“Go fuck yourself.” I slam my front door in the agent's face.

“Who was that?” Mercy says, wrapping her robe around her curvy frame. It wasn't even 9am yet.

“Eh, just the CIA. But, fuck ‘em.”

“I'm assuming they have a job for you?” She asked.

“Yeah, but last time I did a mission based on CIA Intel I spent a day and a half in a cave.”

Mercy offers, “waffles?” and I nod.

We have a nice brunch and then go back to the details of Pathbreakers LLC. Mercy's doing all the accounts and pay and taxes and stuff but is making me learn it too. She says it's in case I do something dumb like break up with her. I assure her I'm not that stupid.

Jose, Amy, their kids and Madeline come over around lunch time to look at the contracts as well. There's a bunch of technicalities with Henry and Madeline being involved and getting paid. We have to list them as “part time consultants,” and they can't get benefits. Henry has a year and a half left in his tour. Madeline can technically quit the FBI whenever she wants, but she doesn't want to leave the bureau. So she's on “Leave Of Absence.”

The adults are around the blue Ikea kitchen table with just delivered Jimmy John's sandwiches. The kids are enjoying Mario Kart 8 on the 97 inch LG OLED 4K TV. Split screen on a TV that big is a treat, let me tell you. That's when I get another knock at my door.

I see who it is and open it. “Why, yes, I'd love to buy some girl scout cookies!”

The blonde bob hairdo CIA agent lady is not amused. “Corporal Han, we really need to talk.”

“It's just Jun now, or if you can pronounce it, Jun Kyung. Also, go fuck yourself.”

She slides a foot in the door frame as I attempt to close it in her face for the second time that day. “It's about R-32.”

I sigh and show her inside.

After trips to both Ikea and Nebraska Furniture Mart my house looks like it's inhabited by an actual adult. This is mostly because of Mercy's tastes but I'm down with it. The place looks modern and “young professional” but not unwelcoming and definitely livable. The living room bookshelves are dotted with Mercy's anime figures. I've got some cool video game posters around. I'm especially proud of my Nuka-Cola poster and my Fallout New Vegas map.

I lead her into the kitchen. I say, “guys, this is a CIA lady-” which is met with immediate boos from Jose, Mercy and Amy. “Who is probably going to give us a fake name and try to lure us into doing something stupid.”

She does not look happy about her introduction. “Ahem. My name is Alicia Bennet. I'm an agent with the CIA's DIAMOND branch. I'd like to talk to you,” she looks around the room and sees that yep, it's the team. “I would like to tell all of you about a mission we'd like you to take on. It's concerning cave R-32 in Afghanistan.”

Nobody says anything so she opens her briefcase and hands me photos. “These were taken one week after the Dracosys initialization.” The photos are from far overhead. They show humans running from monsters three times their size.

“Are those tentacles?” I ask, and pass around the photos.

“We believe so. And these were taken a week later.” She hands me more photos. The humans are gone now. The monsters seem to be... Moving stones?

“And a week later.” These photos show an incomplete building. Walls are half built. None of the sides connect at right angles.

“Why are these stones dark green?” Jose asks.

Alicia Bennet answers, “the monsters are turning the local rocks into some other kind of stone. They have some sort of spell to convert them once they're in place.” She hands me a final set of photos. “And these are from last week. Note the people there, in supplication before the big monster. And in this photo, right here, you can see the human being given to the big monster as a sacrifice. I've seen the video, and you do not want to see what happens next. Then, this last part is the worst.” She holds up two photos. One is the big monster dragging some large mechanical device out of the dungeon, another is the device being driven away in a truck.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

I ask, “wait, so what's happening, here? They're trading humans for spare parts?”

“No,” Jose says solemnly. “Remember what they mined in R-32?”

I do. “Uranium.”

Alicia puts it together for those left behind. “They're sacrificing humans to some eldritch monsters in exchange for nuclear weapons.”

That takes the wind out of our sails. We sit in stunned silence for a while. I don't have to ask if these guys are terrorists. Of course they are. No legit organization would do monster sacrifices.

“This is awful,” Mercy says.

“Yup,” says Madeline who's suddenly back to reticence.

Amy has to leave the table and check on her kids. I think that's more out of nerves than an actual necessity.

Jose crosses his fingers in front of him and looks to me. “You gonna be good?” he asks.

I slowly nod. “Yeah, I'll be fine. It'll be different this time.” I clench my fist in front of me. “I'm different this time.”

Alicia takes that as an acceptance of the mission. “You'll have to go in at night and as a black op. I'll cover transport. We need to leave tonight to get there before the next dungeon break. I also have the condition that I'll be joining you.” I start to object but she stops me. “I'm already a level 8 Spy. I have enough techniques to keep myself alive and distract some monsters.”

“Is it a dungeon or ruin?” Jose asks.

“Dungeon,” Alicia answers. “Fifteen floors, judging by the dungeon break time. The monsters seem to be sea life related, which is odd for the middle of the desert.”

I glance at Jose and he nods. “You must have gotten the redacted report on R-32,” I tell her. “The full report contains the info on the group who was working the mines. The locals were doing the job... But they were controlled by Westerners.”

“What?” Alicia seems genuinely surprised.

“Some of the people in charge there were American and British. I talked to them before executing them and taking their hazmat suits. They belonged to a cult. A cult that thinks that Lovecraft and his cosmic horror buddies weren't writing fiction, but non-fiction.”

I know Jose, Davis and I told just the Rangers commander at the time that info. I didn't even tell Mercy, and I know Amy was in the dark. So I go through it.

“Cthulhu. The Dunwich Horror, the King in Yellow. Nyarlathotep. Madness inducing monsters. World eating dark gods. Awful creatures from the deep. All that stuff. And this group, who's real buddy-buddy with 5 out of 6 of our last Presidents, believes in it. They have the power and money to both work towards their goals and also bury any evidence under the rug. They're called the Ambrose Society.”

“I know that name,” Alicia says, rummaging through her briefcase until she finds a certain document. “Desmond Pierce of the Ambrose Society, spotted talking to some of the people who are working with the monsters. We thought he was just gathering information on behalf of his group, since they do aid work.”

“Got a photo?” asks Jose. Alicia hands Jose a picture of a generic white guy. Short brown hair, well groomed beard, 40s. Jose hands the photo back. He's a sniper. It's his job to identify targets through a scope and take them out.

I continue. “The fact that you were kept in the dark about the Ambrose Society means that the people up top want this stopped, but not exposed.”

Alicia rolls her eyes. “I wish keeping your own agents in the dark was a rare thing in the CIA, but no.”

“And what are you still keeping from us?” asks Mercy.

Alicia tries to stare down Mercy, but her naturally bubbly personality can't be stared down and she just smiles awkwardly in response.

Madeline says, “Jun, Phoenix team has the Chicago raid tomorrow.” That means she and Henry are out.

“That's fine,” I say. “We need to keep plugging away at making the country normal again. Mercy, you want to fight horrors?”

She nods. “I've been waiting to try out the fully mastered White Falcon suit.”

Her subclass, Costumed Witch, lets her gain the powers of a costume she wears, and she can swap between costumes with a magical girl transformation sequence. It's an extension of the Costume Contest medals that work the same way, except when she gains levels she can get the powers of a costume permanently. We think she even got access to the subclass because of those medals, which of course implies that there are other secret subclasses and maybe even secret classes depending on certain factors like items.

After she gains all the powers of a costume it becomes “mastered” and it becomes “real.” This is not usually important for clothes, but it makes cardboard armor pieces into real armor. She's mastered the White Hat Warlock and “Angle Frame - White Falcon,” which is a Japanese mecha-style body armor (from a subgenre called mecha musume).That suit basically makes her invulnerable to regular attacks. I can barely scratch it with my newly powered up knives. She's also working on mastering a more offensive costume, one for the anime character Oni Princess Kaguya, who's a demon with a wavy spear thing and bamboo powers. Yes, I said bamboo powers. Trust me that it looks cool in the anime.

The bottom line is that Mercy had become a real powerhouse.

I turn to my buddy next. “Jose, you in? I'm not gonna force anyone into probably our most dangerous mission yet.”

He nods. “I'm in. Fish monsters are probably weak to lightning anyways.” His Lightning Crack Shot class had basically given him infinite lightning bullets at this point. His Ki pool has ballooned as well, so he can use the special shots he has pretty often. He'd practiced with his best techniques at our facility so his proficiency with those special shots was climbing.

“I'll ask the new guys,” I said, pulling out my phone. I turn to Alicia, “but they're very new.”