That’s why all the other kingpins, in Los Angeles and Sydney and Lima and Shanghai, are looking at each other and wondering who’s going to step into the void he left. With Chau out of the way, the kaiju black market is without its capo. There’s going to be a fight to replace him.
Not that any of it will matter if the kaiju keep on coming. Pretty soon they’ll be trading human parts on whatever passes for a black market wherever they come from.
30
NEWT PLUGGED IN THE LAST OF THE CABLES leading from the electrodes driven into Baby Otachi’s brain to the customized Pons, which he was already mentally designating the Geiszler Array. He went outside and asked some of the PPDC marines guarding the area what was going on back at the Shatterdome. They didn’t know.
“Well,” Newt said, “I’m about to do a kind of hairy experiment in here. You mind pulling the plug if it looks like things aren’t going as planned?”
One of the marines looked at the Geiszler Array and Baby Otachi, with Hermann standing at attention like an undertaker. Then he looked back at Newt.
“Are you kidding me?” he asked. “How the hell will we know if things aren’t going as planned?”
Well, Newt thought. That was a good point. He went back into the tent and tapped the squid cap into the Geiszler Array. Hermann had his own squid cap on already.
“Okay,” Newt said. “You ready?”
Hermann sniffed and said, “Of course I’m ready.”
They both took deep breaths. Newt started the sequence.
“Neural handshake initiating, in three… two… one…”
Then they were in full Drift together… with the brain of Baby Otachi Junior right there with them. Gottlieb had never Drifted, and his mind went through a moment of screaming dislocation before the Geiszler Array took over and performed the neural handshake. Newt had a complete tour of Hermann’s mind, within a faction of a second.
numbers language of the universe and they will hide me I can hide behind them because they are never angry they are never wrong they choose no sides and expect nothing they are purely themselves and will never betray me
Newt had mud between his toes at Lake Como. Gottlieb was soldering together a robot can I build an intelligence that will pass a Turing test and if I could of course I can I must never say anything about it until it is done or Father will
Something triggered a response deep inside Baby Otachi’s species memory. The light around them grew strange, watery and distorted, the Anteverse seen through amniotic fluid, Baby Otachi perceiving its world through Otachi’s senses, aware in the womb, waiting knowing hungry
Precursor
Hermann had never seen one. Newt felt his mind unhinge and put itself back together. Is that what happened to me—
The Precursor knew it was being watched. It looked at Newt, right at him. It knew who he was. It did not care, but it knew. For a hundred million years this being had waited for Earth to be ready. Now it was done waiting. It looked at Hermann too, sizing them up, knowing them for what they were. It had nothing to hide from them because it did not consider them worth hiding anything from.
die all of you will die it is already over you are feeling the last dying impulses in a brain already too far gone to decay we are coming for you and you cannot touch us we have waited and now you will wait for the end we bring you
Newt tore off the squid cap and waited for the world to settle into place around him again. He looked around and saw that Hermann didn’t look any better than Newt felt. One of Hermann’s eyes looked like one big internal hemorrhage.
“Ugh,” Newt said. “Are you okay?”
“Of course. I’m completely fine,” Hermann said. “But you saw it. Didn’t you?”
Then he leaned over and puked violently on the ground between them. Newt sighed and waited for him to finish. Then he stepped around the mess and handed Hermann a handkerchief.
“I did,” he said. “We have to warn them. Their plan…”
“It’s not going to work,” Hermann said.
As soon as Newt was sure Hermann could stand, they both ran out of the tent shouting for someone to get them a helicopter.
Raleigh and Mako were already in Gipsy Danger’s Conn-Pod running their pre-deployment checklist and integrating their Drift. Pentecost was at the elevator door, waiting. Time was short, but he had to be patient because Herc Hansen was sending his son off to die.
Pentecost had sent a lot of people off to die in the years of the Kaiju War, but had had no children. The closest he knew to the experience of fatherhood was his relationship with Mako and he’d found it virtually impossible to permit her to deploy. Herc and Chuck had assumed they would be together whatever happened, but even a tough old bastard like Herc Hansen couldn’t run a Jaeger with a broken clavicle.
He stood a little way off from Pentecost, the fat bulldog Max sitting at his feet as he regarded his son for the last time.
“When you Drift with someone,” Herc said quietly, “you feel like there’s nothing to talk about.” He hesitated, trying to master his emotions and failing. When he spoke again, his voice quavered and the sorrow on his face was impossible for Pentecost to look at. He dropped his gaze to the dog, who looked up at Herc and then around the room, searching for the source of his master’s sadness.
“But I don’t want to regret all the things I never said out loud,” Herc said.
“No need,” Chuck said. “I know them all.”
He wrapped his father in a crushing farewell hug, then took a step back. Pointing down at Max, Chuck said, “Take care of him for me.”
Herc nodded, his expression grave. Technicians approached and guided him back from the deployment areas as over the comm an automated synth voice started the countdown to Gipsy Danger’s Conn-Pod drop.
“Engaging drop in ten… nine…”
The elevator doors opened. Pentecost entered and held the door for Chuck, who did not look him in the eye and did not look back at his father. Over Chuck’s shoulder, Pentecost met Herc’s gaze.
“Stacker,” Herc said. “That’s my son you’ve got there. My son.” Herc gave him a nod. Pentecost nodded back. Farewell.
“…Eight… seven…”
The drop countdown continued. Mako and Raleigh Drifted together, the initial rush there and gone in an eyeblink. Something about her thoughts sparked a realization in Raleigh’s Drifting mind.
“All these years, I’ve been living in the past,” Raleigh said.
Of all the people in the world, Mako was maybe the perfect one to create the thought. She’d been there. She wasn’t judging, only observing. Around them, Gipsy Danger’s command and control systems came online. The Conn-Pod heads-up showed the Jaeger’s body reading green across the board. The Shatterdome techs had done some immortal work in the past hours.
“I never really thought about the future,” he went on. “Until now.” There’s irony for you, Raleigh thought. Nothing like a suicide mission to make you think about the future.
He reached out and touched Mako’s hand.