Ariel Piper is one of the few female hover car racers, and driver of the Pied Piper.
History[]
Early History[]
Born and raised in Mobile, Alabama, Ariel Piper obtained her own racing-class hover car, which she christened the Pied Piper. During her teens, Ariel became one of only a few girls to race in the U.S. tournaments, indeed one of the few female hover car racers in the whole world.
At aged 17, after winning the East-American Regional Championships, Ariel expected to be invited into the International Race School, just as all qualifiers in regional tournaments were. However, she was declined admission by the school, primarily by the Principal, Jean-Pierre LeClerq, simply because she was a girl.
Ariel took the matter to the Australian High Court, which concurred that Ariel's gender was no reason to decline her a place at the school, and forced the School to allow her entry.
Hover Car Racer[]
Immediately upon arrival for her first term at the Race School, Ariel was the focus of many reporters who had heard of her situation, so she sat alone in the Race Briefing Room as the opening announcements and student-teacher pairings were made.
During dinner that night, Ariel sat alone again, until Jason Chaser approached, asking if her could join her. After explaining the reason for the press's attention and her isolation, Ariel almost broke down in tears because of her worries regarding LeClerq not wanting her around and the other racers giving her odd looks. Luckily Jason was able to cheer her up, telling Ariel that crying would signify that everyone that they had won, and promised to be her friend.
During the first race of the School's season, Ariel was able to maintain fourth place for much of the race, until the last turn when all of her right-side magneto drives lost power, and was unable to keep from continuing straight out past the turn towards the cliffs on the other side of the bay. Jason, seeing she was in trouble, gave up the race in order to pursue her, and despite his suggestion to eject, Ariel refused, knowing that without her car it would be the end of her time at school. Jason instead decided to use his own car to lift the Pied Piper above the clifftop, where emergency vehicles caught her.
In the aftermath, Ariel thanked Jason for his heroics, and mentioned that her mech chief had discovered that her magneto drives had been doctored before the race, as well her how pit bay's mainframe had been attacked by a timed virus. Ariel feared that someone was intentionally trying to force her out of Race School.
Indeed, similar problems arose for Ariel during several of the next races, with more magneto drive issues, viruses and thinned coolant hampering Ariel's progress on the Championship Ladder. Despite new firewalls and complaints to Wernold Smythe at the Parts and Equipment Department, little was able to change after 15 races. Fortunately, however, Ariel was able to win Race 18, which qualified her to participate in the Sponsors' Tournament. Later, early into Race 25, Ariel was among the racers caught up in a crash caused by Barnaby Becker, annoying Ariel since she couldn't race any further.
The night before the Sponsors' Tournament, Ariel attended the Sponsors' gala, where she congratulated Jason on his win in Race 25. Since the two had been matched up to face off in the first round of the Tournament, Ariel warned Jason that she would be racing to win, a sentiment Jason shared. In a moment of concern, Ariel asked if they would still be friends after, which Jason assured her would be the case. Later, Ariel was approached by the French pro-racer Fabian, who offered to help promote Ariel's career if she did well in the Tournament and slept with him. After Jason came over to check on Ariel, Fabian slipped her a spare keycard for his hotel room as he told Ariel to consider his offer before leaving. After experiencing a flurry of emotions as she considered, Ariel's ambition won out, and she apologised to Jason as she warned that there were things he did not yet understand before going to meet with Fabian in his room, where she reluctantly had sex with the older racer.
Before the race the next morning, the guilt-ridden Ariel avoided looking Jason in the eye, but did call to him immediately before their match to remind him that there were no friends on the track. Once the match began, Ariel initiated the first chase phase, with the lead switching back and forth between the two racers until Lap 96, where they raced towards the finish line relatively equally. However, Jason was able to take advantage of slightly too-wide turn Ariel made to take the lead and narrowly win the match. Fabian approached Ariel in the pit bays soon after to tell Ariel that their deal was off, her first-round loss having solidified his already-misogynistic views on female racers. Ariel desperately pleaded for him to reconsider, only to be ignored as he left. As she began crying at her own foolish decision to sleep with Fabian, Ariel noticed Jason watching, and fled away in anguish.
After crying some more in her room, Ariel checked on her tv and to her amazement saw that Jason was still in the Tournament. Swallowing her pride, Ariel made her way back to the stadium to watch the final round match between Jason and Xavier Xonora, cheering for her friend and rival, and was proud of Jason's effort despite losing in the end.
A few days after the Tournament, Ariel waited for Jason at a spot he frequented to relax, where she admitted to cheering for him and began trying to explain her actions and apologise. Asking for his forgiveness since he was the only friend she had at the School, Ariel was relieved when Jason told her there was nothing to forgive and that they hadn't stopped being friends, hugging him in gratitude.
Ariel continued on racing in the school championship following the Tournament, and by Race 37 she had worked her way up to eighth place on the championship ladder. Not long after Jason went to Italy to participate in the Italian Run, he was challenged to an exhibition match by Fabian. Recalling how Fabian had used Ariel, Jason called her to ask if she wanted to surreptitiously take his place in the match, both to allow her to get even with the French racer, and to give himself a chance to practice in the Argonaut II in peace. Ariel agreed and hurried to Rome, and when Jason pretended to use the restroom, Ariel changed into his racing uniform and donned his helmet before joining the Bug in the Argonaut.
Once Fabian and "Jason" set off, the French racer quickly took the lead, pandering to the crowd by performing playful maneuvers. Ariel was eventually able to exploit this and overtake Fabian, beginning a series of back-and-forth for leadership until the final lap where Ariel was able to cross the finish line first by half a car-length. With that, Fabian offered "Jason" a racer's salute before stopping the Marseilles and moving to shake "Jason's" hand. However, Ariel removed her helmet to show the world who had really beaten Fabian, to Fabian and the crowd's shock. Explaining when she had switched places with Jason, Ariel humiliated Fabian by asking him about his previous comments on women and hover car racing, to the crowd's amusement and delight.
The stunt proved especially empowering for Ariel, as by the time she returned to the Race School, she began receiving a number of letters from female fans, applauding her and thanking her for giving them the courage to work on becoming hover car racers themselves. Emboldened by this support, Ariel worked even harder during the next few races, racking up enough points to move into fifth place on the school ladder, and decided that she was going to work towards being in the top four by the end of the year and earning one of the invitations to the New York Challenger Race.
On Jason's first day back following his disastrous crash at the end of the Italian Run, Ariel met him to thank Jason for the opportunity to take Fabian down a peg. Seeing him notice the students listening to Zoroastro, Ariel commented on the alliances being made and how they were moving into the serious end of the school tournament.
Some races later, at the end of Race 49, Ariel had fallen to sixth place overall on the school championship ladder, due in part to a new crop of technical issues. Still, she had earned enough points to put herself in contention for the third or fourth placed spot, and with it one of the with it one of the final two invitations to the Challenger Race, provided that the results in the final race went in her favour. Early on the morning of Race 50, Jason overheard LeClerq and Smythe discussing plans to keep Ariel from finishing and earning a placement that would get her to New York, and so Jason warned Ariel about the virus Smythe planned on using to attack her pit machine, leading Ariel and her mech chief to quickly install a new firewall.
During Race 50, Ariel was a part of the pack leading the race, and was in fifth place for much of the race, until she managed to snag an opportunity to pass Isaiah Washington. As the racers pitted one final time on Lap 48, Ariel's pit machine was attacked by Smythe's virus, but due to the new firewall, it was repelled and instead attacked the school's power grid, causing a blackout mid-stop. Seeing Jason and the Bug aid Sally McDuff in operating a manual pit stop, Ariel opted to help her mech chief finish their pit stop too, listening to their explanation about the virus attack. Ariel's aid in the pit stop helped her finish quicker than the other racer, and soon set off again, this time ahead of Varishna Krishna, Barnaby and Jason, and soon managed to take first place.
Thanks to her victory and the other racers' results, Ariel had earned enough points to reach third place on the championship ladder, allowing her to win one of the invitations to the Challenger Race. Additionally, an investigation into the power cut led back to Smythe and LeClerq, whose schemes to provide Ariel with faulty equipment and keep her from doing well at the School - simply for being a girl - were exposed, getting the pair fired. At the end-of-year presentation dinner, Ariel and the other three racers who had won the invitations to the Challenger Race were called onstage by the acting principal to be congratulated on their efforts.
Ariel soon made her way to New York to participate in the Challenger, and once the race began, Ariel found herself in a chase pack pursuing the race's leaders, Xavier Xonora and Jason. Ariel narrowly avoided the major crash that took out several racers on Lap 3, and trailed the rest of the race just behind Igor and Vladimir Krotsky until the end.
Ariel stayed in New York to watch Jason as he joined the professional racers participating in the New York Masters, and was sitting alongside the rest of Jason's supporters during the final race. At Jason's request, Ariel asked a pair of police officers to observe the bookmaker Ravi Gupta, whom Jason had come to suspect had sabotaged the Argonaut during the Italian Run. Jason's suspicions proved correct, and once Ariel and the officers witnessed Gupta detonate a tiny explosive on the Argonaut's tailfin on the home stretch in an attempt to keep the young racer from winning, they apprehended the bookmaker and brought him down to the race officials to reveal the saboteur to them before he was taken away.
Personality[]
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Skills[]
- Expert Driver / Pilot: As seems to be standard practice for anyone wishing to learn how to drive a hover car, Ariel is capable of piloting the aviation-type hover car. She is capable of performing aerial feats and maneuvers that in the present day are only known to pilots of fighter jets.
- Expert Tactician: During her time as the driver and leader of Team Piper, Ariel has repeatedly shown her skills as a strategist in order to try and overcome her rivals.
- Capable Mechanic: Ariel has some ability as a competent mechanic, as demonstrated during Race 50 when she aided her mech chief in a manual pit stop to expedite the process following a power outage, despite her team's evident lack of practise for such events; indeed, she was capable enough to increase her placing in the race as a result of the incident.
Equipment[]
Vehicles[]
- Pied Piper: Ariel's personal hover car, a Boeing Evercharge-III, which she used to participate in the numerous races at the International Race School.
- Argonaut: The custom-built Ferrari Pro F1 made by and belonging to Jason, which he loaned to Ariel in order to race against Fabian during the Frenchman's challenge.
Other Equipment[]
- Team Piper Racing Uniform: Like all racers, Ariel has a racing uniform, comprised of a crash helmet, leather gloves and boots, and racing overalls, all coloured and patterned in Ariel's colours of choice.
- Pit Tarantula: A standard piece of equipment for hover car racers, this machine aids in pit bay maintenance during races, which Ariel's mech chief - Darius - managed during pit stops to keep their team's car in top working order by replacing worn or damaged parts, as well as refilling coolant.
- Team Argonaut Racing Uniform: Jason's racing uniform, a white blue and silver outfit which Ariel borrowed when she posed as Jason in order to covertly race against Fabian and humiliate him for the Frenchman's use of her.
Trivia[]
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