Raleigh must have fallen asleep, because when he opens his eyes again he's not in the middle of an ocean. He's in the middle of a freaking desert.
Yance isn't there anymore. Neither is the rock, or Gipsy, or anything that looks even remotely familiar. He'd kept telling himself, as the wind got colder and the storm got stronger, that he couldn't fall asleep. If he fell asleep he'd freeze. Well, he didn't. He feels like he's burning alive.
He rolls over, slowly, and there's a heat-blurred shape sitting next to him. He blinks again and it flickers into focus as Chuck Fucking Hansen. Wonderful.
"I was beginning to think you weren't gonna wake up, ya dipstick." Chuck is nonchalantly tossing handfuls of sand in the air, and they're blowing straight into Raleigh's face. He blinks, coughs, wipes the grit out of his mouth.
Raleigh thought the cold was bad. This place is hotter than hell, literally. He's beginning to see why Chuck had the attitude problems he did. Growing up here would fry anyone's brain cells.
"Hey, watch the attitude, Rahleigh." Chuck is the same annoying little shit as ever. He's not even sweating.
"Get out of my head."
"Can't help it. Anyway, I'm not in your head, I'm in Mako's. So are you." Chuck shrugs. "Guess she thinks of me as being from the real outback. Sorry to break it to ya, Mako, but I was joking all those times I said I rode kangaroos for fun. I'm a Sydney kid through and through."
"What are you doing here?" Raleigh could see why he met Yance. Yancy was in his head, always has been. But as far as he knows, neither he nor Mako drifted with Chuck. He thinks he'd remember.
"Guess you needed to talk to me?" Chuck flops on his back. "I dunno. Got no bloody clue, Ray."
"Please don't call me that."
"Fine, Rahleigh." Raleigh gives up. Herc may have said his son was grateful for the rescue at Hong Kong bay, but it sure isn't showing. Although, to be fair, Raleigh didn't save him the second time around. Maybe that's where all the resentment is coming from.
He's a has-been… You're gonna get us all killed, and here's the thing, Raleigh: I want to come back from this mission because I quite like my life. So why don't you just do us all a favor and disappear? It's the only thing you're good at.
"I'm sorry I let you down."
"You know I was mostly joking about dropping you like Kaiju shit, right?" Chuck laughs. An unironic, real laugh that it doesn't seem like he should be capable of. "I knew it was a suicide mission from the get-go. Just didn't like him bringing you back. Figured the Marshal was just trying to do a favor for his former golden boy. I thought you were gonna send the whole thing arse-up. But you didn't."
"But I let you die."
"Maybe it was the best thing that coulda happened." Chuck lets a handful of sand run slowly through his fingers. "I was raised in the middle of a war. It's all I knew. I wasn't gonna be good for much once it was over. What do I know how to do? Kill Kaiju, brag up my skills, and piss everyone off. Not sure there's much call for that outside the PPDC."
Raleigh knows that feeling. He's not in a much better place himself. Sure, he can weld, he knows construction, he didn't spend all his adult life in the Jaegers, but really, without a war, he's pretty damn useless.
"Then we both shoulda gone down that day."
"Way I see it from Mako, ya almost did. There's no way you shoulda made it back alive. Way I figure it, that means you're supposed to keep living." Chuck shrugs again. "And I didn't. So I guess I got everything done I needed to do."
"But what if you're wrong? What if you had a whole life ahead of you and I screwed it up?"
"Guess we'll never know, will we? And what the hell did you think you were gonna do anyway? We were fighting two Kaiju at once, and you had a Jaeger with one arm and a crippled leg. There was nothing you could do for us." Chuck tosses another handful of sand in the air. "You know, it's not so bad. Nothing to worry about here. It's quiet. Never thought I'd like quiet, but I do." He lays back on the endless dry sand. Raleigh follows suit. He's right. It's absolutely silent. No screech of metal, no waves slapping shore, no Kaiju roars, no alarm sirens. Peaceful.