it. Getting three of the four of us to the top would be easy, but the last person. That would be complicated.

I played with the weights in my head while Kyle and Lilly finished the slide. If we had two people, one on each side, could we get them both to the top with the spaces? No that still wouldn't work.

I rubbed my eyes thinking. The smoke from the flames was starting to get to me. What we needed was a rope, or something similar, could we tie jackets together? I glanced at the group. Pity none of our clothing looked adequate.

"Well this looks, uh, anyone else feel like a hamster all of a sudden?" Lilly asked. "This should be good, one of us gets to be left behind. I call not it!" She leapt onto one of the metal bars and the giant metal disk swayed.

"Okay everyone think, there should be a way around this, it's just a puzzle." Noah said.

"A puzzle with a time limit." Kyle glanced at the slowly rising flames which were half way up the monkey bars.

"Go ahead and send me up, I'll wait at the top." Lilly smiled at me.

"Hold up!" Noah said, "Why-"

I jumped onto the wheel and sent it spinning to get her up to the top and Noah turned to glare at me.

"Why would you do that!" He asked.

I shrugged, "Better than dealing with her down here. She's not helping anything. Plus now we have someone at the top."

"You'd better not run off and abandon us!" Noah glared upward.

"I totally would, but you seem useful, so I'll hang out for now unless the 'not lava' gets closer." Lilly replied staring down at us.

"What we need is some rope." Kyle said as he examined the spinning disk. "Something that can either bridge the ten foot gaps in the bars or something long enough to just pull the last person up."

What do you know, he came to the same conclusion as me. I hate that. I looked away and glanced at the flaming pool below us again. Good luck finding any rope here, there is only blades, barbed wire, and plastic.

"Noah I'm going to send you up, see if there is any way for you and Lilly to hold spin the ring without getting cut." Kyle stepped onto a bar and motioned for Noah to as well.

I amused myself by watching them for a moment. Kyle was struggling since Noah weighed more than him, which made it all the more entertaining. Noah was muscular while Kyle was more the slim toothpick type.

"Just keep your weight opposite of mine." Kyle called to him. "If we keep it equal we should be able to climb together."

"Won't work." I called over, "The gaps will create and issue."

"Shut up Seeker!" he yelled back, "unless you have a better idea."

I looked at the flames again, our swords had been lost to the bottom when the pillar rose up, not that they would have done us any good. Even the spears would have been too short to jam the giant wheel with.

"Hang on I have an idea." I went back to the slide and started climbing down.

"Seeker what? Where are you going?" Kyle called back to me as he and Noah continued their bizarre dance. I should totally tease them about it later. They both looked hilarious flopping around like dying fish.

"I hope it didn't fall into the flames." I muttered as I searched the bottom of the slide.

There! Tucked between another blade and the side of the slide was the knife that had broken under my foot earlier. I grabbed it and then looked at the monkey bars that were wrapped in barbed wire.

"Spiky rope, is still rope right?" I grabbed the first bar and hissed immediately pulling my hand back.

I twisted my hand up to look at it. A red burn was now covering my palm.

"Fantastic." I growled sarcastically.

Totally my fault for not checking first. It was a dumb mistake. Submerge half of a chunk of metal into roasting flames, of course the rest of it will get hot also.

I tore off a piece of my shirt and tied it around the burn. Then I studied the barbed wire again.

A nice large piece was tied here and could be unraveled.

I stepped onto the bar careful to make sure my shoes weren't burning too fast. Then I grabbed the barbed wire which wasn't as hot thankfully and began unwinding it.

Once I had a large length I started using the blade chunk on it to saw through. The wire wasn't the safest thing, that's for sure, the knife was slowly making progress on the weak metal strands.

I glared at the rising flames.

"Come on break already." I hissed as the flames continued to get closer and sparks fluttered around below me.

I was still covered in the gasoline mixture, even the smallest spark would be a disaster.

"Break, break, break." I hissed again.

A spark spluttered upward and I had to dodge to the side narrowly missing it.

"Break!" I slashed at the metal that was a little over half way sawed through.

The tips of the flames started to reach the rung below mine, this was supposed to be the point where I gave up and left it, but it was so close!