Chapter 2: Gathering

Near Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida, 2:42 pm

They flew as far and quick as they could, before relating some information back to HQ and other command centres. Madison didn't catch much of it and was largely focused on keeping the hatchling in control on board of the Osprey.
It clung to her legs with its arms. Despite barely being a view hours old it already had such a hard grip that she had to adjust her legs repeatedly, as she felt the claws spike into them a little bit.

At some point there was a mention they would land on the Tyndall Air Force Base, currently the closest to them. From there they could rest up a little bit and relay information properly before getting transported to the Pensacola Monarch facility that wasn't too far away from it. Mark hadn't told her yet why he wanted them to go to that facility specifically. It was somewhat close to where she ended up living now with Abby and Miki, something like 1- or 2-hour drive.

For now that was, Miki had mentioned and discussed they might start she might wanted to move again, as a view things changed in the states she didn't like, and the house was originally just rented temporarily. Maybe that needed some more extra discussions with these events.

The hatchling ended up laying down on the floor and taking up a lot of room, the other people in there clearly seemed uncomfortable with having a small titan around like that. They probably assumed whatever happened had to do with it, in which they'd be technically correct, not so much in their judgement.

The baby Gojira didn't sleep, but still had its eyes closed, she could feel its body constantly shaking while it had its head on her lap. The combination of the cold weather and the stressful situation had caused it to shiver. Unsure what else to do, she gave it pets, giving it comfort and warmth.

Madison's own condition wasn't much better, at this point she felt very much tired and exhausted, but also had a lot of conflicting feelings regarding what happened. Godzilla wasn't unknown to show anger, often that was the only emotions he would show. It's what drove him in many of his fights, by harnessing the emotions and turning them onto the opponent.
But this wasn't like that; it was an uncomfortable rage that was unfocused, unleashed upon everything in the vicinity.

Usually, they were in tune with one another, able to see through one another, but for whatever reason he didn't respond to her. He had shut himself into a self-imposed cage in his mind, made up by rage. There was a reason to it likely, at least there must've been, she thought.

Yet an uneasy tightness still sat deep within her chest and stomach. The worry of what he might have turned into, the worry something may have happened that cut their bond just like that. It made her unable to relax or sleep either.

At this point she simply prayed he hadn't hurt anyone, even if that might just have happened. And then there were those who fell due to Zillas attack, which brought its own confusion to it. It had to do with the baby, that was for sure, just what it exactly was, who knew.

Maybe the monster was just hunting, or maybe it wanted to get a possible competitor out of the way. The thought came up that Godzilla might just have been wanting to do the same, which scared her.

No, that couldn't be true, he could be like that, there was something wrong. He would guard the position as alpha if he was being threatened or challenged to do so, but not kick down something that only had a chance to become one eventually. There was no need for him to do so.

Before there was more time to worry, someone tapped her on the shoulder. It was Ilene, she was leaning down to be on eye height with Maddie, carefully going around the baby to not step on its tail or someone else's feet, as the Osprey was quite packed even for its capacity.

Yet with its already keen senses, the constantly on guard baby titan immediately snapped its head upwards as soon as it noticed someone coming, which made Ilene flinch a little. It was directly starring at her, its big eyes glistening with the red emergency lamp above them. It was a bit creepy.
Madison held its head back a little bit as she started carefully petting it once again, trying to whisper some things, and lull it back into a calmer state, still not sure what to do exactly other then what seemed to feel right.

With a bit of a forced smile and breathe, Ilene whispered to her: "We are landing in a view minutes, Mark and I have to go immediately to the command centre, we have to talk with HQ. We'll see what to do after that. Please, just make sure you have the baby under control."

"Right... I'll try, maybe we both can get some sleep in the meantime."
Maddie whispered back, before yawning a little bit, leaning back in her seat, and just letting everything in front of her happen.

The machine started making its usual noises while landing, the baby looked around nervously, making a stressful sounding chirp noise. For Maddie these things were well known, it on the other hand, experienced these things for the first time now. This time around she didn't bother trying to look out a window, it was dark, it was probably still raining, she just had to sit and wait for now.

The Osprey seemed to have touched the ground, but instead of a simple take-off it sounded like it was rolling a bit over the runway, before finally coming to a halt which rocked the hull a little bit.

Slowly, with hydraulic wiring noises and a warning sound, the back ramp of the osprey opened, and everyone made themselves ready to leave. Confused the hatchling looked around as people got up, it still remaining on the floor.

They were right in front of the hangar, its bright glaring light almost hurting after getting used to the dimmed red in the machine. Having stopped roughly 10 meters away from the wide-open gates. Inside the hangar however were no other machines, other than a dismantled jet on the left side with some kind of invisible plastic sheet. In the rest of the hall were tables with equipment and all sorts of other tools, and at the back the wall had a Monarch sign painted in black, with a ladder still standing in front of it.

Unbeknownst to Maddie, the base had been hit by a hurricane in 2018, just around one year before the mass awakening, and already back then repairs were said to probably taking a couple of years. So, when that event hit, it was decided to have it diverge from the military and give it over to Monarch.
Their units like the G-Team could be expanded upon here and also likely make it a landing spot for the Argo, for whenever it needed to land in case of repair and fuels, as rare of an occasion that was.

As everyone now started to get out in a row, they passed by the baby, Maddie tried to pull it closer to her. Two people sitting next to her she asked to leave their seats so the baby could be laid onto them, they obliged and got out as well.
Maddie then grabbed the from the back underneath to the belly to pull it up, which felt like hugging a tree or one of those gigantic plushies you could win at a carnival, just way heavier.
With a bit of struggle, as it let itself be lifted but didn't get up by itself either, she managed to pull it up. A bit of pushing here and there and she finally managed to have it lay down on those two seats, its tail hanging down at the end of them and almost out the on the ramp.

People looked at it, and it looked back curiously. Wagging its tail a little form side to side. Maddie just gave awkward smiles and nodded. Mark and Ilene were the last ones to walk out, he simply motioned with his hand and told her to stay put, "we'll be back quickly."

She watched as the group of people went into the hangar, far at the back to the right and through a door, where probably a hall or other rooms were, that connected to the rest of the base. She saw some people standing at the door already waiting for them, perhaps medical personal or escorts.

And now she was alone, except for the baby that was. The pilots were still in the cabin, but they mainly talked to each other and command, relaying information. It was now eerily quiet again. She decided to take the chance and take a deep breath in and out, taking in her surroundings to keep her mind of worries. The night so dark, outside of the opened hangar nothing else was there to see from her seat in the osprey.

Guess she would try to get some rest, just had to make sure the little one was also ready for it.
Since the people left it now curiously looked around and inspected its surroundings, tried getting away from the seat it was laying on to explore its surrounding, wiggling excitedly with its tail.

But Maddie held it back from leaving for now. She pulled the baby's head in closer, making it rest onto her lap before giving it some more pets. With big eyes it starred up to her, that feeling she got earlier was back, mixing with the other emotions currently going on within. It helped melting the tightness in the chest away with each pulse of the heart.

The weather was relatively speaking still cold, but the rain had significantly cut down where they were, merely being a slight drizzle. The concrete of the runway had some puddles formed inside its cracks, that melded the red and white lights from the hangar and the osprey. A drop of water fell into the puddle, distorting the mix of lights a bit more.

"Should be close to 3 am now."
The thought went through the head as she had to yawn, making the baby yawn too in turn.
It made her pull attention to the jaw, turning its head a bit to the side. The infant titan responded to the motion with a confused chirping, "sorry, just want to check something, easy..."

As she pulled up some of the lip to view the teeth and gum. They seemed to be healthy, quite small for now, still straight and not quite as pointy as the adult ones. Yet already a couple of them were indicating to become fangs later in life.
Godzilla himself had fine teeth for his age, some had grown and twisted a bit, but nothing out of the ordinary for a reptile like him. Having kept them relatively clean and undamaged, with only slight decolouration, so far.

"Wonder how he keeps it clean... alright, all good, sorry again." She let go of the head, the baby nuzzled its head back into the previous position on her lap.

She hadn't asked him how he kept it clean, if she had a guess, the use of the atomic breath might end up burning away all bacteria and plaque. Alternatively, some animals in the environment were picking things off when he rested in shallow waters. Maybe once she got to confront him about the outrage, she could ask him about that too.

Still pouting a bit about what happened, she decided to vent her frustration by giving the baby more attention. She tried figuring out what the little one liked and what it didn't, just like Goji, it enjoyed getting scratched at the chin and cheek. With both hands each at a time she went from the top of its snout, over the brow and to the back of its head, it squinted its eyes at that, but not in a relax way.

Then she tried just the back of the eyebrows and forehead area, lightly moving her hand in a slow backwards dragging motion. Switching it up with a bit of scratching, this it enjoyed a lot more.

Keeping that up she tested around the rest of the body, sides and belly, this it didn't mind but also not cared for much by the look of it, until slipping under the belly and giving it scratches. The baby titan started making strange chuffs and chirps, its tail twitching around more actively, seems like that was a tingly spot for it.

Maddie snickered at that, until she felt something pointy nibbling at her hand that she had kept petting its head. It didn't hurt her but caused some slight scratches, she removed her hand from under the belly, evidently it was getting too excited, as she also felt the claws at its head grip one of her legs stronger again.

She kept poking around, some spots it said nothing, some it made an annoyed sound, some tingled again and others it enjoyed.
Specifically, she seemed to hit a sweet spot that was somewhere at the lower back, which made it cause to fidget around wildly, and bite into one of the seats when getting scratched there.

"Woah, woah, hey there!" she grabbed it by the neck and held it up, immediately stopping scratching that spot. Madison couldn't fail to notice that after she had removed the child's jaws from the seat, it still had a piece of the cushioning stuck between them, which it shook from side to side like a dog who had caught a small prey animal.

"Oh oh." She muttered, looking at the small hole left in the seat.

"Everything going okay there?" The pilot called from the cockpit.
"Y-Yeah everything's fine..." she tried to lie through gritted teeth.

Given it was made from Styrofoam and plastic, Maddie preferred to not have it get stuck between its teeth or having the infant swallow the microplastics within. She grabbed it out of its mouth, which made the baby give out a squeak, not sure if it was out of proudness of having caught prey for its parent or wanting to play with it more.

She threw the piece outside, hoping the two pilots that were just coming from the cockpit didn't notice. They had kept their helmets on, the co-pilot still had his mask and visor on to cover his face, the main pilot on the other hand had taken those off or lifted them.
To her he looked about any other guy from a military thing she had seen, slight beard, a bit of a moustache, brown hair and eyes.

"This lil' guy caused all the ruckus earliar?" The man spoke with a Boston accent, the familiarity comforted Maddie, putting her at ease. Shame she lost her accent a while ago.
"Kind off, we are still not sure."
"Will say, seein' a baby Godzilla wasn' on my list of things to evah see." The notion was spoke with kindness, he gave her thumbs up before going outside the machine.

The co-pilot just calmly went by but stopped at the babies head.
"May I..." he went in for a motion that indicated he wanted to pet it.

Naturally she felt a bit confused, even the little titan looked up at the strange, masked figure. Then she noticed a sticker on the side of his helmet, saying "Godzilla" in blue font with flames.
Couple of memories flooded into her, from news reports on what they said about Godzilla, how he protected them. Sometimes she forgot how people outside of her circles perceive the titans and that it wasn't all always negative, they also inspired people. The hope and awe they and him presented.

A bit shy but with a friendly smile she nodded, moving her hand away from the young titans head.
The man tried to pet it on the head, but each time he got closer it lowered itself, moving away as it was unsure about being touched by anything that wasn't its guardian. The person had these dark gloves and towered over it.
The man himself seemed to shake a little bit. It was weird to see, perhaps he was a fan?

Unsure about the stranger, the baby Gojira uttered a small growl, fletching its teeth as a threat. Maddie needed a second to calm it down again, shushing it and giving some small pets on the head.
"Don't worry, he's nice," she looked at the co-pilot, who she was able to notice seemed to now feel quite embarrassed, despite his face being covered by the helmet.

"Just get on a lower height, he's probably scared of you petting like it from above. Take it slowly, he's been through a lot today."
The pilot nodded and squatted down to its level.

Very slowly he put his hand forward, letting the hatchling sniff it before trying to go in for a pet immediately.
Finally, it allowed the stranger to pet it. At first it seemed unsure, but quickly it embraced the dark gloves he wore, a strange but pleasantly soft sensation for the reptile.
Still a bit nervous, he got a view pets on its head in, before it made a playful snap after the glove. He pulled his hand away stood back up.
"Hey Marius come on, stop bothering the baby G." The pilot that had walked out yelled back them.

Before he left he turned to Madison: "You think Godzilla had a reason behind it?"
He questioned in a very quiet yet sincere sound tone. A bit perplexed by the question she nervously scratched at her head. Coming up with an answer about something she wondered as well.
"I'm pretty sure he had one, just have to figure it out, as always."

He seemed to agree with that, giving her another nod. He thanked the lady, waved her and the baby titan goodbye, his colleague already waiting around at the edge of the ramp.

"Took your time Marius, lets grab some burgers, I know a place nearby."
Marius once again simply nodded in agreement and went with the man around the hangar, wherever that place was they said to know. For a bit she could hear the men talking, then even that fainted away getting replaced by quietness and the drizzle of rain again.

No one else was there to guard them now, but neither were their worries or threats to wonder about, just a moment to them alone.

Maddie breathed out, feeling some of the stress from before leaving her again. The sense of tiredness started to seep in, she adjusted her position and sunk a bit deeper into her sea. Laying down her arm down over the babys neck while she kept petting it. A long yawn was made, she held up her right hand in front of her mouth. The baby seemed to get infectious from it and also yawned, it made her smile.

Her eyelids started to feel a bit heavy, a slight burning sensation around the eyes themselves. She shut them, mumbling to herself to only rest them for a view minutes.

To dream like normally, alone by herself or even to simply sleep with no thoughts to think would have been welcome after all of this stress, but alas something more important required her to stay in a more active state of mind, pulling her in like a vortex.

There were questioned to be asked and answers to be given, instead of resting and dreaming she started to listen in on the flow of sounds that the world let out. An intensive undertaking that she still wasn't really used to and usually stayed away from. Largely because her birth kind were one of the loudest with their masses, and therefore the one with most of the suffering.
It took a little bit of time to filter it out and identify frequency that all the members of the pack could hear.
Going through the layers, taking away one line by another, before reaching a line deep below and grabbed a hold of it.
Synced up.

A call was made to the rest of the pantheon. Able to span everywhere.
Not all would listen in currently, not all would be able to respond. Some rested in a deeper slumber, some were likely fighting again, some were simply not interested in heading her call specifically, finding it unworthy of their concerns.

Who would've known a cold shoulder and uncertainty was also given by the beings she was associated with? Having a human amongst their ranks? What a preposterous suggestion, one might think.

Not something she had expected to learn about them. One of the reasons she often avoided the stream of sounds, having come here only a view times and never alone. Before he had always been by her side, ready to put down and call out someone who attempted to mock her.

Despite the lack of his presence now, she could deal with it and then again not all of them were like this only a view. Scylla and Ahmuluk were some of those, and obviously they did not head her call before and wouldn't this time either.

She sat down and waited. Slowly the completely darkness became filled up with a brighter grey mist, engulfing everything there was to see. A creek made up of a foggy darkness started to make its way next to her. A tree made of blank ink, lines of a hill somewhere around.
A creation of acoustics and thoughtforms being shared between one another in a deep meditative state.
Her own body had become just a shadowy appearance of herself, the shapes becoming very vague and responding to sound by wiggling or vibrating a little.

Out of the mist, gigantic figures started walking, merely shadowy figures and rough outlines of their true forms, making up a circle with her.
Only 6 joined her this time. Behemoth across her. Quetzalcoatl next to her right. Gorosaurus to the left.

Next to Behemoths right side, slithered up Tiamat, meeting up without his wife. Abbadon walked in on the left from the rainforest guardian. In the despoiler's trail, the stilt figure that was the Queen Jinshin appeared, a surprise guest, even more so then the previous one.

Abbadon was not one she had much to do with yet, as he had stuck to regions very far north that were hard to reach. From what she had heard however, this was for his own and everyone else's good, as he could become quite a handful.
The rather brutal ways of combat and protection of his territory granted him the name despoiler once by the people of the past and now also in the present.

A small gathering of the pantheon, but each powerful member in their own rights. Information started getting exchanged. Not with words, as none shared blood or other relations to enable that speech.
Instead, as always, flashes of memories and emotions were shared between on another, enabling innate understanding without the need for spoken language.

The forest guardian showed great interest as to why they were called, Tiamat immediately attempted to absolve themselves of any fault. She knew that and waved it aside, in a friendly matter of course.

She had to be careful with this, not get too many personal feelings involved when sharing information. Bit by bit she gave them what they were called upon further.

The new titan. Godzilla getting angry and ignoring her. The baby.

A stir came up, if they were humans, you could've heard muttering and whispers, here there was growling and other strange noises.

Gorosaurus and Tiamat voiced their congrats on recovering the new child, these days new born titans were a rarity, if not thought to be impossible.
The queen Jinshin grumbled a bit, there was a sense of envy from it though granted, her kinds children could unleash chaos for the balance that He protected, hatching usually in vast numbers and living somewhat parasitic. Not that she could bear any unlike the two that defied the king a view years ago. A damaged egg sack and lack of male prevented that.

Quetzalcoatl whispered about the unknown monsters, whilst unclear of its origin, it believed to have seen it or at least sensed it.

Abbadon asked curiously, yet with a spiteful tongue, as to where exactly he had seen this new monster. With a slithering and disgusted motion, the serpentine bird followed upon the despoiler's beckoning, mentioning that it had sensed it swim near its mountains, coming from islands far away and going up north.

This did match up somewhat with she knew. She asked if there was anything else. Quetzal could not answer on that.

It seemed that Abbadon did know more, mentioning that it was strange how Anguiurs was missing in this conversation, despite being so close to Him.

She asked what was meant by that. The answer she got was some kind of unnerving deep cackling that made its shape go wild.

The despoiler looked like something between a comodo dragon mixed with a gorilla, sporting sharp armour that likely was made up of plates on the actual creature, while sporting a twin split tail, with sharp arrow like tips on its end.

Showing some events from a month back, the deceitful titan explained that he had a squabble with Anguiurs, in which he was bested. Behemoth asked why Anguiurs had fought him. With a foul mouth he mentioned that he, quote, wanted to forcefully remove "the lice" from his territory after drilling into the ground. Something that the kings right hand didn't fully agree with.

The insult wasn't unnoticed by her but she didn't let it get to her yet. The rest of the pantheon present didn't humour him much either, much to Abbadons dismay.

He continued mentioning after he was bested by Anguirus initially, he wanted revenge and tracked the kings right hand, keeping a decent enough distance to not get detected. Then one day something strange happened. He heard what sounded like Godzilla, fighting with Anguiurs.

Obviously, this was strange even to him, everyone else including her agreed. He continued showing that after what seemed the two having finished their fight, he went up to the location itself and had seen a single trail of blood going into the ocean, which looked to be from Anguirus.

That knowledge made her more personal feelings brew up and accidently let out a slight bit to them. The despoiler licked his lips with that split tongue, sensing the emotions like a shark getting a whiff of blood in the water. A rasping deep laugh escaped the despoiler, making its shape explode with sharp spikes, he lifted one of his front legs to point.

Like a swarm of piranhas he chomped at the opening, and started accusing Godzilla of betraying them, that he was now going against Titan kind because the humans told him to do so. Always before had they attempted to remove them, but their weapons were ineffective. They had resulted it in manipulating one of the titans into becoming a vessel for the one who is many, which had caused chaos and terror once again amongst. Didn't Tiamat and his partner fall victim to that? Those were the kind of beings Godzilla decided to ally himself against? And one of them claims to be amongst their ranks too?

Not much else was left to the imagination what Abbadon tried to call for, but unfortunately for him not many here agreed, and especially the one that he stood right next to didn't.

Tiamat hissed back at him to not use his and Mandas mistakes against the king, and Behemoth gave out a roar with loud trumping noise. If the despoiler didn't cease with his accusations, he would make sure to put him back in the ground where he belonged.

The deceitful titan snapped back, answering why the forest guardian cared so much when he had to chase away the lice from the forests he protected as well.
That was the true, but that didn't mean there was malice in those people he chased away nor the people that lived within the forest in harmony, and neither did he hold malice to them either. Compared to what he felt to Abbadon.

Everyone started get more riled up, but before that could happen, she shut them down, striking at Abbadon. As quickly as chaos erupted, equally as quickly it was quilled, and it became clear once again why she was here to begin with.

After things got settled, she confronted Abbadon, she knew he wasn't telling the full story and that he better start telling the full story or otherwise he would be "removed" from the pantheon.

Gutsy from the little one, the despoiler had to admit. It was true, he didn't mention that he heard Anguirus's victory called, that sounded very mournful. Obviously, he hadn't killed Godzilla as he had just shown up again, but perhaps they had squabbled for another reason and wounded each other.

Gorosaurs assumed that likely that two were emotionally hurt as well, having been close allies for a long time, with familial ties almost.
That didn't explain why they fought, but perhaps explained a bit of their current mental state, with Anguirus perhaps, sulking it out as Behemoth suggested and Godzilla still being angry from something else.
The Queen Jinshin noted that the location where the fight took place wasn't too far away from her current nest. And that indeed she had heard what seemed to be Godzilla nearby as well, but something had seemed off about it.

She asked if the Jinshin could describe more, but unfortunately it had remained on distance, having a natural fear of Godzilla despite being one of the members of the pack.

Once again, Abbadon cut in to mention that the humans must have had something to do with it and that the Queen Jinshin had good reasons to fear him, but everyone else shut him down again. Not wanting to draw in more ire from her, as that probably would also invoke ire from him. In a weird way that confirmed their worries.

Behemoth was a wise old titan, but unfortunately couldn't offer much wisdom to this situation. He suggested they should warn some of the other titans and inform them of the ongoings if possible, to stay on guard and vigilant.

Quetzalcoatl and Gorosaurus agreed to that, the later saying they'd try and inform Kong about it but were currently busy creating a new nest with their partner. Tiamat mentioned the same, hoping that maybe the arrival of the new infant titan meant that their own wishes about offspring could be fulfilled.

Behemoth warned the sea serpent that perhaps recourses wouldn't be enough to sustain the another child without coming into conflict with the humans, noting that like she had show, that the young Gojira was much smaller indeed then what a young titan would usually be.

Abbadon grumbled that perhaps if they just got rid of the humans around them that they wouldn't need to bother with those worries.

That was the last straw for her, she roared out to him and swore that he'd regret those remarks, the shape of her body going wild. The despoiler roared back, giving foul remarks and notions about how they should know their place and worship.

Acoustics had grown so loud they were able to be picked up by others despite spanning around the world, alarming them. With a deep and mighty roar, his presence was made noticeable, the area around them shook.

With that the members slowly faded out, shying away from that display of power. Behemoth was the last to remain with her for a bit, he told her to not be angry at him and to not take the comments to heart, but to be also careful now. A future titan was in her hands now.

She thanked him for the advice and severed the connection. Now she was alone again, at least it seemed to be that way.
"Are you there?" she shouted out, knowing he was around, but didn't want to show himself it seemed.

"Why did you attack him?" No answer.

Then, she felt something, a strange sense of emotions being translated to her, an image flicked up in her mind. An apology.

Then something else snapped her out. A childs crying and a scream, it made her run back.

A little bit earlier, Tyndall AFB Command Center

Mark never liked this part. Despite it all he rather be on the field and at this point, deal with another monster, jokingly.

The command centre was rather short staffed, the room still had some plastic covers hanging around for parts being worked on, the artificial taste of wall isolation was in the air. Quite dusty from it as well, made him cough a little bit.

Other than him and one G-Team operative called Martinez, most other people that had been on the Osprey left, assigned to other posts or getting a bit of rest. No such luxuries for him and Ilene right now. HQ demanded to know what was going.

A video feat came up on one of the hung-up wall screens, one of the stationed personal was working around with the cables. The image was a bit stutter, but that would work for now. On the screen were 3 people, General Foster, Barnes who stood a bit further in the back and, the Deputy director. Despite not being in a very humorous mood he would've liked Rick to be there right now.

"Hello- Dr. Russell- Dr.- Chen?"

"Connection still seems bad, uno momento," he wrangled around with the cables, unaware of coming dangerously close to possibly electrocuting himself, "and should work now?"

"Image is a bid fuzzy now but should be good enough for now." With arms crossed he waved with his hand to the personal to move away a bit to see if it'd hold.

"Hello Foster, can you hear us?"
"Yes Dr. Russell I can hear you, now can you please explain why am I getting emergency calls for my G-Team operatives from a coast guard office, that were assigned to your dig site and why Mrs Verdugo here is equally getting some from the same scientist equally assigned to that post?!"

She seemed a little bit pissed. He swallowed a bit, less so because of Fosters rather harsh demeanour, more so about Verdugo, the other Deputy Director currently on equal rank with her and around the same rank as her, rising up quickly recently after the death of Vivienne and Serizawa.

Compared to those two, she didn't seem to have a Dr. Title and was much more of an operational brain, which often get two onto conflict, especially since the current Director favoured her a bit sometimes. At least that how it felt.

The current director wasn't supposed to be permanent; Mark was supposed to inherit the position from Serizawa and the reason he gave him the notes.
There were a view legal troubles with that and things in the slow theocracy that Monarch had wasted time on getting it done. An only half true statement he told to Madison and some others. He himself didn't want to take it yet, not feeling ready for it.
So, he took up some assistant director duties, as well as a more on field operation assignments, even though he himself didn't need to do them most of the time.

A lot of criticism was put on him for that. Likely due to Serizawa also having been on the field and meeting his end there. Lots of pressure put on him that way.

Sometimes that did make him wish him wish he took up the higher position to get things out of the way, since more radical higher up members still wanted to get to Madison and run some sort of inspection and experiments. He fought tooth and nail for them to back off.

So far he could hold off both Verdugo and the temporary director, who's name had been kept a secret, only under a codename known as "Guillerman." Who knows if he could keep them off after what happened.

"We," he wasn't sure what detail to mention just yet, „excavated part of the object with found, it hatched. Shortly after we got attacked by a new unknown titan, then Godzilla showed up."

"What did Godzilla do?"
"Not sure, seemed to fighter the monster for whatever reasons he might've had. We were just caught up in it and unfortunately couldn't really get out in an ordered manner"
Foster breathed an exhausted sigh, not being a big fan of the sarcasm Mark brought. Barnes kept sticking in the back, but gave Mark a look that said something along the lines of "Now is not the time" seems like there was another reason neither Rick or Sam where present.

"I'll send out a search party, next to the rescues party to pick up all the survivors. They'll try and locate new titan and the hatched specimen,-"
"That won't be necessary," Ilene cut in.

Foster had been ready to close the call again, but with a stern look she turned to Ilene.
"Not the, unknown titan of course or the rescue team," an awkward mood went over the room, "but we already have the hatched specimen with us."
"How is that…"
"The creature is much smaller than we expected, standing roughly as a tall as a human, it also wasn't a Mosura specimen as initially reported back."
"Right, so what is it?"

Ilene looked at Mark, nodding to him to see if he wanted to say it, since this might get Maddie involved in the discussion again.

"It's… a baby Godzilla."
The silence was deafening. The shifted to being more uncomfortable than it already was, as Foster simply glared at him, her voice feeling similar to an angry parent finding out their child had something they shouldn't.
"And you have it with you...?"

"Yes, we didn't really expect it to hatch, likely that attracted the titans. It started following us by coincidence, of course we couldn't just leave it there," he tried to make it seem like it was more in a scientific interesting then a moral one, which didn't jell well with him, but he had to give it a shot. Unfortunately, it didn't manage to land correctly.

"You sure this has nothing to do with your daughter, Mrs. Madison Russell, that flew in despite previous discussions and ended up touching the egg causing it to hatch?"
Mark mumbled a curse, knowing full well the agent that escorted had reported probably everything to Verdugo already.

Foster glanced over her back to her. "You knew about this?"
The deputy direct waved her aside. "Dr. Russell we had thought you yourself had wished her to stay away from operations. That was your compromise for no further inspections by the research department," she crossed her arm, still keeping up the serious façade in her face, yet the self-righteous tone of her voice was clearly understandable to him.

"Perhaps we would need to discuss that matter again."

He bit his tongue lightly, feeling very stressed out and aggravated about what she was insinuating.

Ilene intervened, "it was my idea to bring Maddie along, obviously I had discussed it with Mark, but I thought she could help give us some expertise on the matter."
"More expertise than our seasoned scientists? I know she has extraordinary abilities but inviting a teenager to an operation like this seems highly unprofessional Dr. Chen."

The remark didn't go by anyone unnoticed but the only people here that could stick up to her were Mark, who she had by a leash practically now. To surprise of Barnes and everyone else, Foster was the one to tell her off.

"Mrs Verdugo, if you already have already gotten a report on the matter, that you failed to share with me, then I see no further reason for you to be present at this debriefing."

Awkward stares and silence followed, with Barnes walking up a bit behind her on the screen, as if he was ready to escort her out. But the Deputy director seemed to incline on the notion from the technically lower ranking officer.

"Very well, I'll report the matter to the Director, I will arrange a meeting as quickly as possible with the two of you, Dr. Russell and Dr. Chen."
She left, no squabbling no arguing about it, knowing full well that she still had the advantage over him. At least for now he didn't have to bother with it.

They waited till she was completely out of the picture.

"I do have to agree with Mrs. Verdugo however on the matter, I am not keen on having children show up at these operations."

Foster could be stern, but at least with her there was at least a good reason behind it.

"Mam' if I may interject," finally Barnes spoke up, she gave him a nod.
"I think we all know that Madison isn't just another kid. I'm still not sure myself what's up with her exactly, none of my business to be honest. But she's got a thing going with the titans, I see no one else more fitted to help with them."

"I agree too," the G-Team operative named Martinez that stood next to them finally mentioned something as well.
"Thanks to her the rest of the squad got to escape, that's gotta count for something right?"

Once again Foster sighed, not in disappointment or much annoyance, but because she knew Barnes was right on that. Protocols simply tied her hands more then she wanted to and had to play by the rule book if possible.

"Is there any other information I'm missing out on Dr. Russell?"
Mark rubbed the back of his neck, better to come full clean with everything they had to someone he trusted.

"Well, the hatchling didn't just follow us coincidentally really, Madison was the first thing it saw. Seems that it has imprinted on her as a surrogate mother."
"It's likely that Maddie communicated with it when she touched the egg. Perhaps her connection to Godzilla made it think another one of its kind was there and caused it to hatch." Ilene tried to explain. Mark hadn't thought about that yet, but it would make sense.

"You think maybe when it hatched it gave out a signal or somethin' that made that other titan and Godzilla show up."
Foster looked back at Barnes, being very surprised that he was the one to suggest that. A bit awkwardly he cleared his throat: "I ehrm, had looked up some reports recently on the Mutos again, there were mentions of that."

Mark and Ilene looked at each other.
"You think the red glow was-"
"A call for help? Could be."

The two scientists were eager to discuss that idea further but unfortunately the Colonel had more important matters on the table. Meanwhile, someone in the background walked up Barnes and held something up on a notebook for him.

"Okay, revelations about titans aside, what is the current status of the hatchling and Mrs. Russell."
"We left her and the baby in the Osprey," Mark mentioned, "they seemed exhausted and are probably resting now. I had considered flying towards the Pensecola facility."

Foster raised an eyebrow.

"As far as I recall the Holding facility for super species was still under construction?"
"Yes, that's also why I decided we needed to take an in-between stop, to make clear if they are ready to at least provide the space for a creature right now. And of course, to debrief you on the situation-"

"Uhm, Mam'" Barnes cut in again, his voice sounding a bit concerned. "What is it now Barnes?"

He went up to the screen to confront Mark and Ilene.
"Not to concern you but we just got news that apparently we are getting some titan acoustic signals coming from and towards your base."

"That doesn't make sense, they would've shown up already on the alarm system by now." Mark didn't understand at first, but came to the conclusion that Ilene was thinking of at the same time.

"Maybe they are just calling back to here…" They look at each other.
"I'll go check on Maddie, you clear things up here." Ilene said, already walking outside, past the doors and into the dimly lit corridor, glancing at Mark nodding back at her for confirmation.