OOM: Bike Race

[latino_menace]

He's been looking forward to this though he definitely thought the girl would chicken out when it actually came to following through. He's surprised, in a good way, when she doesn't.

It is also inconvenient that the door to the bar would only open onto the front hallway of his house. Not because the place is small - far from it but because the carpet is brand new and his wife will complain forever about the marks.

'Just wheel it through. Mine's out front, you can follow me to where we're starting.'

There's a smirk and not a very nice one at that.

'If you can keep up. If not, good luck finding your way back to here to get home.'

Ramon is even more of an asshole when at home, surrounded by his hangers-on (there are a few of them around, all armed and eyeing Dinah and her bike up).

Comments

[raptorcanaria]

It probably says a lot about dinah that she's more aware of being eyed up when she's in full leathers and short dark hair than in a wig and fishnets. Maybe it's because it's not quite as full-on. She's getting attention, without the confidence of being the Canary.

She glances around at the men quickly, perhaps because she's nervous and inimidated by so many armed men in one room. But in that second it takes to look around, she's counted guns, identified anyone likely to be carrying a hidden weapon, andfigured out exactly what she'd have to do for each man should this go south.

It's not going to go south; she's just Dinah Lance, a florist, and is here to have a bike race, not engage any organised crime.

She smiles back at him pleasantly. "You wouldn't really leave me stranded here, would you?"

[latino_menace]

Oh yeah, still smirking.

'Depends. Might be a price for getting back.'

He shuts the door. Of course, he's planning to win this race anyway so it doesn't really make a difference.

He turns his head to the tallest of his guys, six two and all muscle shoved into a T-shirt a couple of sizes too small, and tells him in Spanish;

'Take her bike outside, Rico. We'll be there in a minute.'

And then, to Dinah (in heavily-accented and not very good English);

'How you want to do this? Drive 'round the route first?'

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah's Spanish isn't brilliant, but she listens anyway, and doesn't suspect that he said anything she needs to worry about.

She watches Rico as he takes her bike, wondering briefly whether anyone would tamper with it, then decides she'd just have to deal if they do. Without her bike in her hands, she lets them fall to her side, loose but she's not relaxed enough to tie them up with activity.

"Works for me. I'd like to see where we're going."

[latino_menace]

'Fine with me. I wouldn't want it said that I won this by having an unfair advantage.'

A heavily pregnant girl walks into the hallway to see what the action is. Ramon ignores her utterly and gestures Dinah to the front door.

'After you.'

It's warm outside but not unpleasantly so. This is a good part of the city, clean and well-maintained, not too much traffic on the road outside. His bike is parked outside and Rico has pushed Dinah's behind it, watching over both of them. It's hardly necessary, no one's going to fuck with his belongings around here.

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah shoots the girl a friendly, winning smile, but before she can asked to be introduced, or even if this is his wife, she's being gestured outside, so the smile becomes an apologetic wave.

It'd be nicer outside if Dinah wasn't in biker leathers and had her legs exposed to the wind, but she can't get away with biking in fishnets. She's even got a helmet, which she never needs but she'd been worried she'd have to explain its absence.

She perks up when she sees Ramon's bike. "That's a beauty," she says. But hers is better. Hers is Ted's.

[latino_menace]

'I know.'

His is better. It's his.

He's looking sourly at her though. For that smile, and that wave. She isn't here to fraternise with his wife (who, incidentally, tried to smile back but got shoved past as they all left).

He snaps some instructions at his guys and some of them get into the shiny black Mercedes a little further up the driveway.

'Yours isn't bad either.' He looks her up and down, his expression returning to something bordering on lewd. 'Maybe I should be racing to win the bike instead.'

A pause.

'...nah. Nice to look at but probably not as much fun.'

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah shrugs, smiling again. "Bike's got a lot more mileage under the belt, as well."

The reminder of what they're racing for so shortly after seeing his pregnant wife knocked some of the wind out of her, but she'd be damned if she's going to let him notice this.

"Anyway," she says as she lays a glove back on the handlebars of her Triumph. "My uncle'd kill me if I lost this."

Ted would laugh at her, actually. Then punch her extra hard in the training ring.

[latino_menace]

'Is your lack of mileage supposed to put me off?'

It does quite the opposite. He's smirking as he lights a cigarette and swings his leg over his bike. He doesn't bother with a helmet, obviously, but does slip a pair of shades on to keep any bugs out of his eyes.

'Try to keep up then. They're keeping an eye on you in the car so if you lose me, follow it instead.'

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah smirks at him as she swings her own leg over. That was the exact opposite of what she meant.

She slips her own helmet on, visor up all the same; bugs have never bothered her, really.

(Perhaps the DC Universe doesn't have bugs)

"Where do those guys think I came from?"

It's been bothering her.

[latino_menace]

He looks back over his shoulder with an expression made entirely of are you stupid?

'How should I know? They know better than to ask.'

They're not his friends. Ramon doesn't have friends. He has people who work for him, do as they're told and shut the fuck up.

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah grins and shrugs visibly for him. She's not really familiar with the concept of not being friends with the peple you work with.

"Just wondered what you'd told them, is all."

[latino_menace]

'Not a damn thing.'

He starts the bike and guns the engine, blowing exhaust fumes back at her.

'Come on then.'

He pulls off with a spin of his wheels, spraying gravel from the drive all over the place.

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah is surprised, but it doesn't last long. Firing up her Triumph, she starts smoothly, without anything like that spray of gravel. He ends up ahead of her at first, but she closes the initial distance in hardly anytime, keeping a respectful distance behind him.

[latino_menace]

Ramon lives towards the north of the city, where the moneyed people live. Once they've bypassed the centre, weaving through near-gridlocked streets, the place seems to visibly decay, graffiti gets worse, trash everywhere, more boarded up houses and shops. There's evidence of crime in places - broken windows, areas cordoned off with police tape, scorched ground where fires have been started or bombs planted; the worst of Colombia's violence will happen in the 80s, but that doesn't mean it hasn't started now.

And after another couple of miles, they hit the edges of what is obviously a slum. A vast, sprawling slum; it stretches like a forest of corrugated iron and trash in front of them, heat haze rising off it, stinking and alive like an ants nest.

Ramon loves it here, loves it and despises it for the shit hole it is.

'We'll wait for the car,' he tells Dinah when she pulls up next to him, killing his engne and lighting a cigarette. 'You don't want to go in there without some guys around who know to pull you out if the shit starts. And don't get off your bike for any reason, if you value it at all. They'll have it stolen and stripped for parts before you realise its gone.'

[raptorcanaria]

"OK."

Dinah's not very good at acting the scared vulnerable young woman, so she doesn't even try; the assumption that she can't take on considerable numbers of armed thugs on her own is so obvious to nearly everyone that she doesn't need to worry about it.

Anyway, she doesn't want her bike stolen while her back's turned in a fight. She clears her throat quietly, responding to a niggle, and realises that she probably couldn't scream around here if she wanted to. None of this is on the plan, anyway; it's just nice to know where she's going.

"How long's the route?"

[latino_menace]

'Depends on how long you want the race to be. And what sort of race you want.'

He smirks, implying that there are a few ways this could go.

'This road here goes all the way around the main part of the barrio. That'd take all fucking day to race so we're not doing that and anyway, it's boring. But if we follow it around a couple of miles, there's a turn off into the actual slum itself. I figure the fairest thing to do would be head inside and the first one back to here, wins.'

This is obviously massively unfair, seeing as he knows this place backwards and she's never seen it before in her life. Plus, he knows that no one in there would dare come near him or try to slow him down whereas her, a lone girl on a beautiful bike? Is likely to get jumped constantly as she tries to find her way back.

But Ramon's never been about fair and anyway, he really wants to win.

[raptorcanaria]

That thought occurs to to Dinah briefly as well. And the biggest worry is how she can keep her time down without hurting anyone too badly. She's sure she'll manage, anyway.

"Sounds good to me," she says, unaware of how naive that sounds.

[latino_menace]

He smirks because yeah that sounds naive and he now knows without a doubt that he's got this in the bag.

'Then lets do it.'

The car has finally caught up and he hops off his bike to toe a line in the dirt. A couple of his guys get out and come over; he tells them in rapid Spanish to head into the slum. Maybe as lookouts. Maybe just to scupper her if it looks like she might, by some miracle, get in front of him.

He restarts his engine, tosses away the smoke in his mouth and draws his front tyre up to the line.

'You need an embossed invitation?'

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah changes her mind about her helmet and tosses it to one of the guys. She figures she'll need all of her peripheral vision for this.

She grins and draws her bike up next to Ramon's, tucking her hair behind her ear as she does so.

The grin she gives him is friendly. They might as well be racing for bragging rights.

[latino_menace]

He grins back. But it's not as friendly. More predatory than anything and it's helped by the way he's obviously, even from behind his shades, looking her up and down as if to remind her what the stakes are for her if, when, she loses.

His wingman, Rico, steps up to act as starter. Ramon nods to him, his hand drops and he takes off - no showy wheel spinning this time, he's all business, shooting off the line like a bat out of hell.

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah's reflexes kick it as soon as the hand moves, but she starts up smoothly, so for a second he's got a lead.

And then she's right on his back wheel, figuratively snapping at his heels. It's not exactly a safe distance, but her handling is perfect, and she's not trying to overtake, just alert him to what he's up against.

[latino_menace]

He's aware of how close she is behind him but isn't particularly worried, as he hasn't opened the bike up fully yet. And if, by some chance, she turns into the slum before him he still knows the place better than her, and all the shortcuts.

He's quite surprised by the way she keeps closed in though, and the way she's clearly proficient at driving the bike. He's never seen a girl be able to ride like that before.

It's not far to the turning, not at the speed they're going. The road - well, it's generous to call it a road, more like a collection of uneven and cracked paving stones bound with gravel and weeds - curves around to the right, circling the mass of corrugated iron shacks that make up this place. She'll be able to see where it gives way to the slum itself, there are people congregated on the corner, waiting for a bus into the city. It's about a mile away and he guns his engine, hoping to leave her behind.

[raptorcanaria]

At this point she pulls back a little, and gives him some space. For about fifty yards, before she guns her own engine and speeds to the side. There's just about enough space there so that, without hurting any of the buildings, she can overtake neatly.

[latino_menace]

He curses and veers in behind her on purpose, catching what little slipstream there is to be gained on a road like this and ready to try and take her on the inside as they turn into the slum.

[raptorcanaria]

Dinah eyes him in her mirror and checks ahead just before they turn, in order to decide that fighting him on the turn isn't worth it.

She gives him a very narrow gap in order to take through; if he's quick, and good, and cocky enough to try it. She suspects he's all three.