"Baby, baby, baby, oh..."
"Like, baby, baby, baby, no..."
Over and over, the song drilled into his brain. Borreipaire froze. Wait... was that...
Justin Bieber's mind-numbing "Baby"?
What was going on?
Borreipaire pushed open his office door and leaned out. He immediately saw George Russell, who had connected his phone to a Bluetooth speaker and was holding it aloft, pretending to enjoy the music. But in the pit garage, everyone's eyes were sneakily darting toward Kai, trying to see his reaction.
If this wasn't a prank aimed directly at Kai, Borreipaire would eat his headset.
In today's free practice, Kai had been slow. His second stint was the same, and his final time wasn't even in the top ten.
Normally, a practice time meant nothing. Everyone knew it was for learning the track and testing setups. But Kai's situation was... special.
The outsider, who had been a ghost all winter, had finally shown up, only to be dead last. His performance seemed to confirm that the "baby-faced" Kai was, in fact, just a "baby" on the track.
And so, this. They were waiting for him to crack.
Russell, for his part, looked completely absorbed in the music, as if he meant no harm at all.
Nearby, Jack Aitken, who had been about to leave, was leaning back, his eyes closed, swaying to the music. He was a good actor, but he was failing. The smile he was trying to suppress was twitching at the corners of his mouth.
He couldn't help but glance at Kai, curious. How would the "baby" respond?
Kai had just finished his debrief and was starving, his mind already on dinner. He looked up, saw the scene, and paused. His dark eyes scanned the garage, taking in the barely-suppressed smiles and the darting, nervous glances.
"Baby, baby, baby, oh..."
A small smile played on Kai's lips, rising to his eyes. He tipped his chin up at Russell.
"Nice taste in music, George."
And without breaking stride, he turned and walked away, leaving the entire garage in stunned silence. Even Borreipaire, who had been about to step in and shut the whole thing down, was frozen.
Swish.
Every eye in the garage swiveled from Kai's back... to Russell.
Russell's eyes went wide. "...I wasn't... I didn't... No..."
His stammering was drowned out by a massive, sudden roar of laughter. Aitken completely lost it, clapping Russell on the shoulder as he grabbed his scooter and glided out of the garage.
Russell was left standing alone, staring at his phone and the speaker, a look of utter despair on his face.
Unlike Friday, Saturday in the GP3 paddock started early. After F1's final practice session, it was their turn.
It was time for qualifying.
Because the F1 qualifying session was also on Saturday, the grandstands were already packed with rabid fans when Kai arrived at the circuit. You could tell from their hoarse voices and sweaty faces that they'd already been partying for hours.
In the bustling crowd, Kai was just another anonymous figure. Even his Asian face drew no attention.
Until a single shout cut through the noise like a thunderclap.
"KAI! ZHI! ZHOU!"
The call sent ripples through the crowd.
Kai instinctively turned. In the sea of people, a figure was holding a handwritten sign high in the air.
"KAI - POLE POSITION!"
He squinted. It was Lorenzo Moretti.
Clearly, Lorenzo wasn't going to miss Kai's official debut. He was here, ready to watch his friend shock the establishment.
Kai let out a disbelieving laugh. He turned to face Lorenzo, leaned back, and mimed a perfect, fadeaway jump shot. The casual, confident gesture seemed to glitter in the sun. Lorenzo roared with laughter, pumping the sign in the air.
But this same scene, to Matteo Vitale, who was standing a few rows away, was a vision from a nightmare.
Matteo stared, his face pale with horror. Nearly half a year had passed. He'd thought he'd forgotten that night in Rome. But in one single glance, the humiliation and pain came flooding back, threatening to swallow him whole.
He looked at Lorenzo, uncomprehending. What is HE doing here?
Lorenzo, catching his eye, just beamed. "Surprise!"
Matteo's face instantly contorted into a perfect replica of the "The Scream."
Kai didn't miss it. He laughed, the last of his nerves vanishing into the air, and walked toward the pit garage.
In the focused rush of preparation, time melted away. Before he knew it, F1's final practice was over. It was time.
GP3 qualifying was a 30-minute, all-out session. There was no knockout format. Drivers could go out whenever they wanted, for as long as they wanted. The only goal was to set the fastest possible lap time within the 30-minute window.
Like F1, the GP3 tires were supplied by Pirelli. Each driver was allocated only three sets of dry tires and two sets of wet tires for the entire weekend—covering qualifying, the Feature Race, and the Sprint Race. You could use a new set in qualifying, but you'd be robbing yourself of tires for the race.
Because of this, strategy was everything. The decisions they made now would affect their whole weekend, especially at a high-wear track like Barcelona.
Normally, drivers want to go out in the final minutes, when the track is "rubbered in" and at its fastest.
But this wasn't an elimination session. All nineteen cars would be on the track at the same time, which meant one thing: traffic.
Just like on a city highway, a racetrack can have traffic jams. Finding a "clean" lap, a piece of empty track, required calculation, observation, and perfect communication with the race engineer. Get it wrong, and your lap was ruined.
If everyone waited until the end, the traffic itself would become the variable, and you might never get a clean lap.
The battle of wits had already begun.
At 12:25 PM, the light at the end of the pit lane went green. GP3 qualifying was live.
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