What The Night Brings

Weaving through traffic like the devil is on my shoulder controlling my every single move, I turn my lights off in search of excitement. Passing traffic at the speed of a jet plane, I turn my head and see a motorbike under the streetlights with its lights off too, keeping up with me, passing the traffic at the same pace. "Some competition, finally" I think to myself as I downshift from 6th to 5th, back down to 4th.

Seeing an empty road in front of me, I look at the biker and they are ready. As I get up to the bikers speed, I blare my horn, once, twice.. Three times, At the same time we both push our machines to their limits in 4th gear. As my tachometer is reading 6,000rpm, I raced into 5th thinking I had this bike. When I look beside me, there is this biker, Waving at me .. Over 180km an hour.. On.. A.. Bike.. I laughed to myself and changed to 6th as my car was screaming for another gear yet, this bike changes gears and quite simply disappears into the darkness of the night. Thinking to myself "I need to know what that bike is" I follow them into the darkness, blind to where I'm going.

I follow the bike to a dead end street, we both looked at each other for the first time without 5% tint between us. "What in the world is that?" I ask. "It's a GSX 1300R" a man replied, still with his helmet on. "You're talking another language to me, what brand?" I replied with a humorous tone. "Suzuki, Suzuki Hayabusa" he replied in a dry tone, I knew why he was so quick now. 0 - 100 in 3.2 seconds, 1340cc, four cylinder liquid cooled engine. No wonder he disappeared like he did.

"And how did you get your hands on that?" I quiz him. "Not in any way you would want to know about, Darl" He replied. 'Darl?' I think to myself. Who says that anymore? "Oh okay" I replied. "So.. You really want to test it out?" I add with excitement. "I don't think you would be able to keep up, even with NOS" he lashed back. "Why do you boys always think NOS will make you faster?" I queried "Because it does. Just not when you need to keep up with a Hayabusa" He spat.

My car sounds like it only has your classic cam, lifters and exhaust setup. It sounds like it makes around 400hp, little does this boy know..

"Alright then. Get back onto the highway and I'll bet you my car. I'll beat you to Exit 46 that takes you to Kent Rd. Sound fair to you?" I bargained. "You're on, Darl" He replied. Before we left, he was talking to himself through his helmet. I pondered about who he might be talking to. It's 1:43am. Who could possibly be up at this time talking to him. On the phone?

We roll down Exit 26. Me in the lines and him beside me. Onto the highway we glide and we find our own lanes. There are three sets of overhead signs in front of us. As we reach the first one, I flick a button on my dash that opens up the valves in my exhaust. As we reach the second one, I find second gear. Between the second and third overhead sign the air is filled with the noise of a whine. The biker looks at me, I can see the confusion through that helmet.

As the shadow of the third overhead sign darkens my vision, all I see is green to go. I plumet my foot. I was flung back into the head rest of my chair as my car screams for another gear. Third is selected. Still screaming, sucking in the air. I again see the green light on my dash begging for fourth. Looking to my left I see this bike still up with me. Leaning down, chest of his tank trying to win. He takes fourth as I do too. Out of nowhere in my mirrors I see multiple pairs of headlights. I'm reaching well over 200km and these bikes are next to me like I'm doing 70km through town. I looked around me in disbelief at all these bikes. That is who he was calling. But why?

My fight or flight kicked in. I was trembling. My hand on the gearstick shaking from fear. I change to 5th in hopes I'd pull away from these bikes and I did. The exit was coming up and coming up quickly. I switched lanes carefully not to hurt any of these bikers. I'm reaching close to 270km.

I see the sign for the next Exit. My Exit. Our Exit. Exit 46. And I only reached 5th. I got there first. I didn't see one bike in front of me when I shot up the ramp. Slowing down, I hear the bikes all revving, downshifting. I put my window down and flick my hand to the biker to follow me. He does the same with his bike friends, to follow him.

We meet on a corner street. "So.. What's my prize?" I say like a spoiled child. "Well, you said you would bet me your car and-" I cut him off "Yeah. And I won? So, I'll get the slips, and you fill them out. Then your bike will be my bike" I rattled to him. After I announced that, all his bike friends got off their bikes at the same time. I pondered about why they did. Sitting in my car I thought about the possibilities. I may have met my end and I'm about to be killed by a gang, OR I am going to end up with this bike and go home in one piece.

The man then took off his helmet, Revealing his mysterious face. "You're not going to cut me off again. And if you do? I will find you. A car like yours isn't hard to track down, especially with the power I have. Darl." His nose curled when he said that. His face had a familiar feel to it, I couldn't exactly put my finger on what was so familiar about him. But there was something.

He started to walk over to me, with a limp. Like he had hurt himself. His walk was still menacing with a limp. I got out of my car to face him. Him and I were then standing face to face. He reached behind his back and took out a gun. All those men around me standing next to their bikes.. Bang, Bang, Bang, Bang.. All of them.. On the ground. Dead. "They were lousy riders anyways. None of them deserved those bikes. You've got four to pick from now"

Limping back to his bike, he holstered the gun into the back of his pants. He then threw his leg over with a struggle and a grunt. Started his machine and rode off into the darkness.

I stood there in the darkness. Four men dead on the ground next to me. The sound of sirens filling the air. I sat back in my car and looked at the clock on my dash that had marked the time of death. 1:58am. Stunned and traumatised, I shuffle down into my seat pondering my next move. The sirens grew closer as my vision grew fuzzy. I lean my head back and then my lights went out.