Chapter 11

The MIT car pulled out of a Sunoco station. The entire cab of the car had been filled with junk food and Gatorade. “Can you drive and eat pizza at the same time?” Katrina asked through a mouth full of her own slice.

“Sure, it’s an automatic.” Richard said. Preparing to be hit, he moved his shoulder in towards the steering wheel. Katrina tried to hit him but missed.

“Smartening up I see.” Katrina said. “It’s like intentionally doing something wrong and then putting yourself in a time-out afterwards. I did that a few times when I was a kid.”

They both smiled for the first time since they met. Katrina noticed but was sure that Richard did not.

The stop at the Willow Hill Sunoco had been refreshing. The race felt like a race again in their minds and the part where Katrina had used her weapon to kill someone had slipped away for a moment.

After Willow Hill, they both felt better. The race stayed true to what the race was designed to be, a test for the technology.

Too much junk food may have ruined their appetite for dinner later. But that didn’t matter. The ride had been safe since... well... since, she had killed two people. And there it was, Katrina’s emotions suddenly fell into a spiraling crash course of dismay and self-loathing. Tears started to flow down her cheeks.

“What’s wrong?” Richard asked, when he finally noticed that she had begun to cry.

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“What wouldn’t I understand? I’m guessing that saving our lives is the problem? Honestly, I think you did the right thing. If I had known how to run that thing, I would have used it. And I wouldn’t have felt bad about it either.”

Katrina frowned. “You wouldn’t feel bad about killing someone?”

“You don’t know that you killed anyone. You turned its power to people who were trying to kill us. You showed them that we have the power to defend ourselves. When they didn’t back down they forced you to use that power. They lost control of their car during the process. You don’t know if they died in the crash. I’ve seen horrific crashes before where the driver got out and walked away without a scratch.” Richard said.

“But I saw the driver’s face burn.” Katrina returned. “It kind of melted.”

Richard put a hand on Katrina’s knee to strengthen his message and show his softer side. “Listen, you can feel bad for a year about what we had to do. But what if we find out that they were arrested and put in jail for running that other car off the road? You might have hurt that driver but mourning their deaths without knowing what really happened seems like a waste of time.”

Katrina nodded. She understood what he was trying to say but she still felt bad about what she had been forced to do. At least Richard’s view made a little sense. She should get all the facts before she spent too much time grieving. She wiped away her tears. Maybe Richard wasn’t so shallow after all.

Katrina decided to do some work to try to distract the pit in her stomach. She changed the computer screen on the dashboard to show a map for a few minutes before changing back to watching the vehicle statistics. She could see that they only had a little less than four hours left until they arrived in Circleville, Ohio and she needed to make sure that they had enough power to get there. Many minutes went by as she investigated the health of their systems.

She needed to call in soon and preorder the work that would need to be performed on the car overnight. In the back of her mind she thought that the decision to not make the car internet capable had been a mistake. Having to call in the work she needed seemed like a waste of time. Their car was so advanced that, with an internet connection, one of the team members could have watched not only what the car was doing performance-wise, they would also have been able to diagnose any problems and makes changes remotely that would have been beneficial to its operation.

For that matter, the team could have disabled the speed governor when she had not been able to during that crazy few moments when they had thought that they were going to die at the hands of the Explorer. Although, having internet capability brought with it a whole other type of vulnerability as well.

While Katrina considered benefits and liabilities of internet connections, a new light came on. It was the image of a heat gage on an old steam pipe was now lit, next to the check transmission’s light that had been on all day. This image brought Katrina back to the real world quickly.

“We have a new problem.” Katrina said as she typed madly trying to get more information. “The transmission is beginning to overheat.”

“We have a CVT. It can’t overheat.” Richard stated plainly.

“Yes it can. The reason it can is that our power plant is oversized compared to what the transmission is actually rated for. This whole car was designed on a Cadillac CTS frame. The reason you were able to pull off all the fancy driving when the Explorer was trying to kill us was because this chassis is really a kind of racecar. We took all the steering components along with the suspension to make this vehicle as close to a racecar as possible without going out and buying one. All of the components are designed to go a hundred and sixty MPH and more. Our engine is crazy powerful, but because we knew about the speed limitations for the race the CVT made sense at the time.”

“So what you’re saying is that everything is race ready except for the tranny?” Richards asked with confusion. “Great. We’re going to overheat before we get to the end of this crazy day?”

Katrina pondered a moment. “The last leg takes us through a small town but if I plot us a different route through back roads, we can come up to the hotel we’re staying at with minimal stress to the transmission. Try to keep the transmission in the same range as much as possible.”

“But we’ll lose all of the time we made up on the highway.”

“If we don’t arrive at all we’re out. For today I don’t think it will matter if we finish first or last. We just need to finish.”

Richard made a “Hmmp” kind of sound and slunk into his seat mumbling, “Racecar without a manual transmission, what a stupid idea.”

Katrina pointed to the video monitor which now showed a new set of directions across a map of the area. “Follow this. I need to make a phone call.”

~~~

Frodes stood at the entrance to the Harper Motor Court. Many vehicles from the race had already arrived. He didn’t count how many had driven in but he was certain that it was far fewer than what had been gathered at the church parking area that morning. He had no idea how long it was going to take for their car to show up, but he knew that the longer it took his car to arrive the less time he would have to do their repairs. He was starting to worry.

The rest of the team all stood around the parking area. There were many high powered lights to illuminate their work place. Boxes of all sizes were stacked neatly, waiting to be ripped open and their contents removed and installed. Everyone on the team had planned to pull an all-nighter and several cases of Monster energy drinks were stacked next to their boxes of supplies.

At the center of the team stood a portable lift that was painted blue and yellow and was ready to be used. Clearly this team was dedicated to getting their car ready for the next race day.

There were other teams working in other areas of the parking lot. The other racecars had small groups of people trying to perform more work than they had been prepared for. There was a lot of shouting amongst the other groups who were obviously worried about the amount of time in which they could make their repairs.

Camera crews buzzed around like black flies. A red Toyota Corolla drove in and parked in a space far not far from where the MIT team had positioned themselves. Frodes looked at it briefly before resuming his impatient search for their car.

Marcus Appleton got out and gazed in amazement at the MIT team’s preparations. He was impressed. Dr. Jenkins had also noticed his arrival and walked up and tapped him on the shoulder.

“Goofy!” Appleton said and he shook Jenkins’ hand.

“Daffy. Welcome to the pit stop.” Jenkins said with less enthusiasm. “Uh, by the way we probably shouldn’t use our old college nicknames in front of the team. All business tonight, okay?”

“Where’s the restaurant? I’m starving. I used the company jet to get here but I’m not important enough to get food served.” Appleton turned, looking around to see what restaurants were nearby.

“If you don’t mind, I’d like to wait for our car to come in before we head over. It’s my baby you know. I have a stash of granola bars if you want one to hold you over. The whole team is high on Monster drinks and granola bars to get through the night.”

Appleton hesitated before he said “Okay.”

As Jenkins handed one over the MIT car finally drove in. Frodes was running back to the worksite behind the racecar. Richard and Katrina both stepped out. The team cheered their arrival and swarmed around Katrina to pat her on the back, disregarding Richard completely.

Richard walked up to Jenkins and took his hand and shook it. “Sir, this is the most fantastic car I’ve ever seen. But a racecar needs a manual tranny.”

Katrina hit him from behind. It was so common an event that he barely winced over it. Richard didn’t wait for Dr. Jenkins response he instead mingled with the team that had converged on the car as it was rolled onto the lift. He wanted to talk to them about things he wanted to have fixed.

Jenkins put a hand on Katrina’s shoulder. “How are you? I’m so sorry I put you in that seat. I had no idea how rough the race would get and I’m still trying to find out who was in that Explorer.”

“You saw that?” Katrina asked looking horrified, afraid of what would happen to her for using the weapon on someone’s face.

Jenkins pulled Katrina in for a hug like a father. “I’m so sorry.”

Katrina started to cry. “I didn’t want to use the weapon on them but they were trying to kill us and, and…”

“It’s alright. You did what you thought was right. It was the only way for you to survive. No one will think any less of you.”

“What happened to the Explorer? Did those guys… are they dead?” Katrina asked.

“We don’t know. I checked with the local police and there was no accident reported. I have a feeling the race’s cleanup crew took care of that too.” Jenkins said as he eyed Appleton. “Go and get something to eat and take a shower. We have your street clothes ready for you in your room.”

“My street clothes? How?” Katrina asked mystified.

“It was Dillon’s idea. He wanted you to be more comfortable.” Jenkins said.

A dawning came over Katrina. She stood still silent pondering on the very idea of Dillon. Jenkins pushed her towards the hotel. “Go on, the night is short and you need to get some rest. Someone will wake you at five-thirty.”

Appleton watched Katrina walk off. “You have a pretty big soft spot for that one.”

“Of course I do. Look at what I did to her. I forced her to be on the weapons team, then I made sure she was the one chosen to be with Bertrand’s son. Right now I feel quite like a bastard. After what I saw them go through earlier, and what they had to do today, I feel just as bad as Katrina does. I need to find a way to keep her safe.” He raised a finger in the air. “A word with my project manager and then we’ll talk about my protection protocols over dinner.”

Marcus Appleton sat at a ‘99’ restaurant eating popcorn while he waited for their food. He was hungry. His friend was still explaining what he wanted him to do.

“Tomorrow morning I have a young genius arriving in Detroit. He will set up an internet monitoring platform. I want you two to dig and find out everything you can about the people on the list I’m going to hand you after dinner. I want to figure out where all the video goes from the cameras and who profits from all of this. I want you to become an information collector.” Jenkins said.

 “I need to figure out where the money goes. Someone is paying out big money to ensure a certain car wins. You saw what these people are capable of. In the video link I watched the explorer also ran another racecar into the guardrail. I have no idea what happened to that team. It looked pretty bad.” Jenkins put a hand through his thinning hair.

“I know of your work in internet protocol design. If you and Kalby can work together maybe we can root out some of the insanity and keep my team safe. The list is the names of all of the people and companies that we know are involved with this race. Grant Phyindress, owner of the company Driven Motor Innovators, is at the top of the list. He set up and organized the entire race.”

Dinner finally arrived and was served by a different waitress than the one who had taken their order. Appleton got the turkey tips he had ordered and Jenkins his burger and fries. Appleton wasted no time in cutting his meat.

When the meat touched Appleton’s lips Jenkins asked his question. “Here’s what I really want to know. How did an internet protocol designer end up designing a car for this race?”

“We all have our pet projects. I’ve been following your One Tree project for as long as you’ve been publishing. Mine is a special software package that operates electric motors. I know it sounds weird but my software makes motors run so efficiently that they can run on a battery for more than four times longer than a standard electrical set up. So I got roped into making this car on the pretext that my software…” Appleton paused to take another bite. “Can make an electric car run longer than anyone else’s. Everyone associated with this project knows that the electric motor is the wave of the future in automobiles. It made sense to throw my hat into the ring since everyone that entered will go that route...”

Jenkins had a big mouth full of french fries when he asked, “How did you generate power? I mean… a battery wouldn’t be able to last all day powering a racecar would it?”

“We went with the multi-generation route. All the fuselage skins made power, so that was a no brainer, we used a braking regenerative power, and we separated water to produce hydrogen and filled a power cell. We used the first two to power the water separator and collect the hydrogen. The hydrogen part made the bulk of our power. Our biggest obstacle would have been the desert stretch of the race. But we figured if we collected enough power and made the best use of my software there would be no problem to cross the desert to the finish line. Honestly, if I had any idea how your One Tree thing worked I would have asked if I could use it. Do you realize that with your machine and my software, we could have scaled down your half and made the car lighter, and still produced all the power the racecar required?”

Jenkins nodded. His mouth was full of burger but he managed another question. “Does anyone else know about your software? Other than you and me?”

“Yeah, NASA wants it.” Appleton said.

Jenkins made a weird face. “Why NASA? You can’t fly a plane or a spaceship with an electric motor.”

“No, but it would be really useful to power servos for satellites, and a moon buggy.”

Jenkins nodded approvingly.

~~~

Katrina was changing out of her racing uniform. When she had only underwear on there was a quick rap at her door. Before she could even say “I’ll be there in a minute” the door flew open with Richard rushing in. He closed the door right behind him.

She screamed. “What are you doing here? Get out, I’m not dressed.” Quickly she pulled her dirty uniform back up to cover herself.

Richard laughed. “Well I’m not dressed either.”

Katrina looked him over and saw that he only had a towel on. There was no denying it; Richard was a very good looking man. His wavy black hair and dark eyes drew her in just as it had when she had first met him that morning. But now she knew better. He was a shallow, uneducated, pain in the ass that used women and tossed them aside when he was done.

“Get out.” She said again.

“Oh, you’re no fun.”

“Get out or I will damage what you have under that towel and finish the race alone.” Katrina scowled.

Richard pulled off his towel and tossed it on the bed. “There, no more towel to worry about.”

Katrina stood in place, shocked by what he had just done. He was better looking than all of her other boyfriends put together. But he was such an idiot. She snapped out of her shocked reverie and ran at him. She started beating him hard. A moment later he was standing outside her motel room door, naked.

The commotion caused many interns to turn to and see what was going on only to find Richard standing there naked. He waved before turning towards his room mumbling under his breath. All the interns who could see Richard laughed at him, the women especially. The camera men ran in to get a better view as he hurried three rooms down and disappeared into his room.

Katrina stepped out minutes later in her street clothes and went over to her team to hand her uniform in to be cleaned. She took a Monster energy drink and a granola bar.

Dillon approached. “What happened in your room?”

Katrina laughed. “That ass. He actually thought we were going to hook up.”

Dillon looked shocked. “Are you okay?” Dillon’s face was so full of concern that Katrina could see him building up his courage enough to knock on Richard’s door to have words.

“Of course.” Katrina laughed again. “I pushed him out my door. Did you see him naked outside my room?”

Dillon nodded and smiled weakly.

“Does anyone know if there is a Subway nearby or someplace else I can grab a sandwich?” Katrina asked the crowd around the car. Frodes told her she only had to go a block down on the left. Katrina turned on her heel and went for a walk. Frodes turned back towards the new transmission install. 

Next Chapter: Chapter 12