The sunset over Japari Park was always spectacular. With the yellows, oranges and reds all fading into one beautiful painting, Serval would always do her best to stay awake to see the setting sun. Tonight's sunset shone brilliantly over the Savanna, with fiery hues reflecting across distant mountains, which in turn exhaled long shadows over the wide open plains.
The star surveyed it's territory like an eye, its fantastic colors spreading across Serval's cheeks as if it were a deep blush.
This afternoon, the calm winds of the Savanna area caught the dry grass like waves over the ocean, the sound of the gentle swishing lulling any spectators into a deep sleep.
Serval allowed her head to rest on the thick branch of her tree, her body lost to the sounds of the wind. With her head tilted towards the setting sun, the scent of the sun-bleached tree was that of dry, dark wood. And that smell was just like the one from the lodge- the one she had visited on her journey with Kaban.
Kaban...
The Friend, as her kind was called, sighed, her tail waving lazily in the wind. Thinking back to the lodge reminded her of why she was there in the first place, leading her pointed ears to twitch with a hint of anxiety.
How was Kaban doing now?
Serval had hoped to come along with Kaban at the last second by making a boat of her own, but eventually decided against it. Her desire to stay at Kaban's side was so intense that it still tugged at her chest.
Just thinking of Kaban, all alone, drifting off to some forlorn island out at sea, sent her belly into spirals. What was she doing now? Did they pack her enough food to make it to a new land? Did Kaban find other humans? And as much as she didn't want to admit it out loud, Serval hoped that Kaban would come back.
That day out on the harbor… that wasn't the end. Right?
Serval thought and thought and thought, letting her rampant anxieties get the better of her. It wasn't her intention to get so caught up on the 'what ifs', but there were so many unknowns…
Tossing and turning over her branch, Serval's face twisted and convulsed with an unfounded fear of what she didn't know.
With one final sigh, the feline let her arms dangle down, her fur tickled by the free flowing wind. Her eyes were closed shut as she tried to squeeze out those feelings.
In the end, she knew that only time would be able to reveal the answers to the questions she never knew she had.
It wasn't easy to resign for the night, but the setting sun did the work for her.
The sky grew dark, with splashes of maroon and navy blue above the mountains to the west. As the light dimmed, Serval's instinctual clock ticked to a dreary limit that she knew was a countdown to her inevitable sleep.
Curled up tight, making sure she wouldn't slip and fall, Serval's soft, shallow breathing gave room for clarity to fill her mind.
With only the wind at her back and the rustling of an unbound nature to fill her ears, sleep came easy.
I wonder, she thought, I wonder if there's a world over the horizon. I wonder if Kaban is out there now, in the habitat of humans. Somewhere over the waves…
...Over the waves…
A massive wave crashed against the mighty hull of the USS Carl Vinson, a Nimitz-class supercarrier belonging to the United States Navy's Carrier Strike Group One.
Escort ships were buffeted by ravenous winds and a rainstorm rivaling that of a monsoon. Blackened night skies were made even more dangerous with the accompaniment of rowdy grey clouds dotted with lightning.
The Navy burst through a mammoth sized wave, the salty seawater exploding like a bomb against the ship's fading paint job. Weathered by hundreds of storms just like this one, the USS Carl Vinson sailed through the seas like a knife, the ocean plowing over the deck and washing away any debris that might have been left in yesterday's sun.
Deck-based FA/18 Multirole Fighters and other battered aircraft from Carrier Air Wing Two were safely clamped to the surface of the ship in anticipation for this virulent sea state.
For some reason, the weather surrounding the Japari Islands had always been unceasingly rough. Although it was common knowledge that there was some sort of resort or animal conservatory on the islands, the secrets behind the Japari Islands were kept in a 'need to know' system.
No one knew anything about the Japaris, and no one cared, really. It wasn't big on the maps, and it was never in the news.
Until the turn of 2012 did the name 'Japari' mean anything to the modern world.
The year begin as monstrous creatures hid onboard cargo ships en route for Japan. Modern stowaways from a fictional world, they were called.
Completely unknown and unlike anything fathomable in reality, they multiplied like rats. The creatures, called 'Ceruleans' by the Japanese, spread across the whole world like a wildfire, like a plague- with no capacity for sentience and a permanent kill switch flipped somewhere in their deformed bodies, the Ceruleans spread across the globe in a matter of days.
Days. Just days.
It was now 2018 onboard the USS Carl Vinson, and almost no one had seen real dirt, real mountains, in a long, long time. Supplied by daring runs to mainland Asia, Austrialia and other Pacific islands, the American carrier group managed to link up with surviving ships from other navies and civilians over the years.
A Combined Fleet, they called themselves.
Without communications to the mainland, the world as we know it seemingly erased from existence. Gone.
But why?
The last survivors of a dead race needed to know.
It was their duty.
Sailing close to the Japari Islands, the carrier group's leading destroyer escort picked up a faint but discernible radio message. A crumb on the trail to the unknown, plucked out despite interference from the storm.
It was originating from somewhere on the island of Kyōshū, one of the few islands that made of the Japari Islands.
Listening closely, the harrowing voice of a woman on repeat could be filtered through the static, over and over. A prerecorded message. In an instant, the men and women of the Mixed Fleet knew exactly what they had to do.
"Japari Park… eace… m… Evacuation didn't come soon enough… my fault that… Sandstar eruption… S-stop them!"
Beep… Beep… Beep…
The screen beeped to the beat of Kaban's heart, each beep corresponding with a fleeting thought flying through her greyed out mind.
Beep… Beep… Beep…
Kaban tried moving her arms up to wipe her face, only to find them tucked under a thin blanket.
With the sand in the corners of her eyes piling up like an annoying roadblock, Kaban reached up her left arm to try and clear her ruined vision.
Oh no… She thought as she lazily rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Her stomach churned. I feel… seasick?
The feeling was new to her, and the nausea was only magnified by her vision returning to her.
Kaban's frayed black hair danged in front of her eyes, leading the human to push them away.
Beep… Beep… Beep…
Kaban inched her weary eyes around her bed, hungry to know more.
Immediately she noticed a thin plastic tube stuck in her right wrist, and like a snake or a leech a sickly looking liquid flowed through it. Feeling an alien pressure in her arm, Kaban gasped, reaching for her arm with a free hand.
Although she wanted to pull out the strange tube, she was afraid that she would do more harm than good. Coupled with the fact that one end was taped securely to her skin, it would be painful to get it out.
Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!
Kaban's heart began to race as her surroundings dawned on her. She was lying down on a thin bed in some sort of cramped grey room that smelled like wet paint and plastic. Tubes connected screens to other screens, bags of liquid to her arm, and wires to other holes that looked nothing like anything she remembered from Japari Park.
With no windows in sight, and some screens around her and on the walls, Kaban was scared out of her mind. What was going on?
She last remembered the sight of the ocean. Leaving the island in search of humans, or maybe even a home for herself in a world where she didn't feel that she really belonged. After all, all the Friends back in the park were part animal, and she was just a human. That couldn't be right for her.
Kaban breathed. In one second, and out another.
She had to remain calm to find out what was going on.
Taking another deep breath, there was a gentle rap on the door across from her.
Was someone there? Was someone out to try and eat her?
"I'm coming in!"
A muffled voice on the other end exclaimed, chipper and at ease.
The door clicked open, swinging soundlessly. With her eyes fixated on the new entrant, Kaban gasped.
A person without ears, without a tail, without claws or fur stepped inside. Donning a white lab coat, there was no way this was any ordinary Friend.
"How are you?" The entrant asked. The woman in the lab coat seemed nice, giving Kaban a warm smile as she brought a tray into the room.
"I'm… I'm fine…" Kaban stammered, anxious.
"Fine? I'm happy to hear it. My name is doctor Elizabeth, and I'm wondering if you'd be willing to share your name."
Elizabeth placed her tray onto a table in the corner, adjusting her ponytail with a free hand. Eyeing Kaban enthusiastically, the human felt compelled to respond.
"I'm Kaban." She nodded. "Are you a human?"
The words escaped her lips before she realized she was saying them.
"Me?" Elizabeth quipped, pointed at herself. Smiling as if Kaban had just told her a hilarious joke, she continued. "Yes, yes I am."
"Woah…" Kaban couldn't help but stare in awe. This was someone from her own race?
Elizabeth approached the bed holding a cup of water in one hand and a shiny white pill in the other. "Kaban, do you swallow pills or do you prefer a chewable?"
"Pills?" Kaban muttered, raising her eyebrows. "What's a pill?"
The doctor blinked, confused. Almost annoyed.
"This medicine is supposed to help you recover from your unconciousness." Elizabeth extended her palm, the one holding the pill. "This is a pill, and I don't know if you prefer swallowing them or chewing them, we can do one or the other if you'd like."
The doctor's patience was running thin, and Kaban wasn't sure what to say. She really didn't know how pills worked, and she wasn't sure if the doctor knew this or not.
"Umm… I'll swallow it." Kaban tentatively took the cup from Elizabeth in one hand, and the pill in the other.
Frowning, she dunked the pill in the water and swallowed it while drinking from the cup. This is what she meant by swallowing, right?
Elizabeth was satisfied, and took the cup back from Kaban.
"I'll be back in a moment, Kaban." The doctor placed the cup in a small sink, then stepped to the door. "Now that you're able to talk, I have a friend that wants to talk with you."
The doctor left, just like that.
Alone and feeling dejected, Kaban frowned. Here she was, finally surrounded by humans. Like the world was taunting her, Kaban felt so utterly alone.
Her chest swelled up from the feelings that she couldn't pin down as easily. Was this joy, finally coming across her own species? Or was it sadness, sadness drawn from the unknowns of what will happen next and the uncertainty of where she even was.
Just as she begun to think to herself, the metal door swung open once more.
A man stepped inside this time, alongside Elizabeth.
He wore a cap on his head and a sharp uniform that seemed intimidating to the girl. Colored blue and grey all over, in a fuzzy, confusing pattern, the uniformed man knelt beside the bed.
The man adjusted his hat so it pointed upwards, showing off some of the hair on the front of his head. He had a thin beard on his chin and below his nose, indicating that he was much, much older than she was.
"You're Kaban?" He asked with a deep, gruff voice that was nothing short of scary.
Kaban nodded, humming affirmatively.
The man blinked, slowly nodding- more to himself as opposed to responding to Kaban.
"My name is Captain Thomas Henry, but you can call me Thomas." Not pausing to let Kaban greet him in return, Thomas spoke as if it were more of a chore than a pleasure. "We found you out in the open ocean, passed out on a makeshift raft… it's too much of a stretch to call it a boat."
Captain Thomas stood up, sternly eyeing Kaban with a face that spelled urgency.
"How did you get there, Kaban?"
A bright sunrise over the skies of the Southern Pacific.
Nothing special. The star in the east was nothing more than a nuisance when flying, a blinding ball of light that would end up costing you your life in a close ranged skirmish.
Of course it was nice to have light up in the clouds when you were flying, but from a high altitude the light would reflect on the cloud layer, creating another blinding hazard for pilots without the proper protective gear.
Jack "Homecoming" O'brien wasn't worrying about getting blinded, however. His flight helmet was wrapped over his entire head as snug as a pig in a blanket. The visor, looking like the compound eyes of an insect, was perfectly capable of mitigating the effects of bright light. His mouth and nose were held in another part of the helmet like a mask, connected to a container of air by a tube in the event he would need it.
His FA/18C Multirole Aircraft was tucked neatly at the front of his flight's formation. In the early morning light, Jack could definitely have used another cup of coffee, even if the rationing system prohibited him from getting one. After all, he was a pilot- a specialty that became more and more valuable as time on the open ocean went on.
They were getting ready to land marines on the island of Kyōshū, the island reported to be the origin point of the broadcast. Not only that, but the person that the group had rescued the other day was keen on this island being home to not only Ceruleans, but several new species of creatures.
But Jack was skeptical.
Opening his mouth, the stuffy helmet muffled his voice.
"Darkstar, Enfield one-one, requesting picture, over."
Jack's flight was callsign Enfield, and he was curious as to the air traffic in the area. He had hailed the mission's AWACS, or Airborne Warning and Control System, Darkstar, to get an idea of any other aircraft in the Japari Islands. As in the past there was never anything in the skies, Jack was asking out of paranoia as opposed to actual practicality.
"Enfield one-one, skies are clear. What are you even trying to do, over?"
The radio operator over in the AWACS was young, and spoke with hopes to tease Jack.
"Just double checking, over." Jack O'brien spoke fast, looking out of his cockpit and at the island in the distance.
He wasn't far from Kyōshū, an island featuring a massive volcano. He hadn't heard of the Japari Islands until recently, when he was told that they would be getting close on their way to Okinawa. There was an... amusement park there? A zoo at one point? Whatever there was, it was nothing that shouted importance
"You anxious?" The man over the radio asked, genuine concern in his voice.
"I guess, yeah." Sighing, 'Homecoming' let his eyes wander to the instruments in his cockpit, then to the HUD mounted in front of him. "I can't believe we fished someone out of the water like that."
"You heard?" Darkstar exclaimed. "They said it was a little girl. Something about not knowing anything about people, as if she had been living under a rock for the past ten years. Personally, I think that's crazy talk."
"You could say that again," Jack said, flicking his radar on and off. "I just hope that we find something on this damn rock. Marines being sent in by helicopter… jeez. They ought to know we don't have enough fuel to just waste on stupid missions."
"She said something about animal people on Kyōshū. Could you believe that? People with animal qualities and features." The man scoffed. "Miss me with that childish shit."
Jack grinned, looking out at the island. The sunlight reflected off the glass, making the image a little hazy for him to see.
"I don't want to shut down any possibilities. You know how stupid the Ceruleans sounded at first, and well…"
They both said nothing for a while, letting silence reign.
"Enfield one-one, Darkstar," Darkstar started off by calling Jack by his formal callsign, and he knew that they were getting into action. "Report from November one through three indicates feet dry in under ten mikes, advise you get your radar on, over."
"Darkstar, Enfield one-one copies all, out."
Jack switched frequencies with the flick of a dial, hopping to talk with his flight.
"Flight, radar on."
As soon as he gave the order, a chorus of affirmatives lined the airways.
Jack reached for his radar and turned it on as well, making sure his four AGM-88 HARM missiles would be ready to get a lock and fire in an instant, just in case.
In terms of fluidy, the mission seemed to be going swimmingly. The three transport helicopters, designated 'November', were right on time. There was no sign of any hostiles, be it human or Cerulean.
This would be a piece of cake and a half. Who knows what they'll find on Kyōshū.
On occasion, the men of CSG1 would send a scavenging group to land in order to get supplies. This time would be no exception-
"Enfield one-two to one-one, I got a mud spike at our one o'clock, check your RWR!"
The shouting of his wingman tore Jack to his senses, and his eyes darted to the warning receiver on his dashboard. Sure enough, the screen revealed that there was a ground-to-air radar lighting up the flight.
A steadily chirping beep filled his ears, and O'brien could feel his stomach crawl. Something was emitting a strong radar pulse.
How? How and why would there be a surface-to-air weapon system on some random, insignificant island?
"Give me a sec-" Jack quickly swapped frequencies to talk to Darkstar when his TEWS began blinking. Swapping back to his flight, he shifted in his seat. "Huh?"
"Watch it, SAM launch at our twelve!" Another wingman cried out, breathing heavily. "W-which one of us is the lucky bastard?"
No one spoke.
"Fuck." Someone said, mirroring what everyone was thinking. As chater filled the comms, Jack looked down and out of the window, towards the island.
There was almost a speck of light, a flicker of fire, a tiny spark on the coastline and the contrail of a missile leading back from the volcano. A helicopter was hit.
A second round of beeping lit up Jack's helmet, and then a third. Wherever that SAM battery was, it was going to massacre all those helpless marines before they even touched the ground.
"Enfield three, requesting permission to kill that son-of-a-"
"He's all yours!" Jack interrupted, looking out to his right. The wingman that just spoke zoomed ahead, firing up his afterburners.
With a grey set of contrails streaking out behind him, Jack trusted his partner to score the kill.
"Magnum, Magnum! Missile away!" The pilot exclaimed, grimacing as a HARM anti-radiation missile ripped through the clouds.
Just as his flight had begun to all break away, Jack heard an electronic alarm blare through his ears.
Missile, twelve o'clock low!
The artificial voice told Jack O'brien the news he had been dreading.
Shit. He thought, his left arm stuck on the afterburner. You ought to be kidding me…
"I got spiked - I'm engaged defensive!" Jack said calmly and with a aura of finality. All other sounds escaped him as the beeping overcame his entire being.
He wrenched his flight stick to the left, towards the island, and rotated his aircraft around. Jerking on the stick, he heaved it towards himself with a firm hand.
His breathing grew labored as the entire aircraft struggled to push such a high-G maneuver, and Jack felt his whole body be pushed into his seat. His eyes darted to his dashboard again, and the neon indications across his RWR forced a weight down his stomach.
As the missile drew in close he slammed on the button to dispense his chaff countermeasure, hoping to spoof the projectile as it honed in on him.
Just a little further...
A powerful and sudden burst of violence raced through the plane, the force of the missile's impact throwing his body forwards, backwards, all around. His mind smashed against the back of his helmet as if he could foresee his entire person being thrust out of the doomed cockpit at unfathomable speeds.
Engine fire left. NES failure. ACS failure. Engine fire right. ECM failure.
Warning. Warning. Critical speed.
With his whole body reduced to a slob of jello and a garbled mess, the warnings were thrown at deaf ears. All Jack cared about was reaching for the ejection handle.
The spinning of the aircraft astounded Homecoming, who felt tears streak from his eyes from the intense pressure. His airplane was in a death spiral, one that would be impossible to escape, even in the best of circumstances. With so many systems failing, Jack's arm reached for the bright red handle on his right.
Fighting against gravity itself, his hand finally made it. And he pulled.
With a bellowing roar he burst from the tumbling jet plane, his body becoming a hacky sack tossed straight into the air. The deafening roar of his burning engines left a ringing in his ears as they grew dimmer and dimmer, their fiery morass streaking for the flatlands below.
With all the forces acting on his ragdoll of a body all at once, Jack 'Homecoming' O'brien felt his consciousness slip from reality…
And then everything was nothing.
AN:
Kemono friends leaves so much up to question, to wonder, that I'm surprised that there aren't more stories out there.
The way the show is carried out is extremely vague as to the circumstances surrounding Japari Park and how to got to be how it was, even when some things are explained at the end, there's too much to wonder.
I'm hoping to draw the most logical conclusions with this, and... jeez... only today did I finish the actual show, and I'm already writing for it.
Damn.
EDITS/ERRORS:
- Darkstar's "AWACS" name is technically called an "AEW" as AWACS is referring to the USAF E3 sentry, not the E-2D that would be onboard the USS Carl Vinson.
- "Music" was replaced to "Radar" as the diddy "Music On" refers to the activation of ECM (electronic countermeasures), not radar.
- The shrill tone would be heard initially as indication of a missile firing, and the beeping heard in the cockpit should be an indication of a radar spike, not missile tone.
- Jack's maneuver, a leftward notch, would have been more than sufficient to evade the missile in real life.