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It's an adage perhaps as old as loss itself that "a parent should never have to bury their child." (Although these days, between the attacks and the food shortages and the fester of the Blue, there seemed to be a lot of that happening.)
But what of the parent with nothing even to bury?
Before it all, Herc had read once that it was important for the grieving process to be around the body of the deceased. That seeing it combatted denial and helped to bring a feeling of closure. That it helped one slowly come to terms with the reality of the loss and to accept it. Herc thinks that is probably true when he comes back to Chuck's room that night and has nothing but empty shoes and once-worn shirts thrown across the floor in the carelessness of youth. A half-eaten protein bar lay on the cluttered desk and a vinyl, all played out, still turned soundlessly on the player, clearly left in a hurry.
Even empty, the room still felt lived in.
It was easy to believe that the damn kid was about to stumble in from the victory party any moment now and flop into his bed with his boots still on. And Herc would have to bitch at him and roll him on his side so he didn't choke to death on his own sick.
His arm aches and Herc hates the damn thing for it. The Kaiju, it seemed, were fans of cruel bargains. A wife for a kid; a kid for an arm, huh? It hardly felt like a fair trade. How funny it was that he understood Chuck's resentment more in that moment than he ever had in the serene blue of the drift.
The metal quarters reeked of the heavy cologne of young men and Herc could see him suddenly in all the empty spaces of the room: kicking his feet up on the desk, pinning newspaper clippings to his cork-board, teasing his hair in front of the cracked mirror, awkwardly crashing into bed with some J-tech girl he met. Kicking her out later like the little shit-heel he was. Max, always welcome, climbing up into the bed soon after and curling into the space made behind Chuck's bent knees.
And speak of the damn devil. Max wandered into the room a moment later, snuffling along the floor determinedly, as if looking for something. Or someone, more likely. Herc bent and cradled the dog's head with his good hand.
"Poor bastard," he murmured, "you're not gonna find him. It's just us now."
Max, absorbing none of that, and ever his cheerfully oblivious self, let his tongue lull out of his mouth before pulling away to carefully examine the space beneath the bunk. Herc frowned, suddenly furious beyond articulation.
"Didn't you hear me, you stupid mutt?! I said he's gone! You're not gonna find him!"
The man kicked viciously at a stray pair of joggers on Chuck's floor.
"He's dead , you stupid dog! Don't you get it? It's just us now! HE'S NOT COMING BACK!"
Max yelped and cringed at the sudden outburst and immediately Herc felt like the world's biggest arsehole. Max didn't understand. Not why he was shouting and not why Chuck hadn't filled up his dinner bowl tonight, either. Herc realized then he was trembling and that at some point in his tirade, tears had begun to leak down his face. Just as suddenly as it had come, all the fight seemed to rush out of Herc like the tide going and the man crumpled to his knees and then finally slid to the floor, leaning against the cool metal walls of Chuck's room.
The dam had burst and the flood came then, wet gasping crashing over itself like waves. Nervously, Max waddled forward, unsure what to make of this behavior. His stub of a tail thumped, cautiously pleased, when Herc reached over and pulled the dog into his lap.
Long moments passed with just the panting of a dog and the grit-toothed sobbing of a man.
"Really thought he was gonna be the one to live, ya know, Max?" Herc mumbled finally into the wrinkles of Max forehead. "Thought he was gonna be the last man standing. If nothing else, because he was just too damn stubborn to die. That's who it'd be at the end. The cockroaches and little Charlie."
He squeezed Max a little tighter. "I mean, that's why I did all this shit anyway, right? Go kill all the fucking Kaiju so my kid could see a world that wasn't constantly being destroyed by those big blue bastards. Monsters are supposed to be under your kid's bed, not tearing up their damn city. "
He'd heard it all from some well meaning J-Techs earlier.
"At least it meant something."
"He helped ensure that nobody else will die from Kaiju."
"He died a hero."
He hated the last one the most. They're right, of course, but the only thing heroism had ever caused the Hansens was grief. Fame and grief.
He'd also heard from those J-Techs that their buddies on the salvage crew hadn't been able to recover any wreckage from either Striker or Danger. "Just too close to the blasts. Blown apart instantly." And then, more softly. "He wouldn't have felt anything."
A shaky sigh. Half of a hysterical laugh.
"At least he wasn't alone, right...? At least there's that."
Stacker had been beside him. Another wound too gaping to grieve at the moment.
A wet nose nudged his own and Herc looked up only to see his own tired, puffy-eyed reflection staring back at him from Max's dark eyes. His mouth felt too full, too heavy. The weight of two decades of things left unsaid. Herc needed a drink. Or several. Definitely several. As many as it took to stop feeling like half of him was in rubble at the bottom of the Pacific.
What was one to do when there is nothing left? Herc thought desperately. No body to bury? When the remains of your child lay in a short burst of radio static as a nuclear flash incinerated metal hull and shivering flesh alike in the space of a moment?
How does one begin to lay that to rest?