“Snek will enter for Kor!” The goblin woman proudly exclaimed as she held the tiny snake aloft in front of her. Shocked silence filled the gathering area, as many goblin eyes darted back and forth from the snake, their boss, and Jigz. He did not seem impressed as he glared down at the snake.

  As he stared at her, Snek’s head drifted back and forth slowly. Her eyes were unfocused. She startled, snapping to attention before lowering her head to rest on her coiled body. It wasn’t long before her eyes began tracking something that no one else could see.

  Kor stared straight at Jigz, seemingly not noticing Snek’s strange behavior.

  Jigz took in every detail, his crusty face twisting from anger into a fiendishly manic grin. “Snek can enter for Boss Kor, if Boss wants!” He yelled, projecting his voice to the watching crowd. The goblins cheered at his words.

  One of the more vacant eyed goblins, who had been about to take a bite out of a large brown blob he was holding, lowered his fist when he heard Jigz’s proclamation. He stepped forward with a goofy grin and held up his fist.

  “Hopper enter too!” He yelled. His voice was filled with an almost childlike glee as he held up a large brown toad for everyone to see.

  Jigz rolled his eyes. “Pebis! Hopper no enter! Hopper lose and die!”

  “Hopper be dinner then…” Pebis mumbled in a low voice dripping with self pity. The toad croaked with concern as Pebis’s head dipped down.

  Is this really happening? Snek thought. She wondered if she was actually hallucinating, and it wasn’t just an act to convince Jigz to let her enter the race. His name is Pebis?

  She knew that she should be using this unexpected distraction to study the track - especially the section with the small hut built over it, as the view of the track itself was completely obscured from the outside - but she couldn’t pull her eyes away from the strange drama unfolding before her.

  Jigz had inclined his head and was now facing the ceiling while rubbing his eyes. He let out a loud and frustrated groan. “Ugh Fine! Pebis can enter hopper. If hopper dies, don’t cry to Jigz!”

  Pebis’s face brightened as he walked to the designated drop off spot. He was speaking to the warty creature in a quick and quiet tone while holding it up in front of his face. Snek couldn’t make out what he was saying, as his words had become a blurbled mess of excited nonsense.

  Oblivious to his surroundings, Pebis let out a surprised grunt as his foot hit a rock and he tumbled forward. He hit the ground with a wet thunk and a pained howl. He sat up while gingerly rubbing his forehead. His eyes held only confusion, and his hand came back covered in a slimy wet muck. It wasn’t blood - not his anyway.

  “Hopper! No!!” Pebis cried, anguish coloring his nasally goblin sobs.

  Before long, Snek was lined up with her competitors at the starting line of the Rat Race. Meaty, the enormous and muscular roid-rat, was on her left. He was standing above her, looking down at her and watching her every move as she sat coiled on the floor. His hot breath periodically rushed down onto her, its stench almost causing her to break character multiple times.

  To her right was a smaller and completely bald rat. Its skin was covered in wrinkly flaps. It didn’t gaze at Snek with an unbroken stare like Meaty did. Instead, it would look down the line of contestants periodically, its eyes lingering on the little snake a moment or two longer than the others. They made eye contact, and it smiled at her. A rotten looking fang protruded from its mouth.

  To the right of the bald rat, was an exceedingly normal rat. Every part of its rodent body looked exactly as you would imagine a rat. It had no defining qualities. Nothing to set it apart in a swarm. Its basic frame made it look unusual to the point of being suspicious. This rat stared straight ahead, hardly moving.

  Next in line was the only rat with brown fur. Snek had overheard the goblin who had entered it, and apparently she had found and caught this rat outside the cavern. It was currently squeaking in a low and panicked tone. Its eyes were darting all around the track, looking for some sort of escape. Occasionally, it would stare at Meaty for a brief moment before cowering and shrinking in on itself. Considering the present situation, Snek figured its reaction was the most reasonable of the bunch.

  Snek was doing her best to keep an eye on her adversaries and scope out the competition, but was wary of altering her behavior too much. She wanted to sell the idea that she was still suffering under the hallucinogenic poison she had been recently dosed with, hoping it would give her just enough of an advantage to turn the odds in her favor and claim an early lead in what appeared to be a hopeless situation.

  She ran through the immediate actions she would take once the race started again in her mind. The beginning of the race was going to be one of the most dangerous moments of the entire contest, and she needed every advantage she could get.

  The first section of the obstacle course was a long and narrow hallway. She didn’t see any traps, and Snek guessed it was designed this way to allow for unpopular competitors to be quickly killed off before getting into the meat of the race. Unpopular competitors like her.

  “Race about to start, Gobs!” Jigz yelled. The nattering chatter of betting, yelling, and general raucousness died down as many yellow eyes turned to look at the contestants.

  Snek idly wondered if anyone had bet on her to win. If her acting had been successful, it wasn’t likely.

  “Go!” Jigz screamed at the top of his lungs.

  Meaty and the bald rat immediately turned toward her, flanking her on each side. The basic rat took off down the first part of the track, completely ignoring the situation unfolding to his left. The brown rat shrunk into the wall behind it, staring at Meaty and shaking lightly as it cowered.

  Meaty lunged at Snek while the bald rat stood ready to intercept any and all of the little snake’s movements. What it didn’t anticipate, however, was her snapping her body into a lightning fast dash through the roid-rat’s legs. With a quick snap of her jaws, she bit down into Meaty’s haunch and released as much venom as time would allow. It wasn’t much, as she didn’t want to hang around for too long, and quickly disengaged and darted after the rat who had taken an early lead.

  Meaty stumbled forward, the bald rat narrowly dodging the large foot that slammed down an inch from its head. Its pink fleshy wrinkles jiggled as it darted after Snek, deciding not to wait for its overly large companion. Snek risked a glance at Meaty, who was standing still and breathing heavily. He looked dazed.

  Perfect, Snek thought triumphantly.

  The brown rat took the opportunity to start fleeing away from Meaty, briskly running down the long hallway, following in step with the bald rat.

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  As Snek watched, Meaty clasped his hands together. He grasped one of his fingers in a fist and snapped it backwards. He let out a deep roar as his eyes grew more focused, the features on his snout twisting into a mask of rage and pain. His head whipped around and they briefly made eye contact before he sped after his competition.

  And he was fast.

  Did he break his finger to end the hallucination effects? Did he use some kind of skill? Snek thought worriedly as she slithered on. It wasn’t going to be long before he caught up to the other rats and Snek. She needed a new plan.

  Snek had almost made it to the end of the section and the wall at the end of the hallway was quickly approaching. The bald rat had mostly caught up to her as well and was nipping at the end of her tail as she slithered. She had lost sight of the basic looking rat - it must have already made it through the doorway to the next section of the course.

  Her plan was falling apart much quicker than she anticipated. It had been a big risk, but Snek had convinced Kor that she could handle the rat race. She didn’t want to be the reason that her friend lost her favorite brain in a jar, even if she still didn’t understand why Kor loved it so much.

  Snek pulled herself to a quick stop right in front of the wall. The bald rat didn’t attack, instead positioning itself in between her and the doorway to the next section. It wanted to pin her down until Meaty - that roided out bastard - caught up and dealt with her.

  The enormous rat in question was barreling toward her. Snek noticed that the gleam of intelligence she had previously noticed in his eyes was strangely missing. No, that's not right. It’s like it's been suppressed.

  The poor brown rat was frantically trying to stay ahead of him, but as she watched, the big lug stomped down and squished the terrified rat into the ground without even slowing down.

  It didn’t get back up.

  Snek didn’t have much time now, but she did have an idea. She coiled herself and waited, completely ignoring the bald rat. When it had realized Snek wasn’t going to immediately try to get past and through the door, it was content to wait and observe.

  Meaty drew closer and closer. Snek reached out with her telekinesis magic, probing the wall directly behind her for a weak spot. She realized the whole wall was a weak spot. It was made from half rotten wood and hobbled together by goblins. She readied herself and her ability, holding her magic steady for the perfect moment.

  The bald rat was visibly getting nervous as Meaty closed in on them without slowing down, each footstep sending slight tremors through the floor. It had seen him trample the brown rat. It jumped backwards and out of the way as Meaty finished closing the distance between them.

  At the last second, just as she was about to be trampled, she gave her snake brain the go ahead. It dove to the side. At the same time, she pushed with all of her telekinetic power against the wall behind her. Meaty didn’t slow down, and clipped the end of her tail with a grazing blow that sent her spinning toward the door to the next section.

  With a loud bang, Meaty hit the wall. It immediately crumpled before the force of the large rat’s momentum and the weight of her spell with a loud splintering crack. The large rat disappeared through the new hole in the wall as dust and debris filled the small passage. Snek used the opportunity to activate her stealth skill and quickly disappeared through the door and around the bend to the next section.

  She might have been able to finish the large rat off if she had followed him - Snek knew he wasn’t dead as she didn’t feel any kill energy enter her system core - but she still had the basic rat to deal with.

  The bald rat crept toward the wall and peered through the hole, before realizing that the little snake wasn’t anywhere to be seen. It scampered through the doorway and into the next section.

  Snek darted around the bend and into the next section of the obstacle course, coming to a halt at its edge. The ceiling of the course had shifted from a knotted tangle of wire to a dark wooden ceiling. This was the section of the course that was underneath the strange little hut.

  She had been excited and nervous about this part of the course, but the knowledge of what it contained obscured itself from her yet again. The section was bathed in complete and total darkness. Her adrenaline made the brief moment it took her eyes to adjust feel like forever as she dove head first into darkness.

  Then she could see. She was a snake, after all.

  A disappointed snake.

  The ‘trap room’ was just another enclosed hallway that led up an incline to what appeared to be an elevated drop. Was the trap after the drop? Some kind of spike pit? Snek supposed she couldn’t expect anything too clever from the goblins. It’s not like it was Kor who made the track, and she wasn’t impressed with the general level intelligence she had from the other goblins.

  Snek also did not see any sign of the basic rat. She wondered if it had already finished this section or if it was lying in wait for her somewhere. She continued to move through the darkness and up the incline, looking for clues as to what was really going on in this section of the obstacle course.

  Yet why have the small goblin shack directly above a spike pit? She strained her senses and heard footsteps above her in the hut. They were slow and light, attempting to avoid detection. I’m missing something.

  Her snake brain must have agreed, because she lurched to a stop. She focused with rapt attention at the ceiling above her. Directly above the the drop, in the bottom of the hut, she could just make out-

  A sharp pain pierced her noodle-like torso. Her head whipped around, mouth open and jaws wide to see… a bald and wrinkly rat ass furiously scrambling away and out of her striking range.

  She glanced down at herself and saw a puncture wound, slowly brimming with red blood. It bit her. Its nasty fang had made it through her scales.

  A screen materialized in front of her face, and she glared through it at the bald rat. She didn’t need to read it to know what it said. She had felt her Adaptive Resistance skill activate briefly before scoffing at the paltry attempt. In the corner of her mind she hoped that poison had been applied to that nasty bald rat’s half rotten tooth, but knew that wasn’t the case. Luckily, whatever disease the rodent carried wasn’t strong enough to bypass her new skill.

  She turned to look at the ceiling and immediately heard the bald rat start moving towards her. He doesn’t want me to look there, she realized with a start. It all clicked into place, and Snek understood what the trap was. She reached out with her telekinesis to confirm.

  A roar thundered through the room. Meaty must have recovered. She needed to move. Darting forward, down the tunnel and up its sharp incline. The bald rat immediately reengaged and sprinted after her.

  As she approached the drop, she slowed slightly to let the bald rat catch up until he was right on her tail. At the same time, she reached forward with her telekinesis and grasped the small wire circle at the very edge of the drop. She didn’t move it, didn’t twitch it, just held it in a loose mental grasp.

  As her body passed over the nearly invisible cord, she felt a force attempt to pull it tight. She flared the power of her spell, and forced it to remain in place. The goblin above hadn’t anticipated the tiny red snake to weigh slightly over 25 lbs, and the wire held in place.

  At the lack of motion from the cord, the bald rat frantically began backpedalling, but its momentum was too great to stop so quickly. Just as the fleshy and slightly folded skin of its torso passed over the small, nearly invisible wire, Snek released her telekinetic grip.

  It immediately snapped taut around the rat, biting deep into its skin and disappearing from sight. A red line formed around the circumference of the rat. Its rib cage must have given enough resistance to stop the wire’s inward progression, as the rat was yanked upwards towards the small holes in the ceiling that the snake had just barely noticed before being ambushed.

  The bald rat's ribs didn’t hold the wire at bay long, however, and couldn’t stop it from being pulled up and through the hole. Two separate, and quite bloody, chunks of bald rat splattered to the floor in a gory mess.

  Snek didn’t stick around to watch them fall. She was already long gone and through the small hole in the wall that led to the next section of the rat race, a warm rush of kill energy illuminating her path.