How To Train Your Kaiju

by Nicholas Knight

  I pull out my phone to call Isabella when I hear footsteps behind me. Turning around I find Isabella standing a half a dozen yards away, looking torn between happiness and vexation. I run to her and pull her to my arms. Oh yeah, I’ve got it bad.

  I pull back. “How are you?”

  “We’re okay,” she says. “You know, considering. Come on, we have to get off the streets.”

  “Why?” I ask, looking around, but she’s grabbed my hand and is already dragging me along behind her.

  “Lusitania’s father,” she says. “He’s been trying to get her to come home.”

  I would be to if I was her father. Hell, if I was anyone’s father. “Your parents can’t be any happier that you’re still here.”

  “Maybe, but they don’t send big men in suits to drag me away.”

  That’s right, Lusitania’s father is a US senator. I feel a sudden surge of hope. If she tells him what’s going on, there’s a damn good chance we might not be so powerless against Dr. Warden’s organization as I’ve been thinking. The question is, is Lusitania willing to talk to him?

  I’m dragged across two more yards and around behind a neighbor’s house, before being led inside through the back door.

  “Our neighbors got out of town after the first attack,” Isabella explains. “But we know where they keep their spare key.”

  The inside is full of the sound of people talking. They’ve got the news playing in the living room. It’s more stuff about the aftermath and relief efforts and discussion about how little we actually know. Somebody is proclaiming Titanocobra to be the great dragon from the Book of Revelations here to devour us all. I shake my head. If Titanocobra is Satan then Taisaur’s an angel.

  It’s enough to make me wish I were a more devout man. I could sure use a miracle right about now. We all could.

  Lusitania’s on the sofa staring at the phone held sideways in her hand. Her expression is blank, but she occasionally snaps her mouth like she’s biting at something or lets out a snarl. Is that how I’ve looked every time I’ve played? No wonder Brett thought I was going crazy.

  She’s only like that a few more moments though before blinking several times and coming out of whatever trance it is we enter when we play the “game.” Lusitania stretches, blinks, and stands up before noticing me. “What are you doing here?”

  “Hello to you too,” I say, glancing around. They’ve clearly been camping out here. It’s more rugged than I would have expected. Seeing Lusitania in a setting like this…it’s like seeing a snowy owl swimming past a coral reef. It’s not her element. And yet she seems to be handling it well. Despite myself I’m a bit impressed. Maybe she’s more than just an angry diva?

  I shove that thought aside. Whatever else she might be she’s annoying, as evidenced when she opens her mouth and tells me to do something anatomically impossible.

  I roll my eyes. “Isabella says you’re hiding from your dad.”

  Lusitania scowls and fixes her glare on Isabella, who shrugs. “Better than having him accidentally lead them to us.”

  Them? Just how many guys has her dad sent to retrieve her?

  “Whatever,” Lusitania says, before turning her glare on me. “Are you here to help or get in the way?”

  “I’m here to try and talk some sense into you,” I say. “You two need to get out of here and quit attacking the aliens.”

  “Get in the way then,” Lusitania says, sounding disgusted. “The only way the attacks stop is if we make them.”

  “Or stop giving them a reason to attack at all,” I say.

  “Pacifism?” She seems genuinely shocked. “You of all people know what a load of bullshit that is.”

  I do. Pacifism is for those willing to die for their beliefs or who are so powerful that it doesn’t matter if they paint a target on themselves. It’s probably not a viable option in this scenario, especially after everything that’s been done to the aliens, but I don’t want to hear that from this rich daddy’s girl. “And what’s your superior solution?”

  I’m not really expecting an answer, but she gives one. “They’re getting that monster here somehow. I think there’s some kind of device located underneath that military base where it first showed up. It’s so heavily defended now I can’t get Halira close before that damn snake shows up. With you providing a distraction though, Halira’s fast enough that I might be able to get her past the security and destroy the device. Then bam, Titanocobra’s trapped on their planet.”

  I glance at Isabella. She’d told me that Lusitania hadn’t seen Titanocobra in the game world. She’d lied. I put that from my mind and focus on what Lusitania’s just said.

  I hate to admit it, but that’s actually a pretty good plan. I’m not about to go along with it, though. I’ve done enough damage to the aliens.

  The television flashes with a BREAKING NEWS alert and a pretty reporter shows up. “We’ve just received word that Titanocobra has appeared in Dallas, Texas. No one is sure how or why the monster is here this time instead of Oxford, Mississippi, but the devastation it’s causing is….”

  I tune her out, staring in silent horror at the footage of Titanocobra demolishing three buildings in a row. Worst of all, I recognize those buildings. The kaiju is only a few miles away from Mom. The aliens must have tracked me from my last login back to Mom’s apartment.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

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  To Lusitania’s credit, she doesn’t hesitate after my abrupt change of heart. We’re both on the sofa and logging in an instant later. I do hesitate, however. Not because I’m scared shitless or because I have my doubts about what we’re doing, although I am and I do. No, I hesitate because I have an idea, and instead of immediately going to the ATTACK menu and following Lusitania into the game proper, I go to Monster Land.

  There’s no sign of Xen or the others at the rocky outcropping at the end of the peninsula. It’s not surprising. Catching each other online at an unscheduled time is tough. I’m still disappointed. Extending Taisaur’s claws and hoping that Xen will forgive me for writing on his rock, I carve out a message letting them know I got a time sensitive mission. It probably won’t work but anything that increases our odds of success is something I’ve got to try. It could mean saving Mom’s life.

  Halira is waiting for me, and I swear the kaiju looks even more impatient than her partner. Where the fuck’ve you been?

  I send Taisaur racing past her, through the wreckage of the city I’d demolished only a week and a half ago, toward the military base. Waiting on you now.

  Halira shrieks behind me and then zooms past. She’s bigger than I remember. Lusitania’s been leveling her up, grinding away like I did right before the mission that brought me to this base in the first place. It’s hard to say how much larger she is now. Although she’s definitely bigger than Taisaur, their shapes are simply so different that the amount is not easily judged at a glance and we’re not about to hold still to measure.

  My rage meter is brimming, glowing. Just the thought of my mother in danger has it ready to explode and surround Taisaur in the Burning Aurora. I hold off, restraining myself from pointlessly burning away the energy. I’ll need it when we get to the base. There’s no telling what kind of defenses will be arrayed against us.

  There might even be another kaiju. God, I hope Titanocobra is the only one they’ve got.

  The plan is simple and straightforward and I absolutely hate it.

  Taisaur will act as the meat shield and draw the defender’s fire. Havoc, destruction, and mayhem are all my goal. I’m good at those things I admit. And I admit that Halira’s better suited to the next part, which is zooming in through the opening I’ll make in the defenses to destroy whatever device is allowing the aliens to send their kaiju to our world.

  I don’t like this for the very petty reason that I’m not the one smashing the device. It’s the most critical p
art of our plan. If the device doesn’t get destroyed, they can keep sending their kaiju to earth. An image of the buildings so close to Mom’s apartment falling in clouds of fire and debris as Titanocobra smashes through them flashes through my mind, quickly followed by my futile attempt to make Taisaur appear the first time Titanocobra appeared in our world.

  I hate being useless. I hate being helpless. I hate being trapped and that even if this attack somehow does end the attack on Dallas and save Mom, I’ll still be able to count what’s left of her life in months. I let that hatred seethe and grow and burn, fueling me forward.

  I catch up to Halira a short while later, not because Taisaur is moving faster, although our pace did pick up, but because Lusitania’s stopped her to wait on me. She’s a glass canon, maximum damage output but no ability to take a hit. If she goes first we’re hosed, so clearly vexed, she waits for me, allowing me to pull ahead and charge the ruins of the military base as we draw close.

  It’s not at all like I remember.

  There’s a mass of triple barrel hover tanks moving in concentric circles around it for what’s got to be a full mile, accompanied by smaller, single barrel hover tanks mixed sporadically among their ranks. The air is full of rotating but otherwise stationary saucers. I have never seen so many of these forces gathered in one place before.

  And all that is enough to shock me before I even see what it is that they’re defending. It’s a pit, with a pillar in the center of it, twice as tall as Taisaur, putting it in the vicinity of about 400 feet. It’s worked over in glowing green pieces that look like they’re actually moving over its surface.

  I guess we found the device. It must have been below the base when I destroyed it and survived somehow. That means it’s got to be all kinds of durable. They had Titanocobra use it to hit the university only moments after my attack. Of course, that assumes that time flows the same way here as it does back in my world. For all I know there could be some kind of Narnia shit going on. Who knows how long it actually is between our attacks?

  I can’t let myself think on that though. It’s madness and not the kind that’s helpful.

  With a roar, I unleash the proper kind of madness and charge straight into the ranks of tanks, activating Taisaur’s Burning Aurora. His stripes glow crimson and then he’s surrounded in the blood hued rays of waving light. I got it up just in time too, because a solid wall of green energy crashes into me as every armament they’ve got turns on me.

  Taisaur slows but doesn’t stop at the onslaught of impact, tearing into the formation. Between his sheer mass and natural weaponry and the Burning Aurora we smash into the tanks like a wrecking ball through a house of cards. It’s almost like swimming, there’s so much energy around me, hitting me harmlessly, deflected or absorbed by the Burning Aurora while I thrash about.

  The saucers begin dropping their bombs, heedless of the risk of friendly fire. They’re too high to hit so I ignore them and focus on smashing the tanks all around me. There’s so much energy, so many explosions I can’t even see. It’s light, light, and more light. But one light in particular stands out and that’s the flashing from my depleting rage meter.

  Powerful and effective as my offense is, I can’t finish them all off before I run out of rage energy. And, despite all the damage I’ve done, there’s still so many left that they’ll finish me off. There’s no cover to hide behind. Nothing but empty terrain for miles, thanks in no small part to my own efforts.

  The attacks diminish enough that I can actually see and with a sweep of my tail, I send several of the smaller tanks flying through the air to crash into an unfortunate saucer. Its payload goes off, taking it and two other saucers with it. This sets off a chain reaction and the sky is suddenly on fire.

  The Burning Aurora fades and Taisaur is suddenly exposed. My HP bar begins to deplete. Chip by chip, splinter by splinter. I’ve taken out maybe a third of the ground forces I realize. It’s not nearly enough. Their combined assault will have Taisaur down and out before I can finish off the rest of them.

  But I don’t need to.

  Halira zips past me, a glittering blur, a shriek escaping her throat. We’ve done it. She’s going to hit the pillar.

  Something falls out of the sky and we’re both blasted off our feet. Taisaur’s HP bar is down by a full third from whatever just hit us. He’s scorched and bleeding and looking around I can’t see at all what just hit us.

  Halira’s in even worse shape. Many of her crystals are shattered and fractured. She’s bleeding. Her HP bar is down to one tenth of its total and flashing red.

  What the hell did they just hit us with? I ask, Taisaur bellowing his own confusion in tandem.

  Missile strike, Lusitania says. The anger is gone from her. She sounds like her mask is back in place, detached and dismissive. Everything is beneath her and doesn’t affect her in the slightest.

  That confuses me almost as much as the missile strike itself. What the hell do you mean?

  I mean they probably just hit us with their equivalent of a nuke or a MOAB, she says, Halira making a sound that’s more whine that roar.

  A MOAB if I’m remembering right, stands for Mother Of All Bombs and is some seriously heavy duty ordinance. Not as powerful as a nuke, but no radiation afterword either. Just a lot of scorched earth. Which is exactly what I see when I look around.

  Most of the tanks are gone. More saucers are inbound. And I finally understand what Lusitania’s change in tone means.

  She’s given up.

  Fuck that.

  I make Taisaur rise up and let out a roar of challenge. That pillar needs to be destroyed. It means stopping them from continuing their attack on our world. Maybe it means stopping their current attack and sparing Mom. I don’t know. I do know that giving up isn’t an option for me.

  My rage meter is quickly refilling. I’ll be able to do a full on Burning Aurora again in just a few moments. Except that I haven’t got a few moments. The new aerial defenses are already in place, coming in fast, ready to drop their explosives on us. Maybe the aliens are even readying another massive airstrike like the one they just hit us with. Our time’s up.

  We failed.

  A glowing white orb of brilliant energy carves through the oncoming saucers like a napalm covered knife, setting every one of them it touches to exploding.

  The cavalry has arrived, Xenatlas roars.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

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  My brief stop in the HUB to message my friends had paid off. Xenatlas is here, roaring his defiance to the sky. And he isn’t alone.

  Solrin and Megaptera are right behind him, blasting their attacks into the flock of flying saucers. The sky became a series of explosions as the alien vehicles burst into flames, combusting in great clouds of fire that sent shrapnel flying everywhere, including into each other. Debris began raining down around the pillar, littering the barren landscape and creating a fiery labyrinth around our target.

  Got your message, Megaptera roars. What’s the mission?

  I point at the pillar in the center of the conflagration. We’ve got to destroy that pillar!

  Megaptera scoffs, the sound coming from his kaiju as a kind of chuffing sound. That’s it? Seriously, the designers should make these things harder.

  His obliviousness rocks me back and I’m momentarily stunned. They still think this is a game. How the hell can they after all that has happened? But then I think about it. None of them have seen Titanocobra except for on the news. They have no idea there’s any connection between the giant snake and this videogame. And why would they? It’s a hell of a conclusion to jump to without having more evidence.

  I don’t know how to convince them otherwise without sounding like I’m crazy. On the other hand, how the hell can I keep something like this from them? Their monsters are real. So are the people that are dying in those explosions they’re clearly taking so much
joy in creating.

  I can’t tell them, I realize, not yet. Not because they don’t deserve to know, they absolutely do, but because I need them. I can’t afford the time wasted on explanation or debate and in the unlikely event that they actually believe me, there’s a chance they’ll log out there and then. There’s too much at stake for that, so I keep my mouth shut.

  It’s unfair, it might even be cruel, depending on how they eventually learn the truth. And in the face of potentially saving Mom and taking these assholes who’ve sent Titanocobra to our world down, it’s still no decision. So, I say the only thing I can, Thanks.

  Can you bumble-fucks get a move on! It’s hard to tell who’s shrieking louder, Lusitania or Halira.

  The other seem to notice her for the first time.

  What’s the PKer doing here? Solrin demands.

  Wait, that’s a girl? Megaptera asks.

  I roll my eyes and so does Taisaur. Somewhere some very confused aliens are watching this exchange and wondering what the hell is wrong with us.

  Yeah, I’m a girl, Lusitania snaps. And my dick’s still bigger than yours.

  Xenatlas laughs. Come on, we need to press the attack before they regroup. Taisaur, this thing hard to take down?

  Very, I say. I don’t actually know if that’s true. I’m making an assumption here, but it seems like a good one, and I want us all to hit it with everything we’ve got.

  Strategy is this, I say. We blow everything up and give Halira a clear path to attack.

  Not that there’s a lot left to clear at this point. Follow up and try to smash the damn thing. Whatever happens, press the attack forward.

  And that’s just what we do. Roaring, bellowing, and shrieking loud enough that were any buildings still standing their windows would have shattered, all four of us charge.

  More saucers are incoming, moving to intercept. They’ve got to be desperate to try and get in our way. Knowing that this isn’t a game has alleviated me of my sense of detachment. There’s actual motivation behind my enemy’s actions now, not just programming. It allows me a certain degree of empathy for them. Not enough that I’m about to stop, but enough that I know if I was in their position and had four massive beasts coming at me in a clearly coordinated attack, I’d get the fuck out.