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You know when you've been expecting something for a long time -like a birthday or a holiday or something- and you think that day is gonna feel different or something? Then that day rolls around and it's just like any other day. I guess that's just the way things go.
The day of the race was like that. I expected to wake up and have stuff going on. I don't know what, maybe a parade or a party or something. Instead, I woke up same as al other mornings, too burnt out by all the stims I'd done the day before to do much beyond open my eyes for a slow minute. I probably would've stayed in bed until the afternoon like every other day too, until a car horn started up outside. It was probably Kyo, or maybe Kammi -another pilot who lived around the neighborhood. Whoever it was, they'd parked right outside and were leaning on the horn, which got more and more annoying every few minutes. Eventually the car horn got me up, but I was still mostly asleep. I basically just fell out of bed and wandered around. When I was mobile enough not to hid my head on the doorframe or anything, I headed towards the bathroom, found some pants, put them on and looked out the window to see who was honking the car horn. No sense in re-enacting that full frontal scene from "Life of Brian," right?
I had been doubly right on guessing who it was. That is to say, Kyo and Kammi were outside. Kammi waved up at me and pounded the horn impatiently a few more times. Kyo was simply sitting on the hood, smoking. The tug already had my plane strapped snuggly against it. That had probably been Kammi's idea, because like I'd said…dims didn't plan ahead.
Heh…Kammi's hot.
Kammi cupped her hands and yelled up at me. "Jet! Get yer ass down here, you've got a race to run! Come on, man! Get it the fuck in gear, it's almost nine!"
Quietly, I thumped my head against the window and just leaned there like that a while. When did the races start? One in the afternoon? Psychopaths…well, I might as well get moving, I figured.
I left the window and picked up my jacket on my way out the door. Hell, the way I figured it, what was the point of getting all dressed if I was only going to kick ass for twenty minutes? I'd be asleep right after that anyway. Pulling on the old pilot jacket, I walked down my darkened hallway that would lead outside.
By the time I got there, the horn had stopped honking and Kyo'd gotten rid of whatever it was he was smoking. Now he just lay on his back on the hood of the car looking up at the dirty grey sky. Maybe he was tripping, or maybe he just felt like doing that. Not knowing much about dim drugs, I couldn't tell you.
Kyo's a really sad case. His parents got shot -both of them- in the massacre a few years back. Him and his kid sister were the only survivors of their family. That kinda thing gnaws it out of anyone. So you can't much blame Kyo, because that's when he started in on the dim drugs. His sister ran away a little after that, now she's a fighter pilot or something. I don't know for sure- Kyo's never talked about it. I don't blame him; I wouldn't want to think about that kind of stuff if I was in his shoes. He's seen stuff no one should see.
I'm not quite sure what happened to my folks. I wasn't a native to Hekshano, the planet that holds the S-mine race. My species was the same as the native one, but I was only in school here so maybe my family's still alive back home. Oh well, piloting beats a normal life any day.
Kammi handed me a concentrated caffeine pill and a glass of water to swallow it with. "C'mon, wake the hell up in there. It's a major day out here."
I swallowed the pill quick but didn't feel the normal rush stims had. Grimacing, I threw open the passenger-side door and opened the glove compartment, looking for some real stims. "Jeez, Kammi, what the hell was that shit? Normal coffee caffeine? Come on, I need to pilot today!" I grabbed a little white pill out of the glove compartment that looked like an aspirin and choked it down quick, followed right after by a greenish stim that was a little bit smaller.
Kammi glared- she'd quit stims a long time ago cause of the affect they had on people. Her temper was already bad, pretty near explosive. She was always trying to get others to go the same way and give it up, become mechanics like her. Kammi had strong willpower. "We all gotta quit some time, Jet," she told me.
Okay, now, when stims kick in the sensation grows from inside your stomach and they tickle, so the first thing you feel is this urge to start laughing at everything. Then your head starts buzzing like a bunch of bees are in there giggling. It's all uphill from there.
The double stim-dose was kicking in, and I vaulted straight over the hood of the car -and Kyo- and opened the driver side, flashing Kammi a smile. "Not today," I told her with a laugh. "Today I'm gonna kick ass, baby. The Jet's gonna be the best god-damn pilot this planet's ever seen!" I jumped behind the wheel, revved the engine and pounded the dashboard with my fist as Kammi climbed in the passenger side and Kyo slid off the hood to head for the back seat.
"Let's get this show on the road!" I roared even as Kyo was climbing in. Throwing the car hard into reverse, I peeled out of the driveway and out onto the road with a howl of premature triumph.
Kammi fixed me with a stern glare that the stim drugs didn't let me care about. "Try to keep it below ninety, this time, idiot." She advised.
I ignored her and stomped on the gas, sending the car down the road with a screech. Look out you rookies, I thought. You're gonna get the race of a lifetime!
