Nine months after the world was saved, Marshall Hercules Hansen stares at a pile of paperwork on his desk that makes his eyes cross.
Bureaucrats.
Nothing exists without the proper documentation, initial here, stamp there... and hope to God that you know what you are signing. Sometime he didn't. Hopefully that wouldn't bite him in the ass later. He chews on the eraser of his pencil and grimaces.
Not a day went by when he wasn't reminded of Chuck.
The media requests had finally dwindled down for interviews and reactions. He had only given one interview, an exclusive to a family friend who worked for his hometown newspaper.
Let the vultures chew on that. His grief was private, not to be exploited for their greedy gains. His son and his best friend had died to save them all, they couldn't expect any more from anyone... but they did. Herc had set up memorial funds for all the pilots' families, the survivors. It was the least that he could do as a paper-pusher.
He leans back and flips the pencil through his fingers. His fractured clavicle had finally knitted. Old men don't heal as quickly as they used to, and Herc felt ancient. Weary to the bone and twice as frustrated. Marshal Hercules Hansen.
He wasn't going to let their sacrifices be forgotten, not as long as there was breath in his body, so he stayed in the Shatterdome. It felt more like home than any other place he had lived anyway.
He wasn't about to let Stacker down, he didn't kill all those Kaiju to just give up and die. Chuck would sneer at him, call him an old man and laugh at his weakness. Herc couldn't stand the pitying looks that strangers would throw his way. At least his crew, the Shatterdome family, knew better than to insult Chuck's memory that way.
Herc picks up a roster of employee transfers. He'd rather go meet the new staff than waste time filling out endless piles of paperwork in triplicate. Herc smiles softly, he'd rather face a Kajiu with a flare gun.
He misses Miss Mori, she was so good at all this paper-pushing. She was off on a goodwill tour with Raleigh, they deserved some time with each other away from this place.
Lots of new families were starting due to the celebration after the sealing of the Breach, new faces and old friends...
At the very end of the roster list is a name, Dr. Y. Yates.
Herc drops his pencil. It rolls under the desk. He doesn't notice because he has already grabbed his jacket and headed out the door to the loading dock, nearly running.
Herc arrives at the loading dock, not breathing hard, but his heart is racing from anticipation. He looks over the new arrivals, hoping for a glint of pale blonde hair. He cranes his neck to see over the arriving freight.
No one with pale blonde hair and freckles down her back all the way to her bum. Herc sighs deeply. One more small disappointment won't really make a splash in his ocean of sadness, but it is hard to not give into self-pity.
It would have been so nice to see her again, so nice to talk, she would understand everything.
He salutes the officers that salute him even though his title is ceremonial at best and walks back to his office. He'll have to pick up Max from the Gottliebs', Vanessa spoils that dog more than Chuck ever did. That woman is a saint. Herc has no idea how she puts up with both Hermann and Newt.
Herc's happy that so many of the crew either stayed or brought their families to Hong Kong. Well, happy as he ever gets these days... The elevator doors start to close and he hangs his head, fighting the urge to punch something. Everything was so much simpler when they just suited up and smashed the enemy. Peacetime made his fists itch.
"Hold the elevator!"
Herc presses the button for the doors and Dr. Yvette Yates bounces through the opening. Herc's mouth falls open and he's speechless. She greets him with a tight embrace that nearly knocks the wind out of him and shoves them both against the wall.
"I missed you both so much, I'm so, so sorry I wasn't here..." His eyes swell with tears that he hasn't allowed himself the luxury of in months. They sink to the floor of the elevator and hold each other until their eyes are reddened, sore and the wracking sobs lessen.
"Good- so good, to have you back Dr. Yates. Yvette..." He pets her hair, leaving the pencils stabbed in her bun intact. "What brings you back to Hong Kong?" He can hope, opening his heart for one more possible wound. How many times can one man be broken?
"You, of course. You. After the Sealing, they didn't need me anymore in Seattle. I have been honorably discharged. I'm a free agent now." She smiles and wipes her nose on the back of her sleeve. "I'm a mess. A soppy wet mess."
She's wearing a long colorful skirt and a pale blue wrinkled blouse. Her face is lined with a few more creases, a bit more crinkled around the eyes behind her glasses, but her pale skin still luminous. The years have been kind to her.
Can't say as much for him. The stress and exposure to the elements has aged him rapidly, but at least he has his health. That's more than any of his co pilots had. When she looks at him like that, he feels younger than ever.
"Come on, I'll show you the office, then maybe we can do some catching up..."
She looks at him strangely, "Didn't you get my emails and packages? I sent them to Chuck, you didn't have an active address. He said that he was giving them to you..."
That little shit.
"He didn't." Herc chuckles softly. "He never let me know, not even for a second. Not even in the Drift." It feels good to talk about Chuck, reminding himself of the young man with all his flaws. "We got pretty damn good at not talking even when sharing the same brain. Maybe even then he needed a secret to keep from me. What did you send?"
She blushes and averts her gaze, "Oh the usual. Half naked photographs, packets of your favorite sweets and boxes of pencils. I can't believe he didn't share." She laughs, "Well, yes I can. Selfish little boy." They both hang their heads for a moment.
"I never got to ask him if he'd gotten over his crush on that new Ranger..."
Herc nods knowingly, "Oh, Miss Mori."
Dr. Yates quirks her eyebrow, "No, this was a Ranger named Raleigh. One of the other heroes of the Breach."
"Well. Huh. Well." I guess that's not too surprising in retrospect, Herc thinks. All the taunts, the name calling and of course the infamous fight. Like a playground crush. Kid never did know how to express his feelings, took after his old man in that way.
Well, that's going to stop now.
Herc cups her face in his large scarred hand, runs his thumb over her lips. She leans into his hand, closing her eyes.
"I have one question, Yvette."
Dr. Yates smiles with her crooked teeth, still so beautiful to his tired eyes. "What's that Marshall?"
"How are you with paperwork?"
"Excellent, of course."
"Good, because I'm going to need your help cleaning up after this." Herc swipes the piles of paper off his desk with one great sweep of his arm. Then he picks her up and sets her on the desk, and kisses her until his knees feel weak and his breath sounds ragged in his ears. One by one the pencils in her hair drop to the floor.
Herc winds her hair in his fingers while tasting the sweat on her neck, stubbled lips rasping at her skin. She clutches the edges of the desktop, and shivers at the onslaught of kisses.
Dr. Yates gasps as his hands push up under her skirt and he strokes her inner thighs. He laughs, a deep throaty chuckle. "Still commando?"
"Well I was hoping you'd be happy to see me..."
He kneels in front of the desk and pushes the fabric above her hip, tucking the fabric out of the way behind her. Like a starving man, he buries his mouth in her mons, licking and suckling at all her tender inner lips. He lavishes her clit with slow, savoring strokes, enjoying the way she twitches with involuntary spasms of pleasure until she clamps her thighs around his head and shudders against his mouth.
When she can catch her breath, she whispers, "I hope you locked the door."
"Can't remember. Nothing wrong with living a little dangerously, right?"
Nothing wrong with living, period, thought Marshal Hercules Hansen as Dr. Yates slowly, sloppily worshiped his hard cock with her mouth. He finally felt alive.