Asphalt Knight (Legacy Version)

Session Three: Spark

Michael and Michelle arrived back at the farm. They found their father out on the porch, sitting in a folding chair. "What did you guys do..." he grumbles.

Michael wanted to tell the truth but... "We.. uh...went to uh see if we could get any water to put out the fire." Michelle says quickly before Michael could say anything.

Their father leans back in is chair. Michael speaks up. "Look, we can sell the Mustang and the BRZ to cover the rent for the next year...I've done the math. " He says hastily. "Don't you fucking think about it. They're the only god damn thing I did right by you two..." their father said. He meant it.

Michelle follows Michael inside. Michelle sits on the couch, checking her HoloWatch. "Dude you have to see this, " she says, her mouth falling open. Michael sits next to Michelle. She waves her hand, and the watch projects a 3D video in the middle of the room. It's a full view of the dash cam video of last nights downhill run. But what Michelle was referring to was the the view counter at the bottom left of the screen. It was at 3.2 million views. Michael took a second to realize what that meant.

Michael was stunned. They scrolled through the comments. Stuff like "I spit my cereal when he turned off his lights" and "Imma kms, don't own a drivable car." Michelle pinned "You missed the crowd!". She quit the the menu by making a fist, then motioned to the private message tab.

There was one. "6:00PM this Friday, Kempton Docks. Bring your cars.-RA" They knew what that was. The message meant they had been invited to a street race. By a Racing Authority talent scout. They would have the opportunity to prove themselves, and if they did well, then they could attract sponsors and if they did well still, then they could be invited to a proper professional race series.

"Which of us was it for?" Michelle asks. "He said cars, not car." Michael said. Michelle raises her eyebrows and says "Do you want to do it?." Michael thought hard for a minute. "It'll be dangerous as hell, and dad won't like it. But we could save the farm with any prize money we win. Assuming Baxter doesn't try and kill us after what you just did."
"Ok then. We should definitely think about it"
*******
The next day was a Monday. School. Michael and Michelle got in their cars at 7:00 AM, and headed into city. The drive into Kempton his long, and they have to go fast in order to make it on time. They needed to average 60 miles per hour on a mixture of dirt roads and rough asphalt. It's nearly 50 miles long, because the road goes precariously through the mountains, and then the city is designed to fit a lot of people and buildings in to a tiny space, meaning they have to take long winding streets and alleyways that are miles long, but the actual distance directly is really a few hundred feet from block to block. This is because the overcrowded city is built in a sort of tiered layout, buildings and streets built on and giant, near transparent, super strength plastic polymer overpasses that twist and wind their way through the skyline like vines through a rain forest. The place resembled a giant hot wheels track. And yet it is the most efficient design. AutoCabs use GPS and are self driving, so they can navigate the streets effortlessly, so there are no issues with traffic or getting lost. Michael and Michelle not only have to travel from point A to point B on the ground, but also go downwards into the city towards the ground. It's like mountain touge, but with heavily banked 5 lane roads and swarms of traffic.

It was in this way that Michael and Michelle honed their driving skills. 50 miles, a short endurance race every morning, with a strict time limit. Weaving in and out of traffic, carrying speed through heavily banked turns, sliding in and out of alleyways. They had been doing it since they were 12, since the AutoBus stopped going to Redview.

They descend into the city from the mountains, going deeper and deeper into the city. The school was on ground level. The drive is incredibly dangerous, because the AutoCabs are blind to driven cars. They won't stop or move out of the way. Then there is the stress on the driver, the blinding neon signs and holographic billboards, the massive sense of vertigo as you plunge your way down the city streets, past skyscrapers hundreds of stories high. But they did it. Every. Single. Morning. Monday through Friday. And loved every minute of it. Because for some reason, they didn't know why, when they were behind the wheel of a driven car, a gasoline fueled, explosion driven living machine, they felt truly alive.