Creation began on 12-13-22

Creation ended on 07-12-24

Godzilla: The Planet Eater

Both Must Fall: Future Symbiosis

The Hollow Earth, once a place thought to be nothing more than a myth, a dream and a fantasy…was no longer any of these things. It was a place that was defined by its only absolute: It was a location that truly exists. Because its location was now verified, it was impossible to discredit those that had believed in it, had seen it…and were seeing right now. Not even a former soldier of the military could be disbelieved.

"It's almost like two different worlds inhabiting the same space," said Yuko as the ship continued to fly around, recording everything they saw. "Oh!"

"What is it?" Haruo asked her and saw her point to something outside.

"A Titanus Kong! A Kong! Right there!" She expressed, and Haruo looked out where she pointed, seeing the Titan.

"Incredible."

It was a Kong, but it was small, about fifty feet in height, knuckle-running across the terrain. It had to have been young, maybe a kid no different from a small child, just big enough to overlook some trees nearby. One of Monarch's discoveries about Titanus Kong was the likelihood that the one from Skull Island had been the last of his kind, as nobody had ever seen more of his species. But now…it was possible that this would have to be updated and looked at more to be sure.

Haruo looked away from the Titan…and saw at least five more running after it, all around the same size and with various shades of hair color, ranging from brown to dark gray.

"Yuko," he went, "what does Monarch have on Kong's species?"

"Only what they were able to research from the only one that knew of at the time," she stated. "He was the only one of his kind, possibly the last of his kind. He lived on Skull Island for ages, viewed as a god by the Iwi, the people that lived on the island with him at the time. Beyond this and the understanding that his species and Godzilla's species had a personal conflict based on their positions as alpha Titans, there's nothing else that can be said about Kong. Besides the fact that he was viewed as a king to Godzilla's sense of godhood."

"But what is a king to a god?"

"A god is one that has power from the start of their life. A king is one that has to rise up and fight for power."

Flash. The two saw something in the air that got their attention for a second.

"Did anyone else see that?" Haruo asked the crew.

"Yeah," a man responded. "It looked like…a signal flare."

"How is that possible?" Another man questioned.

Flash. They looked…and saw two more flares.

-x-

"…But is it possible that there are people alive in the Hollow Earth?" Mori questioned.

"We won't know for sure until Sakaki and Tani have reported in," responded Adam. "For now, all we can understand is that their ship reported seeing three lights in the air that resembled signal flares, which indicates the possibility of intelligent life."

"If there are people living in the Hollow Earth, it's a miracle that they were able to survive for over twenty-thousand years," added Metphies, intrigued by such a possibility of humanity's survival and adaptation in the face of adversity due to the false Godzilla.

"But in a place where radiation is everywhere and where creatures are capable of growing to colossal heights?" Another man questions.

"Mankind has always found ways to adapt and survive, even in a place where survival seems unlikely," Martin states, "and if Monarch's notes are true, human beings used to thrive in the Hollow Earth before leaving to the surface world."

-x-

It was unlike anything they had expected to see when they followed the flares to where they were fired. The mere sight of it was like taking a step back through time. There was…a series of small buildings forming a ring of sorts that had to be at least eighty-five kilometers. Each building had to be at least three stories in height, some one or two stories, and there were these…creatures either emerging from or submerging into this large lake that resembled large bulls with large humps.

"I don't believe it," Haruo expresses.

"Believe it," Yuko tells him.

"There's more," one of the other crew members expresses as she looks at a console showing a scan of the buildings. "There are people down there. A lot of people. Not a million, but more than three-hundred-thousand. There are people living in the Hollow Earth."

The ship found a clearing and set down on it.

Haruo and Yuko were the first to disembark and set foot on the ground. The air was breathable and the ground was stable. But the next sight they saw was one they couldn't believe without further elaboration. The building in front of them bore the Monarch insignia, indicating that these buildings had been built by the organization that searched for, studied and preserved whatever members of the Titans that they could. In front of them, at least five people came from the buildings and halted before moving closer.

"None of us believed it at first," a man utters to them, "but here you are. And if you're down here, then…then it must mean something changed up there, right?"

"We were dealing with a creature we thought was Godzilla," Haruo responds, eased at the fact that this man could be understood, "but we were misled due to lack of information and reeducation of the Titans, learning that Godzilla was impersonated by a plant creature that made itself resemble the Titan and usurped the position of alpha from him. It was recently killed and the Titans have taken back control of the surface."

"How many years have passed up there?"

"More than twenty-thousand years," Yuko reveals.

"Twenty-thousand… Is that really how long it's been up there?" A woman questions. "We've been living down here for almost forty-two years."

"Forty-two years down here…and twenty-thousand years up there… How is this possible?" Haruo wonders.

"The Hollow Earth portals have space-time distortions," the woman reveals. "It's been known to happen at random points in time. Sometimes, people are flung further into the future, and other times, they end up in the past. Monarch had yet to understand how this works before we gathered whoever we could to get away from the creature that perverted Godzilla."

For Haruo, this was still a miracle. The fact that there were people alive down here…and that for them, only less than half a century had gone by. And with the Titans now reclaiming the world, it meant that the people could return to the surface of the Earth and rebuild their world.

-x-

The report from Haruo and Yuko about the Hollow Earth was another revelation that impressed the rest of the crew of the Aratrum. Not only were there people living down there, but for them, a total of forty-two years had passed since Godzilla had been defeated and usurped of his position as the alpha Titan by the false Godzilla. There was more to learn about the Titans than they had previously discovered. In addition to the Houtua, there was a tribe that lives in the Hollow Earth known as the Iwi, and they were a race of people that, apparently, predated all other known races from the Egyptians, Sumerians, Hittites and Aztecs…and were still alive today. It was an amazing find.

"I feel like we're going to be learning many things for years now," Mori says in awe.

"So much to learn from the past," utters a woman behind him. "But we have time now."

-x-

"…Yep," expresses a woman to Haruo and Yuko as they were introduced to the leader of the Great Apes, "this is Kong. King Kong."

The Titan was over three-hundred feet, covered from head-to-toe in scars, and sporting a prosthetic upper tooth on the left side of its mouth. From the files preserved from the sub, they had learned that Kong was a male Titan and had likely been alive for tens of thousands of years and was the only Titan that had a close relationship with humans. Beside Kong on his left was an orange-colored Kong that seemed almost grown up and had a small scar over its right eye. And beside him on his right was a large, quadruped reptile with white and blue scales and what looked like crystals growing out of its back down to its tail.

"Who are they?" Yuko asks the woman.

"The one on the left is Suko," she reveals. "And the one on the right is Shimo, an ancient Titan that once caused an ice age in the past."

"An ice age? Shimo?" Haruo questions; if this creature was able to cause an ice age, he wonders why these people didn't try to use it to face the false Godzilla and stop it. "Why…didn't you try to use Shimo to stop the doppelgänger Godzilla?"

"We couldn't," she explains. "Shimo still has a negative history due to a previous dominance by a member of the Great Apes that exploited her. After Skar King's defeat, Kong became the new leader of the Great Apes and took custody of Shimo. Shimo is…underdeveloped in terms of personality and relationships."

"Skar…King?" Yuko says.

"A ruthless and dangerous ape that ruled the Kongs through violence and death. He controlled Shimo through pain ever since the last ice age. That's not something one forgets, even after just a few decades. The Titans have a greater recollection of events than humans due to being millions of generations older than mankind."

"So, Titans are…just as emotionally complex and vulnerable as humans are?" Yuko asks.

"Yes."

"How are you able to live down here with so many of these Titans roaming around?" Haruo questions, seeing some flying above their heads in the air.

"We're just part of the food chain," the man says. "A great man once said that if we're to survive, we would need to find ways to coexist with the Titans. In the past, we did coexist with them. To this day, we're living beside them in their world. The Titans were worshipped in the past as gods, both the Titans viewed as destroyers and the ones viewed as protectors, each capable of maiming and healing the planet."

-x-

Godzilla swam across the ocean towards a glacier in the northern hemisphere, seeing several flying-type Servum in the air, numbering in the triple digits. He got the impression that they were here for the same thing he was here for. There were at least eight Titans hiding here, and each one held the same trace of limited energy due to the sky still clearing up after the defeat of the usurper that tried to kill him. His best guess is that once he was injured and forced to retreat, some of the others were forced to hide wherever they could and just pray that the usurper would never find them. But that was then…and this was now.

He had returned. He had retaken his position as the alpha of all of them, and he needed their aid to restore the planet to its proper state and they would all be rid of the usurper's stain. The Hollow Earth was the only place it couldn't take possession of because it was sealed off from the surface world, cutting the two environments off from one another until the threat was finally eliminated…and the true rulers of the world reclaimed it for the sake of their survival. It was theirs once more…and there was no room for those unwilling to share it with others that lived in it and contributed to its existence in a benevolent manner.

Charging his breath, he unleashed his wrath upon the Servum…and reduced their numbers down to at least half of what they were in the beginning.

To be continued…

A/N: This was overdue, I know. A lot of chapters are overdue. The real world is becoming increasingly harder to find stability in, what with all the political BS that people are spewing every single day because of their complaints and who they want to win an election against whoever. I just hope that I'll still be around when the dust settles, and I can get back to my joyful days. Hope you enjoy this chapter until the next one.