Drive to Survive

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Two

A cold chill had washed over Max, running ice through his veins and freezing his gaze. He could hear his blood rushing in his ears and his thumping heart was about to leap out his throat. His hands, still gripped around the steering wheel, had gone numb. 

He couldn't blink. 

His eyes were fixated on the crumpled girl ten feet away from him. It was a hallucination. It had to be. Some sort of oxygen-deprivation symptom he'd gotten from being inside the car too long. That could happen, he was sure of it. He'd heard of drivers losing vision or feeling faint after intense races like Singapore.

Yet, it wasn't going away.

Even when his eyes gave into instinct and blinked, the image of Dylan on the floor didn't go away. He felt like he was going to be sick. His heart had never raced like this, not even in the scariest moments of his career when he'd wondered if he was going to live or die.

What the fuck had he just watched happen?

"Max, go! You have to go!"

Go? Where was he meant to go?

The only logical place he should go right now was outside of his car and next to her. She needed help. She was on the floor and she needed to be safe, preferably with him. 

But he was still frozen.

Dylan was beginning to float back into consciousness, the chaos of the garage becoming louder along with a persistent ringing in her ears. She was dazed, and a little confused about where she was and what had happened, but the one thing she knew for sure was that her body felt like it had been hit by a truck.

She couldn't put her finger on where the pain was coming from but her limbs felt heavy and her head hazy. She couldn't feel her tongue in her mouth and her fingers weren't cooperating when she tried to move them. 

"It's just 18 laps! Go, now!"

GP was shouting at somebody. She'd heard his voice a million times and she could hear it now, but it sounded like it was in the far-off distance. 

Was she dreaming?

Max registered the shout from his engineer and it did the job of jolting him out of his freeze but the numbness was replaced with a breathless feeling of panic. This was horrendously new and it was like he'd been sucker punched in the chest. His fingers fumbled over the steering wheel buttons as he suddenly became aware of where he was again. A sharp beep from his console told him he had definitely pressed the wrong button. 

"Shit. What?" He mumbled, trying to move his head but getting blocked by the confined space of the car.

He wanted to get out. He wanted to go to her.

"Max. Go!"

"Fuck!" Max shouted as his body worked faster than his brain and slammed on the accelerator.

Dylan heard the roar of engines and felt the cool breeze of a car rushing past. Piece by piece, things seemed to come into focus but she still hadn't opened her eyes. She wasn't sure why; maybe she was scared, maybe she believed she was dreaming, or maybe she just needed a few seconds longer to figure out what the hell was happening. 

What had she been doing?

"Can someone call the med team?" Another voice called out.

A series of footsteps followed, some coming towards her and some running away. She felt the thud against her head and it accentuated the pounding. She tried to open her mouth and ask for them to quiet down but she couldn't get her body to cooperate and she continued to lay motionless on the floor.