FOREWORD: I, HashiriyaGDB, am submitting this Initial D facfic on behalf of Midnight Dorifuta, the author of this fanfic and a fellow user on the Initial D World Forums. The only things I've done to this is correct some (if not all) the typos.
All trademarks are owned by their respective owners.
Chapter 6: Just because it's an old car...
"Damn it!", Takumi huffed, "It's even harder to drive than it was before! What the hell's wrong with this car?" Exiting through the double chicane, the Starion passed the 86 with still-amazing speed. Fujiwara modulated the throttle and brakes in his usual smooth fashion as they rounded the moderate-speed hairpin that led to the next long straightaway. Going uphill, it was now quite apparent how big the power difference was between the Starion and the 86. Takumi grabbed for third, then fourth gear as they got torwards the end, once again noting his extreme speed and braking just before the harsh bend that led to a double-hairpin. The car was still almost more responsive than he could have imagined on the entry, offering only hints of oversteer but being for the most part neutural - until the exit. Again. The boost kicked back in and he was again in a heavy-angle drift, fighting to keep the car pointed straight.
Takumi was able to use the inertial force he had going with him to sway the car back in the other direction, trying one of his inertial drifts for the second hairpin. Akiyuki watched nervously, as Takumi rev-matched the downshift and stepped on the gas slightly earlier than usual, seeing how he dialed in just a touch of countersteer before the rear broke loose again. Takumi hung on, the rear tires spinning wildly, and the car was held on the exit at an angle similar to dirt-track racers.The countersteer, as well, was very heavy. Wow, Suzaki thought to himself, looking at Takumi with a bit of an awestruck expression, this time he anticipated it, he thought as the countersteer eased off and they shot down the short straight torwards the next heavy angle corner.
On the 45 corner, Takumi was light on the brakes, tapping them right before entry to shift the car's weight forward and loosen the rears, then hammering the throttle once more and lighting up the rear tires. The drift that resulted looked very awe-striking, but unfortunately, it wasn't fast. At all. Still - it was tremendous compared to how Takumi first started out. He was beginning to control the drifts, even though the drifts themselves were overdone and showy... and drifting was no good for racing, anyways. The Starion was beginning to respond to the way Akiyuki was used to, though, and he was suprised. Still - it'd take a week for Takumi to perfect this driving style and run the car at a top speed. It was refreshing, though - every other person Akiyuki chose for experimenting driving this as he tweaked with the engine settings live in-car, was an FF graduate who still followed the tight in, wide out procedure. The results of putting someone who was used to a wide in, tight out style proved useful to Akiyuki's theory...
The theory that a driver is accustomed solely to one style would struggle driving a car that required a different approach to being driven.
Another quick bend, followed by another hairpin. The uphill run was almost complete, and Fujiwara took a quick glance at Akiyuki, noting the expression on his face. He's... happy?, he asked himself. But I'm struggling so hard to keep this car on the road... it's such a difficult challenge! This is worse than transitioning from the old 86 to the new one! The behavior is so unorthodox and unpredictable, despite the fact that the corner entry is so smooth... why? But again, he was right on top of the hairpin before he expected. He again locked the brakes, the look on Akiyuki's face changing to slight fear again. Shimata... Hang on. Hang on, please, Akiyuki's Starion!! He managed to keep the car from understeering into the guardrail, when he instinctively floored the gas, the power surge merely spun the rears, befor sending the car into another extreme slide, all four of the Starion's tires begging for mercy as Takumi tried... so hard... to keep the car facing the right direction, but instead he found himself jamming on the brakes - a few seconds later, the car was once again slightly facing the wrong way - almost staring the guardrail striaght down but facing a few degrees downward.
Takumi sat there, silent. His frustration with the car had him just about on the verge of tears. Just how many years has it been when he found a car this difficult to drive? The entire run both ways, he felt like the car would slip out of his control any second, felt like his commands sent to the steering wheel and pedals was just a casual suggestion, and what the car really wanted to do was completely different. That harsh kick that came with the turbo's spool was just about uncontrollable. Takumi never encountered such a beast like this in his lifetime. Was this car even actually designed for mountain pass racing, and not highway racing? Covering his face with both his hands, he tilted his head up for a second, before slamming both fists down on the D-shaped steering wheel.
"KUSOOOOO!" Takumi looked down, a few drops of sweat falling from his chin. His shirt was soaked, and he was breathing heavily.
Akiyuki sat there with a bit of an empty expression on his face. He knew Takumi was driving the car balls-out from the very start, but just how much he struggled didn't strike Suzaki until now. I guess even superheroes have their faults..., he thought to himself. Fujiwara has probably been nurtured into glory by that little 86 of his, and never, ever, concerned himself with driving anything else. He's so unlike any other racer I know, who would just go from car to car. Akiyuki broke the silence with a simple gesture. "Let's go pick up the Trueno, Fujiwara, and we can continue talking up at the top of the hill."
"Un..." It took Takumi a while to finally turn the key and start the Starion back up, though. Not once, not twice, but three times, he put the car and its owner in danger due to his carelessness. No matter how hard the car might have been to drive, he had no buisness doing that. In other words, what just happened crushed Fujiwara. Once again, he backed the Starion and started driving slowly back downhill.
-
"He asked for Fujiwara specifically?" Ryousuke was now very curious about this Starion-driving pro-racer from Sayama, Saitama. He looked to Keisuke, who stood beside the two, and then Iketani.
"Yes... is something big going on? Is Takumi... in trouble, somehow?", Iketani replied, somewhat intimidated. While he wasn't too hot on the facts about whatever was going on with Fujiwara and Project.D, He knew that winning a battle could really upset a team.
"No, Kouichirou, it's nothing like that. We ourselves ar euncertain to just what the man's intentions are concerning Fujiwara. Speaking of which - where is he?", Ryousuke said to Iketani, glancing behind him and not seeing anyone else present.
"Ah, uhm, Fujiwara doesn't work here any more", Iketani said, with a bit of a suprised look. "Right after he joined your team he took up a job moving furniture."
"Ah, I see... well, I'll just be on the lookout for the Starion driver then, and consult Takumi when he comes to Akagi on Saturday, to see if he's interacted with the Starion kid at all.", Ryousuke said, glancing to his FC as the gas nozzle clicked.
"Hey, uhm.. Ryousuke...", Iketani said in a bit of a low tone, "I'll be on the lookout as well", then removed the gas nozzle and capped the tanks on the RX-7's.
"Thank you very much, I sincerely appreciate it", Ryousuke replied, before he climbed into his FC. Keisuke remained silent as he slipped into his own FD's cockpit, the two cars that just a year ago wore RedSuns stickers but today had no stickers whatsoever. To Iketani, as he watched them both drive away, it gave them even more of a presence. But he was too flustered at the moment to concern himself with that. "Oh, wow...", he said to just about nobody in particular, with a bit of an awe-struck gaze in his eyes. "Ryousuke Takahashi... Akagi's White Comet... thanked me."
-
Akiyuki fetched a pair of sodas, tossing one to Takumi, before propping open the hood of his Starion again. "Have a drink!", he said, with a bit of a happy gesture.
"Uhm... sure." Takumi cracked open the can and took a small swig, before observing the look of the Starion's engine again. Now that it was bright out, he could make out how... how different it looked from his own 4A-GE... especially noting the engine still was single overhead-cam. But its setup seemed different even to Keisuke's or Ryousuke's, about the only two turbo cars he's had a good look at, besides also Itsuki's 85. The spool was small-ish, smaller than Itsuki's 3A-C spool. "The engine... it looks pretty strange", Takumi said.
Akiyuki chuckled a little, "The engine is pretty strange, Fujiwara. For the money invested into just the engine alone, you could probably buy a used late-model Ferrari or a top-notch Benz", he said in repliance.
Takumi's eyes widened, him staring directly at Akiyuki's almost like-anyone-else-would-do expression, before shaking his head twice. "You put that much money into it!? How many engines has this car gone through?"
Akiyuki narrowed his eyes, revealing a small, content grin. "Zero. This is the original engine. It's been rebuilt 3 or 4 times, though. Only the original block is what's left of it. The rest of the engine for the most part has been compiled of top-notch racing parts, or, where there was no such parts to be found, had parts purpose-built for this application. Although, I'm working on getting a Starion specialty store going, supplying parts for both the 4G63 and the G54B - known here in Japan as the 4G54."
Takumi just stood blank for a bit, pondering to himself. Why, compared to my own car... perhaps even Keisuke's car... that's an incredible amount of money I wonder how much time it might have taken, if some of the parts are custom-modified...
"And, Fujiwara, here's one of the awesome features that nobody has been looking into - perhaps because there isn't much of a market for such an expensive mod. But it's what gives this car almost lag-less response." Akiyuki pointed to the - well, it was like an intake manifold, sort of - but was that ITBs it was covering? Akiyuki answered that question quickly. "A turbocharger manifold feeding the ITB's, as opposed to a single manifold setup. The response is crisp, but there's so much boost dialed in that it takes a quick half-second for the boost to come on. That's the kick you were feeling. And that spool? It's an advanced WRC-style spool with strong titanium fins that allow it to spin up to ridiculous speeds. It produces similar boost pressure to a larger turbine but the response is quicker and comes in at a lower RPM."
Takumi continued listening in as Akiyuki went on, overall just wowed by the effort that was put into this car.
"But the modifications don't end there. The piston head design was changed, the crankshaft altered, and camshafts changed as well - just about everything has been re-worked to allow the engine to have an extremely wide powerband, giving after you eliminate the small turbo lag, a feel similar to a large displacement V8 engine. Even the displacement's been enlarged to 2.8 liters - that's almost twice the displacement of your 20-valve. On top of that, it's had a custom-designed head installed as well, utilizing forked rocker arms to turn it into a three-valve-per-cylinder engine, giving it efficiency close to a dual overhead-cam. But, Fujiwara, do you know what the difference is between my Starion's engine tuning and your 4A-G's, aside from the fact mine's a high-output turbo and yours is a free-revving NA?"
Takumi shook his head. "To be honest... I have no clue. they both look like they've had a tremendous amount of work done to them."
Akiyuki chuckled a small bit. "The difference is - your engine is a disciple of very old-school tuning terminology." He pointed to the opened hood of the AE86, shaking his head a bit. "It still runs four individual high-flow Weber carburaetors... that's actually a downgrade, almost, from the stock EFI, because you always have to tune the carburaetor jets to suit the altitude, and the powerband isn't as forgiving as a similar setup with ITB's."
Akiyuki then turned to face the engine of his left-hand-drive Starion, pointing quickly to a metallic silver box with wires running into one side. "Part of the engine's tuning includes an adujstable fuel map along with other settings that you can actually tune while driving the car by connecting a laptop computer, such as the ignition timing, which also allows the use of an anti-lag system. Your engine on the other hand, it still sports distrubitor-style ignition system!"
Takumi nodded, realising the size of what Akiyuki was explaining. The car's tuning was as old-school as the machine itself.
"This car, Fujiwara, is also riding on FD double-wishbone suspension, and also has the same steering system. That's why the handling is sharp and crisp compared to your solid-axle rear. The chasis' been modified to accept these modifications.", Akiyuki continued.
"FD... suspension?" Takumi sat there, blank for second, now in total disbelief. "You can do those kinds of things?"
"With enough money, you can, Fujiwara. I've got good funding. Takumi-san, Just because it's an old car doesn't mean it can't be updated to compete with modern machines. Looking at the exterior and interior shells, not much has changed. But inside, the car's been reworked to be a true monster, well-suited to my style of getting on the gas early in the corner and having a wide exit. It's a car I've built to suit my style. Yet, despite all this, I still would rather not be in the driver's seat. I am more apt at being an engineer and mechanic to a racing team. You see, this car I merely race on occasion, alone, and with no opponents to concern myself with..."
A few minutes later, after the rest of the conversation was complete, both drivers got into their cars and drove off, Takumi returning back home to the tofu shop and Akiyuki heading back torwards Sayama, Saitama. Whatever conspired between the two drivers was largely unknown, but this much was known: Akiyuki Suzaki made a huge impression on the young driver, giving him a lot to think about.