Chapter Ten
It was later in the day that the "President's new toy" was opened. Even before the sphere was found the opening of a plasma power plant had been a source of controversy for the President. Now with the man's approval rating falling to an all time low, it was an act of insanity and desperation. The question was, would the man's gambit payoff? That was why many reporters were there to wait and see.
It was in front of the power plant set in among Kansas fields under a clear blue Kansas sky that President Emmerich was giving his speech. With his Vice President at his side, he was in giving it under a bright happy sun on an open-air platform, raised about five feet up of the ground, for all to see. With the Monster Wars and all things related to it taking up all the best reporters, those recording President Emmerich's speech were second, third and fourth string and even they hated it.
It was strange. A person would think that, being such junior members of their various newspapers, they would jump at the chance to hear what the president had to say. They didn't. Why? It was because they didn't like the man one bit. True, a reporter had to be as free of bias as possible in reporting an assignment, but to have anything to do with Devlin Emmerich that didn't involve writing negative comments about him left a reporter with a bad taste in his mouth.
"And so," concluded the President's speech, "this marvelous feat of engineering is now complete. While it failed to make inroads on Japan and other countries, Plasma Energy and the nigh limitless power it will provide will be put to use here in the United States, thus making the land of the free even greater than before." Smiling, he took the large ceremonial scissors from solemn looking Vice President Franklin Smith and held them high for all to see. He then used them to cut the ribbon thus showing that Plasma Power Plant was officially open. The usual band played along with many balloons released into the air.
However, and perhaps not surprisingly, there were few cheers among the small audience and those cheers quickly ended. Soon enough, there came the questions. Visibly disappointed that no one aside from those whom he had paid to do so had clapped for him, Emmerich glumly looked to the sea of reporters and pointed to the nearest one.
"Ronald Troupe, Daily Planet. Mr. President, Plasma Energy production has been deemed unsafe several times and has even been condemned by the International Atomic Energy Agency. They say that this facility should not have been built and that this is, quote 'Another Chernobyl waiting to happen,' end quote. Mr. President, what is you response to these claims?"
Devlin Emmerich chafed at the young man's words. "I assure you and the public that this facility is perfectly safe. It has been reviewed by the finest inspectors in the United States and has passed every test it was put through."
Troupe was unconvinced. "According to my sources, you hand-picked those inspectors yourself."
An angry scowl crossed his face. "No comment." He looked from the platform and said, "Next question."
"Vicki Vale, Gotham Herald. Sir, there is a rumor that you are opening this power plant not for any desire to help the American people but to improve your image. Is there any truth to these claims?"
"I'd never do such a thing next question."
Some traded skeptical looks. The rushed, nervous way that the man said his words seemed to indicate otherwise. Soon enough, however, the next reporter asked his question.
"George Taylor III, Daily Star. Mr. President, why are you here at all?" Taylor's eyes glared at the president, betraying his hostilities. "The question we all want answered is why are you wasting your time with this boondoggle when you should be committing all the forces of the United States to fighting King Ghidorah? Despite constant demands from the DFE for troop support you have done nothing to help the cause despite the pledge you gave that you would stand by the DFE should the need ever arise in your election speech. Hell, several of America's top generals have resigned and at least one has tried to overthrow your government! The monster is a global menace that will seemingly stop at nothing short of the destruction of all life on this planet. If you let the world be destroyed, I seriously doubt that you'll have much of a chance at winning re-election."
"Further words like that, and I'll hold you in contempt, sir. Scientists have assured me that there is no chance that King Ghidorah will attack the United States. He hasn't before, why should he do so now?"
Taylor raised an eyebrow. "Oh really? According to Steven Martin, you bribed hand picked scientists to say those things. And let me guess, their identities can't be disclosed to us because of Executive Privilege? Mr. President, what of the fact that the Japanese discontinued Plasma Production because of how it seemingly attracted Godzilla more than nuclear energy? Even if you were right and King Ghidorah would not attack, wouldn't opening this Plasma Power Plant serve to attract him and perhaps other monsters?"
Infuriated, the President shouted, "You have no right to say those things! You have no right to question my authority!"
Vice President Franklin Smith stood at his master's side. Sometimes it almost felt that way, that Devlin Emmerich was a master to whom he was slave. Smith had stayed silent through his boss's entire speech and held his tongue even now. It was because he knew that if he said so much as one word, it would be a bitter one directed towards his superior. Over the course of the Monster Wars, Franklin Smith had grown increasingly disillusioned with the man he served and this was only heightened by President Emmerich's utter apathy in this situation.
Looking at the man rant and rave at his detractors, Vice President Smith knew that everything people said about their leader was right. A part of Smith wondered if he should give up his post and let somebody else take the job. But no, Smith knew that he would have to everything in his power to help Earth win the Monster Wars, even if meant putting up with the tyrant. Still, Smith just felt his blood boil at the thought of working for this man.
He couldn't believe he'd defended his boss!
Far from Franklin Smith an aerial battle was being waged above the skies of the Hawaiian Islands between the alleged terror of the skies and the scourge of the galaxy. The scourge of the galaxy was, of course, King Ghidorah while the terror of the skies was Fire Radon, mate of Rodan. The world had thought it had seen the last of them when they were cast into the volcanic Mt. Aso but they had survived. The male had clawed his way from the inferno during an eruption while the female had stayed behind and absorbed the uranium to become far more powerful than before. With her newfound strength she had managed to burst through the side of the mountains in order to find her beloved.
They indeed found each other again and were happy though most humans feared that it meant that they would face the same problems as before and that perhaps the problem would multiply itself. Far from it, Fire Radon and her now little love, Rodan, the Lady and Lord of the skies had had their fill with humans and had found refuge from them in the most isolated land they could find. It had been in the Hawaiian Islands, which were right in the middle of nowhere, on Kaula, a tiny isolated islet south west of Kauai.
Despite some saber rattling, those humans with clearer heads chose to grant the two monsters their sanctuary in hopes that they would respect the borders of human lands just as humans respected theirs. To their credit the two monsters had proved better neighbors than most humans; they stayed on their islet of Kaula venturing nowhere near the other Hawaiian Islands and causing humans no harm. Indeed, Fire Radon even proved some use in her battles against the destructive lava monster, Pele.
However, her battles against Pele left her with no preparation against what she faced now. As for King Ghidorah, his battles with Horus left him everything he needed to know. After killing Nessie he had gone north past the pole and found himself on the opposite side of the world, here and it was here that he found a foe to challenge and destroy.
The pterodactyl monster rushed the Star of Doom as a flame red streak hoping to slash him with the edge of her wing. King Ghidorah let her strike and, hovering in midair, turned around to look at her as she banked around. The Prince of Skyllans looked downwards at the wound; it was small enough to heal itself in seconds. The demon felt that he had had enough playtime and that it was time to end this.
Spreading his wings he began his hurled himself forward through the skies at his foe. However, Fire Radon fell back using her superior speed and agility to take the advantage. King Ghidorah saw this and knew that she was trying to use the same tactic that Horus had used against him and that Fire Radon's mother had used against him eons ago in the Mesozoic Wars. Seeking to stop it before it started, King Ghidorah fired Crimson Lightning in a scatter shot. The female tried to use her aerial grace to dodge her attacker's bolts as best she could; indeed she was seemingly in five places at once. But when the stray bolt hit the female she was paralyzed and the demon immediately turned his three heads to fire a Triple Beam.
Despite having hide strong enough to withstand the flames of a volcano, Fire Radon shrieked in pain as the combined Gravity Bolts tore through her. When it finally stopped time seemed to slow as her singed, smoking body fell from the blue skies to the sea below. They were so high up that the sea looked like a smooth shining sheet of blue and the islet below was merely a green dot. Yet further and further she fell until the painful sting of the ocean water met the pterodactyl monster.
The splash was tremendous and the waves it caused were great and the waters covered her. Her last defense was pathetic and weak, just like her mother's, "thought" King Ghidorah. Now that that was done, the demon sought to find and finish the rest of her little family. For all King Ghidorah knew, the female had hidden a clutch of eggs somewhere on the island; Fire Radon's mother did the exact same thing for Radon and Rodan to have survived in the Japanese mine. Now it was just a matter of finding those eggs.
Meanwhile, back in the warm salty waters of the Pacific, Fire Radon, half submerged in the water, looked skywards at the demon. Fearing for the life of her mate, she rallied all her strength and tried to break through the utter agony. No matter what the pain, no matter what the cost, she couldn't abandon those that were depending on her!
As for her mate he was already preparing for their enemy's arrival. He had been injured earlier when the demon first attacked and was now hiding because of his wounds. Rodan had placed the egg in a hidden location; there was no chance that they might be found, or so he hoped. Now the brown pterodactyl was walking in between the huge trees. Like other Supersaurs, Rodan communicated telepathically and had thus sensed that King Ghidorah did as well. Fire Radon's mate had sensed that she had been defeated by the three-headed monster and was heading towards the island, if not already there.
In fact, the monster was already at the gates, so to speak, and was throwing fireballs to incinerate the trees in an attempt to destroy whatever cover Rodan sought. A forest fire had already begun to engulf the island and King Ghidorah was wading through the blaze, each head looking this way and that, scanning telepathically for his prey. That was what Rodan wanted. Like some giant Killdeer feigning injury to distract predators from its nest, Rodan was intentionally luring King Ghidorah to himself. The difference, however, between Rodan and a Killdeer was that the injury was very real.
He had folded his torn and broken wings as he normally did and placed his forelimbs down to the ground to walk on all fours like a bat. Limping along through the heat and smoke, his blood-drenched wings pointing upwards, he tried to keep a low profile; he didn't want King Ghidorah to find him too soon. Despite his broken wings, he kept dragging himself along, ignoring the pain and pushing though the agony. That was when he slipped on his slick bloody knuckles and fell, making a crater and smashing an entire grove of trees doing so. Rodan kept silent but the thud was heard across island, now completely aflame. With that an evil, sadistic grins spread across King Ghidorah's faces; he knew where his quarry was.
By know the whole island was in flames and Rodan, with broken bones and raw flayed flesh, knew that the end was nigh. Now surrounded in a blazing ring fire and smoke, he heard the mad scream of the Prince of Skyllans cut through the sooty haze. Colored red by the flames, King Ghidorah burst through the ring to finish it. Did he expect to find some pleas for mercy, some cowering wreck? If he did so he would not find it there because no sooner did he find Rodan that Rodan attacked.
The pterodactyl hurled himself at the demon in a ferocious barrage of bites and claw strikes. King Ghidorah was staggered by the sheer savagery of the attack and wound after wound quickly began to appear on his body. King Ghidorah hurled his necks against Rodan to throw him aside and while it worked—the mate of Fire Radon was thrown against flaming boulders—the heads of the three-headed monster were bleeding from the spines that covered his foe's chest and belly.
Fueled by his hate, King Ghidorah outer heads fired their Gravity Beams to blast Rodan's wings to bits. As the beams found their marks, the monster screamed as his skin wings were torn apart into bloody shreds. With the force of gravity gone wild tearing his flesh to pieces and the heat of the beams roasting the Supersaur alive, the beast was left in a sorry state. When it was done, poor Rodan was left smoking and blackened and burned, sores and blisters covered his body and blood bubbled up from his beak.
But saddest of all, his wings were no more. Descended as he was from the pterodactyls, his wings were, or had been, made up of skin stretched between a long outer finger and the rest of his body. Now the long wing fingers that gave his forebears their name were broken in every place and half of the right wing finger was torn completely off, showing the bone. The skin that made up his wings was now left as raw, burnt, bloody sheets of flesh on the ground. In a perverse irony, the blood that was already pooling on the ground around him to make a set of mock wings. It was a sad fate for one who once graced the firmament and touched the welkin.
And yet King Ghidorah was not done with the one time Lord of the sky. Twin tails twitching and golden scales glistening, the Prince of Skyllans strode towards his fallen foe and brought a golden foot crashing down on the burnt chest of him. King Ghidorah ignored the pain he drew in from the spines and instead drew out from himself his necrotic Taint to increase the fallen one's agony tenfold. As blood and screams came from Rodan's beak, one would think that that the demon sought to extract the location of the nest from his foe but it was not so.
This torture was solely for his own pleasure; he had other, more effective ways of getting information. King Ghidorah's cancerous thoughts began to filter into Rodan's mind. The powers that the three-headed monster had wielded before the battles against Apophis was great but after that day he had wielded the power he had stolen from Apophis and could now steal whatever thoughts he chose. He sought the location of the nest so that he might kill the babes held therein for that would be sinful and to bring forth sin was why the demon lived. He probed the mind of his fallen foe and found himself stonewalled because Rodan kept these thoughts from him.
The fool, did the mate of Radon think that he could keep such thoughts hidden from him? He thought he could resist? That was when he received his answer from the mate of Radon in the form of a blood red psychic scream. Rodan would indeed resist. He dared King Ghidorah to do his worst for he would resist until his mind was in ruins! At that the skyllan took a step back and froze. His heads looked at the dying Supersaur before him; if he were indeed to "resist until his mind was in ruins," how then would he learn where the nest lay?
It seemed that King Ghidorah was in a no-win situation and that there was nothing he could do. But at that he decided to destroy his foe's mind anyway and then burn the island until it and the nest would have to be no more. King Ghidorah's six eyes began to glow red and Rodan immediately went into epileptic spasms as his brain was destroyed from the inside out.
However, the three-headed monster ceased his mental torture and turned from Rodan and the inferno that surrounded them when he heard a harpy's shriek coming from the sky. Radon was coming to her mate's rescue and fired a Uranium Heat Beam at their enemy. It struck its mark and hit the King of Terror for he had not had time to raise his shield. Unrelenting in her attack, the injured, battle weary Fire Radon fired again in a constant, searing beam at her foe but soon enough the demon had raised his energy shield and the beam was deflected. King Ghidorah returned fire soon enough but the mate of Rodan dodged back and forth through the sky and not one beam hit. Rodan himself cawed to her, as if screaming at her to leave and save herself but she would not do so. She would leave him to perish alone when he had chosen to die with her on the mountain.
With that, Fire Radon dove at her foe as fast as she could and slashed his side with her wings and talons. King Ghidorah was staggered and steadied himself with his tails but at that instant, his foe flapped her bloodstained wings to create winds to cast him back. With hurricane winds pushing him back, the Prince of Skyllans used all his strength and faced his foe. Glowing gold as he did so, he fired full force Gravity Beams from all three heads at his foe and those beams struck home.
However, when he did that it was not to blast her apart as it would seem. Instead, Radon was held in a tractor beam, levitated above the ground at King Ghidorah's whim. Paralyzed by the beams that came from the demon's mouths the mate of Rodan was helpless, despite all her efforts to break free. On seeing that, that was when the torture began. King Ghidorah brought his head and thus the beams that held Radon prisoner back and then he brought them and Radon crashing down on the island sands. Again and again he did it, first crashing to the ground and then to the sides and every way it could go. Again and again her bones were broken and crushed and organs were ruptured. Again and again until poor Radon was made a broken, bruised, bleeding wreck.
With one final flourish, King Ghidorah cast her victim atop her mate, one broken body atop the other. It was the day at Mt. Aso all over again for both faced death and neither would abandon the other to save itself. Such was their love. Neither able nor willing to escape Fire Radon scooped up the body of little love in her wings and placed his broken head on her breast. When King Ghidorah had callously thrown her atop him, the fall had extinguished the last bit of life in him. He was dead.
Radon looked to King Ghidorah as his body shone gold and wings glowed scarlet. She knew what was coming and for the last time placed her beak next to her mate's and knew that wherever he was, she would be with him soon.
An hour later King Ghidorah was hovering in the air above Kaula, his wings barely moving and motionless in the air as if he were a puppet on strings. Below him, the once green jewel was a roiling cauldron of fire and smoke; it seemed a bubbling mass of red against the blue of the sea. Thick black smoke rose like a black tower into the heavens and blotted out the once fair isle. Rodan and Radon had been atomized; there was not a trace of them left in this reality but yet there was the question of the nest. In the end King Ghidorah knew not where the egg was nor did he even care. If it did survive, if it had ever even existed, he would slay the child contained therein when the time would come, just as he had slain its parents and grandparent.
The Prince of Skyllans was pleased with his efforts for much suffering had been caused this day and there was still so much more pain and chaos and madness to be wrought upon the land. But where to go; where was there suffering for him to cause? He knew not yet that was when he heard it. It cut through him and it was it a sweet sensation that he felt across his every fiber. What was this fine, sweet thing that he sensed?
King Ghidorah was an energy absorber and so he knew that for something to attract him like this it would have to be on the electromagnetic spectrum. He stretched his senses and felt what it was. It was a plasma reactor! Of all the things it could have been, King Ghidorah would have never suspected that. He had seen and destroyed worlds a thousand years more advanced technologically than Earth—his own birth world had been the Atlantis of the galaxy before he destroyed it—and had thus not expected something like a plasma reactor from the ignorant backwards race on this planet.
King Ghidorah quickly flew up into orbit to see for himself what was happening. He was already able to see the curvature of the Earth and ice had begun to form on his body when he saw what it was. It was a continent to the east of the island he had just ravaged and at the center of it was the plasma reactor that he had sensed. From that high altitude where he was, King Ghidorah was able to see that much of the central part of the land-mass was untouched. Strange, he had attacked the lands north of it, where he had fought the wolf Lupis, and south of it, where he had been denied final victory over its greatest city because of a holy power far greater than his own.
King Ghidorah saw that this land that stretched from sea to shining sea had somehow been spared his wrath thus far. Well now he would just have to correct that now wouldn't he?
Nick was asleep in his unmade bed. It was already late in the morning but he was still snoring away. However, a powerful movement underneath his houseboat interrupted that sleep. He woke up with a start, looking around and unsure of anything. Writing it off as the motion of the ocean, he tried to go back to sleep when he heard a loud, shrill, though muffled, ring. The ring sounded again and he groggily opened his eyes. His eyes open, he at first he tried to ignore it and pretended to go back to sleep, for his own sake. It rang again and an ugly look came across his face.
Knowing that he would get no rest until he turned the telephone off, he got off his bed in his pajamas and looked through the pile of clothes for his cell phone. He found it but decided to answer it and curse at the other person just for ruining his sleep. He turned it on and said, "Yeah who is it?"
He got the answer as to who it was. "…What?" He laughed. "Oh its you Juan! Aw hell, I was gonna be all talking smack and stuff! How you been buddy?"
Juan said that he was alright; he'd just gone to see a movie. For the most part he just wanted to see how his buddy was doing. "Me? Oh, I'm alright I guess." Nick yawned and was asked what time was it in Hawaii. "Oh it's eleven and before you ask I was up late last night… Oh I was watching anime… It was Big-O, I think I told you about it already, it's the one with the giant robot."
Juan asked what was it like being on a houseboat. "Oh its kinda cool, just pick up and go where I want. Don't gotta put up wit' no punks foo' huh that right!" He laughed at his little joke and Juan asked his friend where he was. "I don' know, I guess I'm somewhere in the Pacific. Normally I keep the boat in Pearl Harbor. Jus' felt like taking the boat for a spin. So how's the fanfic going? …You're putting me in it? …Cool."
Nick and Juan kept talking for awhile about every topic under the sun, everything from the film "Kill Bill," to whether or not it would have been Jewish matzo bread that Jesus used at the Last Supper. They kept talking for a good long time before they finally hung up. Yawning, Nick decided that he should get up out of bed and went to the ship's kitchen to get water. He poured himself a glass and walked outside.
He winced at the brightness of the sun and his eyes slightly hurt. He stayed underneath the tarp where there was some shade and took a drink. The water was good, he thought. He looked out to the vast blue sea and towards the island in the distance. That was when his boat trembled again. What was it?
He got his answer when Godzilla, ever so slowly, lifted his head from out of the water. Nick was seeing it from his houseboat and he took a sip of water. Nick saw that only the upper half of Godzilla's head was visible; the rest of the monster was underwater. A head the size of an elephant looked towards the houseboat, dead on. However, the head did not move; the eyes glanced one way and then the other yet that was all. That was when the eyes caught sight of the human; when that happened, nictating membranes peeled back and the pupils they concealed they narrowed.
As for the human, Nick, he just stood there, utterly concerned. He groggily returned Godzilla's gaze. He then yawned and disappeared into the boat for some more sleep. The human would cause him no harm? Then Godzilla would return the favor. After all, he had more important things to do such as destroying King Ghidorah and to that end he had managed to follow his enemy to this land. Godzilla turned his head back and forth and saw an island in the distance. The King of the Monsters then submerged his head and soon only a ripple and bubbles marked that he had been there. Back underwater, he began swimming through the waves, his tail propelling him forwards. He would go there to that island that the human parasites called Oahu and find King Ghidorah.
Godzilla did not find King Ghidorah on the island of Oahu though he did find a tremendous aerial and naval battle. Godzilla did not know it but the location where he surfaced was Pearl Harbor Naval Base, home of America's Pacific Fleet. No, Godzilla did not know this, he only knew that humans were there and they were opening fire upon him and that he returned force in kind. The humans, of course, knew exactly was going on.
Although the military men there had been trained to handle monsters because of the proximity of the Rodans and Pele, they were in no way able to deal with Godzilla himself. He had swum up through the lochs and, in a disturbing similarity, was not detected until it was too late. He was already past Bishop Point when human forces finally saw him but it wasn't until he made landfall at Ford Island that the monster was greeted with the full force of the fleet. The force of the entire navy was brought to bear against him and destroyers and aircraft carriers and more attacked with everything they had yet it wasn't enough. Like that awful day on December 7th, 1941, the defenders just weren't ready and then as now, this lack of preparedness cost them dearly.
For years, it had been said that the shimmering oil that seeped from the sunken ship, Arizona, was in fact the tears of all those who had died that day. It was a most appropriate story because by the end of this day, many people were indeed crying. Pearl Harbor was reduced to flaming ruins that served no purpose but that of being funeral pyres for the dead. The thick, black, smoke blotted out the sun and the sky and the ground was slick with the blood of the slain. Everything was destroyed and everyone was dead. Flame, wreckage, blood, and bodies were all everywhere. All who saw this knew it would be, "a date which will live in infamy."
As for the rest of the United States, it was sent reeling by this horrible news. Yet for however terrible it was, it was but a prelude as to what was soon to happen. The United States had thus far been spared the wrath of both Godzilla and King Ghidorah but that would change because of all the nations to suffer the attentions of these two monsters, the United States would ultimately go on to suffer the most. It had tried to stay out of them as long as possible but at long last the United States of America was to fight in the Monster Wars.