Rustles

Part 23

It was dark grey Lexus[1] with mean eyes. When she sat inside, her first thought was not to break anything. This had to be the topmost expensive car she had ever sat inside. Except what Nathan drove in – all those screens and computers it had to cost triple. But this one was certainly nicest.

“You guys know how to stand out in the neighborhood.” She admired the impressive curves and pearl metallic gray.

“Put your bag in the pack,” he sat in and opened the door for her from inside, “you’ll only need your phone.”

“I think I’d need my own phone,” she rummaged her bag for it, “I don’t know how to use it.”

“It only has two buttons – on and off. We’ll call you and all you need to do is press them. Easy, monkey!”

“Don’t call me that.” She wasn’t even up to mocking him back. She was too busy inspecting the new thing. For starters, it was way bigger than her old phone and awfully mundane. She pondered if she could toss it against the wall and then put it back together, like in old days. It sure looked that way.

She closed her bag and put it down on the back seat. For someone, who seemed like man, who travelled and was constantly in trouble, he sure had a lot of money in his hands. To keep such a car, she assumed, he had to live steadily somewhere and well-off. That would explain why her place brought out such disgusted impression to his face, when she reasoned staying there.

Everybody seemed well off compared with her. Even the drunks downstairs seemed better off than she was. They had their entire life to prepare for that, she thought bitterly. Two years ago she had to start from absolute zero and work up from there. To her even the simple chair in the kitchen had come with price of gold.

She didn’t want to hold that phone anymore. New model as it was, it made her miss her own little grey egg with scratched edges and plastic shining through the old varnish. She quickly crossed hands on her chest and tucked the phone under her arms and turned to look outside.

He didn’t explain her anything while they were driving. After a while she started recognizing the houses on the street and understood soon that they were going towards Ellinger street.

She straightened up on the seat. “What’s your plan then?” Surely they wouldn’t toss her in without any guidelines.

“Pray for miracles?” he offered with stretched humor. “We had a plan, but your friends screwed it up.”

“I can always count on them.” She joked.

“The plan right now is to get the canisters, destroy the house and get them out.”

“Yes, that’s your ultimate goal, but some incite on the steps for reaching it wouldn’t hurt.”

He stopped the car three streets down next to a small fountain yard.

“We’ll only need you afterwards.” He pulled his T-shirt over his head and tossed it in the back, he left on his net shirt, before pulling big sport bag out from the back and getting heavy fabric belt from it. He locked it quickly around his waist and adjusted the mirror above the window so he could see anyone passing by while fixing fingerless leather gloves on. “For now you sit in the car and wait.”

He picked out pair of headphones and gave one to her. “You can hear us through this.”

“Don’t they have equipment to spy on spies?”

“Their main purpose is to play zoo guards, not let the rhinos out. The only ones, who know about them, work with them.”

“Plus upper military force, who ordered those tests?” she snorted.