Night of Fire

“You two are really starting to piss me off, now.” Susan spat.

They were still behind her, chasing and shooting like they weren’t out in the open. Pausing for a moment, Susan realized she should’ve expected this from the STI. There was only so much she could do against it, and they were going all out. Susan gritted her teeth and pushed the speed on the turbo engine. The straightaways at this point were good, but she had to give them the slip somehow.

The Lancer flew through the night. Rain was pelting the windshield but the wipers managed to keep up. The road was slick, and fog was starting to drift over. Something in her mind clicked. The fog would help, but the rain was going to make things more interesting. She smirked again as she knew what she had to do. More villages slipped past on the sides. The guardrails all blurred into a single indistinguishable line. What rain wasn’t being swept away by the wipers was rocketing off towards the top of the windshield as the car picked up speed.

Another corner came up. Susan downshifted, whipped the steering wheel over, and put the pedal down. The Lancer swept through both lanes for a small time before she put it back into one. The next corner was easy and didn’t need to be taken with nothing else but a turn. She slipped ahead, but the STI was still keeping a good pace. The Grease Gun was rattling off, making Susan swerve back and forth, but there wasn’t much room to dodge bullets. The two rally cars zoomed past a greenhouse farm.

Susan put the pedal down again and let the Lancer do its work as they rounded the turn. The next corner was sharp, as indicated by the sign ahead. Susan bit her lip as the headlights behind her bathed over the Mitsubishi once again as the Subaru cleared the corner. There wasn’t a lot of room or time, and Susan threw the Lancer into third gear and pushed it hard as she pulled it around the next corner. She couldn’t afford to leave any room for error or slowness. She had to push her Lancer for as much as it was worth.

The sleek black rally car shot through the corner and came around it in a flash. The straightaway ahead allowed her to push it back up into fifth gear, but there was another turn coming up. Her next move was coming up as she downshifted and took the turn with the STI still keeping up behind her. There was a T intersection coming up, and Susan knew exactly what to do. When 32 terminated at Route 389, she swung the car hard as she downshifted and took it on the eastbound lane. 389 hooked around and met with 524 as they moved around the mountain.

Susan pushed the pedal down again as she took the road uphill. The incline was making them both work for it, but she had already put enough horsepower into her engine to swing up the long turn. When the corner came up, she was already downshifting. The tires skidded as she whipped the wheel, and the Lancer hooked around the whole corner without her sacrificing too much speed. She upshifted and the backfiring let her know how far she was really pushing the Lancer. The whole car took off, but she was already downshifting again as a corner came up in no time. It was one of seven.

Susan let both her hands work the shifter and the wheel as her feet worked the pedals. Though she could do it faster, she had to hold herself back to let the mechanics of the car keep up and do their job before she was ready to make another gear shift. It was the same story in the STI as she saw it coming up behind her. She whipped the Lancer back and forth, shifting up and down, backfiring and letting the engine and transmission put their work in as she threaded the car through the corners.

There was a fine line to walk in racing. A perfect line in and out of the corners that let you keep as much power and speed the whole way through. Susan rode that line like an expert as she pushed the Lancer to its limit. Slowly, but surely, the STI’s headlights were starting to lag behind. Susan didn’t let herself have any sort of focus on it for too long. She had a job to do, and damn everyone who got in her way. Especially at a time like this. Even now, as she pushed through the pass in the uphill, she was trying to see ahead to plan her next move within those few seconds.

She rounded the seventh and final corner of the set and shifted back up to sixth gear on a straightaway for mere seconds before shifting back down and taking another corner. She flew around one and it led immediately into another, even sharper corner. She slammed on the gas and pulled the wheel around, letting the car drift the second corner until she was all the way through it. She upshifted immediately. The ALS sounded like a machine gun as it popped off all the way through the pass.

The STI wasn’t quitting yet. As the Lancer reached the straightaway, the headlights showed back up.

“Oh, come on! Give it up, already!” Susan shouted.

She needed more distance. More ground. She saw a sign in the road for a warning of mud over the pavement and smiled. She pushed the Lancer around the next corner and knew that the STI would be right behind her. She took it easy on the drifts until, up ahead, she saw the mud in the road around the final turn. She pulled the wheels around and saw the mud taking up one of the lanes. As the STI flew up behind her she let it get a little closer until, at the last possible second, she swept the car through the clear lane.

The STI plowed into the mud. It wasn’t enough to stop it, but that wasn’t what Susan needed. She put the Lancer all the way past the limit and took off into the night, leaving the STI to work through the mud on its own. The headlights disappeared from her rearview, but this was only the set up. She quickly flew up into sixth gear and had the Lancer rocketing down the asphalt. 524 kept on ahead, but there was a side road off to the left.

It was a fifty-fifty gamble, but nothing else would satisfy her. She pushed the car through until she passed the entrance to the side street. The STI would be coming up soon, and so she flew into the corner and attacked it like she’d never done before. The road swung around and dipped downhill. She pushed through and looked out the windshield. Her heart soared when she saw the glow of the headlights over the guardrail. The STI took the bait. She knew they’d expect her to take the first opportunity to get away from them, but they underestimated the Lancer’s ability to take off with the ALS she had.

Even though they lost ground, she was certain they’d try to come back around. Susan kept the Lancer performing at top form as she pushed it around the corners and flew downhill. Getting through 524 would still take her attention as she forced the Lancer into drifts around the sharpest corners. Being a rally car in all wheel drive, it wasn’t suited for drifting like other cars that only had rear-wheel drive. She had to almost throw it into the turn to get it to behave how she wanted, but that was fine. She was used to this after a few years.

524’s last corner challenged her to keep control, but Susan wasn’t an amateur. She took the time to enjoy the feeling of the G forces on her body as she took the corner. When it righted out, she pushed the speed back up and flew down until 524 terminated into another town. Getting back onto the highway was going to be the real challenge. No doubt that the STI was already turned around and heading back this way, but Susan didn’t give a damn. She got enough time under her to really get out ahead. As the route ended, she hooked right and started following the Ure River as it flowed down to the southwest alongside the rail tracks.

Susan didn’t know how it was going to go. The STI could be heading down back the way they came on 32 or trying to take 389 to head her off. She figured the 389 was the better bet. As she put the Lancer through its paces, she flew through the small towns all along the riverfront. She wondered, vaguely, if there were any police out and about trying to find her. But so far, except with the battle between her Lancer and the STI, everything was quiet. She let the Lancer fly through the riverfronts, passing the intersections with routes 389 and 32.

When the headlights of the STI failed to show, Susan let herself breathe a bit easier. She didn’t stop speeding, but she decided to let off the gas a bit. As the Lancer zoomed through the sleepy river towns, Susan saw exactly what she was looking for as she passed over the Toyokawa River: highways and overpasses. The quickest way to Nagoya. She made her way off the route she was on and took an on ramp to get onto the highway. Even with the tolls, it was a nice cruise into Nagoya. She kept the pedal down as much as she could without garnering the attention of the patrols, but the STI was still a no-show.

Susan looked over at Sable. The girl looked like she was half asleep as she sat in the passenger seat. The case officer giggled to herself a bit. The city of Nagoya loomed ahead. It was the fourth-largest city in Japan, and housed the Nagoya Arsenal during World War 2. It was the largest city in the region, and they were here for a very specific visit. As they came into Nagoya, Susan shook Sable’s shoulder.

“Five…more…minutes…”

“Get up, kid. It’s time to look presentable.”

“Huh?”

Susan wheeled her Lancer through all the tight streets. A buzzing tone entered the car as she reached out and pulled her Nokia 2110 from her jacket.

“Hello?” she asked.

“Do you know anything about a black Mitsubishi that’s been reportedly speeding around my prefecture?” came a voice in Japanese.

“Ah, Senior Commissioner! Just the man I wanted to talk to. Could you meet me in your office in ohhh…about ten minutes?”

There was only the sound of grumbling from the other end.

“Okay fine, twenty minutes.”

“Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“Sure I do. It’s one in the morning.”

“This had better be good.”

“Nothing less than the existence of the free world is at stake.”

“If the free world were any more at stake, I’d consider taking a permanent holiday.”

“Glad to hear it! We’ll see you soon. Buh-bye!”

“We? What w-”

Susan hung up the phone.

“Alright, that settles that.”

“Who was that?” Sable asked.

“A friend. We work together. And you’re going to be meeting him tonight.”

“Oh…okay…”

Susan pulled into the parking garage and shook Sable again. When she didn’t respond much, she knew what she had to do. Luckily, Japan had vending machines all over the place. It didn’t take her long before she was able to get a couple hot cans of coffee. She cracked one and gave it to Sable, telling her to down the whole thing. When she did, she perked right back up.

“Okay…I think I’m good.”

“Here’s another just in case.”

“Thanks.”

Susan led Sable out of the parking garage, but not before taking a walk around to inspect her prized steed. Satisfied it had incurred no external damage; she headed out toward a large building with a security guard outside. She flashed her badge, said something in Japanese while pointing to Sable, and was let in without issue.

“Where are we going?” Sable asked.

“To the Chubu Regional Police Bureau.”

“Oh boy…”