Other Souls 2
By Synaid
v. 1.32
10/1/01
Dedicated to: My mother. I know, I know, there's parts in here you didn't like or wouldn't have put in, stuff you didn't think was necessary, but I still love you anyway! And see, I took out the song too!
Disclaimer: I don't own Eva, Gainax does I think. If I owned Eva, I wouldn't be writing fanfic of it! Instead, I'd probably be writing Gundam Wing fanfic or something...
Author's Notes: Special thanks to all those who put up with my emails and for not kicking me when I asked for proofreaders. Speaking of which, if any of you would like to volunteer to proofread the next chapter, just ask! Anyway, this is set about twenty years after third impact, enjoy!
2035 Tokyo-3 Ruins
"I FIXED IT!" A child that couldn't have been a minute over fifteen popped into what might have once been a computer room. She had dark red hair and emerald eyes. Her face was smudged with a substance that might have been blood, had it not been orange in color. She was dressed in a white lab coat that covered the brown utility uniform she wore underneath, though both were covered in the orange sticky substance, along with soot and dust among other things.
"No way!" A boy clunked his head on the desk he was working under when he tried to sit up too fast. He had hair like milk chocolate and dazzling dark blue eyes. He was dressed in a simple white t-shirt with slightly in style jeans (the pockets turned inside out). "How could you have? That thing went offline years ago!"
"My Mom worked on it! Anything she can do, I know I can do better!"
"Hey, Dr. Akagi worked on the Magi, but she didn't even make it, your grandmother did! My mother and father and Aunt Rei both got to pilot Evas!"
"Yes, they did. Would you stop driving the point home?" Another girl, blue haired and crimson eyed, was crouched on the counter the boy had been working under. A piece of dry toast hung from her mouth as she absently munched on it. Her voice was slightly muffled by the toast. "I swear, Sohn, if I hear about that again, I'm going to be forced to hurt you. All our parents where there, ok!"
"Ok, ok Nagisa." The boy, Sohn, held his hands up defensively. "I'm sorry!"
"Is that your response to everything?" The blue haired girl, Nagisa, flung a slice of jam covered toast at him. With an incredible show of dexterity, he snatched it out of the air and started munching on it.
"You two fight like siblings." Yuriko Akagi, daughter of Ritsuko Akagi, shook her head at the two of them. Though she was older than both by more than a year, the three had always been together, in their minds at least.
"We-" Sohn Ikari suddenly stopped by Nagisa Ayanami shoving another piece of toast in his mouth.
"Cousins. Just cousins." She said.
"Ummm… right…" Yuriko uncomfortably adjusted her lab coat, looking back and forth between her two best friends. Family relationships were always a delicate subject with these two. "So you guys wanna go see it?"
"Hell yeah!" Nagisa jumped from the counter and bolted pass Yuriko, almost spinning the other girl around. As Yuriko struggled to get her balance, Sohn darted by, grabbing her wrist and yanking her down the hallway.
"Come on, Yuriko!" Sohn shouted over his shoulder.
"Damn it, Sohn! It's not like the damn thing is going anywhere! It's been there for almost thirty years now!"
"It's not the Magi I'm worried about! It's Nagisa! I hate it when she beats me anywhere!"
"ARGH!" Yuriko Akagi yelled in frustration, as she was whipped around a corner. "YOU TWO ARE NEVER GOING TO GROW UP!!!"
***
"Wow… They look…" Sohn grasped for a word to properly express his feelings.
"Lifeless." Nagisa supplied.
"I was going to use 'like a pile of junk,' but lifeless works." Sohn grinned at his cousin.
"Guuuuyyyys!" Yuriko whined, desperately trying to boot her monitor up. "It was working just a few minutes ago!"
"Riiiiight." Both of her friends said in unison.
"Damnit." Yuriko slammed her palm against the computer. "I've worked on you for weeks! Come on, come on, please work!" A sudden sputtering of sparks from the laptop was her only reward for her efforts. She sighed and leaned back, glaring at the traitorous piece of equipment. "Ok, once again!" She attacked the keyboard with both hands.
Nagisa snagged Sohn's sleeves and gave a tug. When he swiveled his head around to yell at his cousin, she put a finger to her lips and shook her head. She tilted it to the side a little, indicating for the two of them to step back.
"What is it, Nagisa?" He asked, keeping his voice low so Yuriko wouldn't hear them.
"How… how have you been?"
"What do you mean?" Sohn put on his most confident face.
"You know what I mean." Nagisa piercing crimson gaze cut through Sohn's mask. Sohn sighed, his shoulder drooping.
"I'll be fine… It's dad I'm worried about. He hasn't shown any signs of caring about anything. Not me, not work, nothing. I mean, we've been here for three days now, and he hasn't called me on the cell phone once." He pulled the fully charged phone out of his pocket and looked sadly at it. "Mom gave it to me, you know. In case anything ever… happened…" He sniffed slightly, his eyes starting to tear up. "I… I miss…"
Nagisa could see her cousin starting to break. She wrapped her arms around him, putting his head on her shoulder. "It's ok, Sohn, it's ok…"
"I miss her so much, Nagisa!" He clutched at Nagisa, like a lost little boy grabbing onto a strangers leg for help. "Why, mother? Why did you have to die!"
Yuriko was startled by the outburst and looked back over her shoulder. The sight would have been unbelievable to someone twenty years ago, for it appeared that a fifteen year old Rei Ayanami was comforting Shinji Ikari. But to Yuriko it was just one of her friends comforting the other. Yuriko stood, her knees popping, and walked over to her best friends, wrapping her longer arms around both of them. "We're here for you, Sohn. We'll always be here for you."
For a while they just stood there, holding each other and waiting for Sohn's sobs to die down. Once the waves had ebbed, Sohn backed away from his friends. He looked at the two of them, getting ready to thank them for caring when he started laughing.
"What?" Yuriko looked at Nagisa who had an equally puzzled look on her pale face.
"Nothing, it's nothing." Sohn pushed the giggles down and shook his head. He blinked his eyes several times, trying to get rid of the excess tears. "So, did you get it working?"
"Na. I got the munchies." Yuriko shrugged.
"Yeah, got to feed those growing breast!" Nagisa grinned as Sohn went bright red and Yuriko sputtered.
"Y- y- you're completely perverted!" Yuriko shouted. "I'm going to kill you!"
"She's j- just teasing!" Sohn stammered. Trying to get between Yuriko and Nagisa. Nagisa wasn't helping as she was sticking her tongue out at the older girl. "She only does it because you go so ballistic."
"I'm still going to kill her!"
"Cut it… OUT!" Sohn shoved between them, putting a palm on either of their chests and shoving them apart. For a moment he just stood there, getting ready to berate them both.
"Sohn…" Nagisa interrupted the killer speech Sohn was formulating in his mind. "Could you take your hands off our breast?"
"I… I…. Oh God! I'm sorry!" He shouted, yanking his hands back, his face going as blood red as Nagisa's eyes.
"Ok, so where are we going to go?" Yuriko cut through her embarrassment quicker than Sohn did his. "We're out of food here, unless you like toast."
"I like toast!" Nagisa spoke up.
"Yes, we know you like-" Yuriko started to say but was interrupted by Nagisa again.
"I really like toast."
"Yes, we know you like-" Yuriko started again.
"Toast is the answer to all things!"
"Yes, toast. Now if we could-"
"YEAH, TOAST!
"Nagisa…"
"You are not worthy of the toast!"
"Ok, Nagisa, you can stop now.
"The toast shall clean the world of all infidels!"
"You've gotten to talk about toast, now let's-"
"Look to the toast! The toast has all the answers!"
"SHUT UP! OR I'M GOING TO TOAST YOU!" Yuriko shouted. Sohn was desperately trying not to laugh as Nagisa just looked, straight faced, at Yuriko.
"We can go to my place." Sohn finally got through his gritted teeth, his arms still holding his shaking sides. "The food that's there shouldn't have gone bad. Besides, I need to check on dad anyway."
"Ok, let's head out to the car and-"
"FRENCH TOAST! French toast is evil!" Nagisa shouted.
"AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" Yuriko roared in frustration and leaped, hands out stretched, at Nagisa. The blue haired babe made a beeline for the door and bolted down the hallway. "GET BACK HERE, YOU ANNOYING INSECT!" Yuriko was after Nagisa in an instant.
Sohn stood alone in what was once NERV headquarters, glancing around the dimly lit room of mythic proportions. "And she says I act childish." He sighed and followed the screeching out of the room.
Left alone and by themselves, the trinity of super computers once known as the Magi hummed to life.
***
"AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!! We're all gonna die!" Nagisa was hanging half out of the car's passenger side window. She had as many seat belts wrapped around her as she could, and even a rope tethering her lower regions to her seat. "Save the children! Get off the sidewalks! Lock your doors! Do anything you can to save yourselves! YURIKO'S DRIVING!!!!"
"Allow me to remind you, Nagisa, of the fact that I am more than a year older than either you or Sohn, and thus am the only one old enough to drive?" Yuriko hated driving this car anyway. Technically, it wasn't really hers. It belonged to her mother who had kept it after a dear friend, Misato Katsuragi, had died.
"WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!"
"Someone's gonna die, but it's not going to be because of my lack of driving skills!"
"Guys, could you cut it out? I'd like to make it home in one piece." Sohn sat in the back of the cramped outdated sports car. Yuriko turned all the way around in the driver's seat to glare at Sohn.
"Are you making fun of my driving too?"
"THE ROAD! WATCH THE ROAD!" Sohn shouted. Yuriko whipped around in time to see that she'd just blown through a red light.
***
"Home again, home again." Sohn pressed his thumb to the plate beside the door, waiting for it to read his thumbprint and scan his DNA. The door slid open and the three friends stepped into the cramped dirty living quarters of the Ikari household. The smell of cooking bacon and eggs wafted to the three teenagers. All three of their stomachs growled at the smell alone, it having been almost a week since they'd had any hot meal besides toast. As one, they darted down the cramped hallway and into the kitchen.
A woman with brown hair pulled back into a ponytail stood over the stove, frying eggs. The bacon was already done and setting on the table. She was wearing a yellow and blue sundress covered by an apron. Her back was turned to them so they couldn't see her face. She was humming a soft song Sohn had often heard his father hum while cooking.
"Ex- excuse me? Why are you-?"
"The bacons on the table. Help yourselves. The eggs are almost done." Her voice was muffled slightly. Given the crunch that occurred after she'd finished talking, the children guessed that she was eating one of the "egg sandwiches" Sohn's father liked so much. The sandwich consisted of a fried egg, lots of pepper, between two slices of toast. The only other person besides his father who ate them, to the children's knowledge anyway, was Nagisa.
"Who… who are you?" Sohn asked as the three took their customary seats.
"Friend of your father's." There was a slight giggle and again the voice was muffled, a crunch following the sentence.
A chime above the refrigerator alerted them to the fact that someone was coming threw the front door. Whoever it was sniffed the air and came down the hallway and towards the kitchen just as the trio had. The woman spoke before she entered the kitchen though.
"Yui?"
The woman cooking turned around as she slid the last egg onto a platter. She blinked in surprise, looking at the dark haired older woman in the doorway.
"Naoko?" She asked. There was a sound at the only other doorway into the kitchen. Both women and the children turned to see a man with a three-day beard and tinted glasses. He'd apparently been standing there when the older woman came in.
"Gendo?" Both women said in unison.
For a moment, three people who might have been ghost from a generation ago simply stood staring at each other. The three children who might have been echoes of Rei Ayanami, Shinji Ikari and Ritsuko Akagi were struck by the oddity of the frozen moment. The moment seemed to last forever and yet end in an instant.
"I'm going to go shave!" The man turned and left the kitchen.
"Hey Shinji! Can I use your kitchen sink to wash the dye out of my hair?" The woman who had been cooking shouted after him.
"Knock yourself out!" came the response.
The woman who had just entered the apartment hurried through the kitchen as quickly as she could, limping as she went. "Shinji, do you have any hair dye on hand? Preferably blonde?"
There was a response but the water running in both the kitchen and down the hall blotted it out. The woman disappeared around the corner only to pop her head back through the doorway moments later.
"Sohn, your dad wants to know if you know where his contacts are."
"Yeah, they're in their container by the eye drops in the medicine cabinet."
"Contacts!" The brown haired woman pulled her head out from under the facet, her blue hair already starting to show through the brown. She pulled back her right eyelid and gently slipped out one of the contact lenses that made her eyes brown. She stood there and blinked at the kids for a moment, one red eye and one brown. With the blue hair mixed in with the soft brown and her mismatched eyes, she looked like some odd amalgamation of Rei Ayanami and Yui Ikari. She winked at the kids and removed the other contact lenses before sticking her head back under the facet.
It took almost half an hour but at the end all six of them had gathered around the table again. While the three adults were older, and the evidence of the gardens from which they sprang showed in their features, it was obvious that it was a grownup Rei and Shinji, along with an older Ritsuko sitting at the table. The children, while originally appearing to be their own parents, were obviously not now that the originals were there for comparison. Like their parents, it was written all over them who their parents were, but each had their own uniqueness to them. Sohn had natural red highlights in his hair, and sat up straighter in his chair, more confidence in his stature than Shinji had ever had at that age. Yuriko was missing her mother's tear like mark by her eye, and was dirtier than Ritsuko would have ever allowed herself to be at any age. Her hands also had several burn marks and other assorted scars on them. The difference between Nagisa and her mother was subtle at first, but obvious to anyone who had known Rei at that age. Nagisa was smiling. She was also frowning, chattering, scarfing food, joking with Sohn and occasionally bursting into odd songs that may or may not have anything to do with what's going on around her. Two generations that might have passed for the generation prior, sat around the table and dug into breakfast, as a family.
***
"Nagisa." Rei called her daughter's name, as the three friends were about to split up again. "Why don't you show me around? It's been a while since I've been here and… Well, you know."
"Sure mom." Nagisa put a slight emphasis on the word. She turned back to her friends. "Meet you guys in the usual place later?"
"Like we have anywhere else to go." Sohn waved as he disappeared out the door, Yuriko following him. The sound of the door sliding shut was accompanied with the sound of Shinji's bedroom door slamming shut.
"I think I'll go pick up some groceries." Ritsuko stood up. "Most of the stuff left is nonperishable, and I'm going to be staying a few days anyway. Catch you girls later."
Nagisa sat down at the kitchen table, Rei sliding into the chair across from her.
"How have you been?" Rei asked. Her voice had suddenly changed. Has Ritsuko ever heard Rei talk this way, she would have screamed. Rei's voice could drop the temperature in a room with a single word. This was the voice Rei had used all those years ago, when a glance from her was like a steel spike through the heart.
"As well as can be expected." Nagisa answered. Her voice had also changed, becoming nearly identical to her mother's.
"Have you been practicing?"
"Yes."
"Everything?"
"… Everything."
"And the other, how is it going?"
"I'm not sure."
"How do the others respond to you, then?"
"I don't think they notice the aberrations. If they do, they chalk it up to me just being odd to begin with."
Rei sighed. "And your uncle, how has Shinji been?"
"Before or after?"
"After."
"Like this. He comes out to eat, he acts fine, but then he's gone again."
"Sohn?"
"Been doing better, lately. I guess nobody ever really handles their mothers death."
"I'm touched." Rei's smile was forced.
"You shouldn't be."
"Right." Rei nodded, the fake smile falling away. "The other?"
"Doubtful. But it's done, or will be soon."
"Good." Rei stood up.
"One question, mother."
"Yes?"
"Am I…" Nagisa hesitated. "Am I just a doll? Something that's been given a mask that makes me act human enough?"
Rei sat back down again and looked at her daughter. "I asked myself that question before, many times before, and more often than not I answered it with yes. I didn't even have the mask to hide behind. Shinji told me though, just before his wedding, the fact that I ask the question at all, that I'm worried about the answer being yes, makes it obvious what the answer is."
"I don't understand."
Rei stood up again, and leaned across the table to kiss her daughter forehead. "Neither did I. I'm going to go check on your uncle now. Keep your eyes on the children."
"I will. Goodbye, mother."
"Goodbye, daughter."
***
In a dark place, where there are no walls, no ceiling, and no floor, thirteen columns of moonlight appeared, a red number floating in the center on each one.
03: "Are things progressing?"
07: "They are."
04: "It is inconceivable that we have progressed this far."
02: "Correct. For we do not have the resources our predecessors in Seelie had."
03: "We do not have NERV to control."
04: "We do not have the Evas or the pilots either."
07: "An Eva has been acquired."
03: "How was this possible?"
07: "There were still avenues open to us."
03: "Then I will not inquire into the avenues. Has a pilot been acquired?"
08: "A Pilot has been acquired."
03: "What of the Magi?"
06: "They will not respond to us. They will not bend to our will."
04: "Who is it who brought them back?"
06: "The children of the children."
02: "Perhaps we can bend them to our will, and thus acquire the Magi?"
09: "Unlikely."
12: "Dr. Akagi might be a better choice."
10: "Equally unlikely."
13: "Dr. Akagi is not aware of us, and we are not Seelie. She has no reason to fear or distrust us."
10: "She will not help, regardless."
11: "Dr. Ibuki, then?"
09: "She has her attention… elsewhere."
03: "Oh? How has this come to pass?"
09: "The baby is due soon."
11: "Congratulations."
04: "Should we attempt to attain another computer? The Magi are outdated anyway."
08: "To attain one of the Babel computers would be difficult."
03: "The prototype then?"
06: "It would be noticed."
02: "We are running out of time. Perhaps the children would join us?"
10: "Unknown. They will be a factor, though."
04: "Perhaps we should let things fall as they may. The children might come to us of their own accord."
13: "Are we then in agreement?"
02-12: "Aye."
13: "Then the meeting is adjourned."
All but numbers 13 and 01 disappear.
13: "You did not speak."
01: "It was not for me to speak."
13: "Will the children help us?"
01: "They might not on principle alone."
13: "We are not Seelie, we do not share their goals."
01: "It might not matter."
13, sighs: "Events will begin to move very fast now. The children will notice."
01: "The world will notice."
13: "True. We have things to prepare for."
01: …
13: "We will speak again, afterwards."
01: "Yes, we will."
***
In the dark room there was only one source of illumination, a small screen by a European style bed. The screen was black with a pumpkin orange letters. The screen read, "Data deleted."
Shinji sighed, pulling his hand away from the plate allowing neural interface. He let himself fall back onto the bed.
"What am I going to do? Should I be a hero again?" Shinji rolled onto his side. "No, I've been that. The stage has been set and the hero's been chosen." He scrunched up, holding back the tears that threatened to fall. "The cost… the cost is so high. I've paid, but will they be able to? The tragedy of this is the ruination of the lives of those involved, the destruction of the children's minds." He pulled the sheet over his head, old memories of hiding under the covers doing little to ease his mind. "Listen to me, I sound so dramatic. None of that matters, everything has been set into motion. They really don't even need me anymore."
"I heard that, Shinji." The door to his bedroom slid open, a pair of red eyes peering at the lump on the bed. "We all still need you."
"No, you don't." Came his muffled reply. "Nobody needs me. Nobody ever needed me. Not even… not even Him."
"If you don't stop acting like this, your son is going to go thru the same thing you did. He needs you and you need him. Don't become your father."
"Heh. If I did, I'd have cloned Asuka by now. There'd be a little white haired, red eyed girl running around."
Rei flinched. An uncharacteristic wave of emotion swept through her, pushing her to just leave him there, to let him curl up and die like he wanted to. Instead, she lifted up the sheet and slid in beside him. For a long while, the two just laid there, being close to one another. "I still need you."
"… Rei." He reached out in the darkness only to find her hand ready for his. They interlaced their fingers and looked into one another's eyes. The soft morning light coming in shined through the thin sheet.
"He lost her, Shinji. He lost her and then lost everything in his grief, pushing it all aside. Don't be him, Shinji. Don't be your father."
"He cloned you just so he could see her again. He was willing to end the world just to be with her again." Shinji took a shaky breath and closed his eyes. "I hated him for it, for doing all of it, but now I'm faced with the same thing he was and…" He snapped his eyes open. His voice took on the same cold tone Gendo Ikari's had had years ago in life. "I'd do the same, if I could bring Asuka back."
Rei let go of his hand and looked into his eyes. They were cold and dark, completely closed off to her. "You have something he didn't, Shinji. Something that makes you stronger than him, that'll let you move on." She reached out and pulled him to her. "You have a sister."
He didn't return the hug. Not at first anyway. Then, his hands shaking, he slid his arms around her, squeezing their bodies together. They held each other like that for a long time, Rei finally breaking the silence.
"Shinji?"
"Yeah?"
"My arm's falling asleep."
Shinji let a smile spread across his lips.
"And you need to take a shower, you smell bad."
This elicited a snort of laughter from the former Eva pilot.
"And you need to go brush your teeth."
Rei could feel Shinji's sides shaking as he tried to hold in the laughter.
"'Cause your teeth are turning yellow!"
That final bit was all it took. Shinji erupted with laughter and pushed the sheet out of the way. Rei smiled, glad to see him laughing. It took a few minutes for Shinji to regain his composure.
"You don't have to act like this for me, Rei." Shinji cocked his head cocked to the side, his eyes filled with tears from laughing too hard. "You could just-"
"I like at least pretending to be human." Rei struck a pose that would have done the late Misato proud. "Besides, it feels good."
A cell phone on Shinji's nightstand began ringing. Shinji picked it up and simply looked at it for a moment. "You know, there was a time when I had a phone that never rang. Now the damn thing never seems to stop." He pushed the call button and held the phone up to his ear. "Ikari here. Yes… Yes… Mind if I bring someone along? … No, I don't care. … Of course they're family. … Uh huh. … Yeah, I owe you one. We'll be meeting at the site, correct? … Fine. … No, he's not coming. … I don't care if you do think he's cute, I don't want him involved in my work. … Fine, I'm coming now." Shinji ended the call and dropped the phone back into its spot. He started unbuttoning his shirt and kicked off his shoes. "I've got a call. Wanna come see what I do for a living?"
"Sure. Ritsuko can get in, right?"
"Yeah. Since Yuriko can get in, Ritsuko can get in. Same way you got in because of Nagisa's genetic structure." Shinji finished stripping and pulled the door to his closet open. Digging through his closet, he found his cleanest dirty shirt and pulled it over his shoulders, buttoning it one handed as he fumbled to find a pair of pants that weren't too wrinkled.
"Whatever happened to being obsessive compulsive about keeping things clean?"
"Having a child tends to break you of that. Besides, I've been… busy lately."
"Uh huh. Should I fix my hair, or will they mind?"
"I don't care how your hair looks and they probably won't even recognize you, Rei."
"Come on Shinji, how many red eyed, blue haired babes are there running around?"
"Just two that I'm aware of."
***
Nagisa wandered through the empty streets of the mostly abandoned Tokyo 3. For a while there had been gangs and such, trying to steal what they could, but the city itself seemed to have rejected even that life. Now only a few types of people remained, mostly personnel of companies who used "The Fortress of Mankind" as staging grounds for their more interesting and quiet projects. The organization once known as NERV now existed only in the history books, as did their weapons, the Evangelions. All remnants of that place had been whipped away, save the geofront that was still below the city, though it too had been abandoned and forgotten.
"What am I doing?" Nagisa asked the ghost of the city. "Why am I here, why am I doing this?"
A voice whispered in her ear, telling her the answer in it's own way. Something's coming. She could feel it, something looming over the horizon, something huge. It was like the moon, something huge that hung over her head, waiting for her to look away so it could fall. Nagisa shuddered, feeling cold. She thought she heard something, an echo of steps from far away. Whatever it was, the sound of squealing tires blotted it out.
Tearing down the street in her red sports car, Nagisa could make out the figures of a glowering Yuriko and a screaming for mercy Sohn. Allowing her mask of humanity to fall into place, Nagisa stuck out her thumb and hitched up her skirt. Yuriko slammed on the brakes, skidding to a stop beside Nagisa.
"Hey little girl, ya want some candy?" Sohn leaned out of the window and pretended to look Nagisa up and down.
"I don't know. My mother always told me not to talk to strangers. And no one looks stranger than you."
"Cut it out you two! Come on Nagisa, something big is happening back at the place."
"What do you mean?" Nagisa tried to push away the premonition screaming at the back of her mind.
"It's the Magi." Sohn said as he slid into the back seat. "They're…doing stuff."
***
"Jet Alone, isn't it?" Rei leaned her head back to look up at the giant black and green robot.
"Yes, though this particular unit is actually referred to as JA-17." Shinji didn't look up at the large robot, he'd seen it enough times already. "JA-17 has both a remote and a human interface to control it. "
"So it can be piloted just like-"
"Yeah, just like them." Shinji interrupted. Glancing around, he leaned in close to Rei. "We try not to say that name around here. They don't want to admit that we're trying to replace them with the JA series."
"Which is why you've got a job here, correct?"
"Yeah. I guess I'm just destined to be 'Pilot Ikari' until the end of days."
"Hmmm…." Rei was careful not comment on his response. Shinji was doing a good job of hiding how he truly felt about his job, and Rei didn't want to hurt his feelings. "You said it could also be controlled via remote?"
"Yeah. Not enough experienced pilots stepped up, but there are currently a dozen models in use." Shinji shrugged, still not looking up at the robot. "So, rather than just have a smaller force we have computers control several of them."
"You mean like the Magi?"
"I guess. I said the same thing and they told me these computers are three to four times more powerful than the Magi."
"Really?" Rei asked and Shinji nodded. "Wow. Who built them?"
"Ritsuko, who else?"
Rei laughed. Shinji's trained ear could hear it was a fake laugh, having heard Rei's real laugh only a very few times before. She tries so hard to act human, to be accepted. She shouldn't have to act at all. Rei, why can't you just be yourself? His assistant hurried over to them, interrupting Shinji's thoughts.
"Mr. Shinji, they're ready to launch when you are."
"Have they figured out what it is yet?"
"No sir."
"Figured out what 'what' is?" Rei interrupted.
"We're not sure, madam. Something big is stomping thru the countryside and it's about thirty stories tall." The assistant explained. "Sounds like the kind of job for our hero, here."
"Wow, you made hero status, eh?"
"More like 'legendary' status." Shinji grumbled. He took the offered suit from his assistant and started pulling it on over his clothes, only removing his shoes first. "We've only actually gotten to use these things in battle twice since they hired me, and both times the enemy backed down before we could engage."
"But they might stick around this time, sir." The assistants looked like he was hoping for this.
"Wanting to see your 'hero' in action, are you?" Rei inquired.
"Oh yes! I mean, from when I first was accepted as his assistant I've been waiting to-"
"I'm ready." Shinji interrupted. "I'm taking the lift up. Rei, I think they'd let you take one of these out if you'd like to join me."
"Oh I don't think so. I think I'll just watch from the safety of the control room. My car stomping days are over!"
"Um, huh?" Shinji's assistant said as intelligently as he ever said anything.
"I'm Shinji's- sister." The assistant completely missed the hesitation in Rei's voice. "And a former Eva pilot to boot. I actually have more experience at the job than Shinji does."
"Yeah, the only Eva pilot ever to give her life in the line of duty and then went on to pilot some more." Shinji said under his breath, his assistant missing that as well. He stood and faced the blue haired woman. "Goodbye Rei."
"A wise man told me never to say goodbye."
"Then I'll see you when this is over."
"When is it ever over?"
Shinji laughed and gave Rei a hug. "Goodbye, Rei."
***
"I don't understand! How could it possibly do this?" Sohn stared up at the huge shape. It was yellow with orange markings. It stood taller than anything he'd ever seen, taller even than his fathers JA-17. There seemed to be braces of some sort, perhaps locks, holding its arms and shoulder to the wall. He'd passed through the room itself hundreds of times, remembering Yuriko had once mentioned it as "The Cage" and now he could see why the room had that name. It held the behemoth to it, as if this lightning colored monster was some lunatic chained to a wall in an asylum. Its three orange eyes stared into the empty space before it. "This… what is this?"
"Evangelion Unit 14." Yuriko answered.
"What? How do you know?" Sohn turned towards his dark haired friend. She had her laptop open and was staring at the screen. "How did it get here?"
"The Magi. They did this."
"But how?"
"I don't know."
"Maybe…" Nagisa spoke up for the first time since first see entering the room. "Maybe one of us should try and pilot it?"
***
"Approaching target." Shinji kept his voice professional and cold.
"Wow, we haven't gotten this close before." One of the other pilots said.
"Cut the chatter, JA-5. They might be monitoring." Shinji berated him.
"Do you have visual contact yet?" Renglo, Shinji's boss, asked, his face appearing one of the lower screens inside Shinji's cockpit.
"Negative." Shinji answered. "Correction, visual contact eminent." Shinji crested the hill he was stomping up and halted in his steps.
"My God…" The other Jet Alone pilot voice was filled with awe.
"It's… It's an…" The first pilot stuttered, his mind trying to grasp what he was seeing.
Inside the control room, Rei felt like screaming. "It's an Eva."
***
Nagisa's voice: "It's a showdown between Shinji and the ghost of his past. Rei feels helpless as she watches Shinji fight. But then, a new threat arrives to complicate matters. How will Shinji handle the sudden shock of the reappearance of the Evangelions? Don't worry, the kids play a role too! And of course, MORE FAN SERVICE! YEAH! Maybe I can get Yuriko to do a striptease or something... Hey! She's sixteen! It's legal!"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
OMAKE!
The kids come into the kitchen, looking at the woman cooking breakfast. Suddenly, a woman stumbles in through the same door the kids had come thru.
"Kit?"
The woman cooking turned around. "Ai?"
A sound at the other doorway and both women turned towards it, finding an unshaven man in glasses. "Ryo?"
"Eh?" Ryo cocked an eyebrow. "How did we get in this story? DAMNIT! Synaid's gone to sleep again!"
The three children were stuck by the oddity of the moment.
"What do you mean?" Nagisa tried to push away the premonition screaming at the back of her mind.
"It's the Magi." Sohn said as he slid into the back seat. "They're…doing stuff."
"Like what?" Nagisa's fears seemed to be coming true...
"THEY'RE PLAYING A QUAKE TOURNAMENT!!!!"
"It's a... It's a... IT'S A GUNDAM! AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!" Cannon fodder number one tried to run as the Wing Zero brought his buster rifle to bare.
"Omea o korosu!"
Shinji whipped out a plasma sword. "Come and get me, you MONSTERS!"