sciencesaggressively | not cool, brain, not cool

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kate

not cool, brain, not cool

He'd drifted off easily enough, a smile on his face because his arm had been draped over Kate's waist, their fingers entwined and his forehead resting against her shoulder. He doesn't know how deep into sleep he is when it starts, the images tinted in blue--images and memories and emotions. He can see the Precursors, sees their wide eyes as Gipsy Danger destroys them all and closes the breach, a victory for the PPDC but nothing but pain and tragedy for the aliens; he can feel it when Striker Eureka kills Scunner; when Gipsy blasts Leatherback into oblivion. It's all pain, experience his mind believes he's connected to because of the drifts, and the part of his mind that is still just Newt is desperate to get the hell out of this, for an escape, for the pain to ease and--

He wakes up, chest heaving, and he paws at the nightstand beside him until he manages to find his glasses. He blinks a few times, trying to adjust back to reality, and realizes his hands are gripping the bedsheets so tightly that they're trembling. Or maybe it's his whole body that's trembling, that's quickly becoming a larger possibility. His one relief right now is that Kate only shifts a little in her sleep, and he holds his breath until she stops moving and her breathing steadies again; it's the last thing he wants to do, wake her up because of this shit, but then he feels something wet dripping down his nose and he curses to himself as he reaches up to wipe what he knows is blood away.

"Goddammit," he mutters to himself, trying his hardest to slide out of bed without disturbing her. He makes it to the bathroom quietly enough even without his cane to help and winces when he turns on the light, his eyes adjusting to the brightness. When he catches sight of his bloody mess of a face, he grimaces, shaking his head. He grabs at some toilet paper and perches on the edge of the bathtub, stuffing his nose with a distressed sigh. He has no clue what the hell had spurred the nightmare, he hasn't had one since the first time nearly a month ago. He'd honestly thought this wasn't going to be an issue but even if it is, he needs to be able to figure out if this is going to be a random occurrence or if he'll be able to map this out. Nobody needs to know about this, right? It's nothing.

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"That could've been my job. Need something from a sketchy source? Bring Kate, she's super cute and has a great rack and can probably talk them into anything for you and is weirdly fearless when it comes to her own personal safety," she says with a snort of laughter. She still remembers her first day at the debt collection agency, that weirdo dude who sat behind her asking if she could get to yes and telling him that was just what girls did. It's just been one of those things she's always been good at, getting her way, although she's pretty sure it's not always due to the fact that she's cute and more due to the fact that she's completely relentless when she wants something and is willing to do just about anything to get it.

The whole personal safety thing maybe isn't something to be super proud of, she knows, but it's just not something she thinks about until she's being mugged or stalked or her creepy manager has broken into her house in an attempt to get her to run away with him. Or she's being stabbed by a crazy girl on an island. There's kind of a disturbingly long list of stupid situations she's gotten herself into, now that she thinks about.

"Okay, so maybe the personal safety bit is a bad thing," she admits. "But the rest works."

"Yeah, you'd definitely strike fear into the hearts of all competing Chinese black market crime lords," he replies with a laugh of his own. The though of Kate going head-to-head with Chau--rather, head-to-chest, which had been his own case--is kind of ridiculously awesome and come on, how would Chau even say no to a face like hers? He's thinking she's probably right, she could totally take all those big creeper types; especially when being on the receiving end of her tendency to be endlessly persistent in getting what she wants She's definitely worn him down, in the best possible way, he's pretty sure there's no way he could say no to her at this point. If only Hermann could see him now.

Personal safety, though, there's a thing he's never really paid a whole lot of attention to in his life span. "Personal safety is totally overrated," he says. "World would totally be fucked if I wasted two seconds being concerned about that, so meh."

"Okay, valid point on your part, but you still ended up with nose bleeds and shitty dreams," she points out and she totally doesn't want to get into a serious conversation with him about his health again. It makes her worry enough just to think about it on her own, she doesn't want the both of them lying awake, staring at the ceiling, wondering if he's going to be okay. He is going to be okay, that's all there is to it, because there's no way in hell she's meeting someone like him just to lose him right away to something like giant monster memories.

"And, anyway, I don't have that reasoning, dude. I've never saved the world, all I've ever done is get myself into stupid situations that pretty much benefit absolutely no one, least of all myself. Like, who decides that engaging in risky behaviour with someone clearly less than stable is a good idea? Because shit like that usually ends with people being stalked and like, harassed and just generally not good stuff. No saving the world there, just plain old stupidity." It's not that she thinks she's stupid, she just knows she made some less than stellar decisions in the past.

He tries not to flinch at that--not because she's offended him in some way or anything, it's just that for a minute, he'd almost forgotten the reason they're both even awake right now. He clears his throat, rubbing at his eyes like he can rub his worry from his mind and manages to nod because if he's silent any longer, she'll know for sure something's off and he doesn't want her to think that. At least, not any more than she already does. "Beats the alternative. Although, Chuck definitely beat the odds so I guess it's possible I could have, too."

"To be fair," he counters, "I've had about 15 more years worth of chances to be stupid. And I know plenty of people who would attest to the fact that they think I am, genius thing aside. You make choices, you deal with the consequences, you learn from it. That's how it is and hell, that's a bare bones simplification of how science works, too. Besides, you may not have saved the world but you definitely saved me. From, y'know, bleeding on the floor. More than once."

"Yeah, without me, you'd be totally screwed," she says dryly, but she's smiling a little against his arm. No one's ever really needed her and he hasn't used those exact words, but the implication is still kind of that she'd been necessary to have around. At least twice. And she's fine with not being needed, because it's not like her tendency to blow people off and be a general asshole is the kind of thing anyone needs in their life, but it's nice all the same. Nicer than she's ever realized.

"So is that why I'm being kept around? To be your nurse?" she asks in a teasing voice, tilting her head back slightly to look up at him. "I mean, I know we talked about the sponge bath thing, but I didn't realize I was so important in the whole not bleeding on the floor aspect of your life." She keeps thinking about how she should let him go back to sleep, how much she'd like to be sleeping again, but she likes this more. She's warm and comfortable and content, curled up against Newt's side in his bed, knowing he'll still be there in the morning. "I mean, I guess as relationship standards go, that's less weird than some others I've had."

He murmurs back a sound of agreement at that because okay, no, he wouldn't be like, dead or anything; but he'd definitely have woken up in the middle of the night totally freaked out and alone with nobody to talk him down, nobody to act as an anchor; and that's what she's been, an anchor, someone he's been able to count on from the start of all this. He doesn't think Chuck would be all that enthusiastic to come over and cuddle with him or listen to him whisper cutesy things in German. Chuck certainly wouldn't suggest a game of Sexy Chicken as an exhale.

"Not just to be a nurse, you're nice to look at, too," he shoots back, rolling his eyes playfully. "Well, you were there for the actual bleeding onto the floor, and you still stuck around. So that definitely counts for something." It counts for a whole lot, actually, not that he would ever have thought she'd bail on him just for getting in the way of a car or anything, but the relationship had still been pretty new--by some standards, might even still be considered pretty new--and she could have washed her hands of resopnsibility. But she hadn't. So here they are.

"Yeah, I'm totally adorable, I'm glad your priorities are straight," she says with a laugh, rolling onto her back, one arm throw over her head. She drums her fingers absently on the wall behind them, tapping lightly as Newt speaks and then she looks over at him again, her smile softening. Maybe this is the same way he feels when she thanks him for sticking around after the creepy casket incident, because she can't imagine not sticking around. He's saying it counts for something, but she thinks it's maybe a little more selfish than he realizes. She'd stayed with him the night of the accident because the idea of leaving him, the idea of not knowing, not being around, it had made her feel like her chest was made of a block of ice. She'd stayed because the alternative had been way too awful for her to deal with.

"Only a total dickbag would show up to meet someone for karaoke and then bail when they found him lying on the sidewalk," she says. "Especially when he was trying to buy them flowers. I mean, seriously dude, a guy gets injured buying you flowers and that's it. You're done. You owe him at least a few more dates." She's teasing, grinning over at him, because she clearly has no intention of just giving him a few more dates and then moving on. She's here, she has no intention of going anywhere.

"Oh, always," he laughs, which actually is true of him. Granted, his priorities don't always make sense to other people or line up with what might be considered particularly normal or legitimate, but he doesn't really care about that. Kate really has been his priority lately, which he knows could easily come off as overwhelming, and he's glad he hasn't gotten the sense that she wants him to back off or anything. Though that might have something to do with the fact that she's had to be the one to come to him, what with him being temporarily immobile.

"It was all a ploy," he says, his tone playful in spite of the subject matter because yeah, it had been a really shitty thing that happened to him but he's come out on the other end okay. Better to be able to joke about it now than be mopey every time it comes up, right? It's not like he'd actually lost his leg, after all. "I really just wanted you to nurse me back to health so that we could almost have sex and you could see me bleed from my nose all over the bathroom floor. It's cute, right? I mean, clearly it's been working."

"Clearly," she agrees and although her tone is dry, she's actually serious. She knows none of this has really been a ploy to get her to stick around and if the accident hadn't happened, she's pretty sure they'd still be here right now, maybe even talking about the nightmares, although maybe they'd just be having sex instead, because she's pretty sure getting laid would be a great distraction. Either way, she doesn't think much would change if he hadn't been hit by a car, but there is the possibility that it's brought them closer a lot quicker. Between what happened to her and what happened to him, they've kind of seen some of the shittier sides of life already, and it's all been within such a short period of time that she wonders if she'd be feeling the way she does if she hadn't already seen how willing he is to stick around for her.

"You're always cute, so bloody nose or not, I'm pretty sure I'm fully into you," she tells him with a soft laugh. "But, you know, as far as ploys go, next time you might want to think of one that doesn't keep us from having sex. I mean, if there's a ploy in your repertoire that doesn't end with broken limbs, I vote for that one next time."

He meets her gaze, though it's strangely difficult all of a sudden to maintain the eye contact. Sometimes gravity sets in when he looks at her, during times like now when they're laughing and teasing and just enjoying each other's company at the ass crack of dawn, and his heart gives a lurch because he thinks that maybe losing her would fuck him up a lot more than anything else. He'd thought he'd woken up to the end of the world--or his world, rather--when he'd realized Darrow's a city without kaiju but really, what would he do if woke up one day somewhere else in a city without Kate?

It kickstarts his compulsion to talk, not that it ever really goes away, especially not with someone who enjoys talking as much as he does. But he lifts the corners of his mouth into a smile and small as it may seem, it's genuine. "Hey, thanks, you're not so bad yourself," he retorts and her words have already put him at ease as he tries but fails to keep a straight face. His anchor. And she's right, as far as ploys go, claiming responsibility for the one that forces them to keep their pants on probably isn't his best move. "I promise that next time, I will try not to break any limbs. But then there's the time after that, and I just can't see that far into the future, I might lose an arm entirely. Maybe both my arms. Will you still like me if I'm armless Newt?"

"Hm, I don't know," she says, as if she's weighing the options, when in reality, she's pretty sure she'll stick around through absolutely anything. That thought, more than any others she's had, is the one that's scary, because bailing when things get rough is kind of what she does. It's a self-preservation tactic, it keeps her from getting hurt, and even with Harry, who had been the most serious relationship she's had before this, she'd spent a lot of time under the influence of something. They'd talked about the war he'd been in once or twice, but for the most part they'd avoided anything serious and she's not doing that here. In fact, she's not avoiding much of anything and she sure as hell isn't spending most of her time stoned.

"So you're armless, but you still have your legs, right?" she asks, just barely managing to keep a straight face. "Actually, more importantly, do you still have your dick? I can probably overlook the lack of arms if you still have all your other working parts." But then she smiles, unable to keep it up and her nose wrinkles as she shrugs. "Yeah, I'll still like you. And if you don't have any arms, at least I won't catch you trying to change lightbulbs."

"I still have my dick," he answers, and he's trying to sound super serious but his body betrays him as his shoulders start shaking from attempting to keep his laughter internal. The nice thing is, he knows that even though they're just dicking around--heh--he's on the side of positive that he doesn't have to worry about her leaving. Unless she likes, disappears back to that island or something, which he refuses to even give more thought to because he's not going to waste time worrying about waking up one day to find her gone when she's right here with him now.

"I'd totally stick around for you if you had no arms and no dick, just for the record." And that sounds so off but whatever, she knows what he means even if she'll mock him about it. He's fine with that.

"That's super good to know, given that I currently don't have a dick and have never had a dick," she answers, her eyebrows raised even as she smiles at him. "Wait, that's not true, there was that one time I had a dick, but it didn't last, obviously." And although it still sounds like she's joking, she's not, which she has the island to thank for. It had actually been a pretty good weekend, with the exception of her then-boyfriend being completely terrified of her, as if being a dude somehow meant she was somehow going to convince him that having loads of sex would be the best thing in the world. Which, okay, had actually been her intention until he'd freaked out.

"The weirdest thing about that was my centre of gravity," she admits, although she hasn't explained what she means even a little bit and she pauses, then purses her lips slightly. "The island did stuff like that to people sometimes, which sounds totally fucking crazy, I know, but I swear I woke up as a dude one day and it was kind of awesome. I was tall and had all these muscles and leaning how to walk in a different body is seriously the weirdest thing in the world."

"Wait, wait, wait." He shifts so he's half-sitting, relying on his elbows to keep him up as he shoots her an incredulous look. "You turned into a dude? Like, full biology, DNA switch-up, actual dude?" He stares at her for a long moment, his brain trying to process exactly what that means because it's simply not possible but holy shit. "That's amazing! Can you did it again, does that happen here? Oh my god, could I become a woman?"

He realizes that this kind of thing is probably the reason some people can get so put off talking to him--wondering aloud what would happen if he'd crossed human and kaiju DNA back at the 'Dome had definitely lost him some friends he'd never had in the first place--but whatever, he'd totally take samples of his own blood and do some testing on DNA if he ever turns into a woman in this place. Freakin' awesome.

"Full blown dude," she confirms with a nod, then giggles, because she's still tired and it's pretty funny. "Well, not full blown because no one seemed to think that was a very good idea, but yeah, I was a dude. Completely biologically accurate, although I guess I can't answer for sure about the DNA and all my insides, since no one really bothered to test that or if they did, they didn't tell me. But I felt different, you know? Like... I don't know, things were just different inside me."

Briefly, she thinks about the time she's spent in Darrow and she shakes her head in response to his other questions. "I don't know if it happens here. It hasn't happened to anyone I know. On the island, it used to happen to a bunch of people at once. I was living with my brother in a dorm at that point and we both woke up switched. Jeff, the guy my dog is named after? He'd turned into this really gorgeous blonde woman and shit, he was so mad." Which she still can't understand, because it's not like breasts are that difficult to deal with. A penis is a hell of a lot more uncomfortable when you aren't used to it in the first place.

"That's a shame, you totally missed out," he says with a cheeky smile. He's still preoccupied with thoughts of a person's entire DNA structure changing over night, XX chromosomes transforming into XY chromosomes because, what, some island dubs it so? It doesn't make any sort of logical sense, there's no scientific reason for it, but according to Kate, it had happened and that's enough for him to believe that it's true. It's not that DNA doesn't change naturally, but it's a long process, it's the process of evolution. A person just doesn't wake up with their entire biological structure different, it's just not a thing. Except for on that island, apparently. There are techniques he's worked with, ways to encourage change and jumpstart the polymerase process but he's never tried it with people.

"I want it," he announces, nodding firmly. "Can we call someone for that? Do a rain dance kinda thing? Because I'm so down to become my own experimental patient."

"Wait, you want to turn into a woman or you want me to turn into a dude again?" she asks, laughing. Either way, she's pretty sure it's not the sort of thing they can request, but if she turns into a man again, she would kind of like some advance warning of when it's coming. She also hopes, if it has to happen again, that it won't be a total bust like last time, except she's not really sure how to say something like that.

Totally doesn't matter, anyway, it's all hypothetical.

"If you turn into a woman, can I dress you?" she asks. He's interested in the science behind it, she just wants to make sure he looks good while he's doing it and she's sure he can probably pick out his own clothes as a woman, too, but she has a whole closet full for him to use.

He waves his hands wildly, not even sure what the gesture's supposed to mean, and shrugs. "Doesn't even matter! Either? Both? I'm not going to be picky about a biological miracle." He won't, he swears to the science gods or whatever that he won't, he just wants to see it with his own eyes. Or with his own eyes under a microscope, preferably.

"You can dress me," he allows. "I'm going to draw the line at thongs, though." He's not a fan. Well, he'd be a fan if he saw Kate in one but for himself, not so much. "What do I get to do for you if you turn into a dude again?"

"Take me to the gym so I can build up my man muscles?" she asks before dissolving into laughter again, because the idea of them at the gym together is beyond funny for some reason, especially picturing herself as a guy. She's hardly a gym person to begin with and given how much difficulty she'd had with her balance the last time it had happened, she can't imagine wanting to go work out if it ever happens again.

She kind of never wants to go work out, though, so not much would change there.

"Shit, dude, I don't know. Whatever you want," she says, stretching in the bed. "Take a zillion blood samples and whatever else you want to do to see what's going on internally and... I don't know." She pauses, because she knows exactly what she'd want, but she's already freaked out one boyfriend that way in the past and she hasn't been with Newt long enough to judge how he might react to something like that. She thinks it would be okay, though, and as the pause stretches longer, she lifts her shoulder in a shrug. "Y'know. Anything."

He narrows his eyes at that, glancing down at his decidedly not flat stomach and looks back at her with an arched brow. "Don't think that's gonna work for me, sorry. The last time I went to the gym, it was to ask for change for the snack machine." In his defense, the gym-goers in the Shatterdome had been super intense, especially with the entirety of the Team Russia group dominating most of the machines. He's always been far more than content being mentally actively anyway but hey, he'd managed to outrun a baby kaiju so he's clearly not in the most terrible shape he could be.

"A zillion blood samples and internal examinations, hmm? You might sing a different tune if I actually try those things." He notes the pause, smiling to himself at the thought of what she might say--something sexual, he's guessing, and he's not exactly opposed to that. "Anything?"

She's still giggling at the idea of the two of them at a gym when he echoes her and her smile grows a little as she shrugs. If he wants, she really will let him take blood samples and do whatever he needs to in order to satisfy his scientific curiosity. She's not afraid of needles and doesn't have an issue helping him out, especially when it's something he's clearly interested in. It might be boring because she's sure she won't follow at least half of what he does, but she'll just like, bring a book or something.

Her smile and shrug are more directed at the other thing he's said, though, and she figures she can play coy or she can just be honest about it. He hasn't thrown her out of bed yet, after all, and it's not like she's been super subtle with the lengthy pauses. "Seriously, if I turn into a man again and I don't get a blowjob, I'm gonna be so pissed," she says. "But that's my only real request. Beyond that, the anything totally stands." If she only gets the body for a couple of days, she figures she should take advantage of that, even if people haven't always agreed with her in the past.

He pretends to be on the fence, shifting his hands like he's weighing his options before leaning in to give her a deep kiss. When he pulls away, he rests a hand just above the line of her panties and grins. "I will totally give you the best damn blowjob of your life," he promises, which he figures is legitimate enough because it will have been her only blowjob. "But you're so going to have to return the favor if I turn into a woman."

It's all hypothetical, he knows that, but he's having fun just thinking about it, even aside from the scientific implications and the impact it could have if he could study such a phenomenon. He settles back down, smiling up at the ceiling as he moves her hand from her stomach to grasp her hand. "As long as it's you, I'm not really opposed to much. I mean, there's a short list, but it's for whether you're a man or a woman, so y'know, whatever."

They've done this to themselves all over again and Kate knows she should change the subject or, at the very least, think about something else, but then he's kissing her and promising to give her a hypothetical blowjob and he has his hand right there, so she can't really be blamed for not being able to think about anything else. Even if she's pretty much convinced of her own heterosexuality, she thinks she'd be able to bend the rules a little bit for Newt if he turned into a woman. He'd probably be a ridiculously adorable woman, too.

"I could do that for you," she decides, squeezing his hand lightly, her fingers threaded with his. It's almost as bad as playing Sexy Chicken again, but there's also something really sweet about what he's saying. He just wants her and she only wants him, so that works out pretty well for the both of them, she figures. "I mean, I've never been with a girl before, I've never even really given it much thought, but if it was you as a woman... yeah, I could do that." Maybe it'll never happen, maybe it's nothing she'll ever have to think about it again, but she's pretty sure she'd be into it. "What the hell, right? I mean, I'm not gonna be the one to deny you something like that. That'd just be shitty."

He gives her a gentle nudge in the side with his elbow. "You wouldn't have to do it, I would never like, y'know, force you or whatever. Give you an ultimatum. Any of that. 'Sides, knowing how awesome I think it would be, it'll probably take another 12 years for it to happen anyway so you've got some time to think about it some more." He's so down to give her a blowjob if the dude thing ever happens, but he'll be content not to get any action as a woman himself--he just wants the DNA samples. He thinks it's a little absurd that this is even a possibility, a thing that they're having a legitimate conversation about what guidelines should be followed if either of them were ever to switch sexes.

"But hey, if you're up to it, I'm not going to argue the point. As long as you don't decide to like, never speak to me again until my dick is back where it's supposed to be, everything will be good."

Kate shakes her head, smiling up at the ceiling. "I don't like you just for your penis, dude," she points out, her voice teasing. "Given that I'm totally lying in your bed at whatever o'clock in the morning and your leg is broken and I still haven't seen your dick I feel like that should be obvious. No, I could totally be into getting busy with you as a woman." But she doesn't think the same extends to anyone else. She's kind of surrounded by a lot of gorgeous women in Darrow, as she was on the island, but she never has anything even close to feelings of attraction toward them. It really is just all Newt.

Turning over, she rests her forearm on his chest, looking up at him. "You'd be a gorgeous woman, too. I can totally see it. I don't need twelve years to think about it." The thought that she might be around and with him long enough for that time to pass, though, isn't as scary as she once would have thought. It's a long time, she'd be in her thirties by then, but maybe she'll still be here. And maybe she'll still be with him. It's kind of a nice thought.

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