Terry struggled his way to the Cosmic Dolphin amid the swath of other racers, all struggling to get to their crafts. As he strapped his seatbelt shut, he noticed several crafts zooming off to different parts of Mute City. One in particular, however, caught his eye. It was a red, jagged affair, with what looked like gun turrets mounted on the front. It swept back into two wing-like extensions and followed through with large flares on the back, each with a window inside. Despite the windows on the flares, the cockpit sat firmly in the middle. Terry could barely make out two words emblazoned in white on the side: 'The Ragnarok.' What caught Terry's eye about this craft, though, was that it was just sitting there. He couldn't tell whether the pilot was in the craft or not, but he was fairly certain that everyone had left the building. 'Oh well,' Terry thought. He shifted the Cosmic Dolphin into motion, snapped his fingers, and let his treasured craft drive on autopilot to the practice site.
A loud beeping noise awakened him. 'I must have fallen asleep on the way here,' thought Terry as he gazed over his practice site. It was an oval, fairly small, but it was decked out in the same gaudy fashion that was the Mute City trademark. Terry was slightly dismayed that his practice course was directly under a humongous 'Smoke Laramie Cigarettes – NOW WITH MORE TAR' neon sign, but he decided it couldn't be helped. He moved his craft onto the course, noting the 'Mute City – Sonic Oval' sign that he passed. Terry shifted his car out of city driving mode and started doing laps around the oval.
After fifteen laps, Terry began to get bored. He logged into his craft's central computer and accessed a specially made simulation program. This would allow him to race against computer-controlled opponents. Terry had tried actually marketing this before, but people were too enthralled with the real races to pay attention to a simulation. Terry put his craft on autopilot and immersed himself in the illusory worlds of his computer.
His opponent was a human colored silver, about the same size and stature as Samurai Goroh. He and virtual Goroh wove their ways through a brightly colored dreamland; reds and yellows denoting where the track stopped and empty virtual space took over. Terry snapped his fingers and several holographic screens rose in front of him. He pointed to one of the screens and it beeped in response. It closed the first screens and brought up several more, each displaying one of a number of options Terry could take. Suddenly, however, the screens shut down as the virtual Goroh slammed the side of his craft and thumbed its nose at him. Terry brought the craft out of autopilot and chased after his opponent. He brought the ship over a ramp, launching him in front of Goroh. They traded positions until they reached a passage too narrow to go side-by-side. Terry sped out in front and took a sizable lead, as Goroh had no choice but go in behind Terry. After a long ride through the passage, Terry brought up his options screen once more. He looked at it and smirked. Terry powered his craft down as Goroh zoomed by him, waving as it went. Terry waited a few minutes and powered his craft back up again. He followed Goroh's path until he found his opponent, who had powered down its vehicle as well. A virtual simulation of Phoenix (a recent addition to the program) stood over it and tapped a clipboard with a pen, signifying that Goroh had been going 650 kilometers over the speed limit. Terry stopped the car within his opponent's line of sight, smirked, waved, and zoomed off.
Soon after, Terry decided to stop practicing for the night and find a good place to sleep. He snapped his fingers and a holographic map of Mute City burst into view in front of him. A list of all available hotels was displayed on a list to his right, while the sites of the hotels blinked green on the map. Terry located one and programmed the location into his ship, setting it to autopilot. The ship zipped off, Terry tired with the stress of his first day on the road.
Terry had been on the road for about ten minutes when he noticed that the street he was on was clear of all other cars. He grinned to himself and put his car into racing mode. He returned the controls to manual and gunned his engines. A burst of blue flames flared out of the boosters on the back of his ship.
Terry shifted into forward and was immediately cut off by a sleek, bulbous, monster of a ship. He skidded to a halt. It stopped directly in front of him and a hatch opened. Out stepped a large man, decked out in a very loud set of purple and red clothes. Terry noticed that it was the same man he had seen on the way to Mute City, and shifted with spectacular speed into reverse. Suddenly, the man disappeared and the Cosmic Dolphin ground to a halt. Terry looked behind him, and saw that the same man was holding his craft and keeping it from moving! Terry tried to drive forward, but the man disappeared again and ended up directly on his windshield. Terry's eyes widened.
"Exit the car, boy..." the man growled in a very gravelly voice. Terry shook his head. The man smashed his fist through the windshield of the Cosmic Dolphin and grabbed Terry by the collar. "I said, LEAVE THE CAR!" The man withdrew his hand, and Terry with it, through the windshield, leaving Terry with several deep gashes along the side of his body.
"Wha... what do you want?" Terry whimpered.
"Boy, I know you saw me that night... I can't have anyone, no matter how insignificant, know about me, except for my minions. So, that leaves you with two options... become my lackey..."
"Or what?" asked Terry, dreading the answer.
"Or you will face screaming doom," answered his assailant. He tightened his grip. "Which will it be?"
Terry mumbled, "I guess I have no choice..." and edged his hand toward his belt.
"That's a reasonable child," the man replied. Terry clicked a button on his belt and the Cosmic Dolphin suddenly burst into activity. It zoomed forward, throwing Terry back into the driver's seat and propelling the man underneath it.
'The antigrav engines should fry him,' Terry thought with some satisfaction. He looked back over his shoulder and saw that the man was not there anymore. He also noticed that his car had stopped moving. 'Oh, no...' Terry thought and looked back out front. The man was standing on the front of the Cosmic Dolphin, grinding the nose of the craft into the road. Terry pressed another button on his belt, and the cockpit flew open, launching him past his mystery attacker. He landed squarely on the ground, directly in front of a garish 'Visit Fun-Fun Mountain!' sign. Terry glanced back toward his ship, and noted that it had shut itself down. 'Good,' Terry thought to himself, before realizing that something was missing... and it currently had a hold on the back of his neck.
"You insolent little whelp..." the man snarled. "That just earned you a trip to the farthest reaches of the galaxy!" He grabbed Terry's waist with one gargantuan hand and reached for a button on his wrist with the other. Terry launched a fist directly at the glass casing, which he could now see did encase the man's brain. The fist hit at the exact same moment as the man hit the button. Terry felt the world melt away beneath him and heard his attacker's victorious voice.
"HAHAHA! Fool! Never cross the mighty Deathborn and expect to win! I will rule everything!"
Terry shut his eyes as the world drained away beneath his feet; he knew it was all over...