Chapter 13. Oh, no! There Goes Tokyo!
"Patience," Jack began. "Can I make a very special request?"
"…What is it, Jack?"
"I'm sending you designs for a SMART with a very specific shell. There's something I want to do…" Jack clicked a button on his control board to send the pictures. "I want a SMART that looks like that."
Patience looked away from the camera to view the message. She burst out laughing right away, but quickly composed herself to a chuckle and grin.
"Oh, Jack. How could I deny you that? Yes, I can build it for you. I'll put it to the head of the production line, in fact." She paused for a moment to study the message again. "Wow," she muttered. "I can't wait to see this."
The screen went blank and Jack clapped his hands together happily.
"I can't believe you're actually going to do that," Meg said, shaking her head and laughing. "This is going to be the highlight of my life."
"This will be better than taking over the world!"
Since his beginnings in the Middle East, Jack had already, about a month later, asserted his power in much of Africa and sections of the Mediterranean. He and Meg spent most of their time cruising in the Mother SMART, the equivalent of a flying hotel with a built-in arcade, pool, skate park, air-soft field, et cetera, on a constant circuit of the earth. Occasionally, they would venture even higher into the atmosphere and enjoy weightlessness for a while.
It seemed they always had some kind of missile or other explosive projective headed their way, but the fleet of SMART bots surrounding the Mother fended off most attacks with little trouble. And, because there is no point in relating the action-packed though completely suspense-less short stories of the dozen countries Jack easily squashed and conquered in the long weeks it took for Patience to build his special order, you and I are going to skip happily to the interesting part.
Jack and Meg eloped one day on a regular SMART to a secluded little cove in South America. The SMART stood guard over them at the base of a very large mountain hidden under colorful rainforest when Jack received Patience's long-awaited message.
Jack and Meg were sitting on a blanket near one of the SMART's gigantic talons, snacking on pudding cups and cup cakes and fried dough and tasty drinks with straws. Meg was lying on her back, dressed up rave-style, watching the clouds roll by as she licked all the frosting off a cupcake.
"Where did we get these?" she asked abruptly.
Jack just shrugged. "They were here when we got here."
Down from the clouds Meg was watching dropped a Mini SMART, similar to the one Jack first tested in Kashmir. It retracted its wings before it even reached the ground, and came running right up to Jack like a cheerful dog. It knelt down next to Jack and opened its shield, inviting him to take a seat.
"Must be Patience," Jack assumed, jumping up to see what was happening.
Meg leaned against the body of the SMART to see the message as Jack played it on the control screen. It was only an audio recording, however, as if Patience left a message on their answering machine.
"Well, Jack, I've been trying to contact you for some time now, but your bot tells me that you're down taking some personal time to stuff your pasty face, apparently. So, if you can get to your feet, you should come to Japan whenever you want to see your special order. Don't, however, fly over the islands or land. Loop down from the Artic Circle over the Pacific in a regular SMART, and dive into the waters well inside international limits. Your bot will be able to track me from there. We can't have them expecting anything. Then again, I suppose everyone is expecting something by now, though I don't think they're suspecting this."
Jack threw his hands in the air and laughed wildly.
"Oh boy, oh boy! Today's the day! I finally get to live out my second ultimate all-time fantasy! Get the Camera Bots, Meg! I want to save these next few hours!"
Meg raised one eyebrow as the Mini bot ejected Jack and flew away.
"Knowing you, I have a feeling the whole world will have its video cameras on us. And, they aren't going to be able to handle it."
The sentinel bot standing over them lowered its head at Jack's command and he and Meg leapt in.
"Down from the Artic Circle it is!" Jack laughed. The bot followed the same running procedure to take off, and within moments they were squished to their seats with their ears popping occasionally as they entered the clouds and flew over North America.
"If we're going that far north, maybe we should stop to visit Santa?" Meg suggested. Jack grinned and decided to humor her for a while.
"Why should I? Santa hasn't "stopped in" on me since I was, like, six! And even then, it was only once a year!"
Meg stared at him, feeling a little sorry.
"No, I'm just joking, Meg," Jack continued. "Santa actually had to move to the moon because the polar ice caps are basically gone, and he won't be coming back either because NASA says it's too politically incorrect to fund a Christian Saint and not maintain the Hubble Telescope."
Now Meg really stared, frozen in place, her eyes wide and slightly watery. There were a few moments of silence before Jack burst out in hysterical laughter.
The SMART took them north-east over the Rockies, Canada, and Alaska before they reached artic waters, took a U-turn over the straight between Russia and Alaska, and began their stealthy approach on Japan. With nothing but Pacific waters in every direction, Jack sent the SMART to dive into the ocean.
"I wonder if this will create a really big wave," Jack wondered out loud at they plummeted towards the sea.
"Has anyone ever dropped a thirty-story building into the ocean before?" Meg answered. There was a pause.
"Well, I sure hope it makes a big wave!" Jack laughed.
The SMART cut into the water with its drill and plunged down several hundred feet in just a few seconds. One system maintained the air pressure and oxygen in the cockpit, while the guidance system picked up Patience's signal and automatically corrected its course. The grooves in the drill, it turned out, helped pull the SMART through the water.
After a length of time in the SMART during which Jack could barely contain his excitement, the lights of Patience's bot reached them through the waters of the polluted Japanese bay. When they were close enough to see Patience signal to them from her cockpit, they followed her down to the near ocean floor, where Jack's order stood waiting.
"How appropriate," Jack chuckled when he saw it waiting on the rocky, sea-weed ridden bed. He circled around it a few times, shining the bot's headlights so he and Meg could get a good look at it.
"No. Way," said Meg, gawking in utter disbelief. "That is far too good to be true. I literally can't believe what I am seeing."
Jack almost squealed in delight.
"This…is the happiest day of my life!"
Patience's creation was entirely a SMART on the inside, with many of the same controls, only it had a very special exterior, with a four-limbs, tail, and head design.
And this exterior looked like Godzilla.
It honestly, truly looked like the original Japanese Godzilla, just as Jack requested, and not the modernized Hollywood version. It had no metallic shine, but it was still clearly a robot. Its torso was built in sections, giving it an uncanny ability to bend and twist, while its arms and legs had full range of motion, down to flexing its ankles. It had the same dark green and earth brown or gray coloration, the same spine scales- everything. It had glowing red eyes, which were apparently the windows of the control deck.
"Pass me the keys, Patience!" Jack threw his hands up, greatly pleased. "I'm going joy riding!"
"There's a dock in the back of her head, Jack," Patience called them, "designed to fit the head of regular SMART exactly. Just position your SMART behind it, enter this code, and you'll be able to climb aboard without getting even slightly damp."
"Oh man, Patience! This is even better than I imagined! I owe you big time!"
"Of course you do, Jack," Patience muttered, but she had already ended the transmission.
Jack followed Patience's instructions, and in just a few minutes he and Meg were climbing a ladder from the docking bay into Godzilla's head. The expansive control room was filled with monitor screens, showing almost every part of the robot's body.
"Welcome aboard B.O.C. Godzilla, Spicer," Patience's recorded message played automatically when Jack took his seat. "I have a personal distain for city of Tokyo, for no good reason other than that I dislike giant, modern cities. So, knock yourself out. You're actually in Tokyo harbor, so all you have to do is walk straight. And, just so there's no confusion over just who is sacking Tokyo, I've sent for a number of your now internationally known SMARTs to make their presence apparent and, most importantly, catch every moment of this event on tape, from several angles."
As Junks drifted unsuspectingly alongside the more advanced, giant freights in the Tokyo harbor, all were aware of the bizarre new threat agitating the world, but until now they had only read about the SMARTs or seen them on TV. Tokyo, hacking on its own fumes, stood with its high-density population and world's greatest Average Life Span totally unaware that its most famous B-movie was about to be its undoing.
Breaking through the surface of the murky water, the giant lizard monster trudged towards the city. Seaweed slipped off it, a few fish trapped temporarily on its broad parts threw tantrums, and water poured from its joints and body by the thousands of gallons. It waded through the water, stopping only to pick up an oil tanker.
"Go long!" Jack screamed and laughed at the same time. Pulling levers and pushing buttons, he managed to make the Godzilla bot throw the tanker into the side of the nearest building. It exploded with an entertaining shower of sparks and fire.
Pushing on, Jack guided the Godzilla bot out of the water and onto land, heading straight into the city.
Most of the people who saw Godzilla thunder by their apartment or office window assumed at first that noxious gases were seeping through the ventilation system, or that they had simply ingested some kind of date-rape drug. But, after staring in total (and somewhat insulted) disbelief, they finally gave way to that all-too-familiar panicked screaming and running around in circles panic.
Jack made the Godzilla bot smash an arm into one building, and then take a bite out of another. Japanese citizens were already running wild in the streets and distracted drivers played bumper-cars on the road. There was one little kid down on the side walk who, toting his own Godzilla doll, took a few minutes to thoroughly enjoy the display until his mother snatched him away.
"What does that one do?" Meg asked, pointing to a push-in dial to Jack's right.
"Let's find out!"
Jack turned the dial and pushed in. A jet of flames burst from Godzilla's mouth, pouring down almost the length of its body. A city bus burst in to blames, and then exploded.
Jack and Meg exchanged the ecstatic, shocked looks of naughty little kids who just discovered the magic of vinegar and baking soda.
Jackzilla rampaged through Tokyo, tearing through high-tension wires and smashing buildings apart. He hefted up a subway car of screaming people, paused to take a look inside, and then placed it precariously atop a burning building.
"Y'aren't so industrious now, are ya?" Jack laughed as the tromped onward.
Meg even plugged her i-Poo (Yes, I know what I wrote) into the computer's system and blasted the official Godzilla song by Blue Oyster Cult all over the city. She happily took the sixty-square feet of open floor inside Godzilla's head to dance around manically, rave-style, in celebration. A few of the Jack Bots, improved with Patience's intervention, happened to be on board, so Meg taught them some dance moves.
When the military arrived shortly after Godzilla's dramatic appearance, Jack had quite a bit of fun roasting tanks with his fire breath and swatting helicopters out of the sky. Most of the defenses launched against him had little effect on Patience's armor, though the tip of the tail did break right off after Jack smashed it into one too many skyscrapers.
At one point, Jack even decided to mash monster movies and climbed up the side of the nearest tall building. Meg offered to go sit in Godzilla's hand and scream cheesily, but the building began to crumble under the immense weight.
After about an hour and a half of overwhelming bliss, Jack discovered he was about to be interrupted.
"Oh, come on!" Jack snapped. "What makes them think they have a mouse's chance in hell?"
The Xiaolin Monks came flying in on Dojo, as they had recognized the SMART bots on the news report.
"Get out of my city, Jack!" Kimiko screamed. "Dragon's Breath!" She turned into the Dragon of Fire and rushed at Godzilla.
"This is lame," Jack sighed, cranking up the dial. He blasted Kimiko back with a wall of fire roughly the size of Manhattan and smashed Godzilla's fist onto the nearest building for emphasis.
"Here's the deal, guys!" he broadcast his voice. "Make me ruler of Japan, and I won't level Tokyo! Keep fighting, and there'll be nothing here but a smoldering wasteland by tonight!"
"We won't let you have your way, Jack!" Raimundo cried out, hovering before him as the Dragon of Wind. "Maybe we can't look for new Wu, but we can fight you every step of the way."
"Good luck!" Jack laughed. "SMART bots! Attack!" He paused for a moment as four regular SMARTS swooped in from the edges of the city. "That feels strange to say," he commented. "I'll have to call them Smart Jack Bots…or, something."
To no one's real surprise, the thirty-story SMARTs pummeled the Xiaolin monks. Their Shen Gong Wu had little to no effect, the SMARTs dodged almost every single one of their attacks, and the monks couldn't possibly stop Godzilla from flattening Tokyo and fight the SMARTs at the same time.
Omi escaped the SMART battle for a few minutes to try to reason with Meg.
"Meg! You can't stay on the Heylin side! You are the Dragon of Light!"
"Are you joking?" Meg shouted back, using Jack's broadcast system. "You guys are just a bunch of work-ethic nerds! The Heylin side kicks hardcore butt!"
"But just look at all the people you're hurting!" Omi exclaimed, but before Meg could even retort, Jack swiped Omi clean out of view with the back of Godzilla's claw.
"They are so out of this game," Jack said casually, leaning back in the control chair. "They never modernized, you know? The kicking and jumping stuff worked for a while, but that was all against Wuya, Chase, and Hannibal." He spoke to the monks again. "Face it, losers! You're outdated! You're washed up! It's off to the Geriatric Ward with you! The world is mine and there's no one who can stop me!"
Jack gave his evil laugh, a news crew picked it up, and the laugh finally became world-famous.
He never found out just where the monks went after his SMARTs handed their asses to them on a gilded platter, but he didn't really care. A transmission from Patience informed him that she had hundreds of SMARTs all over the islands of Japan, and that she'd played the role of Jack's anonymous liaison in demanding rule over Japan in exchange for terminating the outright humiliating Godzilla rampage.
"Aww, but I like to spread chaos," Jack whined when Patience told him it was time to pack up.
"Jack, if you keep this up there'll be nothing left to Tokyo. And it wasn't easy to so much as talk to them- they're so obsessed with Bushido that accepting defeat by a punk kid in a Godzilla robot is enough to make them all gut themselves! I'll give you two more minutes, but after that you have to throw it back into the ocean if you want rule of Japan."
"But I'm having so much fun!"
Patience sighed and brushed a lock of hair hanging over her face back into place, only to have it slide back to its original position as she spoke.
"Fine. Clear out in two minutes, and I'll build you a giant gorilla so you can go to New York City."
Jack liked the idea, but slouched in his seat a moment later.
"Yeah, but King Kong didn't breathe fire…" he mumbled.
"Jack!"
"I'm going! I'm going, already!"
Disappointed that his fun was over, Jack made his way back towards the bay and returned the Godzilla bot to the ocean. He and Meg played the Godzilla song one more time as they climbed down the hatch to the docking bay and waited for a SMART to come pick them up.
Once safely in the SMART, the Godzilla bot vomited one more torrent of fire on the city before wading back into the sea and vanishing. It took a couple more tankers down with it.
"That was so much fun," Jack sighed. "I hope everyone saw that."
"Don't worry, Jack," Meg assured him, looking over her shoulder at the burning city as the SMART flew off. "I'm positive they saw it."