by: Laura Boeff
Nick stared sullenly into the dark, murky waters of the bay.
A sharp wind rustled his
hair and jacket, and he hugged his knees tighter, folding into himself
as much as possible.
The wind was a welcomed friend. It seem to bless his dark mood with
it's cold caress.
Everything was so wrong. Everything and everyone was wanting
something from him
and it wasn't his research. All he ever wanted was to do research.
Study, learn, expand
mans knowledge of the earth. Oh, they hide it well. Were discreet,
but he knew, he knew
they watched him with curious eyes. His friends, his associates, and
lord knew who in
Monique's government. Nick had no delusions about how much of their
attention he now
had. Suspected his own government was catching on as well. No longer
curious about his
research, but curious about him. His perceived power.
His control.
He laughed out loud. Control? Yea, right. Control was the last
thing he had right
now. Out of control was more like it. Spiraling down a corridor of
confusion that seem to grow
more everyday he tried to cope. Nick dropped his head onto his knees
with a groan. Dear
god, he'd wished he'd never come to New York. Somedays, in the dark
recesses of his mind,
he sometimes even wished he hadn't been born.
Nick looked back up. His choices were few. Learn to live with
those who now knew
his secret, -his friends he could handle, it was the other eyes he
feared, the governments,
the terrorists that had done this to him- or try to hide from those
same said people on a
planet surrounded by satellite surveillance systems.
Or...
He looked at the black water, not really shocked. Suicidal tendencies
had been
cropping up more and more. Not obvious, no. No, their form was far
more subtle. More
reckless risk taking. Dangerous attempts in the field. Daring perilous
situations, pushing the
boundaries of common sense. Others called it foolhardy and headstrong,
he called it what it
was.
A death wish.
His head hit his knees again. Even that was no solution. It
would only leave Godzilla
unguided and vulnerable. A thought that twisted at Nick's gut. How
many would be hurt by
the great monster before the inevitable death that would follow his
own?
Nick felt a pressure in the back of his skull. A throbbing sensation
that was neither
pain, nor thought, simply existence. An inquiry. He was surprised and
blinked, jerking back
as if burned. Usually Godzilla's presence in the back of his mind was
merely that, a
presence, but now there was more almost an intelligence. A growing
clarity between them.
"No!" Nick screamed, hurling himself to his feet. Not closer
damn it! He couldn't
handle this right now. He didn't want to be closer to the monster's
mind. To understand what
should always remain a mystery. He didn't want to be a freak of nature
like the creature that
had attached itself to him!
Nick turned and ran blindly down the dark wharf, dodging the
crates and barrels
stacked liberally along the shoreside. As if distance was the key to
saving his sanity. He
clambered fences and rolled over boxes in a mad dash, chest heaving
as sobbing breath
tore from his throat. He wasn't a freak! He wouldn't be some one else's
damn research
project!
The inquiry was now worry and he rebelled against it, throwing
his darkest thoughts
at the intruder in his brain.
'Go away!' he screamed silently. 'Go away and leave me alone!'
Alone. It was something he would never be able to take for granted
again. His way
was blocked suddenly by a mammoth stack of steel shipping crates that
towered like an
impenetrable wall. Nick hurled himself at it all the same, body slamming
against the uncaring
barrier with a resounding thud. He never bothered to try and go around,
only through. Nick
hurled himself again and again, screaming to the heavens in rage against
what fate had
been wrought against him. It all ended as his legs gave and Nick collapsed
in a sobbing pile,
burying his face in his arms.
"Go away," he whispered to the shadow in his mind.
His own raspy breathing blocked out the sound of the water lifting
and breaking as a
sleek reptilian head broke water, an exhale scattering drops of water
across the bay.
Godzilla scanned the area in confusion, trying to find whatever
threatened his
parent. So much about his parent confused him. There were no constants
with his parent.
Always changing, always different was the perception Godzilla had,
but, confusing as it was,
he could not ignore the most basic instinct ingrained in him from birth.
-Follow the parent,
learn, protect.- His parent would lead him, teach him, but his parent
also did so many other
strange things. Allowed others in his territory, helped the ones that
hurt him. Try and stop
him from protecting his own territory.
Godzilla shook his head, as much as to shed the last remnants
of water as the odd
thoughts in his mind. This was his parent, and he would follow, and
learn, and protect.
Nick looked up the same time Godzilla leaned over the wharf,
clawed fore feet
gouging across the weathered wood as he leaned down, sniffing curiously
at him. He felt the
pounding confusion in the back of his mind, coupled with territorially
instincts. The two were
colliding in a jumble with his own thoughts of despair and depression
till they were whirling
together, one indistinguishable from the other.
The great orange eye blinked lazily, locked onto him, iris dilating
in the dark night.
Nick stared back into the eye that was as wide as he was high
and stood unsteadily. Godzilla
let out an inquiring rumble, drawing back, one fore claw going back
into the water and taking
a rotted chunk of the dock with it.
"Does it confuse you as much as me?" he asked aloud to the great
lizard. Godzilla
cocked his head, a slight gesture indicating his lack of understanding.
His grasp of the
human language was limited to a small pile of words.
Nick smiled slightly at the familiar gesture. And envied his
giant charge. Godzilla
didn't know the feeling of being different. He was unique and thusly
could be compared to
nothing else. He would never know the feelings of isolation caused
by nonconformity. Never.
Alone. Last of his kind. Alone.
Nick felt an indescribable pity and guilt at those thoughts.
He was both savior and
destroyer of Godzilla's kind. Was this his punishment for the genocide
he had helped
perpetuate? To be charged with the care and well being of the last
of the noble monsters. To
share a part of himself in payment for the flesh he had destroyed.
"Seems fitting in a way," he said softly, holding his hand out.
Godzilla wuffeled at the
strange gesture and looked at him. Nick tried to construct a feeling
of warmth. Of the pride
he felt when Godzilla did the right thing at the right moment which
was the lizards greatest
skill. He sent that feeling of warmth to the pinpoint in his mind that
had become Godzilla's
place within him. Tried... tried to let the lizard know he cared. Despite
everything, the pain,
the depression, the fleeting bouts with his sanity, he cared. Would
the lizard understand?
Was the feeling two way?
Godzilla wuffeled again, blinked and dropped his head, chin
scraping across the
wharf till it was a handsbreath away. Nick leaned forward, scrubbing
at the heavy scales on
Godzilla's lower jaw with both hands; putting all his strength into
his long scratches under the
lip, allowing himself to feel the child like joy of merely touching
this mountain of intelligent
muscle.
Moments like this cut through the murkiness of the real world.
They were the bright
beacons that kept him afloat in the tumult of private agendas and personal
vendettas.
Godzilla rumbled and Nick looked up just in time to see a large wet
tongue snake out and
wrap around him, drenching him head to toe in lizard spit before Godzilla
freed him and
slipped back into the water, certain that all was well again.
Nick could only laugh despite the putrid spit he was covered
in. His curse, his
blessing. One and the same and part of him.
"You sure know how to ruin a good sulk!" he shouted at the turbulent
waters, not the
least bit angry.