Before he could react to his own warning, Hawkins was lifted and thrown straight up. He reached out with his arms and caught a low branch. Looking back, he saw Lilly duck just in time to avoid Gordon’s swing. He followed up the roundhouse with a crushing blow. Lilly leapt to the side while Gordon’s fist punched a crater into the ground.
Rather than running, Lilly sprang back at Gordon, catching him by surprise. She raked her claws against his chest twice, narrowly missing the orange membranes she’d been warned about, leaned away from his hugging arms and kicking him in the gut. When Gordon pitched forward, she kneed him in the chin, snapping his head back.
She moved with grace and speed, but Hawkins could see she was losing herself. Some primal part of her was taking over, urging her to attack. Against anyone else, the tactic would have been lethal and bloody, but Gordon’s body absorbed the damage. Black flesh and brown blood flew away from his torso as she continued the barrage, but each strike seemed to have less effect.
Soon, Gordon was standing up straight, showing no signs of pain, despite the cat-woman burrowing a hole in his chest. Oblivious to her opponent’s change, Lilly didn’t notice him reach out for her. He caught her around the waist and lifted her away.
Lilly shrieked angrily, swiping at his wrist with her clawed fingers while kicking and scratching with her feet. She was caught and helpless.
Hawkins reached for where his bow normally hung. It was missing. As was the shotgun. He looked up to his previous perch and found the bow dangling from a branch. Moving with the practiced swiftness of someone who spent a lot of time in trees, he climbed upwards, leaping between branches, hoisting himself higher.
The climb took just five seconds, but in that time, Lilly’s savagery had faded and been replaced by cries of pain. Hawkins snagged the bow, turned around and balanced himself. He nocked an arrow, drew the string back and let it fly. The poorly aimed shot struck the back of Gordon’s leg, bouncing harmlessly away. But it got Gordon’s attention.
The big man turned around. Lilly still struggled, but wasn’t making any sound now. Gordon was crushing her body, making it impossible for her to draw a breath.
Hawkins took careful aim this time, but did so quickly, and let another arrow loose. This one found its target, striking Gordon’s chest, just above his own explosive membrane. The shot should have hit the man’s heart, but he seemed indifferent. With his free hand, he swiped at the arrow and broke it away.
The next two arrows had the same effect, and Lilly’s body had gone limp. Feeling desperate, Hawkins began moving down the tree. “Let her go!”
He stopped, just out of reach from Gordon and nocked another arrow. He had just five left. But before he could fire it, Gordon shouted in surprise, grabbing his head. “No! No, no, no!”
Gordon fell to his knees and pounded the earth, just missing Lilly. While the general’s back was turned, Hawkins buried two more arrows in him, both unnoticed.
With a roar of anger, Gordon stopped pounding the ground and snapped his head toward the White House. “Hudson... I’m going to kill you, you son-of-a-bitch!” He leapt to his feet and pounded in the direction of the ruined White House. Hawkins knew it was their job to keep Gordon busy while Hudson did his thing, but there wasn’t much left he could do.
Or was there?
After glancing at Lilly and seeing her chest rising and falling, he fired his last three arrows into Gordon’s back, positioning each around where he thought that glowing membrane was located. Gordon showed no sign of pain or discomfort. He just charged forward, heading for the White House and Hudson.
Hawkins reached into his pocket, hoping to end it right there and then, but the pocket was empty. He’d lost the transmitter Endo had given him.
Unable to do more, Hawkins fell to his knees beside Lilly. He lifted her head in his hands and petted her furry cheek. “Wake up, baby. C’mon, wake up.”
47
Nemesis reacts to Karkinos’s charge by rolling her head and torso downward, angling those huge spikes on her back at the approaching Kaiju. Karkinos, perhaps lost in emotion or too stupid to care, continues forward, reaching out for Nemesis and roaring the whole way. Karkinos hits hard, partially impaling itself on Nemesis’s back. For a moment it appears the Kaiju’s weight will be too much, but I see the muscles in Nemesis’s legs flex. Her arms push off the scorched earth. And Karkinos, whose forward momentum never really stopped, is suddenly upside down.
The whole world shakes when the massive Kaiju lands. Ash plumes into the air, obscuring the battle, but not enough that I miss what comes next.
Typhon.
While Nemesis flipped Karkinos, he closed the distance from the side. Moving with human quickness and agility, he snuck in behind Nemesis while her back was still arched. Before she can react to his presence, the giant man-thing has his clawed hands under the sides of her chin, yanking her head back. She tries to push back, thrusting her spikes toward his abdomen, but he plants a foot against the her back, pushing forward on her body while pulling hard on her chin.
It’s a killer move, likely to break Maigo’s neck.