Off to the Drift Races

Posted on Fri May 27th, 2022 @ 6:31pm by Lieutenant JG James Phoenix

Mission: Jupiter Mystery
Location: Holodeck 3
Timeline: Current

Ensign James Phoenix stood yet again in front of the holodeck. He often found himself in-front of one to get his mind off of things. Whether he'd be fighting a blood-thirsty Klingon or taking a peaceful walk. Ether way, he usually found that he was able to clear his head with the holodeck. Though he felt that being in certain places was much more enjoyable than witnessing a recreated version of it.

Right now the Washington crew was dealing with the situation regarding the Jupiter. He himself had been on alert during his patrol rounds around the ship. The Jupiter had a strange mystery going on and he didn't want the same thing to happen to the ship he served on. Either way, Phoenix finished his rounds and was now technically off-duty. He was still alert however. He just needed to clear his head. He reached out to the control panel of the vacant holodeck and began searching the programs he had saved. He kept tapping the control panel controls to scroll up and down the list. He spent several minutes searching the list for something. Potentially something he hadn't watched in a long while.

After he spent a tedious amount of minutes with no luck, he found a program. An automobile drifting event. More specifically a Formula Drift Event. In the early 21st Century these event occurred primarily in the United States and Japan. The specific Formula Drift event he loaded into the room was a race he actually attended a few years before Alpha Three. When he had just finished high school. The FD event was located at Evergreen Speedway in Monroe, Washington, about 42 minutes north of Seattle. But at the time James lived in North Ridge, so it was a lengthy hour and a half to two hour drive to get to the event. But as a gear head the drive was worth the wait.

After the program loaded, he entered from a quiet Starfleet corridor to a gravel pathway that led to the spectator entrance of FD: Monroe. Originally when he had attended that race, because of the long drive he was late to the event. But that didn't matter. Tire smoke could be seen emitted from the track in the distance as race cars slid around it. The cars also sounded beautifully to Phoenix even they were loud. As he grew closer to the event entrance, his face lit up. The sounds and smells never got old to him. Even if he was frozen for more than 350 years. He walked through the gates and was immediately opposed with two options: see the car show and vendors first, or watch the race first.

After a few seconds he made his decision. He knew that there would be a ton of people in the stands watching the race because that is were he had gone in real life when he saw the race. But here, he could make a different choice. So he felt the most logical action was to go see the car show first as there wasn't nearly as many people in the stands. The drifting would still be going on later in the day anyways. Most of the cars in the show part of the event were modified in various different ways. There were some that were wide bodied and put on air suspension. Others were showing off their heavily modified power trains or transformed interiors. Or there were the cars that were modified all around. Some of the cars were meant to be show cars. Others were meant to be race cars that were just being shown off and some of the other vehicles were meant to be 50 percent show car and 50 percent race car. Or more so one or more so the other.

A few hours later Phoenix heard his stomach groan. He was hungry. But given that this was a holodeck program, he couldn't really do much about food so he'd have to wait until after. With this development, he left the show and made his trek to the stands to watch the race. His timing was actually pretty good since there was a big crowd coming towards the show. Presumably some of the people who were watching the race when he got to the event. As he grew closer to the stands he grew more exited. All of the cars racing. So many sights he hadn't seen for hundreds of years. Even if they had only felt like decades. Why hadn't he thought of using this program before?

However his smile faded slightly when his badge chirped.

=^=Ensign Phoenix please come in=^=

=^=Phoenix here=^=

=^=Please come to the Acting Assistant CSTO's office. We are currently discussing our assessments from our rounds around the ship=^=

James sighed. His time in the holodeck had been cut a little short, but he knew he could come back later. At least he hoped so. =^=On my way=^=

Soon after that, he took one final look around the place. He took a breath and spoke out loud. "I'll be back" he started before he spoke to the computer. "Computer, save this moment in the program playback and end program."

The room reverted back to the typical look it always had. Phoenix knew he could come back later and he was sure as hell he'd be back in that room experiencing an old memory. He left the room after that to venture off to his duty calls.