Nemesis (Kaiju)

Nemesis is the main antagonist of Project Nemesis (2012) and a secondary protagonist of Project Maigo (2013), Project 731 (2014), Project Hyperion (2015), and Project Legion (2016) subsequently. She did not appear in Island 731 (2013) which is considered a prequel or book #0. Nemesis is a human-Gestorumque (kaiju) genetic hybrid, created from the DNA of Maigo Tilly (Hudson) and Nemesis Prime, an alien Gestorumque corpse. Grown in a test tube at a secret Zoomb facility, Nemesis possessed the memories of Maigo Tilly and Nemesis Prime. As such, she was compelled to consume any living creature smaller than her to grow to over 300 feet tall in order to pursue the hatred she felt for Maigo's and Maigo's mother's murderer, her biological father Alexander Tilly. This drive put her in direct opposition of Jon Hudson and the FC-P (Fusion Center-Paranormal). Her transition from villainous monster, to anti-hero, to savior of the human race parallels that of Godzilla and she has been appropriately nicknamed, "The Queen of Monsters" (Though this title is also held by Mothra).

After Project Nemesis, in which Nemesis and Maigo, now a single entity, exact their revenge on their father, they slink back into the ocean. However, in the next book, Project Maigo, she re-emerges to take on her five siblings, born from the original Nemesis Prime, and under the influence of General Gordon. She saves Washington DC, at the apparent cost of her own life. At this time she seems to excrete an organic pod containing Maigo Tilly, now a biological 20-something. It is later revealed in Project 731 that Nemesis was merely resting and she returns to exact vengeance on the world. Without Maigo, she becomes more and more unstable, until Katsu Endo becomes her "Voice" or her pilot, bringing her somewhat under control.

As the series of books continues, Nemesis faces down weirder and more alien threats to the planet, becoming a sort of destructive protector and working alongside the FC-P to save humanity. By the end of Project Legion, she seems to sacrifice her own life for a second time, but the epilogue reveals that, with the help of Hyperion, she escaped just in the nick of time to the secret ocean of Europa, a moon of Jupiter. This is the last reader's have seen of this Nemesis since 2016.

## Visual Description

Nemesis began life as a perfectly normal looking Asian woman, modeled after Maigo Tilly. However, as she continued to grow inside her test tube, with no brain function, she began to develop claws, thick black armored skin, a tail, and talons. Upon waking on the dissection table, Nemesis sprung into action, tearing out a doctor's throat with very sharp teeth.

From there, Nemesis maintained a human-like appearance for a couple of hours, brown eyes and a vaguely human face. The black armor had completely overtaken her body at this time, however. She also developed the orange membranes at this time. Despite this, she also became so large that it was nearly impossible for her to crawl in the halls of the secret research facility she had been born in.

In terms of full grown appearance, Nemesis is a significantly lighter Kaiju than Nemesis Prime or Neo Prime in terms of weight and size. Her skin is black in color and has been described as fungal, meaning it is an entity separate from her and can grow back independently and at alarming rates. Her body is also covered in the aforementioned explosive orange glowing membranes, a trait that seems to be attributed to a specific type of Gestorumque. Nemesis, Nemesis Prime, Neo Prime, Karkinos, Typhon, Scylla, Drakon, and Scrion all appear to have this distinguishing attributes separating them from other Kaiju like Lovecraft or Giger, implying there are many races inside the Kaiju species.

Nemesis has razor-sharp claws and teeth, sharp enough to easily tear through the flesh of other Kaiju. The claws on Nemesis do not appear to have a solid design pinned down, the books along with some concept art describe the claws as two giant fingers fused together, while the comics and other pieces of concept art show the Kaiju as having five separate fingers with claws at the end. It has a long trident tipped tail, the end seemingly composed of the same material as its claws. Nemesis in her fully grown form has a more reptilian appearance with an elongated neck and scaly body. However she is described as having feline-like posture when running. Before expelling Maigo Tilly from her body, her eyes were a deep brown color, reminiscent of Maigo's. After expelling her, Nemesis's eyes became pure orange, glowing the same color as her membranes. Even after Katsu Endo took over as Nemesis's Voice, her eyes remained glowing orange.

Nemesis has a "final form" of sorts, where she sheds her black armored skin, much like a reptile, in order to reveal a gleaming white form beneath. This form is mostly similar to Nemesis's physical appearance, but with one big addition of her wings. These wings are not for flight, instead they each hold a dazzling amount of mirror-like feathers that Nemesis can focus the sun through to create an impossible to stop beam of sunlight. It is unclear if she has one set of wings, or three sets of wings, as concept art and book descriptions don't necessarily match.

## Powers and Abilities

**Immense Durability:** Nemesis has been shown to shrug off GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast MOABs, nuclear armaments, and all types of conventional weapons. This is thanks to her outer skin, which is actually its own entity. The black armor is a fungus-like growth that boasts high durability and regeneration. She is still vunerable to other Gestorumque and mashintorum attacks, but unless she sheds this skin to reveal her Divine Retribution form beneath, humans stand almost no chance of hurting the Kaiju. She can also shed a much smaller part of her armor-like skin in order to survive a nuclear+ blast. This shedding is not that of Divine Retribution as she still retains a great deal of durability and does not have access to her wings.

**Denser Biological Material:** The square cube law dictates that creatures like Nemesis or even a Blue Whale, would crush themselves under their own body weight whilst on land. However, Nemesis defies this law and while it is stated by Maigo Tilly that Nemesis isn't exactly comfortable on land with her own weight, she is able to freely move about and run without fear of the square cube law. This means that Nemesis has denser bone structures that any other creature ever recorded and her muscles and tissue also possess an unnatural durability. (Without this, organs like her heart would weigh so much that they'd tear away from the biological material holding them up).

**Aquatic Capabilities:** Nemesis possesses the ability to breathe underwater and also has an exceptional swimming speed. The oceans are where she spends most of her time outside of the Novels' main events as she feels most comfortable underwater. This is due to the fact that Nemesis feels lighter underwater and the pressure that her own weight exerts on her body is lessened.

**Voice:** A Voice is a pilot of sorts, guiding a Gestorumque as Maigo and Endo did with Nemesis. Voices give their Kaiju a tactical advantage over the other Kaiju in the series, as seen with Katsu Endo imparting his extensive hand-to-hand combat skills to Nemesis. Voices can be human or alien, however, only humans and Aeros are shown as Voices so it is unclear if Ferox or other species can do the same. Notably Voices, like Maigo and Endo, don't necessarily control Nemesis, they more so influence her. However, they seem to be the exception as every other piloted or "Voiced" Gestorumque in the series is lobotomized, allowing for their human or Aeros Voices to fully control their braindead bodies.

**Self-Immolation:** Self-immolation is in reference to the glowing orange membranes commonly seen on the Kaiju of the series. The membranes house a biological and renewing liquid that combusts with air, creating nuclear-level explosions. These explosions act as self-defense as they cauterize the wound created to rupture the membranes in the first place and dissuade human and Kaiju forces from targeting those spots on her body.

**Immolating Spit:** Similar to Self-immolation, this attack is done using the same combustible liquid. However, it differs in the fact that Nemesis uses it by spitting a globule of it at an enemy. The liquid is covered in a small layer of her own saliva, ensuring that the liquid does not combust until reaching its target. This attack also creates nuclear-level explosions, and was capable of vaporizing a magically built mountain. This ability, so far, is entirely unique to Nemesis, unlike many of her other abilities that are shared with her siblings and fellow Gestorumque. The implications for this attack seem to indicate that this combustible liquid rests somewhere along her digestive tract, allowing her to upchuck it.

**Divine Retribution:** Upon shedding her skin, Nemesis reveals two gleaming white wings (or six in the concept art). These wings cannot be used for flight, however and instead use their feather-like mirrors to deftly focus the light of the sun into an unstoppable beam of heat and energy. Nemesis can also use other forms of energy for this attack granted that they are strong enough, such as Hyperion's laser cannons. This attack is powerful enough to pierce Gestorumque without any difficulty and it has been shown shearing entire buildings apart. Unfortunately, the attack does not last long as the feathers fall off rather quickly and once the attack is used up, Nemesis is left in a very venerable state. To the point where human missiles are capable of damaging her. However, these wings are also shown to be exceedingly adept at defending heat based attacks, such as Self-immolations.

**Regeneration:** Nemesis has shown some decent regeneration capabilities, coming back from the brink of death three separate times and recovering within a few months from wounds that people deemed fatal. Entire chunks of her body that were blown away recovered, though no limbs were ever lost, so it is unsure to what extent her regeneration power reaches.

**Resurrection(?):** Nemesis has *nearly* perished twice in the series, however, there is a third time that she seemingly came back to life. When she was still humanoid in appearance. Upon being taken from the test tube she was initially grown in, her chest was cut open and her heart was transplanted into General Gordon. At this time, she was also recorded as being braindead. However, despite this, when examined for dissection, she woke up, the hole in her chest closed and her brain very much functional. This implies one of two things. Either Nemesis's growth rate at the time was so extreme that she regrew her heart and jumpstarted her own brain activity, or Gestorumque physiology does not require a heart and the lack of brain activity was merely hibernation as seen when she was recovering from her supposed death in Project Maigo.

**Sense of Vengeance:** One of Nemesis's most defining traits is that of her desire to seek out those who have committed wrong-doings, such as Maigo Tilly's biological father. She is shown to have some sort of telepathic or bird's eye view of the world as she is able to sense these heinous acts. In Project 731 and Project Hyperion, this is explained by a Ferox as the ability to sense certain types of DNA, that of an Atlantean. It is presumed that all the people Nemesis punishes with intent are those with Atlantean DNA, implying that Atlantean DNA causes a loss of empathy, anger issues, and other mental problems. Some proof may reside in the fact that Maigo Tilly also has some amount of Atlantean DNA and she has shown herself to be volatile and bloodthirsty in certain situations. It is unknown how exactly Nemesis senses this DNA or how sensing that DNA gives her visions of their crimes.

**Affects on humans:** Upon her heart being transplanted to General Gordon, he was given immense superhuman abilities, durability, speed, strength, regeneration, as well as a form resembling that of Nemesis and her siblings, though in a much more human scale. People also claim that Nemesis's mirror-like feathers have healing properties when crushed up. This latter aspect was never proven and it remains to be seen if Nemesis can affect anyone else like she did with Gordon.

## References/Appearances in other Robinson Novels

* In Beneath, the main characters encounter a bioluminescent leviathan creature under the ice of Europa that swallows one of the characters and later poops them back out unharmed. The designs of the creatures are slightly different, however, when asked about the relation, Jeremy Robinson stated that it was possibly Nemesis after she had been teleported to Europa's ocean.
	+ It is important to note that in Project Nemesis, it is stated that Nemesis's stomach acids melted several people alive, so it is doubtful that the character swallowed would've remained alive long enough to pass through the bowels. Though this reference is up for debate.

* In Tether, a Project Nemesis t-shirt is referenced several times alongside the novel itself and a tv adaptation. While the t-shirt and novel exist, a tv adaptation has yet to be seen.
* In Infinite 2, the opening simulations display a much darker, less forgiving, Nemesis. The design described reads slightly different to the original design, but it is unsure if that is due to a lack of "screen time" or due to this being a different Nemesis.

## Trivia

* The author has stated a desire to do a soft reboot for the Nemesis series, making a grittier, and darker series than the last, which focused more on action and humor. However, it is unsure if this project will ever come to fruition as the Singularity timeline is currently underway and will take up a good portion of the author's time for the coming future.
* While Nemesis has no official figures there *is* a 3D model commissioned by Jeremy Robinson himself, modeled by Dopepope. Only a few 3D printed copies exist.