I do not own any anime or any video games.
Druid Hills, 6:05 pm.
"Okay I accept the challenge," I said, "Yo Matoko, since I'm going to be racing against you first, where do you want to race at?"
"Red Mountain," he answered, "We're gonna do sudden death/cat and mouse touge race."
There are different types of touge races; there is time attack/ghost battle, grip gambler, and sudden death/cat and mouse.
Now sudden death/cat and mouse is where the lead car wins if the space between the cars increases considerably, while the following car wins if they overtake the lead car. If any car spins out or crashes, the other car wins the race. In the event of the following car keeping pace, the race is usually rerun with the positions swapped. Once again the new lead car must pull away from the pursuer significantly, or the follower must overtake, to win and prevent another run.
This style of battle is often chosen when the road isn't wide enough to allow passing, but if the car in front does indeed somehow get passed, the overtaken car automatically loses.
"I don't know about racing on the mountain tonight," I said, "The police sometimes stop patrolling around that area at 12:00 in the morning, plus I got to get up for school tomorrow."
"Okay how about we do the racing Friday then?" Nuchu suggested, "That way it'll give us time to get a little bit of practice in and get used to the course."
"Hey guys, how are ya'll settling here in Birmingham?" Sai Saici asked.
"It's very different from back home and in San Diego," Nuchu replied, "This city is very slow paced and the people here are pretty friendly."
"How's Senna doing?" Andrew asked, "I see you guys are fixing up on her ride, will you guys be able to get it fully fixed for the race Friday?"
"Unfortunately no," Sai Saici replied, "Luckily Deangelo let Senna borrow one of his rides."
After we finished our conversation Nuchu and his two lieutenants got back into their rides and drove off, my brother and I headed back into the garage and continued fixing on the wrecked RSX.
"Yo Deangelo, you better be careful with that Nuchu dude." Sai Saici said.
"Why you say that?" I asked him.
"Nuchu told me a lot of stories about when he and his family were still living in Newark, they personally know your father, he even said that your father taught him and his other two brothers how to street race."
"Shit, I hope dad didn't teach them some of his techniques."
"I wouldn't know bro, he probably has, all I can say is be careful and good luck."
Later that night….
Red Mountain, 12:13 am.
January 8th, 2009.
With Deangelo…
Red Mountain was pretty active tonight as numerous of pedestrians and street racers were chilling in the parking lot area, I saw Sai Saici, Senna and the rest of the Unbeatable Street racers watching the members of the Society of Supras prepare for their little downhill practice run.
You could see the whole city on top of Red Mountain, it was downright beautiful to say the least, I should come up here a lot more often.
"Deangelo, I'm surprised you came up here," Sai Saici said as he and Senna walked towards me, "Usually around this time you're knocked out sleep."
"Yeah, I'm only staying here for a few minutes," I replied, "I just want to see Nuchu and his boys in action. How is the Evo 4 operating Senna?"
"It's working alright," She answered, "I'm really not used to driving a car with AWD though."
"You better get used to it, ya'll gonna be facing against the ATL chapter of American Royalty Friday."
"Hey guys we better hurry up and find a spot," Sai Saici said, "Nuchu and his other two lieutenants are about to begin."
All three Supras were lined up, Nuchu was in front followed by Matoko and finally Andrew, one of the pedestrians came up to the front to start the race.
"Okay you guys ready!?" he said raising both of his hands up.
Nuchu and the other two cut on their neon lights that shined underneath their cars, the roaring of the engines echoed throughout Red Mountain.
"Ready…….GO!!!!!"
In an instant all three of them simultaneously went flying out the starting line, they were still behind one another.
Sai Saici, Senna and I watched from amongst the crowd as Nuchu and his lieutenants approached the first turn, "It's absolutely crazy," Sai Saici said, "But at the same time it's amazing that they're driving so close together like that."
All three of them went drifting around the first turn, none of them got left behind and none of them left their position I was very surprised at this.
"It's pretty cool seeing the neon lights from up here," Senna said, "It's like they're putting on a show for us or something."
I saw Shinji watching from the crowd yet again along with his high ranking members, one of the high ranking members that was with him was a young female.
She was wearing red oval glasses and long black hair, her hair also had bangs in the front and she keeps the back in two braided pigtails. She was wearing a gray shirt and black sweatpants along with some gray/black colored New Balance sneakers and had a black bracelet on her right arm.
It was Lisa Yadomaru, I've seen her in action on some occasions, she drives around town on a custom El Diablo Softail chopper people say that she's real quick on that bike of hers.
Standing right beside her and also watching the race was another female; she was short and looked very young, she's probably 15 or 16 years old.
She had short blonde hair, her short hair were worn in stubby pigtails. She wore a red jogging suit decorated with the first kanji of her name and flip flops. She also has an overly long fang protruding from the lower left side of her mouth.
The girl's name was Hiyori (Also known as "Snaggletooth" because of her overly long fang protruding from the lower left side of her mouth), now I've never seen her in action but a lot of the other racers told me that she can be downright aggressive on the road; she has a very short temper as well.
The last person was a tall muscular guy with a few sharp features; he had short light-gray/silver hair and brown eyes. He wears a blue and white trimmed unzipped hoodie and underneath it was a muscle shirt that was colored the same; he had on blue cargo pants as well as black combat boots and black fingerless gloves. He has also acquired a series of golden piercings, one in his eyebrow and three on his left ear.
From the looks of it he had a 69 tattoo on his chest; his name was Kensei Muguruma, now this guy is a more mature, decisive and serious individual.
He drives like a bat out of hell in that 74' Plymouth Barracuda, a very beautiful muscle car to say the least, I'm gonna have to give it my all when facing against him.
I continued watching Nuchu and his lieutenants as they continued with their synchronized drifting, in some dark areas all I could see where the red, white and blue neon lights speeding through the roadways. The sound of the tires screaming of pain in consent drifting left and right was music to my ears, along with the music playing in the background and the engines revving, every now and then I'll hear the sound of a car backfiring (Some cars had that misfiring system installed).
Looks like what I said earlier about dad teaching Nuchu some of his racing techniques were kind of true, Nuchu's driving style were very similar to mine and dad's.
The way he drifts is very impressive when he stabilizes the drift, the minimal counter steer is the same but, the counter steer immediately following the turn-in is smaller.
And just like my father and I, Nuchu drifts extremely close to the guardrails, "Whoa, what the hell is they doing?" Sai Saici said in shock, "They don't even know what's up ahead, after that slow right there's a sharp left, if they don't slow down they'll go right into the ravine!"
All three of them went into the turn way too fast and because of it their back had swung out, for a moment we all thought they were going to spin out and there wasn't any place for them to slow down at all. That's when they pressed their foot on the brake and went drifting around the sharp left turn, the way they did it made my eyes widen in absolute surprise.
"Unbelievable, an inertial drift?!" I said. Senna and Sai Saici couldn't believe it either at what they saw.
"There is no way that this is their first time racing on this mountain pass," Senna said, "It's like they've been racing on Red Mountain their whole lives the way they're driving."
I walked straight back to the car, that little performance was all I really needed to see, these guys were racing on a level that I've seen before, it's like my father was racing in all three of those cars.
Deep down inside there was a side of me that was nervous, but there was another side of me that couldn't wait to race them.
The next night….
Friday January 9th, 2009.
Red Mountain,7:30 pm.
With Deangelo…..
*SCREEEEEEEECH*
"Brake, gas, clutch, switch gears, turn!!!" I said drifting around one of the hairpin turns, I've been training nonstop every since I got out of school.
The police weren't active on Fridays which meant an open opportunity for me to get some practice in before Nuchu and the others showed, in my mind I was painting out all kinds of scenarios in my head, like what to do if Matoko tried to pass me on one of the final hairpin turns.
What to do if he tried to counterattack on one the high speed corners or will he try to make his move on one of the straightaway's, "Fuck, what if Matoko knows dad's secret little move (the gutter run)?" I said to myself, "That's an automatic loss right there!"
Elsewhere…..
Patten Park, 7:35 pm.
With Sai Saici and Senna….
"Okay here they come." I said as the ATL chapter of American Royalty came rolling into the parking lot area.
As they all stopped and parked into the parking lot, the leader of the crew got out of the car, he was tall and somewhat medium built, he had black hair and a 69 tattoo on his left cheek.
He was wearing some baggy blue jean pants, a white South Pole shirt and white Chuck Taylor Converse shoes.
His name was Shuhei Hisagi the leader of the American Royalty car club, he was driving 2008 Saleen S302 Extreme which had a two toned color, it was orange in the back and red in the front. It didn't have a body kit but it did have chrome 19 inch rims from MoMo racing company.
"Long time no see you guys," Shuhei said walking towards us.
"Yeah it's been a while since we last race," Senna said.
Back on Red Mountain….
With Deangelo…..
"Deangelo, when it comes to touge races, you got to stay focus. Especially in sudden death/cat and mouse races, if you're leading, my advice to you is to not look in the rearview mirror; if you keep constantly looking in the rearview you'll be too mindful of your opponents' presence making you lose focus. Always keep cool and don't work yourself up, if your emotions get the best of you it's over. And finally if you're doing the chasing, be patient, know when to overtake and when."
Those were the pieces of advice my father gave to me when I started doing races in Red Mountain, I sat on the hood of the car as I waited for the Society of Supras to arrive.
I could hear a lot of people whisper about me and my opponent Matoko, some of them were discussing about my advantages and disadvantages.
Shinji and the members of the Visoreds were watching from the crowd, I also saw Sakura Haruno and Ino Yamanaka looking on as well.
"Hey yo," I said calling one of the pedestrians over, "What the course looking like, what's the condition?"
"Well the course is looking okay so far," he replied, "There are a few twigs and such on the side of the roads but it shouldn't be much of a problem, even though it's a tad bit chilly out here you don't have to worry about any ice on the roads, but there is one problem and that's the leaves on the ground. You land on a bunch of them and you're gonna spin out, plus a gust of wind will start blowing through here every now and then."
Suddenly I heard the sound of multiple car engines, I saw the SOS car club making their way up here, I took two deep breaths and cracked my knuckles, "Alright here we go." I said.
Sai Saici and Senna face off against Shuhei and the ATL chapter of American Royalty, while Deangelo faces off against the SOS third lieutenant Matoko Mashimoto in a sudden death/cat and mouse race see how everything turns out!!
