Chapter 8: Friend or Foe?
San Francisco, California, USA
USMC Anti Megalosaurus Command West Coast Reaction Base, Alameda Point Naval Air station
April 7th, 2019, 8:25 PM
Hours after the smoke has settled and dread of combating the Saurian King of Monsters has dissipated, the city of San Francisco falls under an atmosphere of eerie silence as the Navy focuses their efforts on patrolling the coastal water of the west coast, especially around the area of Godzilla's last known location. Most of the civilian population have returned to their homes, hastily abandoned earlier in the day.
There was an aura of suspicion and paranoia radiated out from the Americans, who has only left their home for a brief period of 2 hours only to be notified that they can return to their normal lives. Although they have never been personally traumatized by a Godzilla rampage, they still feel the unsettling, unusually fast skirmish with no appreciable report on how did it go.
That curiosity wasn't shared by everyone, however, such as Major Richard Glasgow for example. As he watched from the edge of the runway, he saw MechaGirain gently wade to shore with fiery hatred burn in his eyes. Even when her mighty feet shook the earth and send tremors throughout the nearby area, Richard remained unflinchingly still and focus his gaze on the albino war machine as it return to its hangar. "I'll see you reduce to scrap, soon." He grumbled as the hangar door shut tight, leaving whatever the mecha unit up to inside completely secret and out of sight.
Accordingly, within the confine of the hangar, as MechaGirain's body power down and her CPU was hooked up to the computers of Jason, streams of memories and combat footage from her hard drive were pouring in for Jason's viewing and editing. To him, the confrontation between Girain and Godzilla was unconvincing at best and telling of their little secret at worst. Should anyone with the proper authority attempts to view the combat footage, they will be hot water that they can't get out of.
If the people of San Francisco has their share of paranoia to their mechanical protectors, then MechaGirain holds an even bigger suspicion to her own kin no less. Jason's finding of Giryia's forceful installation of a convenient back door/access privilege to her own system sent curiosity and paranoia into taking up real estate in her processor. Why would Giryia give Girain such privilege?
They barely know each other save for one single battle with Megaguirus. She sat meditatively in her domain, viewing the symbol of the access privilege, which shaped like a glowing holographic blue key. Much apprehension plagues her processors, this is obviously a trap by Giryia, the moment she uses the access privilege, is the moment Giryia can take her down with a devastating irrecoverable strike.
Speaking of which, Giryia has proven herself to be able to gain access into Girain's domain without the use of direct assault tactics and computer viruses. If Giryia truly wishes for Girain's destruction, then why didn't the purple machine take the opportunity and be done with it? Nothing makes sense at all, right from the beginning, there were mixed signals coming from Giryia, but there can only be one final definitive answer. Waiting simply will not help her dig up the answer she wanted, now she must dive into the heart of Giryia's memories, from there, Girain might be able to deduce Giryia's true intention.
She subsequently got up to her feet and touched the holographic key. which was floating and rotating in mid air the whole time. With only a slight grasp of her talons, the world in her void quickly dissipated and engulfed into a bright light, blinding MechaGirain's vision for a solid 2 minutes. She felt her mind was drifting away, her mobility was restricted and only her audio and graphical sensors were left intact. For a moment, there was nothing but a white void until she felt something, a burning sensation that was firing up across her body before twitching, then cracking sounds of an egg.
The white light soon faded away as silhouettes came into view before finally taking shape as humans, scientists in lab coats and handlers bringing Giryia out of her egg shell and into the wild of a jungle, a paddock similar to the one Girain grew up in. The infant dinosaur wandered aimlessly around its environment, seeking to understand its surroundings and her predicament. "It's useless, this place doesn't have anything to care about." Giryia's Voice pierced through the void, Girain knew it to be a narration of what was happening to her past life, her thoughts as she went through her life.
A feeling of deja vu crawled up Girain's spine as the memories went on, Giryia's life was so hauntingly similar to her own, from growing up in isolation, fed by a remote control crane. It would seem that they are the literal and proverbial twins in every sense of the word. As the final dramatic moment of her memory, her death, euthanized by the Oxygen Destroyer, came to a close, the world was changing once again, the void Girain was in became a green digital realm with Giryia standing in front of her. "Took you long enough to get here. What's the matter, afraid of your own shadow?" Giryia's sarcastic tone was filled mockeries towards Girain, but there was a subtle hint of serious undertone to it.
Heaving her chest in a breathing motion, the Ghost Dive was a great strain on her processor to bare but she was still able to converse with Giryia. "You tell me, you're the one who spooked me with hacks and infiltration. What else did you do to warrant hostile attention?" For a minute, Giryia paused, her index finger was pointed to her chin in a thinking motion, "Not much, except for...telling Richard that we can think for ourselves and he should back off?"
Reckless action beckons reckless reaction, she was completely dumbfounded by what Giryia had done to reveal their secret to someone else, especially to humans. Her anger was boiling at breaking point, Girain subsequently launches herself at Giryia with a fist at the ready. As she descended down on Giryia, the purple female grabbed Girain's fist before tackling her to the ground, Giryia then move to pin down the albino mecha by using her limbs to restrain Girain's.
"Calm down, it's all part of plan." She calmly spoke to a restraint Girain, the mecha unit in white was likewise, caught off guard and her curiosity beckons her to fulfill its desire. "What do you mean 'Part of the plan'?" Girain asked, sounding as curious as a cat and naïve as a child. Ordinarily, no one can understand a mad plan, neither does Girain considering she has seen no explanations for this convoluted scheme of Giryia.
"Simple, Richard's desire for vengeance would be the perfect motivation for us to escape him. I studied his psychological makeup and understand his desire for personal one-on-one combat." Giryia stopped her explanation abruptly but for Girain, the plan was becoming clear, if they could fake Richard's death as an unfortunate lost on the battlefield, no one would complain and the two can continue with their lives, unimpeded.
"But how can we draw him out? He has a personal death wish on me and an entire military surveillance apparatus to boot. Anything we do, he has evidence to say otherwise." Girain grumbled, but not all was impossible, after all, Girain's little skirmish with Godzilla has presented one more important chess piece for Giryia's master plan. "Tonight's forecast indicates a good night for a swim. Our encounter with Godzilla would be most satisfying." Cocking her head to the side in confusion, Girain find her twin's planning method rather, awkward to say the least.
"You're not saying..." She mumbled, feeling an idea she has never enjoyed before crawls up to Giryia's head. "The creature is interested in females, is it not?" Giryia crooned softly into Girain's audio receptors, her tone was seductive, hinting at possible intimate relationship she might have with either Girain or Godzilla. This notion is further reinforced by Giryia's sudden nuzzling with Girain's muzzle, which sends chill and pleasure down her fibers.
But while they were plotting their plan to be rid of Major Glasgow, agent Tiberius, or known by his real name Trần Thánh Nhân was loitering around the office of Major Glasgow's Raven PMC liaison, Thomas Maddison. In the darkened, emptied office, he searched through the cabinets, drawers and various folders for information regarding the DNA materials of the original Godzilla.
To his dismay, none was found in the usual places, "Dĩ nhiên là không có ở đây rồi. (Of course it's not here.) Chỉ còn một chỗ để giấu cái két sắt đó thôi. (There is only one place for him to hide that safe.)" Thánh Nhân followed his Analyst's instinct to the eastern side of the room, where the wall is several meters thick. The Vietnamese pressed his ear to the wall and began to tap his hand on it, should an echo came back louder than usual, then that's the part of the wall has been hollowed out for a safe. As he tapped the walls, an echo soon came to his ear, joyous as a choir boy, he bent down and peel off the sheet that hide the safe, then the lock picking work began.
Thánh Nhân brought with a laptop and a USB wire, which he uses to access the safe's digital lock mechanism, running a program to zero in on the code number to break the lock. As the matrix rain began to fall and numbers were suggested, he zeroed in on the bright green numbers, which were 8,9,3,7 and the safe was opened in an instant. A peek inside the safe found the vial containing the DNA sample of Kiryu, this was the motherlode that they have been hunting for 13 years. "Trúng tủ rồi, đem hàng đến sứ quán Nhật. (Jackpot, time to deliver this to the Japanese embassy.)"
But as he grabbed the vial and put it inside a briefcase for ease of transport, he heard the loud sounds of heavy machineries and mechanical caterpillar tracks at the works. One look out of the window and Thánh Nhân found the source of the commotion, the Navy were bringing in their new giant combat mecha unit from Raven PMC, intending to operate along side the two MFS units as a combat support. Its shape was rather strange, a penguin like machine with a beak sticking out from the head between the eyes. "Điệu này không tốt rồi. Chắc phải qua bên kia để lôi thằng Brody trước đã. (This won't end well. Guess I'll have to head over there and pick up Brody first.)". He said.