Chapters (88)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Dear Reader …
- Also by Robert Muchamore
- PART ONE
- Walter J Freeman Adolescent Mental Health Unit – East Grinstead, UK
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- PART TWO
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- PART THREE
- Walter J. Freeman Adolescent Mental Health Unit – East Grinstead, UK
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- FORTY-SIX
- FORTY-SEVEN
- FORTY-EIGHT
- FORTY-NINE
- FIFTY
- FIFTY-ONE
- FIFTY-TWO
- FIFTY-THREE
- FIFTY-FOUR
- PART FOUR
- FIFTY-FIVE
- FIFTY-SIX
- FIFTY-SEVEN
- FIFTY-EIGHT
- FIFTY-NINE
- SIXTY
- SIXTY-ONE
- SIXTY-TWO
- SIXTY-THREE
- SIXTY-FOUR
- SIXTY-FIVE
- SIXTY-SIX
- SIXTY-SEVEN
- SIXTY-EIGHT
- SIXTY-NINE
- SEVENTY
- SEVENTY-ONE
- SEVENTY-TWO
- SEVENTY-THREE
- EPILOGUE
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- Have you read KILLER T?
- 1 SLASHED RUBBER
- 2 NOT HARRY POTTER
The three men saw Georgia was close to boiling over. They cast wary glances and feared she’d snap Steve’s finger when he jabbed it towards the screen.
‘What?’ Georgia growled.
‘You missed a decimal point,’ Steve said. ‘Unless you want to fly a spinning top …’
‘Right …’ Georgia said, inserting the point, then clicking an upload box to send the revised settings to the drone. ‘How am I for time?’
Pilots had to have their drones at the launch line two minutes before the race. Georgia hooked her control set around her neck and grabbed her first-person-view goggles as her dad plugged a battery into the drone.
Georgia was the last of the eight pilots to arrive but was fine because an air gate was being fixed after a crash in the previous race. While John stepped over a low barrier to put his daughter’s quad on the launch line, Georgia had her ID badge scanned by a steward, before going four steps up to a podium.
She was still irritated by the argument over trim changes and tried to get her head in the zone by reciting carefully memorised course directions under her breath.
‘Launch, hard forward, gate one – full power, three seconds, gate two – sharp left, laser tunnel, gates three, four – climb and right, gate five, sharp left tilt, through the double doors into loading bay – climb to ceiling, gate six, full power for seven seconds – gate seven …’
‘Excuse me,’ a cameraman interrupted, almost getting Georgia’s toes as he filmed Niels van Hooten.
The exuberant Dutch pilot jumped onto the stage, with a smug grin and a bright orange boiler suit covered with sponsor patches. He waved to a crowd of thirty, with his FPV headset balanced atop waves of greying hair.
If Georgia still cared enough to read her dad’s issue of Drone Monthly, she’d have known Van Hooten and his team’s disqualification had been the scandal of the season in the racing community.
‘What does it feel like having to go through three qualifying rounds to reach a final your big rivals have qualified for automatically?’ a scrawny guy holding a voice recorder in Van Hooten’s face asked.
‘I practise every day,’ Van Hooten told the recorder. His English was confident, but not his first language. ‘Racing is the best practice there is.’
‘But there’s a chance of a crash or a mechanical failure during a qualifier,’ the interviewer pointed out.
‘I may get struck by lightning when I go jogging,’ Van Hooten said dismissively. ‘But I live my life. What good is it to lie awake at night worrying about your own shadow?’