He hadn't been sure about the authenticity, but he was now. This stuff was legit, fresher than expected, well preserved. If only all Kaijui materials came in such great shape. It was getting harder and harder to find them, he was taking more and more risks and fewer precautions. But this was the payoff. Sellers holding out to get a better price, man was it worth the extra dough. Fresh as hell Kaiju skin, not just rawhide but up to twenty layers thick in some places, all untreated, hunks of fat and flesh still attached. Not quite frozen, kept in a cold place, frostbite in some areas but that was just part of the game, part of the job description, hardly any damage otherwise. Like thirty raw pounds. Made him wonder if they'd been keeping it alive, he'd bet both his index fingers there were some stolen and makeshift sample preservation tanks floating around out there, especially in China, especially especially around Hannibal Chau's turf. He would kill to get his hands on more, but he didn't want to chance being in Chau's radar. Couldn't afford to get caught. Those risks outweighed the rewards…at least for now.
He could feel Hermann hovering in his conscious, fuzzy and shadowy and distant but very clearly Hermann, like some funky Cerebro shit. The guy traveled but he always got a little closer whenever Newt got his hands on some new gold, like proximity could help him put a finger on whatever Newt was up to. Maybe it did. He still had dreams. He had dreams of Hermann, of Hermann dreaming, dreams of Hermann dreaming about him. Sometimes he dreamed when he was still awake. Inception level weirdness.
He repressed it of course, he was completely on-board for repressing memories- his or anyone else's- even if it meant nosebleeds and headaches and painfully obvious bloody eyes. And he wasn't the sunglasses type. Probably gonna give him an aneurism someday, someday soon if the nighttime headaches and full body tremors had any say in it. Hermann was having the same problems, so ha, but he knew they weren't quite as bad as his own. Drifting with that first brain did a number on his. No more seizures since then though.
Newt stripped a few layers of skin off, separating out what he could categorize with his eyes. Yes, this was good. Like cadaver skin for a burn victim, this stuff would be useful. There was a chunk of something on one part of the skin- like some sort of growth he figured- a little discolored, darker. "Skin tag," he muttered. Seen it before, on creatures that huge, skin could be a foot thick if not more, they always had some kind of imperfections in the skin. "Microscopic imperfections my dear, microscopic," he muttered, stroking his fingertips over the smooth surface. Surprisingly smooth for a living creature. "But then again they were cloned, engineered for specific functions. Don't want too much randomized variation, no weird cellular growth if this stuff will be reused. Cancer in one means cancer in all of them- but they never live long enough to develop cancer do they? …Do they?" He ignored the dark and rumbling mass that existed both in his own mind and many gigaparsecs out in space, eager to tell him firsthand just how long they lived. "At any rate there's no way you can eliminate all the shit that just happens with age in organic lifeforms, minor asymmetry, coloration variations, skin tags and little growths. Happens to the best of us." He thought about his slightly mismatched pupils after drinking twice of the hive mind. It hurt, but it was still kind of cool. Like his tattoos.
More hours at work, cutting out rotting flesh and separating layers and pinning some to specimen boards and photographing every inch of it to add to the external hard drive with almost 500 gigabytes of pictures and video and PDF news articles and his own research notes (and probably some manga scanlations, he can't really remember), all Kaiju related. He'd need to get a new hard drive soon, a bigger one. 750 gig maybe, that would keep him going for years. Maybe forever. Fewer and fewer new specimens to study. No more news articles to file away. No more Kaiju. He almost laughed. "You hear that?" He muttered, glancing briefly towards a specific point in the ceiling that would be sky if he was outdoors. A point he had glanced at dozens of times over, a point he pretended he didn't know like the back of his hand. "No more Kaiju."
He cut off a few of the skin tags and bagged them. Were they skin? He looked closer but his eyes were getting blurry. Glanced at his watch- approaching the twenty seventh hour with no sleep. He was going to have dreams that night, really funky ones. He could sense Hermann, could almost see him gazing out some window at the dark cityscape and emanating waves of disapproval in Newt's direction. One of these days his former partner would get fed up with Newton's frenzies of brain activity and come find him and beat the shit out of him with that cane, and probably yell at him too which was the worst. He tossed the skin tag bag in the freezer ("Skin tag bag, say that five times fast") , scooped all the unexamined stuff into a shallow tray of preservative liquids, wheeled a cart stacked five feet tall with trays into a refrigerated room. He'd clean up the cast-off from the floor whenever he woke up. For now he was gonna go re-read Fullmetal Alchemist until he fell into an exhaustion coma and probably sleep for like three days. He was really looking forward to it.
—-
Hermann looked out a window in his tiny hotel room on the umpteenth floor and tried to ignore the feeling that Newton Geiszler was in trouble again. That feeling never went away after they finally scrapped the PPDC. Ghost jitters, anxious darting glances over his shoulder in crowded subways and his own empty hotel rooms, the urge to nick the wallet from an unsuspecting tourist's pocket. To follow shifty looking strangers into back alleys. Yesyesyesradicalsoawesomeasymetrymicroscopicimperf ectionsskintagbagneongenesisevangelion.
When Newton's anxiety broadcast on all frequencies at the highest volume it meant he'd found something illegal and self destructive to bury himself in. He was a fool and a danger to himself, his interest in Kaiju turned into an obsession like a man who couldn't admit he was hooked to hard drugs until his supply was cut off. Then it got obvious, at least to everyone around him. But Newton knew as well. He didn't want help, he wanted to be left alone with his addiction. But there's the rub; there was no more alone when you drift with a hive mind.
There was a need in Hermann's chest, his stomach, his heart, his head, for Kaiju. To be close to and see and touch- who? The Kaiju, or Newton, or him- he wasn't sure who was needing or who was being needed, he didn't know which scared him more and didn't want to know. As far as he was concerned these weren't his feelings and he had no obligation to act on them, even when they covered his thoughts like spilled ink.
Hours later. Finally Hermann finally felt like sleeping. Sudden peace, as if someone turned off the switch of Newton's brain, cut the umbilical cord they'd grown when the hive had taken their minds and birthed them anew into part of itself. For a moment he felt alone again, and he desperately tried to cling to it as it slipped away. But like eyes adjusting to sudden darkness the awareness came back. The harder he tried to block them out the more he could sense their many many presences. He stared at the ground because he knew if he closed his eyes he'd see a glowing blue tongue squirming like a worm with little beady eyes, it's own little brain and deformed lungs screaming for its mother, but also afraid to look at the sky because it wouldn't be some random point out of the blue that he'd be looking, sending that fear like a beacon. The only pretense of comfort was the distance, and even that was uncertain.
He wasn't too worried about Newton- most nights like this, after the anxiety and excitement and caffeine-laced adrenaline it wasn't uncommon for him to fall off the map for a while. Hermann could still feel him, sort of like a stunned lightning bug, blip still glowing incoherently if not actively sending a signal. With any luck he'd be out for days and Hermann could get some peace, move on. Restart their little cycle of awareness and feigned ignorance. God knew Vanessa was worried, and angry. Justifiably so.
He let himself fall onto his bed, not even the pain in his leg stopping him from enjoying the temporary, imperfect solace.
—
Death and pain and being torn into little tiny pieces, being taller than skyscrapers (we don't scrape the sky we shatter it) and then being reduced to pigeon feed, toenail clippings, spit merging with old gum on the sidewalk. It wasn't fair. They only did what they knew how to do. Tentacles bloom everywhere on their bodies in bright blue colors and bleed bright blue pus, and a huge mass waits on the other side of the stars, just waits because it's useless without something to destroy, without something to study, without the opportunity to get another tattoo- piercing pain and confusion interrupt the blackness and the many across the stars are momentarily forgotten.
—
Hermann woke an hour later feeling like vomiting. There was dry blood on his nose, but just a bit. He didn't need to check his eyes in the mirror to know how much red had invaded the iris, the white. It took thirty minutes of crouching in the bathroom to realize the nausea wasn't his. Hermann often got the fallout and sometimes it did feel like radiation poisoning. That fool. He struck out angrily, mentally lashed his frustration towards the night sky. He knew exactly what direction to aim it.
He hit something close. Newton. Hermann could feel Newton lurching around, a memory of him stumbling over dark concrete floor that he hadn't had a few moments earlier. Who knew how long ago it had happened. But then there was an image of a familiar cell phone (concern; it wasn't like Newton to not have the most recent gadget), and "gotta call Hermann".
It was tempting to block out the voice in his head telling him to go help. It wouldn't weigh on him, he told himself. The idiot could take care of himself. He'd gotten into worse scrapes, whatever was wrong now. It wasn't the first time these phantom pains reached Hermann long distance, like Newton was a limb he'd lost but couldn't quite shake the feeling of.
He hobbled to the phone on the bedside table and dialed a memorized number.
—-
He spent two hours at drug stores searching for the meds requested. Hermann could stand to brush up on his Chinese. Feeling domestic, searching shelves of drug stores, feeling urgent and incompetent, wondering how Newton was holding up. Finally finding what he was looking for. Not too long on the Line 4, off the subway not so crowded this time of day, at least for China, wandering streets alone for forty minutes, an hour, first alone in the crowd and then alone for real, ghost town, learning it wasn't very hard avoiding suspicion and getting lost at the same time. Hermann finally arrived at the abandoned building, shockingly huge for being completely empty. Twenty stories? More? The arrogance of man, to build these architectural monuments where none were needed. Arrogance, and perhaps a flexing of humanity's muscles. We only do what we know.
Second story, empty concrete floors. Windows blacked out here. "Newton," he called, opening the door he'd been instructed to over the phone, the one that seemed familiar even though this was the first time he'd hobbled onto the premises. The reply was weak, muttered and gurgled, not quite words but desperate for his attention. He knew most of that by means other than its tone. He trudged hesitantly over the threshold. Stepping into the shadow seemed to dim all light coming through the door and his eyes took a moment to adjust. There were blankets strung up from the ceiling to make an anteroom, crude and unventilated. Stuffy. Surely unsafe combinations of chemical traces floated through the air. He pushed a blanket back, found the darkness he had been in wasn't quite so dark as the big empty he was standing in now. Office space, he guessed, and Newton must have boarded up and painted over every window. He was hiding his addiction from the world, but he couldn't hide it from Hermann.
A little ways away there were more blankets hanging, and lights from behind them. He walked over, cane tapping against the smooth cold floor. It was a makeshift bathroom built around a sink and toilet against one wall. Newton was laying on his back on the floor, in blue boxers, bleeding all over. Eyes closed. For a split second Hermann didn't notice the things all over him, but once he did they were impossible to miss. Ticks, he first thought, then his mind registered the size. Two to three inches each, round and fat, spindly grayish legs curled under them as they held on to Newton with just their mouths. Herman tried to stop his mind from reaching out but the moment he thought about it that's just what his mind did, felt those things piercing his skin with sharp-tipped proboscises longer than their own bodies. Embedded deep. A few of the things were scattered on the floor, unmoving. Little pools of blood speckled the area.
"What in ten hells have you done?" Herman muttered.
"Spidertickmosquito things I dunno would you just help me out here?!" Newt brought his clenched fists up to his closed eyes and took a moment to shudder, try to expel the feeling of parasites in him right this goddamn second.
Hermann held out the bag he'd been gripping tightly, gesturing that he'd successfully completed the tasks asked of him.
"Jeeze, thank god, oh my god, okay." Newton pulled himself awkwardly into a sitting position. "Okay. Do you have the styptic pencils? Some kind of anti-coagulant, fucking ticks I swear. Yes, good. Sink, yeah, just leave it on, I pay a flat rate-"
Hermann shot him a 'I don't want to know what kind of illegal deals you're involved with to live in this abandoned shithole' glare.
Newton scrunched up his face. "Whatever man I don't come to your place and judge your living arrangements- ahh!"
His train of thought was cut off with a yelp as Newton touched one of the things on accident, one still attached to his thigh. It wriggled and spread its legs out for a moment, long legs folded over on themselves, before curling back up around its body like a puzzle. Sluggish. It was dying, Hermann thought with relief. Dying because the blood it was sucking on wasn't acid blue. Newton had frozen- if it was possible for one's whole body to grimace, that's how Hermann would have described him. With both hands he'd gripped his thigh right above where the parasite was lodged and squeezed tight, eyes clamped, teeth clenched and bared, trembling. Hermann felt it, could remember his own fists squeezing fingernails into his palms and a mind screaming at itself to just don't think about the pain don't think about the pain as if it had actually happened to him. The moment of absolute stillness and silence that followed was much welcomed by both of them.
Hermann dipped a few styptic pencils into the sink and left it running as requested. He scanned the floor around himself for hazards then kneeled next to his colleague, an action that took quite a bit longer with him than it would with others, and a position he didn't normally put himself in willingly because of the effort it would take to get back up. He opened the plastic bags he'd been toting and spread the various first aide items on the floor. They started with the still-bleeding puncture wounds on Newt's neck and arms, where he'd yanked the creatures out in panic or where they apparently fell off already dead. The sting of the styptic pencil was nothing near the horror of having one of those things anchored in your flesh at the end of a needle-like proboscis, so Newton's squirms where minimal. The bleeding slowed and stopped.
Pulling them out was the only option, they both understood, though they spent a few minutes vainly trying to think of alternatives. Cutting their bodies off and leaving their elongated mouths was difficult with just Hermann's pocket knife, and left a tiny tube for Newt's blood to flow freely onto Hermann's hands. He pulled it out then, yanked it, felt ill at the resistance and worse at the little globblet of flesh that remained at the tip when he finally forced it free. They tackled the rest quickly. Newton managed to pull two himself before almost passing out, then he let Hermann get the last few, his body silently, involuntarily quaking each time one of the creatures was removed. Hermann felt every whimper and yell Newt couldn't vocalize. Heard stopstopstopstopstopstopSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPST OPSTOPSTOP on repeat in his own head. Felt the distress, and that at least was his own. He worked faster. It only took a few minutes. Covering Newt with styptic pencils and spray on bandages took only a few more. Then they were done, creatures dead on the floor and smashed by the end of Hermann's cane for good measure, swept off to one side where they weren't too close but he could still keep an eye on them.
Newt curled into in a trembling ball, legs pulled tight, arms wrapped around his head, savoring the lungfulls of air he gulped down unhindered by pain. They listened to the sound of the sink running. It was soothing. The relief was somewhere between falling into bed after a long day and not being electrocuted anymore.
Hermann's eyes watered, so good was the feeling. He turned away from Newt to brush them off, giving him the chance to brush his own tears away. As if they both weren't sharing the same heart on their sleeve.
Hermann let himself slump against the oddly shaped sink, too tired to climb the mountain of pain that was standing up again. Under normal circumstances he'd bark at Newt to get up, give him a hand. A melancholy had spread over them, though. Even as their alarmingly loud mental voices faded, and the pain was going, they were uneasy. Raw from the experience. Vulnerable.
Hermann became very aware of the cottony black darkness peering in from the rest of the unlit building. Whatever sunlight that crept in before had receded with dusk. He imagined the dark sky, starless even this far from the city, cloying pollution stronger than the pinpricks million year old light. Compared to the darkness, that mass of life in his head wasn't black and formless, but writhing with neon beings more plentiful than insects. Giant insects, skyscraper insects.
Newt wriggled closer, so his head and shoulder touched Hermann's leg good leg. Newton cleared his throat. Sincerity was a strange flavor on his tongue, and Hermann could probably sense what he wanted to say anyway, or at least what he was feeling. But talking out loud seemed a lot more human. His voice was soft. "That was not fun."
Herman sighed, not wanting to know but already knowing.
"It's not… that it hurt that much. Well it did. It fucking hurt." He rolled over, facing Hermann, pressing his face into the fabric covering Hermann's thigh. Putting his arm over Hermann's leg like it was a stuffed animal at bedtime. His good leg.
Hermann wished he could feel Newt's skin, instead of the cloth pressed between them. He wanted to avoid this uncomfortable and unsolicited touching at the same time that he craved a more physical contact. Not his feelings, he reminded himself, and stayed quiet.
"It's that. It's them. Out there. Seein me. Feelin me. Like they were sayin, yeah, we know that. Like they could sympathize, over these fucking parasites." He scoffed, felt like saying fuck a few more times. A few hundred times. Feeling like switching to German and cussing those bastards out in the angriest-sounding language he knew. But god forbid the little creeps would get the best of him. His voice had gotten a little louder, a little higher at the fresh memory of his pain, but it softened again. "If I fucking looked at the fucking sky, I'd know right where to look at them. I'd know the precise angle, declination and right fucking ascension, and I'd know that's them like they weren't on the other side of the fucking universe."
Reprieve. Hermann felt guilt for trying to ignore it. But now there was an understanding between them, better than the alien hive could offer. Words were real, the words they said belonged to them. Not to gigantic acid-blooded sky shattering monsters. Not to giant manufactured flesh machines writhing like neon insects. Not to dead parasites who came from god knows where, whatever foolish deals Newton made with the devils of China's black market. Those words were theirs. So Hermann said what they'd been thinking since they'd first drifted with the baby abomination.
"I get the feeling they know where to look, too."