Mako stands on the deck of a fishing boat, squinting through the spray, watching Raleigh and his brother huddled up together on a rock in the middle of nowhere. She can see them, more clearly than she ought to be able to in this storm, but she can't hear what they're saying. Another wave lashes the boat and she stumbles.
She can feel more than see Sensei's steadying presence beside her. They've been walking through the paths of her mind for hours, through stone gardens and sword forges and schools and burning city streets. Each one a memory Sensei was not there in, and that he's never seen so clearly before. She knows he treasures every part of her past he's getting to know, and she wonders if he wishes he'd seen all this sooner.
It isn't just her long-lost past they've explored. She has newer memories that he's been absent for as well. The victory celebration after the Battle of the Breach, waking up in the middle of the night to sketch the first rough plans for Gipsy Avenger, falling asleep on Raleigh's shoulder when they flew to a conference in London, visiting Aunt Clare and her family for only the third time in her life.
She wishes they were all such good memories, but she has to show him Jake, walking away from an empty coffin and joining the Academy, exactly what his father never wanted, then showing up in LA to climb in a Jaeger with her. He has to see Raleigh flinch when she touches his arms and sit silently on the edge of a bed, too lost in his own nightmares for her to do more than sit and pray he comes back to her. She has to show him Herc, downing his fifth beer in one day, crying while he strokes Max.
I couldn't save them, Sensei. I tried, but I lost them. She was supposed to be just like Sensei. She was supposed to make sure everything stayed together, even if she had to tear herself apart to do it. But she couldn't. She isn't him, and she can't be, and knowing that always feels like losing him all over again.
You've done more than anyone could ask. It isn't your job to save them. They need to save themselves now. Patiently, Sensei led her through hismemories. Luna, his sister, lost in battle. Tasmin Sevier, wasting away with cancer in a hospital bed. Tacit Ronin's collapse. The Gage twins, falling with Romeo Blue. Raleigh, sobbing for his brother in a hospital bed; shakily signing a resignation form, both his and Yancy's dog tags around his neck; walking out of a warehouse to meet a helicopter, grimy and thin and lost. Cherno Alpha and Crimson Typhoon. Chuck, nodding to Stacker just before Striker detonated. I couldn't save everyone either, Mako.
But now they're outside those memories, like walking through a house door into the yard, although Mako doesn't remember any clear transition. It was more like slipping into a Drift. She just opened her eyes and they were here, on the deck of a fishing boat, sliding between crab pots and loose ropes. There are men around them, yelling and running, but they don't seem aware that Mako or Sensei are here. Maybe that's because they aren't here memories, she isn't supposed to be here.
These aren't even real memories, because she knows what this is. She would know even if she'd never been inside it in Raleigh's head, because she studied Gipsy Danger's last fight for years. This isn't how it was in real life. Raleigh should be turning Gipsy around, walking her back to shore on his own, trying to keep going with half his world ripped away. Instead, here, Gipsy is sinking to the ocean floor and Raleigh and Yancy are sitting together on a rock in the middle of the ocean.
She wonders if they're making peace with the past too, the way she and Sensei have, wading through the wreckage of their memories to salvage what they can and start over.
Something about this world changed when she stepped onto this boat. She isn't just in her own memories, her own head now. She's in Raleigh's. Somehow, they're Drifting. She doesn't really know how that happened, because the last thing she remembers of the real world is Venge and Jake. How did Raleigh get here? It would be a more urgent question in that real world out there. Here, she doesn't argue with it. There doesn't seem to be a point to arguing with anything here. Whether Raleigh is actually in a Drift with her or not, she's here, she's seeing this, and it crosses her mind that it doesn't actually matter what's happening in the real world.
She turns when Sensei rests a hand on her arm. "I have to go talk to my son now." She nods, because in front of the fishing boat the memories are changing. They're sailing right onto the lawn of a very familiar house, and through a window she can see Jake. If he's in here too, are they three-way Drifting? Once again, it feels important for a moment, but then the urgency slips away and Mako accepts the world here without a question, like people do when their dreams are wholly fantastical but they're still inside them, so everything still makes sense. Maybe none of this is happening. Maybe she's falling slowly into the Breach. Maybe this is what they mean about your life flashing before your eyes. She doesn't care, because this is peaceful. This is putting all the demons to rest.