OK Number 76 - Oshiyoseru Kōzuki!

"And now, Rolo crosses the line to begin lap eleven of the Brazilian Grand Prix, he now holds a commanding lead over second place as his nearest championship rival on track, Gino, continues to slip back, now down into fifth place. Xingke is still in the sweet spot, still in the championship seat, but what's going on down below?"

Diethard paused, as the ticker displayed the positions down the way, six at a time. The tension was at once thick and fragile, thick and delicate. Xingke was holding on, but the three racers down the road were an unknown quantity, particularly if they didn't need to make another pit stop.

However, they were at least for the time being not an operating factor in the lead championship battle, as Diethard narrated "There's a big gap from Xingke down to the next championship contender, but there's a lot of movement once you get there, there's Suzaku in fifteenth, and he ins being hunted down by Kallen, the chase is on, it isn't for any points, points only start from tenth but both are going at it hammer and tongs. Suzaku is going as hard as he can, Kallen is going as she can, and now… and now they're closing up, Suzaku was held up trying to overtake Futaba, he lost a bit of time and now Kallen says I'm with you Suzaku! And she is… through Laranjinha, she is pushing, pushing! They're together!"

She was, and they were; fighting through the Densōs and Softrolas running down at the back was made more difficult with no blue flags, as they weren't a lap ahead as they would normally be; instead, they were having to genuinely fight these backmarkers for position on track, and these backmarkers had no incentive to leap out of the way to make life easy for Suzaku or Kallen. While the natural difference in speed between the Rebellions and the Camelots and the Densōs and the Softrolas made overtaking much easier, the racing instinct to prevent your being overtaken was not reserved for the frontrunners.

A bit of creative blocking by Ayame Futaba had been just what Kallen needed to bridge the gap, as Suzaku had to take a very long route around her chassis, losing over a second, and putting Kallen within striking distance. Jeremiah, seeing them sit less than a second apart, could only bounce his heels in amusement.

For as well matched as they were, there had been precious few straight battles between them. Hungary 2018, in the midst of the monsoon, had been good for a time, but it had been inconclusive, as Suzaku's tyre had punctured before a definitive winner could be seen. In Italy, Kallen's tyre issues had had a similar effect, spoiling a good duel. In Japan, they had been close for a lot of the race, however Kallen had been playing aggressive defence for laps at a time, with the pace not being indicative of anything with her broken power steering.

For as close as they were, they had had precious few drawn-out duels, however, as they sat, even on points, near the back of the field, this looked to be about to change. Each knew that just a few points could seal the title, and neither wanted to give way to the other.

"And the battle is joined, they're together! The battle is joined!" Jeremiah yelled excitedly. "The battle… it is as it should be, Kallen and Suzaku, line of stern, and charging forward. This is gonna run and run."

The next fifty laps would be one of the most insane runs of the entire season. For years after, Kallen's and Suzaku's charge through the field in the 2019 Brazilian Grand Prix would be talked about as one of the most incredible performances in a Grand Prix of the modern era.

They had come together on lap eleven, and they would keep within sight of one another until the chequered flag flew, keep within a second and a half of one another until the chequered flag flew, neither being able to get a leg up over the other. Wheels locked, often less than a second in the difference, they proceeded to rise back up through the field like oil at the bottom of a glass of water. While Naoto rose with time as well, he was not able to keep up the sheer ferocity of the pace being put out by Suzaku and Kallen, who were flying.

Over seventeen races, over five thousand, two hundred and seventy kilometres of racing, Kallen and Suzaku had both entered Brazil on two hundred and eleven points. They both had picked up four wins, and two second places. Five thousand kilometers, and all that separated them was about ten meters of tarmac. Nothing else could be drawn between them. Five thousand kilometres, and they could, after racing as fast as they could for all that distance and all that time, reach out and touch one anothers cars, such was their evenly matched performances. They could not have had more different seasons, but at the end of it all they had each ended up in exactly the same place, fighting for the same parcel of tarmac, with nothing to choose between them.

All of their fighting, their turmoils, their despair and their victories through 2019 had led to this; two Japanese pilots, level on points, in a four-and-a-half kilometre bullring, left simply to just fight it out, to try to rise back to the top and win ahead of both Li Xingke and one another. The two best young drivers of their generation, now in a prolonged bout for supremacy, with neither holding anything back as they marched up through the pack.

As the race unpacked itself, Suzaku and Kallen began to start trading fastest laps as they picked up the race pace of their cars. On fresh tyres and with a mutual mission to rise back into championship contention, they were the two fastest cars on the circuit, and once their packages had been wound up to full pace, they began storming back up the field.

Of the hundred-and-nine overtakes that would happen on track that day, sixteen would come from Suzaku rising back up through the field, sixteen would come from Kallen rising back through the field, and an astonishing forty-one would come from either Kallen overtaking Suzaku, or Suzaku overtaking Kallen.

Suzaku would go down someone's inside before opening up the steering and forcing them out wide, before Kallen would leap into the gap Suzaku's widewards push had created and pick up two places in one move. Kallen would then go two-wide through a long, slow curve, which would compromise her exit and allow Suzaku to swallow the pair of them up. Excluding instances where they came up to overtake a car, which they could only do one at a time with the exception of one hair raising instance of Suzaku and Kallen going opposite ways around a midfield runner to make it three wide for a hair-raising moment, they ran in consecutive positions, line of stern, for dozens of laps in a row, running continuously nose to tail with either Kallen filling up Suzaku's mirrors, or Suzaku filling up Kallen's, with neither allowing the other to get away.

It shouldn't have mattered. Even as they fought upwards through the field, as they fought and raced their way back, Suzaku sneaking his way into twelfth with a swoop and dive through Bico de Pato before Kallen would follow him up into twelfth with a run up Juncao. It shouldn't have made a difference. Kallen then passing him on the entry to the Senna Ess and claiming eleventh with a ballsy dive down the inside into Descida do Lago, before Suzaku would follow her through Laranjinha to restore the sequence.

It shouldn't have made a difference. Neither was in the points, and while they were likely to make it into the points before the end of the race, they would need to climb a good bit further yet to make it into a championship position. Even still, in spite of that, in spite of the minute possibility of victory, they still fought tooth and nail, slugging it out like boxers, still with a score to settle long after the bell had rung.

Because this was personal. They had known for a long time that this confrontation, this reckoning, was coming not as a matter of if, but when. From the moment the pair first came into conflict in 2018, they had known, as competitors for the crown of the future leader and hero of Japanese motorsports, that there would have to be a moment where they would meet on track, and one would win, and one would lose.

Both sitting wholly absorbed into the task of driving the cars, the thought never arose in either that it would be in any way acceptable, in any way permissible, in any way comprehensible, to put up anything but the most firm fight against the other. They each knew that they owed it to their own senses of worth and pride to prevail, no matter what, no matter how long or how much it took. Kallen's arms could bleed down into the wells of the tub entirely, bleed away until they were stubs, lumpily rounded off at the torso, but she would not lose to Suzaku any more than Suzaku would lose to her.

If there were no context, if they were the last two people alive on Earth, they would fight until they ran out of petrol for the fights own sake. The paths that had drawn them here did not allow for a draw, a tie, nothing. The vicious paths had only one destination, and two doors; a winner, and a loser. Nothing else would do. This time, there would be no stalemate.

Kallen, with higher highs to match her lower lows, came in with eighteen poles and twelve wins to Suzaku's seven and nine respectively, but the more consistent Suzaku had thirty-one podiums to Kallen's twenty-six. They had both fought their corners in the junior formulae to make it all the way to the top level, both had fought to win the title in their regional championships, battling in title finales from Magny Cours to Motegi, from French GP3 to Super Formula. A fierce battle instinct had been drilled into the pair of them up through the feeder series, and it was antithetical to the soul of either pilot to do anything other than fight until the very end. To do otherwise would go against the fundamental reason they got out of bed to engage in this mad, stupid hobby of trying to rush a car around a paved circuit a few dozen times faster than anyone else.

And so they fought, because they didn't know what else to do.

It was almost robotic how they would duck and dive and attack and counterattack. Each pilot was so familiar with the style and tactics of the other, each had so intensely studied the approach and manoeuvres of the other, that it became an instinctual play, each knowing how the other would react to any other move, and knowing that the other would know. Entire complexes could be mentally charted out in advance with full confidence in how the other driver would respond to the moves they attempted.

Like how a chess player might plot in advance the attacks, defences, thrusts, switches and dives, for moves ahead at a time, Kallen might try to break this plan by braking early, hoping to catch Suzaku off guard. Suzaku might fake high before shooting back down to the inside, hoping to have sold Kallen on the dummy. Kallen would play dead through the approach to the hill up Juncao, only to take away Suzaku's slingshot and use it for herself. It was cat and mouse, with the roles switching corner by corner.

Each was trying to outsmart the other as much as they were trying to show off more dominant pace. Kallen, beyond needing a hundred percent of her cognitive processing power to handle her car, needed several dozen more to go toe-to-toe with Suzaku in the area he was most comfortable, that being driving smart, driving tactically, driving with an eye on how to navigate your opponents strengths and weaknesses.

It was the hardest fight Kallen had ever been involved in, through carting, F4 and up. But she was keeping up. She wasn't pulling away, indeed she was spending more time behind than in front, but she wasn't falling back. At the height of his powers, off the back of four victories in a row, Suzaku couldn't shake her.

No matter what well-practiced tricks Suzaku tried to shake her off, she was wise to all of them, keeping momentum through the turns, consistently ready to punch out of corners even if she briefly lost track position. Suzaku would in turn drag his brakes longer to force Kallen to take the corner first and take away her slingshot, by which point Kallen, in no mood to play chicken with her championship run, would counter by nailing the throttle and catch her countryman out while he was trying to incite a braking action from her.

Kallen hadn't ever been good at strategic games. She had only ever played one game of chess with Naoto, where she had lost track of the rules, left the king open to attack from all angles, and ragequit after fifteen minutes. However, there was a difference here.

Part of it was naturally familiarity. She had struggled to remember how the knight moved, and she knew that between the rook and the bishop, one moved crosswise and one moved diagonally, but could not for the life of her recall which did which. By contrast, she knew how to manipulate the controls of this car by instinct, with the fibre linking her brain to the tyres, brakes and throttle transmitting like it was a hard-wired control interface.

But the primary difference that facilitated this change, this upgrade, this late, late improvement into a more complete driver, a more rounded driver, a driver that was more able to adapt to new challenges and be, for lack of a better word, "better", a driver that more deserved the championship, was instinct. It was not a question of thinking of the way to do a process, such as how to counter a dive; it was just a question of knowing to go and do it. Suzaku would try some trick, and Kallen would from preparation and study know the response, know the parry, or the counterattack from her hours of work at nailing down what it was that made him fast, and in 2018, made him champion. She would see the attack coming and know what it was that needed to happen to respond, and from there, the command was sent down to her faraway skeleton, long detached from her mind, to push the buttons, turn the wheels, and push the pedals to make the plan a reality.

And so, they duelled. Over a tightrope, they thrusted and parried and swung and slashed and chopped, knowing that a foot placed wrong could end their race, or let the other driver pull away. As they flew past the rest of the grid, blades and wheels locked, even as they dodged and dived their way through the midfield, they only thought about making sure the other didn't get away. Firing on all cylinders, they steamed ahead and scythed through the midfield and yet they contrastingly could never get a full finishing blow on one another, no matter how bellicosely or how pugnaciously they struggled and duelled as they locked horns in the battle of both of their lives.

It shouldn't have mattered. Even as they fiercely carved their way into the points, it shouldn't. While they could, and would, carve their way past Xingke, bumping him down from sixth to seventh and then eighth, with Kallen slicing up his inside at the Senna Ess in her dramatic, frenzied style, followed swiftly by Suzaku's smooth sweeps, contrasting Kallen's sharp cuts, through the exit of the length of the Ess and allowing him, with a better exit to fly past on the straight and ahead long before the entry into Descida do Lago. Passing Gino was easier for Kallen, as the Briton, fighting floor issues, waved her through, while putting up a noble, if brief fight against Suzaku.

However, as they reached the upper echelons, cars ripe for the passing grew sparse, as each successive one proved more challenging, and more level in pace, if never quite entirely level. Furthermore, each one was further spread apart as the field accordioned apart. Even after the pit stops shook out, with all the cars ahead losing twenty seconds apiece, the gaps between the cars ahead were as daunting as they were rapidly mounting. As they passed Glinda for third and fourth, still as locked in their duel as they were when they first crossed paths, reality was settling in. Darlton in second place ahead was almost fifteen seconds beyond their reach, with Rolo another ten beyond that.

While they had put Xingke back down to eighth, and taken him out of a position to win the championship, Rolo had been ready and waiting to take his place, having been up to that point tied with him on 229 points, and now beyond either of their reach. They would have had to chase down Darlton and pass him to even have a chance, which would require more than a second per lap of an edge over him, which given the narrower and narrower performance gaps they had been battling through as they rose to the top, was near-on impossible to muster.

Right now, Rolo would win the championship no matter how hard they fought. No matter if Suzaku beat Kallen or Kallen beat Suzaku, it wouldn't matter for the championship, but they had long stopped fighting for the championship.

They were not fighting for the cup. Even after they had progressed so far back through the field, climbed so many improbable flights of cars, there were still more to climb, and time was vanishing. They needed second or better, which they seemingly wouldn't get. They were not fighting for the title now, knowing that.

They were fighting solely and exclusively to beat the other pilot, to show in their head to head bout that they were the better pilot, even if they were not the one that would seal the title. The title, like everything else, like the millions of Japanese watching globally, like the tens of thousands watching in the stands, was gone. There was no world beyond the track limits, dancing as if no one was watching. They were fighting for pride alone, though that was a vice they both had in abundance. Not one step back, not one square inch of track could be conceded as they stormed up the road, side by side, with onlookers wondering if it were possible to slip a sheet of paper between them as they hammered around, lap after lap, never driving at a fraction less than absolutely flat out.

It shouldn't have mattered. It was as if they knew what would happen next.

End of Lap Sixty-Seven

First - Rolo Lamperouge – 229 (2 wins)

Eighth - Li Xingke – 227 (5 wins)

Third - Suzaku Kururugi – 226 (4 wins)

Fourth - Kallen Kōzuki – 223 (4 wins)

Fifth - Gino Weinberg – 218 (1 win)

Tenth - Naoto Kōzuki – 215 (1 win)

This chapter, I think, is the point to which the whole thing has been leading. It may as well have just been the two of them, who will collectively steamroll the 2020's. Those stories might be written, though not soon, this one took enough out of me.

Three chapters to go. Leave a review if you're excited.

~G1ll3s