Project Hyperion (A Kaiju Thriller) (Kaiju #4)

I wake with a groan, confused by where I am and my spinning view of the world around me. When I start to feel nauseous, I close my eyes and focus on what I can hear—nothing but a high pitched whine—and what I can smell. The odor is familiar. A mix of mechanical and human scents, one of which is Collins. I hadn’t realized she had a distinct smell before, but I know she’s here. I reach my hand out, and I feel something solid and curved. I then register the tightness across my chest.

A seatbelt.

Then I remember. Nemesis. The attack. The explosion.

I’m in the helicopter.

I open my eyes again. I’m less dizzy, but everything is still shifting left to right. I fight it long enough to look to my left. Woodstock is in the pilot’s seat, slumped forward. His chest rises and falls with a steady rhythm. I look back for Collins. She’s sprawled across the two back seats, but breathing.

When I look forward again, the world twists around me, but I notice another reason for my disorientation. The helicopter landed askew. One skid is on the foot-high landing pad. The other isn’t.

I push open my door, but it slams shut again. Stupid gravity, I think, and then shove it open again with enough power to open it all the way. I can see it’s balanced precariously between “it’s safe to exit,” and “I’m going to smash your face in,” so I unbuckle and pull myself out slowly and carefully.

My legs feel weak when I hit the concrete landing pad, so I take a moment to steady myself. After several deep breaths, I stand up straight and open my eyes. The world is no longer spinning, but I wish to God it was.

I stumble toward the ocean-facing side of the mansion’s roof, taking in a scene of destruction straight out of an apocalyptic movie.

A ring of black covering the land in Beverly and Salem, segmented by the ocean, is the first thing I see. Portions of both cities fringing the coast line for at least a quarter mile inland have been incinerated. I don’t see any fires burning. Everything is just charred to the core—burnt so hot and fast that there isn’t even smoke, though I can smell the burn on wind.

How many people were left in those buildings? How many more people have died?

I clench my fists. If the President was here, I would kick him in the nuts.

A curtain of rising white mist, like a giant ghost, pulls my eyes to the harbor. It’s steam, I realize. The ocean is hot.

Sunlight cuts through the steam, shimmering off the water’s surface and thousands of small reflective objects.

Dead fish.

Everything within a quarter mile of the blast’s epicenter has been superheated—land and sea.

“Oh my God,” Collins says, stepping up next to me. I’m surprised by her arrival, but too shocked to react in any way other than to just look in her direction. “Where is it? Where is Nemesis?”

In my dazed state, I forgot to look for the creature. I focus on the part of the harbor where I last saw the behemoth.

Nothing.

I search farther out to sea.

“There’s no sign of her,” I say.

“I can’t imagine anything surviving an explosion like that,” she says. “Maybe it was destroyed?”

I look for signs of Nemesis’s body. She was massive, so there should be chunks of her everywhere, scattered around the city, maybe farther, but I don’t see anything. Maybe she was vaporized? Is such a thing even possible?

“God damn,” Woodstock says.

I turn around to find him climbing out of the chopper. He gives the helicopter a quick once over, more concerned for it than himself or us, which means he’s fine.

“Any damage?” I ask him.

“She’ll fly,” he says. “Our next take-off is going to be a might wonky, but she’ll fly.”

A shouting woman draws my eyes to a neighboring house. All of the ocean-facing windows have been blown out. I look down the street and see the same thing. I turn around, looking at the houses on the backside of the hill. The same. Stepping to the edge of the mansion, I look down. The Crow’s Nest has no windows, which means all that glass is now inside.

Shifting glass from below is followed by a grunt, then I hear Watson say, “Cooper? Cooper!”

I’m running for the roof door before he’s done shouting her name. I thunder down the single flight of steps and burst into the Crow’s Nest, which is now a kaleidoscope of glass shards. Most of it litters the floor, but several large triangles protrude from the walls like a clan of glass-flinging ninjas rode through.