Chapter 1: Hatchling
A little titan sleeping, dreaming. Feeling suspended in nothingness. Pure bliss and calmness. But also, alone. It doesn't want to be alone; it has been alone for quite some time now. It calls out. No answer back this time.
A forest starts building in front of itself. Ancient and dense, different from the modern day. Fern and tall trees, vines hanging from above. It is hard to see in the foggy atmosphere. It is warm, wet and moist. A familiar feeling. Not unwelcome for once. The smell of earthiness and rotten wood, very deep richness to it. It is pleasant, it feels comfortable.
Droplets fall of the fern leaves and onto its nose. It had started raining mildly. Another time the titan calls out. Something deep in the forest responds. It starts moving towards it, carefully stepping forwards towards the source, causing a twig to snap under it. Trying to listen out towards whatever called it, it stays still, ears sharpened and focused. The little titan can and feel it all hear it all, from droplets of water brisling down against the foliage, to the trees brushing against the canopy. Calls of birds and insects. Its own heartbeat.
There it is again, it called back again. It must get to it quickly. It starts sprinting through the forest, branches and leaves brushing against it, keeping the head down to not get injured. The terrain was getting muddier, leaves almost making it slip.
A bright light is towards the end of the forest, its rays are cutting through it. It needs to wake up.
April 18th, 2021, 0:34 pm, coast of south Carolina
She woke up, her eyes still closed. The journey had taken a while and she decided to take a nap until then. Once she awoke, it was to sound of the Ospreys blades outside of the cabin, as someone had tapped her onto the shoulder. Slowly she opened her eyes and stretched herself a little.
"We are about to land in a minute Mrs. Russell," the tall escort lady with a French accent told her. Madison simply nodded and rubbed her eyes and yawned, having had to leave at the evening and now arriving roughly around midnight.
Not uncommon for her to stay up that long, especially now that she wasn't really in school and was trying homeschooling again her caretaker Miki, whatever there really was left to teach. Her friend and housemate Abby still went to school herself out of choice, they hang out sometimes in the break when she would come and visit. The school was okay, but Maddie didn't really like or care for it and at this point she had the freedom to choose.
Spending most of her time just relaxing, playing or writing small stories that she came up with, usually those took way longer to get done then she would have liked.
But also visiting the coast nearby from time to time because that's where she got to meet him from time to time, in the breaks between his many patrols. It had been roughly a week since they last met, usually a view days after he would call out back to her, something only she could sense, but he hadn't. That was rather strange, if not concerning, yet for now she had waved it aside. He was the strongest there was, he was likely just very busy. Hopefully.
The Osprey started to settle down on the designated landing spot, quickly put together the last week. The noises of the machine and its landing gears had become second nature in Maddies mind, for better or for worse.
Once it had landed, she already was up and going, yawning again, and turning her head a little to ease some tension in the neck, making a slight but satisfying crack.
"Please stay seat Mrs. Russell we must wait for the-"
"It's okay mam, I know, not first ride in an Osprey."
Not much else she had to say, the woman didn't really want to argue about it either, especially with the assistant directors Daughter, and just sighed a bit annoyed, before going back to the cockpit to set some things straight with command. Meanwhile Madison walked up to the front door, waiting to get the go ahead to open.
There seemed to be some floodlights set up around the landing spot, their light coming through the cockpit window. She looked outside the door window to see what was going on, it seemed it rained quite a bit, couple of water droplets falling onto window. In boredom she watched as they went down the glass, what path they would take, what droplet would win a race down and where they came together.
"You are going to need this." Her escort told her, handing over a see-through umbrella with a Monarch sign stamped in black on it.
"Thank you," Madison nodded. She grabbed it before opening the door, immediately greeted with a rather warm and humid weather. The air smelled very rich from the rain pouring down, yet there was also the hint of salt and fish, as they practically had landed right on the beach.
The area for the Osprey and other helicopters to land was mainly designated with a bunch of metal fences quickly set up in a large circle, almost looking like the VIP area on a concert. The ground had been flattened, largely devoid of grass, mostly made up of gravel or sand, and now a bit muddy due to the rain.
She opened the umbrella and waited for the escort lady to get out, who had quickly put on a cheap plastic raincoat.
"Please, if you follow me." The French woman stretched out her arm and pointed at tent setup at the head of the fencing, Madison followed her request.
Under each step the gravel crunched a bit, with some tiny stones flinging around.
As they arrived at the gate like tent there was a lot going on, people calling back to each other, relaying information back to headquarters. There was a table set up at the side that cut off half of the room, someone sat there with a portable laptop.
"Passes please," he muttered, not even looking up for them, the French woman put hers down first on the table. He grabbed it put it on a scan device right next to him, it made a short bleeping noise before he handed it back.
"Hers as well." Once again, the she sighed annoyed and waved Madison over. She already guessed this would happen and had grabbed it out of her pocket. Just like with the escort he scanned the pass in, but this time he looked up.
"O-oh Mrs. Russell, your father is already waiting down at the camp." The man gave a very awkward smile, and Maddie returned and equally awkward one back, trying to be polite.
They got out at the other end of the tent, now the beach was better to see, it went quite far out, seemingly at low tide. The landing spot was at higher spot right next to a road. It looked to be a less touristy part, with vegetation growing over the area. Some type of nonnative beach grass parting the bright sand in the dark.
Further down there where more tents set up around something big. It peaked her curiosity and Maddie wasted no time and went a bit ahead of her own escort, much to her dismay.
They followed down an established path, lined by lamp packs and drive marks from trucks or cars that went up to the road. Lots of people passed them, going up and down the pathway. Whatever was going on here seemed quite big of a deal, so much so her father had decided to call her in on this for help.
Maddie felt a bit strange around them, some people just looked away while passing, some gave a quick glance and kept looking forward. Probably for most of the people that passed her, it was just rather strange seeing a teenager, who recently celebrated their 16th birthday, at a restricted area like this. Others might've realized who she was, since she had become somewhat of a micro celebrity within the confines of Monarch. The abilities she had gained from a visit to temple on Skull Island just a view months after the mass awakening brought her very close with the titans they studied. A gift and a curse at the same time one would say, not to her however.
Maddie knew who she was and didn't make pretences about it. Born as a human, now part of the titans, she tried to help and protect both sides, in whatever way it was possible. Up until this point those interests didn't collide. Yet.
Despite Monarchs overarching role, there was distrust towards her from some of the people that worked. Whenever she was called to case like this, she could sense it, which often made things very awkward, but in the end it didn't matter to her, as long as she could help. Maybe that's why her father pushed her away from all of this so frequently despite her wishes. Perhaps now was a good chance to confront him about it.
After a view minutes they arrived at the base camp. She still followed her escort, but her attention was captured by the large object which the tents were build around in a circle. It looked to be half stuck in the sand, an oval like shape with seagrass or some other type of growth around it, and most importantly, emitted a slight glow. Pulsing a soft blue light within every half a minute or.
She couldn't help herself but stare, feeling hypnotised by it, like she wanted to go towards it, touch it, feels its warmth, discover whatever was within-
"Mrs Russell?" The escort called out her annoyed, holding up the opening of the tent for her to enter.
"Oh sorry..." how long had she been standing there she wondered.
Finally, she arrived to the person that called Maddie to come here. A man and a woman roughly in their mid 40s worked on a laptop, set up on a foldable table, all lit by a harsh, green-tinted lamp hanging at the middle of the tents roof, with the cable going down a metal pole.
The man and the woman wore quite similar outfits, jacket and trousers, with her having put up her sleeves, as their jackets had gotten a little bit dirty, not wanting to dirty the tablet she was holding. She was talking to some other personal there, relaying information and orders. The man just stood next to her for a little bit, having his arms crossed and listening intently, before turning his head towards Maddie as she walked in. He tapped the woman on the shoulder to make her notice, she turned and gave a smile and nod to Madison, before turning back to the person she was talking and excusing her.
Maddie greeted them both with a smile and wave of the right hand.
"Hi dad, hi Ilene."
Dr. Ilene Chen and Dr. Mark Russell, the later now also known as the soon to be assistant director, and her father. They each greeted Maddie by giving her a welcoming hug.
"Hello honey, how you're doing?" Mark asked her.
"Fine just a bit tired, but also a bit hungry, you just had to call me right around dinner, didn't you?"
"I am very sorry, but we might need your help on this. Hope we didn't take you away from something."
"Ah its fine, Miki was just making meatloaf again, there should be some left for tomorrow."
She moved over to Ilene to give her a hug. Despite it all the two had gone very well along so far. Early on Mark and Ilene weren't sure if Maddie was going to be okay with the two dating so soon, but she seemed to be okay with it, even if she didn't want to discuss it too much. Not really out of any malicious feelings regarding Ilene, just a general sense of not wanting to talk about your parents relationships too deeply.
At least they had gotten to spend the Christmas holidays last year together with the rest of friends and family, which was a very nice experience.
"I hope you had a nice flight Maddie," Ilene said, with her very nice Chinese accent, "you're wearing the Heav suit again," she noted.
"It was fine thank you and yeah, I just like it."
The suit Maddie wore was a special fitted HEAV jumpsuit, technically only supposed to be used during Hollow Earth flights at the outposts at the North and Southpole, but she got to keep it at her wishes. It had become something she wore whenever she was called out to the field, it gave her some protection, making it feel like she was wearing armour, and felt very comfortable for her to use whenever things went array. Over it she wore a black flight jacket that had some white fluff on the neck and wrists, just there for colder climate or weather, like the rain right now.
The two let go of each other. Mark picked up a white porcelain cup of coffee with a black Monarch logo printed on it from the table next to him and offered it to Maddie.
"Should be fine now that you're 16, just make sure you go to be early tomorrow."
"Thanks and yeah I will." She smirked while taking a sip. It was unsweetened black coffee, just how her dad liked it, unfortunately a bit lukewarm from standing around.
"Speaking off, did my sisters present arrive already?"
"Oh yeah, Miki received it in the mail last month, wonderful little figure, did she sculpt it?"
"Yes, it's a family hobby-"
The security lady cut her off by loudly clearing her throat.
Mark looked over to her, giving her a judging eyebrow raise.
"Thank you for bringing her here Mrs. Duvall, you're dismissed." She nodded and headed out of the tent.
"What's her deal?" Maddie asked.
"Nothing to concern you with, she just isn't used to dealing with this sort of escort mission."
"You tell me." Maddie murmured. The woman had given her so a rather cold shoulder even back in Pensacola.
"But yeah, whats going on, why'd you call me this time, I see no titan around and Godzillas not around either, I'm curious."
Mark started looking around sheepishly and scratched at this chin, Ilene just rolled her eyes at that, and started explaining to her: "Mark wasn't sure whether or no we should invite you, but I decided we needed your help on this one probably," she looked over at him giving a slight smirk.
"We found an unhatched and intact egg of a titan. We aren't sure however what species it's from."
"Could it be her...?" Madison mind went array with ideas quickly, what the possibilities of another Mothra could mean, maybe that was why she felt so drawn towards it.
"I wouldn't bet on it; the form of the egg doesn't match the ones we had of Titanus Mosura." "The possibility is still there I would say-"
Ilene shot Mark down by holding up a finger towards his lips.
"I told you I made all the comparisons to our data, the chances of this being one of her eggs is very low."
"I agree with Ilene, when I saw a glimpse of it before it didn't really look like the thing I saw in Yunnan Forest."
"I told him so too." The two-woman looked at him smugly, he just waved it off with a smile. "Alright, alright you win." He went over to another table to get some more coffee.
"Still, it doesn't really narrow it down for us. It could be a titan with reptilian origins, a lot of them are despite not always looking like it. Then again, we don't know how they reproduce, when they aren't looking for food or fight that is."
"Reminds me on something your dad once said."
Ilene smirked back at him just as Mark was taking another cup of coffee from the machine, making him snap attention back to her, now giving her an eyebrow raise as well.
"Anyway, we don't really know what to do with it yet."
"No DNA sample testing?"
"Not yet, we wanted to leave it unharmed until we figure out more about the shells structure." Maddie nodded in agreement to Ilene as she took another sip from the coffee. It had gone fully cold now, so she putted it on the table where all the laptops stood.
"We know it might have originally come from Jamaica." Ilene showed her on a tablet, something at this point that she always dragged around. On it where the outlines of the possible routes the egg could've taken.
"Jamaica? But that isn't that really far away from here?"
"We thought so too, but we found some plant material, sediments and a bit of oceanic tar that comes from that area. We assume it was washed away from it and probably dragged by either the ocean current or something else."
"And you are sure it wasn't just laid here by a titan?"
Ilene shook her head in disagreement.
"We found no footprints or other traces of a titan having stepped on land. No reports of one swimming near the coastline either."
As they were about to discuss some more details, someone lifted the opening to tent that went towards the egg.
"Dr. Russell, Dr Chen? Somethings seem to be changing with the object."
"What's happening?" In a haste Mark put his cup on a table, making some of the coffee spill out accidently and in turn making him curse a little bit under his breath.
"Not sure Dr. Russell, but it started pulsating in red about a minute ago."
"Red?"
"Mark come over and look at this."
Ilene called him to one of the laptops they had hooked up. As the other person rushed back their assigned post, Maddie noted how the cables were going along the ground to the outside and towards the egg. Some electrodes had been stuck on the egg, that wouldn't damage it, but at least gave them information on the vital status of the hatchling within.
"The heartbeat is getting stronger, some of the radiation readings are spiking up again."
"Is it leaking anything?" His concern was met with an unsure headshake from Ilene.
"No it's still contained within, for now that is."
While the two where arguing about what could be going on, Madison started to feel a bit strange. There something she could sense, some sort of vibration going through her head, a stinging noise that repeated itself. It made her tense up, making her ball one hand into a fist while rubbing against her head with the other to ease the pain. The thing outside, she felt it, it was-
"It's sending out bioacoustics." Waves on the screen turned from blue to red, spiking up and becoming more frequent.
"Do they match up with anything from the data base?"
"No, but I think I know what it is doing, Mark I think it is calling-"
"It is calling out for help."
Maddie thought, looking to the two, who had become enamoured with the screen and the data. In turn she looked outside, where a bit of commotion was happening, and still that noise, that... singing. She felt the need to go there, it practically dragged her soul out of the body to come closer, putting her in a trance of her own desire.
Slowly she started walking outside, paying her parents no mind while they worked. Lifting the plastic sheet in front of ehr to the side. Taking slow steps as everyone else was running. Being unnoticed as everyone was too busy to see her.
The ground was muddy, she stepped into a puddle, feeling her foot get wet. It didn't matter.
A view rain drops fell on her face, making her eye twitch a bit. In the light that egg gave off her own now slightly glowing pupils were left unnoticed.
It was huge, roughly the size and diameter of a truck while half buried in the sand. Vines of seaweed and algae, but also some other strange plant on the ground form it base. Some red and white tape was set up around it, not really stopping anyone realistically, just more so to establish that it shouldn't be touched without the permission to do so.
Whenever it lit up red every half minute with a pulse, something could be seen floating within and it was definitely alive and active. It seemed to flinch with every pulse, as if it was having a nightmare, and it needed to be comforted. The closer she got the easier it was for her to hear the sound of its heartbeat. It sounded somewhat similar to that of a human, but had its own rhythmics, its own regularity.
Slowly she walked in a circle around the egg, subconsciously trying not to be noticed too quickly, while also observing more of its angles. Just now it came to mind if this maybe was a bird titans' egg instead of a reptilians, but again, there weren't any reports of the known ones moving about. Rodan was in the Philippines, the titan Quetzalcoatl remained in the Andes. There where reports going around of new flying titan, something akin to a giant condor but nothing concrete had come of it yet.
The coloration differed from a stereotypical image of bone white egg. Being browner with spots around it, hard to tell with these lighting conditions. While leaning onto a supply crate under another tent and the rain picking up a bit, she wonder what it must feel like to be in there.
Was it similar to how a baby might feel in the womb of its mother or was it different. If it was a reptile, maybe it could hear or feel things on the outside easier to hatch at the same time as its siblings. Perhaps temperature dictated when it hatched or what sex it might become. Some species of sea turtles would hatch female if incubated above 31 degrees Celsius. If it was below 27.7 degrees, they would likely be male. And increasing issues of a lack of males, with temperatures globally rising, even post titan awakening. Some things couldn't be as quickly fixed as they were broken.
With a giant egg and titan like this, perhaps the ranges of temperatures that were to determine such a thing would be quite larger than that. At least Maddie assumed that, maybe at the end of it all the egg and the life within was so much more fragile despite its size, just like an ecosystem could be.
It made it so much more precious to be next to it, and the need of wanting to protect and comfort it rose. Madison took a breath, and decided she was going to limit test how close she could go without being stopped. Hopefully Mark wouldn't get too angry.
"Just act natural," she told herself and started walking over casually, as if she belonged in with the rest of the people stationed there, easy to emulate after having spend so much time at the Outposts. While walking around it she pretended to make notes, well, less pretending as she kept making notes to herself in her mind.
At the same time, Mark and Ilene had just noticed that Madison was gone from the tent. First they looked around each other, before they heard something over a commlink, someone mentioned a younger person standing right next to the egg. Mark ran out looking for her, immediately spotting Maddie standing way too close to the egg, with a spotlight shinning down on her.
"Maddie wait!"
It was about 1 meter away from her now. She looked deep into its surface. The pulse had gotten a little bit faster, the heartbeat louder and stronger. The specific noises, the signal the egg was giving off to any being that could receive its message grew louder. Her own heart started to feel like it was racing, unknowingly syncing up with the heartbeat of the egg. She lifted her hand up.
Someone approached her, told her to get away. They tried to stop her, someone shouted. She couldn't hear or understand their words even if she wanted to. Some more familiar voices shouted at the other voices, told the others to back down and let her be for now. Arguments started. Unpleasant memories from the past started to be re-lived with that.
Someone was very close to her right, it made her feel uneasy, like she wanted to snap and lash out.
"It's okay, nothings going to happen." She whispered, unable to be heard by anyone but herself, just attempting to focus her mind and energy on what was in front of her.
Next thing she felt was the fuzzy sense of vibrations going through her hand and into her body with every pulse that the egg gave off. Bits of her hair started glowing up as she attempted to communicate with it. There was something familiar to that. Just like when he communicated with her.
As soon as Madison had touched the egg, its pulse started to increase even more rapidly in frequency. A G-Team operative recruit tried to grab her arm but got stopped by his supervisor. People yelled about backing off and how the egg was going to explode, which could possibly leak dangerous radiation.
Ilene and Mark shouted to get the other personal to back down as well, One of the other Monarch scientist wanted to already initiate red protocol, which would electrocute the egg, killing it. Mark threatened him immediately to fire him, if not worse if he did it. He trusted his daughter, he knew she meant well, but even that sometimes brought him headaches.
"Should we get her away from it?" Ilene asked, unsure was well now what to do.
"I don't know..." Mark gritted his teeth.
It was scared. It felt alone. It called out to its kin but they hadn't responded, it seemed they were gone now. It remembered being sung to by a loving figure. Those songs had disappeared long ago. After many noises, it went to sleep. It had dreamed for so long. The one day it was woken up again, still remaining in its bed. It had heard calls, frightening calls. They were scary. And it was alone for all but one. Only one was left and protected it, hid it away. Now that one was gone too for a while, separated by the streams. It was so bright outside, it felt constantly blinded. Now it heard a voice. It called out to it. It didn't feel like one of its kin, not the one that sung to it, but it was kind. Familiar elements were within it. Maybe now it was the time to get out of bed. It had been so long.
The flashing pulse came to a tipping point, as it seemingly charged up, a weird humming noise was able to be heard. Mark recognized it immediately. "Get down!"
The flood lights shortcut as it finally hatched.
A violent crack could be heard as the shell broke. Maddie was right in front of it. Instinctively her head turned, and her eyes closed, she felt some type of wet sticky substance rain down on her body, making her slip and fall to the ground. Something was moving out of the egg, she pushed herself away with her feet to not stay in its way.
With a high-pitched cry, it flopped to the ground in front of her, she felt it touch her leg. She looked at it. It wasn't as big as she thought it would be, maybe just around 2 meters tall or a bit more? It crawled around, going straight towards her, snapping a bit with its jaws while calling out.
She pushed back but, got stopped after feeling metal tent pole at the back of her head. Driven by instinct, she put her hand out to stop it, shouted to it: "Hey hey, easy, easy!"
It somewhat worked. The freshly hatched titan still continued making it whaling cries, looking around confused with its eyes very narrowed down, limiting its vision heavily. But when it heard her voice, it immediately put all its attention towards it.
The infant sniffled and grunted, still covered with the egg white fluid and mud from dropping onto the ground.
It took its first breathes, finally able to smell the humid air around it, tastes the atmospheres unique flavour. Able to hear the sounds it used to muffled and faint the past day to their fullest, and realized how loud they had become.
Somewhere in the distance a thunder went off, causing it to flinch and wince. It heard her voice again, trying to calm it down. Then finally, it fully opened its eyes widening its pupils to see who was calling to it.
Madison locked eyes with the baby, and she immediately recognized it for what it was: a newborn Gojira. It had many similar features to him. The differences was its proportionally bigger head, same for the eyes, but also its dorsal plates were barely grown out yet and lacked definition at this point, yet they already making its heritage quite clear for everyone. Compared to the adult one, the tail wasn't as stubby, much slimmer and pointier.
For a minute nobody said anything, only whispers and murmurs as nobody knew what they should do. It didn't seem aggressive. It had teeth and claws, but they were rather small. That it wasn't as big as expected helped with the worries of it potentially crushing anyone.
The baby Gojira started crawling towards the hand Maddie had put forward. She felt the weight on her legs get a bit heavier, but it was manageable. It curiously tilted its head and tried to get a whiff of her smell, to identify if she was a threat or friendly. During all of this the two kept up their intense eye contact.
Its eyes had a dimmed yellow, almost golden appearance. The rest of the body had colours that were hard to judge in the now barely lit area, but likely a mix of dark grey and brown, maybe it had stripes or another pattern, once again that was hard to tell.
"Hey there little guy..." Maddie tried to reach out to it, coming close with it hand to its face. It backed off a little, feeling very unsure and cautious, it gave a chirp like sound from it, that sound like it was scared.
"It's okay, it's okay, sshhh..."
As careful and slow as possible she managed to touch the hatchlings left cheek and started petting it. First giving slow and light strokes, gently letting her hand glide over the body. Compared to an adult, its skin and scales felt rather soft and squishy, still a bit leathery, which gave an odd sensation with the slimy egg white still being on it.
After a minute of that, the baby Gojira seemed to relax more, and started making a some more quiet cooing sound, approving the pets. Maddie then sat up and started giving it some stronger scratches under the chin and the cheeks, which as expected, it thoroughly enjoyed.
It started cuddling up to her, putting her head against hers and licking her face, it felt very similar to interacting with a huge dog. Madison embraced it with a hug, putting her hands on its neck to push it back a little, having a hard time now to manage the young titans excitement.
"Hey haha that tickles."
Everyone seemed to calm down a little during that, yet already people started to discuss what they should do next.
"Maddie is everything okay?" Mark walked a bit closer. Concerned, the young hatchling turned its head curiously, making him stop in its track.
"Yeah everything's okay. Don't worry, it is friendly."
"I have bad feeling about this..."
"Trust me, if it wanted to hurt me by now it would have. Hey, haha." It licked her face again.
"I see..." Mark put his hand on the chin, thinking himself what to do now.
"What do you think we should do with him?" Ilene walked up next to him, asking Maddie. She struggled getting up as the baby was starting to get clingy.
"I mean, we can't leave him here obviously- hey, let me get up okay?"
She put her hand on its nose and pushed it down, allowing her to finally get back up, now quite dirty from having fallen on the ground, but that wasn't important now. The baby looked up at her with big eyes, and she couldn't help but smile at that.
"Guess now we have a different problem on our hand." Ilene walked over next to Mark and squatted down to be on eye height with the tiny titan. Holding up a Geiger counter she had been given by an assitant. It got scared by the noise of the machine, and hid behind Maddie.
"A baby Godzilla wasn't really something we expected to deal with... that's strange."
"What is it?" Ilenes reaction concerned Mark and Maddie.
"The egg white that was all over the place didn't seem exude any radiation. The baby seemed to have absorbed it all."
"Well, at least that problem is out of the way, but just what are we going to do with it?"
Mark squeezed the root of his nose and let out an exhausted sigh, already he could sense the headaches coming on. Ilene got up, the tiny Gojira seemed a bit confused. Madison petted its head again to make it relax a bit.
"Don't worry, she's family."
"You think it can understand you?" Ilene wondered.
"Maybe, it seems that it follows at least some of the directions I'm giving."
"Likely that it has already imprinted on you," Mark said, looking over at the cracked open egg.
"You mean like birds or reptiles?" Maddie asked, he nodded.
"Yup, likely the first thing it sees and comes in contact with it recognizes as its parent. Just what we needed..." He sounded very exhausted, which Maddie didn't really understand why yet.
"We are probably going to need a way to transport it, just where to is the question."
"I got an idea actually where to," Mark told her, "but don't know how yet."
"I mean... I would say he could fit into an Osprey?" Madison suggested.
While they discussed, the baby tried to mimic to get up on its 2 legs as well. struggling a bit but quickly managing to stand on its legs, slightly hunching over. It walked up next to Maddie, they were roughly at eye height, seemingly learning to walk by itself to follow its parent.
"Hey there, woah- its alright, I got you."
It swung around with its arm trying to hold onto her, she managed to help it stay stable by grabbing it by the waist. The baby licked her again, causing her to giggle from the tickling sensation.
Mark in the meantime spoke with another Monarch officer next to him, the same one that was ready to electrocute the egg, berating him sternly for it.
The people around them started to move equipment and take some field pictures.
A black woman roughly in her 20s and with glasses, came up to Ilene and brought over her tablet with data updates and in exchange took the Geiger counter from her.
"Thank you, do we have some cloth anywhere left? We should maybe help it clean."
"Yes I'll get it-"
"Do you have some thermal protection?" Maddie cut in, trying to hold the baby back a little as it kept clinging to her shoulder.
"The little guy is shivering a bit, the rain is making it really cold and the slimes not helping."
"I think we should have some in the emergency tent."
The woman went away, coming back very shortly with both some dark green towels and the mentioned thermal protection.
First she gave it to Ilene, who wanted to help with the cleaning, but the baby pulled back again, cowering down behind Maddie, knocking over a crate with its tail.
"Maybe I should do that for now."
"Good idea," Ilene agreed and handed over the towels to her.
Maddie started cleaning the babys face, struggling a bit as it tried to bite after the towel, misunderstand it for playing. After they had cleaned themselves halfway decent, she put the thermal foil around the babies back, and also herself a bit. Once again it seemed rather very confused what this thing was and wanted to take a bit from it, but it did very much enjoy the warmth it was giving. They walked underneath a tent as it started to rain a little bit again, and to get out of the way of personal moving things around, Ilene followed them.
"What do you think Foster and the Director will think about this Dr. Russell?" Agent Duvall was talking to Mark, having pulled him aside to another open tent to discuss the matter.
"Foster will probably leave it to us. The Director and the rest on the other hand will probably give me another headache," he said, sighing out heavily. He looked over to Maddie. At least she seemed happy.
"Sometimes I wish I didn't quit drinking for good," he mumbled, not really taking his thought seriously and smacking himself in his mind for thinking that.
"Should we relay any messages to the Outpost 1 sir?"
"You would have done that even if I said no," he looked at her sternly, her face remained in a neutral expression as ever. A poker face like no one else.
"Tell Outpost 1 to get the Pensacola facility ready. We might make an in-between stop at the nearest Outpost or another base." The agent simply nodded and moved back up to a tent that would send out information.
Mark finally got a moment to breath and just, took a small break to take everything in, to let everything sink in fully.
Everyone felt either awkward or confused, more then before. A general sense of being on edge went around the camp, all except Madison and Ilene, they seemed rather relaxed or happy, which he envied now. His gaze moved back to the egg and made him think about the last days of guessing and arguing over its origin, which now all seemed pointless to begin, partially at least.
Where the parent was and who it was remained a mystery for now, it likely didn't come from the only remaining adult, they would have known about that. Perhaps they were related though, or not. It probably would matter little in the grand scheme of things. The other thing that made him scratch his head a little bit was the hatchlings rather small size compared to the egg, but that was something they'd need to figure out later.
The rain was now middling towards a milder downfall again. Here and there thunder would strike in the distance, painting a bit of light onto the dark ocean. Currently the only light source they had were the lamps, the floodlights were broken for now and probably wouldn't be fixed till the next morning. Which made Mark hope they could probably end this a lot sooner then later, given there was little point in staying around.
Meanwhile he was walking around to some other tents, making things clear with the other scientists and personal stationed, ensuring that everything was in order as much as possible, which granted, wasn't a lot. The other scientist were getting a bit hectic to gather data and transferring it.
After that was done, he just wanted to clear up a view things with Maddie, before getting stopped dead in his track.
There was something. He felt some sort of vibration coming from the ground. There was a rhythm to it, like they were... footsteps. Then he started to hear a muffled thud in the distance. It wasn't thunder.
Quickly he turned his gaze down onto a puddle, one that was the impression of the baby titans feet in the mud. The water responded to the vibrations by giving small ripples from the centre over its surface. The thud got louder and the vibrations strong enough that others started noticing now.
Worried looks were going around everyone, the first signs of panic building. Mark swiftly turned his attention towards the tent where the baby, Maddie and Ilene were located, who similarly looked around concerned. Maddie seemed to take in a more defensive position, as the baby started to give little cries and calls to her, scared and confused as much as any child would be.
He ran over, "We are leaving now, get to the Osprey uphill!" He told them, passing by to the G-Team officer, "we evacuate now, everyone needs to get out of the area, nonmatter where, just get away from here!"
"Yes Sir;" the soldier turned over to his radio, "everyone! Move it!" The soldier yelled.
Now things started to get really messy. People sprinted and ran to grab anything they could that'd be important, some just immediately jumped in the trucks stationed there and drove off as quickly as they could. Another violent shake from whatever was approaching made one of the trucks bounce view centimetres off the ground, causing its alarm to go off.
The baby cried out scared, moving back into a tent as the isolation foil blocked its vision, making it knock stuff over with its tail.
Maddie struggled to control it, other people gathered around to hold it from doing more damage and Ilene had to keep putting them at a distance.
Madison ran up to it to tear the thermal foil away while she kept calling out to it.
"Hey, hey, hey, its okay, sshhh, we are gonna go right now, I promise," at least she got a grip on the foil and pulled it back, finally the hatchling was able to get calmed down. Its eyes had started to glow in somewhat of a red pulsing shimmer.
While she couldn't explain it, it made her more drawn towards the baby, similar to when it was emitting the red pulse in the egg.
She went towards it, hugged it around the neck and gave it pets, while also letting her Mothra aura take a bit of hold, not as much as to be visible for everyone around and scare them off, just to make her eyes glow a little like the babies did.
It worked, making the little one calm down, able to be led into direction by her.
Yet before anything got better, it just got worse. A pair of Apache helicopters flew right over them, their engines and blades making one hell of a loud noise. The baby leaned down trying to hide, Maddie assumed a protective stance over it.
Everyone watched as they flew out towards the ocean and shined down search lights into the water. There was an earie quietness, other then the noises of the helicopter and the ocean itself, everything and everyone had gone fully silent. Just observing or waiting for something to happen.
"What are they doing here?" Mark whispered, much to the confusion of Ilene.
"Did you not call for backup?"
"No? They must have tracked it already."
As soon as he said that, finally whatever was approaching was able to be seen in the search lights of the helicopters, as it had remained hidden in the dark and murky waters. Bursting out of the sea and jumping onto land, its response to having bright lights shone into its eyes was not kind, as it had caught one of the helicopters out of the sky, crushing it beneath its massive jaws, causing and explosion that scattered debris and parts of the helicopter across the area. Someone got hit by one of the rotors.
Everyone else either ducked, screamed or cursed. That thing was roughly 100 meters away from them, way too close for comfort and people started legging it out, getting upwards away from the beach and over the road or going somewhere else into the forests around them, leaving everything else behind.
However with bright flames of the explosion, Mark managed to get a good look at it:
Physically, it looked very similar to a modern day theropod dinosaur, with a view some similar features a crocodile with its scales, and also a large point knob at the back of the cheek, reminiscent of an iguana.
A rough, square-shaped underbite and a pronounced chin, a long and thick neck with a small, spiky dewlap, large forward facing fin shaped plates and quite long arms with 4 fingers. It's mouth seemed lipless with a ton of teeth sticking out even when it was closed.
It immediately turned its aggression onto the next helicopter, rearing up to snap after it, before unleashing a roar that sounded a bit too similar to something he heard before, at outpust 32. That was one of Godzilla's roars.
It was different, more shriek-y and breathy, but non the less there was an obvious connection. But He knew that wasn't him, that was something that looked similar to him, maybe even tried to ape the species.
Madison looked at the creature with a lot of ire. The word "Zilla" struck down in her mind. Perhaps another flash of foresight, the aura the creature emitted, or because this creature acted much more animalistic, a bit more of nimble appearance compared to the godlike mountain that was the thing it tried to ape. She wasn't sure why it was here, or what it wanted, but it was scaring the baby, and a danger to it.
It came closer, roaring and whipping its tail around as it snapped after the apache helicopter, cunningly avoiding getting shot at by missiles or guns with its swift nature.
She wanted to strike at it with her weapon, already grabbing onto the hilt at the back of her suit, ready to unleash it and dash out some of her strength. She was about to sprint forward-
Her father grabbed her by the arm to pull her away, forcing her to look at him. The expression he saw on his daughters face, she was so angry, in a way he hadn't seen her in a while. With her eye fully glowing now with that shimmering blue. His hands on her shoulders, telling her: "We need to go Maddie, now!"
The words of her father managed to snap the girl out of that rageful state and made her finally get on the move. She didn't respond but just nodded, getting down to the baby and helping it up, grabbing its back and pushing it forward. At first it was a struggle getting it to move, but another explosion in the back and another shriek from the creature as it stepped on some oil tank caused them to pick up some speed. Ilene tried helping it, making it avoid tumbling down again, just noticing how heavy it actually was and realizing what Maddie had been dealing with so far.
They ran up towards the hill where the Osprey was waiting, already getting ready to start up. On the hillside next to them Maddie saw the G-Team officer and his team, shooting at the monster.
The job of any G-Team operative was rarely to actually stop a monster, just to slow it down and distract it, to have everyone else get out in the meantime.
This brough risks with it that now looked to become fulfilled, as the creature received the gunfire and was drawn towards them that way, even if it looked to be flinching periodically, as its hide wasn't quite as resistant to weaponry as some of the other titans.
It wouldn't take much for it to wipe out the squad, a single bite, a single stomp with its foot or hand, which one it would choose didn't matter, what mattered was its size.
She knew the risks and duty these men and woman took and were ready to put themselves on the line for, but if it was avoidable she was going to do something about it.
Dead in her tracks she stopped, charging up her energy and aura, her titan form, that could either take the form of the queen of the monsters or the king. This time she chose the king, and forming the typical maple leave like dorsal plates structure on her back, a glowing aura made of light and energy that only she had, and only she could wield its power.
While still learning to control it, she had mastered quick attacks at this point. She threw an upside swing with her right arm, throwing an blue glowing energy slash directly aimed at the creatures face as it was charging for an attack on the soldiers.
It struck firm and swift, the motion of the creature causing it to fall backwards and topple over the ground, right into the main camp and onto where the egg had laid, causing another tank to explode, covering it in fire.
The G-Team soldiers didn't know what was happening now, but they knew a chance and when to take it and ran. Everyone else had already gotten out of the camp at that point, most people were running over the street to the other side and hid in the ditch, watching out for what was happening, while a view others ran to the Osprey.
However the creature, Zilla, was quick to get back to its feet. Surrounded in flames, it shook its head, with its hunched posture it looked back at the thing that had hit it in the face, which was currently running up the hill again with the baby.
Maddie looked over her shoulder, the two crossed eye contact. The reflective surface of its eyes shining in a bright green, starkly contrasting the orange and red light from the flames beneath it.
When their gazes met, the human responded to it with a very angry expression, gnashing her teeth, and balling her hands into a fists. No such emotions went over the creature's face. No malice, no joy, no pity, just an expression of an animal that wanted to hunt, or so it seemed. It growled and turned its head to the side like a bird, trying to figure out what to make of the tiny thing that had attacked it with such immense energy.
It seemed that Zillas response to the wave of energy would be an energy attack of its own, as its fin shaped plates started to slowly glow up with a bright green from the tail upwards. Maddie was ready to shield them all from it or attack gain, but that wouldn't be necessary.
A bright blue light hit in front of the new titan, causing to blast it backwards again. A shockwave was unleashed upon the area, some people who weren't already on the ground got knocked over, those that were ducked their heads to get hit in the face by something.
Boom
Madison knew the sound of those steps all too well.
Boom
At first she seemed happy about it. Cherishing to see him again.
Boom
But when she tried to call out to him, he didn't respond, he didn't listen. All there was, was a earth-shattering roar.
"Skreeeoongh"
The King of the Monsters seemed so angered he didn't even noticed that his partner was there. For the first time she felt scared of him. It was like seeing one of your loved ones succumb to anger and lash out at everyone around them without reason. She couldn't remember the last time he had acted this way. Only a view things had brought out that level of undistilled rage in either of them.
Boom
Was it because of the creature that was aping his appearance and calls? Or did his anger come from another source.
"SKREEEEEOOONGH."
Whatever it was, Godzilla was not pleased. His mighty roars tore the sky asunder, his breath had turned the ground it hit to ash, and the steps he took caused everything to shake.
For the first time since a while, Madison didn't feel safe when he approached, and the infant titan recognized its guardians concern.
"Maddie, whats going on!?" Ilene called out to her. She looked back. "I can't hold him back, he's not listening to me. He's gone berserk."
Godzilla dorsal plates and eyes glowed in their typical radioactive blue from his intimidation display, something every titan would usually recognize as a warning.
Yet for whatever reason, Zilla didn't back off right away and a roar could be heard coming from the distance.
As they finally got the Osprey landing sight, everyone who had access to it already went in, now it depended for the baby titan to get in, which initially wasn't sure about, that place was small and unknown to it, Maddie was still by its sight, trying to push it forward, but it gave a little growl as it didn't want to. Finding the red light, the noise of it and tight looking space to be scary.
"What is it?!" Mark yelled out to her, he and Ilene were already in almost.
"I don't know he seems scared of it!"
Mark bit his lips. he could only stall the Osprey for so long in this situation.
"Sir we can't wait, we need to take off now!" The pilot at the back yelled.
Godzilla had approached the flames that his breath had wrought, standing within them he looked around for his opponent. Gnashing his teeth, making a loud rumbling growl, he leaned down trying to smell out his opponent, listening closely for another sign of it.
Letting out another roar, letting it echo among the sound of flames and rain, demanding a response from the challenger. But it never came. Something seemed off, the other creature just wasn't there anymore. Likely it had run off or was hiding, that's what they assumed.
Suddenly and without warning, the ground underneath him tore open, causing him to stumble as he tried to regain balance, and creating an opening for his attacked. Zilla jumped out of a tunnel he had dug, biting into the arm of Godzilla, attempt to pull him over to the ground.
But it seemed that this attack was vastly miscalculated. The teeth carved into the skin of Godzilla, but neither did they cause enough damage to be considered heavy, nor were the 50.000 tons of Zilla comparable to Godzilla, who weight almost double that. With one easy motion of the arm, he flung his opponent to the side, essentially backhanding the creature into the ground. It rolled over, landing on its mouth in the sand.
The shake from that collision finally got Maddie to push the baby forwards. The moment they were in the Osprey it started taking off, which caused the two to stumble onto the floor, luckily Mark caught her before she got hurt, the baby landed safely on her lap with its head. At least they were inside. In the state of fear that it was, the baby Godzilla nuzzled up to Maddie, and close its eyes, shivering. She felt how its heart was racing.
"What a way to come into this world." She breathed out deeply and also closed her eyes for a short moment. Before the Osprey flew up high into the sky and away over the ocean, they witnessed the rest of the battle.
Madison looked upon Godzilla surrounded by flames, his roar echoing in her ears as the ramp finally closed. While she was sitting there, covered in the red light of an Osprey once more. She wasn't sure what to think.
Godzilla readied up another atomic breath, signified with the hum of his dorsal plates lighting up. In order to not get wipe from the face of the earth, Zilla had pull itself forward with its long arms, basically crawling around on all fours, before pushing itself up to sprint to side, narrowly avoiding the atomic breath as it hit the ground.
He kept up firing after it, cutting a path of destruction into the landscape. Only making short breaks in-between the attack to late oxygen fill his lungs again.
The nimble impostor was able to outrun his death sentence by a hair, its mobility being its one true advantage. It looked forward, running towards the ocean, leaned downward to gain momentum and with one long jump, dived right into the cold waters of the sea.
Back in its element, it swiftly swam down to the bottom, grabbing onto the ocean floor with its claws, putting distance between it and the king of the monsters as far as it could, making its escape into the depths, becoming fully quiet, as the thunder and fury above kept roaring.
Now for the first official chapter, I hope you enjoyed it!
When this comes out, its still the 18th of april for me, which means its my birthday. And I thought it'd be appropriate to have the chapter about the newly born baby Gojira be on the same date as it. I hope I can bring out the next chapters as quickly as this one, I feel very motivated to write again. Love, Maddie.