ZZZooom! The crowd is a coloured blur that trails behind me and hangs in the air, as if I have churned them up like dust. Their faces are like the sound that comes from them - I know there must be words in there, hundreds of people saying my name, a couple hundred more saying the name of Peretti - but all I hear is a roar.

Perretti takes the corner and I follow close by. I know it well. A hard turn, a drop, and a narrow chicane giving way to a beautiful wide straight, in sight of the Neo-Mech headquarters. This is where the biggest fans sit, and it's easy to lose your concentration. I've raced this race a thousand times in my head. Two thirds of your racing is done in your head, if you ask me. You watch. If you hop on your ripper every day and train your brains out - you'll start double-thinking, you'll start second-guessing yourself, and before you know it you've screwed up your timing and you're like a cog with a tooth missing. But if you think about it when you're not thinking about it - know what I mean? Just playing it over and over in your head while you're walking down the hall, thinking that if you started taking on the chicane while you were still coming down from the drop, you get on the track the next race and boom! You've bopped it on the beezer. You gotta be looking - but not looking.

Perretti doesn't know it so well as me - he bottoms out at the drop and the back of his ripper skids away from him. I roar past him with ease. There's a thicket of dustbuckets up ahead, but that trick was already pulled back in practise. Daniels barely brushed it - he's stealthy - and what do you know, instant coughcloud! He should have been disqualified. No - those morons oughta get rid of those things round the track, someone's gonna get hurt some day. You know part of me wishes it was all like the days we could just hop on a rip and stir a bit of dirt for a few hours, by ourselves - but everything good has to gradually turn into a pastiche of itself. It's the law of the world. Just look at Neo Eden. But then again - part of me doesn't. Part of me - OK, a big bit of me - wouldn't give this away for the world.

Perretti's in the distance now. She's so far back - I'm gonna pull a personal best here, for sure! I'm even ahead of Anderson, Ludanoo I've barely seen - but where is Takamori? I've still got a fair way to catch up. It's OK. I've got the curves up ahead, and he knows that I make mincemeat out of quick turns.

Takamori approaches. His style is cold, calculating. He doesn't mind bumping up against me to get me out of the way. The back of his vehicle looms like an insect. We pass the pits, and Arlo's red hat seems to leap out for just a second, like a fish out of the water, dropping back in again before I've had a chance to register.

I can see the blue-black sutures in the back of his vehicle now. I don't want to tail gate him - he has a habit of stopping abruptly, just to scare you out of the way. Suddenly, as we enter the curves once more, another ripper sidles up beside us like a curious animal. It's as if the rider's just popped up to say hello. What the hell? It's black and red - I don't think I've ever seen it before. I didn't hear of any disqualifications this morning. Who is it? This insolent bindlepunk who I can almost see smiling to himself. Didn't you notice me? I was here all along! Not much of a racer if you don't know who you're up against. I narrow my eyes and stare at the horizon, trying to move out of myself, trying to look without looking.

I can see moving figures on the tops of the factories. A lot of the Overarchs have branches out here - never would have thought it not so long ago, but the Frontier Guard told me they honestly believed a whole lot of people joined up just cause their headquarters gives such a great view of the track! There's Neo-Mech, there's Multex. On the horizon is Portal Town, which seems to hum and waver with a distant blue-green glow.

Here and there I can see patches of mottled colour. Brown for the beziels. Other colours mark out different crowds from different Overarchs. The colour is sucked away as I pass the Nokturnals. But the last patch - I am temporarily dazzled by the beam of a mirrored surface catching the sun. Cybrids? Here?

I turn my head. It really is. Whoa. I never thought I'd see a cybrid here. Their bodysuits gleam in the afternoon light. For a moment, I'm so distracted I don't realise I'm in the final straight. I pass the red and black ripper as if I'm sitting way above watching the whole thing, as if I'm tumbling down an invisible hill.

By the time I've turned my head back, the red and black ripper has fallen back just enough for me to pass it. It falls away.

Strangely, the gesture is not one of defeat. It's one of an animal recoiling, ready to spring once more.