Brad R Torgersen Racers of the Night (v5.0) (epu

[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.You watch.”And she was right.By the fourth set of turns—and almost one complete loop around the convoluted track—Jane had gotten a nice lead on the other drivers as they headed into the longest, straightest portion of the course.She set the throttles up to as close to max as she dared, knowing that too much acceleration would leave her unable to compensate when she came back around on the first bunch of turns.Jane savored the feeling.It wasn’t better than sex.That was a different kind of thrill altogether.But it was probably the next best thing.After the second go-round, Jane’s lead on the pack was considerable, and she began pacing herself: one eye to the dwindling fuel gauge and one ear wide open for news from the pit.So far, Bill hadn’t said much beyond the formalities of his job.Little naggings about consumption rate and vehicle stress, as relayed to the pit’s tied-in computers.The pit readout told Bill far more than Jane’s display: information which would have been too distracting for her to manage.That was Bill’s role.Jane’s was to jockey for position and build leads.Bill would make sure her machine ran smoothly.After five laps, it was time to tank up.Seeing nobody behind her, Jane slowed and slid into her pit, the space-suited crew rushing out with the fuel hose and jamming it into the side of the Falcon, which hummed lightly as it floated above the ground.Jane saw Bill through the control window and she tapped her right index and middle finger to the rim of her visor in acknowledgement.Bill just watched her, his arms crossed over his chest and his face expressionless.The crew slapped her thigh and gave Jane the thumbs-up, and she applied throttle again just as the pack burst past the mouth of the pit.Shortly, Jane was back in the melee, making her way once more up through the grid by guile, skill, and a lot of chutzpah.Round and round she went, the faces of the domed-over crowds flashing past again and again and again as the laps flew by.Jane was almost beginning to think she’d mastered the Cazetti track, when the Falcon began to vibrate in a most alarming fashion.“Bill?” Jane said, hands gone light on the control bars as she felt the machine rattle through the seat of her tight-bottomed vacuum suit.“Hold on, we’re checking,” said the old man.Seconds, seconds …“Bill, I need status,” Jane barked.“We’ve got a lubricant pressure spike in Number Two.”“Is it red-lined?”“Not yet, but it’s gone up five percent just in the time we’ve been talking.”“Can we bleed it off?”“I already activated the auto-bleed.Look behind you and tell me if you see anything.”Jane craned to check behind her on either side of the bike, and saw nothing.“Nope,” she said.“What’s happening?”“Pressure is up another fifteen,” Bill said.“I’m bringing you in.”“It’s too soon,” Jane said.“I don’t need to fuel up for another three laps!”“I don’t care,” Bill said.“Bring it in.Now.”Jane considered.This was why she’d needed Mike to tell her who she’d do best with.The crew boss wasn’t called a crew boss for no reason.In addition to running the pit, in some ways he also ran the driver—if the driver and the boss had that kind of relationship.And Mike had known Jane would need someone older—who could put his foot down in situations where Jane would want to push things too far.“Did you hear me?” Bill demanded.“Roger that,” Jane said, finally exhaling.She’d have to fight like hell to get back into it on the next pass, assuming the pit crew could identify the problem and fix it fast.If they couldn’t fix it …No.Jane wasn’t going to default, not in this the first run of the series.She flipped the throttle for Number Two all the way down until it clicked, and the vibration coming up through the saddle, ceased.“Two has been powered down,” Bill said, an edge to his voice.“Can you make it back to the pit, or should I signal for a tow?”“I’m not coming in,” Jane said.“I can finish this thing on one main engine.”“If you burn the engine out, maybe.”“Bill, I’m not letting myself get taken out of this heat.Not by a stupid pressure problem.Shunt the lubrication system over to Number One and run it at 150 percent.I can at least try and stay up with the leaders.Make it to the next heat.”There was a fuzzy silence.“Don’t ever do this again,” Bill said, his voice hot.“It’s the reason why everyone buys bikes with two engines now, Bill.Are you with me or not?”More fuzzy silence.“Fine.You’ve got your shunt.We’ll see what happens.”• • •What happened was that Jane finished in fourth place.Not a tremendously encouraging start to the series, but it at least got her to the next heat, to be held one day later.Since the mechanical issue wasn’t of the spectacular, crowd-pleasing, spinning-out-of-control destruct-o-matic variety, Bill and Jane kept the problem to themselves.Though by the time of the next heat, even the best techs on the pit crew couldn’t find the source of the difficulty.Even when running the bike at full-power static.Race time for the second heat was therefore met with a decidedly tense atmosphere in the pit.“It’s a brand new unit,” Jane argued, her helmet hanging in one hand while two pit crew checked the life systems umbilicals of her suit.They prodded at her back while she and Bill glared at one another, his sunken cheeks flexing with quiet contempt.“It’s not the bike,” he said adamantly.“It’s her.”His arm pointed to the ceiling, where the transparent glass gave the pit crew a decent view of the starry sky, as well as Sally Tincakes in the far distance, her CAZETTI RACEWAY sign raised proudly over the field.The youngsters on the pit crew looked at Bill nervously.“You go out there again,” the old man said, “and there’s no telling what might happen this time.First heat was a warning.She doesn’t give warnings, usually.We file a technical disqualifier with the track office, and you get excused without having to take a hit in overall standings.”“And no chance at the Armstrong Cup until next year,” Jane said.“No thanks.I’m here to do this thing, now.Not later.”Bill’s jaw ground bitterly, then he looked away.Silence, for almost a full minute.“Time hack’s in 20 minutes,” he finally said.“Get on the bike and get out of here.”• • •Second heat, and the mysterious pressure problem did not return.The Falcon performed to perfection, earning Jane a first-place finish amidst a much tougher group than she’d been up against for the first heat.She got some nice press in the leader board blogs, and an interview with the track rats who split the news feed back to Earth—for those on the mother planet who were sports-junky enough to care about the exotic stuff going on in the rest of the solar system.If anyone else noted or cared about the female record of zero finishes and 100 percent fatalities, they didn’t say so.Which was just fine with Jane.But it didn’t stop Bill from chastising her again as she prepped for the third of the five total heats.“It’s time to put the baby to bed,” Jane said [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

Pokrewne