Father Of A Pilot
The Seldon Planner Presents:
An ETHERWORLDS Production.
"Father Of A Pilot"
Part One.
~~~
"She's dead."
In the background the electronic beeping faded, the lights were turned off. And the sheet was pulled over the limp form that lay peacefully on the bed of white. Slowly the varied doctors and nurses left the room, passing by the two figures that remained in the room before leaving them to their thoughts and emotions. The first pulled off her glasses and rubbed her nose tiredly. She had been up for several days trying to find a cure, but to no avail.
The other, simply frowned at the covered body. Sneering at its frail form and thin torso as it was covered by the bed sheet.
"I couldn't find anything to counteract the rapid decomposition brought about by her creating an AT Field. It wasn't within my knowledge."
"Enough, Akagi...leave."
The blonde hesitated as she considered her options. One was she disobey him and possibly get thrown back into jail while the other was to leave while she could and take her chance to escape from this hell. She bowed and left, letting the door click shut.
"I don't care anymore. I just don't give a damn-" Ritsuko thought as she rounded a corner, nearly running headlong into Shinji. "Oh-"
"..."
The boy looked horrible. His face was drawn in and tight against his face from lack of food. His eyes were ringed with sleeplessness and reddened from tears. Much like she felt.
"Shinji? What...what are you doing here?"
"They're running some tests on Asuka and I just found out that...that Re-Rei's..." he sobbed softly and stopped, clutching his hand to his mouth as he tried to regain control. The doctor looked sympathetically at him before taking his shoulder and turning him away from the door.
"Wh-where are you taking me? I want to see Rei!" he protested and moved out of her grip.
"Do you 'want' to be in the same room as your father?" sarcasm laced her words like a poison. And they had their desired effect as Shinji's face cringed away and turned bitter, "You need food, so lets go get some."
His face turned away and his eyes stared at the far wall for a moment before he faced back and nodded.
"Yeah, lets..."
Slowly the pair walked away from the medical ward.
Leaving the smell of clean death and sterilized decay behind.
***
Gendo Ikari remained staring at her limp form. He was morbidly fascinated with it. As he finally realized in his second hour of vigil. It was as though he expected her to wake at any moment. Wake and help him finalize his plans for Third Impact.
Impossible, now.
"Damn you Akagi...damn you and your meddling!" Gendo angrily lashed out at the nearby table, his fist slamming into its prefabricated surface with a vicious crack.
His face cringed a bit as he felt his knuckles slice open.
His glove reddened.
"Damn you...damn Seele...damn Keel...damn it all..." he slumped forward against the table, his hands gripping the edges as he let himself vent.
"Fifteen years...all for nothing," Gendo felt his knuckles go white from his grip. "I lost my wife, lost any chance of having a family with my son! And now...I lost my last chance to make that reality...I've lost R-Rei."
Gendo felt himself go slack, felt himself loosen his grip on the table as he felt reality slide away from him. He who held it firmly in check for so long finally felt the first hints of loneliness.
"Yui. Yui I have failed once more...I can't come back with you. I will suffer my own hell for my sins," his head lifted up and stared at the bed again. "I don't even know my son, I'm truly a monster."
***
The pair sat quietly in the abandoned NERV cafeteria. The only personnel active at this hour were the unfortunate few pulling the snack bar duty that consisted of fixing quick sandwiches or light soups and coffee that was essential at keeping the rest of NERV awake in the long cold hours of the night.
Ritsuko absently sipped that famed black liquid as she studied the boy before her. She examined him much as she would study a test animal...it made him feel lonely, distant.
'Poor boy has to endure so much for so little return...its actually a shame,' she thought.
"Why?"
Ritsuko watched him a few more moments. Noting that his head moved in time with his breaths. Raising. Lowering. Raising again. She let the time pass as she studied this, finding fascination in such a small movement.
Shinji felt his patience slipping much like the time that passed. So he asked again.
"Why?"
Ritsuko set down her cup and reached out for his chin. Shinji nearly threw himself away from that hand, but held his body in check and allowed his chin to be raised. His eyes fell across the doctors impassive yet caring eyes.
"Now that I can see you, I will explain," Ritsuko glanced at the clock and wondered how long she had before Ikari came to his senses and ordered her death.
"The seventeenth angel..." she paused as his eyes deepened with sadness and memory. "Do you remember the third AT Field?"
The pause was laden with tension and apprehension as Shinji rapidly made connections in his delicate stream of thought.
"Yes," his voice sounded flat, dead. Monotone. "Rei...it was her wasn't it?"
"She created it yes...and suffered because of what it did."
"H-how?"
"At the Sea of Guf...you remember what I told you and Misato there don't you?" Ritsuko leaned forward and glanced to the door.
"Yes...about her being part of my mother and part of an angel."
***
He had stopped his crying.
It was to emotionally draining for him to show his feelings these days. Too painful, too weak. He couldn't even remember when he started crying, just that in an instant water impregnated with salt was rolling down into the corners of his mouth. Intermingling with the brown hairs of his beard.
Gendo Ikari hated having emotions. It made him weak, made him feel inferior to those above him. Yet it was the only thing that he kept for Yui's sake. The only part of himself that he did not attempt to refine and hone as he wanted.
For Yui.
But now she was gone. Gone forever.
And he was alone, again.
'I will go to hell for this...' Wood protested as white enshrouded fingertips tightened their grip. 'But I will not go alone! I will take those manipulating Bastards with me! Seele...and Keel...all will fall with me...'
Madness crept into his shaded eyes, and a tight, almost sickly grin spread across his features as he contemplated his next move. The move that would bring Seele and all of its plans for a "higher" humanity crashing around their feet. Oh, how he had waited for this moment...how he had planned and positioned in secret that which would be needed. And now it was time, time to move that last piece into checkmate.
His last move of the game.
'...I have many sins...but allowing Seele to complete their scenario, it is far worse than anything I could have done to this world...or to Shinji.' Gendo Ikari narrowed his eyes and stared once more at the still, white form nearby. "Goodbye...Rei."
A moment passed and he was gone, the door behind him closing with a tangible-
Snick
***
Professor, Project Leader, Sub-Commander...old man. Kouzo Fuyutski was all of these things, and perhaps a bit more, in his own mind. Though in these final days it seemed to matter little to him anymore.
The ice rattled in the glass.
Kouzo's withered hand wrapped around the clear solid with a gentleness tendering on extreme care. Delicately he lifted the drink to his mouth and poured its rich, fiery brown contents down his aged throat. The burning sensation was still there, though not as bad as it had been with his first drink. Age and repetition seems to have taken care of that.
Too bad bourbon couldn't solve all of Kouzo's problems tonight. The drink wasn't that powerful...not now at least.
His tired eyes wandered over his rich and antique room, lingering on trophies of importance or meaning. Remembering days long past. Days with his students. Days before the hell and nightmares began. Days before he knew anything about Evangelion, Seele, or the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Days when he knew Yui Ikari, back as a college student.
'So much innocence...yet a harbinger of so much death and destruction, that girl was...' he thought, resting the cool drink against his throbbing head. Letting it sooth away his tensions and worries for the night as the liquid fire raged into his stomach.
Another drink went the way of the first.
'And now that Rei has no more replacements...he will be forced to act soon or not at all,' he stood and moved across the dim room to where the drinks were stocked, pouring himself another full glass.
Another drink.
Kouzo sighed as he felt the alcohol begin to dull his mind, washing away several emerging memories in a blaze of roiling fire. But it didn't stop his thoughts. He reveled in the small bits of information he had managed to glean from the Magi systems about Ikari's recent activities...troops unit allocations, weapons authorizations, vehicle checks, tank simulations. And on top of it all, several dozen covert units from all across the world being deployed to eight locations around the world. What did it all mean? Why was he doing it?
"What do you have ready now Ikari? What little trick do you have stored away to change this into your favor?"
His wall did not answer. It was only a wall after all, though many walls can be said to have heard some of the most important secrets of all human history. Certainly the walls, floor, and ceiling of Gendo Ikari's office heard several of those.
But the home of Kouzo Fuyutski wasn't a famous wall, as walls are reckoned. It was just a wall, paneled in wood and lined with books and pictures. The phone rang.
"Hello?" Kouzo paused for several moments as he digested the information he was receiving. "I understand."
The phone hit the receiver and cut the connection. "So you have begun...God save us all now." Kouzo walked out a few minutes later, rushing the zipper on his uniform and signaling to the chaufer to come around.
The bourbon glass let loose a tinkling as the ice melted and fell. Antarctica to an ocean of death. Ice to bourbon. Ends...and beginnings.
***
The room was cold.
Colder than most human beings would have found comfortable, but then again: only one human being actually used this room. And he never gave a damn about anyone or anything besides the plan.
His plan.
"What is causing this new delay?" Keel asked from behind his monolithic block with the stenciled red Seele 01.
"Yes," called number five. "We should have been ready to finalize the plan nearly three days ago, immediately after the last Angel was eliminated."
Several of the monoliths agreed, but a few remained silent...and one was entirely absent from the meeting. Keel did not like how this was boding for his plans, his scenarios. Everything had to be done quickly, or Ikari would put into place measures that would prevent Seele from realizing their goal.
Seele 8 spoke out, "We've found one source of our difficulties...apparently several JSSDF units are somewhat...loyal to NERV and everything they've done for Japan.I've ordered them to positions in the north and south...far away from Tokyo-3, but we need to act quickly. Their orders only last for a few days...and that's not the only point of resistance I'm facing. Several of the ranking defense council members in Tokyo-2 also feel the same way for NERV."
"Then we should be rid of them," Seele 2 intoned. "After the completion of the Red Earth Ceremony, a defense council will be...unnecessary."
"We cannot," Seele 6 cut through the sudden uproar of agreeances. "If we kill them now then people will begin to suspect our true motives...several of our recent supporters within the JSSDF hierarchy may change back to their previous status."
Keel felt his lips stretch into a grim line as he pondered this new information. He listened distractedly to the continuing arguments flying around the room, well...rooms should one get technical. For each member on the council each had a room similar to this one on their own properties.
Seele 12 appeared and the room fell silent.
Keel frowned, "You're late."
"I have important news about the pilots current status," boomed out twelve's mechanical voice. "Rei Ayanami is dead."
The clamor that had dissipated earlier returned twofold, each member suddenly filled with questions and each demanding that his own question be answered first.
Keel was tired of this all, and let his hand shift quickly to a row of recessed buttons on his black steel desk. His old and worn fingers, those that weren't totally machine, easily found the groove and gently depressed the hair trigger switch.
A loud squeal echoed through the room, causing many on the Seele council to grasp their ears in shock, surprise, or pain. Keel removed his finger and clasped his hands together. "Twelve, how old is this information?"
"Half hour, forty-five minutes...no more," came the reply.
"The source is reliable?"
"As all of my sources are."
"Eight, get your men assembled and ready to depart within the hour, but have enough supplies to last a few weeks should this become a siege. You'll start the assault on Tokyo-3 within twelve hours," Keel ordered quickly, not wanting to loose this golden opportunity. If Ikari couldn't put his plan into operation he would be very frustrated and absent-minded. They needed to take a chance, and soon.
Eight disappeared.
"Six, begin moving the Mass Production Series to our flight base in Russia. Have them ready to go tommorrow."
Six vanished.
"Two, Three, Four, and Seven: prepare your stations for the Magi takeover, co-ordinate yourselves with the JSSDF attack and throw them off balance. Splice into the other two systems needed and set up your remote accesses."
The four faded away.
"Ten, start your anti-NERV propaganda. Make it fast and snappy."
"As ordered One," Ten respectfully said before he went the way of the others.
"Twelve and Eleven, try to gain more information about the other pilots and where they might be in a given hour. If the pilot of that blasphemous creation gets out before we are prepared..."
"Understood," The two monoliths intoned together before departing.
"And us?" asked Five and Nine.
"Enjoy the world while you can."
They left as well, leaving Keel alone in his cold room. Good thing that his mechanical body couldn't feel it anymore. He stood, then walked for the exit.
It was time for tea.
***
Kensuke crouched in the woods, not far from the city limits of Tokyo-3, and gazed out at the massive collection of lakes. It was a breathtaking sight, seeing the moon reflect off of their silvery surfaces.
'I wish I had my camera...' he thought, wistfully looking up at the bright stars and the full moon. Such a bright, white moon. "I wish Toji and Shinji were here."
A loud rumble echoed from off in the distance. Kensuke snapped his head down.
"Oh...my...God."
***
Sensei Taiha Miykuzua was an old man. He felt age creep farther and farther into the marrow of his bones every passing day. The feeling was still a strange one to him, especially since most of his lower body was mechanical parts covered with a very expensive synthetic polymer flesh. A misfortune he suffered from the Second Impact...but that shedding of blood and loss of his lower body helped him more than anyone could know. For in his hospital ward he ran into an old acquaintance, another teacher. Sensei Kei Hyashimaru, a friend from his earlier teaching days who, before the impact, had been a teacher for the Tokyo University. An old friend, and a good friend...who was under the employ for Seele.
The two had recovered together, both with similar injuries and recovery periods. They had reminisced, chatted, discussed, debated, argued...and plotted together. It didn't take long before Kei decided to tell Taiha about the secretive Seele council. It took an even less amount of time before one sunglasses wearing Keel paid Taiha a visit.
And here he was, after fifteen years of pain and debilitation, he was in the ruined outskirts of Tokyo-3. A teacher and watcher of the vaunted Evangelion pilots. A collaborator with the principal, his old friend Kei, and a spy for Seele.
A smile stole across his withered face as he contemplated who, and what, he was. 'A man preparing for the end of the world, preparing for the next evolution.' Plotting and planning, its all he seemed to do these days.
Someone knocked on his door.
Taiha glanced at the wall clock and then groaned as he stood. "What do you want? It's nearly midnight for pete's sake!" He strode to the door and threw back the bolt. The phone rang in the distance. "Hold on, hold on! I'll ge-"
The door suddenly tore itself to shreds, several dozen neat holes appeared all throughout the thin wood as the two NERV Section-2 assault teams peppered the small area with 9mm bullets. Blood flowed like water from Taiha's mouth and nose, his body leaked like a butchered garden hose.
The last thing the old teacher heard was the sound of shattering glass, undercut by the dull thud of lead puncturing old, thick books. The last thing he saw was his dark blood spreading over the hardwood floor as he fell.
The night cold swept around him.
***
Kensuke watched with abject horror as the two NERV teams sprayed the door of his teachers house with their automatics. He felt his knee's go weak and dimly registered the slick feel of grass brushing against his hands.
"My God, my God, my God-" Kensuke stopped suddenly as a new order came echoing across the distance.
"Pull back. AT-1, place two HE in the walls and then one incendiary in the middle."
The teams were moving already, piling into their NERV Humvee's as if they were schoolchildren preparing to leave on a class field trip. There was a dull rumble of a diesel engine, from around the corner a small, light assault tank rolled into view. Thick and dark black smoke pouring out of its exhaust pipe as the treads laboriously pulled their burden forward. Then it ground to a halt, no more than three meters distant from the torn and tattered door.
Kensuke could see a dark, shiny patch seep out from under its frame.
"FIRE!"
The boy covered his ears quickly, but the concussion still pierced his protective hands. His mind shook from the impact, his body quivered from the explosion. A wall collapsed, taking part of the roof with it. A whirring of gears, the turret rotated.
"FIRE!"
Another shot, another wall, another hum of electric power as the turret centered.
"Incendiary...FIRE!"
The man behind the turret felt calm and cool as he went about his duty. Whomever this was, they had brought it upon themselves. He still felt that way as the house began to burn. As the smell of cooked flesh drifted into his nose.
Another order and they were away, the fire department would take care of the rest. They had more houses to visit tonight anyway.
Kensuke threw up.
***
Principal Kei Hyashimaru frowned at his wall as the phone rang again. "Come on, Taiha...come on damn you!" The line went dead. "What tha-"
A distant rumble cut through his soft exclamation, Kei felt his eyes go wide. "Oh, God...He wouldn't!" Kei shouted as he slammed his hand on the receiver, desperately trying to clear his phone line for a dial tone again.
A dial tone came up again, and just as suddenly went completely dead. 'The lines have been cut...Ikari knows who I am!'
"Tsoroko!" Kei shouted, calling for the captain of his house guards.
He wasn't unprepared for such a possibility after all; being a member of Seele, one always considered all the scenarios before committing himself to action. And they planned for every single possibility too.
"Yessir," Tsoroko announced himself with clipped and precise tones. He was dressed in a black jumpsuit, a holstered Glock by his right hip and a navy blue beret on his head that topped off the uniform. Shined boots gleamed brightly in the soft light of the room. Several men similarly dressed and armed with heavier weaponry were assembled behind him in a neat rectangular formation.
"Prepare for an assault on the compound," Kei harshly commanded as he strode into the foyer with the men. "Expect light assault tanks, break out anything you deem necessary to hold them off. I'm going to contact my superior."
Tsoroko took a measured look at the master of the house and saw desperation. Still, he was a military man who followed his orders; and he was Japanese, so he would follow them even if it meant his death. To do otherwise would be a disgrace to his honor.
"Yessir," Tsoroko answered with a crisp salute. Then turned and issued orders rapidly and with unerring precision.
'They will do well,' Kei thought feverishly as he turned away, heading for the holoroom. 'They've trained for this...they will do well enough until support arrives.' Kei reached the double European doors that lead to the secured Seele Council room. A quick scan of his hand and eyes confirmed his identity and he was through.
Tsoroko watched the doors swing shut again.
"We've lost."
***
Kouzo marched in time with the squad of suited agents. They strode confidently past startled personnel and wary technicians all the same. Never wavering or spreading apart. Always together.
'Damn you Ikari, why do you send me to do this kind of job? Wasn't it enough to torture the poor girl with that solitude...only to release her and demand her services once again!?'
The group of six stopped before the stainless steel elevator doors. The indicator above them started to click as Kouzo punched in a override passcode. The elevator descended rapidly.
'Only now to do this to her...and to have me execute it.'
"Sir," one of the agents dared to mention. "Are you alright?"
Kouzo fixed the man with a gaze that rivaled the Second Impact for polar ice melting abilities. The agent was too well trained to shiver, but he wilted visibly under that stare. "I'm perfectly fine, agent. Now, be silent...all of you."
The wait was in silence from then on. The elevator arrived, the doors opened to reveal a startled Maya Ibuki and several other technicians and staff.
"S-Sir?" Maya ventured forth looking scared and cornered within the confines of the elevator. Several of the others looked downright ready to piss their pants at the sight they were witnessing. Kouzo suddenly realized what Gendo felt.
"Out."
They scrambled, and soon Kouzo and the five others entered. Kouzo re-entered his override and depressed a button until it became a bright yellow-white color. The doors closed, the elevator descended again. The indicator began clicking again.
"Get ready," Kouzo mentioned off-hand.
The agents drew their weapons and chambered a round. Five sliding clicks echoed in the metal box.
***
"Are the units in position?" Gendo listened intently for the reply, it was difficult to hear the man on the other end. Static interference broke across the conversation every once in a while and made it impossible to discern what the other was saying. Gendo nodded as confirmation was acknowledged, "Good. I want you to pass the word along, strike in twenty minutes...well done, commander."
He hung up the phone and turned to face the impressive landscape that was the Geofront. He never had really taken the time to look out at this wonderful place, with its deep shadows and hues of midnight blue clinging in convoluted places. He never had realized how simple a pleasure awaited him every day should he have turned around.
His eyes narrowed, 'It's too late for that now any ways...best get going Ikari, or you'll miss the grand assault.' He turned and hurried out of the office, his steps echoing nicely throughout the massive room as he departed.
The room seemed not to care.
***
"Who was that?"
"The Boss, he was confirming the positions of our assault units."
Commander Ivan Broack was a heavyset man of middling years. He wore his uniform like it was his skin, the younger officers joked about how he only took it off to change his skivvies and bang the missus. Course, they never told that to him, but he managed to hear it none the less. He twirled his curly blonde hair about the index finger on the right hand and walked up to the sergeant who asked the question.
"We've been ordered to go in a few minutes...are the tanks coming into position?"
"Two mikes before they're set sir," the sergeant replied after consulting the reports his terminal were receiving.
"Good," Broack slammed his hand forcefully against the terminal letting out a loud bang as he did so. "Now we can finally get rid of those annoying bastards."
"Sir, who exactly are we attacking?"
"Sergeant, we are not 'attacking' anyone...we're just cleaning house a bit. Understand?" Broack let his voice edge on a bit, trying to let the sergeant know not to push for too many answers. After all, some things only the brass should know.
"Yessir, sorry sir."
Broack nodded and pointed to a digital assault unit on the sergeant's monitor.
"Move them in two more meters."
***
"Sorry Shinji, those calls took a bit longer than I expected."
"Its okay Dr. Aka-...I mean, Ritsuko," Shinji blushed a bit, and Ritsuko smiled. Happy that the boy was finally getting past the troubles he had the misfortune of going through right now.
"Well," she said, slipping into a more somber tone, "Where were we?"
"Rei was destabilizing-"
"Ah, yes...her body isn't like others y'know. Hers was only held together by that AT Field...and when she released it with such force and power, well...her form just couldn't hold together much longer. She started to rapidly decay, much like cancer. Except in reverse."
"So...you mean that she started to disintegrate?"
Ritsuko let the question hang for a moment, "Yes, Shinji...she started to disintegrate."
"Bu-but, what about the clones in that, that....that room?" Shinji cried aloud.
"Anti-AT Field technology," Ritsuko sipped her coffee, now cold, and winced at its horribly stale taste.
"A-ANTI?!"
"Sshhhh! Keep it down for pete's sake!" Ritsuko shifted in the synthetic seat and leaned forward. "Yes, anti. I know what you're thinking Shinji. But it wouldn't have worked, the Angels are simply too large of a creature to use it against. Plus, your...Father...wouldn't have allowed it. It would have taken away too much of his funding," Ritsuko ended her revelation of secrets with a bitter, if amused, tone; one eyebrow arched and the other twitching in anger.
"What? I don't understand," Shinji's face could have told her that much.
"I don't expect you to...so young, and so innocent," Ritsuko let a small peal of laughter loose at Shinji's bewildered look. "You would do well to be as such for many more years. But, remember this...Repairing the Evangelions wasn't something that cost us a lot of money. Hell, just the damages to the city cost more than the regeneration of the Evangelions! Most of the funding that NERV gets is used to keep track of certain people around the world...and the occasional covert side-job involving heavy explosives, but that's not the point."
"Then...what is?"
Ritsuko stood and walked over to the newly set coffee machines, "The point is-"
Ritsuko was interrupted by the cafeteria door breaking off of its hinges and exploding inwards. The scuffed, light brown sole of a well-polished dress shoe slowly lowered itself to the white floor underneath. Sub-Commander Kouzo Fuyutski stepped in quickly and leveled a hard stare in Ritsuko's direction.
Five suits fanned out behind him, each with his hand inside their coats.
"Ritsuko Akagi-" Kouzo began in a stiff tone.
'Here it comes...but now Shinji knows some things. Perhaps he will let some light shine on NERV after I'm gone.'
"You are charged with Insubordination, Disrespect to a superior officer, Tampering with national defense, Espionage, Treason, and Murder."
That last part did it, Ritsuko started to laugh in short, disbelieving chortles.
"Mur-murder? You've got to be kidding me! Those damn dolls were no more alive than this table!"
Kouzo watched her wild gestures with a weary calm that comes with age, his vision blurred slightly. 'Must be the alcohol,' he decided. Aloud he commented, "The other charges are sufficient enough to warrant your confinement again." Ritsuko stiffened and stood straight. "And the two before the last are enough to warrant your immediate execution."
Ritsuko's eyes widened, "Ikari wouldn't dare!"
"So, you are hear by condemned to suffer the execution of the verdict...agents, get this done quickly if you please," Kouzo gestured aimlessly to the frenzied doctor.
The five men wasted no time.
Kouzo stood by the door, gazing patiently at the frightened Shinji quickly dart out of the way as the men roughly dragged Ritsuko out of the room. She screamed frantically, clawed at her assailants; it didn't help her in the end. And Kouzo turned his head aside as she was pulled past him, not fast enough though, as she still managed to spit into his face. Kouzo sighed and wiped the dribble away with his handkerchief.
"...nothing is the same anymore."
Kouzo nodded at Shinji's quiet proclamation, "Yes, my boy. Your father has seen to that quite well enough."
"...is she going to be killed?"
Another nod, and a quiet sigh followed.
"Shinji, you should go and visit the Second Child again. I think that you should spend some time with her for a while..." Kouzo looked up at the boy, huddled in his chair with his head hanging in such a way as to hide his eyes. "And try to forget what just happened."
"...what if I can't?"
"...I don't know...Goodnight, Shinji Ikari," yellow, second stage alert alarms began to flash across the empty expanse of the cafeteria. Kouzo paused on his way out and calmly remarked, "Ah...so it has begun."
Kouzo left Shinji in the cafeteria.
Soon, the boy was gone as well.
***
Keel smiled into his warm and steamy cup of tea. He did so enjoy this time of the night, with its playful shadows and its soft illuminescence that gently caressed the land. He had always enjoyed this moment of the night, even after he lost his eyesight to the Second Impact he would still remain up and gaze out over the rolling hills and the sharp mountains of his home.
'Such a wonderful place.'
"Sir," his butler softly spoke into Keel's ear. "There is an emergency call coming from Tokyo-3 for you."
"Bring me the phone if you would please."
"It's not on the phone sir, it's on your private line..."
Keel took a moment longer to look at the landscape and then sighed and handed away his tea. "Business as usual."
It took him two minutes to arrive at the smaller, six man council chambers. He sat down quickly and punched in a rapid seven digit code on his keypanel.
'Who is calling me now? The council will meet tomorrow anyway...has something gone wrong with the Mass Production series?' Keel felt a trickle of anxiousness run through his metallic spine as he keyed in the last number and activated the holoprojectors.
Seele 11 appeared.
"Yes, number eleven. Why are you in my presence, surely you could have wai-"
"Dammit man! Shut up and listen for a change!"
Keel was immediately tensed and angry, "How dare you speak to me in such a manner! I'll have you-"
A loud explosion echoed through the small chamber, and the sharp staccato of automatic weapons fire could be heard from the background.
"LISTEN! I'm under attack by NERV forces. They've got an entire tank company out at my front gate, trying to blast their way in-" another blast echoed through. "My men are being slaughtered, I need help here."
"What about Seele 12?" Keel queried, a pit of dread beginning to sprout in his mind.
"I think they dealt with him first," Seele 11 broke off in a fit of coughing and grunting before he resumed speaking. "His phone line went dead. Mine did too, after I heard an explosion from across the city."
Keel thought rapidly, and found no answers. "How did they know you were in Seele?" he asked in a voice approaching a low growl.
"I don't know, I don't know...damn! They just broke through the outer wall-" another explosion, this one caused the holoimage to waver a bit as its signal became unstable.
"Can you get out of there?" Keel leaned over his keypads and started typing out a missive to the remaining Seele members.
"No," Seele 11 lamented. "They have all exits blocked. And my secret passage was one of the first to be destroyed...do you suppose Akagi betrayed us?"
"No, after all...she was Twelve's informant. If she was going to betray us she would have done it a long time ago...there, the others have been alerted."
"I don't think it wil-" The image wavered again and was temporarily covered in white static before it came back. Seele 11 did not continue speaking though, instead...all Keel could hear was the unnerving sound of footsteps approaching from everywhere, and nowhere.
The footsteps stopped and the holoimage vanished.
'Damn it...how the hell did Ikari know who Eleven was? How the hell did he manage to kill of Twelve without our agents warning him!' Keel furiously pounded out the last of his message and pressed the send button. He lifted a finger against his lips and chewed on the skin a bit, then in a fit of pique he slammed the same hand down hard against the smooth, black marble expanse of the table.
"Damn!"
A soft scrape of leather against the floor was all the warning Keel had. Instantly he leapt sideways out of his seat, knocking it over in the process, and drew his hidden sidearm from its inner pocket. He had one shot, and only an instant to use it!
'No time to aim! Pull the TRIGGER!'
The shot echoed, as all sounds did in the Seele rooms, and died off slowly. Keel watched in horrid fascination as his butler, now bereft half his head, fell to the ground with a wordless groan.
He stared at the dead body a moment longer, then fled the room. Dropping the spent weapon as he bashed open the thick wooden doors that cordoned him off from the rest of his house. He paused for only a moment before running on, calling his house guards as he ran.
'No time, need to prepare...no time, my plans...my scenario! Ikari, IKARI!'
"GUARDS! WHERE ARE MY GUARDS!"
***
Kensuke watched the mop-up start to wind down.
If one could call it a mop-up...slaughter might have been a better term for what the NERV personnel were doing to the remaining house guards that still lived. The house was on fire too, probably incendiaries or hastily made alcohol cocktails. Also, the smell of gasoline...maybe trail lines heading for canisters. It was still hard for the boy to take in. After all, there was a big difference between playing at war and pretending to die...and actually seeing men die.
A helluva big difference.
There was a secondary explosion from within the second story rooms that shot out a gigantic fireball through the slowly melting windows. Glass shattered and tinkled quietly in the night as their glinting shards fell to the blood littered ground. Bodies were rounded up in the center of a garden courtyard, doused with diesel and then lit with a lighter. Then left to be cremated. Dead torches of once-living flesh burned brightly in the eternal summers night.
Kensuke choked on the smell, then turned and headed for his home. It was a long walk back. And, on the way, he could swear that he heard klaxons off in the distance. His pace quickened.
***
"Anything to say...Ritsuko?" Kouzo asked tiredly, rubbing the bridge of his nose as he stood before the dejected-looking blonde. She remained silent. "Very well...Agents? Proceed."
The five suits lowered their issue sidearms and sighted the doctor in very easily, it being at such a close range and all. Ritsuko lifted her head and glared fearlessly into their shaded eyes. Fingers audibly tightened on their respective triggers. Kouzo could almost swear that the girl smiled before the muzzles flashed. In fact he would have bet on it. Weapons were lowered and the men walked slowly towards the door. Kouzo grimly stepped away from the pooling blood that collected at the feet of the dead.
"Do you need us for anything else, sir?" asked one agent.
"No," Kouzo stared fixatedly ahead, "Leave."
"Yessir."
Kouzo waited until the door closed, then he stepped over the five dead bodies and their blood to stand before the tight-lipped and visibly shaken Ritsuko. She was covered in blood, the good doctor, highly tense and nervously awaiting the other shoe to drop. Klaxon alarms began to flare in the background. Overhead, a muted speaker began blaring out unintelligible nonsense. Kouzo didn't try to make sense of it...he already knew what was happening.
The attack of Seele had begun.
"Now then...Ritsuko," he paused a moment and inclined his head down to stare at the dead bodies.
"W-Why?"
Kouzo looked up at the doctor, "Because I will need you...after this is over."
"But, my...my charges?"
"Ikari knew what you were doing. He knew that Seele had given you orders...and so did I." Ritsuko stood silent, letting no sign slip that he was right or wrong. "You are now dead...to everyone and anyone who formerly knew you. Except me, of course," Kouzo started around the wide body of red liquid and headed for the exit, "There is a car waiting for you in the first deck, it will take you to a safehouse within the Geofront."
Kouzo stopped at the door and looked back at her, letting the light from the hall black out his frame. 'I feel too much like Ikari tonight,' he thought privately, aloud he continued, "You are to remain there until I call for you. Should I require assistance with the Magi, there is a terminal directly linked to the mainframe-"
"How long have you been planning this?" Ritsuko interjected.
Kouzo mumbled and hummed for a moment or two and then answered, "About a month, little less." Ritsuko stood still. "Goodnight...Doctor." Kouzo walked out and left the door open.
***
"Sector twelve is in position sir!"
Broack listened to the report and let a smile steal across his lips. "Excellent, excellent...sergeant!"
"Sir?" The man in question replied.
"Issue the order...you may fire, when ready."
"Yessir," the sergeant inclined his head for a moment and then issued the orders required.
Broack smiled even wider as he noted the orange flashes in the trees, and clapped his hands together as he heard the muzzles give their thunderous report. More explosions and orange fire leapt up in the far distance.
"Now order the men forward. Use the LAT's to take out heavy resistance areas."
"Already ordered sir," the sergeant calmly answered, not letting the explosions faze him.
"Good man," Broack complemented before he motioned to the command staff. "I'm going to the front. Pack up the camp and prepare to move headquarters into the primary target once its secured."
The sergeant nodded and began disconnecting wires from the radio. Broack watched a moment longer before he pulled out his pistol and chambered a round. Several others of the staff similarly armed themselves and then filed out, leaving the few remaining specialists and NCO's to clean up.
The sharp pops of weapons-fire sounded harshly in the night. Another explosion erupted from within the besieged compound.
***
Gendo winced slightly as the high-pitched scream of the VTOL's engines whined over the hustle and bustle of the hasty preparations of the air-assault units. A light drizzle had sprung across the skies of Tokyo-3, and the tarmac was lit with a sick shine from the underbelly lights of the heavy assault craft. Men ran and cursed as minor slips caused them to break the quick flow of motion and work that went on. Pilots activated their windshield wipers and quickly ran down their checklist of outputs and payloads. Several men ran back and forth with shells and ammo cases, rapidly and efficiently re-supplying those units who had recently returned from their previous two missions. Men checked and rechecked every conceivable instrument on their vehicles, preparing for their first fight in months.
Only, this time, it was not to be against the Angels. Gendo was quickly ushered to a waiting APC by a corporal. "In here sir! That's where you'll find him!" The man shouted over the noise of the slowly preparing aircraft.
Gendo nodded and stepped up the ramp as it slowly started to raise. Inside, the conditions were crowded and hot, with several dozen men in full battle armor and weaponry standing and waiting for their orders. With a jerk and the throttle of the diesel the heavy vehicle of war sped off, leaving the outskirts of Tokyo-3's protective buildings and leading a convoy of many down towards the road.
Gendo moved up to the front of the vehicle, to stand by the Major who was in charge. They exchanged brief salutes and then turned to face forward. "We'll be there within a half-hour sir," the man reported as he studied the map coordinates before him.
"Excellent," Gendo adjusted his stance as the APC lurched into a turn. "How many vehicles are following?"
"Twenty sir...with three squads of five in each," he consulted his computer readout again before continuing. "As well as a squadron of heavy assault VTOL's that are moving ahead to secure the air."
A smile stole across the icy commander's lips as he considered the firepower he had amassed against the pitiful target he was going against. It would be almost too easy. And victory would be too sweet.
"Approaching the main highway sir!" one of the drivers shouted back, twisting his hands hard on the yolk that steered the armored behemoth. Men grunted and groaned in the rear as Gendo leaned over slightly to maintain his balance and stay on his feet. After all, a leader inspires his men by doing things they do not.
Then his world suddenly spun out and turned over as a flash of heat washed over his body. Pain...and darkness came soon enough.
***
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
The soft chirp of the life-support systems is something described by many patients and visitors alike as...comforting, reassuring. To Shinji Ikari, it was a dagger in his head. Needles in his eyes. A painful echo in his ears.
Not because each beep indicated the continued existence of the one that was so closely monitored by the machines...rather, because that each beep simply indicated a homeostasis, never changing, never wavering.
It seemed hopeless to wish for the person to wake up now. It seemed that she was destined to be a vegetable for the rest of her life.
"Asuka...Langley...Sohryu..." Even his whisper seemed pathetic now. "...I don't know anything anymore Asuka, nothing is the same," Shinji slumped into the soft chair by her bedside and looked across the bed and out the window. "Rei is dead...I guess if you were awake you would be happy...and I don't know if I would hate you for that or not," his head lowered into his palms and he started crying.
"I really don't know. I-I just can't discover what I'm thinking or feeling for anyone...anymore. Everything's going to Hell and I feel like, somehow, I started that trip." He wiped away the burning tears and looked back up to the silent girl across from him. "...I feel like...like its my fault for getting you here. OH! WHY THE HELL WAS I EVEN BORN?" Shinji shouted suddenly in the silence of the room.
"IF ALL I WAS MEANT TO BE IS A PERSON WHO BROUGHT PAIN AND HATE TO THOSE AROUND ME," Shinji paused for a moment to stand and kick his chair away from him, the wood and fiber object impacting the wall hard enough to leave a dent.
Slowly, he calmed down, "If that's all I was meant to do for the world...then why was I born?"
Asuka deigned not to reply.
'Fitting, I suppose,' the troubled boy feverishly imagined to himself. 'After all...why should she want to speak to somebody like me. I'm worthless...trash, refuse. I couldn't save Asuka...and now I couldn't save Rei.'
Shinji's shoulders slumped in defeat, his knees buckled out from under him and he slid down next to Asuka's bed. Her hand was inches away from his face, gently hanging off the edge of her tousled bed. As if she had been shifting around during her waking sleep.
Slowly, tenderly, almost fearfully...he reached out and held that hand. He held onto it and gripped it firmly. "Your hand is warm...Asuka," Shinji smiled a bit as he felt new tears run across his cheeks. Alarms started to sound across the hospital ward.
"Attention, attention," the loudspeaker blared across the small room. "All sectors go to First-Stage Alert! This is no drill! NERV is under attack! Repeat, NERV is under attack by JSSDF forces. All personnel are to arm themselves-"
Shinji listened to the blaring announcement as it finished and started to repeat. In the distance he could hear explosions echo across the Geofront. "Not again."
***
Commander Broack smiled and emptied his magazine of fourteen rounds directly into the faces of several surprised enemy troops. Hot blood sprayed from one of the dead men, catching Broack full in the face and chest. He didn't mind; after all, it inspired the men to fight harder.
"FORWARD!"
His men gave a raucous battle-cry in response and lurched forward into the fixed fortifications of the enemy troops that defended the airbase. Snow swirled around the air and the troops, wind that was cold enough to make water turn slushy bit hard into exposed flesh.
'Makes me remember my great-grandfather,' Broack reminisced as he struggled forward through the rapidly piling drifts. The snow had started suddenly, about ten minutes into the actual fight itself. It was now an hour later and the small, white flakes of ice seemed to come down even harder.
'Such is Russia,' the commander bitterly thought as he wrenched an automatic rifle from the frozen corpse of one unfortunate soldier. He quickly turned its muzzle onto the slowly retreating forms that hid behind camouflaged boxes of Evangelion supplies. A few of which leaked out orange-red LCL, an odd counter-point to the red-pink snow that surrounded most dead bodies that accompanied those boxes.
The muzzle flared orange itself, and spewed its small, leaden projectiles of death and pain.
"God how I love my job!" Broack shouted into the air as he cut down two fleeing soldiers.
A few of his assault team shot grenades into the piled crates and barrels. The explosion that followed illuminated several flying bodies...and body parts, as well as the entrance to the massive air hanger beyond.
The way seemed clear enough...if you discounted the five APC's and two tanks that were slugging their way through the snow. An RPG slashed through the darkening sky and landed amongst Broack's troops. Cries of the wounded and the dying cut above the snap of the guns and made the commander turn his head.
"Call in some medics and direct them over there!" he ordered to his radioman.
"Yessir," the man shouted back.
Broack peered hard across the blaze of flame that had erupted from the crates, and made a rapid count of the soldiers pouring out of the APC's. "And call up the LAC's, we need some support over here."
"On it sir!"
He nodded and dropped the spent rifle. He could always pick up a fresh one later on. Now, though, he needed to get moving.
***
"Echo, Charlie to NHQ...come in please."
Gendo listened to the man repeat his call for several moments, then watched and listened again as the man switched frequencies and tried again. 'Useless,' he thought. 'They would have thought of that already...though, just maybe-'
"Commander," a captain came crawling up to the overturned APC that, a half-hour ago, had been transporting Ikari and a platoon of men towards the city of Tokyo-2...and the JSSDF Headquarters. "We've called in the air support. It should be arriving momentarily. We...should get you to an aid station sir."
A nearby explosion made him and the captain flinch away, with Gendo raising a battered helmet over his head as debris rained down on them. He winced as fresh pain tore across his right arm and thigh; which, in turn, caused his slowly coagulating head wound to re-open and let fresh blood spill down across his eyes.
"I'm fine captain...now then, let this position be the objective for your men. We're already far ahead of the lines and we need to be relived quickly. Direct all your attention here and to re-opening this road."
The captain glanced through a hole in the bottom of the APC, caused by a well-placed shell directed by a very competent gunner. It had caused the APC to turn over originally, the explosion killing nearly everybody from the platoon, including the major, as well as the two drivers.
Gendo supposed that he was fortunate, escaping with only a minor head injury and a deep scratch that ran down the right portion of his torso and thigh. Well, more fortunate than the poor bastard that had been underneath the shell.
"Sir," the captain returned from his peep through the hole. "I don't think that its possible to re-open this road for at least another three months. The entire left side of that bridge up ahead has been destroyed, and what's left is being used by JSSDF to move ground forces across!"
Gendo let a quiet sigh of frustration loose and reconsidered his possibilities. There has to be a way to get through on this highway! The staccato of gunfire rose in volume and quickened in tempo.
"Sir! I've got NERV HQ on the comm!"
He reached over hastily with his left hand to take the offered headset. Keying the radio, he spoke calmly into the mike. "NHQ this is Echo Charlie, over." The reply was crackly and filled with static to the point of being intelligible. "Say again, over," Gendo asked.
"-his is NHQ, Hyuuga speaking, ov-r."
"Lieutenant, this is Commander Ikari here."
"Command-...-hat are you d-ing there?"
Gendo smirked a bit as another shell exploded nearby and pondered that question himself. "Not important, what is your situation? Over."
"...under att-k by JS-F...Heavy fighi-...trying to -t assistance...-ver."
'Don't expect any too soon,' he wryly thought. Aloud he continued. "Keep them held off, my forces here will try to pull back to the Geofront, over."
"Rodg-, out."
Gendo gave a small nod and tossed the communication headset back to the radioman. He caught it with a seemingly practiced easy and set it down before turning back to his rifle. "Captain?"
The man rolled away from the hole he had been firing through and faced back to his commander. "Yes sir?" he asked, straightening his helmet that had threatened to slip down over his eyes.
"Call your men forward long enough to throw the advancing units into disarray, then we'll pull back and head to the Geofront. Somehow they've moved around us." The captain nodded in understanding and rolled across Gendo, apologizing afterwards, and began giving orders to the radioman. Who, in turn, relayed them further on. Gendo winced as the pain returned, and contemplated exactly how the hell he had managed to get himself into this position.
His hand came up to rub his nose.
God, what a headache he was getting.
***
Misato Katsuragi was in a foul mood. She always seemed to be in a foul mood lately. Permanent PMS mode, as the rumors said. If only they knew. She tugged the hair piece free of the violet locks it restrained. Her shiny hair fell loose and free in the cold air of the metallic corridor. The cell phone came out and flipped down. A rapid dial was pressed.
"Hyuuga speaking!" came the rapid and confused reply.
"Hyuuga, Katsuragi. What's the situation?"
"We've got a full battalion of JSSDF Special Ops attacking the Geofront. Maya tells me that the Magi are being hacked as well, from the six sub-divisional Magi systems in China, the two in Germany, the United States, Russia, and in Matsashiro."
"Damn-"
"That's not all," Hyuuga cut in. "They're taking out our remote sensory stations, we have lost all of our above-ground communications and radar stations. And I've just been informed by Commander Ikari that he's tangled up in a ground fight three kilometers out of Tokyo-3."
"What?" Misato walked into the emergency access shaft for the command bridge and entered her keycard through the ID slot. "What in the hell is Commander Ikari doing up there?"
"I don't know! But he's requisitioned nearly all of our available assault vehicles and he's just authorized a full mobilization of the air corps."
The panels slid aside and Misato gripped the proffered railing as a sense of vertigo swept over her. In a few seconds, she was swept up onto the bridge and into the chaos it held. "How far have they penetrated?" Misato rushed over to a nearby command map of NERV Headquarters. It was rapidly turning red.
"They're just entering the fourth level, but we've managed to halt their advance to that point...for now."
Misato frowned and considered the possibilities, 'This place isn't meant to fend off human assaults. We could very well lose this battle.'
"Ma'am? Three units of Section-3 are being moved into position."
"What? By who's orders?" Misato quickly moved over to the terminal and began accessing the latest orders that were issued. However, she was interrupted by a calm and gentle voice.
"You can stop that major, for your culprit is here."
Misato turned and walked up to Sub-Commander Fuyutski, "Sir, it is my responsibility to issue orders for those units! If you do these things without running it past me first then we WILL lose this fight!"
"I am sorry, major...but I had a moment of intuition and acted accordingly."
Kouzo smiled at the woman and then moved for the lift to take him up to the commanders' deck. Misato gave the retreating back a hard glare before turning back and continuing her own dictations. "Find Asuka and Shinji! Get them into their Evas!"
"But Asuka can't pilot hers!" Maya insisted, her eyes wide with fear and frustration as she pounded away at the keyboard of her terminal.
"THEN PUT HER IN UNIT 01 WITH SHINJI, DAMN IT!"
The door closed behind him, cutting off any further orders the very competent woman was giving. Kouzo didn't care too much, she knew what she was doing after all. Instead, he worried about what pieces the hidden players of this macabre chess match had hidden up their sleeves.
'Yes, Seele is starting to fight back now Gendo...but now, instead of all of the council acting in unison...we have them acting individually,' Kouzo frowned as he contemplated the dangers involved with such a risk. 'But if they manage to weaken us with these individual actions...then another might just be able to take it all for themselves. We are in a dangerous position should you fail in any aspect, Gendo.'
The shaft opened above him and he returned to the uproar of the bridge as it directed the defense of the monolithic building. Kouzo's lips turned into a grim line as he stepped clear of the halted lift, "Or is that how you wanted it?" His small sigh was unnoticed amongst the loud explosions echoing through the labyrinthine NERV corridors.
Today had been a long day...and it still had a few more hours left to go. Perhaps, then...it would all be over. He reached for his own cell phone and pressed the 6 rapid dial. "Akagi? It appears that your help will be needed sooner than I thought."
***
"Goddamned bastards! WHY WON'T YOU DIE?!" Broack shouted across the din of weapons fire and explosions. Already half his men were down and out for the count, but so were many of his oppositions forces. It's just that they were too damn stubborn for their own good. After all, if you had the chance to surrender or run, wouldn't you take it?
"Damn Seele bastards!" he cursed again, ripping an old model AK-47 out of the snowy prison that encapsulated it. One sharp pull cleared its jam and it was usable again, as Broack demonstrated by cutting down two holdovers by the hanger doors.
His men closed the semicircle in, bullets flared and sparked as they slammed into the over-large doors of the aircraft maintenance hanger. Men screamed in pain or grunted in amazement as they succumbed to the irresistible pull of death that was delivered by way of a hot piece of dense metal.
Blood melted the snow and ran in streams to form red lakes.
Another rocket shot out into the night and exploded against the ground nearby. Broack let another curse fly as he rolled over several mangled bodies to escape the explosive device. He came out of his tumble with the barrel leading, and sprayed the darkened interior with lead.
Several men rushed the doors, grenades in hand and waiting to be used. Broack ceased his attack and dropped into a bank of white ice just as his soldiers tossed in their explosives.
One-one thousand.
Two-one thousand.
Three-one thousand.
Boom.
A wall of red flame erupted from the darkened entranceway, and screams of those unfortunate enough to believe the grenades to be the shrapnel kind wafted out of the interior. Napalm hand grenades...lethal, and ruthlessly effective. His men stormed through that hellstrom and quickly silenced the burning husks of men forever.
Off to his left, a line of LAT's advanced and opened fire on a similar line of approaching old-model Russian tanks. A distant explosion sounded as an AP round found its mark and cut through the hot diesel engine of its target.
More of his men rushed into the flame enshrouded doorway. Broack wasn't far behind. "LIGHTS! TURN ON THE DAMN LIGHTS AND SECURE THE PERIMETER!" his cry echoed eerily through the cavernous depths.
Soon, enormous flood lamps several dozen meters above the ground, flickered and flared into life. He had to bite his cheek in order to stop the gasp. Nine Evangelions...white...and for all intents and purposes, instruments of the devil himself.
Broack motioned to the red entry plugs that hung ever so above the units and ordered his men: "Blow those damn things to hell and let's be done with it."
The soldiers wasted no time. Nine RPG's flashed through the reeking, smoky air and struck their marks, dead center. The commander smiled as the red plugs twisted and tore apart...then he ordered a second strike. Just to be sure.
***
Keel rushed about his mansion, issuing orders for its defense and drinking glasses of brandy like the end of the world was going to come about before he had his fill. Many of the servants flinched away from his wildly swinging hands, but they followed his orders exactly.
They dared not do otherwise.
Slowly, a man of old age, but younger than Keel himself, stepped forward and before the optical wearing Seele member. "Father? What's happening?"
The deep bass voice had a sedative effect on Keel, instantly calming his furious motions and leaving him breathless with a half-full crystal, cut glass of dark brandy in his hand. The servants looked to the new arrival with a pleading look, and he motioned them out of the room.
"Boy, why are you here? I thought I sent you to look after my investments in Africa," Keel reeled from the effects of the brandy, and only managed to collapse into one of the plush chairs with the help of his son.
"I did, and I have returned to find my father the drunkard...shouting at his house servants about an attack. Father?" Keel gave a slurred grunt. "Who would attack you?"
Keel stared through the red lense of his optics for a moment, then he shook violently. His son began to worry for a moment as the elderly man burst into a roaring, knee-slapping laugh. After several failed attempts, Keel managed to calm himself.
"Who wouldn't..." His son looked on him with simple, questioning eyes. "My boy, my poor, innocent boy...you have no idea, what I have done in my years," Keel shook his head back and forth a few times as he lamented.
"Really? You think that I don't know what you've been doing with Seele these past fifty years?"
That brought Keel up short. "Wh-what did you say?"
The son stared down hard at the withered old man, "You heard me father, Seele...the Dead Sea Scrolls, NERV, Evangelion, Human Instrumentality Project...You really should change the passcodes for your files more often."
The old man could barely move.
"The whole plan is in ruins by now," the younger man scoffed as he wrenched the glass away from his father. "Several assault units have already taken care of your Seele Council...only you, the Japanese Minister of Defense, and your Russian and German friends are left."
"But...how?"
"How did I know? Or how did Ikari know?" his son left the question hanging for a moment. "It doesn't really matter, the point is...you've lost everything. The JSSDF is attacking NERV now, but they will eventually fail...and your vaunted Mass Production Evangelions are now in the hands of your enemies."
"I-Impossible!...the plan, the scenario...how did Ikari find their location so easily?" Keel looked up at his son, who amused himself with a thick, leather-bound book from one of the shelves. The boy read with half-lidded eyes that seemed to look more at Keel than at the Kanji held within.
"Who said Ikari held them?"
Realization broke over the horizon of Keel's mind, "You?"
"Finally! Your dull wit manages to find the mark and sticks!...Yes, my forces now have control of your vaunted Mass Production Evangelions...and Ikari knows about you and your Seele cronies."
"Why?" Keel sank lower into the chair, his hands falling limply against the cracks of the seat cushion. 'There's a pistol in this chair...let him talk, and I will get him after he tells me all he knows.'
The boy smiled, "I have been informing Ikari about certain...plans, since the start of NERV, father. You see, I didn't want you to complete your version of Third Impact...if you had listened to those advisors we'd brought in during the Katsuragi Expedition, you would have known that the last Impact would have been a disaster...just like the first one was."
"How can you be sure!" Keel spat out.
"How can you be so confidante that your version would be...what humanity needed?" the boy put down the book and stepped forward to just behind another seat.
Keel slowly moved his hands down further, "What about the Jet Alone project?"
His son rolled his eyes with frustration, "You know as well as I that your, 'side' project wasn't supposed to do anything. It was merely to keep the other nations in line and continue using NERV...though I admit, I hadn't expected you to personally fund that sham operation." Keel could feel the cold steel of the grip now, just a little bit longer. "But, you should have covered you tracks better, old man. And now, Seele will be incinerated because you failed to keep secrets from your own son."
"Malachi, why?" A hint of disbelief, 'Yes...let the fool think that he is in control. It will all be over soon.'
Malachi Keel smirked, "Well father, you could say it was all your fault really... because of your files...I knew exactly what your, Instrumentality Project was supposed to do...and I knew exactly who every member of Seele was. And thus, your Impact has been averted...and it will never be attempted by man again until we are ready!"
Keel frowned, "But what if Rei Ayanami is still alive? What if there is one more clone of her left for him to use?! He could still initiated his own Third Impact! All you've done will have been for nothing if she's still alive!"
Malachi smiled again, "Trust me father...I can prevented Ikari's Impact if I need to."
Keel felt what remained of his body go cold, and with a lurch he shot up from the recliner. The pistol whipped up and around, the hammer pulled back with a sharp snick, and his finger tightened on the trigger. The hammer fell forward with a dull-
Click.
Malachi frowned for a moment and stepped out from behind the chair, pulling out his own pistol. "Really, do you expect me to put you into a chair that held a loaded weapon? God how you think I'm a fool, as if I hadn't found those things since I was a child." He scoffed and ridiculed the older Keel as his own weapon was pointed at the man's head. "Goodbye, father. Have a nice afterlife in Hell."
The servants in the halls flinched at the sudden gunshot, then scurried away from the parlor doors without a second glance. If any time would be a good time to run, it was now. They took that chance, and fled.
***
Shinji held onto Asuka's hand as though it would be the only thing to anchor him to sanity. He clenched his eyes shut and grit his teeth hard as the explosions rolled through the foundations of the hospital. Several times he had to stand up and block some minor debris from falling on the comatose girl.
'Don't know why I still put up with all this shit for her,' he thought ruefully as he brushed himself off from the latest incident. 'Don't know why...but I do.' Blood dripped from his eyebrow, a minor cut from the second or third time he had put himself in harm's way. It didn't hurt much now, only a slight sting. Still...
"I'm really fucked up."
And here he was, sitting next to what remained of the most beautiful girl in all of Tokyo-3, or Japan if you believed what she often spouted as her rhetoric. Not that it had helped her any...no, no. It hadn't helped her at all. Pride, hubris...what a bunch of Greek nonsense. Yet, at the same time, how true...how true.
"Asuka...please," Shinji pleaded again, desperate for someone to talk to. "Please, you've got to wake up...Please! PLEASE!"
The girl shifted slightly, but didn't sit up or speak. She still slept in her waking nightmare. The door swung open and banged against the wall. "Shinji?"
The boy looked up at the frightened nurse and gently extracted himself from Asuka's hand. "Shinji, you've got to get Asuka and take her to-"
"The Eva...I know," the boy sighed and stood up.
"You just wait outside and I'll get the machines detached...okay?"
Another explosion tore through the building close by, Shinji nodded his assent and moved for the door. "Don't take to long."
The nurse hastened to her duties, leaving Shinji to close the door and wait.
***
Kensuke patiently waited, buried underneath a light covering of rubble and debris from a nearby bomb crater, as a column of JSSDF special Ops moved past him. He nearly gagged again as he spied one of the soldiers gun down a fleeing NERV technician, but managed to keep down his bile.
What the hell are you doing here Kensuke? You're gonna get killed!
'Shut up will ya! I'm trying to make it through this alive.'
He listened to the sounds of gunfire fade in the distance for several minutes before he felt it was safe enough to stand up again. A quick dusting off of his clothes and a short glance around confirmed that he was indeed alone in the hall...apart from the twenty or more dead people that is.
He stopped at one and pulled out its automatic pistol, checking to make sure it was loaded of course, and then chambering a round. 'Won't be needing this anymore,' was his pessimistic thought. 'Now then, I've managed to sneak into NERV Headquarters...what should I do next?'
"Attention! Attention! JSSDF forces have reached the hospital wing! All units are to engage the enemy there!"
Kensuke blinked at the announcement and then turned to look at the directory map nearby. 'Those men were probably heading for the Hospital Wards, so...'
He memorized the map as best he could and then took off for the stairwells. Time to visit a friend.
***
Toji Suzahara wasn't having the best day in his life.
No, actually...he wasn't having the worst day of his life. That had been when his leg was taken by that damned Angel-infected Evangelion. Bastardly creation. Now, now it was just the ever-present sound of weapons being discharged...and grenades going off. Oh, and the screams of the dying, and then there was all of those explosions-
The sarcastic train of thought was derailed when his door opened and in popped one blood and dust covered military brat. "K-Kensuke! What the hell are you doing here?!"
Kensuke impatiently shushed him and pressed his ear against the door, his ears trained for any noise that might give away advancing soldiers.
Toji let his eyes slid down the sandy-haired boy, trailing his arms and spotting all of the small nicks and bruises that he had collected in what might have been a helluva adventure. Ending at his hands, where he carried a smoking semi-automatic pistol.
"I think they've gone past now," the boy sighed in relief and sagged away from the door.
"Who?" Toji asked.
"The JSSDF, NERV...anyone with a pistol or rifle at the moment."
"What's going on?"
"I really don't know," Kensuke slid back from the steel door and further along the wall, deeper into the shadows that played there. "All I can tell you is that the JSSDF has blocked off Tokyo-3 completely...even surrounded and cut off the damn wood trails."
Toji struggled to sit upright, "How do you know?" Kensuke remained silent for a long time, the sounds of battle faded even more in the lapse. "How, Kensuke?"
"I was nearly gunned down by them trying to get back home..." The boy sounded scared, defeated, tired, and lonely. Even with the darkness that enveloped him, Toji could plainly see that Kensuke was shaking horribly. Flinching at every gunshot, shifting with every grenade's dull thump and roar. "It's a lot different...actually being in one."
Toji nodded his head before he sank back into the white sheets of his bed. Absently he noted how stark they would be if his blood was all over them. His body shuddered with the thought. 'I hope Hikari is okay.'
***
"Flood level three with Bakelite! Cut the bastards off and then tell the defending units to press forward!"
"Yes Ma'am!"
Misato sat back and watched the Bakelite infusion begin. Within minutes the entire third level of the headquarters building was covered in the fast-sealing compound. In another few, her own units surged forward and decimated the surrounded JSSDF units. A small iota of glee emerged as she saw the attacking special ops units slaughtered by unmerciful NERV defenders.
'Not one ounce of sympathy...not for these bastards.'
"Ma'am? Asuka and Shinji have reached the Evangelion hanger bays...they're under escort as per your orders," Maya supplied just as Misato's tension and worry for her wards reached it's peak.
She let loose a very audible sigh, "Thanks, Maya. Tell them to get suited Asuka suited up and insert her into Eva Unit 01. Then launch it into the lake."
If Asuka couldn't help fight them off, at least she would be safe with Shinji in his Eva. Misato hoped.
"Yes Ma'am...Shinji is in the changing room and will be done in a few moments."
"Good," Misato turned and studied the last known map taken of the surrounding areas. Since the JSSDF had taken out all of the remote sensor stations they had to rely on old data and guestimations of enemy dispositions and strengths. This would be a long, hard fight to get clear.
Kouzo watched the major work with a delicate interest. He nodded silently with each of her command decisions as they came out, sometimes too fast for him to keep up, and simply noted the actions of his bridge crew. 'That girl does know what she's doing...you trained her well, Akagi.'
Even know, the aforementioned doctor was helping her still-fresh apprentice fend off the attacking Magi daughter systems. Through several invitingly placed program files, Akagi managed to lead Maya to a little accessed protection system that had been installed into the Magi mainframes when she herself had yet to transfer to the Gherin project.
Soon the short haired bridge tech found the file and accessed it. A brief scan and she sent it into motion.
***
In a different part of the world, perhaps in one that didn't even exist in reality, three holograms thrummed in unison as they arrived. Though, to hear that noise, it would set a man's teeth rattling. Three out of twelve.
"One is not here," Four intoned.
"They have killed him then. And our project will still continue forward none the less," declared Eight. "Already my troops have penetrated deep into Ikari's lair...all we need now is for Six to launch his units and start the Red Earth Ceremony."
Six remained silent.
"Six," Four quietly asked. "Are the Mass Production units still within our control?"
Six remained quiet for a few more moments, and then whispered out, "No. Ikari...or someone else...has them now. My guards were destroyed and the re-enforcement's obliterated."
"Impossible!" Eight shouted. "How did Ikari know where we sent the Evangelions?"
The room was silent as each computed the answer. They responded all at once. "Sabotage."
"Yes," Six continued when the echo died. "It has to be somebody from the council who leaked information to Ikari...but who?" Another thrum echoed in the vast expanse of the Seele Council room...Seele One had arrived.
"Keel?! I thought you were dead!" Eight shouted.
"We have been betrayed Keel, Ikari has taken the Mass Production models...our scenario is falling apart," Six began.
"Yes, I know...I suggest that you hide yourselves in far-off places gentlemen. If you survive the next year, I will hold another session at midnight...precisely one year from now. Understand?"
They each let off a thrum in rapid succession and in short order, vanished.
Malachi smiled wanly as he deactivated the holoprojector and the voice-synthesizer.
'Damn old fools, too easily deceived. Should never have put in these voice-synthesizers in the first place...well, its their own fault if they are so easily manipulated.'
He stood and shuffled out of the cold room that his father used to frequent so often throughout his meager lifetime. It wasn't so impressive as it had first been, and now it wasn't so foreboding. Now, it was just a cold familiarity...just another tool.
Like his pistol.
***
"Colonel! We've received the latest reports from Tokyo-3."
"Let me see them." The aide rushed over with the flimsy and crudely written message scrawled messily on the piece of yellow radio paper. It was hard to make out, with his eyes, but he managed to do it. "Damn that incompetent Minister, doesn't that idiot know what these people have done for us? Does he know what he's doing anymore?!"
Of course he does, his inner voice told him. After all, didn't he send you and all of your other NERV supporting buddies out here?
'Shut up!'
Colonel Hashi Yurimai was old, old enough to remember how wars used to be...back before the Second Impact. Back then, wars were a thing of dignity and respect for ones opponents...in the mind. In reality it had been brutal and ruthless, a hard-fought firefight lasting no more than two to three minutes. If it was a prolonged engagement, then it might get uglier. Claymores, grenades, air strikes, attack helicopters, flamethrowers, even bayonets if the ammo ran short.
But this...this wasn't even that kind of fight. What he was reading on the near-unintelligible message in front of him was something that couldn't even be described by the hell that was war. What he read about...was a bloody massacre.
His short and wrinkled frame heaved a sigh in frustration as his hands crumpled the paper. With a blinding fury he found himself ripping his beret clean off his balding head and throwing it across the room. Hashi didn't quite ever remember what he yelled after that, but by the looks on his soldiers faces...it must have been exceedingly foul.
"Colonel," he turned and faced his second-in-command.
"Yessir?" the faithful and competent Lieutenant Colonel replied, taking a brave step forward.
"Prepare the men for departure," instantly the headquarters tent flew into action, men disassembled equipment and started moving heavy equipment out. "We're going to Tokyo-3."
"Sir!" His second gave a smart salute and hurried out of the rapidly moving tent, shouting for the company commanders as he ran for the vehicles.
'Time to get that bastard Minister at his own game.'
Indeed.
~~~
To Be Concluded
"She's dead."
In the background the electronic beeping faded, the lights were turned off. And the sheet was pulled over the limp form that lay peacefully on the bed of white. Slowly the varied doctors and nurses left the room, passing by the two figures that remained in the room before leaving them to their thoughts and emotions. The first pulled off her glasses and rubbed her nose tiredly. She had been up for several days trying to find a cure, but to no avail.
The other, simply frowned at the covered body. Sneering at its frail form and thin torso as it was covered by the bed sheet.
"I couldn't find anything to counteract the rapid decomposition brought about by her creating an AT Field. It wasn't within my knowledge."
"Enough, Akagi...leave."
The blonde hesitated as she considered her options. One was she disobey him and possibly get thrown back into jail while the other was to leave while she could and take her chance to escape from this hell. She bowed and left, letting the door click shut.
"I don't care anymore. I just don't give a damn-" Ritsuko thought as she rounded a corner, nearly running headlong into Shinji. "Oh-"
"..."
The boy looked horrible. His face was drawn in and tight against his face from lack of food. His eyes were ringed with sleeplessness and reddened from tears. Much like she felt.
"Shinji? What...what are you doing here?"
"They're running some tests on Asuka and I just found out that...that Re-Rei's..." he sobbed softly and stopped, clutching his hand to his mouth as he tried to regain control. The doctor looked sympathetically at him before taking his shoulder and turning him away from the door.
"Wh-where are you taking me? I want to see Rei!" he protested and moved out of her grip.
"Do you 'want' to be in the same room as your father?" sarcasm laced her words like a poison. And they had their desired effect as Shinji's face cringed away and turned bitter, "You need food, so lets go get some."
His face turned away and his eyes stared at the far wall for a moment before he faced back and nodded.
"Yeah, lets..."
Slowly the pair walked away from the medical ward.
Leaving the smell of clean death and sterilized decay behind.
Gendo Ikari remained staring at her limp form. He was morbidly fascinated with it. As he finally realized in his second hour of vigil. It was as though he expected her to wake at any moment. Wake and help him finalize his plans for Third Impact.
Impossible, now.
"Damn you Akagi...damn you and your meddling!" Gendo angrily lashed out at the nearby table, his fist slamming into its prefabricated surface with a vicious crack.
His face cringed a bit as he felt his knuckles slice open.
His glove reddened.
"Damn you...damn Seele...damn Keel...damn it all..." he slumped forward against the table, his hands gripping the edges as he let himself vent.
"Fifteen years...all for nothing," Gendo felt his knuckles go white from his grip. "I lost my wife, lost any chance of having a family with my son! And now...I lost my last chance to make that reality...I've lost R-Rei."
Gendo felt himself go slack, felt himself loosen his grip on the table as he felt reality slide away from him. He who held it firmly in check for so long finally felt the first hints of loneliness.
"Yui. Yui I have failed once more...I can't come back with you. I will suffer my own hell for my sins," his head lifted up and stared at the bed again. "I don't even know my son, I'm truly a monster."
The pair sat quietly in the abandoned NERV cafeteria. The only personnel active at this hour were the unfortunate few pulling the snack bar duty that consisted of fixing quick sandwiches or light soups and coffee that was essential at keeping the rest of NERV awake in the long cold hours of the night.
Ritsuko absently sipped that famed black liquid as she studied the boy before her. She examined him much as she would study a test animal...it made him feel lonely, distant.
'Poor boy has to endure so much for so little return...its actually a shame,' she thought.
"Why?"
Ritsuko watched him a few more moments. Noting that his head moved in time with his breaths. Raising. Lowering. Raising again. She let the time pass as she studied this, finding fascination in such a small movement.
Shinji felt his patience slipping much like the time that passed. So he asked again.
"Why?"
Ritsuko set down her cup and reached out for his chin. Shinji nearly threw himself away from that hand, but held his body in check and allowed his chin to be raised. His eyes fell across the doctors impassive yet caring eyes.
"Now that I can see you, I will explain," Ritsuko glanced at the clock and wondered how long she had before Ikari came to his senses and ordered her death.
"The seventeenth angel..." she paused as his eyes deepened with sadness and memory. "Do you remember the third AT Field?"
The pause was laden with tension and apprehension as Shinji rapidly made connections in his delicate stream of thought.
"Yes," his voice sounded flat, dead. Monotone. "Rei...it was her wasn't it?"
"She created it yes...and suffered because of what it did."
"H-how?"
"At the Sea of Guf...you remember what I told you and Misato there don't you?" Ritsuko leaned forward and glanced to the door.
"Yes...about her being part of my mother and part of an angel."
He had stopped his crying.
It was to emotionally draining for him to show his feelings these days. Too painful, too weak. He couldn't even remember when he started crying, just that in an instant water impregnated with salt was rolling down into the corners of his mouth. Intermingling with the brown hairs of his beard.
Gendo Ikari hated having emotions. It made him weak, made him feel inferior to those above him. Yet it was the only thing that he kept for Yui's sake. The only part of himself that he did not attempt to refine and hone as he wanted.
For Yui.
But now she was gone. Gone forever.
And he was alone, again.
'I will go to hell for this...' Wood protested as white enshrouded fingertips tightened their grip. 'But I will not go alone! I will take those manipulating Bastards with me! Seele...and Keel...all will fall with me...'
Madness crept into his shaded eyes, and a tight, almost sickly grin spread across his features as he contemplated his next move. The move that would bring Seele and all of its plans for a "higher" humanity crashing around their feet. Oh, how he had waited for this moment...how he had planned and positioned in secret that which would be needed. And now it was time, time to move that last piece into checkmate.
His last move of the game.
'...I have many sins...but allowing Seele to complete their scenario, it is far worse than anything I could have done to this world...or to Shinji.' Gendo Ikari narrowed his eyes and stared once more at the still, white form nearby. "Goodbye...Rei."
A moment passed and he was gone, the door behind him closing with a tangible-
Snick
The ice rattled in the glass.
Kouzo's withered hand wrapped around the clear solid with a gentleness tendering on extreme care. Delicately he lifted the drink to his mouth and poured its rich, fiery brown contents down his aged throat. The burning sensation was still there, though not as bad as it had been with his first drink. Age and repetition seems to have taken care of that.
Too bad bourbon couldn't solve all of Kouzo's problems tonight. The drink wasn't that powerful...not now at least.
His tired eyes wandered over his rich and antique room, lingering on trophies of importance or meaning. Remembering days long past. Days with his students. Days before the hell and nightmares began. Days before he knew anything about Evangelion, Seele, or the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Days when he knew Yui Ikari, back as a college student.
'So much innocence...yet a harbinger of so much death and destruction, that girl was...' he thought, resting the cool drink against his throbbing head. Letting it sooth away his tensions and worries for the night as the liquid fire raged into his stomach.
Another drink went the way of the first.
'And now that Rei has no more replacements...he will be forced to act soon or not at all,' he stood and moved across the dim room to where the drinks were stocked, pouring himself another full glass.
Another drink.
Kouzo sighed as he felt the alcohol begin to dull his mind, washing away several emerging memories in a blaze of roiling fire. But it didn't stop his thoughts. He reveled in the small bits of information he had managed to glean from the Magi systems about Ikari's recent activities...troops unit allocations, weapons authorizations, vehicle checks, tank simulations. And on top of it all, several dozen covert units from all across the world being deployed to eight locations around the world. What did it all mean? Why was he doing it?
"What do you have ready now Ikari? What little trick do you have stored away to change this into your favor?"
His wall did not answer. It was only a wall after all, though many walls can be said to have heard some of the most important secrets of all human history. Certainly the walls, floor, and ceiling of Gendo Ikari's office heard several of those.
But the home of Kouzo Fuyutski wasn't a famous wall, as walls are reckoned. It was just a wall, paneled in wood and lined with books and pictures. The phone rang.
"Hello?" Kouzo paused for several moments as he digested the information he was receiving. "I understand."
The phone hit the receiver and cut the connection. "So you have begun...God save us all now." Kouzo walked out a few minutes later, rushing the zipper on his uniform and signaling to the chaufer to come around.
The bourbon glass let loose a tinkling as the ice melted and fell. Antarctica to an ocean of death. Ice to bourbon. Ends...and beginnings.
The room was cold.
Colder than most human beings would have found comfortable, but then again: only one human being actually used this room. And he never gave a damn about anyone or anything besides the plan.
His plan.
"What is causing this new delay?" Keel asked from behind his monolithic block with the stenciled red Seele 01.
"Yes," called number five. "We should have been ready to finalize the plan nearly three days ago, immediately after the last Angel was eliminated."
Several of the monoliths agreed, but a few remained silent...and one was entirely absent from the meeting. Keel did not like how this was boding for his plans, his scenarios. Everything had to be done quickly, or Ikari would put into place measures that would prevent Seele from realizing their goal.
Seele 8 spoke out, "We've found one source of our difficulties...apparently several JSSDF units are somewhat...loyal to NERV and everything they've done for Japan.I've ordered them to positions in the north and south...far away from Tokyo-3, but we need to act quickly. Their orders only last for a few days...and that's not the only point of resistance I'm facing. Several of the ranking defense council members in Tokyo-2 also feel the same way for NERV."
"Then we should be rid of them," Seele 2 intoned. "After the completion of the Red Earth Ceremony, a defense council will be...unnecessary."
"We cannot," Seele 6 cut through the sudden uproar of agreeances. "If we kill them now then people will begin to suspect our true motives...several of our recent supporters within the JSSDF hierarchy may change back to their previous status."
Keel felt his lips stretch into a grim line as he pondered this new information. He listened distractedly to the continuing arguments flying around the room, well...rooms should one get technical. For each member on the council each had a room similar to this one on their own properties.
Seele 12 appeared and the room fell silent.
Keel frowned, "You're late."
"I have important news about the pilots current status," boomed out twelve's mechanical voice. "Rei Ayanami is dead."
The clamor that had dissipated earlier returned twofold, each member suddenly filled with questions and each demanding that his own question be answered first.
Keel was tired of this all, and let his hand shift quickly to a row of recessed buttons on his black steel desk. His old and worn fingers, those that weren't totally machine, easily found the groove and gently depressed the hair trigger switch.
A loud squeal echoed through the room, causing many on the Seele council to grasp their ears in shock, surprise, or pain. Keel removed his finger and clasped his hands together. "Twelve, how old is this information?"
"Half hour, forty-five minutes...no more," came the reply.
"The source is reliable?"
"As all of my sources are."
"Eight, get your men assembled and ready to depart within the hour, but have enough supplies to last a few weeks should this become a siege. You'll start the assault on Tokyo-3 within twelve hours," Keel ordered quickly, not wanting to loose this golden opportunity. If Ikari couldn't put his plan into operation he would be very frustrated and absent-minded. They needed to take a chance, and soon.
Eight disappeared.
"Six, begin moving the Mass Production Series to our flight base in Russia. Have them ready to go tommorrow."
Six vanished.
"Two, Three, Four, and Seven: prepare your stations for the Magi takeover, co-ordinate yourselves with the JSSDF attack and throw them off balance. Splice into the other two systems needed and set up your remote accesses."
The four faded away.
"Ten, start your anti-NERV propaganda. Make it fast and snappy."
"As ordered One," Ten respectfully said before he went the way of the others.
"Twelve and Eleven, try to gain more information about the other pilots and where they might be in a given hour. If the pilot of that blasphemous creation gets out before we are prepared..."
"Understood," The two monoliths intoned together before departing.
"And us?" asked Five and Nine.
"Enjoy the world while you can."
They left as well, leaving Keel alone in his cold room. Good thing that his mechanical body couldn't feel it anymore. He stood, then walked for the exit.
It was time for tea.
Kensuke crouched in the woods, not far from the city limits of Tokyo-3, and gazed out at the massive collection of lakes. It was a breathtaking sight, seeing the moon reflect off of their silvery surfaces.
'I wish I had my camera...' he thought, wistfully looking up at the bright stars and the full moon. Such a bright, white moon. "I wish Toji and Shinji were here."
A loud rumble echoed from off in the distance. Kensuke snapped his head down.
"Oh...my...God."
Sensei Taiha Miykuzua was an old man. He felt age creep farther and farther into the marrow of his bones every passing day. The feeling was still a strange one to him, especially since most of his lower body was mechanical parts covered with a very expensive synthetic polymer flesh. A misfortune he suffered from the Second Impact...but that shedding of blood and loss of his lower body helped him more than anyone could know. For in his hospital ward he ran into an old acquaintance, another teacher. Sensei Kei Hyashimaru, a friend from his earlier teaching days who, before the impact, had been a teacher for the Tokyo University. An old friend, and a good friend...who was under the employ for Seele.
The two had recovered together, both with similar injuries and recovery periods. They had reminisced, chatted, discussed, debated, argued...and plotted together. It didn't take long before Kei decided to tell Taiha about the secretive Seele council. It took an even less amount of time before one sunglasses wearing Keel paid Taiha a visit.
And here he was, after fifteen years of pain and debilitation, he was in the ruined outskirts of Tokyo-3. A teacher and watcher of the vaunted Evangelion pilots. A collaborator with the principal, his old friend Kei, and a spy for Seele.
A smile stole across his withered face as he contemplated who, and what, he was. 'A man preparing for the end of the world, preparing for the next evolution.' Plotting and planning, its all he seemed to do these days.
Someone knocked on his door.
Taiha glanced at the wall clock and then groaned as he stood. "What do you want? It's nearly midnight for pete's sake!" He strode to the door and threw back the bolt. The phone rang in the distance. "Hold on, hold on! I'll ge-"
The door suddenly tore itself to shreds, several dozen neat holes appeared all throughout the thin wood as the two NERV Section-2 assault teams peppered the small area with 9mm bullets. Blood flowed like water from Taiha's mouth and nose, his body leaked like a butchered garden hose.
The last thing the old teacher heard was the sound of shattering glass, undercut by the dull thud of lead puncturing old, thick books. The last thing he saw was his dark blood spreading over the hardwood floor as he fell.
The night cold swept around him.
Kensuke watched with abject horror as the two NERV teams sprayed the door of his teachers house with their automatics. He felt his knee's go weak and dimly registered the slick feel of grass brushing against his hands.
"My God, my God, my God-" Kensuke stopped suddenly as a new order came echoing across the distance.
"Pull back. AT-1, place two HE in the walls and then one incendiary in the middle."
The teams were moving already, piling into their NERV Humvee's as if they were schoolchildren preparing to leave on a class field trip. There was a dull rumble of a diesel engine, from around the corner a small, light assault tank rolled into view. Thick and dark black smoke pouring out of its exhaust pipe as the treads laboriously pulled their burden forward. Then it ground to a halt, no more than three meters distant from the torn and tattered door.
Kensuke could see a dark, shiny patch seep out from under its frame.
"FIRE!"
The boy covered his ears quickly, but the concussion still pierced his protective hands. His mind shook from the impact, his body quivered from the explosion. A wall collapsed, taking part of the roof with it. A whirring of gears, the turret rotated.
"FIRE!"
Another shot, another wall, another hum of electric power as the turret centered.
"Incendiary...FIRE!"
The man behind the turret felt calm and cool as he went about his duty. Whomever this was, they had brought it upon themselves. He still felt that way as the house began to burn. As the smell of cooked flesh drifted into his nose.
Another order and they were away, the fire department would take care of the rest. They had more houses to visit tonight anyway.
Kensuke threw up.
Principal Kei Hyashimaru frowned at his wall as the phone rang again. "Come on, Taiha...come on damn you!" The line went dead. "What tha-"
A distant rumble cut through his soft exclamation, Kei felt his eyes go wide. "Oh, God...He wouldn't!" Kei shouted as he slammed his hand on the receiver, desperately trying to clear his phone line for a dial tone again.
A dial tone came up again, and just as suddenly went completely dead. 'The lines have been cut...Ikari knows who I am!'
"Tsoroko!" Kei shouted, calling for the captain of his house guards.
He wasn't unprepared for such a possibility after all; being a member of Seele, one always considered all the scenarios before committing himself to action. And they planned for every single possibility too.
"Yessir," Tsoroko announced himself with clipped and precise tones. He was dressed in a black jumpsuit, a holstered Glock by his right hip and a navy blue beret on his head that topped off the uniform. Shined boots gleamed brightly in the soft light of the room. Several men similarly dressed and armed with heavier weaponry were assembled behind him in a neat rectangular formation.
"Prepare for an assault on the compound," Kei harshly commanded as he strode into the foyer with the men. "Expect light assault tanks, break out anything you deem necessary to hold them off. I'm going to contact my superior."
Tsoroko took a measured look at the master of the house and saw desperation. Still, he was a military man who followed his orders; and he was Japanese, so he would follow them even if it meant his death. To do otherwise would be a disgrace to his honor.
"Yessir," Tsoroko answered with a crisp salute. Then turned and issued orders rapidly and with unerring precision.
'They will do well,' Kei thought feverishly as he turned away, heading for the holoroom. 'They've trained for this...they will do well enough until support arrives.' Kei reached the double European doors that lead to the secured Seele Council room. A quick scan of his hand and eyes confirmed his identity and he was through.
Tsoroko watched the doors swing shut again.
"We've lost."
Kouzo marched in time with the squad of suited agents. They strode confidently past startled personnel and wary technicians all the same. Never wavering or spreading apart. Always together.
'Damn you Ikari, why do you send me to do this kind of job? Wasn't it enough to torture the poor girl with that solitude...only to release her and demand her services once again!?'
The group of six stopped before the stainless steel elevator doors. The indicator above them started to click as Kouzo punched in a override passcode. The elevator descended rapidly.
'Only now to do this to her...and to have me execute it.'
"Sir," one of the agents dared to mention. "Are you alright?"
Kouzo fixed the man with a gaze that rivaled the Second Impact for polar ice melting abilities. The agent was too well trained to shiver, but he wilted visibly under that stare. "I'm perfectly fine, agent. Now, be silent...all of you."
The wait was in silence from then on. The elevator arrived, the doors opened to reveal a startled Maya Ibuki and several other technicians and staff.
"S-Sir?" Maya ventured forth looking scared and cornered within the confines of the elevator. Several of the others looked downright ready to piss their pants at the sight they were witnessing. Kouzo suddenly realized what Gendo felt.
"Out."
They scrambled, and soon Kouzo and the five others entered. Kouzo re-entered his override and depressed a button until it became a bright yellow-white color. The doors closed, the elevator descended again. The indicator began clicking again.
"Get ready," Kouzo mentioned off-hand.
The agents drew their weapons and chambered a round. Five sliding clicks echoed in the metal box.
"Are the units in position?" Gendo listened intently for the reply, it was difficult to hear the man on the other end. Static interference broke across the conversation every once in a while and made it impossible to discern what the other was saying. Gendo nodded as confirmation was acknowledged, "Good. I want you to pass the word along, strike in twenty minutes...well done, commander."
He hung up the phone and turned to face the impressive landscape that was the Geofront. He never had really taken the time to look out at this wonderful place, with its deep shadows and hues of midnight blue clinging in convoluted places. He never had realized how simple a pleasure awaited him every day should he have turned around.
His eyes narrowed, 'It's too late for that now any ways...best get going Ikari, or you'll miss the grand assault.' He turned and hurried out of the office, his steps echoing nicely throughout the massive room as he departed.
The room seemed not to care.
"Who was that?"
"The Boss, he was confirming the positions of our assault units."
Commander Ivan Broack was a heavyset man of middling years. He wore his uniform like it was his skin, the younger officers joked about how he only took it off to change his skivvies and bang the missus. Course, they never told that to him, but he managed to hear it none the less. He twirled his curly blonde hair about the index finger on the right hand and walked up to the sergeant who asked the question.
"We've been ordered to go in a few minutes...are the tanks coming into position?"
"Two mikes before they're set sir," the sergeant replied after consulting the reports his terminal were receiving.
"Good," Broack slammed his hand forcefully against the terminal letting out a loud bang as he did so. "Now we can finally get rid of those annoying bastards."
"Sir, who exactly are we attacking?"
"Sergeant, we are not 'attacking' anyone...we're just cleaning house a bit. Understand?" Broack let his voice edge on a bit, trying to let the sergeant know not to push for too many answers. After all, some things only the brass should know.
"Yessir, sorry sir."
Broack nodded and pointed to a digital assault unit on the sergeant's monitor.
"Move them in two more meters."
"Sorry Shinji, those calls took a bit longer than I expected."
"Its okay Dr. Aka-...I mean, Ritsuko," Shinji blushed a bit, and Ritsuko smiled. Happy that the boy was finally getting past the troubles he had the misfortune of going through right now.
"Well," she said, slipping into a more somber tone, "Where were we?"
"Rei was destabilizing-"
"Ah, yes...her body isn't like others y'know. Hers was only held together by that AT Field...and when she released it with such force and power, well...her form just couldn't hold together much longer. She started to rapidly decay, much like cancer. Except in reverse."
"So...you mean that she started to disintegrate?"
Ritsuko let the question hang for a moment, "Yes, Shinji...she started to disintegrate."
"Bu-but, what about the clones in that, that....that room?" Shinji cried aloud.
"Anti-AT Field technology," Ritsuko sipped her coffee, now cold, and winced at its horribly stale taste.
"A-ANTI?!"
"Sshhhh! Keep it down for pete's sake!" Ritsuko shifted in the synthetic seat and leaned forward. "Yes, anti. I know what you're thinking Shinji. But it wouldn't have worked, the Angels are simply too large of a creature to use it against. Plus, your...Father...wouldn't have allowed it. It would have taken away too much of his funding," Ritsuko ended her revelation of secrets with a bitter, if amused, tone; one eyebrow arched and the other twitching in anger.
"What? I don't understand," Shinji's face could have told her that much.
"I don't expect you to...so young, and so innocent," Ritsuko let a small peal of laughter loose at Shinji's bewildered look. "You would do well to be as such for many more years. But, remember this...Repairing the Evangelions wasn't something that cost us a lot of money. Hell, just the damages to the city cost more than the regeneration of the Evangelions! Most of the funding that NERV gets is used to keep track of certain people around the world...and the occasional covert side-job involving heavy explosives, but that's not the point."
"Then...what is?"
Ritsuko stood and walked over to the newly set coffee machines, "The point is-"
Ritsuko was interrupted by the cafeteria door breaking off of its hinges and exploding inwards. The scuffed, light brown sole of a well-polished dress shoe slowly lowered itself to the white floor underneath. Sub-Commander Kouzo Fuyutski stepped in quickly and leveled a hard stare in Ritsuko's direction.
Five suits fanned out behind him, each with his hand inside their coats.
"Ritsuko Akagi-" Kouzo began in a stiff tone.
'Here it comes...but now Shinji knows some things. Perhaps he will let some light shine on NERV after I'm gone.'
"You are charged with Insubordination, Disrespect to a superior officer, Tampering with national defense, Espionage, Treason, and Murder."
That last part did it, Ritsuko started to laugh in short, disbelieving chortles.
"Mur-murder? You've got to be kidding me! Those damn dolls were no more alive than this table!"
Kouzo watched her wild gestures with a weary calm that comes with age, his vision blurred slightly. 'Must be the alcohol,' he decided. Aloud he commented, "The other charges are sufficient enough to warrant your confinement again." Ritsuko stiffened and stood straight. "And the two before the last are enough to warrant your immediate execution."
Ritsuko's eyes widened, "Ikari wouldn't dare!"
"So, you are hear by condemned to suffer the execution of the verdict...agents, get this done quickly if you please," Kouzo gestured aimlessly to the frenzied doctor.
The five men wasted no time.
Kouzo stood by the door, gazing patiently at the frightened Shinji quickly dart out of the way as the men roughly dragged Ritsuko out of the room. She screamed frantically, clawed at her assailants; it didn't help her in the end. And Kouzo turned his head aside as she was pulled past him, not fast enough though, as she still managed to spit into his face. Kouzo sighed and wiped the dribble away with his handkerchief.
"...nothing is the same anymore."
Kouzo nodded at Shinji's quiet proclamation, "Yes, my boy. Your father has seen to that quite well enough."
"...is she going to be killed?"
Another nod, and a quiet sigh followed.
"Shinji, you should go and visit the Second Child again. I think that you should spend some time with her for a while..." Kouzo looked up at the boy, huddled in his chair with his head hanging in such a way as to hide his eyes. "And try to forget what just happened."
"...what if I can't?"
"...I don't know...Goodnight, Shinji Ikari," yellow, second stage alert alarms began to flash across the empty expanse of the cafeteria. Kouzo paused on his way out and calmly remarked, "Ah...so it has begun."
Kouzo left Shinji in the cafeteria.
Soon, the boy was gone as well.
Keel smiled into his warm and steamy cup of tea. He did so enjoy this time of the night, with its playful shadows and its soft illuminescence that gently caressed the land. He had always enjoyed this moment of the night, even after he lost his eyesight to the Second Impact he would still remain up and gaze out over the rolling hills and the sharp mountains of his home.
'Such a wonderful place.'
"Sir," his butler softly spoke into Keel's ear. "There is an emergency call coming from Tokyo-3 for you."
"Bring me the phone if you would please."
"It's not on the phone sir, it's on your private line..."
Keel took a moment longer to look at the landscape and then sighed and handed away his tea. "Business as usual."
It took him two minutes to arrive at the smaller, six man council chambers. He sat down quickly and punched in a rapid seven digit code on his keypanel.
'Who is calling me now? The council will meet tomorrow anyway...has something gone wrong with the Mass Production series?' Keel felt a trickle of anxiousness run through his metallic spine as he keyed in the last number and activated the holoprojectors.
Seele 11 appeared.
"Yes, number eleven. Why are you in my presence, surely you could have wai-"
"Dammit man! Shut up and listen for a change!"
Keel was immediately tensed and angry, "How dare you speak to me in such a manner! I'll have you-"
A loud explosion echoed through the small chamber, and the sharp staccato of automatic weapons fire could be heard from the background.
"LISTEN! I'm under attack by NERV forces. They've got an entire tank company out at my front gate, trying to blast their way in-" another blast echoed through. "My men are being slaughtered, I need help here."
"What about Seele 12?" Keel queried, a pit of dread beginning to sprout in his mind.
"I think they dealt with him first," Seele 11 broke off in a fit of coughing and grunting before he resumed speaking. "His phone line went dead. Mine did too, after I heard an explosion from across the city."
Keel thought rapidly, and found no answers. "How did they know you were in Seele?" he asked in a voice approaching a low growl.
"I don't know, I don't know...damn! They just broke through the outer wall-" another explosion, this one caused the holoimage to waver a bit as its signal became unstable.
"Can you get out of there?" Keel leaned over his keypads and started typing out a missive to the remaining Seele members.
"No," Seele 11 lamented. "They have all exits blocked. And my secret passage was one of the first to be destroyed...do you suppose Akagi betrayed us?"
"No, after all...she was Twelve's informant. If she was going to betray us she would have done it a long time ago...there, the others have been alerted."
"I don't think it wil-" The image wavered again and was temporarily covered in white static before it came back. Seele 11 did not continue speaking though, instead...all Keel could hear was the unnerving sound of footsteps approaching from everywhere, and nowhere.
The footsteps stopped and the holoimage vanished.
'Damn it...how the hell did Ikari know who Eleven was? How the hell did he manage to kill of Twelve without our agents warning him!' Keel furiously pounded out the last of his message and pressed the send button. He lifted a finger against his lips and chewed on the skin a bit, then in a fit of pique he slammed the same hand down hard against the smooth, black marble expanse of the table.
"Damn!"
A soft scrape of leather against the floor was all the warning Keel had. Instantly he leapt sideways out of his seat, knocking it over in the process, and drew his hidden sidearm from its inner pocket. He had one shot, and only an instant to use it!
'No time to aim! Pull the TRIGGER!'
The shot echoed, as all sounds did in the Seele rooms, and died off slowly. Keel watched in horrid fascination as his butler, now bereft half his head, fell to the ground with a wordless groan.
He stared at the dead body a moment longer, then fled the room. Dropping the spent weapon as he bashed open the thick wooden doors that cordoned him off from the rest of his house. He paused for only a moment before running on, calling his house guards as he ran.
'No time, need to prepare...no time, my plans...my scenario! Ikari, IKARI!'
"GUARDS! WHERE ARE MY GUARDS!"
Kensuke watched the mop-up start to wind down.
If one could call it a mop-up...slaughter might have been a better term for what the NERV personnel were doing to the remaining house guards that still lived. The house was on fire too, probably incendiaries or hastily made alcohol cocktails. Also, the smell of gasoline...maybe trail lines heading for canisters. It was still hard for the boy to take in. After all, there was a big difference between playing at war and pretending to die...and actually seeing men die.
A helluva big difference.
There was a secondary explosion from within the second story rooms that shot out a gigantic fireball through the slowly melting windows. Glass shattered and tinkled quietly in the night as their glinting shards fell to the blood littered ground. Bodies were rounded up in the center of a garden courtyard, doused with diesel and then lit with a lighter. Then left to be cremated. Dead torches of once-living flesh burned brightly in the eternal summers night.
Kensuke choked on the smell, then turned and headed for his home. It was a long walk back. And, on the way, he could swear that he heard klaxons off in the distance. His pace quickened.
"Anything to say...Ritsuko?" Kouzo asked tiredly, rubbing the bridge of his nose as he stood before the dejected-looking blonde. She remained silent. "Very well...Agents? Proceed."
The five suits lowered their issue sidearms and sighted the doctor in very easily, it being at such a close range and all. Ritsuko lifted her head and glared fearlessly into their shaded eyes. Fingers audibly tightened on their respective triggers. Kouzo could almost swear that the girl smiled before the muzzles flashed. In fact he would have bet on it. Weapons were lowered and the men walked slowly towards the door. Kouzo grimly stepped away from the pooling blood that collected at the feet of the dead.
"Do you need us for anything else, sir?" asked one agent.
"No," Kouzo stared fixatedly ahead, "Leave."
"Yessir."
Kouzo waited until the door closed, then he stepped over the five dead bodies and their blood to stand before the tight-lipped and visibly shaken Ritsuko. She was covered in blood, the good doctor, highly tense and nervously awaiting the other shoe to drop. Klaxon alarms began to flare in the background. Overhead, a muted speaker began blaring out unintelligible nonsense. Kouzo didn't try to make sense of it...he already knew what was happening.
The attack of Seele had begun.
"Now then...Ritsuko," he paused a moment and inclined his head down to stare at the dead bodies.
"W-Why?"
Kouzo looked up at the doctor, "Because I will need you...after this is over."
"But, my...my charges?"
"Ikari knew what you were doing. He knew that Seele had given you orders...and so did I." Ritsuko stood silent, letting no sign slip that he was right or wrong. "You are now dead...to everyone and anyone who formerly knew you. Except me, of course," Kouzo started around the wide body of red liquid and headed for the exit, "There is a car waiting for you in the first deck, it will take you to a safehouse within the Geofront."
Kouzo stopped at the door and looked back at her, letting the light from the hall black out his frame. 'I feel too much like Ikari tonight,' he thought privately, aloud he continued, "You are to remain there until I call for you. Should I require assistance with the Magi, there is a terminal directly linked to the mainframe-"
"How long have you been planning this?" Ritsuko interjected.
Kouzo mumbled and hummed for a moment or two and then answered, "About a month, little less." Ritsuko stood still. "Goodnight...Doctor." Kouzo walked out and left the door open.
"Sector twelve is in position sir!"
Broack listened to the report and let a smile steal across his lips. "Excellent, excellent...sergeant!"
"Sir?" The man in question replied.
"Issue the order...you may fire, when ready."
"Yessir," the sergeant inclined his head for a moment and then issued the orders required.
Broack smiled even wider as he noted the orange flashes in the trees, and clapped his hands together as he heard the muzzles give their thunderous report. More explosions and orange fire leapt up in the far distance.
"Now order the men forward. Use the LAT's to take out heavy resistance areas."
"Already ordered sir," the sergeant calmly answered, not letting the explosions faze him.
"Good man," Broack complemented before he motioned to the command staff. "I'm going to the front. Pack up the camp and prepare to move headquarters into the primary target once its secured."
The sergeant nodded and began disconnecting wires from the radio. Broack watched a moment longer before he pulled out his pistol and chambered a round. Several others of the staff similarly armed themselves and then filed out, leaving the few remaining specialists and NCO's to clean up.
The sharp pops of weapons-fire sounded harshly in the night. Another explosion erupted from within the besieged compound.
Gendo winced slightly as the high-pitched scream of the VTOL's engines whined over the hustle and bustle of the hasty preparations of the air-assault units. A light drizzle had sprung across the skies of Tokyo-3, and the tarmac was lit with a sick shine from the underbelly lights of the heavy assault craft. Men ran and cursed as minor slips caused them to break the quick flow of motion and work that went on. Pilots activated their windshield wipers and quickly ran down their checklist of outputs and payloads. Several men ran back and forth with shells and ammo cases, rapidly and efficiently re-supplying those units who had recently returned from their previous two missions. Men checked and rechecked every conceivable instrument on their vehicles, preparing for their first fight in months.
Only, this time, it was not to be against the Angels. Gendo was quickly ushered to a waiting APC by a corporal. "In here sir! That's where you'll find him!" The man shouted over the noise of the slowly preparing aircraft.
Gendo nodded and stepped up the ramp as it slowly started to raise. Inside, the conditions were crowded and hot, with several dozen men in full battle armor and weaponry standing and waiting for their orders. With a jerk and the throttle of the diesel the heavy vehicle of war sped off, leaving the outskirts of Tokyo-3's protective buildings and leading a convoy of many down towards the road.
Gendo moved up to the front of the vehicle, to stand by the Major who was in charge. They exchanged brief salutes and then turned to face forward. "We'll be there within a half-hour sir," the man reported as he studied the map coordinates before him.
"Excellent," Gendo adjusted his stance as the APC lurched into a turn. "How many vehicles are following?"
"Twenty sir...with three squads of five in each," he consulted his computer readout again before continuing. "As well as a squadron of heavy assault VTOL's that are moving ahead to secure the air."
A smile stole across the icy commander's lips as he considered the firepower he had amassed against the pitiful target he was going against. It would be almost too easy. And victory would be too sweet.
"Approaching the main highway sir!" one of the drivers shouted back, twisting his hands hard on the yolk that steered the armored behemoth. Men grunted and groaned in the rear as Gendo leaned over slightly to maintain his balance and stay on his feet. After all, a leader inspires his men by doing things they do not.
Then his world suddenly spun out and turned over as a flash of heat washed over his body. Pain...and darkness came soon enough.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
The soft chirp of the life-support systems is something described by many patients and visitors alike as...comforting, reassuring. To Shinji Ikari, it was a dagger in his head. Needles in his eyes. A painful echo in his ears.
Not because each beep indicated the continued existence of the one that was so closely monitored by the machines...rather, because that each beep simply indicated a homeostasis, never changing, never wavering.
It seemed hopeless to wish for the person to wake up now. It seemed that she was destined to be a vegetable for the rest of her life.
"Asuka...Langley...Sohryu..." Even his whisper seemed pathetic now. "...I don't know anything anymore Asuka, nothing is the same," Shinji slumped into the soft chair by her bedside and looked across the bed and out the window. "Rei is dead...I guess if you were awake you would be happy...and I don't know if I would hate you for that or not," his head lowered into his palms and he started crying.
"I really don't know. I-I just can't discover what I'm thinking or feeling for anyone...anymore. Everything's going to Hell and I feel like, somehow, I started that trip." He wiped away the burning tears and looked back up to the silent girl across from him. "...I feel like...like its my fault for getting you here. OH! WHY THE HELL WAS I EVEN BORN?" Shinji shouted suddenly in the silence of the room.
"IF ALL I WAS MEANT TO BE IS A PERSON WHO BROUGHT PAIN AND HATE TO THOSE AROUND ME," Shinji paused for a moment to stand and kick his chair away from him, the wood and fiber object impacting the wall hard enough to leave a dent.
Slowly, he calmed down, "If that's all I was meant to do for the world...then why was I born?"
Asuka deigned not to reply.
'Fitting, I suppose,' the troubled boy feverishly imagined to himself. 'After all...why should she want to speak to somebody like me. I'm worthless...trash, refuse. I couldn't save Asuka...and now I couldn't save Rei.'
Shinji's shoulders slumped in defeat, his knees buckled out from under him and he slid down next to Asuka's bed. Her hand was inches away from his face, gently hanging off the edge of her tousled bed. As if she had been shifting around during her waking sleep.
Slowly, tenderly, almost fearfully...he reached out and held that hand. He held onto it and gripped it firmly. "Your hand is warm...Asuka," Shinji smiled a bit as he felt new tears run across his cheeks. Alarms started to sound across the hospital ward.
"Attention, attention," the loudspeaker blared across the small room. "All sectors go to First-Stage Alert! This is no drill! NERV is under attack! Repeat, NERV is under attack by JSSDF forces. All personnel are to arm themselves-"
Shinji listened to the blaring announcement as it finished and started to repeat. In the distance he could hear explosions echo across the Geofront. "Not again."
Commander Broack smiled and emptied his magazine of fourteen rounds directly into the faces of several surprised enemy troops. Hot blood sprayed from one of the dead men, catching Broack full in the face and chest. He didn't mind; after all, it inspired the men to fight harder.
"FORWARD!"
His men gave a raucous battle-cry in response and lurched forward into the fixed fortifications of the enemy troops that defended the airbase. Snow swirled around the air and the troops, wind that was cold enough to make water turn slushy bit hard into exposed flesh.
'Makes me remember my great-grandfather,' Broack reminisced as he struggled forward through the rapidly piling drifts. The snow had started suddenly, about ten minutes into the actual fight itself. It was now an hour later and the small, white flakes of ice seemed to come down even harder.
'Such is Russia,' the commander bitterly thought as he wrenched an automatic rifle from the frozen corpse of one unfortunate soldier. He quickly turned its muzzle onto the slowly retreating forms that hid behind camouflaged boxes of Evangelion supplies. A few of which leaked out orange-red LCL, an odd counter-point to the red-pink snow that surrounded most dead bodies that accompanied those boxes.
The muzzle flared orange itself, and spewed its small, leaden projectiles of death and pain.
"God how I love my job!" Broack shouted into the air as he cut down two fleeing soldiers.
A few of his assault team shot grenades into the piled crates and barrels. The explosion that followed illuminated several flying bodies...and body parts, as well as the entrance to the massive air hanger beyond.
The way seemed clear enough...if you discounted the five APC's and two tanks that were slugging their way through the snow. An RPG slashed through the darkening sky and landed amongst Broack's troops. Cries of the wounded and the dying cut above the snap of the guns and made the commander turn his head.
"Call in some medics and direct them over there!" he ordered to his radioman.
"Yessir," the man shouted back.
Broack peered hard across the blaze of flame that had erupted from the crates, and made a rapid count of the soldiers pouring out of the APC's. "And call up the LAC's, we need some support over here."
"On it sir!"
He nodded and dropped the spent rifle. He could always pick up a fresh one later on. Now, though, he needed to get moving.
"Echo, Charlie to NHQ...come in please."
Gendo listened to the man repeat his call for several moments, then watched and listened again as the man switched frequencies and tried again. 'Useless,' he thought. 'They would have thought of that already...though, just maybe-'
"Commander," a captain came crawling up to the overturned APC that, a half-hour ago, had been transporting Ikari and a platoon of men towards the city of Tokyo-2...and the JSSDF Headquarters. "We've called in the air support. It should be arriving momentarily. We...should get you to an aid station sir."
A nearby explosion made him and the captain flinch away, with Gendo raising a battered helmet over his head as debris rained down on them. He winced as fresh pain tore across his right arm and thigh; which, in turn, caused his slowly coagulating head wound to re-open and let fresh blood spill down across his eyes.
"I'm fine captain...now then, let this position be the objective for your men. We're already far ahead of the lines and we need to be relived quickly. Direct all your attention here and to re-opening this road."
The captain glanced through a hole in the bottom of the APC, caused by a well-placed shell directed by a very competent gunner. It had caused the APC to turn over originally, the explosion killing nearly everybody from the platoon, including the major, as well as the two drivers.
Gendo supposed that he was fortunate, escaping with only a minor head injury and a deep scratch that ran down the right portion of his torso and thigh. Well, more fortunate than the poor bastard that had been underneath the shell.
"Sir," the captain returned from his peep through the hole. "I don't think that its possible to re-open this road for at least another three months. The entire left side of that bridge up ahead has been destroyed, and what's left is being used by JSSDF to move ground forces across!"
Gendo let a quiet sigh of frustration loose and reconsidered his possibilities. There has to be a way to get through on this highway! The staccato of gunfire rose in volume and quickened in tempo.
"Sir! I've got NERV HQ on the comm!"
He reached over hastily with his left hand to take the offered headset. Keying the radio, he spoke calmly into the mike. "NHQ this is Echo Charlie, over." The reply was crackly and filled with static to the point of being intelligible. "Say again, over," Gendo asked.
"-his is NHQ, Hyuuga speaking, ov-r."
"Lieutenant, this is Commander Ikari here."
"Command-...-hat are you d-ing there?"
Gendo smirked a bit as another shell exploded nearby and pondered that question himself. "Not important, what is your situation? Over."
"...under att-k by JS-F...Heavy fighi-...trying to -t assistance...-ver."
'Don't expect any too soon,' he wryly thought. Aloud he continued. "Keep them held off, my forces here will try to pull back to the Geofront, over."
"Rodg-, out."
Gendo gave a small nod and tossed the communication headset back to the radioman. He caught it with a seemingly practiced easy and set it down before turning back to his rifle. "Captain?"
The man rolled away from the hole he had been firing through and faced back to his commander. "Yes sir?" he asked, straightening his helmet that had threatened to slip down over his eyes.
"Call your men forward long enough to throw the advancing units into disarray, then we'll pull back and head to the Geofront. Somehow they've moved around us." The captain nodded in understanding and rolled across Gendo, apologizing afterwards, and began giving orders to the radioman. Who, in turn, relayed them further on. Gendo winced as the pain returned, and contemplated exactly how the hell he had managed to get himself into this position.
His hand came up to rub his nose.
God, what a headache he was getting.
Misato Katsuragi was in a foul mood. She always seemed to be in a foul mood lately. Permanent PMS mode, as the rumors said. If only they knew. She tugged the hair piece free of the violet locks it restrained. Her shiny hair fell loose and free in the cold air of the metallic corridor. The cell phone came out and flipped down. A rapid dial was pressed.
"Hyuuga speaking!" came the rapid and confused reply.
"Hyuuga, Katsuragi. What's the situation?"
"We've got a full battalion of JSSDF Special Ops attacking the Geofront. Maya tells me that the Magi are being hacked as well, from the six sub-divisional Magi systems in China, the two in Germany, the United States, Russia, and in Matsashiro."
"Damn-"
"That's not all," Hyuuga cut in. "They're taking out our remote sensory stations, we have lost all of our above-ground communications and radar stations. And I've just been informed by Commander Ikari that he's tangled up in a ground fight three kilometers out of Tokyo-3."
"What?" Misato walked into the emergency access shaft for the command bridge and entered her keycard through the ID slot. "What in the hell is Commander Ikari doing up there?"
"I don't know! But he's requisitioned nearly all of our available assault vehicles and he's just authorized a full mobilization of the air corps."
The panels slid aside and Misato gripped the proffered railing as a sense of vertigo swept over her. In a few seconds, she was swept up onto the bridge and into the chaos it held. "How far have they penetrated?" Misato rushed over to a nearby command map of NERV Headquarters. It was rapidly turning red.
"They're just entering the fourth level, but we've managed to halt their advance to that point...for now."
Misato frowned and considered the possibilities, 'This place isn't meant to fend off human assaults. We could very well lose this battle.'
"Ma'am? Three units of Section-3 are being moved into position."
"What? By who's orders?" Misato quickly moved over to the terminal and began accessing the latest orders that were issued. However, she was interrupted by a calm and gentle voice.
"You can stop that major, for your culprit is here."
Misato turned and walked up to Sub-Commander Fuyutski, "Sir, it is my responsibility to issue orders for those units! If you do these things without running it past me first then we WILL lose this fight!"
"I am sorry, major...but I had a moment of intuition and acted accordingly."
Kouzo smiled at the woman and then moved for the lift to take him up to the commanders' deck. Misato gave the retreating back a hard glare before turning back and continuing her own dictations. "Find Asuka and Shinji! Get them into their Evas!"
"But Asuka can't pilot hers!" Maya insisted, her eyes wide with fear and frustration as she pounded away at the keyboard of her terminal.
"THEN PUT HER IN UNIT 01 WITH SHINJI, DAMN IT!"
The door closed behind him, cutting off any further orders the very competent woman was giving. Kouzo didn't care too much, she knew what she was doing after all. Instead, he worried about what pieces the hidden players of this macabre chess match had hidden up their sleeves.
'Yes, Seele is starting to fight back now Gendo...but now, instead of all of the council acting in unison...we have them acting individually,' Kouzo frowned as he contemplated the dangers involved with such a risk. 'But if they manage to weaken us with these individual actions...then another might just be able to take it all for themselves. We are in a dangerous position should you fail in any aspect, Gendo.'
The shaft opened above him and he returned to the uproar of the bridge as it directed the defense of the monolithic building. Kouzo's lips turned into a grim line as he stepped clear of the halted lift, "Or is that how you wanted it?" His small sigh was unnoticed amongst the loud explosions echoing through the labyrinthine NERV corridors.
Today had been a long day...and it still had a few more hours left to go. Perhaps, then...it would all be over. He reached for his own cell phone and pressed the 6 rapid dial. "Akagi? It appears that your help will be needed sooner than I thought."
"Goddamned bastards! WHY WON'T YOU DIE?!" Broack shouted across the din of weapons fire and explosions. Already half his men were down and out for the count, but so were many of his oppositions forces. It's just that they were too damn stubborn for their own good. After all, if you had the chance to surrender or run, wouldn't you take it?
"Damn Seele bastards!" he cursed again, ripping an old model AK-47 out of the snowy prison that encapsulated it. One sharp pull cleared its jam and it was usable again, as Broack demonstrated by cutting down two holdovers by the hanger doors.
His men closed the semicircle in, bullets flared and sparked as they slammed into the over-large doors of the aircraft maintenance hanger. Men screamed in pain or grunted in amazement as they succumbed to the irresistible pull of death that was delivered by way of a hot piece of dense metal.
Blood melted the snow and ran in streams to form red lakes.
Another rocket shot out into the night and exploded against the ground nearby. Broack let another curse fly as he rolled over several mangled bodies to escape the explosive device. He came out of his tumble with the barrel leading, and sprayed the darkened interior with lead.
Several men rushed the doors, grenades in hand and waiting to be used. Broack ceased his attack and dropped into a bank of white ice just as his soldiers tossed in their explosives.
One-one thousand.
Two-one thousand.
Three-one thousand.
Boom.
A wall of red flame erupted from the darkened entranceway, and screams of those unfortunate enough to believe the grenades to be the shrapnel kind wafted out of the interior. Napalm hand grenades...lethal, and ruthlessly effective. His men stormed through that hellstrom and quickly silenced the burning husks of men forever.
Off to his left, a line of LAT's advanced and opened fire on a similar line of approaching old-model Russian tanks. A distant explosion sounded as an AP round found its mark and cut through the hot diesel engine of its target.
More of his men rushed into the flame enshrouded doorway. Broack wasn't far behind. "LIGHTS! TURN ON THE DAMN LIGHTS AND SECURE THE PERIMETER!" his cry echoed eerily through the cavernous depths.
Soon, enormous flood lamps several dozen meters above the ground, flickered and flared into life. He had to bite his cheek in order to stop the gasp. Nine Evangelions...white...and for all intents and purposes, instruments of the devil himself.
Broack motioned to the red entry plugs that hung ever so above the units and ordered his men: "Blow those damn things to hell and let's be done with it."
The soldiers wasted no time. Nine RPG's flashed through the reeking, smoky air and struck their marks, dead center. The commander smiled as the red plugs twisted and tore apart...then he ordered a second strike. Just to be sure.
Keel rushed about his mansion, issuing orders for its defense and drinking glasses of brandy like the end of the world was going to come about before he had his fill. Many of the servants flinched away from his wildly swinging hands, but they followed his orders exactly.
They dared not do otherwise.
Slowly, a man of old age, but younger than Keel himself, stepped forward and before the optical wearing Seele member. "Father? What's happening?"
The deep bass voice had a sedative effect on Keel, instantly calming his furious motions and leaving him breathless with a half-full crystal, cut glass of dark brandy in his hand. The servants looked to the new arrival with a pleading look, and he motioned them out of the room.
"Boy, why are you here? I thought I sent you to look after my investments in Africa," Keel reeled from the effects of the brandy, and only managed to collapse into one of the plush chairs with the help of his son.
"I did, and I have returned to find my father the drunkard...shouting at his house servants about an attack. Father?" Keel gave a slurred grunt. "Who would attack you?"
Keel stared through the red lense of his optics for a moment, then he shook violently. His son began to worry for a moment as the elderly man burst into a roaring, knee-slapping laugh. After several failed attempts, Keel managed to calm himself.
"Who wouldn't..." His son looked on him with simple, questioning eyes. "My boy, my poor, innocent boy...you have no idea, what I have done in my years," Keel shook his head back and forth a few times as he lamented.
"Really? You think that I don't know what you've been doing with Seele these past fifty years?"
That brought Keel up short. "Wh-what did you say?"
The son stared down hard at the withered old man, "You heard me father, Seele...the Dead Sea Scrolls, NERV, Evangelion, Human Instrumentality Project...You really should change the passcodes for your files more often."
The old man could barely move.
"The whole plan is in ruins by now," the younger man scoffed as he wrenched the glass away from his father. "Several assault units have already taken care of your Seele Council...only you, the Japanese Minister of Defense, and your Russian and German friends are left."
"But...how?"
"How did I know? Or how did Ikari know?" his son left the question hanging for a moment. "It doesn't really matter, the point is...you've lost everything. The JSSDF is attacking NERV now, but they will eventually fail...and your vaunted Mass Production Evangelions are now in the hands of your enemies."
"I-Impossible!...the plan, the scenario...how did Ikari find their location so easily?" Keel looked up at his son, who amused himself with a thick, leather-bound book from one of the shelves. The boy read with half-lidded eyes that seemed to look more at Keel than at the Kanji held within.
"Who said Ikari held them?"
Realization broke over the horizon of Keel's mind, "You?"
"Finally! Your dull wit manages to find the mark and sticks!...Yes, my forces now have control of your vaunted Mass Production Evangelions...and Ikari knows about you and your Seele cronies."
"Why?" Keel sank lower into the chair, his hands falling limply against the cracks of the seat cushion. 'There's a pistol in this chair...let him talk, and I will get him after he tells me all he knows.'
The boy smiled, "I have been informing Ikari about certain...plans, since the start of NERV, father. You see, I didn't want you to complete your version of Third Impact...if you had listened to those advisors we'd brought in during the Katsuragi Expedition, you would have known that the last Impact would have been a disaster...just like the first one was."
"How can you be sure!" Keel spat out.
"How can you be so confidante that your version would be...what humanity needed?" the boy put down the book and stepped forward to just behind another seat.
Keel slowly moved his hands down further, "What about the Jet Alone project?"
His son rolled his eyes with frustration, "You know as well as I that your, 'side' project wasn't supposed to do anything. It was merely to keep the other nations in line and continue using NERV...though I admit, I hadn't expected you to personally fund that sham operation." Keel could feel the cold steel of the grip now, just a little bit longer. "But, you should have covered you tracks better, old man. And now, Seele will be incinerated because you failed to keep secrets from your own son."
"Malachi, why?" A hint of disbelief, 'Yes...let the fool think that he is in control. It will all be over soon.'
Malachi Keel smirked, "Well father, you could say it was all your fault really... because of your files...I knew exactly what your, Instrumentality Project was supposed to do...and I knew exactly who every member of Seele was. And thus, your Impact has been averted...and it will never be attempted by man again until we are ready!"
Keel frowned, "But what if Rei Ayanami is still alive? What if there is one more clone of her left for him to use?! He could still initiated his own Third Impact! All you've done will have been for nothing if she's still alive!"
Malachi smiled again, "Trust me father...I can prevented Ikari's Impact if I need to."
Keel felt what remained of his body go cold, and with a lurch he shot up from the recliner. The pistol whipped up and around, the hammer pulled back with a sharp snick, and his finger tightened on the trigger. The hammer fell forward with a dull-
Click.
Malachi frowned for a moment and stepped out from behind the chair, pulling out his own pistol. "Really, do you expect me to put you into a chair that held a loaded weapon? God how you think I'm a fool, as if I hadn't found those things since I was a child." He scoffed and ridiculed the older Keel as his own weapon was pointed at the man's head. "Goodbye, father. Have a nice afterlife in Hell."
The servants in the halls flinched at the sudden gunshot, then scurried away from the parlor doors without a second glance. If any time would be a good time to run, it was now. They took that chance, and fled.
Shinji held onto Asuka's hand as though it would be the only thing to anchor him to sanity. He clenched his eyes shut and grit his teeth hard as the explosions rolled through the foundations of the hospital. Several times he had to stand up and block some minor debris from falling on the comatose girl.
'Don't know why I still put up with all this shit for her,' he thought ruefully as he brushed himself off from the latest incident. 'Don't know why...but I do.' Blood dripped from his eyebrow, a minor cut from the second or third time he had put himself in harm's way. It didn't hurt much now, only a slight sting. Still...
"I'm really fucked up."
And here he was, sitting next to what remained of the most beautiful girl in all of Tokyo-3, or Japan if you believed what she often spouted as her rhetoric. Not that it had helped her any...no, no. It hadn't helped her at all. Pride, hubris...what a bunch of Greek nonsense. Yet, at the same time, how true...how true.
"Asuka...please," Shinji pleaded again, desperate for someone to talk to. "Please, you've got to wake up...Please! PLEASE!"
The girl shifted slightly, but didn't sit up or speak. She still slept in her waking nightmare. The door swung open and banged against the wall. "Shinji?"
The boy looked up at the frightened nurse and gently extracted himself from Asuka's hand. "Shinji, you've got to get Asuka and take her to-"
"The Eva...I know," the boy sighed and stood up.
"You just wait outside and I'll get the machines detached...okay?"
Another explosion tore through the building close by, Shinji nodded his assent and moved for the door. "Don't take to long."
The nurse hastened to her duties, leaving Shinji to close the door and wait.
Kensuke patiently waited, buried underneath a light covering of rubble and debris from a nearby bomb crater, as a column of JSSDF special Ops moved past him. He nearly gagged again as he spied one of the soldiers gun down a fleeing NERV technician, but managed to keep down his bile.
What the hell are you doing here Kensuke? You're gonna get killed!
'Shut up will ya! I'm trying to make it through this alive.'
He listened to the sounds of gunfire fade in the distance for several minutes before he felt it was safe enough to stand up again. A quick dusting off of his clothes and a short glance around confirmed that he was indeed alone in the hall...apart from the twenty or more dead people that is.
He stopped at one and pulled out its automatic pistol, checking to make sure it was loaded of course, and then chambering a round. 'Won't be needing this anymore,' was his pessimistic thought. 'Now then, I've managed to sneak into NERV Headquarters...what should I do next?'
"Attention! Attention! JSSDF forces have reached the hospital wing! All units are to engage the enemy there!"
Kensuke blinked at the announcement and then turned to look at the directory map nearby. 'Those men were probably heading for the Hospital Wards, so...'
He memorized the map as best he could and then took off for the stairwells. Time to visit a friend.
Toji Suzahara wasn't having the best day in his life.
No, actually...he wasn't having the worst day of his life. That had been when his leg was taken by that damned Angel-infected Evangelion. Bastardly creation. Now, now it was just the ever-present sound of weapons being discharged...and grenades going off. Oh, and the screams of the dying, and then there was all of those explosions-
The sarcastic train of thought was derailed when his door opened and in popped one blood and dust covered military brat. "K-Kensuke! What the hell are you doing here?!"
Kensuke impatiently shushed him and pressed his ear against the door, his ears trained for any noise that might give away advancing soldiers.
Toji let his eyes slid down the sandy-haired boy, trailing his arms and spotting all of the small nicks and bruises that he had collected in what might have been a helluva adventure. Ending at his hands, where he carried a smoking semi-automatic pistol.
"I think they've gone past now," the boy sighed in relief and sagged away from the door.
"Who?" Toji asked.
"The JSSDF, NERV...anyone with a pistol or rifle at the moment."
"What's going on?"
"I really don't know," Kensuke slid back from the steel door and further along the wall, deeper into the shadows that played there. "All I can tell you is that the JSSDF has blocked off Tokyo-3 completely...even surrounded and cut off the damn wood trails."
Toji struggled to sit upright, "How do you know?" Kensuke remained silent for a long time, the sounds of battle faded even more in the lapse. "How, Kensuke?"
"I was nearly gunned down by them trying to get back home..." The boy sounded scared, defeated, tired, and lonely. Even with the darkness that enveloped him, Toji could plainly see that Kensuke was shaking horribly. Flinching at every gunshot, shifting with every grenade's dull thump and roar. "It's a lot different...actually being in one."
Toji nodded his head before he sank back into the white sheets of his bed. Absently he noted how stark they would be if his blood was all over them. His body shuddered with the thought. 'I hope Hikari is okay.'
"Flood level three with Bakelite! Cut the bastards off and then tell the defending units to press forward!"
"Yes Ma'am!"
Misato sat back and watched the Bakelite infusion begin. Within minutes the entire third level of the headquarters building was covered in the fast-sealing compound. In another few, her own units surged forward and decimated the surrounded JSSDF units. A small iota of glee emerged as she saw the attacking special ops units slaughtered by unmerciful NERV defenders.
'Not one ounce of sympathy...not for these bastards.'
"Ma'am? Asuka and Shinji have reached the Evangelion hanger bays...they're under escort as per your orders," Maya supplied just as Misato's tension and worry for her wards reached it's peak.
She let loose a very audible sigh, "Thanks, Maya. Tell them to get suited Asuka suited up and insert her into Eva Unit 01. Then launch it into the lake."
If Asuka couldn't help fight them off, at least she would be safe with Shinji in his Eva. Misato hoped.
"Yes Ma'am...Shinji is in the changing room and will be done in a few moments."
"Good," Misato turned and studied the last known map taken of the surrounding areas. Since the JSSDF had taken out all of the remote sensor stations they had to rely on old data and guestimations of enemy dispositions and strengths. This would be a long, hard fight to get clear.
Kouzo watched the major work with a delicate interest. He nodded silently with each of her command decisions as they came out, sometimes too fast for him to keep up, and simply noted the actions of his bridge crew. 'That girl does know what she's doing...you trained her well, Akagi.'
Even know, the aforementioned doctor was helping her still-fresh apprentice fend off the attacking Magi daughter systems. Through several invitingly placed program files, Akagi managed to lead Maya to a little accessed protection system that had been installed into the Magi mainframes when she herself had yet to transfer to the Gherin project.
Soon the short haired bridge tech found the file and accessed it. A brief scan and she sent it into motion.
In a different part of the world, perhaps in one that didn't even exist in reality, three holograms thrummed in unison as they arrived. Though, to hear that noise, it would set a man's teeth rattling. Three out of twelve.
"One is not here," Four intoned.
"They have killed him then. And our project will still continue forward none the less," declared Eight. "Already my troops have penetrated deep into Ikari's lair...all we need now is for Six to launch his units and start the Red Earth Ceremony."
Six remained silent.
"Six," Four quietly asked. "Are the Mass Production units still within our control?"
Six remained quiet for a few more moments, and then whispered out, "No. Ikari...or someone else...has them now. My guards were destroyed and the re-enforcement's obliterated."
"Impossible!" Eight shouted. "How did Ikari know where we sent the Evangelions?"
The room was silent as each computed the answer. They responded all at once. "Sabotage."
"Yes," Six continued when the echo died. "It has to be somebody from the council who leaked information to Ikari...but who?" Another thrum echoed in the vast expanse of the Seele Council room...Seele One had arrived.
"Keel?! I thought you were dead!" Eight shouted.
"We have been betrayed Keel, Ikari has taken the Mass Production models...our scenario is falling apart," Six began.
"Yes, I know...I suggest that you hide yourselves in far-off places gentlemen. If you survive the next year, I will hold another session at midnight...precisely one year from now. Understand?"
They each let off a thrum in rapid succession and in short order, vanished.
Malachi smiled wanly as he deactivated the holoprojector and the voice-synthesizer.
'Damn old fools, too easily deceived. Should never have put in these voice-synthesizers in the first place...well, its their own fault if they are so easily manipulated.'
He stood and shuffled out of the cold room that his father used to frequent so often throughout his meager lifetime. It wasn't so impressive as it had first been, and now it wasn't so foreboding. Now, it was just a cold familiarity...just another tool.
Like his pistol.
"Colonel! We've received the latest reports from Tokyo-3."
"Let me see them." The aide rushed over with the flimsy and crudely written message scrawled messily on the piece of yellow radio paper. It was hard to make out, with his eyes, but he managed to do it. "Damn that incompetent Minister, doesn't that idiot know what these people have done for us? Does he know what he's doing anymore?!"
Of course he does, his inner voice told him. After all, didn't he send you and all of your other NERV supporting buddies out here?
'Shut up!'
Colonel Hashi Yurimai was old, old enough to remember how wars used to be...back before the Second Impact. Back then, wars were a thing of dignity and respect for ones opponents...in the mind. In reality it had been brutal and ruthless, a hard-fought firefight lasting no more than two to three minutes. If it was a prolonged engagement, then it might get uglier. Claymores, grenades, air strikes, attack helicopters, flamethrowers, even bayonets if the ammo ran short.
But this...this wasn't even that kind of fight. What he was reading on the near-unintelligible message in front of him was something that couldn't even be described by the hell that was war. What he read about...was a bloody massacre.
His short and wrinkled frame heaved a sigh in frustration as his hands crumpled the paper. With a blinding fury he found himself ripping his beret clean off his balding head and throwing it across the room. Hashi didn't quite ever remember what he yelled after that, but by the looks on his soldiers faces...it must have been exceedingly foul.
"Colonel," he turned and faced his second-in-command.
"Yessir?" the faithful and competent Lieutenant Colonel replied, taking a brave step forward.
"Prepare the men for departure," instantly the headquarters tent flew into action, men disassembled equipment and started moving heavy equipment out. "We're going to Tokyo-3."
"Sir!" His second gave a smart salute and hurried out of the rapidly moving tent, shouting for the company commanders as he ran for the vehicles.
'Time to get that bastard Minister at his own game.'
Indeed.
