I don't own Sailor Moon or Pacific Rim.

The cracks in my mind.

I.

The moment Adonis was shot down in a back alley, she knew her career was over. They were good partners – she'd concede to that – they worked well together and he was pleasant enough, but nowhere did she sign up to get benched (after four and a half years of training, no less) because he flashed his Omega watch in the wrong part of town. Christ.

Fuck counselling and sensitivity training: she was allowed to be royally pissed off. Why couldn't she have a Drift partner like Zeph's: Ami was quiet, conscientious, and most certainly a low risk for getting involved in scavenger violence. She heard she was clean too. Adonis was barely even that. She let the punching bag have the rest of it, ignoring the burn in her arms. Four and a half years of her fucking life – down the fucking drain it goes.

"I'm looking for Rei Hino. She here today?"

There was a man she didn't recognise at the entrance of the gym. "She's gone for the day," she called back tersely. If he had any sense, he'd take the temperature of the room and leave her well alone. Even his blond hair, reminding her of her dead partner, was ticking her off.

"Heard her partner got shot a few days ago. They told me she was grieving."

She glowered at the unfamiliar figure. "No one is fucking grieving." The punching bag protested as she landed a few more blows, finishing with a spinning roundhouse kick.

The stranger whistled long and low as he strolled right on in and the sound grated on her nerves like a rusty screw.

"Nice form." He even sounded like Adonis, in the worst ways.

She wasn't looking or anything, but there was more than a passing resemblance. This man was finer in the jaw and face, and lean in comparison to Adonis' jacked frame, but by the way he hauled another punching bag upright, he was clearly no slouch either. She tore her eyes away. Whatever, she was out of here. "If Hector finds out you're on base without permission—" she threw over her shoulder as she towelled off.

He was throwing his shirt into a corner, and he grinned as he turned to face her. "He knows. I'm replacing Adonis." He tilted his head in a mock salute. "I hope I'll have the pleasure, Rei."

Her mouth shut with a click as she tried to school some neutrality into her expression. "It's not possible," she said matter-of-factly, ignoring the way her heart had started racing. "Adonis had Low Versatility. So do I. I'm not expected to be able to pair anymore."

He had started his warm-up, and it was her turn to wait for a pause in his set. She folded her arms impatiently as she tried to look anywhere other than at his muscles flexing sleek and smooth under his skin.

"I heard. Hector and Rumi still want to try."

"With me?"

"With you," he smirked, after he'd dropped into a crouch at the end of his pull-ups.

Expectations, Rei. The chances of this being possible… A second chance. She didn't want to imagine it.

"I'll believe it when I see it," she said stiffly as he started another set. "It was… we were a fluke. Even Rumi thought Adonis and I got incredibly lucky."

Marshals rarely put any time into rangers with Low Versatility. They were usually Drift compatible with one pilot and one pilot alone. They didn't tolerate alternates or swap-outs, and they got little field experience because any kind of neural assault risked putting both pilots out of commission. During the fever pitch of the Kaiju war she would not have even made the initial training selection. Now, they were scrambling for any rangers they could find.

"So what the hell makes you think we're compatible?"

He was covered with a sheen of sweat. His breathing was laboured as he drew to full height, standing a full head taller than her, but she made herself took up and meet his gaze. Whereas her dead partner had had dark brown eyes, his were a piercing azure blue.

"Sibling magic. Adonis is— was my brother."

Rei must have stared at him for a full thirty seconds before bursting into laughter. "Good luck pulling that scam with Hector. He'll throw you down the Drop when he finds out."

He whistled again, completely at ease as he started to tape and wrap his hands. "You might actually be one of the most suspicious people I have ever met."

"I was Adonis' Drift partner," she sneered. "You were never in any of his memories."

"We were separated in the rehoming projects." He landed heavy punches that echoed through the gym. "He was like… two years old. I doubt he remembers me."

"That's convenient as hell. I've never heard anything so ludicrous before."

"I'll prove it tomorrow at the test drive," he replied between laboured breaths.

She was tempted to kick the bag at just the right moment to knock the smirk off his pretty face. "Forget it," she said instead, turning on her heel and heading towards the door. "I'm not Drifting with a psycho scam artist."

He hugged the bag as he caught a break. "Oh come on, we're all stuck on base for another eight months. I'm not about to go coerce your family out of money."

"Yeah, good hunting, nutjob," she called back, striding down the hallway with his laughter echoing behind her. It wasn't possible, so stop hoping for it, she admonished herself. It's bullshit. But her heart wouldn't quit its pounding in her chest.

Her route back to quarters took her across the sky bridge overhanging the Jaeger bays, and she couldn't help but pause. The fourth one down, an older Generation Three painted red with a jagged scar like a thunderbolt, that one would have been theirs. She thought of Adonis, mostly brawn, blond hair tied back in a ponytail. He always took right hemisphere, she remembered, the side that governed creativity, sociality, emotional control, and map-reading, all the things she refused to get better at. Her lips curled up in a smile as she leaned over the rails, high over the smells and sounds of metalwork. He called her mind 'a dark place'; she always had to give him her slice of chocolate cake after a Drift to cheer him up. He even uncharacteristically lost his temper once when Mina stole her last bar of soap, ending in him and Kastor both being thrown into holding after they started trading punches in the mess hall. She rolled her eyes at the memory – the man sulked about it for a week.

She propped her chin on her hands as she stared out over the construction. His entire future, and possibly hers, taken by a bullet in a second. Stupid. She wiped her eye angrily. What a stupid waste. He was supposed to visit his mother next weekend. With them stationed all the way in Vladivostok, he always had to wait until leave to make the long trip home. Beyond the glass domed ceiling of the Jaeger bay, the sky was reddening into sunset. He would never poke fun at her again in that bright, infectiously joyful way, the super annoying way that she both hated and looked forward to in the most contrary of ways.

Look what you've done now, you stupid man, getting yourself shot like that. She surreptitiously wiped at her face again. If that was really your brother, I'm taking it all out on him. He's going to wish he was thrown out on the first day. And she could swear – she knew – she heard Adonis chuckle his assent, deep in the recesses of the Drift.

Author's note

Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim is one of my favourite movies in recent memory; I always had a thing for mecha, and his respect for the anime inspiration behind it was masterful. This short story will take place in his universe, but will not feature any kind of cross-over. I'm especially interested in exploring the mechanics and emotional impact of the Drift.

Any feedback is appreciated! Share the love for old-school monsters and robots in the reviews :)

xx