Samoan-Hawaiian Zachary "Zippy" Kalaloa was an impoverished boy growing up on the Big Island of Hawaii.   His father, Kolo, was once a Hilo Police Officer, but due to his health and size, he had to leave the police force after 18 years and instead went to work at the Hilo International Airport as the director of security. Zippy's older brother, Okono, was routinely in and out of trouble with his father and the police.  Okono hung out in a Hilo youth gang that was known to do jobs for the international black marketeers known as CANIS.  His younger sister, Kalani, age 16, was not only promiscuous, but had already left school and the household and was staying with her 'friends' where they routinely got high and had wild parties. 

 

Zippy was the only one with any positive goals; he wanted to be a professional Linebacker for the National Football League (NFL), and since he was already a star Linebacker as a senior with his high school team ( a team that had already won State Championship twice), he was well on his way. Zippy also worked two jobs to try to help with the bills, since Okono and Kalani weren't providing any additional help for the family.

 

Zippy was always proud of his father. When Zippy's mother died of cancer when he was only 7 years old, his father, took on as many jobs as he could in addition to his police job just to make ends meet. Zippy believed the stress of keeping food on the table and a roof over their heads led to a series of compounding health issues for his father; issues that were now mounting up just as noticeably as the bills they couldn't pay. 

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The night before Zippy and his team were to play the big State High School Championship football game between Hilo High School and Kamehameha High School being played on Oahu at the Aloha Stadium, Zippy's father had a stroke and died before he could get to the hospital. Okono left, never to return home again. Kalani drained the family's bank account and 'sold' the house illegally, leaving Zippy and his two younger siblings homeless and penniless in less than a month's time from burying their father.  To add to the pain, college football recruiters were at the Championship game specifically to gage Zippy's talents...a game that Zippy obviously didn't attend...and that Hilo High School lost badly (0-49).

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Zippy was able to stay with a few friends and high school mates for awhile and did receive some funds from the Hilo Policeman's fund, however with his car breaking down routinely, missing work and now considered a pariah at school, it didn't take long before the state's child services caught up with him and took his two younger sibling and put them in the foster care system.  Zippy fought legally and with social media, but the results were the same. Within weeks, both younger siblings were in foster homes on other islands.

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Zippy was now alone.

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What was once a large family that was getting by, was now tainted by an evil sister and brother who stole from them and now two siblings taken from him and given to other people on other islands.  Zippy was ready to given in to suicide.  There was nothing left to live for as far as he was concerned.  He believed himself a failure, and because he considered himself 'not strong enough' to have fought for his family, he figured he wasn't fit for much else in the life of the living.

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The next day, Zippy wrote a letter to his father and placed it on his grave, telling him how sorry he was for failing the family.  Zippy intended to spend the rest of the day driving around the island and taking in the natural beauty of the island one last time.  That night, he'd go down into the Kilauea volcano and drop himself into the lava below; no muss, no fuss.  Nothing to clean up.  Instant incineration. He figured he'd at least make himself as an offering to Pele asking her to look out for his two younger siblings, wherever they were. 

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After driving all day and enjoying the beauty of the islands one last time, he drove himself to Volcano House at Volcano National Park.  There, he had one last meal with his last $40 and looked out over the Kilauea crater.  He noticed while he was sitting there that a plume of lava had breached the dome at the far end of the crater.  The opening couldn't be more than several dozen yards in all, but it seemed to get more active as he sat there.  He asked a waiter about the plume, for which the waiter mentioned that it was the first plume to spew from the dome in over 10 years...a rare occurrence...and something that usually meant a trouble was coming, according to the waiter's understanding of Hawaiian mythology. "Pele's pissed about something", was the statement the waiter said that sent a chill down his back. Regardless, Zippy didn't care.  He was going to go through with it.  Pele may be pissed about something, but it doesn't change the fact that the world would be better without him, he thought.  With that thought, a new vent plume opened not far from the first plume, spewing pyroclastics all over the crater's far end. It was almost like Pele had heard his thoughts...

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Zippy left the Volcano House restaurant and went to his car. It wouldn't start. It wouldn't even turn over. He got out and started walking the long path around to the other side of the crater where he'd seen the plumes.  By that time it would be close to sunset. A perfect time to die.

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An hour's walking later, he arrived.  It was seconds away from sunset as Zippy stood on a ledge about 250 feet over the edge of the lava plumes. The heat was intolerable.  Even the park rangers had already gated off the area and left; too much thermal activity for them to stay. Blasts of lava shot into the air up past and into the air above Zippy, making the last few seconds even more chaotic.  As the plume subsided, Zippy ran out from the ledge and out into the spewing lava below. With a last statement for Pele to care for his family, Zippy's fall was interrupted by a large rock that came flying up from the upcoming eruption, smacking Zippy hard and knocking him back to the very ledge he just jumped from. 

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Zippy, feeling a bit disoriented, saw a column of lava fill the space out in from of the ledge; heat so intense, his skin began to blister, his clothes began to smoke.  That's when he saw her.

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Pele.

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She walked out of the lava eruption as a beautiful Polynesian goddess and out across the short breadth of air between the plume and the ledge, alighting onto the ledge as if he were walking across the sand on a beach.  She looked across to him.  There was a tear in her eye; a tear of fire that now streamed down her beautiful face.  Zippy slowly got up, wracked in pain from the rock impact and the searing heat around him. Pele continued walking toward him. Her eyes were locked on him.  He felt like her eyes were the only thing in the world to him; nothing else mattered. The heat, the sound of the fiery plume, the pain...it all started to fade away.  Before he could even process what was happening, Pele embraced Zippy like a lover and kissed him with a long, incredible kiss.  His skin burst into flames and blackened. His eyes glowed an orange ember. His mass grew larger each second of the kiss.  Amidst all of this, he felt no pain...no worries...for the first time in his life.  He began feeling the lava below and in front of him; he felt the flow of molten rock as if they were arteries of his own veins.  He became one with the volcano...for a second...and then there was darkness.

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Zippy woke up at Hilo General Hospital, covered with gooey ointment bandages all over his body and face.  The doctor told Zippy he was luckily found by a park ranger just seconds before the Kilauea volcano blew its top...and then died.  The volcano and crater were now sealed, cooled and was no longer active.  Zippy had 1st degree burns on his body and was told that with a month of treatments, his skin should eventually be back to normal.  After the Hilo police interviewed Zippy wondering what he was doing out there, he mentioned his car broke down, and then lied that he got lost looking for a bus stop to take him back to town.  The National Parks Service took care of all of Zippy's medical bills and care.  The most demanding question that Zippy had was a simple one...was that encounter with Pele real, or just a delusion?

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Two months later, Zippy was healed, treated and staying at a friends house as he was trying to finish his senior year in high school, while again working 2 jobs to get by.  The 'incident' that happened at Kilauea with "Pele" was now, as far as Zippy was concerned, a dream brought on by being smacked in the head by that big rock. Still...Zippy had strange feelings about things...like seconds before an earthquake happened, he knew exactly where it was originating from...in his mind.  He also noticed that he would walk unusual paths; paths that would take him to new or fresh geothermal vents on the island.  Finally, the day came when Zippy's true purpose for remaining alive came to be understood.

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While Zippy was sleeping on the couch of his best friends house near the beach, he awoke to wailing warning sirens and explosions.  Blasts of strange sounding energy weapons could be heard down the street.  As he looked out the window trying to see what was happening, a patrol on armed Ningren warriors came up the road and into the yard, firing on Zippy as he stood in from of the window.  Zippy was quick enough to drop and not get hit but the house was quickly being pummelled with a relentless series of blasts, shredding the house into toothpicks. Sadly, Zippy saw his best friend and his parents die before his eyes as a result of the Ningren assault.  Zippy grew furious over this...they were good people; they didn't deserve to die that way.  His eyes felt like they were on fire...then his skin...and that's when all hell broke loose. 

 

A large plume of lava erupted from a vent under the house, spewing lava up into the air by over 100 feet...and then it came straight down on the Ningren in the front yard, incinerating all of them in a mere second. The plume stopped, but now, a pool of builing magma was all about Zippy...who had now changed into a large lava/rock creature.

 

More Ningren patrols arrived and opened fire on the newly transformed Zippy.  With but a thought, another plume of lava shot up from the ground under the Ningren, incinerating them instantly.  Zippy now understood that HE was the one making that happen, and with each use of his new powers, he was becoming more confident. As he exited the debris of what was once his friend's house, Zippy created more eruptions, and, while running at the warriors, he grabbed a street sign on the ground and started using it as a baseball bat, launching terrorized Ningren into the air with one grand slam after another. Eventually, several dozen Ningren patrols found their way to Zippy and were all summarily obliterated in kind.  Zippy ran down the road (melting it as he went) and found dozens more patrols, for which he dispatched, saving hundreds of innocents local Hawaiians that were about to be killed.  

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Eventually, Zippy made his way down to the Hilo Police station. It was like the Alamo.  Surrounded by hundreds of Ningren troops, all led by a battle group commander, Commander Tazlok.  All it took were several minutes and the entire surrounding Ningren troops were decimated, primarily by Zippy (the remaining dozen of so Hilo Police took out quite a good share too!).  Radio alerts came in about evacuating Hilo from the US and Japanese military, who were no coordinating attacks and rescue operations where they could.  The police, once finding out who (and what) Zippy was, asked him to 'hold the line' against the Ningren while they got the innocents to safety.

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After another two hundred Ningren troops, the island was able to be evacuated the best it could before it was completely overrun. At one point, Zippy was fighting one of the more powerful Kaha Koa 'gods', Tumatuenga.  Zippy nearly died fighting Tumatuenga, but was saved by several evacuating Marines who loaded him on an outbound helo that took him to a neighboring Landing Ship Transport (LST).  

 

Zippy had reverted to his human form, but had a cracked rib, a dislocated shoulder and several severe cuts, requiring surgery in the LST's Sick Bay.  The surgery went well and Zippy was taken to the infirmary where he had a dream.

 

In Zippy's dream, Pele, the fire goddess, told him she and the Polynesian pantheon of gods had empowered him and several others to save the Hawaiian Island and to further protect the innocent in and about the Pacific Ocean.  Pele told him to go to Diamond Head crater and meet with her other champions she’d empowered and selected.  She told him that ending his life was not the will of the gods, and as such, he must take charge of that which matters...and to also be the champion everyone now needs him to be.

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When he awoke the next day, he explained to the LST's Commanding Officer (CO) about his powers (with a little display to prove what he was capable of…by melting one of the CO's chairs…by accident of course).  The CO, mentioning that he had a delivery for Oahu leaving in the next hour told him he had a 'one way trip' on a helo and thus flew him out to Diamond Head. 

 

At Diamond Head, Zippy met the other champions. There, they devised a plan to take back the Hawaiian Islands from the invading army that now called itself Kaha Koa, under the leadership of Milu, a supposed Polynesian god of death. Days later, this new band of warriors, now known as the “Pacific League”, allied with the Hawaiian resistance forces and the remnants of the US military on the isle of Oahu, attacked the Kaha Koa troops.  By days end, the Pacific Legion and their allies liberated Oahu; within a week, they liberated all but one Hawaiian Island from Milu and Kaha Koa; the Forbidden Island known as Ni’ihau.  Try as they might, they were not able to retake Ni’ihau.  Eventually, a cease fire was established.  They’d won all but Ni’ihau back, and as far as everyone was concerned, that was a huge victory.

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Today, Zippy, code-named “Kilauea”, is a member of Hawaii’s Pacific League super group, living out of the group’s new base in the Iolani Palace.  Aside from doing his duties as a hero, he is back with his nose in the books, catching up on his grades and schooling.  When he’s not studying or saving lives, Zippy can be seen practicing control of his powers…and playing football with the local kids at the park.

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