Authors: Marc Cerasini
Behind him, people whooped, but he shut out the sound. All of his attention was focused on the game.
As the minutes flew by, Kip seemed to slip into a trance. He became a one-man virtual destroyer, easily and effortlessly dispatching each and every virtual being that came his way.
Finally, his heart slowed and his heartbeat and breathing dropped to normal. His every move was economy in motion. He eased the stick right or left, eliminating each threat as it appeared. It became second nature to him, and each time he fired, he knocked down another threat.
The scoreboard kept jumping up and up, surpassing the million mark. Kip kept firing, oblivious to everything but the game.
Finally, after Kip smoothly knocked down two more Flying Toads, something appeared in the virtual city ahead of him. He pushed the stick forward, rushing to meet this new foe.
But to Kip's surprise, the enemy did not swerve to avoid his attack. Instead, it came toward him at an amazing rate.
Kip's eyes opened wide. And he froze.
A wedge-shaped, feral head of charcoal black hurtled toward his tiny Bullettchopper. Its red eyes seemed to burn into Kip's soul.
As the monstrous head filled the screen, the creature's mouth opened so wide that Kip could see its double rows of sharp teeth and a dark tunnel as black as hell's gate, leading to the beast's stomach.
Kip watched helplessly as the creature's jaws snapped shut. The monster gulped and swallowed Kip's third and final Bullettchopper.
The blue lights turned to red and began to blink. A siren blared, signaling the end of the game, and the final score flashed on a readout above the screen: 1,375,000.
Kip Daniels had surpassed every previous record.
For a few seconds, he was unable to move. He was still paralyzed by the terrifying power of the game's final image.
It was Godzilla
, realized Kip. The reptilian monster that had destroyed Tokyo only a few months before.
At that moment, Kip suddenly noticed the silence all around him. He turned. The gang members were standing in one corner of the video game parlor.
A man in a black suit and a severe, military-style haircut was pointing a handgun at them.
Suddenly, two strong hands gripped Kip's shoulders. "You're coming with us, son," said a second man in black as he lifted Kip from the BATTLEGROUND 2000 cockpit.
The stunned teenager tried to resist, but it was no use. The men effortlessly hustled Kip out of the arcade and into a waiting car.
With a squeal of rubber on pavement, the sedan with U.S. Government plates swerved down the street and disappeared into the rush-hour traffic.
Saturday, October 31, 1998, 11:55 A.M.
Project Valkyrie headquarters
Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada
"They grabbed him too soon," United States Air Force General Jake Taggart complained loudly. He ran his hands through his iron-gray hair, then continued berating the younger officer in front of him. "We had a golden opportunity to evaluate this kid
before
we pour a million bucks into his training. But your boys grabbed him too soon!"
The general punctuated his comments - and his disgust with this miserable turn of events - by dropping the hastily assembled personality file onto his crowded desk.
The file was an expensive document, gathered in the last twenty-four hours with the full resources of the United States government. But General Taggart pointed to the thick bundle of papers as if it were so much garbage.
"That file is absolutely useless!" Taggart cried, emphasizing the point by scattering the pages across his desk like autumn leaves. "What I really need to know isn't going to be found in any personality file Dr. Markham dreams up," he continued. "What I really need to know is if this Kip Daniels has the Right Stuff. Get it, Colonel? Do you know what that means?"
"Yes, sir, I do," the younger man replied stiffly. Colonel William Krupp, the Air Force officer charged with recruitment for Project Valkyrie, had just endured the full force of the general's wrath. Now that Taggart was winding down, the colonel faced his commanding officer.
"Don't blame the intel boys," Krupp insisted with quiet authority. "The kid was surrounded by gang members, two of whom were armed with automatic weapons. One of
those
punks was wanted for questioning in a drug-related homicide."
General Taggart frowned. Then, after a tense moment in which the colonel was sure that his commander would explode again, Taggart visibly relaxed.
"I know, Bill. I know," the general muttered at last, shaking his head. "Sorry I blew up, Colonel."
The two men stood in silence for a moment, clearing the air.
"Hell, they probably did the right thing," General Taggart admitted. "But the kid was so close to the end of the game."
Taggart paused, then looked at the other officer. "And don't forget what one of the Air Force Intelligence agents said at the debriefing," he reminded the colonel. "The kid froze when he saw the image of Godzilla coming at him on the screen."
"But, General," the colonel argued. "That was at the
end
of the game. He may have been distracted when the retrieval team went in to grab him; he may have been tired. Hell, this kid's so good, he may have just been
bored
."
The general nodded, which, to Colonel Krupp, was an indication that it was his turn to push. "This kid hit - then breezed by - the one-million mark. He earned the highest score ever, and it wasn't luck. This Kip Daniels beat Pierce Dillard's highest score - and Dillard only hit a million
after
two months of intensive training here at Nellis."
"I know," General Taggart acknowledged. "But if Daniels freezes in combat, then he's no good to us, the Project, or his country."
"So I should just send him home?" Colonel Krupp asked. "Send the kid back to Los Angeles, to a school full of gang members, and, of course, to his loving mother..." His voice trailed off meaningfully, and the general understood the other officer's concern.
"No, Colonel Krupp," Taggart replied softly. "If his papers are all squared away, then Kip Daniels is in. But only if he
wants
to be."
A look of relief crossed the younger man's chiseled face. Then Colonel Krupp smiled for the first time that day. "I'll go notify the Intelligence team," he announced.
The colonel turned to leave but paused. "When do you want to meet him?" Krupp asked.
Taggart sighed. "Give me ten minutes or so to look over his evaluation."
Krupp nodded, then saluted.
Taggart returned the salute, then sat down into his chair as the other officer departed, leaving the general alone in his tiny office, with his troubled thoughts. As he slumped in his chair, he gathered the scattered pages on his desk. The Project was everything right now. He'd given the past year to it - a year that should have been spent in quiet retirement.
But my country called, and I answered, one last time,
he thought bitterly.
Taggart sighed. The problem wasn't in serving his country, the problem was the mission itself.
I spent my life training to defend America from foreign enemies
, he reasoned.
I trained to fight men, not monsters.
The Soviet threat was gone. In its place was a new menace and a new mission. Now the combined might of the armed services of these United States was retooling - to go into the pest-control business.
General Taggart snorted with contempt as he thought back to the events surrounding the reappearance of Godzilla months before, and how an obscure article he wrote in the 1980s for a strategic studies journal had returned to haunt him.
Taggart had boldly written how certain weapon systems could be modified to defend against the unlikely reappearance of Godzilla, or another monster like him.
Of course,
Taggart reminded himself,
nobody really expected Godzilla to show up again.
But Godzilla
did
show up again, just ten years later. And just when Taggart was ready to retire to his house in California, some pencil-necked adviser to the President of the United States remembered his obscure little article.
"Well," Taggart reminded himself, repeating the familiar words - his personal mantra - "you knew the job was dangerous when you took it." And Taggart had taken it. Truth to tell, he had
jumped
at it.
He was bored after the first six months of retirement, and the call from the Pentagon sounded awfully good.
Taggart recalled the uphill battle he had fought through the corridors of power in the nation's capital. It had been tough convincing his superiors that his crazy plan was sound and sensible. His reputation convinced the military men of his ability to find and lead the perfect team to accomplish the difficult - some said impossible - assignment.
After three months of working on the project, General Taggart was beginning to envy Colonel Krupp. Nobody would blame the colonel if things went wrong. And right now, it seemed, everything was going wrong.
Their weapons weren't ready. Their aircraft weren't ready. Their budget wasn't approved. Hell, they didn't even have office space.
Well
, Taggart reminded himself,
what did you expect? Catered meals and a cheery fireplace?
The President of the United States and the boys up on Capitol Hill wanted Taggart to get the job done, but nobody wanted to spend more of the taxpayers' money doing it, even though the public was clamoring for protection against monsters - or
kaiju
, the Japanese term for "giant monsters," which the scientists were calling the creatures.
So, after they took the trouble to hire him for the job, General Taggart was forced to go to the Oval Office personally to negotiate a budget with a president he didn't like, and hadn't even
voted
for.
"And why should the nation invest even a tiny percentage of defense spending to fight monsters?" the president asked.
Taggart supplied all the stock answers.
We're the only superpower left. If we don't do it, who will? ... It's our duty to be prepared for any threat against the people of this nation. Who knows what type of creature might yet emerge?
They were all sound arguments, and Taggart almost believed them. In the end, though, the president needed a photo op, and the guys building Raptor-One and Raptor-Two were good, card-carrying union men and supporters of the president's party. So Project Valkyrie was born.
All it took was the president's signature, a special dispensation by the House Intelligence Committee, and a billion-dollar black budget from the CIA, the National Security Agency, and the Air Force combined.
And
that
was only the beginning.
Maybe my idea is crazy
, he thought. Many people expected him to fail - maybe even
wanted
him to fail.
If that was the case, then Project Valkyrie was the rope, and Taggart was about to hang himself.
And only a bunch of teenagers can save me, the Project, and maybe even this country, if it should ever come to that.
Taggart shook his head.
I pray that it never will... but just in case...
The general refocused his eyes on Kip Daniels's personality file. As he skimmed the psychological profile, school records, family history, IQ tests, and medical records, the general wondered if he was wrong - if maybe Project Valkyrie wasn't exactly what some of his enemies in the Pentagon called it.
Taggart's Folly.
Of course, General Taggart couldn't take all the credit for this crazy scheme. It was Colonel Krupp and Dr. Markham who developed the video game called BATTLEGROUND 2000. "The perfect way to find the brightest and the best candidates for the Project," Dr. Markham stated.
Taggart had to admit that the psychiatrist had been right, too, because try as they might, Taggart could never train even the best pilots the Air Force had to offer to operate the complicated weapons systems of Raptor-One effectively.
"You can't teach an old dog new tricks," Dr. Markham had insisted. "They're too old. Running the simulator is like learning a martial art. And to learn a skill like that, the younger an individual starts, the better he or she will perform."
That, in a nutshell, was the reasoning behind BATTLEGROUND 2000. Taggart had to admit that it worked. The video game had found seventeen possible candidates - all in their mid-teens - who scored above 800,000 on the game. Each machine was designed with a chip that notified the command station here in Nevada when someone scored above the programmed mark.
These candidates were unknowingly photographed and fingerprinted by the game machine itself, and this information was transmitted by satellite to the Project's massive computers. Each potential candidate was then targeted by Air Force Intelligence for observation and evaluation. Those who displayed past criminal, behavioral, or psychological problems were eliminated.
None of those rejected were even aware that they had been tested, or that the government had completed an extensive background check on them, their parents, teachers, friends, and associates. Only those with a high probability of success were finally selected as candidates for Project Valkyrie.
Which left them with only six potential candidates so far. Six candidates who were summarily drafted.
Oh, the Air Force and the Pentagon liked to call it "voluntary conscription," but that polite phrase covered a multitude of sins. The truth of it was that the best and brightest were conscripted - if need be, against their will. The problem was that pressing, the situation that serious.
So far, conscription wasn't necessary. All of those who'd been offered the chance to join took it - with their parents' or guardians' consent. Indeed, the candidates welcomed their selection for a variety of reasons.
For some, it was an opportunity to get out of a bad situation. For others, Project Valkyrie was a call to adventure, or to duty. Most of the recruits were high achievers in other areas. They were highly motivated and smart enough to recognize a golden opportunity when they were offered one.