Godzilla vs. Kong by Greg Keyes (read people like a book .txt) 📕

Vortex,” Brooks’s speculations—and her own—had been vindicated. Nathan’s older brother David Lind had become the spearhead of a Monarch expedition to enter Hollow Earth via the Vortex. Nathan, whose theories about Hollow Earth seemed to straddle the plausible and the avant-garde, and who had just published a popular book on the subject, was brought in to consult. It was Nathan who had identified and mathematically described the electrostatic barrier separating the surface of the Earth from the maze of chambers and tunnels underneath, as well as what he called the probability of a “gravity inversion.”

Things hadn’t gone as planned. Prior to the proposed expedition, the storms that surrounded and protected the island had intensified and begun to creep toward shore. At first, they thought this had something to do with the widespread environmental destruction wrought by Ghidorah, perhaps also linked with climate change, but in blasting the caverns beneath Skull Island—wide enough for planes to go through—they had inadvertently released Camazotz, a bat-like Titan who had apparently “called” the storm to shield it from the sunlight it abhorred. Kong and the pilots training for the Hollow Earth expedition had managed to defeat Camazotz, but the Vortex had been destabilized—and worse, Camazotz had drawn the tempest ashore and sustained it there.

In any case, Nathan’s dream of finding a path to Earth’s secret depths on Skull Island had been dashed when his brother and two other pilots lost their lives trying to enter the Vortex. Soon after that, Nathan had cut his ties with Monarch. Ilene had made a few attempts to check in on him and how he was doing. None had gotten past a few perfunctory comments, and finally he quit returning her calls and texts entirely. She hated to admit it, but it had been something of a relief; it was hard to watch someone she liked self-destruct.

And now, suddenly, here he was, requesting a video conference. She had agreed, and after working out their very different time zones, they had set up the call.

He looked thinner, hollow around the eyes. He’d grown a beard, and not a well-groomed one. His demeanor was more jaded, or perhaps he was simply exhausted.

“Nathan, you’re looking well,” she lied. “It’s been a long time.”

“Yeah,” he said, nodding. “It has. I’ve been, you know, busy. Becoming a laughingstock.”

She sighed. “I haven’t seen you since … well. I wanted to tell you, I think what happened to you was unfair.”

“I got three people killed,” he said. “One of them was my brother. I lost over a billion dollars in equipment, and I made Monarch look ridiculous. I can’t really blame them for pushing me off the cliff.”

“Priorities were changing,” she said. “Theoretical work like yours and mine got the shaft. I’m only here because of the investment they made—continue to make—in Kong.”

“How’s that going?” he asked.

“There’s a lot I can’t tell you,” she said.

“How about this?” Nathan said. “I’ll tell you what I already know, and we can go on from there.”

“Fair enough,” she said, cautiously.

“I know after the Vortex anchored the off-shore storm to the island, you built a containment facility for Kong.”

“It’s not a containment facility,” she said. “It’s a biodome. A haven.”

“So he hasn’t tried to get out?”

She hesitated, unsure what to say. Instead, she changed the topic.

“What’s this about, Nathan?”

“I’ve been offered a job,” he said. “By Walter Simmons. Apex. They want to fund an expedition to Hollow Earth.”

“Nathan—”

“I know what happened last time,” he said. “I know how to fix it. The aircraft we used before were not suited to the job. Apex has the goods.”

“And why are you telling me this, Nathan? You concluded Skull Island wasn’t a viable entry point. The Vortex is too unstable, not to mention the storm.”

“It isn’t viable,” he said. “But that’s not why I called you.”

She paused for a moment, trying to read his face.

“Tell me this doesn’t involve Kong,” she finally said.

“Do you remember what you wrote about genetic memory?”

She frowned, ran the sentence over in her mind.

“No,” she said.

“You haven’t heard—”

“I don’t have to,” she said. “The answer is no.”

Nathan paused and looked down at his desk. Then he looked back up, and she thought she saw some of his old energy there.

“It’s important,” he said. “Listen, I don’t want to discuss this anymore long-distance. Monarch and Apex are doing this as a joint operation, with Apex providing the equipment and expertise. Monarch has taken me back on, and, uh—I’m in charge. I’ll be flying out this evening to meet with you. All I ask is that you keep an open mind.”

“Is that an order?” she said.

“Look,” he said. “I understand. I’m not here to railroad you. But I do hope to convince you. Kong is your baby, I know that.”

“That’s right,” she said. “And as long as you keep that in mind…” She pursed her lips on the rest of the sentence, then nodded.

“I’ll see you when you get here,” she said.

“It was nice talking to you again, Ilene.”

“The same, I’m sure, Dr. Lind.”

*   *   *

Ilene had worked with several so-called “language apes” when she had been in graduate school, teaching and learning to communicate with them in sign language. One of them, a chimpanzee named Puck, had been a third-generation signer; another, a young gorilla named Fancy, was learning sign from the ground up.

As an anthropological linguist, Ilene had found Puck the most interesting. He had learned his sign vocabulary and grammar from his mother, who had learned it from her mother, and while humans were involved in the process, Ilene was certain she could see a unique language developing, something with striking differences in grammatical construction and semantics than the original language. The meaning of some words had shifted in three generations; the word order was different from English. In Puck’s pidgin sign language, she thought she might learn something about how humans invented language in the first place.

Fancy, on the other hand, had mostly been frustrating. With her, language use was still tied mostly to reward, and