Throttle Ten

Diana shifted in the seat, then stood. That required that she watch where she put her feet. The cockpit wasn’t exactly designed with safety in mind, and there were pipes and control rods running along the floor of it. “Right,” she said.

“What is right?” Ahvie asked.

Diana grinned. The little alien had a difficult time climbing onto her own ship. It mostly involved a few ladders with hooks on the end that could fit into slots on the ship’s exterior hull. Whether the slots were there on purpose or not wasn’t something Diana had figured out yet, but it worked well enough that Ahvie could move over the whole ship without too much issue.

“I think that’s it for the pre-preflight check,” Diana said.

“Ahvie understands,” she said. “Do you know when ChaOS will return? He might be lost.”

Diana looked around. She was tall enough, standing atop the ship, to see across the entire garage space. She could only see into a few of the tarped-off enclosures around them, but what she saw mostly gave her some good vibes.

The other ships were just as rusty and ugly as the Scrap Rocket. Some had painted their ships in offensively bright colours, but that didn’t hide the terrible welds and shoddy work that went into the ships she did see.

Aliens that she presumed were mechanics and pilots were rushing about, and the air kept filling with the sizzle-crack of welding as some aliens desperately tried to fix their ships.

“I can’t see ChaOS anywhere,” she said.

“Ahvie is a little worried. It would be easy to get lost for someone unfamiliar with the place.”

“Are you familiar with it?” Diana asked. She wasn’t worried herself. ChaOS had enough armaments on him to wipe the room clean, and she doubted that an AI that could pinpoint the trajectory of a speck of dust in empty space from a quarter lightyear away would get lost, even in a place as chaotic as the garage.

“Ahvie hasn’t participated in any other races, no,” Ahvie admitted. “But Ahvie has seen a race like this before.”

“Really?” Diana asked. “Where?”

“On a planet called the Blue Mug. Do you know it?” Diana shook her head, and Ahvie went on. “Ahvie was young. She went with all the children from her clan. Terrible seats, far from everything, but Ahvie still remembers it well. It was fun.”

Diana grinned. “I remember my first race, too. It was on Earth, that’s my home planet. Just a plain classic race. Fuel-burning cars so loud we had to wear protection not to lose our hearing. They were fast. So fast. Just blurs passing by on the other side of a shield-wall. I loved it.”

“It’s exciting.” Ahvie nodded. “Are you going to look for your friend?”

Diana shrugged a shoulder, then jumped off the side of the ship. She landed on one of the winglets and slid down to the ground. “I’ll just be poking around. Call me if anything happens.”

Ahvie waved a spanner at her, then went back to fiddling with some hoses that were loose behind the cockpit.

Stepping out of their little enclosure, Diana looked around to try and spot ChaOS’s large frame, but she didn’t see the AI’s droid body. Her eyes unfocused for a moment, and she opened a channel directly to him. “Hey, you alright?”

“I am currently dealing with an obscure and foolhardy bureaucratic system, Mistress. I am enjoying myself.”

“I can imagine,” Diana said.

“Excuse me?”

Diana turned, then blinked at the figure that had addressed her. It was an alien, one with a slight form, in a well-tailored (at least as far as Diana could tell) space-suit with long lapels and a frock-like piece of cloth at the front. Its high collar framed a furry, fox-like visage with cunning eyes and long whiskers squished into a glass half-mask. “Yes?” Diana asked.

“Oh, that’s not Federation Standard,” the alien said.

Diana winced. Her translation device was translating the alien’s words in English for her, but not the other way around. She made a ‘one moment’ gesture, then thought at her augmentations so that she could access her options. She didn’t have much tech on her, not if it meant breaking the rules of the race, but she did have a few handy little things.

“Hello,” Diana said.

At least, she hoped that’s what she said. She was reading a phonetic translation of what she wanted to say, and she was a racer, not a singer or narrator.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“So, you can speak Federation Standard. Sorry, I’m Cynie, ktacha, female, with Rogue Racer Intergalactic,” the alien said. “Are you one of the participants in today’s race?”

“Yes, I am. I am Diana. Uh, human woman from Earth.” Diana said. “What’s… Rogue Racer Intergalactic?”

The little alien stared, eyes going wide for a moment before they narrowed dangerously. “You’ve never heard of us? We’re the single greatest racing-related news organization in and out of Federation space.”

“That’s nice,” Diana said a little haltingly. “I don’t keep up with the news a lot. You’re here for the Overflow Cup?”

“Of course I am,” she said. The fox-alien looked a little frustrated to Diana. “It’s a small-time race, but it’s the only one worth covering today. There are bigger, better races tomorrow and the day after.”

“Bigger races?” Diana asked.

“The Overflow Cup is a small-fry race,” Cynie said. “I’m fairly new with the company, so they sent me to cover it. Actually, I guess getting a soundbite from some random participant wouldn’t be bad.”

“Sure,” Diana said.

“Nothing big. Don’t expect to become some celebrity on whatever backwater planet you’re from. Just a quick couple of questions, then I need to find the sentients who are likely to win this thing.”

Diana grinned. “Just ask your questions.”

The alien reached into her pockets then pulled out a small drone that she tossed into the air. It circled around them twice while she pulled out a small device that reminded Diana of a smartphone, then fiddled with the controls on it for a moment. “Can you repeat your name and origin planet? Maybe tell us a little about yourself?”

Diana grinned. “I’m Diana Danger Slowbane, of the Sol system. I’m a human woman, twenty-nine years old. I’m the best pilot ever.”

Cynie stared. “That’s a bold claim. What’s the best pilot ever doing at the Overflow Cup today?”

“I’m here to win, of course.”

“Is this your first time participating in the Overflow Cup?” Cynie asked.

“It is, yes,” Diana said. “My first race in Federation space. I look forward to it.”

“I look forward to seeing you race as well. You’re very confident in yourself. Are you alone onboard your ship?”

Diana shook her head. “No, it’s me and Ahvie. She’s a very nice mirian who’s a good mechanic. I just fly, she’s there to keep the ship running.”

“No gunners?”

Diana grinned. “If you’re good enough at racing, you don’t need to worry about fighting your competition. They’ll all be far behind you anyway.”

Cynie made a sound that Diana decided to interpret as a laugh. Her translation software had no idea what it meant. “That’s one way of looking at it. What about the accusations that Krison and other previous winners of the Overflow Cup have given themselves a step up in the race? They’re reusing previous ships, and have had a lot more time to practise.”

“That will make it a lot more humiliating when they lose,” Diana said. Having competition that had a head start on her wasn’t entirely new. She’d manage.

Cynie tapped a few buttons, and her camera drone flitted back into her hand. “Thanks for that. It’ll actually make for some decent video filler. Or maybe I can use it as an obituary segment if you die on the track. Some people eat that up.”

“Wow, thank you,” Diana said.

“You’re the one with the unwarranted confidence,” Cynie pointed out.

“How do you know that I’m not the best?” Diana asked.

“Because if you were, then it would be my business to know. But I don’t know you, so you’re not. Still, I do hope you live, and maybe even place well.” The fox-alien scratched the side of her muzzle. “If you do place well, send me a comm ping. There are bigger, better races out there. They could use a few confident new pilots. But don’t call me if you scrape by at the bottom; I’m not interested in losers.”

Diana chuckled. “We’ll see. Maybe you’ll be the one calling me after my spectacular win?”

Cynie cackled again and started walking off. “You wish,” she said.

Diana waved at her, but the alien was already focused on something else. “Nice folk around here,” Diana muttered to herself. Still, she couldn’t keep the smile off her face. She was excited. Excited in a way she hadn’t been since… a while.

***