Author: Joshua Reynolds | Banner: Joshua Reynolds

In the desolate remains of the devastated city, the frozen Godzilla stood like a monument of sin. Decades’ worth of nuclear waste had given rise to a life form beyond that of human comprehension. And yet, humanity was forced to face its own creation. Not only did they face it, but they defeated it. But the city in which this fierce battle was waged would be a ghost town for at least another year. The beast’s radiation would be toxic to anything there. But even now, all eyes were on the behemoth they called “Godzilla.”

And it was on this day, but 385 days after his supposed death, the demon began to awaken. The petrified skin began to flake off like egg shell. A reddish glow began to spread across his colossal body like volcanic blood veins. The devil’s eyes opened, revealing soulless, black pupils. His mouth parted, unleashing the bellow that shook an entire world to its core.

Godzilla had revived.

Immediately, sirens across the empty city of Tokyo began to blast. Clocks began to count down for a nuclear detonation from the United States. The world couldn’t risk the advent of Godzilla once more.

The lumbering giant turned his body and his unnaturally long tail danced slowly behind him. His eyes focused, looking toward the sea. His home. Godzilla’s movement was slow but steady. Streets collapsed under his titanic weight, sinking his clawed feet into subway and sewer systems. Buildings fell like house of cards around him, avalanching his lower torso in debris. And still, the unnatural being pushed on to return to the sea and advanced his own evolution.

And then he heard it.

It was the cry of something else. Another great creature had risen from the depths. Godzilla stopped, his head slowly tilting to the side. He could see the ocean in the distance and something was rising out of it. A gigantic, blubbery body carried on four paddle-shaped fins began to crawl to the beach. Its reddish-black tinted body shimmered in the sunlight as water fell from its leathery hide. On its face, a short snout filled with many needle-like teeth. Its most prominent feature was its titanic tusks, hanging down on either side of its muzzle.

Maguma’s eyes opened, showing their torques color. The king of the walruses had no idea why he was there, but he was. His mouth opened as wide as it could once more, unleashing another haunting cry.

Godzilla stood motionless, almost like a sentry at guard while Maguma crawled through the beach and into the surrounding streets. Then the walrus saw him. The beast from another age had no idea what drew him here, but upon seeing the unnatural form of Godzilla standing tall, something inside his primitive mind clicked. This was why he was here. The Earth itself had drawn him here to rectify a deadly mistake. The walrus remained low to the ground as he began to crawl toward his target. Godzilla, however, remained unmoving and only watched curiously.

Before long, the primitive kaiju closed the gap. Maguma reared up on its hind flippers, bringing its head up to Godzilla’s chest region. He then thrust down. Despite watching the creature approach, Godzilla was taken by surprise as the tusks plunged into the glowing material of his chest. A torrent of blood began to fall, bubbling and sizzling on the streets. Maguma’s head pulled back and thrust down again, stabbing into Godzilla’s front side once more. And again the walrus did this, only this time Godzilla’s tail lashed out with lightning speed. It snaked around his frame and struck like a whip, striking Maguma’s forehead with an awful sound.

The colossal pinniped gurgled deeply in rage as his head was thrust to the Earth. Godzilla remained unmoving and careless. He lifted a leg and slowly brought it down, claws digging into the blubber behind Maguma’s skull. The walrus’ head was grinded into the debris, but the titan wouldn’t be defeated so easily.

With the frenzy of a primal world, Maguma began to thrash from side to side. It didn’t take long for him to free himself from underneath Godzilla’s heel. Godzilla slowly stumbled back awkwardly as Maguma regained his aggressive stance. His jaws came down around Godzilla’s thigh, teeth sinking into the devil’s radioactive flesh and blood. Godzilla’s sickening cry rang loud as his head looked down at it. His jaws spread wide and split apart. Maguma’s eyes rolled up, catching Godzilla’s gaze just before a shiny membrane encased them. Then, a plume of smoke erupted from the demon’s maw. Immediately, Maguma released his hold. He awkwardly crawled back, hacking and gagging from the thick, radioactive smoke.

Godzilla, however, didn’t cease. Instead this smoke began to ignite in his mouth, turning into a concentrate stream of atomic fire. The smoke then detonated like a bomb, erupting in every direction. The force of the explosion was enough to lift Maguma off of his flippers. He was hurled back, flipping several times in mid-air before being slammed back to the Earth, his body now burnt and smoldering.

Godzilla’s mouth suddenly clamped shut, ending his attack. The membrane of his eyes pulled back, allowing the unearthly thing to gaze upon the destruction he brought. He then spotted Maguma. The walrus was on his side, bleeding badly from wounds on his head and ribcage. However, eons worth of life couldn’t be silenced so quickly. Despite the pain, the Antarctic kaiju rolled over onto his flippers and bared his fangs at the demon.

Countless miles away, in the heart of the Pacific Ocean, a U.S. Cruiser launched its payload. A missile, hundreds of times more powerful than the ones used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, lifted up from the vessel with a trail of smoke and brilliant light following behind it…

Godzilla stepped forward as Maguma began to approach. The titan lunged with surprising speed, jaws biting down on Godzilla’s hand. The mutation’s opposite arm came over, claws scraping across the head and face of the pinniped. Trickles of blood began to flow as the walrus began to gnaw. Godzilla released an unheard scream as the bones in his hand were grinded like hamburger. Godzilla’s membrane once again covered his eye, but this movement caught Maguma’s eye. Just as the leviathan’s jaw split, the walrus released his now mangled hand and leaped up like a hungry crocodile. His mouth came down on the mouth of Godzilla, tusks impaling from the top jaw and through the lower.

The sudden weight caused Godzilla to collapse, dropping to his chest and belly with the arctic kaiju attached to his mouth. Embers of radioactive material began to escape from each side of Godzilla’s face while Maguma’s tusks began to smolder.

Godzilla’s massive tail waved behind them and then came down, cracking against Maguma’s blubbery hide. It took several strikes, but the walrus eventually relented. He pulled his head up, ripping his tusks from Godzilla’s mouth and backed away. Godzilla, however, was near helpless. With a crushed hand and mangled mouth, the mutation struggled to stand.

Maguma took his chance again and pounced, this time landing on the back of Godzilla’s head…

This was a mistake.

Almost instantly, Godzilla’s spines erupted with purple light. Beams of atomic power pierced through Maguma’s body, scorching and incinerating tons of blubber upon impact. The walrus screamed in a mixture of pain and horror as he was launched backward, circular holes carved deeply into his fatty tissue. The primal kaiju groaned and coughed, spitting up wads of blood in the process. Still, something inside of him told him to persist. He began to stagger…

At the same time, Godzilla’s lengthy tail snaked underneath his collapsed body. The limb acted like a spring, pushing Godzilla’s body back to a rightful stance. The leviathan snarled, struggling to open his mouth for a moment until, with a disgusting pop, it opened. Godzilla’s eyes looked upon the struggling form of Maguma with an uncaring stare. He then looked at the distant sea. He began to walk, not looking to waste any more time with Maguma.

Godzilla casually walked past the behemoth. Struggling to remain upright, Maguma’s torques eyes were fixated on the devil’s tail now. As Godzilla moved right past him, Maguma’s jaws parted and bit down on the tip of the tail. Godzilla’s eyes, for the first time, opened wide as a wave of pain bolted through him. Maguma’s teeth and tusks tore through the fleshy material of the tail, spilling blood by the gallon. The tail thrashed, lifting Maguma off of its hind for a brief second and throwing him aside.

As if he were insulted, Godzilla spun around with surprising speed. His tail, now bloodied, waved back and forth behind him before snaking around, the dripping tip pointing at Maguma. A purple glow began to channel from Godzilla’s spines and into the tip.

The walrus quickly regained a fighting stance and growled. His eyes watched as the tip seemed to open up into a bizarre mouth. Then it fired, shooting a single, thin beam of neon purple energy at the pinniped. Maguma leaped to the side with a sudden show of speed, belly flopping the ground just as the beam hit where he once sat. The beam followed his movement, adjusting accordingly.

For some reason, the walrus seemed to know if he was hit by this, it’d be his end. So he continued to dodge it the best he could, but the beam nicked him more than once, cutting through his blubber like a hot knife through butter.

Maguma was growing tired as he landed with a thud once more. He couldn’t do this much more. A walrus’ body wasn’t made to be playing leapfrog. He pounded the ground with his chest once more and kicked with his back flippers, jumping away. But the beam still hit, striking his flipper with a horrible, sizzling sound. As his body was propelled away, the walrus’ flipper remained behind pooling in blood. The ancient kaiju cried aloud in absolute agony

And then, all of a sudden, the beam ceased.

Maguma landed with a hard thump, not knowing what happened as he cried in horror upon sight of where his left flipper once was. But then the realization set in: Godzilla’s beam had stopped. With a soft cry, Maguma looked over. Godzilla remained standing tall, his tail unmoving while still pointing at him. Then, without warning, Godzilla’s head fell to the side. In his blind attempt at slaying the walrus, the abomination had accidentally severed his own head with his beam.

Godzilla’s legs buckled. His arms fell to his side. And then he fell, his tail following behind. Maguma shook his head back and forth and groaned, once again looking down upon his stump of a flipper. With an awkward hobble, he began to drag himself back to the sea. Humanity’s mistake had been rectified by nature.

As he dipped underneath the waves, Godzilla’s severed head showed signs of life. His eyes opened. Movement from the cauterized flesh of the neck began to bulge. Suddenly, spider-like legs erupted from them with a creepy, creaking sound. It was impossible to kill this God incarnate. And as his eyes began to scan the area, the nuclear missile launched prior flew overhead, mere seconds away from detonating…

Winner: Maguma