Work Text:
When the much anticipated email popped up in his inbox with a loud ‘ping’ that echoed in the still quiet of the K-Sci lab, Hermann Gottlieb almost wasn't sure what to do.
The knowledge of what information the message likely contained did not cause the clenching twist in the pit of his stomach to abate in the slightest. Rather his trepidation seemed to double down and he wiped the moisture from his palms on the hems of his sweater and trousers in alternation as he deliberately made his way towards his workstation.
He sat down in front of the terminal and rubbed a hand over his eyes, fixing his reading glasses in place to focus on the newly received correspondence.
To: Hermann Gottlieb <[email protected]>
From: Herc Hansen <[email protected]>
Date: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 at 14:27 PM
Subject: File you requested
This was it. This was the email that would clarify his long-held suppositions.
He had been initially surprised when his declassification request had been granted so easily by acting Marshal Hansen. During their post Operation Pitfall debrief, he had mulled it over for only a flash before assenting without questions. He’d told Hermann he’d send it within the day and the Marshal was, predictably, true to his word.
Hermann wasn’t entirely sure which scenario (a confirmation or denial of that which he had presumed true for years) would yield the more complex ramifications. It occurred to him that in some ways, it would not make a difference and perhaps what he believed to be true was more important than the actual veracity of his assumptions.
The thought stilled his movement and Hermann’s hand hovered in hesitation over the holodeck, when suddenly—
“Hey man!" Newton's voice rang out across the lab.
Hermann hadn’t heard his labmate approach and he jumped in surprise and reflexively minimized the program.
"Ah, Dr. Geiszler," he faltered, switching needlessly to his colleague’s formal title. He tried lamely to recover, hoping Newton would not notice the anxiousness he could sense permeating his every word and movement. “H-how was your debrief with Marshal Hansen?”
“Meh,” Newt shrugged, striding across the room to his work bench. “I mean, despite disobeying a direct order and reappropriating PPDC property to initiate an unauthorized drift with an extra-dimensional alien hive mind, it actually went pretty well." He threw himself into his rolly chair and spun it around a few times before asking, "How was yours?"
"Ah, yes, it was…” Hermann struggled mentally for the word as his mind flickered back to the unread item in his inbox, “...productive,” he settled on.
Newton did not seem to pick up on the discomfort Hermann assumed he was projecting. But then again, his colleague tended as much towards obliviousness as he himself knew he tended towards awkwardness, so this was hardly a new dynamic for them.
All the same, it was difficult to focus on anything but the unread email. If his long-standing hypothesis was correct (and they had a tendency to be, especially lately), it occurred to him that the file could reveal information about his lab partner as well.
He unexpectedly felt a pang of guilt as the unforeseen moral conundrum hit him; the file could constitute an indirect invasion of Newton’s privacy. At once, he second guessed his request to access it and found himself losing his resolve.
Adrift in the tumult of his thoughts as he was, he realized belatedly that Newt had started talking again. “...Medal of Freedom and a Nobel Prize and stuff, which meant a lot coming from him, it really did. So anyway, he said, my ‘insubordination’ was, ya know, a net gain for the PPDC and well, uh… humanity. So that was a whole thing. But then just when I was about to leave, he handed me a crap ton of medical requisition forms and sent me straight over to the Med Bay. I just came from the first series of tests and I have a bunch more tomorrow,” Newt said with a sigh and spun the chair around another full rotation before asking, “How about you? What’d he say?”
Hermann startled at the abrupt conversational shift. “Ah, yes, our meeting was very much along the same lines,” he said, more or less, he mentally amended before adding, “I also have to make a trip to Medical. It’s scheduled within the hour.”
“Yeah, I figured,” Newt said and kicked off, his chair gliding across the yellow dividing line to Hermann’s side of the lab. “The Marshal told me that over and above the whole kaiju brain three-way thing, he wants to make sure everything's copacetic for a first-timer drift virgin like me.”
Hermann ignored the innuendo-laden word choices as his brows knitted together in deep cerebration at his lab partner’s revelation. "It was your first time drifting?”
"Yeah,” said Newt and swiveled himself around to straddle the chair and lean his arms on the back of it. “And before you say it, I know what you’re thinking. Drifting is standard protocol in the Academy.”
“Yes, I’m well aware,” Hermann said. “Everyone at officer level needs to understand what it’s like and how easy it can be to chase the rabbit.”
“Exactly. For anyone working with Jaeger pilots and drift tech, it’s essential knowledge,” Newt added. “I mean, you went to the Academy too, you know how it is. It’s nothing like what rangers go through with the whole fancy stick smacky test thingy. That’s only for the leet few who show pilot potential.”
“The Kwoon Combat Trial is a tried and tested method for initial determinations of drift compatibility,” Hermann needlessly expounded, “but, yes, I take your point.”
“Yeah, totally different for the rest of us,” Newt continued. “You remember. It’s a brain scan and a number readout. Then they hook you up to someone who more or less matches your stats. Without the mental load of piloting a Jaeger, it doesn’t have to be exact. But in my case…”
He trailed off into silence and an uninterpretable, faraway expression settled across his features as he gazed absently into the middle distance.
Hermann waited for the continuation but none came. He scanned his remembrances of what he'd seen in their drift together, brief as it had been, but was unable to pinpoint anything of relevance.
After an acquaintanceship in various forms over twelve years, Hermann thought he’d have witnessed the entire gamut of Newton’s emotional range by now. But this apparent wordless disconsolation was entirely new to him. The other man seemed thoroughly lost in thought and Hermann struggled to find something to say to draw his lab partner back to the present.
“Newton…” was all he could manage.
Newt looked back up at him, the little prompt having pulled him back from wherever his mind had taken him. He forced a smile but Hermann could detect the traces of an unvoiced sadness twitching at the edge of his lips. “They, uh… they couldn’t find anyone I’d be drift compatible with. They even ran my numbers against Pentecost, but…”
Newt looked down at the ground and his voice rose in speed and pitch as he spoke. “Even he couldn’t drift with me and he was basically the Jedi Master of drifting. He was god tier. An actual drift samurai. The man could drift with anyone! Literally anyone…”
Hermann did not know how to respond and carefully held his silence.
“At least he told me in private,” Newt said, finally raising his eyes to meet Hermann’s. “You know what the worst part was? The whole time, he kept calling me ‘Dr. Geiszler.’ After our first meeting when I told him to call me Newt, he always, always did. But not then.”
He dropped his gaze again, blinking hard. “It’s like he was trying to remind me of my value to the PPDC. And it’s fine. I mean, I was never gonna be a pilot. But that…” he drew in a shaky breath. “It just sucked. A lot.”
Newt leaned himself forward to rest his chin on his folded arms atop his chairback. He looked… small, Hermann thought. Of course, the man had a slight stature and was several inches shorter than him, but his immense personality always seemed to more than compensate. When Newton walked into a room, he filled it so completely that Hermann had never once thought of the other man in such terms.
Suddenly the space between them felt intolerable and he was seized with the nearly overwhelming urge to do something more; to cross the room and lay a solicing hand on Newton’s shoulder or truly throw caution to the wind and put his arms around him.
The desire was not exactly new. He had been diligently ignoring unacted-upon cravings to be physically close to Newton for years now. However, this was different. This was… well, frankly it was simpler. This had none of the layers of confusion of the usual yearnings for physical and emotional entanglement that he regularly battled. In this precise moment, all he wanted was to make sure Newton was all right.
But the absence of complication did not make it any more possible to act upon and his body remained stubbornly rooted in place. "I'm sorry, Newton," he said helplessly and the words felt hollow and insufficient as he spoke them.
"It's cool," Newt shrugged with well-practiced nonchalance. "Definitely not my favorite moment at work. Or like, in life.”
“Newton…” Hermann chose his words and spoke slowly, as his mind went back to the email once again. “I believe I may have some information of relevance. I’d never drifted with anyone before you either.”
“You hadn’t? Seriously?” asked Newt, shock flashing like a beacon across his features.
“No, never, I…” Hermann paused, suddenly unsure how much he wanted to reveal. He looked at Newt, bright eyes shining with intrigue, as he grappled with how to broach the matter.
It seemed his colleague had not seen this particular memory of his in the drift. That was the trouble now. Hermann kept a rigorous mental catalog of the sparse bits of personal details he shared with other people. Of this file, Newton's was by far the longest; between the letters and the lab, he had disclosed more to the other man about himself than anyone else. But since the drift, he could not be sure what Newton knew and what he didn't anymore, throwing his careful and methodical filling system into complete disarray.
There was also the added obstacle of the lack of context to parse certain memories in the drift. Some of the snippets of Newt's life he’d seen without the tether of circumstance made them difficult to contextualize. He had to assume it was the same for Newton.
Regardless, the automatic cerebral exchange of memories within the drift was one thing. Being forced to articulate them and watch another person’s reaction in real-time was another matter entirely. Putting words to emotions had never come naturally to Hermann and he had always been able and indeed, quite adept, at closing himself off. By contrast, Newton’s emotions were perpetually on display.
He cannot hide how he is feeling, even if he wants to, Hermann realized and he was suddenly unsure which cross was the harder of the two to bear.
He decided then and there to tell Newton everything. “I was about to,” he resumed. “My drift session was in the works but it was shut down before it happened.”
“What?!” Newton started, and sat bolt upright from his slouched position. “Did you ever find out why?”
“Oh, I knew exactly why. There was nothing else it could have been,” Hermann worked his jaw and when he spoke his voice was low. “My father. He knew. He knew that anyone drifting with me would see my memories. And that… well, naturally, he would be in them and they would see what kind of a man Lars Gottlieb really is. And he couldn’t have that.”
“Hermann…” Newt’s eyes were wide behind the thick rims of his glasses. “What did you do?”
“I confronted him,” Hermann said levelly.
“Jesus. Did he deny it?”
“Not at all. He did not hesitate to confirm my suspicions. He fed me a line about how given his standing in the organization it was ‘not appropriate’ for any ‘subordinates’ to have indirect information about his personal life.”
"Wow, he actually used the word 'subordinate?' What a dickwad," Newt said, voice brimming with pure contempt and his prior melancholy seemed to be instantly overwritten with indignation.
Hermann felt a keen swell of gratitude. Newton was angry on his behalf. No one had ever been invested enough in him to feel outrage at anything in his life before.
Perhaps, he speculated, perhaps that is my fault. I have always maintained my distance from others. It should be no great mystery to me that everyone I know has reciprocated. Everyone but you…
Newt was looking at him earnestly and rolled his chair a little bit closer. “I’m so sorry, man,” he said and his voice was as soft as it was capable of going. "That’s really fucked up. Did you ever find out who your potential drift partner was at least?”
"No, not officially. They told me, rather bluntly, that they couldn’t find anyone from my class but had identified an Academy graduate from the previous year…”
“Someone in my year…?” Newt began but Hermann cut in before he could second guess himself.
“Newton, I have to admit something to you. During my meeting with acting Marshal Hansen, I asked for my personnel file to be declassified specifically with a view to find out more about what happened that day.” He gestured over to his terminal. “I only just received it.”
“Is that why you were so sweaty and awkward when I came in?” Newt queried with a quirked grin. “I mean, more awkward than usual.”
“You noticed,” Hermann stated rather than asked.
“Of course I did, man. How many years have we known each other?” Newt said with a little chuckle. “Also, question! Isn’t there a PPDC database where all the personnel drift stats are kept for reference?”
“Yes, all pilot and officer files are encrypted and accessible only by senior management.”
“Okay, so if you know it’s encrypted, then you know it exists and also probably where to find it.”
“I’m not sure what you’re driving at,” Hermann said.
“Just that, like… you programmed the Mark I Jaegers,” said Newt wryly. “You’re telling me you couldn’t hack into the database and get the file for yourself? You probably coded half the damn thing!”
“That is besides the point!” Hermann sputtered. “I would never hack into a classified database to access my own personnel file. At best it would be an infraction, at worst a terminable offense!”
“Pfft,” Newt snorted, with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You’re such a boy scout.”
“Hardly,” Hermann rolled his eyes, before modulating his tone to put their conversation back on track. “Moreover, Newton… there could be information in that file about you as well.”
Newt suddenly went very still. “Wait, so, you think the candidate… was me?”
“I do,” Hermann nodded solemnly. “In fact, I’ve suspected as much for a long time. I was about to open the file when it occurred to me that it would likely reveal data about you. In light of that, if you do not wish me to access it, I will delete it right now.”
“Are you kidding, dude?” Newt said, eyes shining brightly as he scooted his chair even closer. “All the more reason!”
“Newton, are you certain?”
“Look, man… we drifted together,” said Newt, a slight pink glow blooming across his freckled cheeks. “Considering how fucked up we both were after the fact, I have no idea how compatible we were on paper. Like I said, apparently I’m not drift compatible with anyone,” he shook his head, “and maybe the kind of huge X factor of a hostile alien hive mind thrown into the mix was the issue but… but we somehow made it work, didn’t we? Look, I know our drift didn’t last long but if you’re right, then there’s not gonna be anything in that file about me that you didn’t have the potential to see already, no?”
Newton was, of course, correct. He had a rather decent track record in that regard, Hermann reflected, especially lately.
“So, let’s do this, by jove!” Newt concluded with a double exaggerated thumbs up.
Hermann arched a brow. “Are you making fun of me?”
“Of course, I am, dude,” Newt chuckled lightly as he gestured to the terminal. “Now, open that sucker up!”
Hermann conceded, sliding his reading glasses up the bridge of his nose. He clicked open the file and the data illuminated the holodeck as he leaned forward to study the contents.
Dr. Hermann Gottlieb Candidate Number 2016-0442
Compatibility Index Range (CIR) 116-133
Cognitive Architecture Range (CAR) 1-2
Stress Tolerance Range (STR) Q-V
Initial CIR and CAR drift readouts indicate an exceedingly low range of compatibility with other drift-capable individuals and indices demonstrate a need for a potential drift partner with similar lived experience, a significant degree of propinquity or comparable neurological patterning. Given Dr. Gottlieb’s background and psychological profile in addition to his extremely high intelligence quotient, no potential partners have been identified from the 2016 Jaeger Academy Candidates (JAC) for his routine Drift Experiential Procedure (DEP).
However, a potential DEP candidate has been identified from the 2015 JAC pool. Data sets from the previous year indicate a near perfect alignment in a simulated drift scenario with Dr. Newton Geiszler (Candidate Number 2015-0756) and initial drift compatibility numbers suggest the highest potential drift alignment on record in the Pan Pacific Defense Corps Global Database (PPDC-GD). The candidates have an identical CIR and a one point CAR differential suggesting a more than probable stable and sustained drift.
It should be noted that while their scores are highly compatible to one another, the data variation between the Drs. and other candidates in the PPDC-GD is highly disparate and their respective low STR scores are below the recommended range to attempt a drift with other possible candidates, even those with a high CIR.
Dr. Geiszler is currently posted to the Los Angeles Shatterdome as a Kaiju Science Division (K-Sci-Div) Officer and can be deployed within 48 hours. Pending approval from upper management, Human Resources (PPDC-HR) will follow up with Dr. Geiszler to inform him of his temporary relocation to the Academy to drift with Dr. Gottlieb.
***Update 2016-07-23
PPDC-HR has been informed by upper management that Dr. Hermann Gottlieb’s DEP has been canceled. Dr. Geiszler’s temporary deployment has likewise been suspended. No further information is available at this time.
Despite this indefinite DEP postponement, PPDC-HR, Medical Team (MT), Scientific Oversight Division (SOD) and Drift Subcommittees (DS) recommend that Drs. Hermann Gottlieb and Newton Geiszler be stationed together throughout their tenure with the PPDC. While they are not in a likely position to drift given their respective roles as K-Sci-Div officers, there is an opportunity to observe potential organizational benefits in having them work closely together to obtain further data on drift compatibility and intellectual collaboration.
***
Hermann sat back in his chair, endeavoring to grasp the full implication of what he’d just read. Newton must have stood up at some point and now hovered over his shoulder, one hand on the back of his chair.
It was Newt who finally broke the silence after a substantial pause. “Um, okay. Whoa, uh. So I was wrong. There’s totally new info in here that neither of us could have predicted.”
“Indeed,” breathed Hermann faintly.
“Dude, I’m like… I don’t know what to say,” Newt rambled on. “I mean… we drifted. We drifted with a malicious alien hive mind bent on the destruction of the entire human race. A part of me figured, and I’m not gonna lie, hoped that meant we’d been at least a bit drift compatible to be able to manage that kind of neural load. But this…”
“The highest on record…” Hermann repeated in disbelief.
“Like, this is why they assigned us together! This is literally why you couldn’t get rid of me!” Newton started pacing, his hands flailing wildly. “Dude, when you met me, would you have ever guessed in a million years?”
“After our initial meeting, certainly not,” Hermann admitted. “But…”
“But…?” Newt echoed and his pacing slowed to a stop.
“Well, if I’m being honest, I often wondered,” said Hermann, voice becoming quiet. “Our… exchanges… they felt somehow different.”
“Heh, ‘exchanges?’ That’s one way to put it,” Newt chuckled. “The way we argued, you mean?”
“Well, however you wish to call it,” Hermann said, a twitching smile forming at the edge of his lips.
“I’ll admit, some of the most fun I’ve had in this lab was when we got into it,” said Newt and gestured expansively around the room. “And I mean, really got into it.”
“I’ll freely concede it was the same for me,” Hermann said and reached for his cane to stand up. His expression eased into a subtle smile. “However, it was not just the arguments. I felt a connection with you during our letters unlike anything I’d ever experienced.”
“Yeah, man, me too,” Newt said, voice uncharacteristically pensive. “And when we finally started working together, it was like… the rare times we would agree and would bounce ideas off each other...”
“Our repartee was almost… cadenced,” Hermann segued in. “And then, shortly after we were sent to Hong Kong…” he failed to suppress a little grin at the memory, “you probably don’t recall, but I was up writing on the blackboard with such intensity that I had worn my chalk down to a nub. I was about to descend to get another, but then there you were standing at the base of the ladder with a new piece.”
Newt laughed, his smile a spark of light that illuminated the dreary rust of the lab. “I don’t remember that at all, dude.”
“No, I don’t suppose you do,” Hermann mused. “At the time, I didn’t notice either. I took it and kept writing, never losing my focus. It wasn’t until later that I realized I had said nothing. And neither had you. It was seamless to the point that I hadn’t even registered it. I believe that was when I knew.”
He gestured to the terminal where the data display hovered before them. “This only confirms what I have long since suspected. I wasn’t scared of the drift or of connecting my brain to the kaiju. The only thing that terrified me was the thought of losing you. But I never doubted our compatibility for a moment. Newton, you…” he took in a breath, resolute. “You are the only person I have ever felt truly understands me. After years of working together, despite our difficulties, I just couldn’t see it being anyone else.”
“Hermann…” was all Newt managed in a voice too small to echo in the expansive emptiness of the lab.
Hermann soldiered on, mustering a calmness in his tone he was not sure he felt. “I don’t know how much you saw in the drift," his cane clacked on the ground as he took a step forward. “Our time was scant before the hive mind took over and flooded in. But I…” he settled his gaze upon his labmate’s bright, wide eyes and swallowed. “Newton, it had to be you. It has always only ever been you.”
The silence that came next was disconcerting. He hadn’t precisely thought it out, this statement which amounted to nothing less than a confession and he was suddenly desperate for Newton to somehow fill in the lingering overhang of quiet which had descended like a fog, consuming every sound in thick, opaque suppression.
A laugh, a joke, a dismissal, an abrupt change of conversational topic completely ignoring the statement… anything.
Anything but this excruciating silence.
But no words came. Hermann closed his eyes, certain he had done irreparable damage to whatever their undefinable relationship had become and his chest constricted painfully in a familiar effort to master his expression.
Instead, the wind was abruptly knocked out of him as his arms were suddenly filled with the warm, solid body of his labmate. His cane clattered to the floor as he stilled in shock before slowly wrapping his arms around the smaller man’s figure.
Newton was shaking slightly and Hermann could feel every tremor of movement. When he finally spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper. “I’m not brave like you are, man. I was terrified of the drift. I was scared of what we might see in there. I was even more scared of not seeing anything and it all being for nothing. And I thought about what if we couldn’t drift together and you… what if you’d gotten hurt and it was my fault? And—” his voice hitched, “and maybe a little bit... maybe even most of all, I was scared that maybe it would work…”
He broke the embrace to look up at Hermann in earnest. “I wanted so badly for so long to drift with someone, but gave up on the idea ages ago. But then suddenly you were there and it was happening and it was like, holy shit, maybe this might work. Maybe we’re drift compatible?! But then I thought… oh damn, what if we are and it actually does work? And that maybe… you might not like me once you were in my head. Maybe you’d see all my flaws and...” he broke off.
“Silly man,” Hermann laughed softly. “I am well acquainted with your myriad of flaws. And for all that they are a tax upon my sanity, I cherish you for them.”
The room was charged and for a moment, Hermann felt an electricity surge through them. Suddenly, Newt let out a laugh, high and clear and resounding. It echoed around the room.
The next thing Hermann knew, he felt the warm press of Newton’s lips upon his own. They were even softer than the thousand times Hermann had imagined them. He felt the tension drain from his body and he linked unsteady arms behind the smaller man’s waist, lost in the glow he felt radiating from their embrace.
When they broke apart, he gazed down at Newt, eyes dancing across his features and unconsciously mapping the patterns of his freckles.
Newt slowly opened his eyes. “Cherish, huh?” he asked with a tilted grin and canted his head to one side.
Hermann simply nodded and the silence that enveloped them this time was warm and comfortable. Newt cuddled back into his arms with a contented little hum.
Abruptly, the quiet was broken by a loud series of chimes emanating from Hermann’s workstation. He looked around for his cane, trying to regain his bearings as he vocalized his realization. “That would be the reminder for my medical.”
“Wow, well, that totally ruined the moment!” Newt chuckled, retrieving the cane and passing it to Hermann before scooting across to the holodeck. “Here, I’ll shut it off.”
The alarm ceased and silence reigned once again in the lab. Newt stood up again, shifting his weight back and forth between his legs and bouncing on his heels. “So, uh, I guess, you’d better go to your appointment?”
“Ah, yes, I suppose I must,” Hermann answered.
“Right, cool, um…” Newt said. “Want me to lock your workstation while I’m over here?”
“Oh, yes, er, I would be much obliged,” Hermann replied.
“Yeah, no worries,” said Newt, fingers dancing rapidly over the controls. “Let me just close this up… and… hey, there seems to be an addendum at the bottom of the email we didn’t see… I think it’s a link to an associated file…?”
“What is it?”
“I dunno, let’s have a look.” Newton double-clicked the link and a plethora of data illuminated the holodeck. At once, Hermann’s face flushed an intense crimson in horrified recognition.
“Wait, is this…?” Newt squinted at the screen before letting out a burst of laughter. “Oh my god, dude, is this a collection of every single HR complaint you’ve ever submitted about me?! Sweet!!!”
“Newton! Close that file at once!” Hermann sputtered as Newt blatantly ignored him, pointing excitedly to the screen. Much to Hermann’s horror, Newt immediately and unabashedly began to dictate the contents.
“Dr. Hermann Gottlieb: inveterate filer of complaints, primarily against Kaiju Science colleague Dr. Newton Geiszler. Given the aforementioned probable high drift compatibility rating, PPDC psychological staff recommends accepting but not acting on these complaints.”
He skimmed the dossier with unconcealed glee and made a whistling noise. “You need to send me this, dude! At least half of these are frame-worthy!”
“Honestly, this is immensely inappropriate,” Hermann protested as he scrambled his way over to the terminal to try and (futilely, he knew) dissuade Newton from the inevitable airing of Hermann’s officially documented prior grievances.
Newt took no heed of his objections. “Man, you are one petty son of a bitch. Look at this one!” he cleared his throat and threw on an offensively poor facsimile of a British accent. “Dr. Geiszler intentionally snaps his gloves very loudly. Dr. Geiszler frequently makes vastly inappropriate anatomy jokes during his sample analysis. I am convinced Dr. Geiszler does everything within his power to amplify the already offensive noises omitted by his manipulation of kaiju offal— and the list goes on, man!”
“Newton, this is wholly unnecessary,” Hermann objected weakly, clutching his cane.
“No, no, no, hold up, this one’s the winner,” Newt folded his arms in a distinctly (and far too accurate) Gottlebian manner and resumed his impression. “Dr. Geiszler talks and even sings to himself constantly throughout the work day. The singing I mind less (he has a surprisingly pleasant singing voice) but the talking has become a distraction.”
Newt paused and chuckled, “Aww, Herms, you like my singing voice? You’re adorable. Wait, there’s more— Update: Dr. Geiszler has started talking not only to himself but now also to his various kaiju samples, which he has given an assortment of silly names. This has increased the frequency of his monologues and is, as previously stated, distracting and unprofessional.”
“For goodness sake…”
“Further update: The specimens have started talking back and I suspect it is Dr. Geiszler's deliberate intention to be disruptive and a nuisance. He gives his kaiju samples ridiculous voices and carries on long conversations with them in which he overtly disparages my choice of work attire (for which, as an addendum, he is in no position to denounce considering his inappropriately tight pants and his garish tattoos which are frequently on display when he rolls up his sleeves).”
Newt wheeled around with a huge, beaming grin on his face. “So, my takeaway from this is blah, blah, blah, Newt has a nice singing voice, something, something, and his tight pants distract me. Dude, how long have you had such a raging crush on me?”
“This is an absurd conversation,” Hermann huffed, dodging the question.
“Sorry, man, I’m just teasing,” Newt laughed and gave Hermann a playful nudge. “More importantly, here’s what I’m thinking. You go get the medical thing out of the way and then I have two requests.”
"Which are?" Hermann asked trepidatiously.
Newt held up his index finger. “One: I’d like you to kiss me more.”
Hermann felt the tug of a smile pull at the side of his lips. “Ah, well, I imagine that can be arranged. And the second?”
Newt held up a second finger. “Two: I’d like you to take me back to one of our bunks and have your way with me.”
Hermann felt himself blush intensely and immediately. Without a moment's hesitation, he returned once more to his terminal. A few clicks later and he stood up whipstraight to face his lab partner.
“There,” he said, as Newt cocked his head to the side in question. “I’ve just postponed my medical until tomorrow,” he stated and took Newton’s hand in his own.
A wide smile spread over Newt's features as he gave Hermann's hand a squeeze. “Well, in that case… my bunk or yours?”