Department to investigate the faulty parts, only to return an hour later, fuming.
‘Stupid greasy punk. The desk guy just waved me away,’ she growled. ‘Said “Sorry, honey, that’s how it goes. Sometimes you just get a dodgy mag or two.” Honey? Honey! So I told him we got six dodgy mags in one race and he just shrugged and stared at me. It was like talking to an Easter Island statue.’
Their mentor, Scott Syracuse, offered little sympathy.
It didn’t help that their stablemates under Syracuse - Wong and Washington - were in the top five on the ladder and performing well in the same races, and experiencing no technical problems at all.
It made Jason appear simply unlucky, or worse, just not good enough.
The beautiful Ariel Piper was having similar problems - with magneto drives and faulty parts. After her near-catastrophic experience in Race 1 caused by a virus in her pit computer, she had installed a new firewall which seemed to have stemmed that problem. She was currently in 12th place - solid but unspectacular for the first girl to attend the Race School.
In any case, a key feature of the School’s racing season was fast approaching and it was particularly troubling Jason.
The mid-season Sponsors’ Event - a feature race held in front of the School’s sponsors, benefactors and famous exstudents - would be held after Race 25, and it was only open to those students who had won a race during the season.
The Sponsors’ Event was a huge opportunity to perform in front of some of the major players in the pro racing world. The thing was: Jason hadn’t yet won a race, and with 15 races already down, he was fast running out of races to win.
Either way, it was time to address his team’s problems. It was time to go to the source of all the depleted drives, thinned coolants and faulty parts.
The Race School’s Parts and Equipment Department.
CHAPTER TWO
The International Race School’s Parts and Equipment Department was housed inside a gigantic warehouse behind Pit Lane near the banks of the Derwent River.
It was a colossal structure, so big in fact that the School had built a glorious silver grandstand on top of it, giving a superb view of the main finishing straight.
On a rare spare afternoon, Jason, the Bug and Sally McDuff came to the student entrance, opened it - just as a stocky bull-necked youth with a bristly shaved head emerged from the Department.
Sally watched him go with interest.
‘Do you know who that was?’ she said.
Jason squinted after the bull-necked youth. ‘No. Who?’
‘His name is Oliver Koch. He is Xavier Xonora’s Mech Chief.’
‘Is that so?’
They entered the Parts Department, came to the service desk that separated visitors from the cavernous interior of the warehouse. The gritty odours of grease, rubber and coolant pervaded the air.
They were met by a weasel-faced young man named Wernold Smythe. Smythe lazily wiped his grease-covered hands on a rag. He was about 26, laid back, and creepy.
‘Can I help you?’ he asked, wedging the rag into one of the low-slung hip pockets on his overalls.
‘Yes. I’m Jason Chaser. Team Argonaut . We’ve been having some problems with equipment coming out of the Department. Mags which aren’t fully powered up, thinned coolant.’
‘You didn’t get faulty mags from here,’ Smythe said quickly. ‘Doesn’t happen.’
‘But we did. Our mags were only 10 per cent charged.’
Smythe leaned forward. ‘No, you didn’t . Every mag that goes out of here is electro-checked on the way out.’
Smythe jerked his chin at Sally McDuff. ‘Maybe your Mech Chief screwed up; left ‘em too close to a powerdrain source, like a portable pit machine generator or a microwave transmitter.’
Sally growled. ‘I’d never leave a magneto drive next to a microwave transmi - ‘
‘It’s happened before.’ Smythe shrugged. ‘As for coolant. We hand it out in the original manufacturer’s bottles, with the seals intact. I got some
‘Stupid greasy punk. The desk guy just waved me away,’ she growled. ‘Said “Sorry, honey, that’s how it goes. Sometimes you just get a dodgy mag or two.” Honey? Honey! So I told him we got six dodgy mags in one race and he just shrugged and stared at me. It was like talking to an Easter Island statue.’
Their mentor, Scott Syracuse, offered little sympathy.
It didn’t help that their stablemates under Syracuse - Wong and Washington - were in the top five on the ladder and performing well in the same races, and experiencing no technical problems at all.
It made Jason appear simply unlucky, or worse, just not good enough.
The beautiful Ariel Piper was having similar problems - with magneto drives and faulty parts. After her near-catastrophic experience in Race 1 caused by a virus in her pit computer, she had installed a new firewall which seemed to have stemmed that problem. She was currently in 12th place - solid but unspectacular for the first girl to attend the Race School.
In any case, a key feature of the School’s racing season was fast approaching and it was particularly troubling Jason.
The mid-season Sponsors’ Event - a feature race held in front of the School’s sponsors, benefactors and famous exstudents - would be held after Race 25, and it was only open to those students who had won a race during the season.
The Sponsors’ Event was a huge opportunity to perform in front of some of the major players in the pro racing world. The thing was: Jason hadn’t yet won a race, and with 15 races already down, he was fast running out of races to win.
Either way, it was time to address his team’s problems. It was time to go to the source of all the depleted drives, thinned coolants and faulty parts.
The Race School’s Parts and Equipment Department.
CHAPTER TWO
The International Race School’s Parts and Equipment Department was housed inside a gigantic warehouse behind Pit Lane near the banks of the Derwent River.
It was a colossal structure, so big in fact that the School had built a glorious silver grandstand on top of it, giving a superb view of the main finishing straight.
On a rare spare afternoon, Jason, the Bug and Sally McDuff came to the student entrance, opened it - just as a stocky bull-necked youth with a bristly shaved head emerged from the Department.
Sally watched him go with interest.
‘Do you know who that was?’ she said.
Jason squinted after the bull-necked youth. ‘No. Who?’
‘His name is Oliver Koch. He is Xavier Xonora’s Mech Chief.’
‘Is that so?’
They entered the Parts Department, came to the service desk that separated visitors from the cavernous interior of the warehouse. The gritty odours of grease, rubber and coolant pervaded the air.
They were met by a weasel-faced young man named Wernold Smythe. Smythe lazily wiped his grease-covered hands on a rag. He was about 26, laid back, and creepy.
‘Can I help you?’ he asked, wedging the rag into one of the low-slung hip pockets on his overalls.
‘Yes. I’m Jason Chaser. Team Argonaut . We’ve been having some problems with equipment coming out of the Department. Mags which aren’t fully powered up, thinned coolant.’
‘You didn’t get faulty mags from here,’ Smythe said quickly. ‘Doesn’t happen.’
‘But we did. Our mags were only 10 per cent charged.’
Smythe leaned forward. ‘No, you didn’t . Every mag that goes out of here is electro-checked on the way out.’
Smythe jerked his chin at Sally McDuff. ‘Maybe your Mech Chief screwed up; left ‘em too close to a powerdrain source, like a portable pit machine generator or a microwave transmitter.’
Sally growled. ‘I’d never leave a magneto drive next to a microwave transmi - ‘
‘It’s happened before.’ Smythe shrugged. ‘As for coolant. We hand it out in the original manufacturer’s bottles, with the seals intact. I got some
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