Aife just shrugged and said “Look just keep answering till you run out of questions. That should be fine”

Trina groaned before saying “Ok, maybe, but look, if they want to do something tricky, they might make the final question have no answer, or be so obscenely hard that it’s completely impossible to figure out without blind luck. Or maybe they will give out a list of like two hundred words. Do we want to risk running down the timer? Maybe it would be best to call it and accept your points

“Then, there is one more thing that I question. It says the top 75% of humans, but also that you only lock in your score once you confirm them. It makes you wonder when you get informed if you’ve passed or not. Maybe answering one question instantly and then locking it in will get you the win because you are the only person who has completed it, or maybe you have to be the 4th person to lock it in and be the best of those four I dunno”

“Trina” said Sui calmly “Stop”

“This is important Sui” shouted Trina

Sui looked over to Aife for confirmation. Aife shook her head. Sui nodded. Aife shook her head again. Sui narrowed her eyes and nodded. Aife shook her head harder. Sui flicked her eyes to Ito and then to Kanina… Aife shook her head. Fine, don’t let me slap her or throw a spider at her then. Clearly, she needs something though.

Sui glared at Aife. Aife threw her hands up in the air, and then held up a hand in a stop sign for Sui. Sui narrowed her eyes but signalled ‘ok’. Aife nodded, pulled Trina into her lap, and gave her a full kiss on the lips before depositing Trina back onto her hip.

Trina pulled her legs up towards her and buried her face in her hands while letting out a slight wine. Her face was bright red and her cheeks were puffed out. Sui just shrugged and got up to run inside, before stopping. “Hey Aife, can you come with me and grab a table?” asked Sui

Aife glanced down at Trina who was curling into a ball on her lap. “I should probably wait with her a moment”

Sui shrugged “Well I’m going to grab my sewing supplies, if you could grab a table for me when your free but before 5 minutes that would be great”

Aife opened her mouth… closed it and placed a hand under her chin as if she was seriously considering something… before stating “What if we all move back inside?”

Sui nodded “Sounds good to me”

Trina just let out an indignant moan of sorrow as if the entire world had suddenly turned against her. Aife paid it no mind and pulled her into a princess carry. Trina tried to bury her head into Aife’s chest to hide her face better, until she realised what she was doing and promptly tried to shift around. Aife however, had other plans and instead pulled her tighter. Trina let out a small cry of despair that was heavily muted. Sui paid her know mind.

The three went back inside and Sui sat back down and got to work on Trina’s outfit. Once they were seated again, Trina spread her fingers just enough to get an idea of what was going on and saw that Sui was back to work on a dress. “What are you doing?” asked Trina, temporarily using her anger to push away her embarrassment. It sort of worked, she was still bright red but her hands weren’t shaking and she could speak properly.

Sui shrugged and said “Just some more work on your new dress. This isn’t too involved and if you need my help you can just ask”

Trina let out a long sigh “Why can’t you just pay attention. I mean, Aife is paying attention”

Aife very pointedly stared over Trina’s shoulder at her chest, head not moving a fraction of a millimetre as she held it in place and said “Yup totally paying attention to the challenge”

“I’m surrounded by idiots” sighed Trina

Sui ignored her and continued sewing while Aife nodded, making sure to nod closer to Trina’s breasts instead of doing more naturally with her neck staying in place. Trina just rolled her eyes and got ready for the five minutes to be over.

Once it was, a fancy new screen appeared in front of them. It was lines with bright lights that flashed and ran around the edges. At the top, right in the centre of the screen was a bright green plate with dark black text. Below it was a series of six blue plates with white text on them. In each square, was the word’s ‘please wait’, while in the very centre of the entire set up, was a countdown from ten that hadn’t yet started moving.

Another message popped up in front of Sui’s eyes, but she dismissed it before she even finished the first word. Turns out she didn’t need to as Trina gasped before commenting on it. “Correcting colour blindness? That… I didn’t even think of that… does that mean that anyone who was colour blind isn’t anymore? How would that even work”

Aife however, paled at the words “Wait… does this mean that people had to fight the first few waves of monsters handicapped if they were stuck in a wheelchair or something”

Trina froze, eyes going wide. “My mother… I… I didn’t even think. She… she’s always been so active and she has arms to rival your own Aife… but… oh god, I didn’t even think”

Sui paused, finding something to interrupt her “Did you want to go and look for her once this round is over?”

Trina shook her head in slow shuddering movements. “No… no I don’t… she… they were both overseas on vacation this week… I… I don’t even know how I’d get to them let alone ensure they were safe…”

Aife hugged Trina in close, as Trina tried to hold back tears. As this was happening, Sui noticed the timer had started counting down.

10

Shit.

9

Sui glance over at Trina who was trying not to cry and Aife who was trying to help calm her down again.

8

I’m going to need to do the first few rounds then aren’t I?

7

6

Sui carefully put down the dress she was working on and focused her eyes on the screen

5

4

Sui took one last glance at her friends before steeling her mind.

3

2

Ito stood proudly on Sui’s shoulder, ready to assist if need be.

1

The lights around the edge flashed a bright white, except all of the light was aimed inwards blocking the screen from view for a moment. When the flash cleared there was only three words. The target word read ‘Car’, with the two below reading ‘road’ and ‘carriage’

Sui took a glance at Trina who was trying to sit up and wipe away the few tears that had managed to leak out. “I’ve got the first few” said Sui

Trina sniffled a bit “I-I’ll be alright”

Sui ignored her and clicked on road. The lights flashed again and cleared the board. The new target word was ‘Pencil’ with three below it reading ‘Lead(Pb)’ ‘Gold(Au)’ ‘Carbon(C)’

Hmm, pretty sure it’s carbon, right? Graphite is just pencil ‘lead’ isn’t it? Sui shrugged and clicked Carbon.

The next round started with ‘Telephone’ followed by ‘Panda’ ‘Pigeon’ and ‘Panther’

Easy, gotta be pigeon because they are both forms of communication. Letter via carrier pigeon and voice via telephone.

Sui clicked on Pigeon and the screen flashed again. “Sui wait I’m fine” said Trina

Sui looked over at Trina. She still had tear marks running down her face, but they were no longer flowing. “Are you sure?” said Sui

Trina nodded “Yes, I’m sure… my… my mother and father are together… they… they should be fine together. They… they might not be as strong as your Grandmother or Aife’s parents but I have to believe they are fine… at least for now”

“You want to do the honours then?” asked Sui, pointing at the next set of words.

The target word was ‘Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia’ followed by ‘Antidisestablishmentarianism’ ‘Euouae’ ‘Arachnophobia’ and a fourth ‘Amenthaletmanesrana’

“Easy” said Trina clicking on Antidisestablishmentarianism. “The target word is a fear of long words, and Antidisestablishmentarianism, is one of the longest” Trina managed to say Antidisestablishmentarianism quickly without any sign of being uncomfortable. It was clear she’d practiced it… for some reason.