Chapter Text
Prologue
CRASH!—the door recoils, a dull, flat, metallic thud. Everything within a few meters is his to destroy. Let no one in. SNAP—the sound of a shattered plate, then a sharp, piercing ringing in his ears. He is out of his mind, that much is blindingly clear, as he grabs and screams and hurls objects blindly against the wall. He isn't the type to get angry. He rarely loses his temper. But today his heart laments a failure, burning in his chest with the urge to combust.
SLAM—a kick to the mirror. The sight of his own reflection disgusts him. Fuck, how could this happen? I was in the lead, I had the victory in my grasp, for fuck's sake, it was mine, the cup… by the Aeons, I lost the championship. It will ruin my career, goddammit, it will ruin my career—BANG.
What will Aventurine say?
“Open this fucking door!”
Shoulders rigid, hands frozen. For a fleeting second, the world is mute, and the ringing dies in his throat, replaced by a bitter aftertaste. Fear. Veritas grips the collar of his racing suit, yanks down the zipper, and breathes.
“Leave me alone,” he chokes out.
With a clumsy jerk, a wine glass crashes against the door, staining the teal carpet a stark, bleeding scarlet.
“Ratio. I swear to the Aeons, if you don't open this fucking door right now, I'm actually leaving. Act like an adult, can you manage that?”
At first glance, Aventurine doesn't look angry. Veritas observes him in tight silence, shifting his weight to try and conceal the chaos behind him. This used to be a waiting room. Now, it looks more like a scrapyard of fractured emotions and faded memories. The trophies have tumbled from the shelves as though decimated by a vortex. Shards of glass blanket the floor like a second rug. Aventurine barges past him with a shove of his shoulder, and Veritas barely manages to catch his balance without stumbling backward. With a click, he turns the lock, then turns to look at him—or rather, to watch his shoulders rise and fall as if deciding what to make of all this wreckage. Veritas grips the doorknob, terrified Aventurine’s threat might actually come true. The blonde nods toward the sofa, and the rider obeys before a single word is uttered.
“Go sit down.”
The sofa is cold; the room is cold, despite the summer heat that had been suffocating out on the track. Aventurine patrols the space, pacing around him, now touching the trophies, now kicking them aside. Veritas stares at his feet, tracing the frayed edges of his nails and the chewed skin around them. The blonde comes to a halt directly in front of him, and Veritas accepts the challenge, looking him in the eye.
“I'm sorry.”
Aventurine looks down at him with disdain—or perhaps boredom, truth be told—and forces him to hold his gaze, tilting his chin up with two fingers. In the five years since he stopped being his mechanic to become his manager, Veritas should have grown accustomed to this, a routine that echoes the same old tune. Worthless, he can almost hear ringing in his ears. Yet, when Aventurine speaks, his voice is calm. Cold, resolute. But calm.
“What were you thinking about while taking that turn, let's hear it? Were you thinking about how much you like me wet, tight around you, screaming your name like a bitch in heat, or that your fucking tires had been giving out for a kilometer and you didn't listen to me when I told you to pit and change them?”
“Aventurine…”
The grip on his chin tightens.
“That crash should have ended your career. There are candidates out there far better than you without a single cent to their name to afford being on the track, while you sit there just warming the seat of that motorcycle. Look me in the face and tell me it isn't so.”
“I was stupid,” a thread of a voice.
“I didn't hear you.”
“I was an idiot. I didn't listen to you, and I paid the price.”
“Good boy. And tell me, instead of being your manager’s cocksucker, what are you supposed to be?”
“I’m supposed to be on the podium, first in the race. I should… I'm the best rider of the season.”
“Doesn't look like it to me. Still, better than nothing,” Aventurine comments in a measured tone. Straddling one of his legs, Aventurine leans over him and forces his mouth open, sliding his thumb inside. With his free hand, he guides Veritas’s hand down to the crotch of his trousers. “Feel how much I like you when you're pathetic and irritated? Suck it, like a good boy.”
Where he had been sweating cold before, a sudden wave of heat now flushes his cheeks. Veritas nods and moves his tongue against the underside of the thumb, sucking as commanded. Below, Aventurine shifts against his hand, and Veritas feels invited to slightly curl his fingers, stealing a low whimper of pleasure from him. He wants to ask what happens now, how he will recover in the next race, but it’s a stupid question. Aventurine will handle it, with his usual tricks up his sleeves and his habit of betting everything he owns on his rider—the gambler par excellence, and also, despite everything, his predecessor. Veritas swallows around Aventurine’s fingers, pleading with his eyes for him to push deeper, to the very edge of his breath, but the blonde withdraws his hand, and the erotic play abruptly ends.
Not for Aventurine, though.
“You're terrible at this,” the blonde asserts, wiping his damp fingers against the fabric of his shirt. Veritas wants to retort with equal acidity, but the words die in his mouth.
The manager unlaces his shoes beneath the rider's patient gaze—hungry, in reality, barely patient, but he must behave if he wants any more. Next come the trousers, slipping down his hips the moment Aventurine loosens his belt. He is small, in stature and form, but not in ego, and he thinks nothing of lighting a cigarette with the windows shut, standing there in nothing but emerald-green lace underwear, already slick. Along his slender legs, a glossy sheen reflects a barely contained arousal. Veritas, by instinct, reaches his arms out.
“Don't touch me,” Aventurine snaps, cutting him off. With the tip of his foot, he nudges the invading hands away, then rests his leg on the sofa. “You think you deserve me? I was so convinced you'd win that I was ready to let myself be fucked in your favorite panties, but as usual, you can't seem to do a single thing right. I was stupid to think you'd live up to my expectations. Besides, a vibrator is more than enough for me. Lie down.”
Veritas complies, his face burning. Aventurine mounts him, sitting astride his erection, not wasting the chance to comment on how hard he is at the mere sight of the wet patch blooming on the lace. A hand wraps around Veritas’s throat as Aventurine rubs against him slowly, drawing out a muffled, submissive gasp—a sound that escapes with reluctant embarrassment, because he truly can no longer endure the tension. When he attempts to grab Aventurine, he is met with a sharp yank of his hair, a growl, a bite, and a tighter squeeze around his neck. He lacks air, but he does nothing to pull away; instead, he pants with pleasure as Aventurine rides him faster. The arousal mounts as the damp stain on the underwear spreads, and the adrenaline he felt on the track surges back to life, filling his core with a raw, reinvented purpose. Whether he comes in his pants before Aventurine has even finished, like some high school boy, matters not.
“Ah! Pathetic, ungrateful,” Aventurine breathes.
Faster, faster still, the finish line ribbon on the horizon.
“A nobody, mmh, only good for… a quick fuck.”
There he is, speeding down the track, no one to stop him, first in the standings, the ribbon, the ribbon…
“Ngh! Veritas, fuck, yes!”
Brutal is the descent as he crashes headlong, the strike of his helmet shattering the illusion.
Brutalizer
Part I
brutalize
verb
bru·tal·ize ˈbrü-tᵊl-ˌīz
brutalized; brutalizing
1: to make brutal, unfeeling, or inhuman
2: to treat brutally
Five years ago
—And after the footage, back to the studio.
For days now people have been talking about the bad crash of rider Aventurine, team IPC, the great promise of motorcycle racing. Local channels keep replaying the same video. Aventurine lifting the bike in the middle of a waterstorm, a race that was about to be canceled—then a flight of over a hundred meters into the sand off the track. Three broken ribs. He may never race again.
Veritas watches the clip without interest—he’s seen it a hundred times—followed by a short shot of himself on the podium and a punchline that always grates.
Did he deserve it, or should the race have been called off?
He switches off the television. He’s already wasted too much time sprawling on the couch. Normally he would call Jade, book a slot at the gym, train just to kill the hours—headphones clamped over his ears to drown out the constant murmur and the metallic clang of the machines, since he has always been painfully sensitive to loud noise.
What’s different from an ordinary Sunday is simple enough: last week he won his first world cup. Twenty-two years old—the youngest champion since the blond rider, now injured, Aventurine. And precisely for that reason, no one cares. If he were twenty, maybe his victory would have eclipsed Aventurine’s accident. Twenty-seven years old.
He should be preparing for the next championship. Or enjoying the winnings and his climb in the rankings. Aventurine will drop out of the standings, and in two days the papers will talk only about him. They have to. He’s first place.
He turns on his phone and types MotoGP.
The first article is from the prestigious sports paper Penacony Grand Prix (PGP). The headline begins with Aventurine and gets cut off in the preview. When he opens it, his own name is there too—but only in passing.
Penacony Grand Prix
Championship Finale: Aventurine last place, his bike rears
Veritas Ratio: the sport’s new promise?
It truly hurts: we captured the stunned face of Kakavasha’s—stage name Aventurine—beloved sister an instant before his fall from the bike, the Rota Fortunae, the same machine with which our rider won the previous three Grands Prix, renowned for its incredible luck… or engineering brilliance? Click here for a dedicated feature. You can see her—always on the front line for her little brother, his mental coach for nearly ten years—desperate at Amber Hospital in the heart of the capital. Don’t despair: the rider is in good hands. But will he be able to climb back onto the beautiful Rota Fortunae and make us dream again like the first time? In the newsroom we ask ourselves the same. We wish him a speedy recovery and a good luck! Last week, the finish line was crossed by the young rising star Veritas Ratio, who had been running second until that moment, winning by a hair. But our eyes, unfortunately for him, were fixed on Kakavasha’s wheelie, a fall of a full hundred meters. Kakavasha, twenty-seven, born in the reclaimed lands of Sigonia…
Veritas grimaces and goes back.
For the next five minutes he wanders through a maze of platitudes. We wish the greatest luck to “the Gambler,” may this prove his winning bet, and so on. One article catches his eye. The cover photo shows only him. The headline is about him too. Short, but enough to read carefully.
Pier Point Daily
All about Veritas Ratio, IPC’s new rising star
Championship, studies, girlfriend, private life
Let’s admit it: he made us dream. The new star of IPC, managed each year by the beautiful (and capable!) Stoneheart Jade, seems perfectly suited to the new title of Gambler, though he doesn’t like being called that. He prefers “Doctor,” thanks to three completed PhDs—one still in progress—and top marks through high school and university. Where did he even find the time to study to become a nurse? He already surprised us last year at the Belobog seasonal race, nearly stealing victory from his unofficial rival Aventurine, about whom Ratio claims to know nothing. They barely seem to have exchanged a handshake, imagine that! But enough chatter: who really is Veritas Ratio? Subscribe to discover rumors about a possible girlfriend…
Comments:
user696582 says: A possible girlfriend? Better for him if he doesn’t have a girlfriend… I mean, who said that?
guest says: What do you mean three PhDs?? twirls hair D-doctor…
churin_no1_simp says: What’s gotten into the press mentioning Aventurine every time they talk about Ratio? It almost seems like they’re trying to pair them up…
Now that’s a real scoop. Veritas is gay, he’s known since high school. As far back as he can remember, he’s never appeared beside a woman in front of the cameras except Jade, and discovering the article is talking about her would send him into a rage. First of all, Jade is twenty years older than him, a detail that disgusts him. Second, the world of motorcycle racing is what led him to understand his own sexuality. Third: he wouldn’t mind being considered Aventurine’s successor, given the admiration he feels for him, the breathless awe with which he followed his races when he was younger. But Veritas is not Aventurine.
And he never will be. Veritas will build his own name from nothing. A name worthy of his family’s sacrifices and the money it took to put him on his bike—the Vincit Omnia Veritas.
He drops the phone onto the couch and stares into space.
He’s been living for a while now in the apartment Jade bought for him, paid for by the agency. It looks out over the Pier Point skyscrapers and the winter championship track: three kilometers long, seventy-five laps—more than two hundred kilometers total—ridden at an absurd speed of one hundred seventy kilometers per hour.
They aren’t random numbers. He’s memorized them, ready to repeat them during a race Aventurine won’t be part of. Victory is already in his grasp.
As if anyone cared.
He wants nothing to do with it.
One last message from Jade asks for further explanations and urges him not to overexert himself. Veritas doesn’t reply.
*
“Mr. Aventurine!”
“I said don’t touch me!”
“Kakavasha, please, listen to what the doctor is saying—”
“Like hell!” Aventurine snaps, tearing the IV lines from his arms and limping blindly through the hospital’s white, antiseptic corridors, under the piercing stares of passersby. Camera flashes blind him. Of course the journalists have managed to get into a private hospital like Amber too. Figures. “You’ve kept me locked in here for days,” he shouts accusingly, hurling the IV stand at the feet of the doctor and his sister, “without even telling me when I’ll get out—whether I’ll make it back in time for the December championship.”
“Nothing is certain yet,” his sister tries to say, her hair hastily pulled back, her eyes worn with exhaustion. Aventurine woke up this morning to find her asleep on a chair—and the morning before that, and three days ago as well. She sleeps sitting up, waiting for the doctors to give definite news, but there is nothing definite, only lies in the dark, and he is tired of them. “Stop being difficult.”
He clenches his teeth. “Difficult?”
“Sir, please. Can’t you see? You can barely stand.”
Aventurine shrugs. When he turns, a fresh line of doctors is already closing in, blocking the way to the elevator, should he try to bolt. Aventurine may be short for his profession, and slimmer since changing his diet, but that is precisely what makes him agile. He clutches his side and dives headlong into the small gap formed by a nurse’s outstretched arms. They miss him, and in a quick burst he hammers the elevator button a hundred times. The corridor erupts with shouts calling his name. The doors slide open.
Jade.
“Good morning, little peacock. Slept well?”
Time freezes the instant the chime announces the elevator’s arrival: silence ripples through the walls and Aventurine stands petrified. Once the shock settles, he lunges toward the second elevator, but the doctors—who have regained ground—grab him firmly by the arms.
“Let me go! Jade!”
“Is he still like this?” the manager asks.
“We’ve tried everything,” the head physician replies.
“Well, try harder.” Jade waves a hand toward the ward nurses. Her heels strike the floor, swallowed by Aventurine’s shouted protests. “Come on, gambler. Let’s talk.”
A moment later they are back in the ward. The blond rider lies sedated on his bed, IV lines running into his arms and across his chest beneath a half-unbuttoned shirt. His breathing speeds up with anger and helplessness. His sister sits beside him, holding his wrist with maternal tenderness, but he barely notices. In front of him stands Jade, already poring over his charts. She paces back and forth along an imaginary line, then stops at the window.
“Happy birthday, Kakavasha.”
Aventurine’s eyes widen. He looks at his sister; she avoids his gaze. “Happy birthday, Kakavasha,” she murmurs softly.
The phone reads May sixth. “Thanks,” he mutters. Then, to Jade, “Care to tell me something I don’t already know?”
“How stubborn we are,” the woman says, setting the papers aside. “Three broken ribs, a fractured femur, five stitches in your back. And a nice sliding scar across your chest. Still, you passed out before you felt any pain. I have to say, luck is on your side.”
“Why did it take you so long to come see me?”
“I was assessing the situation. You can’t be rash with a case like yours. In the meantime, I made one decision: the December Grand Prix is canceled. Sorry, peacock, but you’d need to start training now, and in your condition it’s impossible.”
“You have no idea who you’re talking to. I’ve been racing for seven years, with breaks of barely three weeks between competitions. I’ll recover and I’ll win this last one. I have to,” he snarls back. “That might be my last—”
“This was your last race. Come now. Did you really think you could reclaim the international rankings with a single win? But let’s say you do recover in time. What vehicle do you plan to race on? The Rota Fortunae can’t be repaired.”
“What?” Aventurine leans forward, and his sister moves to steady his shoulders.
“Please, Vasha, listen—”
“Can’t be repaired? What do you mean, can’t be repaired?”
Jade sighs and pulls her phone from her pocket. The photo on the screen is blurred, grainy, taken at maximum zoom—perhaps from the arena stands. The message, however, is unmistakable. The tires, their rims barely visible, look split clean in two by the impact. A tangle of metal tubes floats on the sand, and the lettering on the windshield—Interastral Peace—is half illegible. Scratches, deep cuts, rust streak the vehicle in every direction. Aventurine struggles to tell where the seat is, what became of the handlebars. Where he himself is in the frame.
He can’t speak.
Jade swipes to the next image, as if answering the question he can’t voice. There he is—himself—surrounded by medics, his left arm bent at an unnatural angle, his helmet fractured at the crown. The next photo is professional. A telephoto lens captures every detail of the fractures with obsessive clarity, intent on producing shocking images steeped in terror. Aventurine’s head is bloodied, resting against the shoulder of Topaz, his first mechanic. Topaz—who will likely face a serious lawsuit if the crash is traced back to the vehicle.
“I have an article for you,” Jade says.
Penacony Grand Prix
The causes of the accident under renewed scrutiny
Jelena, known as Topaz, speaks: the rider’s first mechanic
We interviewed Jelena, first mechanic to Aventurine, builder of the extraordinary Rota Fortunae and an engineer repeatedly awarded by the Intelligentsia Guild for her scientific contributions. The question on everyone’s mind is whether the crash had anything to do with vehicle maintenance. That’s nonsense. As the official documents submitted to the Penacony Grand Prix office show, the vehicle displayed no issues at the time of the mid-race tire change, nor immediately afterward. The real problem—impossible to foresee—was the sudden rainstorm, not predicted until the day before. This is one of those cases no one could have anticipated. Still, I am prepared to submit to further investigation should I be summoned to court. I’ve known Aventurine since his first World Cup victory. He’s a brother to me. What is the fate of the Rota Fortunae, in your opinion? The vehicle was completely destroyed in the crash. Rebuilding it exactly as it was is nearly impossible with the parts we have, but nothing rules out rebuilding it better than before. With IPC technology, anything is possible. I will do my best to recreate Oswaldo Schneider’s engineering masterpiece, however difficult it may be. What will you do now, with rumors saying Aventurine won’t return to racing? Nothing is ever certain when it comes to Aventurine. That said, I’ve already answered this: leaving Aventurine would mean returning to work for the women’s championship. I’ve already made myself available to Pearl—but only if Aventurine is officially declared unfit. Was it fair for the race to be considered valid after such an incident? Fair? I don’t know. Has it happened before? Yes—and in every case there was a winner. That’s how it should be, especially for the audience, which wants and needs a winner. Wishing all my luck to IPC’s new rider, Veritas Ratio, I’d like to clarify that the Corporation would have annulled the race had Ratio not been under the same agency. As I said—it’s right this way. In any case, I personally inspected his Vincit Omnia Veritas and consider it an excellent vehicle. We also interviewed the winner regarding the matter…
“Will there be a trial?”
“Nothing to worry about. Jelena won’t be touched.”
“Jade. Seriously. I don’t want to stop racing.”
“That decision is mine. Topaz deliberately avoided addressing the issue that concerns me most, but one I fear your sister would rather discuss.”
Aventurine turns to her at once. His sister’s gaze is draped in melancholy. She has never looked this sad. She is thirty-five, married, planning to start a family. For those born into poverty, such things once seemed unreachable. But they both worked hard, and Aventurine has enough money to sustain a legacy he has no intention of spending on himself alone. His sister—she can seek a stable life. Yet for a moment that certainty thins, fades, and Aventurine cups her face.
“Vasha, listen. They found traces of amphetamines in your blood, kept out of the public eye to preserve your dignity. If this came out, public opinion would turn. The doctors reconstructed what happened with help from law enforcement. The rain certainly affected the crash, but it seems you passed out on the bike before the accident even occurred. The cause was nervous exhaustion.”
Silence.
“Why did you need amphetamines?” Jade asks, her tone hard.
“I was weak that morning,” Aventurine says, twisting his fingers in the sheets. In the background—beep, beep, beep—an orchestra of irregular heartbeats. “I wasn’t fit. The nutritionist advised me not to race.”
“But you did. Without telling me.”
“I had no choice.”
“You doped.”
“What does it matter?” Aventurine snaps, his voice breaking. “It was one of my last chances to win the World Cup again—and I cared, Jade, I cared!”
“You’ve been weak for months,” his sister says. They both turn to her. Tears brim in her eyes; she barely holds them back. “You’re pushing yourself too hard and you won’t listen to anyone. What’s gotten into you? You stopped eating!”
Aventurine exhales sharply. With a rough motion he pulls free of his sister’s hands. She rubs her eyes and calls his name. Jade helps her to her feet, her sobs growing louder, and leads her out. Aventurine stares at the white wall ahead until Jade steps back into his line of sight.
“You and I have a lot to talk about. Alone.”
“You’ve interrogated me enough already.”
“Not about this. We need to talk about what you’re going to do in the future.”
*
Daily MotoGP
The death of a star
The newsroom says goodbye (and good luck) to the rider who made us smile the most
Three months after the accident, the twenty-seven-year-old rider Kakavasha breaks the silence. Jade: “When a star dies, a supernova is born.” “For me, life is a grand race, and the circuit is a bet. I race against myself, for myself. But the real gamble starts now: my team and I still have surprises in store.” It’s over. No—it’s just beginning, Kakavasha says, smiling at our reporters. The great gamble the rider of the decade has always promised is finally underway. Some thought it would be a Grand Prix victory, but the plans were very different: the opening of a new engine company is on the horizon. Few know that Kakavasha holds a degree in mechanical engineering and worked on the maintenance of his own bike. The next step, he reveals, is recruiting a rider who meets his highest expectations. I already have someone in mind, he adds. But it’s a surprise. He ends with a wink. Here in the newsroom, we can’t help but wonder: who will it be? For nearly ten years, Kakavasha made us dream, his smile entering the homes of fans and non-fans alike. Who will be his successor? May the Lord of Amber watch over him—and may luck never stop chasing him. Go, Kakavasha.
*
He has just finished his evening training when Jade’s car comes screeching across the dry asphalt. Her call came at the very last minute: when it’s like that, not only is there urgent news, but she’s also looking for something in return. He doesn’t know her that well—he’s only been under her agency for two years—but one thing has always been clear to him: you don’t keep her waiting. Two hours ago her message arrived; two hours later she showed up personally to pick him up. Veritas pulls his jacket tighter around himself. It’s September, and at dusk the air is already starting to get cold. He yanks the door open and gets in. The question comes quick.
“Where are we going?”
“To the track.”
Veritas watches the woman’s reflection in the rearview mirror, waiting for her to add something. “Excuse me?”
“There’s someone who, besides knowing you, wants to see you race. Who do you think it is?”
“I’m not in the mood to guess. And I’m not in great shape. Training went on for a long time.”
“Training had its purpose. Think about it.”
“You should’ve warned me. If it’s important, I’d rather be at my best.”
“You drivers make everything so complicated. You sit on a motorcycle: what’s so demanding about that?”
Veritas feels his jaw tighten. “Jade…”
“I’m joking. You’re a sharp kid: I trust your perseverance.”
“One day my perseverance is going to get us killed,” Veritas jokes, though his gaze stays serious.
It works. Jade bursts out laughing. Together they speed along the expressway, the city’s skyscrapers turning into white dots in the night. Veritas rolls the window down, focusing on the roar of engines exploding into the air, and closes his eyes. The wind brushes against him and he’s already on the track. The first time he ever got on a bike, to calm the adrenaline, he focused on the breeze slipping through the sleeves of his T-shirt, and he still clearly remembers the goosebumps from that first ride. The bike had felt enormous beneath his rigid body, and maybe that’s why he’d felt compelled to work so hard—put on weight, muscle, become, in practice, worthy of the blue machine, the words Omnia Vincit Veritas engraved along its side in metal.
He lets himself sink into that feeling, aware it will only trick his anxiety for a while. Over the years he’s become better at managing the breathlessness of always being on top of the world. After all, his job doesn’t save lives, and he doesn’t believe he’s just an entertainment puppet in the hands of commentators. Seen from the outside a motor race isn’t the same thing, and between the grandstands and the couch at home there’s not much difference. None at all. The real experience is sensory—something only the driver ever truly lives.
His job isn’t necessary to society, and that alone is enough to calm him.
“You’ve made it back into the rankings for the October friendly. It’s an experimental race requested by the Xiangzhou agency. It’s also a great opportunity to give you more exposure in the press.”
“Wasn’t coming first in the Grand Prix enough?”
“Forget that race. No one remembers it for the winner.”
“I noticed.”
“Which is why it’s necessary that you win the friendly. And to do that, I put you in touch with one of the big shots.”
The car reaches its destination. He can barely see anything because of the darkness and the poor lighting in the parking lot, but once they step outside, a group of journalists is already waiting for them under a bank of lights. Jade gives him a small gesture, as if to say they were expected, and Veritas frowns. What purpose could a group of journalists serve during a private meeting between him and the unknown individual who wants to see him?
The journalists don’t approach him, nor do they try to ask questions. The group moves forward into a large tent lit directly from above. The light falls straight down, harsh and shadowless, washing away contours and leaving every surface exposed. But it isn’t just a tent. It only takes a few steps to realize that.
It’s a garage.
Almost a hangar. A space that smells of hot metal, new rubber, and industrial detergents. The air hums with a constant electric buzz, the sound of neon lights hanging too high to be clearly seen. On the left, a line of race cars and engines is laid out with near-obsessive precision. Aligned like soldiers on parade, they follow an ascending order of speed and brand. Veritas breaks away from the group and dives headlong toward the cars, inspecting them more closely. Slowly, he runs his gaze over them one by one. They’re set up, not meant to be used. Whoever owns the garage, he thinks, must be a collector—unless the structure belongs to an agency. Or a former driver. No option can be ruled out.
Jade reaches him with a brisk step and starts talking about the division into departments. Her voice bounces off the metal surfaces, becoming more technical. Logistics, development, maintenance. Ordered, precise words that clash with the way Veritas keeps looking around, as if he’s searching for something else. At the center of the space, a long worktable takes up almost the entire lane. On top of it, tools carefully laid out, tablets glowing, cables coiled. The windshield of a race car is suspended between two mechanical arms, lifted like an organ in an operating room. The whole thing feels surgical.
And finally, to the right of the entrance, there’s his motorcycle.
Wrapped in its own matte, metallic gray, silent and opaque, it absorbs light instead of reflecting it. It shows off nothing, and precisely because of that it seems more threatening than the others. Still. Composed. Waiting to be used. Veritas steps closer just as a voice—elegant and haughty—rises above the hum of the machinery.
“Good evening, gentlemen!”
Even the least informed person would recognize it.
Veritas spins around. The journalists applaud his entrance, and the blond driver thanks them with a bow. Their eyes meet immediately, but Aventurine—who has always preferred to be called by his stage name rather than his given one, despite journalists doing otherwise—greets Jade first with a warm embrace. Veritas doesn’t miss the crutch. Aventurine hands it off to a member of the staff, almost rejecting the path to recovery with an arrogance sharp enough to unsettle him. Veritas steps forward as soon as the embrace ends, offering his hand.
Now Jade’s favor is clear to him—if it can even be called that. Otherwise, he’d use the word obligation to describe her request. She gives him a cordial look. Aventurine’s grip around his hand is firm and leaves no escape. The blond driver smiles at him.
“Aventurine.”
“Veritas Ratio.”
“Which one?” Aventurine replies.
“Both,” Veritas answers promptly.
Aventurine studies him with a pair of piercing eyes, blue and fuchsia irises that have become a symbol even of his car. His former car, really. Thinking about it, Veritas can imagine several ways to wipe that handsome face off the board, but this isn’t a challenge—and the fact that it might seem like one at first glance doesn’t help his assessment. What they say is true: his presence is both threatening and reassuring at the same time, commanding the scene so that all eyes are drawn to him. And on top of that, he’s striking.
“No stage name, then. I assume I can call you Ratio?”
Veritas nods. “It’s a pleasure.”
“The pleasure’s mine.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Veritas catches sight of a journalist’s camera filming them.
“Is that really necessary?” he murmurs, hoping lip-reading won’t betray him.
It’s Jade who answers. “Mr. Aventurine—”
“Let’s cut it out, Jade. No need to call me Mister. As you can see, I’m already friends with this fine gentleman here.”
“Friends?” Veritas tilts his head.
“Aventurine,” Jade corrects herself, “is the mechanic who requested you. We talked about it in the car. He’ll be following you throughout the winter season, and during the October friendly.”
“Your bicycle is slow,” Aventurine remarks.
“That’s not a bicycle,” Veritas snaps back, curt. “I won a world championship on that.”
“You were pretty far behind me,” Aventurine goes on. “How do you expect to compete if the leader never goes off track?”
He’s already getting on my nerves. He gesture toward the crutch. “And how do you expect to do maintenance with that?”
Aventurine laughs, loud and genuine. “Come on, champion. Start pedaling.”
Without another word, Veritas hurries toward his bike under Aventurine’s amused gaze. The garage officials follow him—Aventurine joins them only a few minutes later—and as Veritas takes his position on the track, the lights come on one by one, like fireflies marking a path. This is his field. Riding on an internationally renowned circuit, late at night no less, feels surreal to him. All eyes will be fixed on his performance, but that isn’t what drives him. It’s strange. Not the wind, not the asphalt, not the vibration of the engine beneath him. None of it motivates him as much as the need to prove—to the former rider, the gambler, the king of the circuit—what he’s worth.
Veritas glances at the cameras. Aventurine is whispering something into the cameraman’s ear. With a sharp sweep of his arm, he orders the officials to activate the cameras along the circuit. Two guys each pilot a drone shaped like a giant wasp. Jade arrives and hands him his helmet.
“You don’t need the suit?”
“I’ll do without. This race is a formality. How many laps?”
“Three. It’s not really a race. Relax.”
“For him it is.”
Jade shrugs. “You hardly know him. He’ll keep his eyes on you, sure, but the truth is, he’s already made his decision.”
“When?”
“The moment he shook your hand.”
Aventurine is standing with his arms crossed, an energy drink clenched in his fist. Jade studies him, meeting his eyes. Veritas holds that knowing look, then nods, as if asking permission to start. Aventurine tosses the can into the nearby bin. Looking more closely, Veritas has to reconsider: that wasn’t an energy drink. From his pocket, Aventurine pulls out a cigarette. Veritas wonders whether he’d had the smoking habit back when he was still racing—a fair question, because under IPC, and especially under Jade’s supervision, he certainly couldn’t have been a smoker. Jade, for her part, gives him a pat on the shoulder. Aventurine startles, then shouts at the top of his lungs, “To your positions!”
Veritas sits astride the saddle and leans forward, focusing solely on the horizon line of the track. One foot on the pedal, handlebars steady.
“Ready!”
He tightens his grip; holds his breath.
“Go!”
*
For three months, Aventurine has spent his days watching every single race run by Veritas Ratio. For three months, every morning, muscle-rehab exercises paired with obsessive viewing of amateur, professional, then international races. He has memorized Ratio’s movements perfectly—so much so that by the third month he starts talking to himself, to the screen, imagining the rider in the blue suit standing before him and blaming him for not doing enough. Slow, imprecise corners, and yet his opponents are always worse than he is. He spends entire afternoons trying to understand what Jade sees in him. And then, like an apparition, the answer finally becomes clear.
Aventurine and Veritas Ratio are completely different.
When Aventurine approaches a corner, he doesn’t try to force it on the tires; when it’s Veritas Ratio taking a corner, he can’t withstand the pressure of rival riders. Aventurine knows when to rejoin the track; Ratio does so hesitantly, often underestimating the weight of the wheels. When Aventurine is in the lead, he doesn’t think about who’s behind him; Ratio feels under attack and goes on the defensive, easily distracted. He’s often overtaken, managing to win only when his opponents grow tired of him.
So where does his talent lie? If there’s one thing Aventurine has always lacked, it’s strategy. He’s never needed a plan or to overthink things—he’s a physical rider. By contrast, that seems to be Ratio’s one true advantage. He knows how to get inside his opponent’s head, and his perseverance—his stubborn refusal to lose—makes him a potential god of the track.
There is something else that draws him to Veritas Ratio. He doesn’t even tell himself the truth, which is paradoxical. On his living-room couch, between one hour-and-a-half video and the next, he stops to read through Ratio’s résumé. Three doctorates. A degree in nursing and pharmacy. With the phone resting on his stomach, he scrolls through page after page of theses—something not particularly interesting about injuries in the world of motorcycling. According to Jade, he was admitted to university before he turned eighteen, and because of his intellect they had him graduate a year ahead of his peers. Phone on his stomach: Aventurine scrolls through page after page of theses, searching for his name. Ratio plays the mysterious type even in front of the camera, but the truth is the exact opposite. Veritas Ratio is an admirer of his, like many others—a careful calculator, one of those who has followed every single one of his races closely.
Chapter 4
A Journey into the Competitive World of Rider Aventurine
(Page 45). If the previous examples are examined closely, the case of Aventurine’s injuries is a curious one. The fractures recorded in the dossier from last summer’s season include additional laceration wounds that did not exist prior to the preceding season. The issue with MotoGP championships lies in the excessive exploitation of riders at the international level—indeed, if we look closely, the retirement rate of IPC riders is significantly above the global average, and below the average of the age brackets examined thus far.
After closing the thesis tab with more questions than answers, he moves on to simpler things. Social networks.
No beating around the bush: he likes the shirtless photos.
It’s an old picture from his first championship. Ratio with the zipper of his suit open across his chest in the first image; Ratio with the suit hanging loose around his hips, his pecs on full display, sweat sliding down from his nipples, glossing his chest, his stomach, trailing lower into a violet-tinged pelt of hair. Aventurine is left breathless. Only the faintest awareness that his hand is already slipping into his pants, cupping the damp patch in his underwear. With a sigh, he circles it with a finger, feeling it swell.
Then he stops.
For Qlipoth. Five years’ difference. Now that—he likes that.
Do Not Disturb mode.
Hand in his underwear, circling his wet slit. He’s beautiful, really. Aventurine imagines him between his legs with that impassive look, only this time with the hunger in his eyes he wishes he could see on his face when he rides his… what’s it called? Omnia Vincit Amor, or whatever comes after “Vincit.”
Aventurine touches himself, thinking how nice it would be if he didn’t have much experience with sex. He doubts it, with a body like that, but it’s not impossible. He rubs against his own hand, picturing instead Ratio’s hands clenched around the handlebars. Veritas, Veritas, he would pant. Veritas, Veritas, suck my cock.
He’s on his third cigarette now, a second beer in his hand. He isn’t drunk enough for this kind of thing, and Ratio tears around the circuit like a man possessed. But already at the beginning of the third lap—as had been predictable from all his previous observations—he starts losing balance in the turns. The first one, Aventurine sees it through the drone camera, is slow. Too much pressure on the brakes. He’ll burn out the clutch if he keeps that up. The mechanics signal that a tire change would be preferable—already? Aventurine chews on his lower lip.
“Tell him that’s enough.”
Ratio returns to the starting area at a moderate speed. No one dares say a word when he removes his helmet. Their gazes lock immediately.
“Up to your expectations?” Ratio asks.
“Feel like getting a drink?” Aventurine replies.
*
Veritas’ view is filled with Aventurine’s stuffed mouth, mumbling nonsense while he chews a sausage-and-melted-cheese burger. This, he thinks, is the most famous rider of the decade. He’s been talking about himself for an hour—about the job he more or less lost—without once even accidentally mentioning his performance on the track. He’s drunk. That much is obvious. If Veritas weren’t completely incapable of dealing with drunk people since high school, he would have ditched him half an hour ago with the excuse of asking for a cigarette. Veritas doesn’t smoke, but his rival does, and smokers tend to talk easily. Yet the act of smoking itself, for many, is stripped from stress, turned into a ritual gesture that can feel like a suspension of time.
The point is, Veritas can’t bring himself to ask him to go smoke.
The fast-food place is empty, yet Aventurine still wears pink-lensed glasses and the hood of his oversized sweatshirt. Even with everything he’s piled on to avoid being recognized, Veritas can only think about how small he is—short, slight.
He can’t help asking, “How did they even accept you with that build?”
Aventurine stops. Thinks. Squints, like drunk people do. “What do you mean?”
“It’s just that…”
“I look like a girl?”
“Don’t put words in my mouth.”
“Want to see how much of a girl I am down there?” he asks sarcastically, though there’s a deliberately irritating mischief in his eyes.
Veritas shakes his head and looks away. Maybe now would be a good time to go smoke. “What are we even doing here?”
“So you didn’t listen to a single word I said?”
Veritas drops his head into his hand. “No. Sorry. Long day.”
Aventurine sets his burger aside. “This stuff’s disgusting.” Another swig of beer. “Don’t you feel lucky? Out of everything that could’ve happened to you today, Aventurine—the king of the track, the gambler, yeah, that guy—came to see you? I mean, who could’ve had it better than you?”
Veritas wrinkles his nose. “Right. Who would’ve expected that?”
“Definitely not with that face.”
“I’m tired.”
“You said that already. Me too. Let’s go smoke.”
The suggestion relaxes him a little, but not enough to shut Aventurine up. He keeps rambling about work, about what he could’ve done if not for the crash, about the failure of his career as if he hadn’t won three World Cups. Veritas finds him ridiculous, but says nothing, preferring instead to let him tire himself out. You have to realize on your own when it’s too much.
Outside it’s even colder, and Veritas wants to go back in, but Aventurine offers him a cigarette. Veritas takes it. He won’t smoke it—he’ll pretend. As drunk as he is, Aventurine won’t notice.
“Are you a virgin, rider?”
The question catches him completely off guard. He’s known Aventurine for three hours and, to be precise, has met three versions of him: the focused racer, the easygoing charmer who commands attention, and now the drunk.
He shouldn’t answer. “No. Is that relevant?”
“Well, I’m just saying—you wouldn’t think so. You really weren’t fucking that engine.”
“Is that all you can think about? Is that how this sport works for you, through sexual metaphors?”
In an instant he finds himself with his back against the wall and arms looped around his neck.
“Riding a circuit is like having sex. There are a thousand ways to do it well, but one in particular feels like an orgasm for the audience. The trick is finding that way,” Aventurine murmurs.
Veritas swallows. Aventurine’s lips move in quick little motions as he talks—or maybe Veritas is just too focused on the way his tongue slips between his teeth during the pauses.
“You think you’re disconnected from people watching you. But this is entertainment, in a way. And for me, aesthetics matter more than any technical aspect. Long story short—you’re not pleasant to watch.”
The words he says, the seductive way he says them, are completely at odds with his body language. He’s closer and closer now, their chests pressed together, soft against each other, as if it were inevitable. Veritas doesn’t know where to put his hands.
Aventurine tilts his head, searching for his lips. His skin smells like alcohol. His mouth tastes of smoke. Between the fingers at the back of Veritas’ neck he still holds the cigarette. He takes a drag, then exhales directly onto his lips. His free hand darts down and wraps around the erection Veritas didn’t even realize he had in his pants.
Veritas barely stifles a moan.
“This is how your audience should feel when they watch you dance on the track. Got it? Veritas Ra—”
Aventurine’s legs suddenly give out, and Veritas just manages to catch him in his arms.
*
On his cheek, a cooling breeze, enough to give him a colour you might call white, like the clouds. Somewhere at the back of his thoughts, the awareness that maybe he has never slept so well. When was the last time he’d had a night so reassuring it promised that tomorrow would bring nothing at all? Nothing — a lovely certainty. Nothing. No worries, no laps on the track, no running after money, after fame, after the podium, after the crowd.
As a child he used to think that, if he closed his eyes, his body stopped being tangible, like an atom suspended in the air. Himself, a white dot in the galaxy. Maybe that was why he loved the stars so much: success, measured against the size of the cosmos, is nothing, and yet he still wanted to be as bright as something dangerous, to make this life into a better kind of goal.
He could have learned to do something other than race. The truth, sharp as the cold on his cheek, cuts through him. I could have learned to be something other than an object for someone else’s pleasure.
And it’s with that bitter awareness that Aventurine opens his eyes to the world.
Beneath him, around him: light sheets and a soft mattress, something so simple that for years he hadn’t been allowed of, not until he’d saved enough money to compete in his first circuit. Once, he’d been afraid life would happen without him, somewhere far off, at an indistinct point he’d never reach. Maybe that’s why he started racing — the only thing he had ever known how to do. Running after something distant from himself, a bright spot in the galaxy.
The retching tears through his stomach and a hand grabs him by the nape of the neck. Strange, the nape, like you’d handle a kitten. His head spins, but he manages to clutch at something just in time to keep hold of reality: the edges of the basin are foreign against his skin, rough and chipped, though he barely notices. He empties himself into it between sobs and coughs, almost forgetting to breathe. The hand pats slowly at the top of his back, small steady beats. The feeling is awful, but it helps the nausea, even if it doesn’t make it disappear.
Aventurine senses the end of it coming and, like his sister taught him, not all harm comes to hurt you, and in an instant the sickness is replaced with a blind calm. He lifts his head. Black dots scatter everywhere.
“Careful. Or you’ll feel sick again.”
He knows that voice. “Ratio.”
“Good. You remember my name. That’s already something.”
Within his field of vision things line up one by one: an open window, the shutters half-lowered, the question of whether the glass is half empty or half full; a bed — not his, but it hardly matters when he’s slept in so many he’s lost count; a room with white walls, meticulously tidy, grey carpet, curtains hanging still in the air. A furrowed face, long, severe features, a square jaw. Aventurine breathes out softly, suddenly aware of how close he is. Instinctively, he pushes him back with both hands.
“I’m fine.”
“About time. Do you want something to eat?”
“I should really go home.”
“In this state you’re better off not going anywhere.”
“What did you do to me? While I was unconscious.”
Ratio tilts his head. “I slept on the couch. And made breakfast.”
Aventurine clenches his teeth. The vomit in the basin has a strange yellow tinge. He looks down. His jacket is gone, but the trousers and shirt are the same as last night. Right — what happened last night? The race, then he’d suggested they go for a drink. The memories surface but stop at an invisible, opaque wall, and he’ll have to dig through other drawers in his head to remember exactly how he ended up in Veritas Ratio’s bed.
“Did we have sex?”
“What? No!” Ratio grabs the basin and carries it to the bathroom, emptying it. His figure comes into focus. He’s wearing a tracksuit that hugs his hips, a synthetic cotton shirt that emphasises his broad shoulders. He’s really tall, the kind of masculine man who inspires a flicker of resentment in him. Aventurine touches his chest without thinking.
“Look, I don’t know what you take me for, but you collapsed into my arms last night and I didn’t know where else to bring you. My place was closer. If you need something to wear, take it from my wardrobe. And if you want a shower, use my shampoo. Jade asked us to stop by your garage for a quick check on the bike.”
Aventurine curls the corners of his mouth. With some effort he gets to his feet and walks up behind Ratio. “Wow. Someone’s aggressive. Ten minutes. I seriously need to show you some videos.”
Ratio steps aside to pass through the door, then turns, intrigued. “What videos?”
“Of you. And your incredibly boring performances.”
“And since when does the mechanic get to comment on the riders’ performances? That’s what my coach is for.”
“Forget the coach. I’m better than a coach. Go sit down and wait for me.”
Ratio shoots him an irritated look. “This is my house.”
“Cute. Did Jade buy it for you? Then it’s not really yours, is it?”
The rider doesn’t answer. He just shuts the bedroom door with a sharp click, leaving Aventurine muttering under his breath about how boring he is. He checks his pockets. No phone. Ratio left it on the bedside table. Scrolling through the messages, he finds a voice note from his sister. Topaz has sent him a link to a post from the last five hours, signed InterastralGP.
Aventurine loses himself in a well of replies and quoted posts. Smiling, he drops likes on the most popular comments, already aware that in a few hours his most rabid fans will be losing their minds. After sending a short message to Topaz — T: Okay. You owe me an explanation for this. A: I found a toyboy… or rather, a new pastime. — he rummages through clothes far too large for Ratio. They’re all the same colour, some hanging and wrapped in protective plastic, others folded on shelves without a speck of dust. Lucky for Aventurine he likes clean freaks; otherwise he’d think about calling the police, because this is definitely the room of a sociopath.
He grabs the first things he finds in the wardrobe. To his immense annoyance, he’ll have to wear Ratio’s boxers. He lifts a pair printed with the word FORTUNE. He frowns. It’s the brand he once modelled for in an advert, though it could just be a coincidence.
Whatever the reason, after a quick shower he pulls them on in front of the mirror, curious. They barely fit around the curves of his body, and only because they’re tighter than anything he’d expect Ratio to wear. Still, it’s an unmistakable size L. There’s nothing sexual about his body, and the boredom with which he looks at himself proves it.
A masculine, perfect body like Ratio’s, made to impress and dominate, would at least have a purpose. His, by contrast, feels like wasted potential if it isn’t used for something. There are no clues in the rider’s room that he has an active sex life, or a girlfriend.
Better for him. Better to make the mechanic’s experience — the failed pilot’s life — more interesting for himself.
What a nuisance.
He throws the bedroom door open wearing an extra-large hoodie, knee-length denim bermudas, and a green cap — the only thing in the wardrobe that isn’t white or black. His lenses are within reach. He doesn’t need them now, but outside he’ll have to hide. Ratio doesn’t bother, maybe because he’s still too unknown despite the Grand Prix, but Aventurine and the press are working on that.
“Your wardrobe needs a rebrand.”
“Leave my wardrobe alone,” Ratio shoots back, already prepared. He hands him the remote. “Let’s watch my races.”
“Now we’re talking.”
The first video is from the under-twenty season three years ago. The first major circuit Ratio ever competed on. They watch in silence, Aventurine occasionally throwing him curious glances. Ratio keeps a neutral expression, as if he isn’t thinking anything at all. The air smells faintly of dried fruit.
Halfway through, Aventurine pauses the video, suddenly serious.
“What do you think about your turns?”
“I used to take them too late.”
“You still take them late.”
“I’ve improved.”
“Who’s your coach?”
Ratio sighs. “Why do you care?”
“Ratio, if you want me to fix that fucking vehicle of yours, you have to tell me everything about yourself. Otherwise I’m not wasting my time.”
“Skott. His name’s Skott.”
“God, you’re hopeless,” Aventurine mutters. “Your coach is a nobody.”
“Oh yeah? And who was your coach?”
“No one. I had them all fired halfway through my career because they weren’t teaching me anything. I only trusted myself, my sister, Topaz and Jade. You don’t need a team of three hundred officials when you’ve got a decent manager and your annoying mechanic is Aventurine.”
Ratio looks at him now, openly hostile. “You know, I used to admire you. Before you started drinking like a drain and acting like you’re the only person in the rankings worth anything.”
“Thanks. Admiration’s for desperate people with no self-esteem. You’re supposed to set the rules on that track. And you do it from the first lap. Look at this again: three laps without being overtaken, first place overall. See? You overexert yourself, then you give up second place, even third, until you have some fucking divine awakening at the end of the race, when everyone’s already forgotten you. Write me a list of everyone who works with you and send it to me. I’ll handle it.”
“Is Jade okay with your decisions?”
“Listen,” Aventurine says, getting to his feet and stepping in front of the screen. “From now on, if you plan to keep chasing this career for another seven years, you’re mine. Your whole life is mine. I’m already worrying about building your career for you. Why does Veritas Ratio race on the circuit anyway? With your file you could be a doctor. You’d even be sexier like that.”
The rider sits up straighter on the sofa, studying him from head to toe. He’s stiff, tense; maybe Aventurine should tell him to relax. It’s not like him to doubt himself, but he can’t rule out that this domineering tone might have the opposite effect on Ratio. Those orange irises search for something to hold on to, tinged with restlessness.
“Maybe it’s not what someone like you expects,” he says at last, quietly. “But I don’t really have a reason. For most of my life I lived comfortably. My parents made sure of that. But the adrenaline was always missing — the kind I only feel on the track. I didn’t get into the sport because I knew anything about it. Just curiosity. It’s irrational, free, seductive in a way I can’t explain. So I saved the money from my scholarships and used it to get on the track. Someone noticed me — and now I’m here.”
Aventurine can’t relate to a bourgeois life, to that near-certain financial security, as inevitable as waking up in the morning. But he understands the rush of adrenaline on a motorcycle.
Despite himself, his voice softens. “I started by betting on drivers. That’s how I got rich. I didn’t have any money saved, so I don’t really get what you mean by security. As for parents, I lost both of mine.”
“My condolences.”
“That’s why my team is small. I don’t trust anyone. And that’s what I’m going to teach you.”
“I’ll write the list.”
“Good. Now pay attention to what I’m telling you. Let’s start from the beginning.”
Aventurine presses play.
*
They immediately start talking about when he will be number one in the rankings. Veritas has never thought about it, an objective as distant from him as it is fantastical. On the roof of the world, first. Aventurine locks him inside the complex’s small gym and trains him with ferocity. Veritas tells him his goal, and the other drafts a battle plan. But first he devises a course of study. He gathers the phone numbers and addresses of the most renowned sports doctors and nutritionists in the world and contacts them all, making them his personal consultants. He allies himself with the experts at the Olympic Training Center. He flies from one place to another to interview the best researchers—things Jade should be doing, though according to her she has given him carte blanche.
Then he determines Veritas’ physical limit and pushes him right to it. Soon he has him bench-pressing nearly twice his body weight, five to seven sets with more than one hundred and fifty kilos. Then he makes him lift twenty-five-kilo dumbbells in three excruciating consecutive sets of presses that set three different shoulder muscles on fire. They work on biceps and triceps. They reduce his muscles to ashes—the aim is precisely to set them ablaze. They focus on his waist with a machine designed by Aventurine and built by Topaz, who dismantled it, cut it, welded it back together, as she has done with all his bikes. A lat machine. Unlike those in ordinary gyms, it does not focus only on his back or neck. The bar he pulls to work the lats sits slightly in front of him. He is never in an awkward position.
They are alone in the garage after Aventurine has closed the doors to the world. Veritas watches him discard every useless tool and lean over the bike. This thing has far too many wires, he says. He taps the windshield, then the tires, feeling them with his bare hands to see if they are soft. Reaching a conclusion, he climbs into the saddle. His movements are imprecise, but only because he refuses to use a crutch. He had seemed resistant even to Veritas’ decision to drive the car. You couldn't do it anyway, he told him. Aventurine gets to work and there is not much for Veritas to do except pass him the tools he needs. Wrench. Here. Pump. Here. Oil. Here.
“Did you really start out as a mechanic?”
“Yes,” he says. “I started my racing career relatively late.”
“It’s admirable, in my opinion, that you built yourself from nothing.”
Aventurine smiles at him. Veritas is not sure he has ever seen a genuine smile on his face before, excluding the smirks. In his eyes there is not a single light, but a void he cannot decipher. Veritas finds himself holding his breath. It makes him feel self-conscious, he has to admit. Being observed like this, from head to toe, without the certainty of an opinion. What is he thinking? Veritas is not the type to feel uncomfortable under a gaze. He is used to being analyzed, judged—he does it to others himself. But with Aventurine it is different; it makes him feel as if they are racing on the track. He has felt the sensation of being pursued by him before, but he was overtaken with such speed that he could not calculate it.
They pass tools in a ritual silence.
“Maybe I understand why I feel under pressure when I ride the bike, Veritas says. Being chased conflicts with the freedom I want to feel on the track. So I tend to preserve myself.”
“It’s a start,” Aventurine replies. “But what you’re saying doesn't move me. In fact, I’d say the best thing you can do to survive in this industry is find another motivation. I think about winning for the payout. You think about winning for a childish reason, if you’ll excuse the term. Win because you want to dominate the track.” Aventurine surfaces from an intricate knot of electrical wires. “Try starting it now,” he says.
Veritas does, and Aventurine gets off the bike to make room for him. The engine moves the entire machine as if it is coming back to life, but the noise has transformed into a vibration.
“What do you think?”
“At least it doesn't make that strange noise anymore,” Aventurine explains. With a theatrical gesture he drops the tool on the floor and lets himself fall onto a wooden chair. “Ah. Peace. Do you hear it? Just a hum. Did you make the list while I was working?”
“I did it while you were in the bathroom before we left in the car.”
“You were fast. I like smart guys.”
Veritas sends him the list via message. The phone number Aventurine gave him is not the one he uses daily, but a second private mobile. Consequently, the number Veritas has been given, for one reason or another, is the personal one. His hypothesis is that he wants to keep their relationship away from the agency's tracking. Earlier he had a look at his chats. Four. Seven of which are archived. According to him, the seven archived are people he hopes will never contact him again.
“Okay. Done. I’m sending you the updated list.”
Among the names that appear on the screen is, obviously, that of Aventurine—noted as A-V-E-N-T-U-R-I-N-E! Not Kakavasha. Kakavasha does not exist—there is Jade, and the names of a team of mechanics managed personally by Aventurine, whose names Veritas does not need to worry about memorizing—the note says so. Names not to be memorized, a waste of time. Topaz's name is also present, but her role is missing. The substitute head mechanic is a certain Screwllum, but a further note warns him that there may be no occasion to meet him.
The question arises naturally.
“Why don't you want to be called Kakavasha?” From where he is, Veritas can only see Aventurine’s shoulders, and the exact moment they stiffen. Veritas frowns. “Is it a stupid question?”
“It’s an obvious question.”
“And?”
“I’ll explain it to you.”
“The journalists call you Kakavasha all the time.”
“Journalists need to learn to mind their own business,” Aventurine snaps. “One thing at a time. Do you have a girlfriend?”
Veritas has learned to stop answering Why do you care? Instead, he shrugs and sighs. “No.”
“Have you ever had one?”
“No.”
“Because if you had,” Aventurine explains, “I would have told you to forget about your girlfriend too.”
“I’m gay.”
Aventurine turns abruptly and bursts into a loud laugh. “You? Gay?”
“With all due respect, I don't think it's relevant.”
“Oh, it is! It really is. This makes everything more fun. And who else knows?”
“Only you.”
“Fantastic,” Aventurine exclaims, leaping from the chair.
The door is open; Veritas only worries about that much when the mechanic moves within a breath of his face. He doesn't know what to do. He isn't exactly practical in these matters, but he seems to understand one thing: Aventurine has quickly developed an attraction to him. It has happened in the past that he let himself be seduced. Truthfully, sex, relationships—these are things he considers unreachable. He is attracted to them by some stupid biological law, and he cannot hide last night's erection, even if Aventurine doesn't remember it.
“You told me you’re not a virgin.”
Great. He remembers.
“I’m not.”
“And what do you like?” Aventurine breathes, hands on his chest. His breath is warm, smelling of tobacco. In the three hours since he woke up, he has smoked four cigarettes. The last one before entering the garage. “I’ll ask you an easier question. How did they fuck you?”
“I... I let myself be ridden. In university. Actually, I don’t like the idea of having to do everything.”
“But you like being on top.”
“I don't know. If it makes sense, maybe it does, I like... the... warmth I feel around...”
“Around your dick?”
Veritas nods slowly. He is aware he is blushing, something he finds impossible to control. Aventurine moves his hand toward his groin hidden under the fabric, and Veritas flinches back.
“You should stop.”
“Remember what I said about engines?" the blonde asks with a seductive voice. A step forward. Veritas takes one back, instinctively. "It’s like fucking. And if you’re shit at fucking, then you’re shit at driving."
Another step back and Veritas’ back hits the wall. “The door is open. They could see us.”
“I like that they could see us,” the other counters, and his hand snaps onto Veritas’ member through the fabric of the trousers. He should push him back. But something inside him tells him not to. That deep down he likes this thing they are doing. That the way Aventurine desires him is erotic. “Would you like it if they found us while you fuck me on your bike?”
He keeps saying these filthy things because he knows he likes them. He feels like a boy looking at porn magazines for the first time — in the darkness of his small bedroom — which he will be forced to hide under the bed after becoming aroused. His gaze falls on the blonde’s lips, thinking how soft they would be on his, and the mention of the bike—his thoughts spin without direction, even though potentially he could say no. He is bigger. He is stronger, more masculine, if that is a relevant detail for Aventurine as he thinks it is. His goal can only be described with one word. Brutalize. The mechanic, the most famous ex-driver in the world, is trying to impose himself on him, even if in practice it isn't credible. With those arms, the clothes a size or two too big, Veritas' clothes—Aventurine is not credible.
But he likes this brutality. For once, since his parents never allowed it, he could admit to himself: I am having an erection because of this brutality.
Veritas grabs him by the hips and spins them around, slamming the blonde against the wall. Aventurine gasps in surprise, the breath escaping his lips in a distorted sound. Veritas hurls his lips against his, though the kiss he aims for is not remotely comparable to the reality of the situation. He intended to conquer his mouth, to make him his with force, in keeping with his size, but Aventurine bites his lower lip and pushes him back. Veritas stumbles against the workbench, seeking stability in the rounded corners, but the surface is slippery, greasy even. There is no time to think about it. Aventurine grabs his face with both hands and kisses him properly, taking the words out of his mouth. And his breath. His kiss says I’ll show you how it’s done, steeped in wildness, sweat, and blood. Blood. Veritas opens his eyes. Aventurine’s nose is bleeding, that’s why.
“Aven—“
Aventurine rubs his nose against the sleeve of his sweatshirt, Veritas', it doesn't matter. He is exhausted from last night, or in general, but he doesn't show it, guiding Veritas’ hands onto his hips again. Veritas agrees to lift him onto the workbench. An orchestra of metal gadgets hits the floor, but it doesn't drown out the sound of their increasingly voracious kisses. Veritas loses himself in the taste of Aventurine, he likes it, for Nous’ sake he likes it, and the touch of his smooth, soft hips under the shirt even more.
Aventurine pulls away from the kiss, nipping at his lower lip. “Do you have a condom?”
Veritas shakes his head, uneasy. “I'm clean.”
“Of course you're clean. So, let’s do this. From next time, take my credit card and go shopping. A pack of condoms—and I hope you know your size—and a bottle of lubricant. Then go to the pharmacy and get them to prescribe you birth control pills. Does that get through to you?”
“What do the pills have to do with it?”
“You wanted to know why I don’t like being called Kakavasha.”
Veritas looks at him without understanding. Aventurine loosens the zip of his trousers and kicks them away with a resolute gesture. His eyes light up. Beyond the fact that he is wearing Veritas' favorite pair of boxers—which he had secretly bought after the advertisement Aventurine himself starred in—there is no bulge, only a wet patch between his thighs. Aventurine snatches the words from his mouth, forcing him to touch him right there, and now he is certain.
“Are you a woman?”
“Fuck off,” Aventurine replies immediately. “Ever heard of being trans?”
“Of course I have,” Veritas adds quickly. “Of course...”
“Have you ever licked a vagina?”
Aventurine rubs against his hand, holding it steady while he licks two fingers, maintaining eye contact. Veritas looks back, restless because of the open door, but he finds his courage and helps Aventurine remove the boxers. The sight is that, anatomically speaking, of a vagina. In practice, conversely, Aventurine is very aroused and his thighs are wet. With a thumb, Veritas strokes the clitoris. It is strange to touch after so long, but Aventurine emits a sharp moan that makes him want to touch him more. He has many questions—for example, how a trans racer managed to remain in the shadows for so long without it being known, and where the name Kakavasha comes from—and not in bad faith, but because he is curious out of pure ignorance. But he must be careful with these things. It is not the time to ask questions.
Veritas massages his clitoris calmly. There is no hair to obstruct him, and no rush. The open door. Okay, perhaps there are obstacles, but the way Aventurine pushes forward against him, undulating his pelvis and panting at the limit of the pornographic, charges him with power.
“Mmh... don’t just stand there like an idiot. Put your face in it.”
Before he can even speak, Aventurine forces him to bend down between his thighs. Instinctively he opens his mouth and slides his tongue along the entire length, while a trickle of saliva connects him to the blonde’s skin. It is hard work to which he is not accustomed.
“Yes, good boy, fuck, like that... you learn fast...”
That word, good, excites him in a strange way. It goes straight to his cock and Veritas feels the need to touch himself. Can he do it? He must. He begins to grope himself, and simultaneously moves his mouth, gaining speed by the second. It works because Aventurine whimpers louder. Keeping silent is not for him, but what wouldn't Veritas give to hear him say that word again.
Holding his thighs high, he murmurs: “Can you say it again?”
“What? That you’re good?”
“Yes. Please.”
“For the Aeons,” Aventurine chuckles. “Does it really excite you...?” The words die in his throat and end with a sharp moan when Veritas inserts a finger, pumping in rhythm with his tongue. “Oh, mh! Fuck, yes! You’re good, Veritas, you’re so good to me!”
It goes on like this for a long moment, one hand on his own erection, the other on Aventurine’s thigh, careful not to bend it too much because of the fracture. One finger, then two. A chorus of the same word, that delicious compliment. Continuously, over again, it explodes in his ears and charges him with excitement. Moving back up with his head and chest, he continues to fuck Aventurine with two fingers; the other arches his back and sinks his nails into Veritas' hair. Veritas tries to move closer—Aventurine bites him, leaves him no choice but to devour each other, and he keeps pace, to his own surprise. In the room, the smell of oil has been replaced by that of sex. Now he knows what it tastes like.
It tastes like Aventurine.
And how beautiful he is when he abandons himself to pleasure. Veritas does not stop with his fingers even when Aventurine comes around him; instead, he continues with the same fervor, and Aventurine’s hand snaps out and tightens around his wrist.
“Veritas... Veritas, stop, I’m g-going to come again!”
Veritas does not obey. And perhaps, Aventurine expects him not to. And so he fucks him faster, faster and faster. The blonde comes again, tightening his thighs around his arm, sinking his teeth into his lower lip, his nails into his hair. Veritas slowly removes his fingers, and beneath Aventurine’s thin body, transparent liquid drips from the edges of the table.
“Oh, fuck...” he pants and laughs softly. “Ratio, honestly, I didn’t take you for being so determined.”
He feels stupid asking him. “Can you do the same for me?”
“Sweetheart, take off your trousers,” he orders him. Veritas executes with exaggerated speed. Aventurine giggles again. “Put your cock between my thighs, like this. Ah. You’re huge down there.”
“Please, don't say it.”
“And why? They don’t tell you enough. I’m sure it’s fun to ride. How cute. Look, it’s red at the tip.”
It is a strange feeling, but warm, like being inside him. Veritas implodes from embarrassment as he thrusts into the gap formed by Aventurine’s thighs, and the latter returns to panting from the friction he creates with his vagina. In reality, it doesn't last long, partly because he is too concentrated on the sounds he is making. Muffled grunts, set against Aventurine’s high notes. The latter grabs him again by the head and pants directly into his ear. Veritas jolts—and in a few seconds he comes, emptying himself onto Aventurine’s stomach in small trickles of semen.
“You lived up to my expectations and beyond, champ. Now close that door and get back on your motorcycle. Five laps.”