Horsepower #10

“A spy?” You ask, as she stares you down with all the fury she can muster. Which is actually a lot. It’s interesting… Her eyes don’t flicker or drift at all. She’s totally fixated on you. If you weren’t so 100% cool it would be a bit disturbing. “I mean, I’d need like cool gadgets and shit to be a spy. Damn, that would be cool, though… Get me some lockpicks, smoke bombs, that kind of thing.”

She’s gritting her beak by the end of this and points at the exit to the tent. “Uncle Grimthul!” She insists. “Please escort them out!”

He looks at her with a sigh. “Go,” he says. “I don’t think that’s-”

Her head snaps over to him and it’s an almost palpable force. He flinches. “You said I was in charge, Uncle Grimthul,” she says. “You said I was in charge of this whole team.”

“I believe what I said was that you are RESPONSIBLE-”

“And I don’t like the look of these two,” she says, eyeing you and Dusk up suspiciously. Dusk sways back and forth a little, watching her back and infuriating the intense hen with her seeming nonchalance.

Grimthul looks over at you apologetically. “I’m very sorry,” he says, “My niece is apparently in one of her moods. How about we meet up another time and you can tell me how great I am then?”

You nod eagerly. “Ho shit, I would absolutely LOVE-” You say, and catch yourself. “Sure, sounds like a plan. See you around.” You give him a casual salute, unable to stop smiling as he returns it, and you and Dusk head out of the tent while Go begins to storm around and look at everything intently.

“She’s a piece of work,” Dusk says as the two of you start back over towards your tent. “She could probably use a nap and some chips.”

“Chips?”

“I like chips.”

No arguing with that. “Eh, she’s got passion,” you say with a shrug. “Maybe she was being a bit of a bitch, but I’ve seen some pretty dramatic racers in my time. Nothing new. Plus, I will absolutely turn this around on her the second that I get a chance.”

Dusk shrugs in return. “I’m going to head back to my hotel now,” she says, and spins around in a slow, lazy circle. “I’ll be in time for the race.” She waves a wing at you. “Good night, Comet.”

You wave back at her. “See ya tomorrow, Dusk!” That done, you head back over towards your own tent. Heading inside, the place is totally different from the blank slate that greeted you when you first arrived. Tables have been set up everywhere, the car, still hidden under black tarp to your eternal annoyance, has been unloaded. Lug Nut pops out from under the tarp to check one of the pages while Tweak fiddles back and forth with an abacus.

There’s also an earth pony standing nearby. She’s a mare with a red coat and a purple mane, her rump emblazoned with a socket wrench. She starts as you enter the tent, taking a step over to give you a bit more space as you enter.

“G’evening,” she says with a sleepy smile, offering you a hoof. “Name’s Ratchet Racket. Nice to meetcha, just hoping to meet you and your guys, but they seem busy.”

You shake her hoof with a claw and look back over at the two of them. “Yeah, I thought most mechanics were crazy like this. Constantly checking and double-checking.”

The earth mare shakes her head, hair low enough to cover her face. “I mean, most of them maybe, but I’m a grease monkey and a mechanic and usually this kind of stuff psyches me out, y’know? I think about this and I start to panic and do a lot of stuff that doesn’t help. Nah, I have different ways of making sure I feel safe.”

“Huh. Well good on you,” you say, giving her a casual thumbs up.

She smiles back at you. “I’d probably better be heading out, though.” She says, and turns around. “Make sure your mechanics don’t freak out too much.”

She exits the tent, but the task she’s left you might not be possible under the circumstances. Lug Nut’s motions are getting more frantic by the second, and Tweak has started to sort through the papers at an ever-increasing rate. You start to slowly back out of the tent, but before you can get too far, Lug Nut spies you and her face absolutely lights up.

“Comet!” She says, rushing over. In your umpteenth unsolicited hug of the evening, she wraps her hooves around you. Your coat immediately goes from “a few splotches of grease” to “absolutely soaked”, but Nutty’s enthusiasm is rare enough you can’t afford to squander this, and you let the momentum carry the two of you into a spinning hug, your wings fanning out to help you balance.

She’s giggling like crazy by the time the two of you set down. “What’s up, Nutty?” You ask.

“It’s done!” She says, practically dancing in place while she shoots looks back over at the covered car, and you look back at it with a quirked eyebrow.

“It’s done?” You ask. “I mean, like I know that the race is tomorrow, but throwing together a car in two weeks is far and away more impressive than anything you’ve ever done.”

She flushes and tosses a hoof. “I reused a lot of ideas from old projects to make it better, and I didn’t special order many parts…”

“The steering will probably be iffy and the suspension will probably have to be entirely reworked after the race is done,” Slight Tweak says, “I’ve also noticed twenty-seven imperfections within the paint job, but that wasn’t a priority.” He shuts his book, some almanac or another.

“However,” he says with a small smile on his face, “It is an absolutely excellent vehicle. I could not have done half as well with twice your shoestring budget, and I will be proud to work on the vehicle in the middle of the race.”

Lug Nut looks about ready to die at this point, face blood-red. “Alright, alright,” she says, “Cut it out you two. Sheesh.” She looks over at you. “I’m almost ready to show you the car, but first we gotta talk about your personal weapon.”

“Nunchucks.” You say without hesitation, and feel sheer glee as in seconds Lug Nut has returned to her ‘this mare is going to be the death of me’ expression. One of your favorites. “I’ve wanted them since I was five,” you add by way of explanation.

“Comet, you don't know how to use nunchucks,” Lug protests.

“I can learn!”


“By tomorrow? You’re going to give yourself a concussion.”

“Worth it. You think those jackasses are gonna see it coming when they jump at me and WHAM! Nunchucks!”

Maybe it’s time to stop. You think you can see a vein pulsing in her forehead. “Just…” She says, burying her face in her hoof. “Just think about it. Something easy to use. Something defensive. You can’t exactly be out and about attacking other racers, you need to steer the car.”

You chuckle and look over at Tweak. “How about you, what are you doing?”

He walks over to a case on one of the more carefully maintained tables and pops it open, revealing what looks to be a crossbow with two strips of yellow on the button. Like all weapons in the Haymaker, it appears to have been modified to trigger the safety features and remove a pony from the race, rather than harm them. Thus, instead of a sharpened bolt it has a thick black metal rod. Four more of the rods sit in a harness in the case, designed to be worn for easy access to the ammunition.

“It’s magnetized to attach to an enemy’s car and disrupt its magical aura,” he explained. “The car runs worse and will be more susceptible to other tampering.”

You nod. “Makes sense. Gonna snipe some motherfuckers for us?”

“Ah, no,” he said, reaching up to adjust his glasses. ”I am not an excellent gunner. I tend to become easily frustrated when dealing with many conflicting factors, and therefore I,” he considers his words for a second. “‘Wing it.’”

“Huh. I hope Dusk has something to use.”

“She probably does. It kind of comes with the territory of working security, and she should have mentioned it otherwise,” Lug Nut said, and suddenly looks very worried. “I really hope she does…”

“She’ll be fine,” you assert.

Lug Nut looks concerned for another second, but crosses over towards the covered car. Meanwhile, Slight Tweak replaces the crossbow and starts the impossible task of organizing the seventeen or so disheveled piles of paper sitting around the room immediately. The forces of chaos were always destined to win in racing, you think.

Breathing in and out to steady herself, Lug Nut looks at the car. “Okay, okay,” she says, “I tried to make it so that you would like it but I wasn’t sure if you would like-”

She’s panicking. You step in. “The car, Nutty!”

“Okay, okay!” She says, looking nervously at the car once more. With a mighty heave, she yanks the cover off to reveal…

What does your car look like?
What kind of weapon do you want to use?
And what are your parents like?