And as they watched this bizarre contest, the rest of the crowd joined in.

'GO BUG! GO!'

'GO BUG! GO!'

The Bug's little legs pumped up and down.

The Devil's Chariot gained speed.

Jason could only watch, helpless in his seat.

The Bug ran over the giant white letters painted on the road just before the Finish Line - 'START-FINISH' - just as the Devil's Chariot roared up behind him, accelerating...

...coming closer and closer and closer...

...and the Bug saw the Line - the actual Finish Line, a thick white band stretching across the road in front of him - and as the roar of the Devil's Chariot filled his ears and rushed alongside him, he dived...

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

RACE 50.

LAP: 51 OF 51.

RACERS LEFT ON TRACK: 4.

It would go down in Race School history as one of the most bizarre photo-finish photos ever.

It depicted the Bug, frozen in mid-air, diving over the Start-Finish Line, the Argonaut's steering wheel held in front of him in his outstretched hands - while the Devil's Chariot hovered, also frozen, in the background of the photo, its body blurred with speed...and its nose a bare ten centimetres short of the Line.

Thanks to the Bug's little legs, Team Argonaut had beaten Barnaby Becker by less than a foot.

Afterwards, Henry Chaser would ask if he could have a copy of the photo and the School gave him one.

It now hangs in the Chaser family living room.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

Pandemonium reigned in the pits after the consequences of Race 50 became apparent.

Jason leapt out of the Argonaut and threw his fists into the air. Sally caught him, also jumping for joy.

They knew the score.

The results of Race 50 had changed the Race School Championship Ladder dramatically.

It now looked like this: INTERNATIONAL RACE SCHOOL.

CHAMPIONSHIP LADDER.

AFTER 50 RACES.

DRIVER NO. CAR POINTS.

1. XONORA, X 1 Speed Razor 313 2. KRISHNA, V 31 Calcutta-IV 305 3. PIPER, A 16 Pied Piper 285 4. CHASER, J 55 Argonaut 284 5. BECKER, B 09 Devil's Chariot 283 6. WASHINGTON, I 42 Black Bullet 283 7. WONG, H 888 Little Tokyo 278 8. SCHUMACHER, K 25 Blue Lightning 275 Suddenly the Top 4 looked very different.

Barnaby and Isaiah Washington had both dropped out of it completely, replaced by Ariel - who with her 10-point win had leapt up from 6th to 3rd - and Jason, who had gone from 5th to 4th with his 8 points for coming third.

Along with Xavier and Krishna, Jason and Ariel were going to New York.

Almost as pleasing to Jason was the result that Barnaby Becker and Isaiah Washington wouldn't be going anywhere.

But then something else happened - ripping Jason from his thoughts.

Dido ran into the pits.

She spotted Jason, smiled with joy, and hurried over to the Argonaut.

Dido threw her arms around Jason...

...but Jason didn't hug her back.

She noticed his lack of response immediately, and drew away. 'What's wrong, Jason? You did it. You made the Top 4. You won your ticket to the New York Challenger Race.'

At first, Jason didn't speak. Truth be told, he actually didn't know what to say. He'd never had someone so brazenly betray his trust before.

For a long moment, he just looked at Dido - scanned her eyes, her face, searching for something...anything. Something he could trust, something he could believe in.

But he found nothing there.

Both the Bug and Sally saw at once that something was very wrong - but they kept their distance.

'Jason? Are you okay?' Dido asked.

'I have something to tell you,' Jason said, 'something very personal...'

'Yes,' Dido said gently.

'...so I hope when you relay it to Xavier and Barnaby, you tell it to them word-for-word.'

The blood drained from Dido's face.

The Bug spun in disbelief. Sally McDuff turned, too.

Dido stammered, 'Jason...I...what are you say - '

'I know what you did, Dido,' Jason said. 'You were feeding them everything I told you. About my fears. About my strategies, like overtaking Barnaby on hairpins. Stuff I never told anyone else. You were probably also updating them about my health. I'm also now wondering about some of those late nights we had before important races - like in Italy. I'm wondering if you were keeping me out late.'

Dido fell silent.

By now Sally was staring daggers at her. The Bug's mouth was just gaping open in shock.

Jason went on: 'Even that time in the coffee shop, when Barnaby hit on you and you blew him off, I bet that was a set-up, too.'

As if in reply, Dido bowed her head.

'So when you see them next time,' Jason said, 'tell them this from me...Jason Chaser is back. Back to full strength. Which means the next time we're all on the same track, they're going down. As for you, Dido, please leave. I don't want to talk to you anymore.'

Dido clutched her face, then turned and ran away.

Steely-eyed, Jason could only watch her go.

In the immediate aftermath of Race 50, questions were asked about the catastrophic power failure that had occurred during the final pit stop on Lap 48.

Race Director Calder led the investigations...

...and quickly made some sensational findings. Ariel's Mech Chief had been right: on Lap 48, Ariel's pit machine had indeed been hit by a super-powerful computer virus.

But only that morning, Ariel - tipped off by Jason before the race - had installed a new firewall on her system and it had repelled the sinister virus. Unfortunately, the virus then searched for a new host and it found it in the School's power grid.

And so, like a constricting python, the virus wrapped itself around the School's power system...and brought down the entire grid!

The source computer for the virus was soon found: Wernold Smythe's computer in the Parts and Equipment Department.

Smythe was confronted and he broke down in seconds, implicating no less than the Princ.i.p.al of the School, JeanPierre LeClerq, in a plot to damage Ariel Piper's chances at the Race School, a plot that went all the way back to her depleted mags in Race 1. And why?

Because she was a girl.

LeClerq protested his innocence, but the look on his face said it all. He'd done it, all right.

The School's Board held an emergency meeting that night and suspended LeClerq pending further investigations. In the meantime, Race Director Calder - a man of impeccable integrity - would be Acting Princ.i.p.al in his place.

Ariel and Jason just watched the drama unfold from afar.

'Thanks for the tip-off this morning,' Ariel said as they watched LeClerq skulk away from the Race School, get into his car and drive off in a huff.

'Anytime,' Jason said. 'Anytime.'

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

The following evening, the School held its annual end-of-year Presentation Dinner.

It was a formal affair, with parents, friends and some sponsors in attendance, and it was hosted by Acting Princ.i.p.al Calder.

Jason sat at a table with Team Argonaut, plus his parents and - for the first time that year - Sally's entire family, including her parents and all eight of her (very proud) rev-head brothers, newly arrived from Scotland.

As he sat down, Jason noticed Dido over at Xavier Xonora's table, sitting alongside Xavier.

'I asked around,' Sally whispered to Jason, seeing him looking at Dido. 'She's Xavier's cousin. But she's not royalty. Her mum is the Queen of Monesi's sister; lives in Italy.'

'We met in Italy,' Jason said. 'Just before the Italian Run. I thought it was luck, coincidence, fate. But it wasn't. It was a set-up, a big set-up, and I fell for it.'

Sally tousled his hair. 'Jason, if it makes you feel any better, if Xavier had sent a gorgeous young Italian studm.u.f.fin to seduce me for our race secrets, I woulda told him everything, too.'

'Really?'

'Oh, sure,' she said, 'but not before I snogged the living daylights out of the young stallion!'

She roared with laughter, clapped Jason on the back. 'Now, shut up, eat, and enjoy yourself, you big superstar.'

After the main course had been served, the usual prizes were handed out.

It was virtually a clean sweep for the Speed Razor.

First-placed driver on the Championship Ladder: Xavier. For that he took home a huge trophy.

The Race School Medal for the year's best driver also went to Xavier.

The teachers' choice of Best Mech Chief was Xavier's crew chief, Oliver Koch - although his victory was narrow: he only beat Sally McDuff by two votes.

Jason didn't win a single prize. But then he didn't actually mind that.

He'd had an incredible year at Race School, but for him, Race School wasn't about winning prizes, it was about scoring a contract with a pro team - and he'd had one run with a pro team in Italy this year, and that had happened only because he'd been at Race School.