Zilla V.S. Rodan Chapter 6: Snacks

5:25 a.m.

DING DING DING!!!! “Hey Sa-” Mike stops short, because it’s not his Sargeant that he sees. “Sup.” Says Ryan.  “Wait, the fuck are you guys doing with all that candy? Were you really gonna eat all that and not tell anybody?” Says Rick. “... We can explain!” says Vicky. “Tell it to the Sarge, Vic.” “... Well actually, she already caught us…” says Mike. “... you guys really suck at this.” Says Rick. “Well, at least that explains all the yelling. And the ‘Howdy Bitch! How are you this fine morning?!!!’... only Sarge would do that…” The two laugh, much to the embarassment of Vicky and Mike. Ryan says, “So what are you two guys trying to do here? Netflix and chill?” “Why does everyone keep asking that?” Says Mike. “Look, we’re trying to lift everyone’s spirits up with a movie night, are ya happy? That’s why we bought all this candy and popcorn. And ice cream… which melted…” “Wait, why didn’t you use the mini freezer in the corner?” asks Rick. In annoyance, Vicky says, “Well, hindsight is 20/20, isn’t it?” “... But-” “Listen, let’s just forget about the ice cream or lack thereof, shall we?” Says Mike. “Fine. Well, it seems you have a crap ton of stuff around here.” Says Ryan, gesturing to all the food around them. “We were prepared for everyone to gorge themselves.” Says Mike. “‘Were?’” says Rick, questioningly. “Well… Sarge caught us… She has mixed feelings, so she’s going to go tell the commander.” “Ooh, you guys are in trouble! You guys are in trouble! You guys are in trouble!” Says Ryan. “You guys are in trouble!” Joins in Rick. The two continure this for a few more moments before Vicky butts in, “Oh real fucking mature you bastards!” They all laugh a little, until the moment Vicky and Mike have been dreading comes. DING DING DING!!!! The elevator doors open, revealing Sargeant Enden, who looks quite pissed. “Oh shit.” Says Ryan. “Senat, Xeran, the fuck are you doing here?” Says Sargeant Enden. “... We heard yelling so we came down to-” Explains Ryan. “On second thought, doesn’t matter.” Says Madelyn. “I asked the commander, and he thinks it’s a good idea. He wants to know when you want the movie to play, because he wants to coordinate everything else.” “Really?!!!” asks Mike, in disbelief. “Yup. So, when is it going to be?” “... Um… We never really thought that far…” says Mike. “... You had all this stuff planned… but not when you were going to reveal it?” says Madelyn. “You should ask them what happened to the ice cream.” says Ryan. “Oh shut up!” Says Vicky, indignant. “Wait, what happened to the ice cream?” Asks Madelyn, dreading what they’re going to say. “We didn’t put the ice cream in the mini freezer and it melted…” Says Mike. “Well that’s understandable, I didn’t even know there was a mini freezer down here until-” “Actually Sarge… we did know it was there… we just didn’t put it in there…” says Vicky. “Wait, really?!!!!” says Ryan.

Everyone stays silent for a moment, already knowing that they just incurred their sargeant’s wrath. “... wow… just…. Wow…” Says Madelyn, “I don’t think I’ve ever been so disappointed in anything in my entire life.” “What about… Ma-” “That’s not disappointment, that’s pain and sorrow. Disappointment is what you four embody.” “Wait, what did WE-” “You exist in the same half of the universe as me. That’s enough for ultimate disappointment. You might be asking yourselves, ‘Oh, how disappointed in us can she be?’ You have absolutely no idea what disappointments you are. Imagine finding a bottomless hole in the universe consuming black holes of joy and life in one’s life while also absorbing all disappointment from across the universe. And then someone makes a movie about it where the trailers make it look like and action packed, amazing movie and then it turns out it’s a still shot of the thing. And you can’t even see it. No, you all individually absorb that with your endless disappointment. Imagine a bottomless well of sadness and disappointment. Just putting Mike in there would make it overflow so much that every single one of the infinite universes out there would be instantly destroyed by the disappointment, even ones somehow immune to the power of disappointment! A quantum computer calculating infinitely couldn’t even CONCEIVE the kinds of disappoinments you are!” Everyone stays silent for a moment. Mike tries to break through the silence and says, “... Well… I know we let the ice cream melt, but-” Madelyn interrupts,  “No, no that’s not my main source of disappointment. Sure, that’s a good few thousand years of falling into the bottomless well or a few million years of the computer calculating, but no. That’s not it. It’s not your lack of foresight about any of this scheme of yours, that’s not it either. No, it’s the fact that when I said ‘Oh, that sounds perfectly reasonable and understandable’, you decided to correct me and show what disappointments you are. And it’s not like Ryan or Rick would have corrected you either! They didn’t even fucking realize! AND THAT’S WHY THEY’RE SUCH FUCKING DISAPPOINTMENTS, BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T EVEN BRING UP THE MINI FREEZER AFTER HEARING THE ICE CREAM MELTED!!!! Seriously, if you didn’t know that they knew about the freezer, then you probably never brought it up even though you knew about it! WHICH MEANS YOU WERE CONTENT TO LET THEM DO IT AGAIN!!!!!!!!” Sargeant Enden stops and sighs, with everyone else letting out their breath. “So, when is the movie playing?” “Um… 12:00 p.m.?” Says Vicky, “does that work for you guys?” Everyone murmurs their agreement. “There, now I’m going upstairs to tell the commander the time, and leave out what disappointments you guys are. I’m going to go upstairs for awhile afterwards to handle some shit, so do you guys need anything from up there?” “... No?” “Alright, goodbye.” Madelyn presses the elevator button, and luckily it didn’t go anywhere. She steps in, and heads back up. “... Jesus, she’s acting just like she always does. It’s like yesterday never even happened.” says Vicky. “No, she’s almost never THAT short with us. She rarely ever yell twice in one day, or in a single week,” says Rick. “You guys don’t know what I saw on the helicopter. It’s not that she isn’t affected, it’s that she’s trying to pretend it never happened or only wants to deal with it when Zilla’s been dealt with,” says Ryan. “Um… what exactly did you see on the helicopter?” asks Mike. “... Doesn’t matter. Look, we shouldn’t talk about are Sargeant behind her back. If she catches us doing that… we’ll be aiming to break her record of how many times in one day she’s yelled at us and be in the scariest situation of our lives if we keep doing that. So… what do we have to do within the next 6 hours to get everything ready?” says Ryan. 

6:00 a.m.

12th Floor

Analytics And Information Gathering Department

Taylor Enden stares at the picture at the side of his desk, tears and snot running down his face. Thank god that he works in a cubicle or else he would get embarassing really- “Hey Mr. Enden, want something from the vending machines downstairs? Some assholes came up and took all of the food in our ven-” Mark stops when he sees Taylor. Taylor quickly tries to hide by turning away from Mark. “Um… I’ll take a hot cheetos, please…” “... Sure thing, Taylor…” Mark looks at him with a look one has when they see a group of crying, limping puppies, and leaves. Taylor tries to compose himself and gets back to analyzing all the data and footage they have on the creature- Zilla, as they call it now. He wipes his face with some tissues and throws them into the overflowing waste bin at his feet. Alright Taylor, back to work. There’s families out there that need you right now. He keeps watching the footage of it pulling down the helicopter until he hears more footsteps heading towards his cubicle. “That was fast,” says Taylor, “Wasn’t expecting those cheetos for another-” Taylor stops. “Hey Taylor.” “Maddie! Are you ok?!!” He turns to look at his wife. “I told you, I’m doing fine. Man, you won’t believe what just-” She stops and eyes the waste bin beneath his desk, as well as his red eyes. “Um… Taylor, how are you holding up?” Taylor sighs, and looks down at his feet. He looks at his feet for a long moment before responding, “to be honest… I’d be lying if I said I was doing good. I just… I can’t help looking at it,” he picks up the picture frame and holds it up for Madelyn to see. Of course, it’s a picture of them. All of them. “I just… can’t think straight right now. All I can think about is that moment.. It’s almost like I’m still in that moment, still watching him… him…” Taylor stops and looks towards his feet again. Madelyn sees a shiny little drop of water fall from his cheek and onto his shirt. Madelyn goes over and hugs him, at which point Taylor begins to sob. The two hug each other for a long time, all the while Taylor sobs into Madelyn’s shoulder. “Hey, hey… it’s ok… it’ll be ok…” “... How? How will it be ok?” “... I don’t know, but you just have to have faith it will be be ok…” Madelyn never actually believed in that kind of advice, but she knows that Taylor usually responds well to it. “... you’re right Maddie. You’re right…” “... You mentioned you wanted cheetos before, right?” Taylor, puzzled by the sharp change in tone and topic, sniffs and answers, “... yeah?” “Well… that might be a bit of a problem…” “What, why?” “I’m assuming you already know that the vending machine on your floor is almost completely empty?” “Yeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaah?” “Well… let’s just say that whoever went to get more snacks is going to have about as much as luck on the other floors as he will on this floor…” “... Did you already try?” “Didn’t need to, I found the two knuckleheads who are responsible for it.” Taylor laughs a little. “Just guess who it was.” Taylor doesn’t even hesitate, “It was Mike and Vick-” “It was Mike and Vicky! Those little bastards hogged the elevator for fucking 40 minutes!” “FORTY MINUTES?!!!! How?!!!!” “Well… they went through every single floor 3 times to get every single candy they wanted… and for some reason, the elevator button was being an absolutely worthless little shit, so I ended up waiting 40 minutes.” “Jesus…” “You have absolutely no idea what kind of satisfaction I got from watching Mike’s reaction when the elevator doors opened on my floor, when he expected it to be the floor he and Vicky were supposed to meet, and only saw his sargeant staring at him.” “Please don’t tell me you ripped off his ear…” “Not for lack of trying, mind you.” Taylor laughs a little, and then asks the obvious question. “So… why did they do it? Netflix and Chill?” “That’s what I said! I was going to yell at them for being such horny vacuums of snacks, but then I realized that they were stealing all of the snacks for a different reason.” “And?” “Well… let’s just say you’ll find out later.” “Oh my god, is the commander going to wring them out in front of everyone?!!” Taylor looks at her, slitghrly excited. The thing most people don’t understand is that the two both love to see people get their asses kicked, verbally or physically, if they do something hilariously stupid, like Vicky and Mike. “I’m not going to get your hopes up; no, it’s not that. It’s something almost as good as that though. I’ll save you a seat next to me when it happens!” “So we’ll be sitting down… that narrows things down…” “I might have meant that figuratively, though!” “Ah, shit. Got me there.” He knows that she’s just trying to get his mind off of Max, but it’s actually working surprisingly well. As long as he doesn’t act like it didn’t happen, it’ll be fine. “One thing though… Maddie, you do realize what this means, right?” Madelyn, confused, replies, “No… what does it mean?” “That means that the next few hours, or however long it we have to wait, is going to be a warzone.” “... You mean because of Zilla?” “No, it’s going to be Mad Max, but with snacks.” “Why?” “Think about it, every floor has now mysteriously ran out of snacks. No one knows why, but everyone will be feeling the anger and frustration of it. The few who bought snacks before then will become suspects, ostracized, and stolen from. The next few hours will be war. So it’s going to be even more fun for us than whatever the thing that Vicky and Mike have planned will be.” “... You have a point there… and, I mean, no one can work without their snacks… and since I don’t really have anything to do… you want to watch it with me?” “Consider it a date.” “Perfect. Now we just have to wait for it to begin. I’m going to go change out of my clothes and tell everyone else they can change into their normal clothes too, no one wants to be in uniform for when whatever comes. Or during the war… You want to blend in!” Taylor laughs, and Madelyn moves to leave when they see Mark coming back up. “Taylor! You won’t believe what happened!” Taylor gives a look to Madelyn, then turns to Mark and says, “What happened, Kervon? Where’s my cheetos?!!” “That’s the thing, all the vending machines are empty! They even took the pretzels!” Madelyn asks, “Is there any ice cream in the freezers, Mark?” “No! It’s all gone! I saw a person come here and take a bunch of snacks from our room, but I didn’t get a good luck at them because I just saw them get into the elevator with a ton of snacks! It must have been them!” “We need to find them! I’m going to rip off their ear and feed it to the abomination in New York!” says Madelyn. “That’s the spirit! I’m going to go ask around, try to gather information and find out who did it!” Taylor mouths to Madelyn, ‘You should go warn them to hide the snacks’. “Yeah, but before you go, I need you to do something.” “Sir, I know you’re my boss, but I have to disagree! This matter is of the upmost importance!” “Oh relax, it’ll only take ten minutes at most!” “... Fine, but just know that the chaos and the blood that will be shed could have been avoided if you let me go investigate it sooner.” “... Sure. Alright, now come over so I can tell you what to do. After that, I want you to report to Madelyn and I with any and every finding you make in your investigation. I want to be updated half-hourly!” “Yes sir! Now you’re speaking my language!” The two begin talking and Madelyn heads to the elevator, off to warn Vicky and Mike about the incoming investigation. Hmph, maybe they aren’t such disappointments after all.