Gottlieb had a terrible realization. “I don’t think so,” he said slowly, answering Ilya’s question.
On the street, Jake watched the activity in and around the pit subside. Smoke and dust rose into the air. It looked like the army of smaller Kaiju robots had completely consumed the larger Kaiju. No sign of them remained.
But on the HUD, there was one immense bogey.
They felt the ground beneath them shake and saw a motion in the pit. Something began to rise.
At first they thought it was one of the Kaiju, with the smaller creatures hanging on it the way remoras hung on a shark. Then it kept rising and the watching pilots saw that its head was no longer just Raijin’s head, or Hakuja’s, or Shrikethorn’s. It was bigger than any of them. Bigger, Jake realized with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, than all three of them put together. It kept rising, standing up out of the pit, and Jake realized that Newt Geiszler had saved the best part of his plan for last.
He had waited until the Kaiju were already wounded, perhaps dying, and then pulled off the ultimate Dr. Frankenstein trick, remaking all three Kaiju into one gargantuan monster. Its head was as big as any of the Jaegers, and when it reached its full height it was as tall as any of the buildings remaining in that part of Tokyo. The smaller robotic creatures were gone, folded into its mass. Some of them were still visible as attachments to its tail and the edges of its armored carapace. Others were completely gone, chewed to pieces and remade.
Stunned, they watched it emerge from the pit, pieces of itself still knitting themselves into place. The last to come together was its jaw, still pointed like Raijin’s but bearing two-hundred-foot spikes like Shrikethorn’s. The blue glow of Kaiju energy emanated from its throat and glittered in thousands of points on its back and limbs, where the smaller bots had stitched themselves together into a flexible plated exoskeleton.
As its shadow fell over the Jaegers, Lambert said, “Well, he’s pretty big.”
* * *
On the rooftop, Newt felt a surge of pride. Until he’d seen it happen, he hadn’t been one hundred percent sure the plan would work. But now he knew he never should have doubted himself. He’d run the numbers, he’d reworked the design a hundred times over ten years. The Rippers had been created for one purpose, and they had served that purpose perfectly.
He wondered what Hermann was thinking now. Who was the real genius? This was K-Science, baby, the real deal. The greatest accomplishment of a human mind… and the last. Newt knew he was destroying the human race, and even knew he should feel guilty about it. But the Precursors had shut him off from that part of himself. All he could feel was exaltation at his creation, and at the power he had brought into this world.
Across the devastated battlefield, Mega-Kaiju roared. The ripple of sound shattered windows for miles and lifted destroyed cars from the few remaining clear areas on the streets. It stepped up out of the pit and lumbered toward the Jaegers, gathering speed. As it went, its tail twitched, each flick destroying anything in its path.
“This is the way the world ends,” Newt said with cold satisfaction. “Not with a whimper. But with a bang. A very, very big bang.”
* * *
In Gipsy Avenger’s Conn-Pod, Jake gave the only order he could. “All Jaegers, advance and fire everything you’ve got!”
Gipsy led the way, barraging the Mega-Kaiju with rockets and using the Gravity Sling to batter it with rubble. The other three Jaegers advanced in a flanking formation, unloading with plasma cannons and particle beams. Missiles exploded harmlessly or deflected off the plating, which absorbed the energies of the cannons as well. The Mega-Kaiju rocked back on its haunches and pounded a fist into the ground with a tectonic boom. The shockwave rolled down the devastated street, throwing all four Jaegers into the air. In four Conn-Pods, alarms sounded and pilots flailed for balance as they found themselves suddenly weightless. The Jaegers mimicked the motion, their gyroscopic equilibrium destabilized by the shock and their Conn-Pods’ maglev fields malfunctioning in the absence of directional gravity. All of them landed in an awkward heap, except for Guardian Bravo, who managed to keep her feet.
Seeing the other three Jaegers needed a moment to recover, Suresh and Ilya took the lead. Guardian Bravo charged forward, readying the Arc Whip and peppering the Mega-Kaiju with cannonfire. “Guardian, wait!” Jake shouted over the comm. They had to stick together, fight as one, or against a monster this big they wouldn’t have a chance.
“We got this!” Ilya shouted back.
He locked in on the Mega-Kaiju’s head, looking for a target. “Go for the eyes,” Suresh suggested.
Ilya swiveled the targeting reticle over the immensity of the Mega-Kaiju’s head. “Which ones?” He counted more than a dozen.
“All of ’em!” Suresh saw the Mega-Kaiju rearing back for another earthquake punch, but this time they anticipated the move. By the time the Mega-Kaiju’s fists were slamming into the ground, Guardian Bravo was airborne, kicking off a building parkour-style and slashing the Arc Whip toward the Mega-Kaiju’s eyes. Suresh raised his voice in a battle cry as the whip snapped toward its target.
But Guardian Bravo was not the only combatant who was learning to anticipate the enemy’s next move. The Mega-Kaiju got one hand up and caught the Arc Whip, as energy crackled around its fist. Guardian Bravo was still in the air, but now the Mega-Kaiju was in control. It swung the Jaeger around like a rag doll, smashing her back and forth across the street into buildings. When there were no more standing within its reach, the Mega-Kaiju flung Guardian Bravo
