Part 18 – Stacking Penalties…

She was a brand new, chrome-colored ’07 Crow, gleaming frame drawing my eyes alluringly. Like my old Condor, she had an annoyingly bent wing, but I could overlook that perhaps. She looked mean, sporty and fast. I knew I had to have it, especially where I was going to be going.

I walked right up to the dealer, smiling. “Excuse me, but how much is that Crow in the window?”

Like most dealers in Empire City, this one was a faceless goon, but I hardly cared. He responded flatly as I slapped down money, and my Crow seemed to become mine almost instantly, rolling out right into view. How very convenient. Now I had to go shopping for the proper accessories of course. And to plan where exactly in my lawless destination I wanted to go to with that priceless Cerberus blueprint…

I immediately viewed the choices and thought to myself things were looking rather nice. A wide range of possible brands to pick from for fitting my beloved new Crow were available, from the wonderful LV Series tires, to the far more expensive Arbalest tires, that offered .05 percent better roadworthiness.

“Excuse me, but could I get a set of four of those LV-2000’s?” I asked politely to the faceless clerk, who shrugged.

“Sure. If you want to worry about stacking penalties.” He grumbled. “And don’t look at those Tire Tread Stabilizers. If you fit a few of those, your headlights’ll only go half as far and take longer to turn on at night. Didn’t you hear about the new laws an’ stuff that’re taking effect tonight?”

I was startled. Fitting penalties for four tires? Fittings to prevent my wheels from being disabled, causing my headlights not to work? My mind boggled. He tried to explain.

“You see, the first wheel gives you additional traction of ten percent, but the second only gives you nine percent. Then the third…” he blathered on, and my mind wandered away. He finally added. “It’s for new legislation, cracking down on hit-and-run muggers.”

Fair enough. I shrugged and didn’t really care about those types, as long as they didn’t try what they did to me before during that ‘memorable’ little visit to a 0.4 mining spot. “Pardon me then. But what is going on? I need to… em. Take a good, long trip out to 0.0 County.” I said sternly after, returning my thoughts to the task at hand. “What’s going on tonight that’s so important to issue new laws?”

“Holiday. Downtime day.” He said flatly. And I stared. He continued. “Doing most anything is illegal for the next twenty four hours. Go take a nap, or drive yourself insane from boredom. Oh yeah, automakers are releasing some new models tomorrow. You probably should check back then if you’re interested.” He shrugged.

I just wanted to leave. Slapping down more money and watching parts delivered next to my crow outside, I turned to step out… only to find the door locked as my hand fumbled with the knob.

“Its downtime day as of… now.” The man said as he read a watch, before leaning back in his seat and falling asleep quite soundly. The door would still not budge. I waited as the lights turned out, sitting back with myself in total darkness for twenty four hours.

It would be a long wait. The seconds seem to tick by so slowly, and I had no contact with the outside world. I thought I’d go mad waiting.

What happened after that eternity of waiting almost made me wish I had.

(to be continued)