As it turns out, Jake doesn't have to say it's Mako's fault, or his own. Some intern from Drift Systems with a weight on her conscience and probably feeling she has nothing to lose comes forward with the test results on Venge, stating that there's a clear break in one of the main neural links. It's a tech failure, something that happened on the rushed install, and now there is proof.
Marshal McTavish is mad as hell, but now the story's out and there's nothing he can do. The intern is promptly fired, and to keep control of a devolving situation McTavish decides to give in to Jake's demands to see his sister.
So now he's sitting in the private observation ward, watching his big sister laying there hooked up to more machines than she is in a Jaeger. It looks wrong, seeing Mako so still. She was never still. Very few people know she has nervous habits, but Jake is aware of them all. He knows she curls her toes in her shoes when she speaks in front of people, because she broke the seam of her sneakers when she gave a report in biology class on Kaiju Blue. He knows she used to bite her nails until they bled, so Stacker sat down with her every Sunday night before school and painted them all sorts of colors, until eventually she settled on blue, like her hair now. He'd let her paint his too, even if the other PPDC officers gave him crap about it. He knows she twists the blue tips in her hair when she's thinking, taps her fingers in rhythm on tables, and holds clipboards in a death grip. But none of that is anything like the still, silent person in the bed.
Mako looks like a doll now. Fragile, small, easily broken past repairing. He didn't think Mako could ever look like that, and it's terrifying. He puts his hand over hers, avoiding the IV lines they've got feeding into her. "Hey Sharky, please wake up." She hated that childhood nickname. He really hopes she'll wake up just to smack him and tell him never to call her that again. It wasn't my fault we learned about Mako sharks in Environmental Sci.
But nothing changes. Not even the steady beep of the heart monitor. A nurse comes in, fiddles with the IV, and writes something on a chart. She puts a hand on Jake's shoulder as she leaves.
"She's not showing any signs of change. You look exhausted. You should get some rest." Jake shakes his head. He can't leave now. He feels more stable the closer he is to Mako, Drift hangover probably. Maybe it will help her too, if he stays nearby.
Mako's phone, sitting on a shelf with the rest of her personal items, buzzes. Jake jumps so hard he knocks over his chair and almost falls onto Mako's bed. It takes him too long to right himself, and by the time he gets to it the phone has stopped ringing. It's not a number the phone, or he, recognizes. Probably some stupid telemarketer. World is coming to an end, but they're still going to try and sell another credit card no one needs. He puts the phone back, on silent. No one can possibly call who is more important than his sister.