Kaiju Rampage

by Eric S. Brown

  Nori slapped Ruri’s hands off of her. “Get it together, Ruri!” she screamed, not knowing if Ruri could hear her. “We’ve got to run!”

  The tank the creature was tearing into exploded in a blossoming ball of flame that flashed outward even as it streaked upwards towards the heavens. The fire engulfed the creature and several of the soldiers who unlucky enough to be near the tank when it went up. The shockwave from the explosion slammed into Nori and Ruri, knocking them from their feet.

  Nori went down hard but managed to twist her body at just the right angle to avoid being too badly hurt by the fall. Ruri met the ground with her face. Nori scrambled back to her feet as Ruri looked up at her. Tears streamed from Ruri’s eyes, and her nose was a mess of mangled meat and running blood.

  Cupping a hand over her mouth, Nori tried not to scream at the sight of her friend’s face. She honestly couldn’t even believe that Ruri was still conscious after taking a hard blow. Nori got control of her emotions, saying a silent prayer for strength, and took Ruri by the hand, helping her to stand.

  The battle was still raging outside the mouth of the alley Nori had managed to get the two of them into. The sound of gunfire remained constant, though it sounded like there were less guns being fired. The sharp, distinct chattering of a turret-mounted machine gun from one of the tanks more than made up for it, though. It was louder than even the ringing that already filled Nori’s ears.

  Ruri tried to speak, but her words were too mumbled and distorted for Nori to understand. One of Ruri’s pupils was larger than the other. Nori knew that was bad. There was a hospital just a few blocks away, so that’s where Nori decided to try for. She helped Ruri get an arm up and onto her, around her shoulder, so that she could support part of Ruri’s weight and the two of them hobbled away from the battle without looking back.

  ****

  Two Kawasaki OH-1 helicopters came streaking across the sky at speeds in excess of two hundred miles an hour. Captain Orto was in command aboard the Katana. The Katana’s sister, the Shrike, was being flown by Gushi, a long-time flight partner of Orto’s. The OH-1s were nicknamed Ninjas and with good reason. Their capacity for surgical strike-level fire was dead on, and that was exactly what was called for here in the streets of Tokyo. There were scattered civilians everywhere, trapped inside the combat zone, where the fifth column was engaged with two monsters that had apparently crawled out of the depths of Hell itself.

  Captain Orto had a difficult time believing what he was seeing with his own eyes. He had stories of real kaiju but never had imagined such things could truly be real. Kaiju was the only name to describe the two abominations, though. They resembled overgrown and deformed garden moles. Two of them were among the tanks of the fifth column, tearing the great armored vehicles apart with the massive claws of their hands (or were they feet?). The corpse of a third smoldered nearby next to the blown-out hull of an MBT Type 10. Orto was glad he was well above the battle; even so, the phantom smell of burning meat and hair made his stomach twist up inside of him.

  “Weapons hot,” Gushi informed him over the comm. link the two copters shared.

  “Time to send these things back where they came from,” Orto acknowledged with a ferocious grin parting his lips. “Just be careful of the tanks.”

  The Type 91 surface-to-air missiles the two Ninjas carried were perfect for the job and all the tanks closest to the two monsters were long dead. Captain Orto and Gushi had arrived at a nearly perfect time for their strike. Now, they just had to hit the monsters before the things managed to close on the rest of the fifth column.

  “Fire on my mark,” Captain Orto ordered as the engines of the two Ninjas howled, and they descended on a strafing run that aimed the noses of the two copters directly at the monsters.

  Orto waited for only of a fraction of second before giving the order. “Fire!”

  Two missiles left each of the Ninjas, blasting forth from their pods, to go blazing ahead of the helicopters. The first pair struck the larger of the two kaiju moles. It blew apart like a rotten melon as the explosion flung chunks of its body into the air in a rain of blood and splintering bone. The smaller of the two kaiju moles, unlike its companion, saw the missiles aimed for it coming. It tried to heave its heavy body out of their flight path at the last moment but was just too slow. Its death was instantaneous as the missiles. Orto imagined the tips of the missiles stabbing into the great beast like primitive spears before the monster vanished in a flash of light in front of him. He jerked on his controls, pulling his Ninja up hard back into the sky. Gushi’s bird followed him.

  “This is Katana I,” Captain Orto reported over the comm. of his helmet. “The kaiju have been eliminated. Katana I and Katana II—returning to base.”

  Captain Orto wished every mission were as easy as this one had been. He’d heard of what happened to General Akio’s fleet as it had been in route for Tokyo and mumbled a prayer of thanks that the kaiju he had been sent to engage were nothing like those things were reported to have been like.

  ****

  “Well, that was unexpected,” General Akio commented, handing the report back to his aide and advisor, Heather Karza. “Did we know kaiju like that even existed?”

  Karza huffed at him. “There are apparently no limits to what kaiju can be. The attack of those moles things have stirred up all of Tokyo. The entire city is in a panic.”

  “Nothing to be done about it now except declare martial law.”

  “Which is what I had recommended from the moment the tanks starting entering the city,” Karza reminded him.

  “So you did,” General Akio acknowledged. “What do you want from me, Karza? You were right, I was wrong. Does that make you feel any better? Does it help us with the situation we currently have?”

  “No,” Karza answered in a surprisingly calm voice. “No, sir, it doesn’t. I will pass along the order and get things as under control as we can with the forces we have at hand. Most of the troops, outside of those in this building, are already assigned to the city’s defense force and in position to engage the kaiju upon the arrival of the monsters.”

  “These kaiju moles,” General Akio stopped Karza before she could scurry away, “do we know we there are more of them?”

  “Not at this time,” Karza told him. “We are setting up seismograph equipment in hopes of being able to determine just that.”

  “Good,” General Akio sighed. “We need to strongly consider what other kinds of kaiju are out there that we might not see coming as well.”

  “Trust me, I am, sir,” Karza assured him. “If you’ll excuse me, though, I have an entire city of panicked civilians to get under control.”

  ****

  Commander Hiroto stood on the bridge of the DESRON Samurai II’s flagship. Long-range sonar had detected numerous inbound contacts half an hour earlier. The contacts were moving slowly towards the position that his DESRON and the American carrier group designated Task force Gamma Red had taken up just off the coast. All the ships of both groups were on high alert. In fact, the American Admiral Hall had scrambled the bulk of his available air wing. The sky was full of F-16s, F-18s, and even a small group of bombers. Two Seahawk copters circled the joint formation under Hiroto’s command. Hiroto wasn’t exactly comfortable giving the American admiral orders and tried to keep the two of them at least on the appearance of an equal level of power. The American outranked him, but this was a Japanese op. in Japanese waters, and the American had agreed after all to render aid as needed.

  Tearing his thoughts away from the American admiral, Hiroto turned his attention back to the inbound contacts. It bothered him greatly that were approaching at such a casual pace, as if they were totally unconcerned of the joint military force in their path. None of the sonar techs had been able to put a true number on the contacts. The readings were too distorted. At best, three large kaiju were approaching. At worst, it was an entire army of lesser ones. The lesser Kaiju seemed a greater threat by Hiroto’s standards. The large mon
sters were usually easily detectable and even easier targets. Yes, they were more difficult to kill, but with them, at least one knew where they stood. If even one of the odd sonar readings represented a group of lesser kaiju, it could break apart as it closed on the joint task force and swarm it. Not even the American ships were designed to fight an army of fast, agile monsters attempting to board them.

  Hiroto sighed and took a seat in his command chair as his XO sauntered up to him.

  “Should we open fire on the contacts, sir?”

  Hiroto shook his head. “Not yet, John.”

  American names were growing more common in Japan but Hiroto, even after two years of working together, almost had to stifle a laugh every time he called his XO by his first name.

  “Let those things get just a little closer, John,” Hiroto ordered.

  “What if the Americans—?”

  “The Americans won’t fire until we do, unless something changes,” Hiroto interrupted. “Admiral Hall is well aware that I am in command here.”

  “As you say, sir,” John replied. “Are the kaiju still CBDR?”

  CBDR in naval terms meant constant bearing, decreasing range.

  “Sir!” Hiroto’s sonar tech shouted across the bridge at him. “The kaiju are increasing speed!”

  “Well, I guess that answers that,” Hiroto snorted. “Report!”

  “One of the contacts has broken up, sir. It’s become hundreds, maybe more, a clear reading on it is impossible. All of them are inbound for the American carrier.”

  “And the other two contacts?” Hiroto demanded.

  “They’re coming our way, sir. Their speed has increased to over 30 knots!”

  “Heaven have mercy,” Hiroto heard his XO mutter. “That’s ramming speed!”

  There was no more time for Hiroto to worry about the Americans. The larger kaiju were streaking towards the ships under his command.

  “All ships of Samurai II, take the inbound contacts with guns!” Hiroto shouted over the open channel to the rest of the Japanese DESRON. “Fire at will! I repeat, fire at will!”

  His flagship, the Yakaze, opened up on the kaiju first. Torpedoes slipped into the waves from her tubes, darting towards the giant monsters. The Tachikaze, Noakaze, and Akikaze followed suit. Cannons thundered and missile launchers spat volley after volley. In the midst of the churning water and explosions, the two kaiju slowed. One of them appeared hurt, given how it moved on the sonar screen of the Yakaze. It rolled beneath the water and disappeared. The other kaiju remained stationary until the barrage of fire came to a halt, as the ships of Samurai II had no choice but to wait for their armaments to be loaded or cycle up new ammo. As soon as the pause in the firing came, the kaiju hurled itself forward again.

  “The remaining kaiju has increased its speed to over 40 knots, sir!” Hiroto’s sonar tech informed him.

  “Evasive maneuvers!” Hiroto screamed, but he knew it was too late.

  The kaiju burst from the water. Its upper body was like a human’s except that it was covered in reptilian scales. Its head was like that of a squid’s, conical and pointed. Impossibly large, yellow eyes stretched down each of the sides of that head. The massive claws of the fingers of its left hand raked the side of the Tachikaze from bow to stern with the terrible sound of rending metal. Its right hand slammed into the Noakaze at mid-ship. The Noakaze was knocked over onto her side, nearly breaking apart at the point of impact.

  Hiroto could hear the captain of the Tachikaze giving the order to abandon ship. From the Noakaze, there was only muffled, screaming voices that filled the airwaves. Hiroto knew the Noakaze was lost. The kaiju’s punch had lifted the destroyer and flung it through the air before it came down hard on its side. Even now, the ship was continuing to split along its middle. Inwardly, he prayed for any who were still alive aboard it.

  The Akikaze unloaded a volley of missiles into the squid kaiju’s back. Explosions peppered the kaiju as it moved closer to the Tachikaze, taking hold of the destroyer with both its hands. The squid kaiju swung the Tachikaze around through the water into the Akikaze. Both ships vanished in a flash of light that made Hiroto shield his eyes and turn away from the blast.

  In its wake, the kaiju was howling, its head reared back in pain. Both of its hands were gone. The ends of its arms were little more than bloody stumps. The death of the Tachikaze and Akikaze had cost the kaiju far more than the great beast had counted on.

  “Fire!” Hiroto found himself shouting at his weapons officer. “Fire!”

  The squid kaiju was close enough to the Yakaze now that the ship’s C.I.W.S. had sprung to life and engaged it. High-velocity rounds hammered into the kaiju at a rate of three thousand rounds a minute. They ripped away at its already-injured flesh. The squid kaiju was a mess. Burns and grooves of bullet-torn scales covered it. Black blood leaked from its body in rivers that ran into the ocean water around it.

  Every weapon that Yakaze had available that could target the wounded squid kaiju opened up on the monster. Tracer rounds streaked the air between the monster and the flagship of Samurai II. Missiles blew away chunks of the monster’s right shoulder. A volley of near point-blank torpedoes ruptured the already-weakened armor scales covering its guts. The squid kaiju’s cries ended as it collapsed, mid-lunge for Yakaze. The tip of its head sliced the port side of the destroyer as the great beast flopped about in its death throes.

  The bridge crew of the Yakaze were tossed and flung about both by the impact of the tip of the kaiju’s skull and the shockwave of the thing’s massive body splashing down onto the surface of the ocean. As the kaiju’s body sank, the Yakaze was jerked about on the waves.

  The Yakaze’s helm blew out in a shower of sparks that set the helmsman ablaze. He screamed as he threw himself from his chair, rolling about on the metal floor of the bridge. Other stations blew, sections of the ceiling came crashing down to bury panicked crewmen. The forward window shattered, sending a hail of glass shards slicing into those who were still on their feet. Hiroto had managed to remain in his command chair, clinging to it for dear life. He was there when a piece of the forward window struck him. It entered his skull through the right side of his head, slicing away the top of his ear in the process. Hiroto’s life ended in a bright flash of pain before his body toppled from his chair to thud onto the floor. The part of the shard of glass protruding from the side of his head gleamed in the red emergency lighting of the bridge.

  ****

  The air wing of Task force Gamma Red would have been engaging the kaiju that went after the ships of the Japanese DESRON, Samurai II, but they had their own problems. As the two large kaiju laid waste to Samurai II and the ships of Task force Gamma Red fought for their lives against an army of lesser kaiju which had risen from the depths, the air wing itself had also come under attack. The kaiju, somehow completely invisible to radar, had swept down upon the fighters of the air wing without warning. One moment, there were six F-16s and nine F-18s soaring over the unfolding battle, and in the next second, more than half of that force was gone. The bird-like things descended upon the fighters like monstrous banshees. Their shrieks were so loud that they actually played havoc with the electronics of the fighters, blowing out canopy covers and sensitive internal circuit boards. They nosedived into the F-16s and F-18s, plowing through them. The wreckage of broken fighters rained into the ocean, leaving fiery trails of smoke across the sky in their wake.

  “Break hard!” Captain Martin of Eagle Squadron yelled.

  Already, the remaining fighters of Eagle, Hawk, and Falcon Squadrons were doing so. F-16s and F-18s rolled through the clouds, abandoning their formations.

  Falcon 2 veered right, dodging one of the bird creatures that came sweeping at it. Henderson, Falcon 2’s pilot, punched it, speeding away from the kaiju. It angled around to chase after him.

  “Got one on my tail!” Henderson shouted. “Little help here, guys!”

  “Hold on Falcon 2,” Captain Martin said, trying to keep his voice calm, “I
’m on my way!”

  Captain Martin had counted at least two dozen of the bird kaiju so far. He had no idea if that accounted for all the creatures or if there were more outside his field of vision. Whatever the birds were doing to make themselves undetectable by his fighter’s gear, they were still doing it. And the bird kaiju certainly had the advantage. Their unexpected attack had left the squadrons of the air wing in utter chaos.

  Eagle 1 slipped into position behind the kaiju chasing Falcon 2 as Captain Martin tried to get a lock on it. His F-16’s targeting system refused to even acknowledge that the kaiju existed. Captain Martin saw he was going to have to do things the old-fashioned way. The forward guns of his F-16 spat streams of fire at the kaiju. They raked over the kaiju’s back and wings. The kaiju swerved to the left and plummeted from the sky in a downward spin. Falcon 2 was in the clear.

  Eagle 1 and Falcon 2 arched around on a course back towards where the rest of their squadrons fought for their lives against the kaiju. Falcon 4 became a blossoming cloud of flames, smoke, and shrapnel as one of the kaiju crashed directly into it. The kaiju didn’t appear to care if they lived or died so long as they took at least one fighter with them. Captain Martin didn’t know what to make of such insane tactics, but that was something he could think about later if he managed to survive the next few minutes.

  Falcon 6 fired two missiles from its wings. They blazed through the air, streaking towards one of the kaiju. The kaiju saw them coming. It opened its deformed monstrosity of a beak to let loose a shriek that had an effect like that of a sonic cannon on the inbound missiles. They exploded in flight still far from it. The move, however, left the kaiju holding nearly stationary, as the beast had needed to kill its forward momentum. Captain Martin took advantage of that coming in hard and fast at the kaiju. Missiles from his own fighter’s wings roared ahead of him. The missiles slammed into the kaiju, blowing its body apart. Eagle 1 flew straight through the mess of splattered flesh the kaiju had been reduced to. When he emerged on the other side, Captain Martin spotted Eagle 4. Eagle 4 was maneuvering hard to avoid a kaiju that was determined to sink its talons into it.