The Curious Case of the Missing Kaiju

By J. L. Ender

“Kaiju activity in quadrant E74-Delta. Standby for launch, I guess. Ugh, what a pain.” Bossa had no eyes to roll, but the wonky AI’s tone conveyed annoyance well enough.

I settled into the cockpit of my forty-ton mecha, determined to ignore the cold spear of doubt slicing through my mind as the walls of a cannon-like launcher surrounded my megabot. This crazy computer is about to launch me into low atmosphere.

“Just drop my mecha near the target.” I rolled my own eyes.

“Okay, bye, Cindy,” she called.

“It’s Cecilia.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

The world shook. The walls of the launcher flashed past, and I tore through the night sky. I caught a brief glimpse of the Arctic. Long stretches of craggy ice. Hmm, looks a lot like the Antarctica base. But with shiftier floes, and way fewer penguins.

Stars shone overhead, brighter than I’d ever seen.

I’m a long way from the Antarctic Defense Force.

My mecha landed in a grassy median lined with swaying palm trees. Though night here, heat lingered. Warmer than up north, anyway. Bits of sand plinked off my viewport, borne on a dusty wind. City lights from tall buildings shone down on a broad river nearby.

“Bossa, where am I?”

“Don’t know. I think it’s called Cairo or something.”

I glanced at a tall, dome-topped building nearby. Wonder if I could see the pyramids from up there.

I clomped around a few parked cars, alert for the next portal. Monster activity had been detected, but the sensors could be inaccurate. Sometimes we got there early, sometimes late.

We’d shut a rift at the core of the world hoping to end the war, but no such luck. Now—with the help of a certain long-abandoned, bonkers artificial intelligence from a deserted Arctic military base—we had to find a way to stop all these new portals. They could pop up anywhere, generally allowing exactly one monster to appear.

But was it already here, or…?

“Am I getting warmer?” I asked Bossa.

“Um, I don’t know, Cilantro. Bleh. Lemme check.”

Great. We lost the giant monster.

I scanned the road again. “Give me something.”

“You’re pretty close to the energy signature. Just keep looking or whatever. I don’t know. Leave me alone.”

The street I’d landed on was pretty quiet. My eyes roved over the parked cars, the quietly shifting waters. And I heard…

Is that music?

I followed the sound across a greenspace with worn-down grass, dirt showing through in places. Loud music resonated from a big, boxy building near the river. Tall windows emitted pulsing neon light. A nightclub. I stomped my mecha toward it, wondering how anyone could think about dancing with a kaiju on the loose.

I used to be fun, right? I need to get out more.

Through the wide glass panes, people danced, swayed, and sipped colorful drinks. Beyond them, through windows on the opposite side, I could see the glimmer of lights undulating on the waters of the Nile.

And the electric-blue glow of something far more sinister.

An eel-like shape reared up out of the river. Water glistened down its sinewy black form.

Crap on a cravat, the kaiju’s going to crash through the club!

“Clear out!” I blasted over my loudspeaker. No one turned. I always did hate clubs.

Electric blue shone from the eel’s sides.

Ugh. I hope this works.

I stepped back, tensed the mecha’s legs, and leapt. I crashed through the glass. People screamed. Finally! The music kept thumping. The monster burst through the far-side windows. Gut tightening, I soared over the patrons to slam into it.

We smashed through parked cars and shops, and rolled right into the river. The eel glowed brightly as it swam around me. I extended a blade into my mecha’s left hand and slashed out, but the eel darted away.

The brightness intensified.

Swim time’s over!

I thrashed for the shore and tugged my mecha up onto a concrete berm just as lightning filled the murky water.

The eel darted by below, darker now. It opened a shark-like mouth filled with rows and rows of teeth.

“If I ask nicely, will you buzz off?”

The monster chomped my leg. The jaws were stronger than I expected, pulling the mecha off balance. The eel dragged me into the water. I swung out with the blade, finally landing a blow.

The glow returned. Aw, hell.

Frantically, I aimed my grenade launcher down its open jaws and fired. I shook the mecha’s leg. “Get off, get off!”

Finally, grazing paint and grinding metal, it scraped off. My mecha was still in the water when the grenade blew inside the eel with a muffled poomf. Its skin sparked.

I took a step back. The eel exploded properly now. Electricity danced along the water and slammed into my mecha. My screens flickered. The control stick went sluggish. As the megabot sank to its knees, the Nile sloshed up to cover half my viewport.

The screens went black. I slammed on my control console. Finally, everything flickered back to life. Phew. I got the mecha up and turned around. Lightning still crackled across the water on the distant shore. Nightclub attendees had filed out, recording on cellphones.

They’d have to be quick. The eel’s corpse was already dissolving. Victory.

“Okay, Bossa. I’m ready to go home.”

“What, you again? Fine, Celiac. I’ll work on a return capsule… if you really want me to.”

“It’s Cecilia. My name is Cecilia. And yes, I want to come home.”

“Oh, right. Of course. Don’t care.”

I rolled my eyes. A few minutes later, a tall, spherical return capsule landed in the street with all the grace and poise of a descending turkey.

I stepped inside, taking in the atmosphere of Cairo by night one last time. I’ll be back someday. For a real visit. Maybe not a trip to the nightclub.

For now, I had plenty of monsters to kill.

“Are you ready, Charmin?”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

J. L. Ender is the author of the superhero series Steel Fox Investigations and mecha vs kaiju mayhem The Cold Below, as well as a number of other novels and short stories. Ender has worked as a dishwasher, a beef jerky labeler, a warehouse worker, a shelf stocker, a greeter, a traveling technician, a laser engraver, a package handler, a copywriter, a graphic designer, a librarian, an editor, a dispatcher, a phone operator, a hotel clerk, and hopefully someday soon as a novelist… He lives in Ohio with his wife and fellow writer SCE Ender.

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