Disclaimer:

I don't own anything that might count as awesome to anyone, or anything.

Here's another one. Enjoy!

Chapter 15

Margaret's POV

The blast echoed in the remains of the car, bright light flashing ass the laser rebounded slightly, leaving the behind the smell of slightly singed flesh and scales. The slightly hazy air undulated as the creature in front of her raised its hand, before it reached slowly for her. She tightened her hold on the gun in response, before the coarse hand slowly but surely rested the appendage on her weapon, claws scratching slightly on hers, and did what she didn't expect. She expected it to come surging at her, aimed for her throat. She expected for it to push aside her hands, to make a grab for her exposed throat. To throw the gun from her fingers, to lash out in any way it could, considering she hit it point blank with a laser pistol. To express its anger like she expected any monster to. With rage and violence.

But it did none of what she expected; rather, it just reached through car's doorway, slow and patient, until its hand came to rest over hers that trembled slightly holding the gun. Which was strange, as she never shook and was composed in even the direst of circumstances. But something about this was different than usual, it felt more important than many of things that had happened in her life up to this point. Like her fate was teetering on the edge of a steep cliff, and her actions now could doom her forever.

She could hear Duncan rummaging around in the background.

And then its hand slowly pushed the gun down, towards her lap. This was within the bounds of what she expected, but it reached its other hand towards her, and she forced herself to make her eyes look past the rough hand moving closer and closer towards her face and look into its eyes (It was almost touching her now).She saw many things. Sincerity, and more than a little bit of fear. But what really went deep and sent a pang through her heart was the desperate hope that just radiated from the well of its-no his eyes. It was all directed at her. Then the next thing she knew, the surprisingly soft pads of his palm were touching her cheek and he thumbed across the skin beneath her eye.

He whispered it so quietly, she almost didn't hear it, "Mum."

Then Duncan jumped from where he was slowly sidling around the side of the car and punched him in the face. He flew for a tens of feet and left a shallow depression in the sandy terrain. He didn't get up.

She couldn't stop herself from staring at him, the creature, no more than a boy really, and he called her mom. She definitely wasn't expecting to see him here. Oh, , no no no no nonononononono.

Shit, shit, she had made a terrible mistake.

"Oh, no, Duncan… Duncan…."

He was still in front of her, shaking her slightly, as she was stiff in his arms.

"Mom! Mom! Did he hurt you?! Are you okay?! Crap... CRAP, CRAP! What should I do…"

"Duncan."

"Okay. Okay, 911, right? Yeah, that sounds right. Okay, 911 it is."

"Duncan."

"Where is the dang phone?" He turned around to dig through the wreckage of the car in a panicked attempt to find the phone, throwing random junk- part of a seat, a cup holder- out in frantic tosses.

"Duncan!" With that he popped out of the side door,

"What!?" And then he looked like he wanted to take the words back.

"What did you say, young man?"

"…nothing mom."

"That's what I thought. Now, stop making even more of a mess, and help me move this kid to the side of the road."

"Huh?" She could just imagine the comical look of confusion on his face. In any other circumstances she'd be smiling. Right now, she couldn't seem to produce even the slightest tilting of lips.

"Less lip, more action."

With that he ducked away from the back seat and to the front of the car, where she was trying to grab a limb, and he joined her on the other side of the limp form.

Grunting, he managed to support most of the unexpectedly heavy load, with her stabilizing as they moved. His eyes widened when he saw the injuries inflicted on the other guy, "…dang, mom. What'd he do to you?"

She didn't bother to answer as she reached down she rested her hand against the young man's singed chest, trying to feel its movement, only relaxing when she found it.

"So…Mom? Any idea what he might have wanted before he ended up with a blast to the chest?"

She couldn't help the sigh that rushed past her lips, "I might have some idea, Sweetie."

"…So? What's the verdict?"

"It might be a little surprising… and I'm not entirely sure." Not that there is much of a chance that I'm wrong. -She added internally.

They spent a few minutes waiting for some kind of sign that Barnes- and most likely a whole fleet of soldiers, were on their way.

She surprised herself by speaking, "Duncan?"

He seemed startled but recovered well enough, followed by "Yeah, Mom?"

"Do me a favor. Look at him. What do you see?"

"Well, I see a guy… with scales, and sharp arms, and teeth, and a wicked face scar. Kinda cool actually. An interesting kind of guy, except for the fact that he caused us to crash into a ditch."

"That's not what I meant, sweetie. Look. Really look- don't use your eyes. Close them, and use your other senses, and I don't mean the usual ones."

He was just on the verge of rolling his eyes, she knew it, "Duncan. No lip, just do what I told you, and really try."

She almost had him. So she just gave him the Mom look, and he instantly caved. She smiled a bit inside. He wasn't immune to her yet.

"Fine, I'll try."

She could tell that in the first second that he wasn't working at it at all. He was just humoring her, but she could see as the moments passed and his face transitioned from constipated (like he was trying really hard) to just plain confused she knew it.

He was learning the secret she had locked away all of those years ago. What she hadn't expected was that her other son, the one she had given up, to return to her, least of all under these kind of circumstances. Really, the way fate works really needs some kind of tweaking. All it seems to know is cruel jokes.

But she could see from the way that his face was growing blank, how his breathing deepened and how he leaned in the direction of the unconscious boy. He could feel something. He most likely didn't know what, but she had a feeling that he was uncomfortable with it.

Maybe smell a bit of himself or his father in him, or some kind of weird mental or spiritual connection.

"Mom… who is this guy?"

They were interrupted by the soft sound of engines humming, and the sight of displaced sand rising off the ground as something invisible landed. There was a slight shimmer to those parts, and the image of the uninterrupted desert landscape in front of them and was bisected horizontally by a straight line cleaving the image apart revealing softly gleaming steel, and tinted glass.

As expected. And also completely unexpected, because she forgot about the goddamned safety beacon she had in her car's dashboard. What she wasn't expecting however, was the next instance of flying red sand. And the next, the next, and so on. Or the trucks pulling up out of nowhere, that were swiftly turning into weapons of mass destruction, and unsurprisingly, tanks.

She couldn't help but glance around in surprise, and the small grimace that came to her face. Had there been one- with that idiot Barnes, she could have slipped this by him. He always had a thing for her, and that made him easy to manipulate. She could have spun a tail so tight he wouldn't suspect a thing. Probably. But this? With so many agents, with so much weaponry? No chance.

Only a few seconds after the initial touchdown, and already they were surrounded, weapons pointed towards away from their quickly converging group, and thankfully no one had brought up the unmoving lump on the floor. Yet. But someone would, soon, and there was nothing she could do about it.

The stupid flirt, instead of strutting about as she thought he would, strode confidently, but she could tell by the way his hand kept twitching towards the pistol strapped securely to his hip, or the way he had his rifle situated for easy access, he was nervous. Very nervous.

"Margaret, we've received a distress beacon from this location, we've come for a pick up."

He retained his standard cocky tone of voice, underlined with a sort of eagerness that she wasn't exactly excited to hear. It sounded like the last time he had a target painted on some creatures back.

And unless he found a way to destroy Belloc- the living incarnation of several atomic bombs. And maybe a meteor- the one that killed off the dinosaurs, and most everything else.

But he wouldn't be so nervous, he'd be more triumphant, openly flirting and dancing around in his fancy suit of armor. He wouldn't be so twitchy. So she eyed him warily as he came closer, as groups of soldiers ran this way and that, trying to pinpoint something. It really wasn't good.

She scoffed, "This isn't regulation for standard asset pickup- this is full-blown search and destroy. No matter how into me you are,"

Here his face turned a slightly discomfited pink, before he quickly squashed any form of outward emotion save arrogance. Which he always had in spades. "So what's the deal?"

His eyes hardened and his lips flattened themselves into a thin line, and he pulled up an arm, hologram already forming in the air.

"No. We've got ourselves a situation on our hands. We've got a new kaiju, energy readings coming from this exact location, powerful too, more than the freaks, in his current state. Looks like it might have slightly more advanced aether manipulation abilities than the average kaiju."

His glare turns to Duncan, "Which we haven't seen in just about fifteen years, and you know how that one happened the last time someone went and decided to fuck a walking, fire breathing sky scraper."

That bastard.

Her eyes narrowed, and she was a quarter of a second from having her fist greet his face, regardless of the boy she had managed to position behind her, slightly hidden on one side by the car, and easy to miss close to the ground.

Thank god the radars hadn't come this way yet.

But Duncan beat her to it, the next second he was pushing Barnes back, with an angry growl. Of course this pushed him practically off of his feet, eyes turning slit and angry.

He was back on his feet in no time at all, just about chest to chest with her son, Duncan looking up, and Barnes looking down. "I. Am only half kaiju."

He ground out, his teeth glinting as he spoke, dyed red by the setting sun. Barnes himself let out a feral grin, "It only takes half to be a threat."

Duncan's eyes narrowed further, fists clenched, and she swore that his claws, able to damage a kaiju's tough skin, would be digging rivulets into his palms.

"I am not a monster!" he hissed, looking the arrogant Bastard straight in the eye.

He returned the look coldly, save for the gleam of satisfaction that she knew he felt. "It's said that you can tell what a person is like when you look them in the eyes. What does that make them if they're slit, and flaming?"

and as he said this he turned his visor reflective, letting the kid get a full glimpse of his enraged face. This had him reeling back, eliciting a laugh from the man.

Sorry to end it there, guys. I'm looking forward to the next chapter.