CHARMING'S AUTHORS NOTE #1: Ladies and gentlemen, the following story is something i've wanted to write for a very long time. I've tried to write this story for something like nine years now, but i've never been satisfied with it. After I released chapter twenty of Desire, I was especially inspired and I wrote this last week. I've been revising it for something like six days, so it's gone through something like eight revisions. This is about as refined a story as I've ever put out, so I hope all of you enjoy it!

CHARMING'S AUTHORS NOTE #2: I have to give a massive shoutout to my friend Nev. He beta'd this for me and pointed out some logical mistakes that i'd made. Once again Nev was there to make sure I don't suck lol. Thanks Nev!


The Inferno

A Love Story by

CharmingCharles2896

Sarah was a woman of many names; but most of all, she was Sarah Bartowski, loving wife of Charles Irving Bartowski. Her story was an interesting one. She'd grown up a conman's daughter, her mother having died when she was a baby. Her childhood had consisted of moving from one seedy motel to another with her deadbeat father, who often went as Jack. She'd never actually learned her father's real name, the two of them always changing names to escape the police. Sarah left the con game when she was fifteen and struck out on her own, somehow evading CPS and the claws of the government writ large. After legally changing her name and reinventing herself, she'd managed to craft some semblance of a life.

When Sarah was twenty, she'd met Chuck Bartowski at a frat party up at Stanford. She hadn't been a student there, not having finished high school. Instead, she was a barista at a coffee shop just off campus that all the college students went to. She always envied them, envying the success that they'd found simply by being born to a normal family. She'd always loved languages, having read about distant cultures on the many afternoons she'd found herself alone at the library. Her father often left her there to go run a con, so she'd spent years reading, teaching herself all of the things she was missing in school. By the time she'd turned eighteen, she was smarter and more well-read than many of the college students she saw around Palo Alto where she lived. To many of them though, she was merely a set of tits that served coffee; she didn't mind though, she often used her natural advantages to sucker broke college kids out of tips for the tip jar. Everyone at the coffee shop shared tips and with everyone working so hard, she felt it was worth it after all the years of swindling people with her father. Sarah wasn't lonely per se, but when a boy named Bryce Larkin had invited her to go to a party his fraternity was throwing, she'd uncharacteristically said, "Sure." She always got invited to their parties, in spite of the fact that she wasn't of legal drinking age, but she always declined. Today, instead of saying no, she made the fateful decision to say yes.

She met Chuck at the party, having danced the night away and consumed far too much alcohol for her own good. She'd decided to take a break and sit down so that the world would stop spinning so much. In a fateful decision, Sarah Walker sat down next to a cute boy with curly brown hair that made crazy animal shapes. He'd been sitting alone on the couch. She assumed that his fraternity brothers, including Bryce, had left him to go get lucky with one drunk co-ed or another.

It always made her laugh when she thought about his reactions to her. The poor nerd had glanced at her nervously for almost five minutes before she'd spoken up simply to get him to finally talk to her. They'd laughed and joked and she'd flirted shamelessly with him, intent to take this boy home with her, but he'd never taken the bait. Instead, he made sure they had a great time and then ensured that she got home safely without getting raped by some meathead at the party. She'd sought him out on campus in the days following. He'd been a great guy once he'd gotten over his crippling self-doubt and actually talked to her. She'd wanted to thank him for not taking advantage of her while she was drunk, but he'd merely brushed it off as the right thing to do. He'd mentioned that his sister would have killed him if he'd done something so wrong.

Sarah asked him out for Mexican food shortly thereafter and reveled in the fun they continued to have together. Every time she was around him, she liked the person she became. She like the normalcy she felt around him, not to mention he was the first guy she'd met that had respected her as more than a pair of tits that talked. His ability to make her laugh and his emotional intelligence had really attracted her to him. His intellect was the second revelation about him that had furthered her attraction to him. She'd always hated talking to dumb guys; so to find a guy who challenged her intellectually… she just had to have him. She was most attracted to his brain, not to mention the hunky wrapping that beautiful brain of his came in. Their romance blossomed quickly and it was a struggle to resist pulling him into her bedroom on their third date. What they had was too special for anything that frantic, so she'd resisted until just the right moment. Their passion and love for each other burned hot and felt overwhelming at times. The thing was, Sarah was reveling in it. Never had she felt so welcomed and adored as she did with Chuck Bartowski.

They married fifteen months after their first date. The ceremony was a small affair in Burbank with his sister and some of their friends. The small size of the ceremony had been just fine with her, considering she had no family whatsoever. There were times where she wished her mother could have been there to meet Chuck. Sarah didn't remember much about her mother, other than the fact that she was an incredibly warm and loving mom.

Chuck and Sarah settled down in Palo Alto permanently, the two of them moving into a nice apartment. Chuck got a job with the university after graduating, which had made Sarah so proud. Now, Chuck Bartowski was a well-regarded archaeologist, who'd made a name for himself in the field at the age of twenty-seven with his research on early humans. At her husband's encouragement, she'd gotten her GED at the age of twenty-two and a degree in ASL from a small online college in only three years. Now days, she was teaching sign language classes. It had been five years since Chuck graduated from Stanford and this was to be his first archeological expedition to another country. Sarah had begged him to bring her along so she could see him work and be near him for the month he was to be overseas. After much discussion, some slightly manipulative pleading, and some especially steamy sex, her husband had thought it was a grand idea! There was a remote island in the south pacific, so far outside the shipping lanes, that it hadn't been properly explored. Chuck and a team from Stanford University had set out to survey the island and document what they found. There was a hope that maybe they'd find human life on the island.

Chuck had been researching early indigenous peoples in Asia and Oceania, so this expedition was truly exciting. When they'd arrived at Manazura Island, they'd been awestruck by the topography of the island. The island itself looked prehistoric, with thick jungles and a massive mountain at its center. As the team ventured into the jungle, it became clear that humans had once inhabited the island, many thousands of years ago. They'd found fossilized bone, and early tools, which Chuck had just drooled over. On the third day of surveying the island, they'd found a cave at the base of the mountain. Strangely enough, every other member of their party had argued about whether to venture inside or not. All of them backed out, due to a feeling of unease around the cave entrance. It had shocked Chuck that their guide, Lieutenant Cole Barker, who was former SAS, had patently refused to go into the cave. In the end, only Chuck and Sarah had been keen to venture inside. Chuck and Sarah had gone in and found very little of note; that is until Sarah had fallen. She'd tripped on something, something she hadn't seen when she'd walked by. When she'd looked back at it, she'd seen what looked like carved stone, very unusual.

Chuck and Sarah quickly investigated it, extracting the carved stone from the ground around it, only to find something extraordinary beneath. They'd found engravings, obviously left by humans many thousands of years ago. The engravings were unlike anything Chuck had ever seen before. When Sarah had traced them with the tips of her fingers, they'd begun to glow as if by magic of some kind. The husband-and-wife duo shared a glance, astounded by what they were seeing. When Chuck had done the same, the cave wall behind them opened as if a mystical door had been placed there. Through the door was a massive room, all made out of stone. The room itself had a hole that led to the open sky some fifty feet above it, to give the room light. Chuck was the first to see the items, two items that would change their lives forever. On a well-maintained stone pedestal, lay an amulet on a simple necklace made out of some kind of fabric that Chuck and Sarah had never seen before. The amulet itself looked like one half of the yin and yang, with elaborate engravings on all sides. The little thing was made out of metal, but a metal they'd never even seen before. It was an almost pearlescent color, with a laser smooth finish. Beside the amulet was a statue. The statue was maybe eight inches tall, with a stone base. The statue was of some kind of monster, reptilian in design, almost dragon-like in appearance. Chuck had picked up the statue to examine it, while Sarah had picked up the amulet.

The amulet seemed to buzz in her hand, while the statue did the same in his. It was a strange feeling and as they looked over into each other's eyes, they each heard the other's thoughts. In an instant, they jumped back from each other in surprise. As her clumsy husband had often done before when frightened, he dropped the statue onto the ground. The second the statue hit the ground, it broke. The statue broke with a thunderous boom, deafening in its power. All Sarah saw next was a tremendous light followed by darkness…

Sarah awoke to the feeling of wind on her face, the sound of leaves rustling as they do. The ground beneath her was hard, like stone, but the sensations around her confused her. Sarah groaned into the hard stone below. Her face was smooshed into the ground unflatteringly, but she didn't care. The scent of ash greeted her nostrils, startling her back to consciousness. When her eyes opened, she was greeted by the unwelcome light of the sun.

"I thought we were in a cave?" she mused blurredly, still not all the way back. After her eyes adjusted to the conditions around her, she turned over onto her back and looked up at the sky. The sky was filled with dark clouds, black as night. The scent of burning filled her senses once again.

"Chuck?" she groaned, only to receive no answer. Sitting up on her hands, she looked around at the strange sight laid out before her. The walls and ceiling of the cave were gone, completely destroyed from the inside out. It looked like a good portion of the mountain was gone too, as if it had been pushed aside like it was nothing. Standing up, Sarah saw no sign of her husband. "Chuck," she called loudly, trying to hail him. "Where is he?" she wondered curiously as she stumbled back from whence she came. When she stepped out of what used to be the cave's opening, she screamed in horror. Around her she saw nothing but scorched earth, blackened by fire. Amongst the charred sight was twelve burning corpses, all of them people she'd come to this island with. As she looked around, the entire jungle for hundreds of yards, was nothing but a black, ash-covered wasteland.

The sight of a corpse carrying an FN-FAL, Cole Barker's weapon of choice, told her that not even the former SAS had survived. From the positioning of his body, he'd been running away from something, not that he'd gotten far. As Sarah frantically looked at all of the bodies, a feeling of terror and panic overwhelming her. All of the bodies, people she'd come to consider friends, were running away as if something had emerged from the cave and come after them. None of them had made it that far into the trees, some of which were shattered into a thousand burnt pieces as if they'd been hit by something.

As Sarah walked among the burnt aftermath, she couldn't help but wonder, where her husband was? He'd been standing right next to her when there was the big flash; now he was missing and everyone they'd came here with was a burnt corpse.

"CHUCK!" she screamed desperately, only to receive nothing in return but the echo of her own voice off the mountain. As she stumbled back towards the beach, she saw the terrain, littered with massive holes. The ground looked like it had been bombarded with artillery, while every tree for a five-hundred yards was burnt up. There was nothing but smoke and fire around her. It was as if the entire island had been scorched by God. The entrance to the cave was on the far side of the island from where they'd landed and set up camp. They'd driven a jeep along the sandy beaches that ringed the island so that they could survey the far side of the island. Sarah got back to the beach where they'd left the jeep and simply found a crushed hulk of metal. The former SUV looked like it had been hit with a tremendous impact, it had been completely ripped apart.

With no usable transportation, Sarah would have to walk around the island on foot. In that moment, Sarah was glad she'd been jogging so much, because the hike around the island was an exhausting seven miles. It took her some seven hours to walk back to the far shore on the sandy beach terrain. Sarah knew she was close, because she'd finally found the massive outcrop with a steep drop at the end of it that marked one side of the bay where they'd anchored. The cliff must have been over a hundred feet high; she couldn't imagine how a formation like that even existed. As she walked around the last bend before the bay where they'd landed came into view, she saw the ship that they'd used.

The ship was the Daigo Fukuryū Maru, a smaller freighter that was once the flagship of the Nankai Steamship Company out of Tokyo. As the ship came into view, she could see that it was heavily damaged, the bridge entirely destroyed and there was a plume of smoke that seemed to be emanating from the engine compartment. The ship was still afloat, but in a bad way.

As she arrived at what had been their camp, she saw a boat being lowered into the water from the massive ship, which meant there were still people alive on that ship. Sarah yelled for the people on the boat, waving her exhausted arms so that they'd see her. She heard the siren on the ship sound and the little boat took off in her direction. Relief washed over her; she wasn't going to die here.

When the boat had gotten to her, Joseph, the first mate of the ship, yelled to her. "The captain is dead," Joseph called as the boat came to a stop and several men hopped out to tie it down in the sand. Joseph was an African man from Nigeria, who'd been in the shipping business with the Nankai Steamship Company his entire adult life.

"Where is your husband?" Joseph asked Sarah as he hopped out of the boat into the ankle-deep water. Sarah tearfully shrugged, unsure herself.

"I don't know, there was this bright light, then I woke up and he was gone," She said with emotion and exhaustion in her tone.

"What about Dr. Montgomery, or Lieutenant Barker and all the others?" he asked her as concern and fear showed on his face. Sarah just shook her head silently.

"Dead, burnt up," she said as her mind replayed the horror she'd seen. "All of them are gone," Sarah said emotionally, fighting tears. As she'd told them about her experience, they all seemed rather subdued. She'd almost say the surviving crew were in a general state of shock.

"It was La Caccania!" Another member of the crew called in a ghostly whisper, terror in his voice.

"What?" Sarah called as they all surrounded her.

"A giant monster attacked us. It must have been as tall as a ten-story building; flame came from its mouth!" Joseph said to Sarah, who looked at him skeptically. "It destroyed the ship like it was nothing; killed half the crew! We can't move the ship, so we're stranded here," he said to Sarah, who's heartrate was peaking hard.

"Can we survive here?" Sarah asked, lacking any form of survival training. A tall Vietnamese man walked up next to Joseph and gave Sarah a smile.

"Don't worry, ten years in the Army back home, we'll be fine." Sarah merely nodded quietly as the shock began to set in. Joseph held up a satellite phone and spoke.

"I've already called for help; the company said they're sending a ship to come get us." Sarah nodded and looked back at the burning jungles that were once lush and green. Something had come through here and bathed the world in fire. The scene was so stark it was almost biblical. For Sarah Bartowski, the shock of the entire scene was numbing her to her core and she didn't know when that feeling would ever stop.

Over the next two weeks, Sarah and the remaining survivors set up a small camp from materials and supplies scavenged from the ship. During those two extremely difficult weeks, Sarah and several members of the crew, went out in search of Chuck, they never found him. Truthfully, they never found anything that lived. It was as if the island itself was cursed. When they'd gone to retrieve the bodies of her fallen friends, Sarah had ventured back into the remains of the cave. As she stood where the two of them had stood days before, she saw the amulet laying there on the ground, surrounded by ash and dirt. For some strange reason that Sarah would never fully understand, she felt the unbelievable desire to pick it up. When Sarah touched the amulet, she felt that same buzz, but it was different now. It was like she could feel him in her heart; it felt like the lifeforce of her husband was all around her, embracing her in his comfort. Without thinking, Sarah Bartowski put the amulet around her neck. When the small, metal thing came to rest around her neck, she felt a safety and peace that she only got at home with her Chuck.

When the Japanese freighter Yahata Maru showed up in the bay, Sarah knew that her life would never be the same. It was a few weeks before she got back to Los Angeles. As she'd arrived in Los Angeles, she was quickly stopped and questioned by the United States government. Shadowy men in dark suits took her away to a dark room and questioned her for hours on end, asking about what happened on that island. In the end, Sarah told them her story while every surviving member of the crew, told the same story. Something had destroyed the ship and burned up most of the island. The crew swore up and down that a gigantic black dinosaur, standing something like one-hundred and twenty feet in height, had destroyed their ship. They all swore that it breathed fire from its mouth, though nobody believed them. When Ellie arrived to pick her up, the two of them embraced and mourned the loss of the man they loved so much.

Life for Sarah Bartowski returned to some version of a new normal. Sarah had no doubt that normal would never return. How could she return to normal without her nerd by her side? They'd promised to grow old together, they'd planned it all out. Now she didn't even have his body to bury, nothing to memorialize him. Her husband had simply vanished, leaving a hole in her heart where he used to be. As soon as she'd arrived at home in Palo Alto, she'd known that she couldn't live in that place any longer. Everything reminded her of their years at Stanford. She'd packed up everything and left the apartment in Palo Alto, moving to Burbank to be close to Ellie, Devon and their daughter Claira. She missed her husband dearly, but the amulet around her neck seemed to comfort her to no end. Months went by and Sarah started to accept her life as a widow. In September of two-thousand twenty-two, six years to the day from when she'd met her husband, the world changed.

She could still remember the day like it was yesterday. She was in bed, asleep after a long day of teaching. All night she'd had an uneasy feeling in her chest, like something terrible was about to happen. As sleep had beckoned, she'd chalked the uneasy feeling up to gas or some other gastrointestinal ailment. The amulet began to buzz around one in the morning, annoying her to no end. In the end, she'd simply ignored it and gone to bed. A tremendous rush of negative emotion swept over Sarah in the middle of the night, waking her from her sleep. Sarah was afraid, she'd felt anger and tremendous sadness, all from that little amulet. When Sarah looked down at the metal object, she saw it glowing an orange color. The thing wasn't hot to the touch, but it sure looked it! In that instant, there was a knock at the door to her apartment. Sarah rose from bed, threw on a robe, and answered the door. The clock on the kitchen wall said that it was four in the morning. When she opened the door, three men in black suits stood there silently. Sarah took a half step back in surprise as she spoke, "Can I help you?"

The man in the middle, who must have been nearly six feet five inches tall and built like a linebacker, held up his badge and spoke.

"Mrs. Bartowski?" he began, only continuing after she'd nodded in confirmation. "My name is John Casey, I am with the Department of Homeland Security and we need you to come with us." Sarah gave him a weary look.

"Am I under arrest?" She asked this man named Casey who shook his head no and reached inside his jacket for something. At first Sarah thought it was going to be a gun, but instead it was a folded-up piece of paper.

"No Ma'am, the island of Molokai was attacked by an enormous… creature some time approximately three hours ago." Sarah gasped as she saw the photograph that he'd pulled out of his pocket. The image was an island on fire, the entire horizon glowing red with flame. "Early estimates are that up to eighty-six percent of the island's seven-thousand inhabitants may have been killed in the attack." Sarah's skin was as white as a bedsheet; Joseph's story of a giant creature was true!?

"What do you need me for?" Sarah asked, wondering why they were talking to her and not the army.

"None of the other survivors of your incident could be reached, we need you to come with us." Sarah merely nodded and turned to get dressed. After dressing and following Casey and his silent companions to their awaiting Chevy Suburban, she was whisked away to a plane. It didn't take long for Sarah to gather that they were on their way to Hawaii.

When they all landed in Hawaii sometime around ten in the morning local time, she was put on a helicopter and flown to Molokai. As the island came into view, the extent of the destruction became clear even from miles away. It was as if entire sections of the thirty-eight-mile-long island had been scorched with flame. Thick jungles were gone, consumed in an uncontrollable blaze. The island's lone hotel was now merely a pile of rubble, who knows how many poor souls were trapped beneath the building's massive weight. The devastation was complete and horrifying, something you saw in war zones in World War Two documentaries. When they landed at what remained of the small airport, she got out along with Casey and the two silent DHS agents and piled into an awaiting jeep. None of them had said anything as they drove past one smoldering pile of rubble after another. The only people on the island it would seem, were emergency people there to aid in the possible rescue of survivors, assuming they found any.

"These poor people," Sarah said emotionally as the horror of the scene played out before her and the scent of burning flesh filled her nostrils. On the side of the road was a collection of burnt corpses, along with an overturned bus, at least what was left of it anyway. They'd obviously crashed and tried to flee from something, but they hadn't gotten far. The sight of little child-sized piles of charred human made Sarah feel sick.

"I've seen a lot of destruction and death in my time, but this is the worst by far," Casey said to himself.

"Did anyone get a picture of this thing?" Sarah asked the group, none of them nodded.

"So far, all we have is a description from an old Japanese fisherman who didn't own a cell phone. He claimed it was dark in color, the size of a tall building, and fire came from its mouth. He said he saw it from his boat as it walked back into the ocean and swam away," Casey said as they turned a corner and stopped at a checkpoint set up by the Hawaii National Guard. Casey flashed his badge and they were all let through the gate. The jeep pulled up to an elaborate crime scene, yellow crime scene tape cordoning off a massive area.

All four of them piled out of the jeep and made their way to the crime scene. Casey held up the crime scene tape for Sarah and then passed under it himself. What Sarah saw could only be described as a footprint, but she couldn't imagine what could have made a footprint the size of this one. The footprint was reptilian in nature, with three toes that each came to a point like a claw would. The footprint was approximately forty-five feet long and about twenty-five feet wide at its widest.

"Did you find anything like this on that island?" Casey asked Sarah who shook her head no.

"The island's soil was very soft, so we never found anything this pronounced. We found massive holes all over the island, but it had been several days at that point, so I can't be sure." Casey nodded, seeming to accept that answer.

"Did everything look this burnt?" he asked next, looking around at the blackened earth around them. Even in the light of day, the black smoke and charred earth gave everything a gloomy atmosphere.

"Yes," she said simply. "Whatever did this, was what attacked our ship in Manazura Bay." Casey nodded and looked around at the scene of death and destruction around him.

A month went by and the world forgot about Molokai, as it did with every tragedy once the news cycle moved on to something else. It seemed like Sarah had finally been able to put some of the horrific scenes she'd seen in Molokai, behind her, but that peace was short lived. The mysterious creature appeared again, once again extracting a heavy price. This time, it was a destroyed cruise ship, one-thousand miles due east of the Hawaiian Islands, all five thousand passengers lost. The only reason they even knew this creature was responsible, was because some poor girl on a cruise with her family, had caught it while making a TikTok. The video itself ended not long after the creature appeared, but the blink and you'll miss it glimpse was confirmation that the creature did exist. All the video had caught was the creatures reptilian head, large fangs, and bumpy, black hide, not to mention its thunderous roar. The media dubbed the monster Tyrannus, due to its destructive nature and resemblance to the famous dinosaur Tyrannosaurus rex.

Four days later, Tyrannus sank a US Navy destroyer just six-hundred miles off the coast of California, no survivors. A week after that it was a cruiser and three destroyers out on maneuvers. With the continual loss of ships in the pacific, all ship-born trade ceased in the Pacific. Whenever news of an attack broke, Sarah was always called by John Casey. He always called her because she was the only person with first-hand experience who was willing to cooperate with DHS. It would seem he had been tasked with tracking and containing this monster and so far, he'd been failing at his task. Tyrannus was unpredictable and impossible to track. Their spy satellites couldn't track it and nobody lived long enough to report on it after an attack. On December 22nd of that same year, Tyrannus truly revealed himself to the world when he rose from the Pacific Ocean in San Francisco Bay. With a tremendous roar, that was heard for miles and miles, Tyrannus gathered the world's attention. As soon as Tyrannus went ashore, John Casey was at her door, asking her to come to the headquarters they'd set up in Los Angeles for the task force that was tasked with tracking and containing Tyrannus.

As Sarah watched Tyrannus reduce San Francisco to ashes, shrugging off attacks from tanks and jets alike, Sarah couldn't help the feeling she was having. For some reason, Sarah felt like she knew Tyrannus, she knew she should hate and fear this thing, but she didn't, instead she almost missed it for some reason. The headquarters wasn't the biggest room she'd ever seen, but the screen on the wall that displayed Tyrannus' reign of terror, certainly was. As she saw the fire-breathing lizard trample Chinatown, she saw something that would shake her to the core. It was a news chopper feed that they were tapped into. The news chopper was rather close to Tyrannus, shooting shots of the monster's head. When Tyrannus turned to look at the chopper, Sarah's mind ground to a screeching halt… she'd know those eyes anywhere.

In a flash, Sarah was at Casey's side, busting in on his conversation. "Casey!" he looked over at her, rather surprised at her outburst. "You need to rewind the video feed; I need to see something right now." Casey didn't know what had gotten into Sarah, but he'd never seen her like this, so he did as she said.

"Barnes, rewind the feed," Casey ordered the balding technician who was monitoring the feed. The feed rewound agonizingly slowly, but the shot she was looking for came into view.

"Stop! Pause it there!" She commanded as she stepped closer to the screen. As the feed stopped, Sarah was overwhelmed by what she was feeling. She knew those eyes, because she'd loved them for years now. Casey saw the tears appear in Sarah's eyes and he began to grow concerned.

"Is everything alright?" he asked politely. Sarah shook her head silently.

"I know what happened on the island," she said quietly.

"What? How do you know?" Casey asked as he stepped closer to her. Sarah turned to look at him, tears streaking down her cheeks.

"I'd know those eyes anywhere, Casey; especially considering I married them five years ago," Sarah said sadly as she looked back at the frozen image of what she now knew was her husband, Chuck.

"How is that possible?" he asked quietly.

"On the island, we found something, something very old. There was a small statue of an animal that looked just like that," Sarah said, pointing at the screen. "There was also this amulet," Sarah said as she pulled on the necklace and revealed the small metal trinket from inside her tank top. I grabbed this; he grabbed the statue. When we did, I heard his thoughts, and we got scared. Chuck dropped the statue and it broke. There was a blinding light and then I woke up on the ground, with all of our colleagues dead. We never found Chuck on the island, because he had already left the island!" Sarah said forcefully, now understanding everything.

"Even if I believed that, which I'm not saying I don't. But if I did, how can we use that information?" Casey asked skeptically as everyone looked at them.

"I know my husband, Casey. Chuck wouldn't hurt a fly," Sarah said as Casey cut her off.

"Well, he's certainly hurt a lot of fucking people now, Sarah!" Sarah nodded sadly at that.

"I know my husband, Casey, if you can get me in front of him, I think I can stop this. All of this time, I've felt something through this thing," she said as she held up the amulet. "Until now I didn't know what it was, but now I know that it's his thoughts! I can feel him, that's why I didn't feel sad after the incident, that's why I feel so comfortable when I look at images of that monster. It's my husband out there and I'm certain that if you get me onto the roof of a tall building, I can stop this." Sarah said as she took steps closer to Casey, pleading with him to let her try. Casey thought for a moment, contemplating what Sarah was saying.

"What are you going to do, just wave your hands at him and tell him to stop!?" he asked her, angry that she'd waste his time with such lunacy.

"It may be just that simple," Sarah began as one of Casey's advisors stepped up close to him.

"Sir, Brigadier General Beckman reports that the entire 10th Armored Division has been wiped out and 15th Armored is close to exhaustion. She's asking General Graham for permission to withdraw." That news seemed to deflate Casey. Sarah could see the urgency in Casey's features, so she closed the distance and did something she hadn't done since she was fifteen… she begged.

"Casey, people are dying out there and I think I can stop this. The army can't hurt him, Casey. He's not going to stop and you know it. He's going to continue until he's killed every person in San Francisco. You have to let me try, Casey, please." Casey saw the honesty and desperation in Sarah's eyes and knew she was right. He looked back over at the paused image of Tyrannus on the screen. The monster's eyes were rather human looking, with hazel brown irises. If what Sarah was saying was actually true, they could stop this disaster from continuing.

With reluctance in his tone, Casey nodded and spoke, "Okay, Sarah, we'll try it your way," Casey said before turning to his aide. "Patel, I need transport to Travis Air Force Base and I need it yesterday. Fastest plane you can get your hands on!" The short Indian man with the medium length black hair ran off to work as Casey turned back towards Sarah, who was smiling gratefully. "Let's go stop this son of a bitch!"

It was a rather short, but terrifying flight in the back of an F/A-18D Super Hornet flown by the one and only John Casey. Apparently, he'd been a navy pilot before moving over to DHS, so he was well versed in the capabilities of the aircraft. The fact that he was flying at over a thousand miles per hour seemed to be no issue to him at all. Sarah on the other hand had thrown up twice from the G-forces she was experiencing during the half-hour-long flight. Regardless of her discomfort, Sarah had a job to do, so she wasn't going to complain. People were dying out there and Sarah had a feeling that only she could stop this from becoming a global catastrophe. When Casey had landed the blazing fast jet fighter at Travis Air Force Base, they were quickly ushered to a waiting HH-60 Pavehawk, which was the US Air Force's derivative of the venerable Sikorsky UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter. When they took off for San Francisco, the thick smoke and fires could be seen from miles away.

As they got closer to the heart of the city, Sarah's heart constricted in her chest. San Francisco, one of the jewels of the western hemisphere, was burning and part of Sarah felt responsible. If she'd just left well enough alone, she never would have gone on that stupid expedition with Chuck. If they'd just left the stupid statue and amulet alone, this never would have happened. She could see Tyrannus stalking towards the Panoramic Soma apartment building, a place she'd thought about moving into once upon a time, before seeing how expensive it was.

"There! Put me down on that building, it's directly in his path and the right height." Sarah called out through the chopper's comms. The pilot looked down at the building and then over to the towering beast, some miles away.

"Ma'am, we can't land on that building," the pilot said as the thunderous roar of Tyrannus filled their ears painfully, grabbing all of their attention.

"Pilot, if you don't get me onto the roof of that motherfucking building, the entire goddamn city will be destroyed. I can put a stop to this, but I need to be somewhere that he can see me, so do your fucking job and let me do mine!" Sarah screamed into the comms as the footsteps of Tyrannus grew closer and closer.

"Tyrannus hasn't gotten to downtown yet; we may be able to save some of the city," Casey said. The pilot of the chopper looked down at the building and then over to Tyrannus once again, then back to the rooftop.

"Okay, Ma'am, you'll have to jump. I'll get you close, but it'll be up to you to make it," The pilot said as he maneuvered the chopper close to a relatively flat spot on the roof. Sarah gave Casey a grateful smile and unclasped her belts. Casey handed her the flare gun that he suggested she use to grab Tyrannus' attention. After clipping the hard plastic box containing the flare gun onto her utility belt that the Air Force had given her, she moved to the edge of the chopper. Her feet dangling precariously, making her heart beat fast. As she psyched herself up for the jump, she felt a hand on her shoulder. Sarah looked over her shoulder and saw Casey with a serious look on his face, though his eyes conveyed deep emotion. It was clear that he knew this may be the last time they ever saw each other.

"Tell me why?" he said to Sarah, who smiled back at the man who she'd come to know and admire.

"I love him," she said to Casey with a simple shrug.

Casey nodded, "Good luck."

She nodded to him thankfully and spoke softly, "Thank you for believing me." Casey nodded stoically and watched Sarah turn back to jump. As she saw the roof some nine feet below her, she told herself just one thing. "Chuck would do this for you, Sarah, so you've got to do this for him!"

Sarah hurled herself from the chopper and landed on the roof with an unpleasant crunch. She fell onto the roof in pain, her ankle obviously broken. Sarah screamed in pain, clutching at her left ankle. The sound of Tyrannus' thunderous roar regained Sarah's attention. The blonde looked over her left shoulder, seeing the terrible monster on the horizon. She knew it would only be moments before he arrived, so she didn't have much time. Gritting her teeth, she forced herself to get to her feet. Walking on her injured ankle was unbearably painful, but she was doing it for love. Casey watched Sarah limp over to the edge, she was obviously in a considerable amount of pain, but she impressively pressed on. With tears in her eyes from the pain, she heard the chopper fly off to a safe distance. With Casey and the chopper leaving, it was just her and Tyrannus now. As she saw the agent of destruction in front of her about a quarter of a mile, she unclasped the box from her right hip and set it down on the ledge.

"Okay, Big Guy, let's do this," she mumbled, straining from the pain while she opened the box and grabbed the flare gun. Her hands were shaking as she grabbed one of the shells and loaded it. Both the excruciating pain in her left ankle and the fact that she'd never held a gun before, where making her shake like a leaf. She steadied her hands and pointed the flare gun up in the air, firing it into the sky. The flare shot up with a pop and filled the night sky with light. The flare flew through the sky, glowing a deep crimson color. Tyrannus never looked her way, not caring at all.

"Come on, notice me," she muttered frustratedly. Sarah quickly reloaded the flare gun and shot a second time. With Tyrannus a mere thousand feet in front of her, she felt the heat of his flame as it bellowed from his mouth and engulfed a street one block over in an inferno of scorching death. Sarah reloaded her third shell, her frustration starting to boil over inside her.

"Look at me, you dumb nerd!" Sarah screamed angrily as she aimed the flare gun at Tyrannus' big dumb face and fired. The flare flew right at his big, reptilian head and hit him in the eye. Tyrannus reared back in pain and let loose a deafening roar. Sarah dropped the flare gun in a flash in order to cover her ears. The flare gun tumbled from her grasp and fell down to the street many stories below. Sarah fell down from the force of the roar as she covered her ears. The impact wasn't pleasant for her broken ankle, and she reached for it quickly. When Tyrannus had finished letting the world know that a blonde woman had hurt him, he looked over at Sarah angrily. Sarah looked up and saw an angry Tyrannus walking towards her. "Sure got your attention now," Sarah said as she turned over and began crawling over to the ledge. Sarah reached up and used the ledge to pull herself back up to her feet. Sarah screamed through the pain and exertion as she stood once more. The blonde, now exhausted from the pain, looked over towards Tyrannus, who stood less than two-hundred feet from her.

"You are so much bigger than you look on TV," Sarah mumbled in shock as she looked up at the enormous reptile standing opposite her. She adjusted her stance to relieve some of the pain in her ankle, as the fearsome monster approached, his massive fangs snarling at her. As Tyrannus came closer and closer, the immense size of the beast became startlingly clear. "One-hundred and twenty feet my ass; more like one-hundred and fifty at least," Sarah grumbled as she took a painful step backwards.

Tyrannus growled at Sarah and began to lean down. Sarah could feel the giant's hot breath on her face, it smelled… toasty. The massive gills on either side of his neck interested Sarah; those gills were likely how he stayed underwater for such extensive periods of time. As she watched Tyrannus' large head get closer and closer, she noticed the fact that the large beast had two rows of very sharp identical teeth on both the top and bottom jaws, but only one set of fangs.

Tyrannus flinched when a shell from a tank impacted his left thigh. The sound was deafening as Tyrannus turned towards the lone tank that had fired the shot. Sarah's eyes grew huge as Tyrannus' chest began to expand. Sarah hit the deck in a hurry, not caring about the pain as a stunning rush of burning heat seemed to manifest all around her. She heard the sound of Tyrannus breathing his deadly flame and she knew that the men in that tank had just been burned alive… a horrible way to die. Tyrannus released a triumphant roar, much to Sarah's displeasure and then grew silent. Sarah pulled her arms away from her head and looked over her left shoulder, where Tyrannus was once again looking at her. The look on his face seemed… curious. As Sarah got to her feet, only moaning once from the horrible pain, Tyrannus huffed at her. Sarah had a suspicion that was what constituted a laugh from the fire-breather before her, but she let it slide. Discretion was the better part of valor in this instance. Sarah glanced to her right and saw the tank that had fired at the giant reptile. All that remained of the tank was a heap of melted metal, the burning hot fire of Tyrannus having melted it in an instant. As she comprehended the heat required to melt metal in an instant, she began to understand exactly what was going to happen.

"You better be in there, Chuck; or I am so dead," Sarah said darkly with a shrug. She was beginning to understand the two possible outcomes of her present situation. Either Chuck was Tyrannus and she'd be able to stop this, or Tyrannus would incinerate her in an instant and she'd see her husband again in heaven. As she looked into Tyrannus' eyes, she could see his hazel irises, they were unmistakably human. No matter what she wanted to think, Tyrannus' eyes were far too familiar to be anything other than Chuck's eyes. Tyrannus leaned forward and looked at her intensely. In that moment, Sarah thought she saw what might have been recognition. She had this ability to read Tyrannus' emotions, mainly through his beautiful eyes. In that moment, with Tyrannus' head no more than twenty feet from her, she couldn't believe where she was. Sarah never would have imagined herself in a situation like this, staring into the eyes of a fire-breathing lizard the size of a tall building, but then again, when had her life ever been conventional?

"Hey, Big Guy, remember me?" Sarah called to the large lizard who focused in on her. As Tyrannus' snout came within arm's reach of her, she reached out to touch the thick, jagged hide in front of her. "That's it, just take it easy," she said, maybe to herself more than Tyrannus. Sarah's softly came into contact with the monster that had dominated her attentions for the last several months. The instant Sarah touched the monster, there was a blinding flash of light and then darkness…

Sarah awoke in a bed, a bed she hadn't slept on in many months. Sarah sat up in the bed and looked around. She was back in Palo Alto, in her old apartment that she'd shared with Chuck. She could see the Tron poster over on the far wall that was now hanging above her bed in Burbank. Sarah got out of bed and instantly noticed the lack of pain in her left ankle. She walked through the familiar hallways that she used to roam. On the walls were the movie posters that Chuck had hung. North by Northwest, Enter the Dragon, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms. How ironic that a poster for a film about a gigantic prehistoric dinosaur that attacks New York, was hanging on their wall all those years. When she'd bought that poster for Chuck years and years ago, she never could have imagined life imitating art as much as it suddenly did. As she rounded the corner into the living room, she found Tyrannus standing there looking at the Han Solo and Chewbacca action figures on the mantel above the TV. He was smaller, human sized, standing about seven feet tall. Sarah froze as she saw the monster, unsure what would happen if she was seen. Tyrannus turned and looked at her with a neutral expression. Sarah crept closer to the massive animal. As she closed the distance, the sensations emanating from the amulet around her neck grew stronger. It was like she was being pulled ever closer by cosmic forces beyond her understanding or control.

When the two of them stood a mere foot apart, Sarah looking up at Tyrannus' stoic face, she couldn't help but reach out and touch him on the arm. His skin was aggressively jagged, almost scarred. The other thing she noticed was the warmth radiating off of him. Lizards are cold blooded, so this made him even more unique.

Tyrannus looked over towards the couch and saw the picture of Chuck and Sarah sitting on the coffee table. She'd taken the picture of the two of them when they'd gone on vacation in Paris. He'd always talked so excitedly about the Eiffel Tower for a long time, so when she'd won some money from a lottery ticket, they'd gone on the honeymoon that they hadn't been able to afford when they'd gotten married. Kissing her husband at the top of the Eiffel Tower had easily been the highlight of her life. That all felt like it was so long ago now. Sarah saw Tyrannus' inquisitive expression as he looked intensely at the photo.

"You remember, don't you?" she asked softly, unafraid of the monster at this point. Tyrannus looked back over at her and huffed, almost acknowledging her words. "Is Chuck in there? Can I see him?" she asked softly, hoping to get something from the large reptile. "I know he's in there somewhere," Sarah said as she continued to talk to the beast in her old living room. Tyrannus looked away from Sarah and walked off towards the kitchen. The wood floors creaked under the beast's immense weight. Sarah watched Tyrannus stop in front of the refrigerator. As she walked up next to the towering monster, she saw him looking at a doodle that had been drawn by Chuck while they were in Paris. It was the two of them standing in front of a house, with a baby in her arms. He'd drawn it while they'd been thinking about the future. They'd been thinking about children, but they'd held off on trying for one until they'd had the money for a house. In hindsight, Sarah wished that she'd thought differently. That trip to Manazura Island had stolen any chance she had of having children with Chuck. Sarah looked up into Tyrannus' eyes as he looked intensely at the drawing. She could swear there was recognition in his eyes, but he wasn't responding.

"I don't know if we're in some kind of spirit world or something else, but I really need to talk to Chuck, please let me speak to him," Sarah asked, more desperation in her tone. Tyrannus huffed once again and walked past her towards the master bedroom. Sarah watched the mute lizard walk off silently, his footsteps loud on the wood flooring. Sarah didn't know what to do, she was seemingly trapped here in this dreamscape with the most dangerous animal on the planet.

The sound of Tyrannus' roar grabbed Sarah's attention and she was sprinting in a flash. Sarah bounded down the hallway towards what used to be her bedroom with Chuck. When Sarah arrived, she rounded the corner and found Tyrannus standing at the foot of the bed, his tail rising and falling, slapping the ground with a loud thud. Tyrannus looked over at her quickly and then to the Tron poster. As Sarah saw how animated Tyrannus was when looking at the poster, she began to hope that her husband really was in there.

"My husband got that from his father, when he was little; it's the last thing he had from his parents," Sarah said as she walked up next to Tyrannus and faced him. Tyrannus said nothing, not even a huff, he just stared at the poster. "Hey, look at me," Sarah said to the big creature in her old bedroom. Tyrannus never responded, he just continued to fixate on the Tron poster. The tears began to well up in her eyes as she began to wonder if there really was anything more to Tyrannus than met the eye. Her Chuck would have chuckled at that thought due to the Transformers reference, but this monster wouldn't say a thing.

"Please, talk to me, damnit. I need to know that you're still in there," Sarah croaked as her will began to fade. Tyrannus merely looked over at her curiously, his head tilting slightly as a puppy's might. She saw him lose interest and look back to the poster. The tears fell, streaming from her face as the hope began to fade away. As she got nothing from the large lizard, her knees began to fail and she sank to the ground crying over the loss she was finally feeling.

"I lost him," she sobbed as she covered her eyes. Sarah looked back up at the towering creature, devoid of humanity. This monster was going to destroy the world and it was all her fault. "Please make it quick," she said between tears of anguish. Tyrannus turned to face her, towering over her feeble form. The grief had taken hold in her heart and all she felt was a crippling despair. She had no desire to live without her Chuck and with the knowledge that whatever was left of her husband, was gone for good, she had no desire to continue.

"Kill me, please," she pleaded. "I'm begging you." Sarah sank into herself and sobbed, overwhelmed by grief and guilt over what she'd unleashed upon the world. She heard the sound of Tyrannus shift his weight, the telltale sound before he incinerated her… but the searing heat and fire never came.

"Sarah?" she heard in a familiar voice. Sarah looked up in a flash, finding the wonderful sight of her husband, standing there. His hair was disheveled and he looked rather ragged, but he was there and he was beautiful. Sarah was on her feet in an instant, hugging her love like her life depended on it.

"Oh, Chuck," Sarah sobbed into his bare chest. "I thought I'd lost you!" she cried as she felt his arms slowly pull her into him.

"What happened?" she heard him ask, obviously unsure of what was going on.

"The cave on Manazura, those things we touched, they turned you into a… creature," Sarah said, trying to be delicate about the death and destruction that her husband had caused. It all started to come back to Chuck in that moment, Molokai, the ship, San Francisco, all of it. As moment after moment of malice and violence played through his mind, he couldn't handle what he saw.

"Oh God, what have I done?" Chuck said in a ghostly whisper. Sarah looked up from his chest and spoke to stop that line of thinking.

"That wasn't you, Chuck; I know my husband and he could never do those things." The certainty in her voice steadied him as his mind swirled.

"I thought I'd killed you in the cave when I became this thing, and I was so… hurt. I just had this desire to burn and destroy. I couldn't turn the anger off, Sarah, it's like another thing is living inside my head with me, something evil," Chuck said, desperate to make his wife believe him and afraid of what he'd become. Sarah merely smiled up at her husband and rubbed his cheek lovingly.

"Don't worry, my love; it's all done now, you don't have to hurt anymore," Sarah said soothingly to her troubled husband, whose fear never waned.

"I don't know if I can control it, Sarah, what if I lose control?" Chuck said, the fear in his eyes clearly apparent. Sarah smiled at her husband, her hand snaking through the hairs on the back of his head, something she knew calmed him.

"I promise you, Chuck, if you lose control, I will be there to bring you back, I will always be there," she said lovingly to her troubled husband. As she spoke, she saw him visibly relax. Chuck pulled Sarah back in for a hug as the apartment faded away to reveal the burning remains of San Francisco. The two of them were back on the rooftop, Sarah still in his arms. Chuck looked around at all of the fires and destroyed buildings. He knew in his heart that thousands lay dead or dying because of him.

"I'm a monster," he whispered as the sirens and blazing fires broke something within him. He couldn't stop himself from looking at all of the fires and destruction.

"No, you're not," Sarah said intensely, which grabbed Chuck's attention. "You are not a monster, you are my Chuck, and you always will be." Chuck gave her a teary smile and leaned down. When their lips met, it was like fireworks exploded around them. The white light returned, flashing white and red, white and red, white and red, over and over again. Sparks of love and passion enveloped them both in a warming embrace that seemed to seep into their bones. Their lips separated and the love Sarah saw in Chuck's eyes made all of it okay for once.

"I love you, Sarah," she heard as the white light overwhelmed them both and the darkness set in once again…

When Sarah awoke, she was back on the rooftop, alone. Her ankle was in horrific pain and she could hear the faint boom of footsteps retreating into the distance. The sound of a helicopter above her and the blustering wind of the spinning rotors grabbed her attention. Sarah turned over onto her back and saw Casey fast roping down to the roof.

"Casey?" Sarah called tiredly, her mind foggy and struggling with the pain. As the large man got to her side, he had a huge smile on his face.

"Outstanding work, I don't know what you said, but Tyrannus is returning to the sea," Casey said ecstatically. Sarah shook her head no with a smile on her face.

"Chuck," she said simply. Casey pulled back in shock. "I knew my husband was in there somewhere," she said proudly. Casey grunted, clearly impressed. Sarah sat up and hissed at the pain in her ankle. "My dismount wasn't the best, but I think the judges might still give me an eight point five."

"They'll give you a perfect ten, Sarah; you'll be famous by sunrise," Casey said as he helped her to stand up, letting her bear weight on him to spare her injured ankle.

"I doubt that Casey, I'm a nobody," Sarah said as she watched her husband walk back to the sea.

"Not anymore," Casey said as he motioned with his eyes to Sarah's left. Sarah looked over to her left and saw a group of people standing on an adjacent rooftop, all with their phones out. She heard them all cheer, she gave them a nod and an embarrassed smile and turned back towards her husband.

"That's for tomorrow, right now, I need to see where he's going," Sarah said as she hobbled over to the ledge, placing her hands on it to steady herself in the face of the pain she was feeling.

"Chuck!" she called to the large reptile that was well over a mile away.

"I don't think he heard you, Sarah," Casey said, amused by her. Sarah smiled victoriously when Chuck stopped and turned to look at her.

"Where are you going?" she said in a normal voice, now certain that they could communicate telepathically through her amulet.

"Manazura, where I can't hurt anybody," Chuck said honestly, though the world simply heard another of Tyrannus' thunderous roars. Sarah gave him a loving smile and nodded.

"Okay, my love, I'll try my hardest to come see you when I get the chance," she said to her husband who roared once again and walked away. Sarah watched him walk off towards the shoreline.

"Where is he going?" Casey asked curiously.

"A place where he can't hurt anybody," Sarah said, being intentionally vague.

"You're not going to tell us where he's going?" Casey asked, slightly annoyed. Sarah just shook her head no and looked over at him.

"He may be a grotesque, fire-breathing, murder lizard, but he's still my husband. If the army ever found out, they'd drop a nuke on my husband and kill him." Casey nodded, seeing her point.

"I don't like it, but I understand," Casey said as he extended an arm towards Sarah to help her. Sarah nodded thankfully and the two of them slowly hobbled over to a pair of sun chairs that were obviously for the tenants of this building. Once Casey had helped her to sit down, he pulled out a hand radio and radioed for the chopper to come and get them. Suddenly the pilot wasn't nearly as reticent to get close to the building as he was before. Sarah watched, much to her consternation as the chopper began to hover level with the ledge. Sarah merely shook her head and got up with considerable help from Casey. As they approached the raised ledge, she began to wonder how they'd get her into the chopper. That question was answered in a hurry when Casey picked her up in his arms and handed her off to the co-pilot who was waiting to assist. Sarah Bartowski was not one to let anyone carry her anywhere, but in this case, it was over so fast that she didn't even have the time to be upset.

The co-pilot helped her get situated on the floor of the Pavehawk, she was leaning against the back wall, with her left leg outstretched. This was about the only position available to her that didn't absolutely overwhelm her with pain. Casey climbed into the chopper, stepping over her leg and took a seat across from her. The co-pilot retook his seat and the chopper flew away.

"What do you think happens now?" Sarah asked as the sights and sounds of the mayhem below began to fade away into the background.

"We rebuild, better than it was before," Casey said as the chopper flew off into the distance. An exhausted Sarah Bartowski watched her husband let loose one last roar in San Francisco Bay before submerging beneath the waves and disappearing from sight.

"I love you, Chuck… always," Sarah whispered with a peaceful determination in her tone that she hadn't felt in a long time. The road ahead for the two of them would be bumpy and strewn with potholes, but as long as they loved each other, there wasn't a thing they couldn't conquer together.

The End


CHARMING'S AUTHORS NOTE #3: To offer some backstory, I am a MASSIVE fan of Godzilla and the kaiju genre writ large. I grew up watching Japanese giant monster films long before I discovered my love of Chuck. I had collected the entire collection of Godzilla films (29 of them at the time,) before they were as easy to find as they are now. For perspective, i've been a fan of Godzilla since I was six years old. For comparison, I've been a fan of Chuck since I was thirteen years old.

CHARMING'S AUTHORS NOTE #4: So, I know what you're thinking... CHARMING, THIS IS JUST GODZILLA, YOU'VE COPIED IT! Well yes, but actually no. I did take significant inspiration from Godzilla, but I went out of my way to make his origins different, as well as his actions/capabilities. So yes, Tyrannus is a Godzilla ripoff, but so is Gorgo, Yongary, Gamera, and so many other giant monsters from the Kaiju genre.

CHARMING'S AUTHORS NOTE #5: I want to make this clear, THIS IS A ONE-SHOT. This story is a one off that I do not plan to continue. The only possible way to get a sequel, would be if I was seriously inspired to write another one. For those of you who want an update on the progress of chapter twenty one of Desire, i'm working on itm but progress may be slow in the month of July. I've got a few trips coming up, so i'll work on it when I get the chance.

CHARMING'S AUTHORS NOTE #6: Okay, did y'all enjoy this story? If so, please consider leaving me a review to share your thoughts. I would love to hear what all of you think of this story.

Until Next Time :D