Physical Compatibility

He had Yao naked and draped over his chest fast asleep. They were lying in the dark save for the glow of a clock on the bedside table striking two, and as tiny and uncomfortably cramped as it was in the single bunk bed, Ivan thought he never wanted this moment to end. That was when the alarm sounded.

Kaiju alert. Category Three. All pilots to assemble – stat. Kaiju alert. Category Three. All pilots to assemble…

Yao stirred groggily awake, his usually bright brown-golden eyes rheumy with sleep. He looked annoyed. Ivan shared Yao's irritation, but he only smiled and pecked at Yao's frown-creased forehead, wordlessly conveying I'm sorry and I love you.

Yao could not help but return Ivan's smile with a tight, grudging one of his own.

"What time is it?" he croaked.

"Two o'clock."

"In the morning?"

They could hear the other Rangers slamming out of their cubicles and racing down the gangway towards the Drivesuit Room, their boots thudding hard on the metal grilles as they went by. Alfred Jones, the new American Ranger, could be heard whooping over the din of the still-droning alarm, "It's a Cat Three, guys, come on!"

Cursing in Mandarin, Yao peeled himself from Ivan and stumbled out of bed, snatching his clothes off the floor and pulling them on with practiced speed. He put on his shirt first, to quickly conceal the angry-red scar cut into his back. Ivan knew better than to ask about it. Besides he already knew; he had seen it in Yao's memories when they Drifted for the first time together.

He was reluctantly reaching for his own clothes when there was a knock on the door; three hard thumps of a fist against solid metal.

"We're coming!" Yao snapped irritably.

"We?" came the leery, French-accented reply. Francis Bonnefoy.

"Oh leave them alone," they heard his English partner, Arthur Kirkland, grumbling. "As if you haven't had your ear pressed all night to their wall…"

Five minutes later the alarm was finally cut off. Every Ranger had woken and was gathered at their stations getting suited up. Alfred was waving his arms madly about in his infinite enthusiasm, as excited as the dogs belonging to the German Rangers running round and round the room getting under everybody's feet. Through the window they could see the Jaegers powering up in the docking bays, the technicians in their yellow hardhats looking as small as ants as they scaled the behemoths and carried out final checks to the exterior.

Over ten years ago, an alien species they now called kaiju came from beneath the Pacific Ocean. The kaiju destroyed coastal towns and whole continents, and when ordinary military strikes proved ineffective against them, every nation set their differences aside and poured resources into a shared global programme building monsters of their own – gigantic humanoid machines called Jaegers that matched the kaiju strength for strength.

The Jaegers were operated by pilots known as Rangers who, strapped into the cockpit and hooked to the suit, controlled them via a neural bridge connecting their minds to machine in a process known as Drifting. In this way they controlled every action of a Jaeger, and entered into hand-to-hand combat with the kaiju whenever they appeared.

Two Rangers were required to pilot a single Jaeger, as the mental load of Drifting one was simply too much for a single person to take on alone. The tasks were split between them onboard; one controlling the left hand side of the suit and the other the right hand side. To coordinate their movements, the partnered Rangers shared the neural connection running the machine, which also had the side effect of cramming both their personal memories together.

In order for such an arrangement to work, any two partnered Rangers were required to be Drift Compatible from the outset. Most pilots found themselves teamed up with close friends or family members with whom they share certain similarities; the German pilots Gilbert and Ludwig Weilschmidt were said to be a perfect physical and mental match together, for example.

Some partners were complementary, such as the loud Alfred Jones who was matched with his shy and quieter Canadian cousin Matthew Williams. Other partners appeared mismatched outwardly but were surprisingly good partners together; Arthur and Francis of the Anglo-French alliance were two of the most coordinated Rangers for all their differences and constant bickering.

For Ivan and Yao, however, who had not known each for long, and whose partnership had come through a diplomatic pact between their respective nations, it had taken a lot of work for them to get to where they were today. Falling into bed together was one thing; learning to fight together was another entirely. And at times such as this when Yao was in one of his surly lapses and refused to meet his eyes, Ivan wondered if they were ever going to become fully compatible with one another.

All pilots to board Jaegers.

"OKAY GUYS LET'S DO THIS SHIT!" Alfred screamed.

"If you shout into the intercom again du dumme Amerikanische…!" one of the German pilots screeched just as loudly into his own microphone, causing everyone to wince for a second time from their earpieces.

"Idiots," Yao muttered, holding his helmet at arm's length as Arthur joined in with a few choice words of his own.

Ivan simply smiled his usual smile, masking his own impatience.

They were finally stepping into the Conn-Pod, the cockpit of their Jaeger, and strapping themselves into the machine. A technician took to counting down from their earpieces as they lay back and prepared to Drift, feeling the Jaeger rumble with surging electrical power.

Then, on a sudden impulse, Ivan reached out and took Yao's hand in his, squeezing it gently. Yao started.

They had come this far from being strangers, and with every mission they completed the gap between them narrowed. Facing another Drift together, another dip into each other's most intimate memories, Ivan quelled his doubts, sinking them into the depths of his own mind, and convinced himself that one day they would be fully compatible with one another.

He turned to see that Yao was looking at him with questioning eyes. He smiled again, a genuine one this time, prompting Yao's features to soften.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

Yao nodded, and could not help but return Ivan's smile with a hesitant one of his own.

Author's note

I was bitterly disappointed with Pacific Rim for its lack of complexities (lol complexity in a popcorn movie what?). Won't go too much into that because ugh I'll never shut up then. But the biggest craw for me was when the Russian and Chinese Jaegers, with pilots built up as these badasses with killer records, got absolutely annihilated in five minutes flat and I just... uuugh! The pilots didn't even get a line in between the five of them! I mean I could have forgiven the movie for everything if that scene hadn't be so ridiculous I actually shouted, "Seriously?!" to everyone in the theatre.

So this is a sort of savagely-written Hetalia fix-it fic starring RoChu (my precious OTP don't think I've abandoned you ;^;).

Special thanks to Hollyrose for beta-reading. Any mistakes that slipped through are entirely mine though orz