Rogue Racer

The starting line for the underground races was on a rock plateau lifted high above the grounds. As Avea and Bebop crossed the plateau, they tried to ignore the herds of angry faces staring directly towards them. The fury burning in their eyes, as they watched her walk past them. Avea had known the moment Cyrus Elrod had called her out in front of the crowd that a clear message had been sent to all the clan racers. Avea Maxwell was now the prime target. "They're all looking at us" Bebop hissed, flying closely beside her, as they walked past all the clan racers huddled around their race holes in the ground, tunnelling deep below, ready to plunge into the dark depths. "I know Bebop just keep walking" Avea murmured back, keeping her eyes locked ahead, as she strode past them.

She forced every muscle in her body to relax, trying to maintain a facade of calm, but she knew that she had unleashed something and now she'd have to watch her back. The Valent clans grew more raucous as she walked towards the fringes of the plateau. Avea kept her head down, ignoring their growing taunts.

"That gutter rat won't last a second."

"I'll end it for her, quick and messy."

"Elrod's gonna pay good money to have her wiped off the track."

"You're telling me that stray took down Skulldaggers? Impossible."

The slights from the crowd grew louder as they hurled them at her, trying to bait her. Avea tried to contain her composure, turning her head to swiftly surveyed her rivals. To her left, members of the Red Prowler clan sat on their bright red hoverboards, which boasted sharp, sculpted designs with lethal lashing fire singers built into the boards.

The Chrono Raiders, with their scrambler-style hover-bikes. Those stout, durable vehicles ideal for diverse terrain, equipped with frames that could ensnare and crush competing hoverboards under their weight. The Silent Slinger clan, had silver streetfighter hoverboards, compact and agile, gleaming with a smooth metallic finish. Its V-shape allowed its rider to weave through the tightest spaces, perfect for cunning, stealthy maneuvers. A small girl stood at the front of her clan, her board balancing delicately in her hand as though it weighed nothing. Avea's gaze lingered on her board, recalling the way it could slice through the air without making a single sound. The girl, in turn, looked down at Avea's round, rusted hoverboard, evidently worn down with bearings scarred and indented from numerous harsh crashes. The girl's mouth simply turned upwards in amusement, as though Avea's board was a bad joke that didn't even deserve a laugh.

Shifting uneasily, Avea recognised racers from smaller pick-off clans, the Mech Swarms and Ruin Riders, piloting the clunky hoverboards that spewed out thick smog, almost veiling them in a cloud of filth, concealing the hidden sharp pikes embedded in the sides. They were meek competition at best, but still something to look out for.

Avea halted, spotting the Skulldagger clan gathered around the race's central entrance right above the main intersecting route. Their sleek jet-black hoverboards had subtle curves but lethal blades hidden for slicing through hovercrafts with terrifying precision. The Skulldaggers had a reputation for playing dirty, with Cyrus Elrod never letting any of the other clan racers get close, at all times surrounded by his inner circle who were ready to cut down any rival hoverboard. This undefeated status had allowed Cyrus to claim ownership over various sectors in the Valent ring. Avea eye's examined the sleek finesse of the Skulldagger hoverboards, none of the other clans had been able to get close to challenging him ... except Avea. She'd been the only one to outmaneuver Cyrus Elrod's goons and live to talk about it, but only within the Valent borders. Still, it had been an impressive feat, but it had made her a very powerful enemy.

"Oi fray girl, nice junk board."

"Check out the rust bucket?!"

"Which scrap heap did you pull that out of?"

"She's racin' on that?!"

The howling laughter only grew louder around her, and it was all she could do to keep her head down."They're all laughing at us," Bebop said. "That's nothing new", Avea replied scornfully. She hated this bit, of being forced to endure this ridicule, but it would be worth it when she saw those smug smiles wiped from their ugly faces. See, she knew something they didn't, while the scrap yards in Fray, though dirty and decayed, often saw many pieces of discarded tech in their junk piles. There were valuable pieces hidden beneath that were likely castoffs from the high echelons of the Core, you only had to dig deep enough. Avea could still recall the exact moment, she dug up the disjointed fragments of her hoverboard lying hidden beneath a pile of rusted junk. Cruelly pulled apart and covered in layers of dirt, but it was Avea's inherent nature as a scavenger and her skilled hands that enabled her to he pieced them together. Breathing new life into what most would have deemed irreparable. She knew that to the untrained eye, her hoverboard may appear like scraps, but she knew that with her at the helm of this board, she'd be unbeatable.

She finally made it to her starting hole, unsurprised that it was furthest away from the other clan racers. No doubt, a draw rigged. The clan leaders took their places at the forefront of the divided crowd, their flashy attire a strange sight amongst the barren landscape. However, like statues carved from stone, they watched their racers with an scrutinising intensity that left a heavy feeling of suspense in the air. Avea's sensed a tremor move through the crowd. There were no more taunting shouts, heckling, or threats hurled at neighbouring clans. Instead, it had gone silent, leaving all the clan racers slightly twitchy."It almost time" Avea murmured.

Turf. Control. Power. These hoverboard races were not without their agendas, a relentless struggle for power where clan lords fought for sovereign rule over the valent quadrant. The underground races were a merciless trial. On the surface, no blood would be spilled, which remained an unspoken rule. Yet beneath the surface, everyone knew that unspoken rule held no weight and it was every racer for themselves.

Standing on the heights of the plateau, Avea could see the full moon much closer than before, and there was something about the way it sat perched in the sky like a majestic ruler. That caused a stirring deep within her, and in that fleeting moment she caught sight of the skeleton plants below. The light of the moon casting its sickly pale light down on their withered branches. The sight of them covering the expanse of the outlands saddened her for some unknown reason. She looked out further with slight cool breeze blowing past her, to see T'alli's border walls standing upright in the distance. A pang of guilt struck her as she thought of her mother and wondered if she'd now discovered her missing from her bed.

Avea stood at her unmarked entrance, teetering on the cracked edges of the tunnel opening, staring down into the bottomless pit where even the moonlight was lost to the darkness. Avea tried to imagine that darkness burrowing into intricate twists and turns beneath the surface. The first call of the starting horn blew, loud and clear into the night. The clan racers sprang into action with striking coordination, their hoverboards' metallic parts snapping into place. The deafening cheers and cries of the gathering crowd blurred together as Avea released her own hoverboard strapped to her back, expanding it into its circular disc. The racers took their positions. Avea felt the weight of eyes on her back. She turned and instantly met a cold pair of eyes from across the plateau. She met Elrod's merciless stare from across the plateau, as he mouth twisted upwards into a slimy smirk. Itching to go up and punch those crooked teeth right out of his mouth, Avea resisted, refusing to break the stare. The air seemed to thicken with every passing moment.

She could only wait to prove them all wrong.

A heartbeat went by… and then at the last glorious blow of the horn. Avea fell forward into the dark depths of the bottomless pit. It was a dizzying freefall, and a surge of adrenaline rushed through her. "WOOOOOOH", Avea cried out into the darkness, her thighs strained painfully, trying to keep her from being thrown off the board. She kept her body leaning forward, and with a defiant determination, she sailed blindly along the sides of the tunnel entrance. She shifted all her weight to the tip of her board, feeling every quivering reverberation of her hoverboard beneath her. The scraping sounds of the hoverboard rang in her ears as it grated along the sides of the tunnel drop. Completely blind, there was nothing but darkness in front of her, and every fibre of her clung to the exhilaration of the descent, the crushing grip of gravity pulling her downwards. Trusting only the feel of her hoverboard beneath her, it shuddered suddenly, Avea's muscles tensed instinctively as she readied herself for impact. Her blood rushed to her ears, drowning out all other sounds. "Now, Bebop," she cried blindly, kicking upwards. She threw herself into the air, lifting the hoverboard under her feet.

She skidded out into the winding passages of the underground, "That was absolutely insane ... what a rush!" Avea laughed, dropping in on the back group of racers, the hoverboards passing her in a cascading kaleidoscope of colour. "We are in agreement", Bebop replied, the bot antenna awkwardly bent out of shape. The force of racers speeding past her unravelled Avea's braid, with her flimsy goggles flapping wildly at the sides. The drop into the underground had already eliminated a number of the clan racers, with many of the hoverboards the left in shambles in the passageway. The passages were made of a smooth stone that reflected the moonlight streaks from above, illuminating the tunnels in a luminous glow. It was truly a beautiful sight, but one that Avea didn't have time to admire.

She could see that the racers had already broken up, with the Skulldagger clan already leading the pack. I have to get to the front, Avea thought. Her wiry controls were ingeniously wrapped around her wrists, giving her complete mobility to direct her hoverboard from beneath her. She hit her wrists together, activating her controls, the disc fractured into an array of separate pieces, then, like magnets attracting to each other, seamlessly merged back into its circular shape. "Let's take them down Bebop" Avea said, leaping into action, her arms with the controls on her wrists moved in precise slicing movements guiding the orbiting fragments as she vaulted from one to another, completely untethered. There were surprised curses from behind as the clan racers witnessed her rusted, beaten hoverboard fracture and reform around Avea as she swerved in and out, chasing them down with ease. "Yeah, that's right, take that", Bebop shouted to the racers as they passed them.

Riding around the tight bends unscathed, Avea overtook her competitors, avoiding their disgruntled cries, curses, and foul plays. Soaring up and over, under and out from her hoverboard, catching and falling in time, a rhythmic dance that she had honed and perfected. Her legs remained strong, keeping her upright and setting her sights on taking the lead. The tunnel's passages were becoming narrower, forcing the racers to split from the central route, "we need to stay as close to the surface as possible, we can't go too deep", Avea called over her shoulder to Bebop.

Bebop didn't reply.

Faltering slightly, Avea felt everything drown out around her. Lost in the strange haze of still silence, suddenly she found herself alone in the cold dark passageway."Bebop? Where are you?" Avea called out confused, that's when she heard it, a faint scraping sound like nails dragging against stone, echoing around her. It started softly from the far end of the passage, then grew steadily louder, creeping closer with every second. "Avea?" a voice called out from beyond the haze, but Avea couldn't see anything but the wispy shadows crawling towards her and the strange scrapping sound echoing louder. "AVEA WE'RE FALLING BEHIND" Bebop cried, Avea confused shook herself out and suddenly she was back in the midst of the race with her bot right in front of her. "Sorry Bebop I don't..." she shook her head again, attempting to get out of her stunned state. What the hell was that? she thought. There were rumours about the outland's tunnels lurking with various unseen dangers, that the shadows themselves were the condemned souls of past riders, but she'd always assumed that it was just the Core trying to keep them out.

"Move it V! We didn't come all this way just to finish last!" Bebop cried. "You're right, we're falling behind" Avea replied, whatever she'd seen had merely been a figment of her imagination, or maybe even a result from the harsh descent. Kicking her hoverboard into a higher gear, she navigated instinctively, avoiding the declining routes. Only sticking to the inclines wide and brim nearing closer to the surface. Don't get distracted, She thought to herself, as she gained momentum catching up to the other clan racers.

The Mechswarm riders descended on her immediately, their clunky machinery belching thick smog into the air. "Not the smoggers!" Bebop wailed behind her. Avea coughed as the smoke fumes caught in her throat, her eyes stinging as she sped ahead. She leaned low, her hoverboard skimming inches above the jagged rock, the heat of their overworked thrusters licking at her heels. She turned around to face the Mechswamr racers, who were wearing gas masks so as not to inhale the toxic fumes that their bikes were furiously spewing out.

"Enjoy this race, Fray girl. It's gonna be your last," one of the riders sneered. The rejects of the Mech sector and neighbours of the Fray. They were even dirtier than she was, their resentment thick as the smog they spewed. Avea hunched low over her hoverboard, skimming mere inches above the jagged rock.

Bebop’s voice crackled in the ear, "Avea, push ahead!" Another Mech-swarm rider snarled, "Should’ve stayed in the gutters where you belong!" Avea gritted her teeth. The Mechswarm racers were the bottom tier, low pick-off riders. Their bikes were big, clunky, slow. So poorly constructed, Avea could hear their metal joints groaning, the engines sputtering beneath their weight. There was no way she was letting this lot take her down.

Bebop’s voice crackled in her ear. "Avea, they're closing in!" Another rider snickered, grinning menacingly at her. Avea's grip tightened. Directing her hoverboard, she expanded it out like a shield deflecting their vicious grenades. Not a chance. She just had to wait for the right moment.

Then she saw it.

A gap, too tight for them but just enough for her. “And now” Bebop called. Avea fractured her hoverboard and spun outwards, “Oi” the Mech Swarms called out, the maneuver too sharp, too fast. The Mechswarm riders hesitated, their sluggish controls failing to keep up.

A sharp kick sent her diving through the narrowing gap between the two riders hoverboards. Her hoverboard shielding her back. They panicked, reacting far too late. Metal shrieked as their hovercycles collided, as they tried to trap her on the inside. Smashing into a shower of rusted metal and thick smoke. Avea twisted her body, pulling up hard, her board reforming just as she shot back in front. The wreckage faded behind her, swallowed by the smog.

But just before she vanished into the tunnel route, a voice shouted out.

"You won’t get far, Outborn."

The underground tunnel routes were now pitch-black and suffocating. The air hung thick with dust and the scent of damp metal. The ground was treacherous, uneven, littered with jagged scrap, and riddled with sudden drop-offs into bottomless voids. Many racers didn’t need to be attacked or ambushed in the tunnels. A single wrong turn, a moment’s hesitation, and they’d plummet to their deaths. As Avea flew through the tunnels, she navigated instinctively, but there was something strange about these tunnels. Whispering with unseen movement, and shifting shadows that lay just beyond reach. It kept drawing Avea's attention away from the race ahead of her, the one that she'd gambled everything on winning.

"Skull Daggers up ahead," Bebop called out, setting her sights on Cyrus Elrod's sleek jet-black hovercycle in the distance. Skinnier than the other hovercycles, resembling a pointed spear shooting through the tunnels. Holding nothing back, she blazed along the trails unseen but burning bright, like a star in daylight. Leaping off her racer, Avea's feet hit the sides of tunnels, sending shocks of pain along her shins as she catapulted over two clan racers in front, maneuvering her hands to connect the fragments of her board together before landing on it with direct precision. Before skirting another sharp turn, she was gaining on the Skull-daggers formation just up ahead. Hearing the crashes behind followed closely by screams echoing along the tunnel's narrow passages. Avea ignored it, crouching down further, she charged relentlessly towards the front of the pack, the sparks flying as her hoverboard grated against the passage walls.

"V, we've got two on our tail", Bebop called out, "we'll lose them if we change passages," she said, kicking her board and flying into another passage to throw the chasers off her trail. "V haven't lost them" Bebop called out. Gaining momentum and flying faster, Avea couldn't hear the hoverboards behind her. She could, however, hear the slight swoosh of air and instantly knew she had silent slingers on her tail. "Swerve," Bebop screeched. Avea swerved just as a slingshot out at her, trying to snatch the board out from beneath her feet. A small, nimble hoverboard charged after her, its racer crouched downwards, aiming the slingers at a ferocious speed. "Hang on tight!" Avea sprung off her board, flipping over the arrowed slingshots firing at her, her hoverboard mimicking her movements through the air. The Silent Slinger clan, known for their sneak attacks, began gliding along the tunnel's curves, trying to trap her in their formation. The hoverboard morphed beneath her, and Avea's agile body began skillfully leaping between fragments, trying to disorient the trio. The Silent Slingers surged forward, keeping their steady gaze locked on her. The Silent-slinger clan couldn't hold her in their formation as Avea swung the magnetic fragments of her board around her. She aimed one of the fragments at the Silent Slinger, knocking them off their board with a swift throw. "Oh yeah!" Avea's joyous shouts bounced off the tunnel walls taunting the clan riders, whose formation had tightened. That's one.

"Oh no!" Bebop cried, his voice sharp with panic.

Avea barely had time to react before another arrow whistled through the air and slammed into the ground just ahead of her. A burst of sparks erupted on impact. "Damn!" she gasped, instinctively swerving. The sudden jolt threw her off balance, her hoverboard wobbling beneath her feet as she fought to regain control.

Then she saw it.

Her shadow stretched long beneath her, distorted by the dim, flickering lights of the tunnel. But something was wrong. It wasn’t just her shadow. Something else was there. Its form loomed unnaturally large, shifting like living smoke, and for a split second, she swore she saw twisted, monstrous horns sprouting from its head.

Her pulse pounded in her ears, her breath coming fast and shallow.

It lingered. Just for a second. Then, it flew past her and was gone.

Avea swallowed hard, her grip tightening on her hoverboard. What was that? Another slingshot fired at her, with the Silent-slingers moving to attack. Avea snapped back into action, swinging out her arm again, this time directing her hoverboard to face the racers behind her, staring at the duo of silent slingers. They both flashed sly smirks at her, thinking they'd cornered her. "Bebop eyes", Avea said, before turning her back to them, completely blind.

Flipping through the air and flying backwards. Bebop directed her, "Straight...Right...Left...Right again...Steady...Now". Avea didn't hesitate to leap upwards, swinging her hands outwards, her board split in two. She twisted in the air while the board fragments moved outwards, then swung her arms out in a slicing motion. The hoverboard fragments flew straight past the racers, "how did you miss it was right in front of your face!" Bebop cried out.

The racer, who Avea recognised as the small girl from the surface, let out a bark of laughter as the board cut right past her. Avea only turned, breaking into a sprint onto the smaller fragments of her hoverboard that matched her stride. Chasing after her, the Silent-Slinger racer began shooting her down with their inbuilt slingers. Activating her controls, Avea could sense her board moving through the air. The Silent-Slingers couldn't see Avea's hoverboard curve through the air, flying straight back towards the duo, who had their backs to the fragments. There was a loud CRASH as her hoverboard swiped the small nimble hoverboards from beneath another silent-slingers feet. Thats two. The silent-slinger cried out, colliding into the other, while the two hoverboards flew into the tunnel wall, cracking down the centre. And that's three. Avea heard her own hoverboard connect before surging towards her, and she jumped back, her feet planting directly onto the intact hoverboard.

She flew forward, listening out for Silent Slinger racer's curses, but instead, there was only silence. She couldn’t shake the feeling that something, something unseen was still watching, still waiting."That was close," Bebop said." Did you see that shadow?" Avea asked Bebop, her voice weary. "What shadow?" Bebop replied. Avea screeched to a halt, turning around, "The shadow over there ..." she said, pointing to the same spot, but the shadow had evaporated. Out of the corner of her eye, Avea thought she saw something gliding along the wall, but when she turned her head, it vanished. "Nothing", Avea murmured, questioning whether her mind was actually going delirious from being underground.

No, there's nothing there, Avea reassured herself. The number of clan racers was dwindling fast. Trailing the maze of the tunnels, she leapt over the edges and slipped through the narrow cracks trying to keep her lead. Avea breathed a sigh of relief as she drifted into a wide, open passage. The easy pick-offs were out of the race. But before she could settle in, a deep, rumbling growl echoed from behind.

"Chrono-Raider incoming!" Bebop screeched. A hulking mass of metal burst through the tunnel wall beside her. Avea barely dodged in time, her hoverboard wobbling beneath her. "I’ll smear what’s left of you across these tunnel walls," the Chrono-Raider bellowed, perched atop a monstrous boulder-like hover bike. The enormous wheel thundered forward, aiming to crush her beneath its weight. Avea clenched her teeth and kicked into high gear. The tunnel shook as the raider’s heavy metal beast scraped against the walls, sparks flying in its wake. "What do we do?!" Bebop yelped. Avea's eyes darted to the narrowing passage ahead. The Raider's hover bike was too wide, there was no room to maneuver.

"Confuse him," she muttered. Without hesitation, she slid beneath the Raider’s massive hover-vech. "What?!" the racer roared, momentarily losing sight of her. Avea slid out behind him, her hoverboard hovering inches from the ground. A dead end. No winding passages, no alternate routes. Retreating meant losing the race.

"Where are you, Fray filth?!" the Raider spat. She bounced lightly on her toes, then spun out her hoverboard. Its pieces detached, swirling around the abnormally large hover-vech in a disorienting whirl, distracting the racer. Avea crouched low, weaving in and out beneath the massive machine. The Raider growled in frustration as she kept slipping out of view. But she wasn’t just dodging, she was dismantling. Moving with precision, she pried at the bolts securing the giant wheel.

"We’re gonna get crushed!" Bebop squeaked. "I’m going as fast as I can," Avea hissed."Come out and die like the rat you are!" the Raider sneered from above. The final bolt clattered to the ground. Avea shot out from under the bike just as the wheel broke free. Avea connected her hoverboard and slid out of the way just in the nick of time, before the hover bike lurched violently, then crashed, metal crumpling under its own weight. The Raider’s scream of shock reverating over the closed in walls, as the impact sent a shockwave through the tunnel, nearly knocking her off balance. Avea flashed a smile of relief to Bebop, before moving to fly over the heap. As she did a furious large hand shot out from beneath the wreckage, clawing at her leg. "You little ...!"Avea smirked, activating her controls. Her hoverboard shot forward, pulling her just out of reach.

The Raider yelled something after her, but she was already gone.

Avea and Bebop huddled in a narrow crack between tunnel walls, catching their breath. Bebop’s metal plating was scorched with soot. "Is it just me, or is everyone trying to kill us?" Avea wiped the blood from her lip, panting. Her body ached, bruised and battered from the relentless pursuit. Now struggling to stay upright on her board. "I knew they’d be after us," she muttered, voice ragged. "But this… this is full-on warfare." Bebop’s lenses flickered with unease. "Why are they all coming after us?" Before Avea could answer, the distant whirring of hoverboards echoed through the tunnels. The two of them pressed further into the crack as if the stone itself could swallow them whole. Cyrus's warning surfaced in her mind, "after all the risk is the same for everyone."

There was only one reason the clans would forsake their allegiances, their rivalries, their own self-interest… Her stomach sank.

"He put a bounty on us," she whispered, seeing that slimy grin he'd given her from across the plateau.

Coward. Avea could feel her rage pulse through her veins, burning her from the inside out. Cyrus couldn't face her himself, he had to send the entirety of the Valent ring after her. The Valent wasn't built on fair play, it didn't breed decency it bred cruelty. Her back pressed against the cold wet stone, in the slither of the rock the sound of her shallow breaths were low and hushed. She'd defied Cyrus Elrod in front of all the Valent clans. It was dangerous, even reckless. All because she refused to scrape and grovel for the slim pickings. It made her blood boil how the rest of the T'alli rings saw the strays from the outskirts. Easy pick-offs to the Valent, meek underlings to the Crux and low-life scavengers to the Core. She'd race to prove to all of them that the strays from the outskirts could beat them at this game. Bebop saw Avea's face darken, her gaze hard and unflinching. "V what are you thinking?" Avea was clutching her hoverboard so tightly that her knuckles were bone white.

"Let's finish this."

"Or we could retreat in one piece?"

Avea wasn't listening. She shot out of the crevice, fury blazing in her eyes. Her hoverboard was slicing through the air, nothing more than a blink of light that cut the clan racers down. Clearing the path before her, flying so fast it felt like her soul was going to be torn from her body. She set her sights on the sleek jet-black hover-cycle in the distance, shooting through the tunnels. Cyrus's hoverboard sped down the slim route, leading the race, but not for long.

Avea’s bravado was beginning to wear thin. The closer she got to Cyrus Elrod, the more relentless the onslaught became. She barely managed to escape the Razor Ridge clan, their hover-scooters outfitted with massive front drills meant to rip through both stone and racers alike. One came straight at her, its spinning drill churning through the air with a deafening whir.

Too close.

Avea gritted her teeth and lunging backwards as her hoverboard turned sideways, barely skimming past the deadly tip. The Razor pilot sneered, adjusting course to come after her again. But they drove too hard. Just as she hoped. She twisted her trajectory at the last second, the drill screeched as it met stone, burrowing deep into the tunnel wall. Sparks exploded around him, and the rider cursed as his machine stalled. "Elrod’s paying real good creds for your head, Fray girl. You might be fast, but you ain’t outrunning a death mark."

Avea didn’t answer. She was already tearing down the passage right into the foreline of the Red Prowlers. The clan locked onto her instantly, their hovercraft roaring through the routes. Their fire-singed whips cracked through the air, close enough for her to feel the heat against her back. She hissed as one lashed too close, the searing through her jacket. She'd fashioned her gear against these fire lashes, but the whips were still dangerous. One wrong move, and they’d leaving a searing mark. "Run all you want, rogue," one of them growled. "Elrod’s paying in blood money, and we’re cashing in."

Avea’s fingers flexed against her controls on her wrists. "You're about to be disappointed." She moved her wrist, and her hoverboard fractured out on command, shielding Avea as she dove through a narrow crevice in the canyon wall. The Prowlers snarled in frustration, forced into a dead end. Their hovercycles weren’t made for tight maneuvers. Hers was.

She didn’t slow. The air crackled with static.

Voltstrike racers.

Their high speed crafts shot into view, blocking her escape. The bright arcs of electricity crackling along their blasters. One of them leaned forward, eyes gleaming behind his visor. "Make it easy on yourself, Fray. Elrod’s got a score to settle, and I want my cut of the credits."Avea’s pulse hammered in her ears. A bolt of energy shot past her, missing by inches. The walls around her exploded in a shower of sparks and debris. She ducked low, weaving through the chaos as more blasts rained down.

Her lungs burned. Her arms ached. Her entire body screamed for relief.

But there was no stopping now.

She shot past them. "Tell Elrod to shove his creds!" Despite her attempts to keep focused, she couldn't suppress the chilling awareness that something was lingering in her periphery. Avea kept craning her neck, trying to catch it, but she couldn't see the formless presence that seemed to be trailing her. She charged relentlessly towards the front of the pack, gaining on Cyrus Elrod just up ahead. She had to find a way to cut him off. Cyrus kept the lead just out of reach, always in the forefront of her eyeline, though too far away to get an actual look at him. He knew she was coming for him. He was surrounded by his Skulldaggers, there was no way to get to him as she watched his goons viscously cut down any hoverboard that dared to come close.

Their deadly hoverboards spun like sawblades, carving through the competition with merciless efficiency. Avea watched them, their movements sharp and coordinated to keep anyone from reaching him. The Skull-daggers were ruthless cutting down rival clan hovercycles, their hoverboards shattering mid-flight. Wreckage littered the air, forcing Avea to crouch down dodging all the debris of hoverboard parts that came flying at her. Along with the clan racers attached to them. As shredded metal came flying at her like a metallic storm.

She followed closley, turning a tight passage, but when she entered the passage the sounds of slicing metal suddenly vanished. She’d lost him. "Where did they go?" Avea murmured, her voice barely above a whisper. The deeper she went, the harder it became to navigate. Her senses felt dulled, like a heavy shroud had settled over them, distorting her perception. Something about this place was wrong. Avea sucked in a sharp breath, her shaky hands patting over her body, checking for injuries. Still in one piece. Releasing a deep exhale, she glided into the winding passage ahead, following its unpredictable turns. She had been tracking them all through the tunnels, dodging the vicious onslaughts that came her way. Now, only the Skulldagger clan remained, their unit formation tight and unyielding.

But suddenly, she found an veiled sliver of an opening. "Look there's skid markings along the walls... they've gone down here" Avea said, pointing down the mysterious route. "It must be a shortcut," Avea murmured, confusion lingering in the back of her mind."No way… what happened to not going too deep?" Bebop protested. Avea shook her head vigorously. "I'm not letting Cyrus Elrod cheat me with a hidden shortcut… Come on."

Shifting gears, she pushed forward, barely catching the faded outlines of their hoverboards against the dim surroundings. A gnawing feeling settled in her gut, but she refused to slow down.Skidding along the sharp edges of the tunnel, "there he is" Avea whispered. Tracking Elrod and his two goons through the deep underground, "cheating bastard" Avea snarled, as she tracked the leader of the Skulldaggers. Yet, something felt off. Elrod wasn't trying to lose her. He didn’t pick up speed. He didn’t throw her off with a sharp maneuver or sly turn. He simply kept flying forwards."Where is he going?" Avea muttered under her breath. He had to know she was following, but he wasn't even trying to shake her.

The tunnels stretched ahead, their depths growing colder, darker. The last slivers of moonlight reflected off rusted metal rods as the slope beneath them grew steeper."Avea, you're veering off course," Bebop hissed."No, I can see Cyrus," she said, her focus narrowing on the slender figure ahead, gliding effortlessly on his sleek hover-racer.She pushed forward, keeping him locked in her sights. But the deeper they traveled, the harder it became to see.

And the worse that gnawing feeling in her stomach became.