Excerpt
Excerpt from "Detonation Boulevard" by Alastair Reynolds
The start lights came on in sequence. I pressed down on the throttle, the force-feedback from my new legs just a fraction off, but not so much that it was going to throw my race. Traction power flowed from the car's nuclear reactor to my wheels. They strained against supercooled ceramic brakes, the entire vehicle rocking like a theme-park pirate ship. Temperature dials needled into the red on my console.
The car was a beast. It hated standing still.
"Race watchers!" bellowed the commentator. "The course is open! The down-ramp is lowered! The drivers are set, their cars at launch power! Who will cross the finish line first after circumnavigating Io, some sixty hours from now? Zimmer and Catling lead the grid, and all eyes will surely be on their races, but we must still talk about Shogi, looking to go wheel-to-wheel against Mossmann in the Black Shadow. Denied the cup at Callisto after a cooling circuit blowout, the redoubtable Shogi…'
I tuned out the babble and concentrated on my launch. The interval between the fourth and fifth lights always seemed an eternity… and yet there was only room in it for one or two heartbeats.
Five lights.
No lights. And… everything flowed, slow and fast in the same impossible instant. Cars were moving. I saw them all, picked up in mirrors and direct video feeds. A line of huge colourful machines gathering speed like boulders sliding down a mountainside. I studied Zimmer's wheels, looking for a trace of slip against the greasy surface of the grid. Nothing. The bastard had a perfect launch, clean on the throttle. I resisted the urge to gun it, applying smoothly rising power, letting the car find its own grip.
There was no overtaking down the long start straight, and no one stupid enough to attempt it. Speed mounted: one hundred kilometres per hour, two hundred, three hundred. The grandstands became a silent blur of light and tiny faces. The cars were barrelling down a long enclosed tunnel, metal grid below and floods above, premium advertising banners chasing hard on their tails.
All very sterile, all very corporate and controlled. But things would be getting real and dirty very quickly.
Ahead, coming up fast – the Bellatrix Beta was nudging three hundred and fifty kilometres per hour – was a steep down-ramp. Zimmer hit it first, momentum carrying him over the lip, his car following a shallow parabola until it re-engaged with the sloping road.
I eased off just before the transition, keeping all wheels in contact and maintaining my slow but steady acceleration. I fell behind Zimmer, then caught up again as his car bogged down and struggled with traction.
"Rookie error, Zim."
His answer crackled back, his voice juddery with vibration. "You've made enough to know one."
"Oh, the burn!" I shot back.
Joff would be shaking his head about now, telling me to focus on the race, not mind-games.
Zimmer was first down, but only just. I was at his side, less than a third of a car's length from the bulbous nose of the Imperator Six. Now those monster wheels really came into their own, biting into the Ionian crust. I put all power down, red-lining the motors. The huge structure of the grandstand and starting grid fell behind, blurred in the plumes of dust and gas rising behind our cars. The opening leg was relatively flat and level: I could go all-out without risking damage to the tyres, wheels, or suspension.
So could Zimmer, though. His car was no faster than mine, but because he was slightly ahead, he could choose the racing line. He knew this moon like it was his private racetrack. He could pick and choose his course, gunning for the areas of crust where his instincts promised a tiny but crucial advantage.
The only winning condition was this: end up back at Ruwa Patera, after a complete circumnavigation. Twelve thousand kilometres, give or take. Sixty hours, at the average winning speed. Fifty-seven was the course record, set by Chertoff. No one had got close to that since.
Chertoff wouldn't be trying. Hard to race in a lead-lined coffin.
