"I n-never really know what to expect from these cars, but somehow that still m-managed to catch me off guard." Irvin admits.
After the introduction, The Cat had taken the two of them backstage. They were now in a well-furnished dressing room. Irvin occupied the couch, Princess occupied Irvin, and The Cat was touching up her make-up in the vanity mirror.
"I could have told you back at the resort, but the reveal is part of the fun."
"I don't mind the surprise, as long as it's a pleasant one." Princess says, taking a cautious tone. "You don't intend to have us debase ourselves for cheap novelties, do you?"
"My my, does that sound like something I would do?"
She levels The Cat a flat look. "I seem to recall The Obstacle Course Car having a similar introduction to this one."
The Cat looks away, indignantly. "That was a different kind of game. And I was very upfront about what you would be getting yourselves into. Trust me, I have no intention of surprising you with something so unpleasant."
"Um… If y-you don't want to play, P-Princess, we could always just leave." Irvin mentions. The exit door wasn't hidden at all in this car, built into the wall just opposite the main stage. It was only at the feline host's insistence that they stayed.
Princess shoots another warning glare at The Cat, before her smile breaks the act. "It's fine, Irvin. The Cat knows me well-enough to not invite me to a game I'd hate. Whatever this is, I doubt it will be physically exhausting or messy."
The Cat laughs. "Ne t'inquiètes pas, there won't be anything of that sort here."
"That's good. I'm not really a f-fan of that stuff either. So, what exactly i-is this game?" Irvin asks. The beige-furred feline grins, adjusting her bowtie.
"I don't want to spoil too much, however… Companion Ship is a game of bonds."
"Well yeah, the name kind of gave that a-away." He mutters. "I mean, like, what w-will we be doing? Is it like, trivia or something l-like that?"
She tuts. "No more hints." He sighs. Oh well, they already seemed set on playing anyways. Not like knowing now would change anything.
There's a knock on the door. A bear dressed in a dark suit and hat and wearing sunglasses walks into the room, and sets two sheets of paper down on the coffee table. "Merci Frank." The Cat says as he leaves. She jumps off the armrest to the table, and places a paw on both pages.
"Before you can go on set, we'll need you to fill out these forms." Irvin takes one of the pages and scans the fields on it while she talks.
"Name, age, n-number, hobbies, occupation…" He pauses, squinting down at the page. "What are you best at?"
"Curious?" She asks. He nods. "We tailor the game to your specialties. Just be honest, and write out what you feel the most confident with. Language, baking, custodial duties, whatever you want."
Irvin doesn't question further, quickly filling in his own sheet. Princess is only slower with hers because the pencil is too big for her. Once they hand them over, The Cat flips through them curiously.
"Let's see… Ah, I suppose I could have filled yours in myself, Princess. These are the answers I would have expected…"
Her eyes narrow at something on Irvin's page. She stares at it silently, then looks up at Irvin. Her eyes flicker between the two, before she finally asks.
"Irvin Kemp?"
"That's… my name." He says. Why did she feel the need to bring it up?
She gives him an appraising look, focusing mostly on his face. After a few more moments, something flashes in her eyes. Excitedly, she meows. "Ils se ressemblent tellement."
"H-Huh?"
She pauses, considering something. "Nothing to worry yourself over. I just finally found the answer I was looking for."
He and Princess share a look as she walks out with their forms. Whatever she'd just realized, neither of them had a clue what it could be.
…
They both stood at separate podiums in front of a backdrop of a ship sailing across the sea. The set decorations really leaned into the "ship" part of Companion Ship. Even their podiums looked like they were made out of wooden planks, with buoy life rings and fishing nets attached. Both of them had a whiteboard and marker on top of their podium, Princess' marker actually being suitable for her size in a rare instance of miniature denizen accessibility. The only thing out of place was the large digital screen behind them (currently only showing the show's name), and the smaller off-camera screens for their eyes.
The Cat was in front of them both on a plush stool, addressing the camera being manned by Frank the bear. "Competing today, we have the passenger Irvin Kemp-" The camera pans towards him, admittedly making him a little nervous. "-and train denizen Princess!" The mouse took much better to the camera, blowing a kiss as it went to her next. Fake applause filled the room at their introductions. They either had someone in the booth manning the speakers, or a really well-hidden remote.
"Princess, could you tell us about the two of you, and what all you've been through on the train?" She asks, turning towards Princess.
Unsurprisingly, Princess takes to the spotlight like a fish to water. "Oh, so much more than I would ever have time to explain! Irvin and I have been together since his very first train car, a humble little farm. Back then, his number sat at a rather high 764. He's been working hard to improve himself though, and just look at where he is now."
All eyes fall on him. Meekly, Irvin holds up his hand to demonstrate.
299
"My my, that is a rather significant change." The Cat remarks. "And how long have you two been together?"
"Oh, just a little more than a month." Princess answers. "The time has positively been flying by."
She nods, and turns to Irvin. He quickly shakes his head before she can even ask what's on her mind. It's not that Irvin was camera shy, he was just… camera bashful.
Kindly, The Cat doesn't push the matter. She moves on with the show. "Neither of you are familiar with how this game works, so allow me to explain the rules:"
"Companion Ship is a game of friendship. The two of you will be playing together to try and win enough points to win. You'll earn points by answering questions and winning short challenges. Individually, both of you will be able to earn 50 points. To win however, the two of you will need a combined score of 80 points in total!"
Irvin nods along, following the explanation well-enough. He and Princess share hopeful looks. If the challenges weren't too bad, they might just win.
"Is there a prize for winning?" Princess asks. The Cat nods. "Will you tell us what it is?"
She grins. "Normally I would, but in your case… Well, I have something special in mind for you two. Why spoil the surprise?"
"Ominous." Irvin mutters. She didn't notice, already back to explaining the show to the cameras.
"As longtime viewers know, we ask our players before every episode what they're best at. For Irvin, his specialty lies in mathematics. Is this correct, Irvin?"
He gulps, thinking over his words carefully so that he doesn't become a stuttering mess when he speaks. This wasn't live, The Cat had told them as much before they came on-set. This show was instead recorded, copied onto tapes, and then sold to interested viewers in other cars. If he messed up badly, he could get a retake. Keeping that in mind helped him calm down a little bit.
"Yes. I w-went to college on a m-math degree, and it h-has always been my best subject in school."
"A well-educated man, how lovely! Meanwhile, your companion, Princess, is more suited to dealing with people. Her specialty is sociability, am I not wrong?"
She responds casually. "I've dealt with many types of people in the past. It's only natural that I would get better at handling them. Though, I'd be lying if I didn't say some of it came naturally."
"I understand exactly what you mean." The Cat replies with a wink. She turns back to the cameras. "Pour commencer, let's give them each a demonstration round."
"Irvin, would you like to start us off?" The Cat asks. He takes a deep breath. This wasn't a test, it was a game. The prize didn't matter, this wasn't a live broadcast, and they could leave regardless of how he did. There wasn't any pressure right now. He just had to solve whatever math problem she set in front of him.
He nods, so The Cat goes on. "We've prepared a somewhat challenging problem for you to solve. You'll only have one minute to give us the values of X and Y. Feel free to use your whiteboard to work it out. Your time starts the moment we show you the problem. Are you ready?"
It didn't matter that he was being timed, this was just a game. Games had timers sometimes. He didn't need to stress himself out. If he just kept telling himself that, he'd be okay.
He grips the marker and whiteboard tightly, looking up at the screen. Breath. "Show it to me."
"Eager, aren't you? Well I won't keep you waiting. Three! Two! One! Go!" She points to the screen, and the problem immediately reveals itself.
40y + 100x = 1620
5y − 2x = 72
He lets out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. It was a substitution/elimination problem. And an easy one at that.
"The clock has started! Under such a strict time limit, will Irvin be able-"
"Done." Irvin sets down his marker, and flips his board around.
X = 9, Y = 18
The Cat looks back at him with wide eyes, glancing over at their digital clock. It still had 52 seconds left on its face.
"C'était rapide." The Cat mutters to herself. "Frank, did he get it right?"
The bear moves beside the screen, and after a moment to build suspense, presses a button that changes the display into the same answers Irvin had written.
"Irvin was correct! Let's give him a hand, as well as 5 points for that answer." More fake applause, joined by the softer but genuine clapping of the three animals there with him.
"Thanks… I hope you h-have harder problems then that for the next r-rounds." He really did. If that was considered a difficult problem, then Irvin was going to get through this without a sweat.
"Don't worry, I'm sure I'll find a more challenging question for you soon enough, Irvin." The Cat assures him, before looking back to Princess. "Your partner just completed his first problem. Do you think that you can do the same?"
"Well, I won't know for certain until I see what it is… but I'm confident I can handle whatever you have."
Satisfied with her confident response, The Cat looks back to the nervous man's podium. "You'll be participating in this one as well, Irvin."
"Huh? M-Me?" He asks, receiving nods in return.
"Write down three statements. Two of them should be lies, and one should be the truth. Princess will try to discern the fact from the fiction, and she will receive 5 points if she succeeds."
"...D-Do I get anything for tricking her?" He was going to need some motivation to not make this really obvious. They were on the same team after all.
The Cat pretends to think, despite clearly having something in mind. "If Princess chooses incorrectly, then I will give you 5 seconds more for all future questions."
That… was tempting. Enough for Irvin to play along and try to pull one over on his companion.
The phrases he came up with were simple. He flips his board around to show the three.
-I used to have a pet lizard.
-My father's name is Richard.
-Woodrow Wilson was the 38th president.
All of them were based on facts that Irvin knew he hadn't told Princess. The last one he threw in as a wildcard, hoping that it's lack of personal relevance would make it harder for Princess to discern.
After showing The Cat which one was the truth, he flipped his board around for Princess to look at. She examined it carefully, squinting in concentration.
"A lizard, hm?" Her eyes flicker up at Irvin. "Richard…" Again, they move. She pauses.
"Your father's name is Richard. That one is the truth." She declares, nearly causing him to drop the board in shock.
"H-How!?"
"You have a terrible poke face, Irvin." Gah! She'd been trying to read his reactions, of course! He felt like an idiot now for not realizing it.
"Excellent demonstration Princess!" Irvin begrudgingly claps along with the fake applause, still a little upset about how easily he just got read. "Your team is at 10 points now. Now that the demonstrations are out of the way…"
A sly grin spreads across her face. "The real game can begin."
They exchange uneasy looks as The Cat motions to the monitors. Two columns appear on all of them.
-Irvin-
Deduction
Bargaining
Mindgames
Reads
-Princess-
Substitution
Physics
Measurements
Flashcards
Their feline host explains. "Moving forward, I want each of you to choose a category when it's your turn. You'll select all four eventually, but the ones you start with will be easier and the ones you save for last will be much more challenging."
Neither of them wanted to bring it up, but it needed to be asked. Princess bites the bullet for them. "Why does it look like you've given my categories to Irvin and his to me?"
The Cat shrugs nonchalantly. "A game you're bound to win wouldn't be very thrilling, now would it? This keeps things nicely difficile, wouldn't you agree?"
"So th-this is what she meant by it being a g-game of bonds…" Irvin sighs.
The Cat gives him a smile. "On this show, players swap specialties with their partners. You'll be walking a mile in each other's shoes to try and win."
"B-But, I'm terrible at a-all things social."
"I wouldn't say that I'm awful, at math, but it's true that I have never taken a class on the subject. Isn't a game that you're guaranteed to lose just as boring as the opposite?"
"Obviously. That's why even with this twist, you still have a perfectly fair chance of winning."
The Cat motions to the screens, as they change to visuals that go along with her explanation. "For this round, all challenges are worth 5 points. Afterwards, I'll give you both an hour to rest, and we'll start a new round with the same categories and point values. If you've at least reached 50 points collectively by then, I'll give you each a bonus question to make a last ditch effort for the winning score of 80."
"5 points p-per category, 4 categories each, 2 rounds. We already have t-ten points, so we need 8 wins to q-qualify for the bonus question, and 14 to w-win without it." Irvin summarizes.
"My my, math really is your specialty." She compliments. He's unimpressed.
"It's just simple addition…"
She extends a paw in Irvin's direction. "It's your turn now, Irvin. Please choose from one of your four categories."
He sighs. This wasn't going to be pretty no matter what he chose. Deduction and reads were probably his least awful categories, so it'd be better to start with mindgames or bargaining.
"I'll… take bargaining."
"Please come here then." The Cat motions him to a more open part of the set on the side. "All you have to do for this challenge, is convince Randall to give you a piece of gum."
"Wait, Randall?" The name sounded familiar.
Sure enough, a sentient water creature comes out of a dressing room with a pack of gum floating inside of him. He waves his entire body when he sees Irvin.
"You have 60 seconds to convince him. Your time starts now." The Cat declares without proper warning.
"W-Wait, now!?" He turns back, seeing the monitor display a timer in place of the categories. No preparation whatsoever, and such a strict time limit. This was the easy version of this category!?
No time to complain. "Hey, R-Randall, can I get a piece of your g-gum?"
"Sorry, no can do. If I open the pack, it'll ruin its collector's value."
"Collector's… It's gum!"
"A full pack of Fresh-Winter branded mint-flavored gum! In a few years, I can get back double what I paid for it when its value shoots up."
"That's not how gum works… The value only d-declines with age, since the pieces get s-stale and chalky."
"Really? The Cat told me it ages like milk."
"Uh… Milk doesn't age well either. Wine or cheese w-would be better analogies for positive a-aging."
"But doesn't milk turn into cheese?"
"Not by itself, y-you have to do stuff to it. Something about c-curds and whey, I don't really know the whole p-process."
"Huh. I wouldn't have known that." Randall says, looking impressed with Irvin's knowledge. Maybe now if he asked again-
A loud ringing sounds from behind Irvin. "I'm very sorry, but your time is up Irvin."
He sighs. Even with all the progress he made, he didn't have the time to clinch it. Even if it was just a game and didn't matter, he still felt disappointed.
When he's back at his podium, The Cat turns to Princess. The mouse doesn't hesitate with her answer. "I will take physics"
The Cat nods, turning to the water creature still in the room. "Randall, the next category is physics."
He blinks. "Ooh! Should I start doing the thing?"
"If you would."
Without another word, Randall starts running at the wall. He splatters into it, reforms quickly, and then runs straight at the opposite wall. As he repeats this process, Frank sets down a stopwatch on Princess' podium.
"The distance between those two walls is exactly 20 meters." The Cat explains. "Since you chose this first, I'll give you the formula you need to solve this as well." She taps her paw twice, as a screen lights up with a basic speed formula (speed = distance/time). "You have two minutes to find Randall's speed. Good luck."
The timer starts. The moment Randall comes off a wall, Princess starts timing him to get a measure on how fast he was going. After a few cycles, she clocked in a time of 8 seconds per dash. all she needed then was to do the simple division.
Even for someone without formal education, that was easy enough. "2.5." Princess says, holding up her board.
"2.5 meters per second is correct!" The Cat declares. Applause funnels in. "Randall, you can stop that now." The water creature doesn't pull himself apart after hitting the wall again, instead leaving the room as a group of droplet sized versions of himself. It was bizarre to see, but a month on the train had well-since desensitized Irvin to such sights.
They were at 15 points now. If Princess could keep up with the math, and he could squeeze in a few points with his challenges, then maybe this wasn't as bad as he'd thought.
"We'll switch turn order this round, so Princess please pick another category." The Cat instructs.
She glances up at the board. "I suppose that I'll be taking substitution."
He smiles. That category was basically a freebie.
…
Watching Princess struggle was really forcing Irvin to reconsider his perspective on how easy these types of problems were.
He was seconds away from ripping out his eyes watching Princess just stare at the equation in front of her for a full minute and a half. The moment it came on screen, she'd just frozen up. About five seconds later, Irvin had the answer and had to physically restrain himself from shouting it.
Her marker hadn't even been touched yet. She clearly had no idea what she was doing, and he really felt bad for her. Unfortunately, his sympathy was partly buried under his intense frustration. The Cat eventually called it, but the pain stuck with him up until it was his turn to choose.
"M-Mindgames."
His challenge was to guess Frank's favorite food in 6 yes or no questions, with the caveat that he was allowed to lie for one of them. He'd gotten it down to Bacon or Hamburgers, but Frank lied on one of his last two replies so he wasn't a hundred percent certain which it was. He guessed bacon incorrectly. No points for him.
Princess took Flashcards, which Irvin couldn't even imagine being difficult. The cards were all single digit number multiplication, and she had 5 seconds to answer. 7 out of 10 was all it took to pass. She got 2.
He may have smashed his head into the podium at that.
Picking reads gave him flashcards of his own. The Cat would show him a face, and he had to identify the emotion on it within a few seconds. Unfortunately, the cards used random train denizens, some of which being less expressive than others. No points.
Princess took Measurements and had to guess how many jelly beans were in a jar given only its weight, height, and the radius of the base. She was allowed to be off by up to 50.
She guessed 100. There were 1279.
Surprisingly, Irvin's last challenge, deduction, is the only one he ends up passing.
"Your best friend has just lost their significant other. What is the proper response?" The Cat asks.
As the clock ticked down, Irvin had more and more trouble thinking of a proper response. At ten seconds, he voices his uncertainty. "What k-kind of question is that? I-I don't know! I mean, h-how did he even l-lose her?"
Apparently, that was the answer. It was a trick question. If he'd said anything, even "I'm sorry for your loss", that would have been wrong. Without context, there was no way to properly respond.
"And with that, round one is over. Let's double check their score one more time before the break." The Cat says, as the screens put up a big number 20. Out of eight challenges, they'd won two of them. "These two have gotten off to a rough start, but they aren't out of the running yet. If they can get 30 points in the second round, then they will qualify for the bonus question. Before that though, we'll be giving these two some time off. Let's hope they use it well."
…
"We agree that this is unwinnable, right?"
Surprisingly, Irvin wasn't the one saying that. It was Princess, resting on his chest as he lies on the couch, who was the first to give up.
"T-Technically, we just need to win six of the categories next round." He responds, despite also not believing in that possibility. "So yeah, impossible. ...Sorry, I'm a-awful at all of my categories."
"Don't take all the credit. This failure is a team effort." She jokes. Her chuckles fade into a sad sigh. "I'm fine at basic math, but she wasn't giving me enough time to complete those flashcards. I don't even know what I was supposed to be doing on those other two."
Irvin felt that she had more than enough time. The problem was just that she didn't seem familiar with basic multiplication tables.
"Like that jellybean thing. Honestly, what did she expect, was I supposed to count them all? They weren't all visible from the outside, and I didn't have anywhere near enough time to do something so tedious."
"She g-gave you a ruler. You were p-probably supposed to measure the jar to see how many it c-could hold." He says. She gives him a confused look.
"How?"
"The volume of a cylinder is pi t-times the radius squared times the height. Once you get a volume, you c-can get an approximate volume for each jellybean by m-measuring their size like a box. C-Calculate how many the container can hold, a-and guess slightly h-higher than that since the beans aren't exactly b-boxes. You won't g-get the exact number like that, b-but you can get pretty c-close… Uh, sorry, that was p-probably more than you wanted."
After that lecture, he was expecting her to look bored out of her mind. Surprisingly though, she had a warm smile on her face. "...You should see the way your face lights up when you talk about this stuff."
That got his cheeks warm. "H-Ha… It r-really isn't that complicated. Even kids l-learn geometry, anyone could do it if they remember the formulas. You could too, i-if you wanted."
"I'm sure that I could if-" She stops. A thought crosses her mind. "There's an idea."
"What?" He asks.
"We have an hour to ourselves. Perhaps we should use it to prepare for the upcoming round."
Irvin starts to sit up, giving Princess enough time to slide down his body to the couch's armrest. "I th-thought you said it was unwinnable?"
"If we went straight into another round, then yes. But this time, we know what categories to expect. We have plenty of time to prepare, and we have all the resources we need in one another. A bit of study now could make all the difference in how possible this game really is."
"...I would like to m-make it to the bonus q-question at least." He admits.
"Then let's at least try before giving up." She says, pointing a paw straight at Irvin. "You saw how badly I did. What mistakes did I make last round?"
"Mistakes? Um…" He rubs his neck. "It's n-not really like that. You d-didn't have a chance to make mistakes, b-because you didn't have enough knowledge to even try most of the time. With math, you need to know how to solve a p-problem, and then you need to actually s-solve it. You mostly got hung up on that f-first step."
He thinks back to her categories and adds, "flashcards was the exception, but... I d-don't really think that's something you can improve on quickly th-though. If you don't know your multiplication tables already, then it w-would take more than an hour to g-get you familiar with them enough to make a difference."
"They move by too fast for me." She defends, pouting. "I hardly had enough time to start counting before they were up."
"You had five seconds each. That's… actually kind of generous for those."
She gives him a look, so he coughs into his hand and moves on. "I c-could teach you how to work out substitution problems, a-and some general formulas for measurements. If you c-can do the math correctly, and within the time limit…"
"Then that will be enough?"
"Y-Yeah. You could probably net fifteen points, if you a-accept that the flashcards are a lost cause."
"But that isn't enough to win." She says, poking Irvin. "If I can only get fifteen points, then you need to get at least fifteen as well."
"Ah, so it really i-is impossible then."
She frowns. "Irvin, do you actually think that, or was that just your usual automatic response?"
"Yes."
That one gets a chuckle. "Really though, I think you have a better chance than I do. You just need to change your approach slightly."
He watches her idly walk along the armrest as she talks. "For example, you almost had Randall in your first challenge. Your problem was that you let him control the pace of the discussion. You can't do that when you're on a time limit."
Huh. Randall's odd comments had definitely thrown him off, and he lost a lot of time addressing them instead of trying to convince him to share his gum. He hadn't noticed it at the time, but it seems obvious looking back now.
"I g-guess if I handled that one a little differently, that would be an extra f-five points…" If he got five points there and repeated his deduction win, then he just needed to win at either mindgames or reads. He came pretty close on mindgames last time, so maybe it wasn't totally impossible.
"...Can you give me some advice for reads?" He asks.
She smiles. "I think I can teach you enough to pass. But once I'm done, I expect you to show me how to solve those substitution problems."
...
For the rest of the hour, they talk. When one of them needs a break, they swap roles and let the other one teach for a while.
Princess' advice is very broad, as she tries to give Irvin the tools he needs to address any number of situations The Cat could throw at him. In contrast, Irvin's instructions are more specific. Given the categories they know, he prepares her with formulas and techniques to solve a specific range of problems.
When they run out of advice to give, their time is just about up. There was little left to go over, except what order they'd take their categories in. When Irvin gives his list, she only has one alteration to make.
"Put mindgames at the very end."
"W-Why? I thought y-you said I had a chance with it."
"That's true. I'm not suggesting that you give up on it, but I think you'll do better at maximum intensity."
He stares at her, blinking slowly. "...Okay, you're g-going to have to explain."
"How do you think The Cat plans to ramp up the difficulty for that category?"
He thinks. "Probably by switching around my o-opponent. Randall would be the easiest, Frank would b-be somewhere in the middle like last time…"
"And for the hardest variant?"
"She'd… probably p-put in herself."
"Exactly my point. I'm not saying that you couldn't beat anyone else. What I'm saying is that you could definitely beat The Cat."
Before he can ask more, the door opens. Frank the bear leans in to let them know that their time is up. Princess hops off the armrest, only offering one last piece of cryptic advice.
"Try to think of what you know about her, and you'll know how to beat her."
That advice must have been great in her head. To Irvin though, it sounded like she forgot that he'd only met her some hours ago. He barely knew anything about her!
Whatever. Even if he didn't get it, he would be fine as long as he beat all of his other categories. As long as he didn't mess anything up, there wouldn't be a problem.
No pressure.
…
Irvin starts off with bargaining again. Sure enough Randall is brought out to serve as his opponent. Instead of trying to get into his gum this time, all Irvin needed to do was get Randall to accept a present. 60 seconds, no time to waste!
"Randall, I have a gift f-for you."
The water denizen gasps. "For me? Well I'd love to accept it, but I don't have anything to offer in return."
"Just take it, I insist." Irvin pushes, holding it out to him.
"No no, I insist against your insistence until-"
"Randall," he says in a lower tone, "take this g-gift from my hands, or the next thing you get from m-me will be a sponge."
He freezes. "Right-o! That would be unpleasant, so I'll be taking this then." He wraps his liquid arms around the box, taking it out of Irvin's hands.
Success! They were at 25 points, only 25 more to go!
…
"This box can hold 92 bars of soap." Princess answers.
"That is… correct!" The Cat says, as applause funnels in.
Taking measurements first had been a great idea. Just as Irvin predicted, she'd been given a much more simple problem to work with. All the shapes she needed to measure were boxes, which had a much simpler volume formula.
They'd both been a little worried that the round two physics problem would involve a formula they hadn't touched on, but thankfully not. Just another speed problem, with the caveat of not being given the formula or a stopwatch. Not enough to stop her.
35 points, they were on track still…
…
"Confused… Happy… Exhausted… Furious…... er- Nervous?"
The Cat opens her mouth to correct him, but Irvin quickly shouts over her "Wait! Embarrassed!"
She smiles. "Correct! I must say, your performance has shot up quite dramatically this round."
"Th-Thanks. Princess gave me some g-good advice."
Pay attention to the eyes. The eyes are the window to the soul.
Not all denizens had mouths, but all of the ones The Cat showed definitely had some kind of eyes.
Deduction was a little tougher. He kind of lucked into the answer last time, a feat he wasn't likely to repeat.
She sets the scene for him. "A work acquaintance has been diagnosed with a rather serious disease recently. You aren't particularly close to him, but during the week he asks you to cover a shift for him. Unfortunately, you can't do so, having promised to meet with a friend on that day. How do you resolve the situation without discarding your previous commitment?"
"Um… Hmmm..." That was a tough one. There were a lot of variables to juggle, and he didn't want to seem rude.
"Okay, I think… I-I would try to help him find a d-different coworker to take his shift. If none are willing, then I c-could offer to take one for them in the future in exchange f-for this one now. If n-nobody is available, then I guess I would talk to the m-manager with him?"
"So… You commit to helping him find a replacement, while holding firm on your original commitment?" The Cat says, confirming his response.
"Y-Yes."
There's a pause. It lasts for just long enough for Irvin to suspect the worst.
"Correct! Your actions would be entirely appropriate under those circumstances."
He lets out a sigh of relief as applause fills the room.
Just one more to go…
…
Princess knew what she was doing when the substitution problem came up. She followed all of the steps necessary to solve it.
...So why?
"That is incorrect." The Cat informs her, shaking her head.
Princess' eyes widen, as she flips her board around to stare at her work. It all lined up, she didn't understand.
She looks over at Irvin. He gives her a pained look, as he tells her, "7 times 7 i-is 49, not 48. You w-were off by 1."
She flips it back, looking again. "...Ugh. I was so close too."
Flashcards went about as well as expected. They never considered her winning, and at the hardest difficulty? She didn't stand a chance.
That left only one category...
45 points. One challenge left. Everything rested on Irvin's shoulders.
NO PRESSURE!
"I'm r-ready to take on mindgames." He says, not looking sure of himself at all.
"I hope you are, because for this challenge you'll be playing against moi." The Cat says, exactly as Princess had predicted. "The game is simple. You're going to give me a statement, and I am going to guess if it's true or false. If my guess is wrong, then you win. You have to write out whether your question is true or false before I guess, so no changing your answer after the fact."
"By the way, I wouldn't try lying if I were you. If I suspect foul play, I'll ask for verification. We have a lie detector on standby if that's the only way to be sure."
So, he needed to get The Cat to answer incorrectly In a game where even just guessing she'd be right 50% of the time. And given how their demonstration round went, Irvin's poker face was lacking.
...Why did Princess think he could beat her again?
"You have one minute to come up with the best statement you can. Your time starts… now!" The screens change to timers, not helping Irvin with his stress at all.
He just spent all that time strategizing and learning from Princess and he was about to blow it all. There had to be something he could ask that she wouldn't be able to guess right. Princess wouldn't have pushed for this if she didn't think he could pull something here!
Try to think logically. Okay, Irvin's face is probably going to give away the answer. If it doesn't, then there's a 50% chance she'll guess wrong. But if it does, then she'll know the answer 100% of the time. Okay, so it's not worth considering that scenario since he loses immediately in it.
Actually, 100% sounded promising. Even if it was 100% failure rate, it was more consistent than the alternative. There had to be something to go on with that. Like maybe… knowing the answer would make her choose wrong?
Why would she do that? Because she doesn't like the answer. So Irvin just needed to say something like "I'm a terrible person" and guilt her into disagreeing with him. Could that work? If it was Princess, she'd never agree with that. But The Cat seems like the type who plays to win, and would gladly call him terrible to achieve that.
Okay, guilt was out. What did that leave- he really didn't have much time left. Uhh- maybe- wrong…
Why would The Cat willingly choose the wrong answer in lose? If she wants them to win, then he can just say anything. If she doesn't, then the only reason she would lose would be if she physically couldn't give the right answer. Holding down the host and forcing her was WAY too far for just a game.
The answer couldn't be verified, so he wins by default!? Or maybe, she chooses not to verify it, so whatever he says goes? Why wouldn't she verify whatever he guesses? There's no reason not to.
Make a reason! Ten seconds left- why wouldn't she verify the answer? Because if she did, then the truth would be-
"-!" He gasps. Only five seconds left!
Hastily, he writes the answer on his board. He barely finishes in time.
"Time's up! Please give me whatever statement you prepared." The Cat says.
Irvin takes a deep breath. He runs the statement through his head again, looking down at his board. This would either work or it wouldn't. Either way, he gave it his best. "O-Okay. My phrase is…"
"Princess knows your real name."
There's a beat of silence. The Cat stares at him, confusion evident. He didn't dare look back at Princess to see what she thought of this.
After a few seconds, The Cat snaps back to attention. "You and I both know that that's true."
Nowhere to run now. He just prays that he can sell it.
Irvin flips his board around to reveal the word false. "Nope. You're wrong."
"What?" She's taken aback. "Why would you even bother with such a pointless lie? I know that's wrong already."
He takes a deep breath, and then feigns total innocence. "Huuuuhh? I'm wrong? That d-doesn't sound right to me. But if you really th-think she knows, then I guess we could just ask her to say what your name is. Right here. On-camera."
Realization sets in. The Cat suddenly takes on a horrified expression. Princess pounces on it. "I imagine that it would be very unsatisfying to those watching at home if you were to take that scene out of the final cut. If we insist that we're right, and you don't leave in the proof that we're wrong, that would call into question the legitimacy of this entire show, wouldn't it?"
"So, w-what's it going to be? Am I right, or a-are you going to prove me wrong?" Irvin asks, sounding cocky for possibly the first time in his entire life. Even if he didn't know The Cat very well, he knew what she'd pick.
She looks away from them both, clearly trying to hide her defeated expression. "...You were correct. Princess does not know my real name."
The applause that fills the room feels so much sweeter than before, as he lets out a long sigh of relief. He was so glad that worked and that he didn't just make himself look like a tremendous idiot. Princess was so overwhelmed with pride that she had to look away herself to hide her tears.
The Cat is quick to recover. "Congratulations, you two. Since you reached 50 points, you qualify to take on the bonus question for a chance at victory. I hope everyone is ready for the very last challenge!"
…
A large sail had been raised between their podiums, preventing them from seeing one another. Immediately, they both had a feeling what type of challenge this was going to be based on that fact.
Their thoughts are confirmed quickly. "I'm going to ask both of you both to answer the same question. Neither of you are allowed to speak or signal the other until both of you have put down an answer. You don't have to answer honestly this time. Your goal is simply to write the same answer that your partner does."
It made perfect sense as a final round. They had to be perfectly in-tune with one another to succeed. Whether or not they would manage it would come down to the question being asked.
"If you're both ready, then I'll read it out." They both nod. "Your question is:"
"Who most deserves to leave the train?"
Of the questions she could have asked…
This was the easiest possible one.
Neither of them think for more than a few seconds before writing their answers. The Cat sees them both finish, and motions for the sail to be lifted.
"Irvin, Princess, please show me your whiteboards."
They share a look. Without any words or looking at the other's board, they already know that they've won. Still, for the sake of the show, they flip their boards around to reveal the same name on each.
Rico Ricardio
Roaring applause fills the room, greater than all previous instances. "A perfect match! Both of you are les vainqueurs." The Cat declares.
At her request, they milk out their celebration for as long as it takes for her to do an outro. As soon as she finishes, the red lights on all the cameras go off, signalling the end of the recording session.
"Glad th-that's over." He says, letting out a content sigh. Somehow they managed to pull through.
"It's not over quite yet." Princess points out. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't I hear somebody mention a prize earlier?"
The Cat chuckles. "Oh don't worry. I wouldn't forget something like that. Frank?"
The bear nods, and walks backstage. He returns with a colorfully wrapped gift box. It was like a Christmas present, and Irvin couldn't deny wanting to rip it open.
Princess moves to his podium, watching as he barbarically tears through the wrapping paper to reach the contents. With how hard they worked to win it, he just hoped it could live up to the hype.
He gets past the paper to the box, and tears the flaps open. Inside...
"Memory t-tapes?"
Two tapes were sitting there, almost daring them to be disappointed. Irvin grabs one and peeks at the label.
Irvin Kemp
"Figures… Then this one i-is for Prin- huh?" He pauses, thinking back to what he'd been told. "Wait, I thought only passengers g-got memory tapes?"
"Yes, that's right." Princess says, staring at the tape uncertainly. "It can't be mine, I don't have one."
Then… whose tape was this? Another one of Princess' past passengers? Rico's? Someone neither of them know?
Slowly, Irvin reaches out and flips it over.
His eyes widen at the name written on its label. He very nearly drops the tape.
Eliza Kemp
"E...Eliza?"