MBITA, KENYA
JUNE 9, 2015

Joseph Odoyo sighed to himself, clutching the Sako rifle closer to his chest. Coming to the countryside had been a mistake, he was beginning to think. His mother, of all people, had been the one to convince him Nairobi was no place for a young man. A Luo man had to get out of the city and into the fresh air, see the real Kenya, she had said. And so Joseph had found himself out in this nothing town on the shores of Lake Victoria, working for peanuts. A farmhand, for God's sake. If he had stayed in Nairobi he might be running his own company by now. He cursed again, softly, to himself. Guarding cattle in the middle of the night. He certainly wouldn't include this in his next email home.

Not that the rancher's concerns were unfounded, Joseph conceded. Something odd was going on all around the lake, there was no denying it. Fishing ketches and other small craft sinking at an alarming rate. Elephants and giraffes disappearing from the Biharamulo reserve in Tanzania, then washing up in Uganda, ripped to pieces. And, of course, cattle disappearing from ranches all around the lake. The last of these concerned Joseph the most. That, after all, was what he owed his employment to.

He heard the soft lowing of the cattle, nodded, turned back to look at the lake, a mere hundred yard away. The moon looked nice on the water, one of the sole amusements he had on this endless, boring night. But the silvery reflection didn't seem to be sitting on the water. Instead, there was. . . something. Some kind of immense black hulk, sitting in the water.

And then, to his horror, the black hulk seemed to be rising out of the lake.

Joseph wasn't sure exactly what to do, but as it approached him, the lowing of the cows turning into cries of panic, he stood frozen to the spot. Something in him, perhaps bravery, perhaps panic, made him level the Sako at the approaching monstrosity, much taller than the barn and farmhouse. Three .223 rounds did absolutely nothing to stop or slow the titanic figure that loomed over him, blocking the bright light of the moon. Joseph turned, attempted to flee, but barely managed a step before he felt an immense pressure on his middle, found himself falling to the cool grass.

But he was looking at the bottom of his own shoes, how could that be? He was not twisting his own legs to look at them, how could he see them?

The last thing to register in Joseph Odoyo's mind was that he had been somehow cut in half. That, and the panicked screams of the cattle.

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
JUNE 9, 2015
EIGHT HOURS LATER

"Two companies of infantry- one from Bolivia, one from Sweden. A troop of tanks, ten of them. T-72s, from Bulgaria. And one squadron of attack aircraft, generously contributed by the Ethiopian Air Force. Twelve Sukhoi Su-25s, slightly outdated."

"That's all?" Marius van Eyck asked incredulously.

Divisional General Marcel Laprasse shrugged, an unbelievably French expression. "You ask for miracles if you expect more, my dear Lieutenant Colonel. We are new and untested, we are lucky to have even these units pledged. The Japanese are sending a medical unit, and of course you have the excellent services of Silver Talon to fall back on. And naturally the armed forces of Tanzania, Uganda, and Kenya," the general said, with a sideways glance at the three ambassadors sitting in the briefing room. "At any rate, what else can we expect? It's the middle of Africa, the press and other countries do not find it sexy enough to donate top-shelf troops."

"True," Van Eyck admitted. "We will have to make the best of what we have."

"And I am certain you will, Colonel," General Laprasse said tolerantly. "You have a brilliant team to fall back upon. I have every confidence. Shall we assemble them for the briefing?"

Van Eyck nodded wordlessly, stepping over to the tannoy mic that put him in touch with every room in this massive building. "All personnel, please report to the briefing room," he said over the intercom, hearing his accented English echo through the corridors. "We seem to have a situation developing in Eastern Africa."

Samuel Walters
Walters and his men were in a Swiss bar celebrating their new contract. It was a marked improvement over the sand traps in the middle east they were used to working in. Not to mention the UN was paying top dollar. Samuel celebrated by sitting at the bar and sipping at a martini. He was careful to not drink enough to get drunk. He had a strong distaste for mind alteration. The idea of not being completely in control of his own mental faculties was is one of his greatest fears. Still given the celebration he figured it would be acceptable to get a little buzzed. His men certainly took no such caution. Walters heard the loud noises of the parting behind him. He overheard one of his drunkard men trying to sweet talk one of the female bartenders. "That's right babe! It's my job to protect you from the scary monsters!"
Walters laughed at the comment and yelled over. "Reggie you dumb ass. You'd shit your pants if you saw a kaiju up close." It was then that his radio went off. It was Van Eyck. Samuel radioed back. "Keep your pants! I'm coming!" Walters spoke up to all his men in the bar. "Time to sober up boys! We got a job to do! Gerolf get everyone prepped for travel. I'm off to the briefing."
It was a short drive over to base. Samuel walked into the briefing room and took a chair and sat backwards in it leaning his arms against the backrest. He then lit up a cigaret and took a puff. Then he spoke up. "So what's the situation? My men are mobilizing as we speak."

Gerolf Schults
Samuel left the bar with the order for Gerolf to mobilize the men. Schults was more than a little annoyed with this order. He had been the one to strongly caution against everyone going out to drink when he knew they could receive orders at any minute. Still Commander Walters felt the company deserved to celebrate. Now he was the one left to deal with the aftermath of the commander's bad decision. At least he had stayed sober himself. It took a good half hour for Gerolf to convince everyone to head back to base. Reggie was especially drunk and thought he had a chance with the bar tender. Gerolf had to point a pistol at his head to get him to leave.
Eventually Gerolf managed to get everyone back to base. Luckily not everyone had left to go to the bar. There were still a few sober people who could help him keep everyone organized. Gerolf hoped that wherever they were going it was a gonna be a long trip to get there so at least most of the men could sober up. Now that everyone was ready to be transported Gerolf decided he wanted to hear first hand what was going to be going on with the deployment. He began to walk up to the briefing room.

Gant wasted no time making his way to the building after passing through security. "I'm going to be late, eh?" He said to himself as he looked down at his brass pocket-watch with a sigh. He really could have skipped breakfast, but he really wasn't too fond of meal replacement bars; they taste like the pellets you'd feed parrots, only if it were compacted into a small brick and covered in chocolate in a futile attempt to make itself more appealing towards humans. Furthermore, he was afraid that the peanut butter on his breath would cause someone to die from an allergic reaction. No way was he risking that.

Tucking the well-polished device back into the pocket of his new, white-gloved uniform, Gant stopped in his track when he heard the P.A. system go off. Not knowing where on earth(or, more specifically, in the building) the briefing room was, Gant began to panic slightly. Thoughts rapidly flowed through his head as he thought about his situation more. "I'm lost, I can't even read this floor plan, which way do I go...." And then his brain shorted out, leaving him just standing in the middle of the hallway as he looked around, an occasional "uhh" coming out of him.

Adrian Cade

"Bullshit there is no way"
"Better start fishing out that wallet your going to owe me money very soon"
"Just shut up and take the shot"

Adrian Cade was lying in the prone position with a high caliber rifle. At the opposite end of the firing range at 600 meters a quarter was stuck on its side. Adrian was inhaling and exhaling slowly his scope trained on it, while another sniper from a different division tried to throw off his game. They had three hundred dollars on this one shot. Adrian lifted the scope slightly above the target, then exhaled slowly, as he did the scope dropped onto it just as his finger squeezed the trigger. There was a loud gunshot and the quarter exploded Adrian's face breaking into a smirk. The man next to him watching through a spotters scope frowned in disbelief. As the stood the man handed Adrian the money and they departed. As he walked he ran into a fellow soldier.

"Hey man don't you know you white gloves are needed for briefing" the man said.
"What!? Damn allright" was the reply before Adrian took off towards the command center.

- (Wait. Better introduction in progress.)

Rio was situated in one of the base's few science labs, analyzing samples taken from the kaiju that had attacked her home several months ago. She was comparing them against samples taken from other normal-sized animals, trying to find any matches or similarities, but so far her search had proved fruitless. Thin glass slides were scattered around the tabletop (the lab tables were all too high for her to reach since she was confined to a wheelchair, and thus she was forced to settle for a low desk off to the side) each labeled with different names. J. Giant Salamander, C. Giant Salamander, P. Giant Salamander, Okinawan Newt, Fire Belly Newt… So far, Rio hadn't found anything to suggest that the kaiju was more than superficially similar to known species.

Drawing her face away from the microscope, Rio put an elbow on the table and dropped her chin into her hand, giving out a sigh. She'd only been at the base for a few uneventful weeks, and had been given freedom to conduct herself however she saw fit. She'd been told to research "anything useful" when she arrived. It was clear from then that the White Gloves weren't the most organized group and they were still working on a touch-and-go basis… but then again, weren't they all? No one had been the least bit prepared when sci-fi monsters crawled out of the sea.

"All personnel, please report to the briefing room. We seem to have a situation developing in Eastern Africa."

Rio jumped at Col. Van Eyck's voice reverberating around the room. Did that… mean her too, or was it just those combat-ready? Shaking her head, she chastised herself. Of course it meant her too. If he'd wanted only combat personnel, he would've said so, right? Right… probably. Well, better to be safe than sorry, she decided, still unsure. Rio set about to cleaning up her station as quickly as she could and then made her way out the door. Navigating the base was easy enough – she'd yet to run into any stairs yet, thank heavens – and she began making the necessary turns towards the briefing room.

It wasn't long before she had to slow down, finding herself behind a group of rather… rowdy men. Rio could smell a hint of alcohol staining the air around them. The base was small enough that Rio could at least recognize most people, but looking at the men in front of her, she found them all unfamiliar. She'd heard rumors of some private contractors signing on with the White Gloves. Maybe this was them? Probably, she decided.

Rio continued behind them (at a greater distance than was probably necessary) as they walked towards the briefing room.

Gerolf Schults
Gerolf rubbed his head in frustration as he walked up the stairs to the briefing room. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a bottle of ibuprofen. He opened the bottle, took out two pills, and swallowed them without any drink to wash it down. He got to the top of the stairs and continued down the hallway towards the room. Then he came across a man who seemed very confused. He seemed like he was military. Gerolf walked over and talked to him. "Are you lost?"

Anna Miller

Anna pulled the joystick and the nose of her craft went into a steep climb "What are you doing?" Someone asked as she got her craft into a steep climb, enemy .50's streaking past her cockpit, the alarms for a stall started beeping but she didn't care she wanted to stall. As the craft stalled it went into the inevitable freefall, flicking switches calmly she got the F-22 back into a state of maneuverability and behind the enemy who unless they were in the same craft as her or Russian craft couldn't take advantage of the Supermaneuverability, so they peeled off and she hunted them down. Most fighter combat wasn't at these ranges, normally it was up to three miles away but both sides had exhausted missile capabilities.

Her 20MM vulcan shredded the wings of one, rolling her craft to the right shredded another. The pilot in the remaining craft must of jerked back on his stick as she went flying past him, the enemy fired a few rounds that hit her tail but she steadied herself and pitched herself towards the ground, flying slow and low she lead the enemy through a series of ravines and passes then they lost each other at a split. That's when someone shook her out of it "Hey all personnel are needed in the briefing room." She exited the sim and shook hands with her fellow rival pilots and headed towards the briefing room.

She must of been pretty quick because she was one of the first to actually arrive in the briefing room. She stood at attention as soon as she entered ready for the briefing.

---

Thomas Glasgow

Thomas was in the middle of research, trying to find out if the Kaiju are genetically similar to their counterparts, but so far he had no conclusion, he hypothesized yes, but science was a tricky mistress. Then the PA system went off telling all personnel to head to the briefing room so he closed down his station and grabbed a cup of stale coffee that had been sitting there overnight. He drank it on the way as he followed his fellow scientists out of the labs and to the briefing room. They were nearly there when a group of men entered and took up most of the hall way.

Thomas knew from the way they took up the hallway and from the way they acted that they were soldiers of some sort. "Muscle-headed plebeians." He muttered loud enough that a few people around him could hear him but not the the soldiers up front. He didn't say anything after that just followed quietly behind the group.

-

Completely unaware of where he was or what he was now doing, Gant unsurprisingly and unceremoniously had the turds scared out of him by a man that approached him from behind. He shouted something along the lines of 'oh crap', except notably more incomprehensible, before he froze up and landed on his side. After quivering for a few moments in a scrunched-up ball and receiving quite a few odd looks from passerbys, Gant recovered enough to unsteadily stagger to his feet. "Ah, sorry about that," He apologized as he stuck out an arm to catch his balance on the wall. "Must have given you quite a scare from that there, eh?"

Looking around again for a moment, Gant turned back to the man to say, "And sorry, yeah, I am a bit lost here. It's a pretty big building they've got, eh?" By then, Gant had caught his balance and didn't look like a lost drunkard. Well, he was still quite lost. But nonetheless, he suddenly slapped his forehead when he remembered something important. "Ah, right. Sorry. I forgot to introduce myself because of my, er, panic attack." Standing slightly taller as he said his title, Gant stated his uniform. "My name's Gant Blanc, a Warrant Officer of the Canadian Army."

Gerolf Schults
Gerolf stared for a moment at the curious man. He let out a small giggle. Then he began to speak in his thick German accent. "You're a strange man. You know that?" Schults then cleared his throat. "Anyhow if were doing formal introductions I'm Gerolf Schults of Silver Talon. That was quite amusing. I needed a good cheering up after what Ive been through today. Anyhow I assume you're looking for the briefing room. Just follow me. It's not far away." Gerolf began walking and then turned back, made a motion with his hand and spoke. "Come, come. No need to be shy Warrant Officer." He said Warrant Officer with a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

AXEL Labs, Florida, USA

At the AXEL labs, excitement was brewing. Another of Dr. Shao's inventions was going to be test-flown today. In the middle of a spacious concrete clearing in the middle of the complex, a grey robot with a peculiar missile-like device strapped to its back hung limp, suspended by mini-stands. A megaphone roared in the early morning.
"All right! Clear the launching area!"
Blue-shirted men removed the mini-stands, and adjusted the robot's kinetic settings to stand straight. All personnel stayed at least fifty meters away from the exoskeleton, as safety protocol dictated. One man started recording on a camcorder.
"Commencing launch in T - 5... 4... 3... 2... 1.. LIFT-OFF!"
With a sudden and deafening boom, the robot at the center of the clearing exploded into several different pieces.

UNKRCI HQ, Geneva, Switzerland

Mark Shao resisted the urge to cry as he witnessed it all on his double-screen Dell computer in the White Gloves' IT lab. He switched windows and angrily typed into a Skype screen: "what was that?!! what do u call that??"
A bing came up as the recipient responded. "sorry boss. these nasa auxiliary boosters r more than 10 yrs old. delivery from the labs at NY ain't cheap."
"well, speed it up. Minus that unit, we only have 14 units, only 8 of which r serviceable. 4 now until NY delivery gets there focus on the underwater units."
"K boss."

"All personnel, please report to the briefing room. We have a situation developing in East Africa."

Finally. Some action. Mark quickly shrugged on his brand-new Swiss Army backpack and slipped through the mob of uniformed men moving in the general direction of the briefing room. He noted the appearance of a slightly intoxicated an somewhat motley crew taking up most of the space in the hallway, moving away from the briefing room in the direction of the deployment bay. Probably the mercenaries. Silver Talon, from what he heard.

Rio jumped when she heard one of her fellow scientists mutter something beside her. She opened her mouth to say something about his rather rude word choice, but froze instead. Though the two of them spent the majority of their time in the same lab, Prof. Glasgow wasn't the most… inviting personality. Quite frankly, he was intimidating. Rio didn't think they'd ever had a conversation not centered around kaiju tissue samples, and she doubted the older man would want to start now.

Eventually the group of mercenaries split off, heading in the direction of the barracks. They… weren't going to the briefing? Oh well, that was probably for the best, Rio decided. The colonel probably wouldn't appreciate an audience of drunken soldiers.

Thus, Rio found herself alone in the hall with Prof. Glasgow and another scientist. He worked in the IT lab, so Rio didn't see much of him, but he already seemed friendlier option… or at least the less scary option. If Rio was honest with herself, she felt like something of an outsider at the base. She was one of the youngest, one of the only women, one of the only Asians… all of that coupled with her shy nature meant she didn't have any idea how to connect with those around her. Not to mention she was still dealing with the loss of both her parents and her legs. She wasn't sure if she was actually ready to start opening up to people again. But the IT scientist seemed like a good place to start. He was closer to her age and the only other Asian she'd seen at the base. It wouldn't hurt to try, right?

"Umm…" Off to a great start. "You work in engineering, right?" she asked in English. That seemed to be the de facto language here, and she didn't actually know where he was from (or even what his name was). Plus, maybe Prof. Glasgow would like to join in. "We work mostly in the bio lab. Are you developing something in particular or just general research?"

Alekos Diakopi got out of the silver grey car. He had been doing research non stop for at least 10 hours. Therefore, he felt tired, and his appearance surely showed it. His eyes had bags underneath them, his hair was messy, his clothes were creased and he still had his research notes tucked inside his shirt pocket. To say the least, Alekos felt wretched. It was always a tough job with the White Gloves, and sometimes Alekos wondered what it would have been like if he denied the offer and stayed with the museum.

Alekos had been suddenly startled by a voice over the intercom: "All personnel please report to the briefing room. We have a situation developing in Eastern Africa.". Alekos had got out of his seat, and tidied up his desk slightly. In his haste, he nearly knocked over a glass of water, but managed to stop it from tipping over completely. However, a bit of water had gotten onto one of his cards. He bought the cards in case he was asked something, or the reason why he was doing so much research.

Alekos's thoughts when he was in the car were mostly about what Kaiju had attacked now. At one point in his research he had compiled a table of the current attacks, and grouped them into mammals, reptiles/amphibians, invertebrates and a column called "Other". Alekos had a small version of the on one of his cards in his shirt pocket. He yawned as he walked up to the door.

Alekos was greeted with a relieving hum of noise. "Good" Alekos muttered to himself in Greek. "The briefing has not started yet.". Alekos opened the door as quietly as he could, and searched for an empty seat. When he located one, he sat down and begun to slip through his cards. All of his cards were written in English, for easy reading if he was asked to read them out. English seemed to be the general language among the White Gloves. Alekos muttered his notes to himself as he waited for the briefing to begin.

Van Eyck saw the invisible nod General Laprasse gave him, and felt his mouth go dry. He wasn't much for public speaking- sure, he addressed his troops regularly, but he never felt fully comfortable doing even that. Nonetheless, he straightened his necktie, checked his cuffs, adjusted his dark blue beret, and delicately cleared his throat. Finally, once he was sure he was as ready as he could be, he stepped up to the podium.

"At ease, ladies and gentlemen," he said to the military personnel who had automatically stood to attention when he stepped to the podium. He spoke in English, which seemed to have become the lingua franca for the team. "Please be seated. I will keep my remarks brief.

"Firstly, I would like to say what an honor it is to be with you here today. I do not have the privilege of knowing all of you personally yet, but I look forward to working with and getting to know each of you over the days and weeks to come." Van Eyck paused, as he took a moment to look over his audience. Hopefully that line would at least buy him a little trust from the civilians. The research staff and military staff had formed their own exclusive cliques, rarely interacting and occasionally eying one another with mutual contempt and distrust. Not a healthy way to interact, given that their lives might depend on the other team's actions.

"Just a few hours ago, we received a formal request for help from the governments of Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda," he said with a gesture to the three ambassadors, awkwardly seated on stage. They were not trained diplomats, really, just someone's nephew or the recipient of a favor. Any man who is ambassador to Switzerland never expects to deal with much of a crisis. "We have been closely monitoring the situation for some time now, and in conjunction with these three governments we have arrived at the conclusion that there is a predatory kaiju currently living in Lake Victoria." He tapped a small button on the podium, and a map of the lake in question was projected onto the blank white wall behind him.



With a laser pointer, he highlighted a few points of interest. "Five weeks ago, there was a general decline in fish stocks in the lake- odd, but hardly remarkable. Then, four separate fishing boats sank with all hands aboard, almost like they were pulled underneath the water by some immense force. Goats, cattle, and other livestock have gone missing from farms and ranches situated around the lake, not to mention an alarming increase in missing persons reports in the general area. Large animals, such as buffalo, wildebeest, elephants, and hippopotami, have been disappearing at night from numerous game preserves around the lake. On more than one occasion, corpses washed ashore with enormous bite marks taken out of them." He clicked a second button, showing a graphic photo of an elephant missing its trunk, ears, and most of its torso. Parts of it had been messily torn away. "This elephant, by the way, was tagged by the rangers at Serengeti National Park, in Tanzania. It washed up on the shore of Koome Island- nearly a hundred miles away in Uganda."

He cleared his throat once again, taking a sip of water as he replaced the photograph with one of a wooden frame house, the walls pushed in from one side and the shingled roof peeled back like an onion skin. "The worst incident yet occurred early this morning, at a cattle ranch outside Mbita, on the Kenyan side of the lake. Five ranchhands dead or missing, twenty-six head of cattle butchered, a house destroyed, smashed to kindling. Several of the men and animals were dismembered and cut, as though by a gigantic razor-sharp blade. These three governments have been in conference with one another over this issue, this incident convinced them to seek our aid and advice. Ladies and gentlemen, we will be deploying in Africa at the earliest possible opportunity. If you have personal business here in Geneva, I would advise you to conclude or cancel it within the next few hours."

"Now, a few issues I wish to highlight," the colonel said as he returned to the map of Lake Victoria. "This is one of the largest lakes in the world- or at least Wikipedia tells me it is." He hoped his attempt at humor would cut some of the tension, he was not a naturally funny man by any means, but he knew the danger of going into combat full of anxiety and dread. Instantly feeling foolish, he cleared his throat yet again and carried on. "We have a difficult task ahead of us. Islands included, there is a shoreline of approximately 4800 kilometers- 3000 miles, for the Americans. Several major centers of population are situated on the lake as well. Kampala, 1.7 million people. Mwanza, 700,000. Kisumu, 410,000. Musoma, 140,000. Bukoba, 92,000. Jinja, 90,000. Not to mention countless smaller hamlets and villages. A kaiju landfall in one of these densely packed cities could outstrip the combined death toll of all previous attacks. Evacuation merely on a possibility would be ruinous to the local economy, as well as a logistical nightmare. Therefore, unfortunately, we will most likely have to take a reactive role rather than a proactive one."

"UN member nations have pledged support and resources to those of us in the White Gloves for the duration of this mission. The Bolivian Army and the Swedish Army have both pledged 150 infantrymen apiece. The Bulgarians have generously lent the support of ten T-72 tanks and crew, and the Ethiopian Air Force is forming our air wing with twelve Su-25 warplanes, to be placed under the command of Major Miller. The Japanese Self Defense Forces will be responsible for setting up a field hospital in order to treat both civilian and military casualties. The contractors of Silver Talon will help round out our ranks. Finally, the combined military forces of Uganda, Tanzania, and Kenya will be receptive to our advice." He refrained from commenting on the general state of African militaries. While those three countries had some of the better organized and equipped forces on the continent, they were still a long ways off from the standards set by many developed nations.

"As regards the research team," van Eyck continued, "I will happily accept volunteers to accompany us into the field, though I stress you are under no obligation to deploy with us. Your knowledge and ability will be invaluable to our efforts, and I assure you that every soldier and contractor here will do their utmost to protect you from any harm.If you should choose not to come, we will be closely in touch via satellite phone."

He nodded to himself, before looking out at the assembled audience. "The floor is now open. Suggestions? Comments? Questions?"

Samuel Walters
A big smirk comes across Samuel's face. He raised his hand and began to speak without waiting to be called on. "So Marius is it? Let me get this straight. You were given a bunch of tanks and war planes to hunt a sea monster? Did you simply forget to ask for boats or were our allies feeling stingy with their navies? Ill tell you what. I have an old contact in Kenya. Wire me some funds and I think I can get us some boats along with maybe a few sea mines and torpedoes." Walters continued to smirk and sit smugly backwards in his chair while he awaited an answer.

Adrian frowned looking at the map. Finally he spoke up "Yes sir, first lieutenant Adrian Cade sniper speaking. How large is this kaiju, do we have any definite weaknesses, and finally will I be able to do any damage to it?" Finishing his questions Adrian rested his hands on the table and waited for an answer.

Maj Anna Miller

When the Lt.Col walked out in his sunday best, Anna couldn't help but feel a little underdressed standing there in her flight suit. The Col told them to stand at ease and there was the unanimous sound of boots clicking against the ground as those in uniform, as their CO ran through the briefing. She nodded at some parts and furrowed her brow at others. She had a few questions and when he asked for questions she delivered. "Sir." She spoke aloud, "Are refueling craft going to be provided, if not then can we bring our own? It could possibly extend our search from the air. Also sir can our local assets lend us PT boats for radar usage? I'm no squid but enough of those armed with depth charges could bring the beasty to the surface." She continued feeling the eyes of her fellows on her she reddened. She reddened further when she offered her idea after one of the hired guns said the samething his ending as her questions had begun.

---

Thomas Glasgow

As the soldiers ebbed the group of scientists moved forward, the biologist Rio or something in her wheelchair made an attempt at nervous small talk. "You know, i can give you one of my smaller tables, might make things easy for you." He said his statement coming from nowhere, he realized that sounded rude like she was some incompetent. "I don't mean it to sound like i am being rude. Just maybe your work will improve with a smaller table." He stated, he realized he now made it sound like she didn't work at all so frustrated he moved ahead into the breifing room.

He listened to one of the military types deliver his briefing. Then when he was finished, he turned and walked out of the room to go pack his tools. When he made it back to his lab his tools were packed and not trusting them to have proper equipment he loaded his microscope into a tough as nails case and sat there waiting for the order to head out.

Van Eyck arched a single eyebrow at the mercenary's comments. "You are mistaken, Mr. Walters. It is not Marius. It is Lieutenant Colonel van Eyck. As for naval assets, how do you propose we bring them inland to this lake? Disassemble them and bring them in by truck? Try to float them down shallow, dammed rivers? Unfortunately, there is little we can do in this area. Our hosts operate a few fast attack craft and police launches on the lake, that is as much as we can manage. I have taken care to request that our air wing brings along sonar buoys to drop, as well as some antisubmarine weaponry. We will have to compensate for our weaknesses as best as we can."

He nodded to Cade as well. "Thank you, Lieutenant Cade. We have very little hard information on our adversary- there are no known photographs or witnesses of this secretive creature. We have no real idea of the general size, though some biologists have suggested it weighs at least sixty tons, given the damage it has wrought and the amount it seems to eat in one day. I have faith in both your abilities and the .50 cartridge, however, I trust if there is a way to harm it you will find it."

Miller also addressed questions to him, her worries echoing many of his own. "We will be working closely with the Kenyan Navy and the coast guards of Uganda and Tanzania. What little we know seems to suggest this creature is amphibious- keep in mind several of these attacks occurred on land. Accordingly, General Laprasse and I feel that any decisive battle will likely occur when this creature comes ashore. As for refueling aircraft, the Ethiopians are bringing one. Slow and outdated, yes, but it will have to do. Otherwise you'll have to keep flying back to Entebbe Airport."

Major Miller

After the colonel answered questions she offered a solution. "If i may sir, but in vietnam they used choppers to move PT boats up and down Denang, If they need me you can put me on loan to the talons for airlift." She said, she shifted uncomfterably. She didn't do well with all these eyes on her, any assets that could be used to hunt this thing. But she also realized the more she asked questions the more terror this thing could cause.