Happy Valentine's Day, guys! Here is my gift to all of you! I'm pretty excited about this chapter, considering it's one of my favourite parts of the movie. Plus, I've got a new(ish) and kind of unusual OC, whom I really like, so I hope you like this OC too! :)
Chapter 25- Glory Days
"How do you know Smokey's gonna be here?" Cruz quizzed McQueen as they drew closer to Thomasville.
"I don't", Lightning replied.
"Oh. Do you know if he's even alive?"
"Nope."
"Okay..."
"Fudge, has Sammy ever said anything about Smokey?" Lightning questioned. "Or RJ?"
"I think he's come up once or twice. I would've thought they'd have mentioned it if he wasn't alive. Then again, maybe not", she second guessed herself.
"So, tell me this", Cruz requested. "How do you know if it's Smokey? Is there such-"
"Wait! Mack!" Lightning cut her off. "Pull over. Back it up, back it up."
Mack obeyed and Lightning exited the trailer. He was greeted by an ancient sign with Doc's image on it accompanied by the words THOMASVILLE SPEEDWAY HOME OF 51 FABULOUS HUDSON HORNET.
"Good to see you, Doc", the race car murmured to himself.
"Hey", Cruz spoke up as she and Fudge joined him. "Isn't that your old crew chief?"
"And mentor, doctor and father figure", Fudge put in importantly, pushing her glasses further up her nose.
"Hey, Cruz, Fudge. You wanna check out the home track of the greatest racer ever?"
"I know I do!" Fudge answered eagerly, following Lightning. Although her sister had given her an invitation to visit any time she wanted, this was her first visit to Thomasville. Normally, they'd meet up in Radiator Springs, or in Alaska with RJ, or a neutral location.
"Aren't we supposed to be looking for Smokey?" Cruz called after them as she, too, followed. "Oh, that's right. He's dead."
"We don't know that", Lightning reminded her.
"Where the hell is everyone?" Fudge wondered as they walked through the quiet and seemingly-empty town.
"I told you", Cruz replied. "This is a ghost town."
"Well, Fudge's sister's gotta be here", Lightning insisted.
"I don't know if she's here", Fudge pointed out logically. "She might be visiting RJ in Alaska or Finn and Holley in London or something." Even though Sammy left CHROME after she recovered from her cancer, she kept in touch with Finn and Holley and would act as an informant, should they need it. The sixteen-year-old readjusted her glasses. "Though, she's not the only one who lives here. As far as I know."
Lightning pushed open the doors to the speedway under the grandstand, the locks so old that they just broke. They groaned with age.
"Are you sure you have time for this?" Cruz asked.
"For this", Lightning assured her, entering the tunnel, "I do."
Fudge looked around, smiling as she caught a glimpse of B.M. + S.R. carved into a heart in the wood. That was Bobby Miller and Sammy Rose. She remembered hearing that Sammy's firstborn son, Jamie's, father's name was Bobby Miller. She wondered not only what was it like to race here in the fifties, but what it was like for her brother and sister to grow up here. Well, Sammy had moved to Thomasville when she was ten, but still, they must've had so many memories there. It was kind of like Radiator Springs and not at all where Fudge could picture Sammy living.
As the trio entered the racetrack, all three of them felt a wave of nostalgia crash into them. Old and rundown, it may be, but still, it was like stepping back in time sixty-odd years.
"This is amazing!" Fudge breathed.
"I know", Lightning agreed softly. "Wow. If this track could talk!"
"It'd probably say, 'Wow! You're the youngest people I've seen in a long time!'" Fudge joked. "Seriously, though, this would've been an awesome place to race back in the day."
"It'll be just as awesome now", Lightning insisted. "Cruz, what do you say? Let's take a lap." He revved his engine and shot off to do just that. "Whoa-ho-ho! Yeah!"
Cruz watched for a second before letting out a little laugh. "Whoa!" she exclaimed, shooting off after him.
By then, Fudge had climbed to the top of the platform where the flag waver would have once stood. It was really old, as was everything else in sight (except for Cruz!) and rickety and she feared that the whole thing would collapse under her weight. Yet, that was where she stayed for two reasons. First of all, to be out of the way. She wanted to show Lightning that she was sticking true to her word about not asking- or even hinting that she wanted to go racing again. Second of all, the view the sixteen-year-old got from up there was simply incredible! Her first impulse had been to cheer for the two cars racing down there, but there was something about the track that kept her silent. It was impressive and it was powerful. It was something much more than her.
All of a sudden, Lightning had made it to the first left turn. He performed the "turn right to go left" manoeuvre. Cruz, who had failed to understand what he meant at first, imitated him and executed the move exceptionally well, laughing all the way. Fudge watched the two, amazed. She was right about Cruz; she was a fast learner.
"Ho-ho! Yes!" Lightning cheered. "You nailed it!"
"Way easier without the School Bus of Death trying to kill us!"
"Yeah! No kidding!" Lightning agreed as they drifted again.
Even though she was out of the way and not really part of their moment, Fudge found herself laughing along with them. Not only because it was an incredible moment, but she was just so glad to be friends with both of them again.
Lightning and Cruz raced around the track for almost an hour before they ran into another soul. Almost literally. From her spot on the platform, Fudge noticed a vaguely familiar brownish-orange Hudson pickup truck approaching the track. She watched him curiously as he parked in the middle of the track while Cruz and Lightning were still using it. What was he doing? Fudge started climbing down to get back to her brother and best friend. Lightning had seen him and gasped, trying to stop in time. He slammed on his brakes and, luckily, managed to come to a halt just in front of the truck, eyes closed. Everything was silent for a moment.
"Starting to think I might never meet you", the truck proclaimed finally.
Lightning knew exactly who it was. "Smokey?"
Smokey glanced over at Fudge and Cruz as they appeared by Lightning's side. He looked surprised and did a double take when he saw Fudge, but didn't say anything. Fudge could only guess that he thought she looked like Sammy.
Cruz gasped. "He is alive!"
"It's a miracle!" Fudge added, giggling. Only, she spoke quietly, embarrassed about what Smokey would say if he heard her say that.
"I know why you're here", Smokey informed Lightning.
Another silence settled over them; Lightning expecting Smokey to say something else. However, the next words out of the pickup truck's mouth weren't what anybody expected at all.
"You're thirsty!"
He started to drive away and while the other three were surprised and confused, they followed.
As she followed Smokey, Fudge felt someone- or something- give her the fright of her life. They grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back. Fudge yelped and turned around to find Sammy standing there in a dark green mechanic's jumpsuit and black leather boots with her short rainbow hair (which had recently grown back and she'd dyed every colour of the rainbow as she had before her chemotherapy) hidden by a cap. She was grinning from ear to ear. Now that she was out of CHROME, she was looking for a fresh start in life, which meant learning to be a mechanic. She would go to medical school later on to learn to be a doctor. After all, her desire to help others and save lives was still there!
"I hate it when you do that!" Fudge grumbled.
"I know!" Sammy laughed. "That's why I do it!"
"Hey, Sammy!" Lightning greeted her.
"Hey, McQueen! How have you guys been?"
Fudge shrugged. "Okay, I guess. We're trying to get Lightning back in the game for Florida."
Sammy grinned. "So, you decided to keep racing? That's great! Jackson Storm needs to be taught a thing or two."
Lightning sighed ruefully. "Yeah, well, it's not going well so far."
"Yeah, well, I'm sure a drink could fix that."
Sammy started walking with them. As she did, she looked past her half-sister and her surrogate brother at the yellow car. "Who's the racer with you? I saw her earlier. She's not bad."
"Oh, I'm not a racer", Cruz piped up. "I'm just a trainer."
Fudge made the introductions. "Cruz, Sammy. Sammy, Cruz."
"Oh! So, you're Fudge's sister!" Cruz realised. "Well, half-sister! I should've known! You look so alike!"
"Yeah." Sammy slipped her arm around Fudge. "We get that a lot."
Smokey overheard them and laughed. "It's true! I can't believe I didn't realise! So, this is the long lost family member you and RJ have been telling us about!"
"The very same!" Sammy confirmed. She looked back at Cruz. "Well, it's very nice to meet you, Cruz, uh..."
"Ramirez", she supplied. "Cruz Ramirez. I've been training Mr. McQueen for the Florida 500."
"Don't worry", Sammy assured the group. "I'm sure we'll get some help where we're going... Oh! Here we are!"
Smokey led the group to a building with a sign out front, reading: COTTER PIN BAR AND GRILL.
"I tell you what", he declared. "These folks are gonna get a kick out of meetin' Hud's boy."
"Hud?!" Fudge repeated incredulously. She knew who he meant, but she was surprised to hear him call Doc that.
"Who's Hud?" Cruz asked. Then she answered her own question. "Oh. Doc Hudson. Right."
Right when they were about to enter the bar, a large white goose appeared from nowhere, honking loudly. Fudge jumped as she'd always been afraid of geese, Lightning yelped in surprise and Cruz looked unsure of what to do. Sammy laughed at their reactions.
"Whoa! Easy there, Herman!" Smokey called out. "They're with me!"
The goose hissed and seemed to eye each of the newcomers suspiciously, but backed off.
Fudge laughed nervously. "So, this is Herman!" She remembered hearing about him from Sammy and even Doc once.
Sammy nodded. "The loyal goose of Thomasville", she explained as Smokey opened the doors to the bar.
"Am I allowed in here?" Fudge wondered out loud. She hoped the answer was yes, so she didn't have to stay outside with Herman.
"Why wouldn't you be allowed in here?" Sammy asked.
"It's a bar and I'm under twenty-one", she pointed out.
"No one here's gonna care. Don't worry about it", Smokey, who had overheard once again, assured her as he entered.
"Hey!" Smokey called out over the sound of music and chatter inside the bar, prompting everyone to fall silent and look their way. "Act civilised! We got company!"
"Act civilised?" Fudge whispered to Lightning as they followed Smokey, who was greeting the regulars. "Was he talking to them or us?"
Lightning didn't answer. He was too busy staring at who was at the other end of the bar, chatting away. "Would you look at that?"
Fudge looked where he was and her eyes widened. "Oh, my God, oh, my God!" she exclaimed softly and excitedly.
"What?" Cruz asked.
"Three of the biggest racing legends ever!" Lightning informed her, naming each of them. "Junior 'Midnight' Moon, River Scott..."
"Louise 'Barnstormer' Nash!" Lightning and Cruz finished together.
"She had thirty-eight wins!" Cruz added.
"The First Lady of Racing!" Fudge chimed in. "That's very impressive!"
"I see you're familiar with our friends." That was Sammy.
"It's great that they're all here!" Fudge commented. "Now, we've got even more brains to pick."
As Fudge, Sammy, Smokey, Lightning and Cruz approached the table, they grabbed the Legends' attention.
"Well, as I live and breathe!" Louise Nash exclaimed. "If it ain't Lightning McQueen!"
"Ms. Nash, it's a pleasure to meet-" Lightning began.
"You've had a tough year, haven't you?" Louise cut in bluntly.
"Oh! Uh..." Lightning wasn't sure how to respond.
"Shouldn't you be running practise laps in Florida by now?" River Scott quizzed him.
"Yeah, sure, but-"
"They are here to steal our secrets!" Junior Moon announced.
"Looking for your lost mojo?" River added.
"Wow!" Lightning was finally able to speak. "You don't mince words around here, do you?"
Smokey chuckled. "Truth is always quicker, kid."
Everyone made the necessary introductions and exchanged greetings before Sammy turned to Fudge. "Let me get you a chair." She got up from where she was sat between Smokey and Cruz.
"No, no. That's okay", Fudge assured her. "I can stand."
"Don't be an idiot!" Her sister left in search of a chair. When she found one and was coming back, she added, "You were almost beaten to a pulp last night. You're not standing around."
Fudge gave a little laugh as she sat down, her chair having been placed between Lightning and Louise. She was embarrassed about her demolition derby debut being made public. "Okay! Might as well get comfortable if we're gonna talk!"
"Yeah." Smokey nodded with a grin. "We'll get you all some drinks and then I'm sure you'll wanna hear lots of stories about Hud!"
"Oh, yeah!" Sammy laughed. "I still have plenty more that I've never told you, Fudge!"
"We can all fill you in!" Louise added.
The sixteen-year-old grinned. "Awesome!" She loved hearing her half-sister tell hilarious stories about the Fabulous Hudson Hornet that were handed down to her from the Legends. It seemed like he was a lot more immature back in the day because Fudge couldn't imagine Doc doing the things Sammy described.
"Don't start without me!" Sammy requested. "I'll get the drinks! What does everyone want?"
Nearly everyone had alcohol, even Cruz, who said she normally didn't drink. Underage Fudge had a diet Coke (her fathers insisted), as did Sammy. Nobody knew why Sammy did, though.
"Where should we start?" Smokey quizzed the others.
"How about the time Hud went tractor tippin'?" River suggested.
Lightning was astonished and amused. "Tractor tipping?! You're kidding me!" He couldn't believe that. After all the times Doc got on his case about tractor tipping. "That does not sound like Doc at all!"
"Trust me, if you knew him like we did, then it would!" Smokey laughed.
Although the night wore on, the eight in their own booth at the back of the bar lost track of time. Luigi and Guido watched Sweet Tea, the singer, while Lightning, Cruz, Fudge, Sammy, Smokey, Junior, River and Louise talked and laughed, drinking, telling stories about Doc or Hud, depending on what each of them called him. Fudge, however, did more listening than talking. The shy teen kept her head down most of the time, laughing at the stories she was told. She only spoke on occasion, often amid nervous giggles, and it was clear that she was trying way too hard to get the Legends to like her.
"Lou won't admit this", River informed the three newcomers, "but she used to have serious eyes for Hud!"
Based on the embarrassed look on Louise's face, they could see that it was true.
"Oh, ho, ho!" Lightning laughed. "Really?"
"Even if I did, it wouldn't have mattered", Louise insisted. "Hud didn't like fast women. And that left me out", she added with a wink at River, to which Smokey and the Legends laughed as if this was some kind of inside joke.
"But ol' Lou wasn't just fast", River went on. "She was fearless."
"The second I saw my first race, I just knew I had to get in there", Louise explained. "'Course the fellas in charge didn't like the idea of a lady racer showin' 'em up. So, they wouldn't let me have a number."
Cruz gasped. "What did you do?"
"I stole one!"
Lightning, Cruz and Fudge were stunned, but they were most definitely impressed too.
"What?!" Lightning exclaimed.
Fudge's eyes widened. Right then and there, she wished she could be as cool and confident as Louise, but she knew that that would never happen.
"Wow!" Cruz added.
"Life's too short to take no for an answer, right, River?"
"If we had waited for an invitation, we might have never raced", River agreed.
"And once we got on the track", Louise continued, "we didn't wanna leave."
"I think that's how Doc felt too", Lightning commented.
"What with his career being cut short and all." Fudge nodded, saying it like she was trying to sound intelligent. She stirred her ice around her glass with a straw.
"You should've seen him when he first came to town!" River proclaimed. "Shiny blue paint. Not just the Hudson Hornet. He was already calling himself..."
"The Fabulous Hudson Hornet!" Smokey, Junior, River and Louise shouted together before cheering and laughing.
"Wait. So, he started calling himself the Fabulous Hudson Hornet before he started racing?!" Fudge spoke up incredulously. She'd always been under the assumption he'd earned the nickname after winning a couple of races.
River nodded. "That's right."
"Geez, Doc!" the human girl groaned with a laugh, trying to be funny. "Narcissistic, much?"
The others laughed and Fudge gave a nervous smile. It was working!
"Wow! And he said I was arrogant!" Lightning exclaimed, remembering that was one of the things that Doc had hated about him.
That made everyone laugh even more.
"Well, you were both quite the arrogant, hotshot rookies", Sammy pointed out. "It probably annoyed him because you were so much like him. Now, you're experiencing the same thing with Jackson Storm. I guess that's just the way of things."
"Isn't that the truth?" Lightning muttered.
"The Fabulous Hudson Hornet", Louise repeated. "Oh, did we ever ride him on that."
"Not for long", Junior added.
"Hud was the fastest racer this side of the Mississippi", River declared.
"Until he wasn't", Smokey chimed in.
For the first time all night, a brief silence reigned over the group.
"What?" Lightning asked finally.
"Everything changed when the rookie showed up", Smokey explained.
"You're gonna love this!" Sammy informed the trio of newcomers.
Sensing another story coming up, Fudge made herself comfortable as Smokey described a typical race back in the fifties. The four who hadn't been there could easily picture it.
"Took Hud all of no time to work his way through the best racers in both Carolinas", Smokey told them. "Past River, past Lou, even Junior. But there was still the rookie to deal with. Pretty soon, they were side by side and the rookie wasn't having it. He tried slamming him into the wall. But Hud never touched any wall unless he wanted to."
"What did he do?" Lightning wondered.
"What do you think he did? He pushed off the wall and flipped over the rookie. Shot past him and won first place."
"How did you miss that?!" Sammy questioned and Lightning wasn't sure if she was kidding or serious.
"I don't think I'd ever been more proud of him. He knew if he couldn't outrace the rookie, he'd have to outthink him. That rookie never saw anything like that before."
"Doc did that?!" Cruz exclaimed in disbelief.
"Whoa!" Lightning cried. "Are you kidding?!"
"Couldn't wipe the smile off his face for a week after that!" That was Louise.
"It would've been pretty awesome to see!" Sammy sighed, shaking her head.
"Yeah..." Fudge agreed. "Well, that was back when he was cool!" she joked, making another effort to be funny.
"You don't think Doc Hudson's cool?" Cruz asked in mock disbelief.
"Nope." Fudge shook her head, giggling.
All of a sudden, she sighed sadly, fighting back tears.
Sammy came over and put her arm around her sister. "You really miss him, don't you?"
Fudge sighed again. "Yeah."
Just like that, Lightning was depressed again. "Me too... I wish I could've seen him like that."
"Like what?" Smokey questioned.
"So happy."
After a pause, Smokey looked to Sammy and the Legends. "Do you mind stayin' here with Fudge and Cruz? I think McQueen and I need to talk."
"Fine with me", all four of them responded in unison.
Then the Hudson pickup truck turned to Lightning, Cruz and Fudge. "You all okay with that?"
"Sure", the three of them replied.
Without a word, Smokey gestured for Lightning to follow him out of the bar, which he did uncertainly.
As soon as they were gone, Fudge grinned at her sister and her older friends. "So, now that Smokey's gone, do you guys have any stories about him?"
I know Herman is a little weird, but I created him for a crack fic and I liked him so much that he found his way into this story! XD He will appear a little more as the story progresses.
And I had to make Fudge fangirl over the Legends a little bit. I tried to think about what I'd be like in that kind of situation and went from there.
So, please review!
