Tim Lebbon - Kong - Skull Island

“Get down!” Conrad shouted, shoving Weaver on top of Slivko and Marlow, pulling his father’s lighter from his pocket, igniting it and throwing it.

Useless, pointless , Weaver thought, fearing that in his final moment Conrad had resorted to foolish defiance in the face of oncoming death.

Then she saw the lighter spinning towards the small vent in the ground just ahead of the sprinting Skull Crawler, and she understood.

She crouched over Slivko and covered both of their heads with her arms, just as the vent’s gas ignited with a ground-shaking, ear-shattering boom. Heat pulsed across the open ground, singeing the hairs on the back of her neck and legs, and the explosion was accompanied by a high, pained shriek that seemed to split the air in two.

Weaver risked a look and saw the Skull Crawler sprawled across the ground less than thirty feet away. The searing burst of flame had caught it across the side like a blowtorch, blazing into its torso and splitting it open. Superheated insides were spilled across the ground, much of the mess cauterised black. It writhed and groaned, head scraping this way and that, claws scratching messages of pain into the dirt. It was almost pathetic, and Weaver felt a moment of sorrow for this dying beast. It was a hunter and killer, and that was all it knew.

Its movements lessened and she stood and started taking pictures again.

“Nice throw,” Weaver said, as she and Conrad helped Slivko to his feet. “Your dad would have been proud.”

The shooting had ceased and a spooky, uneasy silence hung over the scene. The dead Skull Crawler’s fat spat in the flames. Weaver lifted her camera to take some photos, but then she saw the extent of damage the surge of fire had wrought upon the beast. Its gut was wide open, heavy scaled hide ripped and ruptured ribs scorched to blackened spurs. She had no wish to see what might have been revealed inside its stomach.

The recent meals it had eaten.

Turning away, she closed her eyes and breathed deeply to try and swallow down the puke that threatened. She smelled burning meat and death. It was a smell she had always been at home with, but now it seemed harsher than ever before.

“Rally up, we need to keep moving,” Packard said. His remaining soldiers obeyed his orders, keen to be doing something meaningful rather than simply looking at the results of the recent, shattering battle.

There was no time to dig graves for their comrades. Packard collected the dog tags himself.

Weaver took a moment to look around at the scene of devastation and catch her breath. They were all very lucky to still be alive. Conrad had saved them, and she was pleased to hear a few grateful comments from the Sky Devils. Even Packard gave him a curt nod.

The Skull Crawler would add one more, final skeleton to its own valley of bones.

Packard had seen two more of his men die, but all for a cause: to kill the thing that had first taken them down. To end King Kong. It was his driving force, the fuel that fed his interior fire, and the stench of more death in his nose did nothing to lessen his determination. He had smelled it many times before. This mission had become personal, and the outside world was now very far away. His war had never ended. It had simply shifted focus.

They climbed out of the valley of bones, and on the slopes they entered the jungle once more. Though his troops were traumatised, they still moved with true professionalism, alert to dangers and covering ground silently. Which was more than could have been said for the others.

He heard Marlow stomping towards him from fifty feet away.

“Look, this is crazy,” the old pilot said, drawing level with Packard. “You may outrank me, Colonel, but I’ve been here a helluva lot longer and I’m telling you that thing that just shredded us was the first. And we’re on their turf now. We need to turn back toot sweet!”

“Not with Chapman stranded out there,” Packard said with true passion. He had almost begun to believe his own lie. “No man left behind.”

“He’s not,” Conrad said. His comment brought the group to a standstill on the wooded slope, sun dappling through the trees, insects buzzing them. The atmosphere was loaded. Packard wondered whether he should have brought the ex-SAS man in on his plans from the beginning. That, or killed him.

“That thing we just killed got him.” Conrad held out a set of dog tags on their chain.

Mills took the tags, looked at them for longer than was necessary. Then he passed them on.

“This doesn’t change a thing,” Packard said. We’re still going to that crash site.”

“What’s at that crash site that you want so badly?” Conrad asked.

“Weapons,” Packard said. “Enough to kill it.”

“Kong didn’t kill Chapman,” Conrad said.

Packard pulled a handful of dog tags from inside his jacket and held them out. “But it did kill these men. My men! All dead!”

“No,” Marlow said, shaking his head. He looked like someone had just threatened to kill his momma. And Packard had almost started to respect him. “No way,” Marlow continued. “You can’t kill Kong. He’s just trying to protect this island from those things.”

“He’s right, Colonel,” Brooks said. “We can’t kill Kong. Those other creatures are the real threat.”

“The Skull Crawlers,” Marlow said.

“Right,” Brooks nodded. “There are more down there. Lots more.”

“And Kong keeps them in check,” San said.

“Take away a species’ natural competition and they’ll proliferate out of control,” Brooks said.

“And they have gills,” San said. “Marlow stabbed that thing there when he thought it was an eye.”

“Is this a goddamn biology lesson?” Packard asked. He was quickly losing his patience, but he had to be seen as in control. Not raging. Not mad.

“It means they could get off the island,” Brooks said.

“Then we’ll end them, too,” Packard said. “ All of them. After we bring down that beast you call Kong.”

Marlow unsheathed his katana sword with a whisper of leather on steel, and levelled it at Packard’s face. “I can’t let you do that.”

Packard remained still and silent while his men aimed their guns at Marlow. They did so without fuss, but every single one of them meant it. He knew that each trigger was being squeezed to half of its limit. It would take only a twitch from Marlow for a fusillade of shots to be fired, and he would be torn apart.

“Hold it!” Conrad said. “Hold your fire!”

Packard stared from Marlow to Conrad and back again.

“When I was a kid,” he said, “it was always the ones that shrunk and ran or stared down at their shoes that got it from the older boys. Maybe that’s who you are. Me? I’m the one with a rock in his hand. Ready. And this is one war we will not lose.”

“You’re nuts,” Marlow said. “This is nuts !”

Packard moved quickly, ducking down and swinging his rifle around, pounding Marlow heavily in the ribs. Marlow gasped and buckled in pain, dropping his sword and pressing his hands to his stomach as he tried to catch his breath.

Mills darted in and grabbed the blade.

“Please,” San said, stepping forward towards the gun-wielding soldiers. “You need to listen to us.”

“You’re making a mistake,” Brooks said, supporting his friend and colleague.

“Your lies got my men killed,” Packard said. He clenched his jaw, resisting the urge to lash out at these people, these fools. “ You’re the ones who made a mistake. I’m just putting things right.” They’d let their passion for science blind them against harsh realities. That’s why he was here. He was the realist.