CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The invigoration of driving a NASCAR sanctioned race car astounded Alex. Traveling at top speeds of two hundred and twelve miles per hour overflowed his adrenaline cup. Starting his first engine created a lifelong speed-seeker.
After completing an entire circuit, Roy and Alex decided to experiment with a new style of racing (mainly because Charles dominated them).
Even with simulated racers set to intermediate, Alex or Roy finishing within ten laps of the leader constituted a win. Whereas Charles had multiple top ten finishes. To combat Charles’ natural propensity to NASCAR, he and Roy had been sneaking off to practice driving Formula One cars.
Today, Alex and Roy selected the Giro d’Italia track. A course imagined and designed by Broumgard employees stationed in Sicily. Standing beside his vehicle, Alex angled his face toward the blazing, mid-afternoon sun. Gusty winds and cool temperatures completed the effects of an ideal day.
Alex wore a white fireproof jumpsuit with a red stripe flaring each side. Sponsor decals speckled his front and back. Twenty-five Formula One cars rested in race positions on a two-lane road in a village near Milan, Italy.
Quaint A-framed homes with paned windows and no screens, painted in lime, rose, and lemon colors, lined either side. A population of men and women greater than the homes allowed gathered on lawns, clapping and shouting cheers in Italian.
Roy waved to a gathered crowd and then climbed into his cherry-red, A-26 Turbo, outfitted with a Ferrari engine in its rear fuselage.
Alex shimmied on his helmet, squeezed into his model L-7 Lambourghini-powered machine. Gripping the hard steering wheel, he rocked it left and right. That minor leeway percolated his blood vessels until they danced.
A flagman stepped into the road at the head of the occupied Formula Ones.
Again, Alex sought out Roy. This time, he found his friend waiting for his glance. They shared a nod.
The short man standing in the street pointed to several drivers, received thumbs up, and yelled, “Partenza la tuio motore.”
Alex heard, “Start your engines,” and pushed the ignition button.
His body jumped and trembled as if he sat atop the epicenter of an impending earthquake. The powerful growl of two dozen machines deafened all other sounds, leaving Alex to his thoughts.
Due to Charles’ exiting the Lobby early for a family function, none of the trio had visited “Cosmic Conflict,” and therefore, hadn’t gained a piloting advantage over one another. Charles’ absence today also afforded Alex the privacy needed to initiate the talk with Roy about his planned ninety-two day hiatus from the Lobby.
Since arriving in the Lobby two days past, they had explored some modern worlds: a night strolling in Nice, roller-blading on South Beach. Opportunities to inform Roy had arisen, but courage eluded Alex.
The last medical attendant to visit Roy in Alex’s private access room had left the privacy curtain open, giving Alex a full view as he logged in. Roy’s condition stripped Alex’s conviction.
His first thought as he inspected the skeletal shape: was Roy dead? The liquid nutrients fed to someone while in the Lobby always caused weight loss, which, to many, created an added benefit to vacations. Add mottled skin pulled taut over thin, brittle bones so defined one could teach an anatomy class, a tuft of white hair, and a scent of decay and body odor, and you had a package to rival the Crypt Keeper.
Alex required a full minute of staring at the diminutive chest to verify its almost imperceptible rise and fall.
Thinking of his friend’s health stressed Alex. What if Roy died during the three month break? What if their last conversation discussed Alex abandoning him? What if Roy’s last thought encompassed Alex’s betrayal?
Maybe I should ask Rosa to reconsider. One glimpse proved Roy neared death. The pain that cop-out would cause Rosa inflicted equal nausea.
As Alex had inputted his vacation time, sat, and watched the counter tick down, he’d tried to avoid being grossed-out by his friend’s appearance.
Now, as he sat in the grumbling vehicle, feeling good, he accepted he must notify Roy of his intention. Part of him wanted to wait until they logged-out to break the news—catch Roy on his two day hiatus when he would be weak and hardly able to reply. Exhaling dejectedly, the cowardice shamed him. Once they completed this race, he’d raise the subject.
The flagman casually lowered a small red flag, signifying the start of the wonderful, fabricated tradition of the Girod’Italia race. The drivers would parade through four miles of scenic countryside and three villages in a show of Italian engine supremacy. As they started past the crowd, kids ran along the side barriers. Adults applauded and shouted. The demonic gargle of the engines turned their efforts in a pantomime.
Driving a spaceship on wheels past homes built centuries ago brought Alex back to his childhood, when he and Simon would play make-believe. Alex always chose to be a superhero, flying in the clouds. Funny that he never pictured himself saving anyone, just soaring above the world.
Reaching the starting line, they assumed their positions. Even set to beginner level, Alex had qualified last and held the twenty-fifth spot, while Roy managed to secure eighteenth.
Formula One racing presented more dangers than NASCAR. Fatalities upgraded beyond anomalies; they were facts of the sport. Both Alex and Roy had totaled their cars on the previous two tracks, and the Girod’Italia, with speeds of two hundred and forty miles an hour and winding city streets with limited visibility, was designed as a treacherous course.
Crossing the finish line marked Alex’s goal.
He breathed deeply as the siren blew, fixated on the large, three-tiered light system, currently showing red.
Despite wearing Gortex made to limit perspiration, Alex’s hands poured sweat.
Another bleat of the horn, followed by the shift of light from red to yellow; yellow to green.
Twenty-five engines utilizing twenty-two hundred horses screamed like a team of banshees and soared Alex’s soul to the heavens.
He’d never grow tired of the Lobby. Nothing in life compared to its appeal.
After a few minutes of fierce shifting, the sounds and thrusting g-force infused him with a focus previously accessible only by deciphering code. The bends were tight. The straight-aways lightning fast. Even with applying maximum effort, he fell steadily behind the pack.
Disregarding his position; he concentrated; the laps wound on and on. To be successful racing Formula One cars, drivers must stay in the moment; avoid mental deviation. Drivers needed every neuron to avoid disaster. By lap seven, he had forged a groove and started making up ground.
A crew chief kept communication with Alex through a microphone in his helmet. His reticent instructions seemed limited to course impediments, such as traffic congestions, debris, or crashes.
The first occurred on the second lap.
“Eyes up, Alex. Wreck ahead.” His clear voice temporarily blotted out all the sounds of the drive. “Lower your speed. You’ll have visual in two kilometers.”
He first saw a front wing near a displaced barrier. The twenty-one car, a Ferrari powered SL-48 sat idle, facing the wrong direction.
Its driver stood with two medics, on the safe side of a barrel wall, gesticulating as if explaining what happened.
When traveling a hundred and eighty miles an hour in a machine that weighed less than a ton, a nick could send shredded parts seventy feet into the air.
Unlike NASCAR, if the wreck didn’t block the course—like now—the drivers continued on. Alex grinned as his foot depressed the accelerator.
By lap thirteen, courtesy of losing a driver, Alex advanced to the twenty-second spot—nice surprise. Aligning with his car, he pushed past his fear and focused.
Six laps later, his crew chief spoke again. “Wowser.”A beat. “We got a doozy coming your way, Alex. Three cars.The fourteen, thirty-five, and eighty-nine.Steel confetti, my man. Stay sharp.”
Alex sat forward. Roy piloted the eighty-nine.
Though no injuries in the Lobby transferred to the real world, the initial reactions of fear, shock, and pain remained for those hurt. Alex’s gut tightened at the thought of a suffering Roy.
“Slow ‘er down, Alex. Slow ‘er down. Next bend. This one’s serious. We’re going to get a caution.”
Alex smelled the smoke before he saw the detritus of chewed metal, colorful fluids, and torn rubber littering the roadway.
He slowed his vehicle down to sixty MPH, an Indy crawl, and then to avoid the many tire shredding obstacles, fifty, forty, twenty.
The fourteen had spun out, but remained intact. Its driver stood near the fence, helmet in hand, seemingly answering cognitive questions posed by his pair of medics. Five yards farther, the thirty-five lay upside down, partially leaning against the concrete barrier—a clean tear down its side. Its driver sat on the pavement, also clear of the wreckage, with his own pair of EMTs. That meant the third car—the one demolished down to a flaming cockpit—belonged to Roy.
Between the dancing flames and the black smoke, Alex made out the number eighty-nine on its side. His chest constricted. They entered most worlds with the pain modifications at twenty-five percent or less, and many times, that intensity proved too great. Thinking of Roy burning activated his gag reflex.
He knew the polyurethane 131 suit protected Roy from a good degree of heat, but that didn’t mean the helmet couldn’t melt over his flesh, his lungs couldn’t fill with smoke, or his body couldn’t be ripped open by sharp steel.
Then, Alex spotted two members of the medical team standing near the barrier. They stood rigid, frozen; as if glitched—something he’d never seen in the Lobby. They should be tending to Roy, regardless of his condition. Alex searched the flames of the wreckage for the outline of a corpse.
Through fire and smoke, he found nothing.
Again, he scanned the crowd.
If this collision caused Roy’s death, which seemed probable, he would have popped back into the white of the Lobby by now. Most likely, he would reenter the Giro’ d’Italia world and meet Alex at the conclusion of the race. But passing the wreck without spotting any semblance of Roy added confusion. He could think of no explanation as to why there wasn’t a charred corpse in the cockpit; a deceased body on the pavement; a random limb somewhere. He had been granted clean looks inside the cockpit—no one occupied the seat. Regardless of the crash’s outcome, Roy’s body should have remained. And even if tossed hundreds of feet away, the paramedics would rush directly to him, not stand like mannequins.
As he passed the scene and brought his speed back to par, he tried to wrap his mind around it.
“You’re clear from here out,” the crew chief said.
Perhaps he missed Roy in the stands? If so, fans would have flocked to that section, particularly the medics. What could make them stand about, idle?
“Go ahead and pick ‘er up.”
The voice alerted Alex he’d yet to return to the race. Knowing he’d see Roy soon enough, he shifted the model L-7 into higher gear and tried to get his mind back on the race.
Unfortunate for Roy, yes, but three crashes gained Alex three more spots. He faced an opportunity for bragging rights and his best finish.
The longest straightaway on the course approached. He gassed the accelerator and settled back into the mental niche needed to compete. His fellow AI racers wouldn’t care about Roy’s accident, he shouldn’t either.
As Alex downshifted in anticipation of an upcoming curve, a strange tingling sensation washed over his skin.
“Aleckz,” the crew chief’s voice crackled. Another first time error for the Lobby.
His foot left the gas pedal. A car zipped by perilously close as his world grew foggy.
If Alex didn’t know better, he exhibited the symptoms of exiting the Lobby. But he wasn’t set to exit for days.
The absurd notion of an emergency evacuation crossed his mind as his environment blurred further.
“Cratz nu fuo.”
Many neurologists concluded emergency extractions posed dangers. Only life-threatening situations in the real world constituted the action.
His body growing light occupied half his mind. The other half accepted his slowing car had butted into the wall and now drifted into the hazardous middle lane. Not that he cared. A peaceful euphoria overtook him—the definitive symptoms of an exit.
Fear percolated as well.
When drafting the legal implements for emergency evac’s, none of the scenarios ended with happy smiling faces welcoming a person into the real world.