OK Number 65 - The Dark Night Of The Soul

As Kallen flicked the wheel through the Casio chicane on lap thirty, now having led confidently for several laps in the thick rain and thick thick fog, she felt a sudden tear through her forearm, and the wheel almost seemed to jam up. Kallen tried again to crank the wheel to the left, finding it incredibly difficult to turn without heavy use of her arm and shoulder muscles to almost prop up the turn, her biceps, triceps and deltoids all having to commit every newton of force at their disposal to rotate it.

She tried to shimmy the wheel to loosen it, but all that happened was her momentum bogged down, as whether Kallen tried to turn it left hand down or right hand down, it felt stuck, like she was trying to pull her arms through wet cement. The wheels would turn, but each twist required a superhuman effort, and with fourteen laps remaining, there would be two hundred and fifty-two more corners until the end of the race.

Two hundred and fifty-two times she would have to drag the car through the lap with her teeth.

She was at least able to get round the first corner, managing to rotate the car down through the end of the Casio triangle after two or three attempts at sawing away at the wheel, which about as much give as trying to push a brick wall. There was only one possibility.

She had just lost power steering.

Kallen didn't panic, the numb daze she had forced herself into didn't allow her to, but whatever lizard brain was still working away recognised that her job of reaching the end had become much harder. Not impossible, but much, much harder.

She immediately floored the throttle and allowed the car to build up speed in its natural direction, even if that took her off the track and into the grass. As she skidded across the mud and picked up speed, the steering became lighter, and she regained more control authority. Kallen knew from F4 that cars without power assisted steering were at their hardest physically at low speeds, to the point that they could hardly be turned. Once the car was rolling and had picked up speed, the coefficient of static friction fell, and the wheel became lighter. Kallen sped the car up to make the steering manageable enough to escape the corner, rejoin the track, and pull away.

Kallen had a plan. She couldn't radio in that she her power steering had failed, or else she would receive the black and orange 'meatball' flag, forcing her to retire for being a potential danger on track. She had to work around this on her own, she would need to find a way to drive this car to the finish and win within herself, without help.

She had a few ideas. If she kept more momentum through the corners, trying to take wider lines to keep her speed high enough to turn the wheel, rolling through the sweeping bends rather than accelerating through them to avoid overwhelming the tyres with the increased speeds and longer lines, she could just about make it to the end¸ even if it would tax all the muscles in her arms.

She needed to be everything she wasn't; smooth, putting as little force through the tyres as she could, take wide lines, no rapid changes in the wheel angle, just smooth progressive shifts in lock to conserve precious momentum.

But this was not the first time she had to completely transform who she was.

With the slow exit out of the final chicane, she had taken almost five seconds to grasp the situation and build up speed to accelerate out of the corner. In her mirror as she accelerated along the main straight, she saw a car, and her heart sank.

It was perhaps the worst possible situation; it was not the number ten Rebellion of Naoto Kōzuki. It was the number seven Rebellion of Suzaku Kururugi, who had somehow worked his way up from the back of the grid to second. It was the number seven Rebellion of Suzaku Kururugi, who had won this race for two years running.

The battle was joined. Kallen had to weather the storm, had to defend her lead against the most consistent driver on the grid, the reigning champion, in the wet, on a track where he was in his element, with a broken car that she would have to nurse to the finish.

Because unlike Naoto, Suzaku didn't have a chink in his armour. He didn't have a "130R" like Naoto that Kallen could lever against him. His only vices had been off-track, on track he never put a foot wrong, and had climbed up to second because of it. He would not falter, just simply advance, inevitable as the tide. Kallen knew this would be the hardest thing she had ever done in a car, to keep him behind for fourteen laps.

The first sector was the hardest. Her forearms were now bearing the full weight and force required to keep the wheels turned just so, which was causing problems even by turn one of the two hundred and fifty-two she would have to struggle through. First, with her having to commit so much force into cranking the wheel, she was much less precise, with her wheel wobbling a bit under the deformations in the track, no longer dampened by a steer-by-wire system.

And second, even at speed it was exhausting. It required all of her strength to haul the wheel around, and the force was already hurting her wrists.

But she couldn't stop now, not so close. Not here, not today.

What ensued was one of the craziest stretches of any race Kallen had driven. She took the widest line into every corner, and while it allowed her to carry more speed through the corners to alleviate the weight of the steering, it meant she had to travel a longer distance through the corner and hence her lap times were tanking. Suzaku was right behind her, but Kallen was not letting him through.

Through the first sector, pain. So much pain. She had torn a muscle in late January while trying to emulate Suzaku's fitness and it had hurt less than this; bearing the brunt of being the rudder for seven hundred and forty kilograms of flying steel and carbon between her arms. She torqued the wheel with all her might, every corner a struggle, a question of whether she could muster enough strength, summon enough of a force to tick down the two hundred and fifty two by just one more. One corner at a time, just-

Kallen screamed, hideous, vicious, ugly, deep sound rising from deep within her throat. She was rising up to the hairpin, and with less than a lap since the issue had arisen, she already was feeling the searing pain, both acute and aching, through her arms and reaching into her torso.

If she had not set her mind to getting her strength and endurance fitness up over the winter, it would have been impossible. Even with it, she was already having to move past putting her nose to the grindstone and slamming her face against it, only just about just about able to keep the wheel torqued with all the power her arms had at their disposal.

She was utterly breathless, even in her new fitness, her entire forearm soaked in blood that ran like the Amazon river delta down from her hands and wrists, settling in a pool down on her torso. She was hanging on by her fingernails, she felt her fingernails being torn away by red hot pliers, felt her bones and muscles get stabbed again and again and again, another knife being slid into her arms with each passing corner.

She could not allow her concentration, her self-induced torture to fall away for even a moment. She may as well be putting the knives into her arms herself. It could stop at any moment. It could all stop at any point Kallen wanted it to. She could wave the white flag, she could just let Suzaku past, call it a day, let it all end and be brought to hospital, right now. She wanted to stop. She couldn't drive any more.

But not now. Not so close. She could not falter now.

She bit her lip so hard it joined her arms in the bloodletting. No matter what, no matter how much Suzaku pushed, no matter how much her arms complained, Suzaku would not pass. Fuelled by the concentrated power of sheer spite, tenacity, bitterness, small minded hatred, anger, at waiting three years, she was not going to let a power steering failure ruin this.

Kallen was running as fast as they could, pushing like she had at Britain, or Spa, Suzaku was keeping pace, it was just the pair of them blasting around, with Suzaku trying to pressure her, trying to squish her under his thumb like a bug, which compounded her physical destruction as she tried to cajole her arms into giving a last spurt of energy. The wheel was trying to stop her, Suzaku was trying to stop her, every single thing in this seven thousand square foot enclave of hell was trying to put the heat up to eleven, to boil her into vapour like lakes of fire.

But Kallen's fury overrode her pain, more resentful, determined bitterness than woman. She simply continued grabbing the car by the collar and dragging it kicking and screaming around the lap, ignoring the screaming pain skewering every cell in her body.

As the laps ticked over, with each corner a torture session, a conscious endeavour where the only objective was to keep the lead, she realised something. Suzaku was not being held up by Kallen. He was driving more or less at the same pace as her. He wasn't trying to attempt a move, but she could not shake him. He was trying to do what he had done in Bahrain of 2018.

He was trying to sweat her into a mistake.

Ironically, Suzaku had reversed the trick that Kallen had played on him in the marathon in Belgium. He was just going to keep on her rear, and wait for a mistake, as Kallen sat in the oven, trying to manage her broken car while knowing that Suzaku was just lying in wait to eat her up if she showed a single gap in her platemail. She had to drive flawlessly. No more strategic conservation, no more games, it was just a prolonged slugging match, the cars so unbearably close that a slip of paper could only just about be slipped between them. Suzaku was just sitting on her rear diffuser, trying to psyche her out.

But he was running out of laps, and though Kallen's arms were absolutely obliterated, ripped out of their sockets before being blown up by a mass of TNT and crushed under a mountain, they were still, somehow, obeying Kallen's distant commands. She would tell them to go over the trench to be shot as they crossed no mans land, and obediently be massacred they would. Even as the agony reached indescribable levels, worse than when her hands had been literally on fire, there was a degree of separation. She just ignored the pain, slogged through it with nothing but her grit and determination. Kallen's vision of a world only encompassed by the Suzuka circuit, all else removed, shrunk even further, her solipsism reaching new lows; there was only the next corner. All there was in the world was the next corner, how she would navigate it and how she would defend through it while not overwhelming her broken extremities, broken but not defeated.

Yet. She just had to keep going forwards, only forward.

As the wee small hours dwindled away, she became more reckless, with Suzaku not once having moved from his position, sat right on her rear end, though perhaps sensing that time was running out, he was beginning to attempt a move, first into the hairpin.

Kallen was able to get the better exit, but it took all her strength to do so. She physically felt the muscles in her arm rip themselves apart, tearing and shredding and cutting themselves up and pull themselves to pieces in a desperate attempt to satisfy their masochistic host.

But she was holding, she had just about kept ahead. The first sector was where the steering was heaviest, with the long, sustained curves utilising the cars masses of downforce to direct a lot of lateral forces which Kallen could only keep at bay with her own strength. However, while the lines she had to take through this sector were unconventional and lost her a lot of time, the lack of braking zones did not make it conducive to an overtake, and so once again Kallen's one weak spot was covered off.

For the rest of the lap, it was a mixed bag. The Degners were fine, with Kallen using the throttle and brakes to do most of the steering, however the hairpin required a delicate balance, Kallen deliberately slowing just a bit on the exit to force Suzaku out of the throttle so he could avoid rear ending her, what might be impolitely referred to as a brake check. But whether or not the move was kosher, it was necessary.

Kallen went into Spoon high, before cutting hard down low to shut off a move. Suzaku got a better exit and pulled up alongside, finally able to take advantage of a weary Kallen, but Kallen was on the inside for 130R, and unlike her brother was in no mood to concede it. What was never a two wide corner became one, with Suzaku having the better momentum out of it, about half a car length ahead as they headed for the final chicane, but Kallen still had one more card to play before Suzaku could call this prolonged slugfest finished.

As Suzaku tried to cement the position under braking, he overcooked the deceleration and while he leapt a good bit ahead of Kallen in the slowing down phase, he had sailed past the first apex, making the line to the second apex more acute. Kallen saw this and broke early, going around the outside and getting a much smoother line, carrying more speed and exiting faster than Suzaku, even if she was nominally behind him.

As Suzaku accelerated out of the Casio chicane and up towards the line, Kallen boomed out around the far side, before switching back. She was behind him, but closing, closing, had such immense overspeed with the cleaner exit, move to the outside, pull alongside, pull nose to nose, and pull ahead, only by half a car length as she looked up, they were coming to the stripe, crossing the line, the chequered flag was waving, and the race had mercifully ended.

Kallen had done it. She had survived Suzaku's onslaught, his unceasing advance, had weathered the storm, and had, with a broken car, just about held on.

Resisting a barrage of pressure, she had won the Japanese Grand Prix.

"YYYESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!"

She roared in pain, viciously hollering her agony out to the world for now there was a world to hear. She repeated her roars of celebration mixed with torture and joy, though as the drive to win subsided, no longer necessary as a motivating force to endure her torment for just that bit longer, as the adrenelin faded, and her pseudo-astral projection gave way to the reality that she was Kallen Kōzuki, driver for Camelot, nineteen years old, native of Shinjuku Japan, and all the context that came with the sudden return of reality, however the pain definitely won out over the euphoria of victory, and the euphoria of a job well done, an opponent well endured, and her screams now shifted from having a just an accent of pain to now being howls of torturing, throbbing, stabbing agony, as the aches of the torn muscles up and down her arm set in, all at once.

"AAAAHHH… AAAAAAAAAAAHHHGHHAAAAAAAGHHH!"

"…yes, and Kallen has been nursing some kind of problem for several laps now, Diethard, as they come out of Spoon, Camelot aren't telling us what the problem is, but Kallen has been under pressure from Suzaku for over ten laps. She hasn't cracked, but Suzaku is just sizing up a move, sizing up a move as they charge down the back straight, it's the last lap and if Suzaku wants to make a move stick he is going to have to make it now, into the Casio chicane as they go up to 130R, and- oh, oh is Suzaku going to do to Kallen what Kallen did to Naoto around the outside? Oh so close!"

Jeremiah's teeth clenched as they went two wide into the high speed sweeper, however they just about made it work, with neither driver giving way or lifting out of the throttle. As they passed through the corner, Diethard picked up the narration.

"Suzaku is just ahead, just about, and he has the inside line for Casio, but Kallen gets it all back there, has she got anything left? He hasn't cemented the move yet, but it looks- oh, oh he's gone deep, he's locked up just a bit into the corner, and what can Kallen do? Cut in a little bit early, straighten up the car earlier and get on the power earlier, that should give her the better run to the line. It's gonna be a photo finish, who will it be? Suzaku's just ahead, can he make it three in a row, or can Kallen- she's going faster around the outside to the line, pulling just ahead, and I think- yes, yes she has! To the flag, finally, after three years, it's redemption day, Kallen will come to the black and white chequered, Kallen Kōzuki wins the Japanese Grand Prix! Ahhh…"

Diethards celebratory sigh was interrupted by Kallen letting out a roaring bellow so loud and so fierce in pitch that it almost hurt his ears, simply an animalistic cry. As Diethard recovered, Jeremiah took back the baton, commenting "I'll tell you, for the last ten laps you could throw a blanket over the pair of them they were that close. But Kallen Kōzuki, a winner at home at last. She has held off the reigning champion, and finally picks up a trophy at Suzuka."

Both Diethard and Jeremiah let the point sink in, as the television view switched to the grandstands, in jubilant celebration, before Jeremiah resumed.

"Well the crowds are going insane, they love her and she loves them, they're breaking ranks, the Japanese flags are waving furiously in the rain, and they see Kallen's opportunity to become the world champion grow and grow, a win in Monaco, a win in Britain, a win in Belgium, and now a win at home, she is now on her wind down lap, doubles very joyous indeed as- er, ahem.

Jeremiah paused, finding the display distasteful, however it was happening; the stands were emptying, almost flooding out, with the entire crowds gathered for miles around leaping onto the track, making it just a sea of people, interspersed with Formula cars, driven quite a ways below their limit for fear of running over anyone. Shaking his head slightly, Diethard took back over.

"Now… what's… what's happening, and I don't quite approve of it, is that the crowds in the bleachers and grandstands are now going onto the course, vaulting over the corrugated barriers and flooding the track, now that is incredibly dangerous of course, there are drivers who haven't yet finished the race who will be going at full speed while these people are on the track. Now, we have Kallen Kōzuki, Japanese, followed appropriately by Suzaku Kururugi, Japanese, and Naoto just a bit behind making it an all-Japanese podium, the second time that has happened this year. However, for examples of a single nationality winning at their home Grand Prix, we would have to go back… the 1982 French Grand Prix, and several British Grands Prix in the nineteen sixties. It has been a long time since a home audience has enjoyed a national success, particularly as this sport has become so international. The seed Kyoshiro Tohdoh planted has sprouted, and I am sure he can take some pride in that as we wish him a speedy recovery."

Pausing for a solemn moment, Diethard cleared his throat and continued "Now, the crowd ought to keep off the course, this doesn't mean they are keeping off the course as they swarm around Kallen's car in celebration, the car is now having to stop to avoid running someone over, and I don't think it'll be going anywhere, that car is just surrounded on all sides by throngs of fans, but I'm not sure if that's a situation Kallen is entirely uncomfortable with, as she just soaks it in. It's been a long time coming, and I've no doubt she is just taking in all this energy, this frenzy. Team radio."

There was a pause, before Diethards voice was replaced by that of a jubilant highlander, Kallen's chief engineer, who sounded absolutely ecstatic.

"Well- ahaha, you had us going there Kallen, but you did it, you won the Japanese Grand Prix! You slowed over the last ten laps, what was the problem?"

Another pause, before a rather less jubilant voice came in.

"Argch…" Kallen began.

"Sorry, couldn't hear that?"

Kallen's radio paused, before she tried to explain "Please get-", before her voice fell away.

"One more time?"

Clearly irritated, Kallen roared "Get the fucking medical car down here, I can't get out, my shoulders, my shoulders are fucked… I need help, I need help out of the car."

"Oh my goodness." Jeremiah exclaimed, eyebrows rising. "It's not as if the fans around the car are stopping her from getting out, I think something might be wrong, I think that's why she was slow. We'll have to see, but Kallen sounded in considerable pain there. Now, where is the medical car?"

Li Xingke – 191 (5 wins)

Gino Weinberg – 163 (1 win)

Naoto Kōzuki – 157 (1 win)

Kallen Kōzuki – 155 (4 wins)

Rolo Lamperouge – 144 (1 win)

Suzaku Kururugi – 111

~G1ll3s