The Race

Possible near future science fiction about a race between giant jet racing cars.

The Race 

 

by

 

GeorgeE

 

(From an original idea by Laurence Nysschens)

 

(30 pages  :  13,826 words)

 

 

 

          His name was Jens Bogvad Nilssen and he was acutely conscious of the sweat forming on his palms as he trudged wearily up the long concrete ramp toward the light.

          He didn’t usually feel this way and, as he became aware of it, the realisation dawned that this was not normal. His attention wasn’t usually so introverted before a race. But, perhaps there was good reason this time.

          Salvor had offered him a pill but he had refused it, preferring to let sleep come naturally, and had consequently stayed awake half the night. He wondered now if he shouldn’t have taken the pill after all. Salvor had assured him that it was quick acting and would be eliminated from his system long before morning, but he could not get over his distrust of taking any drug that might slow down his reflexes, however slightly.

          Ah well, too late to regret it now. He looked up to see the square of light at the top of the ramp and forced himself to keep moving toward it.

          His body felt tired and stale and old. Old! He snorted sardonically at the thought. Yes, he was old. Nineteen years old to be exact.

Still, he conceded reluctantly, that was considered old in this business where the peak age was sixteen or seventeen. He was a good three years past his peak and still going strong in spite of his patchwork body of spare parts sewn back together - how many times was it now? -  three times? And the last time he didn’t even want to think about.

          He shivered slightly and shook his head - that kind of thinking would get him nowhere at all.

What did it matter anyway? He was still champion, wasn’t he? He was still alive, wasn’t he? Ah yes, that brought some sort of gloomy satisfaction. All the others were gone. All the young hopefuls - he had watched them come and go - but he was still here. 

          They kept saying it couldn’t last. After his last crash all the ‘experts’ had agreed he would never race again and had shaken their heads sorrowfully. Well, he had recuperated and raced again, only half healed, and against all their expectations, won yet again. He enjoyed that - not giving them the satisfaction of being right. Yeh, screw them all, he thought fiercely and some life came coursing back into his heavy limbs.

          Kids, he thought angrily. It took kids whose natural reflexes were still razor sharp and could be trained to the near instantaneous control of the giant racing machines. Instantaneous was the correct word. After a certain age the mind grew too slow to think with the hundreds of almost simultaneous decisions that were needed to drive at or near the present day track speeds. Sooner or later you hesitated when you shouldn’t have, and goodbye Joey, goodbye Nikolai, goodbye Ling, goodbye François, goodbye Dave, goodbye… goodbye… goodbye. Sleep well, wherever you are now.

          They had been good kids, all of them �" some had even been friends. Which was tough, because out there in the heat there was no quarter. And here he was, no longer a kid, but still around, while all the others were gone. They called him the old man, but he was still the greatest.

          He carried on walking, but he was beginning to feel the heat now as he neared the opening. The ever present noise which had penetrated even to the underground preparation rooms was megaphoning with bone aching intensity near the exit of the ramp. He turned down the sonic controls on his ear muffles to a bearable level and almost immediately found himself stepping into the blinding sunlight, blinking furiously and gasping at the sudden change from the relative coolness and dark of the tunnel. Still, the noise wasn’t quite so bad in the open. He adjusted his ear muffles again and made himself stride forward confidently to the group of mechanics and machines tending his very own monster.

          Once more, pride made him conceal the slight limp in his left leg as he moved towards the men turning to greet him. He also knew that the moment he stepped out of the ramp, his image would be picked up by some of the dozens of TV and Multimedia lenses ringing the vast pits. He could not bear the thought of betraying any weakness in front of their cold gaze as they relayed their images six hundred miles away to the stadiums filled with people near the other end of the track and elsewhere around the world.

          He grinned cheerfully as he got closer and a few forced grins reluctantly returned to him. Some more doubters in the crowd, he noted. Well, to hell with them! Today was the day we would Exercise his Option, and none of them could take that away from him.

At that moment, John Lister came out from behind the others and hurried towards him. The head mechanic’s sour face reflected the usual concern that after all the weeks of unremitting toil his beloved machine was due to get mauled again. Oh Christ, Nilssen thought despairingly, why can’t he, just once in his life, put a smile on that ugly face. But, that would be too much to hope for.

 Lister was still scowling grimly as he came up and took him by the arm. Nilssen could feel his grin slipping totally away. He felt like shaking the clutching hand free and walking off, ignoring him. He restrained himself, however, and put on a polite expression of enquiring interest as Lister led him into the lee of the great machine. Very suitable expression for the Old Man, he thought wryly and wondered if any of the cameras were still picking him up. Probably. This was the commentators’ bread and butter and they would be hamming it up like mad, milking every moment for its store of tension prior to the take-off.

                   They continued walking into the shadow of the racer. This close to the machine, the high, sweet stink of the jet fuel being continually pumped in, was almost overpowering. The tanks were continually topped up during this ‘hot-fueling’ stage as the mechs ran the engines through their final tuning up procedures.

          Nilssen usually loved this part of it. Today, he hated it. The smell of the fuel caught in his nose and throat and he felt suffocated. The noise of the giant, twinned engines, rising to a rushing whine, then slowly descending again to a pounding, thunderous roar was normally a song in his blood. Today he seemed to detect thin screechings in the bellowing notes that etched like acid on his nerves.

          They ducked under a pair of garishly red fuel lines, stiff with their continuous pumping ejaculation, and Lister entered the mechanics’ briefing hut temporarily moored against the side of the machine.

          Nilssen paused for a moment before following him. His gaze travelled up the glistening grey metal side, towering three times his height above him.

          From here, it was difficult to make out the rather beautiful lines of the racer. Built in the shape of a broad wedge, nearly a hundred feet long, from the low, streamlined front, sweeping up to the high back, where the twin jets were located under high rudder fins; the machine was awesomely big. Along the sides, high flanges partially concealed the eight pairs of enormous metal ribbed wheels. The lines were spoiled, somewhat, by the aerodynamic stabiliser foils and planes. This was where the variety of design in the machines manifested itself, as each racer favoured his own combination of shapes, sizes and placement of stabilisers. Sometimes, these placements gave the machines a distinctly odd appearance, quite at variance with the tremendous potential of their performance.

          But, the stabilisers were necessary, Nilssen thought regretfully. At speeds just below the speed of sound, the machines were not so much driven as flown along the track, pressed to the ground by a combination of their great weight and the air pressure playing over the stabilising planes. The stabilisers assumed more and more importance towards the end of the race, as the huge fuel load was used up, altering the trim of the machines and, even with computerised aid, needing constant correction to keep them on the ground.

          Nilssen glanced to his right, past the tasteless collage of sponsors’ advertising, till he could make out the attenuated shape of lettering. Six feet high, in jagged lightning script, it read, Billhawk V. It was the name he had chosen himself and he was proud of it. It had been a lucky name. Lucky enough not to have killed him - so far. He grinned sourly to himself at this then ducked his head into the hut to join Lister impatiently waiting inside.

          Lister motioned to the narrow rest bench and Nilssen moved over and sat down resignedly. The head mechanic’s hands were busily leafing through a pile of checklists on his clipboard. Nilssen knew from previous experience that he would miss nothing in his last minute summary and there was no way to hurry him. Lister had the right to hold up the start of the race until he felt satisfied that he had delivered his complete status report on the machine and his pilot was fully briefed.

          ‘I might as well warn you, Jens…’ Lister began. Here we go again, Nilssen thought, and tried to wiggle into a more comfortable position to favour his aching leg. Finding this impossible, he sighed and relaxed where he was.

          Lister waited for Nilssen to settle down then continued. ‘She won’t take a lot of bashing about this time, boy. She’s in no shape for it, and you might as well get used to the idea. You’re carrying a lot more fuel than usual to give you the extra thrust you want and I’m not happy that the engine modifications are really up to taking it.’ Which Nilssen knew for a lie, as the old engineer wouldn’t let a thing be fitted on the machine that he hadn’t personally tested up to and beyond its ultimate limits.

          The engineer eyed him severely. ‘Now, what I want to show you is this.’ He pulled a sheaf of diagrams out from the bottom of the clipboard and began laboriously explaining the engine modifications that had been introduced since the last race. Nilssen knew these were important as he had planned some of these changes himself, but he somehow could not summon up the interest he ought to be showing. It just didn’t seem worth the energy. In any case, Lister would have ensured they were workable.

          Lister’s querulous voice droned on, but Nilssen had stopped listening. His gaze wandered to the doorway of the trailer. Looking outside, he could make out the shape of the adjacent machine, glistening bright yellow in the blinding light.

          That would be the German, of course. Very boastful and very confident, determined to take the first place, even though this was not strictly a race. It was the last meeting of the season, a sort of lap of honour for the reigning champion who was Nilssen himself. The only thing that mattered this time was getting through that damned barrier without the attendant trim troubles and crashes that had plagued all the previous racers who had tried it. Not just tried it and failed, Nilssen reminded himself grimly �" tried it and died.

          Up to this time, had had been too cautious to have attempted it seriously himself. Partly because of Jenny…  He stopped himself right there and pushed that thought with all its pain back into the locked recess of his mind from where it had somehow sneaked out. This time, he thought bitterly, it would be different. It was expected of him; by them. The great faceless, adoring, but fickle mass of ‘them’. And again the raging hatred of the whole business came boiling up to stick in his throat.

          For the past two seasons now, they had been consistently pushing up closer and closer to the sound barrier, but this had proved to be a greater hurdle than expected. All very well for a jet or a plane �" a true creature of the air �" which could just fly through the turbulence with no more harm than the occasional wear and tear on the unlucky ground lubber’s eardrums caused by sonic boom, but not these uneasy hybrid monsters, bred of a combination of aeronautic and racetrack technologies. The damn things were neither fish nor fowl, Nilssen thought disgustedly

          Oh, everyone knew that jet-powered land machines could be built that were capable of breaking the sound barrier. A few small, highly specialised concoctions had in fact done just that in the late nineteen-eighties and nineties - over a measured kilometre - in near perfect conditions. But, they were certainly not designed to run at close to sonic speeds for over six hundred miles in all weathers and race other giant jet cars at the same time.

          Anyway, all the efforts to push through that final limit with the new breed of long-distance jet racers had proved disastrous. The huge streamlined vehicles, no matter how well designed they were, or what modifications were added, just could not seem to cope with the hellish air turbulence so close to the ground at the critical sonic velocity. True, some had actually made it through, but without exception, the strain had proved too much.

          Whether it was the strain on the driver, or machine, or both, was hard to tell, as no pilot had lived to tell the tale or give any details of it, so the causes were still largely a mystery. Hence the constant modifications and adjustments to find some way of overcoming the problem of how to stop that dreadful shuddering and loss of control as the pilot fought to keep all eight screaming sets of wheels on the ground and get safely through.

          Nilssen was quite frankly scared of it. Twice now he had narrowly escaped with his life as a direct result of these hopeless endeavours by other pilots. But still the crazy b******s kept trying it. And today, it was his turn.

          His stomach felt bilious as he recalled the last time. He had seen the doomed machine, its pale green colour only partly visible in the dust and exhaust clouds thrown up behind it, surging forward off his port side and knew with a sensation of sickening fright that another attempt was being made. As usual, it hadn’t lasted long. Once again, the strange eerie fluttering had begun and in spite of its colossal size and weight, the racer had more and more resembled a stricken moth in a high wind. It had finally whipped its nose into the air and flipped over and over in great random crashing arcs, scattering pieces everywhere -one of which had landed right in front of him and caused his own horrendous crash. He hadn’t directly seen the end of the other machine, but had watched it later on the video re-runs. It had eventually disappeared in one tremendous explosion. It wasn’t even worth gathering up the parts. They had just swept them off the track. Because, by that time, the parts were all very small.

          What a lousy way to go, he thought sadly and wiped the sweat off his lips and out of his eyes then looked round with a start at an insistent tugging on his arm. Lister was still talking.

          ‘… and for God’s sake, don’t try opposite propping those new retractables. You’ll probably take off in a lovely tight circle and disappear right up your own exhaust tubes,’ he concluded savagely, then silently eyed Nilssen again, wondering if he had actually got the message - if he had even been listening.

          Reassurance time again, Nilssen sighed and patted the man placatingly on the arm.

          ‘Sure, sure,’ he said soothingly, ‘it sounds great, John. I’ll treat her just like a baby, okay?’

          Lister snorted and shook his head, then glanced at Nilssen suspiciously, a more deeply worried frown than ever beginning to darken his face.

          He knows, Nilssen realised suddenly. I haven’t told him, but he knows. Anyway, there was nothing he could do about it. Every pilot had the right to Exercise his Option when he wanted to. And today, he thought, with a rising feeling of exultation, was his day.

          None of this showed on Nilssen’s face, however, and eventually the old engineer’s fierce scrutiny turned away doubtfully. He suspected, but he couldn’t be sure. And there was nothing he could say anyway.

          Finally, he looked back at Nilssen and went on tiredly. ‘Well, lad, it’s the last race of the season, and you’ve been knocked about a bit yourself. I hope it’ll be a good one for you,’ then turned away, his shoulders drooping pathetically.

          For the first time, Nilssen felt sorry for him. Today Lister looked exactly what he was - an exhausted old man. At that moment some of his hate gradually dissipated. He realised now that he no longer wanted to hurt everyone to get even - especially not John Lister. Though he was part of it, the price that Nilssen had paid, he was also paying in his own way and in his own way he would be as badly hurt. Nilssen abruptly made up his mind to tell him. He was all ready to do it, but just then a mechanic came to the door of the trailer to talk to Lister, and the moment sped past and was lost.

          As Lister spoke to the mech, the fanfare rang out. Nilssen heard it even over the noise. Nothing could stop the penetration of that reverberating call.

          He rose from the bench and stretched himself. Oddly enough he felt better. All the decisions had been made - now there was only action. Lister turned away from the mechanic and came back into the interior of the trailer. At first, Nilssen thought he was going to totally ignore him and let him walk out without another word, but at the last moment, the old man turned back to him and stuck out his hand. Surprised and rather touched, Nilssen took it and they shook hands gravely. Then, avoiding the other’s eyes, he stepped out into the glare. He didn’t see it, but the old man’s face was heartbreakingly sad as he watched him go.

          Outside, the frantic last minute scramble to get everything out of the way and the machines ready for the start was even more hectic than usual. Mechs running everywhere, the huge fuel bowsers slowly lumbering away, snagged fuel lines that had to be untangled, little buggies with electronic checking equipment darting round the racers like so many fleas; the whole atmosphere of the pits was charged with more than the usual amount of tension. Nilssen was well aware of it as he threaded his way through the tangle to the podium. It looked like everyone knew it was going to be an unusual meeting. Just how unusual they were yet to find out.

          He reached the podium simultaneously with the young German on his left. Nilssen glanced over at him curiously, but there was no answering look in return, the boy just stared straight ahead into the hooded rings of lenses. He must have been aware of Nilssen’s look, however, as a faint flush started slowly spreading up his neck. Nilssen grinned inwardly at this. Not so confident, after all. Then there was no more time for thought. The other three pilots had joined them on the podium and again the fanfare rang out. Nilssen raised his hands over this head in a wide V and turned slightly to the left, then slightly to the right in the traditional salute. He paused for a moment, holding the pose, then slowly dropped his arms again and stood silently, waiting. The pits became very quiet as the bustle died away.

          With a sudden cacophonous blast, the view screens over the podium cameras burst into life showing the milling stadium crowds and transmitting their pent-up excitement in a confused roar of sound. The view cut from scene to scene, close-up to wide angle, now on a pretty girl jumping up and down, back to a sea of faces, then slowly the sound was cut down and the music swelled up, playing a medley of the various anthems. A grand and stirring moment or at least it was meant to be. Nilssen watched it stolidly, completely bored with the whole proceeding and just wishing they’d get it over with so the race could start. Gradually, the music also died away and gave place to the enthusiastically jovial voice of the official commentator.

          ‘Hello, everybody, and welcome to the last, and we hope, greatest race of this season. From Phoenix, Arizona, all the way through New Mexico to Amarillo here in Texas. It really is gratifying to see such a fabulous turnout at the stadium and tuned in on this program in Tele, Web, Vid and Virt and I’m sure the brave boys at the other end will appreciate it. Yes, I’ve been told by our media poll team that we have an audience of over two hundred and eighty million viewers throughout the world on this very special day - which must be a record.’

          Don’t mention anything about the last couple of seasons’ attendance fiascos, Nilssen thought nastily. He knew it had only been in the nature of a rather desperate gamble by the sponsors and auto moguls to recoup their losses that this season had eventually been launched at all. It was also the constant new attempts on the sonic barrier, hysterically hyped and promoted by the publicity agencies, that had kept at least some of the flagging public interest going. There was no explaining it, and the greedy racing magnates scratched their puzzled heads over the frightening new wave of public indifference. Could it be that the masses were losing their taste for blood and flaming death as suddenly as they had acquired it only a few short years ago? Tsk - tsk - tsk! Surely not. Well, let’s keep the farce going a little longer - at least until the massive investments in the stadiums, tracks and machinery had been paid off. What did it matter is a few more foolish teenagers wiped themselves out in the meantime, so long as the glorious profits kept flowing in.

          ‘…so, after that inspiring message from Harold Beamish, the Chairman of the Western United Auto Union, we’ll go over the line-up again.

          ‘First and foremost, Jens Nilssen, Star of the Magnum Racer tracks. Yes, this is his last run of the season and the great secret is out. This incredible guy is going to attempt the barrier today. Yes, indeed. He’s never tried it before, but just contented himself with winning race after race and building up the almost legendary reputation he enjoys today. Well, we certainly wish you luck, Jens. If you make it today, you will have done what no other Magnum pilot has ever succeeded in doing before, which is breaking through the sound barrier at ground level at an approximate speed of seven hundred and sixty miles per hour - a really mind-spinning figure, even for these thoroughbreds of the Magnum Jet Drag Tracks.

          ‘To add even more spice to the general excitement, we have Jens backed up by those other stellar figures, such as Hans Moller, number one in this season’s Trans-Eur, come over specially to take part in the Trans-Am race today. Next, the Kentuckian, that’s right, Jo-John Rufus, from Kentucky, a well-known local boy, who has gained a tremendous following with his consistently reliable performances. A very solid character, who gives you your money’s worth every time, yes sir! After that, a comparative newcomer - Trev Sheridan, from the good old British Isles, with a race winning record that can only be described as meteoric. He’s fast, and he’s come a long way in a very short time. Last, but certainly not least of these daring young men in their oh-so-nearly flying machines, is that comedian of the Magnum Tracks, the Jumping Jet Jockey himself, little Brian Burns. Oh -  ho-ho-ho. He really is a funny guy - when I asked him, the other day, if he was going to make another attempt on the barrier this time, he said - No, Graham, I’m not, but my machine had sure better, and I’ll just run and catch it up on the other side. Isn’t that a rib cracker? Ha-ha-ha…’

          Nilssen sighed and found himself longing for a sudden massive coronary to overcome the commentator in mid-sentence, thereby putting a stop to the whole silly business. He again shifted his weight slightly to favour his left leg and stole a quick glance to this right, past the tall, mild-looking Kentuckian, and nearly choked in sudden amusement, as he caught a glimpse of Burns’ face, smiling hugely and falsely up into the cameras and muttering through clenched teeth, ‘If he says one more word, just one, I’ll drive my machine right through the supports of his goddamn commentary tower.’

          Mercifully, the commentary was cut short by the clock and with a final fanfare and salute to the cameras, the pilots were free to go to their machines.

          Ducking to avoid the jet blasts, Nilssen made his way back to the Billhawk and gave the signal to the remaining small topping up tender to pull out, then swung himself up the handholds, over the rear wheel flange and picked his way carefully along the glassy, smooth metal, to his cab between the huge engine nacelles. He eased himself into the tiny, cramped cockpit and pulled the observation blister down into position. His next few minutes were busy. He strapped himself in, checked the ejection mechanism and adjusted his seating position to the most comfortable he could get it. Only then did he plug in his helmet leads and set the fine tuning. Almost immediately, Salvor’s soft voice came through.

          ‘Hello, Jens.’

          ‘Hi, Sal,’ he replied, somewhat irritably, ‘woken up at last, have you?’ He could hear Salvor’s quiet chuckle in his ears.

          ‘Now, now, Jens. I have been ready and waiting for you to plug me in for the last half hour.’ Then carried on to ask suavely, ‘Did you enjoy all the speeches and commentaries in your honour?’

          Nilssen grinned in spite of himself and relaxed back into the seat a little more easily. As usual, Salvor had known exactly what was annoying him and had handled it in just the right way to put the whole thing into its true, petty perspective.

          ‘Right,’ Salvor’s voice became crisp and businesslike as he started the final preparation checkouts. Fortunately, these didn’t take long as all the real work had been done beforehand. Salvor finished off quickly and Nilssen surveyed the soft, green lights of his instrument panels. Everything was in order and the quick checkout had served its usual secondary, but important function of getting him familiar with the multitudinous instrumentation again.

          ‘Green board, Jens?’

          ‘Green board, Sal.’

          ‘Okay - one minute to go. Please connect your EN hook-up.’

          Nilssen obediently leant his head back against the rest, touched a button on his helmet and immediately felt the feather-fine tingle of the tiny Electro-Neuric pads connecting with his temple, ears and the nape of his neck. This was his real contact with his Control, not the painfully slow audio-visual system which was also used. Salvor had an identical hook-up of his own and Nilssen knew that the small electrodes would also be connecting to similar spots on his Control’s head.

          At their top speeds, when the machines were actually racing, radio-vocal contact was just too slow. By the time a warning could be given from Control and acted on by the pilot, it was usually just too late. The EN hook-up transmitted nearly instantaneous neurological impulses and stimuli which, with practice, became almost telepathic in their intensity. This sometimes had its drawbacks, but Nilssen had learned that it was important to trust your Control. If he spotted some slight malfunction on his array of display screens and relayed it to the pilot, it was perilous to ignore, as many pilots had found to their cost. The Control could and did monitor most of the internal functioning of the machines by maser transmitted servo relays controlled in part by the bunker computers and in part by the Billhawk’s own on-board computer, but in the event of something that couldn’t be handled that way, the pilot had to take action to correct it himself or make adjustments to compensate for it quickly. Even one small rough running part could be enough to throw the fine harmony of the machine’s working parts totally out of whack in a very short time under the strain of the huge speeds - with lethal results.

          Salvor’s voice came on the earphones a little urgently now.

          ‘Forty seconds to take-off, Jens.’

          ‘Right.’

          He pulled the wheel, mounted on its stubby steering column, up into position between his legs, and locked it into place with a click, then reached down beside him for the throttle levers and opened them a bare fraction. Immediately, the screaming whine of the engines dropped an octave and he could feel the restrained tugging of the multiple braking system under his feet. He gingerly cast these off with a quick glance at the ground-anchor warning light, and with a soft rumble, the Billhawk taxied forward the few remaining yards to the starting line.

          Salvor again. ‘Twenty seconds and counting, Jens. Nineteen - eighteen - seventeen…’

          Nilssen acknowledged him hastily and as the Billhawk crept up to the line, he once again gradually closed the brakes while simultaneously opening the throttles more and more. Eventually, as he crawled up to the starting position, the Billhawk was roaring and shuddering as if in mortal agony under the opposing pressures of engines and brakes.        

          ‘- Eight - all set, Jens? - Seven…’

          Nilssen didn’t even bother to reply, only licked his dry lips and glanced quickly left, then right, through the shimmering cockpit cover at the other machines also straining at their brakes. His gaze drew back almost hypnotically to the red overhead starter lights.

          The index finger of his right hand curled slowly round the quick- release trigger.

          ‘- Three - Two - One,’ then there was one terrible, blasting roar and a giant fist tried to grind Nilssen through the back of his seat.

          His vision dulled to a misty red and he felt the pressure suit inflate to grip his body in its iron clamp. He could barely see the instrument panel or the track or anything else as his eyes and cheeks slowly pressed flat, and his lips stretched back into an insane parody of a smile.

          It was impossible to make any movement now. He could only cling onto the controls with a death-tight grip as the Billhawk was slammed forward by the hammer-blow hand of the solid fuel rocket boosters.

          Now the dreadful fight started to keep his swimming consciousness from fading away altogether. Somehow, through the screaming, pounding agony, he was distantly aware of Salvor’s voice calling out the reverse count, ‘- nine - ten - eleven - twelve - Burn out!’ and with a world of relief, the terrifying paralysis eased up as the boosters flamed out.

          Nilssen lay back exhausted his whole body as feeble as a child’s, allowing the storm of torturing effort to ebb away with the soft deflating hiss of the pressure suit.

          His vision gradually returned to normal, though he still felt weak and panted for breath, as his body slowly recovered from the strain of staying alive under that crushing acceleration.

          It was always like this, but he didn’t think he had ever felt it as badly before. He shook his head to clear away the lingering fogginess and pushed himself up in the seat.

          After that initial assisting rocket slam to get the huge mass of the racer moving, the jets had quietly taken over. Even now, they were unfussily engaged in easing the Billhawk up towards its six hundred mile an hour stride.

          He shook his head again as he watched the quarter mile wide ribbon of track unfolding, so smoothly now, in front of him. He still felt fuzzy. After effect - he wasn’t quite over it yet, and then a picture came unbidden to his mind of the other end of the track. The gigantic concrete walls at the sides of the last strip through the end stadiums would have already begun inching their unpredictably slow progress towards each other. At the end of the race they would leave a gap just big enough for only two or three of the fastest machines to get through and sometimes not even that. The pilots had split seconds to get close enough to estimate the gap and decide if it was big enough to get through and make the attempt or safely brake to a halt just short of certain death. Or, Exercise their Option and provide a final fillip of excitement for the thrill-jaded viewing crowds. But this time, Nilssen vowed savagely, it would be different. More different than they could ever guess.

          Twinges of concern were coming through on the EN from Salvor and he forced his attention back onto what he was doing. A quick check to either side showed the other machines flanking him still holding position level with his own and gradually building up speed. They were in the same relative grouping as at the starting line, the German and Englishman starboard and the Kentuckian and Burns to port. The last two he knew well, they were seasoned racers, but the other two were comparative newcomers, intent on making a reputation for themselves at any cost and therefore unpredictable - and therefore trouble. Nilssen resolved to keep a wary eye on them at all times. They would both bear watching.

          Salvor came on the earphones again, ‘Jens, you need to adjust your front and rear main foils slightly. With the extra fuel load, you’re tending to run a little slow. You could stand a little more lift to compensate the weight.’

          ‘Got’cha, Sal,’ Nilssen scowled as made the corrections. He was momentarily annoyed with himself for not having noticed the situation himself. He had already felt the sluggishness of the wheel response. It was such an obvious point, and now he was going to have to use extra throttle to catch up with the others already pulling slowly away from him. Well, he had plenty of extra fuel to do it with, so he’d better get on with it before they all disappeared up into the forward skyline, leaving him ignominiously trundling behind. Damn!

          With deft touches of throttle and compensating foil, he began closing the gap. The other racers made no particular attempt to burn extra fuel to stay ahead. It was pointless this early in the race when they all had plenty of fuel, and could afford to waste it. It was only later when the fuel loads were running low that the deadly game of back-burning began, which consisted of cutting sharply in front of one another in the attempt to burn the following racer with the searing hot jet streams and forcing him to brake heavily. That was when the fuel counted - to build up speed again each time after the brakes were used. The racer who could metaphorically ‘snooker’ the others by this means usually ended up winning. It was a sport which required nerve and concentration and lightning reflexes. Nilssen, needless to say, was a past master at this dangerous pastime and had won many of his races on just this ability.

          His metronomic checking gaze once more swept over the instruments. Everything looked good and the machine was responding much more easily to the wheel with the benefit of the slightly extra lift. The gap between him and the other machines was also almost gone and they were speeding forward neck and neck. Even the tumultuous thunder of the eight big road wheels vying with the roaring jets was comfortably muted. Almost six minutes out from the start and the machines were settling into their incredible six hundred mile an hour cruising pace.

          He checked the throttles slightly, as there was no point in pushing out extra thrust for more speed at this stage. He would need every ounce he could get when he made the attempt on the barrier.

          As if reading his thoughts, Salvor came through again. ‘Twenty three and a half minutes to Deacon’s Straight, if you can hold her at that, Jens.’

          ‘Thanks, Sal. Status?’

          ‘You’re looking good. I’ve got you on the flight cameras and you’ve gained up the lost ground. My duplicate gauges show you didn’t use much fuel making it up, so you’ve still got plenty reserve. There’s a little bit of extra heat on the tubes. It’s too soon to tell if that’s from pushing the extra weight or those last few hi-thrusts or both. Anyway, it’s nothing to worry about yet. It should settle out as you go on, but I’ve adjusted the intake filters a bit, which may help. I’ll keep you posted if there’s a change, but in any case I should be able to handle it from this end. Okay, I’ll shut up now. You’re coming up to First Bend. Thirty seconds. I’d adjust the lift down again if I were you. You can always make up the speed again later. Twenty five seconds.’

          Nilssen decided to ignore this advice. The Billhawk was running as perfectly as a fine watch and the only thing the extra lift was doing was compensating almost exactly for the added fuel burden.

          The machines were headed rapidly for the First Bend now; a long left-hander and then down to straighten out smoothly on the other side. To his right he could hear the deepening thunder of the other two racers’ engines increasing speed to avoid getting left behind on the outer curves of the bend and correspondingly increased his own thrust slightly.

          There was some slight chance the starboard couple might try some back-burning, though it was unlikely this early. Still, he reminded himself with his usual caution, it could happen so he might as well be ready for it. He tightened his strapping a fraction and adjusted the seat-back a trifle higher. Then they were into the bend, crowding as close to each other as they could get, to take advantage of the slight difference in distance covered by the inner and outer curves.

          Nilssen’s glance flicked to his right; the German was crowding him. Close. Too close. It was against the rules on the open track where the flanking distance was rigidly controlled, but not on the bends. He eased the Billhawk fractionally further into the nearside of the bend. This brought him crowding into the Kentuckian, but there was no help for that. He knew perfectly well what the German was up to. It was a nasty little psychological trick to shake him. He tightened his lips grimly; two could play at that game, and there were other bends up ahead, some of them a lot worse than this one. He also knew that the German would try to outmanoeuvre him on this by getting into a different flanking position next time, but there were ways to handle that too. He concentrated on keeping the Billhawk’s line and in a few seconds the bend opened up into the next stretch of straight. The other machines gradually widened out their positions and once more resumed their headlong forward plunge.

          Nilssen looked up, scanning the skies for some sign of the two big Track-Masters’ VTOL jets, and almost immediately spotted one of the bright red machines swinging over to his port side, high up ahead. He wondered if they had spotted the incident on the last bend. He was saved from any further doubt on this by Salvor breaking through noisily on the phones.

          ‘What the hell is he playing at, Jens?’ Salvor was almost shouting in indignation. ‘The b*****d nearly had you over.’

          ‘Easy on, Sal,’ Nilssen reassured him. ‘Just trying me out, that’s all. Relax, there’s a long way to go.’

          ‘Watch him!’ Salvor bit the words off abruptly and closed out.

          Back in the control bunker he let out a long sigh and relaxed limply against the board for a second. His trembling fingers found a tissue beside his wheelchair and he wiped his sweating palms.

          ‘God help him,’ he groaned softly, but whether he was praying for Nilssen or the German, he wasn’t even sure himself.

          It had been abundantly clear from the image on his screens, relayed from the multiple cameras aboard the track planes, that the German had thrown down his gauntlet and he knew that Nilssen would accept the challenge.

          The crowds, of course, would love it, for the cameras had also relayed the same picture, as they would continue to do throughout the race, to the huge view screens at the stadiums, and into the telesets of the millions who were watching from the comfort of their homes. Salvor knew they would be crying for blood now, and the commentator’s voice was screeching in excitement as he whipped up and multiplied their response in rising waves of mass hysteria. Salvor hated him, even though he knew this was the commentator’s job - precisely what he was paid for - but it still sickened him almost past bearing.

          Salvor listened from a moment longer to the high, tinny voice on the commentary intercom, then when he could stand it no longer, snapped the switch off. Sometimes the commentator’s viewpoints were useful in that they gave an added perspective on the pilot’s manoeuvres - but not today - not this game. This one was for real; with death as the price.

          Suddenly a red warning light flickered on the master board, but even as Salvor located it, Nilssen had picked up the EN impulse and his hands shot forward to correct the port side number two wheel beginning to shudder as a nearby vane went faulty. Nilssen trimmed the vane quickly and expertly and the shudder died away.

          He sighed and leaned back into the padded chair and wriggled slightly to ease the discomfort of the chafing pressure suit and safety straps and surveyed the endless black ribbon of road disappearing into the hazy horizon. He could afford to relax now, as this straight lasted almost to the Rio Grande River, close enough to the halfway point. He glanced around and noted that the other racers had spread out, but were still keeping a nearly level line. They were all conserving their energy and concentration for the latter and most dangerous part of the race. There was no point in remaining keyed up all the time and at this moment they were content to simply let the big machines run.

          Nilssen allowed the steady thunder of the Billhawk’s cruising noises to soak into him and for a few minutes enjoyed a peace of mind that bordered almost on serenity. He and the machine were one; a perfect working entity. His rhythmic checking glance slid off the instruments and wandered over to the endless desert scenery. He caught himself quickly and pulled his gaze straight ahead of him again. This was another, though less well known, danger. These oblique glances gave the pilot some indication of the truly awesome speeds they were moving at, but also had the tendency to disorientate the senses. With so much empathy between man and machine, the big racers would drift in exactly the direction of the pilot’s gaze and the next thing would be screaming machines, attempting to brake out of his path and the sudden dazed realisation of what was happening. Safer to watch the road and your instruments and occasionally, the other racers.

          Salvor was not enjoying the brief respite. His moody eyes flicked restlessly from screen to screen, to master board, to screen again. Something was wrong, but he couldn’t pinpoint it. He had encountered these feelings before and was too experienced to ignore them. Something was definitely wrong; but what? He surveyed the board again. It was all green, all the monitor gauges flickered serenely, well inside their safety limits. Nothing there. So where the hell was it? Damn, damn and double damn! He would find it eventually, he knew, but would it be in time? That was always the troubling question. Alright - just look it over again, it must be…

          ‘What’s up, Sal?’ Nilssen’s voice interrupted him softly.

          ‘Sorry, Jens,’ he apologised contritely and cursed softly under his breath. That was one of the faults of the E.N. hook-up, it also transmitted the Control’s general background worry, as well as specific warnings. It couldn’t be helped. There was no way of separating the complex mental patterns. The bad had to be endured with the good, regardless.

          ‘It’s nothing serious,’ he lied. He had to reassure his pilot as quickly as possible. Picking up his Control’s bad vibes could be distracting and out of all proportion to what was actually wrong.

          ‘I think I’ve got a touch of the jitters. There’s absolutely nothing visible from this end. Perfect green board and you’re going nicely. I’ll let you know if anything shows. So don’t worry about it.’

          ‘You got a trace, didn’t you,’ Nilssen’s voice was flat. It was a statement, not a question. Nilssen knew about these odd semi-psychic forewarnings as well as the other did. He had experienced them himself. Salvor almost groaned. Oh well, no use ducking it now. It would only serve to instil a little nagging doubt in the pilot’s mind that would continue to fester to the point of dividing his attention at some critical decision point. It could happen all too easily as the pilot began to wonder what the Control was picking up, and wouldn’t tell him. And, as quickly as that, the rapport would be gone - misread EN signals, hesitancy, wrong decisions, then the terrifying flash feedback of death.

          Salvor scanned the board again nervously. He had to say something. He started again hesitantly. ‘It’s nothing I can put my finger on yet. As I said, there’s absolutely nothing visible this end,’ and immediately picked up the backwash of relief as Nilssen sensed the truth of the words through the EN flow.

          He tried desperately to find words again and for the third time gazed blankly at the top left-hand screen. Now, why was he doing that? Some sort of nervous reflex pattern setting in, he thought in annoyance, and deliberately broke his gaze away and sat back. Even as he did so, his eye caught the tiny flicker of movement that had subconsciously been attracting him and abruptly riveted his attention back on the screen again. It was an up-ahead view with the lens zoomed to its limit and swaying slightly with the track plane’s movement.

          ‘Jens!’ he gasped in excitement. There it was again. But, what was it? So hard to interpret. There - and the racers were now creeping into view at the bottom of the screen. Suddenly he got it. A bird. It was fighting its way out of one of those unexpected, freak, desert gusts that seemed to blow up from nowhere. It was right at the edge of the track. Even as he screamed the warning, Nilssen had picked up the latent thought and was reacting in a blur of lightning movements, trimming, slowing and turning. When the gust hit, he was ready and the Billhawk simply drifted a few feet then settled down again.

          The other machines were less fortunate and there were a few moments of screeching chaos as the wind caught them and hurled them from side to side then Nilssen was out in front with a clear lead building up slowly.

          ‘Thanks, Sal,’ Nilssen’s sigh whispered through the little control bunker like a cool breeze washing all Salvor’s tension away.

          Back to business as usual.

          ‘Fine, Jens. You’re near the end of the straight. Second Bend coming up, twenty-two seconds to go. Remember, it looks deceptive from this end,’ and the haunting memory returned of his own crash on that precise spot resulting in injuries that even the present day surgeons’ remarkable skills had been unable to wholly cure. That, of course, was part of the reason he was such a good Control - he had been there and knew what it was like.

          ‘There’s a report just come in of some drift sand near the crown, your side. You might be able to make some use of it. Twelve seconds, and you’re going in fast. Stand by.’

          Fast as he was, there was another even faster. The German, who had recovered more quickly than the others, due to the extra space left by Nilssen’s prompt handling, was streaming up on his outside on full furious hi-thrust. He deliberately swung and skidded, then swung and skidded again, knowing Nilssen was watching. He swung yet again, overcorrecting wildly and then they were both into the bend. This was a trick the German boy had used effectively on his last Trans-Eur and with his usual arrogance he assumed that even if Nilssen had watched the race he still would not have understood the cleverness of this manoeuvre. So - he tightened his angle into the bend and allowed just a shade of skid again then quickly caught it.

          It was all just establishing the pattern and hopefully the American would add it to his list of worries. Unfortunately, the German thought happily, he had a far greater one due.

          As they swept up to the crown of the bend together, he swung in hard on Nilssen’s tail and smiled in satisfaction as he saw the other’s back beginning to weave in small panicky wags. Good! The idiot was nervous. He didn’t know what was coming next. He swung away for a second and on a huge surge of hi-thrust swung his nose back, right across the grey machine’s bows. That should do it. Wait! What was this? The American was not even moving. Instead, he was holding his line as steady as a rock and practically at the crown, his jets roared onto hi-thrust and he was surging out in front just as the German’s nose angling in, caught the backburn from the American jets. The German braked hastily and that was his undoing as the treacherous patch of sand refused to allow his wheels to grip. Then he was blinded. He couldn’t see through the sand thrown up by the other’s jets. Going out of control now. He fought the wheel and vane trims in an ecstasy of terror to somehow stop the wild, dangerous swaying while all the time the American’s jet streams were placidly frying him.

          Nilssen grinned with unholy glee, as he poured the Billhawk through the increasingly tight bend and watched the German’s discomfort on his rear view screen. Salvor’s laughter was also echoing happily in his ears and he finally saw the other drop back, still skidding helplessly up to the top of the bend and losing precious time and speed just staying on the track. The silly b*****d must have imagined he had never seen that trick before. Well, he’d be a bit more cautious next time.

          He glanced briefly at the rear view screens as he came out of the bend. The others had regrouped and were closing up behind him fast. The German, after getting his machine under control again, was well behind and labouring to catch up. Good!

          Third Bend came up and was passed without incident, the German keeping a more than respectful distance between himself and the other machines. Nilssen chuckled softly to himself at this. He was obviously having enough problems at the moment just maintaining his pace to think of any more clever tricks.

          Salvor came through. ‘Rio Grande coming up, Jens. One minute. Then Deacon’s Straight. You’re still holding to time well and there’s plenty of reserve fuel. Green board and everything looking good. Advance report states all conditions clear up ahead. Thirty seconds.’

          Nilssen strained his eyes up ahead and there it was, a thin silver ribbon stretching across his view. Difficult to make out at first, because of heat haze, then rapidly getting brighter as he approached. Then he was over, and it whipped away behind him with dizzy speed. He didn’t even have a chance to look at it.

          The next river lying far up ahead was the Pecos and between himself and it lay Deacon’s Straight, named in honour of the pilot killed in the first attempt at the sonic barrier. This was always the logical place for it. The track widened out at this point and ran straight as a rule to the far horizon with not a single deviation or rise in all its one hundred and fifty miles. Well, it was basically simple now, just point the nose directly forward and increase speed. Simple! Hell! This was the bit where no one had the faintest idea what would happen next. Nevertheless, he proceeded to do just that. He opened the throttles and the deep, muted thunder of the jets rose steadily to a throbbing angry roar.

          Nilssen glanced left and right at the other machines; slightly slower in making their bid, they were lagging well behind. An increasing feeling of loneliness grew over him as he realised he was strictly on his own from this point. Not even Salvor could really help him. None of the other Controls had ever been able to help their pilots at the critical time either. Everything depended on him alone now. The magic of his honed reflexes and the soundness of his own special theory would be all he could rely on to get him through. He prayed silently that it would be enough. He had a job to complete.

          In the bunker, Salvor sat white faced and silent, his whole body strained in instant readiness over the monitor panels. He watched, first on the big centre screen, showing the full panorama of the machines, not far below the camera’s eyes, beginning to pull away one by one as the speed increased. Jens was still leading, but only just. The German and the Englishman were also now picking up speed for the final rush, with Burns and the Kentuckian only slightly behind and in their turn, quickly increasing speed.

          ‘Six hundred and eighty - ninety - seven hundred - and ten - and twenty…’ He watched, dry mouthed. This was the point the troubles usually started.

          Nilssen was sweating freely as the Billhawk kept accelerating. There was another fierce surge as he ignited the afterburners. This was it. It would happen now or never. He kept his eyes fixed ahead and tried to see through the gradually increasing judder. The whole machine was beginning to rock and sway in an alarming fashion. Would it work? Could he time it right? There was no way to tell. Far away to his starboard side, he suddenly experienced, rather than heard, the dreadful screaming of tortured metal as the Englishman’s machine went foul and began to fantail in great, screaming arcs across the track. Nilssen gritted his teeth and held the Billhawk on course. There was almost nothing he could do now. Attempting to turn at this speed would just capsize him. Then there was a huge cloud of red dust as the Englishman’s machine finally went off the road and was lost to view.

          Nilssen couldn’t relax. The shudder and the swaying were getting worse than ever and he was fighting the controls every second of the way. Almost out of control, but still on the road. He would soon know. Straining his hand away from the wheel, he jabbed a finger onto the new vane panel and the retractable fins gradually began to slide out. For a moment he thought he had lost it, the whole machine went frantic and he simply had to hang on in grim desperation. Then it righted slightly and some small measure of life returned to the wet cement feel of the controls. NOW! He rammed his foot onto the afterburner mods pedal and the Billhawk slammed forward. His pressure suit inflated again and he was struggling uselessly with the stiffness of that as well as the wheel, when the shudder suddenly died. This was it. Steady now. Steady. His stiff, aching fingers found the forward vanes panel and he held them resting lightly over it. There was a sudden whipsaw of the nose and he over-corrected on the rudders. The Billhawk’s nose dived and he promptly punched the forward vanes. There was a huge jerk and the nose lifted again. The shudder died down and he knew the Billhawk was flying. Only a few inches from the ground, but still safe from that terrible air turbulence round the wheels. He had been right. He spared a look at the relative speed indicator. Seven hundred and ninety - eight hundred - and still climbing. He was doing it. His head swam in glorious exultation. Watch it though, this was no time to get cocky.

          Again, the whipsaw of the nose, but he was wiser now and he made no attempt to correct it on the rudders but pushed the trim panel again so the nose rose fractionally higher. Smooth again and still gaining speed. Eight hundred and sixty - seventy -  eighty…  It was fantastic. It was only then that he realised with a shock that he was through. He was already through the barrier and he hadn’t even noticed it. Everything was quiet apart from a sustained shrieking in his ears. He couldn’t make that out at first, till he realised it was Salvor’s exuberant yells of delight.

          He eased the Billhawk’s nose a trifle higher again and felt the increased smoothness. Another quick glance at the speed, then he blinked disbelievingly. Just over a thousand miles an hour. The Billhawk was perched happily in mid air, a few feet off the ground and cruising as smoothly as a Trans-Con jet.

          It couldn’t be. Yet it was happening. Nilssen had never envisaged this in his original plans. A quick brute force blast through the barrier and a bumpy, uneven landing on smoking wheels and another fight to bring the speed back to normal - oh yes - all that he had imagined, but not this perfectly quiet flight. He shook his head in amazement.

          Salvor’s voice came through on the phones. ‘What’s it like, Jens? You look as though you’re riding as soft as a sleeping baby in a doting mother’s pram. My God - everyone’s going crazy here. I’ve had to shut off all incoming calls. Anyway, at that speed, I wouldn’t risk coming down yet. Better damp it down a bit before you try it. None of the others even really tried, except for the Englishman, who went off - but he’s okay. The mad German had a go and nearly lost it in the process, but he’s alright now too.’ Again he laughed in sheer jubilation. ‘You took the heart out of them, babe. None of them are trying anymore.’ Then suddenly,

          ‘JENS…’

          There was a harsh cough from the portside engine nacelle and the Billhawk’s nose was attempting to rise, plunge, turn and cant all at the same time. Nilssen felt like he was simply punching trim buttons at random, till it finally came right. The Billhawk, although wobbling drunkenly, was still in the air, but the speed was dropping fast to the accompaniment of a steady racking cough from the portside engine.

          Salvor again urgently, ‘Jens, your port engine mods are in trouble and it looks like the starboard side is also going to overheat soon. Jesus, it built up so quickly, I didn’t even see it.’

          Nilssen knew he was apologising and cut him short. ‘That’s okay, Sal, but for Christ’s sake tell me when that starboard is due to pop. The speed’s well down now that I’ve cut off the afterburners, but still too high to risk bringing down yet.’

          ‘No telling, Jens - it’s right up to the red, but it’s holding that way. It could go anytime though, so start throttling back as quick as you can.’  

‘Right.’ In fact, he was already doing that, but the big machine felt as heavy as a stranded whale and was proving difficult and treacherous to keep on an even keel.

          ‘Six hundred and dropping fast, Jens. Just hold her like that.’

          Nilssen could hardly see through the sweat dripping into his eyes, but couldn’t spare a hand to wipe it off. Wobble - correct, wobble - correct, again and again, it was pure reflexes now - he wasn’t even conscious of what he was doing any more, just watching, hypnotised, as the track got closer and closer.

          A ripping scream, accompanied by a terrifying jolt and the front wheels made contact. He was slewing sideways - slewing - slewing - he was going to go off.

          ‘Get her nose up, Jens,’ Salvor screamed. Nilssen punched desperately at the forward trim panels. The nose again rose sluggishly and he was free for a second. Salvor rushed on, ‘Bring her down like a plane, Jens. Keep her nose up and let the rear wheels touch down first. Try it again, now.’

          There was a grinding roar and the machine shook in one massive crash as the rear wheels touched off great streams of black rubber smoke, followed immediately by the others. He was down and fighting hurriedly with the wheel and rudders to steady the machine. The Billhawk slowly began to right itself. Only then did he become aware of the intermittent cough from the starboard engine.

          ‘Sal, they’re both out now,’ he cried despairingly.

          ‘Hang on, Jens. I’m bypassing from this end.’ Salvor’s fingers moved frantically over the master board, hastily reconnecting circuits, adjusting, connecting and reconnecting, yet again. He spoke rapidly as he worked. ‘I’ve got an idea of what happened now. The special mods weren’t up to it. As a matter of fact, I’m not even sure they were ever necessary. With the new retractables and full thrust on the afterburners, you could probably have done just as well. Anyway, the damn things are totally burnt out and clogging your thrust. I’m shifting everything else out of the way and then I’ll blow them clear. The mod fixtures are explosive bolt type, so there shouldn’t be any problem. Ah! That does it. I’ve bypassed all the fuel connections to the mods and I’m arming the triggers now. Stand by.’

          Nilssen heard the twin explosions as one and immediately the dreadful coughing dropped to an occasional burp and the Billhawk slowly started regaining thrust.

          Salvor fought to keep his voice steady as he spoke into the microphone again.

          ‘Now listen, Jens. The position is this. Both mods are off now and from what I can make out, they are totally clear, but they may have left some damage behind, which I can only guess at. You’ll be able to get full thrust again soon, but I don’t know what will happen if you try the afterburners again. The safest thing is not to use them at all, if you can help it. They may be okay, or they may be rough - probably rough. If they are, then I’m warning you now that you might explode both engines. So, if you have to use them, for God’s sake, keep it as short as possible. I’m pumping as much coolant as I dare into that area, but that’s only a temporary makeshift, not a solution to the problem.’

          ‘Sal,’ Nilssen broke in agonisedly, ‘how long will they last as it is? I’ve got to know. I’ve got to know.’         

Salvor dropped his head and gazed at the board for a long moment, his vision blinking and doubling with the strain.

          ‘I don’t know, Jens, I just don’t know.’

          He paused again and then went on raggedly, ‘Look, it’s possible you can make it through to the end, if you really nurse her. You’ve still got a good lead in spite of dropping speed on touchdown. I…’ his voice broke suddenly, but he recovered himself and carried on more slowly.

          ‘There’s absolutely no way to tell at this stage. Things may become more obvious as you carry on. I might be able to spot any damage more accurately and do something about it, but there’s no guarantee of that. It just depends on what it is. The interior of the engine thrust tubes is still a spot where we’re almost completely blind. I can only work out what’s going on by inference from other signs - if I get the other signs.’ There was another slight pause then he went on pleadingly, ‘Jens, won’t you consider pulling out now. You’ve broken the barrier and there’ll be no disgrace in losing the race after that. Do it just once. Just this time. For me. I don’t want to…’ he choked off miserably and waited for the angry refusal that was sure to come back.

          Nilssen’s voice was surprisingly gentle when he answered.

          ‘Thanks, Sal. I think I know what you’re getting at. After Jenny died, there was just you and me. You’re all I have left to remind me of the good times. Remember that picnic we went on before…’ his voice faded for a moment, then came back again, almost immediately. There was no sound of distress in it; it was quite tranquil as he carried on deliberately. ‘You must have guessed by this time that I intend to Exercise my Option today. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before. I wanted to… but I couldn’t. Please understand, this is my chance to present my own personal bill to those swine; partly because of Jenny’s suicide, and partly for this whole filthy, stinking game. The game that crippled you for life, remember - and crippled me too, but in a different way. How many more will end up like us before they come to their senses and put a stop to this insanity?

          ‘I can’t give it up now. I just can’t. I’m sorry. Please understand and please forgive me.

          ‘I don’t know what else to say, except… I still need you. I need you more than ever now. Help me make it through to the end. That’s all I ask. I’ll let you know before it’s due, so you can disconnect in time. I promise you that. It’s the least I can do for you,’ he finished, and the ensuing silence dragged on.

          ‘Sal. Sal? Won’t you answer me?’

          Then slowly, ‘Alright, Jens.’

          He had known, of course. Even before the race started. Then the EN hook-up had almost totally confirmed it. But still, he had preferred to ignore it - hoping and hoping - but now that hope was gone. There was no point in resisting it anymore. He would also Exercise his Option in his own way at the moment that Nilssen did his.

          The decision brought him a strange kind of peace and released him from the struggle which had been going on subconsciously inside himself, leaving him free to concentrate on what he was doing.

          ‘Right,’ he cleared his throat and tried to go on as if nothing had happened.

          ‘Status report as follows. Your fuel is pretty down now. You used a lot going through the barrier and lost a lot afterwards while I was bypassing the mods. I think all the connections were okay, as there doesn’t seem to be much more loss. All you can do now is take it as easy as you can and hope for the best. I will add my prayers to yours and perhaps God will hear - and because I understand He is not a gambling man either, we will meantime take all possible precautions.’

          ‘Anything you say, Sal,’ Nilssen’s voice lightened with relief.

          ‘Good. Now open your reserve tank stopcocks to the fullest limit - just wind them right down. I’m going to pump all your fuel down to the bottom tanks, which will help stabilise you and at the same time get the bulk of the fuel as far away from the engines as possible. You’ll probably feel a bit nose heavy for a while, so you had better adjust your forward trimmings a bit to compensate. Don’t do it too soon though - I want you to keep everything as steady as possible while I’m doing the load transfer. Just note when the steering starts getting heavy and adjust your forward vanes accordingly. Got it?’

          ‘Got’cha. Reserve stopcocks fully open.’

          Nilssen glanced briefly at the scenery and saw he was now on the home stretch. The Pecos River was far behind him - he hadn’t even noticed it. His speed was well down and he didn’t want to use the afterburners just yet. There was a way round that though. Instead of adjusting all the trimming to keep the Billhawk down, he could lighten it. It was safe to do that as the speed and thrust were both down.

          He cautiously began trimming the vanes, set after set. The retractables were still out, so he increased their flight angle up a fraction more. The difference wasn’t immediately obvious but the Billhawk was nevertheless slowly gaining momentum again, even under the reduced thrust. Another thought occurred to him.

          ‘Sal!’

          ‘Yes, Jens?’

          ‘I had the throttles screwed well back when I came down. I’m going to open them up a bit. Keep an eye on the monitors and let me know the moment there’s any danger signals.’

          ‘Right. Do it slowly though, and keep her steady. I’m nearly through. The load is ninety per cent transferred. Thirty seconds about.’

          ‘Okay.’ He slowly started opening the throttles again. There was one brief cough from the portside engine, then it settled down again and the Billhawk started picking up more speed. It was none too soon, as a glance in his rear view screen showed the remaining racers catching up fast. Surprise, surprise -  there were only two machines.

          ‘Sal?’

          ‘Okay, Jens. All finished, and you’re still looking good. There’s still overheating of course, but not excessive so far. I’m managing to catch most of it with the coolant. I see you’ve lightened the trim a bit, that’s a good idea, but watch it, you might have to trim down again for the last bend.’

          ‘Yes, yes, okay. But what happened to the others?’ he broke in impatiently. ‘I can only see two in my rear screen.’

          ‘That’s right. Burns went out with engine trouble just after his attempt. Sorry, I should have told you. That just leaves the Kentuckian and that crazy German. Watch him, Jens. He’s been conserving everything he’s got and he’s gunning for you. It’ll be worse now that you’re…’

          Nilssen caught the EN warning just in time and slammed the back trim down as hard as he could. That was all he had time for as a ripping explosion in the portside engine lifted his back up and slewed the Billhawk sideways. He was fighting the wheel and rudders simultaneously, correcting the wild skidding as the other two machines cruised by on either side, giving him a wide berth in the process.

          His breathing was hard, tight and constricted, the blood pounding in his head. Oh God, was he going to lose it all now? He had to clench his sweating hands on the wheel to get any purchase at all. Abruptly, he grew angry with himself. No, he was damned if he would just give up, this close to the finish. It was… then even as the decision was made, control returned.

          Salvor came through excitedly. ‘It’s okay, Jens. It was part of the portside mod that hadn’t cleared completely. It’s gone now.’

          ‘Thank God!’ he sighed and wiped the sweat out of his eyes. ‘I saw you were pumping extra coolant up that side for a while. I should have guessed. Anyway, it’s running smoother now.’

          Nilssen squinted forward and saw the others slowly pulling away up front. He trimmed the rear vanes again.

          ‘Sal, I’m opening up to full throttle. How much load left? I can’t tell properly from here since you shifted it.’

          ‘You’re low, Jens, but not much more than you sometimes have been at this stage. Just take it easy, they’re low too, don’t forget.’

          The engine roar increased as the throttles opened up and the Billhawk surged forward. There was a lot of swaying due to the light trim, but he was just going to have to accept that. He deliberately loosened his grip on the wheel. No point in getting tense now.

          ‘Home rise coming up now, Jens. Twenty seconds.’

          Good, he would catch them on the down gradient on the other side. What the hell was that? As he watched, the red machine on his left went on to afterburn, the machine bursting forward as though released from a brake. The red machine, the red machine...?  Which one was that? For a moment his tired mind couldn’t remember. Oh God - it was the Kentuckian. What was the fool trying to do? Then suddenly he understood. He was going to use the upgrade to throw himself into the air at the critical moment and break the barrier - but he had no special vaning or retractable fins. It was stupid and suicidal.

          ‘No. Oh no, don’t. Don’t do it,’ he found himself whispering over and over again in numb horror as he strained his eyes up ahead.

          The Kentuckian was doing it. The machine rose up off the crest and poised in mid air for an endless, breath-taking moment, then slowly began to sink.

          Nilssen was on the crest then and hastily adjusting his trimming down on totally automatic reflex when he saw it happen.

          The red machine came down and made the same mistake he had made earlier, landing nose first. The rest was a confused blur. It touched down and the back slewed round and kept slewing. It became a high speed spinning-top and whirled across the track in front of the German machine, which braked and swerved. Then it was past and over the edge, disappearing in a mushrooming cloud of dust, followed by an earth-shaking crump and a huge gout of flame stabbed into the sky.

          Nilssen was also swerving to avoid the German when the backwash of the explosion caught him and both machines were thrown forward in the enormous wave of cascading air, turning their progress into a deadly dance to keep out of each other’s way.

          For a moment, it felt like he was going to go the same way as the Kentuckian as the Billhawk threatened to go into a total spin but, once more, by some miracle he managed to fight back onto an even course.

          ‘Final bend coming up, Jens.’ Salvor was screaming his fright right into his ears. The next thing Nilssen knew was that both machines were sweeping round to the nearside curve almost without volition. Nilssen found himself on the outside and hung on grimly to keep the Billhawk tucked in as tight as possible. No use, the German was pulling away fast on full thrust and cutting across in front as the bend opened up. Nilssen almost caught it too late as he swerved out of the German’s way, when the other went onto afterburn. That sort of back burning was illegal, but he was doing it anyway. The long tongues of jet gases licked out to double their length and washed for a terrible torch-blazing moment across Nilssen’s cockpit. Then he was out of it.

          He didn’t know if it was deliberate or not, but the rising fury of his anger would brook no further delay. His own afterburners caught with a jerk and in a second he was slashing up beside the German and started deliberately edging the Billhawk over, closing in tight on the other. For one brief revelling moment, he caught a glimpse of the other boy’s terrified face as he fought to pull ahead and avoid the lethal sideways nudging. The edge of the track was getting closer and closer. Finally his nerve broke and with a terrible screech his brakes caught and snatched him back. Nilssen wasn’t content with that. With a wolfish snarl he also braked and once again started pushing the other sideways, but to the other side this time. However, the slight reaction lag had been enough for the German and once again his afterburner flames leapt out and he forged quickly ahead.

          The end of the track was in sight; the huge walls apparently immobile but in reality moving ever more quickly as the gap closed. The German boy wasn’t interested in any more games. The race was a straight speed test for both machines now as they hurtled up to the diminishing gap. Closer and closer. The gap could be seen now. Nilssen was tempted to rub his straining eyes. God, it was narrow! Narrower than it had ever been. Those filthy, pig-swilling b******s, he thought. They must have fixed it. There was only room for one machine to go through, and the German still on a slight lead was arrowing towards it.

          They’d never make it. Nilssen knew it now, with heart-breaking certainty. Neither could brake in time, even with the aid of the giant drogue chutes, it was too late. One might get through but the other would crash. There was no way out. It just depended on whose nerve broke first. The German had a better line and it was too late to nudge him off it.

          A gust of wind caught the Billhawk and he frantically trimmed to avoid capsizing. In that split second the idea came to him fully fledged. His fingers punched the forward vane panel and almost as the machines reached the gap, he wrenched the nose up and, with a furious burst of the throttles, he was lifting steeply, floating, drifting slowly to the side, right over the other machine. Concrete walls! The gap!

          There was an ear-splitting crack as one of his rear vanes caught the very edge of the wall, and they were both through.

          The German stared up in disbelief at the huge machine hovering and wallowing above his head. Every detail of the underside was totally clear as though magnified, the enormous wheels still spinning. It was gradually drifting over him to one side. Only then did he realise what he had completely forgotten. He was now inside the stadiums and he hadn’t corrected his slight angle through the gap. He looked down just in time to see the side-wall snaking up beside him �" then everything went white.   Nilssen, calmly correcting and settling the Billhawk down, observed the endless scraping crash with complete detached composure. All his emotions were burnt out. He felt nothing any more, neither elation at his revenge, nor pity, nor anger. It just didn’t seem important.

          Almost in a dream he set the Billhawk’s wheels back down. The ensuing crash was remote from him, a thing apart. He corrected automatically as the screeching crowds flashed past him, waiting for his drogue chutes to split open, then gradually getting quieter as he sped towards the end of the stadium, blocking off the track, and still they hadn’t opened and there was no sign of the speed slackening.

          Nilssen was relaxed now, the steady coughing of the engines as they ran out of fuel he ignored. That didn’t matter either with the momentum he still had. Everything seemed to go into slow motion. The end stadium with its frozen mass of flesh crept up.

          ‘Okay, Sal! THIS IS IT! Goodbye…’        

          He wrenched the phone and EN leads out of the helmet and closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them again the end stadium wall was looming up. He started lifting the nose slightly and as soon as the forward vanes were set, his arm dropped tiredly to his side. That last effort had been nearly too much for him.

          His mind conjured a momentary glimpse of Salvor disconnecting his EN leads and bending his head to look at a small pill in his palm then the picture was gone. Nilssen unclenched his hands. He could rest now. Nothing more could happen -- but something did!

          A voice again; coming through on the phones. Whether it was real or imagined, he couldn’t tell. It was impossible, but it was there. A voice that was completely clear, rising above all the other sounds, noises, vibrations and his confusions. It was a pleading voice. It said:

          ‘No, Jens. It won’t do any good. Killing yourself and taking hundreds of innocents along with you won’t put an end to the insanity, it will only add to it. It won’t stop it. Your death will be for nothing. Living and speaking out is the only thing that will help. Please, don’t do it. There’s still time. For my sake - don’t do it!’

          The voice brought Nilssen out of his apathy with the galvanising effect of an electric shock. His eyes bulged in his head.

          It was not Salvor’s voice.

          It was Jenny’s voice in his head - he was sure of it.

          His head lolled back against the headrest and his mouth opened like a gaping wound as he screamed:

          ‘JE-N-N-Y-Y-Y!’

          Then, as the sea of faces swelled up in front of him, he was doing things. He didn’t know what he was doing, but his angle of vision altered strangely, as the faces tilted and careened around him.

          The Billhawk was in a tight screaming turn. Opposite propped retractables - the nose high up and flying once more - for the last time. A racking crash. A series of spine smashing jolts as the drogue chutes finally released and the monstrous machine gradually swayed to a stop, facing back the way it had come.

          Frozen and totally silent, the multitude looked down as the dust and smoke cleared to show a slumped, unconscious figure seen through the cockpit cover, his mouth still open in that last, raw-throated supplication.

          Salvor, staring at his screens, dropped the pill on the floor then slowly leaned back in his wheelchair and closed his eyes. It was over.

 

 

Copyright © GeorgeE 2020

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email: [email protected]

Author's Note

This story is not my own. I wrote it after my friend Lawrence M Nysschens had generously donated his brilliant original idea to me. He is also a prolific online writer of new and unusual social and political algorithms for today's society.
Sadly, this story has never been professionally published but I have had many favourable comments from indie readers. Hope you enjoy it.

Reviews

[GeorgeE]

Hi Margie
Thanks again for your very detailed and comprehensive review. Your reviews are always a joy to read because you take the trouble to read the story or poem, etc, and really understand it. Your comments are always insightful and encouraging. So, many thanks, yet again.
I am sorry to say I have not had the chance to read more of your own amazing writing for a while due to being busy wrestling with the completion stages of an adventure/thriller novel I am trying hard to finish this year, but I truly enjoy the work you have shared with us on this site and I promise I will spend more time doing so in the, hopefully, near future.
You are a lovely shining star in your own right/write.
Thanks again,
GeorgeE

[barleygirl]

This is a perfectly-written story. I find that I am a better writer than I am an originator of good writing ideas. I am often attracted to other writers who may not have the mechanics down as strongly as I do, but their imaginations are off the charts. I still believe this is YOUR story, even tho it's your friend's idea. There are 2 kinds of people -- those who love Nascar & those who couldn't care less about it. I fall into the latter category, so I admit to skimming thru about half your story. I was tuned in enuf to appreciate your flawless writing & imaginative combination of mostly reality with touches of fantasy. I admire how you convey a plethora of details with seeming authority . . . since I have an engineering background, I can say your details sound believable. But I'm not crazy about writing which belabors every single moment of the pathway thru the storyline. You do a great job of embellishing every single little thought & nuance. People who love this kind of writing will be in hog heaven. But for me, it just goes on & on a bit too much for my liking. To me, an action-based story should not have spent about 50% of the story just getting to where there are the teensiest beginnings of action! But that's just my opinion. Tons of readers love this kind of writing exactly becuz it's never-ending. It's the people who have the patience to watch cars go round-n-round-n-round-n-round a track for hours, finding a ton of drama & excitement in every little detail of what's going on . . . those are the people who will love this story! *wink! wink!* I really do envy you your ability to pack a story with a ton of details, even if it's not my particular passion (((HUGS))) Fondly, Margie