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Gan Ning really didn't like the look the kid on the Purple Parrots was giving him. He said as much to his fellow Orange Iguana, Ling Tong.
"That kid has one eye," Ling Tong pointed out.
"Yeah," Gan Ning agreed violently. "And he's looking at me funny with it."
"You're an idiot," Ling Tong said, then added, "The girl with him is giving you and even dirtier look."
Gan Ning glanced back over, "I think she's glaring at you."
Ling Tong leaned around Gan Ning to get a better look.
Zhen Ji, noticing his attention, scowled even more.
"Why is she glaring at me?" Ling Tong asked.
"The teams are supposed to have a boy and a girl, it's not fair that you have two boys, even if you're underdeveloped," she hissed.
"Underdeveloped?" Ling Tong echoed.
"She thinks you're pretty," Gan Ning said and grinned.
Ling Tong jabbed him in the arm, "Shut-up."
"No," Zhen Ji interjected, "The boy over on the red team, he's pretty. You," she paused to level him with a look, "are just scrawny."
Ling Tong would have told her just what he thought she was, especially in her highly flattering purple t-shirt and tent-like khaki pants, but the host Kirk Fogg started rambling on about the challenge so he figured he should keep his mouth shut.
Gan Ning had no such self control and leaned over to whisper, "Well, I still think you're pretty."
"Die in a fire," Ling Tong muttered and rabbit punched him in the side.
Further up the line Sun Ce in the Red Jaguars tuned out the annoying guy in explorer pants, it was pretty obvious they had to get to the other side of murky swimming pool thanks, to stare at the other contestants. "Why are we the only team of two guys?" he whispered to Zhou Yu.
Zhou Yu ignored him.
***
The challenge was pretty straight forward. Get to the other side of the moat. First player climbs hand over hand on the rope suspended above the pool. Second player throws a rope to the first player, who then wraps it around the post on their end and holds it tight so the second player can walk on it while hanging onto the overhead rope. Fall in and you have to go back, first four teams across win, the other two go home with sneakers or bottles of shampoo.
***
"I'm going first," Sun Ce announced.
Zhou Yu shrugged, "Fine by me." He had no desire to get wet. Given how much slack was in the suspended rope whoever went across first was going to get soaked. Zhou Yu was more then happy to let Sun Ce go first, especially considering the other boy could probably keep the second rope taut enough Zhou Yu might get out of it with only wet feet.
Gan Ning and Ling Tong, however, were engaged in a heated Rock, Paper, Scissors dual.
Ling Tong won.
"You really shouldn't use rock every time," Ling Tong pointed out and walked up to the edge of the pool to take his starting position.
The girl in the Green Monkeys, Xing Cai, nodded sagely as she took her starting position next to Ling Tong, "It's a sign of an unimaginative mind," she put in.
"She has a point," Ling Tong agreed.
Gan Ning contemplated pushing both of them into the moat.
Before he could Kirk gave the signal and the first player from every team lunged out onto the overhead rope.
Apparently the one eyed kid's depth perception was still giving him problems because he missed completely and went right into the pool. Zhen Ji screamed and yelled and him as he dragged himself out to start again.
The Green Monkeys were the only team that had let the girl go first, and at first it seemed like they might have been onto something given she was lighter, but about half-way across Xing-Cai's arms started to burn and she lost her grip and dropped right down into the water.
The other teams continued to progress across the pool, slowly, but still ahead of Xing Cai who had to swim back to start over again.
Gan Ning looked at the remaining Green Monkey, Guan Ping, and asked, "You loose at Rock Paper Scissors too?"
Guan Ping pulled his gaze away from the moat to glance at Gan Ning for only a second, "Uh, no, she wanted to, so I let her," he said.
Gan Ning stared at Xing Cai's lost ground and thought about her holding the rope for the much larger Guan Ping. "Why?"
Xing Cai popped up out of the pool soaked from head to toe. Her wet green t-shirt clung to her chest like a second skin. She turned and jumped back up on the rope, her pants had gotten equally clingy.
Guan Ping turned to Gan Ning with a grin, "That's why."
Sun Ce was the first across. He pulled himself gracelessly onto the shore and turned to face Zhou Yu. "Throw it over!" he yelled and held out his hands.
Zhou Yu had been holding the rope at the ready since Sun Ce had reached the half way point and let it fly as soon as he'd gotten the okay.
It feel about six feet short.
Sun Ce groaned, but called back encouragingly to Zhou Yu that it was okay, they still had time.
As Zhou Yu was dragging the rope back in, Ling Tong, who had pulled his legs up onto the rope as well as his hands and made rather good time because of it, cleared the pool.
Ling Tong turned around just in time to get smacked in the face with the rope. It was a scramble, but he managed to grab it before it feel down into the water.
"It's a good thing you went first after all!" Gan Ning yelled across to him, "I bet you throw like a girl."
When Ling Tong looped the rope around the post in front of him, he didn't pull it as tight as he could. It was satisfying seeing Gan Ning take the first step onto the rope and sink right into the water.
"Sorry!" he called back and waved, giving the rope a little more slack.
Gan Ning let go of the above rope with one hand long enough to flip him off. He was sure they could edit it out later.
The boy from the Silver Snakes cleared the pool, and turned to wait for the girl to toss him the rope. The line didn't make it all the way across, but it was close enough he could reach out and pull it in.
Zhou Yu threw the rope a second time. It fell short again, but by less.
"Wait!" Sun Ce yelled when Zhou Yu started to pull it back in. He grabbed the overhead rope and hung out over the pool to grab up the thrown line.
Next to him the first player from the Blue Barracudas, Zhuge Liang, flailed down from the rope. His team mate, Yue Ying, had a hell of an arm and chucked the rope past him. Both he and Sun Ce secured their lines at the same time.
The only teams lagging were the Purple Parrots -not by much once they got going again- and the Green Monkeys –Xing Cai had fallen in again.
Once they quit fucking with each other, Gan Ning and Ling Tong picked up the pace and cleared the challenge first. Ling Tong didn't heckle Zhen Ji when she fell off the rope as soon as she started, but it was a close thing.
The Silver Snakes, both dripping wet, finished right behind them. The girl had quite the high pitched shriek of joy.
The Blue Barracudas came in next, but were much more dignified about it.
Zhou Yu took his time. He was right about Sun Ce keeping the rope above the water, and even though they were the last team to qualify, Zhou Yu was the only contestant to cross the pool without getting sopping wet. That in itself was a victory.
The Purple Parrots and Green Monkeys were eliminated.
Gan Ning looked back to see Guan Ping helping Xing Cai out of the pool. He didn't seem that disappointed. Gan Ning turned back to the dripping wet Ling Tong and grinned.
"What are you looking at?" Ling Tong asked, then added. "Stop, it's creepy."
Gan Ning started to answer, but Kirk and the giant talking head, Olmec, interrupted him with the legend behind that episode's treasure.
***
The artifact of the day was The Lost Tail Feather of Zuo Ci. Zuo Ci was a sorcerer from Ancient China who was searching for the one man who would unit the land. For decades he searched the battlefields of the three warring kingdoms, Wu, Shu, and Wei, looking for such a leader. However the leader of Wu would die too soon, the leader of Shu would be blinded by his need for revenge, and the leader of Wei was too ruthless. Finally, convinced that no such man was to be found Zuo Ci turned into a crane and flew up into the heavens to await the day a true leader would step forward. It was said though, that as he flew away he lost a single tail feather amidst the war torn landscape and that tail feather had ended up in the temple.
It was apparently in the King's Storeroom.
***
Sun Ce looked at Zhou Yu, "Please tell me you paid attention to that, because I zoned out somewhere around lost tail feather."
Zhou Yu shook his head and sighed, "Yes, I did. You concentrate on stomping on the button."
"I can do that," Sun Ce said and brightened. He liked stomping on things.
Despite their plan it was the Silver Snakes who got the first question, the boy stamping down on the buzzer and announcing in a decidedly female voice the correct answer.
Gan Ning gawked, "Wait, you're a girl?"
Sun Shang Xiang scoffed in a very unladylike manner, "Yeah."
"Wait, so there're two teams that aren't a boy and a girl?" Sun Ce asked from down the line.
"Three teams," Ling Tong grumbled.
"Right," Sun Ce said and squinted at Ling Tong. "Sorry, three teams."
"Are the casting directors blind or stupid?" Ling Tong muttered.
"Both," Kirk interrupted. "Now, could we continue?"
Sun Ce did beat the others to the buzzer on the next question. He looked at Zhou Yu expectantly.
"He didn't finish asking the question," Zhou Yu pointed out and made a little exasperated noise. "The Wu Army?" he guessed hopefully.
"That answer is correct," Olmec announced.
Sun Ce pumped his fist and jumped down to the next level. He reached back and dragged Zhou Yu with him.
With Sun Ce's kamikaze tile stomp strategy and Zhou Yu's surprisingly good luck at guessing with only half the question to work with, it didn't take long for the Red Jaguars to make it to the bottom step.
The remaining three teams, who hadn't progressed a single step since Sun Ce's campaign of ground stomping terror, glared at the back of their heads.
The Blue Barracudas got the next question, the Silver Snakes the following one, and the Blue Barracudas again after that.
Only Ling Tong and Gan Ning remained up on the top step.
Gan Ning fumed. "I think our button's busted."
Olmec asked the next question.
If the tile wasn't broken before it was after the particularly vicious stomp Gan Ning brought down on it, before he yelled, "A Crane!"
The quiet that followed was more of the awkward silence variety, then the tense pause variety, and the hosts shook themselves a little before they gathered their wits and announced the answer correct.
Gan Ning and Ling Tong stepped down in unison, "How about I hit the button this time," Ling Tong suggested.
Gan Ning magnanimously gestured Ling Tong to go ahead. He was fed up with the button stamping anyway. He decided instead to focus his attention on the two teams right in front of him.
Just as Olmec started the next question Gan Ning took a calculated dive off the steps and onto the Blue Barracudas effectively distracting not only them, but the Silver Snakes, leaving Ling Tong free to buzz in and answer the question at his leisure.
After the all clear Ling Tong moved down onto the next step where Gan Ning was still sorting his limbs out from Yue Ying's.
Gan Ning held up a hand to him and Ling Tong grasped it and pulled him up.
"You did that on purpose!" Yue Ying said and scrambled to her feet.
"I was feeling light headed," Gan Ning shot back. "I think it's the lights."
"He's probably dehydrated," Ling Tong added and made a show of steadying a suddenly wobbly Gan Ning.
Visions of getting sued undoubtedly dancing through their heads, the crew scrambled to get Gan Ning some water. When Gan Ning bravely assured them he was in fact okay to keep going, he didn't want to let his teammate down, they continued.
Everyone returned to their places and Olmec asked the final question.
Gan Ning spilled his water on Sun Shang Xiang.
Ling Tong rang in with the final answer just as Sun Shang turned and decked Gan Ning.
The Red Jaguars and the Orange Iguanas were going on to the Temple Games.
***
Kirk Fogg watched the very angry Sun Shang Xiang get escorted off set and turned to the remaining two teams, most notably being Gan Ning, his eye was all ready starting to bruise. They'd have to get make-up to cover that, "Are you sure you're all right to keep playing?" he asked.
"You got punched by a girl," Ling Tong added helpfully.
"She punches harder then you," Gan Ning muttered to his teammate, then to Kirk, "Yeah, I'm good."
"All right then," Kirk said. "So why don't we start with you then. What do you want to be when you grow up?"
Gan Ning answered without hesitation, "A pirate."
"Right," Kirk said and laughed a little uneasily. Clearly it was going to be one of those days.
***
The first Temple Game was inspired by Zuo Ci's journey to Nanman where the warriors were said to ride on the backs of elephants. The object of the game was to fire balls -that were supposed to be arrows- from slingshots to knock the pillars, representing Nanman Generals, off the stands set up to represent elephants. The pillars were color coded so the players knew which were theirs to knock down. They had sixty seconds. First to topple all their pillars or whoever toppled the most when time ran out was the winner.
Zhou Yu and Ling Tong were competing.
They displayed not only their competitive spirits, but good sportsmanship.
That is to say Zhou Yu didn't point and laugh when he won and politely accepted his half Pendant of Life.
No, Sun Ce off on the sidelines did it for him.
Gan Ning elbowed him. "It's all right!" he called out to Ling Tong as Sun Ce doubled over next to him, "I'll just have to win this for us!"
***
The second Temple Game was based off another of the battles Zuo Ci had been in: The Yellow Turban Rebellion. There were about twenty wooden crates set up; inside each crate was the name of one of three Yellow Turban generals. The players had to race to the boxes, remove a name and bring it back to post on their board. They could only carry one name at a time, and any name they found they had to pick up. They could however switch a name in their hand for one in a crate. They had sixty seconds. The first player to post all three names on their board, or was furthest along when time ran out, won.
Sun Ce and Gan Ning competed.
From the very start it was ugly. For no reason other then he could, Gan Ning hip checked Sun Ce from the first crate and pulled the name out. It was hardly necessary, there was another crate right next to it, but it made Gan Ning feel better.
Just the way it made Sun Ce feel better to accidently collide with Gan Ning when he was heading back to the crates and Sun Ce was going to his board. Gan Ning fell on his ass and Sun Ce called an insincere "Sorry" over his shoulder.
Gan Ning banged the crate Sun Ce was looking in when he passed and caused the lid fall and smack Sun Ce in the back of the head.
Sun Ce lost his grip on one of the markers bearing a general's name and it happened to fly into Gan Ning's face.
By the end of sixty seconds the two of them were about one accident away from coming to blows and it was only incidental that Gan Ning happened to be farther along and won the next half Pendant of Life.
***
The final Temple Game had Gan Ning and Sun Ce strung up on a cable system with Ling Tong and Zhou Yu below them with baskets. There was an assortment of oversized feathers strung along the cable system that Gan Ning and Sun Ce had to pull themselves to and drop down to their teammate's basket below. If the feather missed the basket it didn't count. They had sixty seconds and whoever collected the most feathers won.
The cable systems of each team never crossed paths, they couldn't even reach each other's feathers, the producers had double checked after the last game.
Just because they couldn't reach each other didn't mean they couldn't harass one another.
"We're so going to kick you ass," Sun Ce hissed over at Gan Ning.
"Please," Gan Ning scoffed. "If your girlfriend throws as good as she catches you're not going to be collecting any feathers."
"Hey, Zhou Yu catches just fine!" Sun Ce protested, then coughed and added, "He's also not a girl."
Below them Ling Tong looked over at Zhou Yu and apologized.
Zhou Yu just shrugged, "Don't worry about it. It's my choice to wear eye liner, and I do catch just fine."
Ling Tong let that marinate for a minute and decided it was probably best he didn't answer.
Thankfully the game started and he didn't have time to think about it anymore.
The round was over far too quickly and the feathers counted up.
The Red Jaguars had won by one point. They got the whole Pendant of Life and were going on to the Temple.
"That'll teach you to make fun of my girlfriend!" Sun Ce yelled over at Gan Ning as the both of them were lowered down.
Zhou Yu was waiting below and rolled his eyes, "My hero."
Gan Ning would have yelled back but he caught sight of Ling Tong's hunched shoulders and glare, "Hey stop looking at me like I killed your dad," he said.
Ling Tong shook his head and groaned, "I'm not glaring at you, this just sucks."
Gan Ning stepped out of his harness to walk over and slap Ling Tong on the back, "Hey, cheer up, at least you met me."
Ling Tong did glare at him then, "Lucky me."
"No really," Gan Ning said, "Just think; now you could join my band."
"I thought you wanted to be a pirate," Ling Tong said, but kept walking next to Gan Ning off set.
"I do, a pirate that has a band," Gan Ning explained. He paused to smile winningly at Ling Tong, "You can play the tambourine."
***
All that remained was the Temple. Sun Ce and Zhou Yu had three minutes to reach The Lost Tail Feather of Zuo Ci in the King's Storeroom. Olmec gave them a long winded rundown of a path they could take and asked who was going first.
"I'm going first," Zhou Yu announced.
Sun Ce started to protest but Zhou Yu shot him a look and he kept quiet.
Olmec finished explaining the rules concerning Temple Guards and Pendants of Life then on Kirk's word lowered the Temple gates with noises that were vastly inappropriate for a children's game show.
As soon as Kirk gave the signal Zhou Yu took off. He completely ignored Olmec's suggested path assuming the talking head meant to lead him to failure, and crawled down through the Ledges and into the Pit of the Pendulum. The column was much easier to knock down by hand then by swinging at it on the damn rope and he climbed into the unlocked door to the Tomb of the Headless Kings.
Naturally as soon as he started yanking on the ropes to drop the bones and find the missing skull a Temple Guard popped out. Zhou Yu held out his pendant and firmly asked not to be interrupted. He snatched up the head from near the guard's foot and jammed it on one of the kings with a vicious twist.
The door opened and he passed into The Jester's Court. He wasted no time lining up to the first painting, and moving onto the second when it didn't work. The room lit up and the door opened into the Dark Forest.
Zhou Yu didn't think too hard about sticking his hand into a dark hole to find a key. Unfortunately as soon as he did the tree came to life and groped him, or at least it might as well have. He yanked his hand free and flailed back to shoot the tree an offended look.
On Kirk's word Sun Ce set off. Instead of following Zhou Yu's path, he went straight up into the Crypt. Sun Ce pulled on the book in the first skeleton's hand and a Temple Guard suddenly came out of the wall.
Sun Ce punched him in the face and broke his nose.
The audience erupted into cheers.
Kirk Fogg covered his face as Zhou Yu exited the temple to stand next to him.
"This episode is never going to air is it?" Zhou Yu asked.
"No," Kirk replied through his fingers. "No it's not." He dropped his hands and sighed, "Just smile and wave."
Zhou Yu did just that.
***
Zhou Yu saw Sun Ce backstage. When he saw Zhou Yu looking, Sun Ce rushed up to him.
"I say we were robbed," Sun Ce pronounced and crowded into Zhou Yu's space.
Zhou Yu was surprised but nodded, "Perhaps."
Sun Ce nodded vigorously, "Yeah, well, who needs this game anyway."
"Indeed," Zhou Yu agreed.
"We'll start another game," Sun Ce continued and threw an arm around Zhou Yu. "Our own game."
Zhou Yu smiled. He liked the sound of that.