Her dreams had come true, she was now a racer and she had won the two races she had participated in. It felt amazing to do what she always wanted to do, race. Not only was she now a racer but she had an incredible mentor and crew chief, a legend in his own right, Lightning McQueen. One of her own personal heroes, someone she had watched on tv from her childhood was now teaching her everything he knew and had learned from the legendary Fabulous Hudson Hornet.

Never had she thought when she was tasked to train Mr. McQueen; which in its self was tremendous, that he would end up training her. But then neither of them seemed to have truly realized what had happened until part way through Mr. McQueen's race when she was told to leave by Mr. Sterling.

That's when it seemed to click into place for him, but not quite for herself yet. Once they switched and Smokey just couldn't tell her what she needed, Mr. McQueen took over. With his help, she beat Jackson Storm and his derogatory comments about her being a trainer. She showed she was more than just a trainer, that she was a true racer. Then when the other racers congratulated her after she won, well that was just the cherry on top.

She knew though she could not race for Mr. Sterling, not after he was so dismissive of her and how quick he wanted to move on from Mr. McQueen. That did not work for her.

So, when Mr. Tex asked her to join the Dinoco team she excepted right away. Mr. Tex had then gone to talk to Mr. Sterling, what she later learned was they brokered a deal for Rust-eze so that Mr. McQueen could still be under the Rust-eze name. That made her feel more confident about her choice.

It was great, after the race Mr. McQueen took her to Radiator Springs to meet all his friends who he called family. He showed her and Smokey Doc's wing of the town's racing museum, and they trained on the town's dirt track.

It didn't matter anymore the reason he started teaching her was so he could train. She found she liked getting her tires dirty and the simulators truly weren't anything like the real thing. She still thought he had a great psych up routine, which he did fully reveal to her and told her he had done it from the time he started racing.

Mr. McQueen had given her the confidence that she lacked. He told her it was because she had believed her parents to dream small, dream realistically. So, she had. But now with his encouragement she now knew she could take on the world. Nothing would stop her now.

She is Cruz Ramirez and she can take on the world.

After Cruz's whirl wind of what happened, I'm sure she would need a moment just to stop and think, yeah that happened this is my life now.

So this is my third little foray into the Cars universe and I still have more I want to finish writing, I still completely blame Cars 3 for my current obsession. One good thing though, it's got me writing again instead of just reading. I might even get somewhere on my non-Cars fics.