Up From The Deep by Vaughn Jackson (highly recommended books txt) 📕

We should be celebrating. I could throw you a parade; would you like a parade?”

“No sir.” MacPherson took a deep breath to calm herself. “It’s about the kaiju.”

“The what now?”

“The—the giant monster, sir.”

“Oh, why didn’t you just say that?” The president spent a few seconds fixing his hair in the camera. “What about it?”

“We were woefully unprepared for its arrival.”

“But we came out on top. Like we always do.”

“Sir, we just barely survived out here. We need to be prepared for—”

“For what? Next time? There won’t be a next time.”

“We can’t be sure of that.” She slammed her fist on the console, an action she immediately regretted. “Apologies, sir.”

“No, no, you might be right. I can spin this. America is afraid, I can give them confidence.” He flashed a grin at her. “What do you need?”

“I want to put together a taskforce dedicated to the research and, if need be, extermination of threats like this.”

“Yes, good, I like it. I can get some people—”

“Sir?”

“Yes?”

“I already have a list of people, and one more thing…”

“What?”

“This team needs to be outside the hierarchy of the armed forces. It needs to be able to make its own decisions and act unilaterally without being bogged down in bureaucracy.” She clenched her jaw and waited for the disapproval.

The president narrowed his eyes and scrutinized her, eyes darting around her face, looking for something. “Let me get this straight. You want to put together a team you created to fight monsters, that also comes with built in plausible deniability for me?”

“I suppose that is one way of putting it, sir.”

“You would no longer be a general in the United States Navy.”

“I know, sir.”

The man leaned back and kicked his feet up on the large wooden desk. He folded his hands across his lap. “Sure. I’ll sign something today. You will be your own little monster island out there. Put together your team.”

“Thank you, sir.”

The video screen went dark and General MacPherson let out a heavy sigh. “Fuck that man.”

“That looked stressful as hell,” Devonte said. The general jumped at the sudden vocalization. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

“How long have you been standing there?”

“Um, we’ve been here since ‘plausible deniability’,” Devonte said, sharing an awkward look with Skylar. “We weren’t eavesdropping, we were just…”

“Eavesdropping,” the general said.

“What was that about?” Skylar asked.

“Brannigan sent you, didn’t he?”

“Will he get in trouble if we say yes?” Devonte asked.

The general sighed and walked over to a nearby computer chair, slowly easing herself into the leather seat. She rolled her neck, letting each vertebrae crack and relieve the tension in her shoulders. After this, she planned to sleep for a week. “You need a place to stay, right? Both of you?”

The two nodded.

“And I’m assuming most places won’t accept a three-meter tall dragon as a pet.”

“How’d you guess?” Devonte said with an awkward chuckle.

“That conversation was about putting together a team to do what we did here over the past few months. A kind of response team,” she said. “Would you be interested?”

“You’re offering us a job?” Devonte asked.

“A job doing what we’ve been passionately doing for the past few years of our lives,” Skylar clarified.

“Don’t take this lightly,” the general said, her tone hardening. “You’ve seen firsthand what the risks are. This will not be a game. It will presumably be life or death in any situation we go up against.”

“I’m in,” Devonte said. “Akuma may not cooperate without me, and risky or not, this is what I’ve always wanted to do.”

“I’m with him,” Skylar said. “He wouldn’t survive without me.”

The general let a small smile play across her face. “Well then, welcome aboard.”

“Thank you, General,” Devonte said.

“You won’t be calling me that for much longer,” she said. “It will certainly take some getting used to on my end.”

“I’m sure you’ll get used to it, Diane,” Devonte said with a grin.

MacPherson shot him the nastiest look she could muster and watched him wither under her stare. “You won’t be calling me that, either,” she said.

“Right.” Devonte stared at the floor. “Oh, am I allowed to talk about this with, say, family?”

“No specifics, but yes.”

“Then I need to make a phone call,” Devonte said.

Epilogue

“So, this is what you’ve decided?” Kurtis’ face was cloaked in shadows as he peered down at Caine through the video screen. “I wondered what happened to you.”

“It is,” Caine said down on one knee in the darkened room. He looked up at the screen. “I... wish to step out of the shadows.”

“And why tell me this? I could have you killed in the next ten minutes and call it tying up loose ends.” Kurtis steepled his fingers in front of his face. “Traitor.”

“If that is what you wish.”

“You didn't answer my question.”

Caine hesitated. “It was...the honorable thing to do.”

“A Phantasm with honor? Novel.” Kurtis let out a long sigh and flicked on the lamp that sat on his desk, illuminating his face. “What have you told them?”

“Nothing, I—”

“What have you told them?”

“They know about the Hand of Legends.”

“Burke? That pompous zealot?” He leered down at Caine. “That’s all?”

“It came up in regard to Formicaleon. That’s all, I swear.”

“Ah, yes, the lice.” Kurtis rubbed at the newly developed stubble on his chin. “What happened to them?”

“They fled into the bay, and presumably returned to the depths.”

“Good. Too many legs on those things.” He cocked his head and gazed upward in thought. “Okay Caine, here’s what is going to happen.”

Caine stiffened.

“You get to live. Surprise,” Kurtis continued, “but on one condition.”

“What condition?”

“I want to control Tempest, as you know, to make it what it should have always been. The other Hands, however, are not known to listen to any reason but their own. Logically, this means they have to go.”

“You want them dead.”

“It doesn't matter to me. You can throw them into the Siberian wilderness for all I care. I just want them gone, somehow, someway.”

“And you plan to do this?”

“No,” Kurtis said, a cold smile stretching across his face. “I want you to do it.