Kaiju for Dummies

by Nicholas Knight

  Lusitania’s old mask is back on. She smiles, looking both pretty and vapid. The ideal daddy’s girl and heiress.

  There’s a tightness around her eyes now that ruins the mask ever so slightly. She put some cracks in it when she didn’t obey her father and stayed behind in Oxford to try and fight Titanocobra and the aliens when they attacked us back. According to Isabella, the disobedience was not taken well.

  The men start to move to intercept me when another figure suddenly steps in my way. He’s above average height and slender enough to make him seem taller than he is. It’s hard to say whether or not he’s Asian or white and while he’s dressed business casual, his clothes are rumpled. He looks like some upcoming businessman who just had a bad day.

  “I missed you earlier.” He’s out of breath and it’s almost enough to hide his British accent.

  “Sorry, pal, you got the wrong guy,” I say.

  The suits are upon us, stepping between me and Mr. British. Lusitania steps up to me, twining her arm through mine, and pulls me away with a soft smile that I swear must be hiding fangs.

  “You couldn’t dress up a little?” she asks under her breath, her tone light and airy so as not to break the illusion.

  “Dress up? I caught the first flight out. I landed, what? An hour, hour and a half ago?”

  Her eyes widen a little. “You haven’t been to your hotel yet?” She looks around. “Where’s your luggage?”

  I jostle my backpack. She stares at me, then wrinkles her nose.

  “Okay, next time, do everyone a favor and hit up your hotel and shower first.”

  “Nice to see you too,” I say, rolling my eyes. She leads me past the line and inside the building. “Don’t worry, I’ve already got our tickets. You’ll have to let security check your bag but if that was just on a plane there shouldn’t be any—"

  “Aaron!”

  I glance back before we slip inside to see one of the suites bodily restraining the guy who’d stepped in front of me. Weird.

  “How did he know my name?” I ask.

  Lusitania rolls her eyes. “I did just call it out.” I’ve always envied her ability to silently tack on “Dumbass” to the end of a sentence with such a minimal change in tone.

  I guess she’s right. Vegas seems a little crazy to me. Who knows what that guy’s problem is. And speaking of problems. “What was that about tickets? I thought we were meeting up to deal with the kaiju problem.”

  “We are, Aaron,” Lusitania says, openly allowing her irritation to show through. Something must really be bothering her. “But the world doesn’t stop just because a kaiju appears.”

  “Two kaiju,” I say, remembering Xenatlas’s debut in Manhattan.

  “Whatever,” she says. “Point is, life is still happening.”

  The inside of the Pearl Theater is arranged so that many red seats are circled around what looks like a cage. There’s a logo from a popular energy drink in the center of it, along with two men in tight shorts beating the living shit out of each other. One of them steps inside the other’s guard and catches him across the chin with a sharp elbow blow that drops him. He hits the ground, blood flowing from his split chin, and he doesn’t get up.

  “What the hell?” This is MMA. I don’t watch much of it but I recognize it. What is the senator’s princess doing watching something like this?

  Lusitania doesn’t say a word, just drags me along to a row of seats and leads me down to a pair of empty chairs. I stare at them, then look at her. “There’s only two seats.”

  “Glad you remember how to count,” she says, taking one of them.

  I take the other, slowly, looking around. “Where’s Isabella?”

  And then I find out.

  Chapter Eleven

  ⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎

  I am blown away.

  There’s nothing left in the world but Isabella. On some level I recognize what’s happening as she strolls out of the tunnel and up the isle with her entourage to some rock music and goes through all the motions of getting ready to enter the cage, shedding her robe to reveal a spandex sports bra and shorts. A man checks her fists and smears a clear substance over her eyes. And then she’s in the cage waiting for her opponent.

  I don’t pay the other woman any attention. My eyes are only for Isabella.

  The super tight clothes show off a physique that is all tight muscle and curves. Her hair is braided tight to her skull and her face is completely devoid of makeup. I’ve never seen Isabella so raw. Her face is intense, her dark eyes track her opponent. She’s a goddess of murder and this other woman has just stepped up to be slaughtered.

  I had no idea she was a fighter.

  Damn she’s hot.

  So many things suddenly click into place. Her rigid diet, her athleticism. I’d been right about her being an athlete, but she’d teased me, saying she didn’t “play” anything when I asked her about it. Hot damn. No wonder I’d never intimidated her. She looks like she could bend steal standing there.

  The fight begins after the two women touch gloves.

  Isabella comes out of her corner hard and fast. Three rapid jabs test her opponent’s guard and then she’s through it, delivering blow after blow to the woman’s face with surgical precision. Blood sprays as her opponent’s nose breaks. Isabella once told me I didn’t know how to throw a punch. I’d thought I was pretty badass. I’ve got nothing on her skills. She’s turned savagery into an artform.

  Her opponent tries to get some distance to recover and throws a wild kick. Isabella sees it coming and takes her opponent off her feet, slamming her down into the ground. There’s a flurry of elbows and mad scrambling. If I hadn’t seen as many fights as I have, I wouldn’t have understood just how hard these two women are working or the skill with which they’re grappling.

  Fighting on the ground is hard. Winning a fight on the ground requires either greater skill than your opponent or overwhelming force. Isabella hits her enemy with both and puts her in an armbar. Her opponent screams. Isabella pulls. The screaming stops as the woman taps the ground.

  Isabella leaps to her feet and does a victory lap as her opponent slaps the ground in frustration and the referee announces the winner. The fight took less than forty-five seconds. I am dating a legitimate badass.

  I’m drawn back to myself by the laughter of Lusitania next to me. There’s a mad light in her eyes. It hits me that she would probably love to be down in that cage. It might even be a healthier outlet for her anger issues than turning into a kaiju.

  She turns to me, a smirk on her face. “How was that?”

  “Is it wrong that I’m turned on right now?”

  Her face wrinkles with disgust. And disappointment?

  Oh, she was hoping this would mess with me. Plenty of guys can’t handle being with a woman who can kick ass that hard. Hell, Isabella could probably kick my ass six ways to Sunday and then some. And I’m okay with that. It’s damn impressive.

  My not-step-cousin doesn’t like me. She told Isabella not to get involved with me when we first met. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that Isabella had told her that I didn’t know about her fighting. It would have been a mean trick if it had worked.

  Lusitania makes a disgusted noise. “You’re wrong, gutterfuck.”

  Gutterfuck? That’s a new one. It also perfectly encapsulates her entire attitude towards me.

  “Love you too, cuz,” I say, giving her my best grin.

  Lusitania chokes on something—I can’t tell what—and turns red before sputtering incoherently for a full thirty seconds. I’m left blinking in surprise at her antics. Apparently being super sweet to her causes some kind of software malfunction in that cold, calculating brain of hers. Who knew?

  “Shut up,” she finally says, and leads me away. I don’t have to ask where we’re going and I can’t wait to see Isabella and congratulate her on her fight.

  T
he bodyguards in suits follow us down to the backroom, stopping outside when a bunch of seriously in shape guys who must be Isabella’s training partners, coach, and friends from her gym step out of the room. They let us pass no problem but get in the way of the suits. “Friends only, hombre,” one of them says.

  The suits start to argue and Lusitania and I slip into the room, closing the door behind us. Isabella’s changed into sweats and has dried off from her fight. Even without makeup and her hair in disarray after being released from its braid she’s glowing.

  I cross the distance between us, pick her up, and spin her around. “You won!”

  She squeals. The sound is so girly it should be completely at odds with the murder goddess I just saw in the cage but it’s not. It’s all Isabella. I pull her into me and kiss her. Our lips meet. Then our tongues dance and our arms pull each other so tight together. Every part of me wants to become one with her and damn the rest of the world.

  Lusitania’s cough pulls us apart.

  My ears burn. I’m not one for PDA. It’s just that when I saw Isabella, I forgot about everything else completely.

  Isabella on the other hand is grinning at her friend like the cat that ate the canary. “I win, you lose. Suck it.”

  Lusitania makes a disgusted face. “Yeah, yeah, whatever. Quit trying to suck each other’s faces off. We need to go.”

  Isabella becomes serious. “Yeah, come on Aaron.”

  “Wait, go?” I ask. “Where are we going?”

  “God, you’re annoying,” Lusitania says, passing by us to open a door on the far side of the room. It’s not visible from the door we entered from.

  “I’ll explain as we go, yeah?” Isabella says, pulling on my arm.

  I go with her because I’m an infatuated dumbass. “Okay, so what’s going on?”

  We pass through the door and into what looks to be a maintenance hall. It’s all barren concrete and steel and smells faintly of construction. This is not meant for the guests to see.

  “Lusitania’s padre went a little bit nuts after the princess didn’t come home right away from Oxford,” Isabella says. “He’s been monitoring us nonstop. Those bodyguards aren’t just here to keep her safe. They’re there to keep us in line.”

  That seemed a little extreme, even for an ex-Navy senator. Oh fuck. Were those men Secret Service? Was I being roped into committing a crime? With Senator Church’s authority and power, I could find myself tossed into a very dark hole and never see the light of day again. “And you two thought it was a good idea to get me involved in your runaway attempt?”

  “Love you too, cuz,” Lusitania sing-songs back to me all sickly sweet.

  I swear and start to slow.

  “Come on,” Isabella urges. Dammit, in for a penny in for a pound. Here’s hoping I’m not the one about to get pounded.

  We pick up the pace and pass through a series of turns before the sound of angry voices and pursuit catches up to us. Lusitania lets out a stream of creative profanity and we break into a run. I have no idea where we’re going or what the hell we’re going to do when we get there, but it’s got to be better than playing punching bag for these guys.

  We burst through a door and find ourselves outside on the sidewalk. The entry is only a little way down. We start off in the opposite direction but only make it a few feet before the suits spill out the door after us.

  “Damn,” I swear. We run. They chase. They’re faster. We aren’t going to make it far.

  A car pulls up to the curb and the door flies open. It’s that guy with the British accent from before. This is so not what I need right now!

  “Taisaur, get in!” he calls out.

  “Get in,” I shout at the girls and we pile into the car. The driver pulls out into traffic with the screech of tires, leaving the suits behind.

  “Who the fuck is this?” Lusitania demands.

  I don’t know. I’ve never seen this man before today.

  Only I recognize his voice. And there’s only a handful of people on the planet who know the name of my kaiju.

  I stare at him. “You’re Solrin.”

  “And you’re a bloody pain in my ass, you know that?” he says. “I go to all the trouble of bribing a cabbie to bring you to me and you fucking hop out early and make me chase you down.”

  I hear his words but they don’t make any sense. “How the hell did you track me down?”

  “Same way the others are tracking you!” he shouts over his shoulder. “Hurry up and login to the game. Quick!”

  A roar shakes the night, rattling the windows and my bones. I turn in my seat and look back through the window.

  Megaptera’s just appeared outside the Pearl. His massive feet sink into the asphalt and concrete under his weight, creating a spiderweb of fissures.

  And he’s looking right at us.

  Chapter Twelve

  ⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎⁎

  “We must go faster,” I say as Megaptera gives chase. He must have seen me through the window. In one step he’s halved the distance between us. The impact of his red foot on the ground makes the car bounce.

  “I’m trying,” the man who plays Solrin snaps. Calling him Solrin feels wrong but I’ve got no other name for him.

  The car speeds around a corner, nearly clipping a pedestrian, and then shifts into another lane, cutting off a chrome Hummer.

  Megaptera rounds the corner and we turn again, zigzagging through the city blocks. He’d have no problem tearing through the buildings, but he doesn’t do that. Instead he picks his way down the road, wreaking havoc with every step. It’s unintentional havoc, though. The kind that something his size can’t help but create in a city.

  “What the hell is he doing?” Isabella asks, horrified as the chrome Hummer is crushed under Megaptera’s foot. The flames licking up around his ankle don’t even phase him.

  “He’s here for Aaron,” Solrin’s player says. He looks back at me. “Damn, Dane must have found out you’re an ex-con.”

  “Dane?” I ask.

  “Dane Burnette,” Solrin’s player says, accented voice clipped, like he’s reciting a memorized report. “Age twenty-seven. Born in Boston. Former running back for University of Alabama.”

  We swerve to avoid a car that’s just caught sight of the kaiju and cuts us off in a mad effort to escape. Megaptera steps over them, foot coming down barely a yard away. The impact bounces the car completely off the ground and it comes down perpendicular to where it was trying to go.

  “Roll tide, motherfucker,” Lusitania says.

  “Was set to be a number one draft for your American football league when he and his wife were attacked on vacation in California of all places. Ruined his career.” Solrin’s player continues, giving Lusitania a look that suggests she’s more dangerous than the wreckage outside. “His wife didn’t survive.”

  Red lasers shoot from Megaptera’s eyes, lighting up his horn as they pass, and strike the pavement ahead of us, melting it. Solrin’s player nearly overturns the car as he swerves to avoid the melted roadway and we double back, momentarily rushing toward Megaptera before swerving again down another street.

  Get the fuck back here, Aaron! The kaiju’s roar sends a chill down my spine. I can understand what he’s saying. Worse, there’s no mistaking the voice inside that roar. Megaptera—or Dane Burnette—is definitely here for me.

  “And you might have noticed,” Solrin’s player says. “He’s got some anger issues.”

  Not so fucking tough now, are you? Dane demands through Megaptera’s roar. I’m going to crush you and all your friends in that car. You can’t run forever.

  “Damn,” I say, swallowing. This is a whole other level of fucked up terror. I’ve been around kaiju before, ducking and dodging their destruction. Each of those times though I wasn’t on the monster’s radar. I was simply collateral. Having a monster bigger than any of the surrounding buildings
actively trying to kill me is enough to make me want to shit myself. “Damn, damn, damn. We have to get him out of the city.”

  Somewhere around the third or fourth damn my brain makes some kind of logic jump. I’m not giving myself up. Fuck that. Sorry, but I’m not sorry that I’m just not that selfless. I’m not so big an asshole that I want this guy running around smashing up Vegas, however.

  Vegas is sandwiched between smaller towns like Spring Valley and Paradise, which are less densely populated but more residential, which sucks. Past them its miles of desert. If we can somehow get out there…we’d die. There’d be no way to avoid those laser beams and without the buildings slowing him down he’d catch us up in no time.

  Lusitania reaches that conclusion at the same time I do. “That’s fucking stupid. Did you forget your brain back there, shitdick?”

  Solrin’s player lets out a mad chuckle. “You must be Halira. I wondered why you were coming out here, Aaron.”

  “How the hell did you find me?” I’ve already asked this question. Maybe this time I’ll get an answer.

  “The update. Friends in the game can track each other down now no matter where we are, or which world we’re in,” he says.

  “I thought everyone unfriended me.” In fact, I distinctly recall the voice of my little AI help-bot telling me that I had no friends.

  “We did,” Solrin’s player says. “You never unfriended any of us, though.”

  “That’s the dumbest fucking thing—” I’m cut off as a building behind us collapses.

  Megaptera—Dane—is growing frustrated and less careful about collateral damage. If this keeps up, he’s going to end up smashing down several city blocks and then turning us into pancakes. I can’t help but envision the flattened, charred remains of the prison in Huntsville.