"I need to start infecting people."
Adam walked around through another section of the arena alone. He was still wandering around getting a feel of the place. He wanted to scope out everything, but he started to realise that it would take multiple rounds.
"This isn't worth it."
A lot of the areas were different, but most of the elements within each area were similar to those in others. Every part had some trampolines, inflatables, climbing structures and a pit of some sort. This place was a giant indoor playground, so overstimulation and fun were everywhere. It was designed for people to do more than stroll around.
Adam changed his course of action and had other things in mind.
"How am I going to go about this?" he asked himself, pausing on the spot, trying to work something out in his head. "Ryan will throw another fit if I don't infect anyone again."
Adam was still unknown to most students. He stayed under the radar and was basically anonymous. Luckily, compared to what he thought would've happened, being with Alexander in the last challenge didn't bring any eyes to him. Everyone saw it as Alexander carrying Adam to 2000 points, so no one thought much of it. He was glad that he didn't get much attention from that.
However, he was closer to the top ten than ever before. If his name appeared on that leaderboard, he wouldn't be able to stay under the radar any longer.
"It'll be best if I bide my time," he thought, hearing the laughter around him. "I can't be impatient. Rushing to infect people will not work."
Suddenly, a strange feeling crawled up the back of his neck. Adam felt his hairs stand up. He sensed something lurking behind him.
He turned his head, stuffing his hands in his pockets smoothly.
"Hey."
A girl stood a few feet away, smiling way too confidently with her hands behind her back like she was plotting something.
"Who are you?" Adam asked, getting straight to the point, skipping past the greetings.
"Natasha," she efficiently replied.
She had short, straight, dark brown hair with dark brown eyes to match. Sharp winged eyeliner with a septum piercing. But it wasn't her face that caught Adam's attention, it was her outfit. She wore a baseball cap and a jacket that fell off her shoulders, leaving her shoulders bare. On both wrists, she had wristbands. On her left was the challenge wristband, and on the right were a bunch of festival wristbands.
It was stylish, but it didn't suit playing around in.
Natasha's eyes fell to Adam's hands, buried in his pockets.
She lifted her left arm towards him. "Can I touch your wristband?" she asked, grinning wider.
Adam's eyes brushed to her wristband, then back to her face.
"No," he told her straight.
"Come on, don't be boring," Natasha said, leaning her arm in and stepping an inch closer.
"I'm boring because I don't want to be infected? Adam asked flatly.
"You won't get infected," Natasha said, dropping her arm. "I'm not the carrier."
"Why do you want to touch my wristband then? What's the point?" Adam asked. The questions came like an interrogation.
"Because I want to," Natasha simply replied, tilting her head and shrugging, like a careless culprit.
Adam gauged her expression, trying to get a read on her. He glanced around, turning his head left to right, checking if anyone else was around, about to sneak up on him.
"Is she bluffing?" he thought. "No. She's acting suspiciously on purpose. 'For fun'. I don't understand how that is fun though."
"Hold on a minute," Natasha said, raising a finger like she intentionally interrupted his thoughts. "Who are you?" she pointed straight at his chest.
"Adam."
"From 1-E?" Natasha asked, her face leaning forward like that name instantly clicked to her.
"Yes."
"Hmmm," Natasha narrowed her eyes, examining him.
Adam stayed his same, expressionless self for the silent moment Natasha was staring at him. He knew he was being heavily judged right now.
"You're acting weird."
Adam didn't flinch, "This is how I am."
"I'm not talking about how you act normally," Natasha said, like he was supposed to understand. "I meant in the challenge now. You're walking alone, watching other people in groups. You're acting like a carrier."
"You've been watching me?" Adam asked, putting it on her to make her look weird.
"A little," Natasha grinned, pinching her fingers.
"Why was she watching me?" Adam thought, finding it weird. He wasn't ready for that comeback.
"If you think I'm a carrier, why do you want to touch my wristband?" Adam asked.
"I told you, because I want to," Natasha replied, lifting her shoulders. "I'm experimenting something."
"This is a weird position," Adam thought. "She's basically forcing me to touch her wristband. If I don't, I'll look more suspicious."
Adam slipped his hand out of his pocket while Natasha kept her smug look.
"What class are you in?" Adam asked as he held up his wrist to her, watching her face. He wanted her to keep talking to get something out of her and distract her from focusing on him.
"1-A," Natasha replied, tapping her wristband on his. "Thank youuu," she cheerfully said. "Now, if I get infected, I know it was you."
Adam blankly stared at her, not giving her any physical information to go off.
"You are going to get infected," he told her plainly. "You've done this to everyone you've seen, haven't you?"
Natasha's eyebrows flashed up for a second, "Or maybe I'm the doctor, and I can't be infected."
"Then what you're doing is totally useless," Adam bluntly said.
Natasha gave him one more smile. "For the challenge, it's useless. Not for me though. I'm having fun," she said before skipping away.
Adam kept her eyes on her as she joyfully skipped away.
"She's on the yellow team. Alexander's team."
Adam noticed the yellow strip on Natasha's wristband.
"There's no way she's the carrier or the doctor. Alexander wouldn't choose her."
Then he thought about it a bit more."But she is in 1-A. Choosing her wouldn't be bad."
Adam slid his hands into his pockets.
"At least I infected someone," he thought.
In the distance, he could still see Natasha. She was talking to a group of people now, looking like she was doing the same thing.
"What's her plan?" he thought, confused. "She can't be acting like that for fun. How is that fun?"
"Nadaaa!" Natasha shouted, cupping her hands around her mouth.
Nada leaned over and looked down to see who was calling her.
"Natasha! Come up here!" she called back, waving up.
Nada was at the top of a spiral slide with a few of her friends, leaning over the padded railing.
Natasha's eyes followed the slide up, "Okay."
She walked straight to the slide.
"...Why isn't she taking the stairs?" Tessa asked, slightly worried.
When I said, she walked straight to the slide. I meant straight to the slide. Natasha didn't go towards the bouncy, padded staircase on the side. She marched straight to the slide.
"No way," Kyle commented, leaning over the railing to get a better look.
The slide wasn't a tube slide, so everyone above could see the whole slide path.
Natasha planted her feet on the smooth surface and began her upward climb. The grip socks played their part and helped massively. Instead of slipping backwards, she steadily made it up the slope. When it got steeper, she used her hands to help her.
"Is she a frog?" Maxine said, amazed at what she was seeing. "How is she not sliding down?"
A few students passing below even stopped to watch the climb.
Natasha reached the top effortlessly and hopped onto the platform.
"Hey everybody," she casually said as if she had just gone for a light walk.
"Heyy," Nada warmly replied, stepping forward to hug her. "How are you finding the challenge?"
Natasha returned the hug. "Fun! Really fun!" she nodded, her eyes clearly supporting what she said. She turned to the others. "Hi, I'm Natasha," she said, waving to introduce herself.
Introductions quickly followed.
"I'm Maxine."
"Tessa."
"Kyle."
Maxine slightly tilted her head. "How did you two become friends?" she asked curiously. She's never seen them two together.
"We both bonded over our names beginning with N," Nada smiled, putting a peace sign up.
"Yeah we did," Natasha added, mirroring Nada's pose.
"That's all it took?" Tessa asked, switching glances between Nada and Natasha.
"That's how we started talking," Nada replied. "We became friends easily. She's really funny to be around."
"Yeah I am," Natasha added, her peace sign still up.
Nada wasn't lying because she did make a few smiles.
"What class are you in?" Maxine asked.
"1-A."
"1-A?" Kyle reacted, surprised, his eyebrows shooting up. "Nada, you can become friends with anyone."
Nada shrugged, "It's not that hard. You just gotta talk to people," she replied. She turned to Natasha, "What have you been doing?"
Natasha's grin got wider and wider. "I've been having fun. Messing around with people."
"Messing around how?" Nada slowly asked.
"Touching their wristbands," Natasha giddily replied. "Do you want to touch wristbands?"
Nada's face flinched at the straightforwardness. That totally caught her off guard.
"Sure."
"Yayy!" Natasha said in a mini-celebratory tone, holding her wrist out.
The two bumped wristbands while Nada's friends watched, visibly confused, looking at each other, checking if they were seeing the same thing.
"You're on the green team," Natasha noticed the green on Nada's wristband as she held her hand. "Do you know Adam? I did the same thing with him. We touched wristbands."
"With Adam?" Nada said, surprised. Her eyelids raised along with her eyebrows briefly.
Natasha caught it, the tiny flash of surprise that struck her face.
"Why are you so surprised?" Natasha asked, smirking, tilting her head up slightly, letting go of her hand.
"I'm surprised you talked to Adam," Nada honestly replied.
Natasha twisted her cap a little, "He is weird."
"He isn't weird," Kyle cut in. "He's just quiet."
Natasha looked towards him, "Are you his friend?"
"Yeah. He's my roommate," Kyle nodded.
"Hehe. You're not a good friend then. He's walking around alone," Natasha said. "He's moving hella suspicious. Unless..." she slowly swung her head to Nada. "He's a carrier, and he's really bad at hiding it."
"No way," Nada replied, matching her grin. "We picked a girl to be the carrier."
"Reaallly," Natasha said, unconvinced, barely blinking, studying Nada.
"Yup," Nada confidently nodded. "Dillon is on my team. He would be angry if everyone chose someone from 1-E to be the carrier."
Natasha continued to stare at her, waiting for her to break.
"Whatever you say," Natasha said, lifting her hands. "We should play poker sometime. That'll be fun."
"Nah. I'm so bad at card games," Nada replied, shaking her head.
Natasha's grin was still there, watching Nada closely. "What about you guys? Do you want to touch wristbands?" she turned to the others, raising her wrist, twisting it like she was flexing a watch.
"No/I'm fine/ No".
Almost simultaneously, they answered and hid their wristbands.
Natasha laughed. "Okay. No problem."
She didn't bother pressing them into touching wristbands. She wasn't very interested in them and wanted to move on.
Natasha leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Nada one more time. She loved hugging Nada because she was tiny.
"I'll see you later."
"Later," Nada waved.
Natasha went to the edge of the slide and sat down. She threw both hands in the air and then, "Byeeee!"
Everyone watched her spiral down the slide and skip away as soon as she landed.
"Nada... are you sure you wanted to do that?" Tessa asked, breaking the silence.
"Meh. It's whatever," Nada shrugged. "I know she's not the carrier."
"She was trying real hard to catch you out. Even though she was acting all fun and goofy," Maxine said.
"That's how she is," Nada smiled, "She's in 1-A for a reason. She is really funny though."
Kyle kept his eye on Nada, "Is Adam the carrier?"
"No," Nada shook her head. "We chose a girl."
"Should you be telling us that?" Tessa asked. "We're not on your team."
"It's fine," Nada said, waving dismissively. "You won't be able to guess who it is."
"But we can narrow it down," Tessa replied.
"Oh come on," Nada groaned. "This challenge is supposed to be fun. You guys don't have to try hard."
"Aww," Maxine reached over and rubbed the top of Nada's head. "Nada, you don't need to be upset."
Nada smirked and looked up at Maxine, "Who said I was upset?"
Nada swiftly grabbed Maxine's arm and pulled her forward. "Let's go," she said, stumbling forward towards the slide.
Maxine was off balance and couldn't sort her feet out. She was being helplessly dragged by Nada. "Nada wait. Let me sit down so I can slide properly."
"Nope," Nada laughed as she sat down with both arms, grabbing Maxine's one arm.
A second later, both girls vanished over the edge.
"WOOOO!"
"AAHHHH!"