Hello, everybody! Here is another story I wrote for Kira McQueen . She was wanting me to write one where Lightning and Kira have a fight after she tells him she wants to be a racer, something like her other fic, Naming Your Tires, so I came up with this story. I hoe everybody likes it!

The nightmare was a familiar one.

It was dark.

He was racing down a well-lit race track, exhausted and breathing hard, but loving the rush of the adrenaline the speed was giving him. Even in his old age, he remembered thinking, it was good to know he could still feel the thrill of a good, intense race.

He didn't know when, but at some point during the race, he had felt a pair of pale, narrowed eyes leering down on him.

"You had a good run."

The silky, smooth, baritone voice penetrated his train of thought, breaking his musings.

Lightning faltered, his tires spinning out of control, and heard the ominous pop of his tire being blown. The next thing he knew, he was flying through the air, flipping over and over for what could've only been a few seconds, but the time he was airborne felt more like an eternity and seemed to be happening in slow motion until he came falling back down to earth and crash-landed on the pavement with a sickening crunch, and time sped up again, his body skidding across the track until he rolled to a stop on the grass nearby.

He didn't remember anything anybody had told him had happened afterwards. He didn't remember the reporters coming up to him. He didn't remember the ambulances and fire trucks rushing to his aid. He didn't even remember poor Sally speeding to his side, trying and trying to get him to wake up, even though she had told him she had when he had been in the hospital. He only remembered the blistering, burning sensation of the paralyzing pain searing all over his body, which felt like it was on fire, and the overwhelming fear of not knowing what was to become of him.

"Dad, I want to be a racer."

Gasping for breath, Lightning snapped awake with a pained grunt, the familiar sound of his daughter's voice penetrating though his fretful sleep with ease, and moaned. He had been trying to sleep in one of Sally's Cozy Cones, having nightmares about Storm again, when his daughter had barged in on him. Even after all this time, long after his and Cruz's hard-earned victory against the sleek, black and blue rookie, he was still being haunted by the cocky, next Gen racer. "What did you say?" he asked, and yawned, blinking the sleep out of his groggy eyes.

"I said, I want to be a racer-"

Lightning cut her off before she could even finish. "No, absolutely not," he said, remembering the wreck he had suffered through all too well, and not wanting to take the chance of Kari having to undergo the same trial of pain, fear and helplessness he had endured because of it. "It's too dangerous."

Kira whined. "But, Dad-" she said, and began to pout, puckering her lips.

Lightning interrupted her again, not about to let the matter go any further. "I said no, you hear me?" he asked, standing his ground, and made his voice as firm and commanding as he could. "Now I don't want to hear nothing more about it."

Anger twisted her grill, her mouth curling into an ugly snarl. "You don't care about me at all, do you, Dad?" she asked, plunging a knife into his heart. "You only care about yourself." She twisted the knife in a little deeper. "I hate you."

Broken and beaten, Lightning watched her leave, wanting to go after her but not having the strength or the energy. He was getting way too old for this sort of thing.

He was astonished and a little embarrassed when he felt a single tear falling down his windshield.

Driving out of another nearby cone where she kept her office and had been working all day, Sally Carrera hoped to take a break from her laborious efforts when her brief moment of respite was interrupted by her daughter's unexpected arrival. "What's is it, honey?" she asked, not having any idea what her daughter could possibly want.

Kira sped up to her, sobbing. "It's Dad!" she shouted, trying to blink the tears out of her eyes, sniffing. "He won't let me race."

Sally sighed. "You're father has his reasons," she said, pressing a comforting tire against the side of Kira's fender in support.

"What 'reasons' are those, Mom?" Kira asked, not about to give up so easily. "When he is going to decide to tell me his 'reasons'?

"He'll tell you when he thinks you are ready," Sally said, trying to as gentle as she could with her daughter, but it was hard. She was beginning to lose her patience with the spirited young car.

Kira gave a furious shake of her head. "No, I never want to see him again," she said, fear suddenly in her eyes. "I told him I hated him."

"KIRA!" Sally exclaimed, shocked by the cruelty of her daughter. "You better go back and apologize to your father right this instant!"

Kira lowered her eyes, staring down at her hood. "I…I don't know if I can face him again, Mom," she said, turning away from Sally.

"I don't care, you should've thought of that before you said what you told him," Sally said, refusing to let her daughter get away with what she had done. "You probably really hurt his feelings."

"I know…but I couldn't help it…I was so mad…" Kira said, still furious.

"I know that, Kira, but you're going to have to really work on controlling your anger issues," Sally said trying to do her best to put her daughter more at ease. "They're going to get you into a lot of trouble one day if you don't."

"Yes, Mom," Kira said, turning to leave. "I'll try to work on them more."

"And go apologize to your father!" Sally made sure she was quick to add.

"Yes, Mom…" Kira said, and left.

"That girl," Sally said, shaking her hood, and went back to work. "What am I going to do with her?"

She didn't think anybody she knew would know the answer to that question.

When Kira returned to her father, she was surprised and saddened to hear soft, quiet sobs coming from his trembling frame. "Dad?" she asked, creeping up toward him. "Are you going to be okay?"

Her father had the sniffles. "Yeah, I'm all right," he said, tears in his eyes when he looked at her. "I'll get over it."

"I'm sorry I hurt your feelings, Dad," Kira said, feeling awful for making her father so sad. "I didn't mean to."

"I know you didn't," her father said, inhaling a deep breath. "You only said them out of anger."

"I don't hate you," Kira said, feeling a little awkward. "I…I love you, okay?"

"I love you, too, honey," her father said, a sad, small, smile stretching across his grill. "Just because I don't let you race, doesn't mean I don't love you, remember that, all right?"

"Yes, Dad," Kira said, still not really satisfied with his answer, but not wanting to fight with him anymore, either. She felt much too tired to fight, and she didn't want to see him cry again, ever.

"If anything I'm doing it to protect you, because I do love you, got that?" her father asked, making Kira feel a little bit better about herself.

"Yes, Dad," Kira said, and almost as if the fight had never happened, everything seemed all right between them again.

The End