by Bob Blanton
“Yeah, you’d swear they have a string attached, wouldn’t you? Now here comes his score.”
Travis’s score was ten points better than Annika’s putting her in third place.
“I’m not sure he was that much better,” Matthew said. “I’m going to go ask Carlos what he thinks?”
“Carlos?”
“A groupie I met earlier.”
◆ ◆ ◆
“Carlos, what did you think?” Matthew asked after he tracked the would-be mechanic down.
“Annika got robbed,” Carlos said. “The judges left too much room. She should be in first place, or at least second.”
“Do you really think so?”
“Definitely. But it won’t be a problem tomorrow. If the judges are fair, she’ll cream Travis.”
“Are you going to be here?”
“You betcha. I’m still looking to latch onto one of the teams.”
◆ ◆ ◆
“I’m going to see if I can find Annika,” Emily said the next day when they arrived at the stadium for the final two rounds.
“Sure, I’m going to look for my source and check out the other teams. See what people are thinking,” Matthew said. He headed down onto the field looking for Carlos. It only took him a couple of minutes to find the would-be mechanic.
“Carlos, how’s it going?”
“I’m doing fine. You back to see who wins?” Carlos asked.
“Yeah. I want to get a read on how the various teams are feeling.”
“Well, I can tell you Travis is not feeling too happy.”
“So, he’s worried about Annika?”
“He should be. He’s been stewing all morning. I‘m worried he’s high. I don’t like the dude, but I wouldn’t want him to get hurt.”
“High?”
“He had a bad crash last year. Had to take some serious drugs for the pain. I’ve heard that he still takes them.”
“Why would he, surely he’s not still in pain?”
“He got hooked. He needs to get off them before they screw up his career. I think he tried a few months ago. He was out of sight for about six weeks.”
“But you think he’s back on them?”
“Yeah. That mean temper is something that showed up with the drugs. He used to be a pretty cool guy.”
“Where are his mechanics?” Matthew asked as he watched Travis pacing around his pit area.
“I haven’t seen them; I think he’s waiting for them to show up.”
“Shouldn’t they be there going over his bike?” Matthew asked.
“One would think so. His manager is pacing around like a mother hen. I heard him asking where they were, and Travis told him to mind his own business.”
“That’s weird.”
“Seems like it. Hey, I’ll see you around. The first guys should be moving up to the start.”
Matthew wandered around checking in on a few of the teams, getting some quotes about how they felt about their chances. While he was doing that, he kept an eye out on Travis’s pit, trying to see when his mechanics would show up again.
He watched as the first ten competitors did their run. None of them scored high enough to make it into the top five that would get a third run. He saw Emily talking with Annika; it seemed like they’d become best friends the way they were chatting. Annika looked pretty calm, a bit amped up, but that was to be expected.
There was a break before the final ten competitors would start their runs. During the break, there was a small fire in one of the pits. Everyone ran over to watch and see if they could help. The fire was out almost as soon as it started; each pit had a fire extinguisher so the mechanic took care of the problem right away. Everyone was trying to figure out how the fire had started, but there didn’t seem to be any clues. Since nobody was hurt and there wasn’t really any damage, they just shined it on and went back to get ready for the next competitor’s run.
“Did you take care of it?” Travis asked his mechanics when they got back to his pit. Matthew saw them heading that way and was using his portal to listen in.
“Yeah, just like you told us to.”
“You didn’t screw it up, did you?”
“No, we slid it into her front tire just like you taught us. As soon as she lands that backflip, that tire’s going to pop. Then we’ll see how she likes it.”
“Good.”
“You know there’s no way we’ll be able to fix her again,” the second mechanic said.
“Don’t care. After a crash, her nerves will be shot, so even if she makes it through to the final round, I won’t have to worry about her.”
Matthew walked over to Annika’s pit. He stopped outside it and leaned against the wall so he could examine her bike using his portal. “What could they have done to her front tire?” he wondered.
He examined the tire and couldn’t see any issue. He pulled out a pocket flashlight so he could examine it closer. “Still nothing.”
He pressed on the tire to check the pressure, but that couldn’t be it. Annika or her mechanic would notice a problem like that. He was still trying to figure out what they could have done when the announcer called out that the last five contestants were up. Nobody had managed to break through into the top five, so they were going to be watching a preview of the finals since no matter what happened, the next five would all get a third run.
Frustrated, Matthew was about to give up. He watched as the mechanic in the pit next to him changed the tire on their bike. It was a weird-looking tire, instead of an inner tube inside a rubber shell, it was like a rubber ring that was inflated. Every part of it was thick. It took a special tool to mount the tire onto the rim before inflating it.
“The rim?” Matthew wondered. He used the flashlight and his portal to examine the space between the rim and the tire. Working his way around slowly he finally came across a stone of some kind caught between the rim and the tire. He examined it closely, it looked like a faceted piece of quartz, and the facets looked sharp.
Annika was getting ready to move to the starting area.
“Emily, stall her,” Matthew used his portal to hiss into Emily’s ear.
“Annika, how are your nerves now?” Emily asked.
Matthew used his portal’s zero friction feature so he could rotate the tire so the quartz was on the bottom. Then he put his portal on top of the quartz and with the other end under his foot he put all of his weight on it. “Nothing.”
He looked around for something heavier to push with. One of the mechanics was a big guy, easily 300 pounds. Matthew slid the end of his portal where the guy would step on it. “Hey, do you know who’s up next?” Matthew yelled.
The guy turned around and stepped on the portal. “Jefferson’s next!” the guy yelled.
“Thanks,” Matthew yelled as he turned back to Annika’s bike. The tire was losing air. When Annika gave it a bounce, it was obvious to her that something was wrong.
“Shit! Where’s my mechanic?”
“What’s wrong?” Emily asked.
“Something’s wrong with the tire,” Annika said as she moved over to the toolbox. It was padlocked. “What?! It’s supposed to be a combination lock. I don’t have a key!”
“Carlos, Annika needs a mechanic,” Matthew hollered, using his portal to make sure that Carlos could hear.
“What’s the problem?” Carlos called out as he ran to Annika’s pit.
“Bad tire, and my toolbox is locked.”
“No problem, I’ve got all the tools we need right here.” Carlos pulled a wrench out of one of the pockets in his cargo shorts. He straddled the tire and had it off in twenty seconds.
“Annika Sorenson, on deck!”
“Damn, Damn!” Annika said.
“Don’t worry, give me your spare,” Carlos said as he pulled another tool out of a pocket. Using it he pulled the tire right off of the rim.
Annika ran and grabbed the spare off of the wall, checking it for any damage as she ran back to Carlos.
&nb
sp; “Annika Sorenson, on deck!”
Carlos used the same tool he’d used to pull the old tire off to wedge the new tire back onto the rim.
“I’ve never seen anyone do it that way,” Annika said.
“Hey, if you’re out in the middle of nowhere with a flat, this is what you have to do,” Carlos said as he grabbed the air hose and started to inflate the tire. He used his hands to squeeze the tire and judge the air pressure. When he thought it was right, he pulled out a pressure gauge and measured it, letting out five pounds of air. “110 pounds, there you go.”
Annika grabbed the bike, smacked Carlos on the shoulder, and raced to the starting point.
“Annika Sorenson, on deck!”
“I’m here!”
Annika paused at the top. She didn’t have much time to gather herself since she was so late. She had to start her routine within fifteen seconds or forfeit this round.
“Do you think she’ll be able to pull it off?” Matthew asked Emily.
“They say she’s got ice water in her veins, so this will tell,” Emily replied.
“Go, Girl!” Carlos yelled as Annika started down the ramp.
She followed the same routine she’d done the day before, nailing each trick, each move.
“Here comes the backflip,” Carlos said. “She’s sure built up a lot of speed.”
Annika did a double backflip and the crowd went wild. She coasted up to the rim of the bowl and turned back, as the bike reached the flat, she went into a handstand on the handlebars, the crowd roared again as she flipped her hips and did a 360 on the front wheel before dropping back onto the pedals.
“That was unbelievable!” Matthew shouted.
“Ice Queen,” Carlos said.
“Annika! Annika! Annika!” the crowd shouted as Annika completed her routine, and after a quick bow to the crowd, rode back to her pit area.
“I wonder what Travis is thinking of that!?” Carlos shouted.
“Yeah, so do I,” Matthew said. He pulled out his cellphone and zoomed his portal over to Travis’s pit.
“You idiots! You screwed it up!” Travis shouted.
“Hey, we did exactly what you told us to. Put the quartz right into her front tire. It’s not our fault that the damn thing went flat early. There must have been something wrong with the tire!” the blond mechanic yelled back.
“I should have known better than to trust you! Now, I have to beat that!” Travis punched the wall.
“Hey, you’re not saying that you’re afraid of her, right? I thought you just wanted us to mess her bike up because she forced her way into the guys’ competition.”
Travis shook his head. “I guess I’m going to just have to beat the bitch myself. Now get lost!”
◆ ◆ ◆
“Annika, that was amazing,” Emily said when Annika came back to the pit.
“You did great,” her mechanic said.
“Hey, where were you, and what’s with the padlock on the toolbox?!” Annika demanded.
“What padlock? Hey, I didn’t put this here!” he yelled as he grabbed the padlock. “You were all set, I just headed up so I could get a good view.”
“Well, if it wasn’t for Carlos, I’d have had to forfeit that round!” Annika pointed to Carlos.
“So she knows you,” Matthew whispered.
“She should, I’ve given her my card like ten times,” Carlos said.
“Thanks,” Annika said giving Carlos a hug. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“Hey, you’d have done it in the third round,” Carlos said.
“Maybe, but it’s a lot easier to take risks when you know you’ve got a makeup round. You’re pretty good. Maybe we can make room for another mechanic.”
“Now you’re talking!”
“Congratulations,” Matthew said.
“Who are you?”
“He’s the guy who called me over to help you,” Carlos said.
“He’s my friend, we’re both in the same journalism class,” Emily added.
“Hey, Travis is up,” Carlos said, pointing to Travis at the starting line.
Travis’s first two stunts looked a bit weak but he rallied and executed the second half of his routine flawlessly.
“You’ve got him!” Carlos said.
“I don’t know,” Annika replied.
Everyone waited for the judges to post the last score and with that the standings.
The crowd roared as the scores went up. Annika was in first place by ten points and would get to go last in the final that night. Travis had fallen to third place.
That night Annika won. She had it sewn up before her turn, nobody had managed to beat her score. She used her turn to entertain the crowd with more tricks and spins, saving the flips for the next competition. Matthew sent the recording to the governing body of the competition, using one of his burner phones so it was anonymous.
Chapter 8
Undercover Reporting
On Monday when Matthew got to school there was a crowd standing by the flagpole. After locking his bike, he wandered over. “What’s up?”
“Do you notice something missing?!”
Matthew looked around. It was obvious that the statue of the school mascot was not where it usually was.
“Where’s the statue?”
“That’s what we’d like to know. Someone stole it.”
“Nah. Are you sure someone didn’t take it to repair it or something?”
“Sure, and they would leave a note saying ‘did your kitty run away?’ And homecoming’s in three weeks; we’re going to be laughingstocks.”
“Well get it back.”
“How? We have no clue who took it.”
“Fallbrook!” Emily said. She’d walked up and was standing behind Matthew. “We play them for homecoming and they’re mad because we beat them in regionals last year.”
“So that narrows it down to what, twelve hundred people?”
“There can’t be that many that would be able to pull off something like this. We should be able to figure it out.”
“We should leave it to the police.”
“Like they’re going to care about our mascot being stolen.”
“You students need to go to class!” Principal Grayson called out. “And leave the investigating to the police. I do not want to hear about one of you getting into trouble over this!”
◆ ◆ ◆
“Hey, Brea, we’ve got a table outside,” Matthew told her as she passed him on the way to the lunch line.
“Good, I’ll be there in a bit.” Brea was always late getting to the line because her class was all the way on the other side of campus.
“Can you believe someone stole our statue?!” Alex wailed when Matthew sat at the table with her and Jason.
“Yeah, it really sucks.”
“I’m sure it was Fallbrook,” Emily said as she joined them.
“That’s the consensus opinion,” Jason said. “They’re mad about last year, and we play them for homecoming in three weeks. Who else would care about our mascot statue?”
“This is a disaster,” Brianna said as she joined them.
“No it isn’t. It won’t change anything about the game,” Matthew said.
“Yes it will!” Brianna hissed; she had tears welling up in her eyes.
Matthew put his arm around her. “We’ll still win.”
“No we won’t. It’ll distract the team. It’s not fair.”
Brianna barely touched her lunch and after a few minutes, she took her tray and left.
“Why is she taking this so hard?” Matthew asked, although he was pretty sure he knew.
“She’s been stressed ever since she got back from the Open. She’s been a bit of a wreck,” Jason said.
“Is there anything we can do?” Alex asked.
“Mom says we have to just wait it out.”
◆ ◆ ◆
“Matt, we have to figure out who took the statue,” Emily said as she and Matthew hea
ded for their environmental science class.
“Aren’t we kind of busy investigating the drug thing?”
“Sure, but this is personal. And I bet we can figure it out quickly.”
“How?”
“We’ll go to their game on Friday. I’m sure we’ll be able to get some info, maybe sneak into a party after the game.”
“Emily, didn’t you hear the principal?”
“Yes, but this won’t get us into trouble. And think of the scoop if we come up with the story.”
◆ ◆ ◆
“Matt, I’ve been invited to a tournament in Mission Viejo!” Brianna squealed when Matthew showed up to work with Jason on their play for their lit class again. It was Wednesday, and it was like she was the same old Brianna, unlike Monday when she was crying over the mascot statue being stolen.
“I assume that’s good.”
“Yes. They’re going to pay me a bonus to come. And I get a chance to avenge myself against Mariam. They’ve set it up so we won’t face each other unless we both make it to the finals.”
“Then congratulations. When is it?”
“Uh. That’s the problem, it’s over Homecoming Weekend.”
“Oh. Well, it’s just a ballgame.”
“And a dance.”
“It’s okay. Will it be televised?”
“No, it’s a small tournament. So it’s not on TV. But this could be the break I’m looking for. If I can beat her, then I’ll be set for next year.”
“I’m happy for you. Really, I am.”
◆ ◆ ◆
“I’m glad you got out of going to the movies with Brea,” Emily said.
“It wasn’t that hard. Brea and Jen wanted to see some chick flick.”
“Right, I told them they should see it, hoping it would make you available for this.”
“It worked. Besides, I think Brea broke up with me.”
“What?!”
“I think we broke up.”
“How? . . . Why?”
“She’s turning pro. So, she expects to be traveling a lot.”
“Oh. I thought that might be coming, but I thought she would wait for summer.”
“No, she was hoping the Open would launch her career. She’s been invited to a tournament over Homecoming Week.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Matt. You should have come and talked to me.”
