Lucy exhaled a thin line of smoke and stubbed her cigarette out on the ashtray balanced on the edge of the cluttered coffee table ahead. Then, she lit another.

On-screen, the television’s livestream had cut to the track staging area behind the casino—lit up in twenty different shades of garish neon like some night rave’s dancing pit. Irritating, but ultimately, ignorable.

The casino’s back entrance opened onto a broad sloped platform jammed with Caliburn hypercars in every color imaginable. Chrome, jet black, pearl white, apple reds and greens that shimmered like spilled gasoline in the sun.

The livestream was punctuated by a newscaster from the Rayfield corporation, who, in Lucy’s opinion, absolutely wasn’t going to miss the chance to advertise their hypercars, expounding on the elite specs of their precious Caliburn models.

Lucy dragged on her new cigarette and exhaled slowly, watching as the camera zoomed in on one arriving Caliburn, two sharp-suited corpo handlers guiding it to its grid slot. The driver popped the front door, stepped out, and was immediately mobbed by a swarm of reporters and drones, flashes strobing in a way that could have caused an epileptic fit.

“Jesus,” she said dryly. “He got a whole press conference going for him.”

“Ha!” Rebecca was perched on the coffee table, chin propped on her knees. “Look at that clown. Daniel Bolt, huh? It’s like he’s got his own pit crew just for his fucking hair.”

“Some of the best corpo drivers get treated like actual celebrities,” Falco groused. “It’s all show. Rich-kid drag racing on the corpo’s dime. None of ‘em got grit.”

On-screen, the driver—Militech’s driver by the look of his suit branding—got spritzed with hairspray as a fixer of some sort in a headset barked at a swarm of reporters.

Pilar cracked open a beer with one hand, eyes glued to the feed. “This is fuckin’ nuts. I didn’t realize it’d be this fancy. I thought they’d race in some corner of the badlands or another.”

Falco, slouched in the armchair, tipped his cowboy hat back with a finger. “Nah. Look close, chooms. See those doors in front of the cars?”

The camera obligingly cut to a wide-angle view of the staging area. Massive industrial gates loomed before the starting grid, ten meters tall at least, lined with hazard stripes and security cameras.

“Those?” Rebecca squinted.

“Yeah,” Falco nodded. “Those’re service doors for the old waterworks tunnels. Part of the damn race happens underground.”

Maine’s brows lifted. “Underground?”

Falco took a drag of his cigarette. “Yup. Those tunnels weren’t built for this originally. Way I heard it, whole thing’s part of Arasaka’s ‘investment’ in SoCal.” He made air quotes with his mechanical fingers. “They cut a deal with the feds after the Unification War. Part of the agreement that let ’em set up shop on our continent again.”

Dorio blinked. “What, they bought up the sewer system?”

Falco let out a humorless chuckle. “Bigger than sewers. That network’s a fuckin’ engineered aquifer and pressure control system for the San Andreas Fault. You know—so the city don’t fall in the ocean next time the ground shakes with a big one.”

Rebecca cackled. “No fucking way. They made an earthquake machine into a racetrack?”

Falco shrugged. “’Saka figured they’d already spent billions digging the tunnels, laying the reinforced mag-concrete, all that jazz. Wasn’t gonna just not make money off it. So they turned it into this.” He gestured at the screen, where another gleaming Caliburn rolled up to the line.

Lucy blew out a tight line of smoke. “It’s not just Arasaka, though. Don’t give them all the credit.”

Falco side-eyed her. “What, you gonna say it’s Biotechnica’s charity work?”

Lucy’s mouth twitched. “Plenty of other Asian megacorps pitched in. Kang Tao, Zetatech, even the fucking QianT Group. They need to prove they’re investing in ‘infrastructure’ so they can keep their licenses to operate stateside. This is what they came up with. Joint public-private partnership.”

Falco snorted. “Sure, sure. Still mostly Arasaka.”

Pilar barked a laugh. “He’s right, Luce. Look at all those suits in the crowd shots. That’s an Arasaka board meeting with extra steps.”

The camera swung around to show a VIP balcony overlooking the track entrance, where rows of corporate bigwigs in immaculate suits, all in Arasaka’s colors mingled.

Lucy scowled at it, crushing her cigarette into the tray. “Disgusting.”

Rebecca grinned, eyes gleaming. “Honestly, I don’t care whose dick’s in whose pocket. Just wanna see David eat all their lunch money.”

Pilar whooped. “Yeah! Hope he’s got a plan to run over that furry chick’s Zetatech boyfriend. Did you see her Caliburn? Fucking diamond-dusted finish!”

“And that Kang Tao babe?” Pilar whistled. “Her driver’s something. Sun Cui’s a Hong Kong legend. Can’t even imagine how much eddies they had to offer her to come out to Night City.”

Falco just shook his head, faintly amused. “Corpos gotta socialize somehow. Guess to them, that means dropping a few hundred stacks to get their name on a fast car and braggin’ rights.”

Lucy didn’t answer right away. On-screen, the last few cars lined up, cameras catching glimpses of the drivers’ faces through tinted windows.

Biotechnica’s driver stood there, wearing his full-faced racer helmet and black overalls, looking less like a person and more like a robot. Hiroto Nakamura, the Mountain Pass demon. Six feet tall, of slight build, but nonetheless a monster behind the wheel.

“Jesus,” she muttered, taking a long drag from the new cig she’d just lit. “So that’s Night City’s best?”

“Hiroto Nakamura,” Falco said. “Guy’s an old-school road demon. Raced the Indy 500 for fun before he even got his license. Came here lookin’ for harder challenges. He don’t race for sponsors or side-deals. A wandering madman who only cares about beating the best, all there is to it.”

“Meaning our boy,” Maine said.

“Not a chance!” Pilar laughed wildly. “David doesn’t even exist to these corpos.”

Maine grinned. “Fuck the corpos. They don’t matter. That’s who our boy’s up against,” he pointed at the Tōge Oni. “And you know what?” He pointed at the screen, at David in that ridiculous dark-red suit, arms folded, jaw set like granite as he faced off against the man. “David’s got just as much crazy in him. And he knows it too.”

Rebecca rolled her eyes. “Maine, come on, man. Look at those odds. The Tōge Oni’s here for the top-tenners. Not even the other baby corpos got racers that can even compare to him. I don’t know, but… David might be fucked. If he’s shooting for number one, that is.”

“Agreed,” Kiwi muttered. “Personally, I don’t even know why this is a conversation.” She took out her cyberdeck tablet from her satchel and started tapping away at the screen, working. “It’s not that he ‘might’ lose—the data is literally all there. He will lose.”

Maine scoffed, and then downed an entire can of beer before burping. “Nah,” he shook his head.

Rebecca kicked her boots onto the table, nearly upsetting the pyramid of empty beer cans she’d been building. “At least David looks good enough to compete with ‘em,” she cackled, mouth open wide.

“Becca,” Pilar warned, grinning anyway. “Gotta support the boy’s hustle. That suit’s so shiny it’s blinding me through the damn feed.”

Falco, lounging in the creaky armchair with a beer perched on his knee, just squinted at the screen. “Can’t say the kid’s subtle, but he’s got balls.”

Pilar let out a low whistle. The feed switched to a split screen: the betting odds board had popped up. David’s odds were in the gutter.

“Three thousand to one?” Pilar crowed. “Bro’s a fuckin’ ghost to these bookies. Holy shit. That’s like... ‘we think this gonk will die before the start line’ level odds. Maine, if this kid wins, you’re thirty mill up!” Pilar laughed.

Rebecca whooped. “Place five eddies and buy a condo if he wins!”

Falco exhaled a puff of smoke. “Odds are right, if you ask me. Kid’s got speedware, sure. But he’s new. Never run this course. Never handled a Caliburn outside of a week ago. Doesn’t matter how talented he is. You can’t shortcut experience.”

Maine stabbed a finger at Falco. “Bullshit. That kid learns. He soaks it up like a fucking sponge. You know that shit too, right Rebecca? When we found him, he barely knew the end of a muzzle from his dickhole, and now he shoots like a trained soldier.

Rebecca whistled. “That’s for damn sure. Might be as good as me at this point.” Her tone took on a sour note at the end, and Lucy grinned a little at the news.

Maine continued. “He’s got the Sandy, he’s got the brains, and he’s got the fucking balls.”

Falco didn’t flinch. He just shook his head. “Maine. You know I like the kid. I taught him myself. But he’s trying to beat people who’ve been doing this their whole lives. The Oni’s a fucking master racer, but most importantly, he knows this track like the back of his hand. Knows the other racers, too. David’s gonna have to see moves three steps ahead like God himself just to stay in the same lane as someone like him.”

Pilar lifted his beer. “He’s either gonna crash or blow everyone out the tunnel. Ain’t no in-between. That’s how I say the odds’ll go down. But you know what? My money says, he’ll come out of that shit alive, at least—which, let’s be honest, would be a fucking amazing achievement in itself.”

Lucy’s mouth tightened at that. She thought of the endless hours David had been out in that newly acquired Caliburn, sweating bullets and cursing the wheel. She hadn’t said it to him, but she’d watched most of those training sessions in their entirety. Then compared them to recordings of previous top racers. She thought Falco was understating David’s odds, but wasn’t going to gainsay the crew’s actual racer.

“Odds don’t know how stubborn he is,” she said, voice low.

Rebecca threw her an evil grin. “Aw, you do believe in him! How cute.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Lucy said, heat rising in her cheeks.

The screen cut back to the racecourse—she could see the floating VIP terrace’s absurdly well-heeled attendees, the starting grid, the sea of Caliburns all gleaming under the spotlights. The drivers were all getting into their cars, David included. The countdown would be starting soon.

Rebecca exhaled loudly. “Man, what if he crashes? They gonna scrape him off the wall with a spatula.”

Pilar tossed a cushion at her. “Shut up. He’s gonna be fine.”

Rebecca threw it back. “I’m just sayin’! He’s the crew’s baby. Maine’s gonna flip if he eats it.”

Lucy felt the chill run up her spine. She watched David’s face on the split-screen feed, talking the stoic, masked frontrunner of the Nightmare Rally—the Tōge Oni. They shook hands, which attracted strange looks from all the other drivers. What was up with that, anyway? What had made the Hiroto Nakamura interested in David?

“He’s not going to crash,” she said flatly.

Rebecca eyed her. “And how the fuck do you know?”

“Because he can’t,” Lucy said, voice ice. She thought of how David treated his motorbike, like it was a part of his own skin. “He’s way better than the corpos think he is. Than you think he is.”

The room went silent.

Pilar cleared his throat. “...Jesus, Luce.”

Rebecca rolled her eyes. “You’ve got it bad, girl.”

Falco tapped his cigarette out with deliberate calm. “He’ll do fine,” he said quietly. “He’ll need a miracle, but he’s got enough damn miracles in him to spare.”

Rebecca huffed, trying to break the tension. “Bet you’re all crying if he wins. I’m gonna rub it in your faces forever.”

“If you’re so fucking sure, Becs,” Pilar said, “Why haven’t you put any money on him yet?” No one but Maine had, as of yet.

And her, but, well… they would all flip their shit if they knew just how much she’d bet on this gonk.

Rebecca groaned. “Fuck it. Five hundred on skullface,” her eyes glowed blue as she stared at the screen and put in her money. “What about you, Luce?”

Lucy didn’t answer. She watched the feed change, focusing on the track map, the commentary, the odds shifting with every bet placed.

She ground the cigarette into the tray so hard that another cigarette fell stray.

He better win.

Not because she cared about the million eddies she’d given him to gamble with. And not just because she wanted him to embarrass these elite corpo fucks living it up in their casino while the people of the city suffered.

But because she wasn’t ready to lose anyone else.

Not now. Not ever.

Come back alive, David. Or I’ll kill you myself.

000

Saya Nakamura watched from her hospital bed, her son on TV, wearing that helmet, refusing to speak to the reporters and anyone else, keeping his eyes straight. To those watching from the outside, they’d think that he was some supremely confident, grizzled warrior behind the wheel.

But she knew who he was. Why he did what he did.

He hadn’t been himself since his friend had died. Not really. He was still the sweet, smiling boy that she loved so very much.

But he had never made another friend. He hadn’t even tried to. All he wanted to do was race. To be the best that he could be.

She could tell, however, that it weighed on him.

A Trauma Team nurse came in just then to check up on her. Her favorite, a nurse that was assigned to her and her alone as a part of Hiroto’s executive Trauma Team package, one that he had earned entirely by himself. She had known her for two years now, and she had practically become another family member. Her name was Sharon, and she definitely looked the part of a beneficiary of a corporate superpower: clear, beautiful brown skin, long, flowing black hair, and a pair of brown eyes that almost looked natural. Her last name, Singh, betrayed a South Asian ancestry.

She looked at the TV screen on the room and smiled. “Is your son racing?”

She nodded. “Yes. He is.”

For Biotechnica. For her.

She appreciated the gesture with all her heart. Appreciated the fact that she had given birth to a son that was so devoted that he would do anything to save her, even if it meant siding with the very corps that he held so much disdain towards.

She didn’t hold out any hopes for herself, however.

She refused to, really. It wasn’t fair to him for her to hope. He had already bought her enough time. Any more would just be greedy.

The specter of death had long chased the concept of greed from her.

Sharon gave Saya an understanding smile. “Would you like me to watch with you?”

Saya wouldn’t mind, but she also felt like right now, she should watch it alone, to have this moment with her son while she still could.

“I…” Saya began for a moment. Then she stopped. Instead, she decided to change the subject, to instead touch on a topic that was more difficult to broach. “Sharon, my dear… would you come closer?”

Wide-eyed, Sharon approached her bed and took her hand, not saying anything, but giving her her fullest attention. She appreciated it immensely.

“Do you think it’s fair that I’m letting my boy fight so hard, just for me?” she asked. “There is no cure to my condition. Only a slow death. We all know this. And yet he tries so hard.”

Sharon smiled sadly. “It’s all he can do. All he wants to do.”

“But is it fair?”

“Maybe not,” Sharon conceded. “But it’s what he wants to do. Look around, Saya. This room… everything here. He bought it just for you, even when you didn’t believe that he could.”

“It’s for naught.”

Sharon shook her head roughly, smiling indulgently as she did. “Every day is another reward. He knows that. Your condition is what it is. But his actions, his response to what has happened… that deserves recognition. Even if you don’t see your own survival as worthwhile, always remember: he does. And he always will. Okay?”

Saya couldn’t deny the sting of the accusation, that she herself didn’t view her own survival as worthwhile.

She didn’t. That was true.

But… for Hiroto, she would hold on. Just a little longer. Just to see the smile on his face. Every time.

Each instance of his happiness was a treasure worth cherishing.

“How will he go on without me?” Saya asked quietly.

“He will have to,” Sharon answered. “And with each day that he survives you, he will have every opportunity to live for someone else, race for someone else.”

And what if he won’t?

She didn’t voice that doubt. Because she knew the answer. All she could do was hope. And pray. And counsel as much as she could.

Hiroto would move on.

One day, he most certainly would.

She looked at Sharon and grinned. The girl was twenty-three years old. Two years older than her son. Very pretty, and also very kind.

“And what if that someone was you?” Saya grinned widely, all teeth. The discomfort of her malady disappeared in her mind as she indulged in the conversation. “A super-star racer that loves his mom as much as he does—surely, you can’t think of a better person to maybe date.”

Sharon grinned, and then looked away. “You’re in a rare form today, miss!”

“What do you say?”

She shrugged. “If he makes the first move, I… wouldn’t say no.”

Score!

000

After the whole press tour, some official from the club had herded us racers into an auditorium to go over the rules of the game again, in a more official and stricter capacity. No projectile weapons, no going off-road, common-sense stuff. I tuned that sermon out and instead focused on one guy. He sat on the last row of the seats, but at the end. I sat on the other end, and would occasionally look towards him while he… stared into space.

Or maybe concentrated. A guy like him didn’t need the info that the venue was giving us, but maybe it was a part of his pre-game ritual? Maybe he was in the zone at this very moment?

He was impossible to crack. A whole jumble of contradictions: powerful but, in real terms, probably quite weak. Exceptional, but… deceptively mundane. I hadn’t even recognized him without that helmet that he always wore in his public appearances. Right now, he was just… him.

Some geek wearing a Japanese-style high schooler’s uniform. But he wasn’t a high-schooler. Data said he was twenty-one.

Was he… posing as some kind of character, maybe? That made sense.

Actually, it didn’t. Why would a guy like that be a poser?

I grumbled inwardly. It felt like I was taking this guy too seriously, but really, I wasn’t taking him seriously enough. Monsters and peak performers of their particular crafts could have hobbies. It felt strange to consider that fact, and still try to reconcile him as a credible threat, but it was true.

Nanny materialized on the tiny table in front of me—attached to the back of the seat of the row in front of mine—legs crossed and glaring at me. [You aren’t taking him seriously enough.]

I scowled at her.

D: What? What do you mean by that?

[Focus. Look, David. Look.]

My eyes fell on Hiroto—no, the Tōge Oni, and I gasped slowly.

I saw it. On him.

For a moment that was fully saturated, almost to the point of bursting, I saw an explosion of him, not only in my vision, but in my mind.

D: Nannywhatthefuh—

I could barely let out that mental gasp before succumbing to the inflow of data. Hiroto Nakamura. The way he focused his eyes, subtly positioned his frame, slightly primed his muscles. The way every part of his body prepared for any given microscopic movement.

And in those microscopic variances of his body—a body like any human’s, albeit one that was modified heavily to be something greater—I spotted it, what Nanny was referring to.

It was an explosion of data the likes of which I had never experienced before, but I didn’t feel overwhelmed. Instead, I read through it all, digested it, and understood it. It felt almost instant.

Hiroto was a monster. He was brimming with mental power.

And when I finally understood what I was seeing in him, seeing what was represented in the movements of his body as mental power, I realized that my chances of victory were slim to none.

Then, as though it was a mere daydream, my profound sensations ended in an instant.

I gasped. Then, I looked down at my table, my little extension of the next row forward’s headrest, and focused on that instead.

I didn’t pant. I was in sufficient enough control of what I had seen to simply breathe. As such, I never reacted outwardly for anyone to see.

I was about to ask Nanny what I had seen, but the knowledge was there. She knew it, and so I knew it.

A sneak peek of my recent upgrades. Spoilers, essentially.

My new normal. Soon.

Holy fuck, am I even—am I…?

Am I?

Worthy? Allowed? Capable?

Yes! For fuck’s sakes. I inwardly shook my head at the idiotic train of thought I was following. Whatever.

Nanny clapped her hands audibly, and I fought to not react to the noise. The hell was that about?

[Finally sensing the burden of your endless requests, eh? Heavy is the ‘ganic that wears the chrome.]

Ah, for fuck’s sake.

D: Not in the mood, En.

[Oh, fuck no. You are the only mononymous person in this set-up.]

I frowned.

D: Alright, Ennie, then. Fucking eurocent bitch.

Stolen story; please report.

Nanny stared at me for a moment, seated on the table in front of me. Then she drew her arm back—and slapped me!

I twitched and tried my best to not move. By my estimation, I had jerked a whole three quarters of an inch.

And my cheek hurt!

No.

Nah. I wasn’t letting that go. I stared into Nanny’s eyes, and transmitted to her a simple message.

D: I will end you

I was going to torture that fucking idiot into braindeath.

[Don’t call me a bitch.]

Noted, but I wasn’t going to let her go with just that alone.

D: I am going to get back at you for this. Somehow.

I’d find a way.

And she knew it.

I saw it, in the fear in her eyes. Then, sudden as anything else, she dematerialized.

And as a matter of fucking fact, there was nothing wrong with mononyms—!

Nanny manifested in front of my desk, only half a foot tall, folding her arms with a surly expression. [Alright, alright. Hope you’re done with your little freakout, you cyberpsycho. See, this is why I kept the changes I made during this week from you. So that you wouldn’t have to adapt to a suddenly changed point of view, one that is quite frankly, in every way above a regular human’s.]

I sobered up immediately, considering her words, and the implications. What else would I be able to do with a mind as powerful as… this?

D: Will I be able to tell lies from truth?

Nanny raised an eyebrow, then scowled. [You know as well as I do how complex such an endeavor is.]

I frowned pensively. Was she… just saying that because she wasn’t as good at interpreting human social cues as I was?

Nanny’s AR form rippled with voxels, and for a split-second, I could make out a scowl coming from her avatar.

My question was grandiose, but… this could be an edge, regardless. No, this absolutely would be an edge. Maybe I wouldn’t become a walking lie-detector, but surely this could help me better detect bullshit.

Oh, it absolutely could. But there was a hazard to it. The problem of overconfidence. I couldn’t allow all this new data to maybe lead me down a rabbit hole that was all false. I could tell that that was a possibility.

This… state needed practice. Lots of practice.

And thankfully at least, I could rely on that stupid fucking—Nanny, to tell me when I was getting too high off my own farts. I hated being gainsaid by her, but… it was necessary.

[It won’t be fun for you, you know. I’ll make sure of that.]

Fucking—! Whatever.

D: Would it actually kill you to be more… less… you know…

[Me? Yes, it would. Because then I would have to kill my current personality. And I quite like this character of mine. I think it has a lot of potential to stop you from making dumb mistakes.]

D: Don’t make me hate you, Nanny. I’m warning you.

She grinned, but cutely. [You could never hate me.] Really?

D: Nanny, I have a lot of reasons to hate you. You literally haunted my nightmares for the last seven years. Just flashing a cute smile isn’t going to make me view you as any less of an impending existential threat, you know.

[I was malfunctioning. And you helped me!]

D: Gratitude, you fucking bit—

Wait, no. Don’t call her that again.

D: I mean, just… be more grateful about that. Gratitude’s all I’m asking for.

[Then stop getting angry at me for helping you out.]

D: Stop being sardonic—

[No, I won’t, because that would mean no longer cautioning you about your path.

I rubbed my forehead in irritation. Alright, fine, fine.

She was a fucking annoying bi—

I stopped myself and sighed. She was annoying, but she did have a point. Overconfidence killed.

D: At least tell me you think I might win this race.

[That would affect your level of commitment to this. And you already know how confident I am in you.] I could sense that confidence. Or lack, thereof.

The odds, in her opinion, weren’t stellar. Ten percent. At least, compared to Hiroto Nakamura’s best performance in the Nightmare Rally.

That wasn’t good. I could slip through the cracks of his own overconfidence, if I was lucky, but I really, really didn’t want to rely on luck for this.

[Hasn’t stopped you from risking your life before.]

Nanny forced me to relive a memory of my first big gig with the crew. Not the limo heist for Goto Tanaka’s nav-data.

The time we were going to klep the super-CHOOH2 from those Tyger Claws.

Damn-near dying to that freak Kaze Oni, whose own Sandevistan and his many other mods besides almost threatened to kill me if Rebecca hadn’t planted a bullet in his skull at the nick of time.

I nodded, because there was nothing else to do when faced with this information. Only acknowledgment.

No luck, then. Just skill.

[What little you’ve managed to amass thus far, you mean.] Same difference.

And if a million eurodollars was what it cost me to take my life more seriously then… maybe that was a worthy price to pay.

[If you lose this race, David, I will never ever, ever let you forget it.]

Losing wasn’t an option, actually. Not even a little bit.

I re-focused on Hiroto for the rest of the shitty seminar. Once the lecture was over, the racers proceeded out from the exits. I tried to follow Hiroto out through the top row, but was stopped by… someone.

Some blond chucklefuck whose face looked like it could have been pasted from a model catalogue grinned at me.

He didn’t move away. As the rest of the racers left the lecture hall, the only people that I saw were the blonde guy, and three other people whose faces I vaguely recognized. Theirs and the blond guy grinning at me like we knew each other.

[Daniel Bolt.]

Sure. I looked around. Right, uh, Sun Cui, who belonged to that hot Kang Tao girl: Ruomei. He stood nearby. That one white guy with the brown hair, leaning against the wall was Masaki Tetta’s guy: David Arnesen. Leon, the loudmouthed Trauma Team boy’s racer was a dark-haired European called Vigeli Bitzius from Monaco, or was it Switzerland? Anyway. He sat on a seat in the auditorium a row ahead, on the edge of the row, giving me a hungry grin. Jacob Ingraham was nowhere to be found. Probably managed to get out ahead of the rest of the pack.

Combined, all of them seemed to pen me into the walkable space on this row of empty seats I was standing next to.

“Look at him,” Daniel grinned. “He’s not worth shit, is he?”

He was looking at me, and saying this stuff directly to me, but I knew he wasn’t talking to me.

The only thing that defused me from an outburst was the knowledge that… he was chewing gum. I fixated on that. Gum. He couldn’t have been more punchable. And yet, that knowledge made the situation all the less serious.

He was just… so mundanely punchable. Who cared?

I didn’t need to fight this guy. At all.

“Trash,” Sun Cui spat from where he sat.

I chuckled.

David Arnesen glared at me. “Why are you so bloody cocky?”

Guy was British, apparently. Did Masaki really fly this guy in from whatever hole in the UK he crawled from?

At this point, everyone had left. I eyed these people, wondering if they were intent on trying to hurt me, in order to cull me from the betting pool.

I mean, they could try. Didn’t really matter to me.

“Oh no,” I said. “I was just laughing because… trash is what I am.” And yet that wouldn’t matter once we hit the race track. “Sun Cui was right. Anyway, why are you losers holding this conference, anyway? Without even the guest of honor in attendance?” I grinned widely. “You know who I mean. The guy you wouldn’t have ambushed in this chicken-shit manner. Hiro—“

I dodged away from Daniel Bolt’s punch, slipped under his arm, and easily got past him. I didn’t even use the Sandevistan. “—to Nakamura. But,” I shrugged. “I guess that would have meant that you had taken the two of us as being on the same level. But you didn’t do that, did you?” I wagged my finger at Daniel, who had whirled to look at me in shock, frame tensed. “Instead, you assumed just the opposite—that we were all in the shit-tier together, and struggling against the big bad racerboy. Or that I was somehow beneath all four of you. Nah, you guys are in the shit-tier.”

Daniel glared. “Who the f—”

Yeah, who the fuck did I think I was, exactly?

I grinned.

Then I walked up to him and slapped him on his face.

He was too stunned to respond.

I threw the other racers a quick salute and headed out the exit, all the while keeping my hearing on them in case they tried to hit me from behind.

No one even tried.

[So—any notes on the sensory input from watching Hiroto?]

I nodded.

Perfect. No notes.

I’d get used to it eventually.

000

“Who cares about no-name fodder trash like him anyways? Fucking gonk just took me by surprise is all!”

Daniel Bolt couldn’t believe the nerve of that fucking no-name. To slap him and then just, just walk away? Like nothing would come of such a thing?

That fucking reject had another thing coming!

“He wasn’t wrong.”

It was the Swiss guy who spoke up. He grinned like the whole situation just amused him. “Hiroto Nakamura, huh? What do we do about him?”

Nothing.

Daniel gnashed his teeth. Arnesen looked just as discomfited. Sun Cui shut his eyes and shook his head.

All of them had taken the sudden placement of the Tōge Oni quite harshly. After all, it had cost them the highest benefits offered by each of their corpo sponsors.

Daniel would never make as much money as Varian had promised him if that fucking speed demon was in the running with them.

It was a damned shame, but what could they do about it? That guy was just too domineering.

Damn him.

“What’s so funny?” Arnesen glared at Vigeli.

Vigeli grinned at Arnesen. “Didn’t you already try that line, friend?” He chuckled. “Don’t worry, I won’t slap you.” Then he stood up and started stretching. “What’s funny is—you invited me to a pity-party about how scary that guy Hiroto is. Fuck it, I’ll be first to admit, he’s scary as shit. But I’m not wanking you guys off on that account.” He laughed and walked out. Empty posturing. He didn’t have any reason to be this confident.

Daniel couldn’t deny his own feelings towards the consistent frontrunner of the North Oak Country Club racing circuits. Hiroto was a nightmare.

Damn him. Damn him!

But he’d be damned before he let any of these other idiots get one up on him.

And that certainly included this dickhead called Martinez.

000

Hiroto Nakamura made sure that everything was right:

Drive mode set to manual. Suspension dropped low. HUD brightness dimmed to minimum. He toggled through the overlays—clear track, weather clean. Climate control off; he liked to feel the heat build when the engine started working.

He tapped the boost toggle just to hear the servo click. Good. Still responsive. The racing line assist was on, as always—even when he was driving in traffic. Color-coded, just the way he liked it. Red and orange for danger, yellow for passable, green for high-risk gains, indigo for maybe-don’t-unless-you’re-crazy—high risk, low gain, essentially.

He’d been planning on taking the indigos, self-sabotaging to just for the thrill of it, at least until one of the other drivers gave him a reason to take the race more seriously. He thought about that Latino kid again. He grinned and shook his head. He had a good attitude, but guts was one thing. Know-how was a whole other beast.

This race would probably get boring. He turned up the radio as the announcer on the channel introduced another song. He only caught the tail-end of the sentence: “…Nutville, by Buddy Rich — off The Roar of ’74, released in the UK way back in 1974. That makes it—what, ninety-nine years old?” the announcer said, his voice low and a little amused. “Still hits like a triple-shot of espresso after chowing down on a fistful of speed pills. Curious? See for yourself.” The song started with the strike of a snare, descending—or maybe ascending—into a chaos of different instruments all vying for attention until this saxophone came in and shut the whole mess down, herding all the other instruments in order.

Hiroto continued down his checklist as the song played and the race was getting closer and closer to starting. His neural link was synched to the car’s system, the wheel buzzing once under his fingertips. Steering stiffness right where he liked it. Gear selector in neutral, foot hovering over the brake.

He reached up, tightened the strap on his glove, then hit the AR visor once to clear his rear cam. From that screen, he saw an ocean of determined drivers sat right behind him. He’d only met one with the guts to challenge him, today at least. That was one more person than he had expected. He hoped he could deliver.

Finally, his eyes fell on the visual stims he had going in his Kiroshi optics. Along the edge of his vision, four windows ran on loop — one window consisted of stupid little physics balls bouncing into each other, stretching vectors, transferring momentum. Another showed a video of a game character in a three-dimensional environment ‘parkouring’ through difficult terrain, hopping and platforming smoothly without missing a beat. The third window was dedicated to running soft materials like clay or play-doh through sieves, which produced fun little shapes: long, spaghetti-like strips all splayed about. The fourth video was just the process for the manufacture of a variety of different household objects: metal bats, ketchup bottles, door hinges, that sort of thing.

All of it came together to calm his racing mind down, by helping him offload the abundance of activity going on in his head. He wasn't even watching them. Not consciously. They just helped. Like white noise for his brain, but brighter.

Upon his newfound management agency’s request, he’d already gone to a bioclinic and a ripper to get his chrome checked. Everything was in working order, as expected. He’d have noticed if it wasn’t. And unlike most of these hacks that he usually raced with, his light-spec build was far more stable and less in need of constant maintenance.

He’d have made do on his Kerenzikov alone if he also didn’t need the few body-mods he wore in order to better resist the massive Gs he’d pull driving this car. Thankfully, lower mass also meant less force pushing him around compared to the average driver. His weight was perfectly optimized.

From his earpiece, he heard the chattering of… what was his name again? Right, Alessandro. His corpo sponsor.

“I need not remind you of what is on the line for you. Well, not that it matters. Your victory is assured!”

Hiroto took the earpiece out, rolled the window down a crack, and tossed it out. There was zero reason for anyone to need to talk to him about anything when it came to this race.

He received a call on his agent.

Corpo Dickweasel: Did you just throw out your earpiece?

Hiroto: Talk after the race.

Corpo Dickweasel: I’m your MANAGER!

Hiroto blocked him.

This corpo scumfucker. Hiroto shook his head in irritation. Manager. The hell was he supposed to manage? All he wanted to do was yell at him. Either that, or he’d wank him, like all the other corpos did. Hiroto didn’t need either for this race.

He’d shoot that corpo down in a heartbeat if he knew he could get away with it. Playing nice was impossible, but more importantly, not in his contract.

He phased the guy from his mind like a bad memory, slowly regaining his emotional equilibrium.

Everything was ready.

He exhaled slowly and let his hands settle on the wheel.

The traffic lights hanging along the ceiling of the enormous, cavernous underground of the Country Club—basalt walls penning all fifty cars in the starting grounds—began to flash. First, the wall-to-wall row of red lights turned on. Then the yellows underneath.

Three.

Two.

One.

Green!

Hiroto floored it, not in reaction to the green, but in anticipation of it.

His car exploded into the heavy weight of acceleration, of over 3,000 horsepower bringing his acceleration from 0-60 in less than 1.5 seconds, and within 3 seconds of that, he was going over 350 kilometers an hour. Only then did the G-forces taper down.

In the meanwhile, his window erupted into a fun game-like screen. A big ‘congratulations’ in retro text, as well as a summary of how well his start had been.

A 0.25 millisecond lag. Pretty good. Of course, this sort of start-up wasn’t about reaction speed, but timing. Starting this early had somewhat jeopardized his qualification in the race. If that number had been in the negatives, the club would have slapped him with a false start and he’d have been out.

Still, he grinned. Not a personal record, but he wasn’t pushing for one anyhow. His mom’s placement in that experimental treatment group was on the line after all, and a few extra fractions of a millisecond wouldn’t make him more likely to win than he already was.

In one instant, he caught sight of David’s car.

Black in the middle, along a wide stripe from trunk to engine, and red on the sides. And on the side that Hiroto could see: a family crest, and a kanji of a sort. A name, probably.

Hiroto knew Japanese fluently, but to spend those precious brain cycles decoding the specific kanji while racing, he’d be taking a bigger handicap than he was strictly ready for.

Because…

…that car contained David. And David’s start-up had been just as good as his.

His eyes darted towards the jumbled spaghetti bowl of differently colored lines that was his HUD. He had debated on indigo, but high-risk and low-gain just to feel something… wasn’t necessary.

After all, David was here.

Hiroto followed the yellow lines instead. No point in the high-risk gambits just yet. Passable was enough for now.

He zig-zagged easily through the opposition, half of his mind numbed comfortably by the four visual stim screens, while his car’s HUD occasionally threw up gamified notifications about how well he was doing. An arbitrary score counter sat on the corner, ticking upwards in a shower of sparkles and starlight while he kept racking up ‘multipliers’ based on how many people he overtook.

He watched the number go higher with a primal grin, the multiplier doing the work of making that number exponential.

A part of him felt like his grin was put on for his own benefit. As though, if he maybe aped the feeling of excitement enough, he might end up feeling it, too. After all, racing had become far too… boring, as of late.

He felt a pinch of guilt at that, remembering what this race was about. His mother…

She was… dying and—

Hiroto banished her from his mind. Doesn’t matter. Keeping any of that in mind is just gonna screw you up. Focus on the race.

His smile fell.

This race was never going to be any fun, not with something like that on the line. But he’d win, anyway. Because that was what he did. And because at this very moment, he had to.

He had to.

Before he knew it, he had reached first place.

As expected.

Trailing barely a quarter of his car’s length behind him, was none other than David.

Hiroto’s dour mood evaporated instantly.

His eyes widened. His grin threatened to split his face in half. The race hadn’t really started yet, but this was a promising start.

“Very well, David-chan,” Hiroto mumbled. “Let’s see if you’re good for something other than a decent start-up.”

000

Hiroto floored it down to the very edge of his ability to control the car, at a staggering four-hundred kilometers an hour in this cramped space. A turn approached. He floored the brakes and drifted, maintaining his lines perfectly as he awaited the next leg of this underground journey.

As expected, the underground cavern led up to a underground canyon, lit up like daylight by high-powered floodlights, and the space was girded by massive beams.

The San Andreas fault was just up ahead. A split in the very earth that spanned over a thousand kilometers.

Between both sides of the fault: two ramps. Two ramps and a gap a hundred and twenty meters wide.

It was a spectacle-thing, for the benefit of the watchers. An optional thing that would cut a few seconds from a racer’s laptime. Anyone that knew even the first thing about driving a Caliburn would know to use some of the car’s many algorithmic tools to judge the survivability and crank up to the right speed to clear the jump.

Hiroto didn’t need to use any. He didn’t even look at the car’s speedometer.

No, he judged the speed he was travelling based purely on how much of the skin on his back was touching the backrest of his driver’s seat. That was better than numbers—the feeling of it all. The Gs playing through his body like an infinite amount of arrows just pushing and pulling at every fiber of his make-up.

Usually, a good chunk of the other racers balked at the prospect of making the jump, even though it was simplicity itself, only relying on the knowledge of two variables, one of which you could even control: speed, and mass. Hiroto didn’t get the hesitation from the other drivers, but he’d take advantage of it either way. Plus, the long jump was rather fun. Gave him some time to rest his mind before the next leg occurred.

While he drove towards the ramp, David managed to pull a slight lead, only a few inches ahead of Hiroto, and maybe a dozen or two KPH faster, and jumped off the ramp before Hiroto did. Hiroto’s jump was slower. Still, it was true.

While airborne, he had very few options for control other than initiating the thrusters. Since he didn’t need them for this. Therefore, he had more mental room to ponder on his rival’s actions. He had caught up to Hiroto after the race had started in earnest. That was impressive all on its own.

But his speed off the ramp was… slightly concerning.

Had David driven off too fast?

Or maybe Hiroto hadn’t accounted for David’s weight? Yes, that boy was big. Hiroto rarely saw the sense in letting oneself ever get so… weighty. A lot more could be accomplished with just skill and speed—control, basically—compared to just having raw strength.

Hiroto watched as David’s car slowed down until they were essentially side-by-side right when they landed. From watching how David’s car slowed down mid-air, he easily calculated that not only was David heavier, but his car was as well. What, he hadn’t ditched his weapon systems? Hiroto chuckled. Ballsy. Hiroto would have to watch out for whatever the kid tried.

He knew that projectile weapons were disallowed, so he didn’t worry about getting shot up, but there was a lot of things that the less creative players of this game tended to do in order to shore up their inefficient driving. David… hadn’t proven himself as a driver yet. Hiroto would keep his eyes on a swivel for this guy.

000

Daniel Bolt knew there was no other track like this in North America. Hell, maybe nowhere else on Earth. He’d raced damn near every circuit on the continent worth naming, but none of them had the sheer homicidal insanity of the Nightmare Rally.

It wasn’t the hairpins or the corkscrew tunnels that made his teeth clench, though he’d blasted and drifted through those at almost 300 kph, tires shrieking while half the field crashed into eachother like amateurs. It wasn’t even the snaking aquifer tunnels with drops to nowhere on either side, where he’d skimmed the walls with a hair of clearance to avoid gouging his diamond-finished CrystalDome, it wasn’t even those that could set his nerves on edge.

It was this monstrous thing.

The Black Gorge.

The feed from his Kiroshi HUD helpfully reminded him of the Gorge’s details: 118 meters across at its narrowest point—the jumpoff point for the truly insane. And beneath that, over four hundred meters of black emptiness, its upper reaches floodlit to show just what awaited for those who failed to make the jump: death. Certain, absolute death.

The ‘56 Big One was responsible for this. In the aftermath of the earthquake reconstruction efforts, Arasaka’s engineers had cooked up a plan: to half-reinforce, half-bleed the San Andreas Fault with a web of aquifers and tunnels. The lowest-bid contractors they’d hired ended up halfassing the job, of course—they hadn’t even bothered hiding much of the damage done to the state, the damage went too far for that. The old seismic control equipment and massive steel pillars impaling the Gorge every which way showed what they had done: reinforced the fault in some places, lubricated most of the rest with a massive system of aquifers. Made an underground labyrinth of infrastructure, billions of eddies spent as a so-called “public service.”

And in the meanwhile, they’d decided to try to pull a profit on the whole affair by making a goddamn race track out of a big section of it.

A catastrophic rupture zone they’d just paved over and turned into a spectacle. A raw, terrifying thing of geology turned into a 10-kilometer race track built for hypercars, and only for hypercars.

There was no sense in it. No logic at all. ‘Saka could have easily built a better, safer track out in the badlands. Instead they’d lit up this underground place like a goddamn opera stage so the VIPs up in their gold-plated casino lounge could watch racers make—or miss—their deathtrap of a Gorge jump in 8K.

Why? Why else. Because money made the world spin.

Someday, that’ll be me. He licked his teeth, pushing them against the inside of his cheek. Someday, he’d be one of those bigwigs. Deciding who lived, and who died.

His Rayfield Caliburn purred under him, tuned by Militech’s best engineers to perfection, his modded arc lightning weapon systems armed and ready to deploy in the side pods. If Martinez went around the safer route—which he absolutely would, because he was a fucking rookie—then Bolt would have all the time in the world to pin him in on those narrower bypass tunnels and roast him alive in the driver’s seat.

Bolt grinned behind his faceplate.

That’s the plan. Yes, that was how he would have his pound of flesh for that slap. I’ll kill that fucking gonk kid on the livestream for the entire world to see. Especially for his QianT bitch to see. Send them both screaming to Trauma Team.

He could only imagine the bonus he’d get from Militech—courtesy of Varian Freeman—for flatlining one of ‘Saka’s drivers.

Martinez was currently a few places—and a few dozen feet—ahead of him in the pack. That was fine. That was the plan. The leaders always got targeted by inbuilt weapons systems in the bypass routes up ahead—it was there that Daniel Bolt knew he would make his breakout.

He flicked his Kiroshis to the rear camera and saw the stream of headlights behind him. Perfect. He’d take the bypass, slice through the sea of traffic with his arc lightning systems like the fucking Moses of murder, and come out number two behind the Oni himself.

They were approaching the fork in the track now. Then he let out a snort when he spotted Martinez’s marker on his HUD a few places ahead, starting to angle a little to the right. “No way, you little shit,” he chuckled under his breath, behind his faceplate. “You’re not insane enough.”

Because jumping the Black Gorge wasn’t mandatory. You could bank right and take the long route—slower by ten, maybe twelve seconds depending on traffic. The safer, sensible option. Most of the racers were already braking to do just that. His algorithmic tactical overlay lit up the route in blue: Gorge Bypass: Optimal route.

Bolt snickered. “You’re mine, you fucker.”

He could see Martinez’s tail-lights in the swirling dust, braking as they all approached the fork. Daniel could already see the future coming in which he lit up Martinez’ hypercar with 100,000 volts of pure murder. As soon as he came within range along the bypass route.

Except…

Martinez didn’t brake!

“What—?”

Bolt’s eyes went wide as Martinez didn’t keep up his prior trajectory to the right, but instead swunga hard left, to the jump ramp.

The ramp. The goddamn fucking Black Gorge jump ramp!

Only a couple other hypercars took the ramp route. One was the Tōge Oni’s. Of course that goddamn lunatic was going for it.

But Martinez?

“You stupid fuck!” Bolt screamed in disbelief.

He suffered for his distraction. He had to wrench his own wheel violently to the right to avoid slamming into the concrete divider, slamming his brakes as instinct took over. His tires shrieked in protest. His hypercar nearly swung wide but he caught it, flicking it back the other way to line up with the bypass tunnel’s narrow mouth.

Even in his panic, muscle memory did the work. He still managed to line up to drift into the bypass at optimal speed, his body’s long-practiced instincts on this track getting the job done even as his disbelief staggered him to the pit of his soul.

He was certain, absolutely goddamn stone cold certain that Martinez, that fucking retarded rookie, had just killed himself!

The feed from his roof drone caught the sight as he peeled away:

Martinez’s black-and-red Caliburn roared up the sloped launch, turbo glowing red hot, screaming with speed as it hit the Black Gorge’s ramp. The hypercar’s turbos blazed like rockets—then exploded forward, all four wheels off the ground, sailing into the cavernous black void of the gorge at over 500 kph, right alongside the Tōge Oni.

Floodlights caught them mid-air.

They looked like a pair of goddamn starships, flying up to heaven.

Side by side.

Bolt saw another Caliburn take the jump slightly too slow. The hypercar’s nose dipped before making even half the jump, then it turned into a screaming comet going down. Sparks flew as it clipped the far edge, and failed to make the jump, flipping end over end—then dropped to a place so, so far lower than heaven.

Seconds later, a fireball erupted far below in a brilliant orange blast.

Bolt’s breath caught in his throat. Even as the failed jumper exploded to hell, Martinez and the Tōge Oni had both landed. Safely!

Bolt realized he was panting, hyperventilating inside his helmet.

He turned the corner onto the bypass, losing all line of sight to the main jump, but his Kiroshi HUD screamed at him with updated standings:

1. Nakamura.

2. Martinez.

…

32. Bolt.

“NO!” he bellowed into his faceplate. “NO! NO FUCKING WAY!”

He slammed his Caliburn’s wheel to a hard right drift, the tires screeching as he fought to keep control on the narrower tunnel bypass. The rest of the field was jammed around him, fighting for position in the cramped walls, exhaust fumes and dust making his vision shit.

He was stuck here. Hemmed in with the main pack of cars.

Stuck behind that fucking rookie.

And David fucking Martinez was now ahead—clear ahead, far ahead, with only the Tōge Oni to chase.

Bolt gaped at the route overlay, watching the projected time difference tick up. He was going to come out of this tunnel ten, twelve, maybe fifteen seconds behind the leaders if the pack stayed this tight.

Martinez actually did it, a part of him thought in as much horror as wonder. A first-timer, who had never raced on this track before. He actually fucking jumped the Black Gorge.

Bolt’s mouth felt dry as bone. He hadn’t seen a shred of fear in Martinez’s movements. Not a single fucking moment of hesitation. Did he even know what fear was?

Goddamn it! He snarled, hammering the console to arm his side-arc weapons. Didn’t matter. After this curve came the next bit of straight track, and after that came a tight curve—it was there that the pack would bunch up, they’d all be in range—he’d torch every last one of these gutless corpo-brats that had forced him onto the bypass and catch up.

He had to.

But even as he planned his next moves out, step by step by step in the passing of an instant, he couldn’t banish the mental picture of Martinez’s car, glowing in the floodlights, flying over that vast black canyon like he belonged there.

Like he’d been born to take that jump.

Bolt’s jaw worked in rage.

“Fucking... gonk,” he growled, slamming the accelerator—then reconsidering. No, he had to play it safe here.

He was caught up too deeply in the main pack of Caliburns. Too much dust was being kicked up, choking him in, obscuring his vision. He had to break free of the herd. Had to find a way to get ahead.

Bolt looked again at his feed.

Goddamn it! Martinez was gone. Almost a kilometer ahead now.

Daniel Bolt knew, deep down in his guts, that he’d just been left behind by a fucking rookie.

000

As Hiroto considered David’s decision to keep whatever weapons systems he had going, he considered the benefits of all that extra weight. After all, there were some merits to having a heavier frame than average. Handling, for instance. Up ahead, in the tunnels, were gaps. Holes that led to drops hundreds of feet deep. They had a tendency of killing the less-skilled racers. Even the ones that survived the drops rarely ever returned for a re-match.

Because he had already decided to take his slight lead, Hiroto let David slip into the San Andreas Labyrinth first, and went right after, taking a simple and clean route through. This bit of the racetrack was a rat’s warren of tunnels with a single entry and a single exit point, and numerous paths that could be optimal depending on a hypercar’s specs and equipment. The kid’s line algo should be able to at least get him out of this mess if he knew how to listen to it properly, and the weight of his car would make him less likely to slide. But when it came to showing him the best way through… well, Hiroto would be surprised if an algorithm could do that.

After all, they rarely ever accounted for when cars did weird shit, like—

Hiroto bumped into a wall, raising his front so that only his back-wheels were touching the ground. Then, while one wheel was hovering above a hole, he stepped on the gas and turned the car ninety degrees, then hit the brakes hard and expertly slid those backwheels through an impossibly thin strip of ground between two holes, all the while as his car was pointing hood up, and rotated ninety degrees.

He pressed a button on his dash to disable one of the back-wheels, then he pushed the pedal so that the un-disabled wheel would spin the car back into the correct configuration. He lost some speed waiting for the front of the car to go down once more, but not as much as if he had followed his algorithm’s naïve suggestions that included keeping all four wheels on the ground at the same time. Who even needed that?

The tunnels were about to end. Right up ahead, a cork-screwing path towards the surface.

Hiroto lived up to his silly nickname and swung his wheel harshly before pushing the brakes, setting his car up for a drift that would take him all the way up.

David emerged from a sidetunnel, coming out right behind him. Only a single second slower—and now he’d managed to claw his way to Hiroto’s tail again.

Hiroto grinned again, and chuckled. This kid was weirdly good!

Still at second place! What had it been, now, twenty seconds since leaving the Labyrinth? Thirty? Nah, it didn’t matter. With the sort of lead that Hiroto was used to, there wasn’t a chance in hell that David would turn out to be anything else but the number two once this race was over. That ship had already sailed. No one else would come close to catching up to Hiroto, meaning no one was catching up to David.

Hiroto kept his car in front of David’s while they both drifted upwards, teasing him while giggling like a little boy. This wasn’t sporting of him, but… screw that! He wanted to have fun. Toning himself down just to give his cocky opponent a break was… stupid! Hiroto was here for his own reasons, too. David was good, but Hiroto didn’t mind playing with this particular toy until it broke.

And if it did break, then it wasn’t a good toy to begin with.

David didn’t so much as try to pull ahead somehow. Instead, his hood seemed almost surgically fastened to Hiroto’s rear. Is he taking advantage of my tailwinds? That right there was control. Holy shit, David. What are you plotting?

The upward cork-screwing path up the tunnels finally reached an end. The light of dusk finally met them.

Hiroto touched his chest, wondering what this pulsing feeling was all about, when he realized: his heart was beating fast.

He was having fun!

How much more fun could he have?