Re: Speed Racer - Jamilah

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah grinned as she walked over to open the hood. "I'll bet you'd like to see what I got, big boy." She made a broad gesture at the engine as a whole. "Stock 429 Super Cobra Jet V8. Drag Pack option, with the ram air shaker scoop," she patted the inside of the hood to gesture at the scoop, "modded crank and stronger connecting rods. Got Ross custom pistons, Holley carb, Plasma moly rings, Fel-pro gaskets, Clevite main, rod and cam bearings, high volume oil pump, brass freeze plugs, Cloyes timing set, hydraulic lifters, and performance wrist pins."

As the young looking woman mentioned each item she moved around the front end of the car and pointed the item out. She shrugged and looked up at JJ. "The 429's rated stock at 375bhp, call it 450 'cause they were all underrated. With the kit in there," Jamilah patted the front end again, "and fiberglass replacement panels, minus the fact that the previous owner put in an a/c and some ridiculous electronics, up somewhere around 475 horsepower and 500 foot pounds of torque."

The petite, exotic looking woman laughed. "Guy had cash but didn't know what to do with what he put together. Give me some time and I'll blow out the bore, port the heads, get a racing carb in there, pull out the extra weight..." the tiny young woman patted the side panel fondly. "Make a real car out of her."

[Jedi_Master_007]

J.J. looked at Jami and snorted something that sounded a lot like a snarl. "We'll see if you drive that piece of junk better then you talk. This is L.A. It's not a place for little girls with their daddy's mustang." He might have been angry or might not. With as deep as J.J.'s voice was it sounded angry even if it wasn't. While he was waiting on you to offer some sort of comeback, J.J. walked over to your Mustang.

He didn't hesitate even for a second before opening up the driver's side door and getting in. He didn't really sit in the seat though, he just pulled the knob to pop open the hood. "Show me what you got." J.J. didn't bother asking Chris for permission. Hell he didn't even look over at Chris, but it was okay because at this particular moment, Chris was on his phone.

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah didn't bristle at being called a bitch. For one thing, that kind of talk had been thrown around so much in the streets that she barely noticed. For another, it was hard to get offended by something that was true.

What she did do was what she would've done back in the day- shoot right back. "Looks like somebody's overcompensating for something." She looked JJ up and down like he was a side of beef she was thinking of cutting a steak off, then smirked. "I guess it's true what they say 'bout what the 'roids do to a boy's huevos."

[Jedi_Master_007]

A second look at the truck changed your mind about it being an off road vehicle. The truck had 24" chrome rims and low profile street wheels indicated that it was used for urban operations. When the driver's side door opened up, the truck didn't even make a well oiled squeak. When the driver stepped his 300 pounds plus frame from the truck and onto the ground, it still didn't squeak. It didn't even budge, the suspension was wound up that tight.

Looking at the guy, you immediately knew it was J.J. Jeremy was a huge black man as wide as he was tall and clad in heavy leather, clunky workman's boots, and equally bad attitude. He stared at you like you were a piece of raw meat and then shot his attention to Chris. His voice was a powerful baritone. "Guage will be here in a minute. Jesse is bringing something to eat. This the bitch?" J.J. didn't even look at you while using the derogatory anarch slang.

Chris nodded once and started texting someone, distracted. "Yea. Her name is hard to pronounce." He looked at you and then nodded. "That's J.J. He's big."

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah tried hard not to look too impressed but she couldn't help breathing out "Damn..." She hadn't realized NOS did off-road racing. Hadn't even realized there was any money in it, for that matter.

[Jedi_Master_007]

Chris was just about to say something to you when you heard a loud, super obnoxious whomp-whomp-whomp-grrrrrrrrrowwwl! WHOMP-whomp-whomp-whomp-whomp. The massive 500 horsepower Viper R10 engine blasted it's muscle through straight pipe chrome exhaust. What you saw was a truck. It wasn't a truck. It was a truck on steroids. It was a Dodge dually. It was sleek black and chromed out. It had a stainless steel kit going all the way around the bottom. It had a huge metal grill on the front and winch too. From what you could see as the truck prowled its way to Team NOS's clubhouse, it was impossible to tell if it was just the driver or the passenger because the glass was tinted so dark.

The engine sputtered once more as the dual exhaust pipes spit out a small cloud of flames and then died. You could hear the belt on the inside slowly cranking down. Yes. This truck was a beast.

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah made a point of not looking around at the facilities too obviously- she didn't want to look like a tourist or a narc. And she had seen more garages than she could count, though her fingers itched with the desire to peek under the NSX's hood.

She shook her head at Chris's question. "I need a crew. You're nothin' 'less you got a set watchin' your back, right? I need facilities to rod up this monster, need hookups to bring in cash to get parts, need people who know where the money races are at."

Jamilah patted the Mustang's hood. "She's a beast, but I could make her fly with time and money. I need a set and I hear NOS is always on the lookout for hot drivers. That's me."

[Ac1ds0ld13r]

Chris laughed. "Fuckin' Two Finger Pete! I fucking smoked him back when all I had was an Eclipse. He still swearing that piece of shit Charger of his is the best thing on the streets?" He cocked his head listening. You couldn't hear anything except the usual road noises. "Cops. We've got a few minutes to get out here. Follow me..."

Chris didn't wait for you to follow or even an acknowledgement. Instead, he took the NSX out of park and drove off slowly so you could follow. Once you were behind him, he brought you back onto the interstate through a twisting and turning roundabout method that took you across four different city blocks, one twice. You knew it was to confuse any cops you went by or to shake a tail. On the interstate however, The NSX easily came to life. Your speedometer hit 128 at one point before he slowed back down to legal limits and dropped off on a service ramp. A hard left, then another hard right to avoid the barriers. Chris was throwing grass up at you. You could tell you weren't on the road just by how the Mustang rolled. The wheel jerked and fought you every inch of the way. His car bumped and sparks shot out from under neath as he rolled it off the curb onto the street a second later. You followed. The mustang took it a little better than the NSX did, but it was still ugly. He whipped the car across the street and drove behind what looked like a closed up strip mall made of unadorned bricks. The signs were just painted plywood or those three dimensional letters with the lights, but all of them were out. You heard sirens on the interstate as you pulled into the parking lot, but they kept going. The over pass, which was still over you, kept you hidden from any aerial support they would've called in.

Another minute and you were inside a well lit garage. An old beetle was in the bay next to where Chris parked. You pulled into the one next to him, and to your right was a BMW M coupe. It was primer gray right now, but that body style wasn't hard to spot.

Chris was out in a flash. "Welcome to Chateaux De NOS or whatever the fuck they say. Thats Ken's piece of shit beetle." He thumbed over his shoulder at it. "He's probably inside playing Halo 2 or something. Gauge and Carysa should be around too, but whatever. J.J. should be coming soon. He's actually the one that spotted you." You noticed he had another lit cigarette in his hands. There were gas tanks on the far wall... Something told you they were filled with high octane racing fuel... He seemed oblivious. "Jade is the one who called me and told me to be on the look out for you. You wanted our attention. You got it. So why?"

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah grinned at him. "I hope they answered that first question right." She went on after a beat. "For the second, you boys are the hottest set on the streets. Two Finger Pete in Dallas, Jade in El Paso, Little Mikey in San Diego- they all told me that I hadn't raced til I'd raced NOS. I see they're right. And all I had to do was come home again."

[Ac1ds0ld13r]

Chris grinned and blew smoke out his window. "Of course. Its not the fastest thing I got, but you can't beat the handling through all the traffic." He studied our features. "You must be Jamilah, He butchered your name trying to pronounce it. Clearly however it got to him was probably already screwed to shit and back. "And I know I fucked that up. A buddy of mine tells me you're here, in LA, with a hot car, and looking for me and my homies. First thing that comes to my mind: Is she hot? Second thing is, why?"

[August Personage in Jade]

The Mustang's window rolled down smoothly as the NSX came to a stop. While Jamilah had one of her Glocks close enough to be grabbed as she raised her hand to the window she wasn't foolish enough to have it out where someone could see it or where it might spook Chris.

She nodded at the other driver. "Yours too. Must have a hell of a garage somewhere to get that much power out of a NSX."

[Ac1ds0ld13r]

The NSX rumbled into the parking lot, almost cautiously right behind you. It circled around your car, hawk like before coming to a stop beside you. The driver's side window came down and you seen Chris taking off a helmet. He lit a cigarette and looked over at your car waiting for you to do the same. You knew there was an uzi in his lap. That was Chris' signature weapon. So starting shit was not going to be the wisest thing to do right now. He'd throw 30 rounds at you through the window before you could start the car.

He looked the car up and down then came back to your window. "Nice whip."

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah hoped their little chase had been enough to give Chris a taste for her driving skill. It hadn't been her finest hour, and it rankled that he had outclassed her so badly. She told herself that there was no way she could have matched that NSX in traffic- maybe on the track, but then again maybe not. It was one hot car.

Anyway, as soon as it became clear she wasn't going to impress him by losing him or breaking away, she started looking for someplace to pull over where they could talk. The small front parking lot of a lighting store, closed for the night, seemed like a good enough place.

She threw the Mustang into a bootlegger turn that skidded from the passing lane over the curb lane and into the small lot, where she killed the engine to wait for the NOS boss to come talk.

[Ac1ds0ld13r]

The NSX swerved, breaked, down shifted, and screamed as it caught back up with you. It mirrored your movements, only more fluidly. The car tapped its breaks, cornered hard and stayed behind you. Once you hit the turn though, the NSX disappeared. It wasn't until after you had made the high speed turn and heard the blare of horns did you see the NSX again. Chris had cut across the turn lane, ran the light, spun the car, in a 180, which effectively killed its speed. Instead of stalling. The NSX screamed again, even from the distance you could hear its engine roar and that cold sound of sucking air as a supercharged engine sucked oxygen. A literal second later, the NSX was beside you.

That. Car. Was. Not. Stock.

What ever it was, it was pushing every bit of horse power you were, probably a lot more. Granted, in the LA traffic, it was hard to get your Mustang up to full speed, where you might, be able to actually out run the NSX. However, at these relatively low RPMs, the car was just too light and agile to get rid of, and Chris drove it like a beast. He let you lead though, keeping just enough behind to see where you were going, and you knew, sooner or later, your Mustang, which loved gas, would need to stop, probably before Chris's car did, and inevitably, you would attract the attention of the police the longer this race went on...if you had not already. A look at your gauges told you that you were doing over 70 miles an hour in city traffic. Far from safe, and LA cops had a notoriously short temper for street racers to begin with. Chris probably ahd the contacts and influence to get out of trouble, you on the other hand....

[August Personage in Jade]

Jamilah grinned to herself as she kept her head and stayed dead center in her lane as Chris threatened to side swipe her. This was exactly what she had wanted. Granted, she hadn't been hoping for Chris, but an audition was an audition.

She knew she had him in raw power. The '68 Shelby Mustang GT500KR she'd liberated from that redneck in El Paso was the king of muscle cars as far as she was concerned. He had barely known how to drive it, especially compared to her. But the NSX was light years ahead of it in handling and braking and she knew no NOS racer would be driving a stock engine; hell, he probably had NOX tanks in his trunk if it looked like she was out-powering him.

Given some time she knew she could transform the 'stang into something to be reckoned with in the world of underground racing. Even stock standard it was a beast. But Team NOS drove cars that might as well have flown right out of the movies; even a Shelby was outclassed by their best. All she could do was try to impress him with her driving. And she knew she was pretty damn good. She hadn't been beat yet, not when she had a car with a chance in hell of making a showing, and she didn't intend to go down without a fight.

From the second furthest lane Jamilah swerved through a tiny open path to an exit onto surface streets, causing a half dozen different cars to jam on their brakes. Chris probably knew the streets better than she did, but she was no stranger to LA. At the bottom of the ramp she swerved around the cars stopped at the light, into the breakdown lane to take a sharp right, taking only the briefest of glances to make sure the black NSX was following her.

[Ac1ds0ld13r]

Your arrival in LA did exactly what you had planned on it doing. It caught the exact kind of attention you were looking for. Team NOS. A black NSX had swooped up on you as you raced down the highway, weaving through the early night traffic. You knew the car belonged to Chris Jones. One of the ring leaders. A knot appeared in your gut. The moment was more tense than you had imagined, but you had your contact drop your name and a description of your car in certain circles and had been instructed to just draw attention to yourself...

Thing was, Chris was just as likely to shoot your car to shit and watch it flip off an overpass as he was to follow you until you pulled over and talk... So, for now, you had to play your cards carefully. You glanced up in your rearview mirror as the NSX whipped out from behind you and slowly pulled up beside you. It caught up with ease as the blur of tail lights shot by you. Only the NSX dared to keep pace, goddamn, if he wasn't driving like a fucking rock star. He swerved away from you into another lane to pass a slower car and darted back into the lane closest to you. This time his veer was close enough to you that he thought he was going to side swipe you, and you almost veered away, but then he was gone. You heard tires chirp as he down shifted and ended up behind you again.

Chris was playing with you...

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