Greg Cox - Godzilla - The Official Movie Novelization

He wondered if he would see his Mom and Dad again.

But a loud, whirring noise intruded on his hard won serenity. He frowned as the noise grew louder and more insistent, dragging him back into the world. His eyes, which had closed without him even noticing, flickered. He tilted his head back in annoyance.

What the hell?

Bizarrely, a voice called out to him, so faintly that it might just be a dream:

“… uuuu…”

Ford stirred, annoyed by the disturbance. A glaring white light shone into his eyes, forcing him to look away. He listened again for the unlikely voice. Had he actually heard something or had he just imagined it?

“… uuuuten…”

There it was again! Squinting into the glare, he saw a blurry object sweeping through the light. He tried to focus, but the blur wouldn’t stay put. It was there and gone, there and gone, there and gone. Like the tip of a helicopter rotor!

“LIEUTENANT!”

The voice shouted over the spinning rotors. The chopper’s backwash whipped up the air above the deck, scattering the splintered remains of the truncated cabin. Hundreds of empty shell casings danced atop the deck. Blinking in confusion, Ford dimly glimpsed a figure leaning out the chopper’s side-door, a megaphone before his lips.

“LIEUTENANT!”

The rescue ‘copter kept pace above the boat. Gloved hands seized Ford and looped his arms into a vest. Only half-conscious, he vaguely registered being lifted from the bloody deck of the boat into the light. Skilled hands hoisted him aboard the chopper, which immediately swung around and sped back toward the bay as fast as humanly possible. Slumped in the crew compartment behind the cockpit, he stared numbly back at the ocean.

The last thing he saw, before passing out, was a tremendous flash of light miles behind them. Night briefly turned into day.

A mushroom cloud rose above the Pacific.

Dawn found the devastated city on the road to recovery.

Fire crews worked tirelessly to douse fires, leaving blackened husks behind. Rescue workers helped shell-shocked citizens from the subway tunnels under the city. Volunteers scoured the wreckage for survivors. Emergency vehicles, their sirens blaring, braved the surviving streets. Helicopters airlifted casualties to neighboring hospitals. There was already talk of a website and televised concert to raise money for disaster relief. The president was supposed to be on his way.

Down by the waterfront, crowds of people began to gather near the prostrate body of Godzilla, coming to see the great beast for themselves. National Guards kept the onlookers at a distance, while TV journalists and camera crews reported live from the scene. Wandering amidst the other pilgrims, Serizawa overheard snatches of the reporters’ spiels.

“In a city spared from fallout by prevailing winds, many feel another force of nature protected them today…”

“Gathering here to witness the fallen creature in what may well be its death throes…”

Serizawa contemplated the downed leviathan, feeling privileged to be able to behold Godzilla in the flesh, after devoting much of his life to merely studying reports of such creatures. Even sprawled atop the demolished piers, appearing barely alive, the formidable mega-saurian was humbling to behold. Serizawa found it hard to believe that such as Godzilla could truly expire from his injuries, and yet there was a skeleton buried in the Philippines that proved that even the mightiest of predators was mortal. Death, too, was part of Nature’s grand design.

Was he truly witnessing the passing of a legend?

Blocks away, volunteers were excavating a buried BART station. A neighboring building had collapsed on top of the subway entrance, all but entombing it. Collapsed and flooded tunnels had made reaching the station a challenge. It was unclear whether there were any survivors left below, but the crew hauled away the heavy wreckage, just in case. The leader of the crew was growing increasingly skeptical of their chances of rescuing anyone, but then, over the grunting of the workers and the incessant wailing of the sirens, he thought he heard something.

“QUIET!” he shouted.

A hush fell over the site. Straining his ears, he heard it again: a babble of voices calling faintly from beneath the rubble. The crew reacted immediately, clearing away the debris as fast as they could. Hope and excitement lent strength to their efforts. A huge chunk of fallen masonry was rolled out of the way, leaving only a layer of smaller rubble behind.

A hand thrust up from the ruins, reaching for the light.

News footage from the city played on the Jumbotron screen at Oakland Coliseum across the bay from San Francisco. A caption along the bottom of the screen identified Godzilla as the “King of Monsters.”

Sounds about right , Ford thought.

He and Sam wandered through the crowded stadium, which had been repurposed to serve as an emergency relief center for thousands of injured and displaced survivors. Ford cradled Sam in his arm while limping on a crutch. His twisted ankle had swollen up badly, but Ford couldn’t sit still, not until he found out what had happened to Elle. A grateful Admiral Stenz had offered to see that Ford and Sam got whatever care they needed, but Ford had insisted on being transported to the Coliseum so he could look for Elle. This was where they were bringing the bulk of the refugees, so this was where he needed to be. Bruised and bandaged, he searched the teeming stadium, looking in vain for his missing wife.

The bomb didn’t go off downtown , he reminded himself. She could have survived.

He circled back to the Coliseum’s main entrance, where a fresh crop of survivors appeared to have arrived. Dozens of dazed men and women staggered into the stadium, while others had to be transported by stretchers, gurneys, or wheelchairs. Thick layers of dirt and ash coated the new arrivals, obscuring their identities. Ford peered past the blood and soot masking the strangers. What if he missed Elle because he didn’t recognize her right away?

He was hardly the only person desperately searching for a lost loved one. A ragged mob of survivors waited behind cordons, anxiously scanning the faces of the survivors. A lucky few had their prayers answered. Calling out the names of friends and family, they pushed their way through the crowds to be reunited with husbands, wives, children, parents, or whoever else they had been worried sick about. Tears of joy streamed from faces, people hugged each other deliriously. It was like the “Welcome Home!” reception at the Air Force base a few days ago, only twice as heart-rending. Until this moment, none of these people had even known if the other was still alive.

Ford was happy for them, but he envied them as well. He gazed down at Sam, who looked crushed by the fact that his mom did not appear to be among the arriving refugees. The naked anxiety and disappointment on his son’s face tore at Ford’s heart. Sam’s tiny fingers clutched the toy soldier he had rescued from Japan. Father and son had both come through the crisis intact, more or less, and found their way back to each other, but there was still a gaping hole in their family.

Where are you, Elle?

His ankle killing him, Ford turned away from the cordon, looking for someplace he and Sam could rest until the next batch of the survivors arrived. He began to limp toward a first-aid station, hoping to secure them a spare cot. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a decent night’s sleep.

“MOMMY!”

Sam’s jubilant cry electrified Ford. He spun around, almost afraid to hope.

The boy leapt from Ford’s arms and charged into the crowd. Ford was briefly alarmed, afraid that he would lose Sam in the crush, but then Elle emerged from the mob, dirty and disheveled, but walking on her own two legs. Sam sprang into her arms and she hugged him close, laughing and crying at the same time. Lifting her eyes, she spotted Ford limping toward them. A radiant smile shone through the soot and dust soiling her beautiful face.