Bee

Burning Rubber Three (Bee and kingkonrad)

The gap in between FP3 and Qualifying quickly passed as the data briefing ended and the engineers of Valkyrie Racing sorted out all the data that they needed to. In what seemed like a blur, Kasumi had found herself inside the cockpit of the VR-01, her gloves off as she stared at the screen in front of her. Hugo was due to be out first today, which meant Kasumi had more time to analyze the data in front of her and listen to what the engineers wanted to tell her. On the screen in front of her were projections of qualifying laps, accounting for the track evolution and standings of the grid. However, since Q1 had just started, the only thing on the board were the various people taking their outlaps.

Kasumi eventually slipped on her gloves as a gap started to open up. Hugo was long gone on his outlap and now was Kasumi's time to go on her outlap. The computer was retracted and pushed away as an engineer stepped out to look at the pitlane. He held out his hand and looked to the side, waiting for a Red Bull to pass before beckoning for the car to come forward. Kasumi shifted into first gear, letting the car roll out and eventually turning onto the pitlane as she made her way on the outlap. Kasumi's heart was pounding as she merged onto the track, slotting in between cars and keeping to the side so that she didn't impede anyone on the way to her qualifying lap.

It was about two minutes before Kasumi made her way to the last chicane. As she rounded around the last set of corners, Kasumi eased off on the throttle to not only let the Mercedes on a flying lap past, but also build up a gap to the car in front of her to reduce the amount of dirty ear. She kept along at a slow pace, before her engineer chimed in on the radio. "You are clear in front and behind. Push now." The engineer said, prompting Kasumi to pick up the pace and set out at full speed onto the straight, commencing her qualifying lap.

Burning Rubber Three (Bee and kingkonrad)

In the gap of time in between FP3 and qualifying, the staff of CASTROL Valkyrie Racing were hard at work on both of the cars, setting them up so that they could extract as much pace from these cars as possible. Kasumi stood next to her race engineer, analyzing the telemetry gathered through the various practice laps they ran over the three sessions. It was valuable information, given that the more that they figured out the car and the track wore in, the more that they were able to hone on in the ideal setup for their drivers. She and her race engineer were working in tandem to make sure they were on the same page, and making sure that the setup was as perfect as possible for not only the upcoming qualifying session, but the race session.

Once she was freed up and the race engineer went to analyzing more data, Kasumi was standing against a wall in the middle, sipping from her drink before she was talked up by her teammate, Hugo. Her old rival in the junior series was now her teammate, and it was still a rather surreal experience for her. The two scrapped a lot and had many encounters together, but to share the same garage and even the same car to an extent... she couldn't have asked for a better teammate to navigate this experience in. It wasn't easy being a rookie in this sport, and she was glad to have someone she could share the experience in.

"I'm feeling a bit nervous." Kasumi laughed, "It's our first quali in Formula 1. The whole world is looking to see how we do in these cars." The British driver said. As Hugo mused about getting into Q3, Kasumi chuckled. "If we make it into Q3 in our first qualifying in Formula 1, more than just a beer will be in order. I've half a mind to get us some champagne for that alone." Kasumi was well aware of the true pace of this car. She wasn't driving a Merc, a Red Bull, or even a Ferrari. This car was the freshest on the grid and was the least developed, with a team just as green. Kasumi hoped that as the season went on, their car would improve to the point where they could even fight for a win. "How about you - you feeling okay?"

Pressure [Suki & Bee]

Joe sighed as he unpacked the last of his things in his dormitory room. It was the beginning of yet another year at this place. Joe had been here for a few years, and this was now the beginning of his last year here. The university life was no doubt something that required quite the adjustment process, but once he settled in he was right at home. The university itself was practically in his backyard, but that didn't mean he had an easy go at the university life either. On campus, Joe was as alone as most students. He didn't have a wide social circle nor was he a particularly popular person. It was intentional, for reasons that he wasn't privy to revealing.

Once he put down the the last box and shoved it into his closet, Joe felt his stomach grumble. He had been so preoccupied with the unpacking that he had forgotten to eat the whole day. "Jesus..." He murmured to himself, before closing up his closet. The next thing in order for him was to definitely get some food. It was lucky that the food at this place was actually good. He'd heard horror stories about campus food at other universities, but for the price tag this university came with, they more than backed it up.

Stepping outside of his dormitory building, Joe kept his bomber jacket on him, his black t-shirt and jeans to compliment the outfit as he made his way to the dining commons. He looked around, and there were a lot of regular, typical college activities. But, with every year that passed there never ceased to be a shortage of new things being introduced onto college campuses. This year was no stranger, with a group of people crowded around what appeared to be the world's smallest trampoline catching Joe's eye. He was rather hypnotized by the people smacking the ball up and off the trampoline that he failed to see the person standing in front of him. He wasn't walking very fast, but he definitely bumped into her.

"Oh, I'm sorry." Joe said, putting his hand against his heart, "I didn't see you there."

Pressure [Suki & Bee]

//Basics:

Gender | ♂
Age | 21
Height | 6'3
Weight | 210 lbs

//Personality:

Given his background and family history, Joe is a bit of a hot-headed, confrontational person. It doesn't take much for him to lose his cool and it is exacerbated by his steadily improving impulse control. However, on the flip side of that, Joe is also very fiercely loyal and goes to a variety of lengths to protect those he loves and holds close. Joe is also a very ambitious and stubborn person and will stop at nothing to achieve his goals. Joe does not like to talk to those he isn't familiar with, but he can do it if he has to.

Midnight Answers [Katkook & Bee]

As the first corner came up, Hana sized up the corner and how it looked and progressed. Watching all of the cars in front of her, Hana knew what was coming if she didn't figure out the correct line. There was no way Hana was going to be able to do the traditional racing line, lining up on the outside and hitting the apex as best as she could. Hana got as close as she could to the car in front of her, before moving her car to the inside. Hana knew that she could outbrake a lot of these cars, considering they were all being held up by the cars in front of them and Hana had a clear line to brake. Stomping on the brakes much later, Hana heel-toed her way down a few gears, before turning the car into the turn, clipping the apex as she powered her way out.

The car squealed as it so desperately wanted to break traction and get squirrely, but Hana wanted none of that as she modulated the throttle and applied as soon as her car re-established traction. Once she was clear of the car behind her, Hana slipped back into the slipstream of the car in front of her. She must have passed quite a few cars, because she couldn't see many taillights in front of her. Keeping her foot pinned on the throttle, another turn was coming up and Hana repeated the same thing. She was more than close enough to attempt a move like that, and she had no problems executing it as she got past the guy in the MR2. "Talk later. Race now." Hana said, as she drove past the yellow flag and into the joker lap.

Seeing the turn come up, Hana was measuring her braking point with the lamp posts on the side of the street. She counted down, barely passing the second one before she mashed on the brakes, starting her turn into the long turn of the joker lap.

Coming up onto the straight leading into the joker lap, this was the time for Hana to knock it out of the way. She was going to lose a few places from doing this, but it also meant she had time to catch up. She also found herself behind the girl's Z, the white car's taillights illuminating her cabin as she followed close behind. On the straights, she had a much better exit and an advantage, but for some reason, the Z was just much faster around the corners than her own car, which was designed for this. As they came up on the joker lap, Hana heard the girl pipe up on the phone.

Burning Rubber Three (Bee and kingkonrad)

Rounding around the last set of corners, Kasumi held down the radio button on her steering wheel. "Car feels alright. Stable through the high speed corners, some understeer in the lower speed corners." Kasumi indicated. "Copy. Push lap. Mode 7, Kasumi, Mode 7." Her engineer said, as Kasumi looked down at her steering wheel. She tweaked the dials on her steering wheel, before her steering wheel screen flashed a giant "MODE 7" on the screen. Rounding around turn 15, Kasumi threw the car around, keeping a moderate amount of throttle as she made her way through the tight series of corners.

Rounding around the last corner, Kasumi opened up the throttle and sped down the opening straight. Rowing through the gears, Kasumi's open wheeled car cut down the straight like a hot knife through butter. The car quickly climbed up to speeds higher than 150 miles per hour, but it didn't phase the racing driver. She was trained to withstand speeds and conditions like this. The g-forces that resulted from a fast lap like this were nothing to her, not after years and years of training and experience. As the braking point for turn 1 came up, Kasumi practically stood on the brakes as the car slowed. At the same time, she went down a few gears to make sure the car would slow down and rotate enough into the next turn.

A bit later, Kasumi back around the last corner again, the car barreling at a much faster rate as she crossed the line. "That was a 1:22.3. 22.3. Box, box." Her engineer said, as Kasumi pressed the button on her screen to confirm the pit. The racing driver had to make another round around the track as she made her way back to the pit stop, eventually finding herself in the speed limited stretch of road after a slower lap around the Melbourne Grand Prix. The pink car of Racing Point pulled out ahead of Kasumi, presumably to go on their practice laps and whatnot. Kasumi only pulled into her pit booth, her mechanics coming in and inserting devices to cool down the brakes and lifting up the car as it was pushed back into the garage. Once the car was settled, Kasumi clambered out of the car, removing her gloves and helmet as her race engineer came up to greet her at her car. "How'd the car feel?" The race engineer asked, pulling up the telemetry data from Kasumi's fast lap.

"Good." Kasumi said, as she removed her balaclava. "I did notice some understeer at turn 11 and 12, car didn't bite in. However, the warmed up tires did alleviate the low speed understeering. Turn 3 felt better on the second go." Kasumi said, getting into a conversation with her engineer. As she conversed, Kasumi glanced at the screen behind her engineer, watching Hugo in his car and working his magic with Valkyrie Racing's first car. Hopefully the car treated him well.

Midnight Answers [Katkook & Bee]

Hana looked at the light, before glancing over at the lady's Fairlady. Hana nodded, "Ready." The racer looked ahead, revving her car all the way to the 9000 RPM it was so capable of. A joker lap, huh? That was something she'd hardly ever heard of outside of rallycross, but she figured things would be different here in Tilview. The strategy was still the same though. She hadn't done rallycross in person but in video games, she'd always take the joker lap as soon as possible to get it out of the way and spend the rest of her time catching up. It was the same principle as pitting in a professional race. Nobody's position was their real position until the pit stop was out of the way. Same with the joker lap. The sooner she got it out of the way the sooner she could fight for her actual position.

As the second light turned on, Hana kept her car in first gear, her hand pushing down the handbrake so that it was no longer engaged. Any second, the light was going to turn green and it was time to go. Soon, the light turned green, and Hana let out the clutch as fast as she could as the car launched forward. As the S2000 tried to find traction as it launched forward, Hana immediately put it into second gear, letting the car immediately establish traction as it made its way down the first straight.

Midnight Answers [Katkook & Bee]

As Hana sat back in her car, there was a slight smirk on her face as the girl who spoke to her offered to double her buy-in. Ten grand? Hana was stupid to not oblige. As she sat back in her seat, Hana sighed a bit, before holding down the button that turned her car on. Hearing her car roar to life once again, the exhaust burbled as she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. An unidentified number showed on her screen, but it didn't take a genius to figure out who exactly was the one who was calling. Sliding her thumb to the right, Hana picked the call up, hearing the lady's voice on the phone. "Yeah, I read you." This lady was pretty enthusiastic for sure. Maybe she just liked to beat up on rookies? Hana wasn't entirely sure what her angle was, but she was her ticket into the Tilview street racing scene.

Seeing the white Fairlady roll out, Hana put the clutch in, shifting into first gear as the car rolled forward and behind the Nissan as they made their way to the starting grid. Hana was ready to deal with whatever was on the grid. She expected a good balance -- exotics, muscle, tuners, the works. And, it was pretty easy to figure out who knew their shit and who didn't. At least, in Hana's experience. Those whose cars were flashier more than anything typically lacked the driving ability to do their car true justice. She'd seen many a fancy Lamborghini get obliterated by something that was perceived as inferior. It was the way the cookie crumbled sometimes.

Letting the car roll up, Hana obliged and let her buddy take the very last spot on the grid. It was an unusual choice to the untrained eye, but people who willingly picked to start from the back were very rarely ever people who could be fucked with. That was the person to be scared of and knew what the fuck they were doing. Hana lined her car up, the dark purple S2000 lined up behind what was a newer Ford Mustang, with an exhaust wide enough to fit a fist through. Chances were - that Mustang was going to spin out immediately. Hana put the car in neutral, ready to launch the car when the race started. "So, how many laps is this? 3? 5?" Hana asked, glancing over at the white Nissan.

Midnight Answers [Katkook & Bee]

Hana looked up as she heard a voice speak at her. The street racer was hadn't expected someone to approach her so quickly, but her previous intuition about their senses was only confirmed as she stared at the girl in front of her. Of course, it was hard to tell where exactly Hana was looking, given her eyes were concealed behind a pair of sunglasses. Hana stayed quiet as the girl in front of her pointed at a course behind her. Based on the way it was being set up, it looked like it had its bounds and limits clearly defined. None of that scrambling shit. That played into Hana's favor -- it took her lack of knowledge about the city out of the equation and it made individual driving skill more of a factor.

"A race?" Hana tilted her sunglasses down, showing her dark brown eyes as she made eye contact with the masked girl. "I'm interested." Hana said, before watching the girl in front of her examine her car. Seemed like she really knew what Hana actually had, which was a change for once. People saw the dinky little Honda that Hana drove and assumed it was just another lawnmower. That was far from the truth -- considering that this was one of the most agile cars to ever exist. Sure, it didn't have quite the same amount of top-end that Lamborghinis and whatnot had, but it more than made up for it in its cornering prowess. Where heavier, faster cars failed, her lighter, quicker car prevailed.

"Yeah. I'm glad someone appreciates what I've got." Hana said, putting her sunglasses back up as she looked at more cars make their way around the airfield. "Where do I sign up?" Hana asked, before putting her hand into her pocket, pulling out a wad of cash and holding it in her hand. "I can buy in, too." Hana said. The way she did things where she came from -- they always had a purse and a buy-in. Racing was different when there was money on the line. There were always egos and pride involved, but money introduced an entirely different breed of tension, often for the better. "Five Gs good?"

Midnight Answers [Katkook & Bee]

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A dim amber light shined on Hana's face as she and her Honda S2000 entered the streets of Tilview. A low rumble from the four cylinder, two-liter engine filled the cabin as Hana looked out at the glowing city lights that filled the streets of Tilview. Tilview was one of the hottest street racing destinations in the entire country. For those familiar with the street racing scene, it was practically impossible to not hear about the hottest street racing destination since the city of Los Angeles was invented. Constantly, there were stories of antics from Tilview being passed around like a blunt at a college party. Hana was definitely no stranger to news about this city either. Hana was informed of a meetup in some sort of airfield in this city. Being from another city, Hana decided it was time to pack it up and move on after conquering the street racing scene of her original city.

Tilview seemed like a more appropriate challenge for her. A few days prior, Hana packed up everything she had and set her sails for Tilview. There was nothing for her in that city anymore. It was her old stomping grounds, sure, but there was no way she had any chance to grow if she kept stomping the same people over and over again. Tilview was written in the stars for Hana, and she was here to capitalize on it. Rolling down the window, the street racer could definitely hear what she identified as the sounds of various exhausts and cars. The city was still somewhat unfamiliar to her, as it would be to most newcomers, but she had a feeling she'd get the hang of the city pretty quickly.

Hana found herself on a sprawling freeway on the outskirts of the city, mysteriously empty for this time of night on this day. Not like Hana minded anyway. That just allowed her and her car to stretch her legs. Hana took a glance around, seeing various red lights head toward a large hangar of sorts. There was no doubt in her mind that was the so-called airfield that everyone gathered at. She'd found it. Now to get there. Hana shifted down, before mashing the throttle down to speed up as she made her way down the freeway. The S2000's tires chirped as it sought traction, before grabbing it and planting itself onto the ground. The next exit surely pointed her in the direction of the airfield.

Coming down a ramp and onto a long, narrow street - Hana's headlights illuminated a paved path all the way to the airfield. There weren't many cars coming down this way for whatever reason, but another quick glance around showed other cars making their way to the airfield from all sorts of different directions. There were definitely different ways to get into the airfield, but why weren't people coming down this way? Hana was curious -- perhaps she'd find out the answer later on as she got familiar with the people of Tilview. Hana only got closer to the airfield as time went on, the various headlights illuminating the airfield and the sound of exhausts got louder.

Hana eventually got onto the airfield, and she could see cars of all sorts. This racing scene was no joke. Hana could see cars of all sorts -- whether it'd be exotic cars tuned to the gills, Japanese tuners with wheels as perpendicular to the ground as possible, and trucks that were tall enough to scale small buildings. This place had it all. Hana kept her window rolled up as she found a spot to park her car, glancing around at potential competition. She'd beaten them all -- tuned supercars, muscle cars, cars lighter than an ant -- she knew how to handle it all. However, a closer look at the cars on the airfield revealed that there seemed to be cars with similar paint schemes and liveries parked close to each other. Did... they have factions here? Were there racing gangs here?

This wasn't new territory for Hana, but she definitely did not experience things to this extent. Eventually, Hana found herself a spot, closer to the middle of the airfield as she backed into the spot nestled in between a Dodge Charger Hellcat and a BMW M3. Before she got out, Hana put on her sunglasses, she knew the sheer amount of flashiness and lights here were going to be a lot to deal with. Not to mention, it helped with the amount of eyes that would inevitably be on her. If there was one thing about a group like this - they knew when someone was new, and it showed as Hana got out of the car.

"Sheeeeeeesh."

"Damn. I wonder if she can actually drive that thing...."