"You don't get to call me that."
Storm laughs. "Isn't that what you call yourself these days, Fabulous?"
"Seriously, cut it out. What are you even doing here?"
"I live here."
Lightning emits a heavy sigh. "Of course you do." This city was built to torture him.
Storm doesn't turn off and disappear into some snazzy, LED-lit garage, though.
Lightning tries to ignore him - just keep driving - but Storm stays a creeping presence behind him for two blocks, then five. Then they hit double-digits together.
"So," Lightning begins as conversationally as he can. He tries not to grit his teeth. "Haven't made headlines in a while. Dry spell?"
"Always in the top ten," Storm replies, dismissive.
"Right, because that's how Jackson Storm wants to define his racing career. Behind nine other guys."
"At least it's an actual racing career. I don't need to rely on dramatic stunts to keep me relevant."
Lightning rolls his eyes. "What, you hadn't heard? That's kind of my MO."
Truth be told, it's not the first time someone's said that about him. Lightning figures if you stick around long enough, everyone will have said everything about you. That's just fact. As long as you can remember that, it makes it easier to drown out the noise.
Or it should, except Storm is Storm, and Storm is a special case. And Lightning's learning that he was wrong - so wrong! - about being over him. It's like a pressure front. It's like Storm shows up and Lighting feels him. Not at his tail, but in him, pulling one plate from another, putting tension in his gears, cracking tightness in his screws.
Now that Storm's back in the picture - lurking insistently, unnervingly in Lightning's blind spot - he's right back to square one, as though Cruz had never beat Storm, and Storm had never ceased to matter, and Lightning had never grown up. He just - Everything about Storm sets him on edge. The growl of his engine, the prickle of his exhaust, the crunch of loose asphalt under his tires - Lightning can't stand it. Heck, he can hardly stand Storm downshifting for the stoplight.
Lightning pops recalcitrantly into neutral, then brakes. This isn't a race, he reminds himself. Pull it together.
Storm's just noise.
"I respect your wins, you know," says the noise. "Seven-time champ? I'd be stupid not to. Maybe if you lived up to them I'd respect you, too."
Steady, Lightning.
Steady.
"Oh, what does that even - " he starts, but Storm doesn't let him finish.
"The thing is, I know that your rookie year, you only took third. Meanwhile, I'm the first rookie to win the championship." Storm fixes Lightning with a friendly grin - if friendly had fangs, and a predilection for burying bodies.
He continues, "I meant it when I said it was my pleasure to beat you. But I'm not going to stop at a race or ten, McQueen. Mark me: When I'm done, they won't have any reason to remember you."
Not that they'll need Storm's help. Where Lightning's concerned, "took third" doesn't seem like the most relevant description of that particular race. But unless you were actually there? That's probably all it is to most cars, not just Storm. After a while, a race is only a number and a winner. There's no stat sheet that remembers what it once felt like, what it still meant.
Sure, there's always the old-timers. The ones who laugh mercilessly when they find out it took you three whole days to recognize the Hudson Hornet - but who then turn around and rattle off your own stats, highlights from your own races, with a lovingly encyclopedic specificity that far outstrips your own memory. But maybe they'll fade with the old guard, too; when the sport changes, so do its fans.
The light turns green, and Lightning braces himself. He expects Storm to shoot in front of him, blind spot to center stage like time and space don't even matter. Because that's what Storm does - it's what he always does, will always do. And Storm's the type to make his points as dramatically as possible.
But after a moment of stillness and silence, all Storm says from behind him is, "Light's green, McQueen."
Lightning sets his jaw and rolls forward. The streets keep getting darker. He figured he'd find an onramp somewhere and drive until he could orient himself around an interstate, but the highway stays loud and distant above them, a constant hum that feels a world away. There's no point of entry. He weaves around a rash of broken glass and kicks at a loose hunk of pavement, which skitters across the uneven street until it plonks against the foot of the overpass.
"How much do you even know about my rookie year?" Lightning says eventually.
Storm wavers from his line, just enough that Lightning catches the movement in his peripheral vision. But if he thought Storm's deviance might mean he had something worthwhile to say, he'd be wrong.
Storm says, "You realize how long ago that was, right? I bet iPhones weren't even invented yet."
"What does that matter to you? Racecars don't have phones!"
"I have one."
Lightning's first impulse is to ask, Does it have Mapquest? He's been driving lost since he left Cruz's doorstep, and if anything, the interstate only feels farther away.
"I don't believe you," he says instead. "What's your number?"
"Wait, why are you asking for my digits?" Storm asks, reversing abruptly.
"Because I don't trust you! Why else? I mean, come on. You don't actually have a phone."
Storm shifts on his tires. After a moment of deliberation, he admits, "It's 20. My phone number, I mean."
"Wow. Seriously?"
"Laugh all you want. But let me guess - your trailer's locker combination is 95. It is, isn't it."
Lightning glares hard and petulant at a distant streetlight. "Maybe," he admits.
He hears a soft ping behind him. Then a droid-like voice: RESUME file: You are in a twisty little MAZE.
Storm frowns. The voice says, You cannot use the BLOWTORCH here. Then it says, You cannot go LEFT.
Then, Are you sure you want to QUIT?
"That's... not Mapquest," says Lightning, wheeling around to face Storm and the voice.
"Obviously," says Storm, though he offers no further explanation. "I told you I had a phone."
Lightning's gotta admit, he is genuinely impressed. "How on earth did you convince - "
"You don't really want one, if you're a racecar - you know, fangirls - but Gale got them to let me keep it. So we can get in touch if we need to."
"Who's Gale?"
"My transporter."
"Who else do you call?" The possibilities seem limitless. If Lightning had a phone, he'd call Sally, and then he wouldn't have to sit out here with Storm.
Storm hesitates.
"Why would you use your phone to call anyone?" he replies. "Please, McQueen."
Right, right. Old man joke. It's not like he doesn't own a computer; he knows what an app is.
But it's more than that, isn't it.
You're lonely.
It's like an electric shock; it's just so obvious, all at once. The feeling rushes through him, fire through his cylinders, because Lightning remembers that. He remembers what it had felt like to be that lonely. To have no one.
You don't understand, Lightning thinks. Because you can't. You've never - No family, no block parties, no direction but a call for the track. No one's ever -
"Stop staring. It's creepy," says Storm.
Lightning executes a turn so tight his steering column squeals. He immediately zips forward, Storm in tow. Street after street, he wrestles with this thoughts. Basic rundown:
1. Storm is lonely.
2. Lightning knows what that's like.
3. Lightning should do something about it.
The thing is, Lightning doesn't care. He doesn't want to be Storm's friend. He doesn't even want to be in the same city, and it's a small but blessed miracle Cruz hasn't had to pit anywhere near him all season. Storm's a snide, smarmy -
Lightning takes an aggressive series of right turns just so he won't have to wait for the light. If he stops, he'll have to say something, and he's not sure yet what's going to come out of his mouth. Three reds and three rights in a row. They're driving in circles.
Because it's more than that, isn't it.
Lightning can't look at Storm without also seeing everything he stands for. He looks at Storm and he sees supersession; he sees futility; he sees the end of a road. And there are so many reasons that's not true - not in that way - and so many things Lightning also loves with all his heart, things that Storm and the race and that whole world can never take away from him - but still he feels it, and it is loss. That loss is cold, and it is thick; it's like washer fluid in his engine and he can hardly breathe around it.
Lightning knows he should embrace the moment. Accept his fork in the road with grace and push on in his newfound direction. He should extend an olive branch - if not for Storm, then for his own sake. It's the right thing to do.
But see, he'd thought he'd already found grace. He'd already made peace. Yet here he is all over again - and maybe this time, there is no escaping that pain, that loss. Maybe it was foolish to think this wouldn't destroy him. He swerves blindly into another turn.
"Do you even know where you're going?" asks Storm, in a tone that suggests he already knows the answer.
"Yes," Lighting snaps, to spite him. He tries to catch a glimpse of the next street sign as they pass by, but it doesn't make a difference. Allessandro Street? Where's that supposed to be?
It's the right thing to do, he tells himself. Befriend Storm, be the better car. Embody grace.
If only Storm would stop riding his blind spot. Or, you know, existing in proximity.
"Why are you still following me?" His voice sounds more strained than he'd hoped.
"Because you said you know where you're going," says Storm.
Which, frankly, Storm does not deserve his grace, even if Lighting had any to give. If Storm is willing to wander Los Angeles all night just to watch him fail, far be it from Lightning to deny him.
The streets are quiet now, untouched by traffic and disconnected from the interstate. The streetlamps are fewer and farther between, and more and more they stay dark as Lightning passes under them. Maybe Storm will hit a pothole his headlight-less face couldn't see and he'll need a tow.
Hey, a car can dream.
And this is - Baxter Street, okay... Oh - Whoa.
"Holy sh - "
"Something wrong, Storm?" Lightning asks, once he, too, has recovered himself.
They're at the foot of a mountain. Or they should be, except it's paved, more or less, and it claims it's meant to be a street. It's Baxter Street. It shoots straight up, the crest so far into the sky its silhouette is only just visible against the urban glow of the city beyond. Lightning's headlights only reach a third of the way up. Beyond them, the road is a dark and seeping mystery.
Lightning takes it in.
This is the kind of hill that mangles. Cars with fewer horses, maybe they don't make it up at all. Cars that can gotta make sure they don't start with too much power, and need to lift off at just the right moment, or end up beached, or worse. This is the kind of hill that tears into low-seated parts and doesn't let go. Twists alignments. Tests suspensions.
But it's also the kind of hill that lets you fly.
"No," says Storm, when he realizes what Lightning's thinking. "No way. Maybe this isn't a concern for you, but I have parts down there I want to keep."
"You know, I've got a friend back home who loves doing this kind of stuff - and he's a rusty old tow truck."
"Good for him!"
And so what if Storm's lonely? He's a big boy. He probably deserves it; heaven knows Lightning did. Lightning also knows that friendship is earned. You gotta meet it halfway. Lightning figures Storm's got the right of way here, and he can either exercise it or get left behind.
Lightning revs his engine. And then he's not thinking about Storm. He's not thinking about right things to do, or good things to do. He's not thinking about what Doc would think, what Sally would think, if he failed to do them. He's not thinking at all.
"Are these the kinds of stunts you pull with that girl!" Storm shouts, but Lightning's attention slams to the road. The road is so much easier.
It's a washboard, but once he hits seventy it's just him and the air. He breathes in deep. Sparks fly as he exhales, goes metal to asphalt with the road as he hits the crest, but he takes another thirsty breath, stretches high, and he's airborne down the other side: He's airborne.
He's free.
He doesn't see the stars, not like from the buttes of Radiator Springs, but the horizon dances orange like the city's on fire, and the matte gray-blue of the night sky for a moment seems endless. It's its own kind of beauty.
He meets the pavement again about halfway down, exhilarated, if no closer to grace. The impact hurts, in a way that almost edges into delight; his shocks quake, and the lights around him melt from their sources until they become writhing worms of neon across his vision. He bleeds his tires against the road and twists to keep from hitting the straightaway face-first. He's 100 percent humming adrenaline.
It's not until he blinks the lights back into their fixtures that he realizes that the lights are headlights.
A lot of headlights.
"Thought we heard something good," says a voice that Lightning can't quite place at the same time he thinks This can't be good.
He squints against the headlights, which vary in tone from yellow-white to searing blue. He can only snatch glimpses of paint, flashes of metal, before the lights drive his gaze elsewhere - into more headlights, more faces. He doesn't know how many there are.
"Lookit that roll cage," says another.
"Nah, I wanna see his cams."
"Pop his hood and let's see the goods!"
"You're a long way from home, ain't you?"
"Hey… guys," says Lightning. He backs up slowly, his back bumper scraping against the road as it inclines sharply behind him.
The headlights, en masse, pulse forward.
"Hello, racecar."
You look a little lost.
He's asleep. He's asleep, and this is a nightmare. It's the only real explanation Lighting can come up with, except maybe he's gotten too swept up in one of Mater's crazy stories, and that's what this is. If it is, Mater's bound to sweep in and save the day any moment now.
The set of headlights directly in front of him has the meanest engine in him Lightning's ever heard, and he's not exactly a stranger to powerful machinery. Definitely not regulation, Lightning babbles at himself, as though he's safe within the walls of the training center, still poring over the new 2017 rulebooks to make sure Cruz meets spec, and not in the dark, in the city, at the center of an infestation of headlights.
Mater doesn't show.
Instead, one of the cars breaks from the pack and sidles up to Lightning's fenders, and it feels so much like that car's about to take a bite out of him that Lightning leaps sideways. "Whoa, whoa! Hey!"
"Caught a little glimpse of chassis!" the car nearest him cackles.
Frantic, Lightning shoots his gaze up the dark side of Baxter Street. He'd kind of hoped he'd topped out on death-defying antics for the year, but apparently for some things, the sky's the limit. And a slight hitch, as far as the "defying" part of that goes: There's a mountain in the way.
"You ready?" someone shouts from the mass of headlights. He's answered by another: "He looks ready!" And another: "Gonna cut and run!"
"Hey, you know we race for pinks out here, right? You ready? 'Cause this is real road - "
Within seconds, someone has called dibs on his drive train, his exhaust system. The car in front - tall, loud, and neon green - doesn't want anything special, just his hubcaps, for style. And there's a mountain in the middle of his escape route.
So he does the only thing he can think to do: Gun it like a Charger outta Dodge.
He has the element of surprise on his side, at the very least, as he careens up Baxter in reverse. It takes enough focus to keep his wheels straight that he doesn't think too hard about what might happen if he hits an unanticipated bump, what happens if someone down there's actually worth his weight in acceleration and charges after him. Whatever the incline, the road's plenty long enough to gain some real speed, more speed than anyone could manage in reverse gear, that's for sure - Dig harder, dig harder -
Lightning gasps as he hits the top sooner than intended and his undercarriage bounces off the pavement, pounding all the air from his system. He feels his back tires lift as his belly scrapes over the crest. Then the feeling reverses and he teeters onto his back wheels again, hits something with a soft crunch.
can't breathe -
"Unbelievable."
Blearily, dazedly, Lightning recognizes that it's Storm, Storm still slowly taking the front half of Baxter at a calculated tangent. Lightning groans, sinks deeper into him -
can't breathe -
His vision spots, rainbow pinpricks in the darkness. For a moment he's bodiless.
Storm jerks away and Lightning brakes on reflex, hugging the incline, abandoned by coherent thought and focused only on the pain - and that's when Storm hears the rest of them coming.
"Unbelievable," Storm repeats, more aggressively. "Come on, we gotta go!"
Lightning just gasps, trying to force air through his engine. He's so turned around he's not even sure which direction "go" means. Storm shouts, "I said GO!" Then something slams Lightning sideways, and suddenly he's facing down the full expanse of Baxter again, rattling down its rough surface toward an unforgiving bottom. Storm's beside him.
They both have the same idea at the bottom of the hill, and they swing out, burn rubber, and disrupt the hedges lining the cross-street in an explosion of wood and petals. The impact brings Lightning around, disorientation hiking into panic. And he guns it, because he knows the only thing he's got on his side is that stupid, stupid hill. Once he loses that lead, he's done for, because those cars know these streets. And they're right. He's lost.