Michael and Michelle tied on their race home, pulling up to the house side by side. Michelle immediately went inside to go to bed early to get extra sleep for the next race, and Michael was left alone on the porch, as his father was out planting the fields with the AutoHarvester.

Michael sat down in the rocking chair his father usually sat in and opened his watch, and found about 50 messages from Shiga, and as soon as he opened the text messages he his watch buzzed with a call. Michael reluctantly answered.

"Yo! Was that you in the Trans Am last night?" He heard Shiga say excitedly.

"W-What? No no no! Uh... that wasn't me!"

"Your a shit liar man... I knew it was you because of the way you drove. You are used to cars that with you, not some heavy armored car that hates corners. You drifted everywhere and rammed way too hard."

"Shit... well... I uh- uh... uhhhhh..."

"Relax man, (you sound like Jeff Goldblum) I wanna help you... I guessed right! You are the Asphalt Knight!"

"How can you help me exactly?"

"I can hook you up with gadgets n'stuff"

"The Nightshade already has a bunch of shit on it, something like a harpoon and a shockwave thingy I swear I've seen in a superhero movie."

"Oh... uh well... if you need a gun or something lemme know."

Michael hadn't thought of that. Evelyn had guns, if he needed one he could ask her, but... would he ever need a gun at to all? Did he have the guts to look a man in the eye and shoot him?

"Uh... well... I don't think I'd want to kill anyone..."

"Ah you're gonna be one of those Batman types eh? Good. Taking a life something you can never go back on."

"Ok?"

"Well if you need anything call me."

"Will do."

Michael hung up.

If Shiga has figured it out so quickly, it was only a matter of time before someone else did.

Michael couldn't believe how much his life had changed in the past couple of weeks. He was on track to becoming a race car driver, or a superhero... or both. Most boys his age would be dreaming of shit like this. But the harsh reality was that superheroes and all stars were constructs of a post modern society, where the general needs of the consumer population had been met, so many people lived through entertainment instead of truly living for themselves. We find our day to day lives so boring and mundane, we resort to creating fake worlds through literature, media, and games where we can subject ourselves to a romanticized version the most horrific of trauma or physical and mental undertaking of being superhero or racing driver.

But Michael wasn't fantasizing. He was living. He was going to outrun police and stress out over tuning his car, only to finish with getting his ass kicked by his hardass mentor who may or may not be a government experiment and then fighting crime from behind the wheel of an armored muscle car, all while the death and injury toll racked up around him.

No one deserves this.

Michael didn't want any of this, either. To him, felt like a bad superhero movie, like all of this had been careful written out by some sick mastermind with an obsession with cars and too much time on his hands. Was any of this real? Was he dreaming? What if he really was the protagonist of some plot, someone else's fantasy, a story?

And If that was true, then did he have free will?

Michael decided to stop thinking about it. None of that mattered right now. He decided to head to Evelyn's trailer in the canyon.

*********

"Is that new suspension? I can hear you using more gas out of the turns." Evelyn said as Michael stepped out of the Foxbody.

"How did you know that? You've never even seen- sorry, I meant encountered the Mustang before."

"You braked earlier because you hit a higher peek speed on the straight. You normally nail your braking points."

"Wow..."

Evelyn was casually cleaning an assault rifle of some kind, it's various parts littering a fold out table. Michael thought it was an AK47, but those had bits of wood in it, this thing looked high tech and was entirely metallic with the trademark geometric discoloration Fusionite had.

Without warning, Evelyn suddenly sprang into action, assembling it in seconds and firing it off into the distance. It triggered Michael's reflexes, and saw its shell casings land on Evelyn's shoe.

Michael turned to see where she had fired and realized the nearby tree had a few new holes in it.

"My aim isn't what it used to be, especially at long range, for obvious reasons... Have you thought of a weapon you would be comfortable using fo your... job?"

"I'm not sure. I don't want to kill anyone."

"Sometimes it's necessary."

"Never will, I don't care what they do."

"You will care when they do something personal."

"Well, who would want to do anything like that to me?"

"Doing something like this will make you a lot of enemies. Some will want you more than just dead."

"I'm not going to kill anyone."

"Fine, suit yourself then."

Evelyn sighed and put the rifle back on the wall of the trailer. She paced around for a few seconds, then went to the back of the trailer. She returned to Michael a few seconds later with a sheath.

"This is worth more money than my Tesla and my Mobile Operations Center combined."

She carefully handed the sheath to Michael.

"Go on." She said.

Michael carefully wrapped his hand around the hilt, and pulled slowly.

It was a long blade of some kind, curved slightly. It's hilt was long enough to accommodate two hands, and was made of wood wrapped in some leather. Michael was stunned by how light it was. It felt natural in his hands.

"That is a katana. Let me tell you something. I've run a lot of jobs,and sometimes I've come across some punks with baseball bats or knives or whatever trying to take my car, or my cargo. I normally carry a gun, but that doesn't intimidate them. I usually have to fire it off once or twice to get their attention. They've seen guns, maybe even fought people with guns and won. But a sword... a sword doesn't need a demonstration. Just having that thing on you will make people think twice about fucking with you."

"But a sword is meant to kill people..." Michael said firmly, putting the Katana back in its sheath and setting it down on the table.

"Yeah, but there are all sorts of ways you can use it. Sure you can stab someone through the heart, but you can also use it for interrogation, open gates... the guy I won it from could deflect bullets."

"Yeah uhhhh this is cool and all, but I don't think-"

"Ah, I know, it's not perfect for long range but that's where these little guys come in."

Evelyn slid two identical silver handguns across the table.

"These are Arc Light Pistols . They run on an arc reactor, so they don't run out of ammo, but have to recharge after firing. Normally a single shot will burn a whole right through a man, but if you put them on the lowest settings, they only cause mild burns and an electric shock, so essentially a long range taser. Plus since you're essentially firing light, no recoil. Pair these with a sword and you're good for pretty much any situation."

"I'll have to think about it... plus I don't know how to use any of this stuff."

"You'll learn. Anyways, what did you want, I didn't schedule any training today."

"I have another proper race tomorrow night... I was wondering if you had any advice."

"Ah... interesting... "

Evelyn lit a cigarette and adjusted her glasses.

"Well to be honest. I'd say just drive as you always have. You can keep up with me just fine. You're consistent as hell, smooth, and fast. My advice would be to be more aggressive. You don't go much out of your comfort zone when driving. Try braking later, pushing the car past its limits. I bet you're barely scratching the surface of what your car is capable of doing, especially with it's upgrades."

"Huh."

********

Michael stayed up past midnight in the West Canyon, going the distance, shaving seconds of his time. By the time he was done, the Mustang was almost out of gas and it was stained with dust and flecks of rubber worn from it's tires.

Michael had no idea if he had improved, but it had helped him let his emotions out, his mind felt clear and he was finally at peace. He was ready for whatever the road threw at him.

********

The next day at school, Michael could barely concentrate on his work, and even fell asleep during some of his classes much to Nick's amusement.

"Bruh, you sure you're gonna be fine for the race tonight?" Nick said with some concern as they grabbed lunch.

"I know I'll be fine. In fact, I think we can win." Michael said confidently.

"Cool... I hope so..."

Michael sat at his table, picking at the tuna casserole with his spork as Amelia eyed it hungrily.

"You gonna eat that?" She said anxiously.

"Uh... No you can have it..."

"At this rate I'll gain a bloody few pounds." She said as she nonchalantly grabbed the styrafoam tray. "I'm wondering about what sort of cars you're going to come up against tonight..."

"It's International B Class, or Festival A, it won't be anything faster than what I'm driving." Michael said.

"Yeah, but here's the bloody thing... It's a major problem back 'ome. See the way the RA algorithm calculates PI rating, it heavily biases towards grip and traction. So you get people dumping built Elle-Esses in old lead sleds that don't have much traction stock and the algorithm allows them to get an absolute load of power in a low class..."

Amelia complained as in between bites of Michael's food.

"Ain't no way yer beatin' anything with 700 horses when you've only got 400." She added.

Michael didn't know what to think.

*********

School ended, and Michael waited in the parking lot for Nick, Michelle, Alex and Amelia.

Without warning, his watch buzzed with a text. Michael normally wouldn't have cared, usually the citizens fortunate enough to own smart devices were endlessly bombarded by sales bots trying to sell them porn or useless AS SEEN ON TV PRODUCTS, (despite the fact that only the elderly still watched network television, as streaming services completely destroyed that market).

Here's the thing. The school had signal jammers that blocked all cellular connections in its vicinity in a misguided attempt to make sure kids payed attention in class (while all it really did was disable vital communications whenever there was some kind of massacre to keep it from getting on the news before it could be controlled, which would reignite the legalization of laser firearms and kinetic shields for civilians debate). (Oh boy, gun control, information filtering, conspiracy theories, I think I just offended... everyone.)

Whoever was contacting Michael knew their computers.

Michael waved his hand and the hologram materialized.

Hello Asphalt Knight. It said.

Who are you, how did you get this number. Michael furiously texted back.

Neither friend nor foe. Catch me if you can ❤️💋

An attachment was sent to Michael, and it was a file. Michael attempted to open it, but found that his watch had no way of opening the file. He'd need to ask Evelyn.

Have fun at the race.

"Who ya textin'" Amelia said happily.

"Just one of those damn bots. I think they found a way to get past the school security system... Anyways what's up with you?"

"Eh not much really... I saw that video of that Asphalt Knight copycat this mornin'"

"And? What did you think of him?"

"Fat lot of good it does saving some rich feckin' mega corporate's previous rare metal! What about freeing all those poor girls put in human trafficking or... Or what about those poor people living in the sewers!"

"I'm sure he's just warming up..."

"He's not a hero until he's helping us, the actual bloody people!"

It was the first time Michael had seen her so passionate about something that wasn't a car. In a weird way, it sort of stung that Amelia blew off what up until now Michael considered to be one of his proudest life acheivements.

"I think he'll do something good soon..." Michael said, doing his best to sound nonchalant.

"It could be a girl you know... People are saying that his voice is an exact vocalprint of Snake from the Metal Gear games, meaning it's modulated..." Amelia said, wagging her finger.

Michael tried really hard not to laugh. It hurt, he really just wanted to say 'look it's me ok! I'm the Asphalt Knight!' but stopped himself.

"I... I mean it could be... but-"

"This yer opportunity to be quiet before ye say somethin' really bloody sexist..." Amelia said putting a finger to Michael's lips with a big smile on her face

Michael fell silent. For a moment their gaze met, and Michael realized his heart was racing. Amelia slowly moved her hand away and they began to inch closer to each other. Michael's head suddenly cleared. For a moment it was just him and her there...

BEEP BEEP!

"HEY! WE GOTTA TO GET GOING!"

Michelle had just pulled up with the BRZ.

"W- we're just waiting on Nick and Alex, give."

"Amelia, can you ride with me, I want to make sure the 2J is running ok!" Michelle shouted over the deep idle of the BRZ.

"Sure thing love!" Amelia shouted back nervously, and she dashed over to the passenger side of the Subaru casting a final look of her shoulder at Michal, her golden hair flowing in the slight breeze as she did so. She was achingly beautiful, downright angelic at that angle.

You had your chance, you blew it, now deal with the consequences you fucking virgin, Michael thought to himself. For all he knew Michelle could make good on her word about taking Amelia for herself knowing his luck.

"Hey man, you look depressed." It was Nick, who was wearing a bright yellow V-Tech sweater and Honda baseball cap.

"I just got co- never mind. Where's Alex?"

"He told me to tell you his mom said it wasn't safe. So it's just me for now."

Michael sighed and got in the driver's seat.

"Get in loser, we're going racing." Michael said sarcastically, and Nick got in the passenger's side.

Michael started the Mustang, it's angry growl causing the surrounding non enthusiast students to flinch.

"Remember to fasten your seatbelt," Michael sighed, "I don't want you putting your head through my wind shield if I hit the brakes too hard."

******
They followed Michelle's BRZ to Ed's shop, where he surprised them with a kit for cleaning and detailing the cars, and a few coupon codes for a free tank of gas at the local race fuel station Michael didn't even know existed.

They didn't have time to wash the cars, (actually I didn't feel comfortable writing a sexy carwash scene to build romantic tension between Michael and Amelia) headed across Downtown to the fuel station to get the cars filled up with E85, and started off in the general direction of the car meet.

*****

Yeah, literally N O T H I N G happens in this chapter, I know I said the soundtrack and a race last time, but I needed to develop things character-wise, and this chapter just got too long as is. I promise the next chapter will he one of my best, and hopefully the soundtrack will be implemented by then as well. I'm sorry.