Carlyle
LadyAmber
FourtyTwo
Chronic
KawaiiOtakuGirl
Abstract Proxy
Forsythe
Tim the Yeti
NoctisMonday March 22nd, 2094, 08:10 UTC (11:10 local)
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Carrera Condor HQ
”...Unfortunately, the crash has put the brakes on our upgrades.” Suárez finished his segment, ”We have the spare chassis ready, but building the new spare takes priority.” Normally a team could get away with having one shared backup craft between both drivers as nobody expects both drivers of this level binning it in practice or qualifying so bad the ship couldn’t be rebuilt overnight, but the specifics of Bea’s suit meant that each driver had their own spare and although Pridwen was paying for it, nobody could increase the amount of hours in a day.
Even Pridwen didn’t have a working time machine. Yet.
”So, off to the sim for us.” Ava quickly came to her conclusion.
”Surely the entire engineering team isn’t busy building the new ship?” Alonso addressed the head engineer.
”No, but nothing is that simple. Adjusting the flight control system for example is an IT team task, but they must work with aerodynamicists and the neural link specialists to ensure it performs as intended.” Suárez explained. Alonso was a solid team principal and an accomplished racer in his time, but he was no engineer. At least he was aware of it and listened.
”Is the entire team needed for the build?” Bea tried another angle, ”Handling isn't important in Tokyo, but it could aid stability too with some tweaks. Could a smaller detachment manage?”
”You cannot rush engineering.” Suárez said firmly, silently lamenting another person without a technical bone in her body. ”We could have done it with the new engine and then both ships would have retired due to overheating. It takes time to do it right, time we are currently short of thanks to Silver Apex. Not to mention the biggest impact on stability comes from repulsors and mag packs, both of which we have purchased from Southern Cross last season to save money and development time.”
”Okay. This is your lawn Ronaldo, you’ve convinced me.” The team principal made a full stop behind that point of the agenda before moving onto the next. ”Ava, Bea, where do you think we stand the most to gain in the simulator?” He had his opinion, but wanted to hear from those piloting the ships first.
”Energy deployment. We're in the top four on speed and are mid-pack on ELS, but the differences are so tiny that even a small improvement will put us in the top few on speed and energy-heavy tracks.”
”Yeah. Stability is so abysmal that nothing we do in the short term will make a big difference unless we change the ship, and I'd rather be competetive at some tracks and take the loss in others than be equally underwhelming everywhere.”
”Three for three, ELS use it is, then. Flávia, anything from your side?”
”Only a few concrete things. For Japan, Fujikura wants both of you for an ad shoot of a new civilian parachute.” The Colombian woman turned to both pilots.
“Do we get to jump?”
Chuckles were heard around the table at the simultaneous, almost synchronised question. Fujikura Parachute Ltd. was initially Ava’s personal sponsor in Junior Formula Antigravity as she used and even helped test some of their equipment in her previous career, the Chilean Air Force being a major customer, before becoming a major partner of Carrera Condor with Ava’s signing and multi-year contract as the team’s number one when the team replaced both drivers in 2093, now supplying several safety systems as well as the standard racing suit Ava used. Between Ava - a former test pilot who still flew as a hobby and was therefore a voice in the aviation community - and Bea - both a skydiver and BASE jumper with a large following - available to them, the Fujikura marketing department had probably the happiest employees in Japan.
”Despite León’s protests, the company wants airborne shots as well and insists you be identifiable in them.” Bea offered Ava a reciprocated fist bump, as much as the matter-to-hologram interaction allowed, quietly mouthing ”Best. Job. Ever.” to the senior pilot.
”The shoot is planned for the afternoon of Wednesday 31st, but depending on the weather we might need to reschedule until after the race.“ Flávia explained, the faces of both racers a mirror image of Alonso’s frown.
Such a high-risk endeavor right before the race? Seriously?
A free jump, maybe more, and an extra day in Tokyo? Yes, please!
”Mr. Hayes also informed me that the Arbor Collective want Bea for a day in Italy. Wednesday 14th.”
”I was wondering when they’d call, they had the new bindings in the oven for a while.” Arbor was one of her first personal sponsors, dating back to 2086 when a mid-level marketing executive’s wife who was a fan of Bea’s art channel showed her husband a stream where a 13 years old Hoverkart racer painted her snowboard, and her designs have been available on some Arbor snowboards ever since.
”I’ll also need both of you for the marketing meeting in three hours.”
Bea didn’t look happy, but at least she was home and could better spend the time until the meeting.
Ava actually groaned.
Tuesday March 23rd, 2094, 15:32
London, United Kingdom
London, United Kingdom
Highgate, Fitzroy Close
”Who’s Paul?” Akela Ward asked before Bea could even sit down.
”Someone interesting by the looks of it, is this what you call ‘be right back’?” Evangeline Ward looked up from her cards while tapping her watch, neither sister ever missing the opportunity to rib the other about their mother’s hounding about grandchildren.
”Simmer down, both of you. It was a work call.” Bea aimed to shoot down any speculation still on the launch pad before spotting an opportunity to parry. ”Actual work call, not the type of private meetings you hold every friday.”
Evangeline barely had time to give her sister a ‘You win this time.’ look as she turned to defend against what would be the first of many series’ of questions on that topic, silently plotting revenge.
Later that evening
"I wish the Pegasus had come through in time. Perhaps if I’d assigned more company engineers to the team, then you would not have been in that position." Federick noted, notably downcast.
”No.” She said as firmly as her voice allowed with a shake of her head, ”The CMG would not have helped, I had no time to do anything there and Ronaldo is right, the engine is not something that could be rushed. The cooling system is at its limit already, I had to stick that pass or back out of their wake to keep the engine cool. I’m even willing to say Hart just made a mistake, even if he’s being a pure dick about it.” She took another sip, ”But the next time he does something like that, he’s going firewall deep.”
"Beatrix…"
”I know, I know… Maybe a little bit mad about it still.”
"You were ahead of Ava, though." He turned the page.
”There is that.” The fire in Bea’s eyes seemed to grow a bit.
"Takeaways?"
"She races smart and has bollocks men should be envious of as per for a test pilot, but as soon as the ship starts dancing under her she pretty much closes her eyes and prays. She’s made ‘slow and steady’ into an art form, and that’s why she trounced Ibanez like she did. He tried to beat her at her own game, you can see it on his onboards." Bea paused, having gotten a bit too carried away with her gesticulating and nearly spilled her drink. "But it hurt her in Cape Town. She rode the ship low to the ground to keep it stable and then couldn’t push in banked corners for fear of bottoming out. I sacrificed that for cornering speed and Bob’s your uncle, P7 and gaining."
"And the prognosis?"
"Handling will be the most useful in the upcoming races. After Italy, speed can pretty much wait until the last three races, and we’re quick as is already. We would benefit from a stability increase, but it would be more for Ava’s benefit than mine. I can handle an unstable ship.
Now the team needs to get their arse in gear on the pilot mods. What we have at the moment makes pirate hooks look cutting edge. There really is nothing we have that could help?”
"Short of buying out a biomechanical company, no. And I’m still not sure about that approach. Surely the benefit can be offset by the actual machine rather than turning yourself into one?" He sounded worried. Limbs were one thing, heart transplants were available when he was just a child and even simple neural links were becoming a thing as he left university, but he was old enough to still be wary of excessive augmentations, particularly of complex structures such as senses and the brain; an opinion that would be familiar to anyone who knew Bea’s. The two were not quite ‘like father, like daughter’ as much as osmosis of two initially vastly different characters: If the youngest Ward could ever treat a situation short of death or serious injury with complete seriousness, it was due to the Ward patriarch’s influence over the years; whereas the latter’s shift from a prim and proper businessman to the man he was today over the last 15 years or so were solely the effect of the former’s golden retriever energy.
"I’m not saying I’ll poke my eyes out or replace my brain with a computer just because I can. I’m not Layla." She quickly reassured him, aware of his opinions of the subject and consequently the pilot in question. "But if we could get more out of the neural link, the faster response time and greater fidelity of information from the ship’s sensors would be great. I’m also looking into artificial lungs."
"Why, the breathing liquid takes care of both acceleration protection and respiration."
"The breathing liquid is precisely why, because I’m risking pneumonia every time I get out of the ship. Being able to get all the liquid out of my lungs faster and more easily would be both a comfort and safety improvement."
"When?" The safety argument worked.
"Start of summer break. That will come with some recovery time."
"Anything else?"
"…togglable sense of taste and smell?"
"Is it that bad?" He laughed.
"Absolutely rancid." She shuddered.
Saturday March 27th, 2094, 14:54
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Buenos Aires, Argentina
El Rancho del Sud
"Sorry I never got to chat to you much after the race. I can't believe they dropped that interview on you so fast. You need to say no, Bea. Even if your head is fine. They'll get a feel for it."
”Nothing to apologise for. You scored half as many points in one race as the team did in the last season, you had stuff to do.” Be waved her hand over Ava’s concerns, her words sounding genuine. ”And the interview was a good distraction. Even if they were inevitably going to ask about the crash, it beats sitting in my hotel room thinking about it too much, and I couldn’t really lose by taking it. Even if they asked something stupid.
If you answer a stupid question seriously, you come out looking like a professional for not laughing at them. If you have fun with a stupid question, either they don’t release it and waste time or they do and most people will find your witty reply entertaining and the interviewer will have egg on their face for asking stupid questions.“ Bea explained her reasoning, ”Plus Aurora and Rory are actually good at their jobs. If it was RTL calling, that would be going to voicemail.” She chuckled, remembering Hans Bakker’s media faux pas.
”Still, it was nice of you to turn up.” She said with a warm smile. It sucked knowing people were worried about you, but on a selfish note it would be worse if they weren’t.
"You are definitely better at that than me though. But if you don't mind me asking....how exactly did you work out Amy was going to get Silver Apex to help us? Do you wonder why they did? I mean, I guess there must be some technical help, but our craft now goes faster than theirs on the speedtraps when we were in South Africa, because we have a speed-focussed craft. I'm just saying, they know we may not take the title, but do you think they saw an opportunity to undercut others?"
”How I figured out it was a possibility? That one was easy, she told me as part of her sales pitch.” Bea sat down opposite her teammate, ”Why she did it, and whether she would at all? 15 minutes couldn’t go by since the moment she approached me during the grid photo to the moment I saw the performance data from the upgrade that I didn’t ask myself that.”
"I just wonder what she's doing, that's all. I am taught to look for patterns, so I wonder if she sees a chance to screw other people over. And if she's offering that to anyone else now. I think she was sincere with you. But it just raised my pulses. And after your crash too. Not that anything in the telemetry says it caused it. We just had a rockship, that's all."
”With hindsight now, I think you’re right, it’s a proxy war. Before, we were inconsequential backmarkers. Now, we can stand our ground against teams up to and including Valkyrie on some tracks, and that helps them. And if she’s handing out upgrades like Father Christmas? Well, nothing we can do about that, is there?” Bea shrugged, in keeping with what she told Rory on Sunday about things you can’t change. ”If that’s the case, I’d expect SuperCat to catch up next. No point bothering with Fitzroy.
Have you seen the data comparisons for next week yet?”
”Zygon close ahead, Valkyrie behind. You look at data in your free time?” Ava said with genuine surprise.
”I can be smart. I have my days.” Both chuckled. ”Zygon will make it interesting. Slower than us, but blowing us out of the water with their augs. Plus some of their fans are absolutely bats, so be ready for those, win or lose.”
”Don’t you call your own community ‘MadLads’?”
”Yeah, in the same vein I call myself mad. But not unhinged. None of mine announce in a public forum they’ll propose to me on the weekend, the crazies I get try to keep their insanity behind closed doors.” Until she drags it out into the light to laugh at it with the normal ones.
”Don’t discount Valkyrie either. Dorian still beat us in Cape Town, and the gap will be tighter next week.”
”We’ll have two ships to fight them this time.”
And she was not losing that bet.
"Aside from that, there is an Asado tonight with the team. You coming? I can't remember if I ever went to a decent steak place in London, but muy bien, the real stuff, here you cannot beat it. Leon is cooking, too."
”Of course I’m coming!” Bea blurted out as if she had ten milliseconds before someone else beat her to the figurative last ticket, ”Oh, before I forget, I had a few questions about ELS if you don’t mind…”
