five times lando saw oscar's face and one time the world did

new kid on the block

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Relationships: Lando Norris/Oscar Piastri Charles Leclerc/Max Verstappen Alexander Albon/Logan Sargeant
Tags: Faceless Driver AU, Fluff, Getting Together, two idiots falling in love, McLaren Formula 1, TeamMcLaren, Challenge Videos, British Grand Prix 2023, Qatar Grand Prix 2023, McLaren Finish the Lyrics Video 2023, the fact that's a tag is hysterical, Angst, Fluff and Angst, oops when did that get there?

Summary:
In an alternate universe, some drivers take on the challenge of becoming faceless until they win their first world championship.

Many begin it when young, but few finish through.

Following Daniel's leave from McLaren, Lando meets his new teammate—the anonymous and faceless driver, OP81.

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The first time Lando met OP81, it wasn't too memorable. All he remembered was some kid—not really, the guy couldn’t have been more than two years younger than Lando—running around the paddock one day, wearing, ugh, gross, an Alpine shirt. Not a fan, since they weren’t allowed in this area, so he had to belong here at least. A quick glance at his shirt confirmed that he was a reserve driver. 

In any other situation, Lando would have waved and kept walking, uninterested in dealing with a gushing reserve driver who might be able to touch the car once in the season. But this time, something caught Lando’s eye. The boy was wearing a black balaclava and sunglasses, completely obscuring his face and leaving everything to the imagination. He waved a quick hand towards Lando before continuing his brisk walk in the direction of Alpine hospitality, evidently late for something but too polite to pretend he didn’t notice Lando, the only other person in the area. 

Lando craned his neck to stare at the retreating figure, before he pushed his hands into his pockets and kept walking in the other direction. He sighed. Of course, the kid must be another Max-Verstappen-wannabe. The current world champion had gained notoriety for a similar strategy of obscuring his face and identity until he had won his first world championship. Lando snorted at the idea. If that kid was wearing that as a reserve driver, he better get used to the feeling of fabric on his face, because it wasn’t going to be coming off any time soon. Especially if the way Max was performing this season was an idea of things to come. 

And so his thoughts were quickly pulled away by imaginings of strategy for Sunday and contemplating what results he and Daniel were going to be able to pull out of the car with their less than ideal qualifying, whether it would be enough to beat Alpine and reclaim fourth in the Constructor’s Championship. 

So imagine his surprise when a year later, it was announced that balaclava boy was going to be his future teammate. 

He was called “OP81.” A bit pretentious, if you asked the Brit. Real full of himself, to not even give his name. Though, when he looked at his young teammate’s CV with the smallest hint of jealousy, he couldn’t help but think that maybe the pretentiousness was a bit earned. Now serving as the youngest driver on the grid, OP came with a series of hard-won victories, being one of a handful of drivers to ever win the F3 and F2 championships in consecutive years and the first driver to ever win 3 F1 feeder series in consecutive years. Drivers and media praised his level-headed attitude towards racing and already labeled him as a future world champion. 

All without even knowing his real name or what he looked like. 

From what Lando had been told, “OP” hadn’t shown his face once during his entire junior racing career, nor given anyone his full name apart from the higher-ups who needed to know for legal reasons. And, of course, because of how much potential he’d shown so early on, the press was absolutely eating it up.