Imamimi Notanobu - XIV

A sound of engine fury explodes from the TV’s speakers. Hong speeds ahead, having used a Nitro-Boost to get an immediate speed advantage. My car ends up lagging behind his, despite the otherwise-accelerational bonus I should have.

I swallow a bitter feeling. There’s a sharp turn on the map ahead, meaning that I’ll have to decelerate to cope with the angle.

What do I do? If I try to gamble and crash my car, I’ll end up setting myself a few seconds behind. But if I don’t, then Hong will zoom forward with his superior handling. I decelerate immediately, pivoting right to avoid a corner. Then I pop a Nitro-Boost.

Black flame shoots from the car’s exhaust pipes, propelling me forward. I trail behind Hong, roughly keeping pace with him. There’s a series of turns coming in ten seconds or so. Hong’s handling can deal with that. But even with my acceleration power…

I grit my teeth. I don’t know if I can manage. I have two Nitro-Blasts left, and I want to save one for the finishing line. If I don’t use the other one now, there won’t be any other chance, seeing as the constant turns ahead will score me an easy crash.

“Screw it.”

I activate yet another Nitro-Blast. The top half of my split-screen whirrs with speed lines. I speed to the road ahead, putting myself ahead of him. Hong meanwhile, just keeps steadily ahead, still calm as usual.

I decelerate for a half-second, then stop just as it happens. I’m going to lose at this rate. As long as Hong has two Nitro-Bursts, he’ll beat me on the finishing line. Meaning, that if I decelerate here, and try to play safe around these turnarounds, that I’ll eventually lose too much speed…

I come to a decision, heart in my ears, and hands curling with a sheen of cold sweat. Gripping that forbidden third button—the one for drifting, I begin to wiggle my joystick like a madman.

My car drifts, grinding rubber and pavement with an incredible sound. I approach one turnaround. I drift through it, the back of my car scraping the wall with sparks of metal. It’s too hard. This is bad. The next turnaround’s even tighter and I have no idea if I can—

“Boost!”

—Crap.

Hong uses his second Nitro-Boost, coming at an angle to slam my car into oblivion. With his heavier weight, the game will send mine flying instead, causing me to lose a few precious seconds of time.

There’s no winning. If I let myself be hit, it’ll be impossible to catch up. If I speed on ahead—well, I can’t, because his car is so close that he’ll crash into me in spite of my acceleration.

Unless.

Unless, oh to hell with it!

I activate my final Nitro-Boost. My sudden acceleration takes me out of the turnabout, and unable to stop, Hong smashes into a wall. His car goes up in smoke, taking a few seconds to repair. I keep going.

I approach the next turnabout. I call upon the fine motor skills contained within my fingers, usually used for naughtier things, to flick my joystick like a madman. There’s a sound like a lever being flicked a half-dozen times per second.

Drifting with a darn near frame-perfect accuracy, tyres screeching, fingers aching, I manage to get past the second turnaround.

Perfect Drift

+750

My painstakingly attempted drift has availed me genuine results, leaving me one final turnaround. As I zoom ahead, deep in concentration, already preparing for the corner, I end up ramming straight into a wall.

The next five seconds are spent watching as my car is repaired. And the next three after that are me gaining sudden acceleration, only for Hong to Nitro-Burst and win anyway.

I have nothing to say. I sink into my position, and stare at the screen with an empty heart. I tried my best, but I guess my best wasn’t particularly brilliant anyway. Isn’t that a metaphor for my existence?

Hong seems like he’s about to say something. Probably searching his head for the appropriate Chinese maxim or whatever to use.

“Are you alright?”

“I’d say so.”

“Should I tell you the answer anyway?”

“You could. But that doesn’t seem very fair to you now, does it? We made an agreement, and I wouldn’t be an honest guy if I went back on it.”

“That is of sound reasoning,” Hong agrees, with a bit of reluctance. “Then, I shall refrain from divulging my circumstances. Though,” he adds, with a mischievous smile. “I don’t believe there was anything preventing a consolation prize from being given.”

Appearing deep in thought. Appearing to muse over something of future or past, Hong takes a moment to recollect. After a half-minute, the sound of movement comes from the hallway.

But before anyone can appear from it, Hong says this: “Circumstances permitting, I’m sure the Tearer would like to tell you everything.”

He stands and motions for the hallway. As he does, the blonde vampiress—Yolanda, waltzes into the living room, shutting her phone as she does.

She gives Hong a serious look, and makes a fleeting gesture with her hand. He takes it as a sign and follows her. They shut the door behind them before going into another room.

I give it a second. Maybe two—I don’t know, I’m not exactly counting. Then I get up and go to the kitchen. I pick through their dried foods, and talk out a few heads of unpeeled garlic, and stuff it inside my jacket’s inner pockets.

I don’t think about what Hong just said. Rather, I’m not sure what I can think about it. Someone’s been sharing the Tearer’s kills online, true, but would the guy himself actually show himself to me?

As my thinking mind plays with theories, my muscle-bound one fiddles with my surroundings. It thinks about taking a knife, but think it might be too obvious. At least I can play off the garlic as having a weird diet… Or just being scared of vampires. I think that’s a pretty reasonable phobia to have, at least in the top ten, really, behind the dark and heights.

The tension in my muscles seems to stretch my mind thin. I can’t help but wonder what it’d look like to them if I’m nosing around. With a complete lack of discretion, I go sit back down in front of the console, and then realising I’d probably have moved around, relocate like two centimetres.

What are they talking about? That expression of hers doesn’t seem like anything good, even given her usual resting bitch face, which I suppose is good for me, since anything bad for them works in my favour… probably.

The two walk out. Now, it’s my turn to get a dirty look. A wayward glance from the blonde vampiress.

“What’s up?” I ask, realising a second in, that it was probably dumb to say.“Circumstances,” she replies. Maybe realising that it was dumb to answer. “You need to come with me.”

I don’t ask why. And without giving any hint, any answer, any gesture of the body beyond a not-so-subtle uh—relief (maybe), she goes to the door, and stops.

“A true man takes responsibility for his actions.” Hong looks at me with almost hollow eyes, as if caught between this world and the next. “Have courage.”

I get lead out of the building by the woman, before going down the elevator. In silence, we enter the van—which I now realise is a black but always understood was a van, and I go into the back. The woman starts driving.

I have little to no clue where we’re going, but the ride is long, and it continues in a strange silence.

“So, where to, driver?”

Iolanda inhales in, and sighs, as if unsure of what to say. “Dinner,” she manages after five seconds. “Someone wants to see you?”

“Can I ask who it is?”

She stops. “The boss.”

The boss? The Tearer? The daoshi?

My heart thumps at the thought. But, why? And why far from these people? The sheer mystery behind it causes me to stiffen in place. Hong said something about the Tearer meeting me, but now?

My head is overrun with ideas, a thousand tidbits of information in soundless conflict. I feel a sweat building on my brow. I look at the back of Iolanda’s chair, and see how still she is.

“It’s only been five minutes. We’ll be there soon.”

I look outside. We’re going south. Towards Kashihara. As a while longer passes, I notice us take a forest route, surrounded by lush greenery with a few spare houses. She finds a open space, and parks the van on the grass outside.

I have a bad feeling. Not a conscious one that puts into words why exactly I feel this way, but a physical one grounding and sinking me into the chair.

The lady steps out. She opens the door, and stands there idly, staring at me with no clear expression.

“Come on.”

I recover my physical body and go after her. The night-wind sends a immediate chill. I don’t have a jacket on. I ask her for something to wear, hinting obviously at her fur-trimmed coat. In a strange gesture of kindness, she actually gives it to me, before going deeper into the forest.

There’s no light around, but the lack of light pollution, and the full-moon makes it easy enough to see. To see the dark green moulded around the long thin trunks of trees, similar enough to human bodies in the glint of half-darkness.

“Let’s go.”

So, I follow after the woman. Going deeper and deeper into the forest. Soon enough, going deep enough so as that there’s no buildings at all, and no company besides me, her, and strange sounds in the nearby darkness.

Needless to say.

It is not a great feeling.

We stop after ten minutes. She turns around with a pleased expression on her face. A kind of look I can only associate with a unexpected happiness.

I’m not going to die, am I? This’d be the perfect place to kill someone. Perfect according to my layman’s understanding of it, but perfect nonetheless.

Her eyes bare white. Her eyes shine a spectacular red. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice you brat?”