OK Number 25 - Survive

The calm of the Canadian hills was once again upon Kallen, even if the context was quite different. Sat in the cocoon of her cockpit, gloves resting on top of the wheel as she waited for her call to go out to the grid, she called back that same feeling, and allowed it to flow through her, relaxing her muscles and concerns about catching. There would only be this race, and she would win it. She took a deep breath as the engine span into life behind her, whirring up, turbocharger wheezing and cylinders bombing up and down, which would give her the power she needed to take victory at the plains of Mogyorod.

This certainty gave a reinforcing confidence, blocking out the memory of races past, which filled her with a quiet determination and a steely gaze down the nose of her car as the mechanic stood in front of the car gestured to his left before leaping out of the way.

With dry tyres, her sixth pole position of the season, and a revitalised hope, it was time to go.

She clicked the gearbox into first, holding in the hand operated clutch until she saw that the way was clear, letting it then slip aggressively to draw the car out of its hiding and out into the light of day, letting it slide down pit lane at the speed limit. Following the markers, she let the natural torque of the hybrid engine carry the car under tick over, confident in its capacity to avoid a stall, before passing the exit line and beginning the parade lap.

In her mirror, she saw the rows of cars behind her line up as she rounded turn one, all feeling out the track for the first time on their way around. It was cold, with the tyres exhibiting little flex. There was an uncertainty in their movements that bode ill, as Kallen experimented with the grip imbued in the circuit. However, Kallen felt confident until it hit her helmet.

A drop, liquid, and clear. It was neither poison nor mechanical; it was far worse.

It was a drop of rain.

She saw the water drip down the lip of her visor, streaking slowly from just beyond her eyebrow down to her nose, and further. This would throw a massive wrench into the stability of the race, as now all strategy would be thrown out in favour of who could read the conditions. A safe pole in one of Kallen's better tracks was now at the mercy of the weather.

"What's going on with the conditions?" she asked as she tried to brake and manoeuvre heavily to bring some heat into her brakes and tyres for all the good it would do. It took a moment for Ohgi to respond, and even then he was less than helpful.

"I'm not certain… I'm not seeing anything, but weather here is very sudden. Humidity is high, be aware."

Kallen shook her head as she rode the car off the camber of turn three, observing understeer as she counted a second, a third drop of rain off her helmet. It was sparse, but each new droplet sent Kallen into greater certainty. All she wanted was a simple race, but she wouldn't get it. However. This was just the start, and by the time the train rounded the final corner, the rain had grown to a consistent drizzle.

"Still not certain Ohgi?" Kallen wrily noted as she approached the starting line, having accepted her fate.

"Okay, okay, we're past pit lane entry but you can box for intermediates at the end of lap one. Lelouch is starting from pit lane, so he'll be at the back but he will be on the intermediate tyres from the get go. You're on the dry tyre, so be cautious, keep the tyres hot, and good luck."

As the grid, minus one Frenchman, lined up behind Kallen, she focused her attention to the first corner as the red lights counted down to the start of the race.

Five, four, ready the clutch, two, rev up, and… the lights were out!

Kallen let out the clutch as gently as she dared, but even so the slick tyres span up, with standing water having already formed within the grooves in the tarmac. The rain had arrived in earnest within two minutes of Kallens first sighting of water, and now masses of the stuff were being kicked up in her wake as the rear wheels tried to find some purchase, a spot of traction that they could launch themselves off. The rain was gentle in its hazy, soft character, seeming content to settle about the air rather than hurl itself into the deck, but it was volumous, and enough of it had amassed about the track to make the start a challenge in patience and throttle control.

However, everyone was at the same disadvantage, and as the grid crawled towards turn one, Kallen retained the lead. Turning in early, Kallen still felt the tyres aquaplane, as they sailed across the top layer of water that had settled on the tarmac. Feeling the front tyres fail to bite, Kallen gave the throttle a squirt to rotate the car about the turn. The car obliged, spinning just so to turn the car in the right direction, at the cost of momentum and longitudinal grip, with her forward speed killed.

Able to use the natural downwards slope of the track to fire the car down the second straight and maintain the lead, with the whole grid wallowing frictionless, with the cold wet track as grippy as ice.

The grid made it to turn two cleanly, however as she understeered through the wide, constant radius ring she observed behind her a car spinning out wide into the grass and walloping the barrier. With the field bunched up at such low speed, it was unsurprising that the low grip conditions meant people were bumping and scraping against one another, as their control of the cars was minimal.

This desperate flailing continued as the grid crawled back to the pits. However, as she moved up towards the end of the lap, she saw Lelouch, who had not gone out to the grid, and had instead opted to go back to the pits, get new tyres, and start from the pit lane exit. This meant he started last, however he had already caught up with his intermediate tyres, which meant that as she moved towards the pit lane, Lelouch came around at over two times her speed, buzzing past her outside as she approached the entry.

However, as he passed by, he cut across her on his way into the corner, forcing her to brake aggressively to avoid running into his sidepod. She locked up the front wheels in avoiding him, and rode over the outside kerb of pit lane, and back onto the racing line.

With the rest of the entry walled off, Kallen realised that she had in fact slid past the entry to the pits entirely, and would not be able to switch to intermediate tyres this lap.

She shook her head, but, not being able to go back, decided to get on with the job. She would lose a lot of time over this lap as the rest of the field pitted to the better tyre, and it was important she didn't push too hard to make up for it.

However, even navigating the circuit at a crawl was now a challenge. This shuu had grown to a full blown rain shower, and the rain which had settled in a gentle mist had now grown a weight and force in their campaign south, pounding away in a visible drizzle. As she arrived at the first corner for the second time, she made a point of approaching it extremely slowly and tiptoeing around the puddles which were now forming as the standing water exponentially grew.

Kallen could not have driven slower if she tried, and yet was at the limits of grip, barely able to tickle the throttle in fifth gear without losing the rear wholesale, and it nearly caused her to lose her head in frustration. However even as she saw the pack behind, who had already completed a pit stop and come back out again, come into view in her rear view mirrors, she kept it cool, and was rewarded as she entered the third to last corner, and saw a curious sight; the other Rebellion car, out on the grass, facing the wrong way.

Kallen had to do a double take as she eased into the sharp ninety degree turn, watching Lelouch spin up his intermediate tyres in the mud as he slid back onto the circuit. He had survived his off track excursion, however it was foreboding that even with his grippier rubber he had span off the black stuff in these conditions. However, she was just about able to pull herself towards the pit lane, just as Suzaku and Marrybel came up to take the lead off her. She had lost a pit stops worth of time, around twenty seconds, in one lap. However, it was only lap 2, and it seemed as if anything could happen.

With a second shot at it, Kallen was able to finally nail the pit lane entry, dragging the front end of the car into pit lane and finally get a fresh set of boots. As the green striped intermediates were swapped on, she leant on the throttle to hop out, and was met with satisfactory bite. Rolling out, she ventured back onto the track, going out into the unknown.

However, it was not unknown for long, as Ohgi radioed her with an urgent voice.

"Everybody is going off into turn one, huge, huge caution, there is extreme amounts of standing water, we have four cars span out at turn one already, approach with extreme care."

Kallen was barely able to digest this information before two cars, already up to speed having blazed down the straight, streaked past her side by side into the braking zone. The one covering the inside braked first, however something went wrong and Kallen could only watch as the driver lost the rear end, and the car pirouetted into the driver next to them, causing them to both skate straight off the road not fifty meters from where Kallen sat, gently nursing the throttle as she took in the scene.

The two cars slid as one unit into the grass, but they were not alone; they were joined by several other visible cars. The healthy amounts of grass and gravel run off meant none were wrecks, but the odds of incoming traffic running into the stranded cars was immense, and that could prove lethal.

Kallen tiptoed into the corner, and immediately felt out the wet patches, where the resistance of the steering wheel would vanish and the car would slide in whatever direction it was already headed, without recourse. She was hardly surprised that the others were flying off the track unsighted; they would lose traction, and as soon as they made a sudden move, would be doomed to spin away like a top into the gravel.

She finally managed to slow into the corner without joining them, and with the new grooved tyres could make the turn in, and make it past the stragglers. However, she didn't make it far before she saw a safety car sign light up as the marshals were faced with a menagerie of cars stacking up at the exit of the first turn.

Able to slice through the water and feel out the grip, Kallen came up around the queue of drivers lined up behind the safety car, as Marianne Vi Britannia kept the pack in a slow, tight bunch to allow the marshals to work safely. With diggers and cranes at the ready outside the track perimeter, they were quickly able to relieve the stricken racers and drag them back onto the track where they rejoined the circulating field, albeit a lap down. Only one car was damaged beyond raceworthiness, that being Li Xingke's Geely, having run headlong into the armco.

Thankfully, no drivers or marshals were hurt.

As the marshalls concluded their business, the Marianne continued to guide the pack safely around, however, as the time ticked along, there was an increasingly severe problem. The rain was getting heavier, and as the track became more and more slippery, the pace of Kallen and the other racing drivers diminished, to the point that Marianne was now driving away too fast, and Suzaku, who was at the front of the field, couldn't keep up.

Kallen gritted her teeth, seeing her drive away, and called on the radio "We need the safety car to slow down, we can't keep at this pace on these tyres. We need to drop the pace for a bit."

Ohgi reported back that the stewards were in contact with Marianne with instructions to that effect, however the safety car was returning to pit lane at the end of the lap, making the exercise redundant. As the field prepared to return to racing, it bunched up further, with Kallen almost able to reach out and touch the gearbox of Luciano Bradley in front of her.

Tiptoeing around the second to last corner, the crowd awaited the green flag, which dropped as Kallen wallowed into the apex without warning, however it was not as if Luciano was sprinting off anywhere, as he struggled to put down the power. The rain, it was obvious, was now approaching torrential categories, and the diabolical amounts of wheelspin on Luciano's car were proof, as they threw up water without purchase all the way through third and fourth gear. Kallen, with a bit more nous in the rain, was able to moderate the throttle marginally more successfully, but she was left with the best house on a bad street, and only made incremental gains into the last corner.

However, it didn't matter. As Luciano splashed through the last corner, he accelerated out of the corner at the apex, which was his mistake. As the rear wheels lost traction, his car began to slip out of his control and the back end flung out sideways, before the car swapped ends completely and came to a complete standstill on the inside of the circuit, missing Kallen by inches.

Startled, Kallen could only chuckle hollowly, with a shiver and a crow of "Goodnight sweet prince.", holding off the throttle until the car was faced straight forward, only opening it once the car was no longer subject to lateral load. This would be an endurance race, and it would take everything they had to just finish.

This point was underscored by the increasing rains, with visible puddles now making up a significant portion of the track surface, and the view ahead was now immensely obscured by the spray kicked up by the cars in front, with only the red tail lights visible in the dense mist thrown up by the cars ahead. The tyres were simply not displacing enough of the surface water from the grooves, displayed perfectly by Kallen herself, who in spite of a cautious approach still was surprised by a lock up into turn two, as she shot off the carousel and into the infield and almost understeered into the barrier, only just keeping her car within her control. She rejoined after regaining control, having last two positions, however this was by no meaningful measure a race, only an exercise in survival.

The downpour was now horrific, and everyone was struggling; it was time for wets, less than half a dozen laps into a race that ran for seventy. However, it would be a challenge to even make it, as the drivers fought through the waterlogged circuit. The struggle was underlined by Suzaku, normally the bastion of consistency and unflagging smoothness, who to Kallen's amazement had spun on the entry to pit lane, having clipped the kerb and had his rear step out, placing his car at a right angle to the slip road into the pits. With the narrow path blocked, Kallen had to wait, sat still at the entry to pit lane, for Suzaku to jab at the throttle to rotate the car about its front wheels, doing a half donut to point his car the right way, and slide, undoubtedly quite embarrassed, into the pit area proper.

"Didn't think Suzaku knew how to do a donut." Ohgi cheekily jabbed, having seen the whole scene unfold. Kallen chuckled as she moved to pit for the blue, extreme wet tyres. The team, soaked to the bone, still dutifully replaced her tyres and sent her away, right on the tail of Suzaku, who was on tyres of equally deep tread, which could carve through the water and displace it to allow the rubber to reach the tarmac as they travelled through standing water, which had already begun to accumulate in the pit lane.

As they passed the pit lane exit line, Kallen took a deep breath and tried the throttle tenderly.

She was rewarded with definite bite, however a wobbling of the wheel was required to keep the car in a straight line as the Type-2/F19-Y shot out into the ocean. However, the rain was keeping pace with the increasing steps in tyres, and now it appeared as if they were in the midst of a rain storm. As Kallen followed Suzaku into turn one, she realised that she could not make out the lines, apex, or track limits of the area, only being able to swim through it with her memory of where the corner should be, following Suzaku's ginger lead.

As they exited the corner and moved down towards the second sector, Kallen observed Suzaku raise his arm out of the cockpit and wave it furiously at the officials, slowing down to gesticulate wildly, with one arm on the steering wheel. His shoulders lifted, with his torso shifted up and his arm now wholly out of the car as he waved and hailed the marshals, aggressively trying to get their attention. It took Kallen longer than she cared to admit to realise what he was doing, only copping on when they went round for another lap and she saw the red flag waving, signalling a halt to the race, presumably to allow the storm to blow over. Suzaku was clearly not comfortable driving in such treacherous conditions, and was prepared to resort to rather primitive methods to communicate this point.

With the racing stopped, the drivers were able to trundle back to pitlane without fear of being overtaken or divebombed at a safe pace, finally coming to a stop in their pit boxes, to remain until the marshals either gave the go ahead to resume racing, or declared the race concluded.

It took twenty minutes for the rain to pause, and another ten for the waterlogged track to drain into the Hungarian plains in large enough swathes to allow the cars to safely return to the track. They would follow the safety car from the pit exit to the end of the first rotation, where the racing would begin again. Following Suzaku gingerly out into the track, Kallen swished the wheel from side to side, teasing out the grip on the wet tyres to see where she could find traction and where she had to avoid. Her response, transmitted through the wheel to her hands, was mixed, as the surface distorted and evolved. The circuit was constantly changing, and as they came around to begin again, Kallen grimly acknowledged that they were once again stepping out into the unknown.

Braving herself, Kallen stood on the brakes into turn one, as the car switched from biting, to slipping, biting, and back to slipping all in the stretch of one corner. Desperate to not go off, she wrenched the steering wheel hard left to stop the car swapping ends, only just avoiding a spin and keeping it on the tarmac, which left her exposed to the car of Viletta Nu, directly behind, and now sneaking up Kallen's inside.

Kallen did not swipe back across, remembering the troubles of Japan and Canada, however she held the outside, which turned to the inside for the next turn. Her caution was rewarded, as Villetta proved to be her own foil, getting too eager in outbraking Kallen into the second corner and spearing off, straight into the barrier. Through the haze, Kallen just about saw the tyres tied to the wall fly up on impact, however the show had to go on for her.

With Nu a non factor, Kallen was now able to look ahead rather than being forced to watch her back, trying to make out Suzaku, who according to Ohgi was two seconds up the road, though trying to sight him was a task.

However, Kallen put her mind to it, immersing herself with the track surface and feeling out the unseen grip. Squirming and shifting about the width of the track from patch to patch of grippy circuit, she bounded up the track like a bizarre game of hopscotch, picking up the pace as her instinctive style came into its own in the conditions that changed at a moment's notice and punished bad habits.

This point was highlighted by the pink Camelot of Kewell Soresi, as the Australian appeared in Kallen's vision, beached on the grass on the exit of the last turn, having likely spun and rolled back beyond the circuit boundaries. Kallen moved through the corner cautiously, not wanting to be caught in whatever did Kewell in.

This was a particularly significant concern given the cars they were driving. To compliment Kallen's dry weather habits, the 2018 car was set up to be inherently unstable and rearward biased, which made it quick to change direction and incredibly twitchy. Kallen knew that the Rosenberg car would likely be set up to drive smoothly and stably to compliment and facilitate his style of handling the car. If that stable layout was spinning, she was in for some trouble ahead.

Indeed, as the laps began to tick away with some overdue consistency, it appeared as if the track surface would not find any such rhythm, as even as they entered the meat of the race Kallen still felt slips and sudden shakes, causing sudden jerks that at times grew to spins. Kallen did not feel that conditions now were much better than before the red flag. However she was just about able to keep it out of the barriers, in spite of moments where she was momentarily out of control, and in the hands of luck.

And today, Kallen was very lucky.

Two people who were not so lucky were Gino and Marrybel. Not that Kallen was initially aware of this, with the fog blocking distant vision, however she was treated to a sudden alert as a flying wheel soared across her vision warning her of catastrophe ahead, before the hull of Gino's wrecked car faded into view, slewing across the width of the track and forcing Kallen to brake aggressively to avoid t-boning him as he skated into the pit wall. He was spinning at incredible speed across the track until he came to an abrupt stop against the steel barrier, just below the pit strategists. His two rear tyres, his entire rear wing, and much of his suspension was scattered about the centre of a track, hinting at a collision with another car.

The exact source of his misfortune was unknown to Kallen until she saw Marrybel rolling down the road but a few meters further on, without a front left tyre or front wing. It must have been a simply hideous shunt, Kallen guessed, and could imagine that Marrybel must have been completely unsighted as she approached the back end of Gino, and was unable to move out of the way until she had hit him.

With all the debris on the track, a second safety car was inevitable, and the cars lined up behind Marianne once again. With Kallen having been in a cloud of visual silence and having been at a loss as to who had crashed, who had spun, and who she was ahead of and behind, at the very least she was now able to see the grid around her bunched up close. While the details were lost to her, she could see that Suzaku was ahead of her again, and there were not very many drivers between her and the highly visible safety car.

Suddenly, Kallen's radio crackled back into life, as Ohgi asked "What are the conditions like, the stewards are concerned."

Just as he asked, Kallen rode over a wet patch, losing braking grip and nearly ploughing into the back of Suzaku. Shaking her head, she sighed "It's too wet… for either tyre, it's too wet for anything. We'd do better with a mast and some oars."

"Understood."

And with that, a red flag was not long in coming, and the safety car guided them back to the pits for the second stop of the race, with forty five laps of seventy still to go.

This was going to be a long day.

~Eth0