The back of my eyelids had the afterimage of a victory of Mira Volt. Those were no racing, it was a coronation. The rest of the day I worked in a fog, my hands doing tedious work in the garage and my head doing back and forth all the flamboyant drifts, all the lightning of violet. Maxon was right. It was a barroom brawl against Mira as I beat Selvara.
There was another type of analysis being performed high above the neon-bathed mess of the circuit, in a sterile observatory which closely resembled a surgical theater.
The room was quiet and it was only lit by the cool light of dozens of holography screens. All of them featured various racers, various angles, various biometric readouts and energy signatures. Dr. Kron Veyl was frozen in the Data streams, and with his appearance of a gaunt frame it seemed less a man, more an element of the room construction. His hook-like artificial fingers jerked a little and sorted and dotted out information with robot precision.
One of the screens was stuck on replay of my qualifier, which was the instance when I broke the scaffolding. The other screen was displaying the Voltage Mirage of Mira Volta in exquisite detail, in slow motion. Kron did not stand to stare expectantly and hopefully. He observed with the unemotional interest of an entomologist as two insects struggle.
A low, artificial ring was heard. A third screen solidified into a new data-stream, which it labelled: VEYRON, KAEL. PSYCH PROFILE: DELTA-G-7. DRIVE RESONance: INSTable/PRimal.
The lips of Kron were pale and thin, and twitched into what was not a smile. It was an involuntary act of recognition.
I shall call you Subject Veyron, he whimpered, and the voice he used was a dry, scratching whisper that hardly aired the atmosphere. "Impulse control: negligible. Survival instinct: high. Imagination... wildly unmanageable. He made a close-up of one of my faces and twisted with terror and savage purpose in the leap. You do not understand how to use things and break them because you cannot know how they work yet. One of the typical symptoms of a low-resolution mind in the presence of the high-resolution stimuli.
His nail was tapping the air, and the screen went over to Mira Volt, in frozen mid-pirouette, a facade of rapturous performance before an audience. "Subject Volt. Dependency of narcissistic supply. Needs outside confirmation in order to solidify internal weakness. Accuracy as a coping strategy on the existential chaos.
His amber eyes were flitting between the two pictures as he steepled his flesh-and-metal fingers. He said Two broken toys, I said, a touch of warmness in his cold voice. One driven by lowly desperation, the other by applause that is aired. There is a dysfunction on both extremes of the spectrum, opposite ends.
He made a gesture with a hand, and the screens changed once again. Now they were showing plans--not of Rigs, but of the Death Circuits themselves. The tracks were luminous with complex figuring of stress point, energy flows, and projected areas of failure.
The existing paradigm, Kron was thinking, is... inefficient, addressing the empty room as though it were a colleague. Racers collide, exchanging shards, however, there is no development. No design. It is random mutation evolution. He was working in a layout of the next race, the Neon Spire Grand Prix, in which the qualifying groups were being completed. His eyes stayed at the slot where my name had just been typed, and on Mira's, typed with an intentional purpose on the other bracket--a maneuver to a possible ultimate clash.
A proper experiment must have a catalyst. An experimental factor that has been placed in the ecosystem to check the consequent adaptation... or collapse. He had fake fingers and they were twirling a console. He made changes in the bracket with just a few specific inputs. My name was gone where I had been before, and re-emerged... at the very bottom of the first round of elimination, at the opposite side of Mira Volt.
The background was humming and whispering softly. His Rig, Puppetmaster Prime, changed his piecey shape, with a half-compliant light in its many-eyed eyes.
Apply pressure, boys, said Kron, and his voice had reduced itself to a whisper. May we not know whether desperation may destroy perfection. Or will perfection just pacify the defect. He sat back staring at the new bracket. "The outcome is irrelevant. The data will be exquisite."
In the Pit of Gearheart an alarm sounded on the main terminal. Maxon walked over, grumbling. He read the screen, and his spliced face grew dark. He uttered a curse that smoked in the oily atmosphere.
Kid, he heavy-voiced called, and his voice. "We've got a problem. The brackets to the Spire are out," said Clay.
I lifted my eyes out of the part of the engine I was cleaning. "Yeah? Who am I against?"
He pivoted the screen so that it was toward me. The title was radiant with a threatening theatrical typeface.
KAEL VEYRON vs. MIRA VOLT
My stomach dropped to my feet. It was too soon. It was not a race, but an execution, which was to be held in prime time.
The eyes of Maxon were raised on the old stage, and in them I could see no encouragement, but a moribund confirmation. somebody, he said to himself, just stacked the deck. And I suppose they are not betting on you.
The first pawn of the game had been discovered, it appeared. And I was gazing at the board, and I had finally figured out that I was being played.