Chapter 5: Redline Rumble

The head start provided enough time for Vincent to make it past the main roads, where he turned into one of the freeway junctions that would lead towards his destination as plenty of traffic filled the streets at this time of day. He wasn't paying too much attention to anyone on his trail given that he focused more on swerving past multiple cars and larger vehicles in front of him, however, that would change soon enough once something pulled up beside Vincent on the right.

It turned out to be some guy inside a lightly armored sports car that had a large graphic of a japanese rising sun posted on the hood. The stranger turned towards them with a hockey mask concealing their face as he yelled out to them.

"YOU! YOU'RE GONNA DIE TODAY KID, I'M GETTING FIRST PLACE AND YOU'LL BE A SMOKING HEAP BY THE END OF THIS RACE!!"

Without warning, the opposing driver slammed into Death Warrant which knocked both vehicles through a narrow gap that led to the oncoming side of the freeway. This forced Vincent to slow down in order to avoid crashing into traffic whilst this unknown opponent pulled ahead and activated a shot of nitrous that blasted out from their exhaust, sending them rocketing away in between the lanes of the road.

"Come on Vince! We can't let him beat us to it, I'll look around for anything we can use while you try to keep up with this guy!" Connie exclaimed, checking the back seats for anything useful lying around as the race began to escalate judging from what was going on in the mirror.

An all out brawl was taking place not too far behind them which steadily grew closer the longer they went along at their subdued pace, and so, the young driver began to accelerate as his eyes spotted a couple of things in front of him. The first was a trio of small red buttons on opposing sides in the center rim of the steering wheel, all of which were likely triggers for either weapons or a boost system. The second thing of notice was a built-in console that contained a strange readout of information on its screen:

Target: Kamikaze [100%]

Weapon: Fire Missile [3]

"Hey Con, I think I got it figured out!" Vincent said with a smile starting to curl on his lips, he saw his opponent not too far ahead so it could be possible to get a good hit. An experimental press on one of the buttons gave him a quick jolt of speed, another had momentarily activated the chainguns on the front end of his vehicle so that meant the final one was reserved for heavy hitters stowed away, the only thing left was for him to come up with a plan of attack.

The driver of Kamikaze was busy pushing his car to the limit as he forced various cars in front of him to swerve out of the way lest there be a violent collision, and while ordinary people would be fearful of their life under these circumstances, it was actually the other way around. A strong sense of adrenaline pumped through his veins like nothing before, if anything, this feeling was addicting. And with the newbie out of the way, he'd be one step closer to getting as much of this rush as his heart could take.

Although, the details didn't really matter much anyway for someone living in the fast lane.

The slight figurative cloud over his head quickly disappeared once a loud mechanical roar screamed around to his flank, his eyes quickly looked at all three mirrors which revealed nothing until he spotted a familiar face smirking at him outside his window.

Seeing the newbie make a grab for first place made the adrenaline junkie tremble with fury as he scowled behind the mask.

Who the hell does this damn kid think he is!?

Vincent said nothing as he ignored the familiar panic rising within him, he positioned himself in an open lane and saw from his peripherals that innocent civilians were getting annihilated by the pack that followed closely behind the two. Although the young driver mustered up the strength to flip off the crazy mask wearing man, later shifting back into gear and hitting the boost before the telltale sounds of gunfire began to go off behind him, multiple rounds met the back end of his vehicle but did little more than that.

Looks like my little gambit worked.

"If getting shot to hell is your idea of getting rid of this jackass, then I'd like to see what the end goal really is Vince!" Connie cried out as she ducked down somewhat to avoid getting hit by a stray bullet. Their opponent was hot on their tail and had no intention of letting them cross the finish line given the stunt her friend pulled.

"Remember that land mine from before? I'm gonna bait him into one and get that guy off our backs, hopefully it should be enough to take out a car like his." Vincent replied with an unusually focused expression on his face as he brought Death Warrant around to the edge of the roadway before inputting the same directional commands that allowed it to drop a mine earlier, and in turn, he could see that his pursuer had virtually no time to avoid the blast due to their close proximity. This sudden explosive damage was reflected on the small information readout from before which gave him a good idea of how much impact it had.

Target: Kamikaze [76%]

Weapon: Fire Missile [3]

"Well would you look at that, I guess you really did have something going." Connie says with a slight tone of amazement, she wasn't sure his idea would work out but decided to keep quiet and let him get to work on dispatching their current foe for the time being.

It wasn't long until Kamikaze quickly caught back up to speed with its headlights flashing into the overhead mirror. The intense light blinded Vincent quite a bit so he shifted down into his seat and simply tried to keep pace ahead of the competition, however, the persistent car behind him changed tactics by firing a strange looking rocket that narrowly shot past him. It was red and had a similarly colored trail behind it as the thing flew by, later crashing into an unfortunate innocent bystander driving an RV which completely obliterated the whole vehicle.

What the hell? This guy isn't gonna let me off easy is he?

Vincent ran his mind through various ideas on how to counterattack, but the fact that it couldn't come without the possible cost of innocent people getting caught in the crossfire had began to distract him quite a bit. He almost didn't notice when Kamikaze managed to slam into him from the side, his hands quickly steadied the wheel and allowed him to break away from the crazed manic while Connie herself took a moment to recover from the mild case of whiplash. The two then saw a large turret pop out from the roof of Kamikaze before charging up something powerful in only a matter of seconds, it shifted its aim towards Death Warrant with a small flame lit at the end of the barrel, indicating its true nature was that of a flamethrower.

"I'M GONNA SHOW YOU WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU FUCK WITH M-" The opposing driver's words were cut off by a blaring horn that came from behind as something large rammed his vehicle, sending the whole thing flying in front of the rookie contestant. The car, Kamikaze, landed on its side where its metal surface scraped along the asphalt which created several vivid sparks that illuminated the underside of the vehicle. There was barely any time to react as Vincent pulled his car away just in time to avoid an oncoming semi truck that was headed towards the two with a huge rectangular trailer in tow, this left the unfortunate opponent to get rammed by the heavier vehicle which caused Kamikaze to violently explode into flames whilst the scene began to fall behind into the distance just as fast as it happened.

With the threat taken care of, Vincent turned into the right side of the freeway and drove on in silence. He wasn't sure who interfered in their little duel but didn't want to know the truth in case it damned him one way or another, as seeing the result was more than enough to remind him how easy one could lose everything. Despite that, the accident gave him enough of a lead to get to the junkyard without further issue since it caused a domino effect that left the other drivers to deal with a nasty traffic jam.