Chapter 9

Internet television is a fairly new phenomenon in the world of entertainment. While it is a less than mainstream version of entertainment, it is a convenient way to stream very real events to the world uncut.

While most of the MIT team had been packing to fly to Circleville, Ohio to set up shop, one team member had not been not actively packing. He had been watching the television in his office in complete shock.

The screen that he was watching showed every cameraman’s video feed, each in its own section of a large grid, in order to keep track of all the cars at the same time. At the moment his eyes were riveted to a small rectangle two-thirds of the way down on the right side of his crowded screen. Dr. Jenkins’ shock had come from witnessing their car having barely survived an accident, although what had happened had clearly not been accidental at all. He had just watched as Katrina had resorted to using the weapon that had been designed only to disable another racecar, to instead fend off assailants. His heart sank. The weapon should never have needed to be used on a person. He imagined the tremendous pain that could be caused by the burning and melting of human skin.

Jenkins had also watched as one of the other racecars had been destroyed by the maroon Explorer. He hoped that the passengers had survived and wondered who had sent in mercenaries to destroy the racecars. He had no love for Bertrand and he didn’t know Bertrand’s son, but he knew Katrina and he had never expected her to be in any real danger. In a low speed race, any possible danger caused by their car being disabled should have been easily minimized by any decent driver. Now there were other vehicles trying to take out the racecars? His heart leapt for her when they managed to use their weapon to fight off the bastard in the Ford. But he knew that she would be regretting her decision to use the weapon, even if it had been the only way to save themselves.

Dr. Jenkins considered who would have dispatched a hunter to get rid of entrants. Obviously they were trying to increase the odds of their own car being the winner. The one person who might be able to help him figure it out was the person who had a family member driving his investment. Bertrand would understand the motives better than other people. Had he known that his son would be in danger of being killed? Had he known that there would be a hunter out there trying to destroy racecars? Jenkins considered these questions and more.

Jenkins went back and forth with his desire to call his investor. Surely he had also been watching and had witnessed what had happened with the MIT car, so calling to tell him what happened would be a waste of time. Asking him why however... Jenkins wondered what would happen if he asked too many questions. That might be a mistake as well. He put his brilliant mind to the task.

It could only be someone who had inside information about the race, but that meant that it could be anyone from the investors to any of the individual team members. Although the range must be more limited than that, it could only be someone who had more at stake than would the average team member. He remembered his first meeting when the head of the race, Grant Phyindress, had spoken about people wanting change in the auto manufacturing industry.

Could someone in the auto industry have enough information about the race to want all of the cars to fail? Or could someone with a weak entrant who wanted to win above all else be trying to fix the race? That, he could see as a more likely possibility. He wondered how much money was at stake. If an investor was desperate enough, and their entrant was weak, that could provoke someone with connections to attempt to stack the deck.

An idea struck Jenkins and he turned off his television. He spun his chair around so that he faced his desk. He went into his file of information for the race. The one thing engineers did better than anything else was keep good records. To give the lead engineers a method to gage their position among all the other entrants they had been given access to an internet site that showed statistics that could be used to measure their position from. There, they could log in and see if they had been falling behind in comparison to other teams.

He typed in the website’s address and followed the links. When the lists came up Jenkins saw that thirty fuselage skins had been made, but only twenty seven teams had been at the starting gate. If thirty teams were supposed to start, what had happened to the other three? Had they not finished in time? Or had they not passed the initial inspections before the race? He looked for the three teams that didn’t make it, George Platz, Lin Hong, and Marcus Appleton. He didn’t recognize the first two names but he knew Marcus from way back. In fact, he was pretty sure that he had his phone number.

After Dr. Jenkins pulled his phone out of his pocket he searched for the number. Sure enough, it was there, just as he had remembered.

“Hello?” Appleton answered. His voice had a level of excitement to it that could not have been inspired by the call.

“Marcus, is that you?” Jenkins asked, not completely sure that the voice matched his friend’s.

“Yeah, but I’m kind of in the middle something. Can I call you back?”

“This is Dr. Jenkins from the MIT team. Can I ask you a quick question?”

“Jenkins? Oh my God. Did you see what happened?” Appleton’s voice turned quickly to worry.

“Yeah, I just watched it happen. Listen I have a question about the car you were building.”

Appleton laughed derisively. “What a waste of effort.”

“What do you mean?”

“We got the whole car finished and the day before the truck shows up to take it to the starting line, a fire destroyed it overnight.”

“A fire? Did they find out what caused it?” Jenkins asked.

“No. The guards didn’t see anything. We’re thinking it may have been electrical. The amps for the laser unit were pretty high and if someone wasn’t careful, you know… We just don’t know.”

There was a silence between the men. Finally Appleton said. “Listen I should go.”

“Wait. I was thinking. You have video security of your work area like we do, right?” Jenkins asked.

“Yeah.”

“Do me a favor and check where your interns parked. I’m looking for a late model maroon Ford Explorer.”

Appleton caught on pretty quickly. “Wait a minute. Do you think that the nut that tried to kill your team is the one that destroyed my…”

“I think it’s possible.” Jenkins said more confidently now that his friend and he were thinking the same terrible thing.

“Oh my God. Yeah… I’ll call you back.” Appleton said and he hung up without another word.

L

Next Chapter: Chapter 10