Nat shook his head. ‘What an unholy mess.’
Dutch nodded. ‘Got it in one, man.’
Signature Move
Nat let her grab a few hours sleep in his own room with the private security he’d hired posted outside. He woke her later that morning with a hard shove.
‘Time to rise,’ he said with brisk efficiency, dumping a tray on the bedside table. She sat up, head still groggy, to find he’d brought her croissants and coffee. ‘Shower first. You still smell like a prison.’
She stared at him through hair fanned across her face. ‘Time?’
‘Time to get the fuck up.’ He glanced at his wrist. ‘I want you in Conference Room Six on the twenty-third floor for a meeting with the boss twenty minutes from now.’ He stepped over to the door and wagged a stern finger at her. ‘And do not be late.’
* * *
She showered with a coffee in one hand and a waterlogged croissant in the other, mumbling to herself. She got dressed fast and staggered out the door, where one of Nat’s hired goons jerked his chin towards the elevators.
He followed behind her, mumbling into a walkie-talkie. Nat clearly wasn’t taking the risk that she might go AWOL a second time.
The conference room turned out to be long, wide and tall enough to host a couple of pick-up basketball games side by side and contained a single U-shaped table. Nat sat far off at one end, staring at a laptop. When she entered, the minion departed, closing the door after him.
Nat gave her a quick up-down. ‘Well, you look like shit.’ He nodded to a side table. ‘Get more coffee and we’ll start.’
She followed his suggestion before taking a seat beside him. She saw Wu on the laptop’s screen, seated behind a wooden desk of such vast proportions it looked like it could be taken out to sea were there any place to affix a sail. His gaze shifted towards her as she sat.
‘I find myself experiencing regret for releasing you from prison,’ he said with a scowl. ‘What, precisely, did you think you were doing last night?’
‘That’s it?’ she asked. ‘No, I’m so sorry you were almost murdered by a sword-wielding maniac?’
‘You failed to inform either myself or Nathaniel here that you had a price on your head.’ A muscle twitched in the old man’s temple. ‘Nor were you meant to abscond in order to steal a car.’
‘I didn’t steal it,’ she said in what she hoped was a reasonable tone of voice. ‘It’s my car.’ Not one hundred percent true, not any more, but it felt right to say it. ‘So I asked for it back.’
‘There may be at least two further assassination attempts,’ said Nat. ‘I’d like to beef security up further at the Fuji track.’
‘Agreed,’ said Wu. He looked back at Dutch. ‘Any more of this nonsense,’ he spat, ‘I’ll hand you over to the Russians with instructions to chain you upside-down in the main reactor at Chernobyl. Do we understand each other?’
‘I promise there will be no further incidents,’ said Nat, with apparent confidence. ‘Last night caught us all by surprise, but I’ll be even more vigilant from this point on.’
Wu massaged his head like he had a bad headache. ‘Just get her to Fuji,’ he said. ‘And for God’s sake don’t let her out of your sight.’
‘So,’ said Dutch, once Wu had signed off, ‘I get to drive the Coupé?’
Nat drummed his fingers, staring at the blank screen before turning to her. ‘It appears so. In which case, I think it’s time to talk about your new navigator.’
‘You’ve found someone?’
‘Watch this.’ He tapped at the computer and a video started running, shot from the perspective of a camera fixed to the hood of a car driving at speed past rusting and long-abandoned vehicles lining the side of a road. She could see one edge of an American Eagle decal on the hood.
Straight ahead of the car were the crumbling remains of a city block, and towering over that was a behemoth-like creature with six legs and spines like shards of black glass bristling up and down its back. It was in close pursuit of a second vehicle that combined the extravagant fins of a Lincoln Futura with the sleek, rounded curves of a Phantom Corsair, like some 1950s idea of a spaceship on wheels. The occupants were hidden entirely from sight behind wraparound black windows grey with dust. It shot past the first car, moving in the opposite direction, and disappeared from sight.
The Kaiju stared straight down the lens of the first car with eyes like burning coals, and let out a shriek that hurt Dutch’s teeth even through the laptop speakers.
Whoever had control of the first car decided, correctly in Dutch’s opinion, that their best strategy involved flooring the gas and driving straight under the beast before it had time to react. Kaiju were big and strong, but paid for that strength by being slow and dimwitted.
The camera viewpoint shot towards the Kaiju with increasing velocity, and Dutch found herself holding her breath. A leg as wide around as a bundle of tree trunks came thudding down onto the tarmac straight in front of the camera lens and the footage came to an abrupt end.
‘Anything look familiar?’ asked Nat.
Dutch let out a shuddering breath. No wonder Wu and Strugatsky made so much money out of the broadcast rights. ‘The Kaiju, or the cars?’
‘All three.’
‘The Kaiju is Long Tall Sally,’ said Dutch. ‘First sighted in 2035, right after the Rift first formed.’
‘And the cars?’
‘The first one is the Siberian’s jeep,’ she replied. ‘I’d know that hood decal anywhere. The other is Lucifer Black.’
‘The Siberian didn’t survive that encounter, I’m afraid.’
Dutch looked back at the screen. ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
‘Black had
