He climbed a steel staircase toward a catwalk that ringed one of the outer levels of the Jaeger bay. The magnificent machines stood at attention, waiting for the next time they would be needed to defend humanity… but if Shao Liwen had her way, that moment would never come.
Behind him, he heard other footsteps on the catwalk. Mako came up next to him. “That was pretty slick,” he said. “How long before they shut all this down and I can go home?”
“I don’t trust the Drone tech,” Mako said. “Not yet, at least.”
“Looked dialed-in to me,” Jake said.
“Remote systems can be hacked or compromised.”
Interesting, Jake thought. She had been a Ranger. She understood. “Well, you’re the key vote, right? Your decision, so there you go.”
“I wish I could just go ahead and approve them. If we’d had Drones back in the war, maybe Dad would still be alive.” She gazed out over the expanse of the Jaeger bay, in the direction of Gipsy Avenger. Jake could see her thinking back to Gipsy’s predecessor. “And Raleigh,” she added quietly.
Jake wasn’t following this. “What did that have to do with the war? News said it was cancer.” He saw the sorrow on her face, and realized he couldn’t understand what it was like for her to have lost a partner. Someone she’d fought with, Drifted with…
“You all right?” he asked.
She nodded. “Everything about the other side of the Breach is still classified,” she said, turning back to Jake’s first question regarding Raleigh’s death. “There’s a kind of radiation, in the Anteverse. We didn’t know how bad it was until it was too late.” She paused, and Jake realized she might be trying to tell him something. She’d been down there, on the edge of the Anteverse, with Raleigh…
“Are you all right?” he asked again, tensing as his mind ran over all the awful possibilities.
She nodded. “Raleigh ejected me. I got sick and couldn’t pilot anymore, but I’m fine. He got the worst of it.”
Jake knew that part of the story, about Raleigh ejecting Mako and then priming Gipsy Danger’s reactor to detonate before ejecting himself. But he hadn’t known about the Anteverse radiation. The Pan Pacific Defense Corps kept a lot of secrets, even from its Rangers.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t know.”
“We can’t change the past.” She was still looking at the Jaegers. “But the future is ours to make. A lot of people want to see the Drones deployed. Nearly half the Council is backing Liwen. They aren’t going to like my decision.”
“How about I go with you for some moral support?” Jake asked, brother to sister. “Never been to Sydney. Hear it’s great.”
“I’m glad you offered,” she said with a smile. “Because I’ve already requested Gipsy Avenger for Honor Guard at the Council Summit.”
“Whoa, hold up. Honor Guard? That’s not what I meant.” Jake had been thinking more along the lines of hanging around backstage before Mako headed out onto the summit dais, so he could crack jokes and let her know that no matter what happened someone was on her side. But the Jaeger Honor Guard?
“What about my moral support?” she needled him.
“Gipsy is Lambert’s ride.” That was the real problem. How was Mako going to justify that to Nate? The shouts of nepotism would echo all the way to Sydney before they ever got there.
“His copilot works for Liwen now. He needs a new one,” she said. Then she let him figure out the rest… which didn’t take him long.
She hadn’t followed him up here to try to make him feel better about the possibility of the Drones kicking all the Rangers out of their jobs. She was focused on the here and now, maximizing the abilities of the Rangers she had… and trying to keep Jake from bolting again now that she had just gotten him back in the program. “One that you already know is Drift-compatible, right,” he said. He couldn’t help but laugh. “I see what you’re trying to do, putting me back in a live rig.”
Her smile returned. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“All right, sis. I got your back.” A thought occurred to him. “But I want to be there when you tell him. He’s gonna be so pissed, he’ll make that dumb face like…” He imitated Lambert’s rigid, Ranger tough-guy pissed-off expression. Tight jaw, frown, crease between the eyes. Mako laughed.
On that moment, Jake headed off. If he had to be in Sydney tomorrow, he had a lot of preparation to do.
Watching him go, Mako’s smile faded.
9
THIS IS LYLE SCALABRINI, NEW SOUTH WALES Radio. I’m on the ground in the plaza outside the Pan Pacific Defense Corps Council Building, and the atmosphere is pretty intense. Police are four ranks thick around the long half-circle driveway coming off the street up to the front of the building, in full riot gear, holding back a crowd that must be in the tens of thousands. Everywhere you look there are banners. Over on the far side of the driveway from where I am, a pocket of Kaiju cultists have staked out a spot. People who served in the Kaiju War, and survivors’ groups, have surrounded them and there’s some… well, let’s just say I can’t get too close or else you’ll have to bleep out most of the audio. The cult group is largely ignoring everyone else. They’re praying, and they’ve brought with them some Kaiju bones out of which they’ve made a sort of shrine, right on the sidewalk close to the eastern end of the driveway. I’m a little too far away to hear what they’re saying, but it certainly looks like in the midst of all this chaos, they’re holding a prayer service. I’m going to try to get a little closer and find out exactly what their reasons are for being here, because it doesn’t seem like they’d have any reason to care one way or another whether Jaegers are piloted remotely or
