Prime Condition

[Jacques (DELETED 6254)]

Diagnostics show green across the board.
The Dynamo test came back excellent.
The onboard computer didn’t report any problems whatsoever…

…so what the hell is wrong with you, baby? Talk to me, show me the problem. You know I can make you sing again, I just need to figure out this little hiccup. Just give me a little hint and a little time, and I’ll have you right as rain.

He sighed, passing his hands along the hood as he listened to the engine’s purr. The sound was wrong. The vibration was wrong. Something was very off, and he was having the hardest time pinpointing what was going on. The complex engineering of the Skyline had never given him so much issue. He had always been able to identify any kind of problem and fix it right away, so this quagmire had him lost, trudging through doubt and worry. He had to figure it out before he would race again, and the next circuit started that night.

He sighed, and popped the hood again, lifting the heavy slab of fiberglass and hooking it into the prop that kept it aloft. His sharp, expert eyes moved over the trembling engine, watching its powerful motions and taking everything in, looking for anything out of place or unusual; something that didn’t belong.

Nothing. I still can’t see anything wrong, but I just know it is… I can feel it.

He slammed his palms against the fender and pushed himself back in disgust. He shoved his hands through his blonde locks and twisted his fingers into the strands, pulling them taut. “****, why can’t I figure this out?” he snapped at himself, and pressed his palms against his skull, squeezing his head as he fought against the headache this worrying was bringing on. It was impossible. There was either something so wrong here that even he couldn’t figure it out, or there was nothing wrong at all, and he was imagining the whole thing. Either possibility was driving him absolutely mad.

He hefted the hood and replaced the prop to its latch, locking it in place as he dropped the hood with a lout bang that filled the garage. He exhaled, letting all of his air leave him in a long, powerful rush before he turned away from the car, unable to look at it again.

Maybe it was something he wasn’t seeing. Maybe it wasn’t something that could be seen. Maybe it was…

He turned, and looked at the car again, shaking his head. As he moved to step around the car, he paused, and saw a cable harness unhooked and hanging freely from the frame, beneath the door. He took a long moment, staring at the cable before he leaned down, kneeling into the floor and taking it in his hand, reaching beneath the car and clipping it back into place. Immediately, the off vibrations, the strange, alien trembles that had plagued the car all day vanished. He frowned sharply and lifted his head, looking around.

He was alone. Thank god he was alone.

No one would ever know about this. He slapped the heel of his palm into his brow, and shook his head with a laugh. “So stupid… of course…”

Now, he was ready.

[Jacques (DELETED 6254)]

The Skyline was in top form, now. He’d taken the car for a test drive that evening, to be sure that the disconnected wire had been all that he’d needed to worry about, and after all of the tweaking and adjusting, that he hadn’t messed anything up. As he drove, he decided that the machine was performing better now than it ever had. Easily. The engine had bellowed a roar of fury and power like never before, the needle shooting through numbers faster than he’d ever seen it. He only hoped that the pristine condition of his settings would hold out through the race that night.

The first race of the circuit was still hours away, his car taken care of, tested, and ready, all that was left to him was the wait. He sighed, and shook his wrist, checking the time on his Tag Heuer Aquaracer watch, the sapphire face glinting in the sharp light of the overhead he was standing beneath in the garage bay of his car. He resisted the urge to tap its glass, a habit he’d picked up with older, cheaper watches a long time ago. His mother had bought him this watch, a gift for his success in their racing endeavors, and an incentive for continuing his education.

His education.

He needed to get that under control, before it was too late, before he’d been out of the classroom for too long, and had settled into a routine that didn’t involve listening to some old man or haughty woman telling him how little he knew, while showcasing how little they knew. But how was he supposed to do something like that now? Night classes, maybe, but would the local university even offer those? If they did, how good were they? Did they offer the classes he would need for… what?

He didn’t even know, exactly, what he would do with a degree, anyway. He would have a mighty expensive piece of paper, saying that he knew plenty about design, but what would that do for him, if he couldn’t walk through a sunny courtyard to get to work? If he couldn’t meet anyone during business hours, how was he supposed to do anything with himself? He would have to figure all of this out. Maybe he would need to get an email out to admissions about his failure to show up to his first year after spending so much effort and money in transferring all the way out here. He did know that the university had been excited to have him.

Aerospace engineering and auto mechanics. He was pretty advanced in both, by now. That much, he had his mom to thank for. She had such a hard break in her life, rising out of nothing, literally, to become what she was now. He didn’t have that kind of strength, he was certain of that. She’d been thrown out of her own home, by her own father… he didn’t even know how anyone could do that to anyone, but especially to her. She was so kind, and cared about everyone so deeply, he didn’t see how anyone could live with themselves, forcing her into the streets.

But she had found her own way, and had paved a way for him. It was stupid to let all of her hard work just go to waste. He knew that, and deep down, he hated that she had to see everything she had worked for go to the wayside for so long. Every time he could feel his desire to go back to school begin to flag, he would think about that, about all of the sacrifices she had made to see to it that he was given every chance, every edge that was available to him. He was smart, thanks to her diligence in his studies, her constant pushing and helping with his problems when he ran into something he didn’t understand. The way she had nurtured a real desire inside of him to grown and learn… he couldn’t think on any one time she had really done something like that, but he just knew that everything he was, he owed to her.

He would have to make it up to her. Somehow. She had practically anything she could want, he already knew. So the only thing he could give her, that she didn’t already have, was something better for himself. He knew Rain would approve. At least, he hoped she would. School was a commitment, and a time sink that was like to drain his focus and attention. He was likely going to have to spread his racing thin, and that wouldn’t really do well for his savings. No winning meant no income. Though, he thought, there will always be weekends. He can keep his racing career and still get an education. He just wouldn’t be able to race as often as he had.

He would miss it, he knew, but it was going to be worth it. With school, he could learn more about the cars than he could with just tinkering and adjusting. He could really start to understand the math behind it all, to figure out how to make his own parts, his own mods. Maybe even his own car, one day.

That made him smile.

He shook his head and wiped grease from his hands on the oil rag before tossing it into the barrel of used rags. Soon, the competition would be pouring into the garage from all around town; some of them even from out of town. There were way too many of them to hide in so small a town all the time, but to spread out across the surrounding countryside, or the cities and towns still large enough to have the right kinds of places to hide out. Some of them even stayed behind in Quebec, but they were still a crew, and they still drove down to Harper Rock to see them.

Honestly, he couldn’t wait to see who did decide to show up.