Emily tilted her head so she could look outside the window and see the mech looming over her house. “Speaking of my eternal guardian, have you talked to dad about moving the robot?”
Kate shrugged. “He wants to keep it there so you have somewhere to run to if a kaiju attacks.”
Emily shook her head. “No, he likes to keep it there to intimidate Sean. Nothing says welcome to the family like a giant robot watching over him all the time he’s with me. Plus, we are at the southernmost spot in the settlement. Ramrod will either attack a lesser mutant or run past us if a more powerful monster is coming.”
Kate smiled. “I promise I’ll keep working on your dad, and he does really like Sean. Ramrod is another story with him. He still worries that the giant sheep will attack you one day. So, he likes having the mech where it is, so that you have a safe place to run to.” She laughed. “And I’m sure in your dad’s mind, a little bit to scare Sean.”
Kate then reached in and grabbed her daughter’s hands. “Now enough about the settlement, monsters, and robots. How are you doing? Are you ready for your wedding?”
Emily smiled. “Yeah, mom. All good to go. Pretty much everyone in the settlement will be there and they all want to help out. We have people who want to cook, people who want to set up games, people with guitars and other instruments who want to play music. It will be great fun for everyone and a really happy day for me and Sean.”
Kate smiled at her daughter. While she had tried to comfort Chris’ worries about Emily not having a traditional wedding, she too felt for her daughter in that respect. Like all mothers, she wanted her daughter to live as happy a life as possible and she wanted her wedding to be picture perfect. It wasn’t until this minute that she realized in Emily’s eyes her wedding would be picture perfect and maybe even a more enjoyable experience than most brides had before the kaiju.
Kate realized that Emily had never been to a wedding as a young girl, she had never seen one on TV or a movie, she had no concept of how big and extravagant they could be. While all of the benefits of the weddings were unknown to Emily, so were the stresses of making sure everything looked just right, making sure everyone was in the right place at the right time, dealing with family drama about who could sit next to who, who was allergic to what food, what her cake would look like. Emily had been born and grew up in a world where survival and the people you loved were all that mattered. In Emily’s mind, she was going to marry the man she loved with all of her friends and family there. That was all she knew and that was all that mattered to her.
Kate was also aware that, as popular as Emily was as a leader in the settlement and Sean was for being a farmer, that their wedding meant a lot to the people in their community. Pretty much everyone in the settlement loved Emily and Sean and their wedding was a chance to celebrate. In a world where trying not to get eaten by monsters or starve to death were real daily concerns, things like holidays and vacations had simply slipped away.
People had neither the reason nor really the time to celebrate. Sean and Emily’s wedding would give them that reason. While not the first couple to be married in the settlement or even the first children born after the kaiju to be married, they were the first couple who represented the first generation of leaders in the community to be married. Children who had been born, grown up in this world, rose to pivotal positions, and were on the precipice of becoming leaders who the people around them could look to up to and aspire to be like.
Emily and Sean’s wedding was proof that humanity could still exist in this world. They also represented a brighter future for everyone. Kate, Chris and other community leaders had done their best to find a way for people to live and be happy in this new world but they would always be connected to the world they had come from, the world before the kaiju.
Emily, Sean, and Kyle’s generation knew nothing but this world. The world of the kaiju was their world. They would do a much better job of leading people forward in it than Chris and Kate ever could.
Even if they could not verbalize these thoughts directly, the people in the settlement all saw Emily’s wedding as a symbolic and massive step forward into this new world for all humanity. For the first time in a long time, the people had a reason to celebrate and they had reached the point where they had the time and resources to do so.
Kate was filled with pride as she looked at the young woman who was the baby she had held in her arms. She tried to tell Emily how proud she was of her but her eyes filled up with tears before she could talk.
Emily saw her mom crying and her face was filled with concern. She reached over and wrapped her arms around her mother. “Mom, are you okay? What’s wrong?”
Kate hugged her daughter back. “Nothing, I’m just so happy, and I’m just so proud of you.”
Emily hugged her mother harder. “You’re crying because you’re happy? I don’t understand.”
Kate sobbed into her daughter’s shoulder. “I know baby, people your age have never been able to experience being so happy that they cried. It’s something that was a luxury when your dad and I were young.”
Emily nodded as she kept hugging her mother. “Okay, and you're also crying because you're proud of me. Proud of me for what? I’m just getting married.”
Kate nodded. “All mothers are proud of their daughters when they get married. The reason I’m so filled with pride that I’m crying is because you are giving people a reason to cry again out of happiness, and I can’t tell you how proud that makes me. Because I can’t tell you in words, I have to show you and the only way my brain can think to do that is to cry.”
Emily squeezed her mother. “I love you, mom.”
Kate squeezed her daughter back. “I love you too, baby. More than you will ever know. Also, even if I can’t put into words how proud I am of you, know that no mother has ever been prouder of a daughter than I am of you.”
After several more minutes, the two women finally let go of their embrace. Kate wiped her eyes. “I have to meet your father for our regular sweep of the area with Steel Samurai 2.0. Kyle thinks we should extend our regular sweeps farther out to sea and he also found a distortion he needs us to check out.”
Emily’s eyes went wide. “An anomaly! Like the one the Atomic Rex disappeared into and then popped back out of later?”
Kate nodded and placed her hand on her daughter’s shoulder. “Yes, but don’t worry about Atomic Rex. Our last satellite image of him still showed him in South America, far away from us and with plenty of food around. The anomaly was definitely not Atomic Rex and in fact Kyle thinks it was likely a glitch in the system. I don’t think it’s anything for you to worry about.”
She looked down at all the plans for the settlement Emily had out in front of her. “I’d ask if you can take care of things in the settlement for me while I’m gone but I can see you’re already on top of everything.” She bent over and kissed her daughter on the head. “I love you, Emily.”
She smiled. “I love you too, mom. Tell dad I love him as well and tell him to park his mech somewhere that’s not looming over my house.”
Both women laughed as Kate walked out of the house and headed in the direction of Steel Samurai 2.0.
Kate had just walked out of the house when Emily called out to her. “Hold on, Mom! If dad is heading out to Steel Samurai 2.0, he will probably pass Sean on his way to feed Ramrod. I want to make sure he didn’t give my fiancé too hard a time about feeding that damn monster as dad would say.”
Chapter 7
Lacandon Jungle, Mexico
Gurral had to shield his eyes the moment that he stepped out of the portal. He had been accustomed to the dimly lit cool interior of the arena and his quarters. Now he suddenly found himself in the middle of a sweltering jungle with a sun shining brightly down on him. As he shielded his eyes and began to sweat, the Smasher caught a glimpse of the cameras that were hovering around him. He knew they were sending the feed of what he was doing back to the Arena Lords and the fans.
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sp; The giant gladiator ignored the cameras, muttered under his breath about too much heat and a bad deal, and then got to work. Gurral surveyed the endless greenery around him, and thought to himself, “That arena shrimp said that I’d run into lots of nasty monsters once I got here.” Gurral could see for miles around him in every direction, but no matter how much time he spent soaking in the intense heat and scanning the horizon, he saw nothing but the seemingly endless tree canopy. “It’s nasty, sure, but no monsters no matter which way I look.” Not being known for his patience, the colossal combatant threw his fists into the air. “Come on out! Let’s go! I ain’t got all day!”
Several birds took to the sky as Gurral bellowed out his challenge, but aside from leaves waving from a slight breeze, nothing responded. The Smasher sighed and began thundering through the jungle, intentionally causing as much noise and damage as possible to draw out something worth fighting. Leaving a trail would also make it easier for his target to find him when it realized he was around, and the sooner that happened and he could get out of this heat, the better.
Sweat poured off the gargantuan gladiator’s body as he continued to trudge through the intense tropical heat and thick, viny jungle. While walking, his thoughts remained fixed on the promises of the Arena Lord who had recently spoken to him. He had the chance to enjoy a life of relaxation with no more fighting, plenty of food, and a supply of the dust every day. He just had to go out there, drop a beating on this replacement champion and anyone else that got in the way, then hit ol’ Rexy with the zapper, and it’d be naps and gravy from here on out for Gurral. The arena champion sighed a little as he spoke to himself. “The arena ain’t the worst. Good food, and lots of exercise, but let me choose and I’m taking retirement with free dust for life.”
As Gurral continued to make his way through the forest hunting for Atomic Rex or anything else worth a scrap, the gladiator was unaware that something was hunting him.
The hover-cams that were following the Smasher noticed the disturbance well before he did, and the spectators throughout the universe watching on pay-per-fight leaned forward in anticipation. As Gurral made his way through the jungle, a wave of movement in the leaves of the trees he walked through seemed to follow him. The farther Gurral went through the jungle, the more the wave expanded its reach. It was no longer just the leaves at the tops of the trees that seemed to have a ripple of movement; soon the very trees themselves seemed to be animated by some unseen force as they leaned in Gurral’s direction after he passed by them.
The Arena Lords’ cameras flew down to get a closer look at the wave of motion in the plant life that seemed to be following Gurral. As the cameras swooped in for a closer look, their lenses zoomed in on the plant life, and their advanced imaging was able to inspect it down to a microscopic level. The hover-cams continued to increase their focus on the foliage, and soon they zeroed in on countless microbes moving along the trees, ferns, grasses, and flowers that made up the jungle floor.
Years ago, the True Kaiju known as Tortiraus had settled into the Florida Everglades, and the shelled monstrosity’s radiation had seeped into the flora that inhabited the swamp. The radiation given off by the acid spewing giant snapping turtle caused the microbes in the Everglades to form a collective consciousness. The microbes found that together they could take over other forms of plant life and bend it to their will, causing it to take any form they chose.
The microbes had inherited two traits from their unknowing father. The first was a variation of Tortiraus’ acid spewing ability. While the microbes were unable to spew acid like their progenitor, every cell of the collective colony was constantly coated in that same highly caustic acid. This in effect gave any construct the microbes created a deadly acidic touch that could dissolve through almost any organic tissue. The second trait the microbes had inherited from Tortiraus was an insatiable need to consume flesh.
When the microbes had first started taking shape and attacking towns near the Everglades, absorbing everything from wildlife and cattle to pets and humans into its mass, the floronic nightmare was given the name Marsh-Thing. As the rest of the kaiju took over North America, Marsh-Thing made its way north in order to avoid conflict with its father. The collective creature had made its way into the wetlands of Egg Harbor, New Jersey, where it encountered and battled Atomic Rex.
Marsh-Thing had nearly slain Atomic Rex when the True Kaiju unleashed his Atomic Wave, scattering the microbes that comprised Marsh-Thing in every direction. The microbes slowly made their way back out into the Atlantic Ocean where they reformed into a floating island of acidic algae that consumed any creature that mistakenly swam into it.
For years, Marsh-Thing drifted up and down the coast of North America ingesting fish, sea birds, giant mutants, and even other kaiju until it was strong enough to make landfall in Mexico. The creature then moved along plant life until it made its way to the Lacandon Jungle where it slowly took over every inch of the flora there. With the entire jungle under its thrall, Marsh-Thing was not only an apex predator; it was a god.
Gurral felt a slight burning sensation around his feet and he looked down to see the trees around his knees wrapping their branches and even their emerging roots around his legs. A second later that slight burning sensation changed into a painful searing attack as Marsh-Thing’s acidic touch soaked the Smasher’s feet, shins, and knees. Gurral roared in anguish as layers of skin were dissolved from his legs.
Gurral tried to bear the pain and trudge out of this patch of aggressive plant-life when he saw the trees in front of him condensing into an ever-growing clump that soon rivaled the Smasher himself in size. Marsh-Thing continued to pull plant life into itself as it formed into a thick pillar-like shape. The pillar undulated as long vines formed a series of tentacles and claw like extensions that protruded from its bulk. The newly formed tentacles and claws shot out from the pillars and attached themselves to Gurral. Dozens of green tentacles wrapped themselves around Gurral’s body while the claws clamped down on the Smasher’s neck and wrists.
With the exception of the areas of the Smasher’s body that were encased in Impervium, wherever Marsh-Thing touched, skin melted away. Gurral’s body was wracked with burning pain as his eyes widened, the red in them grew brighter, and he growled his promise of payback. “You are gonna wish you hadn’t done that!”
Gurral then lifted his right leg into the air with such force that he tore out the plant life Marsh-Thing was controlling by the roots. He then swung his free leg through the roots and tree trunks wrapped around his left leg, smashing them as if they were twigs. Gurral yanked his captured hands down with immense force, ripping apart the claws that held them. He then reached up and used the spiked protrusion on his knuckles to cut through the claw wrapped around his throat. As the final claw fell from his now scarred neck, Gurral used the spikes jutting from his wrists to cut through the vines wrapped around his torso.
As the vines fell to the ground, Gurral looked down at the painful welts and burned-away patches of skin now covering his body. The monster shifted his attention toward the pillar of living foliage and he could see from the movement of the trees around it that Marsh-Thing was pulling more plant life into itself in order to renew its attack.
Gurral shook his head as he yelled, “You got your shot. Now it’s my turn!” The Smasher charged forward with a speed that belied his massive size and weight. With one punch, he shattered the top half of the pillar of plants that Marsh-Thing had constructed, and a swing of his other fist destroyed the lower half. With the pillar reduced to splinters, Gurral turned his attention to the still moving plant life beneath his feet. The gladiator bellowed as he stomped into the trees beneath him until they were nothing but sap and sawdust.
Gurral saw two of the hover-cams fly in front of him and wait expectantly. Knowing that the spectators back on Arena World had watched his confrontation, the veteran gladiator threw his hands into the air and roared in victory as if he had just won a battle in the Arena. He didn’t
feel that he had won a great victory. It was just a plant, but when you were trained from early on in your gladiating career to always boost the excitement in the room, you did your best to play to the crowd.
As he was posing for the cameras, dozens more tentacles and claws created from the jungle itself sprang up from the trees around the Smasher and wrapped themselves around his torso. The exposed areas of the arena champion’s skin were once more burning in the grip of Marsh-Thing’s acidic touch.
Gurral grunted in surprised pain as Marsh-Thing pulled him to the ground, and he thought, “So much for it being just a plant.” The moment that Gurral hit the jungle floor, a wave of moving trees enveloped him. The only saving grace for the Smasher was that the majority of the trees were wrapping themselves around the impenetrable carapace that covered his back. That did little to soothe the enveloped gargantuan as the areas of his skin and nerves that weren’t armored were flooding his mind with agony as they dissolved and sloughed off. Gurral knew that if he didn’t break free from Marsh-Thing within a few minutes, the only thing left of him would be his Impervium-infused bones.
Taking a deep breath, Gurral grunted with effort and rolled to his side despite the thick tangles that strained to keep him in place. Gurral’s roll tore out roots and crushed trees with each rotation of his body. The armored giant continued rolling for several acres until he had destroyed enough plant life to loosen Marsh-Thing’s hold on him to the point where he could stand. Gurral regained his footing and quickly ripped off the remaining vines that were still searing his flesh. As he tore away the final writhing strands of animated trees and plant life from his body, Gurral looked down to see the jungle once again moving and coalescing around his feet.
Atomic Rex: Challenge of Gurral Page 6
