Chương 16: Who said academics wasn't practical?
That lion's roar led us to the scariest mountain path I'd ever seen. It was barely wide enough for two people, with a rock wall on one side and a drop that made me wish I'd never looked down on the other.
Considering Hercules' huge body, I was barely moving while keeping the balance on my toes!
"This looks super safe," I said, stepping back from the edge. Iolaus looked confused. "Are you perhaps scared of heights, Herculeus? You've even climbed the great Mount Olympus!"
"Who said I am scared? I am not scared at all," I said quickly. "Just looking at the rocks. These cliffs formed millions of years ago when—" A scream from the village cut off my teacher mode.
"The village!" Iolaus shouted. "We need to hurry!"
But there was a problem - huge rocks blocked the path.
Time to use Hercules' strength, if I could figure out how to control these muscles properly.
"Stay back," I told Iolaus.
"I'm about to do something either brave or really dumb." I grabbed the first big rock and lifted. It came up way too easy, making me stumble back near the edge.
"Hey, careful!" Iolaus yelled. "We don't need you falling off!" I nodded and started thinking like a physics professor.
Less muscle, more science.
I tried again, this time remembering my lectures about leverage and force. The rock moved smoothly away from the path. One by one, I cleared them all, muttering things like "force equals mass times acceleration" under my breath.
Iolaus kept giving me weird looks. "Since when do you think before smashing things?"
It seemed like his questions were getting too frequent these days.
Anyway, I tried to play it cool. "Oh, you know, trying new stuff. Keeping it interesting."
Then I saw something on the cliff - fresh claw marks.
"Look here," I called to Iolaus. "Based on these marks, this lion must be thrice as big as an African lion, with huge claws."
"How do you know about African lions?" Iolaus asked.
Oops.
"Uh... heard it from a trader? From Africa? Nice guy, really into lions."
He gave me an odd look, ready to bury me with questions.
But another scream from the village saved me from those questions. We hurried along the path, but the ground felt shaky.
Rocks kept moving under our feet.
"Watch out," I warned. "This whole section looks ready to—" And just like that, the path crumbled.
I grabbed Iolaus with one hand and punched into the cliff with the other, making a handhold.
We hung there while rocks fell into the empty space below.
"Well," I said, trying to sound calm while I was screaming inside, "this isn't great."
Iolaus didn't sound happy to head that either.
"You think? Got any smart professor ideas?"
"Just one," I said, feeling my grip slipping. "We should go up."
I started swinging us back and forth. "When I say jump, grab that ledge above us."
"You sure about this?" he asked.
"Nope," I admitted.
"But it's better than falling. Ready? One... two... JUMP!"
We went flying through the air. Iolaus grabbed the ledge like he'd done it a thousand times. I just waved my arms around until I caught something.
Once we pulled ourselves up, we heard more chaos from the village.
But we had a new problem - the path ahead was completely gone. Just thirty feet of empty space between us and the other side.
"Any more clever ideas?" Iolaus asked. I looked at the gap, then at these super-strong arms, then back at the gap.
A crazy idea hit me.
"Actually," I said, "I might have one. But you're really not going to like it..." The lion roared again, closer this time.
I looked at my hands, thinking about the physics of what I was planning. In my classroom, this would just be numbers on a board.
Here, it was life or death.
My students would never believe this - their boring old professor calculating the force needed to throw a grown man across a cliff.
Pretty sure this wasn't covered in my tenure review.
If my department chair could see me now, hanging off a mountain in ancient Greece, muttering about trajectory calculations... Well, at least I'd finally have an interesting answer to "How did you spend your summer?"
The screams from the village were getting closer. No time to second-guess myself. Sometimes you just had to trust your math and hope the ancient Greeks hadn't discovered different laws of physics.
At least if this went wrong, I wouldn't have to grade any more papers.
Though dying in ancient Greece would make for one interesting obituary back home - if anyone ever found out what happened to me.
I took a deep breath and turned to Iolaus.
Time to see if years of teaching physics could actually save our lives.
Who said academics wasn't practical?
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