Pacific Rim: The Official Movie Novelization Mass Market Paperback (11 page)

That was one more reason to find out.

Newt set aside the squid cap and got down to the business of retrofitting the Shaolin Rogue processor so it was up to the task he had set for it. He performed some quick recoding, and swapped out two of its chipsets for newer versions he plucked from the back of one of his workstations. Then he wired it into a holographic projector. He got out the soldering iron again and put together two interfaces so the squid cap and the liquid-core trunk line to the kaiju brain had their own dedicated plugs that would handle the torrent of information.

He looked at his watch. The sun would be up pretty soon. Not too long after that, Hermann would show up. Newt wanted to be done before Hermann got to the lab. Otherwise he’d have to explain himself, and Newt wasn’t always very good at that. He tended to assume either that everyone was as smart as he was—which was never true— or that everyone listening to him was an idiot who needed elementary explanations. Which also was never true, at least not around here, but Newt wasn’t too sensitive to social cues. He knew this. He didn’t care.

Anyway, he didn’t want to explain himself so the only thing to do was to get the whole thing over with before Hermann showed up.

Therefore, it was go time.

Newt ran a check on the squid cap to make sure it was transmitting at the specified levels: It was. Then he went to the specimen jar containing the partial kaiju brain. He wished he knew which kaiju it had come from, but the kind of people who bought and sold kaiju parts were also the kind of people who didn’t keep very good records. Maybe the kaiju’s identity would become clear when Newt Drifted with it. Maybe not.

He unsealed the jar, and pushed the copper pins into the brain one by one, trying to keep an even spacing between each pin, to increase the probability that he would get input from every possible portion of the brain that might be dedicated to different processes. If the kaiju brain was organized along principles analogous to human gray matter, it would be compartmentalized, with specialized neurons adapted to different functions. Newt’s analysis of the specimen indicated this was the case, but you never knew what was really in a brain until you Drifted with it. When he had the pins all in place, he connected the trunk cable to the processor and turned on the holoprojector.

An image appeared. It didn’t look at all like the image of a human brain, but Newt would have figured he’d done something wrong if it had. Kaiju brains tended to be pyramidal in shape, and this one generated a hologram that indeed appeared to be part of a pyramid. So maybe he’d gotten the pins in the right places.

He quickly ran a series of connectivity tests to see if the brain was still transmitting information: It was. The bath of silicate transmission medium still carried neuronic signals inside the brain, just like lipid plasmas did in human neurons.

After that, the only thing left to do was Drift.

But first Newt thought he would grab a quick bite to eat. He knew this would be a huge strain on his mind, and he wasn’t dumb enough to ignore the effects of fatigue on the human body. At least not all the time.

He went to the fridge and dug around in it until he had half a salami and cheese sandwich, some German potato salad, and a bag of baby carrots that belonged to Hermann.

Newt sat down back by his cobbled-together Pons. He was proud of himself. Not too many people could have done what he’d just done.

And once he finished breakfast, he was going to be the first human being in history to Drift with an alien brain.

RALEIGH HIT THE MESS HALL AT FIVE-THIRTY
sharp, figuring on a quick bite that would leave him time to warm up before the trials. He wasn’t a big breakfast eater as a rule, but this morning he was starved. He was going to have to be careful not to stuff himself and then be groggy when it was time to fight.

The mess hall was the product of the same mold as the mess halls in every other military and pseudo-military facility all over the world. Serving area along one wall with trash cans and a counter at the far end. Through an open window Raleigh could see the kitchen crew energetically washing dishes. The main floor area was taken up with long tables set parallel to each other.

Even this early in the morning, most of the tables were occupied. Each Jaeger crew appeared to have a designated spot. The Wei triplets were accompanied by the syncopated thump of their ever-present basketball as they carried trays with one hand and dribbled between the three of them with the other. The Russians, a few tables over, had brought along their soundtrack. Ukrainian hard house rumbled and boomed from a portable speaker set in the middle of their table. Raleigh didn’t see Mako, and he hadn’t yet met any of Gipsy Danger’s crew, so he wasn’t sure where to sit.

He’d just decided to find a spot at an empty table when he heard Herc call out to him.

“Raleigh! Come with us. Plenty of food on our table.”

Herc was coming from the serving area, and Raleigh fell into step with him. He couldn’t believe the bounty on Herc’s tray, it was a feast compared to what he’d been used to over the last five years of ration cards in Alaska.

“Haven’t seen bread in ages,” he said, picking up a piece from Herc’s tray. It was still warm. The smell made his mouth water.

“Hong Kong,” Herc said. “That’s the beauty of an open port. No rationing. We have potatoes, peas, sweet beans, some decent meatloaf...”

They got to the table and Herc waved at the crew to scoot down and make space for Raleigh.

“Sit down,” he said. “This is my son, Chuck. He’s my co-pilot now.”

Raleigh nodded. He remembered Chuck from the night before and he figured that Herc was making the reintroduction as much for Chuck as for Raleigh. He was making a point:
he’s one of us.
Max the dog was under the table patrolling for scraps. A good guy, Herc. Raleigh remembered thinking that five years ago, and he appreciated the gesture now. Five years ago, Chuck was still in high school, or whatever Australians called it. Now he was looking at Raleigh like... well, like Raleigh had looked at Tommy back on the Wall.

“He’s
my
co-pilot,” Chuck said. Then, as Raleigh sat down, he started talking to his father as if Raleigh wasn’t there. “This is the guy that’s supposed to run defense for me? In the steam engine? Is Pentecost actually working
for
the kaiju now?”

Raleigh turned. He was having a bit of deja vu, like the scene in the Alaskan commissary was about to repeat itself.

“When was the last time you jockeyed, Ray?” Chuck asked.

Ray.

“Five years,” Raleigh said.

“And what did you do those five years?” Chuck pressed. “Something pretty important, I reckon.”

“I was in construction,” Raleigh said.
Here we go,
he thought.
In Alaska I took all kinds of shit because I used to pilot Jaegers and nobody believed in Jaegers. Now I’m going to take more shit because the cocky son with a chip on his shoulder doesn’t think I’ve got what it takes anymore. No matter where I go, I hear it from someone.

It was enough to make a guy want to kill some kaiju.

“Oh, well, that’s... that’s great,” Chuck said with great blustering sarcasm. He looked to the crew, trying to egg them on. To their credit, they didn’t react. “I’m sure that’ll be really helpful, Ray. If we ever need to build our way out of a fight.”

Raleigh waited for him to finish, then calmly said, “It’s Raleigh.”

“Whatever,” Chuck said. “You’re Pentecost’s idea, and my old man seems to like you, but from where I’m sitting, you’re a liability. You slow me down, I’m going to drop you like a sack of kaiju shit.”

He stood with his tray and stepped back from the table. Raleigh watched him steadily, not reacting at all. There were plenty of guys like Chuck in the world.

“Enjoy the rest of your vacation in Hong Kong, Ray,” Chuck said. He whistled and Max scrambled out from under the table. “C’mon, boy.”

Trailed by the dog, Chuck swaggered off in the direction of the dishwashing station.

After a moment, Herc cleared his throat.

“You can blame me for that one,” he said. “I raised him on my own. Smart kid, but I never knew when to give him a hug or a kick in the ass.”

Raleigh took his time enjoying a mouthful of the delicious bread. When he had finished chewing, he said, “With respect, sir, I’m pretty sure which one he needs.”

***

The sun had barely peeked over the Jaeger bays when Mako found Marshal Pentecost in the LOCCENT.

“The candidates are ready,” she said. “We will commence the trials immediately, sir.”

She had gone to his quarters first, the spare quiet space that doubled as his personal office. Sensei—she had begun calling him that when he had first taken an interest in her, in Tokyo—had begun keeping unusual hours. Sleeping poorly, eating irregularly. He said nothing and Mako had not asked, but she could see others in the Shatterdome starting to glance uneasily at each other after he passed in the corridors. What was wrong with him? Was he sick? Everyone under Pentecost’s command was asking the same question, none of them out loud.

She had to remind herself to call him Marshal. He had ordered her not to call him Sensei since her admission to the Jaeger Academy in 2020. For the last five years she had held her tongue. Someday she would call him Sensei again.

“Good,” Pentecost said to her.

In the dimly-lit LOCCENT, to her he appeared distracted and worn down. She owed this man everything, and seeing him like this worried Mako deeply.

But she had not come to meet him just to inform him that his orders had been followed. Stacker Pentecost was not the kind of commander who needed constant reassurance. He chose good people and let them be good at what they did, as long as they understood the rules from the beginning.
Overcommunicate. It’s better to tell someone something they already know than to not tell them something they needed to hear. Do your job and let your colleagues do theirs. Once a decision is made, it is made for the entire team.

Mako was here in violation of that last principle. She was going to broach a difficult subject, and not for the first time. She already knew what he would say. He had said it before. It made no difference. She would keep trying.

“There’s one more thing,” Mako said.

He turned to look at her, anticipating her question.

“We’ve talked about this, Mako. We are not talking about it again.”

She ignored his warning.

“You promised me,” she said. Then she switched to Japanese.
“Gipsy no noru kata ga jibun na no.” I should be the one riding Gipsy.

“Mako. The kaiju took everything from you, but vengeance is like an open wound. You cannot take that level of emotion into the Drift.”

“What level of emotion is Raleigh Becket taking into it?” she countered. “Has he forgotten about his brother?”

“You are not responsible for Raleigh Becket,” Pentecost said. “I am. As I am responsible for you.”

“For my family,” she said. “I have to do this.”

“Motto jikan ga areba,”
Pentecost said.
If we had more time
.

“But we don’t,” Mako said.

Pentecost turned away from her, looking out over the Jaeger bays, where the future of the human race stood catching the first rays of the sun. Mako knew that move. She had seen it more times than she cared to remember. When Stacker Pentecost turned his back, that was all there was to say.

For the moment,
thought Mako.

She went to finish preparing for Raleigh’s trial.