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Like everyone else in the world, Raleigh had a clock. It fascinated him by the time he got into middle school and really understood what he meant, and he’d stare at the permanent mark on his inner wrist and watch the seconds tick by. He was obviously not the only teenager so obsessed with the moving clock, and he had a pretty average clock. He’d meet his soulmate when he was 26, which wasn’t bad. One of the girls in the class had a clock running that read 70 years. He shuddered. He’d not want to be her.
They called it the Clothos Clock, after the weaver of fates.
As he got older, he learned to stop checking it every so often. It’s like a growth rite, his brother would tell him. But still, Raleigh would glance at it and grin at it as it trickled down steadily. He was in Jaegar Academy when one of the students in his class suddenly screamed. When they’d gotten her coherent enough, they’d found out her timer had burned into an angry, jagged scar reading ‘0’. Her soulmate had died.
After that, Raleigh kept seeing soulmate deaths more and more often. A kaiju would come across a nation and sweep murder, and more and more people found themselves with a scar. When Yancy died, his timer ticking away just under 5 years, Raleigh wondered who it was that had the angry scar, and stared at his slowly trickling timer.
His brother’s death while they were still connected left Raleigh scarred and unhealing for many reasons, and one was the split image he’d seen right before Yancy had died. Raleigh still didn’t know if it was cruelty or a small mercy for the two soulmates to get a glimpse of each other right before one died, but he had the image of Yancy’s soulmate burned into his head.
It haunted him in nightmares even five years later, when he first met Herc Hansen and Chuck Hansen, the first thing he noticed was the burnt ‘0’ on the son’s wrist. He looked up to say something, but he froze – and Chuck froze the moment their eyes met. Herc eyed them, frowning lightly, but Chuck burst up from his seat, stumbled backward, and stared at Raleigh. “Can’t be.” Chuck moaned. “No way.”
“Can’t be what?” Herc demanded, and the entire cafeteria was eerily silent. Chuck stumbled again, but turned and bolted.
Raleigh stared, his body trembling. He’d never forget the frightened face he’d seen through Yancy’s Drift, and seconds ago, it had just run away from him.
--
After Herc had demanded what it was all about and Raleigh had tried to explain as best as he could, Herc took him to Chuck’s room. “I don’t know what I’m hoping would happen.” Herc said, quietly, but unlocked the door for him.
Raleigh didn’t quite know either as he stepped into the room. Chuck bolted up warily from his bed, and Max the bulldog whined from his place at the foot of Chuck’s bed. “What do you want?” Chuck hissed, cradling his arm.
“We should talk.”
“About what?” Chuck was understandably wary, and Raleigh didn’t understand his need to talk to him, either. But he had to.
“I was connected to my brother when he died.” Raleigh said, and saw Chuck stiffen. “I saw your face when he died. You must have seen me, too, through the Drift.”
“Stop.” Chuck whispered, his voice raw. He was rubbing at the scar on his wrist. A habit, Raleigh guessed.
Raleigh sat, and Chuck looked at him. He was trying to glare, but failing spectacularly and instead looked like he was going to cry. “When he died, I was still connected to him, and I felt him rip away. I felt all of it. His fear, his pain – everything. Our Drift never ended properly, so there’s still empty space in my head. I never thought anyone could understand, but…”
“Stop. Please.” Chuck said, his voice trembling. His head was ducked, and he was gripping his wrist with his other hand. “I left that behind me five years ago. I don’t need you to dig it up again.”
--
Mako had no scar, but also no soulmate. She explained, “I met her, when we were both children. Before the attack on Tokyo. She died during. The scar only happens if your soulmate dies before you meet. I’m sorry you’ll have to feel the emptiness she left behind when we Drift.”
Raleigh tried to smile. “I think that’d about the same as the hole I have from Yancy.”
She nodded wisely, looking sad, and patted his arm. “Let us talk about happier things. How long is left on your timer?” He showed her, peeling his long sleeve back. 15 days, 16 hours, 4 minutes and 26 seconds. “Do you think it is someone in the Shatterdome?”
Raleigh shrugged. “Probably. I mean, I don’t exactly go out unless it’s in a Jaegar. It’s probably one of the Jaegar techies that I haven’t met yet.”
Mako’s smile was genuine. “Are you looking forward to meeting your soulmate?”
Raleigh grinned. “Doesn’t everyone?”
--
He met Chuck again lunch that day. Chuck narrowed his eyes at him when Raleigh sat across from him, but all he did was shove his fork into the salad he was poking at. But Chuck’s stance was no longer defensive and sad. He reminded Raleigh of a tiger ready to burst into action, so Raleigh stayed wisely quiet and decided to enjoy his meal. Chuck didn’t eat a single bite until Raleigh himself was done. “You aren’t eating?” Raleigh said, motioning at his plate of green leaves.
Raleigh actually snarled, snatched up his plate and dumped it out on the way out of the cafeteria, Max waddling behind him. “Don’t mind him,” Herc said, rolling his eyes. “He’s just unhappy all the time.”
Raleigh finished his food as fast as he could and chased after Chuck. There wasn’t much places Chuck could go – Herc had told him Chuck never really went out of the Shatterdome (none of the pilots really did), and so Raleigh followed his gut instincts to find Chuck lying down in the middle of the Kwoon Combat Room. The Wei triplets were whining at him, trying to get him out of the way so they could train, but the fucker had his eyes tightly shut. “I was here first,” Raleigh heard.
“But you are not even training!” One said, jabbing his bare toes into Chuck’s side. “Come on, Chuck. Let us use the room.”
Raleigh decided to interfere. “Don’t be such a brat.” Four pairs of eyes shot to him. Jin, Cheung and Hu looked grateful for the interruption, but Chuck was glaring at him, propped up on his elbows. “You’re just taking up space.”
“Fuck off, has-been.” Chuck growled, springing up to his feet with unsurprising grace. “This is part of training.” All the same, he stalked past the triplets, his hands jammed into the pockets of his jeans. He reminded Raleigh of a kid who knew he’d done something wrong but was sulking anyway because he got scolded. With an apologetic wave at the triplets, he chased after Chuck, easily keeping pace with his angry rush.
Chuck glared at him. “What do you want from me?”
“Listen, I get that you’re mad because you blame me for Yancy’s death. I don’t blame you for that, but there’s no need for you to take it out on other people.” Raleigh sighed and rubbed his forehead.
Chuck braked and turned to look at him, his eyes wide. He looked incredulous. “You think I’m mad at you because you were in the same Jaegar as your brother when he died?” Chuck took a step forward, crowding Raleigh’s space. Chuck was smaller than Raleigh was, but he was still intimidating face-to-face. He jabbed a finger in Raleigh’s chest. “Listen, Raleigh.” He growled. “I’ve been piloting a Jaegar for 6 years. I’ve killed 11 kaiju. I know what I’m getting into when I get deployed, and I know what everyone else goes through, too. Shit. Happens. If you think that’s why I’m pissed off, you’ve got me all wrong.”
Chuck took another step forward until they were hairs apart. “I’m fucking pissed off because you ran away. You’re a coward who doesn’t know how to face himself, and a rusty pilot. You just proved my point when you and Mako messed up the fucking Drift. Mako’s a first-time pilot. It happens. But you? You call yourself a veteran? Look the fuck around you, Becket.” Chuck jabbed his chest, growling. “7 million people in Hong Kong. 7 billion in the world. You know what happens when you fuck up? You put those 7 billion people in fucking danger. Just like how you almost wiped out half the Shatterdome today.” With a last jab to emphasize his snarl, Chuck swerved on his heel and stalked away, leaving Raleigh to rub at the bruise that was definitely forming at his chest.
--
“He means well, huh,” he said to Mako the next day, over lunch.
Mako looked up at him. “Who?”
“Chuck.”
Mako rolled her eyes. “Of course Chuck means well.”
“He called you a bitch and said you needed to be leashed, though,” Raleigh pointed out, feeling a little hurt that Mako was agreeing so readily.
Mako rolled her eyes. “Do you not insult your friends? Chuck and I grew up together. That was not the worst I heard from Chuck. And he has heard worse from me.”
Raleigh stopped and frowned. “Wait. So I didn’t need to get into a brawl with him?”
Mako snickered. “No. But it was sweet. In any case, what brought this revelation?”
Raleigh leaned back as far as he could on the bench. “He gave me a bruise.” Mako raised an eyebrow, so he quickly added, “He was yelling at me about how stupid he was, and while he was at it, I realized he’s… I mean, he cares a lot about actually saving the world. He doesn’t like me because he doesn’t think I can help.”
Mako nodded sagely, smiling enigmatically. She was silent for a while, just gauging him, and Raleigh knew she was thinking genuinely about what he’d just said, so he waited. She finally said, “Chuck is special, Raleigh. We have all lost family to kaiju, but there’s not many people in the world that have not. The difference is that he has actually stepped up and started to fight. He wants to save the world, not for the glory, not to be a hero, but because he wants to stop little children from losing their parents, to stop parents having to bury their children, and to put a stop to all this. And he started so, so young.”
Raleigh looked at his hands. “You’re younger than he is.”
“You are correct,” Mako allowed, but added, “But I did not start piloting when I was 15.”
--
Raleigh was drawn to Chuck like moths were to fire. He found himself looking for Chuck again, wandering aimlessly until Tendo took mercy and pointed him to a small ladder at the corner of the Shatterdome. It reached all the way to the ceiling. Raleigh eyed it. “He climbed up that thing.”
“Does it all the time, with Max tucked under one arm. Drives Herc nuts.” Tendo said, sipping his coffee and waving Raleigh away. “He’s more agile than you think.”
Raleigh stood at the foot of the ladder for about half an hour, thinking, why the hell is this here anyway until Sasha came up to stand next to him. She was definitely judging him. “You get into a Jaegar that is multiple times this height,” she pointed out. “You cannot climb this?”
“I’m strapped in when I get into that Jaegar.” Raleigh protested. “Fuck, I’m going, all right?”
“Aleksis will catch you, if you fall.” Sasha said, and Raleigh wondered if she was serious when her mountain of a husband came up behind her. “He did, the first few times Chuck fell.” That didn’t make him feel better at all, but he gripped the closest rung and started climbing.
It must have taken ages, but he managed to reach the top rung (his hands were slippery with sweat) and punch the hatch door open. Chuck raised his eyebrow when Raleigh climbed out onto the roof of the dome, panting. “What are you doing here?” He said, eyes narrowing. Max bounded over to him and wagged his stump of a tail so energetically Raleigh was scared he’d slip down the slope of the dome. Chuck was perched on top of a little notch that a window made, sitting cross-legged comfortably.
“I wanted to see you.” Raleigh said, making his way over to the window-nook with Max in his arms. When Chuck narrowed his eyes at him, Raleigh stopped him. “Come on. I’m not that bad, all right?” Chuck glared, but settled for snatching Max out of Raleigh’s arms. “You come here often?”
Chuck plopped Max down in between them. “Yeah. I like it here. Quiet.” He wasn’t sitting to face the Hong Kong night scenery, Raleigh realized – he was looking out into the quiet ocean. It was dark, black, and contaminated with so much Kaiju Blue that Raleigh got sick just looking at it, but apparently that wasn’t the case for Chuck. He kept staring at it and finally said, “I grew up by the sea, you know. Got to enjoy the Sydney waters. The Great Barrier Reef was a bit far away, but still. My old man and my mum used to take me all the time when I was a sprog. Then all the Kaiju Blue fucked it up.”
Raleigh had never been a beach person, really, but he nodded along like he understood. Chuck fell quiet again, and after a while, the silence was comforting. Raleigh could kind of see why Chuck liked it up here, looking at the dark abyss of an ocean. It was strangely comforting, smelling the salty waters and listening to the waves slap the sides of the cliff.
After a while, Chuck got up. “Leaving?” Raleigh asked, wondering how he was going to get down the ladder. Going down had to be more difficult. Chuck nodded, and then pointed down the slope of the dome. Wait. What? Raleigh blinked down the slope. “You’re kidding.”
“No. It’s easy. Look.” Chuck put Max on the slope and gave him a heavy push. Max didn’t even struggle, just sat on its ass as it slid (rapidly) down the slope of the Shatterdome. Raleigh watched, wondering if he was dreaming, as the bulldog plopped down at the end of the slope onto the roof of the flat part of the building. “Even my dumbass dog can do it. I fell down the ladder every single time and Aleksis caught me, and one day I tripped and rolled down this thing. Thought I was gonna die, but turns out it’s an easier way to get down.”
Raleigh was pretty certain that near-death experiences were supposed to be handled more seriously, but Chuck was saying fell down the fifty-story-ladder and tripped down the sides of the gigantic Shatterdome like it happened on a daily basis. When Raleigh didn’t move, Chuck shrugged and walked a little to the steeper slopes before sitting down and sliding down the slopes.
Raleigh had just watched Chuck Hansen sliding on his ass down the side of the Shatterdome-Dome. Chuck glanced up at him impatiently, and Raleigh realized Chuck was probably not going to wait for him if he stalled any longer. He swallowed thickly, sat down near where Chuck had started to sit, and pushed off.
The slide was decent at first, but as the slope got steeper and steeper, he found himself near-panicking and had to breathe to remember a bulldog had done this. Before he could get himself sane again, he found himself landing on his ass into a puddle. Chuck snickered. “Yeah, the landing takes a bit of practice. C’mon, Max.”
His tailbone throbbed when Raleigh stood and his ass was soaked from the puddle of rainwater, but Raleigh was still grinning like an idiot the entire time he limped to his quarters and changed his pants.
He joined Chuck almost every day on top of the Dome. He’d only fallen once on the ladder, and it was at a position so low that Aleksis didn’t even have to catch him. Which would’ve been embarrassing. They usually sat in silence, and Raleigh took Chuck not snapping at him to get lost as a good sign. Also, Chuck stayed around for a little longer after they slid down the Dome, and even taught Raleigh to start bracing his boots against the side of the walls to slow down when they slid, so his landing wasn’t as hard as his first.
He was feeling pretty good about it all, until Otachi and Leatherback attacked Hong Kong.
--
Raleigh didn’t even have time to grieve the deaths. He was sitting on top of the roof again, and Chuck was next to him, his face buried in his arms and knees. Raleigh pretended he didn’t know Chuck was silently crying under his coat, mourning the loss of his friends the way he couldn’t while he was stuck in the powered-down Striker Eureka.
Max was in between them, as always, whimpering lightly, but Raleigh reached over the dog and pulled Chuck close, gripping his shoulder and tugging Chuck into an awkward hug.
Chuck didn’t throw him off, so they stayed like that as Hong Kong rained on them.
--
The clock on his timer read 0:00:08:12. 8 minutes, 12 seconds. He stared at it. He’d forgotten about it, during the time he’d spent with Chuck on top of the Shatterdome, staring out into the dark waters. “How do you know?” He asked Mako quietly, unsure if he wanted to meet his soulmate in the time of sadness. He’d wanted to meet his soulmate his entire life, but now he was suddenly unsure.
“You’ll know.” Mako reassured, squeezing his arm. “It’s like no one else in the room matters. You won’t hear anything else, or see anyone else, or even think about anything else. It’ll be amazing. You just wait.”
He stared at his timer. 7 minutes, 12 seconds. 11. 10. He tore his eyes off of it. “It doesn’t feel right.” He said, and she looked up at him, frowning. “We just lost 5 amazing people. I don’t… Do I deserve this?”
Mako squeezed his arm again, and she was sincere when she spoke. “You deserve to be happy, Raleigh.”
--
He had his hands jammed into his pockets. Mako had suggested not looking at the clock as it passed the 5 minute mark, and then had disappeared, smiling enthusiastically and saying something along the lines of leaving Raleigh alone with his future soulmate. He found himself wandering near the Striker Eureka as the techs worked to restore damages and to make sure the sudden power down hadn’t made anything malfunction.
His eye caught the ladder behind the Striker, and he wondered with a sharp jolt what Chuck was doing. Probably sitting, hunched up on his windowsill on top of the Shatterdome, holding Max. He’d seen Chuck glance at his timer, and knew that Chuck realized that today was Raleigh’s day. He got a sudden urge to take the now-familiar ladder up to see Chuck, and was about to head toward it, soulmate or not, when a shy voice interrupted his thoughts. “Hi.”
He whirled and came face-to-face with a redhead. She was one of Striker Eureka’s tech crew, and her face was smeared with engine grease, and her engineer’s outfit smudged everywhere with oil, but her smile shone brilliantly at him. He felt an uneasy rush in his gut and he whispered, “Hi.”
It wasn’t anything like Mako had said at all. He felt uneasy, unsure, but she was smiling radiantly at him, and she seemed to be sure. He glanced down at his arm and his timer had all but disappeared from his arm, and she shyly held out hers – also empty. “Wow. Hi.” He said, again, trying to smile. It must have worked because her smile got brighter.
She was beautiful, he realized. Stunning, even, beneath all the grime she got restoring the Jaegar. He heard the Striker’s crew whistle as he led her away, feeling numb.
--
“It didn’t happen.” He told Chuck the next morning. He’d actually gotten on the top of the dome before Chuck had, and he’d been waiting. Chuck, Raleigh realized, was without Max today.
“What didn’t happen?” Chuck asked, and something in his tone told Raleigh he already knew what didn’t happen. “You don’t like Abbey?”
Abbey. Right. That was her name. Raleigh had almost forgotten, which was not what at all should’ve happened with his soulmate. “She’s beautiful. And really nice.” Raleigh said, and then got stuck.
“And your soulmate.”
“And my soulmate,” Raleigh agreed. But he frowned. “Mako told me I would think of nothing else but her. But that didn’t happen. I’m not even sure she’s the one. It’s just that my timer was already gone when I checked it after we said hi.”
Chuck raised an eyebrow at him, looking a little less sad. He had a spectacular bruise across his cheek that hadn’t faded yet from yesterday’s fight, and the cut the bruise centered around hadn’t yet closed, either. “What were you thinking about, then?”
Raleigh didn’t answer for a while, wrestling with the idea of not telling Chuck, but finally said, “You.” Chuck said nothing. Didn’t even look surprised, and they sat in the comfortable silence that was starting to become their blanket.
--
Everything about Abbey reminded him of Chuck. Her ginger hair, her green-gray eyes, her Australian accent, even the way she walked and talked. He didn’t think that was normal. He hadn’t even held her hand yet. Sure, it had only been three days, but soulmates were supposed to hold hands the first time they met. It completed the bond. And then they moved onto kisses. And sex.
He ran a frustrated hand through his hair, wanting to growl out loud. Mako didn’t judge, but he knew everyone else on base thought it was weird that he wasn’t bunking with Abbey already. He threw his arm across his eyes and willed himself to sleep, hoping tomorrow would make things ‘normal’.
He didn’t even know he’d fallen asleep until a searing burn on his arm startled him awake. “Shit!” He cursed lowly, gripping his arm. He snapped on the lights and stared, and then jumped out of bed. He ran out into the empty hallway, not even knowing where he was headed, but he bumped into Abbey on the way. It was the first thing they’d managed to do together.
She smiled sadly at him. “You too, huh.” She was rubbing her arm gingerly. She hesitated, and then showed him her arm. A brand new timer had been stamped onto her arm, reading 43:10:42:13. 43 days, 10 hours, 42 minutes, 13 seconds. “I’ve never heard of this happening,” she said, leaning on the wall and sinking down. He joined her cautiously. “But I… I think I knew we weren’t meant to be. I guess Clothos made a mistake with us.”
She looked resigned, and Raleigh gripped her hand. “Listen, Abbey. I am really, truly sorry. I really, really am.”
She smiled at him. Not as brightly as she did when they first met, but still one full of warmth. “I know.” She gripped his hand, and he gripped her. She had a strong grip, calloused hands from working on machines. “Listen, Raleigh. I wish you luck. I mean that. And I hope we can stay friends. I mean that, too.” She looked at him, her eyes fierce and honest, and he couldn’t help but smile and nod.
She reminded him so much of Chuck.
--
He hadn’t told Abbey, mostly because he didn’t think he had the rights to bother her anymore. But he didn’t have a new timer. His skin was blank, without a timer in sight, and before he could even contemplate it, they were setting out into the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. “We will talk about it when we get back,” Mako said, after they Drifted and she saw.
She said when, he noted, not if.
--
Chuck was dead. He and Mako sat on top of his pod, barely breathing. “He’s dead,” Raleigh whispered. “Mako, he..” Mako looked painstricken, and he didn’t know how to talk to her. She’d lost her father, her teacher, and one of the only friends she’d had through childhood.
Raleigh…
Raleigh felt empty. Like half of his soul had been torn out from inside him. He felt even worse than when Yancy had been torn from his head, and he threw up into the ocean as the chopper neared them.
--
Twelve hours later, the (now re-opened for absolutely no reason) Sydney Shatterdome called the Hong Kong Marshal. [Herc,] the man on the other line said, his voice trembling, [We found Chuck.]
And Marshal Hansen hung up, handed his duties off to Tendo, and packed the fasted jet. “I’ll be back in three days,” Herc said, his voice trembling in a way Raleigh had never heard it before. Herc looked at Raleigh. “You coming?”
Of course Raleigh was coming. Mako told them, “Take more than three days.”
Herc himself flew the jet to Australia, and Raleigh sat next to him in the co-pilot’s seat, unable to think anything other than Chuck’s alive. He had no idea how Herc was managing to pilot the jet, but when they landed, Herc wore the same face he’d had since he heard the news. Herc was greeted by a man. “Connor,” Herc greeted shortly. “Fill me in.”
“The pod washed up actually in New Zealand, sir. The police force there opened it, and there’s no one in Australia or New Zealand that doesn’t recognize Chuck Hansen. We got the call, retrieved him, and then called you while he was being operated on.”
“Status?”
“Stable, sir. He broke a lot of bones and some of the pod as well as his suit was melted onto his skin but… in the end that prevented him from bleeding out.” Herc nodded, thin-lipped. “He just got out of surgery, and the doctors reported that he was alive and stable. He’ll need intensive care, but he will live. The doctors predict light concussion, but otherwise most of the damage was centered around the pod and the suit.”
Good to know the suit’s doing its job, Raleigh thought with a dry throat. “Can we go see him?”
The Australian turned to him like who the heck are you, and Herc cleared his throat. “Right. Connor, this is Raleigh Becket, one of Gypsy’s pilot. Raleigh, Connor Taylor. He used to be Sydney’s Chief LOCCENT Officer when it was still running.” They shook hands politely. On the way inside, Herc explained, “In Sydney, they only really cared about the Australian pilots. That’s why he didn’t recognize you, just your name.”
Honestly, Raleigh barely cared. His mind was still on Chuck is alive, and when they finally stood at the glass separating them from Chuck, his mind reeled. Chuck was bandaged almost everywhere he could see, and there was a bandage across one of his eyes. There were more wires and tubes than Raleigh could count, along with an oxygen tube inserted into his throat, but he was alive.
Alive.
Herc shoved past the nurse that was trying to make sure he was in his decontamination suit properly, barreled into the room, sinking to his knees before his son. “It’s okay,” He heard Taylor say. “He knows how to put one of those on.” Herc’s blue-gloved hand took Chuck’s thickly bandaged one, and Raleigh watched quietly as Herc brought his son’s hand to his lips and cried silently.
--
“You sure you want to leave?” Raleigh asked.
Herc hesitated, but sighed. “I was always a soldier first before I was a father.” He thumbed the helmet he was holding. “The world needs me, now. It gave me back my son, and I owe it to do my best restoring it.” Raleigh felt like he’d swallowed a lead weight. “But,” Herc said, smiling wickedly in a way that told Raleigh that Herc would get his way, “I’m planning to move the PPDC HQ to Sydney. You’ll see be again soon, Becket. Until then, watch over him. Also, I forgot Max back at Hong Kong. Gotta get that dog here, or he’ll shit himself all over the floor. Watch over Max when he gets here, too.”
Two days later, Mako stood at the hangar bay of the Sydney Shatterdome, equipped with a huge grin and Max’s leash in her hand. “Mako,” He greeted, more relieved than ever to see her. “How’s Herc doing?”
“He is very happy.” Mako smiled. “He keeps slapping the techs on the back and laughing.” She winked at him, handing over Max’s leash as Max barreled into his leg. “It is scaring some of the newer recruits,” she said, making Raleigh grin. She didn’t even bother unpacking – just demanded to be taken to Chuck. Max whined at them through the glass as Taylor (Max barreled into his leg, too) held him back. Mako didn’t look surprised or sad at Chuck’s injuries. She merely smiled at him, rubbed her gentle fingers on his bruised cheek, and said, “He is strong. He will be all right.”
--
Herc rechristened the Sydney Shatterdome as the PPDC HQ (the world couldn’t really deny the hero), and left Tendo in charge of recovering parts of the old Jaegars. “I told him,” Herc said as he stepped off the jet, “that he could come relocate once he was done overseeing restoring Cherno and Typhoon. Gave him incentive to work faster.”
It was relief to see Newt and Hermann squibbling as they hauled in kaiju parts, and it was hilarious to see the Sydney and Hong Kong Shatterdome kind of merge. The Shatterdomes around the world were re-opening, becoming sites of research and restoration. The only piece missing, really, was Chuck.
But Mako, as was always with Mako, was right. Chuck was a fast healer (“The brat got his immune system from me”, Herc said), and soon he needed bandages only for his most severe burns and the broken bones. Raleigh was relieved when the bandage around the eye came off and it actually turned out to be a bandage for a cut across his temple, not his eye. The life support machines decreased to the regular feeding tubes and the IV drip, and Chuck could even breathe by himself after a bit.
When the nurse unwrapped the bandages from Chuck’s sprained wrist, there was an intense burn across Raleigh’s arm, and Chuck whimpered in his sleep. “Ow,” Raleigh said, and Herc glanced at his arm.
“Time until he wakes up, I reckon,” Herc said, and Raleigh stared at the new countdown seared across his arm where his old timer for Abbey had been, the time matching the new countdown on Chuck’s arm, over the angry red scar he’d had before. It read 2 days and 29 minutes.
--
He was strangely not rushed or frantic the next two days. It passed normally. He walked Max, trained with Mako, listened to Newt’s ramblings about Kaiju and watched Hermann roll his eyes at them, helped Herc manage the Shatterdome, and came to sit with Chuck.
He wasn’t counting down to the time. He had pulled a sweater over it and decided he didn’t need it, so he was only half-aware when Chuck stirred. “Fuck,” Chuck groaned, his voice raspy with days of no use. “I’m all sore.”
Raleigh didn’t hurry. He closed his book and steadily raised his eyes until his eyes met Chuck’s, and Mako was right. Everything was Chuck. Raleigh couldn’t hear the beep of the heart monitor, and the normal buzz of the Shatterdome faded to nothing. Chuck swore, but it was soft, and Raleigh cautiously raised his hands to stroke the back of Chuck’s hand and to weave his fingers through the scarred fingers.
The bond passed through them like electricity. Chuck whimpered and Raleigh felt his distress, felt the phantom dryness in his throat that was so bad it was almost painful. He blinked twice to see the world as the world again, and gripped Chuck’s hand tighter, drawing himself closer until they were touching foreheads. Chuck was scared. Unsure. He needed to fix that. “You’re mine,” he whispered, and Chuck flinched. “Forget Yancy. We were supposed to happen.”
Chuck chuckled through his nose. He was still scared, but Raleigh felt Chuck lean on him, both physically and mentally. “Gimme some water, you old-timer.”
Raleigh did, and peeked at his clock. It was gone, and the angry red scar on Chuck’s arm was also wiped clean. He’d just known, from the moment he’d laid his eyes on Chuck. That was why he could only think about the younger pilot when his timer had ran out. Because he’d just always known.
Chuck snorted behind him, sinking limply into the pillows behind him. “Don’t get cocky.”
Raleigh grinned, handing him a cup of water. “Can you feel it?” The bond throbbed between them, raw and electric and so intense, relaying their emotions back and forth, and Chuck didn’t have to answer for Raleigh to know yes.