“Not all the time,” Tor contended. “There are far more failures in motorsport that are far less graphic than the ones that are widely publicised. Graphic failure is not the only kind of failure in motorsport, and is actually rather uncommon.”
Vater looked rather disgusted. He turned to his laptop, raising the screen and doing something on it before turning it to face Tor, revealing that he had a motorsport video cued up on the screen.
“You mean to say that this is not graphic to you?” Vater asked coldly.
Pressing a button with a firm strike of his finger, Vater withdrew his hand while the video started into motion.
Tor very quickly identified the cars as IndyCars, as they looked rather like Formula E cars, except with windshields and engine sounds, which — along with the cheering of the crowd behind the protective fencing — was all Tor could hear.
The camera was fixed on a corner, through which several of the cars were passing, many with brightly coloured liveries that Tor actually felt were quite cluttered, making it a challenge for him to tell what teams the cars represented.
Suddenly there was an explosion of debris, Tor could see that a tire on one of the cars had failed, sending it spearing into the barrier, allowing Tor to see that its racing number was 29.
In an instant a pursuing car, unable to stop in time, collided at full speed with the rear end of the 29 car, whose nose was flung away from the barriers in a mangled mess and spun back across the track into the path of an unsuspecting car that was unable to stop, and hit the 29 car squarely in the side while another car, seeking to avoid the melée, launched upwards, the camera panning slightly to follow it, causing Tor to see a familiar logo along the barriers.
It was the logo of the most recent Indianapolis 500. That 29 car had been Uncle Zikki. Tears rushed to Tor’s eyes; he felt sick.
The footage changed to another angle, and looked like it was going to show the incident again. Tor closed Vater’s laptop with a trembling hand. He didn’t want to see it again. He hadn’t even ever wanted to see it at all.
Shifting his gaze to Vater, Tor saw a self-satisfied — and also smug — smile on his face. He knew full well that Tor had been sleeping and hadn’t seen the crash live, and he’d had the nerve to go and find it somewhere.
As if his body were a room full of gas vapour in which a match had just been lit, white-hot rage exploded within Tor. He didn’t think he’d ever been more upset in all his life.
“You are heartless!” Tor screamed. “You are remorseless! That you would dare use such horrid and grotesque things for your own ends! How dare you! I will never follow in your footsteps! I have never had any intentions to do so, and what you have just done has accomplished the absolute opposite of helping your cause! I hate you! I will always hate you! I’ll go to my grave hating you! Even if you’re already dead!”
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