Disclaimer: I do not own Godzilla, Pacific Rim, or any other franchise elements contained herein.
Notes: Hi, all! Sorry it took a while, but I'm finally back with another chapter! This one's focused more on the human side of things, but there's definitely still some Kaiju action too. Hope you all enjoy!
Chapter 3: Family Ties
May 2016
Tokyo, Japan
The cool air of the Tokyo Shatterdome sent shivers down Pentecost's spine. He shifted position carefully, trying to sit a little higher up against the pillows without aggravating any of his bandages. A bit of wry amusement filtered through the ghost Drift in his head, coming from where Tamsin was lying in the bed next to his.
It had been two weeks since the battle with Onibaba, and the two Rangers had been in the infirmary for most of that time. The good news was that they'd both survived their ordeal, and had come through the post-battle recovery period without too much trouble. Tamsin's seizure had run its course by the time her pod had been recovered by one of their spotting choppers, and both she and Pentecost had received full treatments for their injuries over the next five days. Pentecost's torso and arms were now lined with a network of crisscrossing burns, courtesy of the overloaded circuits in his drivesuit; they would leave permanent scars, but luckily the damage hadn't been too severe.
Unfortunately, that was the end of the good news. Once the immediate crisis had been dealt with, both Pentecost and Tamsin had undergone a thorough medical evaluation, and the cause of Tamsin's seizure had been confirmed. Both Rangers had been diagnosed with cancer, caused by the radiation leaking from Coyote Tango's nuclear reactor. They weren't entirely surprised by the diagnosis – the potential risk of Rangers developing cancer from their nuclear-powered war machines had been well-known from the very beginning of the program, and every Jaeger pilot who'd signed up knew the risk that they were taking – but it was still horrifying to have that threat turn from theoretical to reality. Pentecost's wasn't as advanced as Tamsin's, which was why she had been the one whose neural handshake had fallen apart during the battle, but they would both need to start treatments right away.
In addition, the stress that had been placed on their minds in that battle, Tamsin's from her seizure and Pentecost's from the strain of piloting alone, had caused permanent damage to both of their brains. As a result, neither of them would ever be able to pilot a Jaeger again; the stress that it would put on their minds would be too much, and even if they successfully finished that mission and made it back, they'd be lucky to survive for more than a few hours afterwards. As a result, although Marshal Tachibana and the rest of the PPDC leadership had made it clear that they were both welcome to remain in whatever capacity was feasible, their time as Rangers was over.
That announcement had been made clear to them the night before, but neither of them had been able to talk about it yet. The fact that they were out of the battle, unable to keep fighting the Kaiju, was like a knot in both of their stomachs, weighing them down and keeping them rooted to the spot. But Pentecost could still feel Tamsin's mind, and he could tell that she couldn't hold herself back anymore.
"So," she finally spoke up, leaning back on her pillows and looking over at him. "What're we gonna do, Stacks?"
"I…" Pentecost sighed heavily. "I don't know. I'd like to stay with the PPDC, even though I can't keep piloting. I suppose I could see about getting a position as an instructor at the Academy, or possibly helping at one of the Shatterdomes."
"Makes sense," Tamsin agreed. "You'd be good at that. Although honestly, I think you'd be better suited for command." She glanced over at him and grinned. "They are opening a couple more Shatterdomes this year, and I think you'd be a good candidate for a new Marshal."
Pentecost's eyes widened at that. "Seriously?"
"Why not?" Tamsin chuckled. "You've got the right mindset for it. Tachibana'd definitely vouch for you, and I'm sure the other higher-ups would too." She fell silent for a minute, gazing thoughtfully up at the ceiling. "Me, on the other hand… I'm thinkin' of looking into K-Watch. That was my fallback option before we graduated from our Ranger training, and working at their observatory wouldn't be a physical strain, so I could get my treatment done there."
Pentecost felt a pang lance through him at that, mixed with fear as he pondered the danger that they were both facing. He reached across the narrow gap between their beds, which had been moved closer together following the PPDC's post-battle protocol of making it easy for Rangers to have physical contact as a treatment for "Drift shock", and took her hand. The trembling that was running through her fingers belied her calm exterior, but she returned his comforting squeeze and shifted a little closer to his bed so that the full length of their arms was pressed together, allowing them to draw comfort from the physical contact.
"It's going to be okay, Tam," Pentecost murmured, his voice a little shaky but his determination unwavering. "We're going to get through this. Whatever it takes."
A few hours later, Tamsin had decided to take a nap, but Pentecost couldn't sleep. His mind was too crowded with thoughts and worries, so he decided to get some exercise to distract himself. With that in mind, he left their room and headed off to the base's medical wing, where the two girls that his spotting chopper had rescued from Tokyo were being housed. He honestly wasn't sure why, but he'd been insistent in the aftermath of the battle that those two children needed to be taken care of, and Marshal Tachibana – who had a daughter himself, if Pentecost remembered correctly – had been kind enough to acquiesce.
When he arrived outside of the medical bay, Pentecost was greeted by Tachibana's LOCCENT chief, Kiriko Tsujimori, who had been there going over some data from the battle. She smiled when she saw him, inclining her head respectfully. "Ranger Pentecost," she greeted him.
"Major," Pentecost replied with a smile, returning her nod. "How are they doing?" Through the glass window of the medbay, he could see the two girls, each lying on a separate bed. The younger one, who couldn't have been more than twelve, was fast asleep, while the older one, who appeared to be in her mid-to-late teens, was awake and looking straight in their direction with a strange intensity in her eyes. Even though they were separated by the window and the medbay door was closed, he couldn't help the feeling that she could somehow hear him.
"Still recovering, but they're both improving," Tsujimori replied. "And we were finally able to confirm who they are." She nodded down towards the younger girl's bed and held up her clipboard to show a picture of that girl's face on it. "The first one: Mako Mori, age twelve. She was apparently in Tokyo on vacation with her parents, but we haven't been able to locate either of them." She grimaced. "There's no way to know for sure yet, but… it doesn't look good."
Pentecost winced and nodded slowly, feeling a wrenching pang of sympathy in his gut as he looked through the window at the sleeping girl. "I understand."
"For the second one… that's a little tricker." Tsujimori's frown deepened as she tapped a second photo on the clipboard. It showed a second young girl, similar to the second one that they'd brought in but at least a few years younger and with longer hair. "She won't confirm her identity for us, but based on the DNA and fingerprint results that we got from her medical examination, her name's Miki Saegusa. Age sixteen, Japanese-born, lived with her parents near Lake Ashino… until 2011, when her parents both died in a car accident, and she was taken in by the Shiragami ESP Institute here in Tokyo."
Pentecost's eyes widened at that, and he looked over at the window again, to where the older girl – Miki – was staring straight at them. "So… she's psychic?" he questioned, a little incredulously. He knew that psychics were real, of course, as their existence had become common knowledge after the United States' MK-Ultra program had gone public back in the '80s, but he also knew that they were pretty rare, and he'd never actually met one.
"It looks that way," Tsujimori confirmed, following his gaze and suppressing an instinctive flinch when she saw the girl looking at them. "The main problem now, though, is that as far as we can tell, neither of them have any living relatives who could take them in."
A painful twist lanced through Pentecost's stomach, and his eyes shifted from one girl to the other. His parents had both died when he was a teenager, and the only surviving relative who'd been close to him, his older sister Luna, had died in combat on K-Day. So, faced with these two orphaned girls, he knew exactly how that must feel.
"Sorry, I need to report back to the Marshal," Tsujimori spoke up again after checking her watch. "Glad you're feeling better, Ranger." She nodded to him and headed off down the hall, making her way back towards the LOCCENT control room.
Left behind, Pentecost leaned back against the wall for a minute, rubbing his eyes and letting out a sigh. As he thought things over, however, his gaze was slowly drawn back to the medbay window and the two girls inside. An idea slowly began to take root in the back of his mind, growing stronger with each passing minute. Finally, he straightened up and, despite not being sure if it was a good idea, crossed the hall to the medbay door.
Mako Mori was clearly fast asleep, because she didn't even twitch when Pentecost opened the door. Miki, however, was already sitting upright and looking in his direction, as if she'd known he was coming… which, of course, she probably had.
"Miss Saegusa?" Pentecost greeted her in Japanese, speaking quietly so he could hopefully avoid waking Mako. "I'm Stacker Pentecost. It's nice to meet you."
To her credit, Miki's face didn't display any reaction to his addressing her by name, but after regarding him silently for a long moment, she finally responded. "You're a Jaeger pilot, right?" she spoke up in accented English, her voice quiet and even.
Pentecost was caught off-guard for a second, but he shook it off. "I am," he confirmed, before wincing and rubbing one hand over the top of his head. "Well… I suppose I was." He walked over and sat on one of the empty beds across from the two girls, picking a spot where he could lean back against the wall. "I'm sorry for barging in like this, but I wanted to check on the two of you and see how you were doing."
"It's okay." Miki looked at him again, her dark eyes seeming to pierce right through him, and Pentecost felt an odd pressure inside his head, before she nodded slowly. "Yes," she murmured, this time in Japanese. "You're telling the truth, and you really do just want to help. So I guess I can trust you."
Although he was taken aback by the realization that Tsujimori hadn't been wrong – Bloody hell, she really is a psychic – Pentecost was able to keep his nerve. "You can trust me," he agreed in Japanese. "I know who you are, Miss Saegusa, but I promise, I just want to help." He frowned as a suspicion came to him. "You don't want to go back to the Shiragami Institute, do you?"
A brief flash of fear in Miki's eyes confirmed his suspicion, and she nodded. "No, I don't." She sighed, looking down at her hands. "They didn't hurt me or anything. It's just… I've been there for five years, and I don't have anywhere else to go, but I hate it there. So when the Kaiju came, I saw a chance to get away, and I ran."
"I see." Pentecost couldn't help feeling conflicted, but he felt a rush of sympathy as he looked from Miki's pained expression to Mako's sleeping form in the bed next to hers. These girls had suffered so much, been through far more pain and terror than anyone should have to endure, and neither of them had anywhere else to go. He had to do something to try and help them. And, maybe, he could.
Miki's psychic talents picked up on what he was thinking, and her gaze lifted back up to focus on him. Her eyes slowly grew wider as she presumably read through his thoughts, following them to their logical conclusion. "Really?" she questioned, her voice incredulous but carrying a thread of hope. "You… you would really do that?"
"I would," Pentecost confirmed, sitting up straighter as a newfound resolve came over him. "If that's what you both want."
"Well, you can ask her when she wakes up," Miki quipped, nodding to Mako. "But in my case, at least…" She met his gaze without flinching, and nodded as a small smile crept onto her face. "Yes. I would like that."
"Good." Pentecost returned her smile, feeling real warmth in his heart for the first time since he and Tamsin had deployed for the battle with Onibaba. "So would I."
In the aftermath of the Tokyo battle, the four survivors went their separate ways. Once Pentecost and Miki had explained the situation to Mako, the younger girl had accepted his offer as well. She'd become very attached to Miki ever since they'd found each other in the ruins of Tokyo, and that attachment quickly extended to Pentecost and Tamsin as well once she got to know them. Once all of the necessary paperwork had been completed for Pentecost to become their legal guardian, both girls were sent to a private boarding school in Pennsylvania, which had an arrangement set up with the PPDC to house the children of Jaeger Program's pilots. They would be safe there, far away from any possible Kaiju attacks and out of reach of the Shiragami Institute or anyone else who might try to acquire Miki for another psychic research program.
Neither of Coyote Tango's pilots, however, had any intention of leaving the war effort. Although neither of them would ever be able to safely pilot a Jaeger into battle again, Pentecost and Tamsin were both able to find other ways to contribute. Tamsin chose to take a position in K-Watch, the PPDC's early-warning system whose job was to identify Kaiju emergences from the Breach and to track them wherever they went. Accordingly, she was transferred to their headquarters in the Mauna Kea observatory, on the Big Island of Hawaii, where she would begin undergoing chemotherapy for her cancer while still performing her duties to the best of her abilities.
Pentecost, meanwhile, was promoted to the position of PPDC Marshal, with a recommendation from Marshal Tachibana. His first posting was to the Shatterdome in Anchorage, Alaska, where the Jaeger Academy had been established. Like Tamsin, he also began to undergo treatment for his cancer, but since his wasn't as advanced as hers, he was assured that he should have a better chance of overcoming it. While that was good news, he had a hard time feeling happy about it, simply because of what that could mean for Tamsin's chances.
Coyote Tango was also taken to Anchorage to undergo repairs, and once the Jaeger had been fully mended from the damage that Onibaba had inflicted, she received a new set of pilots: Victor and Gunnar Tunari, one of the three new pairs of Rangers who had graduated from that spring's "2016-A" class at the Academy. While Pentecost couldn't deny that it stung to see another team of Rangers piloting his and Tamsin's Jaeger, it also felt good to know that Coyote would be able to keep fighting the Kaiju, even if he couldn't.
With the spring term of the Jaeger Academy coming to a close, applications for the fall class (designated as "2016-B") were now underway. Hundreds of applicants were already pouring in, of course… but two of those prospective PPDC Rangers would have a much more significant impact on the course of the Kaiju War than anyone could have imagined at first glance.
June 2016
Kodiak Island, Alaska
Raleigh Becket sighed heavily as he leaned back in his chair and glanced around, taking in the crowd that had crowded into the main auditorium of the Jaeger Academy. Apparently, more than three thousand people had applied for the second term of this year (aka "Class 2016-B"), but only about four hundred had passed the initial screening process, a mix of written exams and physical tests that had been designed to identify all the most promising candidates. They'd been testing for a week straight, but the first step in their path was finally done, and a small, weary smile flickered across his face as he looked up at the stage.
Andrew… we're really gonna do it, he vowed silently. We're gonna make those monsters pay, no matter what it takes.
"Raleigh?" a voice murmured, bringing his attention back to the present. He turned to see his older brother Yancy looking at him, frowning with a bit of concern. "You all right?"
Raleigh yawned and rubbed his eyes, fighting off the exhaustion that he'd been feeling after the past week of physical and written tests. "Yeah, I'm good," he muttered with a weary grin. "Just been a long week, that's all."
"Damn right." Yancy chuckled. "But I'm pretty sure we're gonna have plenty of long weeks ahead of us before this is over."
Before Raleigh could respond, a commotion in the audience drew their attention up to the stage at the front of the auditorium, where three people were taking the stage. The first one, a blonde woman wearing glasses and a white lab coat, was immediately recognizable as Caitlin Lightcap, one of the founders of the Jaeger Program and one of the two pilots of Brawler Yukon. The man standing next to her, a dark-skinned man wearing an officer's uniform, Raleigh recognized as Stacker Pentecost, another Jaeger pilot and the new Marshal of the Anchorage Shatterdome. But it was the other man accompanying them who stepped up to the microphone in the middle of the stage. A few years older than Pentecost or Lightcap, he wore a long brown duster over simple dark clothing; his short, dark hair was accompanied by a thick, bushy mustache, and his cool, dark eyes had an almost-predatory look in them as they swept over the crowd. Raleigh had never seen him before, but he could already tell that this was not someone you would want to mess with.
"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen," the man called out in a deep, gruff voice. "For those of you who don't know me, I'm Captain Douglas Gordon, head instructor for the Jaeger Academy. As you know, all of you are here because you have passed the preliminary round of screening, thereby confirming that you are viable candidates for this program." His eyes narrowed. "However, if any of you think that things will get any easier for you from here, think again."
"Told you," Yancy whispered under his breath, drawing a subtle elbow to the side from Raleigh.
"The previous class of this year, 2016-A, received over a thousand applicants," Gordon continued. "Less than half of those passed the initial screening, as you all have. But out of the several hundred prospective candidates who made it into Class 2016-A, only forty-eight of those passed the first cut after their initial eight-week training period. And out of those forty-eight… only six candidates ultimately became Rangers, having formed strong enough bonds with their Drift partners and reached the level of skill that is necessary to graduate as Jaeger pilots." He paused for effect, allowing the muffled chorus of hisses and sharp breaths to echo through the massive room. "That should hopefully give you some idea of how difficult it will be for any of you to reach that level yourselves."
Both Raleigh and Yancy grimaced at that. Only six people, out of more than a thousand applicants, had successfully become Rangers in the previous class? That definitely brought home the difficulty of what they were trying to do… but at the same time, Raleigh already knew that neither he, nor his brother, had any intention of giving up.
After a brief pause, Gordon carried on. "Now, I want to be clear: I am not saying any of this to try and discourage any of you from continuing with this training. My only intention is to make sure that you all understand just how challenging this will be for each and every one of you… and that you shouldn't start thinking that you can afford to slack off just because you made it this far." His cold eyes swept over the audience again. "Passing the initial screening tests was the absolute minimum of what succeeding at this academy will demand from you. This training will be like nothing that any of you have ever experienced before." He indicated Pentecost and Lightcap with a sweep of one arm, a faint smile flickering across his face. "But if you do succeed, then you will have what all of the PPDC's Rangers and support personnel have: namely, a chance to show the whole world what you're capable of, and to do your part in overcoming the threat of the Kaiju."
Raleigh and Yancy exchanged glances and nervous grins, and Raleigh could see his resolve mirrored in his older brother's eyes. No matter how tough this training got, no matter what challenges they had to face, they would do it together, and they weren't going to give up. If there was any chance that they could succeed, and avenge Andrew's death… then they were going to go for it, no matter what it took.
Anchorage, Alaska
A few miles away, Mark Russell sat in the living room of the Becket-Russells' family home, not paying much attention to the news broadcast that was playing on their TV. He could dimly hear Emma's voice echoing softly from another room, singing a lullaby to help Madison fall asleep, but that didn't do enough to soothe his nerves. All he could think about was the prospects of what his two headstrong stepsons were trying to do at that moment, running headlong towards the monsters that had already taken one child from their family.
Mark Russell and Emma Becket – or Emma Bishop, which had been her original last name – had known each other for a long time. They'd met in college and had been close friends by the end of their senior year, both pursuing careers in sciences (hers in marine biology, his in zoology), although nothing romantic had ever happened between them back then. After school, they'd gone their separate ways, but they had stayed in touch over the years and had remained fairly close. Mark had moved down to Wyoming for a few years and gotten a job working as an ecological surveyor for Yellowstone National Park, but Emma had stayed in Anchorage, where she'd eventually married Richard Becket, a fairly-successful contractor and a mutual friend to them both. Emma and Richard had had two boys, Yancy and Raleigh, and they'd been happy together for a few years… until Richard had been killed in an industrial accident, back when Yancy was a toddler and Raleigh was still just a baby.
In the aftermath of Richard's death, Mark had returned to Anchorage for the funeral, and had taken it upon himself to help Emma and her boys. He'd never had any intention of trying to take Richard's place, of course, but as time went on, he and Emma had stayed in touch and slowly grew closer, both gradually realizing that the feelings they'd both suppressed back in college were still there. Eventually, after a couple of years, they'd decided to give dating a try; Mark had moved back to Anchorage full-time, and their relationship grew stronger as a result. Finally, Mark had made the decision to propose, and Emma had happily accepted.
Over the next few years, the Becket-Russell family had grown larger with the additions of two other children, Andrew and Madison. They'd eventually moved south to California, after Emma had been offered a position in a marine biology lab at the University of San Francisco, and had settled in nicely there. Their lives had been perfect: a happy, loving family, committed to moving forward together.
And then, on that fateful morning in August 2013, a monster had risen out of San Francisco Bay, and the Becket-Russells' happy, peaceful lives had come crashing down. After six days of horror, the city that they had called home lay in ruins… and Mark and Emma's youngest son, Andrew, was gone.
In the wake of K-Day, the family had moved back north to Anchorage, the only other place that they could really call home. They'd each come to terms with their loss in their own way: Yancy and Raleigh had drawn strength from each other and from their shared desire to be there for Madison, while Emma had occupied herself with her work, getting a new position at the University of Alaska. Mark had felt rudderless at first, and he couldn't deny that he'd been tempted to just drown his sorrows as best he could, but with three other children to care for, that just wasn't an option. So he'd found a new job too – working part-time to help with an ecological study off the Alaskan coast – and had forced himself to keep living and to keep moving forward, one step at a time.
The subsequent Kaiju attacks in other parts of the world over the next two years had darkened his outlook even further. One attack had been bad enough, but the fact that it was now a recurring phenomenon case a grim shadow over the future. At least he'd been able to take some comfort in the idea that the Kaiju might not find their way this far north… until April 2015, when Karloff, the sixth monster to emerge from the Breach, had been detected heading towards the Pacific Northwest.
Mark would remember that day just as vividly as the horror of K-Day, albeit for different reasons. He, Emma, and their three remaining children had been ready this time, and as soon as the alarms sounded and the emergency warning broadcasts began to play on every channel, they started packing immediately. Less than an hour after the sirens went off, they were on the road, heading inland as fast as they could. They'd relaxed a bit when it had been announced that the Kaiju was heading for Vancouver, Canada, but Mark hadn't been able to banish the knot of tension and fear in his gut.
At least, not until they stopped at a crowded rest stop a few hours later, just in time to see an INN news broadcast of Karloff's attack on Vancouver… and to watch in amazement as Steve Martin, the now-famous reporter who'd earned his reputation by personally documenting Trespasser's rampage through San Francisco, provided his audience with a front-row seat to the extraordinary battle which was unfolding between the newest Kaiju and a gigantic robot, known as a Jaeger, that had been built by the Pan-Pacific Defense Corps to take on the monster. And Mark would never forget hearing the reporter's delighted, triumphant shout, as his usual icy calm cracked when the battle reached its end.
"The Kaiju… it's dead! It's dead! They've killed it!"
The entire crowd at that lonely rest stop, packed into the small building so they could get a view of the ceiling-mounted television screens, had erupted in cheers and applause. Mark and Emma had been no exception, embracing each other and their children with tears streaming down their cheeks… but that event had been even more impactful for their two remaining sons. From that moment on, Mark had slowly realized that Yancy and Raleigh had been given a new purpose in life that day. His two teenage stepsons had just gotten their first glimpse of a path that could lead them to what they both wanted more than anything: a chance to get some payback on the monsters that had taken their brother away from them.
As soon as the Jaeger Academy officially opened its doors in Anchorage, Mark had instinctively known what was inevitably going to happen. Sure enough, as soon as Raleigh had finished his junior year of high school earlier that year, he and Yancy had informed Mark and Emma that they intended to apply to the Academy and join the PPDC, with the ultimate goal of becoming Jaeger pilots. On one level, Mark could totally understand their motivations: if he hadn't had a family to care for, there was a decent chance that he might've applied for the Academy himself. And he couldn't deny that given their passion and their drive, the boys might really have what it took to achieve their dream. But on another, deeper level, he couldn't deny that the thought of losing any more of his children to the Kaiju was the worst fear that he could possibly imagine.
As a result, Mark and Emma initially hadn't approved of Yancy and Raleigh's decision … but in the end, they'd both been forced to come to terms with the fact that they didn't have a choice. Their sons were both adults now, and if this was what they wanted to do with their lives, that was their decision to make. Mark had tried to comfort himself with the knowledge that it would be unlikely for the boys to successfully complete their training, so it wasn't likely that they would ever actually get a chance to pilot a Jaeger, but that didn't really help his nagging fears. The idea of watching a news broadcast of a battle just like the one from the previous year, but knowing that two of his children were the ones inside the giant fighting machine and trading blows with a gigantic alien monster, was terrifying to say the least.
"Mark?" Emma's voice snapped Mark out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see her standing in the doorway. Clearly he'd gotten more distracted than he'd thought, long enough for her to finish getting Madison to sleep. She frowned as she looked over at him, clearly seeing the look on his face. "Are you all right?"
"I…" Finding himself at a loss for words, Mark just shrugged. "I'm… as well as can be expected, I guess."
Emma nodded and smiled knowingly. "Same here, believe me." She walked across the room and sat next to him, leaning against him and resting her head on his shoulder. "But it's going to be okay. I know it will."
"How can you be so sure?" Mark closed his eyes and let his head fall back against the couch cushions, shivering as another flash of memory flickered behind his eyes. "They have no idea what they're getting themselves into!"
"Actually, they know exactly what they're getting themselves into," Emma countered with a soft, wry chuckle. She took one of his hands between both of hers, giving it a comforting squeeze. "After what happened three years ago, you think there's any way they wouldn't leap at the chance to fight back against those things?"
Mark sighed and shook his head. "No," he admitted. "Hell, I'd probably do the exact same thing if I was in their position. I just…" He felt a stab of pain in his heart and fought against the tears that were threatening to well up in his eyes. "I don't want to lose them the way we lost Andrew."
"I know." Emma exhaled slowly and nestled closer to him. "But we have to trust them. Yancy and Raleigh aren't like Andrew. They're not kids anymore, and if they do end up piloting one of those things… then the next time they see a Kaiju coming at them, at least they'll be able to fight back." She looked up at him, and Mark saw the watery look in her eyes too. She'd always been better at keeping her emotions in check than he was, but even she had her limits. "I remember how scared we all were in San Francisco… and then again, last year, when those sirens went off. And if doing this means that our boys never have to be scared of those monsters again… then I think that's a good thing."
After a long moment of thought, Mark finally nodded. "You're right," he agreed, a little shakily. "I don't like it, but… you're right."
For a few minutes, the pair sat there in a more comfortable silence, drawing comfort from each other. Eventually, however, the sudden buzz of Emma's cell phone ringing drew both of their attention, and she sat up to fish it out of her pocket. Mark didn't recognize the number on the screen, and judging by the perplexed look on Emma's face, neither did she, but she ultimately shrugged and answered it regardless. "Hello?" she questioned, putting the phone on speaker.
The voice that echoed over the phone was unfamiliar – an older man, by the sound of it, with a Japanese accent – but it was calm and polite. "Good evening," he greeted them. "Am I addressing Dr. Emma Becket-Russell?"
Emma raised an eyebrow and exchanged a puzzled glance with Mark, but she ultimately shrugged and turned back to the phone. "Yes, that's me," she confirmed. "I'm sorry, but… who is this?"
"I am Dr. Ishiro Serizawa," the voice replied, "and I have a proposition for you. It involves a project that you and your current husband, Dr. Mark Russell, developed in your college years, as part of your thesis on bioacoustics."
That got Mark's attention as well, and he sat up straighter as he and Emma's eyes both widened. They both immediately knew what this "Serizawa" guy must be talking about, but neither of them had really thought about that old science project since before they'd gotten married… hell, even since they'd both graduated from college.
"You're talking about our 'ORCA' project, right?" Emma inquired, raising an eyebrow as she glanced back to Mark, who shrugged.
"That's correct," Serizawa confirmed. "I represent a scientific organization known as Monarch, which is currently in cooperation with the K-Science division of the Pan-Pacific Defense Corps. We have been researching ways by which we could improve or upgrade their existing Kaiju detection network… and I believe that your work in bioacoustics could be helpful in designing a more efficient tracking system, which could be used to help us better anticipate where future Kaiju might make landfall. To that end, I would like to arrange a meeting where we could discuss that project, and perhaps gain input from both of you on the best way for us to proceed with developing something similar for the PPDC."
Mark and Emma had both been caught thoroughly off-guard by this, but Mark's caution prompted him to speak up. "And what exactly would you have in mind, regarding the ORCA?" he put in. "Because we never completed our work on that thing: we dropped the project after our first test run of it turned out to be a failure." Failure had been putting it mildly: they'd intended for the ORCA to be a means by which they could study the bioacoustics of whales, possibly even communicate with them. But when they had tested it for the first time, on a small pod of humpback whales in the Gulf of Alaska, it had ended in disaster. The ORCA's scanning capabilities had worked just fine, but its broadcast, intended to merely imitate the whales' calls, had caused the humpbacks to panic, resulting in three members of the pod beaching themselves. Two of the beached whales had been successfully towed back out to sea and survived, but the third one had died before it could be rescued. Mark and Emma had never quite forgiven themselves for that, and that disastrous test run had ultimately driven them to scrap the project.
"Ah, Dr. Russell. It's a pleasure to meet you." A sympathetic tone entered Serizawa's voice. "I understand your concerns; I have read your papers on the subject in detail, and as of yet, I assure you that we have no intention of attempting to use the ORCA's secondary 'bio-mimicry' function against the Kaiju. But like all living things, the Kaiju produce bioacoustics, and we believe that your ORCA device could be an excellent blueprint for a new and improved Kaiju tracking system, based on scanning for their bioacoustics rather than their radar or energy signatures."
"Huh." Mark considered that idea, and he had to admit that it did make sense. Part of his and Emma's initial plan for the ORCA had been to develop a system that they could use to track migrating pods of whales from many miles away, using long-range sensors to pick up the animals' bioacoustics as they traveled. It did stand to reason that something similar could potentially be done for the Kaiju, making it easier to track their movements.
Emma nodded slowly, clearly also thinking it over. She looked back at him and shrugged, mouthing Might as well hear him out, right? Although Mark was still a little hesitant, he nodded.
"All right," she agreed. "We can at least meet with you and discuss it."
"Excellent. I will be in touch in a day or two to arrange a meeting." Serizawa fell silent for a moment. "I understand why you both have complicated feelings about this idea, but… thank you. If this plan works, it may help us to save many lives in the future." With that, the call disconnected, and silence fell over the room once more.
For the moment, Mark's worries about his sons were forgotten, replaced by a mix of curiosity and apprehension at this new proposal. "What do you think?" he questioned, turning to face Emma as they both leaned back against the cushions again.
"I mean, it'll be tricky," Emma replied thoughtfully. "But… it could be helpful, there's no denying that. So I think we should at least hear him out."
"Yeah." Mark nodded, still turning the idea over in his mind. "Makes sense."
August 2016
Kodiak Island, Alaska
In retrospect, Raleigh now knew that Captain Gordon's warnings certainly hadn't been an exaggeration. The first eight weeks of their training at the Jaeger Academy, which made up the first of three "terms" that comprised the 2016-B semester, had been absolutely brutal.
In additional to lots of normal physical training to make sure they were all in the best possible shape, all of the candidates had spent several hours every day being drilled at "Jaeger Bushido", a new hybrid martial art incorporating elements of numerous different styles, which had been developed specifically for Jaeger pilots. On top of that, there had been more traditional schooling as well, with extensive lessons in military tactics, protocols, Kaiju science, and Jaeger engineering. This training method was designed so that everyone who went through the Academy would get all the knowledge and training they needed to pursue careers within the PPDC, even if they didn't end up becoming Rangers.
The final tests had been the hardest part. Fortunately, the academic tests hadn't been too difficult after eight weeks of intense study, and the brothers had both managed to pass them all. It was their last test, the "Final Spar" – a final sparring match where each student had to go one-on-one with one of their Jaeger Bushido instructors, to show just how much they had learned in every aspect of the new martial art – that had really pushed them to their limits.
Raleigh, however, had earned the highest score out of the entire class, after setting an Academy record for the number of times he'd managed to get back up and continue the match. Most people tapped out after two or three rounds, and even the best normally dropped out after seven or eight, which was as far as Yancy had gotten. Raleigh's match had lasted eleven rounds, his sheer relentless determination driving him to keep hauling himself back up at the end of every clash, until exhaustion and pain had finally gotten the better of him and he'd been forced to concede defeat. Even Captain Gordon and Marshal Pentecost had been visibly impressed by the younger Becket brother's performance, although Raleigh tried not to let that go to his head.
Out of the four hundred or so pilot hopefuls who'd passed the Academy's initial screening tests, only sixty of them made it through the first cut and into the second term. In a speech to them all on the first day of the second term, Dr. Caitlin Lightcap made it very clear that most of them would not be able to Drift successfully, but that it wasn't a matter of skill or knowledge.
"Drifting is a new science," she explained, pacing back and forth on the main auditorium's stage as the now-much-smaller crowd of candidates gathered in the seats that had been provided. "And Drift compatibility operates under rules that we don't fully understand yet. There's no way to truly predict who each of you might be most compatible with, but that is what we'll work to discover over the next eight weeks. Of course, synchronization tests for family members are mandatory, as they statistically show higher initial levels of compatibility, but beyond that, the sky is the limit. For all those of you who are strangers to each other, now's the time to change that. The more potential Ranger partners you have, the higher your chances of finding the right one."
As Dr. Lightcap continued her explanation, she folded her hands behind her back and smiled faintly as her eyes flicked back and forth over the crowd. "Dating and physical intimacy between candidates is not forbidden, but it is discouraged – at least for the moment – as that could potentially make finding the right Drift partner more difficult for you. However, you are strongly encouraged to get to know each other and to make friends. Everyone in this room has the same goal: to do everything they can to help in the battle against the Kaiju."
Smiling, she nodded to the candidates one more time. "You've got the rest of today off, although I recommend taking the available free time to start socializing with each other and identifying potential candidates that you'd like to try Drift-testing with. We'll be starting our first tests tomorrow morning, so make sure you get some sleep tonight. For now, that's all. Congratulations, and welcome to the second term of Class 2016-B." With a brief bow and smile, she exited the stage to a brief chorus of applause.
Once Dr. Lightcap had departed, the room briefly fell silent as the candidates were left alone, before one of the guys Raleigh had encountered a couple of times during their first term, a young man with vaguely Chinese features and an irrepressible grin on his face, stood up and clapped his hands together. "All right, boys and girls!" he called out. "You guys heard the lady, so how about we get a little meet-and-greet started?"
Nervous chuckles echoed through the crowd, but the class all seemed to agree, so they all dragged their chairs into a large circle. The guy who'd first spoken up promptly chimed in again. "So, I guess I'll go first." His grin became a little more playful. "Hi, everyone: my name's Tendo Choi, and I'm a Jaegerholic."
More snickers and laughter rippled around the loose circle, but the tension had been broken. "Where're you from?" someone called out.
"Born in Beijing, but raised in San Francisco," Tendo replied, his amusement notably fading a bit. Numerous sympathetic hisses came in response to that, and Raleigh couldn't help but wince at the nightmarish memories of K-Day.
"'Frisco survivor here too," Yancy spoke up, raising a hand as he leaned back slightly in his chair before bumping his shoulder against Raleigh's. "I'm Yancy Becket; this is my brother Raleigh. Originally from Anchorage, but our family moved to San Fran a few years back for our mom's work." His jaw clenched at that, and Raleigh knew he was remembering that day too.
With the ice broken at this point, other members of the class began to introduce themselves. Kennedy LaRue and Stephanie Lanphier, lifelong friends from Seattle, who had been planning to attend college in northern California until their chosen university had been leveled by Trespasser's rampage. Ford Brody, originally from San Francisco but raised in Japan, who'd decided to try for the Jaeger Academy instead of the Army once its applications had been opened to the public. Elle Chase, a young would-be nurse who'd been attending medical school in Los Angeles when the rest of her family, back in San Francisco, had been wiped out on K-Day. Yoshito Chujo, an aircraft mechanic for the Japan Air Self-Defense Force, who'd lost relatives and friends when Onibaba had attacked Tokyo. And a trio of Japanese soldiers – Shinichi Ozaki, Katsunori Kazama, and Akane Yashiro – who'd originally been pilots for the JASDF, and had actually flown into battle against Onibaba, but had chosen to apply for the Academy after that.
Everyone's specific reasons for being at the Academy varied widely, but by that point, all of the remaining candidates of Class 2016-B had a few things in common. They all had the skills, talent and drive necessary to make it through the physical and mental challenges of the first term. They were all compelled, for one reason or another, to join the fight against the Kaiju in any way that they could.
And as Raleigh looked around at the men and women who would be joining him and Yancy in the next phase of their training, he believed that they all had what it took to succeed.
September 2016
Mauna Kea, Hawaii
Vivienne Graham gazed out the window of the Monarch helicopter as it soared above the jungle, looking away from where the sun was setting on the western horizon in a blaze of orange light. The beautiful scenery below would've been captivating for her under normal circumstances, but she was so exhausted that she barely even noticed it. She'd spent the past few hours on a last-minute flight from Monarch's headquarters in Japan, ever since the alarms had gone off across the PPDC and Monarch communication networks, and she had been too worried to get much sleep.
She had good reason to be worried. Two hours before her hasty departure from Monarch's outpost in the Philippines, the most recent Kaiju had emerged from the Breach. This one, a Category II designated Reckoner, was currently swimming west across the Philippine Sea, wreaking havoc on several inhabited islands as it made its way towards the east coast of the Asian continent. The PPDC Marshals were already in the process of deploying their Jaegers at strategic locations along the coastlines of Vietnam, China, Japan, and the Philippines, in preparation for the monster's arrival.
Vivienne, however, had a different mission. Monarch had been planning to establish a partnership with the PPDC's K-Watch division soon anyway, but Serizawa had made a snap decision to rush things along when this newest Kaiju had appeared. To that end, she was on her way to K-Watch headquarters, on the volcano of Mauna Kea in Hawaii, to assist them in monitoring Reckoner's progress.
Before long, the chopper left the jungle behind, and began cruising up over the rocky, barren slopes of Mauna Kea. Finally, it reached the summit, and Vivienne smiled as she saw the series of buildings set up along the expansive plateau atop the dormant volcano. Mauna Kea housed the largest astronomical observatory in the world, with telescopes operated by astronomers from eleven countries. When the Kaiju had begun to appear three years earlier, the PPDC had made arrangements to establish another observatory there as well, as the headquarters of their K-Watch division. A network of satellites had been established, covering the entirety of the Pacific Ocean, to track the Kaiju whenever they emerged from the Breach. Now, she had been charged with the task of combining the K-Watch monitoring system with the older tracking systems that Monarch had been developing in their attempt to track Godzilla's movements.
For the moment, however, Vivienne was much more concerned with the crisis that was currently unfolding in the Philippine Sea. Luckily, she wouldn't have to deal with it on her own, as was evidenced by the uniformed figure standing near the helicopter pad outside of the K-Watch observatory. Even from the air, Vivienne recognized the red hair gleaming in the sunlight, and her weary smile widened a bit as the chopper came in for a landing.
Sure enough, Tamsin Sevier was waiting at the edge of the landing pad as the Monarch chopper touched down. She was wearing a more casual K-Watch uniform instead of her Ranger attire, but she still looked just as imposing as she had during their previous meetings. Some of the cheer that she'd demonstrated before was gone now, as her attitude was much more serious this time; however, as Vivienne climbed out of the helicopter's side door, the former Jaeger pilot's lips twitched up in a grin.
"Evening, Doc!" Tamsin called out as she hurried forward to greet Vivienne, shielding her eyes against the cloud of dust whipped up by the chopper's blades. "Welcome to K-Watch!"
"Glad I could be here!" Vivienne replied with a weary smile. "Although I wish it was under better circumstances."
"Oh, trust me, so do I." Tamsin snorted and nodded back towards the observatory building behind her. "C'mon; I'll take you to the command center."
When they made it into the main operations room of the observatory, Vivienne was thoroughly impressed by the extent of the PPDC's tracking system. A map of the entire Pacific was displayed on the massive main screen that dominated one wall of the room. The Kaiju's position was signified by a solitary red blip, still moving west across the Philippine Sea, with a roughly cone-shaped area of shading stretched out ahead of it in various shades of red, orange and yellow, similar to the projections that were used to predict the movements of a hurricane. In addition, several green blips had appeared, representing the Jaegers that were being deployed along the eastern coastline of Asia.
"They're starting to send out Jaegers to guard the most likely targets," Tamsin explained as she indicated the screen. "So far, Lucky Seven's been deployed to Manila, Horizon Brave to Shanghai, and Tacit Ronin to Okinawa. What happens next depends on where this bastard ends up going, and whether he decides to swing north or south over the next couple of hours." She scowled at the tiny red blip, clenching and unclenching her fists. "Damn it… I hate being grounded like this."
Vivienne felt a pang in her stomach at that, but she did her best not to let it show on her face. She had a feeling that Tamsin wouldn't want sympathy at a time like this, no matter how bad she felt about the struggle that the ex-Ranger was currently going through. Instead, she found an unoccupied station where she could set up the laptop that she'd brought with her, and set to work on incorporating Monarch's tracking data into the observatory's existing network.
Over the next couple of hours, Vivienne, Tamsin, and the rest of the observatory's on-duty crew watched as Reckoner drew steadily closer to the mainland. In the end, it chose to veer south, passing between Taiwan and the northern Philippines on a course that led it straight towards the city of Hong Kong. The nearest Jaeger, Horizon Brave, was quickly picked up by its lift choppers, which started making their way towards Hong Kong, but at this point there was no telling whether the Jaeger or the Kaiju would get there first.
Commercial and civilian ships that hadn't been able to get out of the way, represented as blue and yellow blips respectively, began to cross the Kaiju's path, and promptly blinked out of existence as it destroyed every vessel that got in its way. Each vanished blip prompted another wince from Vivienne, and while she wasn't particularly religious, she found herself feeling the urge to start praying as the Kaiju drew closer to Hong Kong with each passing minute. Tamsin was outwardly calmer, maintaining the professional detachment of a soldier, but Vivienne could see the tension in her rigid stance.
As bad luck would have it, Reckoner reached Hong Kong just a few minutes before Horizon Brave did. When the Kaiju surfaced and began wading in towards the city, the live feeds of various news helicopters gave the K-Watch observers their first good look at the newest monster to emerge from the Breach. Unlike Onibaba or Keunsango, this one looked more like an oversized theropod dinosaur, vaguely similar to a giant Tyrannosaurus rex but with longer, more powerful arms.
Jets dove from the sky and flights of military choppers converged on the monster, launching volleys of missiles in an attempt to distract its attention from the vulnerable city, but Reckoner shrugged off most of the attacks without taking much notice, and any aircraft that came too close were swatted out of the air like flies. Those moments were when Vivienne noticed Tamsin having the strongest reaction, the redhead visibly wincing with each downed craft.
Finally, just as the Kaiju finally waded onto land and began tearing through the city, two pieces of important news came through almost simultaneously. First, a signal crackled over the PPDC's communications channels, confirming that Horizon Brave had just arrived in Hong Kong. And second, another blaring alert came up, on both the main screen and Vivienne's laptop.
"The bloody hell is that?!" Tamsin barked, taking a step back and looking around the room.
"Here!" Vivienne's fingers raced across the keys of her laptop, briefly removing the news feeds from the main screen and bringing up the larger tracking map again. The red blip marked K. Reckoner was still in Hong Kong, and a green blip labeled Horizon Brave was just a couple of miles away… but out in the South China Sea, several hundred miles away but heading straight towards Hong Kong, was a large orange blip that hadn't been there before. At first, this one was labeled Unknown, but as Vivienne continued tapping her keys, a new designation replaced it: T. Gojira.
Tamsin paled, her eyes widening as she turned to Vivienne with a stricken look of realization on her face. Already knowing what she was going to say, Vivienne nodded. "It's him," she breathed shakily. "He's coming."
"Shit," Tamsin hissed, before she swung around and started snapping orders to the K-Watch personnel. "Somebody get Hong Kong on the phone, now! Horizon Brave needs to take that Kaiju down fast, because it looks like they're gonna have more company in less than an hour!"
Luckily, Horizon Brave was already in the process of landing when the live news feeds of Hong Kong came back up, and its pilots wasted no time in taking off after Reckoner. Barreling through clouds of dust and smoke, the Jaeger's instruments homed in unerringly on their target. Just before Reckoner could pull down another skyscraper, Horizon came thundering in and slammed into the Kaiju with a full head of steam, shoulder-barging it out of the city and back out into the harbor.
Vivienne had seen the previous battles between Kaiju and Jaegers, of course, but she was always stunned by the sheer scale of the clash, buildings buckling and crumbling around the two combatants as they traded a series of thunderous, punishing blows. The destruction was horrifying, of course, but for someone who'd spent most of her adult life studying giant monsters, it was also the closest thing she'd ever seen to what battles between the Titans might have looked like when many of them had roamed the Earth, thousands or millions of years ago. Without really thinking about it – after all, she'd already gotten the tracking system operational, so there wasn't much else she could do – she stood up and walked over to stand beside Tamsin, both of them totally fixated on the screen.
Fortunately, Tamsin's warning of Godzilla's impending arrival seemed to have reached the local PPDC authorities and been passed along to Horizon Brave's pilots, because the Jaeger suddenly redoubled its efforts, fighting with a higher level of urgency. The pilots – Jing and Min Li, a brother-sister pair who had become China's first successful team of Rangers – were hammering relentlessly into Reckoner, driving it steadily back and heading it off whenever it tried to charge back into the city. The twin cryo-cannons on Horizon's shoulders were particularly effective, blasting the Kaiju with high-pressure jets of liquid nitrogen and producing shrieks of pain whenever a burst hit home.
Over the next few minutes, the news reports from the circling helicopters became more and more optimistic as Horizon began to gain the upper hand, but Tamsin and Vivienne were both frozen in place, gazes shifting back and forth from the battle footage to the tracking map. The main projector was now showing both, with the left side of the huge screen occupied by several different camera feeds of the fight and the right side filled by the map, showing that ominous orange blip that was steadily drawing closer to the action.
Vivienne inhaled sharply when Reckoner got in a good hit, its claws tearing into one of the cryo-cannons and releasing a huge cloud of white steam, but Horizon's other cannon blasted the Kaiju squarely in the throat, and it fell back with a strangled roar as the Jaeger unleashed a salvo of missiles into its stomach. Horizon knocked Reckoner backwards, sending it crashing to the ground, and managed to catch one of its arms under one of their feet as they charged after it, stomping down and snapping the bones in that limb.
"C'mon, c'mon…" Tamsin muttered under her breath, rocking from one foot to the other as her eyes flicked back and forth across the screen. "You've got him, just finish the bastard off!"
Horizon's pilots clearly had the same idea. Pinning Reckoner's good arm with one of theirs, they snatched up a jagged slab of metal (probably part of a roof) in their other hand and began stabbing it repeatedly into the Kaiju's stomach, blue blood spraying into the air. Reckoner howled, thrashing in the Jaeger's grip, until Horizon's remaining cryo-cannon blasted it right in the face, leaving it blinded and disoriented.
"That's it!" Tamsin grinned fiercely, and Vivienne couldn't help but get caught up in the adrenaline, one of her hands clasped over her mouth as her other one was clenched into a white-knuckled fist at her side.
With a brutal, slashing motion, Horizon sliced open the Kaiju's chest cavity from top to bottom, before ramming their makeshift blade up into its throat. That, finally, was enough, and Reckoner's last gurgling snarl faded into a death-rattle as its head fell back and its thrashing slowly ceased. One final blast of the Jaeger's remaining cryo-cannon filled the Kaiju's opened stomach with a dense layer of ice, freezing the exposed organs and hopefully minimizing the environmental contamination that its toxic blood could cause.
"No signature!" a call from the Hong Kong Shatterdome echoed over the comms channel, as the red blip representing Reckoner vanished from the map, leaving only the green blip of Horizon. "Kaiju destroyed. Well done, Horizon Brave!" Cheers rang out over the speakers as that Shatterdome's LOCCENT crew began to celebrate.
Neither Tamsin nor Vivienne, however, was cheering yet. As soon as the red blip vanished, both of them turned to the other half of the screen, focusing on the incoming orange blip, which was now less than fifty miles from shore. At first, it just kept coming, not slowing down or changing course.
"Shit…" Tamsin hissed, her eyes narrowing as she glared at the screen. "C'mon, just turn away, big boy. There's nothing for you there anymore."
Vivienne stared wide-eyed at the orange blip, hoping with every fiber of her being that her theory had been correct and that Godzilla really was only interested in hunting down the Kaiju. "Please," she whispered under her breath. Show us that we're really on the same side.
There was another long, tense moment… until, suddenly, the orange blip began to slow down. It quickly decelerated until it finally came to a stop, and remained motionless for a full thirty seconds. And then, to Vivienne's immense relief, it banked into a turn and began moving south instead, away from Hong Kong, heading back out into the deeper waters of the South China Sea.
Both women's shoulders sagged in relief, and they reflexively turned and hugged each other as the room around them, in a delayed version of the scene that must be unfolding in the Hong Kong Shatterdome, finally erupted in cheers and applause. Vivienne realized that her hands were trembling, but the feeling of Tamsin's arms around her sparked a warmth in her chest that helped to calm her nerves.
As the celebrations continued around them, Tamsin pulled back from their hug, a weary grin appearing on her face. "Well, now that that's over, Doc, I think your official tour of this place can wait until tomorrow. In the meantime…" She shrugged, jerking a thumb over her shoulder. "Wanna join me for a drink?"
Vivienne raised an eyebrow, unable to suppress a slowly-growing smile. "All right," she agreed. "Why not?"
Luckily, the K-Watch Observatory included a restaurant and bar which were open twenty-four hours a day. This was a necessity since the observatory always had people on duty, making sure that there was no chance of them being caught off-guard in the event of a Kaiju emergence; in this case, it meant that Vivienne and Tamsin were able to grab a pair of seats at the bar as most of the observatory's personnel poured in to celebrate that day's victory. Both women had taken a seat at the end of the bar, and were chatting over drinks and a late dinner, taking the opportunity to get to know each other a little better.
"So, Doc…" Tamsin grinned and leaned casually against the bar as she took a sip of her drink. "Okay, I've gotta ask. How does somebody end up devoting their life to running around the world looking for a giant prehistoric lizard?"
Vivienne blushed and laughed despite herself, shaking her head. "Well, I was interested in that kind of thing even before Monarch recruited me," she explained. "I've always been fascinated by prehistoric life; my absolute favorite place to go as a child was the museum, so I could see the dinosaur fossils there." She chuckled softly at the memory. "I got an MSci degree in geology and geophysics at the Imperial College in London, and a Ph.D. in earth sciences at Oxford, so I was planning to go into a career in that field. But Monarch was in the process of finding and recruiting some promising young scientists at that point, and I caught Dr. Serizawa's eye. He recruited me himself, told me the truth about Monarch and their real mission, and I leapt at the chance. I've been working for them ever since." Her wistful smile widened. "It's certainly not what I'd imagined my life would be, but I don't have any regrets."
"Yeah, I can understand that." Tamsin shifted her chair around so she could lean back against the wall behind her, sighing as she idly swirled her glass in one hand. "I've definitely been there." She snorted. "Hell, if you'd told me four years ago about all the shite that we were gonna be dealing with, I'd have said you were insane."
Despite Tamsin's sardonic grin, Vivienne could hear a note of pain in the former pilot's voice, and she felt a pang in her heart. "So, if you don't mind me asking… how about you?" she inquired, a little hesitantly. "How does a Royal Air Force pilot end up volunteering to punch giant monsters in the face?"
Tamsin legitimately snickered at that, her melancholy attitude lifting for a moment, before she frowned and looked down at her drink. "I mean… do you really wanna know?" she questioned. "It's definitely not as nice of a story as yours."
"I do." Vivienne was a little surprised by the conviction in her own voice, but she shrugged it off. "As long as you're comfortable talking about it, of course. If you're not, I understand."
Tamsin sighed. "No, it's okay." She downed the rest of her drink and signaled for another one, before leaning back against the wall as she continued. "See… Stacker and I joined the RAF together a few years before K-Day, but it wasn't just us. His sister, Luna, also signed up with us, and the three of us were inseparable. More than that…" She closed her eyes for a second. "Back in 2013, she was my fiancée."
Vivienne's eyes widened, and her heart sank as she put the pieces together.
"When Trespasser first made landfall, Luna and I were at a military base in northern California, working with some American pilots on training maneuvers," Tamsin explained solemnly. "Stacks was back in the UK, and I'm honestly glad he was, because I don't think I could've kept going if I'd lost him too." She grimaced, clearly recalling the memories of that horrific first week of the Kaiju War. "Hundreds of pilots went into battle on that first day, including Luna and me. I made it back… but she didn't."
"Oh, God…" Vivienne's stomach lurched as she tried to imagine how agonizing that would feel. She'd had a few romantic relationships before, of course, but nothing serious enough that she would have considered marrying them. To lose someone who was that close to you… she couldn't fathom the pain of that loss.
"So, to answer your question… that's why I joined the Jaeger Program," Tamsin concluded quietly. "Stacker too. And obviously it's taken a heavy toll on both of us… but I still don't regret it." She looked up, and the fire flickered back to life in her eyes. "As soon as we figured out that the Kaiju were going to keep coming, he and I made a vow: that no matter what it took, we were gonna do everything we could to kill every single one of those bloody monsters. And even if I can't pilot a Jaeger anymore, I'm gonna spend the rest of my life doing everything I can to honor that vow."
Silence fell for a couple of minutes after that, both women collecting their thoughts as a second pair of drinks arrived. Vivienne was initially at a loss for words, until she finally looked back over at Tamsin and saw the pain lingering in the other woman's eyes. That pain, and the rush of sympathy that it triggered, was enough that she spoke up without thinking. "I'm sorry, Tamsin," she murmured, catching the former Ranger's eyes as she looked up and holding her gaze. "I can't imagine what you must be going through. But… I want you to know that I have a tremendous amount of respect for you. If I'd gone through what you have, I don't think I could have handled it… and I certainly don't think I could've stayed as strong as you have." Her cheeks darkened briefly, and her eyes flicked down to where Tamsin's free hand was resting on the bar, but she forced down her embarrassment. "But… if there's anything I can do to help you feel better – anything at all – then I'd be happy to."
For another moment, they were both quiet. Vivienne cursed inwardly and looked down at her drink – Damn it, Viv, she just told you about her dead fiancée and you decided that now was the time to make an offer like that?! – but Tamsin actually looked a little amused. One corner of her mouth twitched up, and the pain in her eyes faded away. "So…" she spoke up. "Are we talking, like… anything?"
Vivienne's head snapped back up, eyes wide and lips parted, momentarily dumbstruck at the teasing tone in Tamsin's voice. She wasn't the best when it came to flirting, which was why her past romantic dalliances had been few and far between, but there was no mistaking the playful grin that was forming on the Jaeger pilot's face.
"I…" Her blush deepened, but she took a long sip from her drink and then nodded slowly. "I suppose so, yes."
The tension between them grew a little stronger as the seconds ticked by, before Tamsin's smile suddenly flickered. "Look, Doc…" She trailed off for a second. "No… Vivienne." Her smile faded away entirely as she sighed and looked down at the table. "You… you know I can't promise you that you'd have any kind of future with me, right? Don't get me wrong, I haven't given up hope or anything, but… if the chemo doesn't work, chances are I'll probably be dead in a year or two." She shivered at that thought, closing her eyes and gritting her teeth, before she shook her head and looked back up at Vivienne. "So, if we're gonna do this… then I need to know that you understand that."
There was a long moment of silence, until Vivienne finally nodded. "I do," she admitted solemnly, before her expression softened as she tentatively reached out and placed her free hand on top of Tamsin's. "But… as an adventurous man once said: 'The function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.'" Her eyes locked with Tamsin's again, and she gave the other woman's hand a comforting squeeze. "And, with the way the world is right now… frankly, in a year or two, it's entirely possible that neither of us will be here. So…" Her hand trembled a little, but she didn't break eye contact with Tamsin. "I think we owe it to ourselves to use our time. Don't you?"
Tamsin raised an eyebrow, and her lips slowly curled up in a smile again. "Fair enough," she replied with a soft chuckle. She lifted her free hand a bit and interlaced her fingers with Vivienne's, before lifting her glass with her other hand for a toast. "All right, then. To using our time?"
Vivienne returned Tamsin's smile, still blushing as their glasses clinked together. "To using our time," she echoed.
December 2016
Kodiak Island, Alaska
By the end of the second eight-week term, the sixty remaining pilot candidates had been whittled down to forty-nine, and less than a dozen of those were likely to become Rangers and move on to the official pilot-training course in the third and final term, although the others could all move on to standard PPDC training. In the end, only four pairs out of the 2016-B class demonstrated strong enough Drift compatibility to pass the final requirements and move on as Ranger candidates: Ozaki and Kazama, Kennedy and Stephanie, Akane and Chujo, and the Becket brothers.
Most of the candidates who didn't make that second cut, including Tendo, Ford, and Elle, chose to pursue other positions within the PPDC where they would still be able to help in the war effort. Tendo chose to pursue engineering, with the goal of becoming a LOCCENT chief officer; Ford opted for helicopter piloting, hoping to become the pilot of a Jaeger's spotting chopper; and Elle chose to continue the path that she'd started in med school, channeling her skills into becoming a medical officer for one of the Shatterdomes.
As coincidence would have it, the Academy's graduation day for its fall term was also Christmas Eve, so the ceremony was also turned into a celebration of sorts. To the delight of the candidates, any family and friends who could attend the event were welcome to do so. As a result, the rest of the Becket-Russell family were present for the ceremony, having caught a ferry ride over from Anchorage on the morning of Christmas Eve.
Mark and Emma, who had officially been recruited into Monarch after their first couple of meetings with Ishiro Serizawa, had taken a break from working on their bioacoustics project for the event. Along with them was the Becket-Russell family's youngest child, their daughter Madison. Outside of video calls, she'd only seen her brothers a handful of times in the last six months, so she raced up to Raleigh and Yancy with a delighted cry when she saw them and practically leapt into their arms, drawing a chorus of laughter and calls of "Awww!" from the gathered students of Class 2016-B as the brothers took turns lifting her into a hug and spinning her around. Mark and Emma also took turns hugging each of the boys; their embraces were less energetic, but just as loving.
Once everyone was present and gathered in the Academy's assembly hall, Captain Gordon took the stage, accompanied by Marshal Pentecost. All of the Rangers who were currently in Anchorage – Caitlin Lightcap and Sergio D'Onofrio, the pilots of Brawler Yukon; Bruce and Trevin Gage, pilots of Romeo Blue; and Vic and Gunnar Tunari, the new pilots of Coyote Tango – were also present, along with each Ranger team's support staff. The forty-nine graduates of Class 2016-B were lined up on the stage, with the four pairs of future Jaeger pilots at the front.
"Candidates!" Gordon's deep, gruff voice boomed through the auditorium as he regarded the eight young men and women who were looking back at him, with varying levels of excitement or trepidation. His gaze swept over each pair in turn: Kennedy and Stephanie, Akane and Yoshito, Ozaki and Kazama, and finally the Beckets. His lip curled in a small, proud smile, and he nodded decisively. "Upon review of your training performances and test results, all four of your teams have been approved by the Academy's senior officers and the Pan-Pacific Defense Corps, for assignment as pilots of the Jaeger Program." His grin widened as he saluted to them. "Congratulations, Rangers."
All eight of the newly-minted Jaeger pilots beamed proudly, the partners all nudging closer together and trading excited glances, as the crowd erupted in applause. Mark, Emma and Madison were in the front row of the audience, the latter cheering wildly while the first two were both smiling proudly. Raleigh and Yancy's faces both lit up as they looked down at the crowd, both brothers feeling a bittersweet joy as they remembered the one member of their family who couldn't be there with them.
"There's one final order of business," Gordon added once the applause had finally died down. He nodded to Pentecost, who signaled for someone in the crowd to come up onto the stage. As the man that he'd signaled walked up the stairs, all the candidates and PPDC personnel recognized him as Jasper Schoenfeld, a colleague of Dr. Lightcap and one of the founding members of the Jaeger Program, who was now in charge of the J-Tech engineering division and responsible for overseeing the construction of new Jaegers.
"Raleigh and Yancy Becket," Gordon intoned, nodding to Pentecost and Schoenfeld as he indicated a side door. "Follow us, please." His mischievous grin returned as the brothers' eyes popped open wide, while a series of excited whispers rippled through the crowd. Most of the people in the room immediately knew what Schoenfeld's presence had to mean, and the Beckets were no exception.
"Oh, and your family are welcome to accompany us," Gordon called over his shoulder as he led the way off the stage. Mark, Emma and Madison promptly hurried after the brothers as they followed Gordon, Pentecost and Schoenfeld out of the auditorium.
It took a couple of minutes for the group to walk from the Academy buildings to the huge Assembly Building where new Jaegers were manufactured. Madison stuck close to Raleigh and Yancy, who kept glancing eagerly at each other as they grew closer to the building up ahead. Mark and Emma brought up the rear, walking hand-in-hand and looking both proud and nervous at the same time. The eight of them reached an outer door and ducked inside, entering the first of the massive testing bays where newly-constructed Jaegers were prepared for deployment.
"Since your appointment as Rangers is finally complete," Schoenfeld called out as he led the way into the massive open space of the testing bay, "we decided that an introduction is in order." As they entered the bay proper, he took a couple of long steps out in front of the group and turned to face them, making a broad, sweeping gesture with one arm to indicate the mechanical giant that towered over them. "Raleigh and Yancy Becket… meet Gipsy Danger."
Raleigh and Yancy froze, their jaws going slack as their breathing noticeably hitched. Gordon and Pentecost both allowed themselves small, amused smiles, while Mark and Emma gazed up in stunned silence. Only Madison managed to get any words out, uttering a soft, awestruck "Wow…"
"She's the first of the Mark-3s," Schoenfeld continued. "Twenty thousand tons, and three hundred feet tall; originally she was only going to be two-hundred-and-sixty, but we've decided to started upping the size of our newer Jaegers after Godzilla showed up last year. Nuclear vortex-turbine core in the central torso, with sixty feet of radiation shielding for the conn-pod to protect the two of you from any potential leakage. Plasma-particle cannons in each arm, along with elbow rockets to amplify her punching power and turbo jets built into the back to increase her jumping capabilities on land and give her extra speed underwater. The most advanced neural circuitry to date, and a fully-detachable conn-pod head that can rotate three-hundred-sixty degrees." His proud smile widened as he nodded to the brothers. "And she's yours."
It took a full minute after their first sight of the Jaeger before either of the Becket brothers could speak. Finally, Raleigh managed to break the silence. "Yance?" he spoke up, his voice quiet and unsteady.
"Yeah?" Yancy replied shakily.
"I think I'm in love."
Yancy grinned. "Me too."
Over the next nine months, the Becket brothers and their new comrades-in-arms continued their preparations, eagerly awaiting their chance to step into the fray and do their part. The next two Kaiju attacks, however, occurred before Gipsy Danger was fully ready for deployment, so Raleigh and Yancy, like their fellow graduating teams of Rangers, were forced to remain in the role of onlookers for the time being.
In February 2017, two months after Class 2016-B had graduated, the Breach spat out the next Kaiju, a Category II designated Vaulimi. This one made its way east across the Pacific, towards the Americas, but chose to veer south and ended up making landfall in the city of Guayaquil, Ecuador. The PPDC's detection system eventually picked up the telltale signature of Godzilla, homing in on the Kaiju's trail, but just like Reckoner, Vaulimi reached the coast before he could catch up with it. The newest batch of Rangers observed the attack from the LOCCENT of the Anchorage Shatterdome, where they could get the best possible live feeds of the action.
Luckily, the Australian-built Jaeger Talon Tasmania had been deployed close enough to Guayaquil that they were able to intercept the Kaiju before it could do too much damage to the city, but that was where the good luck stopped. Talon was able to inflict some serious injuries to Vaulimi… but the eight-legged, arachnid-like Kaiju proved to be a formidable opponent, and the Jaeger's nuclear reactor was breached by its raking claws before the pilots could deliver a killing blow, causing a catastrophic meltdown.
When the battle ended, Vaulimi was badly wounded, with only three of its eight limbs remaining… but Talon Tasmania had been destroyed, and its pilots – Miguel and Maria Blanco, a recently-married couple – were dead. Gasps of horror echoed throughout the Anchorage Shatterdome's observation room as the pilots and support crew watched in stunned disbelief, seeing the injured Kaiju dragging itself away from the broken, burning Jaeger.
Fortunately for Guayaquil's citizens, another Jaeger, Solar Prophet, was already inbound, just a little too late to reinforce the stricken Talon. But just as Solar was moving into deployment position, more alarms went off in the LOCCENT, and a warning call crackled over the communications link, originating from the Lima Shatterdome in Peru. "Solar Prophet, do not engage the Kaiju! Deploy and be ready, but stay as far back as you can! We have a second bogey approaching the shoreline, ETA two minutes!"
Raleigh's eyes widened, and he exchanged a nervous glance with Yancy. They'd heard about the new, larger monster that had killed Keunsango and Onibaba, and they'd seen the recordings from those battles as part of their Ranger training, but they'd never actually seen any live footage of the now-infamous Titan. So when the new arrival to the battlefield reared up out of the sea, bellowing a deep, challenging roar that rang in their ears even through the news footage, Raleigh's breath caught in his throat and he couldn't help feeling a chill at the sheer size of the prehistoric leviathan.
"So that's Godzilla," he muttered grimly.
Obeying orders, Solar Prophet stayed well clear of Vaulimi as Godzilla waded ashore and made a beeline for the stricken Kaiju. Just like with Onibaba, since this one was already heavily wounded, he didn't even bother actually fighting it; he just walked up to his outmatched opponent, slammed a clawed foot down on one of its three remaining limbs to keep it still, and blasted it at point-blank range with a jet of blue atomic fire. Vaulimi shrieked in agony as the blast hit home, but it took less than ten seconds for it to stop thrashing as the fire burned through flesh and bone, and its signal promptly vanished from the LOCCENT's monitoring screens. Despite the display of brutality, nobody in the room batted an eye; that Kaiju had deserved everything it had gotten.
To everyone's surprise, however, Godzilla didn't immediately return to the sea after he'd made his kill. He appeared to be sniffing the air as he turned in a slow circle, until his eyes came to rest on the smoldering hulk of Talon Tasmania. Leaving the burned-out Kaiju carcass behind, he began walking slowly towards the fallen Jaeger, not displaying any of the aggression that he had against Vaulimi but something more akin to curiosity.
"Lima, we… we are ready to engage on your orders," one of Solar Prophet's pilots called over the airwaves, but Raleigh could tell that his voice was wavering. Frankly, he felt the same way; the idea of trying to fight something the size of a Category V Kaiju, even in a Jaeger, was absolutely terrifying.
"Negative, Solar Prophet!" That voice was instantly recognizable: Marshal Pentecost, who'd transferred from Anchorage to Lima at the end of the previous year once Class 2016-B's term had ended. "Remain at a safe distance, and do not provoke him. Only engage if he attacks you first!" Considering that Pentecost had gone face-to-face with Godzilla in the Titan's two previous appearances, Raleigh could tell that the older man knew what he was talking about, and Solar's pilots clearly felt the same way, as they stayed put, not moving any closer to Godzilla.
Fortunately, apart from letting out a low, rumbling growl when he glanced in Solar Prophet's direction, the saurian Titan didn't pay much attention to the standing Jaeger. He loomed over the fallen body of Talon where it lay half-submerged in a river, crouched down beside it, and dug the claws of one hand into a seam in the Jaeger's chest armor. With a wrenching yank, he tore away the outer layers of armor, exposing Talon's breached nuclear reactor with a burst of flames and smoke.
"The hell's he doing?!" Yancy exclaimed. "Damn it, that's just gonna make the fallout worse!"
Raleigh's eyes widened and he took a step forward as he saw Godzilla actually shove his jaws into the ragged hole in the Jaeger's torso, like a predatory animal scavenging a carcass. The rows of jagged bony plates on the Titan's back lit up again, glowing with rhythmic pulses of blue light, and with the way his jaws were moving, it almost looked like he was eating something, as if he were ripping out pieces of the reactor and swallowing them.
Everyone was thoroughly confused until, a few moments later, another call came over the radio. "Lima Shatterdome… the radiation levels from Talon's reactor leak are dropping!" More confirming alerts came in, and the readings projected onto one of the Anchorage LOCCENT's screens also showed that the radiation leak was somehow being reduced.
Or… maybe being absorbed? Raleigh looked more closely at Godzilla's unusual behavior, as the radiation levels continued to drop lower with each pull of the Titan's jaws… and then it hit him. "He's doing that," he breathed incredulously. "I dunno how, but… I think he's eating Talon's reactor, and it looks like he's somehow absorbing all the radiation too!"
Sure enough, Godzilla continued that bizarre feeding behavior until the radiation from Talon's reactor leak had dropped all the way to normal background levels. Then he pulled his head back out of the broken Jaeger's torso, rose to his full height, and let out a low rumble as he shook himself in an oddly doglike movement. With a final snort and an imperious glance in Solar Prophet's direction, he turned away and began lumbering off down the river, ultimately wading into the ocean and heading back out to sea.
On the one hand, the fact that Godzilla had somehow neutralized the fallout from Talon's reactor breach was definitely a good thing. In fact, the giant reptile had probably saved hundreds or thousands of lives by absorbing all that radiation. But it didn't change the fact that Talon's pilots, along with hundreds of civilians who'd been caught up in Vaulimi's initial rampage, were dead. So, despite the victory, no one in the Anchorage Shatterdome was in a celebratory mood this time.
To the relief of everyone in the PPDC, the next Kaiju attack, four months later, was much more easily repelled. In June 2017, when a Category II labeled Hammerjaw emerged from the Breach and made its way north towards Japan, a pair of Jaegers – Japan's Tacit Ronin and China's Silver Lion – were able to intercept the monster on the outskirts of Osaka, and managed to take it down without sustaining any serious damage.
Just like with the battle against Reckoner, Godzilla's signature was detected off the coast of Japan shortly after Hammerjaw made landfall in Osaka. However, once again, after the Kaiju was killed, his advance towards the coast came to a halt, and he veered away and returned to the deep ocean, dropping back off of the PPDC's radar after he dove into the depths of the Japan Trench. This continued to reinforce Monarch's argument that the Titan was only really interested in the Kaiju, and helped to reassure some of the PPDC higher-ups, such as Marshal Tachibana, who were still worried about the potential threat that he posed. However, while the Jaeger Program's official policy regarding Godzilla was still Do Not Provoke, the fact that a Category V-sized creature was still freely roaming the world's oceans meant that things were still understandably tense.
It helped that more Jaegers were still being built and readied for battle… and in July 2017, the Becket brothers finally got their chance to officially greet the world as Rangers for the first time, as Gipsy Danger was finally ready for its debut. The first of the Mark-3 Jaegers was unveiled to the world in a grand ceremony on the grounds of the Jaeger Academy, with live television coverage for the entire world to witness. Mark, Emma, and Madison were given seats of honor in the high-profile spectator box, along with the PPDC higher-ups and politicians who had come to attend the event. Even President Palmer and Vice President McCord were present, having flown into Anchorage's airport aboard Air Force One, and were visibly beaming as they watched the ceremony unfolding.
The other two Jaegers who were currently stationed in Alaska, Romeo Blue and Brawler Yukon, were both standing at attention in front of the Assembly Building as the massive double doors slid open and Gipsy rolled out into the sunlight on her roller-mounted crawler, accompanied by a blaring chorus of the Star-Spangled Banner and a deafening chorus of applause from the thousands of onlookers who had gathered for the historic occasion. After a brief speech from President Palmer, the Beckets went into action just as they'd rehearsed, bringing Gipsy's hands together and slamming one fist into their opposing palm with a metallic thunderclap that echoed across the grounds. Brawler Yukon then stepped forward, gingerly holding a man-sized champagne bottle in one massive hand, and smashed it over the new Jaeger's joined hands with another eruption of cheers from the crowd.
"Rangers of Gipsy Danger," President Palmer called over a microphone, his deep, smooth voice echoing from the giant speakers that had been set up at regular intervals all over the area. "By the power vested in me by the United States of America and the Pan-Pacific Defense Corps, I officially declare you active, in the defense of all mankind."
All three Jaegers' foghorns blared in unison with a new wave of applause from the crowd, as a flight of jets swooped overhead with streams of red, white and blue smoke trailing in their wake. Gipsy, Brawler and Romeo all saluted, a symbol to all who could see it of the Jaeger Program's dedication to their cause. And inside Gipsy's conn-pod, Raleigh and Yancy Becket exchanged proud smiles as they felt the rush of emotions flowing back and forth between their minds, with a single shared thought rising above them all.
We did it, Andrew. We did it.
After the ceremony, Gipsy Danger and her crew moved south to the newly-opened Los Angeles Shatterdome, where they would operate alongside one of the Mark-2 Jaegers, Yankee Star. Yankee's pilots, Tanisha Davis and Caleb Mitchell, hailed from a military background, and it took a little while for the two pairs of Rangers to get used to each other. Luckily, after a few weeks of team sparring, simulator training, and bonding over meals after their on-duty shifts, the two teams learned to work and fight alongside each other, leaving them all satisfied that when the time came for them to face a Kaiju in battle, they would all be ready to fight.
In October, when the next Kaiju finally emerged from the Breach, the timing was particularly bad. Two large typhoons were moving across the South Pacific, disrupting the PPDC's tracking system and making it harder for them to predict the creature's movements. In addition, the sonar profile that the initial detection instruments had picked up indicated that this Kaiju was the biggest one to emerge from the Breach to date, large enough to be designated as the first Category III. Every Shatterdome was on alert, ready to deploy their Jaegers as soon as the monster's target became clear, but the Kaiju remained off their radar.
Normally, a Kaiju's general path could be predicted within a few hours of its emergence from the Breach. But with the typhoons interfering with the PPDC's sensors and obscuring the view of their satellites, more than thirty-six hours passed without any signs of the beast making landfall. Some people were starting to speculate that Godzilla might have already intercepted and killed the Kaiju while it was still in the open ocean, as he was now known to have done with Verocitor back in 2015, but since there was no way to prove that yet, everyone remained on guard.
And it was a good thing that they had… because, two days after the Breach alert had gone off, the Los Angeles Shatterdome received an Extreme Red Alert warning. The Kaiju, designation Yamarashi, had finally surfaced on K-Watch's tracking systems, less than a hundred miles off the coast of Southern California. And less than a hundred miles behind it, hot on the monster's heels, was the by-now-familiar orange blip of Godzilla.
October 2017
Los Angeles, California
Raleigh's pulse was racing as he gazed at the viewscreens of Gipsy Danger's conn-pod. Without even looking over to his right, he could feel the tension running through Yancy's mind too, but they were both able to keep their emotions in check. The knowledge that this was real, that they were about to enter their first battle, was simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying.
Both of the L.A. Shatterdome's Jaegers were being carried towards the Kaiju's landing point – Los Angeles Harbor, in Long Beach – with Gipsy in front and Yankee Star slightly behind them and to the right. Ahead of them, columns of smoke were already rising into the air, from several large container ships that had been anchored in the harbor and were being torn apart by the monster.
Finally, the Jaegers got close enough for a clear view of the Kaiju, and Raleigh's eyes narrowed as he took in their target. Like Reckoner, Yamarashi was vaguely reptilian in appearance, but this Kaiju looked more like a crocodile than a dinosaur: it was four-legged and lower-slung, standing about two hundred feet tall but measuring at least six hundred feet long. It had an elongated, vaguely crocodilian head and four glowing blue eyes, and its back was covered in spiked, scaly armor. Most impressive, it was notably bigger than any Kaiju that had surfaced before; only Godzilla was larger.
And he's on his way, Yancy thought grimly as he picked up on his brother's thoughts. "LOCCENT, what's the status on the big guy?" he called over the communication link back to the Shatterdome.
"Just passing San Nicolas Island," Tendo's voice replied. "He's still about sixty miles offshore, but he's doing at least fifty knots, so he'll be there in a little over an hour. Which means you've got an hour at most to kill that thing before he shows up."
"Gee, thanks, man," Tanisha Davis chuckled from Yankee Star. "No pressure or anything, right?"
"None whatsoever," Raleigh muttered, grimacing at the thought of coming face-to-face with the monster who had effortlessly slaughtered four different Kaiju over the last two years.
"If Godzilla does make landfall before you can eliminate the target," the voice of Marshal Ana Ramirez (the commander of the Los Angeles Shatterdome) cut in as she addressed both Jaegers, "then both of you are to fall back and prevent the Kaiju from escaping inland. Hopefully, if that happens, he'll finish it off and return to the ocean, like he did with Onibaba and Vaulimi."
"Understood, ma'am," Raleigh replied, nodding as he shifted in his harness. He and Yancy traded glances, and they silently exchanged nods. While they would obey those orders if they had to, they both vowed in that moment that they would do everything they could to kill this Kaiju on their own. Keeping collateral damage to a minimum – and getting first crack at this monster – was their priority.
Yankee Star deployed first, splashing feetfirst into a water channel on one side of Terminal Island, the heart of Los Angeles Harbor. Gipsy touched down behind them, and the Beckets straightened up to see Yamarashi moving west onto the island. That was a good thing, as it meant that the monster was moving away from the surrounding city and into a more open area where it would be easier for the Jaegers to cut loose without having to worry about collateral damage.
"Gipsy, flank him and make sure he can't head back towards the city!" Tanisha called from Yankee's conn-pod. "We're gonna light the bastard up!" On cue, Yankee spread its arms and opened fire, launching a barrage of missiles and laser beams that slammed into Yamarashi's flank. The Kaiju roared and stumbled back, but it came away without anything more than some burns on its armored scales.
"On it!" Yancy called back, before his voice echoed through the Drift into Raleigh's mind. You ready for this, kid?
Raleigh glanced over at his brother and, to his surprise, realized that all of his fear had melted away. His lips curled in a fierce grin, and the lingering fear and pain that had haunted them ever since that awful day four years ago receded. They didn't have to be scared anymore. This time, they could fight back.
Hell yes, he thought back. Yancy returned his grin, and they started forward, moving to cut off Yamarashi's retreat while Yankee kept up their barrage, driving the monster right to where Gipsy was waiting.
"Engaging now!" the brothers called out in unison as Gipsy's strides got faster. As they cut in front of the Kaiju and drew back one fist, the old refrain flashed through both of their minds: the same thought that had been driving them both ever since they'd first decided to try out for the Academy.
This is for you, Andrew.
And then Gipsy Danger swung a punch that caught Yamarashi square in the face, and four years of haunting memories shattered in an instant.
Despite their determination, the battle wasn't easy. Even with two Jaegers working together, blasting away with Gipsy's plasma cannons and Yankee's arsenal of long-range weaponry, Yamarashi's tough natural armor made it hard for them to inflict any serious damage. They were able to keep the Kaiju contained in the port area and away from the city, but none of their attacks were causing any crippling damage. Both Jaegers played to their strengths: Gipsy fought up-close, taking the brunt of the physical combat, hammering away at their enemy's defenses and blasting it with plasma whenever they found an opening, while Yankee covered them with a continuous barrage of missiles and lasers, striking all over Yamarashi's body and looking for a weak spot.
After almost an hour, they still hadn't come close to landing a killing blow. Raleigh and Yancy had managed to inflict a few minor wounds where they'd found some chinks in the armored scales, while Tanisha and Caleb had scored a lucky hit that took out one of the Kaiju's four eyes and prompted a shriek of pain, but the monster still had three more eyes and it wasn't slowing down. The minutes kept ticking by, and both Raleigh and Yancy were getting more and more worried at the prospect of Godzilla's impending arrival, but they were too preoccupied with the fight in front of them to really think about that. All they knew was that they had to start doing some real damage soon, because the Jaegers wouldn't be able to keep going forever.
Finally, however, a stroke of luck came. A particularly vicious blow from Yamarashi's tail knocked Gipsy into one of the massive cargo cranes that were used to unload the harbor's large container ships, sending both Jaeger and crane toppling to the ground. But as they rolled over and clambered back up, an idea came into the Beckets' heads as they spotted the thick metal cables that ran through the crane. "Hang on…" Raleigh muttered, before his eyes widened as a new strategy crystallized in his brain. What if we can…
"Right with you!" Yancy agreed as he picked up on his brother's plan. Gipsy surged back to its feet, grabbing the fallen crane and hoisting it in one hand, before they charged after the Kaiju. Yankee was blasting away at Yamarashi with everything they had, keeping it from charging back into the city, and they were able to distract the monster long enough for Gipsy to attack from behind. The Beckets landed a solid downward punch with their free hand to the top of Yamarashi's skull, driving its head into the mud; it reared back up and roared as it twisted around towards them, but the angry bellow became a screech of agony as Yankee landed a direct hit to its face with a volley of lasers, taking out another eye and releasing a spurt of blue blood down the side of its head.
Disoriented and pained, Yamarashi was off-balance for a few precious seconds, and the brothers made full use of them. Swinging the crane down and looping a bundle of its wires around the Kaiju's neck, they grabbed the other end with their free hand and yanked back with all their strength, using the crane's wires as a makeshift garrote. The wires snapped taut, digging into the dense scales and muscle of the monster's throat, and Gipsy kept up the pressure, refusing to let it go slack even for a second.
"You've got him, Gipsy! Hang on, don't let up!" Caleb yelled from Yankee Star, which was moving closer to them and blasting away at Yamarashi's less-armored underside as Gipsy wrenched its head further back. Blue blood was starting to spill from the deepening cuts in the monster's neck, sizzling as it poured over Gipsy's hands and the constricting wires. Raleigh and Yancy both hissed in pain as they felt the burning sensation in their hands, but they let their anger wash away the pain and pulled even harder, both of their voices rising together in a yell of strain as they bore down with all their might.
Yamarashi's roars had been replaced by choking gurgles as their makeshift noose kept tightening, but it was still thrashing in their grip, desperately trying to break free. Bone was crunching, flesh and muscle tearing, and the brothers let out one last scream of effort as they gave a final wrenching pull…
And then the pressure was suddenly released with a muffled crunch, and Gipsy Danger crashed backwards with the Kaiju's body on top of them, still jerking and spasming but no longer fighting back. Its head fell away to one side, completely severed from its body, toxic blue blood pouring from the stump of its neck and cascading down over Gipsy's head and shoulders.
"Gipsy, you've got Kaiju Blue all over your conn-pod! Get in the water and wash that shit off before it burns through your hull!" Tanisha's voice hollered over their speakers. The sudden burning pain all over their heads reinforced the order, and both Raleigh and Yancy cried out in unison as they heaved the headless Kaiju off of them and rolled over, scrambling on their hands and knees to a nearby channel and plunging into the water. Submerging as much as they could, they swung Gipsy's head back and forth to wash away the acidic blood, which had already started burning away at the metal exterior of the conn-pod. The welcome coolness of the water sent a surge of relief through them both, and they kept rolling back and forth until the burning sensation finally faded away completely.
Panting and gasping as they focused on washing off the Kaiju's blood, Raleigh and Yancy were too distracted to hear the sudden sound of blaring alarms and raised voices coming over their speakers from the Shatterdome, or the additional rush of water that suddenly washed over them. They were still clambering back to their feet when they realized that Yankee's pilots and the LOCCENT crew were all yelling at them simultaneously. Tendo's voice came through the clearest, and just as they finally regained their footing, they realized what he was saying.
"…Guys, seriously, get the hell out of the way! He's there, he's right behind you! Do you copy?! He's here!"
Raleigh and Yancy both froze as their minds finally came back into full clarity, and they realized what Tendo was talking about. A deep, rumbling growl echoed through their conn-pod, and they could finally make out the low, booming footsteps that had been reverberating in the ground beneath them for the past couple of minutes. A shadow fell over them, and they slowly turned, looking up into the burning orange eyes of the dark-scaled leviathan who was wading up the channel towards them.
Oh, Raleigh thought numbly.
Oh, Yancy concurred.
Godzilla glared down at them, curled his lips back to bare his dagger-like teeth, and snarled.
The Titan must have just come ashore, wading in through the harbor and heading right towards the fight. Seeing him on a video feed was one thing, but seeing him up close and personal was something else entirely. Gipsy Danger was three hundred feet tall and weighed twenty thousand tons, but Godzilla stood more than fifty feet taller than the Jaeger and, according to the scans that the PPDC had performed on him, had more than four times their mass. His gleaming orange eyes blazed down at them like burning coals, and the bony plates on his back were pulsing and flickering with a baleful blue light.
"LOCCENT, what the hell do we do?!" Caleb demanded from Yankee's conn-pod. The second Jaeger was a short distance away, on the far side of Yamarashi's corpse, with all of its weapons still active and trained on the new arrival.
"Do not engage!" Marshal Ramirez ordered, managing to keep her cool. "Only engage if he attacks first. Gipsy, that goes for you too! Back off and get out of his way, but don't do anything to provoke him. Do you hear me?"
Raleigh and Yancy were rooted to the spot. Neither of them could even think about fighting or running; they were totally frozen, caught in the glare of those burning eyes like a deer in headlights. This was a completely different feeling from the battle that they'd just won. Facing Yamarashi had been terrifying, of course, but nothing like this.
When Gipsy didn't move, Godzilla's eyes narrowed, and he leaned down a little closer, his eyes seeming to pierce right through the Beckets' viewscreens. His chest swelled, and the brothers' eyes widened in alarm just before the Titan let out a deep, thunderous roar right in Gipsy's face, so loud that it completely blotted out all other sounds. If they hadn't been frozen in place, they would have clapped their hands over their ears; as it was, they were too stunned and terrified to move a muscle.
As the deafening roar faded to silence and Godzilla's jaws snapped shut again, the Beckets' ears were ringing so much that they barely heard Marshal Ramirez's voice as she called out to them again, her voice slow and deliberate. "Gipsy? Move back and get out of his way. Now."
Finally, Raleigh and Yancy managed to snap out of their stunned daze, and they forced Gipsy shakily into motion. Taking a few slow, dragging steps back, they stepped up out of the channel and onto solid ground, keeping their weapons powered down as they backed away to a safe distance. Godzilla's eyes remained fixed on the Jaeger as it backed away from him, but once they were far enough away, he let out a dismissive snort and turned back to focus on the dead Kaiju.
As soon as it became clear that the Titan wasn't going to attack them, Raleigh and Yancy slumped in their harnesses, relaxing visibly and gasping for air as they tried to catch their breaths.
Godzilla, meanwhile, strode over to where Yamarashi's carcass lay sprawled on the ground. His eyes narrowed and his teeth ground together as he glared down at the headless Kaiju, before he lifted one foot and stomped down on its severed head, crushing it like a human stepping on a soda can. After grinding it into the dirt with a twisting motion of his foot, he stepped back as the plates on his back started to glow brighter, accompanied by that low, terrifying thrum. Both Gipsy and Yankee shuffled a little further back, moving closer together so they would be ready in case the Titan decided to turn his wrath on them next.
Rearing back on his heels, Godzilla opened his mouth and unleashed a stream of blue fire; however, it was a little less intense this time, more like a flamethrower rather than a concentrated beam. As a result, there wasn't as big of an explosion this time; instead, the blast simply set the carcass ablaze, burning off most of Yamarashi's toxic blood and hopefully minimizing the amount of contamination that it would otherwise have caused to the surrounding environment.
As the explosions died down, the Titan turned away from the burning remains of Yamarashi, and his gaze swept over the pair of Jaegers who now stood shoulder-to-shoulder on the shoreline, putting themselves between him and the city despite their pilots' nerves. Luckily, he didn't seem interested in continuing the fight, and after uttering a final low snort and glowering briefly in their direction, he turned away and started heading back out towards the sea.
"Damn," Raleigh muttered under his breath as he watched the Titan wading back into the harbor. "Good thing he's on our side, right?"
"No kidding," Yancy agreed quietly.
But as the brothers gazed after Godzilla's departing form, one worrying thought kept welling up in the back of their minds.
But… for how long?
Notes: And there we go!
So, a few things to mention here:
– I figured that the Jaeger Academy would be a perfect opportunity to bring in a few more characters from various Godzilla films, so I ran with it. Captain Gordon from Final Wars seemed like a perfect head instructor/drill sergeant for the Academy, and I also brought in Ozaki & Kazama from that movie as Jaeger pilots since they were pilots in my original version of this AU. Akane Yashiro and Yoshito Chujo are from Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla and Godzilla Tokyo SOS respectively, as I felt like they'd both be pretty good fits for the Jaeger Program. Finally, Ford Brody and his future wife Elle are both from Godzilla 2014. Kennedy LaRue & Stephanie Lanphier, meanwhile, are canon PPDC Rangers from the Pacific Rim franchise.
– So, as we can see, Mark and Emma are in a very different situation here than they were in MonsterVerse canon, courtesy of their different lives in this AU and their altered family dynamic with the additions of Raleigh & Yancy. I decided to have them get recruited into Monarch after K-Day in this AU instead of having them already be a part of it like they were in canon, just because I felt like that works better for this story.
– Since we never got maiden names for Emma Russell or Elle Brody in the canon MonsterVerse, I came up with my own for them here. Emma's last name being "Bishop" in this AU is a reference to another of Vera Farmiga's characters (Eleanor Bishop in Hawkeye), and I went with "Chase" (Elizabeth Olsen's middle name) for Elle's last name.
– The "I shall use my time" quote that Vivienne cites during her conversation with Tamsin is a real quote by Jack London. And if it wasn't obvious at this point, since I liked how their interactions played out last chapter, I did decide to go all-in on Vivienne & Tamsin becoming a thing! Although, for everyone who isn't familiar with how Tamsin's story plays out in PR canon, I will warn you: you should expect some very bittersweet angst for this ship in the future.
– I decided to beef the Jaegers & Breach Kaiju up a bit so they'd be better-equipped to contend with MonsterVerse Godzilla, which is why Gipsy Danger is 20,000 tons here as opposed to the 2,000 tons of its canon mass. Obviously that still isn't anywhere near as massive as MV Goji, who's still at his canon size of 90,000 tons.
– Since neither Pacific Rim nor the MonsterVerse mentions any fictional U.S. Presidents, I decided to include cameos from a couple of other fictional Presidents as the President & VP in this AU. Specifically, David Palmer is from the drama series 24, while Elizabeth McCord is from Madam Secretary.
– And, of course, I had to include the Becket boys' first canon Jaeger-vs-Kaiju battle with Yamarashi! Like I did with Pentecost's fight against Onibaba, I knew I wanted to give them a moment without Godzilla doing all the work, so I held off on him showing up until the end of the fight. And we get another example of how the PPDC's "Do Not Provoke" protocol is working pretty well so far in avoiding fights between the Jaegers and Godzilla… but how long will that last?
Next time, the Jaeger Program encounters a mysterious new threat, and the PPDC's defense against a Breach Kaiju attack on Manila goes horribly wrong after Godzilla joins the fray. Stay tuned!