by Samit Basu
And battle is just what it gets.
A horn-missile from Oni’s mecha, bobbing squat and ugly behind the tanker, fizzes up from the water and scores a direct hit on the monster’s right eye.
Amabie’s metal-scaled mermaid tail launches a ball of adhesive goo that disables one of its lower claws.
Raiju’s wolf-mecha emerges roaring from the water and gets smacked squarely on the side for her pains. The lightning wolf goes flying across the shipyard, scattering massive shipping containers like dominoes.
Baku taunts the kaiju with machine-gun fire, skimming away just out of the creature’s reach, keeping it distracted.
As Goryo’s mecha-demon breaks the surface to the north, Norio looks at his teammates in wonder. He knows why he’s doing this, but he’s never understood why four other human beings, all mostly normal and hopefully sane adults, have agreed to help him. He doesn’t know about the others, but Azusa seems to be in this fight out of sheer nobility. To protect and serve the citizens of Tokyo? That seemed illogical. Unless she has a secret burning need for revenge as well. But who is she avenging? His father?
The lobster dives off the tanker, thousands of tons of angry beast hurtling straight at Oni. The demon-mecha skids away, but not fast enough. The edge of an outstretched claw catches the mecha’s right foot, and for a moment it looks as if Oni is captured, but a foray by Baku along the beast’s underbelly distracts it long enough for Oni to slip away.
“Please explain why I gave up two hours of sweaty sex for this,” says Oni on the communicator.
“We pay more,” says Norio.
“My mecha’s badly damaged, in case anyone cares.”
“No one cares.”
“Another inspiring speech from our glorious leader,” says Oni, and returns to the fray.
The lobster thrashes for a gut-churning two seconds in the water, shudders violently, and is still. The mechas rise above the surface and hover in the air, circling, waiting. Norio has seen this before; there’s no conclusive way to prove his theory yet, but he knows the lobster part of this kaiju is now dead, simply unable to cope with its new behemoth body, with the sheer impossibility of pretending to have any control over its massive limbs and nerves and sloshing liquid insides. No one knows what the Kaiju King’s power involves – magic? Induced metamorphosis from some dystopic future? Freak natural organic nuclear reactions? Whatever it is, the beast has now surrendered to it. It is all monster now, and has only one thing on its mind.
The waters swirl, eddy and foam as endless antennae and the first pair of claws emerge. The kaiju rises.
“Form up?” asks Baku.
“Hold position,” says Norio.
“The public wants us to form up.”
“What?”
“Seventy-seven per cent of viewers say we should form up right now.”
“Get off the internet. We have to crack its shell.”
The monster emerges from Tokyo Bay, rising eerily, silently, turning on some magical mid-water suspended hinge like the world’s largest and ugliest drawbridge.
“A hashtag about how you suck as a leader is trending, Goryo,” says Raiju.
“Shut up, Raiju. I need a lightning strike. Aim for the plectrum at the base of the antennae. Take your time, don’t miss.”
“Aim for the who?”
“Look it up, since you’re online. Why are you online? You want some netvillain to hack us all?”
“I’m not an idiot. I’m surfing from my phone.”
“Stop.”
The kaiju stands up again in the water between them, a towering nightmare made flesh. It screams, and the mechas rattle and shake.
“Raiju?”
“Yes, sorry. Just sending a message asking how everyone would feel if we just went home, since we’re so terrible. Bloody whiners.”
Norio understands Raiju’s anger, but the truth is there is no one left to help ARMOR fight the kaiju any more. Every time one of the Kaiju King’s overgrown children attacks the city, superpowered criminals run amok, and civilian defence squads, both human and powered, have more than enough to do. At least the real supervillains stay hidden – they don’t like coming out while the media is occupied elsewhere.
The kaiju turns around, facing Odaiba again.
Team ARMOR springs into action.
Goryo, stung by complaints about his leadership, heads the charge, zooming up in front of the kaiju and hitting it with dual sonic blasts – ineffective – and showering its carapace with plasma. The beast swings its claws, but Goryo is out of range.
Oni, Baku and Amabie plunge into the bay again, hacking at the creature’s legs.
“At least this one isn’t breathing fire,” says Baku.
No doubt stung by this criticism, the kaiju charges at Goryo. Twin flaps on either side of its head open, and jets of smoking liquid gush out, arcing through the air. Goryo swings aside, but is caught in the stream. His mecha’s controls fail, and the machine shudders and lurches in the corrosive onslaught. Goryo cuts his engine, and the mecha-demon falls stone-like into the water.
“Acid spit,” says Norio. “Oni, Baku, rise and engage.”
“Actually, Goryo,” says Raiju. “That’s not spit.”
“What?”
“I just looked it up,” says Raiju. “It peed on you.”
“What?”
“Well, you asked me to look it up. I know where the plectrum thing is now, if that’s any help. The lobster’s bladder, though, is located…”
“Focus,” Azusa says coldly, silencing the team’s laughter. “Kill it!” screams Norio.
The red lightning wolf rises high in the air and turns. Its jaws open, a cannon emerges. The other mechas fall back.
The kaiju swerves, looking for its next victim.
Then Raiju bathes it in lightning. The kaiju’s carapace cracks down the middle; shards of shell fly out in fractal patterns. Sizzling, hissing, screaming, it convulses, but somehow manages to stand. Smoke billows from the crack in its shell, and huge quantities of thick black kaiju blood ooze out, dropping into the sea in smoking globs.
“ARMOR form,” says Norio. “Let’s give the people what they want.”
The mechas shoot away from the monster, and a ragged cheer rises from the news helicopters hovering far above them. A hundred feet above sea level, the mechas transform and unite. In an impossible dance of mid-air toy building, plates emerge and slide, limbs interlock, blades swing into place. Bursts of multi-coloured light streak across the sky, keeping the kaiju distracted. Five spirits merge, a single giant figure towers over Tokyo Bay. ARMOR is formed.
Norio hadn’t come up with the name – Advanced Robot for Monster Onslaught Resistance is a term that was cooked up by their anime producers. But ARMOR itself is Norio’s creation, Norio’s child. The giant mecha-warrior hovers, arms folded across its chest, warrior’s helmet and crest sliding into place on its bullet-shaped head. Its blank, eerily beautiful diamond eyes light up. Its wristbands click as rockets slide into place in their launch tunnels. The last ray of the setting sun gleams on its elongated, razor-sharp shoulder pads. Three hundred feet tall, impossibly strong, Tokyo’s greatest defender stands ready, and cries of jubilation ring out across the watching world.
The kaiju charges.
With impossible agility, ARMOR leaps back to avoid its acid jets, then kneels, splashing, in the water. Its right arm straightens, and rings of blue light shoot out, knocking the kaiju back, halting its mad rush towards the mecha gladiator.
The kaiju wavers.
ARMOR runs at the monster. Giant waves merge into a wall of sound as it speeds towards its enemy, and a sickening crunch echoes across the bay as it slams into the beast’s thorax, folding it in half, sending it flying backwards. The cracks in the kaiju’s carapace widen; its mysterious power source groans and somehow holds it together.
ARMOR launches seven missiles from its left wrist. They swerve and converge, and fireballs blossom on the kaiju’s chest. Chunks of monstr
ous flesh hurtle in every direction, and rivers of black ooze sizzle into the bay. The beast screams in pain.
“Sashimi time,” says Norio.
ARMOR launches into a series of quick charge-up katas. Parts rearrange themselves, humming and clicking, plates rising, folding, turning, a hundred aeroplane wings sewn together.
A seventy-foot-long sword emerges from ARMOR’s right arm. The kaiju sees its death approaching, swinging, gleaming, glittering in helicopter spotlight beams. It cries out one final time, bellowing its defiance to the emerging stars.
The first stroke pierces its heart. ARMOR draws the sword out, covering itself in a mist of kaiju blood. Five more precise slashes, and it’s over. All that remains of the Kaiju King’s monster is a mountain of steaming shell and flesh trickling into the all-forgiving bay. ARMOR performs its customary celebratory air-punch, turns and strides into deeper waters, unfolding, transforming, reshaping itself into its five-part mecha-army.
“Do you mind if I stick around for a bit?” asks Baku. “I’ve actually ordered industrial amounts of seaweed and rice. My lobster volcano roll is a big hit nowadays, but kaiju lobster roll…”
“No, but could you please stop telling us exactly who you are and what you do?” asks Norio.
“Of course, Goryo. Apologies. I just want to see if kaiju meat works while fresh.”
“I don’t want to know. Good work, team.”
Baku hovers near the kaiju’s corpse as the other four victorious warriors disappear into the murky waters, projecting holograms to confuse the following news crews as they wind their way back to ARMOR base. Oni and Raiju chatter excitedly, reliving the fight. Azusa is silent, as always, and so is Norio. His day is far from over, and the ordeal he has to face now is potentially more dangerous than a kaiju battle.
Norio Hisatomi has a celebrity auction to attend.
* * *
At four a.m., a tuxedo-clad Norio lounges poolside at Tokyo’s most glamorous new hotel, the Ginza Mikado, trying not to let his extreme tiredness and irritation bubble to the surface.
An ambitious society matron spots him from across the pool, and tries the time-tested technique of wading into the fluorescent-lit warm water, approaching Norio in a straight line, with the single-minded precision of a hungry shark. In a few seconds, her piercing giggles and admirably toned figure have captured the attention of everyone at the gathering, with the single exception of her quarry. Norio looks away deliberately, desperately wishing she were just another kaiju. And in doing so, he spots something far above him, silhouetted against the neon-hued night sky, something that actually makes his jaw drop. He sits up sharply. He blinks, shakes his head, and looks again.
It’s real. It’s still there.
With his left arm, he gently dislodges a Brazilian supermodel’s death-grip on his right, rises, and excuses himself. Ignoring numerous parting witticisms, he strides out of the pool area, through the lobby, away from lurking paparazzi, and into an elevator.
A few minutes and several bribes later, Norio is on the Ginza Mikado’s roof. He runs, swiftly passing vents, chimneys, and a couple of intertwined off-duty cleaners. He finds the corner where he had seen it, standing on the roof.
Where he had seen him.
It doesn’t look like a statue. It looks like… him. Black cape, fluttering in the gentle breeze. That unmistakeable twin-pointed silhouette, perfectly framed in the cityscape around them, so many skyscrapers, so many people, so many stories.
Norio clears his throat nervously, reminds himself he’s a billionaire, an action hero, and nobody’s fanboy. He struggles to say the word, feels ridiculous, but there’s nothing else to say.
“Batman?” asks Norio.
No response.
Norio asks again, louder, and is met with silence once more. Rage wells up within him, and embarrassment, and more rage. Of course it’s not him. It couldn’t be him. He isn’t real. It’s so easy to forget that, in a world where nothing seems real.
“Do you have any idea how much trouble you could get into, standing around in that costume?” he asks. “Not just with the bloody super-copyright lawyers, but with every passing supervillain who decides you’d make the perfect trophy?”
“It’s just a mannequin,” says a voice behind him. Norio spins around just as the dart sticks into his neck. The night blurs, and Norio falls, heavily, staring through the all-enveloping haze at his assailant. She’s short, curvy, mid-forties. Very pretty.
“Hello, Norio,” she says. “Sorry to do it this way, but I need to talk to you, and it’s so difficult to catch you alone. I’m—”
“Tia,” slurs Norio, and passes out.
CHAPTER TWO
Before waking up wholly, Norio makes the mistake of leaping up, ready for a fight – and hits his head. He is lying, he finds, on the lower portion of a bunk bed in a small cabin full of wooden furniture and ornate maroon drapes. He climbs out of bed, rubbing his head. There’s a lump on the top of his skull threatening to grow to epic proportions, and a dull pain on his neck, where Tia’s dart hit him. He doesn’t know whether the throbbing sound that fills his head is inside it, or all around him. The cabin is windowless, and in a few moments Norio realises that the slightly queasiness he feels isn’t because of unknown drugs in his body, but because the whole room is moving. He cannot tell from the shape of the cabin whether he is in a private train or jet. Or maybe a caravan? He notices that his clothes have been changed: he is now wearing a terribly loud Hawaiian shirt and a kilt. He wonders if this is a violation of his human rights. The shirt alone…
The door opens, and Norio tenses, ready to attack.
“Oh good, you’re up,” says Tia brightly.
Norio waves a pained hand at his clothes. “Was this really necessary?”
“Oh, you should have seen some of the other outfits we tried. We just didn’t have too many options in your size, sorry.”
“What’s wrong with the clothes I was wearing?”
“Nothing.” Tia smirks.
“Well?”
“Please don’t run berserk or anything – I hate sweeping up after myself.”
Norio has seen news footage of Tias in action, taking on a militant base in Zimbabwe: a platoon of beautiful rifle-toting women in combat fatigues storming a base under heavy fire. He has seen, in shaky handheld footage, clusters of Tias turned to dust by RPG fire, replicating and reforming from survivors without falling out of step. He knows what she is capable of, and spares himself the effort of trying to overpower her. He sits down on his bunk instead.
“Where are you taking me?” he asks.
“I’ve kidnapped you, darling. I’m new at this, but I do know I’m not supposed to tell you where I’m going to hold you.” Tia giggles. “That said, I don’t plan on holding you anywhere, but there are other Tias nearby who are much more liberal than I am. And you’re wearing a kilt, too.”
Norio suppresses a smile. “I’m hungry,” he says.
“You poor thing.” Another Tia emerges from the first, and walks out of the cabin.
Norio blinks in astonishment. Watching Tia replicate on a screen was easy, like watching any other piece of technical wizardry, but in real life there is something disturbing about the ease with which she steps out of her own body without a break in conversation. He wants her to do it again, to see her new body flow out of the old. He can’t take his eyes off her.
She sits next to him on the bunk, uncomfortably close, and looks keenly at him.
“First of all, apologies. Tried to get through to you in less, you know, dramatic ways, but your secretary… Bodyguard? Butler?”
“Associate.”
“Very cute, by the way.”
“And an excellent detective.” Norio yawns and stretches. “She will be with us soon. I’ve been kidnapped before. It only ever ends one way.”
“She has no idea where you are, love,” chuckles Tia.
“Wait and see,” says Norio.
“You don’t have any tracers on
you either. I checked while you were asleep.” Tia grins lecherously. “I checked very thoroughly.”
Norio shrugs.
Tia rises. “I’m not a kidnapper, Norio,” she says. “I just have a few questions for you.”
“First, I have a request,” says Norio. “If we are flying at this moment, I want you to promise me we’re not going through any known charged zones. I have a lot invested in not turning superhuman.”
Tia looks surprised, then amused. “This is a submarine,” she says.
Another Tia enters and sets a tray of food on a table near Norio.
“Indian,” she says.
Norio grimaces.
“I feel like I should give you a feedback form,” says Tia-on-the-bed. “How has the experience of this kidnapping been so far, compared with your other kidnappings?”
Tia-by-the-table grins, and walks over to the bunk bed.
“Above average? Good? Excellent?”
The Tias merge. It’s the strangest thing Norio has ever seen, all sea monsters included, but he looks on as if two gorgeous women blending together is something he sees every day. He crosses over to the table and starts wolfing down the food. Rice, lentils and fish curry, very simply prepared. He would die before admitting it, but it’s very tasty.
“To business, then,” says Tia.
“Are you planning to kill me?”
“No.”
“What do you want to know?”
Tia wrinkles her nose in distaste at the question she is about to ask, but goes for it.
“Are you a supervillain, Norio Hisatomi?”
Norio laughs out loud. “No,” he says. “Anything else?”
Tia gets up, and paces about the cabin.
“Now I think you’re a good guy, Norio,” she says. “And I’m a big fan of team ARMOR.”
“I have nothing to do with team ARMOR,” says Norio on autopilot.
Tia smirks. “You’ve certainly done a lot of good work, both as Goryo and as Norio.”
“See previous answer.”
“Sure. Anyway, this isn’t about ARMOR. This is about your other life, the celebrity billionaire playboy Norio bit. Even there, as far as I can see, you look good. Saved people from supervillain attacks, lots of charity work, lots of funding to superhuman research. No involvement with Utopic’s dirty bits. But I get the feeling that there’s a lot that’s missing.”