Chapter III: Enter The Terror
:South Coast, Florida:
Hunger. It was warmer now, much warmer. She liked the warmth. But she was still hungry, so hungry...
Something else tugged at her. A strange, yet familiar calling...


Palm trees swayed gently on a coastal breeze. It was a perfect day, and he should have been at the beach, relaxing with his family. Not here in full uniform, sweating in Florida's god awful tropical summer's heat. And what was this about a monster? A monster, in America, gimme a break.
General alert sirens suddenly began whooping in the silence. Strange, even the gulls were silent, hidden away as if there was a hurricane approaching. The soldier shifted uncomfortably from the heat and nerves. Remember the gulls, his grandfather used to tell him. They can tell you more from their silence than anything else in the world can. Heed their warnings. But that was just an old wives tale to scare him, right?
"Object heading onshore from the southwest." He heard someone call over the radio. "Object ETA is 30 seconds."
Missile, he had heard some of the other soldiers say. It was some sort of new weapon, probably launched by the Cubans. But how had they obtained it?
The other rumor he had heard, and which was the craziest ever, was that it was a monster, risen from an excavation site in Antarctica. Crazy. Nothing lived in the middle of that godforsaken land, much less a monster. Monsters were a thing to scare kids with.
The sirens continued to whoop as ops counted down the objects ETA
"10, 9, 8."
Well, I suppose we'll find out soon enough what it is, the man thought, clenching his teeth.
".3, 2, 1."
An enormous wave formed near the edge of the shore, rolling, boiling. It was so large, and hit with such force that if the platoon had been any closer, they would have been smashed and sucked into the ocean, men, weapons, and vehicles.
Then, behind the wave, he saw it rise like the devil himself..
At first, he though, Loch Ness monster. The head was small, and the neck was so long, a quick memory of playing with dinosaurs in his childhood flashed through his mind. The memory faded fast though as the rest of the monster - a god, actual monster! - climbed up out of the tropical waters and onto the land.
One man screamed next to him. "Welcome to America!" shouted another from somewhere off to the side, opening fire on the beast. The cries of guns went off as men began to open fire on it, military precision and calm stripped away suddenly by the sight of the monster.
The soldier stood there, wetting himself in fear as the beast made a strange, moaning-rumbling sound as it approached.
Missiles went off, splashing small pinpoints of red onto the beasts beautiful scales, yes, they were beautiful. A small patch of the rotting feather things was ripped off. The creature moaned again, rolling its neck around, bringing up its incredibly long arms, swinging, trying to knock away the missiles, small needles that seemed to irritate more than hurt it.
The last thing the soldier saw as he screamed in terror, too late to run away, was one of the giant hands come crashing down on him.

:Tokyo, Japan:
General Takahashi led the two American teens to the temporary command center that had been set up outside of the city. It was in the wake of Gojira's destruction, so they were safe, unless the king decided to come back this way out through Tokyo-wan.
"General, sir!" A younger man ran up to him, saluting. "We're just received a message from the US. A kaiju has made landfall from the Gulf of Mexico onto the southern Florida coast, heading north towards residential and industrial areas. They are trying everything they can, but the situation is out of their hands it seems. They are asking for any international assistance they can get."
Takahashi nodded, a puzzled expression on his face. "Kaiju? Is there anyway to tell which it might be?"
"No, sir. In fact, according to their reports, it's a new one. Our men are calling it Tsunagara for now."
"Tsunagara.." He repeated it silently, looking over at the two teens.
The one teen, Eric, didn't seem to hear what the Lieutenant had said. Samantha though, had. Her face had gone white with shock. Her face had been pretty white most of the way to the temporary command center in fact.
The Lieutenant dropped his salute and looked around the General to the teens. "Gomen, sir, but who are they?"
"They're Americans. They didn't know what to do, and were hiding in an ally. I found them just before Gojira knocked the building over."
The Lieutenant muttered something, nodding.
"Lieutenant?"
"Hai?" He snapped back to attention.
"Take them someplace safe and out of our way for now. We'll try to reunite them with whoever they're with when we're done, but for now, keep them safe."
"Yes, sir!"
As Takahashi strode away, the Lieutenant moved towards the two Americans. "Do you understand Japanese?" He asked them slowly, hoping they did. His own English wasn't that good, it had been years since he had to use it last.
Both the teens nodded.
"I'm second lieutenant Natsuki of G Force command. General Takahashi has put you two into my care until we can reunite you with whoever you were with."
JSDAF helicopters buzzed by over head, laden down with large missile launchers, machine guns and advanced antinuclear impulse weapons. Spot lights attached to a few of the lead helicopters raced over the small camp, adding even more light to the already generator-powered fixtures. Eric looked up and stared at them in awe.
Samantha took little notice of them as she smiled politely back at Natsuki. "My name's Samantha, and this is Eric, Lieutenant Natsuki. Are we safe from Gojira now?" She asked in Japanese.
Natsuki shook his head, smiling apologetically. "For right now, yes. Gojira is an unpredictable beast though. Who's to say he won't head back this way?"
The girl seemed to go white again. "And... what about the one General Takahashi was talking about? The one that is in America? Tsunagara, I think you called it?"
Natsuki shifted his weight uncomfortably. How much were these teens supposed to know, and how much was classified? Takahashi hadn't mentioned anything about that. Damn him for leaving me in charge of a decision like this. He just hoped this wouldn't get him booted from G-force, or even the JSDF!
"Hai, there's reports of a kaiju on the North American mainland."
Eric spoke something to her in English, Samantha probably translating what he had said.
"Nani?! Tsunagara?" Eric burst out, excitement from the sight of the JSDF 'copters leaving his face.
"Gomen. Would you two please follow me? The General has left me in charge of your safety."

:Osaka, Japan, Ikeda-Remming main HQ:
Hiroki Ikeda stood behind a large glass window that overlooked Osaka-wan, hands clasped loosely at the small of his back. Gulls dove and soared below, and even farther down, cars passed, and people dashed around like so many ants in the artificially lit streets. All that though seemed to pass by without his notice. His mind was on something else. A frown tugged at the corner of Hiroki's lips. John Greenfield was late. And Hiroki didn't like to be kept waiting.
"Koban wa." A man said upon entering the enormously spacious office.
Hiroki waited until he heard his secretary close the gigantic double oak doors before turning to face his visitor. "Konban wa, Greenfield-san. You are late." He spoke without emotion, bowing slightly before the tall, built American.
"My apologies, Mr. Ikeda. I had some last minute things to attend to in Chicago. I was lucky enough to catch this flight as it was." John bowed back.
Hiroki grunted in response, moving towards a large, black leather chair behind a matching black desk that was spartan of anything warm and friendly. "Please, have a seat." He motioned to another leather chair, smaller though, on the opposite end of the desk.
Nodding, John shifted a small briefcase to his left hand. Walking up to the seat, he sat down after Hiroki took his own seat, placing the briefcase onto his lap and unclasping its combination locks. With hardly a rustling of the papers, John pulled out three sheets of printout reports, handing them acrossed the desk over to Hiroki.
Accepting them, he sat back into the leather chair and began reading. John sat patiently as Hiroki flipped over one page, then a second, and finally placed the report onto the desk.
"As you can see, everything in both the American and Japanese labs are going as well as was expected." John broke the silence.
"I see." Hiroki said with a nod of his head. "And the results of the Antarctic core samples?"
John's heart stopped as he stared at the one man who possessed more power than even he did with as neutral an expression as he could command. Obviously, Ikeda had somehow found out about the creatures awakening. He knew he should have contacted him, but what could he have done? Neither of them had the power to stop a creature with such a capacity. Might as well just let it go and let the army deal with it. If and when the military had the monster under control, then they could take control of the beast itself. "Sir, I thought it best that the military take care of it. There was nothing either of our groups could have done even if I had let you known."
"I don't like getting information about my projects over the news." Hiroki growled at the man, slightly irritated. John was right though. Even if he had been informed about the development, there wouldn't have been a single thing he could have done, even with his ties in both the Japanese and American military hierarchy. "So, the Antarctican beast has awaken. What of the one from Siberia?"
"Still hasn't awaken. My teams lead scientist thinks it might be in some sort of coma brought on from its landing." All for the better, John thought, smiling to himself. The one from Siberia had been a major pain in the ass to ship to New York where they had to build a holding facility for it, disguised as an military airplane manufacturing warehouse. This one was smaller then the one that had suddenly awaken in Antarctica, and with the new one's sudden arrival onto the mainland, John began to worry that maybe they were holding the baby of...whatever these aliens were.
Yes, aliens. Monsters that had arrived here, according to their latest calculations, just at the extinction of the dinosaurs at the beginning of the first great ice age. Dormant for all those millions of years, and they were still alive. It was incredible, almost impossible to conceive that something in their molecular structure could give them such longevity. Which was part of their research, to unlock those molecular secrets.
"Something else, Greenfield-san?" Hiroki asked, breaking the sudden silence between them.
"Yes. We have reason to believe the new alien is actually the mother. It is larger in size, and is headed on a now direct course for the facility in upstate New York. Sir, unless we destroy the baby, and break whatever telepathic link there is between the two, the larger one is going to wreak hell all over the East Coast!"
"No!" Hirkoi leapt from his chair, moving back towards the window. "You do not have permission to destroy the beast."
"But sir!" John stood, his hands spread out on the desk. "Millions of people will be killed or injured. There'll be hundreds of billions of dollars worth of property damage, and all the equipment and men that our military pour into their efforts to stop this monster will be completely lost!"
"I said no, Greenfield!"
"Mr. Ikeda! You can't condemn us like this! Either you bring in your own men to stop the mother, or I will have the baby destroyed, by god!" Snatching his briefcase, John stormed from the office, letting the heavy oak door to bang shut with loud thunder.
Hiroki scowled as he stared angrily out of the window. Wrong move, he thought, slowly reaching into his business jacket, pulling out a small cell phone. Punching in an already preprogrammed number, he listened as the phone rang twice before someone answered. "I have a job for you. Three million for John Greenfield. I want it done tonight." Replacing the phone back into his jacket, Hiroki continued to stare out the window. He had done so much, and come so far to simply let an ant crush his efforts now.