realistically: early on, to newt’s delight, unrealistically: not until they drift and newt sees all of hermann’s WILD ELABORATE fantasies about him and he’s just like “holy shit dude”
Stacker isn’t a character I’ve got a firm lock on (the one headcanon I have for him is that his larger than life attitude is also in imitation of someone else, that it’s a mask he can put on or take off, or at least he could, but now he’s worn it so long it’s basically part of him).
That aside, there’s a fine balance for Stacker that I do not envy. On the one hand, he must be deeply aware that everyone sticking with him at this point in the Hong Kong Shatterdome is basically a volunteer, they’re being paid peanuts if that, definitely below what they could command elsewhere as experienced scientists. He owes everyone who stuck with him a lot and he knows it and treats everyone with respect (though I think he’d do that anyway, but there’s an added layer here).
But we need to remember his moment chastising Raleigh Beckett. Respecting the people who follows him still means he has to impose discipline as a leader, which is what makes his task so unenviable and why he’d have to walk a careful line between not scaring off the people who stuck around, but not letting them run wild too. And there’s plenty of reasons people in that scenario, even as volunteers, might run wild including but not limited to: they’re under a monstrous amount of stress which tends to freak even the most level-headed people out (which K-Science IS NOT), in general there’s a lot of big personalities there, which tend to clash (K-Science but also the Jaeger pilots), probably everyone who stuck it out has a sense of their own importance in doing so to some extent, and may even expect special treatment which is resource-wise impossible, and finally: managing people is tough! Even with the best of intentions, organizing a bunch of people towards a single goal is a full time job, even if they’re very smart and able to self-organize as well.
Stacker probably has to crack the whip on occasion (to Hermann: You! Shut up!) so that things don’t spiral. I think he does so respectfully, but he can’t be seen as easy to sway given that so much is at stake.
So all of this applies to the K-Science team but to be more specific I’d say this: he is always short but scrupulously respectful with them. He calls Newt “Newt” which is his preferred name, and he calls Hermann “Dr. Gottlieb” which is his preferred form of address. He probably has to be short with them because both given the chance would just ramble for hours and he doesn’t have the time, literally. But he’s up front and honest about this fact, which is important for communicating with subordinates, he doesn’t snap unless they step out of line first (like Hermann when Stacker’s trying to talk to Newt). You’ll notice that even though he goes with Hermann’s research over Newt’s, he doesn’t put Newt down, he listens to everyone involved and makes a decision. Time is precious, and he doesn’t have the time to listen to the ins-and-outs of what might or might not work.
As for his opinion on them? I think he respects them. I think he’s aware they’re brilliant, and he’s aware that they’re giving up a great deal to help him. I think he’s aware they’re eccentric and will talk for hours if given the chance, but they will deliver the results he needs and then some, because they’ll look for unusual solutions, which is also what he needs, since obviously the past studies have not been enough to figure out a way to close the Breach.
I’m sure they can be exasperating too, but that just requires a firm hand so they don’t run amok. They’re a managerial nightmare but they can be managed and I’m sure, if Stacker ever had the opportunity to drop the mask and spend time with them as people, they wouldn’t necessarily be the first ones he’d seek out just for funsies and down time, he would always walk away having learned something and would probably politely excuse himself before the urge to strangle one of them set in (and just leave them to strangle each other, what they do on their down time is their own business ;P)
honestly when aliens arrive we should start having sex with them as soon as possible. so when they decide to take over a lot of them already have emotional connections/physical offspring and will form a sizeable resistance. not me, i don’t want to, but i know a lot of you would be into that, and i’m telling you it’s okay, you’re actually the last hope for our species.
Manny Flores has been with the PPDC for nearly a decade by the time he’s transferred to Hong Kong. He just wants to do his job. And he’s good at it. But when he receives the 15th complaint from one Dr. Hermann Gottlieb in only three days, his patience is running thin.
He wonders which of the two scientists would be more of a nightmare to cohabitate a working space with: Dr. Gottlieb – sender of endless petty complaints, or Dr. Geiszler, their hapless subject.
From a @geniusbeehive tweet requesting “…a fic from the POV of the shatterdome HR rep who knows hermann’s in love with newt before hermann does based on the complaints he files” (and I am not the first to fill the prompt)
““Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself.” Tulkas commanded, yet Melkor could not, as the Vala had him by the wrists and was hitting him with his own hands.”
Taken from Sophia Chua-Rubenfeld, daughter of the Tiger Mother
Preliminary Steps
1. Choose classes that interest you. That way studying doesn’t feel like slave labor. If you don’t want to learn, then I can’t help you. 2. Make some friends. See steps 12, 13, 23, 24.
General Principles
3. Study less, but study better. 4. Avoid Autopilot Brain at all costs. 5. Vague is bad. Vague is a waste of your time. 6. Write it down. 7. Suck it up, buckle down, get it done.
Plan of Attack Phase I: Class
8. Show up. Everything will make a lot more sense that way, and you will save yourself a lot of time in the long run. 9. Take notes by hand. I don’t know the science behind it, but doing anything by hand is a way of carving it into your memory. Also, if you get bored you will doodle, which is still a thousand times better than ending up on stumbleupon or something.
Phase II: Study Time
10. Get out of the library. The sheer fact of being in a library doesn’t fill you with knowledge. Eight hours of Facebooking in the library is still eight hours of Facebooking. Also, people who bring food and blankets to the library and just stay there during finals week start to smell weird. Go home and bathe. You can quiz yourself while you wash your hair. 11. Do a little every day, but don’t let it be your whole day. “This afternoon, I will read a chapter of something and do half a problem set. Then, I will watch an episode of South Park and go to the gym” ALWAYS BEATS “Starting right now, I am going to read as much as I possibly can…oh wow, now it’s midnight, I’m on page five, and my room reeks of ramen and dysfunction.” 12. Give yourself incentive. There’s nothing worse than a gaping abyss of study time. If you know you’re going out in six hours, you’re more likely to get something done. 13. Allow friends to confiscate your phone when they catch you playing Angry Birds. Oh and if you think you need a break, you probably don’t.
Phase III: Assignments
14. Stop highlighting. Underlining is supposed to keep you focused, but it’s actually a one-way ticket to Autopilot Brain. You zone out, look down, and suddenly you have five pages of neon green that you don’t remember reading. Write notes in the margins instead. 15. Do all your own work. You get nothing out of copying a problem set. It’s also shady. 16. Read as much as you can. No way around it. Stop trying to cheat with Sparknotes. 17. Be a smart reader, not a robot (lol).Ask yourself: What is the author trying to prove? What is the logical progression of the argument? You can usually answer these questions by reading the introduction and conclusion of every chapter. Then, pick any two examples/anecdotes and commit them to memory (write them down). They will help you reconstruct the author’s argument later on. 18. Don’t read everything, but understand everything that you read. Better to have a deep understanding of a limited amount of material, than to have a vague understanding of an entire course. Once again: Vague is bad. Vague is a waste of your time. 19. Bullet points. For essays, summarizing, everything.
Phase IV: Reading Period (Review Week)
20. Once again: do not move into the library. Eat, sleep, and bathe. 21. If you don’t understand it, it will definitely be on the exam. Solution: textbooks; the internet. 22. Do all the practice problems. This one is totally tiger mom. 23. People are often contemptuous of rote learning. Newsflash: even at great intellectual bastions like Harvard, you will be required to memorize formulas, names and dates. To memorize effectively: stop reading your list over and over again. It doesn’t work. Say it out loud, write it down. Remember how you made friends? Have them quiz you, then return the favor. 24. Again with the friends: ask them to listen while you explain a difficult concept to them. This forces you to articulate your understanding. Remember, vague is bad. 25. Go for the big picture. Try to figure out where a specific concept fits into the course as a whole. This will help you tap into Big Themes – every class has Big Themes – which will streamline what you need to know. You can learn a million facts, but until you understand how they fit together, you’re missing the point.
Avelera 