Chapter 6: Rotary Power, And A 4WD?
April 21st.
Ako Izumi was jogging on one of the bridges early in the morning. It was something routine for her, since she needs to keep herself fit, since she was a football coach to a team of young boys in the elementary school. Strange it may sound having a girl as a football coach to boys, she does her job very well.
She decides to stop by to have some stretching exercises, in which she stretches herself to make sure she is always flexible most of the time. Going through all that, she begins to walk home to prepare for school. As she was walking on the roadside, something that sounds like a loud vacuum cleaner appears. She does not give notice to it, but as she continued, the thing passed her very quickly. The sound is so loud that she closes her ears with her hands. The thing passes under a streetlight, and she could see that thing clearly. It was a blue coupe with a vented front carbon bonnet, and a spoiler on the rear boot, and a large exhaust underneath the bumper, presumably more than 3 inches. Strangely, the front and rear wheels are different, with front being meshes and the rear being spokes. The words 'RX7' and 'RZ' are seen on the car. The car disappears after passing the streetlight into the darkness, with a 'tsssh' sound following shortly after. There was nothing but sadness that shows on her face, as there is a sad past behind it. She continues to walk on to her dormitory after that.
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The blue Mazda RX7 parks itself beside a grey Skyline sedan in the school car park, which belonged to Kyo. A brown-haired teenage boy came out of the low car, and seeing that the Skyline is an automatic, remarked, "Hmmm, automatic wimps."
Saniro Yamamoto, 2nd year in Mahora Academy boys' senior high, studies in the same class 2-B as Shun and Kyo. He is known to be one of the cool guys in the class, in contrast to Shun, who seem to be more sedate. And he is rich too. Drives a MY2000-spec Mazda RX7 RZ (FD3S) as his daily driver, although strangely most modifications are actually carried out using used but quality parts, despite having the financial means to do so. It is not known how he is able to source some of the parts, since some of them appeared to be new, like the vented carbon hood from Mazdaspeed and the Trust TR Power Evolution exhaust. His car is the easiest to recognize, since it uses 2 different sets of wheels front and rear, with the front being 17-inch BBS RG-Rs from a FD3S RX7 Spirit R, and the rear being 18-inch Advan TC-IIs, all on high-performance Falken Azenis tyres. He claims that his car makes about 360ps from using the original twin turbo that came with the car. No one dares to argue with that, since the FD3S RX7 is considered the most powerful student-driven car in the academy. Other than that, he is famous as the captain of the school's football team. Plus, he is a hit among the girls, being very popular. He is also very friendly with everyone, which is strange given his status. But he is well known to be a flirt too, always changing girlfriends faster than anyone could imagine, or to Shun, faster than changing gears.
But he does have his own aims too. He takes Shun as a rival of sorts in drifting, since Shun once defeated him in a one-on-one car park drifting during one night, in the Silvia. He has his revenge later, when Shun's Chaser could not catch up with him in a rematch. It is also that that causes Shun to send his Chaser for modifications, knowing that it will be equivalent to suicide if he does not do anything about it. He also wants to has a touge race with Keisuke Takahashi, driver with the Project D team one day that drives an FD3S RX7, albeit an older Type R, because it is him that gives him inspiration to get an FD3S RX7 himself.
"Hey Shun, what happened to your Chaser? Haven't seen it around the dorms these days," Saniro begins to speak to Shun as he arrives in the class.
"Something happened to it, and it's nothing bad. And don't be asking me for drifting in the car parks these days with your crazy rotary beast. Been busy since I'm back in the Engineering Department."
"Ahhh, typical of you, Akimoto Shun, to be hardworking. You should learn to be a bit more carefree, like me, ehehehe," Saniro adds.
"Yeah, you and your flirtatious ways, trademark of Yamamoto Saniro. There will be someone you'll be madly in love with later, only to see her not accepting you," Shun replied, and carries on reading some notes.
Saniro walks off to his table, wondering what to do before class starts. He then decided to lay his head on the table, and snores off.
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"Senpai, how can you…?" cried a girl with short blue-white hair, with tears coming out from her eyes. "I thought we are good friends, and…"
"I'm sorry, Ako. But I felt that it's best for us to remain as friends only."
"No way!" the girl runs off, crying.
"No, wait, I can explain…" Saniro shouted as the girl disappears. As he tried to run, something pulled him.
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"Hey Saniro, sleeping in class again heh?" a male teacher said as he shakes Saniro out of unconsciousness. "I know your football practice takes up a lot of energy, but…"
"Eh, what happened? Sorry, Daitokouji-sensei. Must been busy these days," Saniro says as he pushes his hair back and sits still on the chair.
He was wondering he dreamt of. It was a long story, a fateful day in the stadium where the football team trains.
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"My name's Izumi Ako, from the girls' middle high. Nice to meet you," a girl with light blue hair, wearing physical education uniform, answered in a shy tone.
"So, you're the new football coach to the young kids that I has been hearing about?" he asks the girl.
"Yes, I am. Just started some time ago," she replied.
"I see. I'm Yamamoto Saniro, from the boys' senior high, the captain of the team."
"You're the captain Yamamoto Saniro that everyone has been talking about? Cool!"
"Well, that's nothing compared to a girl that coaches football to kids." "Seem that you need some help with your methods. Should I take you in as my junior? Since I has experience in coaching too."
"Well, if that helps…"
"Hmmm, maybe we should go somewhere and discuss about it."
"OK then, senpai."
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"Class, you're dismissed."
It was the end of lessons for the day. After seeing everyone off, Saniro proceeds to walk off to his Mazda RX7. He starts the engine, and the 2-rotor rotary engine is revved several times. Other than using the standard sequential turbo, the most fragile aspects of the engine have been covered. The engine has been rebuilt and modified with 3mm apex seals and Teflon O-rings, and it has undergone port and polish. Air enters the twin turbochargers via double Blitz SUS Power air filters. Cooling is improved with use of an ARC radiator and a front mount Greddy intercooler to cool the air before it entered the engine through FEED throttles. The fuel system has also been upgraded with 2 additional Greddy injectors and a fuel pump from Walbro. He fiddles with the GReddy boost controller, which worked in unison with the Greddy e-Manage piggyback ECU. It was certainly more aggressive than anything else in Mahora Academy, especially with the use of coil-over suspensions from Tanabe. He puts the car in gear, and moves off slowly. The 'vacuum cleaner' sound slowly fades.
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The drive in Hakone was a breeze, as he wants to go to the nearby lake to refresh his mind, knowing that the sight of nature helps a lot in cooling off one's mind. As he drives the RX7 slowly, suddenly a black car appeared behind the RX7. The black car refuses to back off, and choose to stick close to the RX7. Saniro tries to drive faster to create a distance between him and the black car, but the black car still sticks up right behind him.
Saniro begins to feel angry about the black car trailing him. He was not looking for a challenge, and was not about to be challenged. He looked at the rear-view mirror, trying to identify the car. It was not a Japanese car, although it looked like one, and it was having Japanese licence plates. It was not anything from the West either. Feeling agitated, he proceeds to go for the clutch, and goes a gear down. A burst of fire from the fuel that is not completely burned could be seen coming out from the Trust exhaust as the RX7 begins to speed off on the straight, with a hairpin coming up. The driver of the black car does the same, and a burst of fire comes out from the car's exhaust, like the RX7 in front.
It started to rain. Saniro switches on the windscreen wipers, which sweeps some of the rainwater off the windscreen.
The RX7 quickly approaches the hairpin, and Saniro hits the brakes. The black car, not giving up, does the same, placing itself right behind the RX7.
