Mayday: A Kaiju Thriller

Chapter Ten

I never noticed myself slipping into sleep.

~~~

Choking. I was choking. My lungs strained, but the air wouldn’t come. My arms were pinned to my sides. Colossal beasts walked the lands, footsteps pounding in my head. The pressure tightened on my throat. I struggled. My head spun. The world collapsed around me. A creature turned his massive bulk towards me. I recognised him. Tempest. His arms flexed, claws pointed towards me. His eyes burned with fire. He watched me die, impassive. His mouth hung open like a cavern of darkness.

He roared.

My eyes snapped open and I jerked awake, grasping at my throat. Air rushed into my lungs. The glow of the fluorescent light overhead burned my eyes. A figure appeared in front of me. I held up my hands to ward him off.

“Boss, easy.” Healy’s voice came to me through the dream fog. My vision cleared and his face resolved. “You all right?”

I looked around. The rest of the waiting room was staring at me. I must’ve only been out a couple of minutes. I could feel sweat trickling down the back of my neck.

“Come on,” Healy said. He took me under the arm and silently urged me to stand. I followed his lead as he guided me to the bathroom.

He pushed the door closed behind me and left me by the sink while he checked the cubicles were empty. I grabbed a couple of paper towels and wiped my face.

Healy leaned against the sinks and eyed me. “What was that about?”

“Just a bad dream. My mum always told me chocolate before bed was a bad idea.” I glanced at him to see if he was buying it. He wasn’t. I changed the subject. “What are you doing here?”

“The thug you coldcocked came around, so I spent a few minutes leaning on him. You look like hell.”

“Ah, piss off,” I said. The nausea was back with a vengeance. I swallowed to keep my stomach inside me.

“Boss, tell me what’s going on with you.”

“Give me a break, kid. I nearly got killed today. Is a man not allowed to be affected by that?”

He shrugged.

I whirled on him. “What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?”

“This is more than just nerves, Boss. You’re not coping.”

“Tell me how well you cope next time someone strangles you.”

“I’m just having trouble understanding,” he said. “You’ve faced death before. You were in Sydney when Grotesque hit. This was bad, but it can’t have been as bad as that.”

I curled my lip. “I wasn’t in Sydney.”

“What?”

“I was out of town on a case for a defence team.” I shook my head. “That’s a lie. I’d finished conducting the interviews three days before. I stayed away because I’d brought the junior assistant I was screwing with me. We turned it into a long weekend. You know, a hotel room and room service, that kind of weekend. We were heading back on the Monday when news of the attack came over the radio. We were less than an hour out. My wife—my second wife—was still in the city, right in the centre of town. She didn’t drive, I had our only car.” I closed my eyes. “Radio said Grotesque was tearing the place up. So I turned the car around and followed the traffic fleeing the city. I never saw Grotesque, only what they showed on TV. I looked up the aerial pictures of the city after the attack. Our apartment building was gone. Not flattened, just dust.”

Healy was quiet for a moment, pursing his lips. “Did you ever hear from your wife?”

I shook my head.

The bathroom door opened and a man walked over to the urinal. I tossed the paper towels in the bin and headed for the door.

“Boss,” Healy said.

“Forget it.”

He followed me back into the hospital corridor. “Go home,” he said. “Get some sleep. Or better yet, stay here and get your neck looked at. You need to rest.”

“I don’t need to rest,” I said. “I need all this shit to start making sense. If we don’t get some answers, Volkov’s going to have our heads.” I turned away and stared out the window at the rain hammering down outside. “This day. This fucking day.” I sighed. “Did you get anything out of the other thug?”

“Nothing substantial. Not yet. I need more time.”

I exhaled and leaned against the wall. A nurse walked past carrying a cup of coffee. I could go for one myself.

“I wonder,” Healy said. “That roar before. All those Maydays, roaring at once. Do you think they mourn their dead?”

“I don’t think they have any concept of death.”

“Maybe. Even animals mourn sometimes.”

“That’s the thing, though. They’re not animals. They’re not like us either. Maybe they see that Yllia’s dead, but I don’t think they….” I trailed off. Something clicked in my head.

“Boss? What’s up?”

I licked my lips. That was it. That was the answer. I grabbed Healy’s sleeve. He looked taken aback. Maybe it was the wild grin I could feel creeping across my face.

“Where’s Dasari? Has she come out yet? She was visiting her family.” I checked my watch. Her half hour was just about up.

Healy stared at me. “Uh, I can check.”

“Do that. Bring her to my car.” I shook my head. “No, wait. I’ll get her. You head back to the office, find the reporter, Cunningham. He’ll want to see this. Get Cunningham and meet me at Tempest’s pit.”

“Tempest? Boss, what’s going on?”

I grinned. “He’s our witness. Tempest. He’s our witness.”

~~~

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