Captain Granderson saw PT2 shoot Garudasaurus in the shoulder and then he saw the kaiju fall to the ground. Granderson immediately armed his TR-3B, locked two missiles onto PT2, and then fired them. The missiles exploded against the cannon on the robot’s head, destroying it and knocking the robot off balance. The cannons on PT2’s hands were still operational, and they fired on Garudasaurus, but because the robot had been knocked off balance, the shells it fired buried themselves in Garudasaurus’s arms and wings instead of his chest, creating painful but not fatal wounds.
Captain Granderson circled back around and emptied what was left of his high-powered machine guns on PT2. He cursed loudly when he finished his attack and saw that PT2 was still standing over Garudasaurus and threatening to kill the leader of the Kaiju Corps.
Garudasaurus’s body was racked with pain, but the kaiju knew that he had to act quickly if he was going to save his own life and destroy this mech. Garudasaurus thrust his leg out and swept PT2 at its legs, knocking the robot down. Garudasaurus stood, and as he did so, he realized that his wings were too damaged to fly and his arms were too damaged to fight with. He looked down to see PT2 starting to stand up. The kaiju also saw the mountain of rubble that was between him and the robot. Garudasaurus’s wings were too damaged to fly with, but they were still far from useless. The kaiju screeched then he started to flap his wings. The wind gusts generated by Garudasaurus’s wings started with the force of a large storm and quickly accelerated to the force of a level five hurricane. The concrete, steel, and cars that littered the ground were caught up in the strong winds and were hurled at PT2 at speeds over one hundred and fifty miles per hour. The shrapnel that was being tossed at the robot was slowly shredding it ribbons.
The winds were so strong the Granderson had to fly his TR-3B away from the battle to avoid being caught in a wind shear. He looked down to see that the constant stream of shrapnel had all but torn the outer layer of armor off PT2. Granderson was shocked to see that despite the damage to it, the mech was still operational. Granderson was considering trying to arm two of his remaining missiles and fire them at the mech in an attempt to finish it off, but he was concerned that the high winds would push them off target.
He decided that he was going to attempt it when he heard his radio come to life, “Granderson, this is Okafur. Pull away from the target, I have something that will finish it off.”
Granderson replied, “Copy that.” Then he flew his TR-3B away from the battle.
Okafur flew his craft in low and from behind Garudasaurus. When they were almost directly over the kaiju, Michelle opened the door to the TR-3B, jumped out of it, and transformed into Bearadon. She was still falling when she dropped directly in front of Garudasaurus and into the wind gusts that he was creating, adding the force of the wind to the speed of her free fall. Bearadon was fully formed when she slammed into the mech with the force of her jump and Garudasaurus’s wings propelling her massive weight. Bearadon’s body smashed through what was left of PT2’s body, ending the robot’s existence.
As soon as Garudasaurus saw Bearadon plow through the mech, he stopped flapping his wings and slumped to the ground. The still badly injured Bearadon walked over next to Garudasaurus and laid down next to him. Granderson and Okafur both landed their TR-3Bs and exited from them. The two pilots shook hands as Brian ran from one ship to next as he continued his efforts to prevent the Signal from gaining control of the TR-3Bs.
Okafur pointed to the computer programmer. “Who is that guy, and what’s he doing running onto my ship?”
Granderson shrugged. “His name is Brian Linke and he is a civilian programmer. He has been more or less drafted by the Horsemen. Right now, he is cutting the ships off from external communications based on the Horsemen’s orders.” Granderson looked at the two giant kaiju that were lying on the ground near them. “Why haven’t they turned back into humans yet?”
“They heal faster in the kaiju forms. From the looks of them, they may have to stay in those forms for a little while.”
Leviathan and Chagon moved their injured bodies as best they could toward Garudasaurus’s position. When they saw that he was not only alive but that he had Bearadon with him, they both roared and hissed respectively to inform Garudasaurus that they were alive and that they had won their battles as well. Garudasaurus screeched in reply.
Satisfied that the battle was over, Leviathan sat his exhausted body down on the street. Chagon then gently wrapped her body around that of Leviathan and she looked up into his eyes. Leviathan stared back into her eyes and then he ran his claw slowly over her head. They were in their kaiju forms, badly injured, and surrounded by death, but they were together, and for the first time in their lives, they both felt complete.
Chapter 13
Catskill Mountains, Horsemen Facility
Clarissa turned off her tablet, cursed loudly, and then she exited her office. She took the long walk down three floors to the hangar five. When she entered the hangar, she saw Timothy and Susan working on several of what appeared to be a series of pencil detonators. Jerome’s Instructor Thomas was with them as well. He had just overseen the deployment of four of the TR-3Bs who had come back to base, been fitted with updated weaponry, and then sent to Chicago. Aside from the four Instructors, there were other Horsemen scientists in the hangar who were working on a variety of other weapons and projects as quickly as they could.
Clarissa tried to calm herself down as she walked toward the other three Instructors. When she reached Timothy and Susan, she simply said, “We are just about out of time. Our network is falling apart. I could barely keep an incoming transmission from falling apart while I was conferring with Granderson and Okafor. Bearadon is now with the rest of the team in Chicago. They were able to defeat the robots that were attacking the city. During the battle, however, all four members of the Kaiju Corps were badly injured. They may need to stay in their Kaiju forms for a day or two in order to heal.” She looked toward Thomas. “What is the status of our TR-3B squadron?
Thomas pulled out a notepad that he had been using to keep track of information in place of his tablet. “We just armed and deployed four of the TR-3Bs that had returned to base with our newest sonic cannons and magnetic compression missiles. The sonic cannons can punch a hole through a mountain. They can be utilized as either a single burst or as a continuous blast. The magnetic compression missiles attach to a metal object and then create a powerful but concentrated magnetic field that will cause the structure to condense upon itself into the smallest unit possible. We also restocked their typical ammunition and disconnected them from external input to help protect them from the Signal. Those four ships are also transporting sonic cannons and magnetic compression missiles to be attached to Granderson’s and Okafor’s crafts. In addition to new weapons, they will also carry supplies, including ammunition and missiles, to restock Granderson and Okafor’s crafts as well as food and water supplies to last the team several weeks if needed. The four TR-3Bs should reach Chicago within the next few minutes.” He flipped to the next page of notes. “We have ten more TR-3Bs here that are currently being fitted with new weaponry and are being disconnected from external communications. Once the necessary weaponry installations are complete, we will send them to Chicago as well. Our reaming eight TR-3Bs are scattered around the world, delivering the last of EMP bombs. The last instructions that they were given were to deliver their payloads and then to fly to Spain where they will follow instructions sent to them by Mr. Linke on how to disconnect their craft from external communications. Once they have completed that task, they are to fly to the Great Lakes area of the United States and Canada. They are to search that area and the US East Coast for the Kaiju Corps and other survivors so that they can become a part of the resistance.”
Clarissa nodded and then turned toward Timothy. “What is the status our bombing raids.”
“Our targets have attacked fifty-three percent of the major cities in the world. It’s a remarkable pace, but with
still nearly half of the planet’s manufacturing plants creating robots at a pace of every half an hour, the effectiveness of phase one of our plan has been greatly diminished. Had our original two-week projection held out, we may have been able to completely stop the production of the robots across the globe, but with our time frame being cut to twenty-four hours, we will never reach that goal. With the craft that we still have in the air, our best estimate is that we will be able to the stop production giant robots in about fifty-five percent of cities using the EMP bombs. The good news is that we were successfully able to stop production of new robots in the targeted cities along the Great Lakes and along the US East Coast from New York City to Atlanta. The Kaiju Corps will have to contend with the robots that already inhabit those cities, but no new ones will be created in them.”
Clarissa nodded. “What about the other robots across the planet? After they capture all of the remaining humans in their cities of origin, will they move into other areas?”
Timothy shrugged. “We have not seen any of the robots leave their city of origin yet, but given how efficiently the Signal has approached the invasion so far, we believe that robots moving from their cities of origin to be a logical next step.”
Clarissa threw her hands into the air “Then our plan is a failure. The Signal will just continue to create new robots until they overwhelm the Kaiju Corps and the remaining humans with sheer numbers!”
Susan walked over and placed her hand on Clarissa’s shoulder. “That’s not necessarily how things will play out. While the Signal has managed to take over our technology, it’s still limited to the finite resources of our planet. Currently, the robots it has created have all been made from vehicles and other forms of transportation. The main reason for this approach is because that when the Signal entered the internet, it was able to determine that we had the technology to shut down their robots with EMPs. In order to prevent this from occurring, the Signal has thus far created all of its robots in plants where there is an ample supply of rubber, usually tires, to insulate the mechs against an EMP attack. As long as EMPs continue to be a threat, the Signal will be limited to the number of robots it can create by the amount of available rubber. Granted, there is a lot of excess rubber out there, but we can least be sure that the number of possible robots created is limited by something.”
Timothy spoke up, “Our surgical EMP strikes may have been too high tech an approach to dealing with this problem, and we are currently considering other options. Specifically, we are looking at using a low-tech variation on Program 437.”
Clarissa shrugged. “The program that focused on detonating nuclear bombs in the upper atmosphere in order to create wide- spread EMP dispersion? That program was put on ice in the 1960s.”
Timothy nodded. “Yes, it was put on hold because it was difficult to predict exactly how the EMP would disperse. The US and the Soviets were unable to ensure that they could launch the attack without affecting their own satellites. That is no longer a concern for us. In fact, we want as wide-spread a dispersion as we can get.”
“Even if we could gain access to our nuclear weapons, how do we get them into the upper atmosphere without having launch capability? The TR-3Bs are not capable of flying that high.”
Thomas walked over to the group. “That’s where our low-tech approach comes into play. The Signal has taken over most our technology, but apparatuses without CPUs will be totally free of the Signal’s influence. Our delivery method will be weather balloons. We can attach our nukes to them and let them loose into the atmosphere. We can detonate the bombs with the delay switch pencil timer that we are currently constructing. These timers would be unaffected by Signal’s ability to override computer systems.”
Thomas then led the group over to a world map. The map had several red dots with large areas of blue emanating out from them. The blue areas of the map overlapped in numerous places, and together, they covered nearly the entire planet. Thomas waved his hand over the blue areas of the map. “We would only need to release roughly ten nuclear balloons to cover the parts of the world that we have yet to address with EMP bombs.”
A small glimmer of hope was starting to work its way into Clarissa’s mind. “Where are we going to get access to nuclear weapons? All of our military bases have been totally compromised.”
Thomas motioned for Clarissa to follow him over to one of the other several large maps that were hung along the walls of the hangar. “With our network failing, we have had to dust off some of these old maps to help us locate targets.” He pointed to an area of the map that showed a wooded area in New Jersey. “The forest known as the Pine Barrens, which is located in New Jersey between The Delaware River and The Atlantic Ocean, houses underground nuclear missile silos. It is in a rural area with a small and dispersed population. Not only are the Pine Barrens within our targeted area along the US East Coast, but because it is so sparsely populated, the last data that we have suggests that there is no robot presence in the area.”
Clarissa pointed over in the direction of the detonators that had already been created. “We are almost at zero hour. How many of those detonators have already been created?”
Thomas shook his head. “Only two so far, but we can make more from scavenging materials from old clocks and other similar machines if we had to leave the base. Creating the detonators is not the problem. The issue would be our balloon-based attack would have to occur simultaneously from various sites around the world. If we were to release one balloon at a time, the robots would quickly figure out our plan and then they would be on the lookout for our balloons. We also have the benefit of knowing the TR-3Bs circuits are shielded from EMPs. They will still be functional after the warheads are detonated.”
Clarissa’s eyes lit up as the full meaning of what Thomas was saying occurred to her. “You have found a method that doesn’t require us to stay until the last minute creating EMP bombs and deploying them before blowing up the facility! We can live on and continue to fight against the robots!” She sprang forward and hugged Thomas.
As she was hugging Thomas, there was crashing sound that shook the entire facility. Clarissa’s eyes went wide as she yelled across the hangar to anyone who could answer, “Are we under attack?”
A voice yelled back, “No, ma’am. There is no sign of any attack coming from outside the structure.”
The facility shook again and the floor split beneath their feet. Timothy looked down at a newly formed crack in the floor. “That was an impact tremor that came from below us.” His face took on a crimson hue, as his mind ran through the schematics of the building they were standing in. He began to scream out orders in a panicked fashion, “Open the bay doors! Load the detonators onto one of the TR-3Bs!” He grabbed Clarissa and Thomas then he began pushing them toward one of the TR-3Bs. “I want Clarissa and Thomas in the TR-3B closest to the bay door! Get them in the air as soon as they are on the craft! Then we need the TR-3B with the detonators to follow in the air right after that! Once those two craft have taken off, evacuate the building!”
Thomas picked up Clarissa and ran onto the TR-3B closest to the bay door. The craft’s pilot ran in behind him, jumped in the pilot seat, and took off out into the sky.
Thomas could see that Clarissa was still trying to process what had occurred. “The tremors were coming from below Hangar 5! Hangar 6 houses most of our computer banks and Hangar 7 is where we construct the TR-3Bs. We were worried that we were running out of time and that the Signal would soon infiltrate our network. It seems that the Signal had infiltrated our system some time ago. The Signal has also taken over the hangar where we construct our TR-3Bs and has likely created a giant robot using TR-3B parts.”
Clarissa gasped. “My God! The TR-3Bs are the fastest and most advanced aircraft on the planet. They are dangerous enough on their own, but in Hangar 5, we also had the sonic cannons and magnetic compression missiles with recent modifications made to allow them to be attached to a TR-3B! If the robot is able to incorporate that
technology into itself, we may have just given the Signal the tools to create a robot that is powerful enough to wipeout our TR-3Bs and the Kaiju Corps!”
Thomas nodded. “I know. That is why Timothy sent us out first. You know what areas of the world have been bombed, and you have the most current information about what area we are going to attack next. I know how to create detonators from scavenged clock pieces, and where we need to launch the balloons from for maximum effectiveness.” He reached out and grabbed her hand. “It’s up to us to make sure that we get those EMPs into the air and give the Kaiju Corps and the resistance a fighting chance.”
Back in the Catskill Facility, Timothy watched as the TR-3B that he had just run a detonator onto took off out the bay doors and into the sky. He saw Susan running another detonator onto a TR-3B and he yelled at the craft, “Take off! Go! Go!” The craft was moving through the hangar, and it had just reached the bay door when the ground behind it exploded. Susan yelled at the TR-3B, “Show me rear visual, now!” Susan screamed when she looked at the hangar and saw a colossal black robot climbing out of the floor. The mech was clearly created out of TR-3B parts. It had a roughly humanoid appearance with notable differences on its extremities. The robot’s triceps, thighs, and the back of its head all had triangular-shaped protrusions sticking out of them. Its shoulders were also large and rounded. They also had the appearance of a human who was wearing football pads.
The most terrifying aspect of the robot was that Susan could clearly see the rockets which propelled the TR-3Bs attached to its back. The TR-3B that Susan was on increased its speed as it gained altitude, and she quickly lost sight of the robot and the hangar. She whispered, “Goodbye, Timothy. You were the best of us, and if there is heaven above us, I hope to see you there one day.”
Kaiju Corps Page 12