S1, E10 | Cover My Six

​Season 1 Finale

“Fffuuuccckkk” Alec groans as he wipes at his eyes, trying and failing to hold back a yawn as he stands over the hood of his McLaren. Taking a moment of reprieve from his initial work on the vehicle, the Esteemed’s leader battles with exhaustion as a pair of footsteps sound off in the distance, drawing his attention away from the luxury car. “Why the hell are you out here at this hour?” Mark questions aloud, stumbling upon the opulent young adult with surprise.

“Why? Who the fuck are you to tell me when I can and can’t work on my own damn car?” Alec inquires, presenting the rival faction’s member with a hostility that goes both surprisingly unrequited and dismissed. “I’m not out here telling anyone what to do; I just wanna know why you’re out here so late” Mark calmly replies, letting his hands hang by his sides as he casually approaches the usually-irritating racer, doing so in a more approachable manner than he otherwise would.

“I would’ve thought you rich people would be sleeping in and shit- not staying up late into the night trying to maximise your tread depth or whatever it is you’re doing” Mark responds, his composed tone allowing Alec to take his comments like less of a focused attack. “I didn’t stay up late” the Esteemed’s leader replies, correcting the conclusion that the Crew’s third-in-line had come to, “I woke up an hour ago.”

“What the hell do you mean you wo-?” Mark responds, immediately looking at the watch on his left arm before his eyes go wide, “it’s two in the morning!” Not phased by the revelation, Alec shrugs as he tosses his wrench into the nearby box of tools, not having much care as to where it lands within. “I don’t trust Caesar’s guys to tune my car up just right” the wealthy team shot-caller replies, “I’m sure they know what they’re doing, but I don’t want them touching my car.”

“What, you got trust issues or something?” Mark questions back, leaning his arm against the side of the garage’s entrance as the conversation proceeds, slightly surprised at how long he’s managed to tolerate the enemy driver’s presence thus far. “I watched my father get stabbed in the back by his own investors so many times that you’d think he was just a terrible businessman” Alec replies, reclaiming a set of pliers from within the metal tool chest beside him.

“I don’t like people being around me when I can’t trust them” the man carries on, passing a glance over his shoulder at the visiting driver, “maybe you should take that as a hint, little bro.” Though he’d normally take offence at the gesture, Mark instead reacts with the lowering of his head, a subtle nod carried as he remains put, standing in the place that he’d occupied since approaching his rival.

“Waking up early is the motto of the working class” Mark remarks, his presence beared by the at-work leader of the Esteemed, who- without a reason to act otherwise- finds confrontation to be uncalled for in these early hours. “That’s what my father used to tell me whenever I didn’t wanna get up for school” the younger Wayland sibling explains, crossing his arms as he watches over the car owner’s work, “he’d tell me we were ‘blue collar boys’ and didn’t have time to sleep in.”

Paying little in the way of consideration toward his guest’s comments, Alec focuses his sights on the task he attempts to complete at hand, allowing the spoken words a faint attention as they’re spoken. “Some other people like to do things with their lives other than waste it away in bed, street punk” the wealthy young man calmly says, finally using the latter-most name as an addressing title rather than an insult, “I’m not some spoiled little rich kid just ‘cause my dad’s got money.”

“He did get you this car though, right?” Mark questions back, watching as the vehicle’s owner looks up at him, speaking not a single word as he waits for the Crew member’s point, “I doubt you’ve done enough in this life to be able to afford this import.” Clicking his tongue, Alec returns his line of sight to the internal pieces of the machine that he takes into each stratum, allowing the comment to resonate with him before responding to it.

“Have you ever seen struggle, kid? I don’t mean not being able to find the remote to your T.V, I mean real struggle” Mark questions aloud, the prodding inquiry growing to strike the Esteemed leader’s nerves, though he bears them as best as he can. “Have you ever been without food at night? Have you ever had to work a day in your life? Have you?” the younger Wayland sibling continues to ask, pausing as a smirk forms upon his face, “have you ever even seen the inside of a public school?”

Calmly placing his wrench atop the flattest component he can spot beneath his hood, Alec stands upright and turns his body toward his visitor, clearly displeased at the route in which the conversation has headed. “I grew up without a dad” the younger man replies, his tone of voice much more composed than the antagonistic reflection it normally takes on, “it didn’t matter if he was flying halfway across the world or taking some bimbo out on one of his eight yachts... he was never home.”

Quieting down, Mark looks into the rival team leader’s face as the man continues to speak, addressing the questions that he’s raised. “No, I’ve never been without food or water. No, I’ve never had to work a day in my life, and of course I’ve never been inside of a public school” Alec concludes, getting in the face of the man who occupies the floor of his own garage, “they may not be the struggles you’re used to, but I’ve seen my fair share of them. Thanks for asking.”

Attempting to return to the business that is left for him to take part in, the mostly-disliked leader of the Esteemed refocuses himself on the task at hand, trying his best to disregard the man that continues to stand just a short distance away. Hearing the rebuttal that’s offered, Mark remains quiet for just a moment, reserving his thoughts as the driver resumes his duties to the vehicle, his head bowing as he takes a moment to adjust his approach. 

“Listen, kid. You’ve been pissing off a lot of other drivers since you’ve gotten here. They don’t like you, they don’t like your attitude, aside from one of them- they don’t like your friends. You’ve got a target on your back- all of you” Mark explains, his warning doing little to rattle the leader of said group, “maybe the two of us aren’t so different. I’ve been giving people- those Kaiyo dudes especially- a good few issues.”

“Maybe we do, so what?” Alec questions back, this time refusing to drop the attention that he pays to what resides under his McLaren’s hood, “I don’t like you any more than you like me. Just ‘cause we’re similar doesn’t mean that we have to be friends.” Shaking his head, Mark steps away from the supercar and begins leaning against a nearby workbench, his arms crossed as he lets the rival driver retain some distance.

“No, it doesn’t. But I’ll tell you what- it’d come in real handy if the two of us could guarantee we had people watching our backs” the Crew member replies, his proposition doing little to change the demeanour in which the Esteemed’s leader reacts, “we don’t need to be friends in order to keep an eye on each other. We could make sure the other isn’t left out in the open with no line of defence, y’know what I’m saying?”

Smirking, Alec shakes his head as he finishes up on a pair of bolts, pulling away from his vehicle before dropping them into a plastic cup a few paces off to the side. “I’ve got my own people to watch my back. He may be constantly on some kinda substance at all times, but I can count on Ross” the pest of a racer reassures, “Lana’s my girl and Eric’s had my back for years. As far as having people to watch my back goes- I’ve got my six covered.”

“All I’m saying is-” Mark attempts to interject, only to fall silent upon the opposite man’s continuation, his initial reply having yet to fully present itself. “If you’ve started fucking up your own standing in the Crew- that’s your problem” Alec carries on, letting the rival driver know exactly how he feels about the proposal, “I’m all set with people that I know I can trust. So, if you’re looking for some support, you can shop it around to people that don’t hate you- if you can find them.”

Nipping the conversation in the bud, Alec gestures his hand for the Crew’s increasingly-distrusted third wheel to exit the unit in which his car resides, flipping on a light in the garage’s corner before closing the metal entrance. Shut out from the Esteemed’s leader, Mark snarls at the result of his proposition before angry slamming his fist against the door’s exterior and walking off, hands balled into fists as he traipses back toward the clubhouse area.

With his arms crossed and whilst leaning back in his driver’s seat, Kurt watches on through the still-open entrance of his own garage as his brother retreats from the Esteemed’s section of the lot. With his window cracked open the slightest amount, the older Wayland sibling sits with the result of the conversation that he’d just barely managed to overhear, a squint carried in his eyes as he considers the discourse’s outcome.

= Driveline is created by Zachary Serra, all rights to the series belong to Zachary Serra and his entity of Pacer1 from the start of Season 1 onwards =

“Good morning, sunshine” Vert quips, watching Talia’s face roll over toward his own as her nose sniffs around at the pleasant aroma that lingers throughout the room. “It definitely is now” the injured driver replies, stretching out as best as she can whilst her head leans as far back as it can manage, the fingers on her free hand curling toward her teammate, “they gave me the best drugs last night and now I want more... Gimme the blunt.”

“This one’s actually a spliff” Vert grumbles, forced to do so in order to hold down every last strand of smoke that fills his lungs, offering up the rolled pot cigarette to the woman whose M-Coupe has copious amounts of it in the backseat. “All that matters is that it’s weed” Talia assures, rolling her eyes back in pleasure the second she begins her drag from it, gently pulling it away from her pressed-together lips as she pulls her head back, “fuck me, that shit’s good.”

Giggling as he exhales, Vert nods along whilst the right foot he lets sit atop his left leg bounces, fully agreeing with the statement that’s made. “So, did the doc tell you when you could get back out on the road again?” he wonders aloud, watching the absolute deep-in-bliss squad member rest her head against the pillow that props her up as she lets the cloud she’d taken in settle.

“I’ll be out of the next stratum and that’s all I was told” Talia concedes, disappointed in the result, though the jubilation she takes from the hit of cannabis allows her to not take the ruling too heavily. “I wouldn’t worry too much” Vert reassures, grabbing a nearby stool and rolling it over to his seat, making use of it as an ottoman to rest his feet atop, “knowing you, there’ll be a way you sneak into the next race before the doc even realises you’re gone.”

“I still have one good arm; there’s always going to be a way for me to take the wheel” Talia replies, doubling down on the man’s claims before thinking back to an earlier piece of information she’d received, “thanks for coming by earlier, by the way. I’m sorry I was still asleep, but I appreciate you dropping by sooner.”

“What do you mean?” Vert retorts, squinting his brows as he leans forward once more, reclaiming the rolled dart for another hit. “The doc said someone came by earlier but left ‘cause I wasn’t awake yet” Talia reiterates, nestling further into the cushioned support beneath her, “I would’ve tried to wake up earlier if I knew you were coming.”

“That wasn’t me” Kaiyo’s youngest member responds, correcting the assumption his teammate had come up with, “I mean, I would’ve swung by earlier if I’d known you were going to be awake. But whoever came by earlier wasn’t me.” Curious, Talia looks away from her friend with the question of whom her mystery visitor had been, staring across the room as the man returns the spliff to her, stepping out of his seat with the room’s exit in sight.

“I’ll go grab your visitor’s chart” the man remarks, gently patting the outline of one of the woman’s legs through her comforter as he makes his way toward the room’s front entry. Seeing little reason to not put the conundrum to rest, Talia lifts the dart back toward her lips for another hit as her eyes wander off into space, affording her mind a chance to wonder who it would’ve been aside from her teammate.

“Oop” she murmurs, catching the faintest glimpse of an out-of-place object resting at the top of the pillow she’d been laid atop, purposefully placed a safe enough distance away from the woman to not interfere with her rest. With the spliff placed between her lips, Talia grabs one of the two metal prongs that reside at the base of the dense cushion in order to take a hold of it, pulling it into her proper line of sight.

Amused, Talia takes notice of the marker-drawn smiling face that’s been drawn onto the front of a cushioned headrest one would normally find protruding from the top of a carseat. Confused, the woman turns the padding over to read the brief message scrawled upon the opposite side, left as a note for her eyes only.

“Nolo wants me to keep my distance while you recover as much as I can. I don’t blame him- I wouldn’t want my friends barking around you guys either” the handwritten note reads, the black lettering appearing easily legible across the felt, grey upholstery, “nevertheless, I know there’s no kiosk to buy a stuffed animal off of like Vert said, so I took on some liberties. Please accept my crude attempt at drawing a stuffed bear’s face on my passenger seat’s headrest. Sincerely, Eric.”

Forming a smile, Talia’s lips curl upward as the room falls quiet, left as such for a further few seconds as she lets the makeshift gift rest on her lap, reclaiming the dart in her one good hand. Both amused and grateful, the woman shakes her head as it leans back, face tense with an adulation that she tries to play off well, blowing a cloud of smoke through her parted lips and toward the ceiling.

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“Clearance approved” a monitor reads, reacting to the plastic card that had gently rested atop its sensor, turning the tiny, once-red light bulb green and unlocking the adjacent door’s internal mechanisms. Being left to his own, a bald man in a fitted suit enters the wing closed off from anyone without the same access as he holds and steps along its carpeted floors with a predetermined destination in mind. 

Neither paid a greeting or stopped by anyone, the man in the navy suit and white dress shirt continues about his business whilst others barely acknowledge his presence, paying him not the faintest glimpse until after his journey passes them. In the wake of his progression onward, those that the professionally-dressed gentleman has travelled beyond immediately dart their attention toward his back, watching his figure as it furthers down each corridor and disappears around corners.

Still holding the plastic card, the domineering figure continues through the next quartered-off area and into a much less-occupied stretch of hallway, the doors along either side of the rather-narrow walkway seeming off for a building with the interior of the latest wing just beyond it. Speaking not a single word, the man of above-average height continues to keep to himself as he rounds the next corner, vanishing into a stairwell just as secured as the other passageways he’d wandered through.

Descending only two flights of stairs, the oddly-slender figure steps into yet another locked-off doorway and continues walking another few hundred yards before finally finding himself in a secluded, quaint, and quiet lobby void of anything other than a leather couch, two chairs and the entry to an elevator. With the push of the button, the well-dressed professional waits patiently with his hands folded at his lap, watching as the number on the screen above the lift begins ticking upward.

For another few moments, the man waits without issue as the platform rises to his level, allowing the doors to part and greet the figure who’d called for its arrival. Before stepping forward, the slender gentleman peers to the side and takes notice of the analog clock positioned at the top-centre of the marble-patterned wall. With its short hand on the twelve and lengthy arm stopped at the ten, the businessman takes his rightful place beside a blonde woman in the elevator.

“Good afternoon, Delilah” the bald gentleman greets, the tone in which he offers the gesture proving cold and distant, less welcoming than it is rigid. “Good morning, Dr. Caesar” the woman in the pantsuit replies, handing over a pair of stapled-together papers to the figure who joins her company, “we have a lot of work to do.” 

Taking a quick read over the text that lines the front page, the hairless businessman gives himself a quick nod before taking the sheets into one hand. Clipping the identification card that reads ‘Hamilton Caesar’ along its front in bold, black text, the doctor steadies his posture and holds his chin firm, eyes taking toward the lobby that soon falls out of view as the lift’s doors close, allowing him to descend toward the direction in which his accompanying colleague had originated from.

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“I’ve told you plenty that I don’t like that name” Caesar responds, addressing the quip made by Ellis whilst rewatching footage of his drivers’ dashcam footage from the prior stratum. “I still don’t understand that” the mechanic replies, aiding his partner in rewatching the video taken from the prior race- his eyes glued to the one from Talia’s car whilst the scientist’s attach themselves toward Harland’s- “if your name is Anthony Caesar, why not use your first name?”

“As I’ve stated before, I’ll go by whatever I have to in order to ensure that my family name is kept as far away from being synonymous with my brother” Caesar responds, repeating himself much to his own displeasure, “that man deserves to be linked to nothing other than evil.” Looking to his superior out of the side of his eye, Ellis takes his boss’ comments to mind and jots them down mentally for future reference, shrugging off the remark before returning his gaze to the cameras.

“Have any of your maths given you the ability to more accurately predict when the next stratums will open?” Ellis queries, snapping off a piece of licorice whilst leaning back in his chair, feet kicked up atop the desk. “It shouldn’t be too much longer” Caesar reassures, snickering at his right hand man’s posture before reaching over, knocking the man’s coupled shoes off the table’s surface before redirecting his line of sight toward Talia’s dashcam footage.

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“I just don’t get why Wayland’s acting up now” Ronny responds, sitting on a tire beside the group leader’s garage while a crossed-arm Taro stands in the opposite corner. “Because we’ve never really raced Kaiyo before. Wayland’s only got to drive with us against the other drivers in Annapolis” Harland responds, speaking from the comfort of his driver’s seat whilst his co-founder remains quiet, keeping himself out of the discussion, “this is the first time he gets to race his brother.”

“Still, he’s been around long enough to know better, right?” Ronny questions back, genuinely curious to hear the answers the rest of his team comes back with. “He wants to prove that his brother made the wrong call in turning him away from Kaiyo. It’s respectable and understandable, but the problem is that it’s clouding his judgement” Taro confesses, disappointed in having to do so, “if that starts getting to be a problem for the rest of us- it’ll cause issues.”

“You’re not opposed to kicking him out?” Harland queries from behind the wheel, his car’s engine purposefully not started. Looking toward his closest confidant and the group’s co-founder the Crew’s leader takes his eyes toward the reserved and well-spoken tempo-influencer, noticing his eyes to be steadied toward his own feet.

“We’ve already let him know what’s up. He’s got the picture and the only person that can make the call on what happens from here on out is him” Taro answers, again swallowing a bitter pill in admitting what he honestly hopes they won’t have to come to, “I don’t get the right to oppose kicking someone out who brings it upon themselves.”

Letting his eyes fall whilst his chin remains high, Harland goes quiet for a few moments before their mechanic teammate climbs out from his makeshift seat. “I’m gonna go see if I can find some jerky around” Ronny proclaims, delivering himself an opportunity to step away from the conversation that none of the trio wish to have, its importance not changing the fact of its uncomfortability.

Keeping hush for a few seconds, Taro watches as their fourth member wanders off before speaking once more, purposefully waiting for the driver to fall out of view before saying anything. “I’ve got something to tell you” the co-founder proclaims, turning his head to face the group’s leader, watching the eyes of the man behind the Oldsmobile’s wheel fall toward his direction.

“Does it have anything to do with Wayland or the Crew as a whole?” Harland questions back, wanting to cover those two bases before any others. “No, it’s actually got something to do with Caesar” Taro responds, letting his hands fall to either side as he approaches the leader’s door, coming to a stop within whispering distance from the man, “he let me in on a little information the other day, but the only people that I want knowing about it right now are you and I.”

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“Attention drivers, the next stratum is opening!” Caesar proclaims, trying to shout over the intercom whilst the buzzer sounds off in the cavernous second level’s every direction, the heaven-stretching walls that surround all within being bathed in a shade of red. Whilst his superior addresses the competitors, Ellis hurries from one side of the control centre to the other, powering on monitors and ensuring that all is in order to make sure the next leg goes off without a hitch.

“We’re not gonna let being down a man get the best of us, Kaiyo” Kurt proclaims, hurriedly walking between both Nolo and Vert as they draw closer to their garage. “We running with a similar plan to the Cavern race?” the youngest of the three questions aloud, looking past the man in the middle and toward the group’s leader. “We’ll figure that out when we figure out where this race is actually gonna be” the shot-caller responds, only for the scientist’s voice to interrupt him.

“This next race will be the Warped Stratum” Caesar proclaims, slightly put off by the coded language that clues him into the next level. “What the fuck does that mean!?” Kurt questions aloud, both he and the men that he prepares to race alongside having come to a full stop, their eyes taking toward the heavens as the flashing lights turn yellow. “I don’t know, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see!” Nolo shouts, shrugging his shoulders as he hurries for his car, leaping into his Porsche.

“Do this shit, boys!” Dale proclaims, watching on as Butch leads his formation-following DSRC members toward the tracks that lead into the next leg’s entry, refused permission to enter himself. “Let’s win us another one, boys!” Ross howls, wiping at the nose he’d just used to snort a line of cocaine, “these other motherfuckers don’t got shit on us!”

Slamming the palm of his hand against the roof of his McLaren, Alec starts the frenzy that his group soon breaks into, unable to notice the subtle refusal to match his group’s energy that Eric feigns his way through. “You ready, Taro?” Harland questions aloud, fitting his head into the black helmet that had sat upon his passenger’s seat, only to be initially met with the roar of the ‘Cuda Convertible’s engine his co-founder responds with.

“I’m as ready as ever” the reserved man replies, only throwing his car into drive once he overhears the tires on the group leader’s Oldsmobile rolling forward. Coming together alongside their teammates, the four squads embark upon entering different stretches of race track, their winding turns, steep ascents and fan-propelled straight aways all leading to the same epicentre of concentrated energy, its magnetic and pulsating flashes of blue light reaching their steady climax.

“The next stratum is now open!” Caesar proclaims as the alarm goes off one final time, taking the warm, yellow glow that had encompassed his building into a steady shade of green, triggering a brief flash of light from the newly-formed portal that his racers make a final approach to. One after another, the fifteen drivers vanish into the spherical power and join the recon bots in taking their fight to the corporation once more, a new world to explore and a new leg to triumph over.

== Driveline ==