Finally getting to this:

4



It was almost eight and the sky was becoming a reddish brown cloud as a

nearby refinery expelled today's remaining waste fumes. A familiar sight for
anyone who lived south or east of the Plaza.

Bit of a run on there. I'd make that into one sentence.

We obviously could not get board clearance to run the Turbine, but there
were several practice tracks with in

% within

 a few miles of Diago's garage. Most of this side of the city was occupied
by two industries: manufacturing plants and race tracks. All the garages for
the big name cars were here, and the bigger the name, the closer to the
Turbine itself. The low bass thrumming the Turbine made was almost
completely drowned out by engine noise. Engines which were charged by
generators, which were in turn powered by the Turbine. I had been informed
that it was ironic.

% Sounds like it to me.

Jarred did not want to wait. So we drove the six wheelers themselves over

to the nearest track and set up. Diago had some new armor for me, but I
chose to wear my old set. I said I was afraid my car wouldn't remember me if
I didn'

% Nice to see a little superstition there.

We filled up the tanks, rolled the cars out into the gates, and exchanged

the necessary formalities. "See you in hell," "Shit doesn't age like wine,"
and "Is my exhaust supposed to be making that grinding sound?"

% Heh. Nice.

 I strapped up, and Diago got on the starting podium to work the lights.

Before I knew it, there was red, orange, then yellow, and finally green. I

floored it and shot ahead.

It may be important to say a little about the layout of the track. The

Turbine is two hundred and forty miles around. We race anywhere between
three and five laps, clockwise, and it takes around that many hours.

% Whoa. Some track.

We raced on tarmac that had small pits buried into it every tenth of a

mile or so. Out of these pits, tall steel pyramids shot up periodically. If
you hit one, that was just about it. Driving someone else into one was a
talent that was necessary for any car-jock to learn early. The steel
obelisks appeared with out warning, and sometimes they came up right under
your car. That was called 'bad luck.'

% Yeah. Real bad luck

In the whole track there was only one place to get off with your car. You

would drive as close to the inner wall as possible until the ramp came up,
and you could get off there. If your car could not make it to the ramp, you
would get out of it on the track and climb up rings set into the inner wall.
That is if you could get there without being run over.

% Sounds high risk all right.

Aside from the steel pylons, the spoke of the Turbine that you raced away

from had equally large gears on it. Cars that were left behind were ground
to bits so as not to collect there.

% Question time, was this inspired by something, or did it all come from
your mind? It's quite the track, and I like the way it sounds. Very nice
imagery and conveying of the risk involved.

Jarred was a few hundred yards ahead now, and I could barely see him

around the wall. This gave him a somewhat better chance of springing up on
me. I gunned the engine and soon had her back up to the red line. I was
catching up to Jarred faster than I expected, probably because he was
waiting for me. And a few more hits like the last one and he would not have
to worry about winning at all.

An obstacle shot up in front of me and I swerved.

I still hit it.

% Hmm. Something wierd going on, all right.

I kept my foot on the gas and turned tighter toward the center of the

track. A few more laps went by with out

% without

much event. My steering was sluggish, so I relied more on staying away from
Jarred altogether than trying to maintain my couldn't keep his poker face.
He waited until an obstacle shot up in front of us, looked at me, and
turned. I waved as I braked. But he suddenly decelerated faster and his rear
end hit my hood. Again, something that would not have happened before. I
just did not understand it. My body was working fine, but it was like the
car was going off in its own directions. I yelled obscenities in frustration
and punched my speedometer.

% He'd better figure out what's going wrong or he's going to be toast.

After a minute Jarred caught on to the situation and also tried to swerve,

but my car was pulled right behind him. Towing this much weight would soon
overheat his engine. Would that mean I won? It depended. I figured what I
would do in his situation would be to sling the car behind me into an
obstacle. Jarred decided on the same thing. He saw a pylon rise up, and
changed course. The cars began fishtailing slightly and I was flung against
my side window. Half a mile to go.

% Gonna be close.

I relaxed and listened to the tone of my damaged engine.

Inner peace. And all the rest of that crap.

% Heh

Therefore I had to get out of my car. Of all my options, this seemed like

it had the highest chance of success. If I acted fast I could climb through
my windshield, out across the hood, and onto the back of Jarred's car. His
car would not hit the pylon of course, and escape would then depend on him.
I unbuckled my harness and took my foot off of the brake letting the cars
accelerate again. I had never heard of anyone doing this, but I was also not
about to die to preserve tradition

% Heh.

Suddenly he hit the brakes and I flew forward through the partially

cleared hole. It was quite a shock. Jagged edges of the glass cut right
through my jacket and into my stomach.

% Ouch.

I screamed in pain as I saw the mess of blood and skin. It was too much. A

subconscious whimper escaped my lips, mimicking my ability to deal with the
sensations God never wanted me to feel. In my tear blurred vision, colors of
red and streaming yellow stood out against a shadow background like a liquid
beehive, flowing around a bubble of thinnest ether. Ether expelled from me
as a byproduct of understanding.

% Nice imagery.

"There is in any charter, asshole."

I didn't stress a reply.

% stress a reply? Never heard that one before.

Stepping further out of the cab, he raised his knife above his head. I

tried to kick off the ground again, failed. Dangling from the back of a
speeding car, while the driver hacked at me with a knife was not my idea of
any kind of time.

% But it does make for good reading. :)

His hand broke through the front windshield under me as my bare fist shot

down. His knife gouged itself against my upper shoulder a second before I
grabbed him by the neck. With a heave that was aided by that unexplained
force, I lifted him bodily out of the car and raised him above my head.
Jarred let go of the knife and dug his fingernails into my cheek.

He shrieked "SCREW! SCREW!! SCR- "

And then I threw him. Nothing pushed him back on like it had done for me,

and he dropped. Screaming onto the tarmac. The body did not even have time
to roll before a pylon shot up under him, hurtling his corpse into the sky.
I looked quickly away, and did not see it fall.

% Ouch. But he deserved it. Jarred was a psychotic  asshole.

Despite the help I had received, the wind was full of smoke and I was

still hurt badly. I dropped down into the driver's seat through the missing
windshield, and turned the wheel hard to the right. The car slowly arced
back toward the middle of the track, but it was not turning fast enough. The
turning radii on these race cars were very high. The balding rear tires
started to skid and an instant later the whole car lost it's

% its

With the large track lights receding from view, my world of colored

confusion dimmed. I guessed it was around a hundred more feet to the ground
and I was going to hit hard. I held my head in my arms and closed my eyes. I
could not believe I fought so hard against that bastard Jarred, only to be
wiped out in the ensuing car accident. Denied either way I went.

At least I had no misconceptions about fairness.

My whole universe exploded and pealed away my thought.

Ohh. Nice way to end things. Result of the race surprised me since I had
assumed Screw would win fair and square. Very tension building and exciting.
Prose flowed well. Will try to get to more when I'm able.

D.B. Sommer

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