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"You're a bastard," Herman tells him exactly thirty-four minutes after they meet and Newton doesn't get why. Okay, he's lying, he gets why because he's him, he knows people see him as a nerd when they first lay eyes on him and a bastard once he opens his mouth, all sharp elbows and even sharper words and he's been talking a mile a minute the way he does, words spilling out of him without even registering in his brain so maybe, just maybe he might have said something dickish to Hermann ("Gottlieb, it's Doctor Gottlieb!") about the numbers the man can't stop writing on any available surface. He's a bastard and he knows it but it doesn't stop him from smiling wide, all teeth and a promise of a bigger bite, and answer "Takes one to know one," and wants to take the glare Hermann throws at him and marry it.
*
When the fist Kaiju surfaced Newton wondered if this is how people felt before -- before science and Wikipedia and Earth-is-actually-round-y'know days -- when they saw a meteor shower: like the world was suddenly a new and scary place not made for the likes of them. When it crashed through the Golden Gate Bridge like the structure was made of cards he sat down at his desk with his head between his legs, taking shallow breaths and trying to make the panic attack that scratched at his lungs go away. He got the first tattoo two days later in a small parlor next to his apartment and when people asked him why, he always said it was because he loved them. No one ever asked why, just presumed it was a weird kink that came with a career spent in biology and the knowledge that giants walked the Earth again. He never did correct them and just kept adding more and more.
*
It takes Hermann a few months to reach the end of his patience and finally draw a line in chalk in the middle of their shared lab and declare that if Newton as so much crosses it, there will be hell to pay. Newton laughs and deliberately leaves pieces of dead Kaiju on Hermann's desk for the next week until one morning he takes a sip of his coffee and almost chokes when the taste of the cheap shampoo they use in the communal bathroom invades his mouth. He turns, wide eyed and with a mouth full of bitter lavender, and stares at Hermann, who just lifts his head from his file with a neutral expression and stares right back.
Newton swallows the coffee and makes sure it's loud enough to be obnoxious and says, "I knew that statistically there was the probability that you had at least 2.3 percent funny genes in your body and I'm happy to know I was not wrong."
Hermann drops his eyes back to his papers and says, "If you ever want to drink any more coffee again, keep your damn Kaiju away from me. And don't even try to convince me you don't need it, I've seen you live on nothing but that and air," and his voice is so bland and expressionless that it's unnerving albeit funny. Newton stares down at his mug, calculates how long it would take to get fed up with the taste of shampoo and comes the conclusion that he doesn't like his chances.
"Touché," he says. After he's washed the pot and smelled the coffee grounds twice just to be sure, he catches a fleeting smirk on Hermann's lips. He still leaves bits and pieces of organs on Hermann's desk from time to time, because he needs to remind Hermann that even small wars can't be won with lavender, but that’s it. The chalk line gets refreshed every few days and then less and less because cities fall and people die and monsters still come out of the ocean and chalk can't hold up in the face of all that, but Newton still stays on his side of the lab.
*
The tattoos keep coming as fast as the Kaiju keep appearing, until his skin is nothing but color and lines stretching from wrist to neck. He looks at the creatures and realizes how small he is, how his brain can move at lightning speed but how that doesn't matter because suddenly he is just one of billions living on this planet and they're not at the top of the food chain anymore. He loves them because they make him feel small but they also make him move faster, think better and push himself over his limits so he could maybe, just maybe, not be insignificant.
When he looks at them he wants to find out what makes them breathe, live, be so he can find a way to stop the clock that has been counting down how few days he has left. He loves them for that.
*
They fight like schoolchildren on a playground, both of them the bully and the bullied. They spit insults at each other from day one; Newton calls Hermann a soulless fucker who doesn't know anything about life, and Hermann calls Newton a monster-obsessed freak who can’t use his brain for anything worthwhile. They keep at it even when there are people around, even when they get stares and see that vein almost close to popping in Pentecost's forehead when he's in the same room with them.
They fight but then one day they don't. Words still get thrown around because Newton has a big mouth and Hermann is not, to Newton's delight, a pushover but Newton realizes one morning, halfway through a rant, that his mouth moves and says the mean words but this time it's not out of anger, or spite, it's just because it's what he does now. He spends his days cutting up Kaiju pieces and smelling of ammonia and formaldehyde and yells at Hermann to get his goddamn books out of the way, there is actual science going on around here you dimwit, and it seems to work. It's a surprise because Newton is used to hating people and people hating him and, yeah, Hermann sometimes trips him with his cane when he's feeling especially annoying and Newton sometimes rearranges Hermann's books by color just to piss him off. But at the end of the day Hermann is still next to him when they share a late night dinner in the mess hall and Newton always makes sure to grab some of those weird plant teas Hermann drinks when he gets his weekly transport of coffee ("You're an embarrassment to the scientific community with that crap, it smells like a Kaiju's rear end," Newton yells and throws the pack on the table and Hermann glares and says "Of course you wouldn't be able to notice quality even if it bit you in the face, you annoying slob,") and they do all of this with at a volume above what some colleagues deem normal but it works.
Newton hasn't had anything that works for him in a long time.
*
They get peace for some time. Their cities still stand and their Jaegers win one battle after another and Newton buys a little Kaiju action figure and keeps it on his desk. People relax and Newton feels like he's getting closer and closer to crawling out of his own skin. He gets drunk one night alone in his lab and stares at the ceiling for a few hours, glasses abandoned on the desk, blinking the blurriness away and trying not to think about how the alcohol is cheap and too bitter on his tongue. The world is slow and dizzy around him; when the sound of keys rattling breaks his haze he looks up to find Hermann in the doorway with his ugly parka and sour expression. Hermann looks at the empty bottle on the desk and at Newton's face and frowns, but doesn't say anything. Newton would make a joke about how Hermann is a workaholic who needs a life outside of his equations ("-- seriously dude, chicks dig the cane! Makes you look like you're a war hero or something as long as you lose the cardigans,") but his tongue feels like lead in his mouth and it's all too ‘pot meet kettle’ so he just follows Hermann with his eyes as he sits down at his desk and starts shoving his papers around.
They sit in silence for a while, just the scratching of pencil on paper and the sloshing of alcohol in an almost empty bottle breaking the quiet. Newton chews on the inside of his cheek and breathes through the dizziness and says, "You know they're never gonna stop coming, right?" and even though he can't see clearly, he looks up at the blackboards behind Hermann's back that are scribbled all over with numbers and formulas and a language that Newton can only dream of speaking. The pencil in Hermann's hand stops moving. Newton didn't think quiet could ever be this loud.
"Yes, I know," Hermann says after what feels like hours. Newton could swear he can hear the fear in his voice.
Newton nods even if he knows Hermann isn't watching him and spends the rest of the night trying to fight the burning in his eyes. He doesn't think about how the noise of pencil on paper makes him feel better, grounds him through the bite of dread that pulses in his body to the beat of his heart.
*
Hermann throws a book at Newton's head the day the last UK Jaeger falls. It misses him by an inch. Newton almost slams a door in Hermann's face when they find out they broke a new record for biggest Kaiju sighting so far. Pentecost sets up meeting with both of them separately and asks them if they would want new lab partners in the near future because he is damned tired of losing people on the field, he doesn't need to start losing them here too just because two of his best minds can’t act like normal human beings. Newton spends 15 minutes ranting to the walls in the boss' office and in the end says, "The guy is a dick. But anyone else you might find might be even worse," and tries to not read anything in the way Pentecost regards him for a painfully long moment before he gets dismissed.
Hermann is still there tomorrow and the day after and Newton tries to not break his face with the door again.
*
He wakes up some nights drenched in sweat and screaming from dreams of teeth and claws and deep dark oceans that never end and in those nights he scratches at the symbols on his skin and wants to laugh because he never believed in God but he now has his very own fucked-up rosary beads.
*
The Jaegers fall like they're nothing but the toy Newton keeps on his desk so he works longer hours, makes himself push harder and harder and tries not to think about how if a giant robot can't keep the Kaiju away how will he? He forgets to eat for a few days and builds a pyramid out of Red Bull cans but he doesn't stop, can't stop. So he's not surprised when one moment he's watching the static-filled broadcast of the last Panama City Jaeger going down and the next moment he's on the floor of one of the bathrooms puking his guts out in the toilet. His hands are shaking and his hair is sticking to his forehead, beads of sweat dripping down under his shirt collar. He tries to breathe through the nausea and recites the names, family and genus of every bacteria he's probably coming into contact by being this close to a public toilet when he hears footsteps and the click of a cane on the floor.
"I think you're sitting in piss," Hermann says and it's so unexpected that Newton loses it right there. He starts laughing and it's uncontrollable and sounds demented even to his own ears. He rests his forehead on the toilet seat and laughs some more, laughs even when he's out of breath and laughs even when he knows he's past amused and just having a panic attack, gasping for air between frantic cackles.
There's a hand on the back of his neck and Newton thinks he's imagining it but he lifts his head a bit, pushes into the heat as he keeps his eyes shut tight, glasses poking the left side of his face awkwardly. He sits like that for some time until his lungs remember how to work again, until he stops hearing his own pulse in his ears. When he opens his eyes he's staring at his hands clutching a toilet seat and the back of his neck feels weirdly cold. Newton looks over his shoulder and Hermann is there, shoulders a bit slouched, one hand in his pants' pocket and the other gripping his cane.
"Pentecost wants to talk to you," he says; his voice is calm and non-judgmental like he didn't just witness Newton clutching a dirty toilet for dear life.
"You think I'm presentable enough for our great and shiny leader?" Newton jokes because he can't do anything else.
Herman tilts his head a little to the right and says, "I'd change my pants if I were you. I wasn't joking about the piss."
Newton smiles and knows it's shaky but Hermann still doesn't comment, so Newton keeps smiling as he gets up and walks past Hermann and out of the bathroom to find clean clothes and water and a way to not think. He doesn't stop shaking until he's back in his room. He sits on his bed and runs his hands over his face and plays with the hair at the nape of his neck and realizes it's the first time Hermann has touched him in all the years they've worked together.
The next day Hermann doesn't comment too much on the volume of Newton's music. Newton would thank him if he did that sort of thing, but instead of words he just keeps the Kaiju organs on his side of the lab.
*
He's a genius, he knows that and everyone knows that. But they don't know just how much of one, do they? They see skinny ties, tattoos and hear his voice always louder than anyone else’s in the room and they think him just really smart. He lets them. And sometimes, in the quiet of the night when he can't shut his brain down as much as he tries, he thinks that it's better to underestimate him, better to just think of him as the annoying guy with a mouth too big for his own good because maybe that way they won't see the crazy look he gets in his eyes, when sleep has been scarce and the fear is getting to him. And when they finally realize he is not just smart but more, a fucking walking brain with jagged edges and bloody nails ready to scratch his way out of whatever box they've placed him in, well, he can't say he doesn't enjoy the nervousness in their eyes a bit too much.
*
He and Hermann find a weird rhythm that seems to work for them. From the outside it probably looks as organized as an ancient battlefield, all coffee cups and banter that is too close to insults and pages waving as distrustful white flags, but it really works for them. They burn the midnight oil and burn themselves down and sometimes Newton feels like they're no closer to solving anything, that thought curling inside of him and eating at him until he can only quiet it down with sleepless nights and loud music. Cities still get built around them and Jaegers are still moving and sometimes Hermann will leave a coffee mug on his desk in the morning and call him a maniac with no understanding of personal boundaries in the afternoon and Newton does what he does best: he keeps on walking.
They share a lab and they almost share a life because they're insane, the goddamn terrifying thing is now actually their life and they push until they both bleed numbers and science and sometimes, at the end of the day, Newton falls asleep on the couch and uses Hermann's ugly parka as a blanket and Hermann glares at him and but doesn't take it back until Newton wakes up.
"One day I'm gonna burn this thing. It's an insult to anything beautiful in this world," Newton tells Hermann as the furry collar scratches at his face from where it's squished up under him.
"Not before I burn those damned ties of yours," Hermann answers and his tone is rough like sandpaper but Newton has learned that it can never be anything else so he closes his eyes and takes what little sleep he can get.
*
Newton always knew he'd either end up in an insane asylum clutching his 8th grade biology book or be a mad scientist. The giant monsters from the sea are a bit of a surprise though. And so is Hermann. He gets used to the monsters eventually but Hermann still makes his heart beat awkwardly while his brain tries to catch up with that realization.
*
Newton stares at the backs of the last teams of Jaeger pilots they're ever gonna get and he wants to grab them by the throat, dig his nails deep into their skin and tell them to not fuck up and to be careful because the world can't end like this. He doesn’t, of course. He just lets his voice get louder and lets the insanity creep up around him slowly until it’s constricting. He yells over Hermann's words not because he doesn't think Hermann isn't right but because he knows it's not enough. Numbers may be the closest we get to the handwriting of God but God isn't here anymore, it's just them and the Kaiju and a fight for being the dominant species. Newton pokes at Hermann, and Hermann yells back at him that he might get hurt and that surprises Newton but it doesn’t stop him.
In retrospect, mind melding with a Kaiju was probably not the brightest idea he's ever had. He can feel every cell in his body shaking but Hermann's hands are on his face and he is calling Newton every last possible name and insult he knows, muttering words at him in German that pierce the fog in his brain. There are two things that he's certain of all of a sudden: that he needs another Kaiju brain and that he wants Hermann to never stop talking to him and both of those scare him equally as much.
"You're a bastard," Hermann says as Newton is leaving after talking to Pentecost, with a bloodshot eye and a new purpose.
"That's why you love me," Newton answers back and laughs when Hermann rolls his eyes at him with part disdain and part something else that Newton can't name yet. He keeps that image in his head, close and tucked safely away when the world goes to hell around him and he’s staring up at a ceiling that cracks.
*
He was right in loving the Kaiju. He stares down at the dead body of the baby creature and thinks how he was this close to not being anything again and knows he was right. They are big and terrible and they make bile rise to the back of his throat but he loves the goddamn things because if he was apprehensive at first, he isn't anymore. He has its brain and he has a mess of wires and he is ready to let it rip his mind apart all over again because he's already gone too far already so why stop now?
*
His tongue stumbles on the words, on the 'for me' and the 'with me' and he is soaked to the bone and covered in what he thinks is embryonic fluid, but he doesn't care. Hermann smiles at him, a crooked lift of his lips and offers something that is too big, too scary and Newton takes his hands and hopes they don't die soon because Hermann's hand feels really good in his.
He has a moment where he regrets it, as soon as he presses the button and feels his mind slip down the rabbit hole. He tries to focus, tries to walk down the path towards his goal but other things slip by without his consent. Classrooms and words scribbled on whiteboards, the sting of needles on skin and the memory of a few lingering touches. When he wakes up he's got blood on his face and his lungs feel like they're collapsing. He looks at Hermann and pushes back the questions that want to escape his lips because this is bigger than both of them. Newton has always been an egotistical bastard most of his life, for reasons that feel petty now, but when Hermann looks at him with wide panicked eyes and says, "It's not going to work," he knows this is not the time for him to be himself. As they scramble out of the plane back on base, Newton really hopes he doesn't regret being selfless for once because that would really suck.
*
He doesn't cry when he sees the last of the living Kaiju die. He knows he should because there is so much more he wants to know about them, wants to cut them up and look at them through the lens of a microscope and catalogue and breathe in all the knowledge but he doesn't. Because he'd miss it all anyways if he were dead. He'd miss… a lot of things if he were dead.
*
The cheering is deafening and Newton knows that if he could bottle this feeling he could make millions because this is what good drugs feel like. He is laughing because he might drop down on the floor and cry from relief otherwise. He stares at the screen where the two green dots tell him Raleigh and Mako are alive and breathing (he'd wish there were more of them but he takes what he can get when it's given to him) and then looks to his right and sees Hermann. Hermann who is laughing too, and when he sees Newton staring his face relaxes a fraction and the laugh turns to a smile, soft-edged and honest, as he slowly creeps closer to Newton like he's scared he will run. Newton throws his hands over his shoulders and pulls him in close, closer than they've ever been before and it takes all of his strength not to lean over and just bury his face in Hermann's collar. They're alive and Hermann relaxes under his touch and Newton puts this moment in his top five favorite moments in his life ever.
The base goes crazy that day. People are split between working and partying because there are still things to do, to put back into order, but there's this energy that sparks in the air around them all day. People are drunk on happiness, so it's only natural that as soon as the sun sets and all official business has been delegated to the people in the suits, they start getting drunk on alcohol too.
Newton walks through the mess hall alone, Hermann having extricated himself from his grasp at one point and leaving to take care of things and Newton let him because he didn't want to be that guy. He is dodging people who are dancing to the music that seems to be blasting from every speaker on base, getting patted on the back by colleagues he can't remember the names of, and he sees shiny eyes and bright smiles everywhere. He sees Mako and Raleigh at a table, him sprawled over the bench with his head in her lap and her blue highlights seem even brighter today; they're both laughing at something Tendo is saying and for a moment he wants to join them, but changes his mind and walks in the other direction. There are candles on every table, to keep away the dark and mourn the dead and Newton tries not to think of the numbers and how there aren't enough candles in the world for some things.
He moves to a dark corner and slides down the wall until he's on the floor, knees bent and head leaning back. He likes watching the people around him but he needs the quiet and that thought makes him almost laugh because he's always been many things but quiet isn't one of them. It's amazing what almost dying can do to a person. He can be a rock star tomorrow, but for now he'll just observe and for a moment, he almost misses the sound of the Jaegers that used to dominate the place like warriors from screwed-up fairy tales.
A few minutes or maybe a few hours pass by, he's not sure, but suddenly he hears the clack of Hermann's cane and it's almost instinct to turn around and look for him. Hermann is heading straight for him, and he's lost the parka and vest at one point during the day, shirtsleeves rolled up past his elbows and hair a mess. He stops next to Newton and they look at each other for a few long second before Hermann clears his throat and asks, "May I join you?" and actually waits for Newton's answer, the light pat he gives the floor next to him, before he sits down slowly. He keeps the cane close and stretches his bad leg and Newton can't help but lean into him a bit, until their shoulders are almost but not quite touching.
"I honestly expected you to be right in the middle of all of this," Hermann says as he looks over the crowd. Newton shrugs and feels his shoulder brush Hermann's with the movement.
"They already know I'm a badass, I can leave my throne unprotected for a day," Newton jokes. His voice is low. "I expected you to be back in the lab."
"Nothing left to save," says Hermann, swallowing hard at the end of that sentence, and Newton rolls his eyes, turns to look at his profile and says, "Dude, there's always something to save. Science never sleeps."
"Science does sleep, you're just the one that keeps waking her up," Hermann answers and his voice is as dry as ever, making Newton laugh.
"I'm doing her a favor, she'll thank me one day."
"As should I, I think," and that's when Hermann turns to look at him and he's so close that Newton wants to run away and get closer at the same time.
"I think I should be the one thanking you," Newton whispers and wants to say more, wants to say that a 'thank you' will never be enough but the words don't seem to come out so he just stares back and breathes deep and hopes his face is saying what he can't.
"Ah, I never expected that to be your style. It'd be a shock to me and I've had too many already this week."
"How about if I promise never to leave dead Kaiju on your desk ever again?" Newton answers and he's smiling now as he gently elbows Hermann.
"That would be more like you, I guess."
They sit like that for a few moments and Newton feels himself tense but in a good way. He looks at Hermann's face, tries to memorize it like this, and sees the red circle around his left iris that matches his. Before he knows what he's doing his hand is moving and he touches Hermann's face right under his eye, fingertips barely ghosting over dark circles. "You've got one too. We match now," he says and wants to add something more but Hermann suddenly moves closer until their lips clash. It takes Newton by surprise but then Hermann is opening his mouth and all Newton can think about is heat and tongue and Hermann right there. He moves until he is kneeling in front of Hermann, lips not leaving his and hands now clutching the sides of Hermann's face and he never wants to let go. If a damn Kaiju broke through the roof right now Newton thinks he'd like to die like this, with Hermann's mouth opening under his and Hermann's hands clutching at his shirt.
They break the kiss sometimes later, when Newton's brain tells him he really needs air and he's gasping as he sits there, forehead to forehead with Hermann.
"I knew you liked me," he laughs between them and Hermann rolls his eyes but his fingers hold on tighter to his shirt so this is good. Newton moves away a bit, asks, "Wanna get out of here?" and wants to kiss Hermann again because his lips are swollen and his face is flushed as he nods. He gets a smile from Mako as he leaves the mess hall and can't help but smile back because Hermann is holding his hand and dragging him after him and they’re both alive.
He spends the rest of the night memorizing every inch of Hermann's body, leaving kisses over his collarbone that feel more like promises and scratches on his ribs that he will touch with his lips in the morning. His skin is burning where it touches Hermann's as he pulls him closer; he doesn’t want to close his eyes because he doesn’t want to miss anything, not Hermann’s little gasps or the bead of sweat trailing down the side of his face. It's all nothing but pushing and pulling as ever with them, even here, even when Newton is straddling Hermann's hips and Hermann is pushing inside of him, forehead resting on Newton's sternum and moans muffled as he bites down on the sensitive skin there. As Newton lets the feeling cascade over him he knows he wasn't expecting it to be different.
*
He still wakes up some nights from dreams that make him feel like he's got saltwater in his lungs that keeps him from breathing, but this time there are hands running through his hair and lips tracing the images on his wrists and he’s still scared, but it's getting better. He holds on to Hermann, looks into the red-rimmed eyes they both still have and says in the dark, "It's like we both got marked by God that day," and Hermann shakes his head and scoffs at him but he knows. He knows Newton has never believed in God except for in that moment.