“Thank you Marshal,” she said.
Nate smiled at Mako. Then he reluctantly headed off with Quan, Liwen, and Burke. As Shao Liwen passed Jake, she gave him a long studied look.
Mako walked up to Jake. He grinned. He had always considered Mako to be his sister.
“Good to see you again,” said Jake.
“That’s a much better look on you,” said Mako.
Newt jumped toward them. “Is this him? What am I talking about, of course it’s him! Newton Geiszler, pleased to meet you. Gotta say, huge fan of your old man.” Newt shook Jake’s hand. “Today, we are canceling the apocalypse!” Newt said, mimicking Jake’s dad. “Love that, use it all the time.”
Jake was about to respond when suddenly Gottlieb appeared. He ran over to his old friend. “Ah! Newton! I was hoping you’d be tagging along. I could use your help on an experiment—”
Gottlieb rushed into the lab with Newt in tow. He hurriedly started setting things up.
“This will only take a moment. I don’t want to impose, but—”
“Hey come on,” Newt cut Gottlieb off. “We’ve been in each other’s heads. Without the intel we yanked from that Kaiju brain, Raleigh never would have been able to close the Breach. That was you and me, pal.” Then Newt checked his watch. “But I am running a little tight, so . . .”
“Yes, ummm . . . deployment!” said Gottlieb. He searched through his cluttered terminal desk.
“Deployment?” asked Newt.
“Of Jaegers,” explained Gottlieb. “Deploying them into combat via Jumphawks takes too much time. The amount of damage a Kaiju can inflict before—Ah! Here!” He pulled a pile of singed notes off the desk and handed them to Newt. “I think I’ve found a solution.”
Newt eyed Gottlieb’s scribblings and then chuckled. “Rocket thrusters?” Newt asked. “There’s no fuel in the world with that kind of boost-to-mass ratio.”
“From this world, no,” said Gottlieb. He presented Newt with a vial of neon blue liquid. Newt tensed.
“Kaiju blood?” asked Newt.
“Exactly!” said Gottlieb excitedly. “I’ve discovered it’s highly reactive when combined with rare earth elements like cerium, lanthanum, gadolinium . . .”
“Dude, you can’t be fooling around with this stuff! You’re going to blow yourself up,” said Newt. Then he held up the singed lab notes. “Look at these! You already did, didn’t you? You done went and blew yourself up.”
“I just need to balance the equation. No one knows more about Kaiju morphology than you, Newt. If you could just take a look—”
“Buddy, it doesn’t matter. Once my boss’s drones are approved, deployment time’ll be a nonissue. Within a year we’ll have drones everywhere.”
“So you won’t help me?” Gottlieb asked.
Newt’s watch beeped. He frowned an apology and started to leave. “Sorry. Duty calls. Been nice catching up.”
“Newton?” said Gottlieb. “I—I still have nightmares. About what we saw. When we drifted with that disgusting Kaiju brain.”
“Yeah. But sure was a hell of a rush, wasn’t it?” asked Newt in a soft voice.
“No one knows what it felt like. To be in its mind. Except us. You and I. Together,” replied Gottlieb.
Newt heard the pleading in Gottlieb’s voice for help, for friendship. He struggled with how to answer it. He wanted to respond, but just as he was about to say the words, he was interrupted by Shao’s security chief, Kang.
“Dr. Geiszler. Time to go,” Kang said firmly.
“Okay, okay,” said Newt. He mustered a smile at Gottlieb and then followed the chief away. Gottlieb watched him go, feeling completely and utterly alone.
Shao strode quickly down the long corridor. Newt hustled to keep pace with his boss. Kang and his men trailed behind them, but Shao was focused on Newt.
“You and Dr. Gottlieb were close, weren’t you? During the war,” she said.
“Hermann? We shared lab yes okay,” said Newt in broken Mandarin.
“English. Your Mandarin makes you sound like an idiot,” said Shao.
“Um, yes. We shared a lab,” said Newt in English.
“He was your friend?” asked Shao.
Newt hesitated. The word reminded him of the past. He had been close to Gottlieb during the war. Not only had they accomplished a lot together, he did see him as a friend. One of the closest people to him during that time, to be sure.
“Yeah. He was,” said Newt finally.
“What were you and Dr. Gottlieb talking about?” Shao asked.
“Nothing. Just some nutty idea he has about thruster pods,” said Newt.
“I can’t afford a misstep before Secretary-General Mori makes her recommendation at the council summit. No more contact with Dr. Gottlieb until after the vote,” said Shao.
“But he’s harmless—” said Newt.
Shao snapped at him angrily, in fast Mandarin.
“Uh, could you say that again? About 80 percent slower?” asked Newt.
“I said don’t make me question your loyalty.”
“No, no question. We barely talk anyway.”
“Then it won’t be a problem,” said Shao. “And work on your Mandarin. I don’t like to repeat myself, in any language.”
Shao marched out of the room. Newt followed, his emotions as complicated and mixed up as ever.
Inside the war room at the Moyulan Shatterdome, a massive hologram displayed a drone Jaeger in all its glory. Liwen addressed the ranger Jaeger pilots and J-Techs, including Jules. Newt beamed at his boss while Burke, Jake, Nate, Mako, Gottlieb, and Quan looked on.
“The system I designed processes commands through a quantum data core, relieving the neural load. This means that a single pilot can operate the drone via remote link from anywhere in the world. As soon as the council approves deployment, the days of struggling to find and train drift-compatible pilots will be a thing of the past,” explained Shao.
Dissatisfied murmurs rumbled through the room. The rangers were especially riled. Gottlieb wiped his glasses and squinted at the drone in scientific curiosity.
“You think a bunch of desk jockeys playing with their joysticks can stop a Kaiju attack?” asked Nate.
“Not only can they stop it, they can do so without putting pilots at unnecessary risk, Nate,” said Burke.
Shao nodded.
