.April 9th 2035
Shatterdome, Hong Kong
Jaeger Bay 7
1000AM
Jack's hand flew over the left hemisphere's controls like he was born knowing what sequences would power up his massive Jaeger.
"Okay." He flicked one last control and Blue Winter roared to life.
"Cranium pit online, awaiting second pilot." Tooth walked in glumly and plugged into her harness without a word. "Nice of you to make it 'Majesty.'" Jack teased softly, as he continued checking the systems. Tooth ignored him, her mind still could not believe what happened yesterday, as she began to activate the neural systems.
…
Tooth had walked into the Marshal's office and her prayers were most definitely not answered when she saw her partner was indeed the pervert that had been ogling her yesterday. Perfect. And he was staring at her again. Creep. Now she had to live with that guy and his dirty thought in her head. Still, she'll do her duty. Just not happily.
Then Marshal Pentecost walked in with Miss Mori at his side, as per usual. Jack was immediately focused on his superior, and Tooth was glad to have his eyes off of her. She sat down in a chair next to Jack's and waited.
Awkward.
Finally the Marshal addressed them both.
"Thomas Iceland, meet Tulika Teerthankarovna. She'll be your co-pilot on Blue Winter." Pentecost's tone brokered no argument.
"Call me Tooth." She said, more than a little frosty. "It's expedient."
Jack had nodded to her flashing a million dollar smile, but Tooth just rolled her eyes and focused back on the Marshal. He had caught the little exchange, and seemed…pleased? "I take you two have met already?"
One glare from Tooth, told him plenty. She did not want to retell him stripping her with his eyes. The Marshal surprisingly chuckled a little as he went to sit down. He tapped a few keys on his desk and the shutters on his large window closed up leaving the room in near darkness. "Miss Mori." He said quietly.
Suddenly a film began playing on the shutters. Tooth recognized it in an instant. It was her simulated battle with Jack in glorious 3D. It was good. They were good. Really good. Like early Kaiju War propaganda movie good.
That was just straight-up ridiculous.
How did she get that good?
As the film cut off the shutters reopened and the Marshal stood again.
"Given how well you two are at trying to kill each other, I'm going to try something else. Miss Tooth, you are hereby promoted from Chief Machinist to Pilot, and I am transferring you to the Jaeger Blue Winter. Jack," He said, directing his next breath to him. "Meet your co-pilot."
…
The Blue Winter's drop suddenly shook Tooth from her reverie as the head portion dropped down to join the rest of the Jaeger. She heard Jack give a loud 'Whoop,' as they dropped into the Bay holding the titan.
"Engaging Neural Handshake." Kowalski's voice chimed in through the radio, as the head finally stopped screwing on. Tooth felt repulsed at the idea that this creep would be strolling through her head, and vice versa.
Tooth felt the tug then suddenly she flashed through memories. First she wound around battles and fights Blue Winter had participated in, but when she reached Jack's memories there was nothing. No memories, no ranking, nothing. It was just him and the Jaeger. Always together, but always fighting. Where was the rest of his life? It was like somebody redacted his Brain!
The feelings he was putting into Blue Winter, those were really different too. Most Pilots don't think about their Jaeger as more than an extension of themselves, maybe they have pride like a fighter pilot for his plane They all came off as so detached. With her... gifts, she could never look at Winter like that.
Jack knew, down to his bones that this thing was his family, his home. It was so odd, but it was him. It was actually kind of endearing. He hadn't even thought of her naked since the neural handshake. Now that she was paying attention to his memories, he hadn't even thought of her naked once, just curious as to why a beautiful woman was in the bunker. Never had she felt so embarrassed for judging someone.
She could feel what Winter felt about Jack too. He was so proud of his pilot. How far he had come, the battles they won from Jack's shrewdness, and his well hidden, unflinching sense of duty. At this Tooth couldn't help the smile of admiration cross her face.
As Jack connected to Tooth he felt the familiar presence of his Jaeger, then he suddenly stepped into another Jaeger. No, Wait. On second thought Jack realized he was in Tooth's head he'd never gotten this deep into someone else in the Drift before. What had he been doing wrong all these years?
He watched as the memory replayed inside her head, and then suddenly-
DON'T CHASE THE RABBIT
"Tooth!" Tooth looked up shocked, and she immediately tapped the radio. "What, happened?"
Kowalski's voice sounded panicked as he quickly popped on her communication.
"It's Jack! I can't get a lock on his mind and my heart feels like its going to explode!" Tooth glanced at Jack and watched in horror as he seized up, like he'd had his brainstem jammed in an electric socket. Or plugged into a massive killing machine. Forget Kowalski's heart exploding, she had to worry about her co-pilot.
...
The Blue Winter's current crew was in a chaos induced frenzy in the control hub.
"Jack's nearly at cardiac arrest and the Drift is dragging her along for the ride!"
"He's somewhere deep, but telemetry doesn't look like he's in Tooth's memories!"
"I've lost him on Handshake, but he's still in the Drift somewhere!"
"How is that even Possible?"
"Kowalski! Track him down. That's an order. Everybody else, stay frosty."
"Aye Skipper."
"I think I found him. He's bypassed the Synch system somehow and jacked himself directly into the weapons systems. How the heck did he get in there?"
...
Why was it so cold all of a sudden? The Conn-Pod was frosting over. Some malfunction in the cooling system? What was Jack doing? Tooth stretched over as much she could to grab his arm.
...
"Get him gone gentlemen; I'm not loosing our Ranger on our first Drift." Skipper ordered steely in the face of disaster. "Rico! Get him out of weapons ASAP before he freezes the little lady. Kowalski! Dig him out of Blue Winter if you have to drag him out one circuit at a time. Private! Override motion control. Last thing we need is a rampaging killbot in a bunker. Look alive, gentlemen. This is Game day."
"Yes Sir" The Tech crew chorused with a surprising amount of enthusiasm for guys typing really fast without looking away from their screens.
"Done!"
"Done!"
"Done!"
"Done!"
"Outstanding gentlemen! Now pull them out. Call the Medics. And pull them out, now."
...
Then Jack surprised everyone and unplugged, hanging limp in the harness as water vapor cooled and cloaked the floor of the pod in mist. "Neural Handshake invalid, would you like to try again?"
That freaking AI. Ugh.
Tooth stared at him, as he dangled unconscious in the harness. She un-latched in record time and raced over to Jack.
His nose was pouring blood.
She gently eased him on to the floor, his whole body felt too warm, as if he touched the sun. She felt so useless, she knew Jaegers, not people. She could sense Blue Winter adjusting the temperature, and cool Jack down.
She heard a flurry of voices flooding the radio, but in that instant she didn't care as she cradled Jack's head. And frantically recriminating herself.
"This is my entire fault. Stupid Tulika! What did you think would happen if you put your messed up head in a Jaeger, much less somebody else!? So stupid."
And after a moment:
"Please. Please. Please be alright."
Suddenly a voice of authority pierced her head. She looked up to see Marshal Pentecost standing above her flanked by two medics. One look conveyed all he needed to say as he gently pulled Jack from her lap. She just looked at them wordlessly, and followed as they half-dragged, half-carried Jack to the medical bay.
She waited there beside Jack, forlorn, until he woke hours later.
It was there where her parents found her when they got back from patrol.