Gears and Steam

Grand Prix Race Two

Edmund

I always thought the races would get boring after a time. I mean, how many times can you watch four cars speed around in a circle before it got repetitive? I supposed it was the outcome that made it interesting. Four different cars allowed for the possibility of four different outcomes. Different combinations of cars and new people made each race, and each ending, different.

That didn't mean the races didn't get boring in the middle sometimes. In the second official race of the Silver Grand Prix, Glory Rise had fallen behind due to unknown circumstances, Starlight was in second, Guillotine was in third, and we were in first. It had been the same since lap twenty. It looked like we would win this one easily. Unless our engine exploded or something, but Jules and I had checked and double checked every mechanism on the car to make sure that didn't happen.

It was quite nice to know what lap the cars were on without having to ask someone. The lap counter Jules and I built seemed to be working perfectly. According to Jules, it matched the machines high above.

Speaking of my assistant...I still didn't quite know what to make of him. He was officially my longest working assistant since Floyd. Dealing with me for that long was an achievement in itself. The two of us seemed to fall into the odd spells of silence. We had worked side by side on the lap counter in our free time, barely talking to each other after that first day. Jules tried to talk sometimes, but the conversations never lasted long. Sometimes he tried to hug me. Sometimes I let him.

"Edmund, are you okay?" Jules asked, startling me out of my thoughts.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm fine." I glanced over that our hovering lap counter. The brass numbers across the silver wheels showed me that the cars had reached lap one hundred. That meant that there was just around half an hour left in the race. I really didn't want to be standing out in the sun for, by my best calculations, the next thirty five minutes.

"You look hopelessly bored," Jules chuckled as the cars raced past again and blew his raven hair into his face.

"The cars have been in the same places since the start. It's not very interesting because it doesn't seem to be much of a race anymore."

Jules nodded in agreement. "It's not too much fun if the cars aren't competing for first. At least this means that we'll move on."

"Don't jinx us," I muttered as the cars passed again. First, Theo in our brass and silver car. Second, a streak of white and blue that belonged to Starlight. Next, Guillotine's plain silver car. Finally, Glory Rise's gold and black car passed, a few seconds behind all the others. At least our biggest competition seemed to be out of the race. Starlight was decent, but they were still behind us.

Jules tapped me on the shoulder to get my attention again. "Wanna go sit in the alcove to get out of the sun?"

I nodded. If it was the right time of day, the cave would be shaded from the June heat. The rest of this race would at least be bearable if I wasn't melting. Jules sat on the bench against the dirt wall. I opted to sit on the floor, a meter or two away from my assistant.

"Where's Freddie?" Jules looked through the opening of the alcove, trying to spot her fiery red hair amongst the crowd.

I shrugged. "She goes up to the stands sometimes. Usually it's to look for an assistant for me, but you're our fourth. She's always insisted that it should be four of us, no matter what. She should be satisfied with you, so she's probably just watching from up there today."

Jules grinned at me. "Looks like I'm not going anywhere anytime soon. Um, not to compromise my own position or anything, but why does it have to be four? You, Theo, and Freddie seemed to be doing fine without me."