PROLOGUE



Osaka, the house of retired Defense Force General Akira Iwa.

The old soldier sleeps now, dreaming. His dreams are sometimes of battle, and sometimes of love. Tonight his dreams will be of only horror.

"Iwa sama," it calls his name. Slowly, the soldier opens his eyes. A figure stands wavering in a darkened corner, a vague aura surrounding it. "Iwa sama, help me." It spoke again, in a voice vaguely familiar.

"Sato san? Is that you?"

"Help me, General," it shifted closer. "You've got to kill me. You've got to make it stop!"

Iwa found he dare not move at the sight of the thing now standing at the foot of his bed. A being composed not of flesh but of fluids. Something that may indeed have once been young Maki Sato, now become something else. Something for which Man has no name.

The creature's luminance was shifting, growing brighter, and it let out an unearthly yowl! "Tell them, General!" The thing shouted fiercely, rage and pain now burning in its eyes! It shuddered, flowing closer. "Tell them to kill me before it's too late!!"

The glow dimmed as the creature flowed suddenly away through an open window. Iwa rose from his futon to peer after the being. Whatever it was had vanished into the night, leaving the General alone, and afraid. "Oh God. Sato..."



War against the Wild Gods

BOOK FIVE

Godzilla versus The H-Man



Part One: THE TEMPLE





Osaka. G-Force Command.

"What on Earth is going on here?!" Captain Inoshiro Tanaka entered the medlab, shouting. The place was in chaos. Equipment and supplies strewn about, tables overturned and broken. A technician stood in a corner, bandaging a bloody wound. There was a loud thud, and Doctor Noribu Noto rose from beneath a counter, rubbing a bump on his head.

"Captain, thank God you've come! She's uncontrollable, a devil! She bit my radiologist!"

Tanaka ran a hand through his close cropped hair and sighed. "Where is she now?"

"Under that cabinet. She won't let anyone near her. Look what she's done to my lab!!"

"I'm sorry, Doctor. Why don't you attend your assistant now. I'll stay and do what I can."

"Be careful, Tanaka, she's a demon," said the doctor, leading his assistant from the room.

Alone now, Shiro walked through the debris and picked up a chair. He sat and looked about him, awed at the destruction the tiny beast had wrought.

"Okay, Mikki. Playtime's over, come on out of there." From beneath a cabinet a shaggy blonde muzzle poked out. It gave a quick snort, then retreated. Shiro thought for a moment, then added, "Please."

The cheeky little terrier pulled herself slowly from her hiding place and sat before him, a self satisfied look on her canine face. Everyone had the same reaction when Shiro brought her back; the dog was adorable, and he had to force himself to scold her.

"Mikki, you have behaved very badly. Look at this mess!" Tanaka spoke firmly, trying to intone disappointment in his voice. "You know you must not bite people. We only wanted to make sure you are all right." Shiro caught himself speaking to the dog as if she was human and could understand him, another reaction shared by those who met her. Mikki rose to her haunches and pirouetted, as if saying "See, I'm fine!" Shiro could stand it no longer, and laughed with affection! "Come here to me, you little beast!"

"She seems to like you, Shiro. A testimony to your good nature perhaps." Tanaka turned, and there stood General Iwa, smiling. The man had an uncanny knack for sneaking up on people. A natural stealth that had probably helped keep him alive for so very long in this line of work.

"General!" The Captain rose, dog in arms, and saluted. Mikki watched him, and raised a paw herself. The General laughed, amused by the gesture.

"Did you see that, Shiro? What a soldier she would be!" Iwa patted the pooch. Mikki responded with the affirmative double yap.

"She seems to agree with you, sir, as do I," said Shiro looking around him. "Mikki is already well versed in demolition. A little protocol would round her out nicely."

"Ha ta, I see what you mean! Any word on the whereabouts of her masters, the Bradley's?"

"None, sir. We still can't determine if they successfully escaped the battle on Ogasawara using the device the Starman gave them. It's just as likely they both perished, caught in Godzilla's nuclear blast." Shiro looked at the dog, her expression quite melancholy as if she were following the conversation.

Iwa shook his head. "I don't know. Kenji and Kyoko have survived too many encounters with the monster already. I cannot believe their part here has ended in such a fashion. I have been unable to contact Mr. Bradley's mother in the United States, however. She too seems to have disappeared. It is all very vexing, Shiro. Very vexing indeed." The old soldier stood at a window, peering out at the grounds. "No. I am certain the Bradley's still live. I want you to work from that assumption, Captain. I want them found."

"And how do you suggest I begin, Sir?"

"How have we always found them before? Follow Godzilla. They are bound to reappear somewhere near the beast. I must now see to my young charge, Sato. I had a strange dream last night. I think I ought to check on him."

"And what about our little mascot, 'the demon,' as Doctor Noto calls her?"

"You brought her here," said Iwa, turning to leave. "You take care of her."

"Me? But I...!" Tanaka began, and the General was gone. "Oh my."

Outside, Iwa's jeep sped off in the direction of Sato's new quarters, a puddle of what appeared to be anti-freeze left on the ground behind him. The green fluid shuddered, then flowed unseen into the complex...



*

Ogasawara gunto, sometimes known as the Monster Islands.

Stone shatters and flies across the ground. The earth shifts, then collapses, and a vast pit is formed. Godzilla steps back to observe his work, and decides the hole is ready.

The beast's enormous tail swings, raking over the valley floor, casting the broken, hulking debris of the alien warship into the chasm, burying it forever. Somehow, those beings had managed to control him. He would tolerate their rotting stench no longer.

Godzilla stands before the pit and roars. This island was not the haven he had hoped it would be, so he turns from the valley, heading shoreward. He would return to the sea now. To remain here could only invite further attacks, and Godzilla was weary of attacks.

At the edge of the shattered valley, the saurian pauses. It is as if the entire world has gone into silence. Even the wind has stopped. He knows; something nasty's about to happen...

Beyond the valley, the sky was lit like a sheet of fire. A great rumbling noise was growing, filling the very air. Then the ground ripped wide beneath the beast, shaking him off his feet and plunging him headlong into the depths of a nascent volcano! Godzilla raged, and slipped deeper into the burning earth.



*



Osaka. Sato's quarters.

"So, it was not a nightmare," Iwa stood shivering amid the shambles Sato's new home had become. The simple, orderly environment the young scientist had made lay shattered. Iwa feared he already knew why. The notes he found confirmed it.

"Now I know I must be truly going mad," the General read. "The transmutation is nearly complete, and I am haunted by the memory of my father, and my failure.

"I do not know what it is I am becoming, but I do know what made me this way. The Radion Wave." Iwa remembered the day. Sato's machine detonated, driving the monster Godzilla from Kyushu. He watched from cover as the lad was caught in the shockwave, exposed to whatever strange energies he had tapped into. Now, those energies may have turned him into a monster.

"I will not be human much longer. I must destroy my lab at G-Force Command while I still can. I have discovered the Wave is extradimensional in origin. Something never meant to exist in our universe. No one must be able to duplicate my work, I will make sure no one can."

Wordlessly, Iwa stuffed the notes into his pocket and raced to his jeep. He knew Sato would follow through once his mind was set on something, no matter how dangerous. One way or the other he had to be stopped, and there was a bad feeling in his gut, like somebody was going to get hurt.





G-Force Command.

The fire was under control by the time Iwa arrived, contained mostly to the labs. Ambulances and emergency vehicles raced about the scene, and he realized; the battle had begun.

"Tanaka-San!" The General's voice cut through the clamor, and from a group of those wounded in the siege, the captain responded.

Tanaka rose to his feet and saluted. "I am here, sir," he called. The man was bandaged at both arms and half of his face, his uniform torn and bloody.

"What the hell happened, Shiro?"

"An attack, sir, some kind of creature! It destroyed the labs, we couldn't stop it." Shiro grasped the General's shoulders fiercely. Iwa guided him slowly down to sit upon the ground.

"Captain, you will take it easy. That is an order. Now slowly, give me your report."

"Yes sir. The infiltrator appeared without warning, it seemed to target Sato's Radion generators in the research wing. We fired upon the creature to no effect. It injured over a dozen guards in its escape. I seem to have lost the dog as well."

"The creature, roughly humanoid, green aura, and a liquid surface?"

"Hei, though it moved as if the entire being was composed of fluid. How did you know?"

"I told you, I had a strange dream last night."



*

Ogasawara.

The valley smolders in the twilight, the scorched and twisted earth pumping clouds of steam. Lava floes puddle and spew, igniting the remaining underbrush in the sickly glow of forced combustion. The island shakes with force, and the immense form of Godzilla erupts from the molten crater and into the air.

Godzilla rises, dripping with magma. Its bony dorsal plates begin to flare, then flash, then the Atomfire bursts from its jaws, burning into the heart of the volcanic hellpit. A wall of nuclear steam rises, blanketing the area in a cloud of radioactivity, and the monster screams.

The giant creature treads slowly from the magma, great chunks of the now cooling lava sloughing free from his hide. He stands at the rim of the shattered valley, the winds now rising, sweeping clear the wall of steam to reveal something incredible...

Before him looms an enormous temple, risen up from the depths of the Earth. The structure reeks of age, and power. For a moment, the monster stands transfixed, then slowly, begins to approach...