Every day at 5 p.m., find a new episode of Mortal Derby X on 20 Minutes , Rocambole's soap opera, the app for reading differently. This series of SF projects us into a post-collapse world, the king sport of which is Quad Derby, a confrontation halfway between Roller derby and Rollerball. Its author, Michael Roch, is not an unknown. He has already published science fiction novels and hosts the YouTube book brigade.
Summary of previous episodes: During an accident in a Quad Derby match, Molly Pop, star of this sport, is violently kicked off the track by another competitor. She wakes up in the hospital with prosthetics in place of the legs and hatred deep in the heart. What is not tolerated in the Cocoon, the only protector of the human species since the Great Collapse of 2030 ... Molly is condemned to exile. Barely out of the Cocoon, she falls on Tob who makes him discover Althen, the largest city in the Free World and enlists him in his team to participate in the Mortal Derby X. During the competition, Molly discovers a bomb threatening the Cocoon and Althen. The authorities of the Cocoon make an agreement with her. If she and her team manage to prevent the bomb from exploding, she will be reinstated. But after her success, it's the whole team that she wants to bring back to the Cocoon.
EPISODE XIX - Quad Derby ™
In the corner of the elevator that leads the Ravine Skulls to the top of the Cocoon track, a small speaker connects to the Quad Derby ™ frequency. “We once again welcome our listeners and viewers for the live broadcast, en-di-rect, of this first round of the Quad Derby ™ League! We are very happy, Garret and myself, your official commentator, very happy, to find you. I thought, stop me if I'm wrong, Garret, catch a glimpse of Molly Pop's red hair going into one of the central elevators, explain to us! ” The Ravine Skulls look at each other. Broody B. raises his helmet to the small speaker.
- Can we unplug this thing?
- Do not even think about it. None of you. I remind you, we are in the Cocoon. The rules change: no punch, no kick. For hits: hips and shoulders only.
Broody growls. The tension is so thick that it could bite the air with a bite. The team has a few minutes to climb. Their bodies are tense with nervousness.
- Don't forget why you're doing this, says Molly Pop: for you. You do it for you.
Silence. Quad Derby radio takes over the space. “… Nine runners from the Ravine Skulls team will compete in this first round against the promising new pro-metering team from the Rocket Warriors. This may prove to be complicated for the Ravines since they do not know the terrain. The favorites are obviously, e-vi-dem-ment, the big winners of the Quadrennial Quad Derby ™ Championship, I named the Cherry, Cher-ry, Blood! All bets are placed, but nothing is certain, because the GoreGones would have implemented a new strategy… ”
Flow snatches one last prayer:
- I do this for Tob. Where we left him, he must surely be watching us on an old visioboard. This race is for him. He deserves it.
The elevator is a glass cage that climbs to the center of the tower. The unevenness of the track, still unknown to the Ravines, is revealed one by one. Facing them, meanders draw the course that awaits them. Molly Pop gives them the details.
- As on Althen's track, you have gutters that follow each other with tubes. Be careful to control your speed so as not to end up at the bottom of the net. This section, it must be the Braid. I have - Molly hesitated - never been able to test it ...
- Take the middle gutter, reassures Broody, it's the shortest.
The Ravine pivot checks that its own braids are properly pressed before making them disappear under its striped helmet. His closed face betrays his situational awareness. Everything is played on the Track, Molly will have to finish first, for all of them. It is the most important. However, Broody Bee Queen retains her aura, her role as leader, mother to each member of the team. Molly Pop watches her adjust the straps of the elbow pads from Tit Sè. She and Jenny Fer will be the first blockers to exit the elevator.
- Tit Sè, Jenny, and all the others. You will be dispatched in packs, with other opposing blockers. Your role is both to allow me to get through you, but also to block other jammers. The only difference with the free world track is that the circuit has a start and an end. If a jammer passes, you will find it very difficult to catch it, except by taking shortcuts. There are two. The chances are slim.
“Four times eight blockers, four packs to exceed throughout this race of about thirty minutes, it's more than sport, Garret! - It's Quad Derby ™, sir! - Quad-Der-by, of course! ”
The glass cage continues to climb. She passes the hills, the tube blind, then the one which, translucent, cost Molly Pop her accident. After each major stage, she deposits RockSan and Narguerite, then Karot ', East Hell. The girls give themselves courage by hitting their helmets, slapping each other on the buttocks. Then comes the turn of Broody B. and Flow, the last starting line for the packs before the highest point of the track. Molly serves her arm.
- Follow me at all costs. If I fall again, there will be only you to finish the race.
- You will not fall.
Broody's teasing nose disappears behind the first bend in the track and the elevator goes to zero. Up there, a referee waves a white pennant above his head. Molly concentrates, flexes her legs, takes support by hitting her brake on the ground. The doors of the four elevators are about to open under the echoes of the public, gathered in clusters on hanging bleachers. But much more than the doors, it is the tension itself which frees the jammers of the four teams. A tension at the height of the confrontation that is preparing on the Track. The challenge of a lifetime for nine of them, escaped from Althen, swollen by stress, sharpened like the rubber of their quads. The stake of those who, remaining on the replacement bench, look at them with stars of hope in the back of their eyes. Fifteen women who look at the arid sky as one waits for the rain. The referee takes down his pennant. Molly Pop propels herself out of the elevator.
White track. Chromed lengths. Nothing has changed on the heights of the Cocoon. Molly skates with strength and ease in the straight line that overlooks the world. What flows into his legs is not adrenaline. It is in the heart, in the arms, under his helmet. What flows to her along her bionic legs is confidence in herself, in her daughters, her team. Confidence in this track, what it brought him and these sensations found. Very quickly, Molly overtakes her opponents and avoids the fight. She knows that this time she will finish the race. In a few quad bikes, the jammer already takes the first turn which leads to the start of the slope. The long curved slope that it will slide until the finish.
In a breath, Molly Pop rushes into the first tube. The wind against his face panics in his curls. The wheels of his quads hit and growl on the surface of the gutter. Everything smells, light, sound, smell - which is not that of Althen, who has nothing alive, who has nothing powerful. Molly's heart is racing. A feeling of deja vu seizes her. She sees herself spinning, right here, a few meters behind Ubie Stevna, before leaving the track, mutilated. But over her shoulder, it's the new jammer of the Rocket Warriors who is close behind. Molly Pop recovers from a leg whip. The lights of the Cocoon burst all around it. Open gutter.
Everything slips. Everything goes. Everything is on fire. The track stretches out into a river of perceptions where racing lines and muffling intertwine. It twists and dodelines, and Molly Pop bounces in the hollows and the vertical drop. Gathers speed. Hit the chrome. Stay on the rope. Don't falter. Don't derail. Do not eject.
The other jammer is still in his legs, taking advantage of his aspiration, when Molly Pop sees the first pack moving in slow motion on the track. Broody, flashy outfit on black skin, distinguishes herself from other runners, by her side Flow plays elbows to impose their presence and form a breakthrough for their jammer. Less than a hundred meters separate it from the eight blockers. Arms, Molly indicates to her teammates a strategic code. Flow pivots, blocks the outside of the pack and protects Broody B. from hips. Molly Pop takes the rope. Fifty meters. The pack prepares for the frontal impact and presents its elbows. Some blockers understand the trick too late. At the last moment, Molly brakes. It takes the tangent. As the opposing jammer crashes on the Pack, she goes under the legs of Flow, Broody on his heels. And both decamp in the translucent tube under the delighted and astonished rumor of the stands.
- OK ? launches the pivot.
- Right in the rush!
- Aren't we crushing them, your girlfriends?
Molly smiles back at him. She hits her helmet. Stay focused. Skate. Feel the quad stick the track, stick the gutter, stick the slope. Just after the tube, a small fork catches their attention. They saw the short cut, narrow and dangerous. Intuitively, they assimilated the difficulty they had to face to enter it. They preferred to continue, to trace on the gutter between the rescue nets, to keep the advantage and not to take the risk of the fall.
Broody adapts his pace. She watches their backs so that Molly ensures the opening. The other jammers are far away. The Ravines sprint towards the second pack. It appears after a few waves, flown over gently. Molly analyzes the position of the blockers. She raises her arms crosswise to warn East Hell and Karot 'of the strategy to be followed. They complied. Gently, they reduce the pace of the pack. First by skating in front of their opponents, guiding the rhythm of the quads. Then, splitting the human chain, they slide on the back of the pack. They occupy space.
Molly Pop and Broody tumble like two furies on a prey. With a voice call, Molly is wreaking havoc. East Hell sends his hips crashing to the right. Karot 'stamps a blocker on the left. A breach forms, closes. Fight. Hit. Hoof hook. Four blockers are on the ground. A slide over the edge of the gutter. Molly Pop swallows a few meters without managing to cross the body barrier. Broody no longer knows what swells his temples, whether it is the snoring of quads or the jubilation of the feverish crowd that reaches them from the stands. The legs get tangled. The elbows collide. We are pulled, then hit.
What remains of the pack disappears in a tube without light. Silence replaces pressure. The half-light invades each part of the body, each territory of the spirit. The runners skate instinctively, without knowing who is standing on the left, who is hurrying to the right. A few screaming calls ring positions, rally tactics. The light gradually returns from the end of the tunnel. We no longer know where we are or who is who. The first hits put the ideas back in place. We are still accelerating. Heartbeats, too.
On the gutter, Molly Pop is no longer the leader of the race. She sticks to the Rockets' jammer train. The little one took advantage of the brawl and the stunning tunnel to go up by miracle. Broody B. is too far away to attempt an assault with two. Molly takes advantage of the suction. A better opportunity will present itself. She resolves to run, without risk, waiting for her turn, when already, the helmets of the third pack appear.
The leader swings her arms wide without noticing that behind her, Molly tells her team to wreak havoc in the pack. She looks back: the rest of the blockers are in close combat with the last two jammers. Broody goes back little by little. This is his chance. Molly jumps forward, disturbs the leader. This one is maintained, avoids one by one the attacks of the Ravine. Molly Pop perseveres. The Rocket pushes it away again. Broody B. is about to lend him a hand, but the trio quickly falls into an impasse. The third pack is a bulwark. Between their wheels, Narguerite and RoskSan are busy. They undermine the foundations. The opposing tactics do not resist. The legs get tangled. No one passes. Neither the Rocket nor the Ravines. All the runners tighten at the entrance to the hills. The cork is cemented.
Hits. Mess. Shoulder against shoulders, hip against hip. We support each other, we cringe. Molly slides. Wipe the drop. Brake. She's drawn into dangerous lines. Hit. Hands, thighs, grimaces and sour looks. Molly Pop expels a few heads at the bottom of the nets. Right, Broody B. reports Narguerite, who has fallen. East Hell sends blow after blow on an opposing pivot, which struggles, which responds. Molly is recovering. Dodge. Rebel. Go get the rope. Star helmets have already left in front. It vacillates in the fray. Flow comes to support him. It has lost ground. It is time to recover.
It stinks of body heat. It drips with sweat and aggressiveness. It hoots in all directions, it barks, it fires. It screams the rubber of the brakes, the metal of the quads on the tortured chrome. It roars in the hollow of the knees, under the rib cages, each thigh on fire, each calf on alert. And then it cracks. Molly splits the mass. Undeniably advantageous. She places each stride, each quad. It opens in the waves, sprints in the hollows, builds on the mistakes of opposing blockers, those they leave in their wake. She sneaks up. She looks around for Broody, but the pivot is no longer there. Molly Pop hits the track. She hits and passes the pack.
On the hill gutter, she finally frees herself from the weight of her adversaries. She traces with, at the bottom of the eye, only one objective: the star helmet of the first jammer. It bounces between bumps. Molly Pop doesn't bother to calculate a trajectory. She is on the run. She takes off. With each jump, it is her rage which flies away, her rage to conquer, that which she has always held in a cage and which, in contact with the free world, has changed, has become free, has become so clear and limpid that it fills it today with a force against any test. Molly Pop goes for it and nothing stops her.
Behind the hills, the jammers are already fighting in the setbacks of the last pack, at the entrance of the braid. In a few crossed legs, Molly Pop throws in, sits there. Tit Sè arranges it, releases an escape. Molly Pop points, slides under the quads of her blocker, finds herself at the edge of the pack. An opponent hits it. The helmets collide. Tit Sè comes in reinforcement, pushes it forward, hands on hips. Where's Broody, Molly yells at him, I can't see Broody! Tit Sè is hit. Respond with a cry. The pack swallows it. Molly Pop goes by the middle entrance of the braid.
She is alone, but she has passed. She does not know where the others are. Where are the opponents. So she skates. Molly Pop burns the rubber of her quads in the meanders of the gutter. Sometimes, on the upper portions, it perceives the rounded edges of some helmets from the pack, protruding from the walls. But no stars. No jammers. So it bends, it accelerates again. She almost breathless, going back to lose breath from a low portion of the braid, until the end of the last obstacle. To the last curved line.
That's where she sees it. The Rocket, the competitor. A good ten meters in front of it. Unrattrapable, in short. That's where she feels it, her Broody B., somewhere behind her back. No, somewhere above her. The pivot of the Ravine Skulls arises from a raised gutter. She flies over Molly, spins, lands again on the runway. She faces Molly Pop, holds out her hands, more concerned than ever. The jammer catches her in two pushes.
- Where the hell were you ?!
- On that fucking shortcut! Grab me, I'm throwing you!
Molly Pop grabs her by the wrists. Broody B. pulls her like hell to hell and catapults her between her legs. Molly Pop bends, balancing on a quad, her right leg stretched like a spearhead, she tears away the distance that separates her from the leader. Twist, game of quads, the brake in support, it opens, recovers and hits the track. Here she is teasing the race leader a few lengths from the finish. Here she nibbles the inches of chrome. Here she growls in the hips of the Rockets jammer.
But she doesn't care about the finish line. She feels it in her veins: what flows in it is not victory, or even her desire. What floods her body, under her boiling skin, under those of all her blockers, under their chest, in their heart: this is the track, this is the Derby. It is their reason for living, their reason for pushing life towards its ends. It was the Derby that shaped them. It's the Derby that they rely on. Molly Pop closes her eyes because she has to catch the breath. Capture the time. Capture the race. Whatever the finish, she knows that she will be back on the track. It is only him that she listens to. She listens to speed in her locks. She listens to the burning of her muscles. She listens to the freedom that rolls under her quads. She knows she belongs to him. Just like victory, when it opens its eyes.
END
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