by J. E. Gurley
Costas feigned a pained expression. He placed his right hand on his heart. “Now that hurts, Major. That just plain hurts.”
Walker picked up his M24 and slung it over his shoulder. He preferred the M24 to the newer M110 sniper rifle. He had used one of the M110s before but didn’t like the fact that it was a semi-automatic and had no forward assist to chamber a round quietly. In the field, silence could be the difference between life and death. He never carried his rifle with a round in the chamber. The M24 was trustworthy, accurate, and easy to maintain. Its powerful 7.62 mm rounds could knock a man down at a hundred yards, remove his head at two hundred, and punch a hole through his skull at eight hundred. On a windless day with good visibility, using his Leopold 10x42mm scope, he could kill at a thousand yards.
If he needed close-up firepower, he carried a FN Herstal Special Forces Combat Assault Rifle, the SCAR L-CQC with a 10-inch barrel instead of the standard 14.5-inch one and configured to fire 7.62 mm M118LR 175 grain ammo, allowing him to carry only one type of ammo in the field to save weight.
He looked at the sniper trainee, who was listening to the two veteran soldiers’ banter. Walker took in his hairless chin and bright, innocent eyes, wondering if he had even been that young and naive. Maybe before Vegas, he thought, before the Kaiju. Certainly not now.
“This big lug used you as bait, you know,” he said. “He wanted me to shoot you so he could fix my position.”
The kid stared at Costas in disbelief.
Costas replied, “Love and war, kid. No rules.” To Walker, he said, “You always said if the army wanted someone killed bad enough to risk a grunt’s life, then sometimes a grunt was expendable.” He jerked his thumb at the trainee. “I deemed him expendable.”
“Thanks, Sergeant,” the rookie replied. “I appreciate the consideration.”
“Come on,” Walker said. “I need a shower.”
“Big date?” Costas asked. He wore a big grin on his face. He had been nagging Walker to ask out the sweet young lieutenant from the motor pool for over a week.
“No. Just grungy.”
“What’s the matter, turning gay? Lieutenant Wong is as hot as they come, and she can strip down a jeep faster than you can say your morning prayers.”
Walker smiled at Costas’ jibe at his being a Muslim. Even though they had spent a lot of time killing fellow Muslims in Iraq, his religion had not gotten in the way of their working relationship or their long friendship. “She’s a hottie all right. She’s also married. Didn’t you see her ring?”
“Sure, but what’s that matter? I’ve seen her staring at your ass, while I’ve been ogling hers of course. Her old man’s back in Cleveland or somewhere boffing the neighbor’s wife. You should go for it.”
Walker shook his head. “I’ve got too much to do.”
“Oh, I guess those new major’s gold leaves weigh pretty heavy on you. You should use some of that 0-4 pay raise to buy her dinner and a motel room.” He twirled his moustache with his finger. “We can double date. I know these two sisters who might like a bit of ménage a cinq.”
“This isn’t the al-Khaleej district in Baghdad.”
“You’re telling me. Whores cost a fortune in California. Must be a new sin tax or something the governor imposed.” He started back the way he had come.
“Where are you going?” Walker asked.
Costas stopped midstride. “Just showing junior the way home.”
The kid looked at the two of them, shook his head, and started the five-click hike north to Cowboy Drop Zone where a chopper was waiting for them.
“I parked about a click that way,” Walker replied, and set out for his truck.
“Son of a bitch! Me and the kid hiked all over this damn desert looking for you. We even climbed halfway up Killer Escarpment for a better view of the surrounding countryside.”
“That’s why you’re a sergeant and I’m a major.”
They hiked down a narrow arroyo south past Bruno Cave to the spot Walker had parked his 2010 Chevy Silverado beneath the scant shade of a Joshua tree. The Mojave Desert sun didn’t seem to know that it was almost Christmas. When he opened the door, the hot air trapped inside the cab him like a slap in the face. He cranked the A/C to full blast and waited for the cab to cool.
As he stripped off the Ghillie suit, he said, “There’s a cooler with some Dos Equis in the back.”
Costas raised an eyebrow. “Since when did you start drinking?”
“They’re for you. Pass me a Gatorade.”
Costas reached behind the seat and fumbled through the cooler. He tossed Walker a bottle of Gatorade. “Horse piss,” he said. He fished out two cold bottles of beer for himself and twisted the cap from both bottles. He drained one and dropped it to the floorboard. “Damn I needed that,” he said, smacking his lips loudly.
He drank the second beer more slowly while Walker carefully wiped down his rifle, cleaned the scope, and placed both in the form-fitted Samsonite case. Later, he would disassemble and clean it more thoroughly. Only then did he drink his Gatorade to quench his raging thirst. The needs of his weapon came before his own needs. His rifle could save his life. When Walker dropped the empty bottled behind the seat and reached for the gear shift, Costas stopped him.
“Why don’t we sit here for a while and enjoy the silence?”
“Why, Costas, I didn’t think you were a nature lover.”
“Nah, I’m just not looking forward to the ride back. My kidneys can’t take the punishment.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t drink so much beer.”
“Alcohol is part of my religious experience.”
Walker waited until Costas finished his beer and belched before putting the truck into gear and leaving. Even with the 20-inch lift kit and heavy-duty shock absorbers Walker had installed, the ride was torture with the truck bouncing one way and rolling another, slamming his ass into his seat like a bucking bull, as he maneuvered through the twisting arroyo. Costas groaned with every bump.
It was a bumpy thirty-minute ride back to Barstow Road and another twenty minutes to Ft. Irwin. Costas didn’t let up the entire time. His insistence that Walker hook up with Lieutenant Wong or any available woman began to annoy him. He considered shoving him out of the truck to see if he bounced on the asphalt, but decided he did not want to deal with the paperwork. As they pulled up to the base gate and Walker prepared to show the guard his ID, a jeep screeched to a halt in front of them, blocking the road. A young corporal climbed out of the vehicle, walked over to Walker, and saluted.
“Sir, I was sent to locate you and Sergeant Costas and escort you both back to Colonel Hassert’s office.” He glanced at Costas. “Before the sergeant shacks up with a broad and a bottle of booze,” he added. “The colonel said that, not me.”
Costas smiled. “The colonel does remember me.”
Walker’s stomach twisted into a hard knot, just as it did before every mission. “What shit has hit the fan and where, Corporal?”
“It’s another one of those things, sir, the alien pods. It landed in Kiribati less than an hour ago.”
Walker’s stomach crawled up his throat and took a dump in his mouth. After Vegas, he had thought it might be over. He should have known better. Gate Rutherford did. He had predicted just such an event.
“Where in Hades is Kiribati?” Costas asked.
The corporal shrugged. “I don’t know. One of those islands in the South Pacific I think.”
“Corporals don’t think,” Costas replied. “It’s against the regs. Fucking Kaijus,” he snarled.
Walker could only agree.
* * * *
Colonel Jonathan Emmet Hassert eyed the strange pair sitting across from him while he toyed with his cigar cutter.
“This solid silver Prometheus was a gift from President George W. Bush for my work training troops for the deserts of Iraq. I’m proud of this cigar cutter and especially proud of the engraving on its side.” He read it aloud to Walker and Costas over the rim of his glasses. “Fr
om a Grateful Nation – George W. Bush, President USA.” He laid the cutter on his desk and glared at them. “Anything that rocks my tightly run base upsets me, gentlemen, and two soldiers being given carte blanche by the Joint Chiefs of Staff bothers me even if one of them is a major who’s killed a Kaiju.”
He tapped the top drawer of his desk. “I’ve got a humidor full of Cohiba Esplendidos cigars in here. I want one so badly I could piss my pants. It rankles me that a colonel, the commander of a goddamned army base, I can’t smoke in my own office. My wife won’t let me smoke in the house. I have to sneak out back for a smoke like a goddamned buck private.” He opened the drawer, removed three cigars from his humidor, and leaned forward his seat. “You would think that with normalized relations with Cuba, the price of these would drop, but they’re still thirty-bucks-a-pop. A colonel’s pay only goes so far. I allow myself one lousy cigar per week; two if it was a damned rough one, and gentlemen, this one is shaping up into a granddaddy, son of a bitch, ball buster of a week.”
Walker was eager to get on with the briefing, but he knew the colonel was making small talk to ease his own mind. That meant whatever he was about to say made him uneasy. He said nothing as Colonel Hassert laid the cigars beside the cutter on his desk, carefully removed the cellophane wrapping from each one, and snipped off the tips. He handed two of the cigars to Walker and Costas.
“You’ve been doing admiral work here, Major; you and Sergeant Costas. Now, it’s time to get back to what you’re really good at, killing fucking Kaiju.” He jammed his cigar in his mouth, pulled out a box of matches, and lit it. He smiled as he slowly exhaled a cloud of smoke.
In the two months he had been at Fort Irwin, Walker had never heard the colonel utter as long a speech or reveal as much about himself as he just had. He’s scared, he thought. Hell. So am I. He didn’t smoke, but he accepted the gift for what it was, a sacred rite between three soldiers about to go into combat where death was a glaring probability. He held the cigar in his hand as he spoke.
“What do we know about this one, Colonel?”
“The son of a bitch slipped in under the radar for one thing. No warning. NASA didn’t see it coming, and they can’t tell us if there are any more.”
Walker wondered what Doctor Gate Rutherford was doing right about now. The NASA catastrophist had gone above and beyond when he had joined Walker’s team delivering a baby nuke inside Kaiju Nusku in the desert outside Las Vegas, but then he had disappeared off Walker’s radar screen. The phone calls became less frequent and then stopped altogether. Walker suspected he had undergone some kind of test of faith. Many people had after the Kaiju, even him.
Kaiju Ishom in California and Kaiju Girra in Indiana had wiped out San Francisco, Oakland, Chicago, Omaha, Des Moines, and a few other major U.S. cities. If not for the sacrifice of Astronaut Commander Erwin Langston in riding his Orion spacecraft into the communications nodule controlling the three creatures from the moon’s surface, the trio of Kaiju would still be rampaging across the country.
“What are they calling this one?”
“Kiribati, pronounced Kir-ih-bahs, for whatever the hell reason,” the colonel replied.
“I guess they ran out of them heathen gods to name them after,” Costas quipped.
Walker shot Costas a dirty look to silence him. “Any current word from the area?”
Hassert shook his head. “Not much. They’re moving some military satellites to fly over the area for a look see, and two subs, the USS Colorado and the British Essex, are a couple of hours out, but most of what we know is from a few survivors with ham radios or Sat-phones.”
Walker didn’t like going in with no Intel. “If the aliens operate on the same time frame as before, we have twenty-four hours before they come out of the pod. Of course, that’s just conjecture. Doctor Rutherford said to expect a few surprises from the next Kaiju. We may be too late already. When do we leave?”
“That’s the rub. Since the Republic of Kiribati is an independent sovereignty, we require their permission to go in. So far, we’ve heard nothing. We’re going to fly you and Sergeant Costas to Pearl, where you’ll join your fire team, and then fly on to Wake Island to wait for word.”
Walker frowned as he fought back a flood of bitter memories. “I don’t have a team, Colonel. They all died inside Nusku.”
“You do now. Six men with experience doing mop up work in Girra under the command of Captain Ian McGregor will be waiting for you at Pearl. They’re experienced and they volunteered. They’ll have any equipment you might need. If you have any special needs, let me know and it’ll be waiting for you in Pearl.”
Walker didn’t like working with untried men, but he had no choice. At least they knew what to expect. “I suspect we’ll need SCUBA gear. I think this one landed in the ocean on purpose. I doubt we’ll be using gliders this trip like last time.”
Hassert opened his hands wide and nodded. “Anything you need, Major Walker.”
Costas leaned forward in his seat, his unlit cigar jammed in the corner of his mouth. Before he could speak, Hassert added. “No booze and no broads, Sergeant Costas. Major Dire warned me about you.”
Costas snorted. “He would.”
The colonel handed Costas a box of matches. “Never use a lighter on a good cigar, son. It taints the flavor.”
Walker smiled. Dire, codenamed Postmaster, was their handler in the Mideast. He had issued all their wet work sanctions in Iraq, choosing the targets and bypassing the usual military channels and local civilian authority, allowing them an added layer of anonymity that had been very useful to them in a country rapidly descending into chaos. The situation had only gotten worse since the Kaiju had come. Some mullahs had seen their arrival as a sign from Allah and encouraged their followers to double their efforts to conquer the country. Now, Iraq consisted of Baghdad, narrow strips of land bordering the Euphrates and the Tigris Rivers, and a semi-independent Kurdish province in the north. At a time when the country needed men like him and Costas over there, the administration was undecided about how to deal with ISIS. The Iraqis had failed to fight together as a country so many times they no longer had the heart to win. He was relieved they had pulled him out.
“How long?” he asked.
“The C-5 is warmed up and waiting on the runway. You’ve got twenty minutes to shit, shower, and stow your gear.”
Walker sighed and nodded. The trouble with being the first person to kill a Kaiju was that they considered him the foremost authority on Kaiju slaying. He didn’t think this one was going to be a by-the-book operation. If the aliens were intelligent enough to send bioengineered creatures to wipe out a planet’s population, they would be smart enough to learn from their mistakes.
“What’s the national drink of Hawaii?” Costas asked.
“For you, Diet Coke,” Walker replied.
Costas frowned, slapped his right shoulder, which still bore the scars of the Wasp attack inside Nusku, and winced. “It’s for the pain, mind you. You being Muslim and all, you wouldn’t know about the miraculous pain relieving effects of good Kentucky Bourbon. Coke doesn’t work for all of us. My religion doesn’t forbid alcohol. In fact, it encourages it.”
“Well drop by the PX on the way to the airfield and get you some aspirin.” He rose from his seat and saluted Colonel Hassert.
Hassert returned his salute. “Good luck, Major. Sergeant, keep the major safe.”
“Colonel, I’ve been watching his back longer than I care to remember, though now I’m wondering if it’s been worth it.”
Costas ignored Walker’s look of consternation as he lit his cigar and tossed the matches back onto the colonel’s desk. Walker shook his head sadly at the sergeant’s irreverence and walked to the door.
3
Saturday, Dec. 16, 2:15 a.m. Radiant Princess, South Pacific –
Mark Talent was the luckiest man in the world, at least as far as he was concerned, and in most instances, what concerned him was the only thing he considered wor
th bothering with. He always told people he had a talent for luck. It was a poor pun on his name, but Talent was not big on humor. He was not exactly humorless, but his wit ran slightly off kilter to societal norms. An internet meme of a cute kitten with a ball of string did not elicit a smile from him, but a woman hit in the ass by a closing door, or a politician caught with his or her pants down did.
Few people were even aware of that side of him, for Talent was not a gregarious man. At thirty-four, he was the typical layperson’s image of a Prepper – a loner, quiet, rugged, and deadly serious about survival. Atypically, he had a four-year degree from the University of Arizona in Business Management and spoke three languages – English, Spanish, and his native Tohono O’odham.
His small, one-bedroom adobe home in Vopolo Havoka, Arizona, a small village in the middle of the Sonoran Desert on the Tohono O’odham Reservation, was his fortress against disaster, his wickiup of solitude. It was located seventy miles southwest of Tucson, twenty-seven miles from the reservation town of Sells, and nine miles north of the Mexican border. He had a deep well that provided good water, a few goats and chickens for meat, a small garden for fresh vegetables, and an ample supply of dried and canned goods stored in a wooden shed behind his house.
Talent especially enjoyed his view of 7,700-foot tall Baboquivari Peak, or Waw Kiwulki in his native Tohono O’odham language. Baboquivari Peak was the most sacred site in the Tohono O’odham Nation, home of I’itoi, the Creator. He did not really believe in a creator, neither I’itoi nor the Catholic God his parents had beat him over the head with as a child, but it made a good story when he sold guns and homemade flint-tipped arrows made from local flint at area gun shows. Gun shows and the occasional construction job kept him in folding money, and a small annual stipend from the Tribal Council from casino revenues and a yearly grant for his small, traditional farming methods ranch paid for his food and fuel.
However, none of that was luck, except being born Tohono O’odham. The rest he had achieved by hard work. Luck had stepped in at the most opportune time. A spur of the moment purchase of a lottery ticket in Sonoita had paid off. Hoping to win at most a few hundred dollars, he and a man from Rhode Island split a sixteen-million-dollar Powerball Jackpot. After taking the cash-out option and paying Uncle Sam his lucrative share, he had a little over three million dollars left. Three alien Kaiju stomping America’s butt four months earlier had deepened his sense of the likelihood of an apocalyptic scenario. Even his Arizona desert retreat didn’t feel safe enough. His people had it bad enough already. If a few hundred thousand Mexicans streamed across the border, things would only get worse, and his ranch was right in their path north.