The first time Max Verstappen sees Carlos Sainz, it is not in the way people usually meet someone who will later ruin their sense of reason.

It is at a traffic light.

Max is already late, already weaving his bike through the thin spaces between cars like he owns the road and the road has simply forgotten to argue back. The engine of his motorcycle hums under him like something alive and impatient, and Max leans forward over the handlebars with that familiar restlessness in his bones, the kind that never quite lets him sit still, never quite lets him be bored without turning it into trouble.

Then he sees the Jeep. It is absurdly clean. Too clean for the chaotic road.

That is the first thing he notices. Not the model, not the plate, not even the careful way it sits perfectly within its lane like it is afraid of offending the paint. No, what Max notices is that it looks like it has never been rushed in its life.

And inside it, at the wheel, is the driver.