A/N: Many thanks to everyone for your reviews and comments! This chapter introduces several original characters, but also some familiar ones from the broader Pacific Rimverse. Where possible, I've used canon details for the canon characters, but had to fill some things in. There's an original character guide at the end of the we switch to Tendo Choi's POV for several momentous meetings!
Canon Note: Something that bugged me a bit about the movie was that given the size of the Pacific and the location of the Breach (in the Marianas Trench off Guam), unless the kaiju can swim as fast as a jet plane, it should take close to a day for them to reach any mainland. The action sequences in this stories reflect how long and grueling that wait must have been on the PPDC.
Chapter Three: We Answered The Call
Jaeger Academy, Class 2016-B, Term 2
August 2016…
In between each of the eight-week trimesters came a week's respite leave. Candidates still in the running to be pilots usually took the whole week, to recover from the grueling pace and get ready for the next term. There were jobs to be had from the PPDC for more than just would-be Jaeger jockeys. Anyone who passed the initial screen tests could probably land an office job. Those who made it through the first trimester could join J-Tech crews and support staff.
Few turned it down.
Tendo Choi was among the many pilot hopefuls who made the first cut in Section 2016-B, but took seriously the warning that most of them would not be able to drift successfully.
"It's not a reflection of your character," Dr. Lightcap cautioned. "Drift compatibility is still something we're working to understand, and we're not entirely sure whether it's innate or learned or what combination of the two."
The class that had made the first cut of 2016-B totaled sixty. All the first-term break-out classes were combined, and the survivors were instructed to choose their first drift test partners on their own, which came as a surprise.
"Trust is an integral part of this, but you can develop that," Dr. Lightcap told them. "I am requiring mandatory sync tests for family members, since the statistics show higher rates of compatibility. But those of you who came with a partner can choose to test with others as well. For those of you who are strangers, now's the time to get to know each other. Dating and physical intimacy is discouraged," she smirked at the stifled groans, "though it is not a violation of the regulations. Sparring in the Kwoon, board games, strategy and trivia, even dance are ways to get to know a person and judge your interaction. This first week will be dull for many of you when you're not in pons training and brain scans. You're confined to base. Use that time well."
"Keep in mind, candidates," said Marshall Pentecost. "Your performance in and out of uniform affects both your standing in your class and your drift compatibility."
And Class 2016-B was left alone. Everyone looked around. "So!" Tendo clapped his hands. "Let's get this party started!"
Nervous chuckles rippled through the room, but by mutual decision, the class circled their chairs. "Hi, my name's Cady Spencer, and I'm a Jaegerholic," said another smartass.
Laughs rang out again as the tension eased. "Where you from, Boozehound?" someone asked.
"Portland, Oregon. My family's trying to get inland, and the benefits here would cover the costs."
"So you're just about the money?" asked a guy wearing an Air Force jacket, sounding disapproving.
"Hell, no. My Mom's from Manila; we still don't know if any of her family are alive. I knew I'd be enlisting in something after that. When PPDC started recruiting, I picked this over the army."
"Good deal, man." An enormous black guy with some kind of Caribbean island accent waved to the room in general. "Antwan Ferrier, Jamaica."
"What made you come in this direction?"
"I worked in tourism. I was in Cabo San Lucas."
"'nuff said," Tendo observed dryly. "Tendo Choi, born in Beijing, raised in San Francisco." Hisses rang out, and one of the other guys got up to offer him a "bro fist." He wondered idly if there was anybody in this crowd who hadn't lost somebody, or at least lost their way of life by being too close to where one of the kaiju came ashore.
Another of the more social-minded guys suggested a group get-together in the mess hall for ice-breaking that would feel less like an AA meeting. Everyone backed him. Tendo was among those who jumped up to help out - gathering drinks, utensils, moving tables, and casting a few side-eyes at the more standoffish souls. Everyone had potential partnership on their minds as they chatted and ate and made introductions, which was a bit of a paradigm shift from the competitiveness of the first trimester. Even though there'd only been a few Academy classes before this one, the mess hall staff looked like they'd seen this meet-and-greet routine before.
That was where Tendo met Yancy Becket and his little brother Raleigh, local guys who now had the distinction of being the only ones from their hometown crowd to make it past the first cut. Raleigh was more like Tendo in demeanor, though Tendo was older than both of them. Word had got around about the younger Becket's epic Final Spar, and Tendo was sorry he hadn't seen it. Although he would've liked either of the Becket boys as potential partners, they were making their first attempt together, so that was that.
There were several already-matched pairs of relatives. There were Chloe and Christian Warner, a handsome pair of black half-siblings from the deep South who'd never been further north than Missouri and now about to experience their first Alaskan winter. They were more nervous about that than they were about Pons training. Chris had a beautiful tenor singing voice; he'd been a handyman moonlighting as a choir singer before K-Day. Chloe was an accountant.
There were two sisters, Susanti and Devi Hassan, and their male cousin Indra, who were from an Indonesian family living in Australia. They were generating a lot of interest with the testers, who had passed a set of triplets from Shanghai a year ago. That was an interesting idea. "Think about it: if they ever get to the point of having one pilot compatible with multiple people, you could rotate 'em out," said Cady.
"What's the point of that, though?" Yancy wondered. "If one pilot's down, both of them are down, right?"
"Not always," Chloe pointed out. "Physical injuries don't always happen in sync. One of the Gages got burned last month when Romeo blew a fuse, and Dr. Lightcap was the only one on crutches after - "
"'Romeo blew a fuse,' I see what you did there!" crowed Christian.
"Shut up!" She smacked him upside the head as everyone else broke up laughing. "Dammit, I don't wanna drift with you, I don't want your dumbass puns in my head!"
They really did cover all walks of life at the Academy. The youngest was barely seventeen, a pretty, petite brunette from San Jose who was so shy that Tendo wondered if she had some kind of disorder. But she always stepped forward with a timid, "Can I help?" when they were setting up for those precious social hours. Her name was Lea Franklin, and she'd been on her way to Tokyo for some international robotics competition when Trespasser wiped out her family. A few of the guys in Tendo's group exchanged dubious looks when she walked by, only to have the other group mutter that they'd seen that little girl take down guys twice her size in the Kwoon.
"She's wicked fast," Chloe Warner said enviously. "And even more wicked smart. Even if she doesn't get through Pons, I'd bet there's a spot in J-Tech R&D with her name on it."
This class boasted a large number of candidates who had signed up in pairs in response to the recruiting calls trying to narrow the field for drift compatibility. There was a pair of cousins from China, Bao Wang and Shan Thou, who had left technical school to take a shot at the Jaeger Program. Another pair of cousins, Brian Patrick and Janet McDonald, were from an Irish military medic family who'd been living in Panama when Trespasser attacked. They'd each lost a parent to Kaiju Blue. There were also unrelated pairs, like Kennedy LaRue and Stephanie Lanphier, high school grads and childhood friends from Seattle, who had lost their funding for college (along with the prospective college, which had been in the nuke zone) when their parents' employers were obliterated by Trespasser.
Out of their class of sixty, there were forty-six males, fourteen females. Seventeen Americans, six Canadians, nine Japanese, ten Chinese, four Mexicans, five Russians, the rest a scattering from around the globe. There were Christians, Muslims, Jews, a couple of Hindus, and a large number of "somewhere in between" and "none of the above." Their ages ranged from seventeen (Lea Franklin and Raleigh Becket) to thirty-eight (Antwan Ferrier). Some had never finished high school, others had multiple post-grad degrees. All had the intelligence or at least the attention span to absorb the first trimester's written material and pass the exams. All were physically fit enough to have made it through the first trimester's intense physical demands.
Everyone's specific reasons varied, but all felt the compulsion to join the fight against the kaiju. Levels of passion varied, from fiery determination (Brandon Pines, an Air Force pilot who'd been among the small percentage on active duty out of Edwards Air Force Base to survive, and Brian and Janet, who wanted to take up their family's fight) to "eh, we'll see what happens" (Yancy and Raleigh.)
Weeks one and two were mind-numbingly boring. Brain scan after brain scan, cognitive test after cognitive test. All the cut-ups in the class were coming up with more and more ways to liven things up during off-hours. Tendo won the Name That Tune contest, and placed third in the Dance Dance Revolution tournament behind Antwan and Stephanie, the eighteen-year-old former cheerleader. Raleigh Becket swept the history portion of the Trivial Pursuit tournament, and Yancy Becket was the first one to get a perfect score on the bushido drills.
October 2016…
It all got a little too lively at the Academy when the kaiju alert sirens went off. Hanbōs hit the floor in the Kwoon, as instructors simply dropped what they were doing and ran for the door. Most of the candidates had memorized the Event Instructions (they'd been drilled and tested on those as well), but a few still forgot themselves and just followed the instructors.
The rest remembered what candidates were supposed to be doing: clean up and stay out of the way. "Hey, where you going?!" Raleigh yelled after one of the more gung-ho guys. "That's out of bounds for alert!"
"Never mind," said Yancy, catching his arm. "Come on, people, let's close up."
Equipment went back into place, all the monitors went on the emergency channel, and people hurried for the locker rooms to change. "We're at yellow alert, that means we've got time to shower, thank god," said Chloe, brushing past Tendo for the women's room.
"Even so, we've got one hour to be at stations, so don't do your hair," Christian called after her.
"Har har har."
"I can never keep this shit straight, what's yellow alert?" asked Cady.
"You mean other than Star Trek?" Tendo quipped. He had absolutely no doubt that whoever had designed the PPDC kaiju alert system must have been a Serious Nerd – and he approved.
"Movement in the breach," Raleigh and Yancy chorused, then eyed each other.
"Jinx," said Tendo.
"Tendo, man, do you use any slang that isn't a decade out of date?"
"Nope." Just to emphasize it, he and Cady and Antwan pranced out of the shower singing Saturday Night Fever, getting eyerolls from the other guys and loud groans echoing from the girls down the hall.
They all shut up when the next alert tone sounded. "Kaiju Alert. Condition Orange. Target Codename Reckoner, cleared breach at 14:22 hours, bearing west-northwest at sixty-three kilometers per hour. Red alert initiated for the following locations: Philippines, China, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam..."
Coming into the hallway, all the monitors now displayed a map with a red, orange and yellow "cone of uncertainty" not unlike hurricane projections. The candidates reported back to barracks for their emergency gear, then gathered in the main assembly hall for instructions.
Their briefing supervisor turned out to be Ranger Tamsin Sevier of Onibaba fame. Outside of her drivesuit, Tendo was astonished to think the beautiful Scottish redhead couldn't possibly be older than he was.
He knew she'd been severely injured in Tokyo, and she and her partner had both been discharged with highest honors, but she didn't show any obvious signs now. She stood in a fighter's stance as she watched the candidates checking in on the monitors, and her gaze moved between the roll call and the kaiju blip in the Pacific moving steadily westward.
"Good evening, Candidates."
"Good evening, ma'am," they chorused.
"I'm pleased to see you all remembered your Event Drills." She tapped deftly over her console and gave them a small smile. "I see only three warnings for persons out of bounds, and one hundred percent checked in on time." A few people started to applaud - Tendo almost did, but caught himself from the look she shot them. "Please, this isn't high school." For someone so slim and pretty, she was damn intimidating. "While our Eastern compatriots are deploying in response to this alert, your previous schedule is being suspended so that we can take this opportunity to instruct you further on alert response procedures. Base alerts last from the time movement is detected in the Breach until the kaiju is destroyed, anywhere from two to four days."
Even the smartasses lost their sense of humor in a big hurry as the kaiju signature moved closer to land, and every few minutes, Sevier would pause in her lecture to take stock.
Almost everyone jumped at the double-tone alert that sounded as three Jaeger blips appeared on the screen, signaling deployment. "Lucky Seven is deploying to Manila. Horizon Brave to Shanghai, and Tacit Ronin to Okinawa. A great deal depends now on where the bogey goes around Taiwan."
"Christ, not Manila again," murmured Cady behind Tendo.
Sevier gave him a sympathetic look. "Family there?"
"Yes, ma'am. Dunno if any of them are alive as it is." Cady, the Indonesians, the Chinese, and Japanese recruits had gradually moved closer and closer together as the night wound on.
She nodded grimly. "You're going to find that one of the most difficult aspects of life in the Corps is hearing the transmissions from an event. Once we have contact with the bogey, I'm going to turn them on. Brace yourselves, ladies and gentlemen. We are thousands of miles from the contact point, on alert, but the reality of the situation is that there is not a bloody thing you or I can do. The media makes these engagements sound very romantic, but hearing it in real time is not the same."
Ranger Tamsin Sevier knew what she was about. Reckoner, the largest kaiju recorded so far if the sonar readings were to be believed, cruised through the Luzon Strait, making brief landfall over the Balintang Islands, which luckily wouldn't inflict damage to more than wildlife. Cady let out his breath as the kaiju passed the Philippines by, but the mainland Asians' tension only grew. The candidates nibbled on emergency rations and dozed on and off on the floor as the base personnel changed shifts.
The projection cone narrowed onto China and Vietnam. "South China Sea," murmured Yancy. "Straight line into Hong Kong."
The blue kaiju bogey began crossing paths with multiple green and yellow blips. "Commercial vessels," said Sevier calmly. "Civilian vessel." Each time the bogey came into direct contact with a blip, the blip vanished. The bogey honed in on a larger gray blip. "Oil rig. Ninety-three hands."
"Jesus Christ," someone muttered.
In the corner of his eye, he could see Chloe and Christian with their hands folded, eyes closed. Mariella from Columbia was pulling a rosary out of her pocket and hesitated when Sevier looked at her, but the Ranger nodded. "Can't hurt, can it?" Sevier observed.
Tendo fingered the one in his pocket. It'd never meant much more than an heirloom from his father's family before, but he supposed Sevier was right: it couldn't hurt. Not that it was likely to help either, he thought bitterly as the oil rig's blip vanished. Someone's breath was hitching somewhere behind him, but he didn't embarrass whoever it was by turning to look, and apart from that, almost nobody made a sound.
Sevier was calm and focused to a degree that astonished Tendo, knowing she'd been in combat only a few months before in another major population center. Everyone except for her jumped again when the first comm transmissions came over the speakers: "Code Red issued for Hong Kong and Macau, Extreme Red Alert issued for Hong Kong. Horizon Brave re-deploying Victoria Harbor, ETA: 90 minutes."
They'd gambled wrong by sending it to Shanghai. The kaiju was going to get to Hong Kong first. "How's the Civil Defense over there?" Yancy asked one of the Chinese candidates.
"Up until now, I thought it was good," Shan replied. "Many shelters, evacuation plans, warning drills. Now..." He shook his head. "There are over eight million people in Hong Kong. It's not enough."
"Lamma Island, Visual Contact!" It was still daylight there, late afternoon from the looks of it. There again was a sight that everyone in the room would once have scoffed at, having seen only in movies up until three years before.
"Another T-Rex lookalike," murmured Raleigh.
"Better arms than T-Rex," mused Brandon Pines. The Air Force pilot seemed to have a stick up his ass sometimes, but now he was sitting close to Lea Franklin, both of them eyewitnesses to Trespasser.
"Yeah," Tendo sighed, as Reckoner bowled over buildings and casually swept aside a ferry pier, reducing it an avalanche of kindling and metal into the East Lamma Channel. "Much better arms."
As they all tracked the red Jaeger blip moving south, the kaiju came ashore again in Ocean Park and began cutting a swath of destruction along the Western shore of Hong Kong Island. The roads were still full of cars, and buildings both ancient and modern crumbled like aluminum cans under Reckoner's feet.
Fighter jets divebombed him only to be swatted aside like flies - that was the one time that Tendo noticed Sevier wincing. He wondered what - or who - she was thinking about. Brandon Pines actually averted his eyes from the screens a few times. Tendo knew that less than half of the active duty pilots based in California had survived K-Day.
"He's coming in at Union Square, heading straight for ICC Tower!"
"Structural collapse reported at New Yau Ma Tei Bunker, major flooding!"
"International Commerce Center, Kowloon Metro Station, you've got less than two minutes to get underground, he's coming right at you!"
"This is Support Chopper Squadron Epsilon, we're preparing for barrage at target's face. We need to blind him, don't take any of us out!"
"Acknowledged, we're aiming our anti-aircraft batteries at target's feet."
A formation of choppers came blazing over the skyline firing missiles at Reckoner's eyes, while guns mounted on rooftops fired at its feet. The kaiju recoiled a few times and roared, slashing at the air, but then headed for the tallest skyscraper on the shoreline that much faster.
"Oh, fuck," hissed somebody.
"This is Jaeger Horizon Brave, preparing for deployment at Kowloon Park."
Too late for the tower, Tendo thought miserably, as the kaiju seemed to embrace it. The skyscraper came down on its side like a felled tree, raising a massive cloud of rubble even as the tactical display finally showed the Jaeger at combat readiness.
"Horizon Brave neural handshake complete. Ready to deploy," announced a female Jaeger was visible now on the video cameras, being released by the Jumphawks just outside a stadium to the east of the dust cloud. "Moving to intercept."
"Target moving north towards civil service headquarters, Horizon Brave. If he takes it out, Hong Kong's going to have a problem!"
"Considering he just knocked down your largest skyscraper, I think you already have a problem," said the male pilot's voice. "Spotters, stay well above us, please, visibility is dropping fast."
"Roger, Horizon Brave, all units ascending."
"Eight hundred meters and closing," said the female pilot.
"Target is directly over Kowloon Station - structural collapses reported in the tunnels."
"Four hundred meters and closing. We're going to try and cut him off at Jordan Road - visual contact!"
"Horizon Brave, this is Lead Spotter Peregrine, we have no visual, repeat, no visual!"
"Acknowledged, we have him on instruments."
"Here we go!" For a few moments, all the watchers could see was dust, then the kaiju came hurtling out of the debris of another row of skyscrapers and splashed back into the harbor. It came back up, well, roaring mad, as the Jaeger surged out of the dust after it, and the pair collided again.
Tendo sucked in his breath as Horizon Brave toppled into a highway interchange, and Reckoner headed back into the city. The Jaeger righted herself and gave chase. It was strange to remember that the mech itself was not the living being, but that there were two people in its head, one controlling its left side, the other controlling the right.
Who were the pilots? He wracked his brain for the stats that most of them had committed to memory - oh, that was right, a brother-sister team. Jing and Min Li, China's first test pilots, the minds behind much of the combat that the candidates were learning here at the Academy.
"Kaiju Blue sighting - target wounded. Wēnshén!" Min spat as Reckoner suddenly took a flying leap over several buildings. Unnecessarily, he added, "Target can jump."
"He's moving northeast towards Coronation Towers," Jing warned.
"Aw, for the love of - Horizon Brave, I've been asked to inform you that Queen Elizabeth Hospital is not evacuated." A stream of Mandarin profanity followed, and Sevier dropped her face into her palm.
"Fuck!" snarled Yancy. "Morons!"
Luckily for all concerned, Reckoner got himself distracted tipping over more skyscrapers, and Horizon Brave managed to catch up with him. The Lis tackled him into more buildings and managed to hang onto his ankle when he attempted to jump again, at the cost of pulverizing every structure in the vicinity with his thrashing.
"Deploying cryo gun in three...two...one..." Steam erupted from a cannon mount on Horizon's shoulder, and the kaiju screamed. The second cannon caught Reckoner in the throat, and he was definitely in serious trouble now, unable to rise. He rolled onto his back, and Horizon launched a salvo of close-range missiles into his stomach. "Cannons recharging..." Jing grunted.
"Your range is dangerously close for a flash freeze, Horizon!" a spotter warned.
"Understood." They crawled on top of the kaiju and wrapped their hands around its neck.
"Come on, come on, come on," Tendo could hear Raleigh whispering.
"Horizon, watch your right arm!"
Yelps rang out as the kaiju managed to get one of his arms free and clawed around Horizon's right shoulder, ripping chunks out of the cryo cannon, and tearing pieces of armor away.
"Chòu biǎozi! Losing cannon pressure - discharge, discharging!" More steam obscured the torso of the Jaeger and the kaiju, and they could hear someone coughing over the speakers. "Cào nǐ zǔzōng shíbā dài - right side oxygen line cut. Switching to portable," Jing croaked.
"Horizon, do you need backup?"
"Negative, we have thirty minutes, and I think we can finish him," Min panted. "Both kaiju arms immobilized... LOCCENT, do you have signature? We've lost instruments."
"Still getting signature, Horizon, but he's not moving."
"Not with his arms and legs frozen. Stand by, let us see what's inside." Horizon picked up a random slab of sheet metal and began hacking apart the kaiju's stomach.
"Horizon, I hate to be a spoilsport, but you're spraying Kaiju Blue everywhere."
"Don't worry, we have a plan. Signature?"
"Signature... down. That's down for the count, Horizon Brave, congratulations!"
Whoops rang over the speakers, and Min announced, "Now for our final trick, discharging left cannon." They blasted coolant over the shredded torso, freezing the exposed organs. "That should help with the contamination."
"Well done, Horizon Brave! This is LOCCENT Hong Kong, local time 15:56, declaring kaiju destroyed."
As cheers sounded over the speakers, Ranger Sevier shot a faint smile at the suddenly-restless class. "Now you may celebrate."
"WOOOOO!" Tendo was never sure who started whooping first or who came flying to their feet first. Well, nobody got any demerits. After all, they had permission.
To be continued...
Coming Soon: Drift testing begins in earnest, and another Ranger team visits the Academy to give Class 2016-B some guidance. Tendo Choi is good at making friends, but discovers that even friendship doesn't make drifting easily, and the folks in charge start to notice the pairs with serious potential in Chapter Four: Teaming Up.
PLEASE remember to review!
Translations (MandarinChinese)
Wēnshén – god of plague
Chòu biǎozi – stinking whore
Cào nǐ zǔzōng shíbā dài – fuck your ancestors to the eighteenth generation
Original Character Guide
Cady Spencer - mid-20s, Filipino-American from Portland, Oregon. His mother's family is from Manila, and she lost all contact with them after Hundun attacked in 2014.
Brandon Pines - early 30s from Monterey, California, Air Force PAVE Hawk pilot. Flew missions against Trespasser on K-Day, one of the few surviving pilots.
Antwan Ferrier - Jamaican national, age 38, was a cruise ship steward in Cabo San Lucas when Kaiceph attacked.
Lea Franklin - age 17, lived in San Jose, California. Sole survivor of K-Day out of her family because she was traveling abroad with a school group. Has intense social anxiety due to PTSD, but trained for military service to avenge her family.
Christian and Chloe Warner - African-Americans from Atlanta, Georgia, ages 25 and 23, half-siblings from a blended family.
Devi and Susanti Hassan - first-generation daughters of Indonesian immigrants to Australia, ages 26 and 24.
Indra Hassan - Devi and Susanti's cousin, born in Jakarta, Indonesia, age 37.
Bao Wang and Shun Thou - first cousins, Chinese nationals from Bejing, early 20s, put off enrolling in technical school to attempt the Jaeger Academy
Brian Patrick and Janet McDonald - first cousins, Irish nationals, mid-20s. Their parents were NATO aid workers who went to San Francisco after K-Day, Brian's father and Janet's mother both died of exposure to Kaiju Blue toxin.
Jing and Min Li - China's first Rangers, co-founders and designers of the Jaeger Academy and curriculum, current pilots of Horizon Brave, siblings, early 30s.
Familiar Faces
Kennedy LaRue and Stephanie Lanphier - childhood friends from Seattle, age 18, high school athletes and cheerleaders who opted to try the Jaeger Academy after their college plans were derailed by the war. If you don't know more than that, well, wait and see!
Tamsin Sevier - retired Ranger, co-pilot of Coyote Tango with Stacker Pentecost. Grounded after being diagnosed with cancer. (At this stage, it has only been three or four months since her diagnosis, and major debilitating treatment doesn't always begin right away. So in this headcanon, she's still putting her hand in the war effort where she can.)
Dr. Caitlin Lightcap - age 30ish, from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, inventor of the pons neural bridge and co-pilot of Brawler Yukon, the first Jaeger, until its destruction.