"Do you think something went wrong?" the lieutenant muttered to General AisHower. It was now a little past midnight, far past even the latest record of portals opening, and yet not a single portal was reported opening anywhere in the world.
"There had been reports of the portals opening briefly at erratic times all day today." the lieutenant added. "It is possible that the anomaly is destabilizing?"
The general however did not respond. He stared at the screen as if a kaijuu would attack the moment he looked away. At his unfaltering focus, the officers around the world shifted uneasily. Why today? Why now? The portals had been almost like clockwork for months! Was this a fluke? Or was some greater power at play that had caught onto their plan?
Peggy on the other hand had not been handling the pause so well. She had been expecting the adrenaline of the mission to keep her focused, but after hours of staring at empty space, the drowsiness was starting to catch up with her.
Resting her chin on hands, she continued to stare blankly at the screen, her eyelids growing heavier with each passing minute. Even the itching and discomfort seemed to feel numb with how tired she felt. The sounds of the room seemed to become more and more muddled and distant until at last, she closed her eyes and left consciousness.
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"THE PORTALS ARE OPEN!" a voice cried out over the comms. causing everyone save for one sleeping officer in corner to jump to attention.
Sure enough, on every screen, the space in front of each platoon appeared to warp and bend. The distortion grew larger and larger until finally a loud shrieking could be heard. Before each platoon, giant kaijuu swarmed through the portals crawling over each other into our world, but the anti-kaijuu army was ready.
Giant metal fists out grabbing the exposed heads and pulling the kaijuu through and crushing them. Soldiers in power armour stood before the platoons to clear the way for their entrance. The scene before them was like a gate out of hell had opened before them but they did not falter. After a tough 10 minute battle, the hoard began to lessen slightly.
"GO!" the soldiers in power armour cried out, and the platoons answered.
Four different platoons in four different countries entered through four different portals simultaneously. As they did the light around them warped and bent as they entered the new world. Some soldiers clenched their eyes shut at the unfamiliar sight before them. When they opened their eyes again they each found themselves on a planet unlike anything they had ever seen before.
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"This is command! Repeat this is command! Somebody answer already! What is it that you see?"
Team Bravo were the first to regain their signal after entering through the portal, but they felt too dumbfounded to answer.
Being tasked with the destruction of the Mole Class Kaijuu, they had expected to find themselves on a mountain range or desert area. Where they found themselves instead was standing on the edge of a sheer white cliff face. The cliff face rose higher and fell further than anyone could see, and the horizon was near impossible to look at due to the bright light that shone at them. The platoon would have most likely fallen to their deaths as soon as they had spawned in this world if it hadn't been for the thick long black branches that grew out of the cliff face. Each branch was thick enough for majority of the platoon to stand upon and they grew so close together that they could drive their heavy machinery over it.
"Repeat! Come in anyone! Can you confirm you have made it to the other side?" the voice crackled over the radio again snapping the sergeant back into awareness.
"This is Team Bravo." he reported back. "We have made it to the other side, sending over visuals now."
With a click of a button, the screens at the command center became full of images from the strange alien world. Each soldier's armour had been equipped with a camera which allowed command to change views at any given point in the mission. As they cycled through the shots of the world before them, they were just as dumbfounded as team bravo.
"We are currently investigating the terrain to adjust the plan for the best method for proceeding." the sergeant continued. "While the terrain is unsteady there is currently no sign of any Mole Class Kai--"
The sergeant's words were cut off by a loud shriek to his left and the sound of gun fire. Turning around, he watched in horror as a Mole Class Kaijuu began to climb out of a hole formed between the roots of the massive black branch and the white cliff face. Panic began to spread through the troops as other Mole Class Kaijuu began crawling out from the cliff face.
"GET BACK IN FORMATION!" the sergeant blared out to the men, but they were not listening. With a deep sigh, the sergeant aimed his rifle and shot a Mole Class Kaijuu straight between the eyes. The men all stared in disbelief as the beam of light burnt a hole straight through the entirety of the kaijuu's body before colliding harmlessly against the cliff face.
The soldiers now silent, the sergeant pumped the "cool down" function of his rifle before turning back to his men.
"This will not be a repeat of March 17th!" the sergeant cried out. "While normal weapons and ammunition may not be of any use against them we are now armed with the MG-69. The weapon that is gonna make these mother buggers regret ever setting foot on our blue planet!"
With this speech and the example set before them, the troops managed to rally and each began picking targets to shoot down. There were a lot of tunnels to explore, but they would not stop until every last kaijuu was wiped out.
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"Ah, I think I get it now..." one more bookish looking officer exclaimed looking at his screen. "For a long time, we have wondered why the Mole Class Kaijuu have such long thick tails thinking they were meant to help them flow underground. In fact, it is far more likely that these tails are meant to root the kaijuu in place in the cliff wall as it hunts for food!"
Some other more scientifically minded officers all compared notes and nodded in agreement but then the radio crackled again with a new message coming in.
"This is Team Alpha!" a voice crackled in. "We have arrived in the base of what appears to be a jungle, as well as a breeding ground for the Lobster Class Kaijuu. Switching to visual now!"
The screens flickered on as the command center was shown a dense jungle full of tall black branchless trees which seemed to go upwards into eternity. The ground was a pale colour much like the cliff face, and little light managed to trickle in through the thick foliage, but that wasn't what grabbed the command center's attention though.
Fused to the sides of numerous trees there were long white ovular sacks. Everyone who witnessed this scene knew what they were looking at. They were the same sacks which had been fused to the sides of skyscrapers around the world. They were the Lobster Class Kaijuu's egg sacks; what would one day hatch into new Kaijuu to invade earth.... and there were thousands of them...
"Sergeant..." the general announced into the radio. "Shoot to kill with prejudice..."
"Aye aye sir!" the sergeant called back. At his signal, the whole jungle became lit up with lasers as the soldiers shot their MG-69's at every angle. The egg sacks burst like gross slimey bubbles releasing the desecrated corpses of undeveloped baby kaijuu. The soldiers were rained down upon by the slime of kaijuu guts, but that just meant they were completing their job. It was then that the team noticed the trees were swaying unnaturally around them...
"LOOK UP!" a soldier cried out as he suddenly began shooting almost straight above him. "IT LOOKS LIKE THE PARENTS AREN'T HAPPY TO SEE US!"
The soldiers all turned left and right as the large Lobster Class Kaijuu jumped around them left to right. These monsters had been hard enough to track down when they had been in the city. But in this jungle, their native home, with its thick foliage and haphazard placement of titanic black trees, these creatures now had a manoeuvrability beyond what they had ever seen before.
"GET YOUR MEN INTO FORMATION SERGEANT!" General AisHower blared into the radio. He watched as the sergeant attempted to corral his men to stand back to back in order to better target the fast moving targets. This would be a tough fight for them and they had a lot of ground to cover. This jungle likely went on for miles and there were egg sacks on almost every tree!
"C-Command?? Come in Command do you read me?" Another voice began to break in over the comms. From the sounds of it it was a chaotic battle happening there. "This is Team Charlie! We were ambushed the moment we switched to the other side sir! The sergeant was... he was eaten right before us! It took a while to regroup, but I think we are starting to hold our ground again!"
The voice was young and wavering. It was clear this was a rookie trooper on the line.
"Share video feed with us son..." General AisHower replied in a serious yet steady tone. This young man had clearly seen enough already. A hard hand wouldn't be helpful in this situation.
After a bit of fiddling around, Team Charlie's camera feed came on screen. The environment they had landed in seemed very similar to the jungle Team Alpha had found themselves in yet also slightly different. The thick black trees were darker in colour and more wirey than the ones in Team Alpha's jungle. They also appeared to be far shorter than the other trees which might have explained why Crab Type Kaijuu preferred lower altitude battles. While the sun barely perforated the thick foliage of Team Alpha's jungle, Team Charlie's jungle had no light at all. The sky was dark and thick, as if it were a solid piece of white cloth draped above them. According to the environmental readings, the atmosphere within this jungle was breathable yet almost unbearably hot and humid which might account for the Crab Type Kaijuu's toughness. Much like Team Alpha's quandary, there appeared to be multiple white kaijuu egg sacks glued to the sides of the black trees. The pale white ground was covered in red splotches giving the whole area a horribly unhealthy appearance to it.
Team Charlie had been backed into a dangerous spot. Having lost most of their heavy vehicles and command crew deeper within the forest, they now were holding out for their last stand on top of a large hill at the edge of the forest. The hill was made of craggy dark stone and seemed to be a touch unstable, but it gave the team a height advantage and they could fit dozens of them side by side on top of it with no problems as well as use the creases in the ground as makeshift trenches to hide in when their MG-69's needed to cool down.
Beneath the hill behind them was a sheer cliff face with a wet crack down the center. The team had discovered this crack led into a seemingly endlessly deep cave. The cave was even more humid and hot then the jungle, as well as gave off a strange, yet somewhat familiar aroma, yet desperation had forced them to use it as a makeshift medical base. The soldiers had dragged their injured deep into the the tunnels where they had attempted to find a dry patch along the slimey walls in order to treat their injuries. An almost constant line of people would bring supplies and healed soldiers along the edge of the cave to the soldiers on the hill by way of the natural crevices in the hill's soil.
The MG-69 was still effective against the Crab Type Kaijuu, but not AS effective as it had been against the other types due to the Crab Type Kaijuu's thick armour plating. That, mixed with the inexperience of the panicked remaining troopers meant that it was taking far more shots to down the steadily approaching hoard of Crab Type Kaijuu.
General AisHower took a deep breath at this sight.
"Patch me through to every soldier in Team Charlie." he ordered. A nearby comms agent worked a few switches before giving the General the thumbs up that he was live.
"This is General AisHower of the Anti Kaijuu Army!" he announced in a commanding voice. "You have all done well and shown your bravery in the face of great peril and uneven odds. You have shown the wisdom to improvise, the tenacity to survive, and the perception to use a never seen before alien landscape to your advantage. I am proud to call you all my men. However, I am going to need you to fight a bit longer before this all is over! Release your worries. Don't focus on how many enemies are before you. Focus on the one you are currently targeting. Take a deep breath, and aim for them right between their buggy little eyes. Trust the great weapon which was designed specifically for this battle. Trust the training you went through to get this far. And trust in yourselves to have what it takes to get through this alive. I hereby order every last one of you remaining soldiers to wipe out this hoard and then return here alive!"
The young remaining soldiers looked puzzled for a moment before closing their eyes. After a deep breath, the soldiers too aim once again, this time shooting slower and more carefully. As a result, their targets fell much faster and rallied their hope.
"It looks like they're gonna get through this just fine..." the General mused to himself with a smile. "That just leaves one more thing to worry about.
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"I want you to emergency patch me through to Team Delta!" AisHower commanded. Connecting to the team via a forced connection from the command center's side was untested and risked blowing out the sensitive transdimensional instruments, but Team Delta had been taking far too long to check in, and drastic actions were needing to be taken.
"We are picking up a faint signal from the probing pulse!" the comms officer announced after a brief moment. "Working to lock on to it now."
The screen grew fuzzy as they attempted to direct the signal towards the crew of Team Delta. As the image cleared they saw the sergeant of the main vessel and his men bracing for impact.
"HERE COMES ANOTHER ONE MEN!" he shouted. Immediately following which the whole submarine began to shake as the men were tossed to the ground.
"QUICK! CHECK FOR LEAKS!" the captain shouted in a panicked tone. "WE CAN'T AFFORD TO LET EVEN A DROP OF THAT LIQUID IN HERE!"
The command center watched as men began running left and right checking every inch of the submarine's hull. Finally the General began to speak up.
"Sergeant! Tell me your condition!" he shouted over the comms. The sergeant gave a surprised glance towards the screen finally realizing they were connected.
"Sir! We have entered the Leviathan Class Kaijuu's breeding ground, but it isn't at all what we had expected!" the sergeant quickly explained.
"In what way sergeant?" the general pushed.
The sergeant's face went pale, as if even as a hardened battle warrior he was holding back from vomiting.
"There isn't a nest of Leviathan Class Kaijuu's sir." he explained. "There is only one in these tunnels... and it goes on beyond the length of anything I have ever seen before!"
The General's eyes widened in shock for a brief moment before his expression turned grim again.
"Show me the external view of the submarine."
The command center looked in awe at what lay before them. The submarines were floating through a long thick tunnel completely submerged in liquid. No light existed in these tunnels save for that which the submarines shone on the dull brown walls. A strange tentacle like coral seemed to coat the walls that swayed along to the current. But these sights were almost overlooked next to the absolutely massive Kaijuu that was before them.
There was no head in sight and apparently the team had been spending the past hour eradicating it from its tail yet with no progress seeming to be made.
Every time the team shot the Leviathan Class Kaijuu, several sections would be evaporated and the main body would thrash around stirring the currents and risking to destroy the submarines. 6 ships had already been lost. Their crews beyond saving.
"They couldn't have swum to safety could they?" the General inquired. At this, the sergeant's face went an even paler colour.
"The liquid in these tunnels..." he began "This monster doesn't swim in water... It swims in acid..."
The whole team stared in horror as they imagined what that sergeant must have witnessed watching his men melt on camera with him being unable to do anything about it.
"Sergeant.." the general began, but the sergeant cut him off.
"Don't say anything General!" the sergeant snapped back swallowing back his vomit. "We knew what we were signing up for when we joined this mission, and it's for the sake of the whole world. One team lost seems like a small price to pay if it means that... THING won't ever make it to our side of the galaxy! One way or another, we WILL take it down!"
"Sergeant... you and your men are brave beyond your years..." the General responded in genuine respect.
The sergeant gave a brief smirk back at the camera but before he could respond, the crew began to shout again.
"IT'S GOING TO COLLIDE WITH US AGAIN SIR!" a young cadet shouted.
"ALL HANDS! BRACE FOR IMPACT! THIS ONE IS GOING TO BE A---"
"SERGEANT!" the general shouted, but there was nothing he could do. The screen went fuzzy as the Leviathan Class Kaijuu, a true titan even among the kaijuu, slammed into the ship cutting the feed. That beast was a monster. How many continents could it spread its body across? It wouldn't have been surprising if it would circle the entire world like the great snake from Norse mythology. The sergeant had little time to ponder this however, as one by one, their connection with each of the teams was disconnecting.