‘It’s like an accident: You just cannot turn your head away!’ Alec thought as he watched Apex’s security personnel carefully taking Hopewing out of his ship, while his camera drone was filming the whole incident.
“Well, it probably is an accident…” he mumbled, still sitting in the PTV together with Mr. Nelson and Robin Tulward.
“Yeah, it is.” The latter confirmed, “A pretty nasty one, if I have to say so.”
“Oh, you know what had happened to him?” Alec asked a bit skeptically and noticed the Apex official to his other side nervously shuffling around.
“Probably some kind of malfunction of his ship that wounded his arms.” The man chimed in.
“No, I don’t think so,” The young pilot brushed it aside, “Those burns are coming from overstimulating his nerves. With my mutation I could see it a bit better, but now, with his wounds wide open, you can see the bio-technological enhancements that are attached to his muscles with the naked eye. There probably was an overcharge while his system was flooded with external energy. But he is rapidly healing already, he should be fine in no time. At least we now know his mutation's general alignment!”
“Those are some heavy accusations you are making there, Mr. Tulward!” Bart Nelson shot back in a cold voice.
‘Wait, what are they talking about?’ Alec didn’t quite catch up yet, but something definitely was off.
“What accusations? Wait a moment - would it be illegal to have an external system control one’s movements to enhance motor skills?” Robin exclaimed in obvious fake shock.
“That can’t be, I didn’t know! No worries, Mr. Nelson, even if he had worked outside the rules, these body modifications would be really hard to detect without knowing what to look for. No one will address reproaches to Apex - you couldn’t possibly have known that.”
Alec just sat there between the two men that were talking back and forth. Only when he saw that they seemed to have come to some kind of silent agreement, with both giving polite nods, did he have the mind to process what he had just heard.
“No way…Hopewing was cheating?” He mumbled in flabbergasted, “That… that… oh fuck!”
“Mr. Boosalis, please don’t draw conclusions too early. Apex will give this incident a deep inspection and make sure that everything gets clarified.” Bart Nelson calmed him down, while Robin just kept quiet.
Collecting himself a bit, the reporter immediately activated his Interface and dived into his video. He fast-forwarded to the moment where Hopewing could be seen through the open canopy of the ship and zoomed in on his bloody arms.
There it was, he could see metal glistening through the blood - Hopewing definitely had implants in his arms!
‘Holy shit, this is big…really big! I have to send the video back to Rucasur before Apex can demand its deletion.’ Alec began to sweat and immediately started the upload.
‘This will be my promotion!’
***
It didn’t take long for the story to hit the media. Alec's video was sent to the office of his sports channel and specialists immediately began to analyze the recording. Meanwhile first news leaked that Hopewing was challenged by Niu Alaris and apparently had lost while he even sustained critical injuries.
Apex used this short window of opportunity, before the video was finally evaluated and the cheating exposed, to do some damage control. They stormed the room in the office building, where Robin and Jim broke in before, and found the still unconscious Mohait, Jeralop, lying on the floor. When the poor dude woke up a few hours later, he was already on a ship back to Rucasur and charges were brought up, painting him as the main, and only, accomplice of Hopewing’s fraud.
Mr. Nelson had a short, private meeting with Niu and Robin, in which he explained that Apex definitely didn't know of any of this and wanted to make sure their version would tell the same story. For Niu and Robin this was perfect, as Apex would try to keep the damage as small as possible and continue with the AHC as if nothing had happened. All they had to do was keep their mouths shut.
Of course, Apex definitely made sure that they understood how pissed they were. But there was only so much Apex could do. If the company would begin to mistreat the two pilots, they could go straight to the media and tell the whole story. It wasn't worth the hassle for Apex. As such, a silent agreement was made and Hopewing quickly declared the scapegoat.
As he was in the infirmary recuperating, he didn't publicly show up. Not that Apex would have let him give some interview for the media, even if he had been available.
In the evening Mr. Nelson gave a press conference and explained all the sad circumstances and expressed his deep shock at the betrayal of one of their biggest partners. Boosalis’ channel was kind enough to hold back the release of their footage until after the Apex's announcement was done.
After that, there was a shockwave going through the whole Mereus Cluster. Not only was there an uproar from Hopewing’s fans, most were disappointed but some accused the officials of spreading fake-news, there was also quite the impact in the gambling industry.
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As the most famous racing pilot of this era, Hopewing’s ranking was often part of any kind of bet. Now questions were asked about the validity of these bets…loud questions.
Niu was unofficially declared as the hero of this drama, as she brought down the mighty evil. She got quite some points in the good books of her family, buying her a few more calm years without them pressuring her too much.
Robin got little attention and was mostly mentioned as Niu’s student. Him getting so far in his first tournament gained her even more credit in the public eye. He was happy with this arrangement since he had little interest in becoming famous overnight. That would only complicate his plans for the finals.
***
When night came, after this eventful day, Robin returned tired and exhausted to his room.
Today has already been crazy, but tomorrow will be his big day. Finally his chance came to uncover a new Drel outpost, a well of knowledge and fortune for humanity.
“With so much stuff going on right now and throwing my mind in tumult, I have no idea how I should be able to get a good ranking tomorrow.” He sighed and sat down on the couch.
“Lucky me, I have other plans to follow!” Robin chuckled but suddenly was interrupted by an incoming call. Seeing the unknown contact, he had a good guess who it was.
He took a breath and sent a quick prayer to whoever might listen - let’s hope these maniacs are satisfied and don’t try to be a dick now. He accepted the call and immediately recognized the voice on the other side.
“Mr. Tulward, it’s good you are free for a talk on such a short notice! I’ve to say, I was quite elated when I watched the news today.” Hash cheerfully laughed.
“Great, I’m happy to have fulfilled my part of the deal. I hope you will do the same?” Robin didn’t even try to play games and got directly to the point.
“Not in the mood for chit chat? Well, fine for me.” The priest reigned in his emotions and continued, “You have done your part and I speak for the community when I express our gratitude.”
“Uhh.. okay, great. Then…have a nice day!” Robin was about to end the call, finally able to close this damn chapter.
“Ah wait a moment, Mr. Tulward!” Hash stopped him, “People with your mutation and skill are rare, the Great One blessed you with a valuable gift. Why don’t we stay in contact? We’re still looking into the explosion in Beakrath that destroyed our ship and every now and then are in need of someone with your talents. What do you think?”
‘Ughh…’ Robin suppressed a sigh, he really wanted to cut ties with these damn zealots as fast as possible. But then again, he was on the best way of leaving Rucasur, so why not use these last days to stock up ‘hard to acquire’ tech?
“Sure, you already have my contacts, just send me yours and maybe we'll come together for further cooperation later.”
“Glad to hear, may you continue to follow the Great One’s path down to your enlightenment!” Hash fell into some kind of preacher-mode and Robin quickly ended the call before he slipped up and said something about imaginary techno-gods, people that force others into submission to their beliefs or religions as a whole, that he couldn’t take back.
Taking another deep breath, he checked the Cetro and TechnoBlood from his list of worries for now and remembered something else.
“I should prepare the Melody. Just in case there isn't enough time later, before the race, without someone watching me.”
Crawling back up from his comfy seat, he made his way towards the hangar. It was late in the evening but it had been a busy day. No one would judge him if he visited his ship before going to bed.
When he entered the hangar, he heard people talking. Was someone else also making his last minute preparations?
He looked around and quickly spotted two figures standing near the Melody. The bigger one didn't notice Robin's approach and pestered the smaller man beside him.
“...just for a moment! Come on, you came through this unscathed. The least you could do now is help me to pay back that little fucker!”
Someone wanted to tinker with his ship? What the hell was going on? Not really thinking this through, he immediately began to curse loudly.
“You wanna mess up my ship? What the fuck is your problem, dude?” Robin shouted angrily. They wanted to manipulate the Melody? Holy.. good he stopped by.
“Ah, the little pup came. Well that's fine, too. I'll give you a taste of what I'm going through right now!” The man snarled and pulled an energy weapon out of his jacket while turning around to face Robin.
“Hopewing?” Robin exclaimed after recognizing him, “Shit! What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be lying on some bed and recovering from your wounds?”
“You damn asshole, it was you who dragged me down, wasn't it? Together with that bitch from the Alaris family…could never stand her always fucking smiling face. ‘Happy’… ‘tsk!”
Robin only listened with half an ear as he was concentrating on his mutation to observe the gun that was pointed at him. It wasn't powered yet…
“Mate, I have no idea what you are talking about. But to be fair, the only one who dragged you anywhere, is you. Why the hell did you even need those bio-techs? You should be quite the decent pilot even without them, right?” He stealthily threw some glances around to find a cover nearby or a route to flee.
“Decent? Of course! But ‘decent’ is not enough if you wanna fly in the real races and not only these back-alley rubble here in the Mereus Cluster. The real deal is taking place in the center of the Pranum Expanse!” Hopewing began to huff and his hands to shake. Robin could see the still open wounds on his arms, even though they were way better than he had expected. This only confirmed his suspicions that Hopewing must have some kind of fast-healing G-Anomaly.
The other guy, a staff member of Apex Robin assumed, slowly shuffled back and tried to fade into the background.
“I was so close to fulfilling my dream, flying against the best of the best… You took everything from me! You Fucking SHIT!” Hopewing began to yell and Robin saw the gun powering up. He only had a blink of moment to decide what to do… run and look for help or stay and fight?
‘His arms are still looking quite bad, he is unstable and shaking, there is a lot of cover for me and … I really wanna kick this guy's ass!’
Not waiting any longer, Robin jumped behind a big cargo container before the gun was even ready.
‘He's literally crippled right now, that's my best chance!’ He thought and began to make a plan.