Realm of Kong: The Culling

by Dane G. Kroll

  She escorted six scientists from the biomimetics lab out to the helipad. A helicopter was waiting for them and six other groups of scientists and soldiers. This was their last day in the country. One of them was not happy about that.

  “You cannot do this,” argued Dr. Leto. “Our work has been going on for five years. You cannot stop us now. All of our progress will be lost.”

  Ishikawa did not stop to talk or even turn around. She kept her eyes on the helicopter ahead of her. That was her only concern.

  “Your work will not be lost,” she said. “All of your records will be stored away. When there is a chance to bring you back you may start where you left off.”

  Dr. Leto scoffed at Ishikawa’s claims. “I will see you in hell before I see you here again. They are not bringing any of us back. They do not care about our advances. All the higher ups want is better weapons to kill the monsters with.”

  Ishikawa stopped in her tracks. She turned around and approached Dr. Leto. She was a taller than him. He had to stand as straight as he could to appear confident in this exchange.

  “What is it that you do, Dr. Leto?” Ishikawa asked.

  “My team and I were examining the kaiju and how to incorporate their abilities into our mechs. Granted, our primary subject was Robo-Kong. People have been trying to understand the Manlin’s designs since we received the robot almost four decades ago. Their technological capabilities are unfathomable, but we are close.”

  “Close?” asked Ishikawa rhetorically. “You have shown no progress since you came to this country. Robo-Kong never received any upgrades due to your work. Now, Robo-Kong is scrap metal. It will take the Mechiju Corporation possibly years to rebuild the robot. There is nothing further to work on here. No one will let you work on Babel 4. It is on the field until further notice. What will you do until then? Will you keep toying away at thoughts in the air? As of right now, your work is no longer important. Until further notice you are unnecessary to the team.”

  Dr. Leto put his head down. Ishikawa was right. He was no closer to figuring out the abilities of the kaiju or replicating the Manlin’s technology than his predecessors. The alien technology was still years ahead to what mankind had developed.

  Ishikawa began her duties again. She continued leading the scientists to their departure. When they arrived, Dr. Leto had one last thing to say to the lieutenant.

  “Cutting us is a mistake,” he began. “Maybe not now, but we are essential to the defense of not only this base, but the world. There are many others that are less important to you. We should not be going.”

  “You are on the list,” said Ishikawa.

  “Who else is on that list?” Dr. Leto asked. “Is Dr. Campbell on it? What about Russell? Macy? Hell, Kabbat better be on this ride back home. All of them are worthless. They were brought here to chase whims, impossible dreams, nothing more.”

  Ishikawa glared at Dr. Leto. “Get on the helicopter, Dr. Leto. We will contact you when it is time to return.”

  When all the scientists were on board, the helicopter took off. That was one less headache for Ishikawa to deal with. Dr. Leto was getting to her. She would never have admitted it to him, but he was right. There were several of those scientists that were on the list. She had just not gotten to them yet.

  One name stood out to her down on the list, Dr. Scott Macy. She had been assigned to his team when he first arrived. Despite his past he was brought in to help develop the next greatest weapon against the kaiju, a giant soldier for one on one combat with the monsters. Since the grounding of all teams on Japan, Dr. Macy had become a recluse. He retreated to a lab down in the sub-basements and was rarely seen. He never showed his work to anybody. He just kept reporting that he was working on his project and that was all. He was soon to be on the chopping block.

  Ishikawa made her way down through the facility to the lab that Dr. Macy had been residing in. The hallways were typically empty this far underground, but along with the cuts of the facility’s staff there was also the building’s resources. Many of the lights only functioned when someone was in motion and even dimly at that. All of the facility’s funds were being redirected toward fixing Robo-Kong. It left a gloomy tone on her journey to Dr. Macy.

  The door to Macy’s lab was locked as usual. He had changed the code several times since beginning his work. He did not trust anybody, not even his own teammates.

  “Macy, open up!” she yelled. Her knocks echoed down the hallway. She pounded on the door until her fist was red and bruised. The door did not open.

  “Will you stop making all that racket,” said Macy over the intercom. “I am trying to get some work done.”

  “Let me in, Scott,” said Ishikawa. “That’s an order.”

  “My hands are full right now. I can’t,” he said.

  “If you do not open this door, I will send a team down here to blow it off,” she screamed into the speaker.

  “I’ve heard there were cutbacks. Do you have enough people for that?”

  Ishikawa punched the door in frustration. She paid for it with the pain coursing down her arm. “You are on the list of cutbacks if you do not produce any results soon. I know how important your work is, but if you are getting nowhere with it then your time here is worthless.”

  “That’s not true,” said Macy. “I’m making huge advancements. Literally.”

  “What are you doing in there? I need a report.”

  “I’m working. That is all you need to know,” said the soulless speaker.

  Ishikawa heard the click of the speaker turn off. She was cut off from further speaking with Macy. He had shut himself in again.

  On the other side of the locked door, Dr. Macy was hard at work. He leaned over his examine table going over his most fascinating test subject. It was the body of Mellora, a refugee from the country of Mu. She and four others escaped from the rule of the new Doiar, Tol-in-Ar. Then Lord Tatsumi came to retrieve her. She was one of the chief engineers of Ryugu-jo, and a valuable figure in the planning of the city.

  The Mu kaiju was at the gates of the Japanese facility. The only solutions were kill Lord Tatsumi or kill Mellora. Macy had no problem making the choice.

  During all the chaos he was able to bring her body to his lab and secure the area. Mellora was not human. She was Homo caudata. They were an amphibious people, children of the kaiju as legend told. He was not going to miss the opportunity to study her biology. He believed the Mu people held a key to understanding the differences between the kaiju and other species of animals.

  Macy had already begun to study the differences between animals and their giant kaiju counterparts. To his surprise the differences between those animals were found in Mellora’s body. He was finding the legends to be based on truth. The Homo caudata were in fact similar to the kaiju.

  You should let her in.

  Macy did not look up from his table. He had been hearing that voice in his head for weeks now. It started shortly after he began his work on Mellora’s body.

  “Then they would find your body,” said Macy out loud. He had already figured the voice he was hearing in his head belonged to Mellora. The pressure of the job was getting to him. “I still have a lot to go through. I can’t let them know what I am doing. They wouldn’t understand.”

  That you killed me?

  “Your death will save millions of lives. It already saved thousands when Lord Tatsumi quelled his attack. Now, we can benefit from your biological knowledge. You were doing nothing of importance before I came along.”

  I had friends and family. What of them?

  “I don’t care about them,” said Macy. “I only care about you, your body.”

  Will you gut them?

  “If I had the chance, yes,” snarled Macy. He was getting frustrated at his thoughts. He put down his scalpel and stepped back from the table.

  His eyes were getting heavy. He had not slept in over twenty-four hours, he was sure. There was no clock in his lab. He had destroyed it long ago.r />
  Will it be worth it?

  “Of course it will be worth it. Why the hell would I even ask myself that? Everything is worth it if we learn what we want to know. There is nothing that makes people more special than animals. We are all insects in this world, especially now.”

  Then why try?

  “Because I can change that. I can put us back on the top of the pedestal.”

  Macy rubbed the side of his temples. It was time to get some rest. He was losing his focus. His mind kept wandering.

  He began to shake his head in disbelief. He smiled under the pressure of exhaustion. “Peace and quiet would be nice.”

  Then why are you talking to yourself?

  Macy put down his hands. He stared at the motionless body on his exam table. He never talked to himself before. Even after the events in Oregon, he kept his cool. Why now?

  Macy’s eyes moved around the room. Nobody was there, and for the first time since locking himself in the lab he felt alone for the moment.

  In another part of the facility, Colonel Jordan Honsou sat in a small office nearly identical to every other office inside that building. The walls were all painted the same shade of beige and they all included the same fake snake plant in the left corner. Honsou knew it was meant to comfort the people in the offices, and he had to admit it was working. There was a peaceful tranquility inside the offices that did not exist out in the world of the kaiju.

  The office building was reserved for the workers behind the scenes at the Japanese facility. Not everybody was a soldier or a scientist on the base. This was the building that housed the more corporate nature of the United Nations. Politicians that visited Japan worked in this building, and agents in the fields of administration and more found themselves with offices in the building.

  Honsou was currently sitting in the office of Dr. Mark Caruso. Caruso was a psychologist. He displayed his diplomas proudly on the wall behind Honsou. Not that it mattered to the colonel. He wasn’t looking for a doctor with an easy fix. He just needed somebody to listen to him.

  He would have gone to anybody, but confidentiality was important for Honsou. He did not want others to know his problems. He thought if he voluntarily went to the doctors then he could find the help he needed and sleep restfully again.

  “I appreciate you coming to me,” said Dr. Caruso. “It’s why I’m here in Japan. What you all do out there is a heavy burden. Talking about it later is not a weakness.”

  “It still feels like one,” said Honsou. “I’ve been doing this since I was eighteen. I’ve been fighting monsters since day one. It finally caught up to me.”

  “What caught up to you?”

  “Whatever the hell it is that says, enough is enough. I’ve seen others go through it. One day we’re on the field charging head first towards a kaiju, the next they can’t leave their room in fear that they’ll be seen by the monster. You stare into the eyes of something so much bigger than you and you realize just how small you are. It’s like looking into the stars at night, only the stars are looking back at you.”

  “What happened?” Dr. Caruso asked.

  “Lord Tatsumi,” answered Honsou. “We were on a rescue mission. I was outside of Babel 4 ushering civilians inside to get them to safety. Lord Tatsumi destroyed the building we were standing on. All of those people died while I hung in the air, helpless. I haven’t been able to get that image out of my head.”

  “The image of Lord Tatsumi? Did he stare back at you?”

  “No,” said Colonel Honsou. “It was the little girl. She was reaching out for me. Her eyes had such determination, but she was only going down.

  “Our lives are meaningless. Lord Tatsumi did not care about who he was killing. Life or death does not matter to Lord Tatsumi or the kaiju.”

  “Hasn’t Tengi tried to preserve life on Earth?” Dr. Caruso asked. “I think life is a very important thing for the kaiju.”

  “I have brought down over a dozen kaiju since I joined,” said Honsou. “We have nothing to show for it. Every single one that has died by our hands is still roaming this world. They always come back. They refuse to die. And here we are; human beings, now such a small part of the scale. That little girl is not coming back. All of those people are not coming back. I am watching this world die, crushed under the feet of monsters. Where is our second chance?

  “We have fought for every inch of land. Maybe Tengi is trying to save our lives or maybe she is just delaying the inevitable. Lord Tatsumi did not listen to Tengi. Will more follow? The kaiju will trample through our world without giving it a thought. How do we defeat something that finds us irrelevant?”

  Chapter 4

  In what remained of the Pacific Ocean there were still several small islands unaffected by the rising of Mu. Tengi’s shadow cast down on every one of them as the giant crane soared through the sky.

  At each island Tengi approached she flew down and cut across the surface with the piercing tips of her wings. Her feathers dug a six foot trench from shore to shore. This continued with every island she found heading north with the Japanese coastline.

  Tengi approached a new island. Its trees were disheveled and it looked like it had suffered through a flood in the recent past. Tengi dove down like she had with the previous islands. Her wing cut into the island’s surface.

  Then the island screamed in pain. Blood filled up the trench that Tengi had created. Tremors shook down the remaining trees. Blood mixed with water as the island’s surface began to descend into the ocean.

  Tengi circled around. She had found her target. It wasn’t an island that she was attacking. It was Giland, the living land mass. The kaiju was one of the oldest living creatures on the planet. It had been dormant for over a millennia. It waded through the waters allowing safe passage across the ocean for the honorable. It could go for so long without moving that plant life would not only grow, but thrive on its back.

  Giland was completely submerged as Tengi began her second strike. She skimmed across the surface. Her talons went under. They reached down and grabbed hold of Giland. With her powerful wings Tengi ripped Giland out of the comfort of the ocean.

  The kaiju flapped its pudgy legs and webbed feet rapidly in the air. Its body was rolls and rolls of soft blubber and skin. Cries of desperation spilled out of Giland’s mouth of gill slits and rakers.

  Giland landed back in the water belly up. Tengi stayed on top of her prey. She did not give the living land mass any chance to return to its upright state.

  Her talons dug into Giland’s soft stomach. She kept Giland from sinking down to the bottom of the ocean where she would not be able to reach it. Giland was powerless to defend itself. Its legs were too short for any kind of physical fight.

  Giland could only wail in pain as Tengi stabbed it several times over with her beak. The ocean turned red as Giland’s chest was cut open by Tengi’s attack.

  Tengi only stopped once Giland went motionless. Its pleas had stopped and the ocean went still. The rest of the marine life in the area kept their distance. Even with blood spilling out across the ocean’s surface there was not a nibble.

  Tengi finally let go of Giland. She flew back into the air toward the Japanese coast. Giland’s body was left to sink to the bottom of the ocean.

  Tengi’s culling had begun.

  Chapter 5

  Outside of Kyoto, tucked away in the forest, was Tengi’s sanctuary, Anazako Village. It was the only other location officially sanctioned to allow humans to live in Japan.

  When the first evacuations occurred in 2012 many refused. They either feared to evacuate as many had died on their escape from the country or they simply wanted to stay. A lot of the people saw the kaiju as gods returning to the world. Then Tengi emerged and brought order to the rest of the world. She tamed the other kaiju.

  Once the world quieted down, Tengi found refuge. She then allowed whoever remained in Japan to come to her. She would protect them from the dangers of the rest of the monsters. People flocked from
the abandoned cities and towns across the country. The village became their new home. As the years rolled by, new generations were brought into the world only knowing the life under Tengi’s protection.

  The UN kept a working relationship with the village. Tengi demanded little intervention from mankind, but had allowed representatives to stay at the village to keep the communication active between the two quarters.

  One of the representatives from the UN facility was Randal McClare. His new team had been staying at Anazako for a week now. They were allowed out during the grounding because of how crucial the alliance between Tengi and the UN was.

  McClare was now the most seasoned of the group to have dealt with both Tengi and the kaiju's representative, Arikura. His previous team with Colonel Honsou fell apart in Tokyo months back. The team was scrapped, but McClare wanted to be kept on at the village. He was doing no good at the facility. There he was just a soldier, a watchman, or just another cog in the machine. At the village he felt like he could be one with the community. He helped raise new houses and barns. He was one of the earliest out to help with the crops. They all appreciated it, and he was glad to help. It was the reason he joined the UN military. He wanted to help.

  He had already pushed his body as far as it could go. A procedure had been developed that altered the DNA of humans. It enhanced their abilities. They were altered into mutants, often called super soldiers. McClare was more than happy to use his abilities to help with the village instead of standing back while the giant machines took to the battlefield.

  Dusk had rolled in. The stars would be out soon. McClare had taken to his guard shift early. He usually took the night shifts over his comrades. They were not enhanced like he was. He could see in the dark and was more useful compared to the others. He didn’t mind. It gave him the chance to relax. The days at Anazako were often hectic. There was never a dull moment, but sometimes that was what McClare needed.

  The waterfall outside of the village churned in the background. Most of the villagers were at a celebration across the way. McClare had taken his shift early so the others could join in. With fewer people outside the waterfall was louder than ever.