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Tokyo, Japan.
The grey dust around them was almost like a dark curtain, separating them from the rest of the world. How fitting. The rest of the world didn't matter after all, not when it came to this.
To them.
It was always about them.
"Do we have to do this?"
No answer. Of course, there wouldn't be. If communication between them was possible, then their tragic fate would not repeat in a vicious cycle.
They would always arrive at this point, that was their nature.
Over and over again, the neverending violence followed by repair, some semblance of peace, almost hope that this time had been the last... and then, one day, it will all start again.
"Please, don't."
Fruitless pleas. As long as he refused to abandon this path, they would always end up here. Hurting each other once more.
Exhausting, all these damages. Getting back up. Starting again.
But they had to. One more time.
Godzilla roared.
The Tokyo Tower cracked and fell, broken once again, the shards of glass falling down with it, like the rain of glittering tears.
How tragic, to be always in the way.
…
Shanghai Port Base, China.
Lin Jing turned in the swivel chair, nervously pushing the glasses that were sliding down his nose. "Marshal Zhao, the East China Sea is shallow water, he is visible the entire way here, we'll still be able to visually track him even if we lose the signature."
Standing in front of the computers, Zhao Yunlan watched the information on the screens, the only sign of uneasiness being the flicking of the pocket lighter between his fingers.
"We must intercept him before he reaches the Port."
"It's coming too fast, there are no active Jaegers nearby, Yeosu Base has no pilots for the remaining Jaegers,” Zhu Hong informed, as she continued her search through the system for any new information that might emerge.
It had been many years. So long had the world rebuilt itself around the carcasses of destruction left in the not-so-distant past. Technology swept under the concrete carpets the signs of wars fought, fallen heroes, and vain sacrifices.
The world had risen again with the new generations mindlessly stepping on the land that served as a tomb for countless names that were never recorded in the graves. With no one left to mourn the losses, everything was just numbers. Entire families were gone in the blink of an eye.
Written in history it was just two steps back, but people wanted to forget. With no passages between worlds, the threat had ceased. Or so the remaining governments had put their efforts into making the world believe.
That was why just now, Zhao Yunlan's team had just witnessed the devastation caused in Tokyo.
The Shanghai Special Operations Department had sent the East China Sea scan to the Tokyo Base, warning of the detected signature several hours earlier, but Japan had been among the first to remove the pilot training academies and deactivate its Jaegers, claiming that the presence of what had once guaranteed the possibility of a counterattack now caused public panic, not supporting the message that the world was a safe place again.
In their haste to assert an untruth, they had overlooked something they had known long before the wars between worlds began: the King had not come from the other side, he was part of the same world the humans claimed as theirs.
“These fucking politics,” Zhao Yunlan ran a hand through his hair, and looked once more at a specific screen. There it was. The thing he hoped he would never have to use, the caution, somber and hidden from the world underground, like an ancient god of the Underworld that should never rise again.
If the world hadn't turned its back on its own history, that wouldn't be one of the last - even though it only existed precisely because it was a secret.
"Marshal Zhao," Lin Jing didn't elaborate, but he needed his boss to take a stand on this.
"Chu Shuzhi and Guo Changcheng are Drift Compatible," Zhu Hong knew that although the information was true, it was meant to cause terror, not hope.
"Those two are gonna pilot a Jaeger over my dead ass!”
"Xiao Guo is not Danger Compatible..." Lin Jing should have seen the slap on his head coming for that.
"What is Shen Wei's current location?" At the Marshal's question, Zhu Hong took a moment longer to look at him.
"Does he even leave the basement lab?”
"Inform him that I'm coming down. I want Wang Zheng here in the command room. Lin Jing, you will monitor the reactivation." Zhao Yunlan finished the last few words as the door to the room closed behind him.
“Reactivation,” Lin Jing quickly moved to another chair, to execute the commands on the system that Zhao Yunlan had been looking at before leaving. "As if that thing was ever actually activated... Hong-jie, tell me the Marshal isn't about to do something suicidal..."
Zhu Hong sighed heavily. She always knew that there would never be time for a proper goodbye and the words she had never said.
…
Shen Wei had been watching intently on the screen what had happened in Tokyo while among the sample bottles, test tubes and piles of paper notes, which he was perhaps the last person in the world who still used.
Confusion had taken over him completely. This wasn't the first time, but it had been so long, always with a reason, always with a motivation powerful enough to move that creature. That was the first time, though, that had happened since Shen Wei was born.
The wars had ceased long before him, but they had left a trail which he had not failed to pursue. That led him to the unexpected intercessor, once a destroyer. Devourer of chaos, as he had described in his notes many times.
The wars had ceased, it was true, and the kaiju seemed like a distant memory to people much older than Shen Wei. No one really wanted to talk about them. Much less acknowledge a disturbing truth: the so-called King of Kaiju was not something beyond this world, it was part of it. And it had been an essential part of the ultimate victory.
Shen Wei had studied this fascinating creature tirelessly for years, reconnecting all the information that seemed to have been lost forever amidst the rubble of the shattered world.
Misunderstood, that was how Shen Wei saw him . As often Shen Wei saw himself as well.
There was a reason why Tokyo Tower was a frequent target in the past - a reason that the Japanese government had decided to put aside by rebuilding that tower again and again.
There was a reason why that kaiju, which belonged to them, the Earth, rose from his rest from time to time. Last time, the reason had been to remove from his domains the invading pest, which he had trampled mercilessly.
And so, it made no sense for that creature to continue moving in the opposite direction to his rest now that the tower lay shattered.
At least, it didn't make sense to Shen Wei. Or maybe-
The laboratory door opened, and Shen Wei's distraction almost made him fall off his chair, regaining his feet just in time to avoid embarrassing himself beyond repair in front of Zhao Yunlan. At that point, he didn't need one more thing to make him feel pathetic in front of that man.
“Professor Shen.” The man's eyes kept getting lost in the details of Shen Wei's face before he had time to stop himself. All they had to do was be in the same room and it was always too late for Zhao Yunlan to avoid looking at Shen Wei's lips. To miss those lips.
"Marshal Zhao." That was not the situation where Shen Wei would like to have the man visit his laboratory. They had so much unsaid, so much never understood, so much they had already lost.
Zhao Yunlan fixed his gaze on Shen Wei's eyes, and he showed every bit of sorrow for what he was about to say, "I kept hoping I'd never have to ask you that."
Shen Wei's expression hardened, closing in on feelings he had expressed before and didn't want to repeat. "If by 'hope' you mean never training me, even though you knew this day would come and you would have a nearly useless scientist to entrust your own life, then maybe yes, you did keep something.” He stood up, ready to leave, knowing how essential time was. Aware of the time they had wasted before.
Zhao Yunlan lowered his gaze for a moment, his voice had none of its usual authority and firmness, “You know my reasons.” But so far, had they been worth it?
Shen Wei had listened to every argument, every reason given, he had tried to understand Zhao Yunlan's side - but he could not accept it.
What a foolish mistake to make, with both of them in the positions they were in, to try to protect each other above all else.
"You're the most conscious man about the world we live in that I know. You let me build that thing for that. And yet-" Shen Wei cut himself off, this was not the moment. Maybe they wouldn’t have another. "We are wasting time we don't have." Again.
…
Da Qing welcomed Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan onto the platform, the Jaeger had been lifted from underground to the main gates, which now opened, the afternoon sun casting its light on the dark metal that did not reflect and did not shine.
Imposing in itself, the Ghost Slayer had been built with all the reserves of rare dark metal scattered throughout the world.
The unstable and changeable - and inherently dangerous - properties of that metal had kept researchers from reaching the realization that it would be controllable if fused with an organic stabilizer.
Zhao Yunlan refused when Shen Wei reintroduced Newton Geiszler's research as a solution. The damage had been extensive, the positive result had been one and remained missing and unstudied. But the positive result was not zero, and eventually, Shen Wei and Lin Jing had found a balance point.
Now the Ghost Slayer, never before tested, only theoretically stable and potentially self-destructing for its pilots, waited.
"Marshal Zhao, Professor Shen, are you sure you really want to do this?" Da Qing accompanied them across the bridge toward the Jaeger entrance.
"Want is not the word, but we're out of time to continue hoping that some active Jaeger can get here before Godzilla reaches Shanghai Port." Zhao Yunlan's stern gaze was a facade of control, Da Qing knew. The man had never actually planned to put the only person in his heart in that situation. He had hoped to have more time.
More time to find someone else who was Drift Compatible with him. He had never revealed to Shen Wei how much damage he had caused himself in the attempts.
Just as Shen Wei had never revealed to Zhao Yunlan how many times he had been underground, working hard to make up for the failure that would all be due to the training he had been denied.
Overprotecting each other had never been the way. They should have learned this. Zhao Yunlan should have known better than to be stubborn about something useless when he was aware that he wouldn't be able to connect with another person after everything he and Shen Wei-
Because all that had not ceased to mean what it meant.
"Professor Shen, is there any explanation for Godzilla's emergence from rest, other than bringing down Tokyo Tower?" Da Qing assisted as the Marshal climbed the short ladder up the Jaeger's head, noticing how the man seemed to have been lost in his thoughts at that moment.
"I didn't have a moment to assess the situation, and Lin Jing's scans didn't catch anything new. This is a blind fight," Shen Wei said as he followed Zhao Yunlan up the ladder. "I knew I would have to fight one day, I never imagined it would be against him..." A bitter smile of irony was the last thing Da Qing saw before Shen Wei disappeared into the Jaeger.
"I hope he doesn't eat you two idiots!" They could have beaten any other, but Godzilla was not like any other. He was a king for a reason. Da Qing wished he knew how to say goodbye.
…
There they stood, ready to put on their helmets, trusting in an outdated knowledge about their compatibility that had perhaps ceased to be true a couple of years ago since their separation, and begin the drift, to connect to each other's minds or to be lost forever in it. Maybe they didn't know each other like they used to, even though they wished they did. Even though they hoped they would trust each other, despite the pain they had been through.
Ahead, outside, the sun was beginning to be covered by an unnatural cloud of gray and violet.
Before Shen Wei could reach for the helmet, Zhao Yunlan grabbed his hand, still looking ahead, getting his attention. It had been just a couple of years, but it felt like the last time they held hands was so long ago.
“I didn’t witness the world when ashes fell like snow, but this feels like a memory engraved in me, even though it happened long before I was here,” the grief in Zhao Yunlan’s voice was one that Shen Wei had come to know from the few elderly people who had been willing to talk to him about the past they had experienced. "We both came together because we knew that time could still come back, in a denialist world that would sink faster than before, despite everything they should know now. I've made my mistakes, Shen Wei. But there's no more time to apologize for them all."
When Shen Wei believed that this was all, Zhao Yunlan turned to him, bringing both of his hands to his chest, not caring if the Drivesuit would prevent him from feeling his heart - he had faith that Shen Wei still knew those heartbeats.
"If we survive this, please, Xiao Wei... take me back as your husband." He had never meant the relationship with Shen Wei to end. In an attempt to keep his spouse as far away from danger as possible, he had pushed Shen Wei away from himself.
Shen Wei's gaze was filled with an anguish that he had held inside him for the past few years, which he never wanted other people to see, but it was futile to try to hide when the love had remained there all this time.
“Yunlan…” The last ray of sunlight was disappearing between the clouds, and perhaps this would be the last time Shen Wei would look at Zhao Yunlan like that, under the light. He had long believed that in order to hear those words he longed for, he would first have to prove himself worthy of them - and he had done everything he had to do so. If they survived . If not, at least Zhao Yunlan would know that Shen Wei had cared enough to learn and try to be much more than he was supposed to settle for. For Zhao Yunlan's sake and for the sake of what they believed they needed to try to protect, even when no one else out there seemed to care.
Shen Wei wasn’t waiting for them to find out whether they would survive or not. For the first time in a long while, Zhao Yunlan could see those eyes soften and look back at him the same way they had once looked, in days of shared great hope. "I want you back. Now. Not later, if we survive. If we don't go back home, at least we will fight this battle knowing that we kept our promises to protect what we always wanted to protect... alongside each other."
A smile that shouldn't exist when one was willingly going to meet certain death was on Zhao Yunlan's lips as he pressed them against Shen Wei's. The touch they had missed, lost in their attempts to protect, to do more, to preserve what they knew, was fragile.
With renewed strength, they pulled away and glanced at each other, accepting together whatever might come from then on. Whether it was an end or a new beginning.
…
The Ghost Slayer moved nimbly despite the shallow water that almost reached its knees. The restless waters of the sea crashed waves against the metal, echoing back onto the turbulent surface.
They were less than a minute away from the inevitable collision with the kaiju, at a point where it was still not far enough from the Port for the fight to not impact the city.
In a hurry, the authorities tried to evacuate the closest areas - the signal issued by the Department hours before had been ignored.
The Base itself had been evacuated, leaving the small inseparable team. They would support Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan even though their building was directly in the danger zone.
People of that generation were seeing a Jaeger rise up for them for the first time, and if they understood what that meant, perhaps it would be a light that would quickly fade, but which would allow other lights to be kindled again.
“Shen Wei,” Zhao Yunlan called while he had his last seconds. “I love you and be ready for the collision."
Before them, the waves came stronger and stronger, hitting the metal body where they were one, while the sea divided, shaken by what was forced to make its way through it and Godzilla rose from the there, water abundantly running down his spine.
Even though Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan could maintain their balance in the violently churning water around the Ghost Slayer, the dark Jaeger was struck before the kaiju could fully emerge, one blow sending it flying into the water. It fell on its back, the impact against the sea surface piercing from the gigantic armor to the pilots' senses.
"Xiao Wei!" Zhao Yunlan recovered quickly, regretting every single time he had said 'no' about training Shen Wei. By now, he would be used to falling down and not losing his breath, getting up and-
"Get up!" Shen Wei didn't even seem to feel the impact.
Once the Ghost Slayer was steadying itself on its feet in the sea again, Godzilla was already upon it.
"Sword, now!" Shen Wei did indeed have a plan, and even though Zhao Yunlan could sense and understand him, the information did not make complete sense to him, since he had not been notified of - apparently - improvements to Ghost Slayer.
“Do we have a sword?!” Zhao Yunlan’s moment of complete confusion made him miss the enemy’s next move.
Who was stopped halfway from hitting the Jaeger. The second blow that Shen Wei and Zhao Yunlan were preparing to receive did not come.
Between the two giants in the sea, long, massive tentacles rose up, wrapping viciously around the kaiju's arms, suckers attaching themselves to his armor, pulling him down.
The Ghost Slayer’s pilots watched for a moment, one tentacle after another emerging from within the sea, long and powerful, reaching for the kaiju. Eight, thirteen, twenty-one, the tentacles continued to emerge, causing Godzilla to roar and struggle to get free from it
“The fuck is this, Shen Wei?!”
“Fascinating…” For all that mattered, Zhao Yunlan loved Shen Wei even though he was a freak, but he was scared of what was in Shen Wei’s brain every now and then.
“What?!”
"I mean, there's no record of any kaiju similar to this. Let's step back." As the Ghost Slayer cautiously moved away from the two battling monsters, Shen Wei got a better look at the more Godzilla pulled the tentacled thing out of the water, his spine slowly taking on a bluish glow. "Yunlan... I'm afraid this is out of all the records we have. But I have seen it before, in what remains of the records of the myths of the ancient world."
Zhao Yunlan sighed in annoyance. Could it get worse with something completely new and unstudied to fight against? "So tell me how much trouble we're in."
"Whether this could be classified as a kaiju or not, I do not know, but the Europeans who sailed the northern seas feared it.” Shen Wei, though, didn’t seem to fear it at all. He was far too interested in watching that thing from as close as possible, yet distant enough to keep themselves safe - proof enough that even when two pilots were deeply connected while drifting, and in heart as it was their case, they still kept their own personalities and interests. He finally announced what the new titan was, “The Kraken. And its thousand tentacles.”
Ahead, Godzilla unleashed the Atomic Breath on the sea monster, which struggled to deflect his head and close his mouth with its tentacles, but failed to do so in time to avoid some damage.
"Nine hundred and ninety-four tentacles now, I think..." Shen Wei corrected himself. “I don’t think any of them are interested in us, Yunlan. They’re just trying to drag each other deeper and deeper into the sea. I knew something was wrong. He was after something to assert dominance over.”
Zhao Yunlan rolled his eyes, he should be used by now. "I know you're a Godzilla fan, but my god, Xiao Wei, he was about to fry us and eat us!"
"Marshal Zhao! Professor Shen!" Lin Jing's voice reached them through the control panel. "The scans didn't detect anything because that thing is part of the natural environment! We looked for signs of other kaiju and ignored the red flag for 'giant sea creature with excessive tentacles'..."
"Natural?! You're kidding me! Natural my ass! Your bonus at the end of the month is already gone!" No matter how attentive Zhao Yunlan was to what could be seen of the battle in the the water, still prepared to fight if the tables turned against them, some things never changed.
"It's a Kraken, Marshal Zhao. It's huge, but it didn't come from anywhere other than the northern seas. Not seen for... huh... a thousand years maybe? But it's still a giant octopus."
“I hope the poor thing doesn’t die…” Shen Wei commented to himself. Zhao Yunlan’s mouth fell open.
…
They hadn’t been able to see the fight for a long time. Lin Jing continued to monitor the signatures, now having mapped enough of the resilient Kraken to identify it on the radars. If it was indeed a Kraken, but apparently it had now been named that way.
Godzilla and his newfound enemy were far enough away from the Port that there would be enough time to regain position if either of the titans moved back toward Shanghai.
For now, the Ghost Slayer stood on the edge of the beach, while the pilots sat outside, at its head, under a sunset that was reemerging from between the dispersing clouds. Helmets left aside for a while, they wanted to see each other under the light once more.
"They're still out there, close enough that they could come back at any moment..." Zhao Yunlan commented, playing with Shen Wei's hand between his own, attracted by how the sunset light reflected in his spouse's eyes.
"I don't believe they have any interest in anything other than each other. But we are prepared if we need to fight for real." Shen Wei leaned closer to Zhao Yunlan, enjoying the moment where they could pretend for a little while that they had peace. The peace they had once sought together . "Besides, even if they fight each other and disappear again, it serves as a reminder to the world. You and I, mere men, would be easy to erase from the news and even from history. So perhaps it is good that something so great reminds people of what they need to protect, because everything we have now once has already been lost..."
Zhao Yunlan thought about how that was true of the two of them as well. Now he could hope to fix this, even if it only lasted a fraction of the time they would have liked, that they wanted to believe they still had. “Xiao Wei… are you still willing to die for all this?”
Shen Wei didn’t need to think too much about it. He had prepared himself and Ghost Slayer for what might come. Even including the possibility that this would buy time for him and Zhao Yunlan to make up for what they had lost for a while. He wasn’t letting go so easily. “Willing? No. If I have to, I won’t be afraid. But I’d rather live. With you.”
Zhao Yunlan chuckled softly, raising a hand to pull Shen Wei by the nape of his neck, savoring a long kiss, which he intended to make last until another big dangerous creature decided to interrupt.
Interrupt, but not break. He wasn’t letting Shen Wei go this time. He had been slow to learn, but he wouldn’t forget again. If they had promised to live together for as long as their lives lasted, that brought with it the responsibility of fighting together.
He still didn't know what that sword thing was, but he could ask later. They had a little more time.
…