In 3 parts, it chronicles the first decade of the emergence of Kaiju into the world of men. Cities are destroyed and countries are brought to their knees as man and monster battle each other for supremacy.
This is a prequel work to the Godzilla|Mar...
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THE MODERN KAIJU ERA
Part 1:
"Dawn of the Age of Monsters"
By: 2nd Lt. Anthony Hicks,
United States Army
"They say the Age of Monsters (AoM) began in 1954, when Godzilla left Tokyo, Japan a smoldering wasteland of destruction and death. Others call 1954 the beginning of the Second AoM, since all the evidence seems to suggest that before Man, and even a bit after, the Kaiju ruled the Earth in ancient times. Some even say that we have always lived in the AoM; we just exist on the planet by their good graces. Well I say damn their 'good graces', because for me, the Age of Monsters began in 1953, in the greatest city in the world.
Growing up on Staten Island, I had the same fascination with the giant monsters roaming around as any other little boy. I had all the toys, read all the comics. My friends had their favorite ones, like Rodan, Godzilla, and all the giant creatures in the southwest, a result of the nuclear tests. But my favorite was one I considered to be a hometown boy. True he immigrated, but isn't New York City the place for that sort of thing?
In 1953, the unimaginatively named: "operation: Experiment" was conducted far north of the Arctic Circle, and was another in the series of tests to understand the effects of Nuclear explosions. How could they be expected to know that they would unleash a creature straight out of mythology, and usher in 60 years of worldwide conflict between man and monster? History may forgive them, but I wonder if they ever forgave themselves
In any case, the Rhedosaurus then freed from eons of icy imprisonment, made it's way southward, following the eastern coast of North America, causing millions of dollars in damages and taking about a dozen lives in separate assaults on commercial ships and coastal settlements. The Paleontologist Thurgood Elson, who had used eyewitness testimony to identify the animal using depictions of fossilized creatures found in the region.
Tracking it to the Hudson River canyon, Professor Elson was killed when the beast swallowed the diving bell he had used to observe the creature at a depth. Soon after, the Rhedosaurus came ashore in Manhattan in a rampage that killed a hundred and eighty people, injured 1500 more, and caused over 300 million in damages. In the process of repelling the monster, the army had drawn its blood, which unleashed something just as destructive, a prehistoric contagion. Pictures I saw of the sick in history books as a kid still give me nightmares, hundreds of people crammed into hospital wards because of the fear of the thing returning. Whole families sitting together, with blood leaking from their eyes, and their lips swollen and covered with hardened barnacle-like growths.
When it was finally killed, taking Coney Island down in a blaze of glory with it, I think the entire country felt a wave of relief. New York newspapers, the sensationalist rags they ever were, plastered the title: "The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms" across their headlines. I guess 'Rhedosaurus' wasn't eye-catching enough to be above the fold. It was that same moniker that I looked at every weekend me and the boys went to Coney Island, where the bronze statue of the monster still stands today.
