Author's note: This was random and I purposely didn't give you any info on the narrator. It can literally be anyone you want it to be.
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Now We Reap
I'd taken up residence in a huge pine tree in the middle of beautiful Imperial Park. Why sit under a tree when I can climb it? Yeah, I even brought a book- a translated journal written by Yasuaki Shindo that chronicled his experiences with the Godzillasaur on Lagos Island. Really sad tale.
The sun was shining, people were frolicking...
...and then the sirens went off. Everyone, and I mean everyone, scattered. From a calm Sunday afternoon to a stampede of sweaty, frightened people. Boy, it made me glad to be up in a tree and not on the grass!
"Gojira! Gojira!" Someone screamed.
I didn't know a whole lot of Japanese. Enough to read some signs and ask for the bathroom. But that word I recognized. Oh, crap. The sound of it halted my intestines and sent ice jolting through my veins. I started to climb down, but realized my digital video camera was still on a branch hanging by its strap. That thing cost a pretty penny. No way was I going to leave it there!
"You idiot," I muttered to myself as I shimmied back up the tree. Yea, color me stupid. Godzilla was coming and I felt more concern for my camera than the possibility of being squashed flat.
Then began the artillery fire, each boom, deafening as it resonated off the canyon of buildings in the distance. It would be one of the loudest noises I'd ever hear in my life. Movies didn't do this sound justice. Every explosion shook the ground.
Smoke and fire dotted the horizon. It looked like a forest of mushroom clouds growing around the tall buildings. And walking almost casually amidst them was a black shadow whose footsteps rocked the earth in rhythmic earthquakes. Godzilla appeared to be taking a stroll in the woods, but the trees were smoke and human dwellings. At such a distance he was just a child's toy set between miniature buildings. I was mesmerized by his tail- it flipped up, bumped his shoulder and dropped with a crash. A creature like that shouldn't exist, let alone walk!
Awed, I turned my camera on and filmed through the branches. Forget coloring me stupid- paint me INSANE!
Smoke turned the sky brown and the sun shone cherry red. The smell was horrible. Everything seemed muffled, surreal, like the surface of Mars. Ash- pieces of lives- drifted down in an eerie gray snowfall.
My breath came heavily. The branches concealed me. Godzilla loomed less than a mile away. He covered a lot of ground between the sirens and his appearance. I propped my camera up against the foliage to keep it steady- though anything staying steady proved impossible with a giant monster's footsteps shaking the ground. He was coming straight towards me. It suddenly occurred to me that I should climb down, but at the rate Godzilla walked I'd never get down from the tree in time to run away. I was dead meat!
But I kept filming. Maybe if the camera survived, somebody could use the footage for science...or something.
Godzilla reached the edge of the park. The green trees came halfway up to his knees like tall grass. My God, he was all muscle. His legs were like redwood trunks. That fancy tail rose and slammed against the ground, making the tree I was sitting in quiver. Something exploded from the impact...probably my car. Just my luck. I park it in the open so birds won't poop on it, and Godzilla smashes it. Nice! Thanks a lot! Well, it wasn't like I'd be needing it anytime soon.
All at once, Godzilla took a step and his head blotted out the sun. I got a very up close, intimate and real idea of his sheer size. He had to be thirty stories tall! His feet were the size of houses!
And he was looking straight at me. I felt sick to my stomach. Cold sweat broke out in prickly beads all over my back. No, no way, I was in a tree over a hundred feet away. How could he possibly see me? I zoomed in on his face for the heck of it. Oh hell...he was looking at me. His eyes were golden brown, like honey on wood, and coldly feral.
Why wasn't the military shooting? I didn't hear anything...no helicopters, planes, tanks...nothing. Nada. Zilch. I guess they were regrouping.
Godzilla roared at me. Jesus, Mary and Joseph! He made artillery fire sound like pin drops. I almost went deaf. The air vibrated around me and it was all I could do to hold onto the camera and the branch above me at the same time. I dropped my book and it flipped open to a full-page photograph of the Godzillasaur lying wounded on Lagos island.
Roar all you want, just don't use the breath. Pleaaaaaaase don't use the breath! I thought while Godzilla's gleaming teeth filled the little screen on my camera.
He came closer. One step. Two steps. Trees parted around his charcoal gray thighs and his tail thumped trenches in the grass.
God, I thought my heart would explode. I barely heard the blood roaring in my ears because they still rang from Godzilla's roar. I zoomed my camera out to keep Godzilla in focus, but beyond that I didn't dare move while he was still looking at me. What the hell did he want with me? A meal? Cheese, compared to him I was the size of a gummi bear. Did monsters like gummi humans? We are rather squishy...
My irrational line of thought cut off the moment Godzilla took another two steps forward. Should I mention he stunk like wet leather and pond water? That's how close he was. I could smell his hide. He narrowed his eyes, no, squinted, studying me as if he could figure out my whole life. The spines on his back glistened like silver spires. Something intelligent gleamed in his eyes. For that moment I glanced down at my fallen book and saw the picture. My gaze returned to Godzilla. He was still that dinosaur under all the spines, claws and thermonuclear breath.
I remember the news story that broke the day Godzilla destroyed Shindo's building. Did Shindo have time to look into Godzilla's eyes this way? Did he see the monster, or did he see the dinosaur he left behind?
My mind drifted to the final entry in Shindo's journal:
"This isn't Godzilla's fault. His life, his existence- it isn't his fault. He didn't choose to be what he is any more than a congenitally blind man chose to be born without sight. Human beings are the reason Godzilla exists. We're reaping what we've sown. My only hope is that he can forgive me for leaving him to his fate."
Godzilla roared one more time and brushed past the tree. I held on for dear life as his pitted flesh snapped branches and sent pine needles raining down like missiles. His tail swept by, generating a downdraft that nearly ended me.
Then everything stopped as Godzilla paused by the park's edge. Something in the sky caught his fancy. A white crane. A single bird held him transfixed. This had to be a Twilight Zone trip. Godzilla being quiet? I thought all he ever did was fight, fight and fight, and somewhere in between that he stomped on Tokyo. Seeing something else looked surreal. I couldn't believe it.
I heard a clanking noise and turned just in time to see maser tanks creeping up to the park's edge. Trees covered their approach. Godzilla didn't seem aware of what waited in the immediate future.
A flash made me jump.
Godzilla clutched his eye and screamed in animalistic pain. Two more shots nailed the side of his neck. He flailed, his serpentine tail smacking into the ground and debris left over from his arrival. Then he spun around to snarl the maser tanks, his huge body a dark shadow against the horizon. The calm on his face transformed into a vicious sneer. He puffed his chest out and roared. This howl was different from the one he shot off when he emerged from the ocean. It sounded deeper and lasted longer...a very clear threat.
One last maser shot arced over Godzilla's shoulder and barely missed me. Being startled like that sent me tumbling. I caught myself on one of the lowest branches and tried to see through the pain of my hard landing. Wood, meet butt. Ow.
Closer now, Godzilla's cry almost drowned out the rumble of maser tanks. I refocused on him just in time to see his spines glow. His eyes were savage and his face twisted in rage. Who wouldn't be pissed off at having a quiet moment ruined by people who didn't want you there?
Then Godzilla's death ray decimated the tanks, half the park and the buildings across the way. Blistering heat surrounded me, reminding me of what Godzilla stood for.
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There is nothing more I can do. Memories can't save me. All I have is this camera and a fantastic view of Godzilla back-lit by flames. They're illuminating his brown irises, which are gleaming and strangely sad in the smoky sunlight. I see him peering at me over the edge of my book. His teeth are bared and a snarl issues from his throat. I can't blame him for being upset. Those lousy tanks did mess up the peaceful bird watching moment. Would he have gone back out to sea on his own if the tanks just left him alone?
Smoke chokes me. Godzilla's fierce gaze burns into my skull. I must look like an ant to him.
Or maybe he sees me as a monster.
An ember lands on the Godzillasaur photo. It catches fire and the past burns away until all I see is my future looming over the trees. He is a monster in human eyes because he's big and destroys everything in his path. Human beings must be monsters in his eyes. He might be huge and violent, but we are the ones who left him lying there in his own blood. We are the species that made the bomb resulting in his mutation.
Now I understand how Shindo felt when he saw Godzilla face to face for the last time. We are all Shindo in Godzilla's eyes. Every human he sees reminds him of the man that left him to suffer.
I smell ozone. Godzilla's spines are glowing. He opens his mouth and blue light wells behind his tongue. In a few seconds it will be over. I can't tear my eyes from him. His whole mouth glows. Here comes the beam.
Time slows to nothing as reality turns white-hot. This must be what Godzilla saw and felt before he woke up forever changed. Maybe vaporizing people is his way of showing us what we put him through.
We've sowed. Now we reap.
Agony fades as my body disintegrates. All I see is light and the last thing I feel is pity.