The Gate bikes boom quieted. The boosts started to fail under the sheer velocity of trying to keep up in a race that mirrored the circuit and endurance tracks.
The lights from The Gate riders lit up the road again and brought a brief sense of neon daylight to the scene. The Selector’s concentration wasn’t affected. He had quickly learned his lesson in power management by deactivating his electronics for the most part, other than his audio feed. Nothing high-level could be caught by their attempts to muddy his frequencies.
The sonic tones resonating from them were used as weapons through their technology and language broadcasts. The words were unsettling, making the hair on his neck stand up under his helmet. This time, if he gave in to fear, he really would be facing a permanent red flag. No paddock reset; the race would be over and done.
The Selector focused his mind on the rhythm, the BPM, the cutbacks, scratches, and beat jumps. The workflow was anchoring his thought process. The strategy was playing like a movie in his mind, with future steps sequencing as a predictive model of when to execute a change-up and when to drop.
The Gate’s flankers leaned over, repeating the same method. Armored arms stretched over again, but one arm lowered to target the wheel-rim of his bike.
The sluggish blur returned; the roads, buildings, and signs passed slowly. The Selector looked ahead—the chicane was approaching, moving ever closer in his view. It was almost upon them.
The Gate riders were unaware, assuming his takedown would be easy.
At 0.2, the lightning spears were almost on target.
Panic returned to the Selector. Another vocal sample was isolated on his mix; the chorus line—'Gonna make you feel something'—it was all the Selector needed to reawaken. He threw out his right leg, safely out of reach of the Gate rider's electronic spear primed for his front wheel rim. He leaned over with his bike, riding the knee and turning the bike inward, narrowly avoiding the electronic speartip in a high-stakes gamble.
The Gate rider's spear hit the tarmac, unbalancing the rider as they started to lose control. The Gate bike shook violently. All of it was playing out in slow motion to the Selector. His bike cut into the back of the Gate rider, easily nipping the rear with the softest touch—but it was enough to trigger what had played out in his mind.
The Selector took the inside arc of the chicane and quickly rode the knee to the left side before exiting into another slipstream to take him out onto a long straight. Clean execution, precise to the microsecond. He glanced over his right shoulder, witnessing the carnage unfolding behind him as anticipated.
The Gate rider's bike had been nudged to the right side for a second; it was enough to cause the rider to lose their balance completely. An armored figure was catapulted forward to the left into the air, its spear snapping in half on the tarmac.
The other Gate rider on the left flank was already holding his spear in thin air when the Selector executed his counter. He was also unsteady, and now it was The Gate's turn to taste fear—and the freezing sensation many others had felt under their scathing judgments regarding what tribe was true and who was allowed to live in their sectors.
The right flanker smashed into the left rider headfirst, hitting the bike’s chassis and rider. Both riders were thrown violently together, instantly ceasing to be upon impact as the armor cracked under the pressure before the bike exploded.
The scene was complete chaos, and it had caught The Gate completely off guard.
The right flanker’s bike had also exploded while the destruction was unfolding. One of the riders from the triangle squad at the rear had plowed into the bike at high velocity with no space for a pass. Another visceral scene filled the air with both bikes obliterating into pieces; it was a deconstruction in real time. Both upper-tier Gate bikes were torn apart into countless tiny fragments sputtering everywhere. Shrapnel rained down on everything around.
