Chapter 11
“No.”
“Okay,” Clarke says. “Why?”
“Because it won’t work.”
“Sure. But why?”
Chief Engineer Timothy doesn’t glare. There’s nothing derisive in his tone. He just looks at Clarke, calmly, and says, levelly, “Because it won’t.”
“Maki?” prompts Elke Bonner, technical director.
Maki’s been called on as unofficial interpreter so frequently during the past two hours that Clarke hopes he’s getting paid extra for it.
He obligingly scoots to the edge of his chair again and gets his hands up into the projection of the EM-83 that’s rotating above the conference table.
“It’s about weighting, Clarke. The alloy you’re suggesting would help, but it’s also lighter than the blend we’re currently using, and not by an insignificant amount.
We’d be under regulation weight by almost eight kilos. ”
“And if we added that as ballast under my seat, it’d throw off the ship’s whole balance,” Clarke says, a few seconds ahead of that playing out on the projection after Maki’s adjustments.
Eight kilograms might not sound like much when you’re talking about a 902-kilogram ship, but seeing that there’s a four-person team consisting of a nutritionist, a physician, a trainer, and a holistic medicine practitioner who all work together to keep Clarke’s body weight precisely steady throughout her menstrual cycle, she understands that an eight kilo difference isn’t tolerable.
Timothy could’ve just said that.
That’s how this entire meeting has been. And okay, yes, Clarke came in hot. She’s excited to have gotten the invitation, even if it was an afterthought, and she’s desperate to show that she can add value on this side of the operation. She came prepared.
She’s not trying to tell anyone how to do their job.
She knows a good amount about ships, like every pilot, but is well aware that she’s not an expert in the way the engineers and mechanics are.
She is, however, an expert in her own flying style.
Her ideas are specific, targeted ways next year’s ship could be altered so that she’s not constantly battling her own machinery.
Each of her suggestions has been shot down, and it’s becoming increasingly clear that Clarke’s style as a pilot is fundamentally incompatible with some of Elemental’s core design principles.
Making the modifications Clarke’s asking for would require a complete overhaul of the plan, a whole new way of thinking about ship engineering.
There’s time to do it—it’s Terran July, and they don’t need the EM-83 to be track-ready until February—but they’d have to start now, and basically write off the rest of the current season as a rebuilding year. No more upgrades to the EM-82.
Elemental would also have to commit to Clarke for that plan to work.
Or, at the very least, a pilot like Clarke, and she’s not totally unique but there aren’t many like her floating around.
She favors the adaptability and brute force of off-planet racing to the dexterity and banked power of on-planet.
She brakes late. She prefers to overtake on a ninety-degree planar rotation.
She relies heavily on thruster differential.
A ship can be designed to make all those things easier, more efficient.
If they change the ship for Clarke, they have to keep Clarke for at least next year to reap the benefits. At the moment, Clarke’s contract expires in 130 days.
“Thanks for explaining,” Clarke says to Maki. To Timothy, she says, “Ready for my next one?”
Timothy and his rather impressive mustache do not look enthused.
Yves stands up. He’s been on and off calls, in and out of the room this whole time, so no one pays him much attention until he clears his throat. “Let’s call that lunch. Clarke, with me.”
Clarke’s supposed to eat with Amira, and Matthew and his race engineer, but those three shrug as Yves swoops out of the room. Clarke jogs to catch up.
Normally, Clarke loves Elemental Headquarters.
It’s part factory, part office building, part test track.
Old Elemental ships and helmets and trophies line the walls.
You can feel the energy of everything Elemental’s accomplished and everything they still want to do with every step.
Clarke typically feels like she belongs here, like this place understands her drive and fire.
Now Clarke’s wondering if this is the last time she’ll feel like this walking through these halls.
Yves is taking her on the familiar path to his office, crossing a skybridge that looks out over a jaw-dropping view of Mare Insularum.
Why deviate from the schedule, why take Clarke to practically the other side of the compound if this is good news?
Is this when he tells her that she’s not getting extended?
Maybe he invited her to the meeting to make it painfully obvious that Clarke and Elemental aren’t a good fit, so his decision will make more sense.
Maybe he’s just stringing her along. She thought she had at least a few more races to prove herself, but maybe he’s looking at the investment Elemental’d have to make, the effort they’d have to put into changing next year’s ship, and thinking that it’s not worth it. That Clarke’s not worth it.
The next time Clarke takes this elevator, she might officially not have a seat for next year.
The next time she passes this window over the machining floor, her dream of winning a championship with Elemental might be dead.
The next time Yves swings open his office door to reveal Naomi and Sara and Julian and—
“What’s going on?” Clarke asks, stopping at the threshold of the office.
“I’ve been kidnapped. I’m here against my will,” Julian says, flat.
“Wasn’t funny the first six times you said it, but sure, keep trying,” says the guy next to Julian. He gives Clarke an aggrieved smile. “PK Ostenoff, from Chronicle’s media team.”
“Hi,” Clarke says automatically. Yves brushes past her and joins the others in the seating area across from his desk.
The entire wall over there is taken up with a blueprint-style graphic of the EM-64, the last Elemental model that won the championship.
“Not to be rude, but what are you doing here?”
“Kidnapping me,” Julian mutters darkly.
“Making sure Julian holds up his end of the deal,” PK says.
“What deal?” Clarke’s mind flips over itself a few times, irrational horror building at the base of her skull. “Is—is Elemental signing Julian? Are you giving my seat to Julian?”
She demands the last part of Yves, but everyone in the room who isn’t Yves answers all at once. “Fuck no” is Julian’s rapid, vehement response. “We couldn’t afford him” is Naomi’s, which is true, embarrassing, and comforting all at once.
Yves gestures Clarke into one of the seats around the table. “Naomi and PK have a proposal that stands to benefit both Elemental and Chronicle.”
“We’re resurrecting the rivalry!” PK says cheerfully.
Clarke says, “I’m sorry, what?”
Naomi is delicately picking through one of the boxes of food on the table.
“Your favorability is at an all-time low, even among Elemental fans. The public thinks you’re resentful of Julian’s success.
We’re going to turn that on its head. Remind everyone that the two of you have been competitors since Juniors, but convince them it’s founded in a true, lasting friendship you’ve been keeping private until now. ”
Clarke’s jaw is on the floor. “No one’s going to believe that. Julian and I can’t be in the same room for five minutes without ripping each other’s heads off. Right?”
She directs the last part at Julian, sure he’ll see that this plan is absurd, but he just shrugs, resigned. “I already agreed.”
Irritation blows through her, both that she’s the last person to know what’s happening and that Julian’s not on her side. “Why? Sure, it’d help my image if people thought you and I were friends, but what do you get out of it?”
“A personality,” Naomi says sweetly.
“Watch it,” PK warns.
“It’s not my fault you designed a PR strategy for your guy that’s based around him being less emotive than a droid.” Naomi crosses one leg over the other. “At least my guy’s not insufferably boring.”
Is that Clarke? Is Clarke Naomi’s guy? And why isn’t Julian talking, why is he just looking at Clarke?
“You’re the only other pilot Julian consistently reacts to off the track,” Sara says quietly to Clarke while PK and Naomi keep bickering, Julian continues to watch Clarke like no one else is in the room, and Yves ignores them all in favor of reading something on a screen.
“He’ll banter with Delphine if he’s in a good mood, and he and Engel have a brothers-in-arms thing, but he doesn’t tend to interact with anyone else much, and when he does, it’s stiff.
Chronicle’s been playing it off as a side effect of his focus, but it’s starting to hurt his likability. ”
“He needs a friend on the grid, and you’re the best candidate,” PK adds.
Julian’s mood sours further. “I have friends.”
“I am not having this conversation again,” PK says loudly. “There’s footage banked from Julian’s first year in F0, when Clarke came to his races. There’s a gap, but it’s explainable. We can work with it, tell a cohesive story of coming back together after a shared tragedy.”
The allusion to Connor’s death hits hard, like it always does when Clarke’s not expecting it. She works to breathe around the sudden hole in her chest while Julian says, sharp, “No. We are not using Connor like that.”
“Julian.”
“Bring it up again, and I’m not doing this at all.”
Julian and PK glare at each other while the rest of them try not to stare. Clarke’s grateful to Julian for drawing this line in the sand, but she can’t imagine speaking that way to Naomi or Sara. Or anyone at Elemental, really.
Sara clears her throat. “We can do it without leveraging Connor Bennett’s passing. I have some ideas. An hour or so each weekend should be enough.”
An hour every week of Clarke and Julian pretending things between them aren’t rotten just under the surface?
There’s no way. This is not going to be good for Clarke’s headspace, and she needs her headspace intact if she has any hope of turning this season around and saving her contract.
But she can’t just say no; she’s obligated to do as she’s told, and Yves obviously wants this to happen.
She’s trapped. There’s no good outcome here.
Starting to panic a little, she again looks to Julian for help.
He meets her eye with a steady, searching gaze.
She wonders what he can read on her face.
They used to be able to pick out each other’s emotions easier than their own.
She doesn’t love the idea of him still having that type of insight into her, but she’ll take it if it means he can get them out of this.
Julian studies her for another few seconds, then nods to himself. He snags a box of food, sits back in his chair. “I want better incentive.”
What? No. That’s not what he was supposed to—
PK groans. “You already agreed!”
“I agreed to participate. Now I’m asking for better incentive.”
“I hate you,” PK says. “We’ll have to run anything additional by Val, you know that, but what do you want?”
“I want my and Clarke’s race. The one-on-one.”
Clarke’s breath catches on the swell of longing that rises.
“No,” Naomi says.
“Val already said no to that,” PK adds.
“I’ll handle Val.” Julian’s eyes lock on Clarke, and she can’t look away.
“After the season. We can use a neutral track, neutral machines. I’m sure there’s no shortage of lower circuit teams who’d kill to have us fly their ships for something like this.
We can donate the proceeds from ticket sales. ”
Damn him. There’s one thing that would make Clarke put aside her reservations about pretending to be friends, and it’s this, and Julian knows it. Competing against him on a level playing field is something she hasn’t been able to do in years.
She, Julian, and Connor were all so close in skill level that there was never a front-runner among them.
Clarke tended to do better off-planet, Julian did better on the twistiest tracks, and Connor did better on courses that played the most with the true zero G aspect, forcing pilots to completely dispel any sense of up or down.
Clarke came out ahead their last year in Juniors, but it was close, and then they all moved on to different pro and semi-pro circuits.
Clarke genuinely doesn’t know which of them would win now, as adults and with matched ships.
She wants to find out.
“I’ll do it,” she says, breaking away from Julian’s eye contact to look at Yves. “Can we?”
Yves is looking at the EM-64. He was on that winning team, Clarke remembers.
A mechanic. “There will be conditions. Val has to approve, or we’re not doing it.
If you don’t cooperate with the friendship plan, we’re not doing it.
If you keep fighting my decisions on the track like a child, we’re not doing it. ”
Humiliation at being publicly scolded colors Clarke’s cheeks. She sees Julian open his mouth out of the corner of her eye, and hears PK whisper something that shuts Julian up before he can get a word out.
There’s another condition that goes unspoken due to present company. If her contract doesn’t get renewed, there’s no way Elemental goes through with a post-season exhibition. This is another way for Yves to keep Clarke in line. It’s why he’s agreeing.
All the more reason to work her ass off in the coming months.
“Deal,” she says, and settles in to eat her lunch (in a separate box, helpfully marked Clarke by a well-meaning nutritionist) while Naomi, Sara, and PK spar over format and content.
Julian’s shoe brushes hers under the table. There’s concern in his eyes when she looks up, and the idea of him pitying her is too much to bear. She pulls her feet under her chair and stays quiet for the rest of the meeting.