Ruin the Kaiju: Part One (special preview)

It’s easy to complain about the state of things when you have some massive, overshadowing presence is always hovering above you. It’s become almost boring to hear everything wrong with the world being blamed on those asteroids that hit earth ages ago.

You were born into a world that had been hit by asteroids, for you and your friends growing up it was the most common thing. Giant asteroids hit earth? Okay. Giant super monsters called kaiju emerged from these asteroids and caused destruction often? Sure. You grew up accepting, adapting, and ignoring these things. Because what else was there to do?

Hobbies became big for your generation. Not that they weren’t before, but there was some sort of new culture that arose around it. Yeah, they were being used to distract from the very real forces of ‘not your nature’ just outside. Lots of people discovered themselves while diving deeply into these hobbies. You knew you did.

Your hobby began when you and your childhood friends snuck into the ‘abandoned properties’, a huge segment of your city ravaged by the kaiju that no one seemed to want to touch again. It became a dumping ground and was filled with wrecked cars, destroyed landmarks, and whatever else could be chucked in. You found what you called the ‘technology graveyard’ and your life changed from there.

“Oh, so you grew up in the king’s district?” Holly, your coworker, laughed after you told them about this.

“Yeah,” you replied with a shrug. “So?”

“Did you ever see his corpse anywhere?”

You gave her a long and disgruntled look. “His corpse? No! Why would you ask something so morbid?”

“Because King vanished.” She said this like you were out of the loop. “He's not been seen in ten years.”

“I’m well aware,” you grumbled. “But that happened while I was in college.” You both walked into our office, which was cluttered by computer equipment. You set your things down and noticed a manila folder on your desk.

“Uh oh?”

Holly had a car of suckers on her desk, which she was trying to choose through. “What’s that about?”

You held up the envelope. “Special assignment duty.”

Holly frowned, popping a bright red sucker into her mouth. “You get all the fun.”

“You could call it that,” you huffed. Inside the manila envelope was a new ID badge as well as a birthday card. “I’ll see you later I guess.” You picked your bag back up and walked out the door.

As you went down the hall you opened up the birthday card. It was a silly means of communication from the higher ups. They thought it would perfectly disguise secret information. Inside your card was a small brief about how you would be working on Project Walkie Talkie, something you’d been with since the ground floor.

You flashed your new ID badge at the elevator and took it down to the deepest basement level. The elevator never seemed to end, it just kept going down, down, down, down. This used to be a terrifying experience, but these days you have gotten used to it. Once downstairs you’re greeted by the project handler, a very disheveled looking tiefling who also looked as though he hadn’t left this basement in months. His skin was a faded, pale blue, almost like frayed denim. His hair was tied back in a ragged bun, but if any dared to hang in his face it was pinned back by colorful clips.

“What’s going on Meyers?” you asked.

“Project Walkie Talkie is entering the final stages. I just need your combined skills to pull it off.” His hands moved in grand gestures, like he was trying to make up for his quiet voice. Even his long tail added to the inflection.