In the future, daring couriers resurrect battered and discarded status symbols of the past. They modify old Lamborghinis and Ferraris, or other high powered old cars or ‘bikes, and then set off in search of thrills and fortune. They become despised by society, hounded by the law, and barely tolerated by the corporations that begrudgingly come to depend on them.
Jupiter has this recurring dream, a story, something that could become a book, a film, a game, all of those things, or just a blip on this blog.
The story is set in an imminent future, a flawed utopia some twenty
or thirty years out from now. Most people are getting around by shared and driverless
electric vehicles. These ‘cars’ pick up power from the road surface, which is
controlled by the government, who can then ensure that speed limits and traffic laws
are rigidly enforced.
Old internal combustion driven cars still exist, but even
though they are not illegal, they are socially despised. They are usually
driven by eccentric throwbacks, and those too poor to afford the latest
whirring blobs. The World is clean, safe, connected, and anodyne. However, there
is a new problem in this paradise, and it’s huge. The World’s online data is no
longer secure. Cryptography has been irrevocably hacked, and electronic
connections are no longer discrete ways to transmit information. Anyone needing
to move data around securely now has to revert to the crude methods of the
past; they have to put it onto physical media, and physically carry it to where
it needs to be. This spawns a new, dangerous, and exciting industry; high speed transit by
road.
So this is the scene, and the story starts like this:
Jupiter likes the first generation Ford Focus. The design is
attractive and innovative, and the driver’s seat is a nice place to be.
When Jupiter was a boy, every last Saturday of the month, he
used to jump on the number 188 London Bus to go see the Chelsea Cruise. This
happening was a vibrant collection of modified cars (customized was the word
used back then), classic American cars (Yanks), and ‘bikes. During the
seventies and eighties, the US car scene was particularly appealing to a
certain kind of Brit. Many lower middle class, or skilled working class, people
embraced the culture, because it seemed more fun and egalitarian compared to
the effete and snobby World of hillclimbs and sports-car clubs. The products of
this enthusiasm had a particularly local twist. The resulting ‘Street Machines’
were a kind of pastiche of custom, street rod and local styles, and they even
had a magazine more or less devoted to them.