Sweeper woke up early Tuesday night; he had gone early to bed while the remaining of the team had a nightlong party at Chang's bar.
Unable to sleep he decided to head to Akina and practice on the course, at this time to the day he wouldn't be likely to encounter anyone else.
Which would give Sweeper a lot of elbow room to play around and analyze the course at his own pace.
Sweeper quickly got dressed and jumped into his FD and took off lightly since his 4 rotor was everything but quiet and he didn't feel like waking up everyone with a loud roar from his engine.

As he arrived on Akina he begun to take a few runs on the downhill, getting used to the line through the corners, it was a difficult course to drive, and he understood why the AE86 was at an advantage on it.
The hours went by and on Sweeper's 4th downhill run, he noticed a set of headlights catching up, and they were coming up pretty fast.

"What the hell? Somebody is driving here at this hour and at that speed?" Sweeper thought.

As the car caught up Sweeper noticed it was a blue Impreza WRX.
It started to make a few moves to pass on the straightaway.

"Like hell that I will let you pass! This will be good practice." Sweeper slammed the gas pedal to the floor and the 4 rotor woke up to life leaving off a roar like a F1 engine.

The Impreza was being left behind due to the massive power in the FD.
Sweeper got a shock when he begun to dive into the corner, the Impreza was catching up to him.
It was a lot faster through that corner than Sweeper was with his FD.

"What the hell? You can keep up with my FD? I guess you are a bit better than I thought you were; now you leave me no choice but to go all out." Sweeper thought as he dived in at the FD's limit in the next corner.

The Impreza followed by a drift and were closing in the gap on the FD yet again, still corner exits were the same with the FD winning on traction and power.
At the 5 hairpins Sweeper started drifting the car, a sign that he was taking the opponent seriously and using a skill that he had perfected over long time practice.
However, when he looked in his left mirror he saw the Impreza drop into the gutter to keep a higher speed through the corner.

"DAMNIT that is a technique I cannot copy, my tires are too wide to fit into the gutter!" Sweeper cursed as the Impreza lined up at his side for the next corner.

At the next corner the Impreza cut in front of Sweeper and dived into the gutter while Sweeper braked to clear the corner.
The last thing Sweeper saw was the driver lighting a cigarette while driving with no hands and that took Sweeper's breath away.
At the corner exit Sweeper slammed on the gas pedal in a last attempt to use engine power to catch up to the Impreza.
But it was of no use, the Impreza dived into the next corner and mind dazzling speeds, and an undefeated legend had ended.
Sweeper slammed on the brakes and stopped the car.

"In all my years of driving, I have never lost like this, I have lost a few times due to mechanical failures but never have I experienced such a difference in skill before. So such a driver does exist, I lost to an underpowered Impreza with my high powered and modified FD, this is outrageous really." Sweeper thought before he started driving again, heading back to Tokyo.

Back in Tokyo the rest of the crew were eating breakfast when Sweeper came barging through the door.

"Hey what's up Sweeper? You look like you have seen a ghost." McClintock asked.

"Maybe I have." Sweeper replied.

"Stop messing around, we all know that ghosts do not exist. Or else I would be seeing lots of them." Carlos said in an attempt to fire up a joke.

"Well, you can forget my last statement that I said a week ago!" Sweeper said as he went to the breakfast table.

"Which statement?" Keiichi asked.

"I am NOT going to retire…" Sweeper started before he paused and reached for the bread.

"WHAT? I know you Sweeper; you NEVER go back on a statement like that, what made you change your mind? Sure you aren't ill?" Carlos asked.

"I went to Akina to practice while you guys were sleeping out after that party last night… And I…" Sweeper stopped.

"I don't like this." Chang said as he had a feeling of what he was going to say.

"I… Lost a race… I lost to a blue Impreza WRX, it wasn't a close loss either, I was totally outrun and the guy was doing zero counter drifts while lighting a cigarette, now how embarrassing is that?" Sweeper said while clearing showing that he didn't like the outcome.

Carlos' immediate response was spitting the coffee over the floor then shouting out "WHAT!"

"You lost to an Impreza? GIVE ME A BREAK! 4WD system to 4WD System your FD is superior, grip wise your car is superior. Handling and weight wise your car is superior. I just don't see how in the hottest and blackest hell you could possibly lose! I don't care who this guy is, but I want to meet him and avenge you with my GT-R!" Carlos said with a clear tone of anger and disappointment.

"Did you see which type of Impreza it was?" Jane asked.

"Of course I got a good look at it, front first then the rear. It was a Version 5 WRX STi GC8 Coupe with the front end from a 22B Impreza, but that driver is beyond what you can beat with your GT-R Carlos, I even tried to pull away with my engine power; I could only mount a successful assault on the straights, only to lose badly in corners. No matter how hard I pushed my tires grip, he still seemed to stick more and have a lot more control than me." Sweeper said.

"Winning on power is elementary in your case… But with those tire sizes you guys use I would believe that your FD should have a lot more gripping potential than that Impreza, from your description it does seem like the driver is top notch." Jane started.

"Indeed he is I was beat at my best skill, tire grip management… Nothing is more frustrating than to lose in corners and win on power when you got very little straights to work with. The more I think about it, the more frustrated I get." Sweeper took a bite of the bread he had on his plate.

"Now that has me puzzled… I doubt it can be the guy I am thinking of… He was said to be just a legend after all. But it doesn't match the car at all, he didn't drive an Impreza at all, heck, back then the Impreza didn't exist. But this has me interested" Keiichi said as his face took the pondering expression.

"Whatever Keiichi, just remember everyone not a word around this must leave this room! Is that clear?" Jane said while knocking her pointer finger at the table.

"Fine by us…" Carlos, McClintock and Chang said in choir.

"It is not like I want to tell anyone else about this." Sweeper replied to Jane.

"To change subject, did anyone hear of the incident up in the mountain pass that Norio frequents?" Jane asked.

"You mean where all the rejects go?" Chang asked back at Jane.

"Yeah, some guy was being a wise guy last night and headed up there, I recall his last name was Stella or something, an American unless my memory is faulty… He didn't return after challenging Sinjo." Jane said.

"I never liked that guy anyways; usually a bullet is the best way to fix people like that… I guess that Sinjo for once did us a favour. That guy kept criticising our cars and skills at the bar before Chang here told him to head up and see Sinjo if he thought he was that good himself." Sweeper commented.

"And allow me to guess, Sinjo got off from the police without an incident after this too?" Chang asked.

"Of course, it was all blamed on reckless driving, or as racers say it: He pushed it too far." Keiichi replied.

"I must say that Sinjo really knows how to clean up his house so to speak." McClintock said as he sipped of a glass of juice.

"Enough about Sinjo for now and before I lose my appetite lets change the subject. The team leader of Emperor called me not long ago wanting to reschedule the match due to some matters that had gotten in the way. I said it was ok after speaking with Kenneth of the Southern Knights, he has agreed to have his battle this weekend instead of the next. So you guys can put Sudou Kyoichi hunting on hold for now and focus on the old school V8's instead." Keiichi announced.

"Old school V8's… I have owned one, a Pontiac Trans Am that I lately bought a Chevrolet engine to put in it. But cornering wise, V8's isn't something that worries me. The old school V8 cars are horrible platforms to build race cars from unless you rip out everything including the chassis and start from scratch. But then again, the expenses and time spent would make a GT-R or RX-7 near F1 cars in comparison. There is a reason I retired my Trans Am for drag racing." Sweeper said.

"A Trans Am? You owned an American muscle car?" Carlos got really puzzled.

"I have owned a few cars before I finally settled on the RX-7, there was that black understeering Trans Am and an old blue 1980's Porsche 911 RR layout… The latter I crashed in a Porsche 911 racing event. I braked too late and under steered into a concrete wall, I survived though but the car was done for, the cost of repairing everything was so high that I decided to retire it instead. Back then I was really in a pulp, I thought I didn't have anything going for me when it came to racing. But the purchase of my 1998 Type RS changed all of that." Sweeper said.

"How much power does that Trans Am put down?" McClintock asked.

"Around 2000 HP or so, boosted of course. It isn't a true car before it is boosted in some way. Plus a big power nitrous system on top of that." Sweeper replied.

"Why don't you use that for Wangan racing? I am pretty sure that you would give Kenneth a run for his money with that BTR of his. That Demon machine as they call it." Carlos asked.

"Simply put, even though the highways here in Tokyo and other places do not have that many sharp corners, that Trans Am would probably dust the BTR when it was straight, but the first sloppy corner it would be HELLO concrete wall and you would be having a Pontiac Trans Am that was fulfilling the length requirement for Japanese K class cars!" Sweeper replied a bit harshly.

"So compared to Kenneth he has a power demon and you have an understeer demon?" Jane asked as a joke.

"Could probably beat the Front wheel drive cars in the field of understeer… And to make it more embarrassing it is REAR WHEEL DRIVE!" Sweeper partly shouted out.

"It doesn't sound very good." Chang said.

"Well, now that I think of it, I am glad Jane pointed me in the direction of rotaries. If it hadn't been for her, I would never been a World Cup driver, I would probably be wrapped around the nearest tree or something like that." Sweeper said while throwing a look at Jane.

"Ok, Akina's mountain pass it is then! How is it to drive Sweeper?" Carlos asked.

"It is very difficult, it would really challenge you and your R34 Carlos, I understand why the AE86 can drive so fast on it now, but what I don't understand is how that…" Sweeper was interrupted by Jane.

"THAT topic is finished, wrapped up, gone, MIA, KIA, Away with leave! Whatever, don't talk about it!" Jane said.

"Well then, we better prepare ourselves for the run against the Southern Knights then." Carlos said.

As the weekend came, the team headed off to Akina to the race against the Southern Knights.
Even though Sweeper had a hunch that he had seen Kenneth before, he didn't reveal that.
It was time for the races…

Author's notes: The race on Akina is not featured in this story, for that you will have to refer to SouthSideSlider's "Southern Knights" As he has featured it there under the chapter Project S. Even though the chapter numbers may seem weird that I am leaving out a chapter and a race here, just bear with it for now. Ok, onward to chapter 20 then! Next stop Irohazaka and Emperor!