CHAPTER SIX.

- the Argonaut.

By the tip of its nosewing.

The official winning margin, taken from the digital radio transmitters on the nosewings of the two cars, would later be recorded as 0.04 of a second - four hundredths of a second - in favour of 'Chaser, J'.

Physically exhausted and emotionally spent, Jason returned to the pits.

Around him the tournament continued apace; the next pair of racers already lining up on the grid, getting ready to go.

The Argonaut slid into its bay - steaming - the acrid smell of overheated magneto drives wafting through the air all around it.

Jason and the Bug stepped out, removed their helmets from their sweaty heads - to be at once embraced in the arms of Sally McDuff and their proud parents.

'You are one gutsy little racer, Jason Chaser!' Sally exclaimed. 'I thought she had you in that first chase phase.'

'Me, too!' Henry said. 'Nine laps! You held her off for nine laps! I've never seen anything like it! How did you do it?'

Jason offered a wry glance to Scott Syracuse, standing nearby: 'Never give up. Never say die.'

With that, Jason's parents let him be, allowing him and the Bug to slump into their chairs in the rear corner of their pit bay.

Syracuse came over. Looked at Jason and the Bug, exhausted, their hair all sweaty and tousled.

And he smiled.

'Nice racing, boys,' he said. 'Very nice. I haven't seen a racer hold his nerve like that for a very long time, Mr Chaser.'

'Thank you, sir,' Jason said.

'Now take a shower and get some rest, both of you. The next round will be here faster than you know and you want to be fresh for it.'

Jason emerged from the showers of his pit bay ten minutes later - just in time to see Ariel over in her pit bay, talking animatedly to Fabian.

Well, in actual fact, only she was talking.

He was walking away, dismissing her tearful pleas with a curt wave of his hand.

Fabian strode off, leaving Ariel standing there in her pit bay, alone, tears streaming down her face.

Jason knew what was going on. Ariel had gone to Fabian's room the night before - he didn't want to think about what happened there - and now she'd lost in the opening round of the tournament, and suddenly Fabian didn't want to know her.

As he gazed at her now, Jason felt for Ariel. She'd given Fabian something last night, something of herself, and for all the wrong reasons, but Fabian had only been using her - But then Ariel turned suddenly, and caught Jason staring.

And the two of them stood there, on opposite sides of the pits, just looking at each other.

Jason didn't break eye contact. Nor was he going to. It was Ariel who turned away and disappeared into her pit bay.

'I'm sorry, Ariel,' Jason whispered to no-one. 'But there are no friends on the track.'

CHAPTER SEVEN.

The tournament continued apace, its carnival-like atmosphere pumping. In between races there were pop music acts, while in the VIP marquees, sponsors and Race School officials did deals over flutes of Moet champagne.

Of the six first-round races, Jason and Ariel's had easily been the longest. The others had been quicker, less-intense affairs, and had variously been won through crashes or mishaps in the pits. None of them had even come close to reaching the 50-lap mark, let alone 100.

And so with the completion of the first round, the tournament draw looked like this: ROUND 1 QRTR FINALS SEMI-FINALS FINAL.

1. XONORA, X.

16. [BYE] 1. XONORA, X.

10. LUCAS, L 8. WONG, H.

8. WONG, H.

6. CORTEZ, J.

11. PHAROS, A 6. CORTEZ, J.

14. MORIALTA, R 4. KRISHNA, V.

4. KRISHNA, V.

3. WASHINGTON,I 3. WASHINGTON,I.

13. TAKESHI, T.

12. CHASER, J 12. CHASER, J.

5. PIPER, A.

7. DIXON, W.

9. SCHUMACHER,K 9. SCHUMACHER,K.

15. [BYE] 2. BECKER, B.

2. BECKER, B.

The opening race of the Quarter Final Round saw the first appearance of the top seed, Xavier Xonora, and he showed everyone exactly why he was the favourite to win the tournament.

Up against Jason's stablemate, Horatio Wong, Xonora was quite simply merciless.

His driving around the figure-8 circuit was faultless. He didn't take a corner more than an inch off the optimum racing line and within eight laps, he was a full third of a lap ahead of Wong.

Then Wong pitted - a huge tactical mistake, the Bug commented to Jason; you never, ever pitted when you were that far behind - and suddenly Xavier was all over him like a rash.

The all-black Speed Razor loomed behind Wong's car like a giant hawk - while Wong swerved defensively, panicking, wrestling with his steering vane.

Xavier made a couple of lazy feints to the left, before he just powered easily by Wong on the final turn of Lap 11, overtaking him on the inside, and the race was over almost before it had begun.

It was the shortest race so far. Some likened it to a chess expert dispatching a novice in five quick moves. Others said it was nothing less than the clinical execution of a lesser racer by a master.

It even seized the attention of the a.s.sembled sponsors.

Xavier Xonora was good, very good. And he had charged into the semis without even breaking a sweat.

2ND QUARTER FINAL:.

CORTEZ V KRISHNA.

A tight and tense race between the gifted but unpredictable Mexican, Joaquin Cortez, and the No.4 seed, a very talented 18-year-old racer from India named Varishna Krishna.

It was ultimately won by Krishna on Lap 74, during the race's sixth chase phase.

3RD QUARTER FINAL:.

SCHUMACHER V BECKER.

This was a race, all agreed, that ill.u.s.trated the cruelty of match-racing.

The German, Schumacher, had led all the way. He had been pitting superbly - consistently clocking astonishing 8-second stops - and rocketing around the track like a bullet.

By the 50-lap mark, he had built a solid half-lap lead on Becker and all the commentators were certain that after his next pit stop, on fresh mags, he'd pounce.

That pit stop, however, saw Schumacher's pit machine freeze in mid-air.

System crash.

And while Schumacher's Mech Chief swore and rebooted their pit machine's central processing unit, Barnaby Becker just whipped around the circuit - alone, on semi-depleted mags - and lapped Schumacher in the easiest possible way, while he was still in the pits, thus taking a race that by all accounts he really didn't deserve to win.

But then, everyone said, that was match-racing.

There was one more Quarter Final race to be run and the crowd murmured in antic.i.p.ation.

The public knew that both racers studied under the same teacher at the Race School - which always made for interesting racing.

But everyone at the Race School knew that there was more to it than that: they all knew that Isaiah Washington particularly despised his upstart young stablemate, Jason Chaser.

The stage was set.

The two cars lined up on the grid.

4TH QUARTER FINAL:.

WASHINGTON V CHASER.

The race between Isaiah Washington and Jason was nothing short of electric.

More than any of the other races in the day so far, there was feeling in this one. The crowd sensed the tension in the air as the two cars lined up on the grid and Isaiah Washington glared over at Jason and the Bug.

And then they were off and the race was run at a blistering pace, with multiple lead-changes and daring overtaking manoeuvres from both racers that had the crowd gasping.

After 20 laps, there was nothing in it. They were going stop for stop.

40 laps, and at the Bug's urging, Jason skipped a stop and tried a quick three-lap chase - but Washington held them off determinedly before embarking on a chase phase of his own, but that also failed.